Cowards Die Many Times

by Peter Hey

  Peggy

  The angel

  He awoke more tired than he had ever felt, as if all life had been purged from his mortal body. But he also felt a serenity, the weightless freedom of one reborn without care, without sin.

  And then there was the light, a blinding radiance that flooded and drowned everything. At its heart, its very source, was a silhouetted figure. Vast, powerful, wild haired and bearded, ancient yet ageless, it raised a hand in greeting. Or was it a blessing? Or a farewell? To one side, a screen of ephemeral tapestries, with the glowing colours of stained glass, floated and fluttered on the softest of cooling breezes. To the other, a wall of purest white stretched unendingly down an eternal gallery. He could vaguely discern the outlines of others like himself, reclined, immobile, somewhere between life and death, awaiting judgement.

  And God sent an angel to his bedside. The light quietened and her face emerged from the dazzling mist. It was a face more beautiful than he had ever seen, could ever see. Its smile radiated compassion and unquestioning love, and a porcelain hand reached out to stroke his face. Its touch filled him with renewed strength and he tried to lift himself. The angel shook her head gently and opened her lips. Her voice was like music. It rose and fell, and soothed.

  He lay back, closed his eyes, and the cruellest of sleeps stole him away.

  He dreamt of falling. He was tumbling and spinning down the blackness of a seemingly bottomless abyss. The dark was total, yet he could clearly see rocky walls racing past his face, the stone carved into grotesque shapes: obscenities and writhing, gargoyle-like monsters. And as he dropped, his temperature climbed. He began to burn.

  As good as it gets

  Hi Tommy

  This is just a quick email to:

  One, moan at you for not phoning me back.

  Two, thank you for pointing me in the right direction. I won’t bore you with all the detail as I know you’ve got a lot on your plate, but I think I’ve found the man who Thomas sailed to America with. He was called Henry Pickup and he died of typhus shortly after arriving in Ohio. His aunt wrote a letter back home explaining what happened. It was rather sad and I can understand why the family kept it all these years. If only we could find more documents like that. Anyway, it says his ‘confederate’ had fallen victim to the same illness and was left dying in a New York hospital. I’ve been digging around and I think he would have been taken to the Verplanck State Emigrant Hospital on Ward’s Island. I haven’t been able to find any definitive confirmation that a Thomas Ramsbottom died there in 1873, but I’ve read that its records were destroyed in a fire around the turn of last century. Ultimately, we’re left with slightly circumstantial evidence but I think it’s as good as we’re going to get. (I still have a nagging feeling he could have survived and began a new life, perhaps had another six kids with some poor dupe of a woman, but I’m sure I’m just being silly.)

  The point is, I’ve pretty much got to the bottom of things and I don’t want you to even think about it anymore.

  Hope you’re making progress with your project and PLEASE DON’T WORK TOO HARD!

  Love

  Jane xx

  Emma

  At short notice, Sarah had asked Jane to make up a ladies’ four. Cynthia had been called in to work on her day off, as one of the other GPs had childcare issues. That left the tennis players one short for their regular Thursday afternoon doubles match and Jane was drafted in as replacement.

  She threw her tennis bag in the boot of the Mazda and briefly thought about lowering the roof again. The sun was shining brightly, but she looked at her watch and saw she was in danger of running late. It would only take seconds, but she decided against. It was probably too hot and she might be more comfortable in the shade.

  Sarah’s club was exclusively expensive and offered a selection of surfaces from traditional grass through to synthetic carpeting and asphalt. The ladies chose to play on artificial clay as it slowed the ball down and the higher bounce gave them more time to get across the court. None of them were teenagers anymore.

  Joanne had two children at prep school and ran a small Internet business from home. She was herself a ball-shaped woman, but deceptively agile and with an appropriately bouncy character. She was playing alongside Emma, who was somewhat less smiley. A daily gym session had banished all padding from her frame and she sought to distract from her lack of curves by drawing attention to her long slender legs. Jane was sure she had a belt wider than what passed for Emma’s tennis skirt.

