7,19 €
Mehr erfahren.
- Herausgeber: Allison & Busby
- Kategorie: Krimi
- Serie: Jane Cowan
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018
While Jane waits for renovations to be completed on her new permanent home, she remains in temporary accommodation under the watchful eye of her landlord Brian Dawes, chair of the governors at Wrayford School. Her work life is dominated by preparations for the all-important school play, but behind the scenes the threat of major cuts to the school's budget puts a strain on morale. Alongside these concerns are her landlord's deteriorating health and the odd behaviour of her neighbours - both mysteries she could do without. As events unravel and with her students' welfare at the forefront of her mind, can Jane unravel the curiosities in which she finds herself tangled?
Das E-Book können Sie in Legimi-Apps oder einer beliebigen App lesen, die das folgende Format unterstützen:
Seitenzahl: 421
Ähnliche
Head Wound
JUDITH CUTLER
For my dear friends Jill, Jerry, and the inspirational Jeffrey
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
‘I think she’s still alive!’
A girl. Yes, still alive – but not for much longer.
She was nailed, hands and feet, in a parody of the crucifixion. She was gasping for breath – hadn’t enough to scream, though the pain in her hands must have been excruciating as the weight of her body pulled against the nails, leaving trenches in the flesh.
A bleak February day. An east wind apparently straight from Russia hurtling across the grey fields of Kent to sling horizontal rain at the windows. What does everyone want? A quiet evening at home. What do I get? An emergency meeting with the school governors.
In fact, since I was head teacher of two schools, Wrayford and Wray Episcopi, I had two sets of governors to contend with. They had agreed to have a joint session since the problem was one that would affect both schools equally – proposed changes to school funding throughout the country. For once we were all pulling in the same direction. We were desperate to avoid staff redundancies and any reductions to the curriculum. So – after much depressed discussion – we had agreed what I had actually told them at the start: while we appreciated the huge efforts everyone put into Christmas and summer fairs, and spin-off raffles and refreshment sales from the play, we needed to raise a lot more money than they produced to support all the activities that broadened the children’s horizons. It wouldn’t stop at funding things like sports equipment and school trips, no matter how educational. It would mean buying books for the library and for the classroom. Even then we’d have to recruit volunteers for appropriate tasks – in other words, anything that didn’t need properly trained teachers.
‘I’m sure we can rely on the parent–teacher groups at both schools to step up to the plate,’ the chair of Wrayford governors declared, leaning heavily forward and eyeballing each governor in turn, as if challenging them to object to the cliché. Not just because of his physical presence – his thick neck and heavy shoulders – Brian Dawes was a man hard to stand up to, though he could be charm itself. He flashed me a disconcertingly conspiratorial smile even as he spoke.
Hazel Roberts shook her head. In her seventies, she was a little older than Brian and was actually chair of the Wray Episcopi governors. She had graciously – or sensibly – allowed Brian to take the lead in the meeting. Others might say she had been elbowed out, though with a great deal of persuasive courtesy. ‘Our Parents’ Association – which pointed out that the teachers don’t get much involved—’
‘Not through lack of interest,’ Colin Ames said quickly. He’d drawn the short straw, as the secretary of the Wray Episcopi governors, the job of taking the minutes. ‘Lack of time. It’s even worse than when I was in the profession. I can’t believe the amount of paperwork teachers today have to deal with.’ He looked at his own reporter’s notebook, as if expecting it to sigh in sympathy. He’d certainly covered a huge number of pages, taking conscientious note of everything – though I would have thought nice succinct resolution minutes would have been enough.
Brian was ready to leap in, but Hazel was there before him. ‘Exactly,’ she said firmly. ‘More importantly, there’s been something of a schism within the Parents’ Association, largely because of the disruptive presence of one parent whose politics and manner of expressing them were offensive in the extreme.’
I could see Colin’s pen move.
… in the extreme …
‘Sadly, as things stand, it’s impossible for us to force the man to resign. It would be worse if he was a parent governor, of course, because …’
Which was true but not to the point. At last Hazel pulled herself up short, continuing more relevantly, ‘We also lack the village infrastructure so helpful to Wrayford. You have your playing field and the Jolly Cricketers’ garden. We have neither field nor pub. Lady Preston used to allow us to use her grounds for our fete but while she’s not in residence at the Great House, nor likely to be for some time’ – she coughed with delicate irony – ‘we can hardly expect the same privilege this year.’
‘The greed of the woman!’ someone put in. ‘Owns all that lot and still wants to make money by exploiting others!’
‘That’s a bit strong. She did a lot of good in the village.’
‘Once upon a time! And now she’s a convicted criminal doing her time, quite a lot of it, in jail. Don’t waste your sympathy on her and her like.’
