by Penny Kline
‘Hallo?’
‘You’re out of breath. Have I interrupted you in the middle of something interesting?’
‘David?’
‘Is somebody with you?’
‘No.’
He laughed. ‘Sure?’
‘Yes, of course I’m sure.’
‘Anyway, how are you?’
‘I’m all right.’
‘Good. Look, are you free for lunch tomorrow? One o’clock. Usual place?’
I hesitated.
‘Anna? Are you still there?’
‘I thought we agreed not to see each other for at least two months.’
He sighed. ‘Yes, I knew you’d say that, but there’s something I need to tell you.’
I should have used my head. I should have said, ‘Tell me now, then.’ But I didn’t.
Chapter Four
It was almost three weeks since we had seen each other. He arrived fifteen minutes late, just as I had known he would.
‘Oh, God, I’m sorry, have you been waiting ages?’
His eyes met mine and we both knew what the other was thinking. He was always late.
He stood beside me with his hand on the back of my neck.
‘Oh, it’s good to see you. You’ve no idea.’
He was wearing a new suit. Light grey and cut in a style which made him look taller, thinner. His shirt was the one I had given him for his birthday. The tie I had never seen before. A present from Iris?
He sat down very close so that our thighs were pressed together under the table. I had pictured this moment ever since his phone-call the previous evening. Gone over and over it in my mind. There would be no need for words. For the first few moments we would not even touch. Just sit looking at one another with all the misery of the last few months wiped out by the strength of our feelings.
‘How are you then?’ His voice was bright and cheerful and he was looking straight ahead, pretending to be interested in what was going on behind the bar. ‘Plenty of new cases on your books?’
And then, misjudging my lack of response. ‘Oh, come on, do let’s be nice to each other. No recriminations. Not today.’
He picked up the bar menu and gave it his whole attention for what seemed like several minutes. He was nervous but trying to disguise it. He didn’t want to give too much away until he had worked out what I was thinking.
‘I have to be back at two o’clock,’ I said.
‘Me too,’ he said, straightening up and rubbing his hands together. ‘Anyway, it’s lovely to see you.’
When I said nothing he looked a little wistful. ‘You’re very quiet today. Is everything all right?’
It was such a ridiculous question. ‘I’m fine,’ I said. ‘How’s Iris?’
‘Ah, Iris,’ he repeated gloomily, ‘that’s really why I thought we should meet.’
Then he smiled at me, stood up, still holding the menu, and walked towards the bar, calling back over his shoulder to confirm that I wanted ‘the usual’.
I watched him exchanging pleasantries with the landlady, who looked a little like Diane Easby but without the bright brown eyes, and wondered, not for the first time, how it was possible to be in love with someone you didn’t even like very much. For weeks, months I had tried to understand why he had lied to me or, as he saw it, why he had lied to himself. It was because of his basic insecurity, his fear of upsetting people, of being criticized. It was because his mother had cried so often, because he had never felt he could live up to his father’s expectations. And I had fallen for it, lapped it all up, because I wanted to believe him, because I wanted him to be the ideal person I had created in my imagination.
‘Right,’ he said, returning with the drinks and placing them on the glass-topped table, ‘what’s new?’
‘Nothing.’ I sounded edgy. He would pick me up on it immediately.
‘Something’s happened. I can see it in your face.’
‘I’m waiting to hear whatever it is you want to tell me.’ I sipped my drink, avoided his eyes.
‘Oh, nothing special. I just thought it was time we saw each other.’
‘Why?’
‘Does there have to be a reason?’ His gaze was steady, relaxed.
He began searching in his pockets, creating a diversion, playing for time.
‘My address book. No, it’s all right, I must have left it in the car. I have to visit an out of town company this afternoon, based in that God-forsaken business-park place.’
‘You’re as busy as ever?’
‘You know me. If I’m not rushed off my feet I find ways of looking as though I am.’
I made no comment, just mentally checked off the familiar tactics, the last a rueful confession of his wish to appear superhuman. If I kept up these unpleasant thoughts about him it would keep me on my toes.
He took hold of my hand. ‘Have you seen Chris and Bruce?’
‘Yes. Have you?’
‘No, of course not. They’re your friends. I don’t want to make things awkward for you.’
‘I wouldn’t mind.’
‘Yes, you would. You’d deny it, but you’d be furious.’
Perhaps he was right. He could see Bruce as often as he liked for all I cared, but come to think of it Chris was the one whose company he had enjoyed.
‘You used to go out for a drink with Bruce,’ I said.
‘Twice, I only went twice.’
‘Did he talk about his work?’
‘Never stopped. One long moan. That’s what made him such dreary company.’
‘Did he mention any of the social workers?’
‘What is all this? Don’t tell me he’s having it off with someone at work.’
‘No, of course not. I just wondered if he’d told you about someone called Karen Plant.’
He thought for a moment. ‘Doesn’t ring a bell.’ He rubbed the back of my hand, then turned it over and inspected the palm. ‘Oh, I’ll tell you who I saw, those people who sold you the flat.’
‘The Knights?’
