Graham awoke to find Elizabeth standing at the side of the bed, looking out across the window towards the open ocean. It was Saturday morning, six o’clock. The sun was up high, and she was holding her cup of tea.
“Hey,” he said as he pushed himself up in the bed. “How long have you been awake?” He could see her tired un-rested eyes staring back at him the moment that he put his glasses on. He wore dark-rimmed frames that reminded Elizabeth of eye glasses issued many years ago by the National Health Service, once worn by many people and that now were somehow and inexplicably fashionable again. She turned and sat on the edge of the bed.
“About an hour. Daddy’s coming today, remember?” He hadn’t forgotten. He knew that Elizabeth was anxious about it, and that it had the potential to be difficult for her. They hadn’t been close for years now, since they had moved to Haven. He could only recall a handful of times that her father had visited, and never with the intention of staying the night, let alone the week.
“Yeah, of course.” He picked up the cup of tea that Elizabeth had placed at the side of the bed for him. It wasn’t hot, but it was still warm enough to taste good. It was hot in the bedroom and his legs felt damp from his sweat. He flicked the sheets away from his body. “Are you feeling OK about him coming?”
“He’s the one that wants to come. Wants to be in the loop.” Her words were straightforward and to the point. Elizabeth’s attitude had changed somewhat in the last few days. Since she’d returned from Chesterwood and had had the row on the telephone with her father, Graham had sensed a fragment of the old Elizabeth, the confident sure-of-herself woman that he had fallen for back in that coffee shop. He’d always known that she had a vulnerable side, but it was so long since he had seen the streak of determination and all-out readiness to fight for her rights, that he had almost forgotten that it existed. She added, with more softness in her voice, “It’ll be good to see him though.”
They sat propped up in bed for a while, drinking their tea and summarising their week. This time last week they had been looking forward to having David and Helen coming to stay for the weekend and had virtually managed to convince themselves that there had been no truth in the crazy thoughts that had consumed their minds throughout the preceding week. Then, out of the blue, Jack Fraser had turned up on the doorstep telling them that they weren’t crazy after all. She had been thinking all week about the conversation that they had had on the beach. She had been dreaming about it too. Her dreams had become a mixture of her own story and of his. It had begun with her walking into her mother’s house. Her mother was seated on the floor, upright and talking and yet somehow, Elizabeth still knew that she was dead. She pointed at the corner of the room, but it wasn’t Rebecca there. Instead, in her place, with his hands gripped against the wall was Jack. He was whimpering and she crouched down next to him and took his arm. She guided him to his feet, and they found themselves on a road. It was a long winding road, shrouded in trees which swayed fitfully in the wind. The road was black as a raven from the rain that had been falling. She pulled against his reluctance, dragging him gently up the road, forcing him to look over the ravine. She kept telling him that he would find his son there, that he would find his wife, but as they looked over the edge of the cliff towards the smouldering car, the dust of white rising into the air as it was whipped up on the breeze, it was not his family that he saw, but Elizabeth herself, her hands raised up out of the window, stretching up and mumbling ‘help her!’ over and over.
In her waking hours, she kept visualising how it must have been for Jack to wake up in that hospital bed, lost and dazed, with no clue as to where he was or what had happened. She thought about the starched white sheets that would have felt rough against his skin, the pillows propped up on a metal rest, the tubes and dressings and wires that would have only further increased his anxiety. She thought back to her own sense of incapacitation when she had first heard about Rebecca, when stood at the edge of the ravine, with the rain beating down on her shoulders pitter-pattering onto the umbrella held up for her by an officer. When she recalled those memories there were little details. She couldn’t even remember Graham at the scene; she couldn’t remember the police, or the flashing blue light flickering onto her face rhythmically as she sat in the back of the ambulance, her clothes soaked through and her skin cold. She could barely remember what her father had said after the crash. Her first solid memory of that whole time was the day of the funeral; her father’s steely gaze, Graham’s tears, and her own absolute belief that she had no solid evidence to prove to herself or anybody else that Rebecca was dead. Eventually, she had accepted it as a matter of practicality, because for all purposes, Rebecca was indeed dead, but Elizabeth knew in her heart that she’d never really believed it. That’s why she could never stop looking for Rebecca. She would see her everywhere: the beach, the supermarket, in cafés and restaurants. She always believed that one day she might find her. She thought it a torture worse than her own that Jack must have been living: to continue to search for them, even after having had to identify two blackened and charred bodies. To look for their faces, whilst haunted by the memory of the last time you saw them in that way. She couldn’t imagine it. She knew now that she would never search for Rebecca again. She hoped for his sake, that Jack could get to the same point, for it was ultimately better than where she had existed up until now.
