by Allan, Gilli
‘Don’t apologise. It was the catalyst Fran needed. The experience triggered a sort of mini breakdown, which led to her begging me to check her PC.’
‘Her computer?’ he queried, confused; he’d thought she was going to tell him something about her niece.
‘Bizarre, I know, but Fran got herself into a bit of a fix. The Dermot thing was the proverbial last straw. After the lesson it all came out. She admitted she was being cyber-stalked. Fran’s a bit dozy about computers and the internet. She was worried she’d given away her actual address to the stalker, but she’d been deleting everything so couldn’t reread her sent emails. She asked me for my help.’
‘But what could you do?’
‘There were no guarantees I could find what she needed, but I knew where to look. As it turned out, it was unnecessary.’ Dory recalled her sister’s transfixed horror when confronted by Peter. ‘I’ve never seen her husband so angry. So, what I was useful for was to give moral support.’ Dory rolled her eyes. ‘That’s something I hope I never go through again. Arguments with a loved one can be bad enough, but it’s almost worse … agonising … being a witness to that sort of row between people you care about.’ Her mouth turned down at the corners. Though still in the dark and losing his grip on the story, Stefan felt an answering clutch of emotion.
‘Why was he so angry? It wasn’t her fault she was being cyber-stalked, was it?’
‘It was her fault. But at that point, Peter knew nothing about it. I’m sorry. I’m explaining this badly. At my sister’s house the desktop in the study is, to all intents and purposes, hers. That’s where all their personal emails go. Peter has the laptop with his business email account set up on it. Fran had become so totally enthralled with this other correspondence that she’d stopped reading her regular emails, even those from her own daughter.’
‘But why did she engage with the stalker?’
‘At first she was thrilled by it. The lure of the forbidden but without the guilt.’
He shook his head. ‘I’ve always suspected women were weird.’
Her expression changed and she gave a small rueful smile. ‘Communicating virtually felt abstract, uncommitted. Safe, I suppose, safer even than handwriting a letter and posting it. It answered a need that she was still desirable, still a sexual being. Most women need that to some extent.’ Dory’s eyes connected with his. He felt a pulse of response and wished she’d stop mentioning sex. ‘But then the emails from this saddo degenerated into a form of sexual harassment. Having finally admitted the problem to me, after that last lesson before half-term, I offered to block his incoming mails and to try to recover the deleted emails from her hard drive.’
Dory sighed and sat back further into the chair, raising and dropping her shoulders, arching her head back. For a brief moment, he stared at the curve of her throat. ‘But when we got to her house there’d been one of those off-the-wall coincidences. An hour earlier, Peter had been visited by Jacky, a friend of Mel’s who lives in the village. She’s not one of Mel’s closest friends, she’s in the year below her at school, but she’d received, out of the blue, a curious, miss- spelt email from Mel, saying she was in trouble and claiming that her parents were ignoring her. To find out what was going on, Jacky had tried to text Mel, then email and ring. There was no answer, so, rather heroically I feel, she went round to speak to Peter.
‘Of course, Peter reassured her. He couldn’t believe that Fran was ignoring their daughter. He assumed the email Jacky received was a scam or a phishing exercise. You know, someone hacking an address book and sending out fake messages to everyone on it to try to blag money or gather sensitive information. So he tried to phone Mel himself, but kept getting the “unavailable” message. Eventually, just before my sister and I arrived, he’d gone into the study to open the Live Mail account, to check if there was anything untoward there. We walked in just after he’d discovered a whole batch of unopened emails, cries for help, from Melanie. And he was on the phone, booking himself a flight to Bangkok.’
‘How long had she been out in Thailand?’
‘Since last summer. She accompanied a couple of girlfriends who’d organised the trip for their gap year. Fran and Peter had tried to persuade her not to go. She’d failed to get the grades she needed for her first-choice university and hadn’t organised a place anywhere else. For her, it wasn’t a gap year, it was just a long holiday financed by some money left her by her grandmother. They wanted her to concentrate on retaking her A-levels.’
