Stranger at the Wedding

by Jack G. Hills

  Walking passed the heavy set oak, nail-studded door, they found themselves drenched in bright sunlight and standing in the south east corner looking out over the expanse of the grassy Tom Quad. Taking time for their eyes to adjust to the light and generally to absorb the academic ambience of the historic quadrangle, they stood for a moment before heading off for the exit.

  Fully immersed in the tourist mode, they took their time to wander around the perimeter before deciding to leave the sanctity of the beautiful building via the small sally-port, which Ingrid had assured Donald led to a short alleyway that finally spilled out into Boar Lane and their ultimate destination… the Boar’s Head pub.

  “That was amazing, thank you. I know you expected more of a reaction but it was wonderful just being here.” Donald said, as they stood to one side to let two elderly academics enter the quad before they left. The doorway wasn’t strictly speaking for general use and was, if you obeyed the sign to the left of the doorway… ‘For the use of Students and Alumni of the Christ Church only.’

  Donald was going to add that perhaps they ought to find another exit but realised too late that Ingrid wasn’t actually listening to him or looking at the two fellows who rather than cause a fracas had decided to ignore the couple flouting the college’s rules and report the misuse of the side door to the head porter, as they passed his lodge.

  As if by instinct or maybe a sixth sense or perhaps to avoid eye contact with the two Oxford fellows, Ingrid had instead glanced backwards whilst she’d waited for the two men to enter and as she cast an eye back along the path, there in the shadow of the cathedral doorway she saw the spectre in the red coat. But just as she was going to bolt back and confront the person and discover who was following who, Donald seized the opportunity to make a quick exit and avoid any sort of embarrassing confrontation. Without a word of warning, he grabbed Ingrid’s hand and pulled her unceremoniously through the open door and out into the alleyway beyond.

  The red coat vanished in a flash, as it was consumed by another wave of tourists and the oak door, which had slammed shut behind them. Now Ingrid was certain… five times couldn’t a coincidence.

  After a sandwich and a couple of stiff drinks, which Donald had hoped would take the edge off Ingrid’s nerves, they’d waited for the bus opposite the Martyr’s Monument and the entrance to Balliol College.

  “You know I think we may have been worried for no particular reason.” Donald said with a renewed calmness to his voice. “Sometimes I think not having all our usual faculties, combined with the hypnotherapy sends our imaginations into overdrive. Take me for example, I can’t make up my mind if what I’m thinking at any time is a lost memory or merely my imagination running riot… so naturally I usually assume the worst. Anyway, I don’t think we should worry about our ‘friend’, we’ll be gone soon and then they’ll have someone else to follow and haunt.” Donald said, wiggling his fingers in an eerily ghost-like manner.

  “We? ...Did you say we’ll be gone soon? Does that mean you won’t mind if I tag along… just as your friend of course.” She lied unconvincingly, just as the bus stopped and with a hiss of pneumatic air, the doors parted as if by magic. In reverential silence, they climbed aboard, paid their fares and headed upstairs. Trapped on the tight spiral stairs Donald stopped and turned to face his friend. He’d not mean to say we… it had just happened but as he looked into her eyes… eyes that seemed so full of hope and love, he knew he couldn’t say no.

  “I guess not and it’ll be good to have someone around who knows me better than I know myself and you’ll only get into trouble if you stay here.” The smile that creased Ingrid’s face was worth all the misgivings Donald felt right at that moment. “Come on let’s grab the seats upstairs at the front.” Donald hoped he sounded like a big brother, whereas Ingrid was certain that he sounded like some ardent lover who couldn’t say goodbye.

  As the bus trundled along the Woodstock Road, Ingrid forgot all about the red coat, which had plagued their last day in Oxford. Whilst it obviously hadn’t been an apparition, it had also proved to be singularly non-confrontational… never once had the stranger approached them or bumped into them or called out. Whoever the person in the red coat was, Ingrid decided, as she settled back to watch the world drift by, she wasn’t important enough to hinder their impending elopement.