It was ten-thirty when she heard the crunch of the gravel under the tyres of a heavy saloon car. With Graham home, it could only be her father. She had opened the gate earlier, ready for him to park directly in the driveway. She left her comfortable garden spot, her ever-changing vista a natural canvas, and walked round to the front of the house. They had spoken only once since the argument on the telephone. He had called her the following day, after having seen the press conference. It was then that he had said he was coming to Haven. He didn’t want to stay in the city where people were talking about the case and making suppositions about the nature of what had happened. He had apologised for shouting, and had invited himself to stay.
She walked around the corner of the cottage, and sure enough, parked on her white gravel driveway was the dark grey monstrosity of a car on which she believed he had no right to spend such a large amount of money.
“Elizabeth, there you are.” He held open his hands, as if he were about to embrace her. Instead, he clasped his hands over her upper arms and kissed her on the forehead, in the way he used to when she had been in trouble with her mother and was therefore deemed unworthy of a proper kiss and cuddle sat on his knee. His kiss at least, was warm and lingering. “It is good to see you, and the house. My, you must have made some changes since I was last here.”
She wanted to say that of course they had, because it had been so damn long since he had been here. “Well, you haven’t been here much, Daddy.” Her words were not laced with vilification, but there was a tone of vindication in them, and she wanted to make sure that he understood as much. “But that gives us plenty of spare time to get things finished,” she added with a half smile, as if to cushion the blow.
“Yes, I suppose I don’t really come enough, do I? But that will change now. You’re my only girl now. I have to be here for you.”
“Daddy, don’t talk about her like she doesn’t exist. I know I’m the only living child of yours, but Rebecca shouldn’t be forgotten. Not anymore.” She had found a new place for rationale now; she no longer wanted to run from Rebecca. She wanted to bring her back into her life. She wanted to put her back into her memories. He didn’t answer her, but they walked together amicably enough around to the back of the house to where Graham was coming out of the kitchen, aware of the arrival of their house guest.
“Graham.” There was a tension in his voice. With Graham being older than Elizabeth, he always assumed a natural role of authority in their relationship. Not in a controlling way, but with a gently grounded attitude that grows with the simple passing of time. Edward knew this, and he treated him more on a level
playing field.
“Edward.” They shook hands, never yet able to shake the sense of formality between them. It was true that Graham had been of great assistance to Edward over the years, none more so than following the deaths of Alice and Rebecca. When Alice had been murdered, Graham had tried to support him, and after the disappearance of Rebecca, even more so. He had helped practically, as men do, arranging the legalities and ensuring that David had as much support as he needed to make the insurance claims happen. Edward had been truly grateful for the help, and Graham had hoped that it might unite them, but it only functioned to separate them further, to the point that Elizabeth and Graham barely saw him.
