by M B Vincent
Not so discreet was the officer sneaking a quiet smoke by the porch.
Jess threw him a ‘Hello’ and hurried indoors. The cold was almost a physical presence, knitted together with the darkness to make a dreary blanket. She needed to be in the warm fug of central heating, as she struggled with what she’d learned from the West Country Female Entrepeneur of the Year tape. Who should she tell? Should I keep schtum?
Inside, the lights were on in every room, and laughter drew her to the kitchen. Things hadn’t really changed all that much since pagan times, when fires were lit to ward off the winter. The standard lamp in the hall did much the same job.
The laughter in the kitchen shut off abruptly when she got there.
‘Hello there, dear Jess!’ Patricia Smalls stepped smartly away from the Judge.
The Judge’s greeting was similarly hearty. And suspect.
‘Um, hi.’ Jess was barely gracious when on her best behaviour; taken by surprise she made Baydrian look like Cary Grant. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘Just visiting, popping in, dropping by, looking in on you all.’ Patricia was wearing a dress that just had to be described as a frock. ‘Tea?’
Jess was speechless to be offered tea in her own kitchen by Patricia Smalls. She still accepted; tea is tea, after all.
The Judge giggled. Actually giggled. Jess averted her eyes, as if she’d caught him in a gimp mask.
More footfall in the hall.
Bogna stormed the kitchen, tearing off her raincoat, kicking her shoes to the skirting board. ‘Look who I found sitting in his posh car, all sad and mopey!’
Rupert was behind her, carrying shopping bags. ‘I broke down, well, my car broke down, right on the corner of the Market Place,’ he said. ‘Bogna rescued me.’ He set down the carrier bags and flexed his fingers as if testing to see they still worked.
Bogna froze. Her gaze travelled from the mayoress to her teapot and back again. ‘Put that down,’ she said. ‘Is heirloom, isn’t it.’
‘I have made tea before,’ said Patricia. She put down the teapot all the same.
‘Sit, sit,’ said Bogna. When Patricia didn’t sit, she said it, very loudly, in Polish. ‘Siedziec!’ and Patricia sat. And so did Jess and so did the Judge and so did Rupert and so did Moose.
‘Are you staying for dinner?’ The Judge asked Rupert as they were supplied with biscuits and bad vibes by Bogna.
‘I’d love to, but no.’ Rupert unwound his scarf. He managed to catch Jess in the face with it. They laughed. ‘Jack’s on the way to pick me up. We’re pulling an all-nighter. Lots of prep for our meeting with the money guys tomorrow.’
‘When are you actually packing up and going?’ Jess hoped she’d made her question sound casual.
‘I told you,’ said Rupert. ‘Nineteenth of December.’
‘That’s just before Christmas!’ That didn’t sound casual. It sounded bereft. Jess was trapped in a heartless Dickens novel.
‘This way, you won’t have to worry about getting me a present.’ Rupert sounded wistful.
‘As if she would!’ laughed Bogna. ‘I know what I’m getting everybody this year.’ She looked Patricia up and down. ‘Almost everybody. This!’ She whisked a hardback book out of the nearest carrier bag.
‘Nic Lasco’s book?’ Jess was emphatic. ‘Don’t give me one, thanks very much.’
‘He sign it, look!’ Bogna brandished the title page. To Bonga, it said. ‘He call me darling and ask if I am married.’
‘He has to be nice to the public,’ said Patricia, who was seated farthest from the biscuits.
‘He says he like older lady,’ Bogna went on. ‘Not as old as you, obviously,’ she added. ‘I’ll take biccie out to lovely cop boys.’ She whisked the plate away just as Patricia reached down the table.
‘Don’t spoil them, Bogna.’ The Judge’s alarming good humour had worn off. ‘There are too many of them out there as it is.’
‘Dad,’ said Jess, ‘Eden’s just making sure you—’
‘Eden’s overreacting.’ The Judge cut her off. ‘He’s already been wrong about the timing of the next murder. Who’s to say he’s not wrong about the victim? Or indeed the killer?’
‘You just can’t bear to cooperate,’ said Jess. She folded her arms.
The Judge folded his.
Rupert moved the conversation on. ‘Gillian Cope was stuck behind me in her sports car when I broke down. I learned four or five new swear words. There was a suggestion that she might cut off a vital bit of my anatomy and feed it to me in a smoothie.’
‘Terrible old bag,’ said Jess.
‘Gillian has issues,’ said Patricia. ‘Underneath, she has a heart of gold.’
‘How far underneath?’ muttered Rupert.
‘Don’t know why you defend her, Patricia.’ Jess had seen the photographs, and had an inkling what Gillian’s upbringing was like, but still she couldn’t like the woman. ‘She’s rude to you.’
‘Not at all.’ Patricia wouldn’t hear of it. ‘We’re the best of friends.’ There was a hint of wobble, however, when she insisted, ‘Deep down, Gillian’s terribly fond of me.’
***
Jess lured Rupert to the conservatory.
‘That Patricia’s getting her hooks into my dad. And he’s . . .’ Jess let out a frustrated ugh. ‘He’s letting her do it.’
‘So they like each other.’ Rupert shrugged. ‘That’s good, surely?’
‘Rumpole, this is Patricia Smalls we’re talking about. She’s like dry rot; you don’t bloody well invite her into your life, you’ll never get rid of her.’
‘When my mum got together with my stepdad, I hated him.’ Rupert edged a little closer on the rattan bench. He had put his scarf back on. It was freezing in there. ‘Then I got used to him and now I look up to him.’
‘Yeah, but he’s not Patricia bloody Smalls, is he?’
‘They’re both lonely. Your mum left a big gap in this house. If Madam Smalls makes your dad happy then maybe you should have a bit of compassion.’
Jess grunted.
‘Or, if compassion is asking too much, at least keep this out.’ Rupert tapped Jess’s nose.
Teasing usually brought out the Tasmanian Devil in Jess, but Rupert sometimes got away with it.
‘Sometimes butting out of other people’s lives is the best option,’ he said. ‘Like you and Mitch.’
‘Like me and Mitch what?’
‘Like I don’t ask what you and Mitch get up to.’
‘Get up to? Who are you, my disapproving grandma?’ She could have said We don’t get up to anything. But she didn’t.
‘No, I’m the nice guy you take advantage of,’ said Rupert.
They stared at each other for a moment.
‘I’m worried about something, Rupert. I saw something at the cop shop today and I want to ask you what I should do.’
‘Shoot.’ Rupert sat back.
‘Why do I do this?’
‘Is that what you want to ask me?’
‘No, no, it’s just . . . why do I have this urge to tell you stuff?’
‘Because,’ said Rupert, ‘you like telling me stuff.’
He was right. She did.
His name was called by the officer on duty outside the front door. ‘Visitor for you!’
‘It can wait,’ said Jess. ‘Can’t keep the sainted Jack waiting.’
Rupert went out ahead of her, picking up his briefcase en route, pulling on his gloves.
Jess got to meet Jack at last. And noticed that, despite the name, Jack was very much a woman.
CHAPTER 17
I FELT YOU TWO SHOULD MEET
Wednesday 11 November
The postcard that landed on Harebell House’s welcome mat was a colour-saturated shot of the Market Place.
Jess turned it over and read, ‘Dying to see you x’, and flipped it again. This time she noticed the photo of Judge Castle stuck to the market cross, his eyes obliterated with Xs.
The wolf was send
ing postcards.
***
It hadn’t been easy getting Stephen into the Morris Minor.
Jess had stopped at Castle and Buchannon Solicitors on her way home from the university. A receptionist had asked her to sit and offered her coffee.
Jess hadn’t heard the offer. She was thinking about Jack. About the way Jack dressed – smartly, expensively, stylishly – and about the way Jack had spoken to Rupert.
Familiar. Fond. Conspiratorial.
It was sneaky, truly it was, to go about with a man’s name – Jack – but have breasts and great hair.
Stephen had been surprised to see her. He’d blustered a confused greeting, asked if Dad was okay, asked if she was okay, asked if she needed money.
‘No, I need to talk to you, Bill Gladstone,’ she’d said.
His face had fallen inwards. Now, sitting in the lumpy passenger seat, it still hadn’t recovered. ‘How did you find out?’
Jess explained about watching the West Country Female Entrepeneur of the Year. ‘The warm-up act came on. And the warm-up act was you.’
