She's Out

by La Plante, Lynda

  ‘No, and you’re hitting the bottle a bit too hard.’ Ester pushed back her chair angrily.

  ‘Where you going?’ Gloria asked Ester.

  ‘To the toilet, if that’s all right with you.’ Ester opened the kitchen door silently and peered into the hall.

  ‘Don’t go in there, Ester,’ Connie said hesitantly, but she was already out, listening at the drawing room door.

  Craigh was still standing with his back to the fire, and Dolly was sitting in a big, old winged armchair. She gave a soft laugh. ‘So what you here for? You want to make a deal, is that it?’

  Ester froze. The kitchen door opened wider and Gloria peeped out. Ester hurried across, pushing her inside. ‘She’s making a fucking deal with them,’ she hissed.

  ‘What?’ Julia said in disbelief.

  ‘I just heard her. Connie, get out the back and see if they’re alone – see if they got any back-up. Go on, do it.’

  Connie opened the back door and slipped out. Gloria had dodged behind Ester and gone into the hall to listen for herself. Ester followed and pulled at her arm. ‘Go and search her room,’ she whispered. Gloria glared but Ester pushed her hard, pressing her ear against the door.

  Dolly’s voice could be heard clearly. ‘No way! You must be joking. I’ll do a deal but not for a quarter. Let’s say half.’

  Craigh looked at Palmer and then back to Dolly. ‘You’ll get it in cash.’

  ‘Oh, it has to be cash,’ Dolly said. She got up from the chair and moved closer to Craigh. ‘Fifty per cent.’

  ‘I can’t do that,’ Craigh said louder.

  Ester dived back into the kitchen as Gloria scuttled down the stairs after her.

  ‘Look at this lot! Fucking passports – she’s got Kathleen’s kids on hers and there’s one for Angela.’

  Julia could feel her legs turning to jelly. ‘Oh, shit.’

  Ester pushed at Julia. ‘She’s doing a deal for fifty per cent of the cash, I just heard her. She’s going to shop the lot of us! How much proof do you want?’

  Ester shoved the passports under Julia’s nose and then looked back at the closed door. ‘Right. We got to get that money. You, Julia, get Gloria’s car, get over to Norma’s, take Gloria with you.’

  Connie came back in from the yard shaking. There are police in the lane with dogs and some up in the woods but they’re not heading towards us, they’re just sort of patrolling as usual.’

  ‘Shit.’ Ester walked to the deep freeze and opened it. She delved inside, brought out a huge twenty-pound frozen turkey and carried it to the sink, turning on the hot water. Julia was putting on her coat, heading for the back door, as Ester removed a .45 pistol from the inside of the bird. She dug further inside and brought out the cartridges.

  Julia grabbed her wrist. ‘Jesus Christ, Ester, what are you doing?’

  ‘She’s selling us right down the river! What the hell do you think I’m doing? Go and get the money, get as much as you can, and we’re getting out of here. I said we couldn’t trust her! I warned you! Now do it.’

  Again Julia hesitated but Gloria gave her a shove. ‘I’ll come with you, let’s go.’

  Dolly was chuckling at Craigh as he tried to deal, and then she patted his arm. ‘All right, you win, gimme three grand and we’ll call it quits. You should have been a market trader, you know. But it’s got to be cash.’

  On Dolly’s last line, just as she placed her hand on Craigh’s arm, Ester walked in, the gun held in her right hand, her arm pressed close to her body.

  Dolly turned, smiling towards Ester. She was feeling so good and confident because she knew now they had nothing to worry about. Craigh and Palmer weren’t there because of the robbery and she couldn’t wait to have a laugh about it with them all. Then she saw the gun. It was all over within seconds. Dolly was faster to register Ester’s intention than either police officer and, as she lifted the gun to fire at Craigh, Dolly moved forward, protecting him with her body as she screamed one word. ‘No!’

  She felt the scorching red-hot explosion as if it came from inside her, and her blood splattered Ester’s face, making DCI Craigh take an involuntary step backwards, arms up to brace himself as if he was to be hit next. Palmer sidestepped at the same time and red dots of Dolly’s blood speckled his shirt. Ester’s body was rigid, her teeth clenched, her arm still outstretched. She pulled the trigger again. The second bullet spun Dolly a half-step backwards and everything began to blur. She could hear a distant, distorted voice and she saw her own face.

