by Jane Jesmond
I hummed the tune but nothing else came back to me. Being on the road out of my mind on roofies made no sense. I’d walked along the coastal path. I knew that because Kelly had seen me. Unless I’d cut through to the road after.
It was cold at the top of the lighthouse. A damp cold that hinted the long-threatened rain would come soon. I needed to think logically. To be cool and calm instead of leaping after random memories that probably weren’t real anyway. I’d spent most of my life round here. My brain was stuffed with memories of the place so it was impossible to tell which were from Friday and which were from long ago.
I looked at the wall bordering the viewing platform. How difficult would it have been to hang an unconscious body over the edge? I’d assumed it would have taken a few people but now I wasn’t so sure. I took my coat off. Imagined it was a limp body, heavy with unconsciousness. Imagined tying a loop of rope round the body and one of the blocks of stone along the top of the wall. It would have been easy enough to lever the body over the edge and let it hang. I wasn’t big and the rough stone of the wall caught and held the rope in place. One person could have done it on their own. No problem. Although one of my boots might well have slipped off as they manhandled me.
But the knowledge didn’t help. And the memories were nothing but wisps. Fleeting and insubstantial. I was no closer to learning the truth. Nothing Gregory had told me helped either. Drugs. Immigrants. Nick Crawford telling him he’d helped me back to the hotel. And anyway, I wasn’t sure if I could trust Gregory’s observations any more than I could trust my own memories.
Gregory had half woken when I went back with the tarpaulin. He looked surprised to see me, in a grumpy sort of way, but took the tarpaulin with a nod.
‘Gregory,’ I said. ‘The night when the lighthouse was broken into. What do you remember?’
‘Already told you.’
‘You said a seagull woke you up screaming.’
‘Ay.’
‘When was that?’
He thought for a bit.
‘Must have been around nine. Turned the radio on after that and I seem to remember it was nine.’
I’d thought it was later because he said he’d been sleeping but now I realised he probably dozed the evening away in his chair. I wondered if he ever went to bed.
‘And you’re sure it was a seagull? Because they cry a lot round the lighthouse and it seems strange it would have woken you.’
He shrugged.
‘Might it have been something else?’
‘Sounded like a seagull. Screaming.’
But it could have been a human scream, I thought. It could have been me.
I concentrated on what I knew. I’d got to the hotel around four-thirty. I’d had to park up, check in and take my stuff to my room. I reckoned I’d been out of the hotel by quarter past five. Maybe a bit earlier because Kelly had seen me around six and to walk that far along the coastal path in forty-five minutes was going some.
Next sighting was around seven, back in Craighston in the rain. If that had been me; I was beginning to think it wasn’t.
After that, nothing until a cry had woken Gregory around nine.
‘Do you remember anything else?’ I asked Gregory. He looked blank. ‘What about earlier? Before the storm.’
‘Kit stopped by because of the storm coming. He wanted to check I was going to be all right. I had a bit of a flood last time. He offered to take me back to Tregonna for the night.’
Kit and Sofija must have been on their way back from Seb’s wake.
‘We had a cup of tea. He told me what your Pa was up to. But he didn’t stay long because he had to go and pick up Rosa.’
‘Where was Sofija?’
‘Kit said she had something to do in the village.’ He started to lever himself out of his chair. ‘I’ll maybe have a cup of tea.’
‘Sit down, I’ll put the kettle on.’
‘You’ll have one too?’
‘I ought to get back to Tregonna. But, Gregory, be careful of Nick Crawford. I think there’s more to him than meets the eye. And not good stuff.’
I sensed he wasn’t listening. I put the kettle on and stared at the hooks above Gregory’s sink and the strange mixture of things that hung from them: old rags, a pair of long-nosed pliers, a tea strainer, a carrier bag full of kindling and a collection of postcards balanced above. All showing lighthouses from different parts of the country.
‘The night of the storm,’ I said. ‘Did you go outside?’
Gregory nodded. ‘When the seagulls woke me. Put on my waterproof and had a quick look round. Just in case.’
