Out of Mind

by Catherine Sampson

  “Whoever had him risked doing him real damage.”

  “It was a risk, even more so if he really was left for long periods of time on his own. But you don’t have to have a medical degree these days to get hold of information about dosage, you can just type the name of some drug into your search engine and away you go. You can probably buy it the same way and have it delivered to your door.”

  “Did you find anything in the warehouse?”

  “No. Whoever was there was careful not to leave fingerprints, shoeprints, any kind of print. There were no bloodstains, there is no indication that Darling’s bullets touched him, which is something we find strange.”

  “I’m not sure he ever got a clear shot at the kidnapper.”

  “Still,” she said dryly, “we expect more of our soldiers. Hit the target, at least. Mind you, he’d be in real trouble if he had.”

  “Are you suggesting that he wasn’t trying? Or that it was for show?”

  There was a moment’s pause before Veronica answered.

  “A show for who? He didn’t know you were there.”

  “He knew Jacqui was there.”

  “Does she care about displays of machismo by her father?”

  “She just cares about her little brother,” I said. A picture of Jacqui came unbidden to my mind, walking up to Sheryl, sitting next to her, saying something that Sheryl did not want to hear.

  “I understand the cash came from Sheryl,” I said.

  “Against her husband’s wishes, yes.”

  I thought back to Mike’s rescue of his son. His face victorious, his fist punching the air, gloating as he rubbed Veronica’s nose in it: “Left to them, he’d be dead.”

  “Now Christopher’s back, are you going to question Mike again?”

  There was silence on the line for a moment, and I thought I’d lost the connection.

  “Mike came to us while the baby was gone,” Veronica told me. “He’s given us a full statement concerning that earlier meeting with Melanie Jacobs.”

  “Oh really?”

  “He said he wanted to get things straight with us because we were working with him on the kidnap. He said it was preying on his mind.”

  “He told you about the ambush?”

  “You already know about it, I gather.”

  “What do you think?”

  “What is there to think? He was with Melanie when his friend was killed. He didn’t feel like talking about it. He didn’t think he needed to. He’s very apologetic about not coming clean in the first place. I don’t think there’s any great secret; he just got stupid when she disappeared, and once he hadn’t told us, he couldn’t go back on it. It happens more than you’d think.”

  When we had hung up, I told Dave what she had said. He shrugged and said, “So I guess that’s that,” and I’d have been stupid to argue the point. I sat back and watched the flat countryside glide by. Why had I become so obsessed with Mike’s supposed guilt? Perhaps it was just that I hated not to know. If there was no good answer, I would invent one and try to make it fit. It didn’t make me feel good about myself. I’d cursed the people who’d done the same to me. I closed my eyes.

  My mobile trilled into the quiet of the car. It was Tanya. She apologized for shouting at me and invited me round for a birthday dinner.

  “I’m inviting Lorna as well,” she said. “I’m still angry with her, but I can’t bear that we’re not all friends.”

  Lorna, I could have said, would have held out much longer. Tanya, the youngest of us, is the most forgiving, except where our father is concerned. Instead I just thanked her for the invitation and promised to be there as early as I could.

  Then, as Dave and I got closer to London and the traffic slowed, I called Sal. There had been a new sighting of Melanie in the Lake District. A woman of Melanie’s description but looking unkempt had been seen in a supermarket, buying groceries and an armful of newspapers. As she paid at the checkout, the cashier pointed out a picture of Melanie that had been posted on the notice board and commented on the likeness, and the woman had left the store in some distress, taking her shopping but failing to pay.

  I caught sight of a sign for Sydenham, and I thought of Jacqui bad-mouthing Sheryl, then going straight to a meeting with her. I thought of Justin, and how he’d begged me to go to Morden, and the way he’d broken his promise to me to call the police. And I decided I was owed some answers.

  “Dave,” I said, “would you mind dropping me off in Sydenham?”

