Kind of Cruel

by Sophie Hannah

  ‘Sorting out’s not going to be possible,’ Charlie said briskly, mentally flicking through the dozens of vicious accusations she might hurl at her sister, given the chance. ‘The only thing I can think of that might work is if we pretend everything’s normal and there was never an issue. I’m willing to try it if you are.’

  Liv looked worried. ‘Can I ask something, just to clarify?’

  ‘Everything’s clear.’

  ‘Not to me it isn’t. You say I can talk about Chris as I would any other boyfriend, but you don’t really mean it, do you? How will you feel if I ring you in a complete state on the day his and Debbie’s twins are born?’

  Maybe she hadn’t made herself clear after all. ‘How I would feel is irrelevant. That’s the part we wouldn’t talk about and you won’t ask about if you’ve got any sense. What I’d say is the same as I’d say if you were seeing a man I didn’t know whose wife had just given birth to twins: if it upsets you that much, end it, unless ending it would upset you more.’

  ‘I’ll feel too guilty to mention Chris’s name ever,’ Liv said moodily. ‘You know I will. How can I have a conversation and leave my feelings out of it? I’m not a robot.’

  Charlie wanted to groan and rest her head on the table. Was she going to have to draw up a contract, complete with sub-clauses and restrictive covenants? ‘You can talk about your feelings all you like, as long as it’s not your feelings about me and my feelings.’

  ‘So, for the sake of argument . . .’

  ‘We won’t be having any arguments,’ Charlie said firmly.

  ‘. . . it’s okay for me to say, “I stayed up all night weeping because I have to marry Dom and I can’t marry Chris,” but not okay for me to ask if you’ve forgiven me or if you ever will?’

  ‘By George, she’s got it,’ Charlie quoted My Fair Lady, another favourite thing from her and Olivia’s childhood.

  Liv shook her head, looked irritated. ‘All right, then. I agree to your ridiculous terms. God, you’ve only been married to Simon four months and already he’s got you talking as if feelings are some kind of disgusting waste product. Please, for your own good, don’t talk to me about it if you don’t want to, but please try and feel some emotion while you still can, before Simon roboticises you entirely. Because that’s what’s happening, Char.’ Liv’s voice shook. ‘He’s trying to turn you into a . . . a blank space, so that he can live with you without feeling threatened.’

  Charlie smiled. ‘Oh well,’ she said. ‘To go back to the theoretical example you just gave: it makes no odds to me whether you do or don’t, but you ought to realise that you don’t have to marry Dom.’

  Liv started to cry. ‘You got a tissue?’ she whispered.

  ‘Blank spaces don’t need tissues,’ Charlie told her. ‘We’re dry, dry, dry.’

  ‘How can you bear this, Char?’

  ‘Ginny would say because I learned in early childhood to block out my emotional responses. Did you know that unprocessed traumatic memories are stored in a different part of the brain from the rest of our experience?’

  ‘Ginny?’ Liv asked.

  ‘My hypno woman. Apparently I’m one of the most emotionally dissociative people she’s ever met.’

  ‘Is that what your new rules are about?’ Liv asked. ‘“One of” isn’t good enough for you, you’re going for the gold medal?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Charlie played along. ‘Just wait till Ginny hears about this conversation – she’ll have to agree I’ve blown the competition right out of the water.’

  ‘It’s so not you to go and see a hypnotherapist. You’ve never said anything about wanting to give up smoking.’

  ‘Ginny says I’m not ready to give up yet. While we both wait for me to be ready, I have a feeling I might learn a thing or two. Like, did you know that some people repress painful memories so that they’re not conscious of the memory being there at all until they recall it under hypnosis, whereas other people have accurate factual memories – they know every detail of what happened – but they shut out the feelings that ought to go with the events? I’m that kind, the second kind. It obviously makes more sense to be the second kind.’

  ‘Charlie . . .’

  ‘The other lot, Group A, they never know when they’re going to be blindsided by something they suddenly remember. We’re cleverer and more devious. We tell ourselves we can’t be repressing anything, because, look, we know everything there is to know about ourselves, all the facts. And we feel like shit all the time anyway, and we’re proud of it, so there can’t be any bad feelings we’re repressing, right?’

  ‘It’s Simon, isn’t it?’ Liv said. ‘That’s why you’re seeing this woman. It’s all for him.’