  ‘I have never committed a criminal act in my life.’ The board of directors looked towards the straight-backed Dorothy Rawlins.

  Ester fired the third bullet.

  ‘No, I killed someone who betrayed me, there’s a difference, Julia.’

  Ester pulled the trigger again.

  No pain now, she was urging her horse forward, loving the feel of the cold morning air on her face, enjoying the fact that she had succeeded in learning not only to ride but gallop flat out and jump hedges and ditches – at her age.

  Ester fired again, her terror growing with every fragmented second.

  Dolly’s shirt was seeping blood and she still remained on her feet, but the impact of the fourth shot had, yet again, forced her backwards. The images and echoes of voices were fainter and she could only just make out the figure in an old brown coat standing by a garden gate. ‘It’s me, Dorothy, it’s your auntie. Your mum won’t talk about it but that young lad, he’s no good. You got a good life ahead of you, grammar-school scholarship.’

  At the sixth bullet, her body buckled at the knees, her hands hanging limply at her sides. ‘I’ll always be here for you, Doll, you know that. I’ll always love you, take care of you. Come on, open your arms wide and hold me, hold me, sweetheart, that’s my girl. Come on, come to me, it’s all over now.’

  At last she lay still. In death her face looked older: there was no expression – it was already a mask. Her mouth hung open, and her eyes were wide, staring sightlessly. The shooting had taken only the time it took for Ester to fire six shots at point-blank range, but in those seconds Dolly Rawlins’s life flashed from the present to the past. She had died a violent death like her beloved husband. She had not been expecting it; she had been confident, proud of herself and looking forward to a future, looking to make her dreams of a children’s home come true. Maybe that had all been a fantasy, maybe this was how it was meant to end. Fate had drawn these women together, and it was fate that it was Ester who killed her, Ester, who she had never really trusted. She had taken such care of them all, checking her back and sides just like Harry had done. And yet, like him, she had faced death straight on, face forward.

  Now her cheek lay on the old, dirty, stained carpet, blood trickling from her mouth and her body lying half curled in the foetal position. Her death had been as ugly as her husband’s, the only difference being that she had never betrayed anyone.

  The sound of the shots brought the officers in the woods running towards the house, shouting into their radios as the others in the lane turned back towards the manor. A patrol car had already received the call and they in turn radioed for further assistance.

  Within minutes, the manor was surrounded. Gloria and Julia were hauled out of the Mini, Connie was arrested halfway up the stairs, and Ester was handcuffed to DCI Craigh. She said not one word but stared vacantly ahead, her face drained of colour.

  One by one the women were led to the waiting patrol cars and taken away. They were in a state of shocked confusion. None of them spoke or looked at each other.

  Dolly Rawlins lay where she had been shot, a deep, dark pool of blood spreading across the threadbare carpet. She had been covered by a sheet taken from the linen closet. It was covered in bloodstains. Angela sat huddled with the little girls. They had heard the gunfire but did not understand what had taken place. For the time being, Angela was allowed to remain with the children but down stairs the house was full of movement and police, plainclothed and uniformed, were outs
ide in the grounds, watching the women being led out.

  Dolly Rawlins’s body was removed, after a doctor had testified she was dead, and taken directly to the mortuary. Angela saw the stretcher from the little girls’ bedroom window. They stared down, not understanding, and then Sheena asked Angela if she would read their favourite story, The Three Little Piggies.

  The big bad wolf huffed and he puffed but no matter how hard he tried, he could not blow the house down.’ The tears trickled down Angela’s face as she closed the book. It was the end of the story.

  The old coal chute at Norma’s Rose Cottage, with its door dated 1842, was never opened by the police. Cemented into the wall and bricked in from the cellar, there seemed little point. It remained a rather kitsch feature of the ‘olde worlde’ cottage. Therefore no one discovered the sixteen black bin liners, each tied tightly at the neck, each containing millions of pounds in untraceable notes. Sixteen heavy-duty, black bin liners, tied tightly at the neck.