by David Haynes
He shook the thoughts away and pressed down on the pedal. He felt better than he had on the night he’d arrived but where was this all heading? There was no miracle cure hidden away under the floorboards in Joe’s cottage. Although Joe had some answers, he didn’t have them all.
He looked over at Joe in the passenger seat. He admired him more than anyone else he knew. The old man had been dealt the worst hand imaginable but it hadn’t stopped him. Losing a wife and then a son was an unimaginable hell that nobody should have to live through, and yet he had. He hadn’t allowed himself the luxury of running away either, he’d just got on with life.
“Eyes on the road,” Joe said quietly.
The lane wound its way through the fields like a snake. The hedges on either side were as high as a man and although they looked like they were made of gorse, beneath them was a hard stone wall. Many a tourist had found out the hard way when they tried to make room for a car coming the opposite direction.
“So how many books have you written now?” Joe asked.
Chris inhaled deeply and let his breath out slowly. He didn’t really want to talk about his books or writing. “Well, there are five out there at the moment and two more with the editor.” Joe had started it all off. His tales about King Arthur were at the root of all Chris’s writing, or what he used to write before this year kicked in.
Joe nodded. “Have I got them all?”
Chris smiled, despite the topic of conversation. “I sent you a copy of each one. Haven’t you read them?” In each of the books, Chris had put Thanks Granddad! in the acknowledgements.
Joe laughed. “Nope, not one. There’s enough horror out there.” He pointed at the road in front. “When are you going to write a proper book?”
Chris laughed now. “A proper book?”
“You know, a thriller. A proper book.”
“Just read the first few pages, Granddad, that’s all I ask.”
They drove past the first row of houses that signalled the start of the village. Most of them were either second homes or holiday lets, which at this time of the year were empty. It made this part of the village seem like a ghost town. Chris drove slowly through the centre, past The Queen’s Head and the closed antique shops, out of the other side. It was just after nine and the village was dead. In the summer months there would be a queue of people outside the bakery waiting for fresh bread and croissants. The Co-op would be busy with people buying bacon to make sandwiches to eat outside their tents and caravans. Just over a month had passed since the summer holidays ended but it was like a different place entirely.
They passed more houses on the way up the hill, then the view opened up again. Dotted across the fields were the remnants of the tin-mining industry. Ollie thought they were castles the first time he’d seen them which prompted Joe into one of his stories about Arthur. Just like Chris had done at the same age, Ollie sat open-mouthed and wide-eyed while listening to Joe’s tales.
The road carried straight on toward Penzance but Chris took a right turn onto a minor road. He could count on his hand the number of times he had actually been inside the cemetery. It was a good deal fewer than the number of times he’d sat in the car on the lane outside, willing himself to go in.
As they pulled to a stop, he left his hands on the steering wheel. Now they were here, he found himself wishing he was somewhere else.
Joe put his hand on top of his. It was cold.
“I think you’ve got a lot you need to say to him. I’ll pop and see Lizzy and then walk back to the village. We need some more eggs.”
Chris looked at him and nodded. “Okay.” Joe was right, as usual.
They climbed out of the car and Joe opened the cemetery gate. He was clutching a small bunch of violets to leave on his wife’s grave. The flowers shook in his hand. Chris was immediately taken back to the day they brought his dad up here in a coffin and stopped on the threshold. He had been blind on that day, such was the flow of tears. And when they lowered his ruined body into the ground, he felt something snap inside his head. Whatever it was had stopped him speaking for more than a week. Whatever it was, was still partly broken.
“Come on.” Joe waited for him.
They walked side by side along the path. There was a small building by the side of the entrance, little more than the size of a shed. It served as a store and probably a waiting room but its dilapidated condition was an indication of obsolescence. Chris remembered how bright the building’s whitewash had been on that day. It had pierced his blurred vision and made a sun where the real one was covered by cloud.
