‘It’s a complete non starter, Louise,’ he said crossly. ‘Why not just put him in touch? We’d be glad to plant a flower for him, wouldn’t we, Ciaran?’ The son looked at his watch.
Chas had already left. I was annoyed with him for leaving me here, and worried at the reasons for it, though he insisted he had to press on with his research. I had put myself forward to help Stasia, the least I could do was get on with it. She wanted me to sit by Gustav’s body while she made out lists of invitees and food supplies for the wake. She seemed much calmer today, resigned to what lay before her on a sort of elevated bier in the meadery. The Byrnes had massaged the rigor from Gustav’s features and dressed him in a simple white shroud, drawn up to the chin to cover the stitching in the neck. He looked yellow and washed out, in spite of the tinted embalming fluids (Mrs Jury would fix that, I thought). But his mouth wore a smug sort of smile, not that unlifelike, really, for he had been a pompous little man, there was no getting away from it. I was glad that Stasia was seeing him after the embalming, that she had been spared the sight of a body post-autopsy, blotchy and broken, still traumatised from that last bout with life.
Knowledge that I could do the job, that I was somehow miraculously adept at undertaker’s business, made the business of the phone calls easier. Some of the mourners had to travel to south Devon from the other ends of the earth (India, Australia) in time to make the funeral in a week’s time, but few made excuses, such, I thought, had been the draw of Gustav’s preaching, a message that was lost on me. Many people offered to ring others, pass the bad news on, so by the time I was through, I calculated we should cater for at least four hundred. This was going to be a tall order, I told Stasia, unless she bought in outside help, but that, too, was forthcoming. An organic bakery in the little town nearby agreed to supply a selection of pastries and eggless cakes for the price of the ingredients alone. Since Gustav had been strictly teetotal, there was no need to order drinks, and instead of a minister or other kind of professional celebrant, Stasia was planning to let Gustav himself conduct proceedings by playing a videotape of one of his meditations. How crazy is that? I concluded, thinking once more of locked-up Roy.
He still kept me awake at night, though not in Chas’s flat above the stable. I had moved into a guest room in the main house, which was steadily filling up with other friends of the deceased, who were arriving for his send off. Some of these friends had building and carpentry skills which they put to use restoring the chapel, singing to Gustav as they worked while he lay at rest in his newly-arrived zinc-lined coffin. The catafalque was a lumbering construction, rough-hewn and rather pagan looking, I thought, like something from an ancient barrow. When it was finished, on the eve of his big day, Gustav was taken out of the coffin and laid across the empty stone shell on a wide bier strewn with the branches of evergreens. The ‘specialist’, Mrs Jury, had given a rosy bloom to his cheeks, which made him look like a smiling cherub, far younger than his fifty-eight years. In his hands she had placed a theatrical-looking object, which Stasia said was the caduceus of Mercury, an ancient symbol of healing. When Chas saw it, arriving back at the eleventh hour, he remarked that it reminded him of something out of Up Pompeii. ‘Be serious,’ I told him. ‘Everybody else is.’
But there was no denying the flavour of kitsch as the funeral got underway and Gus walked onto the screen above his coffin to sounds of taped applause, seconded now by the crowd of mourners who packed out the small chapel. The canned Gus wore peach-coloured robes, his hair combed up into a bouffant halo. ‘Let go,’ he commanded, pointing that caduceus thing in the direction of the bier on which his dead self lay. Mr Byrne was standing by, his top hat in his hands, his lavender coloured gloves folded neatly away. His son looked like an overdressed bouncer. There was no need for them to have returned, I thought. The funeral was running itself, or, rather, Gus was running it, a celluloid star: ‘Give it up,’ he admonished. ‘Let go of your desires. The end of desire is the beginning of enlightenment.’
