Death in Disguise

by Caroline Graham

  ‘Really.’ Brian sounded more cheerful. ‘We could give it a try, I suppose. Not as if we have anyone else in mind.’

  ‘There’s Alan Bennett.’

  Brian sniffed. He was rather off Alan Bennett. At the beginning Brian had been very much under the writer’s influence. He had hung around outside the village shop and the Old Dun Cow with a tape recorder, talking to the villagers, hoping to unravel the rich and poignant complexities of their inner lives as he understood was the great man’s way. It had been a dead loss. All they talked about was Neighbours and football and what was in the Sun. Eventually a drunk had called him a nosy piss pot and knocked him down.

  Laura said, ‘I thought we were keeping him for an emergency.’

  ‘Let’s take a vote shall we?’ said Rex. ‘Asking Jennings?’ He put his hand up as did the others, Honoria last of all. ‘Gerald?’

  Gerald had turned his still damp trousers back to the fire. He looked over his shoulder at the six raised hands then back to the artificial blue and yellow flames. However he voted it could hardly affect the outcome. Yet he could not let this terrible suggestion pass without some form of protest.

  He said, ‘I think it’ll be a waste of time,’ and marvelled at the neutrality of his voice. At the even tone. The regular and unhurried spacing between the words. The words themselves so mild in contrast to the torment raging in his breast.

  ‘Sorry, Gerald. You’re outnumbered.’ Brian was already pulling on his knitted hat.

  ‘Even so,’ (he couldn’t just give up) ‘I don’t think there’s a lot of point—’

  ‘If you won’t write I will,’ said Brian. ‘Care of his publisher, I suppose. In fact I might ring them up—’

  ‘No, no. I’m secretary. I’ll do it.’ At least that way matters would stay in his own hands. ‘No problem.’ Gerald stood up, wishing only to be rid of them. He saw Laura covertly watching him and managed to stretch his lips in the semblance of a smile.

  He did not sleep that night. He sat at his desk for the first hour quite motionless, drowned in recollection. His head felt as if it were being squeezed in a vice. To see the man again. Max. Max. Who had stolen his most priceless possession. To have to speak words of welcome and no doubt be forced to listen to hours of self-aggrandisement in return. Gerald knew he would not be able to bear it.

  At three o’clock he started writing. He wrote and wrote and wrote again. By six he was exhausted and the waste basket was overflowing, but he had the letter. One side of one sheet of paper. He was as sure as he could be that the balance was right. It was out of the question that he should beg Max not to come. Even at the time—even at the very moment of that terrible betrayal—Gerald had not begged. Victorious Max might have been but that was one satisfaction he would forever seek in vain.

  Now Gerald, gripping his pen hard in his right hand and holding the paper down firmly with his left, started to address the envelope. Necessarily he began with the name. M.a.x. J.e.n.n.i.n.g.s. The pen slipped and twirled in his sweating fingers. It was as if the very letters had the power of conjuration. He could hear the man breathing, smell the fragrance of his cigar smoke, look into the brilliant blue eyes in that bony, sunburnt face. Feel the old spell being cast.

  He read the letter again. Surely no one comprehending the emotional turmoil from which such an invitation must inevitably have sprung would accept.

  Gerald affixed a first-class stamp, put on his muffler and overcoat and left the house. As he set off for the post box the milkman’s float materialised out of the dark.

  ‘You’re up early, Mr Hadleigh.’ The man nodded at the white square in Gerald’s hand. ‘Making sure you get your pools off.’

  ‘That’s right.’

  Gerald strode off, his spirits curiously lightened by this mundane encounter. The real world rushed in, familiar and banal. It was the night now that seemed unreal. A hothouse of unhealthy imaginings.

  He quickened his pace, filling his lungs with fresh winter air. By the time he was starting back towards the cottage the bitter reflections that had so tormented him just a short while before now began to seem no more than over-heated fantasies. He was projecting his own wretched memories on to someone else. For all he knew Max had practically forgotten about him. And in any case, even if he hadn’t, Gerald could not somehow see him driving nearly thirty miles just to talk to a bunch of amateur scribblers. He was successful now. Each new epic in the Sunday Times Top Ten without fail. No, the more Gerald thought about it, the more insubstantial and unfounded his previous fears now seemed.