On either side of the path, there were neat rows of headstones. Some were covered in lichen and unreadable, some were made of the glossy black marble that made them impossible to age. They knew where they were going, though. The exact location had been scorched into their brains. Even blindfolded and dizzy, they could have walked straight there without missing a step.
Joe removed his cap and crouched to place the violets on his wife’s grave. It was a little overgrown and remnants of rotten bunches of flowers were scattered on the earth. They were brown and lifeless beside the vibrant dark purple of Joe’s fresh bunch.
Joe kissed the tip of his forefinger and touched the top of the black headstone. He said nothing for a moment and just stared at the golden letters. Chris stared too. Next to Lizzy Kestle, his grandmother, was his dad and he didn’t want to look at him just yet. It seemed that the whole world was silent. He couldn’t hear the birds or even the hum of traffic on the main road. The cemetery was cut off from the world which was exactly how he felt at that moment.
“I’ve bought your boy up to see you, Jack.” Joe’s voice broke the silence and he touched Chris on the arm.
“Go steady, lad, and I’ll see you later.” Joe kissed his finger again and touched his son’s headstone. He squeezed Chris’s arm and walked away. Was that a slight limp? No, it couldn’t be, the man was rock-steady, yet he was over ninety so it shouldn’t be a surprise. Chris watched him walk away.
As Joe closed the gate, he touched the brim of his cap as if he were signalling someone; as if he were saying, ‘Good morning.’
Chris smiled, but something moved on the edge of his vision and jolted him. He was sure something had shifted beside the little building. He hadn’t seen anyone and there was no sign that any animals were here. And yet something dark had flickered on the periphery of his sight. There had been movement; rapid, sharp movement. He stared at the shed and listened. The only sounds were Joe’s footsteps and they were retreating into the distance rapidly.
“Hello?” It was probably just a crow. There was nothing and nobody here except him. Except of course for his dad, his long-dead dad. He turned and looked at the headstone. It was black, just like Lizzy’s.
“Jack Kestle.” His voice sounded like it had been turned up to ten on the volume dial.
“Dad.” He’d said the word many times before, many, many times. Now it felt different. He was looking at the place where the body of his dad had been left and he was calling him that word. He hadn’t said that to him since he’d been scared out of his wits by a woman who nobody else believed was there.
“I’m sorry, Dad. I’m sorry I fell in. I’m sorry because it’s my fault you had to save me, you had to fetch me out and... and...” He could feel the tears flowing down his cheeks and his voice shaking but he wanted to carry on. If he stopped now, how would he ever start again?
“But why did you go down there? Why did you go down there to her? I followed you, I had to follow you but it wasn’t safe, Dad, it wasn’t safe and we shouldn’t have gone. Why? Why? Why?” He banged his fists on the top of the headstone.
“We shouldn’t have been there!” His voice came in ragged sobs but there was anger too. He hadn’t expected it to be so strong, so close to the surface.
“You were going to leave me. Granddad showed me the note. You were going to leave me. You were going to leave me!” He was close to erupting. He wanted to rip the head
stone out of the ground and smash it to pieces with his bare hands. He wanted to jump up and down on it until the bones in his feet were in a thousand pieces. Mostly though, he wanted to dig six feet down and take the skeleton from the coffin and... And what?
It was his fault. It was all his fault that his dad was down there in the box. He’d put him there. He fell to his knees and grabbed the shoulders of the cold granite. “I want you here. I need you!” He could no longer see the words on the stone through the tears in his eyes. It was as it had been on the day he was buried. “I need you, Dad.”
Agonising cramp was the only thing which finally forced him to move. Both of his arms trembled but his right forearm bulged as the muscle tightened and went into spasm. He rubbed it furiously and fell back on his haunches. His dad wasn’t to blame and neither was he. He knew that really, he knew it deep, deep down, but the guilt was there, it would always be there. To blame someone was easy, even if it was yourself.
He rubbed his eyes and wiped his face on his sleeve. There would be no more tears. She was to blame, she had always been to blame.
