The Color of Bee Larkham's Murder

by Sarah J. Harris

  I heard the grayish black geometric shape of footsteps. A man wearing a black duffel coat walked towards us, smoking a cigarette. I turned back to look at the tree, afraid I might miss something.

  “What do you think of all this, Ollie?” Dad’s muddy ocher voice asked. “Are you a fan of our street’s new visitors or not?”

  I didn’t pay attention to the low mutterings or cigarette smoke because five parakeets fluttered from one branch to another, screeching glimmering violet-blue shades.

  “I’ll tell you what I think,” the dull grainy red voice said. “Those buggers woke me up. I want to blow them out of that tree with my shotgun.”

  David Gilbert.

  I closed my eyes and tried to block out the shotgun’s toxic oil-spillage shade. It easily overpowered the amethyst blues of the parakeets. It merged with the rancid seaweed swearword, producing something far more dangerous.

  Something that could wipe out all the wildlife on our street.

  “Come on, David, it’s not that bad,” Dad said.

  I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t defend the birds. I couldn’t move.

  This was the first time I let them down badly, but it wasn’t the last.

  I focused on important details about the Death Threat, which I could write down later in my notebook and produce as evidence for the police. I checked my watch and shut my eyes again. The time was 8:29 A.M. The potential murderer was David Gilbert at number 22.

  There were three reliable witnesses: me, Dad, and Smoking Black Duffel Coat Man. I hadn’t seen the color of this man’s voice, but Dad had called him Ollie. This would probably make him Ollie Watkins, from number 18, but I’d have to check with Dad later to make sure my notebook records were truly accurate.

  Bee Larkham hadn’t heard the threat. She’d been shielded from the ugly colors, but they quickly darkened to an even nastier shade that I couldn’t protect her from.

  Murky brown unstructured shapes.

  Bang, bang, bang.

  My eyes flew open. Cherry Cords was no longer on the pavement. He stood outside Bee Larkham’s house, knocking loudly on the front door. His dog barked yellow French fries next to him.

  This time I acted, because my friend, as well as the parakeets, was in danger from David Gilbert. I ran after him.

  “Come back, Son! We need to stay out of this. It’s not our fight. You’re going to be late for school!”

  Dad followed, trying to catch my arm, but I shook him off. He was wrong, yet again. I had to protect my friend. This was my fight. She was my friend. They were our parakeets. We’d brought them to this street. We were in this together.

  It took Bee Larkham forty-five seconds to open her door. She was wearing her cobalt blue dressing gown again.

  “Wow. I have an early morning welcoming committee.” She stared at the man on her doorstep, at me, followed by Dad. Last, she looked past us as she fastened her dressing gown tightly. Smoking Black Duffel Coat Man had stayed behind on the pavement—he must have wanted to keep out of the argument. Bee’s mouth didn’t turn up at the ends. It didn’t even twitch.

  “I want to talk to you about the parakeets, Beatrice,” David Gilbert said.

  “Her name is Bee, with an e not an a.” My voice cracked. “And you should leave, David Gilbert.”

  I must have spoken too quietly because he didn’t correct himself. He didn’t leave.

  I tried to speak again, but my light, cool blue words were wiped out by scratchy red shards of glass.

  “You have six feeders, hanging from that tree.” He pointed over his shoulder. “They’re encouraging the birds to infest our street, which is something we certainly don’t want.”

  A smooth, dusky blue sigh escaped from Bee Larkham’s lips. “That’s the point, David, to encourage the birds to visit the street. They’re beautiful, don’t you think? Such vivid colors; so exotic. It reminds me of home, of Australia. They make me feel homesick.”

  “That’s all very well, but they’re incredibly noisy. Over here, they’re treated as pests, like foxes. If you encourage them with your feeders they’ll end up staying. These sorts of birds develop habits rapidly. Believe me, I know. They wreck habitats and drive out other birds.”

  “Well, I certainly hope they do stay on this street,” she said. “I think it could do with brightening up. They’ll inject color into everyone’s lives. Shake everything up around here.”

