by Thorne Moore
‘No ghosts!’ I laughed, with relief. Everything was solid. Not even a creak in the floorboards. ‘Just seeing everything’s sound, for when we convert these attics.’
‘Oh that’s all right then. Cool.’
Yes, very cool. There would be no more bodies.
Chapter 14
Bertie was Mediaeval. Not even Dark Ages, let alone pre-Roman. Ronnie couldn’t be doing with anything so ridiculously modern. He tried to redirect his students back to the plotting of post holes, but he’d lost them. They wanted bodies, or nothing.
What Molly wanted was mollification of the Goddess. Fortunately, only a dozen fellow believers turned up and, before I could raise objections, Al shunted them off to a camp site in Newport.
‘Can’t have them here: it’s a matter of sanitation,’ he explained. ‘Once Molly’s done her thing at the holy well, they’ll be out of your hair, I promise.’
We went to watch the Thing being done, standing in solemn silence as Molly’s chanting entourage filed into the gloomy hollow and cast compensatory offerings into the foetid water. Some of the archaeology students attended, drinking up the awe of the moment. Others, further up the slope, added derisive cat calls, but they were largely ignored.
Sylvia stood with hands clasped. Tamsin, by Al’s side, surreptitiously filmed on her phone. Michael shook his head over the scene.
I watched with relief. Oak leaves, a gold bangle, a burning brand. I had wondered if Molly might try offering herself.
Everyone accepted that Bertie had been a sacrifice. No one except me suspected a miserable common-place murder, unrecorded and probably unpunished. When everyone else had gone, I crept back to the site, to see what difference any of it had made to the horror captured there.
What I felt, instantly, was extreme frustration, and it all emanated from Hannah Quigley, who was on her knees at the water’s edge, groping for the still-smouldering wood that Molly had presented to the oily waters.
‘Hannah, I hope you’re not trying to get the bracelet.’
She snorted indignation. ‘I don’t want it!’
‘Good. I doubt if it’s real gold, so not worth drowning for. Can you leave that wood be, please? It’s been offered to the Goddess.’
‘It’s an archaeological site! They have no right!’
‘Yes they do have the right, because we gave it to them.’
‘It’s devil worship. That’s against the law. I’ll report them!’
‘I’m not sure worshipping anything is against the law, Hannah. We don’t burn witches anymore.’ Fortunately for me.
Hannah managed to touch the smouldering branch. It sparked, she shrank back, a dainty plume of smoke rose and the wood sank from view with a faint hiss.
‘Leave it,’ I said, beginning to feel sorry for her.
She got to her feet, dishevelled and distressed, facing me in a gale of hostility. ‘This is Professor Pryce-Roberts’ excavation. You’re just trying to spoil things for him.’
I noticed the bandage on her wrist, where Al had grabbed her. Had he really hurt her? He’d swung her arm around with enough force to dislocate her shoulder, maybe, but she was obviously nursing a lot more than physical wounds. ‘Come on Hannah, the excavation is going fine and Ronnie is very pleased with it. You want to be a part of his work, don’t you? Leave this be and go and help him.’
‘No thanks to you!’ she said, brushing past me and storming off down the path. From the heaving of her shoulders as she ran, I suspected she was crying.
Ronnie’s problem, not mine.
I turned back to the dark dell and listened to its silence, now that it was free of Hannah’s turmoil.
A clean breeze filtered through the trees. Mud had been stirred, water defiled, flowers strewn, and with the upheaval, that shadow of raging anger had been churned free of its tomb in the stinking mire. Perhaps there was purpose to Molly’s cleansing ritual, after all.
But she hadn’t cleansed all away. One thread of that knot of trapped emotions still remained. One sensation, etched in the rocks, that wasn’t fear or anger or despair; but an unidentifiable see-sawing - something. What else was it that a person could feel at the moment of death, other than fear, anger and despair? Whatever it was, it eluded me and I had no wish to penetrate its secret.
*
London beckoned. With phone calls still bombarding us about Bertie, and the great Elizabethan Fayre fast approaching, I felt guilty about absconding, but I needed my illicit interlude with Al more than ever.