He looked at his dad’s name on the stone. “I saw her, Dad. I saw you trying to help her but they all said I made her up. They all think you killed yourself and I made her up to help me cope.”
Chris stood up and bit his lip. “I know you didn’t, though. I know she was there.”
There it was again. That flicker on the edge of his vision. He snapped his head around and looked to his left and then to his right. There was nothing except for rows of graves and withered flowers. His eyes were just sore from the tears.
He put his hand back on the stone. “I did see her.”
“And I see you.”
He dropped his hand and turned around. A shadow, a jet-black shadow, slid across the front of the shabby shed. It clung to the dirty whitewash as if it were crawling. He stared open-mouthed. It stopped, just for a moment, and subtly changed shape. She was here. It was as if she were looking directly at him. The moment seemed to last for an age, then she slipped around the side of the building and was gone.
A cloud maybe? He looked up. There were clouds, the sky was full of them; so full that there was no sun to cast a shadow.
He looked at the shed. What was he expecting to see? There was nothing except for some fading graffiti and a green stain under the water tap. He shook his head and turned back to the headstone. Something had changed again. He had vented his anger, frustration and grief before. As a child he’d spoken to the counsellors his mum had arranged. He’d tried three of them before she realised they weren’t helping him.
He’d spoken to Joe too. And that had worked, at least on some level. But this was different. He now stood in front of his dad saying the things he’d needed to say to him for the last thirty-three years. Why hadn’t he done it sooner?
He knew the answer to that. He was frightened. He knew if he came here, he would start blaming his dad for what happened. He would blame him for going down into the cove, down onto the slipway, and for trying to help someone. He didn’t want that. Jack Kestle was a hero, he was a man who died saving his son from drowning. He hadn’t made a mistake. He hadn’t put them both at risk. He wasn’t to blame. It was easier to blame himself. Chris Kestle had killed his own father.
And yet now that had changed. At least some of it had changed. Jack Kestle had chosen to go down into the cove and try to save a complete stranger. Jack Kestle had chosen to do that in the same way as he’d chosen to write a goodbye note to his son. Jack Kestle wasn’t to blame and neither was Chris Kestle. She was to blame.
He kissed his forefinger, just as Joe had done, and touched the top of the stone.
“I’ll find her, Dad. I’ll find her.”
Chapter 8
“If you’re buying the food then I’m paying for the drinks. Okay?” Chris pulled into The Queen’s Head car park.
Joe reached for the door handle without saying anything.
“I’m not going in if you don’t let me.”
Joe sighed and tapped his jacket pocket. “I’m not destitute yet. I can still afford to treat my grandson to a pint now and again.”
“I know you can but fair’s fair and it’s my round. Agreed?”
Joe grunted and opened the door. “If you’re buying, I’ll have a pint of Tribute then.”
Chris climbed out. He felt better than he had for a very long time. He was ravenous and Joe had given the curry a very good review on the drive into the village, particularly the effect it had on his digestive system.
Joe led the way and walked straight into the rear of the pub. It was like a cave; a place you might expect to find a smuggler hunched over a table with a purse of doubloons. There was a snug where Joe would probably meet his friends later for dominoes, and a lounge where families and tourists went. Candle-shaped lights, complete with fake dripping wax, gave the room a gloomy, orange glow.
When Lou and Ollie were with him, they rarely came to the pub. Instead, they would buy fish and chips and take them to Cape Cornwall for a picnic. It was Ollie’s favourite and if he was given the choice he would eat that every night, or they might buy warm pasties and eat them in the village square. Ollie loved that too because Lou allowed him to go on his own and buy an ice cream from the shop on the other side of the square. She watched him like a hawk every step of the way though. They both did.
“We’ll sit there.” Joe pointed to a table at the bottom of the room, closest to the fire. It wasn’t lit, but in another month or so the room would be glowing with real flames, not the fake electric ones on the wall. Joe liked to eat early so they were the only people in the room.
“And I’ll have chicken jalfrezi with a naan and extra poke.” He wandered off toward the table.
“Poke?” Chris called out after him.
Joe waved his hand in the air. “She knows what I mean.”
“He means extra chillies.”
Chris turned and looked into the face of a smiling middle-aged woman. “He always has extra poke with his jalfrezi.”
“Sooner him than me,” Chris said. He quickly scanned the menu on the bar. “I’ll go for the lamb bhuna please, with a naan as well.”
“No poke?”
“I’ll leave it this time, thanks. Can we have two Tributes too, please?”
She started pulling the beer. “You’re Jack’s lad, aren’t you?”
Chris nodded. “Yep.” Inside, he groaned.
She put one of the drinks on the bar. “He was in the year above me at school. Nice lad.”
He never knew quite what to say in these situations. “Thanks.”
She stared at him as she pulled the other pint. He smiled but it felt uncomfortable, as if she were examining him.
She finished and put the pint down. “You’ve got the same eyes.”
Chris paid her and she walked off toward the kitchen. How close had she got to his dad to know they had the same eyes? He shook his head, stuffed the change in his pocket. Joe had taken his jacket off and had already pushed the napkin into his collar. He wore a shirt every single day, not always with a tie but he’d worn one at the cemetery earlier.
Chris put the drinks on the table and sat down. “Cheers!” He held his glass up.
“Here’s to you. Happy birthday, son.”
They chinked glasses and took a drink. He loved it when Joe called him son or lad. It made him feel connected to both Joe and his dad.
The shadow at the cemetery had been bothering him all day, even more so than the photograph frame incident. That had come from fatigue and stress, nothing more. He could explain what happened at the cemetery in the same way but the shadow on the shed wall wasn’t a trick of his eyesight, he was sure. The way it crept across the wall was... revolting. It turned his stomach just thinking about it.
“Do you believe in ghosts?” He put his glass down and looked at Joe. He had an idea what the answer to his question might be.
“Yep,” he answered immediately.
It caught Chris off guard. He’d been expecting a response containing the words ‘stupid’ or ‘ridiculous’ or maybe something even stronger, not a straightforward ‘yes’.
“You do?” He looked into Joe’s eyes for a sign he was being mocked, especially now he knew how Joe felt about the genre of his writing. He could see none.
“Of course I do. I think anyone who doesn’t is a fool.”
Chris remained silent. He still wasn’t entirely sure whether he was being teased.
Joe took a drink and winked. “They keep a good pint.”
“Are you taking the mickey?”
Joe shook his head. “I see Lizzy every time I go up there. She’s waiting.”
“Waiting?” Chris asked. He was sure Joe wasn’t teasing him now.
“Waiting for me. At least that’s what I think anyway. Waiting and watching. Watching over her boy. The son she never met. Anyway, she looks happy enough up there so I don’t see any harm in it.”
Chris took a moment and thought about the shadow that dragged itself across the cemetery store.
“And what does she look like?”
Joe took another drink. “At this rate, I’ll need another one of these before my dinner.” He put his glass down. “She looks just like she always has done in here.” He tapped his forehead with his finger. “On the day we met. Beautiful.”
“And is that who you tipped your hat to this morning?”
“Yes. Yes it was. I think maybe I’m being broken in, nice and steady like.”
“What do you mean?”
Joe picked his drink up again. “Well maybe, just maybe, when you get to my age you start seeing a few things you never thought you’d see. The layer between us and them gets a bit thinner and you’re given a little peek through now and again. Just so that when you go it isn’t quite as much of a shock. Give me another couple of years and I’ll be seeing Lord Nelson and Queen Victoria wandering around in the square over there.”
They both sat in silence for a minute. Chris could find no hole in Joe’s logic.
“Here it is!” Joe grabbed his knife and fork. “I hope there’s extra poke in there.”