Hurting Distance aka The Truth-Teller's Lie

by Sophie Hannah

  As she speaks, I can see it. She’s right. That’s the detail I couldn’t quite remember about the curtains—I knew there was something. They didn’t fall down from the ceiling. They were attached to a sort of rail. If I hadn’t been tied to the bed, if I’d stood up, I’d have been able to peer over the top.

  Silver Brae Chalets. In Scotland. A real place, where people go for their holidays, to have fun. Where I wanted to take you, Robert. No wonder you were so shocked and upset when I told you I’d booked it.

  ‘Yvon, my best friend, designed their website,’ I say. ‘There were no wooden railings between me and the audience. Just a horizontal metal rail, going round three sides of the stage.’

  ‘Maybe each chalet’s slightly different,’ Sergeant Zailer says. ‘Or maybe the one you were in was unfinished.’

  ‘It was. The window I looked through—there was no curtain there. And the skirting boards were still bare wood, not painted yet.’ Why has this not occurred to me before?

  ‘What else can you tell me?’ Sergeant Zailer asks. ‘I know you’ve been withholding something.’

  I stare at my hands in my lap. I’m not ready. How does she know Graham Angilley’s name? Has she been to Silver Brae Chalets? Something feels not quite right.

  ‘Fine,’ she says. ‘Let’s talk about the weather, then. Shit, isn’t it? I’m surprised you make a living out of sundials, in this country. Anyone ever invents a raindial, they’ll make a mint.’

  ‘There’s no such thing.’

  ‘Yeah, I know that. I was talking crap.’ She lights a cigarette, opening the window a fraction. Cold rain slices in through the rectangular slit, hitting me in the face. ‘What do you think of sundials that don’t tell the time, ornamental ones?’

  ‘I object to them,’ I tell her. ‘It doesn’t take that much longer to make a proper dial. A sundial that doesn’t tell the time isn’t a sundial. It’s just a piece of junk.’

  ‘They’re cheaper than real ones.’

  ‘Because they’re rubbish.’

  ‘My boss wants one for our nick. He wants a real one, but the powers-that-be won’t let him spend the money.’

  ‘I’ll make him one,’ I hear myself saying. ‘He can pay me whatever he can afford.’

  Charlie Zailer looks surprised. ‘Why would you do that? Don’t say as a favour to me—I won’t believe you.’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Because if I promise to make something for your boss, I will have to survive this trip. If I talk as if I believe I’ll survive, then maybe I will. ‘What sort does he want?’ I ask.

  ‘One that can go on the wall.’

  ‘I’ll do it for free if you’ll take me to the hospital again to see Robert. I have to see him, and they won’t let me in without you.’

  ‘He told you to leave him alone. And he’s a rapist. Why do you want to see him?’

  She will never guess. Nobody could guess the truth, apart from me. Because I know you so well, Robert. However you feel about me, I do know you well.

  ‘Juliet Haworth wasn’t involved in organising the rapes,’ I say. ‘Whether they were . . . done for some kind of perverted pleasure or whether money was made out of them . . . whatever. Juliet has nothing to do with it.’

  ‘How do you know that?’ Sergeant Zailer takes her eyes off the road, interrogating me with her sharp glare.

  ‘I’ve got nothing you’d regard as evidence,’ I tell her. ‘But I’m sure it’s true.’

  ‘Right.’ She sounds bitter. ‘So that pottery model of the chalet, the same chalet you saw through the window while you were being assaulted . . . Juliet just guessed what it looked like, did she? Divine inspiration. Nothing to do with her putting on rape shows with the help of Graham Angilley and her husband, and knowing exactly where they took place.’

  ‘I said she wasn’t responsible for the rapes. I never said she hadn’t seen that chalet.’

  ‘So . . . you mean Graham Angilley asked her to make a model of it? Because he knew its significance even if she didn’t?’ She smokes furiously as she demolishes what she thinks is my theory. ‘But Juliet told us what had happened to you, for fuck’s sake! She guessed you’d accused Robert of raping you—she knew all the details. If she wasn’t involved, how the hell would she know?’

  I can’t believe she hasn’t got there yet. She’s supposed to be a detective. But she doesn’t know you, Robert—that’s why she’s lagging behind. It’s why I was lagging behind, the first time I spoke to Juliet in a police interview room. Your wife knew you better than I did at that point.

  Not anymore.

