My tummy mouth opens and closes once for yes.
“Jasper?”
He didn’t receive the secret signal through my shirt. Maybe the fabric’s too thick. Or maybe his mind’s on something else.
“Eating my parakeets made me angry.”
I can’t say anything too complicated. Keeping the sentence simple makes it easier for him to understand.
“You didn’t actually eat them, Jasper,” Rusty Chrome Orange says. “I want you to understand that. I’m sure of it. Bee Larkham made you think you’d eaten parakeets, to be cruel. She realized she couldn’t manipulate you into taking any more messages to Lucas and was distressed after discovering she was pregnant. She wanted to hurt you. Badly. The way she’d been hurt.”
Unfortunately, I don’t believe a word he says.
“I hurt her too. With the knife. There was a lot of blood. I’m sorry.”
I want to tell him how we’d studied George Orwell’s Animal Farm in English class.
All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.
It was the same with Bee and me. Rusty Chrome Orange has probably never heard of Animal Farm or Orwell’s 1984. He wouldn’t understand what I want to tell him:
Bee Larkham and I were equally guilty, but I was probably more guilty than her.
“Let’s leave the pie for the moment and discuss something that might make you more comfortable,” Rusty Chrome Orange says. “I’d like to talk about your paintings, if I may. You’re an amazing artist, Jasper. I wish my sons had an ounce of your talent. They spend all their time playing Minecraft, but you could be famous when you grow up.”
“Minecraft,” I repeat. I don’t know what’s more surprising, the fact that he has sons or that they’re into playing one of the all-time best computer games.
“What color are they?” I ask.
“Their color?”
“The color of your sons’ voices. Are they the same as yours?” Please tell me they’re not.
“I don’t know, sorry.”
“OK.”
“Your parakeet paintings are my favorites out of all your pictures. I think they’re sensational. Truly wonderful abstract art.”
Rusty Chrome Orange picks up a large plastic bag from beside the table and places it in front of him. I see a blur of color. These can’t be my paintings. They’re safe at home.
“I want you to know I asked your dad’s permission to look at your parakeet paintings, Jasper,” he says.
I stare harder. I see a blur of parakeets, struggling to breathe beneath the plastic.
They’re suffocating.
“He gave us his permission to go into your bedroom and fetch them. Is it OK if we look at them together?”
“No!” Piercing aquamarine with white edges.
“We’re just going to look at them,” Rusty Chrome Orange says. “We understand they’re very precious to you. We’ll return them as soon as possible.”
I refuse to look at him. I hate him.
Dad should never have allowed the police into my bedroom. My paintings are mixed up. My notebook boxes are out of order.
So are Rusty Chrome Orange’s questions.
“Have you found the white rabbit yet?” I ask, because that creature’s out of place too.
“We’re just interested in the parakeet pictures for now,” he replies. “Your dad explained how you only paint sounds, not actual objects. That’s incredibly original, Jasper. Extraordinary. When did you start painting like that?”
Five, four, three, two, one. Three, five, four, one, two.
He won’t answer my question; I won’t answer his.
I count backwards and out of sequence, mixing up my number colors on a giant piece of white paper in my head. Now I’m painting cobalt blue over the rusty chrome orange.
“Do you want to try a new line of questioning?” my solicitor asks.
“OK, let’s start with this, Jasper. Are these the parakeet paintings you took to Bee Larkham’s house on the evening of April eighth?”
He pushes the plastic-imprisoned pictures towards me. “Some are on paper, some on canvas. You kept them separate from all your other parakeet paintings. You hid them in a black case—an art portfolio, I’m told—beneath the blankets in your den.”
He’s been inside my den?
I haven’t dared look in detail at these paintings since that night—I just peeped inside the portfolio once to check all seven were accounted for. However, I remember the brushstrokes of each.
“I can see the dates on the back of the pictures,” Rusty Chrome Orange says. “You painted them all the week Bee Larkham died. Perhaps you could look at them again? To check if these are the right paintings?”
I don’t want to. I know without examining them they’ll be all wrong, like everything else today. The sunrises will be mixed up with the sunsets, the fights with games of playful chasing. I’m not going to let him wind me up. I don’t want him to win.
“I find these paintings surprising, Jasper, not only because you’re painting the sounds of the parakeets. Do you want to hear what I find surprising?”
No. I start to paint again in my head, splodging delicate smoky blue over his words. I’m not interested in anything he has to say. Rusty Chrome Orange talks anyway.
He keeps repeating the word surprising, and now all I can see is the word’s silvery yellow. My colors aren’t strong enough to paint over its hue.
“I find it surprising you had the presence of mind to collect up all your paintings, the portfolio, and bag of notebooks, and take them home after you accidentally stabbed Miss Larkham to death.”
Rusty chrome orange again, splashing through the silvers and yellows in my head. He’s jumped ahead to me leaving the scene of the crime.
“Your solicitor claims you carried the knife and the paintings home after you stabbed Miss Larkham,” he says. “Is that correct? Or did someone else help you?”
I try again. I streak cobalt blue across my mind. It’s so beautiful. Calming too.
“Before we cautioned you earlier, Jasper, you told us that your dad cleaned up all the blood and moved the body,” Dull Light Green says. “Was he with you at this point? Did he carry the paintings home?”
I cover my eyes and paint a new picture in my head: a parakeet shrieking, demanding that Bee Larkham’s bird feeders are refilled. Will Custard Yellow hear? Has he remembered to feed them? He said he never broke a promise.
“Jasper was specific in our conversation earlier—he carried the knife and paintings home alone,” Leo says. “He put the items in his den for safekeeping and waited for his dad to get home from work.”
“That’s what we need to talk more about, Leo,” Rusty Chrome Orange says. “Where exactly was his dad while this was happening? When did he get home from work? When did he try to help his son? We need to drill down on the timings, who was where, when. Who did what.”
Whitish gray blurry lines.
“Jasper?” Milky coffee.
I take my hands away from my face.
“D.C. Chamberlain wants to talk to you about what happened immediately after the fight with Miss Larkham,” he says.
“OK.”
I stare at the table because I don’t want to look at Rusty Chrome Orange.
“You see, Jasper, the problem is this,” he continues. “We don’t understand how you managed to carry everything yourself without smearing bloody fingerprints on any of these paintings, the portfolio, or the bag of notebooks. You were bleeding from your stomach and also carrying the knife. Forensics tells us that none of your blood was found on the pictures or the bag. How is that possible if you left the house alone, as you claim?”
I have no words. I have no colors; there’s no point pretending I do. I remember the spots of blood on the floor, the spatter down Bee Larkham and me. I don’t know where else the blood ended up.
“Perhaps we could move on,” Leo says.
“Of course,” Rusty Chrome Orange says. “Did y
ou take this painting to Miss Larkham’s house that evening, along with the other seven?”
He pushes a photograph towards me, not a painting, but I recognize the distinctive swirls of paint.
I suck in my breath, bluish white pasta spirals. “Yes. Water splash.”
“Thank you for confirming that, Jasper,” he says. “You see, this painting is different to the others. It interests us most of all.”
I don’t get it. Why does everyone like this painting? Bee Larkham damaged it with a splash of water but still picked it as her favorite. That was the odd part—she loved it because it was flawed.
Like her.
I sigh. Moving translucent lines with a hint of blue.
“Do you know where we found this painting?”
No, I don’t.
“It was hanging on the wall of Miss Larkham’s kitchen,” he says. “Did you see her put it there?”
I hesitate, then shake my head. No, I definitely did not see her put this on the wall.
It must be a lie. He’s trying to trick me.
“A large smear of Miss Larkham’s blood was discovered on the back of this canvas, along with her bloody fingerprints. Again, there was no trace of your blood on this picture.”
“Do you understand what D.C. Chamberlain is saying to you?” my solicitor asks.
No. I move my head from side to side.
