‘Yes, I’m certain. Come in.’ She closed the door and was suddenly shy. ‘What was all that about?’ she said, indicating the argument with the taxi driver.
‘I had to get a cab.’
She assumed he’d had a breakdown. ‘You shouldn’t have bothered tonight, we could have talked about it in the morning.’
‘What? Don’t be silly! I wanted to see with my own eyes that you were all right. I wanted to get down as fast as I could.’
Slowly it dawned on her. ‘You don’t mean you took a cab from London?’
‘There was no other way. Either that or walk. Haven’t you heard the news?’
She shook her head. ‘I’ve kept away from that.’
‘You must have wondered what the hell I was up to, why I wasn’t down hours ago! A bomb went off at Clapham Junction. The whole of the southern rail network was shut down. All the major stations.’
‘Have you been to the prison?’
‘No, I came straight here. The first I knew about it was when I saw a paper at Waterloo. No one seemed to know when the station would reopen so I jumped into a cab. Of course the traffic by that time was horrendous. So . . . anyway . . . tell me.’
‘Let me get you a drink. Have you eaten?’
‘I had a pie in the cab. But a Scotch would be marvellous.’ He flung himself into a chair. ‘I felt terrible for you!’
‘It’s all over now.’ She handed him the drink.
‘Tell me,’ he said.
She started with Stephanie, for that was the beginning, and she saw his face stiffen into a frown. She thought he might want to talk about her first but he said she should go on; they could come back to Stephanie. So she told him about Ida Tribe and her fall and then, in detail, what had happened. She told him in even greater detail than she had told the police, and that helped her, too.
Halfway through he rose and began to pace and when she finished he stood over her chair and put his fingers on her cheek in the way that her father sometimes did and said, ‘Poor you.’
He sat and stretched out his legs. After a moment he said, ‘So we’re to blame, are we?’
‘No one’s actually said that, but they’ve implied it.’
‘At this point everyone’s rushing about looking for scapegoats. The Home Office will be catching it in the neck from the police; the prison service will be getting it from both; and we’ll be the targets for everyone; we’re the soft option. The point is, it’s happened before in a similar kind of way. The taxis are the weak link; no radio contact with the prison. If we had our own secure vehicles with radios it wouldn’t happen so easily. But it’s too expensive.’ He lay back and rubbed his hair. ‘My God, what a horror.’
‘You were right all along,’ she said.
‘In what way?’
‘Billy Sweete was having us on. I remember when you made me play devil’s advocate; you were talking about the secret part of the human mind where the thoughts are controlled and hidden from people like us. That’s what he was doing.’
‘Telling us something but not all of it. Something just bizarre enough for us to get our teeth into. There was always one door that was closed to us.’
‘The door to Bluebeard’s room.’
‘What?’
She repeated what Sweete had said.
She offered him another drink but he shook his head. ‘I must be going.’ He rose and she rose with him. He hesitated, then said, ‘I’m sorry about Steffie.’
‘I wouldn’t have told you but I thought you should be prepared. Anyway, it’s not your fault.’
‘Yes it is. She’s been to the house since you saw her. She talks as though she’s only been away for a fortnight’s holiday. She said how much she’d like to redo my sitting-room.’
Anne felt a stab of jealousy. She remembered her own reaction to that room.
He went on, ‘She talked as though we were having an affair and when I denied it she didn’t really believe me.’
Anne found herself flushing.
‘There’s something wrong with her. I think I’d always suspected it but now . . . I mean, it’s been six years . . .’
‘Where’s she living?’
‘In London. She was married to a merchant banker in France but that’s ended in divorce, too. I’m afraid this is something I’m going to have to live with for a while. I just don’t want you bothered.’
‘Don’t worry about me. I can look after myself.’
He nodded. ‘Of course you can.’ Then he said, as much to himself as to Anne, ‘There’s a theory that some men marry the mirror images of their mothers. I went to some lengths not to do that, but it turned out Steffie was a bolter. She wanted an “open” marriage. In fact, in that respect she was exactly like my mother. She’d hop into bed with anyone. The trouble was I was working in a partnership and she hopped into bed with my partners. It became intolerable. That’s why I joined the prison service. We’d broken up by then but we weren’t divorced and there was talk of us getting back together. I knew what would happen; she’d wreck any partnership. The service gave a kind of protection against that, plus long leaves so I could get away into—’
‘The far blue yonder.’
‘Precisely. As far into the blue yonder as I could.’
There was a cry from upstairs and Anne said, ‘That’s Hilly.’
She went up. Hilly had been dreaming, and Anne held her for a moment and pulled up the blankets. In a matter of seconds Hilly’s thumb was in her mouth and she was asleep again.
Anne turned away from the bed in the half light of the room. Tom was standing at the door. ‘That’s what I always wanted,’ he said.
‘What?’
‘A family.’