  ‘Juliet knew what had happened to me because it happened to her too.’ Am I saying this aloud? Yes; it seems I am. ‘The man, Graham Angilley—he raped her too.’

  ‘What?’ Sergeant Zailer pulls over on to the hard shoulder. The screech of the tyres makes me wince.

  ‘Think about it. All the women Graham Angilley raped were successful professional women. Juliet was too, until she had a breakdown. That’s why she had one: because she was raped. She was tied to the same bed as I was, on the same stage—mezzanine, whatever. There will have been an audience, men eating and drinking. And while she was tied to that bed, she saw exactly what I saw through the window. She made a model of it. She put it in the display cabinet in her living room.’ I stop, fill my lungs with air.

  ‘Go on,’ says Sergeant Zailer.

  ‘She didn’t know Robert knew what had happened to her, so she had no reason to think the little pottery house with the blue arched door would be familiar to him . . . Like me, she hadn’t told anyone what had been done to her. She was too ashamed. It’s not easy, to go from being envied and successful to being pitied.’

  ‘But Robert did know, didn’t he? And when he met Juliet in the video shop that night, it wasn’t a chance meeting.’

  ‘No. Nor when he met me at the service station. He must have followed us both, for weeks, maybe months. And Sandy Freeguard. Didn’t you say she crashed her car into his? He was within crashing distance because he was following her too. That was the pattern: his brother raped us, then Robert followed us until he was able to arrange a so-called chance meeting.’

  ‘Why?’ Sergeant Zailer leans towards me, as if greater proximity will coax the answer from me. ‘Why did he want to meet and start relationships with his brother’s victims?’

  I don’t answer.

  ‘Naomi, you’ve got to tell me. I could charge you with obstruction.’

  ‘Charge me with high treason if you want. What do I give a shit?’

  Charlie Zailer sighs. ‘What about Prue Kelvey? She doesn’t fit the pattern. Robert raped her, and she saw him before he put the mask on her. He couldn’t follow her and contrive a meeting, couldn’t become her boyfriend.’

  ‘Juliet tried to kill Robert because she found out he knew about her rape all along. Probably the only reason she was able to marry him, or even to look him in the face, was because she was sure he didn’t know, sure he’d never know. In his eyes, her dignity was intact. She wasn’t . . . violated and disgusting; she was how she used to be. But Robert did know, and Juliet found out, and she realised he’d been lying to her for years, letting her think her secret was safe, and her privacy, but actually all the time . . .’ I swallow hard, trying to quell the lurching in my chest. ‘She thought he’d been laughing at her behind her back, that the whole relationship was a mockery, him taunting her. His secret knowledge was a way of having power over her, power he could wield at any time, or keep in reserve for as long as he wanted. He didn’t need to tell her he knew until he was ready, didn’t have to tell her at all if he didn’t want to.’

  Charlie Zailer frowns. ‘Are you saying this is how it was, or how Juliet saw it?’

  ‘How she saw it. I’m explaining why she tried to kill him.’

  She nods.

  ‘I won’t speak to her again. Juliet. Those interviews—I’m not doing it again.’

  Your wife is out of control, Robert. Well, I don’t need to tell you
that, do I? Talk about stating the obvious. So far she’s been content to goad me with her maddening ambiguities. If I talk to her again, she will become more explicit, step up her campaign of hate. She will start to tell me things, and I can’t allow that to happen. Next time I come to the hospital, I want to tell you what I know in my heart and soul, not what I’ve been told. There’s a big difference; it’s the difference between power and helplessness. I know you’d understand, even if Sergeant Zailer wouldn’t.

  ‘How did Juliet find out that Robert knew?’ she asks me. ‘Do you know that too?’ An uncomfortable silence fills the car, one I am determined not to break. ‘Naomi, this is no time to clam up! Jesus! How did she know? Why did Robert want to go out with women his brother had attacked? Why?’ She taps the dashboard with her fingernails. ‘You know, everything you’ve just told me about Juliet could be true of you as well. You didn’t know Robert knew about what had happened to you, did you? But he did. Perhaps you’re the one who feels he was laughing at you behind your back, wielding some sort of sick power, manipulating you. Perhaps you want revenge, and that’s why you want to go to the hospital—to finish off what Juliet started.’

  ‘I want to see Robert because I need to talk to him,’ I say. ‘I need to explain something to him. Something private that’s between me and him.’ Just the two of us, Robert, and nobody else. It’s what I’ve always wanted.