  At the next set of traffic lights, the road split into three lanes and whilst they waited patiently in the inside lane for the red light to turn green, the other bus, which had followed them out of the city pulled up alongside them. Unthinkingly, Ingrid looked to her right, just as the lights changed.

  There sat in the identical seat on the other bus was the woman in the red coat.

  In the very instant that their bus inched forward, the stranger turned her head and her brooding, eyes cut right through Ingrid. The coldness of the woman’s piercing stare sent a shiver throughout Ingrid’s body and caused her to close her eyes in some form of weird self-defence mechanism. Fearing the worst but knowing she must try and identify the anonymous woman, she forced open her eyes and looked out across the chasm that separated the two vehicles. The woman appeared to be oblivious to their presence and with her red hood pulled down, Ingrid was able to see every blemish on the woman’s skin and count every freckle on her face but it was as if her own memory had been bleached white, for Ingrid could remember nothing from her past that told her she might know the woman.

  Desperate for answers, Ingrid wanted Donald to look at the woman, to see if he might recognise her but when she glanced to her left, he was staring blindly forward in blissful ignorance and then just as she was about to attract his attention and force him to look sideways, the girl’s face creased into a sickly, evil smile.

  There was no mistaking the look or the message, but as if to ram home her threat of malice, the woman waved her fingers at Ingrid, as if she were playing some satanic arpeggio on an invisible keyboard.

  With the last vestige of doubt eradicated, Ingrid’s body erupted into a ripple of quivering that resembled a jelly on a treadmill… finally she recognised the red mask of death that had been stalking them.

