If When

by Barbara Gaskell Denvil

  So Sylvia laughed too. “But he didn’t really. He didn’t even bother asking you much about the blood. He knew it was all nothing to do with us. But Tony –?”

  “I’ve been reading books,” Harry admitted, parking in front of Rochester Manor’s main doors. “Sadism and hacking totally unknown women to pieces is more common than you could ever imagine. I was looking at the murderers’ photos. Ted Bundy has the most malicious look I’ve ever seen. Poor Tony doesn’t look like that. He’s usually sort of blank, except at the races.”

  Having waded through books that made her sick, Sylvia had been looking too. She climbed out of the front passenger seat of the car, flexed her arthritic knee and straightened her skirts. “I was looking at old photos too. Murderers have empty faces. Especially empty eyes. Psychopathic eyes. A complete lack of understandable emotion. And no empathy.”

  He was sure that was right. But Harry said, “They must have had emotion. Loads of it, even if it’s sparked in ghastly ways. You surely don’t kill and torture without emotion. Without empathy, well obviously. But plenty of sick passion.”

  “We have unhealthy preoccupations.”

  The fine chilly raindrops were in her hair, making it shine white. “Yes. Should we stop? But you don’t want to and nor do I.”

  Now the rainbow was brilliant, perfectly arched with a small pale sister forming within and echoing the glimmer. Both wandered inside and chose the smaller lounge. Sylvia tossed off her trench coat and left it damp on the pegs in the hall. Then she curled on the small paisley couch, legs beneath her. Harry shrugged out of his jacket, undid the top button of his shirt, and sat on the opposite couch, long, slim and red velvet. The window arched the rainbow outside over Sylvia’s head, crowning her in its seven vivid lights.

  “Fred West never looked empty. His photos make him look like some sort of hungry animal. He actually looks capable of doing what he did.”

  Harry mumbled, staring over Sylvia’s head to the rainbow. “When I read what he did, I couldn’t believe it. Those things were impossible. Really impossible. And some of them to his own children.”

  “I have an idea his wife was even worse. She has an empty face.”

  “He killed himself. At least he had the sense to do that. She hasn’t.”

  “If we are talking murder, I shall leave,” said Ruby from the doorway. “But I want tea first and I asked Pam to make us some and bring it in. Look,” she extended both arms and twirled, “do you like it?”

  “Did you know your hair’s turned blue?”

  “You call me bluebell,” Ruby giggled. “How can I have red hair if I’m a bluebell? Your name is Sylvia and your hair is more or less silver.”

  “But your name’s Ruby.” Harry wasn’t keen on the glistening blue hair. She was also wearing a billowing ankle length Kaftan of blue glitter.

  “All glorious,” said Sylvia. “Now sit down and share our tea. Or are we sharing yours? Anyway, we saw the police and left a complaint about Arthur. But if they gaol him, you have to look after David.”

  “Unless he’s the murderer.”

  “The police didn’t seem to take that idea very seriously.” Harry stopped, and didn’t mention Tony. “But tell me, what do you think of Syrett? He’s on Sylvia’s list.”

  Staring at Sylvia, Ruby cuddled up on the red linen sofa, and smirked. “He’s a lecherous old man who never married and limps around feeling sorry for himself. Vague, daft, rich because of his parents but never bothered to earn a thing for himself, limps after what he calls an act of heroism in the Vietnam war, but I doubt it, some old woman probably hit him with her walking stick after he made a pass at her.”

  “You like him a lot, then.”

  “Oh, he’s alright,” said Ruby. “None of us is perfect. “But I don’t see him as sadistic. He’s not creepy.”

  Sylvia thought he was somewhat creepy. “He’s sweet. Creepy and sweet together is all wrong.”

  “Did he come with us to Monte Carlo?”

  “Yes, as far as I remember.”

  The tea came. Pam also brought a plate of almond slices and a couple of doughnuts left over from her own private Sunday supper. She loved donuts but no one else did and they ate all the almond slices instead, finished the large bubbling teapot, and stretched their legs.

  Ruby, taking the left-over donuts, scampered off to volunteer her help at the Salvos, and Sylvia nodded at Harry, then closed her eyes. “We’re not very good at this, you know, my friend. I don’t intend giving up any more than you do. But I can’t help feeling, if we did suddenly discover this vile depraved Ian Brady creature. I’d just be sick.”

