‘I had no idea what had happened, but I knew it wasn’t right. I love Will. Anyway, about six months later, I was investigating whether all the hype about the internet was relevant to our company, and I came across an article on the BBC website about something called Rohypnol. Nowadays everybody’s heard of so called ‘date rape drugs’, but then it was real news. It had been used in a few cases of rape in the US, but this was the first time in Britain. I became absolutely convinced that Rohypnol had been slipped into mine and Laura’s drinks that night.’
Stella had listened as requested, but she remained unconvinced.
‘Why would Hugo want to drug you and Laura? And where would he get hold of the stuff anyway?’
‘Didn’t I mention that Sebastian was American? It was easy to get hold of in the US because it wasn’t illegal in Mexico, so I presume Sebastian brought it with him. Hugo must have agreed it with him in advance. The plan was to disgrace me, so that Laura could be banned from ever seeing me again.’
‘Well, I can’t think why Hugo would want to do that, but we’ll get to that later. How could anybody have known that Will would get back in time?’
‘At first, I thought it was just the worst of bad luck. But it all seemed too well planned for me. So I phoned the company in Southern Ireland. They’d never heard of the man who had phoned Will. I phoned British Airways to try to find out who had paid for the tickets, but I got no joy there either. Hugo knew what this job opportunity meant to Will. The timing was all too perfect.’
Stella was starting to believe that this could just hold a grain of truth, but it would make her dead son-in-law more evil than even she had believed. She grabbed a piece of toast from the plate and started to spread it liberally with jam. She made no attempt to eat it, though, and just pushed the plate away.
‘I’m sorry, Imogen. It just seems too far-fetched. Why would he do that? And what did Laura think of this outlandish theory?’
‘Laura was way too far under his spell, and she just wouldn’t believe me about the Rohypnol. She told me not to call her again, and I was so upset that I didn’t. I tried and tried to get Will to understand, but like you he was unconvinced. By this time, I’d realised what might have triggered this chain of events. A few days before we got the dinner invitation from Hugo, I was on the phone to Laura. She was crying; really sobbing. She said there was something that she desperately needed to talk to me about. I tried to get her to tell me what the problem was, but she said she couldn’t say on the phone. I was all for going straight down to see her, but she begged me to wait until Hugo was away. He was due to go to Paris a few weeks later. Then she would tell me everything, but there were things she wanted to show me too - so it had to be in Oxfordshire. Just as we were completing our plans, I heard Laura gasp. ‘Shit! I’ve got to go,’ she whispered. ‘Oh please God, don’t let him have heard!’ and she hung up. The dinner party happened before we had a chance to meet, and we weren’t left on our own for a minute after I arrived for that weekend.’
Stella couldn’t keep the doubt out of her voice.
‘So you think that Hugo heard you talking, and didn’t like the fact that she was going to tell you something - or didn’t like the fact that she had somebody close to talk to. You think that he engineered this whole elaborate event just to break up your friendship?’
‘Yes Stella, I do - and it worked.’
‘And what does Laura think now?’
Neither of them had heard Laura enter the room, where she had been listening for the last couple of minutes.
‘It’s the truth, Mum. All of it. You have absolutely no idea what Hugo was capable of. This was the least of his crimes.’
*
Becky stopped dead in her tracks in the hallway as she heard these words. Arriving just seconds before, Becky had found Mrs Bennett on her hands and knees cleaning the front steps. Not wanting to make the poor lady get up, she had told her not to worry as she could make her way to the kitchen and see if anybody was out of bed yet.
The door from the hall to the back of the house was propped open with an old umbrella rack, and Laura had spoken from the open kitchen door, which swung closed behind her after she uttered the sentence which had so mesmerised Becky. Their voices were more muffled now, and hating to be an eavesdropper but remembering that primarily she was a police officer, Becky made her way towards the door. The voices were slightly raised, so it wasn’t too difficult to make out the words. She recognised each of their voices from the previous day, and Stella was first to speak.