‘A characteristic of the young, their refusal to take advice.’
Dory nodded. ‘Originally, she and her friends were island hopping. They were enjoying themselves. Mel had an uncomplicated relationship with an Australian lad. It came to an end when he went home to Oz at Christmas. Then she found herself a far dodgier boyfriend. A resident this time, an Irishman called Tyler. He told them he owned a club in Bangkok and could give Mel a job as manager. Her friends didn’t like him, apparently. Thought he was too full of himself and Melanie had been taken in. Mel thought Tyler was being straight with her and her friends were just jealous. There was a parting of the ways. They moved on to Bali. Mel went back to Bangkok with him and moved into his apartment. It was then Tyler changed.’ Dory pushed her fingers through her hair, making it stand on end, in that way he liked. Stop it, he told himself. Concentrate.
‘Mel was emailing home, but Fran was so consumed by her obsession that even when she was still reading Mel’s emails she failed to pick up on any subtext. Then she stopped reading them altogether. I’ve now read every one and to be fair, though it was obvious Melanie felt let down by Tyler, she didn’t really spell it out in what way he was bullying her. It was only the emails Fran hadn’t even opened which rang loud alarm bells.’
‘What was going on?’
‘We didn’t know the details till she got home. There was a club, only it was more like a bar, on the fringes of the Patpong area – the red-light district of Bangkok. Tyler was the manager, not the owner. When Mel got there, the only job on offer was hostessing. You know the kind of thing … socialising with the clientele and getting them to buy expensive drinks. She went along with it to begin with, but most of the men wanted more than a few hours’ flirting. Tyler started to pressure Mel. The customers expected extras, and when the girls weren’t willing to oblige it reflected on him. And if the customers didn’t get what they expected, Tyler didn’t get his bung.’
‘He was pimping.’ Stefan was all too aware what Melanie’s close relatives would feel about this.
‘In his eyes, apparently, it was commission. He was doing his customers a favour and they paid him for the privilege. The other members of staff were mostly Thai nationals, girls and boys, some very young. And most of them were offering sex.’
‘It’s an age-old trade,’ Stefan said, his thoughts ranging wider. ‘There will always be a demand. There will always be people willing to meet the demand.’
‘Most of them were sending money home. It was the only way their families could get by. Mel, of course, didn’t have that pressure. She dug her heels in. The whole situation was horribly distressing for her. She’d made friends with many of them. But she still didn’t blame Tyler. Even though he continued to try to coerce her, she still somehow saw him as her boyfriend. As if she believed they were just going through a bad patch and he was bound to come round. But then things changed. He got drunk and took her Blackberry, her passport, and her wallet. From then on, even if she could get out, she’d no money, no plastic. But he kept her close, locking her in the apartment when she wasn’t working. Told her the chief of police was his friend and she’d find no allies there even if she managed to get away.’
Stefan uttered a low whistle. ‘How was she emailing home?’
‘He wasn’t so daft as to leave her locked in with a phone or a laptop. But I suppose it’s typical of bullies. They underestimate their victims. He assumed she was too stupid to do anything to help herself. But her friends were helping her. Sh
e was writing out her messages and when they could, one or other of the girls would slip out to the internet café and log into Mel’s account. Some of the messages are a bit garbled where the Thai girls have mistranscribed Mel’s original message. And it is only those last emails, the one’s sent by her friends, that really push the panic buttons.’
‘Shit!’ Stefan said. ‘But she’s all right now?’
‘I think so. We hope so. Her father flew out there and alerted the authorities. Whether or not he really had friends in high places, Tyler was arrested and Peter brought Melanie home on Friday. Pete’s a gentle, laid-back kind of guy, but I’ve never seen him so angry. In fact, I have never seen him angry, full stop … but he was utterly furious with Fran.’
‘But …? Presumably he wasn’t reading his daughter’s emails either?’
‘Maybe part of his anger was at himself for leaving all the parenting to Fran. But that’s not all.’