  Charlie snorted. ‘Yeah, it’s Simon’s idea. Doesn’t it sound exactly like him to suggest consulting a hypnotist? Alternative therapies are never far from his mind, as you know.’

  ‘He’s told you he doesn’t like you smoking, hasn’t he?’ Liv persisted.

  ‘No. He doesn’t care. He’s used to it.’

  ‘He’s worried about your health, now that you’re officially his. He’s trying to protect his investment. He doesn’t want to spend his retirement nursing a wife with emphysema and an amputated leg.’

  ‘With an amputated leg? I think, if you have your leg amputated, you don’t hang around with it afterwards. I could be wrong. You definitely are. The hypnotherapy was my idea. And of all the men who might end up with a crippled wife who can’t breathe, Simon would handle it better than most. There’s nothing he likes more than the tragic symbolism of making huge sacrifices.’

  ‘Sex!’ Olivia announced, banging her fist on the table in triumph. The taxi-drivers huddled around the buzzing fridge interrupted their half-Polish, half-English banter to look over. ‘Sex, not death.’

  Charlie nodded. ‘It’s a winning campaign slogan. I’d vote for you.’

  ‘Simon’s using your smoking as an excuse for why he won’t sleep with you. That’s why you needed to meet me suddenly and tell me about your hypnotherapy that’s purely for the purpose of helping you to stop smoking, which you want to do only for health reasons. It’s plausible. Lots of people would fall for it. You weren’t sure I would, though. You know I know how much you love your fags, how little you care about long-term consequences. You couldn’t risk Chris telling me when you weren’t there to monitor my reaction, could you? You needed to see for yourself if I was going to fall for it.’

  ‘All true,’ Charlie said. ‘You’re wrong about the sex, though.’

  Olivia looked affronted. ‘I’m not wrong,’ she said petulantly.

  ‘Look, believe me, I know how painful it is when you have to ditch a theory that fits perfectly. Simon using my smoking to avoid sex – it’s a great idea, one that deserves to be true. Unfortunately, it isn’t. Simon’s never said anything about my dirty habit, positive or negative. It’s never occurred to him to try to use it as a way of avoiding sex. He doesn’t need to.’ Charlie laughed. ‘We’re talking about a world expert on intimacy-avoidance here. You think he couldn’t avoid sex with a non-smoker? His methods are effective across the board. They aren’t nicotine-dependent.’

  ‘So if it’s not what I think it is, what is it?’ Liv asked. ‘Why are you seeing a hypnotherapist?’

  Charlie gave it some thought. Then she said, ‘I can’t answer that question. You’ll have to ask my Hidden Observer – the part of me that’s in charge of storing information that on some level I need to know, but that mustn’t be allowed to reach my conscious mind.’

  Olivia reached into her handbag and pulled out her diary. ‘When are you next free?’ she asked.

  ‘Why?’ said Charlie.

  ‘I’d like us to meet up again, as soon as possible. Talk.’

  ‘We’re talking now.’

  ‘Yeah, and it’s not working for me,’ Liv said, standing up, open diary in hand. ‘Email me a date. I’ll be there, wherever and whenever you say. Hopefully next time I’ll enjoy it more.’


  ‘Not much chance of that,’ Charlie muttered as her sister ran for cover.

  ‘While the fire crew was trying to tackle the blaze at Sharon’s house, the landlord of the local pub, the Four Fountains on Wight Street, was ringing the police,’ said Sam. ‘Dinah and Nonie Lendrim had walked into his pub wearing only their pyjamas, shivering and holding hands.’

  ‘Are you trying to give me the creeps?’ Gibbs said.

  ‘Landlord’s name was Terry Bond. He was staying open late that night. He had a special licence for a live event, an open mic comedy night. He was pretty surprised to see two little kids walk in, and even more surprised when they told him what had just happened to them. They’d been woken by a firefighter in uniform: helmet, protective mask, the works. Dragged them out of their beds, down the stairs, out of the house. According to both girls, this person said only two things to them the whole time: “Fire”, and then, “Run”, once he or she had got them outside onto the pavement.’

  ‘He or she?’ Gibbs said. ‘They couldn’t say if it was a man or a woman?’