If he’d gone up onto the lighthouse, I wondered, what would he have seen? It was probably a good thing he hadn’t.
‘Make a pot,’ he said when the water boiled. I did as I was told and put the pot and a mug on the grate with a carton of milk nearby, where he could reach it all without standing.
‘He’s all right, you know,’ Gregory said as I opened the front door to go. ‘That Nick Crawford.’
I thought about trying to persuade Gregory otherwise but it wasn’t worth it. Anyway, Talan was on the case and, with luck, Nick Crawford wouldn’t be around for much longer.
‘He likes you.’ Gregory laughed to himself. ‘That old Hammett magic. Always works.’
It was dark when I got back to Tregonna and I knew Kit was home because the first thing I heard was his voice. Sharp with anger but muffled so his words were indistinct. He was in the kitchen and the door was closed. Correction. The kitchen door was locked. What the hell was going on? I banged my fists against the wood.
Silence.
I hammered again and shouted, ‘It’s Jen. Open the door.’
Silence, then the sound of the key turning in the lock, and Sofija pulled it open. Kit stood by the sink and Ma sat, head in her hands, coat slung on the table next to three empty bottles of wine and a fourth that was half full. Clearly Sofija had drunk some of it: she looked close to the point of collapse and leaned into the wall for support, her face loose and her mouth sagging.
‘What’s going on?’
‘Ask her.’ Kit flung his arm in Ma’s direction. The force of it wrecked his balance and for a moment I thought he was going to fall. Kit was drunk, too.
Ma lifted her head from the table and looked at me steadily. I didn’t think she was drunk. She didn’t speak. She didn’t need to because Kit started.
‘I’ve been to see Pa’s solicitors,’ he said. ‘In London. Pa told me to. He phoned the other night on a satellite phone. He said his solicitors would sort something out for me. Told me they’d explain it all.’ He used his hands to lever himself round to face me. ‘Tregonna belongs to Pa.’
‘What?’
‘Tregonna. The house. The land. Everything. He owns it.’
‘Not…?’ I turned to Ma but she put her head back down in her hands.
‘No. She’s never owned it. He was the one who bought it. It was his money plus a mortgage. Which he’s still paying off, by the way.’
‘But the divorce. Didn’t Ma get it in the divorce? I thought she’d got it when they split up.’ Actually, I’d never thought about it. Ma and Tregonna went together. Inseparable in my mind. Tregonna was her home, her past, her life.
‘They’re not divorced. They were never married.’
I tried to take it in. Never married. Yes, it made sense. Ma wouldn’t have cared, free spirit and anti-Establishment as she was. No wonder there’d been no wedding pictures in her chest when I’d searched her room – or divorce papers.
There’d been an unwritten agreement between the two of them, Kit told me, that Ma could stay in Tregonna after they split. Pa would carry on paying the mortgage but Ma would have to pay for everything else or she could sell up and they’d divide the money. She’d chosen to stay. No surprise there.
But when Kit wrote about his problems, Pa realised he could sort them out. The land over the road was as much his as the rest of the house. On paper. In the eyes of the law. Besides, his solicitor had told Kit, he’d agreed Ma could stay in the house; he’d never said anything about the land.
A thought came to me.
‘So we’re…’
‘Illegitimate. Bastards. Yes.’
I laughed. It was funny. But no one else thought so. And my laughter stirred Kit back to anger. He staggered over to the table and leaned over Ma.
‘And you never mentioned it. When I asked you about selling the land, you never told us it wasn’t up to you. You let us go mad with worry instead.’
I knew he was drunk but the venom in his voice and on his face was too much. I grabbed his arm.
‘That’s enough, Kit,’ I said. And to Ma, ‘He’s drunk.’
She went to stand and push her chair back in one movement but misjudged it and sent the chair scuttling over the tiled floor until it hit the wall and stopped there, leaning against it at a crazy angle. It was enough to stop Kit but as he went over to get the chair, Ma slipped out of the room.