  Dad looked down at me as I applauded. Those were my views exactly; we spoke with one blue voice. We had stood up to David Gilbert, something no one else on this street dared to do.

  “You’re not going to take all the feeders down when I’ve alerted you to a potentially serious problem?” David Gilbert asked. “When the parakeets woke up half the street this morning with their racket?”

  “No. I am not. This is nature, David. Who am I to interfere with the circle of life? The parakeets are free to come and go in my front garden as they please. I can’t control them any more than you can.”

  “You are interfering with nature by encouraging the birds. Six feeders is totally overboard.” His voice became a darker shade of blood red. “Not only are the birds a problem on a noise level, they could ruin people’s gardens. They’ll strip all the flower buds off the trees come spring.”

  Bee Larkham folded her arms in a tight knot and didn’t reply.

  “I take it from your silence, Beatrice, you’re not going to be reasonable about this? Or about the music you’ve played at top volume ever since you moved in? Or the car you’ve left, leaking oil, directly outside Mrs. Watkins’s house? It’s an inconvenience for Ollie. He has to park much further down the street now.” He pointed at Smoking Black Duffel Coat Man, who hadn’t moved from the pavement.

  “I’m sorry you’re upset, but I must get on with chucking out the crap my mum collected over the years,” she said loudly. “It all has to go. Even the precious ornaments you old people seem to like so much. I don’t want to keep any of them.”

  She waved, I think at me, so I waved back vigorously, to signal I was 100 percent behind her.

  I was her ally in a hostile environment despite her bad language.

  As she closed the door, David Gilbert stuck his foot out. The door bounced back sharp chestnut as it hit his shoe.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” she asked.

  “You don’t seem to understand the way it works on this street, Beatrice,” he said. “We look after each other. We treat our neighbors well, the way your mother used to. We don’t deliberately go out of our way to upset the balance.”

  “Good. You and your friend here can lead by example and not upset me again. I’ve had enough of the pair of you already and I’ve not been back a week.”

  “I’m sorry—” Dad started.

  “Please remove your foot, David,” Bee Larkham said quietly. “Before I do something I doubt I’ll regret.”

  “Of course, but let me tell you something I doubt you know,” David Gilbert said, stepping back from the doorway. “Parakeets have officially been declared a pest by Natural England. That allows a landowner or an authorized person to shoot them if they cause a specific problem.”

  “Seriously? Are you threatening me? Is that what you’re doing?”

  “I’m threatening the parakeets,” David Gilbert said. “Remember that, Beatrice.”

  “Leave me the hell alone! All of you!” She slammed the door shut, shiny conker-colored rectangles.

  I silently screamed as I stamped my feet hard on the ground over and over again. I’d never felt the urge more strongly to kick someone than I did at that moment, standing next to David Gilbert.

  “Was that necessary, David?” my dad asked. “They’re just birds. They’re not worth having a massive fall-out about.”

  David Gilbert took a step closer.

  “Yes, I believe it was necessary. Beatrice Larkham needs to know the ground rules. She has to understand there will be serious repercussions unless she starts toeing the line on my street.�
��

  23

  THURSDAY (APPLE GREEN)

  Afternoon

  I check from my window—Bee Larkham’s long gone, but the battle line remains. It hasn’t faded from people’s shoes walking over it every day or been washed away by rain. It didn’t disappear the day she died. It remains bright and strong in hue because David Gilbert hasn’t gone anywhere. He’s carrying on as normal, as if nothing’s changed.

  The line knows different. It became permanently etched on the pavement outside our house the day of his first threat, defiantly stretching across the road in a bright sky blue color, not caring what the other neighbors thought or said. It encircled Bee Larkham’s front garden and disappeared down the alleyway at the back of her house.

  Methodically, I go back through my bird notebooks and stack them next to the canvases I’ve completed—Pandemonium and Pandemonium in Grave Danger.

  They’re both facing the wall; the parakeets must be protected from David Gilbert’s evil colors.