  ‘Dinah was sure it was a man. Nonie reckoned a woman. Eventually DS Shearer and her team stopped asking. The girls were getting more and more disturbed by their inability to agree and started shaking every time a detective went anywhere near them. Both changed their tune a few times, to make the other feel better. It was useless, Shearer said. Which is a shame because, whoever was behind that mask, man or woman, that’s who murdered Sharon Lendrim.’

  Gibbs waited, not quite as patiently as he would have if it had been Simon explaining.

  ‘Dinah did as she was told and ran towards the main road,’ Sam said. ‘Nonie hung back, worried about her mum. She saw the person wearing the fireman’s uniform run back to the house, and then Dinah yelled at her, “Come on, Nonie, run.”’

  ‘As you would, if you’d been given the order by an adult supposedly trying to save your life,’ said Gibbs.

  Sam nodded. ‘The uniform would have been enough to do the trick. People wearing firemen’s uniforms save lives. They’re heroes. Everyone knows that, even kids of six and five. Nonie assumed the firefighter was heading back into the house to get Sharon out. Her sister was telling her to run, so she ran.’

  ‘Leaving the killer to, what? Lock the front door, throw petrol through the letterbox and set it alight? Fire-starter, not firefighter.’

  ‘Right. A fire-starter with a front door key, so probably someone Sharon knew. Someone evil enough to coldly take a life, but who also cared enough to save Sharon’s daughters.’

  ‘I doubt Sharon was cold when she died.’ Gibbs frowned. ‘Unusual for an arsonist with a grudge to shift the kids out of the way first. Normally they don’t give a shit. As long as they get their target, the whole family can burn for all they care – it’s part of the punishment.’

  ‘Not in this case. This killer’s twisted enough to imagine her principles are intact because she left the two girls alive. She took a big risk to save them: let herself be seen, spoke to them. Mask or no mask, Dinah and Nonie might have provided the police with a detail that would have given her away.’

  ‘Why “her”? Say “him” if it could be either.’

  Sam grinned; he’d seen the objection coming. ‘The proper non-sexist approach is to alternate, if you’re unsure of the gender. And that’s not why I said “she”. If I had to guess, I’d go for Sharon Lendrim’s murderer being a woman, for two reasons. Most arsonists – the ones who don’t give a monkey’s if spouses, babies, grannies die too – they’re men. This one saved two girls. It’s the sort of thing a woman might do.’

  ‘There are plenty of men out there who’d eat a bullet before they’d burn two kids to death. I’m one of them, you’re another. Is your second reason any better?’

  ‘Dinah and Nonie were disorientated,’ said Sam. ‘It’s the middle of the night, there’s a stranger in their bedroom in a firefighter’s uniform and mask. I think, all other things being equal, they’d both assume it was a man. It’s a job people associate with men. For Nonie to say it was a woman . . .’

  ‘Whereas for Dinah to say it was a man, she could have just assumed it was?’ Gibbs shook his head. ‘But they both heard his voice. Her voice, whatever.’

  ‘Ursula Shearer agrees with you,’ Sam told him. ‘Just as likely to be either, she reckons.’

  ‘Wonder what Waterhouse’d say.’

  Sam sighed and pressed on. ‘One thing the girls are unanimous about, though it only occurred to them later when they were questioned: they didn’t see fire or smell smoke as they were leaving the house. And Nonie didn’t see anything when she looked back. The only reason they had for thinking their home was burning down was the uniformed firefighter saying, “Fire” and dragging them out of their beds.’

  ‘Because there was no fire, at that point,’ Gibbs muttered.

  ‘The girls ran as far as the BP garage on the junction of Spilling Road and Ineson Way, but it was closed – it’s not twenty-four hours. That’s when they thought of the Four Fountains. They knew it was still open, that Terry Bond had a special licence for that night. Well, Dinah did.’

  ‘A six-year-old who knows the closing time of the local pub?’ Gibbs slurped a sip of his pint. ‘I don’t get it. Why didn’t they run to a neighbour’s house?’

  ‘They couldn’t explain. Ursula Shearer thinks it’s the way their mother’s murderer said, “Run”. Urgently, as in “Run and keep running, get the hell out of here, don’t look back”. Not “Nip next door”. Also . . . Dinah mentioned to more than one of Shearer’s DCs that she didn’t want to wake anyone who was sleeping, not if she didn’t have to.’