  There were streaks of rose pink, lemon and silver on the horizon as he let himself back into the house and put on the coffee pot. And by the time the sun’s scarlet rim had appeared he had persuaded himself that writing such a careful and painstaking letter had been a waste of time and effort. Because there was no chance in the world that Max would come.

  Almost a month to the day after the group meeting Laura stood by her kitchen door, knowing what she was about to do even as she entertained the delusion that she might yet change her mind. In her hand she held an empty sealed envelope. Laura did not own a dog and had more sense than to walk around an English village in the dark for no apparent reason.

  On her last excursion (just under a week ago) she had met the Reverend Clewes coming out of the vicarage with Henry, his basset hound. They had all walked along together and Laura had been compelled to post her envelope before being accompanied all the way back home and seen safely inside. She had not dared to venture out again and had gone to bed fretting miserably with deprivation. But tonight Henry had gone trotting by with his master, and trotting back, a good half hour ago.

  Laura buttoned her dark reefer jacket up to the neck. She wore jeans, strong leather gloves, black boots and a sombre head scarf concealing distinctive coils of hair that glittered like copper wire. She stepped out into the still, silent night, locked the door, turned the key very gently and stood for a moment listening.

  There was no sound from either of the houses flanking her own. No cats being put out or let in. No chink of milk bottles or rattle of dustbin lids. Or friends being seen off the premises. She set off, hushed on rubber soles, turning left without even having to think.

  She walked quickly, keeping close to tall hedges—the Englishman’s modest horticultural version of the medieval stockade. Suddenly a crumpled-silver-paper moon occupied the sky and Laura stepped into a negative. Pumice-stone houses, black trees painted with pale light. Previously lost in the anticipation of journey’s end, she was shocked into self-consciousness. Exposed, like a solitary actor on a brilliantly lit stage.

  It was still several yards to the post office, which was, in fact, nothing grander than the properly fortified sitting room of Wiworry, Mr and Mrs ‘Midge’ Sandell’s bungalow. The pillar box was by the gate and as Laura drew level with it the moon became obscured by clouds again. She put the envelope into her pocket and walked on. This was the tricky bit, for if she ran into an acquaintance now she could hardly say she was on her way to post a letter. But luck was with her and she saw no one.

  Plover’s Rest was the last house to face the Green proper. From then on the divided road joined up again and the property on either side consequently became less valuable. There was a gap of around thirty yards before these houses began and this area had been left wild. It was filled with a tangle of hawthorns, sloes and wild crab apples and was a godsend to Laura for, like most of the houses on the Green, Plover’s Rest had a halogen lamp which any direct approach set off immediately.

  She made her way through the tangle, holding vicious briars away from her face, staring into the blackness unafraid, desire outweighing apprehension a hundredfold. Then, heart pounding, she crept out of the tiny copse, made a left turn and squeezed through a second gap, this time in a waist-high wattle fence. She was now in Gerald Hadleigh’s back garden.

  Laura stood for a moment, keenly aware of her surroundings—a massive beech tree, empty ornamental urns, the barely vi
sible outline of patio slabs sparkling with frost. Over her head the sky was crammed with stars. Avoiding the gravel, she tiptoed softly forward, preceded by puffs of her own breath immediately visible on the icy air.

  There was a light on in the kitchen but, as Laura approached, it was plain that the room was empty. Boldly she stared in. There were some dirty dishes in the sink. A half bottle of claret and a glass on a tray. Changing her position slightly she could see the long shelf of boxed spices and narrow glass jars with dried shavings of fungi and ginger and some brackish curly stuff the colour of dried blood.

  Gerald had mentioned once that he liked to cook Japanese food. Laura had at once said she adored it too and asked if he would give her a lesson. He had smiled and said he wouldn’t dare but next time he cooked teriyaki she was welcome to try some. She had waited, in a daze of happiness, for that invitation, which had never materialised.

