by Joan Smith
‘Hello?’ The voice, that of a youngish women, was suspicious, and Loretta wondered whether she’d got a wrong number.
‘I’d like – is that Tom Neil’s house?’
‘Are you the police?’
‘The police? Good God, no! I’m a friend of Sandra’s – of Mrs Neil.’
‘Oh. Well, Mr Neil’s not here.’ If Loretta had expected to dissolve the woman’s hostility by identifying herself as a friend of the family, she was disappointed. She tried again.
‘When will he be there?’
‘Tuesday – after the inquest.’
‘The inquest? You mean – on Sandra?’ It had never occurred to Loretta that Sandra’s death would be the subject of an inquest, and she was momentarily astonished. Ignorance vied with curiosity: was this a matter of routine, or were the police unhappy about – about what? After all, Sandra had died in a car crash. How could there be anything sinister about that?
‘Yes – waste of time and money, isn’t it?’ The woman at the other end of the line had read her own interpretation into Loretta’s expression of surprise and was now rather friendlier.
‘I – I had no idea. Do the police. . .?’ She hesitated, wanting to ask questions, but hampered by not knowing who she was talking to. The conversation was so at odds with what she had expected when she dialled Tom Neil’s number that she was temporarily unable to gather her wits.
‘The police,’ the woman snorted. ‘They were round here again yesterday, soon as he got back – he only came to pick up his letters. Three times they’ve been now, four if you count the ones that come to tell him. . . you know. Not that it’s any of my business, I wasn’t here – I don’t normally come weekends, only tomorrow’s a bit awkward ... It was Mrs Fraser two doors down saw them. She was out of her house this morning, soon as I arrived, fishing. I told her – I don’t know what it’s all about. All I know is the inquest’s on Tuesday morning, half past ten, and Mr Neil’s coming back here after.’
‘Half past ten,’ Loretta repeated, still turning the information over in her mind.
‘That’s right – you want to leave a message? There’s – hang on – there’s an envelope here I can put it on the back of.’
‘No, don’t worry. You’ve been very helpful.’
‘No trouble. I’ve got to go, my husband’s coming to pick me up at three and I’ve got the upstairs to hoover. Bye.’
The line went dead. Loretta put the receiver back in its cradle and leaned back in her chair, a frown creasing her forehead. What was she to make of what she had just learned? It had already occurred to her that the inquest meant nothing; she had occasionally seen newspaper reports of inquests on road accident victims, not that she made a habit of searching out such stuff. Only the most spectacular cases, multiple pile-ups on motorways and the like, got into the Guardian, but for every one that made the nationals dozens must go unreported, or appear only in the pages of local newspapers. By itself, the inquest wasn’t significant.
She was more perplexed by Tom Neil’s visits from the police. They had been round three times, the cleaner had said, in addition to bringing the news of Sandra’s death. Obviously Neil would have been interviewed, that was only to be expected – in all likelihood it would have happened when he went to identify Sandra’s body or shortly after. A small shiver ran through Loretta at the picture she had conjured up, and she moved her thoughts on swiftly. Why had the police needed to see him on three more occasions? A car crash was an unpleasant but relatively straightforward way to die; there could be grounds for suspicion only if the police had found evidence of mechanical interference with Sandra’s car, with the brakes or. . . Loretta’s knowledge of such things was hazy. In any case, the notion that anyone had tampered with Sandra’s car was outlandish, not worthy of serious consideration – except that she had been a social worker, and there were cases of social workers being attacked, even murdered, by psychotic clients. Perhaps the police had discovered something amiss, and were keeping Tom Neil informed. . . Loretta seized the phone and dialled the Winchester number again.
‘Hello – I called a minute ago. I forgot to ask, where’s the inquest being held?’
‘Lymington.’
‘Lymington?’ Loretta repeated the name blankly, unable for a moment to think where it was. She realized she had expected the woman to say Winchester – illogically, since she had not yet inquired where the accident took place. Then she remembered the other phone number Sally had given her and the Neils’ house on the coast.
‘Is that where – isn’t that where their other house is?’