  ‘A considerate six-year-old who knows the closing time of the local pub?’ said Gibbs. ‘I don’t buy it. Could she and her sister have offed the mother?’

  ‘Not outside of a horror film, no.’

  ‘Some people’s lives are horror films.’

  ‘There’s a less creepy explanation, thank God,’ said Sam. ‘There was quite a history between Sharon Lendrim and the Four Fountains. In June 2008, Terry Bond applied to the council to change the terms of his licence. He wanted to stay open later on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays – one thirty instead of eleven thirty – so that he could host regular open mic nights.’

  ‘Amber Hewerdine’s Licensing Manager for the city council,’ Gibbs muttered under his breath.

  ‘Well spotted,’ said Sam. ‘Keep that detail in mind. It’s important.’

  ‘I’d never have guessed,’ said Gibbs sarcastically.

  ‘Terry Bond didn’t want to have to apply for a special licence every time he wanted to put on a comedy night. He was more ambitious, wanted to make the Four Fountains the number one venue for live comedy in the Culver Valley. A group of concerned locals opposed the extension to the pub’s licence. They argued that later hours would mean more drunks making more noise late at night, more damage to property, more litter.’ Sam would have been on their side, if the pub had been in his neighbourhood. ‘They had a strong case: the pub’s in a primarily residential area, it used to be a family home, it’s surrounded on all sides by family homes. You get the idea. The head of the local residents’ association did a recce and established that Sharon Lendrim’s back garden backed onto the pub’s car park, with only a low fence separating the two. This woman – bit of a puritan, by all accounts – persuaded Sharon that an extension to the pub’s hours would be a disaster for her, especially with two young children. Sharon panicked and joined the campaign against the licence extension. Within a couple of weeks, she was in charge of it – a very vocal and articulate champion of the cause, whose best friend since school just happened to be the city council Licensing Manager. Dinah and Nonie knew all about it. There were posters and papers all over their house, residents’ association members traipsing in and out.’

  ‘Killjoys,’ said Gibbs. ‘Sitting quietly in their houses not drinking. Freaks.’

  ‘The killjoys were delighted that their spokeswoman just ha
ppened to be Amber Hewerdine’s best mate, until they found out that Amber, far from being willing to use her influence to help her friend, did the very opposite: told Sharon she was being ridiculous, paranoid and unreasonable. The two of them fell out for a few weeks, didn’t speak. Meanwhile, Terry Bond, not quite understanding why all this trouble was coming his way, withdrew his application. The last thing he wanted was to be hated by all his neighbours. He wasn’t Sharon Lendrim’s biggest fan, as you can imagine, and she wasn’t his. When she was murdered, twelve people contacted Ursula Shearer’s team to say that he must have been behind it. Only one person contacted them to say that Terry Bond definitely wasn’t Sharon’s killer.’

  ‘Amber Hewerdine,’ Gibbs guessed.

  ‘After Bond withdrew his application, Amber rang Sharon and asked if they could meet, try to sort things out. Sharon agreed, mainly because Dinah and Nonie adored Amber and were missing her. A lunch was arranged, at which Amber told Sharon a few things about the residents’ association that Sharon hadn’t previously been willing to listen to – that basically they opposed anything and everything they could. Objecting to things was their hobby. They’d protested about an Indian restaurant opening nearby, a French bistro, even an art gallery, on the grounds that it would serve wine at its private views which would lead to drunks staggering out onto the pavement armed with dangerously sharp-cornered framed pictures. Seriously, I’m not joking. They disapproved of anyone having fun, wanted everybody to sit at home in silence drinking water, or at least that was Amber Hewerdine’s take on it. Not dissimilar to yours.’ Sam smiled.

  ‘Amber presented Sharon with a challenge: to go with her to one of Terry Bond’s specially licensed comedy nights and see how she felt afterwards. According to the statement Amber made after Sharon’s murder, Sharon agreed to go along out of guilt. She was worried Amber was right: that she’d been tricked by a load of Nimbys into panicking when there was nothing to panic about, and destroyed a harmless pub landlord’s dreams in the process.’

  ‘I’ve yet to meet a harmless pub landlord, but carry on,’ said Gibbs. ‘Or shall I do the honours? Sharon had the best night of her life, she and Terry Bond got on like a—’