  Renewing their schoolgirl partnership, Jane and Sarah made reasonably short work of the opposition. Jane’s rustiness had largely worn off by the second set, which was fortunate as Sarah’s stamina was not what it once was and she was beginning to fade in the heat. Joanne took the defeat well, but Emma was a woman who saw competition in everything she did. Just walking down the street, she would speed up if someone was making faster progress than her. She was decidedly peeved that the tall, athletic interloper with the off-white whites was so much better than she was. Her line calls had become increasingly suspect and she even shouted out a foot fault in one of the later games.

  Jane had encountered enough gamesmanship in her youth to not rise to the bait. She left it to Sarah to register the mildest of rebukes.

  ‘Are you really sure, Emma darling? I don’t normally overstep the line, but it’s hard for us to see of course. Still, it’s your call. Now, what’s the score again? Oh yes, forty love, second serve.’

  After the match, Joanne rushed off as her au pair was having a crisis with the dishwasher, leaving the other three women to repair to the club’s lounge. At the bar, Sarah insisted on buying the drinks. She and Emma decided they’d earned a small G & T; Jane opted for a sparkling mineral water. The steward said he’d bring them over and the women, still wearing their tennis clothes, made for a large wicker sofa on a veranda looking out over the courts.

  As they sat down on the green and white striped cushions, Emma explained the gin was also merited because she had cause to celebrate. Her husband had just been promoted to the board and it promised a significant increase to their income.

  ‘You’re not married?’ she said, pointing to Jane’s left hand.

  Jane stared at her ring finger, searching for a vestigial mark. ‘Not anymore. Divorced,’ she mumbled. It was the second time her marital status had been queried recently and it prompted her to turn towards Sarah. ‘I ran into Christine Jackson in the supermarket a day or so ago.’

  Sarah raised her eyebrows. ‘Still a total and utter chav, I presume?’ Sarah’s expression slipped into one of concern. ‘It didn’t... I mean, it went okay. She behaved herself?’

  Jane nodded. ‘Yeh, yeh. I’ll tell you later.’

  ‘Who’s Christine Jackson?’ asked Emma, feeling left out of the conversation.

  Sarah chose to answer a different question. ‘Jane’s husband was a police inspector. Very tall, very handsome.’

  ‘Very unfaithful,’ added Jane. ‘Well, not that unfaithful, I suppose. Only with one person, as far as I’m aware anyway.’

  ‘Once is enough,’ cut in Emma firmly. ‘So, have you replaced him? I would, and quick. I wouldn’t want him thinking I was moping around without him.’

  ‘Not yet. I’m guess I’m busy setting up my new business. Too busy to have time for men and all that painful dating stuff.’

  ‘Not that she hasn’t had offers,’ said Sarah, looking up as their drinks arrived.

  Jane accepted her glass and mouthed her thanks. She waited until the steward had gone and then responded. ‘What offers have I had exactly?’

  Sarah swallowed a sip of gin as she quickly assembled an argument. ‘Well, the client on your last contract, the rich Anglo-American businessman. You had dinner and everything. He definitely had the hots for you.’

  Jane sighed. ‘It was lunch, and I think I had the hots for him and misread the signs. And then I met his beautiful, successful wife and realised I wasn’t in the same league.’

&nb
sp; ‘Jane Madden, don’t put yourself down,’ scolded Sarah. ‘You’re very much first division, or is it premier... championship these days? Whatever it is, you’re in it. And now that tart has left him, Dave would have you back tomorrow.’

  Emma looked horrified. ‘Is that your ex? You can’t go back to him! That would be total capitulation.’

  Jane shook her head slowly. ‘It’s not going to happen with Dave—'

  ‘Well, Tommy’s hopelessly in love with you,’ interjected Sarah, simultaneously wincing as she realised she was betraying a confidence.

  ‘Tommy’s not in love with me. We’re just friends. Good friends, but friends.’

  ‘Who’s this Tommy?’ asked Emma, clearly enjoying the gossip.

  ‘He’s someone…’ Jane paused while she weighed up how much to reveal. ‘I wasn’t very well a while back and he was having treatment at the same place. We got on. He’s so nice. He helped with some family history stuff I was doing. It took my mind off things. But, we’re totally different. He’s got a brain the size of a planet.’

  ‘You’re not exactly stupid, Jane,’ said Sarah, putting a reproving hand on her friend’s shoulder.

  ‘I’m not saying I’m stupid, but he’s one of those cerebral people who’s awkward socially. He’s not my type and I’m certainly not his. He’s got a girlfriend, well, an online girlfriend. But they talk about programming and computer games, things like that. I’d bore him to death. Very quickly.’

  ‘He’s a good-looking man.’ Sarah’s words come out hesitantly, as if her mouth and brain were out of step. ‘But he’s just a bit shy. He confided his feelings to me at that auction we attended.’ She winced again. ‘I’m sorry, I’m sure I wasn’t supposed to tell you. It just slipped out. He knows it wouldn’t work – you are too different – but he’s totally besotted with you. I mean, gaga.’

  ‘No, he’s not. I’m sure you’re putting two and two together and making five. We were all a bit drunk—'

  Jane’s denial was interrupted by an earnest sounding Emma. ‘Am I the only one to think it’s a bit creepy? I mean, a grown man having kind of a schoolboy crush. That’s the sort of thing that leads to stalking. I mean, forgive me, but you said yourself he’s had mental health issues.’

  ‘I’m not sure I said that.’ Jane’s expression had become pained. ‘Look, he’s a really nice guy. I wasn’t feeling great a while back and he got the train all the way from London. I hadn’t even told him my address. He worked it out from my grandparents and online copies of old electoral registers—'

  ‘And that’s not stalking?’ said Emma, somewhat triumphantly. ‘He sounds like he’s one of those who lives on his bedroom computer, looking at God knows what. I’m not being funny – you might find the wall is covered with pictures of you, taken with a telephoto lens when you’re not looking.’

  Jane raised her hands to take charge of the conversation. ‘Look. First of all, Tommy isn’t in love with me. I know him best and he just isn’t. Secondly, he’s not some kind of nutter I need to be frightened of because he’s spying on me. So, please, can we change the subject?’

  ‘Just keep him at arm’s length. That’s all I’m saying.’ Emma downed her gin decisively. ‘Now, can I get you girls another drink?’

  Shredding

  Jane slammed her front door and went into the kitchen to make a cup of coffee. Eventually its soothing warmth began to calm the fury that had started to build as she drove home. Reliving the post-match conversation in her head had made her far angrier than it had at the time. Jane had now wound herself up to thinking Emma was a bitch of the first order. She was a bad loser who tried to get revenge for her on-court thrashing by bragging about her wonderful, bloody husband and suggesting Jane’s only real male friend was some kind of creep. It hurt all the more because of a secret Jane knew and kept. There had been some difficulties at one of Tommy’s previous employers. But he’d not been well and it sounded like the female complainant simply misunderstood what was really a cry for help.

  Jane was cross with Emma, but also angry with herself for letting the woman get under her skin. Nonetheless, if they ever played again, Emma had better keep her head down. Bodyline tactics didn’t just apply to cricket. A smashed tennis ball can leave a nasty bruise. Maybe a black eye.

  Jane sat down in front of her computer and tried a relaxation technique she had been taught by an otherwise useless therapist. It was ineffectual when the red mist was well and truly down, but seemed to help when she was starting to regain control. She held the inside of her wrist and felt the smooth skin under her fingers. It was the trigger to take her mind back to an event from her childhood when she felt safe, secure and happy. Her mother was on one of her honeymoons, but Jane had gone away with her grandparents and had got up early to cycle along a deserted seaside promenade which ran at the bottom of gently sloping, grassy cliffs. It was a beautiful, cloudless morning; the air was still and warm. A low sea wall curved into the distance, and over it the faintest of waves hissed softly as they tentatively encroached on the remaining sliver of golden beach. The water was almost perfectly flat and reflected the sky in a shimmering, hazy blue. Jane breathed steadily and easily. Her pulse slowed.

  After a few minutes, Jane opened her eyes and reached for her coffee. It had gone cold, as had her anger towards Emma.

  ‘But your backhand’s still crap,’ she said out loud, before lifting the lid on her laptop and logging on.