He’s talking to Rusty Chrome Orange now. “You’re confusing him. You need to get to the point instead of trying to lead him. Please ask him direct questions.”
“Can you explain how this painting came to be hanging on Bee Larkham’s wall, if you didn’t see her put it there before you killed her?”
Impossible!
Of course I can’t!
How can I possibly do that?
“I’m sorry if we’re muddling you,” Rusty Chrome Orange says. “What we’re trying to clarify is how this canvas got on the kitchen wall.”
I don’t know. I don’t know.
“Did you hang this picture on the wall after you stabbed Miss Larkham? Before you ran from her house?”
No, no, no.
“Did you see anyone else hang up this picture in the kitchen that night?” he continues. “Could it have been your dad? Was he with you in the kitchen when you killed Miss Larkham?”
I cover my eyes with my hands and rock.
I can’t do this. I’m too young. I can’t do this. I’m too young.
“Do you want to say anything in answer to these questions, Jasper?” Leo asks.
“Tell them I want my painting back,” I shout, from beneath my hands. “It doesn’t belong to Bee Larkham. Not now. Not ever. I didn’t see Dad touch it and it couldn’t have been Bee Larkham. Dead people can’t hang up pictures. It’s impossible. Everyone knows that!”
52
Interview: Saturday, April 16, 3:10 P.M.
I’ve had another break with my Appropriate Adult in tow. What’s Dad telling the police? They still haven’t let me see him. That’s because he’s been arrested in connection with the murder of Bee Larkham too. I want to tell him I’m sorry. I’m sorry about everything.
Leo says the detectives are still confused, mainly about how the parakeet paintings got home, who helped me, and who put the painting up on the wall. I need to explain this all over again in as much detail as possible.
I have to work hard to keep everything in the right order this time.
I start straightaway when we meet up again because I don’t want to be told to take it slowly in this interview. I want to get it over and done with, because this is the part that incriminates Dad.
I close my eyes.
I begin.
• • •
Drip, drip, drip.
I’m standing again, holding the knife. Bee Larkham’s on the kitchen floor. She’s not moving.
I don’t remember seeing my parakeet painting hanging on the wall. I see the pattern of blood on the floor. Spot, spot, spot.
I look at the knife. Glint, glint, glint. The parakeets don’t want more cuts. They screech at me to escape.
I run away from dead Bee Larkham’s house.
Over the road and into my house.
Stop! Reverse!
I’ve forgotten all my paintings and notebooks. I hesitate at the bottom of the stairs.
Too late to go back.
I’m the worst soldier in the world. I’ve left my parakeets behind enemy lines. I’ve eaten some and abandoned the others.
I can’t go back, I can’t go back, I can’t go back.
I can’t see the dead parakeet pie.
I can’t see dead Bee Larkham.
Now I’m in my den, blanket pulled down. Entrance closed. I rub and rub and rub a button from Mum’s cardigan. My tummy mouth screams at me: You killed Bee Larkham!
I try to yell to Dad, but nothing comes out of my real mouth. I can’t see any colors in the house. It’s quiet. He’s not back from work.
The knife stays with me in the den, watching over me. My clothes are blood-spattered. I can’t pull them off. My arms don’t work. My mouth doesn’t work. My legs don’t work.
My tummy mouth hurts.
How did Bee kill the twelve parakeets? Did she borrow David Gilbert’s shotgun and shoot them? Did she set a trap? Did they suffer?
When did she kill them? When I was at school? The night I delivered Lucas’s message and she cried? On Thursday night because she’d guessed I’d failed her? Or this morning, when she realized I’d been lying all along?
• • •
The front door bangs shut: a rich brown, loosely rectangular shape.
“It’s me! I’m home!” Muddy Ocher.
I don’t know how long I’ve been alone in the house. I can’t see the clock from inside my den. I can’t move. I can’t look down at the watch strapped to my wrist.
Dad bounds overripe banana colors up the stairs and steps into my bedroom. “Is everything OK in there, Jasper? Have you had your tea?”
Rub, rub, rub.
