by Leo McNeir
“I enjoy it, maybe because it is so different. People change. You’ve changed. I’m surprised at you writing poetry.”
“Why not? I did English at university. It’s not so strange. Anyway, I had a lot of time on my hands for quite a while. Eventually I saw a therapist who encouraged me to write, to help get things out of my system.”
”What sort of poems do you write?”
“All sorts. Lately I’ve taken up haiku.”
“Haiku? What’s that?”
“It’s a Japanese form. They’re very short poems, usually just seventeen syllables in three lines. Five, seven, five. No rhyming. It’s not as easy as you’d think. They’re very intense. Every word counts.”
“When do you find time to write them?”
“Odd moments, at an airport, on a plane, having a drink, any time. Sometimes they come to me in a flash, other times it’s harder. But they’ve helped me come to terms with things.”
The gate they had closed began to swing open. Simon leaned on the balance beam to push it back into place.
“Don’t worry about that,” said Marnie. “There’s nothing you can do about it. Just let it go.”
*
Ronny and Anne were sitting together. They had laughed like children when Ronny had made a dog’s breakfast of putting up a deckchair. Now they were drinking chilled fruit juice in the sunshine.
“Haven’t you got A Levels some time soon?” said Anne.
Ronny grimaced. “Next week. Don’t remind me.”
“Er ...”
“I know, I know. Just a short break from revision. Where’s Marnie?”
“You’re changing the subject.”
“I was just curious.”
“She’s gone for a pub lunch with ... a friend.”
“Her ex-husband?”
Anne stared at him. “How did you know that?”
“It’s all round the village.”
“But he only phoned this morning. Are we wired for sound and hooked up to a loudspeaker in the high street?”
“Everybody knows he’s around. He was in the shop a few days ago. It’s no secret.”
“We’re becoming a regular soap opera,” said Anne.
Ronny laughed. “That’s what my mum says. She reckons the place was boring until you two arrived. Oh, sorry.”
*
Marnie and Simon strolled back towards the pub and stopped on the bridge spanning the cut. They looked down over the parapet. The sun was shining directly onto the canal, and a shoal of tiny fish was lit up in the cloudy water.
“This is very much your world now, isn’t it, Marnie? Are you happy?”
Marnie watched the fish swirling about. “Yes.”
“And that was your ... what do you call him ... your partner, that I saw on your boat the other day?”
Marnie turned to face Simon. “The man on the boat? No. That wasn’t Ralph.”
“Ralph,” he repeated. “I just assumed ... it looked such a cosy domestic scene.”
“You didn’t recognise him?”
“Should I have?”
She hesitated. “It’s confidential, a secret. You know about Anthony Leyton-Brown?”
Simon thought about it. “The man in the paper, the MP who’s gone missing?”
“Yes.”
“You’re not involved with him, surely?”
“Not in the way you mean. He’s staying on a boat next to Ralph’s. We’ve been trying to persuade him to come out of hiding and go back to his wife. She’s having to face everything alone.”
“I can’t help thinking you were better off with me,” Simon said quietly.
“What do you mean?”
“At least you didn’t get nearly murdered, go round finding bodies and end up harbouring stray weirdoes. Why did this guy come to you, anyway?”
“He’s a friend of Ralph’s.”
“I see. And Ralph ... he’s a permanent fixture?”
“It’s a permanent relationship, yes.”
“Okay.” Simon ran a hand through his hair. Marnie thought she saw a few touches of grey at the temples. He was one of those men who age well. In ten or twenty years he’d still look good. Like Ralph.
“Thank you for lunch, Simon.”
“You’re welcome.” He turned towards the pub car park. Marnie did not move. “You coming?”
“You go ahead. I want to get something from the museum shop over there.”
“Okay. See you around. Take care of yourself.” He kissed her on both cheeks and went off without looking back.
*
They both heard the car pull up at the same time. Anne knew at once that it was not Marnie’s MG. It had a distinctive growl, and Marnie always blipped the accelerator before switching off the ignition.
“Is that her now?” said Ronny.
“No. It’ll be Ralph, I expect.”
They heard doors slamming, and Ralph came past carrying a cardboard box that looked heavy. He spotted them and called out cheerfully, asking Anne if she was feeling better..
Ronny watched Ralph head off through the spinney with his load. “Is he really a professor at Oxford? He seems so normal.”
“Ralph’s great,” said Anne. She smiled at Ronny. “Another star in the soap opera?”
*
Marnie admired the MG as she walked back to the pub car park, reaching in her pocket for the keys. She loved driving it in this weather.
She was just musing on the need to find a modern car before the end of summer, when she noticed something attached by an elastic band to the leather sleeve round the base of the gear lever. At first she thought it was one of Anne’s interminable lists that she had failed to see when she left the office. That girl! She pulled it out from the elastic. It was just three lines. She read it carefully and frowned.
Almost bearable
You, heartachingly lovely
One day at a time
She counted the syllables on her fingertips, like playing a scale on the piano. Five, seven, five. Haiku. Sayonara, Simon, she thought. But as things turned out, she was wrong.