  There had been a light rain, and the wet grass clung to my sandaled feet, wrapping itself around my toes. I went round to the back of the house and hammered on the glass door. I saw Jacqui emerge from the alcove she shared with Christopher, the baby on her hip, so at home that it seemed he had never left. He was holding the palm of his hand against Jacqui’s face, as if for security

  She opened the door. “What are you doing here?”

  I fancied that Christopher had become thinner. He had never been a fat baby, but now his cheeks looked sunken, his fingers as thin as chopsticks.

  “I’m pleased to see Christopher,” I said. I put my hand out to touch Christopher’s head, but he flinched away and started to whine anxiously.

  “He’s still jumpy,” she told me, lowering her voice. “They drugged him with Valium. Talk about sickos. Just like the stuff Sheryl gives to Mum. . . .”

  Anita’s mental state was not at the top of my list of priorities, and I didn’t want to be distracted from my purpose, so I didn’t follow up on it, but I made a mental note of what Jacqui had said. Jacqui turned back inside the house, and I wasn’t sure what I was expected to do, so I stepped inside without being invited.

  “Sheryl’s exactly what I want to talk about,” I said quietly. “I want to know what you were doing meeting her in Burger King.”

  She stood there, still holding the door open, too shocked to remember to shut it behind me.

  “It’s none of your business,” she said, recovering. “I can talk to who I want.”

  She pushed the door shut—she was too considerate to Christopher to slam it—and turned away from me, back toward the alcove she had come from. I paused at the entrance while she laid Christopher in his crib. I turned my head, my eyes caught by something in Anita’s alcove. I stared. On the wall that faced me there was a violent stain. For an instant I thought I must be looking at art. But the smears of paint were ugly, and they were surrounded by a larger wet mark. The whole area stank of turpentine. On the floor lay the remains of a bottle that must, I thought, have been smashed against the wall.

  Pots and brushes, a canvas, even an easel, lay untidily on the floor where they had been hurled. Then I saw that Anita lay on the bed, on top of the tangled sheets, propped against pillows, her eyes wide, staring at the ceiling, her hand plucking at the silky nightdress that was twisted up around her thighs.

  “What happened?” I murmured.

  Jacqui looked up, then realized what I could see, and her face flushed.

  “Mum lost it,” she said. She bit her lip. “It all got too much for her.”

  Without thinking, I took a step closer. I must have made some sound, or disturbed a shadow, because suddenly Anita half sat up and saw me.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, and took a step back.

  She collapsed back onto the pillows, and I ventured to her bedside.

  She stared up at me. Tears were flowing down her face and soaking the pillow.

  “What is it?”

  “It’s my own fault,” she muttered, her words slurring, “the whole thing’s my fault. What was I thinking?” Then her voice turned into a wail. “What on earth was I thinking?”

  She buried her face in the pillow and beat her fist against it.

  Behind me Jacqui spoke, and Anita pulled another pillow over her head to block out her daughter’s voice.

  “Leave her be,” Jacqui said. “You should go. Stop sticking your nose into our business. Christopher is back, there’s no need for us to be p
ublic property anymore. I’m not going to tell you what I said to Sheryl, and that’s final.”

  She held the door open for me, and I had no option but to leave.

  I didn’t arrive as early as I’d intended at Tanya’s, but apparently I was the first. We were greeted by her three girls, who had prepared little packages for Hannah and William.

  “I know it’s your birthday, but we don’t know what to make for old people,” Chloë said as the twins ripped the paper from packets of chocolate drops, “we only know what little kids like.”

  “I told them,” said Patrick, appearing behind them, “that their present to you was to look after Hannah and William this evening.”

  I kissed Patrick on the cheek. “I like that present.”

  I watched the twins follow Chloë and her sisters eagerly up the stairs. I knew I would not see them for some time. Then I followed Patrick into the kitchen, and Tanya greeted me as though she had not, just days before, charged yelling into my house. She kissed me, then pointed me toward a pile of onions. The onions, I decided as I picked up the chopper, were probably my punishment for not telling Tanya that Gilbert had been stationed in Ma’s house. I decided to take it on the chin. Not because I thought I had been traitorous, but because someone had to chop the onions, and it might as well be me.