‘It’s because our resources aren’t quite equal,’ I put in, hoping to draw things to a close so we could all go home, ‘that I suggested that the schools and the parents acted together for the common good. United we may stand; divided we will almost certainly fall. If we can’t run the schools “properly” – in the eyes of Ofsted, that is – I’ll bet my pension that someone will decide to put them in special measures and then quite coincidentally close them. The villages will be a great deal poorer in every sense if they lose their schools and the children have to go to bigger ones in towns that may be some distance from their homes. What I’d like to suggest, Chair, is that we reconvene next week, each of us with a list of ideas for heavy-duty fundraising that the schools with their PTA or PA will do together. If we don’t raise funds we might even lose teachers. It’s as serious as that. Now, it’s unlikely we can all be present, of course – but if we email each other our ideas, even non-attenders will be making a significant contribution. I’d also like a subcommittee to be set up to evaluate the ideas that seem to have the greatest potential …’
‘And to organise a search party at Wray Episcopi for Lady P’s mythical missing masterpieces,’ someone added, to general laughter. By now everyone knew about her ladyship’s strange insistence that one of her forebears had donated paintings to the school and that she now wanted them back. There were two problems: firstly no one could find them anywhere, and secondly the county council archive’s search for any documentation stating that they had been loaned, not simply given like the school itself, had so far been fruitless. More to the point, no one could find any references at all to the paintings. But her ladyship’s lawyers, when not trying to get her a reduced jail sentence, were threatening legal action if they were not returned.
I wasn’t surprised when Brian dawdled at the end of the meeting, falling into step with me when I walked back to the office I shared with Tom, my deputy.
‘Will you be eating at the Cricketers this evening?’ he asked. ‘Would you mind if I joined you?’ This comparative humility was new. The behaviour of the said Lady P – Cassandra Preston to her intimates, one of whom was Brian – had rocked the village. Brian seemed to have been hurt more deeply than most by her fall from grace: his shoulders slumped from their previous quasi-military straightness, his face had sagged into deeper lines. A man who valued trust had had his betrayed. He added, ‘I could use a really stiff drink.’
‘Me too.’ There was something in his voice that stopped me reminding him that I was driving. Perhaps I could simply leave the car locked in the school car park and indulge after all.
We set off, leaning into the wind, which might have been exhilarating. But in fact it was simply unpleasant, though at least the rain had stopped. Refuse from the collection earlier in the day was blowing round the playground: lit by the security lights we both gathered handfuls and shoved them into the bins.
‘It’s worse in cities where they use black refuse sacks,’ I observed. ‘You should see the mess when people leave the bags on the pavement the night before a collection.’
‘At least we have wheelie bins – almost impossible to blow them over,’ he said confidently.
Usually, brisk though I am, I have to work hard to keep up with him. Now I was already a metre or so ahead. Was he dawdling because he was planning to ask me something? I risked a sideways glance, but out of the lights’ range, the village’s lack of street lights made it impossible to detect any subtle changes. In a sudden lull, the wind dropping almost to stillness, his breathing sounded laboured. Was there a problem? But there was a limit to the personal questions I could put to a man who was not only the chair of governors but also my landlord, and I certainly couldn’t demand that he turn back so I could inspect him under our security lights. Then the wind, as if it had paused for a greater effort, let rip again. Waving the stiff drink goodbye, I turned towards the car after all. Brian sank on to the passenger seat with a deep sigh, forgetting his seat belt till I prompted him.
Perhaps I shouldn’t try any conversation till we’d reached the pub.
He was already well down his first glass of wine and we were ready to order when he muttered, almost as if he was hoping I wouldn’t hear, ‘When you’re walking against the wind like that and it’s cold, do you ever feel as if – well, as if you’ve got something tight – like a belt – round your ribs? So you can’t breathe?’
I put my hand over his glass. ‘Leave that. I’m taking you to A & E right now.’
He shook his head dismissively. ‘No, no. It’s not an emergency. I’ve had the feeling before. Several times. I was just wondering …’ His hand went to his ribs.
Conversation in the car was a bit stilted, because I was pretty sure no one had ever ordered him about so much and because I was having to concentrate very hard on my driving. ‘Are they making progress on your new house?’ he asked, with an obvious effort.
‘Yes. At last. The builders and architect have managed to persuade the powers-that-be that it’s not interesting enough to be listed – which took far longer than any of us anticipated. So long as the police don’t keep wanting one more look at the garden – just in case it’s still a crime scene.’
‘But they haven’t found any more … remains?’
‘No. Nor anything else of forensic interest. Nothing in the house, either. Yet,’ I added dryly.
‘And is that neighbour of yours any friendlier? The one who looks like a fashion plate? Hair cut like a Frenchwoman’s?’
He was spot on. She always looked as if she’d stepped from the pages of a chic magazine for the older woman – Saga, Vogue, maybe. ‘Joy Penkridge? Much friendlier. She really improves on acquaintance. She’s stopped peering over her garden fence all the time to complain about the building mess. In fact, she invited me to Christmas drinkies and I’ve been to coffee a couple of times. We have a shared interest in her granddaughter, who started school in September. Charlotte Bingham. Nice bright kid.’