‘They were back here for the weekend, visiting friends. They asked after you, hoped we were enjoying living in Clifton wood.’
‘They didn’t know you were moving in with me.’
‘Someone must have told them. You remember, I met them that time you went round with the estate agent.’ The sandwiches arrived. David picked one up immediately and bit into it. Then, with his mouth full, as though that gave him some kind of protection, he started talking. ‘Iris. You want to know about Iris.’
‘Only if you want to tell me about her.’
He took a tissue from his pocket and rubbed his chin. It was crumpled and looked as though he might have used it to wipe mud off his shoes, but once it had been white.
‘David?’
‘What?’
‘Nothing.’
He sighed. ‘Look, this is difficult enough — ’
‘Sorry, I just wondered if you ever used coloured tissues. Peach ones.’
‘What?’ He thought I was trying to change the subject. ‘Look, it hasn’t been easy.’
‘What hasn’t been easy?’
‘Don’t bully. I’m trying to explain.’
‘Go on, then.’ I washed down a piece of sandwich that had wedged itself somewhere behind my breastbone.
He sighed heavily. ‘You hate me. I suppose I can’t blame you.’
‘I don’t hate you. I just wish you wouldn’t talk in riddles. If there’s something you want to tell me I’d prefer you to say it straight out.’
‘I want you to understand.’
I was fighting a losing battle with myself. Even as I recognized the familiar games, keeping me guessing, trying to elicit sympathy for his difficult situation, I longed to put my hands inside his jacket and feel the warmth of his body. He would respond at once, tell me how much he loved me, how he had changed, gained new understanding of himself. All he wanted was a second chance. This time everything would work out just as we had always wanted it to.
He was watching me, wondering what I was thinking, trying to find a way to tell me how he felt.
‘Anna?’
‘Yes.’
‘Iris wants me to move back in.’ He paused to assess the impact of his words. ‘For Sian’s sake more than anything.’
‘I see.’ I was struggling to control my voice.
‘I just thought you deserved to know.’
‘Yes, well, thank you for telling me but really it’s nothing to do with me.’
‘All right, I don’t blame you. What the hell’s the matter with me? I seem to mess up everything. Oh, don’t look like that. It’s best for both of us, it’ll give us a chance, take away the uncertainty. Surely you can see that.’
*
I took the long way round, crossing the Downs, then turning down Whiteladies Road and negotiating the maze of roads that led back through Redland and Cotham.
In twenty minutes’ time the Careys would be sitting in the waiting room. Mrs Carey, a depressed fifty-year-old, who wanted her husband to be more expressive, and Mr Carey, who used jokes to conceal his anxiety and only succeeded in making his wife dissolve into tears. Time and again I found myself struck by the sameness of people’s problems. The misunderstandings, opposing needs, everyone looking for love or security — or both.
Reaching an unfamiliar junction I realized that I had missed my usual turning. I glanced at a street sign, partly obscured by a bedraggled berberis. Effingham Road.
Unconsciously, I must have taken this route by design rather than accident. The address must have been stored away in my brain along with the millions of other pieces of information that might or might not come in useful at a later stage.
It was in a street off Effingham Road that Karen Plant’s body had been discovered by her flat-mate, who had been away for the weekend and returned late on Sunday evening. I was remembering a report on the television news rather than the account that Diane Easby had given me. Now the story had a new reality. I pictured the flatmate putting her key in the door, calling Karen’s name, hearing no reply, and wondering if she had gone out for the evening. Then she would have looked in the kitchen, the bathroom, and last of all the bedroom, where Karen lay sprawled across a bloodstained duvet. But there would have been no blood, well, hardly any.
Pulling up across the road from number twelve — I could even remember which house it had been — I opened my glove compartment and pretended to be studying a street map. I had no wish to appear like one of those people who slow down at motorway accidents, craning their necks for a glimpse of an injured victim, or worse. On the other hand the murder had taken place almost two months ago. The police would have come and gone, another violent death somewhere in the area would have provided copy for the local reporters. By now the road had returned to normal.
As I watched a small red-haired woman, dressed in a long black coat, came out of the front door of number twelve and climbed into a silver Metro parked outside the house. The flat-mate?
The house was a large semi with a fussy porch that had been added on and ridiculous lattice windows. There were two doorbells but it had a shared entrance. One flat on the ground floor, another on the first like my own, although mine had its own outside entrance which was one of the main reasons why I had decided to buy it.
Had the flat-mate been another social worker? This was the kind of information I had been hoping that Bruce would provide but I doubted now if Chris had passed on my message. Why had she reacted so oddly when I mentioned the case?
When I had time I would visit the library and look up the reports in the local paper. At the very least it would be a good idea to get the facts straight so that I was in the best possible position to help Diane Easby.
I released the handbrake and drove slowly down the road. Now that the Metro had left there was not the smallest sign of life, not even a curtain twitching, a shadowy face peering out. I wondered if David had reached the business park, if he had told me the truth about the afternoon ahead, or if, at this very moment, he was with Iris reassuring her that he had spoken to me, that things had been settled once and for all.