  A line’s drawn in my notebooks too, dividing the bird sightings before this date and after. From the day of David Gilbert’s threats onwards, I didn’t just record the sightings of parakeets, coal tits, pigeons, goldfinches, and chaffinches on our street.

  I started a detailed log of David Gilbert’s movements, the comings and goings of the man at number 22. I also jotted down descriptions of everyone who walked up Bee Larkham’s front path in case they posed a danger to the parakeets, music pupils included. That was necessary, because wasn’t there a chance that David Gilbert was devious? He could try to get other people on his side, the way Dad said he’d asked all the neighbors to sign his petition to get speed bumps installed on this street.

  To be especially careful, I noted the movements of other neighbors too—particularly Cindy at number 24, a lunchtime supervisor at a local primary school who has two daughters. I’d seen Cherry Cords knock on her door several times, which meant they could be in cahoots.

  I had to build up a case, which I could present to the police after I’d gathered enough evidence because they hadn’t taken my first 999 call about the death threat seriously.

  This was hugely time-consuming but totally necessary.

  I had to collect evidence of criminal wrongdoing.

  Evidence of a serious, imminent threat to the parakeets.

  Evidence the police couldn’t ignore.

  I check my notebook from January 22 again, flicking forwards and back, and it confirms what I already know. My recording system had a fatal flaw: too many glaring holes.

  I’d made a record of David Gilbert’s first threat to kill the parakeets but failed to accurately record what he said to Bee Larkham on her doorstep minutes later. I’d tried to be truthful, but I remember ripping out the page in my notebook and tearing it into tiny bits later that evening. The terrible words had hurt my eyes too much.

  That was a mistake, along with all the other gaps in my account, the incriminating empty pages that followed.

  I know it’s no excuse, but I couldn’t guard the oak tree twenty-four hours a day. I had to go to school. I had to sleep. I had to eat. I couldn’t stand all day and night at my window, with my binoculars, however much I wanted to.

  Lives were lost during one of those blank spaces, when I didn’t spot the danger. I wasn’t around to prevent the attack.

  My failure led to a dozen dead parakeets.

  I can’t fill in those gaps on white paper, the way I’ve repainted the disturbing scenes from our street.

  It’s not because I’ve blanked it out or can’t remember but because I don’t know exactly when the massacre happened.

  Another mystery for me to solve, and I know I won’t like what I finally discover.

  Soft buttery yellow. Dad’s creeping up the stairs to check on me. I can’t bear to talk to him. To look at him, to see the color of his lies about Bee Larkham and Mum.

  I spring forward and wedge a chair under the door handle.

  Tap, tap, tap. Small dots of caramel.

  I ignore the colors and shapes as the handle jangles impatiently.

  “Jasper? Son? Can you let me in?”

  I line up my brushes and rearrange my paints, ready for the next scene. I don’t want to be interrupted. I don’t want my memories to be colored in for me by Dad. They’re mine, not his. Like my binoculars. He can’t borrow them. He could damage them, make them useless.

  “I want to apologize for what I said downstairs,” he says loudly. There’s a blob of khaki brown as he gently butts his head against the door. “We should talk about Bee. About the baby you think she’s having too, if that’s what you want to do. I was wrong to stop you from talking about her. I know that now.” The door makes another light brown blob. “I’m trying to get my head around what’s happened.”

  Is he?

  I don’t believe him. I hate him. He lies. All the time.

  I watch the door. The handle’s stopped moving, but I know he’s still there. The floorboard creaks dusky pink. I want his color to fade into the background and disappear completely.

  “I’m sorry for earlier, Jasper. Honestly, I am. I wish I could take back the things I said.”

  I’m sorry for earlier.

  That’s what Dad said the first time he met Bee Larkham.

  I close my eyes and can already see the painting I must attempt next. Dad’s voice: soft, blunt shapes and light, muddy ocher.

  I’ll make it dance around the paper with Bee’s sky blue. The colors will circle each other suspiciously at first before they merge as if they belong together.

  Which they don’t.

