A Shot at Nothing

by Roger Ormerod

  She sipped at her brandy, then she pointed it at me, one finger extended round the glass.

  ‘It doesn’t fascinate me.’ She said this emphatically, the internal spark glowing brighter every second. ‘Frankly, I don’t give a tuppenny cuss. It’s over and done with. I’m home. So why should I trouble who did what, and why?’ She darted a quick look at Oliver, as though this noble comment had been aimed at him. He was forgiven—whatever needed to be forgiven. ‘It’s in the past,’ she went on grandly, flicking a hand in that direction. ‘I don’t care what happened, and nor does anybody else. Oh, thank you, Oliver. Yes, I’ll have a little more.’

  Her face was flushed. She raised glowing eyes to him. It was over, it was done, it was in the past. We were meant to understand that she included any possibility that Oliver could have been closely involved in it. But I couldn’t bring myself to accept that such a volte-face—she was normally so determined and inflexible —could be relied on. After all, the wellie experiment had in no way affected Oliver’s possible involvement.

  As he poured the brandy, a very small measure, she twisted round to look at me, her lips pursed. Her glass wasn’t steady. ‘There’ll be fireworks later,’ she told me. ‘Do stay for that.’

  The implication was: but no longer.

  ‘We shall probably have to, the way my car’s blocked in.’

  ‘And Phil’s still got so much to see,’ Oliver put in, attempting briskly to lighten the mood. ‘She hasn’t even consulted Madame Acarti…’

  ‘What! She’s here again?’ The fire within her was growing now, brandy-fuelled. ‘I warned her off, last year.’ She bit her lip. ‘Last time.’

  ‘It’s not the same Madame Acarti,’ Oliver assured her. ‘This one’s more astute.’

  ‘All-knowing,’ I put in. Then, in explanation, I added, ‘Ralph Purslowe told me. He said she wished to see me.’

  ‘Then you must go, Phil,’ said Oliver.

  Clare was darting her eyes from one to the other of us. ‘She’ll see somebody she doesn’t want to, if I hear any complaints.’

  I was interested. ‘You’ve had complaints in the past?’

  ‘Have I just! The previous one, she was putting the galloping fears in them all, forecasting doom and distress right and left. I had to put a stop to that.’

  ‘This one’, I assured her, ‘encourages. Offers light at the end of a shady tunnel, so long as certain things are done or not done, as the case may be. I think the general impact ought to be beneficial, in the long run.’

  She gave me a twisted smile, tried to straighten it and failed, then giggled. ‘Then you’ll have to see her. Maybe she’ll tell you that the thing to do is go home, and forget you ever came to this house.’

  ‘As a warning?’

  ‘Oh…you mustn’t say that. Even think it. You’re always welcome, and you know it.’ She nodded, though it didn’t carry any conviction.

  I waited, but she didn’t amplify that remark.

  ‘We might stay for the fireworks,’ I said at last. ‘If I were you, I’d have a little rest.’

  ‘Yes, yes. I’ll do that.’

  ‘Oh…and Clare…I meant to ask you. However did you manage to throw those guns inside here from down on the lawn? I could never have managed it. Not throw them.’

  She gave me a slanted glance of sheer animal mischief.

  ‘Well, you know…I didn’t…really.’

  ‘You didn’t throw them back?’ I looked up in despair to Oliver’s hovering face, meeting only the patient resignation of one who’s been there before and knows the pitfalls. Clare’s character was riddled with traps, deep holes in it only lightly covered with flimsy fabrications. She was now contemplating the glass in her fingers, looking down at the ripples in the surface as it shook. She spoke to it.

  ‘Of course, I tried. I mean—they were mine. A fortune in precious guns. I tried, but I couldn’t throw them. You couldn’t have done it. Admit it.’

  I already had. I did again. ‘I couldn’t have done it.’

  ‘I had to pick them up, one in each hand, and…sort of…carry them, and place them on the edge of the terrace. Just place them. I remember…I had some sort of idea that I would carry them inside, afterwards. Sort of. But Harris kept throwing them. And they were mine. Mine! I could barely see for the rain running down my face—or the tears. So I placed them, and Harris kept throwing the others from inside the room. This room. Oh—he was furious. At that time, furious. Because I wouldn’t give him one of them, for him to sell. Not one! And he’d said one would probably do it—two at the most. But I wasn’t going to. Hell, Philipa, I could’ve found the money without selling any of my guns. But he hated them. Hated. Because they were mine…my precious guns. All I had left of my father—my lovely, lovely guns.’

  She stopped. Her eyes seemed completely blank, but on her lips played a tiny, hesitant smile. At the memory of her father, no doubt. She had wandered away from what I had wanted to find out, but into a pathway I hadn’t guessed existed. Now I had to discover where it led. Yet she was lost to us for the moment, in a distant and, it seemed, pleasurable past.

  ‘So you placed them on the edge of the terrace,’ I said quietly at last. ‘And your husband went on throwing the others out.’

  ‘And laughing at me. When he watched me crawl up the steps…yes, crawl, because I could barely stand by then, at that time he was laughing. Because he was only waiting…oh, I knew he was only waiting until I’d got them all ready to carry back in…and I was right, because then he slammed the French windows shut, and I heard the lock go over—and there he was, the other side of the glass, still laughing. But I’d found out there were cartridges in the pocket of the Barbour jacket he’d left on the hallstand. Crawling up, they’d dug in my side. So I loaded one of the guns. A gun. The first one that came to hand. As it happened, it was a twelve-bore, and the cartridges were too, so they fitted. I loaded both barrels, and…and…let him have it. One barrel. Let him have it.’

  She was now cradling the glass in both hands, staring down at it, spilling her words into it.

  I didn’t dare to raise my eyes to Oliver. Only by concentrating on Clare could I urge her to carry on. As she didn’t seem about to, I said softly, persuasively, ‘This isn’t quite the story you told the police, is it?’

  Without looking up, she claimed, ‘The one I told them was better.’

  ‘Better?’

  ‘Sounded better. Dramatic, sort of. Not stinkingly wet and ghastly and…and miserable, and a bloody stupid farce.’

  I took a breath. ‘You’re a show-off, that’s what it is. A downright exhibitionist. You’d lie your head off for a good, rounded-off story.’

  At last she raised her eyes to mine. There was a child’s impishness in the way she drew her lower lip between her teeth, and a very mature challenge in the way her eyes opened wide, staring in mock innocence.

  ‘And I suppose it was a lie about the dyke and the Eurasian girl?’ I went on, as she seemed unmoved by my provocation.

  ‘Oh yes.’ She was proud of it. ‘Not entirely,’ she amended. ‘I shared a cell with the girl, and she did teach me things.’

  ‘And you’ve scattered lies all over the place, in between?’

  ‘In between what?’

  ‘The shooting, and when you came home, Clare. Today. Lies. Now you tell us that you did aim at your husband.’

  ‘His name was Harris. Call him Harris. And I aimed at the glass.’

  ‘Very well—Harris. And did you aim at Harris, through the glass?’

  ‘Harass, he should’ve been called. He certainly harassed me.’

  ‘Did you aim at him through the glass?’

  ‘Oh yes. But they told me it wasn’t that that killed him.’

  ‘It wasn’t. No. But you thought you had?’

  ‘Thought it—yes.’

  ‘So you were pleased with your efforts?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You aimed at him, and you thought you’d killed him. So you w
ould be pleased. At that time, you would have been pleased.’

  That drew a small amount of aggression from her. Clare was on the attack again. ‘Yes, I was damned well pleased. How dared he try to ruin my guns?’

  ‘But…you said…it was only about money. And you could’ve given him the money. So why all the anger and the fury and the frustration?’

  ‘I wasn’t going to give it to him for that.’

  ‘For what? If I remember rightly…Oliver, didn’t you tell me it was a debt, some money he owed a man he’d been out shooting with?’

  I knew the answer to this—it was just that Oliver had been silent for too long, and I wanted to draw him into this. Why was he so silent? Was it that he was encountering a Clare he hadn’t met before?

  ‘What?’ he said. ‘The debt. Yes.’

  Clare twisted her lips sourly. ‘Oh yes. A debt you might as well call it. Except that it was he who’d done the giving in the first place.’

  She gave an abrupt, even disconcerting giggle, then clamped her free hand over her mouth. Above it, her eyes were huge with an emotion I couldn’t analyse. Was it mischief?

  ‘Clare?’ I asked tentatively.

  ‘But it’d grown. The interest on the investment, you could call it.’

  ‘Riddles, Clare? Is this the time for riddles?’ I had to be more patient, the more she tried to irritate me.

  The hand was lowered, and abruptly she showed her teeth. Her emotions were apt to fly around all over the place. Now she was savage.

  ‘Oh, I knew all about his women. But he’d always been…careful…circumspect covers it. But one…he’d got her pregnant. And he wanted me…expected me…me to pay for her abortion. How d’you like the sound of that, then? And d’you know the argument he threw at me—the persuasive logic! Oh, he was a beauty, my Harris. Something unique. He said, if I didn’t, she’d have to have it on the health service, and it’d get about, but if I paid for her to go away—some private hospital far away—then nobody would know. And I wouldn’t need to face the knowing eyes and the nods and sneers…’

  She stopped. With her face now lowered, she was staring into the empty glass which was still in her hand, sobbing, the tears dripping into the glass.

  I glanced up at Oliver. His face was set and expressionless, distaste freezing his features. Very gently, because I had to know, I asked:

  ‘So why would they sneer?’

  ‘Because,’ she chattered, as though a chill had brushed against her, ‘Harris and I didn’t seem to be able to have children, and he thought they’d sneer…in the village…if it was shown to all and sundry that he could, with a different woman.’

  Then, abruptly, the mood shattered, as did the glass when she hurled it at the floor. Her head came up. No chill now, because there was a glowing fury burning in her eyes.

  ‘And if he thought I’d pay for that…’ she shouted. ‘If he thought I was frightened of sneers, then he’d got another think coming. I’d have seen him dead, first.’

  I allowed a restful few seconds to elapse before I commented on that. I took a deep breath. ‘You did see him dead, Clare.’

  She took that literally. ‘I couldn’t see him clearly through the window. I thought he was dead. That was why I phoned. But he wasn’t, was he! Somebody else finished him off. And not before it was due, I can tell you that much.’

  I looked at Oliver, who shook his head. I couldn’t decide why. Did it mean he wanted an end to it? But so did I, and to demonstrate the fact I thrust back my chair, its feet squealing on the floor. A fit comment. I felt like screaming, myself, if only with pity, though I wasn’t sure for whom.

  But Clare reached out a hand to stop me. I couldn’t interpret her expression, then it flowed free, and I realised she was laughing, though tearfully.

  ‘Don’t go. You’ve got to hear the best bit. I lied. Oh yes, I’ve told another lie. Suggested one, anyway. It sounded better. Made me sound better, I mean. Isn’t that what lies are for?’

  Clare, being sweetly candid, had to be living another lie, but if so she’d told it to herself. I was cautious.

  ‘Your lies, Clare, that’s what they’re for,’ I agreed. ‘Are we to hear the truth? And will we recognise it as truth?’

  We now stood facing each other.

  ‘Harris and I didn’t seem to be able to have children,’ she said. ‘I was sure I was normal, and that it wasn’t me. So it had to be him, something wrong with him. But I hadn’t told him that. I mean, you don’t like to throw things like that at a person’s face. Now—do you? Of course not.’

  A Clare reluctant to throw anything at anybody’s face I found difficult to imagine. I murmured something about tact, but she didn’t seem interested.

  ‘But you get the point,’ she demanded, leaning forward in emphasis. ‘You see it, surely. It meant that the child he wanted the money to destroy wasn’t even his. Now—there’s a laugh for you.’

  Then she tried to embroider the point by laughing, but she was weeping at the same time, and it didn’t come out properly. I could do no more than stare at her blankly, because if there was anything in what she said that was amusing, then I’d missed it.

  ‘And no doubt you told him that,’ I said tentatively.