July, and there was thunder in the air. Heavy rain began to splatter in huge drops as we dragged bags and cases from the capacious Volvo and bundled Tamsin into the terminal at Heathrow. I kept my promise of discretion, and diligently browsed the shelves of W H Smith’s, while she met up with her rowdy friends and paraded Al before them. We drove on into the city, with the windscreen wipers going for gold, but the storm passed, the sun came out and the glass and concrete shimmered, the air heavy with carbon monoxide and the smell of diesel and deep-frying.
‘I presume you’ve fixed up somewhere to stay?’ I asked, as Al changed lanes on the Cromwell Road. It had belatedly occurred to me that we might be bunking down in some New Age squat.
He grinned. ‘A hotel – I did some work there; they give me a discount.’
We stopped in Kensington at a gracious terraced house, sash windows, classical pillars and sculptured bay trees at the door. Al was greeted like an old friend, and I gazed up at the elegant plasterwork, wondering how much of it was his.
‘We’re going Dutch,’ I whispered, as we were ushered to our elegant room.
Al laughed. ‘Forget it. I rifled the petty cash.’
I obediently forgot about it, as he slipped his arms round me. ‘Eat out? Or in?’
‘In,’ I said.
*
He’d warned me he had business to see to the next day. ‘Lawyers?’ I’d asked. He’d dropped a mention of Kim’s trust fund on the journey. ‘Do you have to make yourself look smart?’
‘Clean T shirt?’ he suggested.
‘I think so.’
But when I emerged from the shower, after a decadent breakfast in bed, I found him in a suit. Suited him surprisingly well. Worn, of course, with a clean T shirt.
‘You’re a different man.’
‘I try to be, at least once a day. You’re not going to be bored, are you?’
‘In London? Of course not. You go and charm your lawyers. I’ll be fine. You’ve got my number.’
I waved him off, then paused on the kerbside. I had friends to meet, shops to visit… Instead, I found myself heading for the Pimlico street where Leo had lived and died. I stood on the pavement, gazing up at his balcony. A child’s voice babbled through the open window. New tenants. The mess had been cleaned up, decorators had freshened the place and none of them would feel what was locked in that wall.
Emotions that wouldn’t be locked in that wall, if I had responded to Leo’s desperation in time. Instead, I’d sat in the interview room, glowering at the coffee stains, thinking ‘Damn you, Leo, for dropping me in this,’ while Leo hanged himself.
Killer Queen. Christian’s insidious words whispered at me. Had I somehow channelled death at my baby? My mother? Mr Jackson? Leo?
Behind me, a taxi hooted exasperation at a van. A blare of reason. A kamikaze cyclist scooted past. The noise and bustle of London shouted at me, ‘Reality, Kate: clamour and energy and life getting on with itself. There’s no time and place for your whimsical delusions and your moping guilt trips. Leo died up there, and now there’s a child, doing what children do. Get over it.’
Whimsical delusions. It was all so ridiculous. Bones and bog bodies – just good publicity for Llys y Garn. I needed to laugh at it all, and at myself. I needed to move on.
The problem, I realized, as I prepared to while away a day in the metropolis that had been my home, was that I had already moved on. From London. What was I to do here? Meet up for a morning of idle bitching with old
colleagues I couldn’t say anything meaningful to? Gaze at a house, contract pending, that I no longer shared with Peter? Stroll among towering offices where I might once have worked? I didn’t belong here anymore. The only thing in London I wanted was Al, so I mooched, alone, and I waited for him to return.
He sent me a text to say his meeting was done, but he had to see some people over in Battersea, and he’d be back at the hotel by seven.
I was there, waiting for him, glass of wine in hand. ‘How has your day been, dear?’
‘Not too bad, dear. And yours?’
‘Delightful. So who were these Battersea dogs who kept you occupied all this time?’
‘No one you’d want to meet.’
‘You know that’s just going to make me more curious.’
He shook his head, warning me off. ‘Just a bunch of junkies. Some of Kim’s old contacts.’ He dumped the case he’d been carrying. A long narrow case.
‘Is that a violin, or a machine gun for your next bank robbery?’
‘Kim’s.’ He flicked it open to show the violin, before depositing it in the wardrobe. ‘I promised to collect it for her.’