He left soon after that. She’d offered him the sofa downstairs, offered to ring for a cab, but he’d refused both. His Land Rover was up at the prison and he said he needed a walk.
She stood on the top step of the house. He took a few paces, then turned. ‘You’re not going to resign, are you?’ he said.
‘No. Apart from anything else I owe quite a lot of money and I want to repay it as quickly as possible.’
‘Can I help?’
‘No. But thanks for offering.’
He raised his hand. ‘Thank God you’re all right.’
He paused. She looked at him. The word ‘stay’ formed in her mouth. It would be so easy. But she didn’t speak. He nodded as though he understood, waved, and turned away, and she watched his lanky, long-striding figure go up the street towards the castle, leaning into the cold night wind.
*
Henry was ironing when Dr Thorpe arrived. He had covered the kitchen table with a blanket and was ironing on that. Thorpe was fascinated.
‘That’s how my mother used to do it,’ he said. ‘She loved a big table. I use an ironing board.’
Henry, who was dressed in evening trousers, a heavy sweater and fleece-lined boots, said, ‘I can’t stand ironing boards.’
‘I quite agree.’
‘The things always seem to collapse.’
‘You want to do what I do. I’ve got one set up permanently in a cupboard. I’ve bolted it to the wall.’
‘My daughter won’t let me bolt things to walls. I’m not sure why. Anyway, let me get you a drink. I can’t match your claret but I’ve got a decent single malt and it’s past five.’
They went down to Henry’s flat where the ranks of African curios still waited to be placed as decorations.
‘What a splendid room,’ Dr Thorpe said.
‘Anne keeps on at me to tidy it.’
‘But it is tidy.’
‘Of course it is.’
Dr Thorpe sipped his whisky and, after a false start, said, ‘You were good enough to come all the way to Bath and take an interest in Jason so I thought it only right that you should know what’s happening now. I’ve been to see him.’
‘I’m glad.’
‘He’s changed. There’s a kind of calmness about him. I suppose a psychiatris
t would say it was a catharsis, that killing that man Sweete was like killing his father, exorcising all those demons.’
‘Psychiatrists will say anything,’ Henry said, dryly. ‘As long as you go on paying them.’
‘Yes, well, I wanted you to know . . . I’m going to look after him as best I can. We’ll find a new lawyer and fight the case. He says he didn’t try to rape the girl, that she was keener than he, and I believe him.’
‘So do I and I think I can help his defence lawyer when you get one. I’ve done some investigating on my own and I’m satisfied Jason has an excellent chance of acquittal.’
‘Are you wearing your judge’s wig when you say that?’
‘Yes, I am.’
‘What about the killing? Self-defence?’
‘Of course. And Anne is the witness. That’s a formality.’
‘I don’t suppose you’d consider taking Jason’s case, would you?’
‘Me?’
‘Well, you know the whole background. And you could practise in this country, couldn’t you?’
‘I suppose I could. But you need somebody younger; somebody with more go.’
‘My goodness, I’ve hardly ever met anyone with more go.’
‘What about his mother?’ Henry changed the subject.
‘Still the same. But she gets weaker every day. It’s like sand running out of a glass. You know, this has all been a bit unsettling for me, if that isn’t a silly word.’
‘It’s been a bit “unsettling” for all of us. Especially my daughter, Anne.’
‘Shocking business. I really felt for her and for you when I heard what happened. Terrible thing. And the little girls. They say they found torture marks on the bodies. What sort of person does things like that? And they stuck Jason in a cell with him. Apparently they did it for Jason’s own sake! Thought he was a suicide risk. Anyway, it’s brought it all back and stirred things up. I thought I’d done with it, except for Elizabeth, of course’
Henry gave him another whisky.
He stared at the glass in silence for a while. ‘I . . .’ he bean.
‘Go on.’
Thorpe shook his head. ‘Why should you have to listen?’
‘Because that’s what my life has been . . . listening.’
‘It’s just that . . . Well, the trouble is that if anyone should be going on trial, it’s me.’
‘Oh?’
Thorpe looked round the room as though there might be a hidden tape recorder and, satisfied that there wasn’t, said, ‘I’ll tell you something. Of course I’ll deny I ever said it.’
‘Then maybe you shouldn’t. Don’t forget that I’m an officer of the court.’
‘Ah, well, there’s probably nothing you could do about it, even if you wanted to. But it’s been on my mind and I’ve never told anyone. It’s about Jason’s father. If the psychiatrists are right – I mean about Jason metaphorically killing his father in the guise of this man Sweete – then I’d have to tell them I already did it. I killed him. I didn’t shoot him or strangle him or anything like that, but I killed him nevertheless. I could have saved him that night, but I chose not to.
‘He and Elizabeth must have had a real fight, I mean a physical fight. I think what happened was that he started the fire without realising she was there, or perhaps he decided it didn’t matter whether she was there. And then suddenly he saw her and they fought, wrestled perhaps. She might have hit him with something, because when I saw him he was crouched down on the floor. He’d inhaled a lot of smoke.
