In a Dry Season

by Peter Robinson

  He had even seen what was left of the Labyrinth at the Palace of Knossos on Crete, where a pedantic guide inflicted with a serious case of synonymitis had explained it all to Sandra and him as they tried to hold back their giggles. “And this is King Minos’s throne, his regal seat, his chair of office . . . And they carried her body to the hill, the rise, the tor, the mountain.” He remembered the olive trees with their silver-green, oily leaves and the orange trees lining the road from Heraklion.

  But now wasn’t the time to be thinking about Sandra.

  He was about to say that he thought of Annie more as Ariadne, seeing as she was probably the only one who could get him out of there, but he bit his tongue. Considering what transpired between Theseus and Ariadne on Naxos, it didn’t seem like a very good idea.

  He followed Annie deeper into the labyrinth.

  Her keys were jingling in her hand now. “Almost there,” she said, glancing back at him, then she opened a high wooden gate in a stone wall, led him through a small flagged yard and in the back door.

  “Where do you park?” Banks asked.

  Annie dropped her keys on the kitchen table and laughed. “A long way away. Look, it’s tiny, there’s not much of a view and very little light. But guess what? It’s cheap, and it’s mine. Well, it will be when I’ve paid off the mortgage. You must have been a DS once?”

  “A DC, too.” Banks remembered the early days, scraping and saving to make ends meet, especially when Tracy and Brian were little and Sandra had to take extended periods off work. There were no maternity benefits back then. Not for dental receptionists, anyway. Even now, as a DCI, it was difficult making payments on the cottage. He also had to furnish the place by driving around to local auctions and car-boot sales. There would be no Greek holiday this year. “At least you get overtime,” he said. “You probably make more than me.”

  “In Harkside? You must be joking.” Annie led him through to the living-room. It was small but cosy, and she had decorated much of it in whites, lemons and creams because of the lack of outside light. As a result, the room seemed airy and cheerful. There was just enough space for a small white three-piece suite, the settee of which would probably seat two very thin people, a TV, mini-stereo and a small bookcase under the window. Several miniature water-colours hung on the walls. Local scenes, mostly. Banks recognized Semerwater, Aysgarth Falls and Richmond Castle. There was also one oil portrait of a young woman with flowing Pre-Raphaelite hair and laughing eyes.

  “Who painted these?” he asked.

  “I did. Most of them.”

  “They’re very good.”

  Annie seemed embarrassed. “I don’t think so. Not really. I mean, they’re competent, but . . . ” She put her hand to her head and swept back her hair. “Anyway, look, I feel really grubby after being down in that basement. I’m going up for a quick shower first, then I’ll start dinner. It won’t take long. Make yourself at home. Open the window if you’re too warm. There’s plenty of beer in the fridge. Help yourself.” Then she turned and left the room. Banks heard stairs creak as she walked up.

  This woman was an enigma, he thought. She had a DCI, her boss, as a guest in her house, yet nothing in her behaviour towards him indicated a deferential relationship. She was the same always, with everyone, not adapting herself to the various roles people play in life. He imagined she would even be the same with Jimmy Riddle. Not that she’d invite that bastard into her home, Banks hoped. He heard the shower start. Though it was small, the cottage wasn’t particularly old—not like his own—and it had an upstairs bathroom and toilet. Even so, he guessed Annie must have had the shower installed herself, because it certainly wouldn’t have come with the original building.

  First, he did what he always did when left alone in a new room; he nosed around. He couldn’t help it. Curiosity was part of his nature. He didn’t open drawers or read private mail, not unless he thought he was dealing with a criminal, but he liked to look at books, choice of music and the general lie of the land.

  Annie’s living-room was fairly Spartan. It wasn’t that she didn’t own books or CDS, but that she didn’t have many of either. He got the impression that she may have had to pare down her existence at one time and everything that remained was important to her. There seemed to be no chaff. Unlike his own collections, where the mistakes piled up alongside the hidden gems. Discs he never listened to shared shelf space with some that were almost worn out.

  First, he crouched down and checked the CD titles in the cabinet under the stereo. It was an odd collection: Gregorian chants, Don Cherry’s Eternal Now and several “ambient” pieces by Brian Eno. There was also an extensive blues collection, from Mississippi John Hurt to John Mayall. Next to these stood a few pop and folk titles: Emmylou Harris’s The Wrecking Ball, Kate and Anna McGarrigle, some k.d. lang.

  The books mainly centred around Eastern philosophy; it was a real sixties’ treasure trove, considering that Annie was a nineties’ woman. Banks remembered some of the titles from his old Notting Hill days: Baba Ram Dass’s Be Here Now; Gurdjieff’s Meetings With Remarkable Men; Ous-pensky, Carlos Castaneda, Thomas Merton, Alan Watts, and old blue-covered Pelican paperbacks about yoga, Zen and meditation.

  The shower stopped, and a few seconds later Banks heard the roar of a hair-dryer. Shaking off the memories that seemed to cling to his mind like cobwebs, he wandered into the kitchen. Like the living-room, it was decorated in light colours, white tiles for the most part, with chocolate brown around the work area, just for contrast. In addition to the small oven, fridge, sink and counter-tops, there was a dining-table. It could probably seat about four comfortably, he guessed.

  Banks opened the fridge and took out a bottle of Black Sheep. He found an opener in one of the drawers and a pint glass in one of the cupboards. Carefully, he poured out the beer so it had just enough head on it, then he took a sip and went back into the living-room. The hair-dryer stopped, and he could hear Annie walking around upstairs. He took Eternal Now from its jewel-case and put it in the CD player. He had heard of Don Cherry, a jazz trumpeter who used to play with Ornette Coleman, but didn’t actually know his work.

  The music started with strummed chords on oddly tuned stringed instruments, then a deep, echoey flute-like instrument entered. Banks turned down the volume, picked up the CD liner notes and sat down to read while he waited for Annie, abandoning himself to the weird combinations of wooden saxophones, Indian harmoniums and Polynesian gamelans.

  Before the first track had finished, Annie breezed into the room exuding freshly scrubbed warmth.

  “I never took you for a Don Cherry fan,” she said, wicked grin on her face.

  “Life is full of surprises. I like it.”

  “I thought you were an opera buff?”

  “Been asking around?”

  “Just station gossip. I’ll start dinner now, if you want.”

  Banks smiled. “Fine with me.”

  She disappeared into the kitchen. “You can keep me company,” she called out over her shoulder.

  Banks put the CD case back on the shelf and carried his beer through. He sat down at the kitchen table. Annie was bending over pulling vegetables out of the fridge. The jeans looked good on her.

  “Pasta okay?” she asked, half turning her head.

  “Great. It’s a long time since I’ve had any home cook ing. Mostly these days it’s been either pub grub or something quick and easy from Marks and Sparks.”

  “Ah, the lonely eater’s friends.”

  Banks laughed. It was funny, and rather sad, he had often noticed, how you saw so many young, single men and women wandering around the Marks food section just after five on a week-night, reaching for the prawn vindaloo, then changing their minds, going instead for the single portion of chicken Kiev and the carton of mixed vegetables. He supposed it might be a good place to pick up a girl.

  Annie filled a large pan with water, added a little salt and oil, then set it on the gas ring. She didn’t waste a gesture as she was
hed and chopped mushrooms, shallots, garlic and courgettes. There was a certain economical grace to her movements that Banks found quite hypnotic; she seemed to possess a natural, centred quality that put him at ease.

  She went to the kitchen cupboard, took down a bottle of red wine and uncorked it.

  “Want some?”

  Banks held up his beer. “I’ll finish this first.”

  Annie poured herself a generous glass. Soon the oil was hot in the frying-pan and she was dropping the vegetables in, a handful at a time. When they were done, she added a cup or two of tinned tomatoes and some herbs. Banks decided to make cooking his next project, after he had fixed up the cottage. Something else to keep depression at bay. He liked food, so it made sense to learn how to cook it properly now that he was alone.