  It was yet another dodgy email. They seemed to be arriving with tedious regularity and she deleted it quickly, not wanting to let it fire her anger again. But then she had second thoughts. Was this one unusually targeted and personalised?

  She’d recently switched her electricity and gas supplier. She’d never bothered in the past, but she knew that was what you were supposed to do and had, indeed, saved money on her monthly bill. She didn’t understand why the utility companies couldn’t just give you their fairest price. It might something to do with injecting competition into an otherwise artificial market. Or maybe big business was just happy ripping lazy people off. Either way, she was now with one of the smaller players. A week or so ago they had sent her a letter confirming the transfer and they’d apparently followed up with an email asking her to download an ‘account management’ program.

  Somehow, something hadn’t seemed quite right. Sure enough, when she’d checked, the link was actually to a suspiciously named website, presumably somewhere in Russia or the Far East. Or maybe it was in some spotty teenager’s bedroom in Basingstoke.

  But how did they know Jane had moved to this particular company? Was it just a coincidence? Was the spammer taking a chance and hoping that relative obscurity would work in their favour? And they’d included the first four digits of an account number. The rest was asterisked out, purportedly as a security measure, but presumably every customer’s number began the same?

  Jane wondered if she should recover the deleted email and look at it more carefully. But her patience felt at a low ebb and she found this aspect of modern technology painfully dull at the best of times. If there had been some sort of hack it wouldn’t only have affected her and hopefully she’d just avoided the worst of the consequences. And then a different thought occurred to her. Could this be the first step in an attempt at identity theft? Could someone have been through her recycling and found the discarded welcome letter? She was guiltily aware her shredder had been broken for some time now. Perhaps she wasn’t always as thorough as she could be tearing out personal details from any official correspondence she received.

  She looked at her watch, sighed frustratedly and decided she was being overdramatic. She would simply stay vigilant, and the lesson was that she needed to buy a new shredder with some urgency. And then there was her aging laptop with its unsupported software. Should she get a new computer at the same time? That sounded more expensive and harder work. The shredder would have to do for the time being.

  The unusual item of spam had tested her nerves, and at least it h
ad taken her mind off the exchange after the tennis match. She was briefly reminded when she saw she had a bona fide email from the man Emma had warned her to be wary of.

  ‘Stuff you, Emma. And buy a proper skirt while you’re at it,’ said Jane.

  LostCousins

  Hi Jane

  Sorry about not ringing. You know I’m not good with phones and my other excuse is that I’ve been away for a couple of days. They called an urgent project meeting, up quite close to you. I could have done without it, but they managed to make some important decisions which have taken some of the immediate pressure off. There are a few short-term problems to sort out, but I think I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. You’re right, of course, about my tendency to get obsessive about things, but I’ve been taking a bit of time out. It’s helping. I think.

  But going back to your family history research, I’m seriously impressed with what you’ve found. You’re good at this stuff.

  One quick thought on your man, Thomas Ramsbottom, and his possible survival in America. Given the evidence, I think it’s almost certain he did die soon after his arrival in New York, but have you considered getting your client to do a DNA test? You might want to ask his cousin to do one as well. The down side is that it’ll take a while for the results to come through. But what you’d be looking for is a match with someone living in the States who is descended from a mysterious Englishman with no past before the 1870s. The relationship would be something like a half 3rd cousin which is pretty close in genetic terms. I know I’ve talked to you before about DNA, but I don’t know how much you’ve done with it yet. This masterclass is a very good place to start – though hopefully you’re up to speed with most of this already?

  Tommy x

  Tommy’s link took Jane to LostCousins.com, a website designed to facilitate contact between lost or distant cousins researching the same ancestors. The specific page was a detailed guide on how to use DNA for family history research. It was from a regular newsletter containing news and tips that went out to a distribution list with tens of thousands of email addresses worldwide. As Jane read it she felt stupid, stupid for not subscribing to the newsletter herself and stupid for not thinking of DNA before. Tommy had been right when he said she needed more training. He was wrong, however, about having to wait for samples to be processed. Both Guy Ramsbottom and his cousin had already taken the test. Their results had been staring Jane in the face and she’d been ignoring them.