Graham had managed to convince Elizabeth that they had to leave the house at some point over the weekend and that they couldn’t just sit around. He had spoken to Charles Stewart, who had reserved for them a table overlooking the sea, but in a private corner of his restaurant. He promised them privacy, with no questions. It was a busy weekend in August, and there were still a couple of weekends of enjoyment to be milked before the tourists would return to their city homes, once again to be consumed by piles of household chores and new school year homework and after-school clubs. Haven would claim its village back, and that would make ‘outsiders’ even easier to spot for the likes of Charles, Mr. and Mrs. Lyons and Mr. Madden. Charles had promised them privacy, and his actions were as good as his words. After finishing their cups of tea in the garden, where Edward lamented the view and offered his understanding of their decision not to remain in the city, they ambled slowly down the coastal road, until they came near to the bay. From a distance, they could have looked like any other ordinary family, but their discomfort was clear to see in their suspicious eyes and Elizabeth’s hunched up shoulders. She was uncomfortable with Edward’s apparent lack of concern; he was speaking quite loudly and this would be sure to attract attention should they stumble upon a hidden reporter. It was easier for her father, Elizabeth thought. He was invisible and unrecognised here. He may as well have been incognito. From Elizabeth’s point of view, she knew that she now shared her face with a dead woman, too similar in characteristics to Rebecca to remain unseen and pass by undetected.
They took their seats in Charlie’s fish restaurant, his greeting friendly and sympathetic, with only the smallest hint of pity. This was another reason that Elizabeth had wanted to stay at home; she didn’t need people’s pity, she simply needed answers. She needed Jack to find the answers. In fact, she almost felt as if Jack had become her only friend over the course of the week. Their shared seafront conversations and time spent in the bus station had been only the start, for since then they had kept in almost constant contact. Since the press conference, several people had called in to say that they knew Rebecca, but none of them had yet revealed themselves to be anything more than another acquaintance. In fact, Barry was still the most significantly connected person to Rebecca’s life, and this very fact had done little to make the ongoing investigation any easier for her to bear. Jack had called her almost as many times as she had called him, and they exchanged thoughts and information on a more than daily basis. There had still been no further developments with the newly discovered key; they hadn’t found any bank or health records; there had been no mortgage payments, no good friends. Rebecca’s life was still a mystery.
They had enjoyed their meal at the restaurant, and it had passed without incident or interruption. The fish was always fresh, and even when the restaurant was empty, there was still an indisputable atmosphere, courtesy of the sound of the waves as they hit the shore and the sides of the fishing boats moored just ten feet away. They discussed Edward’s retirement, and what he had been doing with his time: his salsa classes were incredibly time-consuming, and his gentlemen’s only club, where he spent his free evenings, was always a good environment in which to discuss the headlines of the day and the impending general election next year. He had never felt able to return to work, and with Alice’s and Rebecca’s life insurance money it had been an acceptable alternative to retire and take an early pension. Elizabeth had always found it a little strange that he had chosen to retire after her mother had died: most people at least, she thought, when they lost a loved one tried to cling on to any routine that they had left. As far as she could see, he couldn’t wait to retire, desperately calling David and telling him to push the case forward so that he could ‘leave the mess behind him’. David had done an excellent job, by all accounts, and had argued the case that the police had managed the scene of the crime very poorly, beginning their searches in the dark and in the rain. It was impossible, he argued, that the scene had not been contaminated, that evidence hadn’t been lost, and that therefore, under no circumstances, did the insurance agency have any right to withhold payment. There was no evidence, he argued, that the case was a suicide.
As they walked back to the path and climbed the steep uphill section towards their cottage, she could see her father’s car protruding out from the end of the driveway. She had taken an instant dislike to it the first day that she had seen it in the car park of the police station in Chesterwood. She thought it crude and pretentious to drive such an outwardly showy car. Graham, too, drove a car for which she saw no purpose: a huge saloon that haemorrhaged petrol on his daily commute, and was a waste of time and money, if you asked her.
“Why the hell did you buy that thing, Daddy?” She pointed at the car, its rear end on view.
“You don’t like it?” He sounded shocked, almost hurt.
“She’s beautiful, Edward.” Graham didn’t share his wife’s viewpoint. He had clocked eyes on it straight away, after listening to Elizabeth complaining about it since her return from Chesterwood. In all honesty, Graham had been anxiously awaiting its arrival.