  Harry buried his nose in steam. He wanted to kiss Sylvia again. The pressure had delighted him, and her reaction had seemed encouraging. He wanted the warmth and closeness. Instead he ate a doughnut which he didn’t enjoy.

  Chapter Six

  The last thrill had been more than two months past and now the weather was growing chilly. Somehow winter froze the highlights and turned them grey. There was little time left for one final leap of adrenalin before settling into a domesticated cloud, floating the dismal nothingness until spring woke in the following year.

  Three days past, he had failed. Twice! The girl had pulled out one of those damned smart mobile things, and phoned first her father and then the police, so he had driven off with a faint yet disappointed wave, hiding the anger. The second attempt had come as soon as he left work, and had followed a similar pattern. The girl was less attractive anyway, being older, but he had been desperate. His groin ached, and he couldn’t stop the whirling in his head. She was on foot, so easier, but when he’d offered a lift, she had spat at him, and run.

  At home, almost desperate, he had faced his wife and the plate of rubbish pie and chips placed in front of him, and had thrown it at her, demanding a beer. When it arrived, he had slapped her, and drunk the beer. But this had brought no thrill, only a faint sense of appeasement. He had barely slept that night, nor the next.

  Now he held the small knife very carefully, his fingers shivering with excitement, and slid the angled point of the blade into his own thigh. It was interesting to see how long he could wear the pain. The sting turned to ruptured agony as he pushed deeper, and his groin ached with pleasure. The blood poured, and he watched it slip into the crease of his thigh around his testicles, weeping with colour. Again he shivered in delight. But there were arteries he did not dare dissect, and he pulled out the knife, licking his own blood from its blade. He felt so alive. His heart beat faster, he could hear it, and his veins pulsed. Sitting still for some moments, he drank in the sensation, stretched naked in the bath with just a little burning hot water in the base, tickling at his buttocks with the sting of heat.

  Absolute control. Life in his grasp. Power. His own choice and his own lethargic depression disappeared into the pain, turning to immediate sparkling sensations of being so alive, he could make his own decisions, and they were all vivid with the seesaw of living and dying. The ultimate power. His power.

  Gone, all too soon. Turning on the tap, adjusting the temperature, the blood was washed away and the bath clean. He had the plasters on the enamel edge, and closed the clean slice in his upper thigh, sighed, and climbed out. He stood for some moments, breathing deeply before finally slumping back into bed. Turning away from his wife’s snoring heap, he calmed his breathing, and slept until the alarm woke him next morning. A good night. But not good enough.

  Just one day later he was presented with the perfect solution and the girl, both fairly young and sufficiently attractive, was attempting to change a flat tyre. A winding country road, empty except for the little red car pulled to the thorny roadside hedge.

  “I could take you to the nearest garage.”

  A cheap dented car, a cheap dented face, but slim with pretty eyes. “I’ve tried phoning, but there’s no signal. It’s the hills, I expect. Could you just inform the garage at the next roundabout and ask them to send someone?”

  “I supp
ose so.” Rubbing his chin, looking worried, suppressing the excitement inside. “But I’m in a bit of a hurry. It would be easier for me just to drop you off. Then you can sort it out yourself. No one’s going to steal the car, are they? Not with a flat tyre. And you won’t be gone long.”

  The stranger seemed kind and she needed kindness. Besides, he was elderly with a rough grey stubble turning white around the chin, and wispy white eyebrows. A safe age and a safe face.

  “Well, thank you, you’re right. Just drop me off at Monroe’s. It’s not far.” And she climbed in. So it was done.

  The automatic button beside his steering wheel locked all the doors on his own car from the inside, and he sped off, taking the wrong roundabout and heading west. The girl was tense. “We should be there by now. You’ve taken a wrong turning.”

  ‘There’s a tyre place just up here – on the right, I think. Two minutes, no more. Anyway, it’s nice to know you. My name’s Gregorio Kirk. Always glad to help damsels in distress.”

  Worried, but polite. “I’m grateful. And thank you. But – wasn’t that the tyre shop? You didn’t stop.”

  “A drive first, I think. The sun’s shining, there’s a small valley of birches just off here. I have a thermos. We can talk.”

  “No, no, no. Let me out. I’ll walk back. “

  The birches curled up their leaves, some turning into autumn finery, many still brightly summer tuned. The ground was soft and grassy, and her legs, each ankle tied to a different slender tree trunk, were spread wide. He looked down at her, judging the amount of zoom he wanted on his camera, then clicked five or six times. Finally he put the outsize glove back on.

  Tightly gagged, she could not speak, nor even grunt, but her eyes were frantic and spoke to him of her fear of his power, her knowledge of his utter control, and her weakness in his strong manipulative hands. That was exactly what he wanted. Needed. Chuckling, eyes bright, he began work.

  Having seen less of Harry over the preceding months, Sylvia was surprised, and pleased, when she recognised his car outside. There had been omelette for breakfast and she’d eaten too much, so was now coping with hiccups. She welcomed Harry inside, and said, “Hicc, haven’t seen you for ages, hicc, come in. Tea? Or walk in the grounds before it rains? Hicc.”

  “Just an indoors flop and a coffee. Hicc.”

  She grinned at him. “Copying my hicc hiccups isn’t obligatory.”

  “Then we ask Pam to make her wonderful perfumed coffee.”

  Up the front steps and pushing the front doors open, the lights from the hall sprang out. “Pam, hicc, hasn’t come in today. Must be sick. I’ll, hicc, ask Lavender to make the, hicc, coffee. Or do it myself. Or Ruby. Hicc. Or David.”

  “And how’s David?”

  “David’s been crying again. Someone from Child Protection, hicc, turned up, but after they left, Arthur accused David of calling them.” Sylvia curled on the long red velvet couch, bare feet beneath her. “So Arthur beat David. I hicc went to find Arthur out by the old stables, and said I’d called the hicc authorities and we had a huge stand up shouting match. Hicc. Lavender bustled out and calmed us all down without actually hicc, achieving anything. So she owes me a decent coffee. Hicc.”

  “I can’t imagine you being browbeaten by Arthur.” Harry sniggered. “I’ll talk to him if you like.”

  “You imagine you’d do a better job than I would?”

  “Never. But he doesn’t know me and that’s an advantage. And man to man, you know. Bullies are always cowards.”

  “Talk about something else.” Annoyance had curtailed the hiccups.

  Smiling, Harry shrugged back against the cushions on the other sofa, yellow paisley against his yellow shirt. He was now accustomed to the manor, its furniture and some of its inhabitants. He stretched his legs to the empty fireplace. “Murder. Is that a prettier subject? But there’s been no developments for some time. I decided to get to know Tony a little more. Completely dull. But I’ve an idea his wife isn’t as happy as I originally thought. I also have an idea they never went to Bournemouth.”

  “They went to Wales instead?”

  “I think he went off alone and she doesn’t know where. When I asked her how it was, she was simply confused. Just muttered, Where? Oh yes – fine.”

  “Does she look bruised?”

  Lavender Dawson obligingly pattered in and smiled at Harry with a nod. “Coffee, Mr. Joyce?” She turned to look at Sylvia. “Espresso?” Everyone was nodding at everyone else. Then Lavender said, “I don’t suppose you’ve heard from Pam? She didn’t turn up this morning. Actually, she was supposed to check in yesterday evening. I haven’t even had a phone call.”

  Sylvia had no idea, but any unexpected and unexplained absence of a young and reasonably attractive woman was worrying these days. “No. I’m the last would know what the housemaid is up to. But if we don’t hear from her today, you should phone the police.”

  “Don’t be paranoid, Sylvia.” Lavender trotted off to make the coffee, but called back, “I should ask Arthur.”

  “You should sack Arthur.” A call through the open door, but with no answer. Sylvia turned back to Harry. “And you’ve been unusually busy these past two months, I gather? Or was it the kiss last time that frightened you away?”

  He hadn’t expected her to mention it. “Yes. No.” He scratched his earlobe. “I wanted to get to know Isabel. That’s Tony’s wife. And besides, you have my phone number, landline and mobile, and didn’t ring.”

  “True.” Frowning. “But that wasn’t the kiss. It was – never mind. Let’s talk murder. I’ve been reading.”

  He had too. But it didn’t explain the two months absence. “But I didn’t mean to be rude. Anyway, whoever the murderer is, he’s keeping under cover perhaps, or can’t find an easy victim.”

  “If it was Tony after all,” she decided, “you might have made him suspicious, I mean being friendly with his wife and so on. He might have felt obliged to lie low until you backed off.”

  “I wasn’t that obvious.” At least, he hoped he hadn’t been. But all answers were interrupted when Lavender opened the door and ushered in Arthur, who was carrying the tray of coffee, glared around him and thumped the tray on the low table.

  Lavender was smiling, sat daintily beside Sylvia and indicated for Arthur to wait. She started to hand out the coffee cups, spoon and sugar. “I’ve been talking to Arthur,” she explained, stirring the mug she’d kept for herself. Arthur wasn’t given one. “We’ve had rather a serious discussion” Sipping, she looked over the brink of the cup. “I feel that young David is his father’s responsibility, and not my place to interfere. But, naturally, since he’s living here, we can’t help taking an interest.”

  Although continuing to glare, Arthur remained silent. Harry slurped his coffee. Sylvia put hers on the table. “Since young David lives amongst us and is often willing to run messages or help in other ways, I feel he is the responsibility of us all.” She glared back at Arthur. “And particularly because the poor boy is so frequently in tears and tells dreadful tales of abuse and misery.”

  Shifting his feet, Arthur mumbled, looking over everyone’s heads and out of the wide window. “His Mum died young. She got the heart business. Stroking. David misses her. But I gotta be strict. He’s an odd one, and he pinches stuff if I don’t stop ‘im.”

  “All I’ve ever seen him do,” Harry said, “is hide under the kitchen table crying.”

  “You don’t even live ‘ere,” Arthur glowered. “You don’t know nuffing.”

  Lavender tapped her finger tips on the table and continued to sip her coffee. “Never-the-less,” she said, “I cannot employ someone who mistreats his son. Poor David is autistic. Some years ago when I was a primary school teacher, I studied autism. Making the boy unhappy and confused is not the way to teach him anything. He doesn’t steal, he simply picks up things that appeal to him. I can cope with that.”

  “I don’t beat the lad. “Arthur shook his head vigorously. “Just
a push or a slap and tell ‘im off, like I got to.”

  “If you push or slap him again,” Sylvia insisted, raising her voice, “I shall report you again to the police.”

  Arthur bit his lip and loped off, while Lavender tottered to her high heels, collected the empty coffee cups, and smiled. “All done. It can be quite civilised, you see, if you resist the temptation to get angry. Now it’s dealt with and we’ll never see David cry again.”

  David was sobbing under the kitchen table. Sylvia could hear him from the corridor to the garden, and hurried in. The cook Francesco was on his knees on the tiles, attempting to coax the boy out, but David wouldn’t move.

  “My dear David,” Sylvia called, peeping down under the table, but unable to bend further, “what has your wretched father done to you now?”

  Through sniffs and tears, she heard the words, “He dun killed my Mum,” stopped very still and raised her eyebrows at Francesco.

  “Did I hear that accurately?”

  “But it cannot be true,” complained the cook. “The poor lady died of a stroke, tanti anni fa. A long time. Little pumpkin boy is mistook.”

  Uncurling, David climbed from the shadows. “My mum loves me. Dad don’t.”

  “I shall return to the police tomorrow morning,” said Sylvia. “In the meantime, do please give the poor child a cake or an apple or something.”

  Harry had wandered off home an hour past, leaving Sylvia alone to watch the sunset. The days were shortening, and September was half way through. There had been no repetition of the kiss. She was sorry. At closing in on eighty, she also felt that a longing for physical touch was pathetic. She had no desire to be pathetic. Solving murders was far more elegant an occupation that huddling in her bed feeling lonely and unloved.

  She huddled on the hammock instead, its stretch facing the distant hills, its stand steady on the timbers of the back decking. She remembered the kiss. Too brief but deliciously pleasant. She remembered the slaughtered remains of the girl on the Welsh cliff face and felt a sweep of nausea. Then she wondered where Pam was, and if Arthur Sims really had murdered his wife.