‘Well, just outside.’ The woman sounded eager to get off the line.
‘And that’s – is that where the crash happened?’
‘Yes. If you don’t mind. . . my husband’s waiting outside.’
‘Oh, right. Sorry. Thanks very much.’
Loretta put the phone down a second time and got up from her chair, moving to a window. Outside in the street a red London bus thundered past and she glanced down into the sparsely populated upper deck. She caught a glimpse of two teenage boys who appeared to be wrestling each other in one of the front seats, and a black woman in a hat at the back, well out of their way. The weather was unchanged, wet and blowy, and she wasn’t surprised that so few people had ventured out.
Another odd circumstance struck her – the fact that the inquest was taking place after Sandra’s funeral. She thought about it for a moment, then decided it wasn’t so strange after all; weren’t inquests sometimes opened and adjourned so that the body could be released to relatives? She was probably making far too much of the little the cleaner had told her. On the other hand, what was behind those visits from the police? The thought nagged at her, and didn’t fit easily with a simple road accident. Then another question began to bubble in her mind: why had Sandra rushed off to the house near Lymington? She hadn’t mentioned any such intention when she rang Loretta at her office on New Year’s Eve; on the contrary, she had suggested dinner in London that very evening, and if Loretta had accepted. . ., She pushed away this thought, concentrating on the fact that everything pointed to a very sudden change of plan on Sandra’s part. It was an awfully long way to drive on a dismal winter afternoon, especially when the alternative was a warm London flat – unless Sandra had arranged to meet someone there? It seemed an odd choice for a rendezvous. Sally hadn’t said much about the house except that it was right on the water, and that Tom Neil kept a boat there. Loretta thought it fair to assume it was bleak and unwelcoming on a bitterly cold December night.
She turned away from the window, aware that there was a simple way of getting answers to all these questions. Her gaze travelled round the peaceful room, taking in the cat stretched sleekly in front of the log fire, the book lying open on the sofa. It was an appealing domestic scene, and she felt a surge of resistance to the idea which had taken shape in her head during her first conversation with Tom Neil’s cleaner. She certainly didn’t want to go to the inquest, the trip would be tiring and she had so many other things to do – term started on Thursday. . .
At the same time, she had already made the decision. She knew her motives were far from altruistic, though a less honest person might have claimed to be doing it for Sandra’s sake. Loretta accepted that going to Hampshire was a way of allaying guilt, of being able to feel she was doing something after the fiasco of the women’s group. She was still standing with her back to one of the windows, and her glance fell on Sandra’s luggage in the far corner of the drawingroom. She cheered up, thinking that this was another reason for attending the inquest: she could take the bags with her and hand them over to Tom Neil. Relieved to be thinking of practical matters, she turned her mind to the journey. How long would it take to drive to Lymington? She had never been there but she had been to Southampton a couple of times, to conferences at the university, and it was in the same general direction. The M3 went most of the way, so it shouldn’t take more than – what? An hour and three-quarters? Bett
er allow a little more, to be on the safe side – a couple of hours should be enough. Loretta noticed that the fire was burning low and went over to add some logs, taking care not to disturb Bertie as she did so. Then she went to the kitchen in search of a carrier bag for the neat pile of clothes still sitting where she had left it on top of Sandra’s suitcase.
When Loretta’s alarm went off at seven-thirty on Tuesday morning, the trip to Hampshire seemed momentarily less attractive. She stirred, leaned across to turn off the insistent beep-beep of the dock-radio, and inadvertently rolled Bertie off the bed on to the floor. He picked himself up, dazed with sleep, and leapt back on to the quilt.
‘Sorry, Bertie,’ she said, pulling up her legs from under the duvet and swinging them over him. ‘I’ve got to get up.’