‘He wanted to know why his wife had been distracted?’
‘Exactly, what she had been doing online that was more important than Melanie’s welfare.’ Dory’s taut half-smile betrayed the stress she’d been under. Again, he felt that empathetic tug. ‘That’s when she fessed up to the whole thing.’
‘That was brave.’
‘I think she was so tired of it all she needed to unburden herself. Needed to lean on someone, preferably her husband. Perhaps she secretly hoped he would take it in his stride and forgive her. Poor Fran.’ Dory shook her head. ‘She had been double deleting everything. But that evening, when she gave Peter her password to log on to her account, there was another email from her stalker. They’d simply been hitting the reply icon to one another. When Peter scrolled down, the whole sorry correspondence was there to read. Fran and I had the additional agony of standing there, like a couple of lemons, while he read every one, including the links to some very dodgy websites right back to the first.’
‘With each step forward in technology, the world gets scarier.’
Dory nodded. ‘Thankfully, the thing she was most worried about, that she might have given away her home address to the creep, was unfounded. It was the one saving grace of a pretty shitty day.’ Dory was gazing into her glass. She gave a short sigh and looked up at him with a wan smile.
‘And how is Melanie?’ he asked.
‘Health-wise she’ll be fine. In the last weeks, the so-called boyfriend was forcing himself on her without condoms. But she’s had a thorough health check. Fortunately, she’s not pregnant and hasn’t picked up any significant sexually transmitted infections.’
‘But I thought … She’s only been back a few days. How can you be sure so quickly? Dom was told there had to be a window of time, as much as six months after contact, before HIV tests could be considered reliable?’
‘Speed and peace of mind can be bought at a price. I work in the NHS, remember? Our Health Trust has yet to provide the sexual health department with the funds to offer the most up-to-date screening tests. But Mel’s had a PCR test, which can detect the presence of the virus as soon as the body’s been exposed to it. Physically, she’ll be absolutely fine. Emotionally, who knows? Only time will tell. As you can imagine, poor Fran is devastated that she was ignoring her while her daughter was in such a plight.’
‘I sometimes think it’s their raisons d’être,’ Stefan said. Dory put her emptied glass down on the coffee table and gave him a querying look. ‘The young.
Their purpose is to put the adults in their lives through agonies of worry.’
‘This wine is far too good to drink quickly but …’ Dory refilled their glasses, with a shrug. ‘You’re talking about Dom,’ she said, handing him his.
‘Of course.’
Later, he followed her into the little kitchen and sat on a high stool while she sizzled some cloves, bay leaves, garlic, cinnamon, allspice, and split cardamom pods in the bottom of a heavy-based saucepan.
‘That’s a wonderful smell.’ Stefan breathed in appreciatively, aware of a blossoming lightness of spirit. Dory hadn’t seemed to require any kind of explanation of his relationship with Dom. Just by relating his concerns to her, a weight had lifted from his shoulders. Her offer to speak to the boy might not resolve anything, but it was another step forward. ‘I don’t bother to do much cooking for myself. And Dom’s still a burger or pizza kind of guy.’
‘Don’t expect too much, it’s a bog-standard chilli.’ Dory tipped in the rice and gave it a stir around with the spices. ‘Can you hand me the kettle?’
He watched her as she waited till the rice began to smoke. She poured in the pre-heated water. Instantly, as it hit the hot pan, it churned into an explosive boil. She gave the rice a stir then quickly crammed the glass lid over the pluming steam. She added a weight to secure the seal and turned down the heat.
‘I give it seven minutes on simmer,’ she said. ‘Then another seven off the heat with a tea cloth under the weighted lid to absorb the moisture …’
‘Duly noted, Delia.’ He groaned, suddenly realising how this gave him away. ‘God, that probably dates me! She was the last TV cook I was aware of.’
‘No more than it dates me,’ Dory said, with a laugh. ‘Only I daresay I watch more television than you. Nigella is a bit more current, but I can’t, of course, aspire to her voluptuous figure.’