*
This time, Anne knew it was Marnie. She heard the little car roll into the garage barn, waited for the brief growl from the engine and the light clunk from the door. She looked up, expecting Marnie to come round the corner at any minute. There was her light footfall on the gravel and Marnie walked straight towards the spinney in the direction of Sally Ann. For a second Anne was going to call after her. But there was something about Marnie’s demeanour that made her hold back.
“She doesn’t know we’re here,” said Ronny.
“No.”
He watched Marnie disappearing into the spinney. “Can we have a look at her car?”
Anne held out a hand. “Help me up, then.”
Ronny tried to keep hold of the hand once Anne was on her feet, but she turned to put the magazine on the deckchair and he had to let go. Ronny shook his head as they approached the MG.
“Wicked,” he muttered. He ran his hand over the top of the leather driver’s seat and on to the four-spoke steering wheel. “You can smell the engine,” he said. “It comes through the louvres in the bonnet. It’s like hot oil. Brilliant.” He was beaming.
Anne leaned forward to sniff near the steering wheel and caught sight of a bag lying on the floor in the passenger’s foot well. She reached into the cockpit to pull it out. The bag contained a magazine and a packet of ice creams that were going soft.
“What’s that?” said Ronny.
“Just a few things from the shop. Fancy a choc ice?”
“Great.”
“Happy, now you’ve seen the car?”
“Sure. It’s not the reason I came, though.” He looked at the MG. “It’s a bit dusty. Pity.”
Anne turned towards the office barn. “I want to get the rest of these into the freezer.”
“Tell you what,” Ronny began. “Why don’t I give the MG a quick clean? Marnie would like that, pay you back for the ice cream
.”
Ronny rummaged around for cleaning materials in the barn’s kitchen area while Anne put the ice creams in the freezer compartment. His thoughts were fixed on British Racing Green bodywork and shiny wire wheels. Anne was wondering what it was that had made Marnie so pre-occupied that she had left her shopping to melt in the car.
*
It surprised a number of drivers on the main road leading towards the M1 when a Mercedes travelling at high speed suddenly braked heavily and dived into a lay-by, dust and dirt flying up from its wheels. The car remained stationary for a moment or two before making a U-turn and accelerating hard back in the direction from which it had come.
Minutes later, people turned to look as the silver Mercedes drove through Knightly St John. The few villagers in the high street recognised the car and knew who the driver was, even if they could not see the man behind the tinted windows. Most thought it was going faster than it should, as it sped towards the field track that led down to Glebe Farm.
*
Ronny could not resist the handles that held the old car’s bonnet in place. They were the shape of teardrops, two on each side of the engine. Each had the MG octagon badge moulded into it at the thicker end. He gripped them and turned.
“Surely, you’re not going to wash the engine, Ronny,” Anne said. She had planned to sit nearby in her deckchair and give him moral support while he worked.
“Just wanted a peek under the bonnet.” He lifted the lid and pulled it towards him. It was hinged along its full length for folding flat on top of the engine compartment. Still lifting it, he called out, “Oh, look at that! There’s even an MG badge on the top of the dipstick.” He let go with one hand and pointed inside at the stubby handle, half-turning to see if Anne was looking. As he did so, he lost his grip and the bonnet fell. Anne winced as the edge of the lid slammed down on the back of Ronny’s right hand. She heard him grunt with pain as he struggled to release the pressure.
Anne leapt from the deckchair, forgetting her own discomfort. She seized the bonnet lid and pulled it clear. Ronny grasped his hand to his chest, the colour draining from his face.
“Shit!” he muttered. “Oh, sorry.” His face was contorted with pain.
Anne held him by the shoulders, her mind racing. What should she do? What if he’d broken his wrist? She had stopped noticing that her legs were stinging. “Can you make it to the office barn?”
“Yeah,” he croaked, rubbing the back of his wrist.
“Do you think you’ve broken anything?”
“Dunno, hurts like bugg- ... like hell.”
Anne sat him down in the office, quickly soaking a tea towel in cold water to wrap round his wrist. Thank God for tea towels, she thought. She had an idea that a cold compress was the first treatment for this kind of injury, but had no idea what to do next. She picked up the phone and pressed the button for Marnie’s mobile.
A minute later Marnie arrived like the Seventh Cavalry. Anne explained what had happened as she inspected the damage. Ronny was mesmerised at the sight of Marnie’s slim tapering fingers delicately probing his wrist. He confirmed that the pain was throbbing but bearable and that he was not going to faint. He did not tell her he was now wishing he had been injured all over.
When asked if he could move his fingers, Ronny wiggled them cautiously. When Marnie asked if he could grip her hand, he managed to squeeze it with moderate firmness and waited until he was asked to let go before relinquishing it. After he had performed a few light wrist movements, Marnie announced that he was likely to survive with nothing worse than bruising. She applied witch hazel from the first aid kit, easing the gel into the damaged area with her fingertips, and rounded off the treatment with a tubigrip bandage.
Finally, she asked if he would like her to drive him home in the MG. To her surprise, he said he would prefer to sit out for a while with Anne.
Marnie muttered, “I think he’s on the mend.”
*
Once Ronny and Anne were settled in deckchairs, eating ice creams, Marnie tidied up in the office. Ralph called in and put the kettle on while Marnie told him about the accident.