  I have to work hard to keep them apart. I don’t want their colors to bleed into each other. I can’t bear to see that happen. I don’t want to look at the hue they produce.

  “Go away!” I shout at the door. “I’m tired. Go away and leave me alone. I hate you both.”

  “Jasper!”

  We can both lie. “I just want to sleep. I need to sleep. I’m going back to bed.”

  “OK, OK. That will do you good,” Dad says. “But I can’t let you lock yourself in. I can’t let you hurt yourself again. I’ll go away now and check up on you in fifteen minutes. I’m going to time it on my stopwatch. If the door’s not unlocked when I come back up, Jasper, I’m going to kick it down, whether you’re asleep or not. Do you understand?”

  I look at my watch. It’s 1:30 P.M. I’m going to time him on my watch, which he fixed. He’s deceiving me yet again. He’ll be back in ten minutes, not fifteen, but that’s long enough to attempt another troubling painting.

  I must re-create the unsightly color that’s produced when muddy ocher is introduced to sky blue.

  24

  January 22

  Dirty Sap Circles on paper

  The threat to harm the parakeets lingered over me at school, long after the 999 call I’d made in the toilets.

  My geography teacher, Mr. Packham, was upset because I’d kicked chairs and refused to sit down. He didn’t understand I couldn’t put my mobile away. I had to hold it and wait for a detective to ring me back. I needed to know what the police planned to do about David Gilbert.

  Mr. Packham tried to take the phone off me and I screamed electric aquamarine clouds at him. He took me to the head teacher’s office, instead of Learning Support. I sat on the dull navy chair beside the door for three minutes and twelve seconds. When Mrs. Moore told me to come in, she already knew the story. She’d rung my dad at work and he’d spoken to the police. They had his details on file from my other calls to the unhelpful 999 operators.

  Your dad says not to worry about the parakeets. The police have logged your call. You mustn’t get upset about this. It’s not a problem.

  What does logged mean? Are the police actually doing something? Are they investigating David Gilbert? Will they arrest him and arrange patrols of our street to protect the parakeets while I’m at school? What are they actually doing?

  Mrs. Moore didn’t know, which I stressed mad
e her totally useless. After that, I had to work in the learning support room all day and didn’t even leave to go to the canteen at lunchtime.

  A teaching assistant brought a tray and sat next to me. Her jaw made a dark pink clicking sound as she chewed on a sandwich, which made me grind my nails into the palm of my hand.

  The day stretched on, without any detective arriving to talk to me.

  Bad news.

  I feared the police had closed the case before they’d even opened it, because it involved parakeets, not human beings, who were their first priority. I knew this was a huge mistake.

  I told another teaching assistant who came to supervise me, but he wasn’t interested. He told me to stop talking and get on with my work. After that, I gave up. I pretended I was working.

  I pretended I was normal.

  Deep down inside, I didn’t believe my head teacher. I didn’t believe Dad. I worried about Bee Larkham and the parakeets all day.

  • • •

  Two dozen parakeets fluttered around Bee Larkham’s oak tree when I got back from school. Bee had also draped strings of peanuts from the branches of the smaller Chinese red birch. I raced upstairs to my bedroom and stood on guard with my binoculars at the window, but I didn’t catch a glimpse of David Gilbert and his shotgun. Maybe I was wrong; the police hadn’t ignored my call. They’d patrolled the street while I was away and protected the pandemonium of parakeets.

  I’d scared David Gilbert away.

  Despite this, Dad was worried about our new neighbor when he came home from work. He said we should double-check she was doing OK after the argument with David. I pointed out this was unnecessary as the police knew all about the bird killer at 22 Vincent Gardens.

  My tummy growled budgerigar green colors, signaling it was close to teatime. They clashed with a bunch of wilting purple tulips Dad had picked up from the corner shop on the way home.

  “Let’s pop round now in case we miss her,” he insisted. “She could go out for the evening.”

  He clutched the flowers in his right hand, the way he’d held my binoculars the night we watched her dance. Tightly. Like he didn’t want to ever let go.