‘Overrated,’ he said. Then felt the need to explain, ‘Voluptuousness, I mean. Not every man’s cup of tea.’
Chapter Thirty-six - Dory
‘Not every man’s cup of tea.’ Like a wet flannel striking her face, it was almost as if he were warning her off. He might just as well have said outright, ‘Don’t bother fishing for compliments, love. I’m gay!’
Until that moment she’d been enjoying the evening, despite the tricky subjects they’d discussed. She was touched by how much he seemed to care about Dom. His love for the boy was evident in every word and gesture, so much so she’d been momentarily fooled. He spoke like a father about his son, not like a lover. When she offered to talk to Dominic, it was as much to please Stefan as it was to help the lad.
There’d been a short silence afterwards. She stared into the bowl of salad she was tossing, determined not to let him see the plunge of disappointment mirrored in her face. But what had she been expecting? She knew he was gay. Her rationality was something she prided herself on. Yet when their arrangement to meet had changed, from a casual early evening chat to supper, she’d begun to agonise. Eventually she’d settled on a favourite silk dress that she’d had for years, so was armed with the disclaimer – ‘What, this old thing?’ And her make-up was applied with unusual care. Everything so far this evening – the vintage wine drunk on an empty stomach, the soft, fragrant breeze through the window – had conspired in her delusion. Now she felt ridiculous.
Initially, it was he who seemed to withdraw a little. Was he embarrassed? Had he been afraid she was about to make a move on him? The awkwardness passed. Nothing further was said about celebrity cooks or their attractiveness. Anyway, he’d probably prefer Jean-Christophe Novelli, she thought grimly. If nothing else, her guest gave every appearance of enjoying the chilli. Even so, perhaps it was time to put this evening back on a businesslike footing. Forget the chocolate cake. She led the way to her desk.
‘OK,’ she said, briskly. ‘Since our conversation in March, I’ve been thinking about how you could market yourself more successfully.’
‘Really? You shouldn’t have bothered.’
‘It didn’t take long.’ She tapped the mouse on its pad and the screen sprang to life. ‘It’s clear you could do so much more than you have. First, the website. I looked into a few ideas and found these domain names available.’ She could hear her voice rattling on, like an old-time schoolmistress. From the moment this evening had been arranged, she’d intended to raise the subject, but the earlier, easy atmosphere had dissipated. Get this over with, was now her overriding instinct. ‘Up to you. You might have some other ideas that I can test out. But I can secure this one
, for instance, for less than forty quid for twenty-four months.
‘Now, look at this. A website for another sculptor. It’s quite effective and stylish. I could do something like that for you, without much trouble. To make your registration money back, you’d have to put up with other people advertising on your site. I’d add more keywords and links, which would bring it up readily for someone Googling.’
Stefan was speechless, gazing at the website as if he’d never seen such a thing before. Dory scrolled rapidly through the high-quality images of sculptures, some set in a dramatic landscape and some on a beach with the sea behind them.
‘Then I found these.’ Dory pulled up one website after another of sculpture parks and sculpture gardens all over England. ‘And these are the links to apply to have your own pieces considered for inclusion,’ she said. ‘This one is just over the county border. ArtSkape is the next site you should look at.’ Dory brought up the website of the local artists’ community. ‘You should get yourself included, particularly when it comes to the open studio events. There’s no one else doing anything remotely like the kind of work you do. And then there’s this.’
Another website, this time a commercial business selling garden ornaments, opened on the screen. Glancing at him briefly, she couldn’t interpret his expression. His eyes were riveted to the screen as she scrolled through the images of statuary and classical urns in a grand garden setting. She saw neither pleasure nor gratitude in his face.
‘You may not stand a chance with a firm like this,’ she soldiered on, nerves clipping her voice. ‘These look like replicas of originals. But I don’t suppose the owners sell their permission to reproduce them ad infinitum. They’ll hire it out like a royalty. Selling your originals at a flat rate is a really bad idea.’