The doors had been left open so that those in the courtyard could hear. People crowded forward as we neared the end. Behind Chas and me were the people from Tasmania, a man and woman who had criticised us for wearing black. Gus was gone into the light, they said, as though we were suggesting otherwise by opting for this monochrome. I turned to offer them the sign of affirmation, as Gus was ordering us to, but they looked studiously sideways for more worthy people to kiss. At last the tape played out, the bearers lowered the bier into the heavy coffin sited inside the catafalque and sealed the lid. Mr Byrne had promised Stasia that the seal would be absolutely airtight. I thought again of the mean little send off that Edith Woods and John Frederick Getty had been given at the North London crem, without any followers, except the old folk of The Tuesday Club and, of course, that crazy-looking bald girl who spoke of Edith’s wisdom. One sees so much if one is observant. What I was observing here at Gustav’s funeral looked pretty much like the other thing, but clearly I was in a minority.
Chas was taking me back to London that night and wanted to make a quick get away. I removed a black bordered envelope from the front passenger seat as I got into his car.
‘I’ll have to settle that when I get back,’ he said. ‘Byrne’s bill.’
‘You’re settling it? Didn’t you call the insurers?’
‘What’s the point? The policy will be invalid.’
‘What?’
‘The bastard had been taking amphetamine. I always wondered how he made it through a hard night’s meditation. Insurance companies dig very deep.’
‘You’re joking, Chas. How the hell do you know?’
He was aggressively beeping his horn at a group of mourners thronging the drive. ‘A colleague called me from Plymouth. Seems there was a twist in Gustav’s tale. The technician didn’t mention it, cause of death being coronary failure, no need to get the Coroner up, etc, etc, but I guess the pathologist thought he’d better fill me in.’
‘I don’t understand,’ I said. ‘The autopsy was really quick. You said the crash team saw him.’
‘Right, but the mortuary took a few samples from Gus as a precaution. I mean, you do, don’t you?’ He glanced at me. ‘The pathologist got around to running some tests when he had carved a little hole in his writing-up pile. Seems Gustav’s liver was in pretty bad shape for a teetotaller, but it now looks likely that amphetamine abuse brought on the heart attack. That was still the primary cause, you understand, so Stasia need never know. Not now at least. Maybe I’ll let it emerge,’ he said grimly.
‘Mr Byrne didn’t say anything.’
‘How the hell would he know? The liver wasn’t there, none of the organs were, you know the score, Louise. Whatever, the funeral has to be paid for. I’ll deal with it.’
‘Two and a half grand? That’s very generous for a man you didn’t even like.’
‘I want my sister to move on from that fairy, not get bogged down trying to work out the fraud he pulled on her for years and years. Let him pull it on other people – she stands to make some money out of this shrine thing.’
‘She’s certainly bucked up over this week,’ I said, remembering the massive crowd who sat affirming Gus’s enjoinders to live pure and let go.
‘As long as they buy into this saint thing,’ Chas said ‘– and I mean buy into it, so she can keep the B & B afloat, why should it matter? People have been buying into false prophets since Moses came down from the mountain.’ He switched the radio on, to let me know, I guessed, the discussion was at an end. But I could not let it go. ‘I think it’s awful,’ I said. ‘Gus always struck me as someone with integrity, and you’re saying all that time he was popping pills like you.’
‘I don’t take amphetamine, Louise. I don’t drink as much as he did either. Seems his liver was like a sponge.’
‘Well, it’s good of you to cover up for him like that, to spare Stas…’
‘I’m not covering up for him. I’m not covering up for anybody. Don’t make that mistake a
gain, Louise.’
‘You covered up once,’ I said, remembering how he had lied to the police about a missing organ from the store.
‘Yeah, and that was a mistake.’ He turned up the radio volume. The news was warning of power cuts later in the autumn. The government was stepping in again with measures aimed at curbing the influx of asylum-seekers. This led me back to Roy again, for he was an asylum-seeker too.
I watched the exit signs flash by as we drew nearer to London.
‘Where are we going from here, Chas?’ I said flatly. ‘I mean, it’s hardly been ideal …’
‘I’ll drop you at home,’ he said curtly, and turned to a different channel.
***
Chapter 18
Roy Woods had sent me a note in my absence. It was written on brown paper folded in on itself, a large exclamation mark by the address warning to me not to throw it away:
Dear Louise,
Hope you’re well and thriving. I have been chucked out of Hammond House and they now say they can’t find my bits and pieces. I was wondering if you’d picked them up for me while I was in The Nunnery. Sam Veil won’t let me stay there either. He says there’s nothing wrong with me. But I know what I did and so do you.
Anyhow, I’m back to sleeping rough again. You know where to find me daytimes. I’d be grateful if you’d get in touch.
Yours truly,
Roy W.
There were also a couple of messages from Cassie, now back from her travels in India. I must have sounded keyed up when I called her back since she asked if all was well with me.
‘No it isn’t,’ I said, when we connected. ‘I don’t know where to start. I fell off a bus and left work. I’ve got involved with someone I shouldn’t, a schizophrenic. The night I got back with my ex, his sister phoned to say her partner’d died, and I just got back from the funeral.’ I blinked at that, wondering if it had come out right. ‘He said he’d killed somebody.’
‘Who did? Start again, Louise, you’ve lost me.’
‘I’ve made such a mess of things, Cass,’ I continued. ‘I was wondering if I should carry on with the course. I’ve broken every rule in the book, I’ve …’
‘Hang on a minute, Louise, you said you fell off a bus …’
‘That’s right, returning from the crazy man’s mother’s funeral, except he’s not that crazy. He said he’d killed his mother to get himself a bed in the asylum. I got involved. I should have left it alone.’
‘This man pushed you off the bus?’
‘No, no, that wasn’t him.’ But I wondered about that sometimes. Roy had been following me after all. He had climbed the security fence and crawled like a June bug through my bedroom window, to surprise me.
‘I don’t understand. Who’s the schizophrenic?’
‘He’s the son of a woman I had to remove at work, the son of one of my cases.’
‘But what’s the connection with the counselling course? You weren’t trying to counsel him, were you, not professionally? We can all make these slips between counselling practice and other professional work, especially when we’re starting out. At least you recognise that, Louise. Anyway, you fell off a bus … what’s that about?’
‘Shall we meet?’ I said, looking at my watch. ‘Say Regent’s Park café at lunchtime?’
‘I can’t, Louise, I’m not at the college today. I’ve got a meeting down in Bermondsey. Look, the course resumes tomorrow. Let’s meet in the morning before it starts. Nine fifteen? We could go out for a coffee.’
‘I was hoping we could meet today,’ I said.
‘I can’t, I’m sorry.’ But I heard her rustling through her diary. Like Stasia, Cass was busy busy. ‘I could see you tonight perhaps,’ she offered. ‘Have to be brief though. I’ve got prep to do for tomorrow, for your group. I hope you’re coming …’
‘I was hoping to,’ I said. ‘I’m seeing Chas tonight.’
‘The orthopedic surgeon, you’re back with him?’
‘No, he’s a pathologist. It’s early days yet. I really need to talk this through with you, about the schizophrenic.’
‘You seem very keen to label him with that, Louise. What’s his name?’
‘Roy Woods. He came to me with a terrible confidence, except it wasn’t a confidence because he went straight to the police after that. He believes he killed his mother.’
There was a pause. ‘Killed her, you said? What do you mean believes?’
‘He believes it, even though she’s been cremated, and the autopsy showed she died of natural causes. The police passed him on to a psychiatrist, and now he’s passed Roy over, too. I feel responsible for him …’
‘Why should you?’
‘Because he’s miserable,’ I said feebly. ‘He’s miserable and he’s had a miserable time with all this – they gave him his mother’s ashes in a carrier bag. He had a miserable childhood. She rejected him, his mum, I mean. She had him sectioned when he was younger. How could anyone cope with that loss, with that sort of history?’
‘This is the Twenty-First Century, Louise. You can’t have someone put away because you feel like it. If he was sectioned, then there must have been good reason. Is he paranoid? – No, no, forget I said that. It doesn’t matter what he is or what he isn’t. He isn’t your responsibility.’
‘I befriended him, Cass.’
‘OK,’ she said cautiously. ‘You have the course tomorrow, maybe you can bring this to the group – respecting his confidentiality, of course.’
‘He wants to plant a rose for his mother in the park. He wants everyone to know.’
‘Shall we meet tonight?’ she said, ‘just for an hour? I can drive over to you.’
‘That’s good of you, Cassie. I can call Chas …’
‘What does Chas have to say about all this?’
I laughed. ‘He thinks I’m off my head. He’s had a lot on his mind at present. I told you, his sister’s partner died, some crazy New Age guru, except nobody thinks he was crazy …’
‘You’re losing me again, Louise.’
‘I’m sorry, it’s just that Roy Woods, the man I befriended, gets labelled schizophrenic and passed around from pillar to post while Gustav Schneller – that’s Chas’s sister’s friend – gets made into a saint for saying a carrot has a soul.’ I bit my lip. ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead.’
‘Gustav Schneller? But I knew him,’ Cassie breathed. ‘I met him in India. I didn’t know he’d passed away.’
‘It was very sudden,’ I told her. ‘Just last week.’
‘I’ll have to cut this short now.’ She sounded upset. ‘I’ll come over when I’ve finished work, say six-six thirty?’
‘There’s no need, Cass.’
‘Maybe I’ve a need. I’ll bring my pictures of India. You can tell me about the funeral. I really rated Gustav Schneller. We worked at the same orphange once. I wonder if they know?’
‘There were loads of people there,’ I said. ‘He’ll certainly be missed.’
‘I’ll see you later then, Louise.’ She sounded choked.
I replaced the phone and stared back at the tidy pile of counselling books. Fancy Cass knowing Gustav, fancy her rating Gustav. What if I told her he’d been an amphetamine user? Would that change her opinion of him, injure some sacred memory by exposing him as a play-actor when the last curtain fell? Gus had preached one thing and done another – according to Chas’s colleague at the Plymouth mortuary. I thought I would tell Cass about the drugs if she gave me a hard time for befriending Roy. Woods. But maybe Roy said one thing too, and did another, like pushing me off a bus maybe, and being the person his mother always said he was. Maybe he did kill his mother.
Since he had asked a practical favour of me, I went round to the men’s hostel to find about about his belongings. The same concierge was in reception, defying the No Smoking sign. I was sure that he remembered me, although he gave no sign of it.
‘I’m a friend of Roy Woods’,’ I said. ‘He was here a cou
ple of weeks ago but lost the room when he went into hospital. I’ve come for his bag.’
The concierge looked smug. ‘We’re not a left luggage joint,’ he said. ‘We don’t store residents’ stuff.’
‘Is there anyone else I can ask?’ I said impatiently. ‘What about the cleaners? They’d know.’
‘Know what?’
‘About what happens to the things they find in people’s rooms, people who check out suddenly. I work for the Coroner,’ I said with sudden authority. ‘Everything has to be logged.’
‘You didn’t say the bloke had snuffed it.’ The concierge touched his keyboard. ‘Know how many blokes we got in here?’ he said, glancing up at the screen. ‘Nah, no Roy Woods here. Jeanette’s over in the canteen. She’s one of the cleaners, ask her.’
I pushed through the double fire doors. The canteen was empty, apart from a cap-wearing man sitting placidly before a cup of stewed tea, most of which was in the saucer. In a far corner, a woman swung a heavy floor polisher backwards and forwards. ‘Are you Jeanette?’ I called, hearing my voice bounce back at me from the pink and yellow tiles.
‘Yes, darling.’ She switched off the machine. ‘Who wants to know?’
‘I’m from Social Services,’ I lied, feeling this would give me more clout. ‘I’ve been asked to collect the personal effects of a man who was staying here, a Mr Woods.’
The woman leaned heavily on the handle of her machine. ‘What personal effects you taking about?’ she said. ‘I just clean up the place.’
‘He left suddenly,’ I told her. ‘He was taken into hospital. Room 397, I think, or was it 395?’
Grave Truths Page 15