  ‘You can be damn sure I did. Shouted it in his face. Because there was something he didn’t know. He was my second man, second husband. Harris wasn’t born around here, so he didn’t know. About my baby, I mean, because I’d never told him. But she died, my little girl, in a car accident. Clive—that was my first husband ¬he died too, in the car. But I knew I could have children. And that was what I told Harris. This new baby wasn’t his. Oh…you should’ve seen his face! His face! That’s what I shouted after him, right out into the hallway. And when he went into the gunroom and locked the door, I knew it was just to get away from me. From my voice. Coward. Ran away from my voice.’

  There was so much emotion involved with this claim—if that was what it was—that I was sure she felt it deeply. Yet there seemed to be nothing I could say.

  Clare lifted her head. Her voice was dead. ‘So why the hell can’t you drop it!’ she demanded.

  ‘I would’ve liked—‘

  ‘Forget it, and go away from here.’

  It was no good telling her what I’d have liked. There was nothing now to say. How could I explain that I wanted to help her, when all she wanted was to see the back of me?

  Oliver cleared his throat. ‘Phil…’ he said softly. Then he nodded towards the open, clean air.

  I was aware that he had taken my arm. We negotiated the terrace steps and walked diagonally across the lawn to the gap in the rhododendrons. Then we stood and looked over the spread of activity down the slope. It had in no way decreased. In fact, the crowd seemed to have grown. The sun still poured down on them.

  I found this to be surprising. It had seemed so oppressively dark in Clare’s gunroom that I had expected to find the sun declining over the meadow.

  Oliver paused. He said, ‘The house faces west, so we’re looking east from here. The ideal location for the fireworks would appear to be the other side of the lake. That’d give a darker sky, and a reflection in the water. And all those people down there will be able to gather here, on the slopes, and get a splendid, unobscured view.’

  He was trying to distract my mind, to drag it into the sunlight. I knew that, but I went along with him.

  ‘Need I know that?’

  ‘It was just in case you thought we ought to reserve a place.’

  ‘Quite frankly,’ I said, ‘I don’t think we’ll be here that late.’

  ‘You’ll have sorted it all out by then?’

  ‘I’ll have managed to get the car out by then. Let’s see if we can find Glenn and his mates.’

  He didn’t say anything for a while, but walked me slowly down the slope. Then:

  ‘You’re giving it up?’

  ‘I can’t sort her lies from her truths, so I don’t think she’s worth helping. And I think the danger�
�s past, anyway.’

  ‘You’re talking in riddles,’ he complained. ‘You’re catching it from Clare.’

  ‘You know exactly what I mean. Let’s look for Glenn Thomas.’

  8

  We failed to find him, though I didn’t get the impression that Oliver was searching with any enthusiasm, as he seemed more interested in distracting my mind by dragging me round the numerous entertainments. It was some little time before I realised that he was stalling. Now it was he who wanted to stay around a little longer.

  ‘She was upset,’ I suggested, exploring.

  ‘Who? Oh…you mean Clare. Yes. Well, she would be. You stuck a lot of nerve-racking memories under her nose, Phil.’

  ‘It’s a wonder you didn’t want to stay behind and comfort her.’

  It slid right past him. He didn’t even react. ‘I haven’t had a chance for a good chat with Ralph Purslowe yet. Only a quick word…’

  ‘So you’re looking for him?’

  ‘Just to keep in touch.’

  ‘Old friends…’

  We walked a little further, and he hadn’t taken it up. A race new to me was in progress. Hay-rolling. It didn’t seem to me to be the period of the year for hay, but somebody had produced, possibly from the back of a barn, four or five of those big rolls they bale the hay into these days. With these they were racing, two men to each bale, which seemed, on the face of it, to entail no technique at all, only strength, as the course ran uphill. But I soon realised that it did. Two men pushing…if one pushed harder than the other it swerved, and time was lost. Likewise, if they pushed out of unison. And they had to lean forward for it, so that they could barely see over the tops of the cylinders of hay, and thus aimed incorrectly. Oh yes, technique was necessary.

  ‘Old friends, yes,’ said Oliver, after so long an interval that I’d forgotten our previous remarks. Yes, of course—Ralph Purslowe. ‘I want to ask him something.’

  ‘You do?’

  There was no immediate response. Two bale-rollers had collapsed in coughing spells, the dust being a major hazard. Their bale escaped and ran out of control down the slope, scattering a few sunbathers, and finished up in the lake.