She padded barefoot into the bathroom, shivering because the central heating hadn’t yet come on. It was still dark outside, and she groaned as she turned on both bath taps. She went downstairs to put on the kettle, stretching, yawning, and longing for another half hour in bed as she waited for it to boil. She discovered mould on the last few slices of bread in the breadbin, and her resolution wavered. Pushing away the temptation to forget the whole thing, she rummaged in a cupboard and found an elderly packet of porridge oats. At least porridge didn’t go off, she thought, mixing the oat flakes to an unattractive sludge with water and turning on the cooker. Then she remembered that she’d left the bath taps running, and had to abandon the porridge for a moment while she ran upstairs to prevent an overflow.
‘Damn,’ she said mildly, putting her hand in the deep, tepid water. There was far too much cold, and the hot water had now run out. She pulled out the plug, letting the bath drain to the last couple of inches before putting it back. Then she opened the airing-cupboard and switched on the immersion heater, half-heartedly hoping there’d be enough hot water by the time she finished breakfast.
The result of these delays was that Loretta left her flat late, pulling the front door shut behind her just after half past eight. She struggled down the stairs with Sandra’s suitcase in one hand and her large holdall in the other, opening the street door just as the postman reached for the letter-box.
‘Oh – thanks.’ She put down the luggage and glanced quickly through the envelopes, automatically sorting out those addressed to her downstairs neighbour, Shahin, which she placed on top of the meter cupboard. She was left with three: a credit card bill which she put unopened in her shoulder-bag, an airmail letter from Cyprus addressed in John Tracey’s hand, and a white envelope franked ‘Vixen Press’. Her heart beat more quickly at the sight of the latter; she had not expected to hear from Vixen so soon – it was only eight days since she posted the typescript – and she was suddenly afraid that the envelope contained a rejection slip. She tore it open, anxiety tightening her chest as she smoothed out the single sheet of paper inside. Then, as she read, her cheeks began to glow. Her editor, Susie Lathlean, wrote that this was a preliminary note to say the typescript was ‘fabulous’; she had taken it home last week when she was struck down with flu and found it ‘riveting, a tremendous read’. The letter ended with the information that Susie had given it to another Vixen editor to read, but she was sure there wouldn’t be any major problems. Vixen would be delighted to publish the book, and did Loretta have any ideas about illustrations? Loretta was still basking in the praise heaped on the biography when she got to a handwritten PS at the bottom of the letter: ‘Are you very attached to the title?’ Susie had scrawled. ‘My instinct is for something simpler.’
Loretta tutted her disappointment, suddenly ready to defend A Woman and her Fate: A Life of Edith Wharton to the end. She read the letter through again, this time with a slightly jaundiced eye, asking herself if the praise wasn’t a bit overdone – a rather hasty judgement. There must be something Susie didn’t like, apart from the title. She was already marshalling her arguments when she remembered why she was standing on the doorstep and looked at her watch. Quarter to nine; if she didn’t set off now she was going to be terribly late. She stuffed the letter from Vixen into her bag, followed it with the unread airmail envelope from Tracey, and hoisted Sandra’s luggage for the short walk to her car.
Loretta’s progress across London was slow, and included an unexpected halt in standing traffic on the Westway as a result of roadworks. There was a further hold-up in Shepherd’s Bush, and even though the motorway was relatively empty going west, the final stretch on A-roads through Lyndhurst and the New Forest took longer than she’d anticipated. Loretta arrived in Lymington a little after eleven, eager to find the coroner’s court and in no mood to linger over the beauties or otherwise of the town. She headed into the centre along a prosperous shopping street dominated by a rather ugly parish church on her left, and stopped a passer-by to ask for directions. The woman couldn’t help her, nor could the next person she consulted, an elderly man with a small, fierce terrier.
‘Have you tried the police station?’ he asked, struggling to prevent his dog attacking Loretta’s car. ‘They – sit, Charlie! – might know.’
His directions to this building turned out to be excellent – if you were on foot. Loretta promptly got lost in a one-way system, and it was twenty past eleven when she drew up outside a wide, two-storey building with the words ‘Hampshire Constabulary’ over its porticoed double doors. She parked her car and hurried inside, where she was surprised to find the reception area empty. A laconic desk sergeant appeared after she had rung the bell on the counter several times; he stared for a full thirty seconds at her red fake fur coat, then informed her offhandedly that inquests took place in a room at the side of the police station. Loretta thanked him and went back outside, following his directions to the public entrance. She was half convinced that the case was already over, but when she pushed open the unmarked swing door she found a lobby populated by three people, all of whom stared at her with interest through a haze of stale cigarette smoke.