  About the time Banks finished his beer, Annie announced that dinner was ready and delivered two steaming plates to the table. Don Cherry finished, and she put on Emmylou Harris, whose voice seemed to catch on sharp notches inside her throat before it came out, singing about loneliness, loss, pain. All things Banks could relate to. He ground pepper and grated some Parmesan onto the pasta and tucked in. After a couple of bites, he complimented Annie.

  “See,” she said. “It’s not all salads and tofu. You learn to be more inventive in the kitchen when you’re a vegetarian.”

  “I can tell.”

  “Wine?”

  “Please.”

  Annie brought over the bottle of Sainsbury’s Bulgarian Merlot, refilled her glass and poured one for Banks. “Plenty more where that came from,” she said. “You know, I’d really like to find out more about this Hobb’s End artist, Michael Stanhope.”

  “Why? Because you think he’s connected to the case?”

  “Well, he might be, mightn’t he? He was living in Hobb’s End during the war. Maybe he knew the Shackleton woman. There may be other paintings. They might tell us something.”

  “They might,” Banks agreed. “Though I’m not sure how far art could be trusted as evidence, even if he painted the murder itself.”

  Annie smiled. “Not technically, perhaps. But artists often distort reality to reveal the truth about it.”

  “Do you believe that?”

  Annie’s eyes, the colour of milk chocolate, shone in the failing light. “Yes,” she said. “I do. Not about my own work. As I said, I’m technically competent, but I lack whatever it is that makes a great artist. Vision. Passion. Intensity. Insanity. I don’t know. Probably what most people call genius. But the true artist’s reality is every bit as valid as any other. Perhaps more so in some ways because an artist struggles to see more deeply, to illuminate.”

  “A lot of art is far from illuminating.”

  “Yes, but that’s often because the subject, the truth he’s trying to get at, is so elusive that only symbols or vague images will do to approach it. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that artists are always trying to get some sort of deep message across. They’re not preachers. What I’m saying is that Stanhope obviously perceived something odd about Hobb’s End, something that went below the surface, beyond the superficial ideas of village life. He saw something evil there and maybe something redemptive in the children.”

  “Isn’t that a bit far-fetched? Maybe it was just because there was a war coming?”

  “I’m not trying to make out he was a visionary. Just that he saw something a lot of other people would either not see or would gloss over. He really looked and maybe he saw something that might be useful to us. Damn!”

  “What?”

  “Oh, I just spilled some pasta sauce on my T-shirt, that’s all.” She grinned and rubbed at the red mark over her breast. That only made it worse. “I always was a messy eater.”

  “I won’t tell anyone.”

  “Thanks. Where was I?”

  “The artist’s vision.”

  “Right. It’s got nothing to do with personality. In life, Stanhope might well have been a mean, lecherous, drunken slob. Believe me, I’ve known a lot of artists, and many of them have been exactly that. Talk about groups living up to their stereotypes.”

  Banks sipped some wine. Emmylou Harris was singing about wearing something pretty and white. Banks thought he could detect Neil Young’s high-pitched warble in the background. “You seem to know a lot about the subject,” he said. “Any particular reason?”

  Annie fell silent for a moment, looking down at her empty plate, moving the fork around in her hand. Finally, she said in a quiet voice, “My father’s an artist.”

  “Is he well known?”

  “Not really. In some circles, perhaps.” She looked up and smiled crookedly. “He’ll never go down in history as one of the greats, if that’s what you mean.”

  “He’s still living, I assume?”

  “Ray? Oh, yes. He’s just turned fifty-two. He was only twenty when I was born.”

  “Does he have what it takes to be a great artist?”

  “To some extent. But you have to remember, there’s a big, big gap between someone like my dad and Van Gogh or Picasso. It’s all relative.”

  “What about your mother?”

  Again, Annie was silent a few moments. “She died,” she said at last. “When I was six. I don’t really remember her very well. I wish I could, but I can’t.”