  “Ingrid? Are you alright?” Donald asked feeling her body shake with fear and seeing her face drain as white as any ghostly apparition. But as he looked around searching for the answer, which Ingrid seemed unable to utter for herself, all he saw was an empty top deck. The other bus, together with its passengers, had long since taken the right hand turn to Banbury and had disappeared from view.

  ~~~~~

  By the time the helicopter landed back at the Atlantic View Hotel, Patrick had dropped Sally at their earlier rendezvous, flown back down to Cornwall, landed at the old farmhouse, picked up Rachel and then landed back at the hotel in Padstow as if nothing untoward had happened during their two days away.

  For his part, John McGovern of the Bristol and Bath Insurance Company watched the helicopter land with just a glint of green in his eye. Why was it he wondered that some people got all the breaks and made all the money? Patrick Fitzgerald was obviously a man of many talents or very lucky. To McGovern he had everything, a successful business, fast cars, brand new large house, a beautiful wife and his own personal helicopter, which he handled with all the skill and ease of the consummate professional. The insurance man had taken an instant dislike to him or more likely what he represented.

  He took another sip of his gin and tonic and from his seat next to the French doors, which on warmer days led out onto the rear terrace, watched the hotel’s owner climb down from the pilot’s seat and walk round the front of the helicopter to help his passenger from the cockpit.

  The woman, he recognised immediately from her photograph, which was stapled to the outer cover of her file and which John McGovern had indelibly imprinted into his own memory. He had to admit that she didn’t look like a potential husband murderer and insurance fraudster but if he’d learnt anything over the years of investigation it was that there was absolutely no stereotype when it came to d
efrauding insurance companies. Money had a strange way of disguising even the most avid killer.

  As Patrick Fitzgerald held out his hand to help Rachel down from her seat, he couldn’t have known that the man sat in the Land’s End Lounge, was watching every move and twitch of his body with the eagle-eye of an experienced investigator. It was usually the little things… a casual look, the holding of a hand for a second longer than appropriate or the accidental brushing of bodies, as two people passed that gave an affair or a conspiracy away. But try as he might John McGovern couldn’t be sure if he’d just witnessed such a moment. Maybe Fitzgerald had caressed rather than held the woman’s hand and maybe there was a frisson between the pair that shouldn’t have been present but it was nothing that anyone working for the hotelier had noticed. Well if they had, they hadn’t been willing to discuss the rumours and gossip that occasionally swept around the workplace, with a complete stranger. Even the concierge had been a closed book when it came to selling personal information. An address, which could have been discovered in any of the town’s pubs, was one thing but information which might damage his employer and hence his own livelihood and future was entirely different.

  “Mrs Bouchet?” The barman had replied sceptically. “What do you want to know about her for?”

  “I’m working for the coroner’s office.” McGovern lied.

  “Well I don’t really know anything except that her first husband disappeared one night and was never seen again. It was only later that she received news from abroad to say he’d been killed in an accident of some sort. After that she married Mr Bouchet… he has a small restaurant in the town. I can give you the address if you want?”

  “No that’s fine thank you. What’s she like?”

  “Who Mrs Bouchet? She’s always been very pleasant when she’s been here… of course we’re not what you might call friends but she gets on very well with Mrs Fitzgerald.”

  “And Mr Fitzgerald? How does he get on with Mrs Bouchet?” John McGovern knew that sometimes you had to revisit the same question from a different direction if you were ever going to get to the truth.

  “Their friends, just like Mrs Fitzgerald and Mr Bouchet are friends.”

  The police car pulled up to the front of the hotel just as John McGovern was leaving.

  He’d decided that he’d learnt all he was going to learn from Patrick Fitzgerald’s staff and the man himself had left word that he wasn’t to be disturbed. So making a note of the expenses he’d incurred, he’d finished off his second gin and tonic and thought he’d try the regulars at the Anchor Inn down at the harbour side, before trying to get something to eat. There was no lack of establishments, only the prices precluded him eating at the majority of restaurants. His company’s expenses policy didn’t quite extend to include Michelin stars but then they normally didn’t serve enough food to satisfy his grumbling appetite and the concierge had gladly recommended the fish and chip shop down by the harbour. So that had seemed an appropriate direction in which to head… and information, food but especially drink were the grist to the mill for any good insurance investigator, he’d always thought. Perhaps after a good night’s rest all round, he’d feel more invigorated and the Fitzgeralds and the Bouchets would be more amenable to answering a few of his questions.

  But just as his mind had savoured the first piece of battered haddock and he’d imagined dipping another chip into the bloody pool of tomato ketchup, the man climbing out of the front seat of the police car, made him stop in his tracks and forget all about his grumbling stomach.

  “Inspector Langford…” McGovern tried to sound disinterested but friendly. “…what brings you down here? Business or are you and the sergeant looking to spend a quite night away somewhere?” He asked with jovial familiarity that had been honed over the years to disarm any objectors.