‘I still think the location is too isolated for a woman on her own. It would have been better to find a property in the village’ – he smiled almost apologetically – ‘had there been any on the market, of course.’
Had people like him not snapped up every single one before the public even knew they were for sale in order to turn them into highly profitable holiday cottages or second homes. I couldn’t bitch at him because he’d been prompt to offer me one of his properties – more accurately, another of his properties, a mishap having occurred to my last one. In fact, the whole row had had to be demolished and work was about to start on new ones. The present one was a four-bedroom family house in Little Orchard Close. This was a pleasant little enclave of forty or so dwellings, mostly houses though there were some bungalows, in a variety of sizes and shapes built in the 1980s a couple of hundred metres from the main part of the village. Apparently the hotel originally occupying the site had been gutted in a fire that everyone – except Brian – assured me was an insurance job. That was village life for you.
‘Might I ask how that police officer friend of yours is? Will? Is there any change in his condition?’
Personally, I didn’t think there would be, ever – until a merciful death claimed him. I said quietly, ‘Thanks for asking. He’s still deeply unconscious.’ Persistent vegetative state. What a terrible way for a life to end. Or had it ended before I even tried to resuscitate him?
‘All these months after the attack on him. Yet they say you still go and talk to him all the time.’
Did I detect a strange sort of jealousy? If he hadn’t been so worried about his own health I would have challenged him. As it was I said quietly, with only the slightest emphasis on the noun, ‘All his friends do. And we all read to him and play his favourite music. Jo – you know her: she’s the part-time maths teacher – she and her husband are regulars. There are other people I only ever meet there. Some talk to him; some talk across him. Now things are so tough at work I can’t go as often as I’d like, of course. Plus training the new women’s cricket team takes time,’ I added, not admitting that one of the reasons I didn’t go so often was because I couldn’t deal with all the unresolved emotion.
It was time to change the subject.
To my amazement, A & E was relatively empty – it was, as the receptionist observed, before the pub-closing rush. Waiting time now was about an hour; later it would grow, exponentially.
It was my time to accept Brian’s instructions. I was to go home and leave him in these safe hands. He’d probably be subjected to a battery of tests, all of which would take time. ‘Please, before conditions get any worse. I’m sure you have a mountain of work to get through.’
‘I won’t argue,’ I said, adding with a smile it took him a moment to reciprocate, ‘because it’ll only add to your stress levels.’
And it would only add to mine if I called in on Will. Resolutely, I turned my back on the pair of them.
Weather like this always rattled the kids – kids everywhere I’ve taught – and I have to admit I found it hard to settle into the work I was supposed to finish before school next day. It might have been concern for Brian, or perhaps it was the drive home: there were twigs and full-size branches everywhere; I’d had to move two wheelie bins out of the main road (yes, Brian!) where they lay helplessly on their sides, like beached porpoises. In Little Orchard Close there was a smattering of smashed tiles, though my own – Brian’s own – roof was intact, as far as I could see. So it was time to draw the curtains, turn up the heating, make a sandwich and get on with it. I might even treat myself to a glass of wine once I’d finished.
I’d hardly opened my laptop when my mobile rang. Drat.
‘Jane? Joy here.’
Joy Penkridge? Oh dear, I really didn’t have time for a nice girlie gossip. I looked at the pile on the desk. All that work to get through! All the same I tried to sound polite, enthusiastic, even. ‘Hi, Joy. Everything OK?’
‘Yes. No. Not really. Ken’s away with his wretched model boats, and I didn’t know who to ask.’
Feeling in my thumbs I was going to get involved, I tried to stop the question, but it came out anyway. ‘What’s the problem, Joy?’
‘Tiles. I can see them on the drive. Quite a lot. Do you think you could ask your builders to fix them when they come tomorrow?’
Were roof repairs as simple as that? ‘Of course. And if they can’t they’ll know someone who can. Don’t worry.’ I could relax after all.
‘I’ll do my best. When do you think you’ll move in? It’ll be such a relief to have a neighbour like you.’ Which was not what she’d said at first, but I’d be the first to admit I couldn’t blame her for her original hostility.
‘Easter, all being well. What was that noise, Joy?’
‘The fence, I think. What should I do?’
‘Go and have a quick look.’ Oh dear. I was implying something, wasn’t I? But no way could I go and sort it out for her myself. Not at this time of night.
She was back. ‘Yes. It’s all over the front garden. What should I do?’ she repeated, this time quite desperately.
‘The big larch-lap one the other side from me? That’s far too heavy for us to lift, Joy. The builders will be able to shift it in the morning. Now do as I’ve done. Draw the curtains and turn up the volume on the TV. See you soon.’
‘Do you think I should phone Ken?’
Yes! ‘I think he’d want to know, don’t you? