A Deep Deceit

by Hilary Bonner

  I turned my back on him and headed for the door. I heard him cry out in anguish but I didn’t look round. I half ran out of the room and the tears were running down my face.

  I wasn’t crying for Carl. And at that moment I could already feel my love for him turning to hate. I was crying for my own lost life, for all those years he had stolen from me.

  Fifteen

  I returned to the cottage. After all, where else did I have to go? I arrived there just before 9 p.m., having caught the 5.22 from Exeter, and treated myself to a taxi home from Penzance.

  I was exhausted and very hungry. There had been a buffet car on the train but I had not had any appetite for a while after seeing Carl and by the time I arrived in St Ives my stomach had begun to send serious messages to remind me that it had not received any food all day. I made tea and toast, and scrambled a couple of eggs. After I’d eaten I lay down on the sofa. I didn’t even have the energy to make it into a bed again.

  I think sleep could have been my body’s way of providing me with a kind of therapy. Had I been bothering to think about it logically I might have worried about being unable to sleep, but instead the oblivion descended almost as soon as I put my head on the pillows.

  Once more I was woken by a hammering on the door.

  I peered out of the window. At first I couldn’t see anybody, but then, illuminated by the street light on the corner, I watched the tall, bulky figure of Will step back from the porch and tip his face towards me, peering at the upstairs window. The last thing I felt able to cope with was a visitor, so I ducked away. I didn’t want him to see me. I waited almost a minute before I looked out of the window again. Mercifully Will seemed to have gone.

  I looked at my watch. It was almost 10.30, a bit late to come calling, I thought vaguely. Then I slumped on to the sofa again and tried to recapture the oblivion I had achieved before he turned up on the doorstep, but without success at first. At some time during the night I found the energy to turn the sofa into a proper bed and maybe that helped me eventually to fall into a deep sleep.

  I was awoken by another loud knocking on the door. But this time it was broad daylight outside. Morning had presumably arrived. I reckoned the caller could reasonably be one of three people – Will again, Mrs Jackson, or Mariette – and it made little difference to me which. I didn’t want to see anybody, not even Mariette – in spite of the undoubted success of our last evening together. I did not even look out of the window but waited quietly for the caller to go away.

  After a moment or two I heard Mariette’s voice calling through the letter box. ‘Are you there, Suzanne? It’s me. Are you all right?’

  I continued to ignore her. After a bit she went away.

  I had no intention of even trying to face the world. I just wanted to stay hidden away in my bed. I buried my head in the pillow and ultimately cried myself to sleep.

  It was different, you see. Until confronting Carl face-to-face in jail I had been kidding myself, I suppose. But Carl had not been able to tell me that the American allegation was all a dreadful mistake. Indeed, he had admitted to me that he had killed his daughter. I was devastated.

  I had to accept that I had been quite wrong about him all those years. And to face the strong likelihood that he had known that I was not a murderer, that he had let me suffer those awful nightmares for six long years without telling me the only thing that could have made it all stop – and all so that he could have control over me. So that I would be dependent on him.

  The letters were part of the way in which he kept me dependent. That made such a dreadful kind of sense.

  Even so, in spite of what I had told him in his cell – that he had stolen my life from me – it wasn’t really true. Carl had turned me into a fugitive, Carl had taken my freedom from me, but I had to take some responsibility for that too. I had wanted to run away with him and he had not made me unhappy. He had given me a life, a curiously good kind of life, I had to admit. He had promised so long ago when we met in Richmond Park that he would make me happy and at times he had made me quite blissfully happy. I accepted totally that he had loved me – obsessively perhaps, but truly too, there was no doubt about that.

  I could even half forgive him the kidnap. Back at home in the comfort of the little house I had shared so contentedly with him it was hard to recall that I had not long ago been frightened of him. It still didn’t seem real, somehow. I was so confused.