Stephen hung his head, as if exposed in some dreadful sin. The sin of stand-up comedy. ‘I thought if I gigged outside a twenty-mile radius nobody would find out.’
‘Gigged’ was a very un-Stephen word.
The first thing Jess had thought when she’d seen the comedian on the badly lit stage was, What kind of comic has the same name as a nineteenth-century prime minister? The second was, That suit is pretty funky. And the third was, Sweet baby Jesus swinging on a star – that’s my brother.
Sauntering across the stage, he’d asked, ‘How come there isn’t a recycling bin outside Sainsbury’s for families?’ Nobody was really listening. There had been one titter. ‘You know the ones. You bring your old wellies and the school uniforms the kids have grown out of and that gym kit still in its packaging five years on.’ That got a laugh. ‘They should provide one for families. The toddlers recycling bin’d be full in ten minutes.’ A member of the audience shouted ‘True!’ and was shushed. ‘I’d take my dad along to the father recycling bin. Maybe there’s somebody out there who needs to be bullied, then ignored, then bullied again, eh?’
Now, in the car, Stephen was quiet.
‘Talk to me,’ said Jess. Then, when he didn’t seem able to, she said, ‘You were good.’
He was stupefied. ‘No, I wasn’t.’
‘Yeah you were.’ Jess was every bit as astonished as he was. Stephen was dull; that was a given. He was interested in rugby and the law and . . . that was it. That was the entire list. ‘How long have you been secretly funny?’
He looked hurt. ‘Secretly?’
‘You do know Susannah’s tearing her hair out? She thinks you’re having an affair. Or a nervous breakdown. Or both.’
‘Suze? No, she barely notices me.’ Stephen didn’t sound bitter; he sounded accepting.
‘She’s noticed the late nights. The new clothes. The new friends.’
Stephen, who never cried, began to cry.
‘Don’t,’ said Jess. She reconsidered. ‘Actually, do. Have a good cry.’
‘I shouldn’t,’ sobbed Stephen. ‘This is so embarrassing.’ He took the tissue Jess held out and blew noisily into it. ‘I’m your big brother, not a little girl.’
‘You’re still my big brother and there’s nothing wrong with little girls.’ Jess was brusque. ‘Don’t let me hear you talking like that in front of your own little girl, Stephen. Now, come on, tell me why didn’t you tell us? What are you scared of?’
‘Are you kidding?’ Stephen spluttered his amazement. ‘Imagine what Dad would say. I expected you to laugh, and not in the right way. Susannah wouldn’t understand, she’d be mortified.’
‘Listen, Gladstone, you’ve done nothing wrong. Nothing.’
Stephen looked sideways as if waiting for her to shout ‘Gotcha!’ ‘I’ve messed up, Jess. Big time. If I’d had your guts none of this would be happening.’
‘My guts?’
‘The way you stood up to Dad, told him he couldn’t run your life, that you wouldn’t go into the law.’
He made it sound like an inspiring scene in a movie. Jess remembered it as a lot more passive aggressive. ‘But you love the law.’
‘I hate the bloody law!’ Stephen blew his nose again. ‘I never wanted to be a barrister.’
‘Yes, you did.’ Jess heard herself and wanted to take back the words. ‘Sorry. If you say you didn’t, then you didn’t.’
‘Nobody even asked me what I wanted to do. Rupert’s different. Always wanted to be a barrister and is brilliant at it. But me, I just bob along, daydreaming, writing down jokes.’
‘This is heresy.’
‘My entire life has been mapped out for me. Never even occurred to me that you could love your job. The way Rupe does. The way Dad did. And you. Now that you’re at Bristol you’re loving your job, aren’t you?’
‘Yeah. I like Bristol. I like my students. I like the commute in this little car.’
‘And you like the police work?’
‘It’s exciting. It’s fascinating. But most of all . . . it makes me feel like I matter.’ Jess rummaged in her pocket. Found a custard cream. Showing great fortitude, she gave it to her brother.
‘Thank you.’ He sounded about five years old.
‘I won’t tell Dad. But you have to tell Susannah.’
‘I promise.’
‘I’ll promise you, one day Dad will see Bill Gladstone.’
‘Christ.’
‘And I’ll love watching his face all the way through it.’
***
Turns out you can surprise a witch.