  “That’s sad. I’m sorry.”

  “More wine?”

  “Please.”

  Annie poured.

  “That oil portrait in the living-room, is it your mother?”

  Annie nodded.

  “Your father painted it?”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s very good. She was a beautiful woman. You look a lot like her.”

  It was almost dark outside now. Annie hadn’t put on any lights, so Banks couldn’t see her expression.

  “Where did you grow up?” he asked.

  “St Ives.”

  “Nice place.”

  “You know it?”

  “I’ve been there on holiday a couple of times. Years ago, when I worked on the Met. It’s a bit far from here.”

  “I don’t get down as often as I should. Maybe you remember it was a magnet for hippies in the sixties? It became something of an artists’ colony.”

  “I remember.”

  “My father lived there even before that. Over the years he’s done all kinds of odd jobs to support his art. He might have even rented you deck-chairs on the beach. Now he paints local landscapes and sells them to tourists. Does some glass engraving, too. He’s quite successful at it.”

  “So he makes a decent living?”

  “Yes. He doesn’t have to rent out the deck-chairs any more.”

  “He brought you up alone?”

  Annie pushed her hair back. “Well, not really. I mean, yes, in the sense that my mother was dead, but we lived in a sort of artists’ colony on an old farm just outside town, so there were always lots of other people around. My extended family, you might call them. Ray’s been living with Jasmine for nearly twenty years now.”

  “It sounds like a strange set-up.”

  “Only to someone who hasn’t experienced it. It seemed perfectly normal to me. It was the other kids who seemed strange. The ones with mothers and fathers.”

  “Did you get teased a lot at school?”

  “Tormented. Some of the locals were very intolerant. Thought we were having orgies every night, doing drugs, worshipping the devil, the usual stuff. Actually, though there always seemed to be some pot around, they couldn’t have been further from the truth. There were a few wild ones—that kind of free, experimental way of life always attracts a few unstable types—but on the whole it was a pretty good environment to grow up in. Plus I got a great education in the arts—and not from school.”

  “What made you join the police?”

  “The village bobby took my virginity.”

  “Seriously.”

  Annie laughed and poured more wine. “It’s true. He did. His name was Rob. He came up to see us o
nce, looking for someone who’d passed through, one of the occasional undesirables. He was good-looking. I was seventeen. He noticed me. It seemed a suitable act of rebellion.”

  “Against your par—your father?”

  “Against all of them. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I didn’t hate them or anything. It was just that I’d had enough of that lifestyle by then. There were too many people around all the time, nowhere to escape to. Too much talk and not enough done. You could never get any privacy. That’s why I value it so much now. And how many times can a grown person listen to ‘White Rabbit’?”

  Banks laughed. “I feel the same way about ‘Nessun Dorma.’ ”

  “Anyway, Rob seemed solid, dependable, more sure of himself and what he believed in.”

  “Was he?”

  “Yes. We went out until I went to university in Exeter.

  Then he turned up there a year or so later as a DC. He introduced me to some of his friends and we sort of started going out again. I suppose they found me a bit weird. After all, I didn’t throw out the baby with the bathwater. I still had a lot of my father’s values, and I was into yoga and meditation even back then, when nobody else was. I didn’t really fit in anywhere. I don’t know why, but being a detective sounded exciting. Different. When you get right down to it, most jobs are so bloody boring. I’d thought of becoming a teacher, but I changed my mind and joined the force. It was a bit impulsive, I’ll admit.”

  Banks wanted to ask her why she was in a dead-end place like Harkside, but he sensed that this wasn’t the moment. At least he could ask a leading question and see if she were willing to be led. “How has it worked out?”

  “It’s tough for a woman. But things are what you make them. I’m a feminist, but I’m the sort who just likes to get on with it rather than whine about what’s wrong with the system. Maybe that comes from my dad. He goes his own way. Anyway, you know all about what it’s like, about how unexciting it is most of the time. And how bloody boring it can be.”