“She,” Elizabeth mocked sarcastically, “is not a she. It’s an It. And a damn expensive It, at that.” Graham gave Edward a little wink, throwing him both his approval at the car and disagreement with his wife. For the first time in their relationship they appeared to be in cahoots. They all wandered around to the back of the house, and took a welcome breather, sitting at the table. Edward’s lungs were not what they once were, and whilst he might be able to enjoy a bit of salsa dancing, buoyed on no doubt, Elizabeth thought, by the instructor whom he had described over lunch in just a little too much detail, walking up that hill was another thing entirely. Graham grabbed the silver kettle from its position on the base and filled it with water. He noticed Elizabeth’s mobile phone next to the microwave. The little green light at the top of the phone was flashing frantically and he felt the skin in his face tighten as he realised that she had forgotten to take it with her. He set the kettle to boil, and then reached over to grab the phone. As he did so, the large oversized screen responded and sprang into life. He saw that she had eight missed calls. He turned around quickly, making both Edward and Elizabeth jump.
“Elizabeth, you didn’t take your phone.” His slowly spoken words dragged her immediately back to reality and she reached forward, snatching it from him. Without saying anything, she dialled Jack’s number, as Graham and Edward stared at her anxiously. She listened intently to what Jack had to say, and apologised for having forgotten to take her phone with her. Before she had hung up she was already on her feet, her last words, ‘We are on our way.’
Graham’s and Edward’s faces mirrored each other’s; they were both standing up and waiting, desperate for answers. She put the phone down on the table and looked first at Graham, and then at her father.
“Well?” said Edward, impatiently. Elizabeth took a big breath in, bracing herself before she spoke.
“They found her house.”
Thirty
The journey back to Chesterwood passed by in a silent daze. Elizabeth sat in the back seat, her mind desperately juggling the pieces of her conversation with Jack, trying to piece together exactly what it was that he had said, and exactly what he had meant. Short of telling her that they had found Rebecca’s house, he wouldn’t go into any
details on the telephone. Was that a police thing, she thought to herself. Was he just not prepared to talk over the phone? She recalled the day that he had turned up on her doorstep, and had driven her to Chesterwood. He hadn’t spoken to her on the telephone on that morning either. But he had since; he had called her every day, sometimes twice and had related what had happened during her absence. He had been prepared to tell her that the local shopkeeper had been in touch with him to say that Rebecca used to shop in his store. He’d told them that Rebecca would pass by the shop, and that she would always ask if there was any out-of-date food destined to be thrown away that he could give her to eat. He told her that they had received regular sightings of her in Chesterwood, and that even another person from the bus station had remembered seeing her regularly talking with a short red-faced man. Barry had been interviewed; his house, work lockers, and every minute detail of his financial life had been searched more thoroughly than Jack had really thought necessary, and he had told her that he hadn’t been at all surprised to find that he had come back clean as a whistle. Barry hadn’t even protested once, such was his own eagerness to help. He had shared all of this information on the phone, and yet wouldn’t tell her anything about the house. She couldn’t shake the thought of Rebecca begging for food, like a common street beggar asking for handouts. It was an image that refused to stop playing over and over in her mind, and she found it hard to equate the Rebecca that she once knew, the well dressed city banker who would dine out five nights out of seven, with a lonely isolated woman living off the handouts of strangers. Now, as they drove towards the place where Rebecca had been living, Graham continuously tried to lighten the mood: small talk about the traffic; he questioned them about stopping for a coffee break; he asked Edward trivial questions about the smooth and even ride of his slate grey Jaguar that was steadily purring along the road. Edward had agreed, against Elizabeth’s wishes, to stop for a coffee break and they had continued their discussion regarding the car. Edward had told him that he had paid for it outright. When Edward had gone to use the toilet, Elizabeth had scolded Graham harshly for his banal conversation and irritating questions. He had snapped back at her, something that she wasn’t used to. He was usually so calm. He had clenched his teeth together as he spat that her father was stressed too, and all he was trying to do was support him and take his mind off the situation.
Escaping Life Page 21