‘Come back!’ Sofija shouted. ‘Don’t run away again.’
‘Is that why you locked the door?’ I asked her.
‘Of course. She slips away. She always slips away. But this time I stopped her. Kit had things to say.’ Her voice was low again and her words slow with the effort of speaking through the alcohol.
‘You locked her in?’ I said to Kit.
‘No. Yes. But it was only for a minute. She didn’t want to listen.’
Sofija muttered something in Bulgarian and slid down the wall onto the floor.
‘Go to bed, Sofija,’ I said. ‘I’ll tidy up.’
She stopped muttering and seemed surprised to see me. As if she’d thought she was alone, muttering her private thoughts into the night. I helped her up, took her upstairs and pushed her into their bedroom.
What a mess. What a shitty, horrible mess. Kit and Sofija’s anger had left my nerves jangling. I fancied a spliff, just a small one, and I wondered if Ma was doing exactly that.
She was in her room, sitting by the window and looking out into the night. It must be a Hammett thing, I thought, staring into the dark when your life is falling apart. And when she turned her face to me, I saw I was right. Tears ran down her cheeks. I had never seen her cry before, not when she broke her ankle tripping over a rabbit hole on the moor and lay there for hours before Pa found her, nor during the years after Pa left when she and I were alone together and she was trying to make everything all right. She never wept. I should have gone in and put my arms round her but it felt impossible. There was something essentially untouchable at the heart of her. Something I’d never understood.
‘Ma,’ I said from the door. ‘Ma. Are you OK?’
She flicked the tears away with the backs of her hands.
‘Can I put the light on?’ I asked.
‘No.’
‘Don’t sit in the dark.’
‘I like the dark.’
‘They’re drunk, you know. And the stress of it all has been too much.’
‘I don’t think so, Jenifry.’ Her voice was perfectly calm. Tears ran down her cheeks but her breathing was quiet. ‘They hate me. Sofija hates me. Kit –’
‘Kit is angry. But he’s angry with everyone.’ Somehow Kit felt we’d all let him down. Ma by not helping him. Me with my stupid risk-taking. That’s why he’d been so angry when he made me promise to give up climbing. How strange. The old Kit would have put his arm round me and given me a hug.
‘He’ll get over it,’ I said, but I wasn’t sure he would. I wasn’t sure there was a way back for him.
‘I don’t think so.’ Ma stood up and pushed the window open. A chilly breath of air rushed in. ‘I don’t think I can stay here.’
‘Ma, give it time. We can sort it out.’
‘No. I’ve lost. I’ve failed. I should never have asked Kit for help. He’s destroyed Tregonna, bit by bit. Killed its spirit. I kept on hoping he’d see that and leave some part of it free. And then, when it started getting difficult for him, I hoped he’d give up and walk away. That’s what Kit always does. When something doesn’t work out his way. When he gets bored with something. But she wouldn’t let him.’
‘You mean Sofija?’
‘It was a bad day when Kit met her.’
‘Ma. You’re being…’
‘You don’t see it, do you? She told Kit he had to see it through. Told him he couldn’t give up. She’ll do anything to get Tregonna from me. Anything. So you be careful not to get in the way of what she wants.’
I can’t deal with Ma when she goes all dramatic. It sets my teeth on edge. So I muttered something and left. Time, I thought: they all needed a bit of time to recover, and for a lot of alcohol to leave their systems.
Downstairs Kit was slumped on the kitchen table, fast asleep, his head lolling on his arms and a small snore escaping with each breath. I removed the debris from their meal, stacked the dishes into the sink and sat down opposite him. In some ways he was as stubborn as Ma. Trying to get either of them to do something they didn’t want was like building a sandcastle from the fine, white sand at the top of the cove where the tide never reaches. The tighter you held it, the faster it sifted away through your fingers.
Our family was crap at communicating, anyway.
So many things unsaid.