‘I think you know, Laura, that I have never been comfortable with this marriage of yours. But you refused to tell me anything. Not a word against Hugo in all these years. So now I want to know what the hell has been going on. What do you mean, this was the least of his crimes?’
‘Let’s not go into all this now, please Mum. I know you never liked Hugo, and whilst I might play the devastated widow in front of the rest of the world, I’m not going to play that game in front of you.’
Becky heard somebody start to say something.
‘No, Imo, don’t interrupt me. She’s my mum and she needs to know that I am so very glad that Hugo is dead. We don’t need to rake over the past, and I’ve no intention of doing it. But just let’s get this over with.’
The older voice of Stella came loud and clear through the door, and Becky realised that she must be facing this way.
‘Is that all you’ve got to say? What were you going to tell Imogen that made Hugo do what he did? Did you know what he’d done? Why didn’t you tell your brother? Laura, I don’t know what to think.’
‘Mum, it doesn’t matter what I was going to tell Imogen. It’s all in the past, and I’ve no intention of repeating it. When Imogen phoned me and told me about the Rohypnol, I didn’t want to believe her. I couldn’t. What would that have told me about my husband? But I suspect he used it on me after that on several occasions. That, or other drugs. No, don’t look like that. Not to rape me, but when he needed me to be compliant in other ways. It took me a long time to realise that Imogen was right. She knows how guilty I feel, but by then it was too late.’
‘So exactly how does Imogen know how you feel if you never saw or spoke to her after that day? You barely had time yesterday, and there were constant interruptions. What, precisely, am I missing here?’
There was a pause, and Becky was terrified of moving and giving herself away. Then Imogen answered the question.
‘I’m sorry, Stella. We’ve been lying to you. Laura and I have been in touch now for the last eighteen months or so, since just after Laura was packed away to that awful place for the second time. We didn’t want anybody to know in case somebody slipped up and Hugo found out. We kept in touch over the Internet, which they allowed her to use in the home. They’d blocked all email accounts, but somehow the whole concept of communication via social networking sites had passed them by.’
Seeing that this had also passed Stella by, Imogen continued without further explanation.
‘I was confident that there was actually nothing wrong with Laura, but she seemed to have given up. I wanted to give her back her fighting spirit. I wanted to restore the person that bastard had tried to destroy.’
The words were spoken with such heartfelt venom that there was silence, complete and utter. Then Stella dropped her bombshell.
‘Imogen, I want you to answer me truthfully. Did you kill Hugo?’
After only the briefest of pauses, Imogen answered.
‘No, Stella. I can say with complete honesty that, much as I didn’t think he deserved to live, I didn’t kill him.’
At that moment Becky sensed some movement behind her and glanced back into the hallway. Mrs Bennett was walking towards her from the open front door. Thankfully the corridor that Becky was standing in was dark, but she knew she would be discovered in seconds, so starting to hum a little tune, she pushed open the door into the kitchen, and feigned surprise that the room was full.
‘Gosh, you’
re all up early. I hope you don’t mind that Mrs Bennett let me in. Did you all manage to get a reasonable night’s sleep?’
Three pairs of eyes turned towards her as she bluffed her way through the first few seconds. They all looked slightly shocked, but she pretended she didn’t notice. Mrs Bennett was not far behind her.
‘Good morning Lady Fletcher, Mrs Kennedy and Mrs Kennedy. Ah sergeant - I see you’ve not managed to get yourself a cup of tea yet. You sit down, and I’ll see to it. Does anybody else want one whilst I make the breakfast?’
Becky saw Stella’s puzzled frown. It clearly hadn’t passed her by that since coming through the kitchen door, Becky had barely had time to walk to the kettle, let alone make herself a hot drink. She just hoped that she wouldn’t have to explain herself.
*
After a cup of tea and yet more rounds of toast as nobody could face anything else, all of it consumed in relative silence, people began to make excuses to leave the kitchen. Anything, Becky thought, rather than stay in this charged atmosphere. She felt sure that Stella hadn’t finished questioning her daughter and daughter-in-law, but Imogen said she was going for a bath and Becky suspected that she’d make it as long as she possibly could. Close as they were, she didn’t think Stella would follow Imogen into the bathroom.
An unhappy looking Stella had returned to her cottage to get dressed. She had suggested that Laura join her, so they could have some time alone, but Laura had politely declined, saying that she needed a few minutes with Becky.
As the door closed behind Stella, Laura gave Becky a rueful smile.
‘Sorry, Becky, I don’t really need any of your time. It’s just that Mum is determined to extract every detail of my life for the last ten years. It isn’t going to benefit the investigation in any way. All it does is satisfy her natural curiosity. I’d rather go and read the papers, if that’s okay with you. I presume if you had anything to report, you’d have told me by now.’
Becky watched Laura’s retreating back with a puzzled expression. There was a layer of deceit and subterfuge here and she was struggling to understand Tom’s “softly softly“ approach with these women. He was firmly of the opinion that without hard evidence, tough questioning would just cause barriers to be erected and the truth might never be told. He liked to collect his little ‘nuggets’, and store them until he could use them to maximum effect. But Becky wanted to be proactive, and as Tom was coming to Oxfordshire later, she decided that there was something that he might be able to bring with him.
She pulled her mobile phone from her bag, and walked far enough away from the house to ensure she couldn’t be heard.
‘Tom, I’ve heard some interesting conversations this morning. There’s quite a lot to report, but something occurred to me. We know that Imogen Kennedy flew in from Paris, and we’ve checked that she didn’t also fly out from London the same day. But did anybody check the passenger lists for the Eurostar? It only takes a couple of hours or so. That might have given her time.’
Becky was pleased to hear a note of respect in Tom’s voice for her suggestion, but obviously he didn’t believe that this idea had come out of thin air.
‘What? No, I’ve no specific reason to suspect her, and I’ve certainly not heard her admit to anything. In fact, quite the opposite. Stella asked her directly, and she flatly denied it. But I only heard the last part of the conversation, and I wondered what had been said before to make Stella believe that she might have done it. If you can get the printouts of the passenger lists, I’m more than happy to go through them all here. Let’s face it, with them all doing a Greta Garbo on me, I’ve got nobody to talk to so I could do with keeping myself occupied. I’ve got my laptop and my 3G card, so I can do a bit of additional research on times. And I want to look into Rohypnol, and how easy it was to access at the end of the nineties.’
She paused for a moment, as Tom asked the inevitable question.
‘I’ll explain it all when I see you. But you might also like to know that Imogen and Laura have secretly been in touch for eighteen months or so, and perhaps you should check up on that when you speak to Laura. She’s tougher than you think, Tom.’
***
She was weak. So very weak. And she was going out of her mind. Too much thinking time, that was the problem. She had begun to question her own understanding of reality, wondering if this was really happening to her or was it just some awful dream - a nightmare of such clarity that she felt sure she would wake up soon. Perhaps it would be one of those sudden awakenings; when the dreamer falls off a cliff and awakens to a dull thud somewhere around the heart. Perhaps the terror was building to such a crescendo that it would wake her. She hoped so.
But whether she was awake or asleep, she knew now how it must feel to be in solitary confinement. What did they call it? She’d read it somewhere. The Invisible Torture - that was it. Nobody can see the marks, but it drives people to madness.
She tried to think of strategies to keep herself sane. She saw a film once where somebody exercised every day in his prison cell. But she couldn’t do that. She was too weak, and it might make her thirsty. That would be a disaster. She’d even tried to lick her tears, but wasn’t sure whether they would still come if she had no water to drink.
And her mind kept wandering. She needed to focus, otherwise when he came for her - as she was sure he would do - he wouldn’t want her anymore. And if he didn’t want her, she didn’t know what he would do with her.