‘He started to crawl towards the door of the bar. And after I’d pulled Elizabeth free I went back for him. He was stretched out, coughing. He looked up at me and his eyes said help me, save me, and I thought: what a bastard you’ve been to my daughter. And I turned away. Well, what do you say to that?’ He drained the last of the whisky.
‘I’m not sure what to say.’
‘You were a judge; judge me.’
Henry shook his head. ‘I’m not a judge any more, thank God.’
‘But if you were?’
‘It’s a crime of omission and I’m not sure that a charge could be framed. Anyway don’t brood about it. By the way, what’s happened to Margaret? Does she still want a divorce?’
‘As far as I know.’ Thorpe finished his whisky and rose. ‘Would you think about it? Taking the case, I mean.’
Henry did not reply for a moment then he said, ‘You’re tempting me. I’m not sure I’m cut out to be a housemother.’
‘But will you think about it?’
‘There’s someone I need. If I can get him to work for me again then I’ll think about it.’
Thorpe stuck out his hand. ‘I’ll let you get on with the ironing,’ he said.
*
Winter had come to the South Downs. The wind was from the east and powdery snow lay on the tops. On Ridge Farm the old water troughs were frozen, and dirty wool on the fences streamed in the wind. Police tapes fluttered around the front door of Major Gillis’s house and around the bunker fence. The metal plate which led down to the catacomb was closed and padlocked.
The police had gone and the place was deserted except for the figure of Ida Tribe, in her long coat and head scarf, battling along the track, just as she had done all those years ago after the death of her husband Jimmy.
She’d come to the Major on a month’s trial and had slept in a caravan. Even so it had been better than the flat she’d shared with Jimmy, with its rising damp and the rats and Jimmy drunk half the time. So when the Major had offered her the job permanently and the cottage to go with it, she had thought her luck had changed.
She walked past the bunker she had always thought was a reservoir, past the old barns, to Gillis’s house.
She had done her crying and she had finished her talking; she had cleared her goods and chattels from the cottage and taken them to a cousin’s near Chichester. Now that the police had gone there was only one thing left to do and she had come up on this bitter morning to do it.
No one was supposed to enter the Major’s house, that’s what the police had told her, not until they had finished their investigations.
What investigations? Ida had wondered. The Major was dead and so was Billy and so were the two little girls and they knew who’d done it – and that was that.
The police had taken the front-door key but she had a key to the side door. She opened it now and went into the freezing house. She avoided the kitchen, for that was where she had found him, and the memories would always haunt her. Instead she climbed the stairs and went along the landing. She looked in at the spare room. The soldiers were all set up. Apparently they were valuable. Well, his nephew in Wales would benefit from those. She wondered what would happen to the farm. They’d probably sell it.
She went into his bedroom. One wall was lined with books. The Major had been a great reader; not novels, books about warfare.
He had been interested in battles.
She pulled out the books one by one and shook them. Each held a five-, ten- or twenty-pound note. Sometimes two. She stuffed the money into her plastic shopping bag. She’d never touched it when the Major was alive but why should the nephew have it now? God knows she’d earned it.
She opened two dozen books and there was money in almost every one. The Major had never trusted safes. Then she opened one on the Peninsular campaign and inside was a piece of paper, not a banknote.
It was printed in red on buff and the first words were, ‘Certified copy of an entry of birth given at the General Registry Office, Somerset House, London’. Under ‘name’ it said ‘William John Sweete. Sex: male. Name and surname of father: Edward Llewellyn Gillis. Name, surname and maiden name of mother: Ida May Tribe, née Sweete’.
She had not seen Billy’s birth certificate for many years.
She remembered the fight she and the Major had had over it when he found his own name on it. What had he expected her to put under father’s name: Unknown? She had wanted to keep it. No, said the Major,
he’d do that. She knew why, of course; he’d never wanted to acknowledge the fact that Billy was his son.
But she’d had one abortion to please him and said never again. That hadn’t stopped him wanting her. And if she hesitated it was always, ‘I’ll have you out of that cottage.’ And then where was she to go?
The lies had been born with Billy and grown up with him. The lies had become her life. Even her own relations thought she’d been his grandmother. Well, it was too late to change now.
She read the birth certificate for the last time. Poor Billy. She’d only really wanted it to make the Major take up his responsibilities. But that hadn’t worked either. Billy had never stood a chance really, not with a father like that.
She took the paper to the fireplace, put a match to it and watched it burn to ashes.
Billy would have liked that.
Then, like the good housekeeper she was, she picked up the ashes and rubbed them to black specks and the draught of the flue sucked them up the chimney and out into the icy skies.
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Table of Contents
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
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Burn Out (Dr. Anne Vernon Book 1) Page 25