  25

  4/8/06

  THEY ARRIVED AS daylight began to fade. Charlie didn’t stop where she should have, in the circular gravelled area where chalet guests parked their cars. Instead, she drove up on to the grass, feeling the muffled bump beneath the car. She kept up a steady pressure on the accelerator. There was only one thing in her mind and that was the necessity to keep going, keep looking straight ahead, not allow herself to think too much. How many times had she wondered, about both the victims and the perpetrators of violent crimes, how they had done it, how they had made themselves carry on? Now she understood: the trick was to avoid, at all costs, seeing the full picture, the overview. To avoid seeing yourself.

  Charlie slammed her foot down on the brake only when the blue door with the arched top was right in front of the windscreen. Her and Olivia’s chalet. Not long ago, she’d leaned against that door, smoking a cigarette and talking to Simon on her mobile phone while Graham waited in her bed. It would be easy to think, And now . . . , but Charlie wasn’t going to fall into that trap. Thinking about the past in relation to the present and the future would be enough to make her lose it, and she couldn’t risk that. She was here to get the information she needed from Graham and Steph; that was what she had to focus on.

  She heard Naomi’s ragged breathing as it harmonised with her own; it reminded her she wasn’t alone in the car. ‘This is it,’ said Naomi. ‘The cottage I saw through the window.’ She pointed to the chalet beside it, which was bigger than the one Charlie and Olivia had stayed in and had a rectangular, pistachio-coloured front door with matching window frames. ‘That’s the one I was attacked in. And that’s the window.’

  Charlie didn’t bother asking if she was sure. Naomi was looking around, eyes bright and sharp, as if trying to remember every physical detail of the place for some future test. Charlie wondered how she would feel now if she too had been raped by Graham, instead of what had actually happened. Instead of her going out of her way to flirt with him, to seduce him . . .

  A loud banging on the car window made her jump. Knuckles as well as several bangles knocking against the glass, a flash of pink fingernails. Steph.

  ‘Who’s she?’ Naomi sounded jumpy.

  Coming here had been a mistake. Another one. Charlie was in no fit state to interview Steph or to reassure Naomi. I ought to phone Simon, she thought, and then, I can’t face it. He’ll know. There’s no way he won’t already know. She pressed the button to open the window. Cold air filled the car. Naomi huddled in her seat, wrapping her arms round her body.

  ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ Steph demanded. ‘You can’t park here. You can’t drive over the grass like that.’

  ‘Too late,’ said Charlie.

  Steph sucked on the inside of her glossy upper lip. ‘Where’s Graham?’

  ‘That’s what I was going to ask you.’

  ‘Don’t be stupid! I thought he was staying with you. I thought the two of you were having a nice, romantic weekend together. That’s what he told me, anyway. Don’t tell me he’s got someone else on the go as well. Typical.’ She folded her arms.

  Charlie didn’t think she was acting. ‘He’s not here, then?’

  ‘As far as I know, he’s at your house. What do you want, anyway?’

  Charlie felt Naomi’s horrified stare branding itself on her skin. She couldn’t look at her, kept her eyes fixed on Steph instead. She should have told Naomi about her and Graham, should have known Steph would let it slip. But that would have involved thinking ahead, and even Charlie wasn’t self-destructive enough to do that at the moment.

  She opened the car door and stepped out into the chilled air. It wasn’t raining anymore, but the grass was wet, and so were the tops of the cars in the car park. The walls of the chalets were streaked with dark, damp patches. Even the air seemed thick with moisture.

  ‘Let’s talk in the lodge,’ said Charlie. ‘For the sake of your guests.’

  ‘About what? I’ve got nothing to say to you.’

  Naomi emerged from the car, pale and solemn. Charlie watched the expression on Steph’s face change from one of irritation to one of shock. ‘You recognise Naomi?’ she said.

  ‘No.’ Steph’s denial was too quick, too automatic.

  ‘Yeah, you do. Graham raped her, in that building there.’ Charlie pointed. ‘There was an audience of men, eating dinner. I bet you cooked that dinner, didn’t you? Your famous home-cooked meals.

  ‘I don’t know what you’re on about.’ Steph’s face was red. She was a bad liar; at least that was something. Charlie didn’t think it’d take long to break her.