  Maybe I could eventually forgive him for sending the threatening letters, but what I could not live with, could never forgive or forget, was what he had done before he met me. He had killed his own child – and all through his total inability to let go of anyone he loved. I had suffered enough with guilt because I thought I had killed a violent, drunken monster of a man. Carl had been responsible for the death of an innocent child. He had assumed a different personality and invaded my life, and all the time kept his past, even his real name, a secret from me.

  I wondered how he had managed to do that for all those years. We had been so close. At least I thought we had been so close.

  I slumped into a kind of trance, reliving my years with Carl, going over and over all that I had learned, all that had happened. I lost track of how long I stayed like that, but I suppose I knew that several days must have passed. Physically I felt lethargic and washed out, but there were no signs that the pneumonia threatened to return.

  I ate everything that Mariette had brought, all the eggs and milk and cheese, the potatoes and the other vegetables, and all the fruit plus the stale digestive biscuits and a tin of sardines I found lurking in a corner of the cupboard. I wasn’t hungry and had no interest whatsoever in food. I ate automatically and for comfort in the same way that I slept, welcoming oblivion again and again.

  But when the food ran out I did not consider shopping for more provisions.

  I had little concept of night and day. I kept the curtains drawn all the time. I cocooned myself in my own misery.

  At some stage a letter arrived from Carl:

  My darling Suzanne,

  I know I have hurt you but all I wanted to do was to look after you. Please come to see me again and I will try to explain everything to you. I love you so much. I had to keep you safe . . .

  There was more of the same but I was no longer impressed by it. He did not mention his daughter once. In fact, the letter only increased my anger and sense of betrayal. I tore it into small pieces and flushed it down the lavatory.

  Intermittently, somebody or other knocked on the front door. The days passed. In a way they were endless, it was as if time had stopped. I continued to ignore callers. Mariette always shouted through the letter box. She began to sound increasingly anxious. I don’t know why I couldn’t bring myself at least to speak to her. But I just didn’t want to be bothered.

  Eventually, early one evening, I heard a particularly loud, authoritative knock on the door, followed by Mariette’s voice through the letter box: ‘Suzanne, please, please open the door. I’ve been so worried about you.’

  Again I did not respond.

  Then I heard a man’s voice. ‘Mrs Peters, are you there? This is the police. Constable Brownly. Please open the door.’ He repeated the request several times. Then he said: ‘Mrs Peters, I’m concerned about your safety and your health. I should warn you that if you don’t answer the door I’m going to break in. If you’re there, please answer.’

  I had been sitting at the top of the stairs, hugging my knees to my chin. Almost grateful that a kind of deadlock had been broken, I got to my feet and stumbled downstairs. My movements seemed clumsy. I knew that once more I was barely functioning.

  I opened the front door. Constable Brownly, a very young uniformed officer, looked relieved and as if he didn’t know what to do or say next.

  Mariette’s face, breaking into a smile as I pulled the door towards me, changed to an expression of shock when she saw me.

  I hadn’t washed or changed my clothes in the time I had shut myself away in the co
ttage. And I had not even really thought about it until this moment. There were dirty dishes all over the place. My usually immaculate little home was a mess and so was I. That would never have been allowed were Carl still in residence, I reflected obliquely, and just thinking about Carl cut into me again.

  I didn’t speak. I couldn’t find words. All I could feel was a dreadful blankness.

  Mariette didn’t say anything either. She just stepped towards me and hugged me.

  I started to cry again then. And I just couldn’t stop.

  Mariette took me home and, with remarkable fortitude, her mother agreed that I could stay, even though the cottage was so small and had only two bedrooms. Mariette insisted on giving up her own pretty room at the back of the house for me and said she would be quite comfortable on the sofa bed in the brass-ornamented front room downstairs.

  I had neither the grace nor the energy to protest. She undressed me, washed me, lent me a nightie and tucked me up in the little single bed. Still I could not stop crying.

  ‘Mum’s called the doctor,’ she said.