  Eventually, driven by longing, by a vision of the two of them sitting at a candlelit table drinking glasses of warm sake she reminded him of his promise. He assured her he had not forgotten and how would next Thursday at seven be?

  Laura had danced away to steam her skin and brush her glorious hair and massage scented lotion over immaculate, slender legs. On Thursday at six forty-five she had put on her Jasper Conran maize jacket and ivory silk shirt and narrow damson crêpe skirt and hung glowing cornelians in her ears. She looked lovely. Everyone said so—the Clewses, Rex, the couple from Windy Hollow who were in computers. A first invitation, she discovered later, for all of them.

  Anyone else would have learned from that. Laura, crying herself to sleep, awoke to the conviction that Gerald was simply nervous. Socially not at all gauche where romance was concerned, Laura told herself, he was simply out of practice. He wanted to entertain her in his home but, the first time, needed other people present. That had been nearly a year ago. The invitation had never been repeated.

  Wretchedly unhappy, needing to protect herself, Laura struggled to create in her mind an alternative situation, charting the progress of an imaginary affair to Gerald’s disadvantage. He was a rotten lover, a boring conversationalist, faddy and finicky and set in his ways. Completely self-absorbed. After no time at all, light-hearted and free as a bird, she left him. With a huge expenditure of imaginative energy Laura could hold on to this comforting fiction, sometimes for days. But then, of course, she would see him again.

  Sound and light! Bathed in panic she dodged from the window and pressed herself flat against the cottage, feeling the flints jab into her back. But it was only Brian, Gerald’s nearest neighbour, putting his permanently red-nosed Volkswagen away. The headlamp’s beams were gradually eaten up. The garage doors banged shut. She heard him walk down the side of the house and go in. A bolt was shot. No doubt Sue would, even now, be making bedtime drinks. Laura felt a fleeting pang of envy. Not, God knew, that she, or surely anyone in their right senses, would want to be married to Brian. But there was undoubtedly a brand of cosiness obtainable à deux that was simply not on the menu when you lived alone.

  Oh, what am I doing here? Laura pounded her gloved fist on the wall, scraping the leather. I am a grown-up thirty-six-year-old woman. I am attractive and have even been called beautiful. I am not neurotic. I have friends and I have known love. I run a successful business and have a pretty house full of beautiful things. Children smile at me. Cats and dogs give me the time of day. Men ask me out. So why am I creeping around like a criminal at eleven o’clock on a freezing February night on the off-chance of catching a glimpse of a man who couldn’t give a damn whether I’m alive or dead?

  Falling in love. She had never understood before how literally, physically true the phrase was. One minute she had been choosing oranges in the village shop, the next she had stepped back and trodden on a man’s foot. A tall man with greying curly hair and rather cool hazel eyes. What happened next (the falling) was quite extraordinary. Laura had seen a film once—Hitchcock perhaps—where someone in their dreams tumbled down and down into a black and white spiralling vortex. And that’s just what it had been like. She closed her eyes, feeling again the force of it, tugging on her heartstrings like a falcon’s jesses.

  Sure that he would be married, Laura had become weak with relief on hearing that he was a widower. Such a tragedy. His wife died several years ago. Leukaemia. They hadn’t been married long. He’s never got over it. And she, confident of her femininity, her lovability, thought: I will show him how to get over it. I will make him happy again. And when I do he will forget all about her.

  New to Midsomer Worthy, she attended the harvest supper in the hope of seeing him. He was not present, but she did discover that the village boasted a writers’ circle of which he was a member.

  Though having no talent or interest in the subject she joined immediately, under the pretence that she was transcribing a mass of letters, papers and receipts she had bought in an auction job lot. And so, once every four weeks at the very least, she was sure of seeing him. Not just to smile and wave at across the Green but truly to be with for two and sometimes nearer three hours. She thought of these periods as quality time. Time spent doing what mattered to you most in all the world. She had come across the phrase in a magazine article about parents with only limited access to their children.