‘Is she as good on the violin as she is on the penny whistle?’
‘Better.’
He wasn’t refusing to answer my questions, just not eager to discuss Kim’s affairs. I respected that. ‘So do I have you to myself tomorrow?’
‘Almost.’ He sipped his wine, beginning to relax into the evening. ‘Got to see a man in Kent first thing, but—’
‘A man in Kent!’
‘A possible job, sorry.’
‘You’ve got a job! You’re working on our hall.’
‘And when that’s finished?’ he laughed. ‘Sorry, Kate. Promise, I’ll see him first thing, be back in time for lunch, and then I’ll be all yours.’
‘You haven’t got a man from Essex or somewhere to see tonight?’
‘Not tonight, no.’
‘Good,’ I said, refilling his glass.
*
He slipped quietly from the room while I was still blearily trying to decide whether to wake fully, or drift back into sleep. I opted for sleep, but before it came, his absence prodded me into wakefulness. Why did he need to look for another job? The work on Llys y Garn could go on forever if I played it right; always some plaster to smooth and screw to tighten. Wasn’t that enough for him?
I sat up, fighting my pillows. Kent. About as far from West Wales as he could get. Did he have to be such a nomad? I pictured his yurt in the middle of Kensington, while he’d worked on this hotel. A different man at least once a day, he’d said, and how many of them were involved with me?
I wasn’t demanding to have him all. Just one version of him, for the summer. I wasn’t asking for commitment, or marriage. Just a brief interlude of idle play, a chance to pretend I wasn’t alone in the world.
And sex, of course. Hugely satisfactory sex.
So what was I complaining about? I got up and sauntered out to another morning of retail therapy.
I bought nothing.
He returned for lunch, and we spent the afternoon seeking out a little gallery displaying some of Michael’s pieces. Then we strolled round the Serpentine.
‘Ice-cream,’ said Al, and raced off to get some. I sought some shade, listening to the babble, the distant traffic, the subterranean hum of a city that had, just a few months ago, been so much part of my life that I barely noticed it. Now I noticed it.
A sharp yank and my bag was off my shoulder, jerking me backwards. I swivelled to find a boy in a grey hoody trying to run, while I clung on for dear life. ‘Get off, you little sod!’
The boy raised his free hand. What if he had a knife?
He didn’t. Or if he did, it was thrown wide as he went flying. I hadn’t noticed Al return. He moved so fast I didn’t see what he did, but there was the boy, sprawled on his face, trying to figure out how he’d got there. Al reached down, snapped him to his feet and whispered something in his ear.
‘Gerroff,’ whined the boy, a dribble of blood running from his nose.
Al’s grip on his collar tightened, and the boy choked, almost off his feet. Al whispered again, dropped him, and the boy loped off, on wobbling legs.
‘Are you okay?’
‘Fine.’ I wasn’t sure whether to laugh or tremble. ‘I’d like to think I could have fought him off, but thanks for the intervention.’
‘My pleasure. You still want an ice-cream?’ Coolly, he offered me a cone, which had miraculously remained intact. The other one was a splatter of goo on the ground. ‘Or would you prefer a stiff drink after that?’
‘Maybe a drink,’ I agreed, and we sought a bar.
‘We can stay another day if you like.’ Al handed me my glass.
I thought about it. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘That little thug shook you up, didn’t he?’ He reached for my wrist, feeling my pulse. ‘I didn’t think you could really be that cool about it.’
I laughed. ‘Maybe not totally cool, but stirred more than shaken. It’s not the first teenage highwayman I’ve run into.’ Truthfully, I was more disturbed by Al’s reaction than the attempted theft. That swift meting out of violence. It was too primal for comfort. Looking at him now, relaxed and unconcerned, I couldn’t quite get my head round it, so I looked out across the park instead. Across city haze that suggested illusion, deception, sleight of hand. ‘I know it seems impossible, but I’m not sure London does it for me anymore. It all seems a bit hollow. I want proper fresh air again. I want real woods and owls.’
Al laughed. ‘We’ll have you hugging trees yet.’