  I began to protest.

  ‘No, you need help. Something to calm you down, maybe.’

  I protested more loudly. ‘No,’ I more or less shouted. ‘No, no more drugs.’

  ‘All right, shush,’ said Mariette, who was proving to be extremely stoical. ‘Whatever you say. Nobody’s going to make you do anything you don’t want to ever again. I won’t let the doctor bully you, don’t worry about that.’

  I gave in. She was probably right. I did need help.

  The doctor turned out to be a young blond woman with old eyes. She introduced herself as Mavis Tompkins and in spite of her age was one of those people who instantly inspired confidence. Quite a bonus for a doctor, I thought. You almost felt better just for seeing her. We talked about therapy and victim support more than drugs, and, although her manner could not have been further from any kind of bullying, I did allow myself to be coaxed into agreeing to virtually all her suggestions.

  ‘Not yet, though, not yet,’ I said anxiously, after saying, yes, I would see a therapist.

  ‘All right, not yet,’ she acceeded perhaps reluctantly, as I buried myself yet again in the dark warmth of Mariette’s bed.

  I stayed with Mariette for almost three weeks, regaining mental and physical strength, and I shall always be grateful for the patience and support she and her mother unstintingly gave me.

  During that time I made no attempt to enquire about Carl and what was happening to him, and I heard nothing further from the police. DS Perry was still in Plymouth, more than likely, and DC Carter was not the kind of man who would make contact if he could avoid doing so. He wouldn’t want to risk stirring up trouble for himself unnecessarily.

  I told myself I didn’t care what happened to Carl, as long as I never had to see him again.

  I suppose I had a kind of breakdown. Not surprising when you considered all I had been through. I blocked everything out. Most important of all was to block Carl out.

  And that might have been the way it would remain, had it not been for the intervention of Will Jones.

  My time with Mariette and her mother was actually surprisingly peaceful, in spite of my distressed state of mind, but after three weeks I knew I must be overstaying my welcome. The sofa bed in the front room couldn’t be that comfortable, and Mariette continued to insist that I remained in her bedroom until I was both mentally and physically stronger. However, when I eventually expressed a desire to return to Rose Cottage both Mariette and her mother were worried that the house itself might upset me and suggested I looked for somewhere else to rent.

  Perhaps stubbornly, I insisted on going back to the cottage. More than anything else I wanted at least to try to bury the demons that lurked there. I felt it was something I had to do alone, so I made my own way up the hill, carrying the small bag containing the few clothes and books Mariette had collected for me.

  I had not been back since the night she and the policeman had knocked so forcefully on the front door. I remembered clearly enough that we had left the place in a fearful mess, complete with all those dirty dishes piled in the kitchen sink. I just hoped no mice or even rats had been attracted.

  But when I unlocked the front door a pleasant surprise awaited me. The place looked and smelled fresh and clean, there were newly cut flowers in a vase on the table and not a dirty dish anywhere to be seen.

  ‘Bless you, Mariette,’ I said to myself with feeling.

  She had been back to collect one or two things for me and to pick up the mail occasionally, and must have worked her magic on the cottage then. There had been no further letters from Carl. Maybe he had accepted that I wanted nothing more to do with him.

  Rose Cottage was a wonderful surprise. I spent the day pottering around and realised that I must be beginning to cope. At any rate I was functioning after a fashion. I walked down to the town to do some shopping. I was still conscious of curious stares and had yet to venture back into any of the hostelries Carl and I had frequented. Nonetheless I didn’t find the exercise too difficult.

  Steve, the matinée idol fishmonger, fussed over me charmingly and insisted on giving me a small, beautifully dressed fresh crab as a present. ‘Good to see you back, Suzanne,’ he said. ‘I’ve got some first-class fresh halibut coming in in a couple of days. I’ll save you a piece.’

  I had smiled wanly. Halibut, Carl’s favourite. The king of fish, he called it. How the memories flooded back.