Abonda smiled at Jess, but when she recognised the woman at Jess’s side she staggered backwards. The gimcracks on the dresser in the narrow hall danced and fell.
‘It’s cold out here,’ said Jess. Blotmonap was in full swing; sleet pasted the pavement. ‘Can we come in?’
Abonda glared at the slender stranger on her step.
Cheekbones so gaunt they cast shadows. Fair hair in a pixie cut that was painfully tight to the skull. The eyebrows which had been overplucked and were now doomed to be two pencil lines forever. Louise Mannix didn’t flinch under scrutiny. She seemed too drained to take seriously any threat from Abonda.
‘You’re angry, Abonda.’ Jess sometimes liked to state the bleedin’ obvious. ‘But there’s a lot at stake. I felt you two should meet.’
‘You’ve got a nerve.’ It wasn’t clear who Abonda was talking to.
Louise spoke. She had the local accent. ‘Are you frightened,’ she said, ‘of what I might say?’
Never one to refuse a dare, Abonda stood out of their way.
The kitchen was manically tidy to the casual eye, but it was untidy by Abonda’s own crazed standards. Jess noticed, also, a slowness in Abonda. A dimming.
She had evidently been making something on the table. Abonda cleared it quickly, putting away a notepad and a book and some scissors. A white lolly stick fell to the floor and rolled beneath the radiator. She sat. She didn’t invite them to do the same.
‘What, no tea?’ said Jess.
‘Don’t push your luck, gorger. And you . . .’ Abonda turned to Louise, who held her handbag defensively in front of her. Her coat hung off her shoulders; she was as thin as Abonda’s cat. ‘What can a lying whore like you have to say to me?’
‘Abonda, no!’ Jess stepped between the women. ‘Don’t.’ She felt responsible for Louise’s safety, both physical and emotional.
When Jess had knocked tentatively on Louise’s hotel room door, she hadn’t rehearsed what she was about to say. Certain of only one thing – I won’t push her if she’s unwilling – Jess had floated the idea of a meeting with Abonda.
Giving little away, Louise had listened. She had a quality of stillness that drew Jess to her. Jess, of course, had been the opposite of still. She had burbled. Words had not been easy to find; after all, she was proposing a sit-down with the mother of the
man who raped Louise, and then gone on to kill, horribly, the father of her children. At each juncture, Jess had stressed that this was Louise’s decision, that she didn’t want to push, that if it was too much then anybody would understand.
Finally, Louise had put a hand on Jess’s arm. ‘Stop apologising,’ she’d said. ‘Nobody can make me do anything. Not anymore.’ She had stood up, put on her coat, and said, ‘Let’s go, while my mum’s looking after the kids.’
Now, Louise took the seat Abonda hadn’t offered. ‘Mrs Norris,’ she said. ‘Somebody lied about that night, but it wasn’t me.’
Abonda thumped the table. ‘See? There you go.’ The look she gave Jess was part fury, part plea. ‘How can I sit here and listen to this?’
‘Because lives are at stake.’ My father’s life. Jess squatted at Abonda’s side. ‘Louise’s children lost their daddy, violently, just five days ago. The police think your son killed him.’
Abonda put her finger to Jess’s lips. It smelled of vanilla. And something else blackish, bad. ‘Abonda won’t have her son slandered in her own home.’
Jess stood. ‘If you’re so sure Steven told the truth about what happened four years ago, then what have you got to lose by listening to Louise’s side of the story?’
Abonda was silent.
Jess had gambled. She knew Abonda was capable of thinking two things at once. Norris’s innocence was so vital to her that she had decided to believe in it. Despite that, somewhere deep in Abonda’s soul was a dark seed of doubt.
Abonda chewed her lip.
‘This,’ said Jess, ‘is the right thing to do.’
‘Talk, missy,’ said Abonda.
***
The rain really meant it this time.
Harebell House was a soggy smudge. In the police car, just feet away, a Thermos of Bogna’s hot chocolate helped steam up the windows.
The brief noise of a nail being hammered into wood disappeared into the chorus of the downpour.
The rain stopped, as if turned off by a celestial switch.
The crow nailed neatly above the front door dripped both rainwater and blood.
***
Abonda’s sitting room had the chill of little use. Plastic protected the sofa cushions. Ornaments stood stiff and correct. There was much gilt.