I was trying to maintain the anger that with any luck would keep me going for the rest of the afternoon. I thought about poor Karen Plant, whose death had been so swift, so shocking. It was no good. My self-pity was so much stronger than my compassion for a total stranger.
I drove slowly, unwilling to return to work even a few minutes before I was due back. While I was in the car I felt safer, insulated from the reality of my life. On the way from one destination to another. In control of things. On the move.
When I was honest with myself I could admit that the danger signals had been there right from the start. Our first weekend away together, staying in a hotel in the New Forest. Lying in bed, curled up against my back, with his hand on my breast and one of his feet twisted round mine he had said we were to imagine what it would be like if Iris suddenly walked through the door.
Why? What had Iris got to do with us? Iris was ancient history, his ex-wife.
‘She’s not like you, Anna. In fact, she’s the exact opposite.’
Then he flung back the bedclothes, exposing us to the chill of the badly heated room, and started kissing me all over, starting with my toes and working slowly up my body …
It had started to rain. The wipers smeared the windscreen and for a moment I could barely see where I was going. Past the gates to the park, and on through the one-way system which was so simple when you knew how it worked but so impossible if you were a visitor to the city.
How could I feel so sorry for myself when there were thousands far worse off? It was a question clients often asked. ‘Surely there must be other people who need your help far more than I do?’
What they meant, of course, was that it was painful facing up to their real feelings and was the pain going to be worthwhile?
I was gripping the steering-wheel too hard, just as I had done when I first learned to drive. Sitting in my father’s Vauxhall Cavalier, trying not to get flustered when he complained that I was letting the clutch up too slowly.
I forced myself to relax. I was moving slowly, watchfully, looking out for pedestrians, children hidden behind parked cars. An imaginary test examiner was sitting beside me as I carried out each manoeuvre with extreme attention to detail, as though my life depended on concentrating on the job in hand, on keeping a cool head.
Chapter Five
Diane Easby was back, dressed in a red calf-length skirt, a black and white sweater with a zig-zag pattern, and a white zip-up jacket.
‘Like it?’ she asked. ‘Got them from the catalogue. Alan did his nut. Well, he can’t have it both ways. If he wants me to look good he’s going to have to pay for it.’
I nodded sympathetically.
‘Not that he’s ever been mean with money, but he never knows one week to the next what he’ll be getting in the way of a wage packet.’
‘He’s self-employed?’
‘Eh?’ She was licking her finger, rubbing at a snag in her tights. ‘They take him on when there’s the work.’
‘That must be difficult.’
‘Of course the kids are the real trouble. Their feet. Never stop growing. Lisa takes a size five. Soon be into adult shoes, then they’re double the cost.’
‘Yes, I see.’ I had been all prepared for her to ask what I had found out about Karen Plant’s murder, but she seemed more interested in talking about her family.
‘Anyway,’ I said, ‘how have you been feeling since we last met?’
She crossed one long smooth leg over the other.
‘Oh, ever so much better, thanks to you. What did the police say about Keith? Stuck to the same old story, I suppose.’
I hesitated. ‘To tell you the truth I don’t really want to involve the police at this stage.’
‘No? Oh, right you are, you think it might be better to do some investigations on your own. If you want any help just let me know. Evenings are best, when t
he kids are in bed.’
‘Tell me about your children.’
‘What d’you want to know? Lisa’s twelve. Siobhan’s two. I was married before, see, but it didn’t work out. Then when I fell for a baby — Alan’s, I mean … Of course he treats Lisa just like she was his own. They’re ever so close.’
She traced a line round her lips, then inspected her finger for smudges of lipstick. ‘Don’t suppose you allow smoking?’
‘Not really. It makes the room — ’
‘That’s all right. Anyway, I’m giving up. D’you think it’s a mistake to give up cigs and tranx at the same time?’
‘It might be difficult.’
‘That’s what I thought.’ She picked up a pencil that was lying on my desk, lifted it to her mouth, and inhaled imaginary smoke. ‘Don’t believe in all that addiction stuff, do you? What it is they make you feel better, like having a can of extra strong. Stands to reason you’ll want some more.’
‘Yes, I know what you mean.’ I was letting her move away from the point. But what was the point? Her feelings about what had happened to her brother? The general state of her life? Her ‘nerves’? I was keen to avoid being cast in the role of amateur detective. On the other hand since Keith’s death had been the reason for her referral we could hardly ignore the subject.
‘Tell me about your brother. Did you see each other quite often?’
‘Poor kid. I reckon he was starved of oxygen or something. Never learned to read and write but there’s lots the same and I can’t see it matters that much.’
‘How old was he when he … ?’
‘Twenty-six years, two months, and a day.’ She paused to dab at her eyes. ‘Ten years between us, there was, only of course there’s others in the middle. One sister, two more brothers. One’s in London, another’s up North. I expect they’ll turn up sooner or later.’
She beamed at me. ‘I like your hair. Have it done at that place in the new shopping precinct, do you? How d’you get a job like yours? Well-paid is it?’
‘Not too bad.’