The front door slammed. I went to look but when I opened it there was no one there. I ran upstairs. Ma was not in her room. I checked the rest of the house. No sign of her. Shit. She’d gone out. She’d said she couldn’t stay but I hadn’t thought she meant she’d leave straightaway. I stood on the steps outside the front door and called for her until the cold drove me indoors.
Kit was still asleep on the kitchen table and he wasn’t too happy about being shaken awake.
‘Fuck off, Jen. Your hands are freezing.’
‘Come on, Kit. I need your help.’
‘Leave me alone. I’ve got an early start tomorrow.’
‘You’re asleep on the kitchen table.’
‘Am I?’ He lifted his head and rotated it like an owl. ‘Oh yes,’ he said and put his head back down on his arms.
He was right: my hands were freezing. I grabbed a coat from the hooks outside the back door and put it on, burying my hands in opposing sleeves like we used to do when we were children.
‘Ma’s gone out without her coat.’ I said.
Kit lifted his head again and gazed at me as though trying to make sense of what I’d said. There were red marks on his face where it had rested on the table and his eyes were bleary and unfocussed.
‘Ma’s gone out,’ I said again. ‘She hasn’t got a coat. I guess she couldn’t face coming in here to get it.’
Kit shut his eyes. ‘What did she say?’
‘Nothing. I didn’t see her leave. Just heard the door slam.’
‘She’s got other coats. In her room.’ He stood up and stretched his arms above his head. The bones in his back cracked as he reached for the ceiling. ‘I’m going to bed.’
‘But we need to find her.’
‘I’m going to bed, Jen. I’ve got to be up early tomorrow.’
‘It’s freezing out there.’
‘She’ll stomp around in the woods for a bit. Hug a few trees and then come in. You know what she’s like. She wants you to go looking for her.’
He gave the table a quick wipe and flung the cloth back into the sink.
‘She was really upset, Kit.’
‘So she should be.’
‘What’s the problem between her and Sofija?’
‘The same as between me and her. Money. And now, her lies.’
‘There’s more to it. She’s very angry with Sofija.’
‘Christ,’ he said. ‘Now is hardly the time…’ He sighed heavily and sat down again. ‘When I first realised how desperate things were, Sofija wanted me to get some kind of written agreement from Ma.’
‘And Ma said no?’
‘Not exactly. You know how she is. Impossible to pin down. Always changing the subject or picking up on some minor bit of it. Or saying we were family so we didn’t need to put things on paper. Finally Sofija lost it and asked her to at least make a will in our favour. And yours, of course.’
‘Does Ma have a will? I mean with solicitors and stuff?’ It seemed improbable. She’d be more likely to arrange for some of her madder friends to burn Tregonna down around her dead body as a sacrificial funeral pyre.
‘I don’t have a clue. I don’t think so, judging by her reaction. She went mad. Accused Sofija of wanting her dead. Anyway, now I know she hasn’t got anything to leave.’ He paused as a new idea occurred to him. ‘Maybe that was why she was so furious when Sofija suggested it: because Tregonna wasn’t hers to leave.’ He considered that thought for a moment. ‘Are you really going to go looking for her?’
‘Yes.’
He stretched again, uncurling his body vertebra by vertebra. ‘OK. I’ll help.’
I looked at him, so tall in the dingy room, and suddenly I wasn’t so sure. His words jangled in my head. He’d spoken about Ma making a will. A will. Something about this had poked awake a flurry of unease. But why?
‘You won’t be much help, the state you’re in.’ I said. ‘I’ll be better on my own.’
‘Sure?’
‘Sure.’
‘It’s going to rain,’ he said.
My thoughts came together and a frisson of fear chilled my skin. I didn’t want to go out into the dark with Kit. Oh, God! How had I not seen it before?
All the talk about Ma’s will.
I’d written a will when I bought my flat. The solicitor had told me I should. Just a simple one. Everything to Kit. All my worldly wealth: my car, the money in my accounts and my flat. Especially my flat. Free and clear, the debt paid off by the life insurance I’d had to take out as a condition of the mortgage.