  When the doorbell rang I blinked the tears from my eyes, wiped my hands on my jeans, and went to let Lorna in, but she was not alone. For a moment I didn’t recognize her dinner guest.

  “I thought of bringing Dad, but I decided Joe was less controversial,” Lorna said defensively. I found my tongue and welcomed them both in, noting—silently and to myself—that Lorna had dispensed with the priest’s title. I led them into Tanya’s tiny kitchen. They made a gorgeous couple. Lorna looked Pre-Raphaelite with her ringlets, pale skin, and fine bone structure. Father Joe had shaved off his beard—an act surely calculated to make himself look less ascetic—to reveal what could only be described as a gorgeous mouth and chin. Lorna was assessing the situation in the kitchen.

  “Joe, chop the mushrooms,” she ordered. “I’ll wash the salad. Tanya, what are you doing with that chicken?”

  Tanya turned and put her hands on her hips. “Is that it? What am I doing with the chicken? How about hello, thank you for the invitation, and sorry for offending you? Because that’s what it was. Offensive. She’s my mother, too, you can’t just go doing what you did.”

  I realized then that I had got off lightly with the onions. Lorna stood stock still, staring at her little sister. I heard Joe cough softly. It was a subtle clearing of the throat, no more. But it was communication, and the kind of communication that happens between lovers, when other things take the place of words. I wondered whether they had stopped at coughing.

  “Of course,” Lorna said mechanically and not entirely graciously. “Hello, thank you for the invitation. I regret anything I’ve ever said or done that might conceivably have offended anyone in this room.”

  Lorna and Tanya watched each other for a moment, while the rest of us held our breath.

  “You know Dad’s gone, don’t you,” Lorna said.

  “Good.” Then, despite herself, my little sister asked, “Where to?”

  “I don’t know. I went to Ma’s, but he’s not there, and all his things are gone. I thought you might know. Robin?”

  I thought of the information Finney had given me about Gilbert’s devastation of the school in Paris.

  “I don’t know. He’s a grown man. I’m sure he can look after himself.”

  The doorbell rang, and I went to get it, mostly because I wanted to get out of the kitchen.

  Finney was standing there, his hands in his pockets.

  “I’m here on a mission of destruction to pay you back for what you did on my birthday,” he said. We smiled at each other, and I stood back to let him in. He took off his jacket and kissed me.

  “Okay,” I said, “but my family doesn’t really need any help. It’s quite capable of self-destructing.”

  I led him through to the dining room, where Patrick, who had grown up a Roman Catholic was berating Father Joe about the impossibility of the celibacy of the priesthood, much to the delight of Lorna.

  “I agree with you,” Father Joe said in a voice calculated politely to put the subject to rest, “the present situation is untenable. But these things don’t work themselves out overnight.”

  Lorna’s eyes were shining. Had Father Joe given her cause to hope? I could not see it, but then I was not looking for it as hard as she was. We talked about other things, in particular about Ma and her romance with Randy, and the tone of conversation lightened.

  As Tanya brought on coffee at the end of the meal, I noticed that Lorna was slumped in her chair as though she could not hold herself upright. She had not taken part in the conversation for some time. Father Joe’s eyes were on her, too. He pushed back his chair, got up, and went over to her, squatting beside her chair and speaking to her quietly, not making a scene. Nevertheless, conversation dried up as the rest of us realized what was happening. Lorna nodded, a tiny inclination of her head.

  “If you’ll excuse us,” he said, “Lorna’s wiped out. Can I call for a cab?”

  “I’ll run you home,” Finney said. “I’ve got to be at work by seven tomorrow, so I have to go, too.”

  Father Joe nodded his thanks and held out his hand to Lorna; she took it, but she couldn’t pull herself up, and without any hesitation he leaned over, reaching one arm around her shoulders and the other under her knees. He scooped her off her chair and stood there holding her like a babe in arms. She didn’t protest. Instead, with a small smile on her face, she rested her head on his shoulder, her red gold curls draping his arm. We all stood to say good night, and Finney followed them out of the room, thanking Tanya for dinner.

  When they had gone, Tanya and I looked at each other. She bit her lip, she shook her head.

  “Whatever,” she asked, “is he thinking?”

  I helped Tanya with the washing-up, enjoying the opportunity to gossip more, mostly about Lorna and Father Joe: What was he thinking? What was she thinking? Less luridly, we worried that Lorna’s sudden and dramatic exhaustion was an indication of just how much she had been pushing herself recently. We talked about Ma and Randy, like parents discussing their children. Could there be any real future in such a long-distance romance? Were they really compatible, or was this just the lure of the exotic?

  “And while we’re on the subject, what about you and Finney?” Tanya asked. “Do you have any plans, or are you just going to tease each other on like this until you’re sixty?”

  My mobile rang. I grabbed it from the table, eager for any excuse not to answer the question. It was Mike, although he didn’t stop to introduce himself, just launched into a tirade. I pulled a face of disbelief at Tanya.

  “What do you want from me?” he shouted. “Why are you coming here to harass my wife? Leave me alone, leave my family alone, and leave my friends alone. If this goes on, I swear you will be sorry.”

  He hung up.

  “What was that?” Tanya asked. She was standing stock still. “I could hear him from here.”

  “He’s upset,” I said, “he doesn’t mean anything by it.”

  But we didn’t gossip any more after that, and when I gathered up the sleeping twins to put them in the car, Tanya helped me with them and watched me get into the driver’s seat, hugging her arms around her against the evening chill.

  “I wish you had Finney with you,” she said. “Take care.”

  She waved me off. When I looked in the mirror, she was already back inside, closing her front door.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  I got home and locked up, hardly able to stay awake. When the phone rang I snatched up the receiver, ready to snap at whoever was ringing. I was afraid it would be Mike with more warnings to stay away. But when I heard Justin, apologetic and anxious as ever, I staggered as far as the sofa and lay down, with my eyes closed, to liste
n.

  “I’ve got Jacqui with me,” he said. “She’s really scared, and she wants to talk to you so someone knows what’s happened. The police won’t listen to her anymore. I think maybe she’s imagining it. . . .”

  At this point, the telephone was grabbed out of his hand, and Jacqui started to tell me her story.

  Justin and Jacqui have established what can only be called a love nest in the grounds of the house at the edge of the wood. In fact it’s a garden shed, but like a bird building a home, Jacqui has stolen cushions and blankets, one by one, from the house and piled them high in the tiny wooden shack. Jacqui’s need to create this warm and soft environment for their lovemaking springs from something deep inside her, something that is made more urgent by Justin’s severed limb. She wants to surround him with the comfort he has longed for ever since his mother died.

  They have created this haven in secret—which fact on its own lends an erotic frisson. The atmosphere inside the house is now so oppressive that neither of them feels they can breathe. They know without discussing it that their respective parents will freak out if their precious child sleeps with the other parents’ precious child inside the house. But they also know that their respective parents are so distracted that they don’t give a damn what goes on in the garden shed.

  Justin, his time filled with doctors and physiotherapy, challenged by his own impaired and painful body, and his loins on fire for Jacqui, pays only glancing attention to the eddies and flows of misery inside the house. When they lie down together, there is nothing on Justin’s mind except his body, made whole, her body, and the fact that he loves her.

  Jacqui’s body is equally consumed. Their frequent bouts of sex distract her intermittently from the fact that she is terribly frightened. She has developed a quick, soft way of walking around the house that gets her from room to room discreetly. She watches her mother and father and sees that the return of Christopher, which she thought would save them, has not done so.

  Jacqui is also frightened of Ronald Evans, who passed her in the street two days after the police raid on his house and laid into her.