I could think of better things to hug. Not all things primal were discomforting. But in the morning, I was happy to be heading for home. That’s what Llys y Garn was, even with its shadows. Llys y Garn with its deep woods and meadows of long grass, the espresso machine hissing in the nicotine kitchen and a sea-charged sky overhead. Most of all, Llys y Garn with its people.
All of which seemed a long way off as we shunted our way to the M4. The motorway was surging, heavy lorries grinding around us, the sun pulsating, the tarmac at melting point.
‘How about getting off this and going across country?’ said Al as we slowed into a jam at a Reading exit.
I sensed hesitation in the suggestion, but there was none in my answer. ‘Oh God, yes, anything’s better than this.’
So we headed up through Oxfordshire. I offered to map read, but Al knew where he was going. Way off the motorway. The Cotswolds.
Yes, beautiful countryside and pretty villages, and I really had to stop cringing every time I saw a sign to Stow on the Wold, just because I’d been there when my mother died.
Al probably had a cosy little pub in mind for lunch, and why not? I’d have to forgive the area sometime. But Al didn’t head for a pub. Again, I sensed his hesitation, then decision, as he turned onto a side road, up into thick woods and over the brow of a hill. He pulled into a farm gateway and turned to me.
‘Let’s stretch our legs, take a walk,’ he suggested, as if the idea had just struck him. I could tell it was anything but spontaneous.
‘All right. Why not?’
It wasn’t a particularly inviting spot for a stroll, along a stubbly verge. I kept to the tarmac.
A sharp corner lay ahead. Al’s long legs carried him ahead, out of sight, but as I rounded the bend, I found him waiting for me. Watching me, intently.
The road plunged down a steep hill into a picturesque green valley, where a church and village of pale golden stone clustered by a brook that twinkled in the bright light.
A charming view, but still no explanation for our little walk.
‘Very pretty,’ I said. ‘Why are we here?’
‘Good to get out of the car.’
‘Is this a game? If it is, tell me how to play.’
‘No, I was just stiff driving. I thought there might be a …’ He gestured towards the village, then stopped, pushed his hair back and squinte
d back up the hill. ‘Sorry. This was stupid.’
‘Was it?’ I kept pace with him, this time, as we returned to the car. ‘If I knew what we were doing, I might judge.’
‘It’s nothing. I’m out of my mind. Let’s find a pub, get some lunch.’ But I could feel his eyes on me still, watching for the slightest sign of – what?
I stopped him, a hand on his arm. ‘Was I supposed to feel something?’
‘No, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t – did you feel anything?’
‘No. What was it I was supposed to feel?’
‘Nothing. No, if you felt nothing, that’s fine.’
‘Al. Why here?’
He paused before replying, staring back at the sharp bend. ‘That was where my parents were killed. I just wondered—’
‘Oh Al.’
‘Yes, I know, it was stupid. But you say you feel emotions that get left behind. I thought you’d feel if there was anything there. I have this nightmare they died screaming.’
I swallowed. There was no breeze. There were no shadows. There was nothing, to see or to feel. Just July heat and dust and the suspicion of another thunderstorm approaching.
‘I felt nothing,’ I said. ‘It’s all quite empty. Nothing there.’
‘That’s all right then. Sorry. I shouldn’t have done it.’ Contrition, but enormous relief.
I felt nothing because shadows never lingered out in the open, and my mind had been so focussed on memories of my own mother’s death, I would probably have felt nothing anyway. ‘I do understand. Don’t fret about it. Come on. It’s my turn to drive.’
He tossed me the keys, then leaned back against the car and laughed. ‘Sorry, Kate. You did warn me how people reacted, and I slipped right into line, expecting you to reach out to the dead for me.’
‘That’s the one reaction I can forgive. You couldn’t have passed this by. I wouldn’t, if I’d been you.’ I turned the key in the ignition. ‘And there really is nothing here. Nothing but peace and the quiet earth.’
‘That’s all I wanted to know.’ He took a deep breath, satisfied.
What else could I have said?
*
Pembrokeshire, when we reached it, was unbelievably busy. The school holidays had begun and the roads were clogged with traffic, caravans and camper vans lurching up hills, cars creeping cautiously along winding lanes. Pedestrians too: the road up from the Cemaes Arms was littered with students I didn’t recognise.