My tummy mouth screams for help. He doesn’t hear. He’s going to leave.
Come back!
“Call me if you need anything. I’m going to grab a quick bite to eat downstairs.”
Rub, rub, rub.
Dad’s gone.
No. I’m wrong.
The door clicks open again, peanut shell brown. He’s back with a dusky pink creak outside my den.
“There’s blood on the stairs, Jasper. There’s blood on the carpet in here as well. What’s happened? Are you hurt?”
The blanket’s wrenched down. A hand stretches in. I scream ice blue jagged shapes at him.
“Ohmigod. What’s happened? Jesus Christ. Where’s all this blood come from?”
The hand pulls me out. I kick and scream more rough aquamarine crystals. I drop the knife.
“Jasper, Jesus. What have you done to yourself?”
I open my eyes. Now I’m the one on the floor and he’s standing above me with the knife in his hand. He drops it as I lift up my sweatshirt.
“Oh God.” He rips off his shirt and shoves it against my tummy. “I have to stop this bleeding.” He presses harder. “Why, Jasper? Why did you do this to yourself? Was it because I had to work late? Are you punishing me? I’m sorry, Jasper. I couldn’t help it. The meeting ran over.”
He presses harder. Pointy, silver stars stab me all over.
“You’re hurting me!”
“I’m sorry.” His grip on the shirt loosens. “Let me see and I won’t touch this time. I promise. I’ll just look.”
He stares at my tummy. “Thanks, Jasper. You’re doing brilliantly. You’re going to be all right. This looks superficial, but we’re going to need to get you to a doctor to check you out.”
“Bee said . . .”
“Bee said what?”
I stare down at the blood on my hands and sweatshirt. It’s spattered over my jeans and anorak too. How will the stains ever wash out?
“Jasper? Does she know about
this? How does she know?”
“I can’t go to the doctor,” I yell. “Bee says I’ll get us both into trouble.”
“She saw you do this and didn’t call me? She didn’t take you to A & E?”
I’m shaking and crying. Snot runs down my face.
Silence.
“Wait. Did she do this to you?”
“No!” I shout. “I stabbed her because she deserved it.”
“Jasper!” He picks up the knife again. “Did you hurt Bee with this?”
“I’m too young. I can’t do this. I’m too young. I can’t do this. I’m too young.”
“Oh God.” He rushes over to the window. “The light’s on in her front room. I can’t see an ambulance parked outside. Maybe you didn’t hurt her badly? What were you arguing about?”
I’m rocking forwards and backwards, forwards and backwards.
“Parakeets.”
“Jesus. How badly did you hurt her, Jasper? Can you remember? Does she need to go to hospital as well?”
I close my eyes to keep out the color, but the red seeps behind my eyelids.
“Stop it, you’re killing me!”
Dad drops the knife and sinks to the carpet, beside me. “It could be a mistake. You could have made a mistake. Couldn’t you?”
I want to be sick. I retch repeatedly, but I can’t bring anything up.
“I’ll get you cleaned up and then I’ll go over the road,” he says. “I’ll sort it, I promise. I’ll sort Bee. I’ll call the police and an ambulance when I know how bad it is.”
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”
He pulls me to my feet and steers me to the bathroom.
“What about that?” I turn and point at the weapon on the carpet.
“Don’t worry. I’ll get rid of the knife and your clothes. You won’t have to see them ever again.”
He turns on the shower tap and doesn’t wait for me to answer.
“This changes everything, Jasper. I can’t take you to a doctor until I’ve checked on Bee. I can patch up your stomach with tape, and we need to stop any infection. We have antibiotics so we can manage it. I saw far worse in the Royal Marines, right? We’ll come through this.” He sits me down on the side of the bath and undresses me, slowly peeling off my clothes. “When I’m done, I’m going to give you some painkillers and half a sleeping tablet. When you wake up tomorrow morning, this nightmare will be over and I’ll have sorted Bee Larkham. Do you understand?”
The Color of Bee Larkham's Murder Page 28