  At home that evening I blessed Steve for his crab, not least because it meant I barely had to cook. I boiled some rice to eat with the crab and made a little green salad. The crabmeat was rich and sweet and, as ever, the plain boiled rice brought out its flavour beautifully – that was something, one of so many things, Carl had taught me. As I ate I realised I had not enjoyed a meal in a long time, probably not since before it all happened.

  Afterwards I settled mindlessly in front of the TV for a couple of hours. I went to bed before midnight and slept surprisingly well – no more nightmares, not of any kind.

  In the morning I made a concentrated effort to think about my future: what I was going to do next. I needed to work, I understood that. I had no money and no apparent way of acquiring any. It was hard to imagine what kind of work I could do, Carl had certainly been right about that. The library job had long been filled and, in any case, I still doubted that I would ever have been regarded as suitably qualified.

  Mariette and her mother had kindly allowed me to stay with them free of charge but there had been rent to pay on the cottage and other bills to settle, and there was not a lot left of the £500 Will had given me – certainly not enough to pay for the next month’s rent, which would soon be due.

  I counted the remaining notes and coins, still in the original envelope over and over again. Each time it came to the same amount: £110 25p. An electricity bill for almost £100 had come in the post that morning. That effectively took care of that. Suddenly I began to feel quite desperate. How was I going to live?

  Strange for me to be worrying about money after a lifetime of having someone else to take care of such matters. It was actually quite frightening and was one bit of independence I could still do without, I thought wryly.

  Then I had an idea. I wondered if Carl might have left any cash in our usual hiding place. I thought it unlikely, I assumed he would have taken whatever money he had with him when he rushed me off to that awful damp shed in the middle of nowhere, but you never knew.

  On the off chance I decided to have a look in the cellar. I rolled back the linoleum floor covering and found the crowbar under the sink. I had never prised up the flagstone that served as a trapdoor on my own before and it did not prove to be an easy task. I had to lean on the iron bar with all my weight in order to budge the stone at one side. Then I wedged a piece of wood under the open end, did the same trick with the crowbar on the other side and somehow managed to slide the stone to one side. I fetched the small ladder that lived
under the stairs and lowered it down through the hole.

  First putting a torch in my pocket, I climbed carefully down. Although I had been as tickled as Carl when he discovered the cellar, I did not much like being in it and certainly not alone.

  Resolutely I switched on the torch and felt behind the pile of Carl’s paintings, which were neatly stacked in one corner. There was no sign of the leather document case.

  ‘Damn!’ I said out loud. I wondered if the police had found it in the shed or in Carl’s van, and if it was at the police station now. I had not thought to ask. But even if it were there, I doubted they would hand it over to me. After all, it was Carl’s property, I supposed.

  I shone my torch over the paintings. There were five of them, all abstracts. Will would take any number of the chocolate box landscapes, but never more than two or three of the abstracts at a time. There was a very limited market and he just didn’t have the wall space. In spite of various attempts, Carl had not found any other gallery in St Ives prepared to take his abstracts at all. Still, they were worth as much as £200 or £300 each on a good day. I decided to get them out of the cellar and see if I could at least get them displayed somewhere. Maybe I could play the sympathy ticket.

  I carried the five paintings to the foot of the ladder, then climbed up a couple of rungs reaching down to pick them up one by one, lift them as high as I could and push them out on to the kitchen floor. As I did so I reflected that any revenue from their sale would surely technically belong to Carl, but I thought I might be able to persuade Will at any rate to bend the rules. He had already done so once, after all.

  When I had successfully manhandled the paintings out of the cellar I carried them into the dining room and propped them up around the walls. They were good, no question about that. Whatever else he had done in his life, Carl could certainly paint. For just a fleeting moment I experienced a flash of nostalgia for what might have been. But I knew all I could do now was concentrate on the present. Carl was in jail. Our life together was over.