“I might as well leave the first aid kit on my desk. This place is turning into a field hospital.” She sighed. “What a day! I feel like I’ve been through a shredder.”
“That came from the heart,” Ralph said. “It was only a minor accident, surely. He’ll have a swelling and a bruise. It won’t stop him doing his exams.”
“I wasn’t thinking of Ronny. It was the rest of the day.”
“Would it help to talk? Or do you need caffeine first? Perhaps I ought to get you a brandy.”
Marnie smiled weakly. “Yes, it would help, talking I mean, not the brandy. We’ll have that later.”
“You’re on. So what was so bad about your day?”
“Well, I had a phone call this morning ...” Before she could continue, they heard a car approaching fast, sliding on the gravel beside the barn. “That’s all I need. I expect this is Inspector Bartlett coming to raid us for protecting a fugitive.”
Ralph looked out of the window. “It’s not the police, not unless they have a contract with Mercedes for their cars.”
“That’ll be Simon,” said Marnie. She heard footsteps running across the yard and prepared herself for a dramatic entrance.
“Simon?” said Ralph. “As in ... your ex?”
“The same.”
Simon burst into the office. “Marnie, have you heard? It was just on the radio as I was going home.”
“What was?”
“On the news bulletin.” He caught sight of Ralph standing to one side. “Er ...”
“It’s all right,” said Marnie. “You can talk freely. What was it?”
“It’s about your visitor.”
“Leyton-Brown? Go on.”
Simon walked over to Marnie. “It was about his wife. She’s ... committed suicide.”
Marnie put her hands to her mouth. “Oh my god.”
Ralph said, “You heard this just now?”
“Yes, just after leaving Marnie. You didn’t know?”
“No.”
Marnie said to Ralph, “Do you think Anthony knows about this?”
“No idea. I haven’t seen him at all today.”
“I expect she couldn’t take the strain any longer,” Marnie said. “Poor soul.”
“Look,” said Ralph. “I’d better go and see if he’s all right. I’ll break the news to him if he hasn’t heard it already.”
“Do you want me to come with you?”
Ralph hesitated. “No. I’ll go. I’ll get down there straight away. I’ll keep you posted.”
For a few moments Marnie almost forgot that Simon was there. She was thinking about the anguish of Melissa Leyton-Brown, alone and abandoned to face the world with her husband’s disgrace, without her husband.
“So that was Ralph, was it?” said Simon.
*
Ralph walked quickly through the spinney, not running, keeping himself in check. He did not want to arrive breathless and make a dramatic entrance that would only make matters worse. In his mind he was preparing what to say to Anthony. There was no easy way to do this.
He stepped across the bow of Thyrsis and edged his way along the gunwale between the two boats. The central doors in the side of the grey boat were closed, and he moved slowly towards the stern. The hatch over the steerer’s door slid silently when he pushed it. Leaning forward, he called out softly into the cabin.
“Anthony?” He waited. “It’s Ralph. May I come aboard?”
No reply. He stepped down into the boat and walked past the engine compartment. The sleeping cabin was empty, the bed unmade. He passed the open door of the bathroom and continued on towards the galley and the saloon, calling quietly as he went.
“Anthony?”
The galley was empty, a few dishes drying on the draining board, a smell of something indefinable in the air, alcohol perhaps. Ralph looked through to the saloon. A cup and
saucer stood on the table. The name Mary Celeste drifted through his mind. On the wall above the workbench was a notepad. He tore off a page and moved into the saloon to write a message. As he began to sit at the table he saw the body lying on the floor.
*
Marnie and Simon were out of the office barn in a second and raced through the spinney in response to Ralph’s call. They clambered onto the grey boat and found Ralph speaking to the emergency operator on the phone. Marnie rushed forward into the saloon. Anthony was on the floor, half curled into a ball. Beside him lay a whisky bottle and two bottles for tablets, all empty. Simon stood over Marnie as she crouched beside the body. She leaned forward and touched Anthony’s hand. It was still warm. Pressing her fingers against the side of his neck, trying to find an artery, she looked up quickly.
“He’s alive!”
Simon squatted down, took Anthony’s wrist and nodded. “Come on! Let’s get him out of here.” To Ralph he called out, “Tell them not to bother about the ambulance. No time. We’re taking him in to the nearest hospital. It’s his only chance.”
Unceremoniously, Simon grabbed Anthony, turned him over and pulled him upright, lifting him awkwardly to his feet in the confined space. They looked like drunken dancers as Simon dragged Anthony through to the cabin doors. Ralph brought his conversation with the operator to an end and climbed out ahead of Simon, reaching down to pull Anthony through the doorway, holding him while Simon scrambled out. Together, they manhandled the silent form along the gunwales to the bows where Simon hoisted Anthony over his shoulder in a fireman’s lift.
Marnie ran on ahead, shouting over her shoulder. “I’ll get the car.”
Simon bore his burden swiftly through the trees with Ralph following behind. They reached the garage barn as Marnie arrived from the office clutching a bunch of car keys.
“Where’s your car?” Simon yelled, breathlessly.