So the best thing she could do was to think about good things. Remember the happy times in her life.
She searched her mind for a single day when it had felt good to be alive. There must have been one, surely? She’d had her share of dreams, though. Dreams of a life away from poverty; dreams of being a famous model; dreams of a life filled with love and laughter. And every dream she had ever had had been shattered.
CHAPTER 22
Imogen had locked herself in the bathroom and run a deep hot bath. She’d brought the letters with her, but she decided to soak for a while. She needed to brace herself, because reading them was so very painful.
Laura would be seeing the executors of the will later in the day, but to Imogen’s relief she didn’t seem at all concerned about the outcome. She was certain that Hugo wouldn’t have been kind. He never was.
The signs had been there for Laura to see from the day she met him, but his clever manipulation and her eagerness to bend to his will had set the pattern for the future. Imogen could see that Laura blamed herself for lacking the strength and courage to recognise the web in which he was slowly ensnaring her. And it was almost unbearable to witness the depths of her shame.
She picked up the next letter, and began to read.
***
JUNE 1999
My dear Imogen
It’s months since I wrote one of these stupid and pointless letters. Not since the last day of my honeymoon. The truth is, I’ve realised how ridiculous they are. But I have to pour my heart out to somebody, even if it’s just a complete pretence.
My life now has changed. I don’t work, and Hugo doesn’t want me to help with the charity. I wanted to redecorate the house, although that’s come to nothing either.
And now I no longer have you! I’ve lost my best friend, and I miss you desperately. You tried to call me yesterday, but I couldn’t listen to your lies. They must be lies, surely? It’s tearing me apart Imo - my husband, or my best friend? Nobody should have to make that choice.
The last time I wrote to you we were about to return to England, where Hugo promised life - or at least sex - would be better. He seemed to think I needed to understand more about a man’s desires in the bedroom. He seemed to think that he could find a way of giving me greater pleasure.
He was wrong. Oh God was he wrong. And I wanted to tell you. I was going to tell you!
Life isn’t bad. We attend a lot of functions together, and Hugo is attentive towards me. He’s still insisting that I buy new clothes for all the events, and he’s
still helping me to perfect the way that I behave in the sort of circles that he moves in. I often get things wrong though, particularly when I decide to go and choose an outfit for myself. Hugo doesn’t ever get angry with me if I select something inappropriate. He just gives a slight frown when I appear dressed and ready to go out. Then I know he doesn’t like it. When he approves he always does something wonderful. The other night I walked into the room, ready to go out, and he gave me one of his most glorious smiles and jumped up from the sofa to kiss my hand. He told me I would be the belle of the ball. Another night he disappeared and came back into the room with a box - and inside was a beautiful pair of emerald earrings. They’re not mine to keep, because they’re part of the family treasure and must be passed on - but it was so good of him to think of it.
But you know how self-opinionated I can be. I’ve decided more than once to ignore his obvious displeasure, and I’ve chosen to wear something he doesn’t like. But it’s not worth it. I can tell he disapproves, and he becomes so distant with me that I instantly regret it. He doesn’t shout, and he doesn’t say a single unpleasant word. He just speaks to me as little as possible, without appearing overtly rude, and it ruins my evening. It obviously ruins his too - so on the whole it’s easier to just go with the flow. I’m beginning to dread these functions. I am almost guaranteed to do something wrong. I almost wish he would tell me what he’s thinking. Then at least I would have an opportunity to put across my point of view. But you can’t really fight silence.
We don’t argue, which is surely a good thing? On a few occasions I’ve got a bit frustrated about something, and started to sound angry. But if I so much as raise my voice or sound irritated, Hugo just turns and walks out of the room. The first time it happened, he didn’t speak to me for a couple of days. Eventually I had to ask him why. I suppose his response was predictable.
(2011) Only the Innocent Page 22