  ‘She didn’t see me,’ said Naomi. ‘I didn’t see her. How could she recognise me?’

  ‘From the photographs Graham took with your phone and sent to his,’ said Charlie. She saw Naomi wince and thought that perhaps she’d tried to forget that detail. ‘Isn’t that right, Steph? I bet I’d find plenty of photos if I had a look round. You’re probably stupid enough to keep souvenirs, and Graham’s certainly arrogant enough. Where are the pictures of Naomi and all the other women? In the lodge? Shall we go and have a look?’

  ‘You can’t look anywhere! You haven’t got a warrant, so it’s against the law. Get lost, all right? I’m not wasting time talking to one of my husband’s many whores!’

  Charlie’s arm flew out, knocking her to the ground. Steph scrambled up on to her knees and tried to speak, but Charlie grabbed her by the throat.

  ‘You could kill her,’ said Naomi quietly.

  It was probably meant as a warning. Not as the excellent suggestion it was.

  ‘You know what your husband is, don’t you?’ Charlie spat at Steph. ‘You know about the rapes. You cooked the meals. Probably sold the tickets and did all the admin, like you do for the chalets, the legitimate side of the business.’

  ‘No,’ said Steph, gasping for breath.

  ‘Why the change of venue, from one of your chalets to Robert Haworth’s lorry? Were you worried someone’d recognise the location? Or did some of the chalet guests hear screams in the night and start asking awkward questions?’ Charlie took pleasure in embedding her nails into Steph’s flesh.

  ‘Please let me go, please! You’re hurting me! I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Did you know Robert had changed his name from Angilley to Haworth?’ Charlie positioned her mouth so that it was next to Steph’s ear. ‘Did you?’ she shouted as loud as she could. It felt good, a necessary release of tension.

  ‘Yes. I can’t breathe . . .’

  ‘Why did he change his name?’

/>   ‘Charlie, for fuck’s sake! You’re choking her. You’ll kill her if you don’t watch out.’

  Charlie ignored Naomi. She wasn’t interested in hearing about how she ought to be behaving. It was too late for that. ‘Why did Robert change his name?’ she asked again, feeling Steph’s throat fluttering in panic beneath the skin of her palm.

  ‘He and Graham had a row. They haven’t spoken since. Robert . . . I can’t breathe!’ Charlie relaxed her hold, but only slightly. ‘Robert didn’t want anything to do with Graham or the family. Even the name.’

  ‘What caused the row?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Steph coughed out the words. ‘That’s Graham’s private business. I don’t get involved.’

  Charlie kicked her in the stomach. ‘Like fuck you don’t! How do you think it’d feel to be kicked to death in front of an audience? How much would you sell the tickets for? Hey? What about Sandy Freeguard? You recognise that name, don’t you? Juliet Heslehurst? Prue Kelvey? Although it was Robert who raped her, not Graham. Why? Why the change, after Graham had raped all the others?’

  ‘I’m not saying anything until I’ve spoken to Graham.’ Steph sobbed. She curled into a ball on the grass, clutching her stomach.

  ‘You’re not going to be speaking to him, shit-face. Not today and not for a fucking long time. What, do you think we’re going to put the two of you in a cosy little furnished cell together, let you play house?’

  ‘I haven’t done anything, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I haven’t done anything wrong, nothing at all!’

  Charlie pulled her handbag out of the car and lit a cigarette. ‘That must be a nice feeling,’ she said. ‘To have done nothing at all wrong.’

  Steph didn’t try to get up. ‘What’s going to happen to me?’ she asked. ‘What are you going to do? None of it was my fault. You’ve seen how Graham treats me.’

  ‘None of what was your fault?’ Charlie asked, feeling better for the nicotine.

  Steph covered her face with her hands.

  Charlie felt like kicking her again, so she did. ‘If you want to spend the rest of your life in prison, that’s up to you. Keep denying everything. If you want to stay out of jail, though, you’ve got choices.’ Yeah, right. Steph was an idiot if she believed there would be any way out of this for her. If she was involved in arranging the rapes and profiting from them, she’d be going down for a very long time. Charlie had no doubt that both the lodge and Steph and Graham’s home were full of pictorial evidence of their crimes. Never in their most extravagant and far-fetched dreams had they expected to get caught. Charlie gleaned all of this from Steph’s eyes, from her manner. Graham must have promised her there was no danger, that he had it all under control.