‘Is it – is the inquest still going on?’ she asked, addressing the question to the uniformed policeman who appeared to be single-handedly responsible for the pollution.
‘You a witness?’ He lowered his copy of the Daily Express.
‘No.’
‘Go on in then.’ He jerked his head towards the double doors in front of her. ‘You’ll have to be quiet – he started ages ago.’
Loretta had never been in court before, and she did her best to open the right-hand door silently. It swung inwards with a dismaying creak, and she had a momentary impression that everyone inside had turned to stare at her. Then they went back to the business in hand, leaving her stranded at the back of the court. She had no idea where to sit, and the small, bare room with tables along three walls was not what she had expected; there was no dais, and she was able to identify the coroner only because he was sitting opposite her, under a picture of the Queen. A policeman sat on his left, staring fixedly at a stack of manila files tied with pink ribbon. A few chairs had been placed haphazardly in the well of the court, only two of them occupied, and Loretta glanced around for a less conspicuous spot. She found it in the shape of a small table on her right, at the back of the room, and tiptoed across to join a middle-aged man who was sitting behind it. He gave her a surprised look, then went back to sketching a harbour scene on a yellow pad on his knees. It occurred to Loretta that she should have brought a notebook.
She transferred her attention to the coroner, a portly, balding man in a dark suit and gold-rimmed spectacles which had slipped down his nose. His sharp little eyes peered over them at a witness, a tall, spare man with wavy, iron-grey hair who appeared ill at ease in the portable witness stand in the far corner of the room. It took Loretta a moment to get the hang of what was happening, and when she did she was surprised by the snail-like pace of events. Each of the witness’s replies was laboriously written down by the coroner, leaving long silences in between. After observing this numbing procedure for a couple of minutes, Loretta had gleaned that the tall man was a patholo
gist and that he was halfway through his evidence. He was describing Sandra’s injuries in some detail, but in medical jargon so obscure it might have been another language. Loretta found his explanations hard to follow, but thought this was just as well; the dry, medical language blunted the horror of his subject. His delivery was rapid, and he had just moved on to another point when the coroner intervened.
‘Mr Brown – I have mentioned this before,’ he said testily. ‘We don’t all have the benefit of a medical education – is this a matter of substance, or merely a medical curiosity? We’ve already spent a considerable amount of time on your evidence and there is another witness to follow.’
‘It does raise an interesting question,’ the pathologist said eagerly. ‘If I could just explain – very broadly, vital reaction appears to have set in at the site of this laceration and –’
‘Vital reaction?’
‘The massing of leucocytes –’
‘White blood cells, Mr Brown!’
‘Sir?’ Brown seemed bewildered by the further interruption. ‘The massing of – of white blood cells at the site of a wound in a living body is observable in the form of inflammation at its edges. Such repair work is visible, naturally, only in living tissue.’ He had speeded up, and was giving nervous sideways glances at the coroner. ‘Different types of leu — – white cells appear in sequence, over a period of forty-eight hours –’
‘Doctor, we are not interested in a period of forty-eight hours in this case,’ the coroner snapped. ‘We’ve already established that a period of, at the very most, two hours elapsed before the unfortunate lady expired from the massive injuries you have described. The relevance of this –’ The coroner shrugged crossly.
It took Loretta a few seconds to grasp the import of his speech, and then a fullness came into her threat. She stared at the table in front of her, clinging to its ordinariness as an antidote to the ghastly picture which had come into her head. Sandra had survived the crash, had lived for up to two hours afterwards – Loretta pushed the image away. She had not immediately understood the pathologist’s reference to some sort of reaction in living tissue, but now it was clear. She blinked back tears, trying to calm herself by lifting her head and concentrating on the two actors in the drama – on the dull rhythm of question-and-answer. The argument was still going on, however.