  “John.” The inspector nodded curtly, as he walked passed the insurance investigator without making eye contact, followed moments later by his sombre-faced sergeant.

  McGovern’s investigative senses bristled with anticipation. Suddenly, whatever the police were doing at the Fitzgerald’s hotel certainly had to be more interesting than chatting to a tap room full of half-cut locals, whilst sipping pints of warm beer with nothing to look forward to except a greasy fish supper.

  So without another word and certainly no invite, he fell in behind the two police officers and walked back inside.

  “I’m Detective Inspector Langford and this is Detective Sergeant Morris. Is it possible to speak with a Mr Patrick Fitzgerald please?” The policeman asked the stunned receptionist, as politely and quietly as he deemed necessary. As the girl picked up the telephone and called her boss, Langford spotted John McGovern loitering near the doorway and dispatched his sergeant to take care of the unwanted intrusion.

  “The inspector says you can bugger off.” Denise Morris said in a hushed voice.

  “Really? Why’s he being so polite?” McGovern asked, as his interest grew exponentially.

  “Well actually he wasn’t… his exact words were, ‘tell that nosey bastard to fuck off and if he refuses arrest him’… I just translated in the hope that you’d see sense and tonight isn’t the night to test him, believe me.”

  “Give me a clue sergeant and like everyone that falls in love with you… I’ll go quietly.” He teased in a half-hearted sort of way… the other half was that he’d always fancied the pants off the sergeant and hadn’t yet given up on the idea of getting her into bed. DS Morris looked back to where her boss was still waiting for Patrick Fitzgerald to appear and then with a knowing nod said…

  “It’s Fitzgerald’s wife and another man. They were found shot out at the house late this afternoon.” The sergeant felt that was enough, now it was McGovern’s turn to reciprocate by disappearing, but surprisingly he just stood and stared at the detective.

  “But I was there this afternoon myself. Apart from the place looking and sounding deserted there was nothing suspicious… I even went round the back and saw nothing.”

  “What the hell were you doing there?” The sergeant asked stunned at the admission. She’d seen the crime scene for herself and how anyone could miss that bloody mess she couldn’t imagine.

  “The man was probably Mr Bouchet, he and his wife are… were staying with the Fitzgeralds.” McGovern corrected his own error quickly. “I’d gone there to speak with him about his wife… who by the way was away in Scotland with Patrick Fitzgerald. They’ve just got back… I watched them land not more than an hour ago.”

  “Forget what I said earlier. Sit over there, don’t say a word and wait for the inspector. If I have to come looking for you, you’ll wish you’d taken out your own life insurance plan. Understand?” Without waiting for McGovern to agree, she hurried back to the reception desk and had just relayed the information given to her when Patrick Fitzgerald appeared from the door marked private.

  From his owl’s perch in the lobby, John McGovern watched with interest as the dapperly dressed business man made his regal entrance, as if he was about to address his pitiful subjects. But McGovern noticed one small change in the man’s appearance that might have escaped some but not his eagle eye… the man had changed his shirt. Out was the pure white silk Ralph Lauren shirt, to be replaced by a simple white cotton Lacoste shirt. It was a change that fascinated McGovern… if the hotelier was so keen to get home to see his wife, as he’d just explained to Inspector Langford, why hadn’t he waited until he’d got home before changing, unless of course the reason was more salacious.

  It was that thought that forced McGovern’s natural curiosity to ask why? ...why after spending the last few days away together would it be so necessary, within ten minutes of touching down, to rip each other’s clothes off and go at it like rabbits… unless the truth was that they hadn’t actually been together. Now that thought, more than the fact that the pair might be having an affair, intrigued John McGovern the most.

  “Inspector… whatever it is, can’t it wait until the morni
ng? I’ve been away on business for a couple of days and I’m desperately keen to get home and see my wife. I should have been back hours ago and she’ll only worry herself to death if I don’t show soon.”

  “About your wife sir…”

  PART SIX

  “Dream on, dream on, of bloody deeds and death.”

  William Shakespeare, King Richard III

  GROUNDS FOR SEPARATION

  June 2010

  On reflection and under the pendulous swinging of Dr Atkinson’s hypnotic pendant, Donald replayed the events of that day and tried to recount if there’d been anything that he could have done to prevent the tragedy… but in the end the only conclusion that he, and the staff monitoring his treatment, could draw was that it was like all the other events that seemed to have plagued his recent life, it was fate… a pre-ordained destiny that couldn’t be altered.

  Neither of them had talked about the red coated spectre once they’d returned from their trip into town and for the next couple of days Ingrid had simply mooched around the clinic moodily keeping her own council and growling at anyone who dared approach her. The sight of the woman on the bus had spooked her more than she cared to admit, but in an establishment built around conversation and trust, she thought that neither was appropriate where the woman was concerned especially as she couldn’t decide if it was herself or Donald that had been the target of her creepy attention.

  Donald knew something was upsetting Ingrid. She hadn’t been the same since they’d returned from Oxford and try as he might he couldn’t get her to open up about what might have brought on the change… he’d told her she could travel to Cornwall with him and she’d seemed to have accepted their friendship on his terms… but there was more, something else, something more dark and brooding was bothering her.