  Telling him was out of the question. She was not even remotely tempted. Everything would inevitably change, perhaps—no, almost certainly—for the worst. Things were easy now between them. Or at least Gerald thought they were, which is what mattered. But how might he handle a passionate declaration of undying love that he was either unable or unwilling to return? It would place him in an intolerable position. He would be embarrassed when they met. View her perhaps with distaste. Or worse, with pity. He might even drop out of the group to avoid an awkward evening. Goodbye, quality time. Hello, end of the world.

  God, it was cold. Her feet, even with thick socks inside the boots, were frozen. Laura moved on to the grass at the side of the house where she could, inaudibly, stamp up and down. I must be mad, she said to herself. I’ll be seeing him in twenty-four hours.

  She had a sudden sharp perception of how she would appear to an observer. A peeping Thomasina. A voyeuse. And vowed to give up. Tomorrow.

  A vehicle was approaching. The sound became louder, filling her ears. It was not Gerald’s Celica. This car had a much heavier, louder note. And when the door opened and closed it was with a louder thunk. Laura ran into the trees on the far side of the cottage. Then, dry-mouthed with apprehension, moved swiftly forwards to where she could see what was happening.

  A taxi stood in the drive. A woman, her back to Laura, was paying off the driver. She wore a smart black suit and a little hat with a veil. The driver called out something of which Laura could make out only ‘safely in…’. The woman rapped on the cottage door. As the cab drove away, the door opened and she stepped inside.

  Laura let out the breath she had not even realised she was holding in a low moan. She clapped her hands over her mouth and waited, rigid with alarm, in case someone had heard. But it seemed no one had.

  As she stood absorbing the shock other feelings were released. Misery, jealousy, a great bursting sadness and rage at her own gullible complacency. Because Gerald had shown no interest in her she had been vain enough to assume he had no interest in any woman. How completely she—indeed all of them—had been taken in by the pose of grieving widower.

  Knowing she would be sorry, yet driven to turn the knife, Laura moved away from the shelter of the trees. As she did so a branch pulled at her scarf. The velvet curtains in the sitting room were not quite drawn. She stood in the flower border, past caring by now whether she was seen or not, and applied her eye to the chink.

  She could see part of the bookshelves, the section of the sideboard supporting the wedding picture with Grace, appropriately enough, cut off. Half a vase of pink viburnum. The woman came into view. She was carrying a glass of red wine, presumably the claret. She had taken off her hat and thick f
air hair tumbled in waves over her shoulders. She was beautifully made up but, thought Laura, older than I am. Much too old for him.

  The woman lifted her glass, smiled and spoke. Then drank deep. Gerald’s wine. The intimacy of this very ordinary little ritual nearly drove Laura mad. She could no longer see for tears. Certainly she never saw or heard old Mr Lilley from Laburnum Villas walking by with his collie dog.

  Amy could remember quite clearly the moment she became aware that servitude had entered her life. She had been living at her sister-in-law’s for several months and had tried to make herself useful from the start, being only too keenly aware of her inability to contribute financially to the household.

  The moment in question had occurred on a sunny afternoon in May. Honoria had been sitting at her desk surrounded, as usual, by genealogical charts, old letters and other documents relating to the Lyddiards’ family tree and books on heraldry. The doorbell had just rung and Amy had put the pillowcase she had been mending aside, looked across at Honoria’s broad back, half got up, hesitated. Honoria did not even turn round. Just jerked an irritated finger in the direction of the sound.

  Until that moment Amy had dignified her increasingly lengthy range of daily tasks under the term ‘being useful’, which she certainly was. Within a month of her arrival Amy had taken over the shopping (village store daily, Causton once a week), garden maintenance, collecting wood for the boiler, washing and ironing and helping Honoria with her research. But there were certain things that she might not do. Duties that were below the salt. Although only a relation by marriage she was still a Lyddiard, which meant no kneeling. Mrs Bundy came in once a week for that sort of thing, which was called ‘the rough’.

  On the rare occasions when visitors were present Amy was not even allowed to clear away the tea things. ‘As if,’ she had grumbled during one of her secret conversations with Sue, ‘they are going to think we’ve got a black and white maid hiding in the kitchen.’