by Rebecca Tope
‘It’s true about Daisy,’ said Harry. ‘Martin worked hard on her, and now she’s a model citizen.’
‘But Susanna?’
Harry shook his head. ‘We all thought Susanna was doing fine. It seems we were wrong.’
Thea snorted. ‘She’s a complete psychopath. She’s off the scale.’ Thea’s fists clenched, and she began to sweat. ‘I never saw anything as evil as her when she was holding that knife.’
‘She was very badly addicted to heroin in her twenties. It probably did permanent damage.’ James spoke gently, almost, Thea felt, reproachfully.
‘Are you defending her? She killed two young men. She stabbed my dog!’
‘She wanted to save Fairweather Farm,’ said Harry, slowly, as if assembling his thoughts as he uttered them. ‘She owed her life to it. She was devoted to Isabel and Martin. It was the first time anybody had given her any responsibility, and it matured her remarkably. She was a dreadfully spoilt little girl – I remember it only too well.’
‘If you’re talking about Susanna, I’ll second that. She was a holy terror at school, according to some of the Old Girls I know,’ came a voice from the doorway. Thea turned to see June standing there, holding a teatowel. Their eyes met. ‘Hello, Thea,’ she said. ‘I’ve been in the kitchen. I thought I’d let you talk to your brother-in-law for a few minutes.’
Thea didn’t reply. She was still sweating as well as beginning to shake. The mug rattled against her teeth when she tried to take a swig of tea.
June went to her, squatting on the floor putting an arm across her legs. ‘Steady!’ she advised. ‘It’s all OK now.’
‘But—’ Thea didn’t know what to say.
‘Let me tell you about Susanna,’ June said. ‘She was famously badly behaved all through her teens and twenties. Her father bought her a fast car, a horse and a husband. She destroyed all of them, in the process of destroying herself. People did everything they could to stay out of her way. Then the Staceys arrived, and somehow got through to her when nobody else could. We never worked out how they did it, but it looked like a miracle. That was ages before the network got going, but it probably sowed the seeds for it. When Susanna took up with Joel, we were worried, obviously, but it all seemed to be working out. She inherited money from an uncle, and put it into Fairweather – the same as Helen and others did. They were always getting donations from grateful families.
‘But she was always pushing Joel – and Paul – to do more for the place. She wanted them to give an evening of their time to working with the addicts. The system involves learning new skills, understanding that there’s a world full of possibility waiting for them – that sort of stuff. But Joel and Paul were both completely unconvinced. They disagreed with the whole basis of the way it operated. Paul dabbled with pot when he was younger, and had plenty of friends who were into drugs. He wrote an article about it—’
‘Yes, I know,’ said Thea, with a glance at James. ‘It’s on the internet.’
‘Good grief! Well, his ideas only got stronger, and Joel shared them. When Felicity Winstanley went back on the crack and dropped out of sight, that proved to them that the Staceys were charlatans.’
‘But not Helen? Helen stuck with them?’
‘She hadn’t much choice. It was her only hope of finding her daughter again.’
‘And you knew all this? About Susanna and everything? What about her affair with Clive?’
June rested her face lightly on Thea’s lap. ‘I never even dreamt,’ she mumbled. ‘Not in a million years, that she shot Paul. And the thing with Clive was blown up out of all proportion by Lionel. He should never have told Joel about it, silly old sod.’
‘So he never suspected her of killing Paul?’
‘Not at the time. He never liked her, but he didn’t ever connect her with Paul’s death. We all thought it was just some poacher from town.’
‘But why Joel? I mean, why such a long gap between them?’
‘We’re still guessing, but we think she must have believed he was going to try and get the place closed. He had made some threats. Jennifer was involved, trying to force Fairweather to go public, get the Social Services to take it over, and have the whole thing properly registered and monitored. Ironically, nobody on either side wanted that. She put herself right out on a limb.’
Thea looked at James. ‘Then you’ve got your woman? Is Hollis happy?’
James sucked his teeth in prevarication and glanced at Harry Richmond. ‘I’m not sure happy is quite the word.’ He looked around the room. ‘None of you knows this yet, but Susanna almost had the last word. She picked up the knife, as you were running off to the vet, and stabbed herself with it.’
The collective gasp seemed to empty the room of air. ‘Is she dead?’ June whispered.
‘Not quite, last I heard. I called Hollis just before you got here. She’s in intensive care.’
Thea groaned at the tangled ironies and ethics, unable quite to utter the thought that Susanna might well be better off dead.
‘And there’s somebody by her bedside who won’t let go of her hand,’ he added. ‘The person, we believe, who helped her wheel Joel’s body down the field and into that pool. The person, perhaps, who Susanna was most fiercely defending all along.’
‘Martin Stacey?’ Thea supplied.
‘No, not Martin,’ James told her. ‘Isabel.’
Thea almost let it lie there, but remembered images prompted her to seek full clarification.
‘You don’t mean they were lovers? Do you?’
‘Not that, no,’ June said, with a glance towards Harry for his confirmation.
‘Right,’ he said. ‘Nobody doubts the strength of Isabel and Martin’s marriage. No – it’s a closer bond than a sexual relationship. Isabel understands Susanna’s pain, you see. And, more than that, Susanna understands Isabel’s.’ He looked down at June. ‘You tell her,’ he said.
‘It was eight years ago. Susanna was at her lowest point. She was out in her fast car, driving like a lunatic, when she turned it over in a ditch. Isabel found her, and hauled her out before the car caught fire. Saved her wretched life for her.’
‘Wow!’ Thea breathed.
‘That’s not the point, though. Isabel was pregnant at the time, about eighteen weeks, after a string of early miscarriages. She was supposed to take it easy. She lost the baby. She’s never conceived again since then. These druggie kids are a kind of substitute for her. It isn’t surprising that she’d fight to keep the whole thing going.’
Thea closed her eyes, tasting the reproach, the guilt, the sheer unspeakable agonies. She reached blindly for Harry Richmond’s warm hand.
‘I see,’ she said. ‘Poor people.’
Harry gripped her fingers, giving them a little shake. ‘Hang on,’ he urged her. ‘Isabel’s going to gaol for a while, but I bet you Martin’s not going to give up. It’s good work they do, and now it’s all going to be out in the open, some good people will come forward to help.’
Thea smiled shakily. ‘Like you?’
He shifted on the cushions. ‘Better than me, I hope.’
James Osborne cleared his throat. ‘Harry’s right,’ he said. ‘In the long run, this might all be for the best.’
Thea looked slowly from face to face, absorbing the concern, the reassurance and admiration they were all showing her. ‘Thanks,’ she said.
Table of Contents
Cover
Title
Copyright
About the author
Available from Allison & Busby
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Dedication
The Cotswolds
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR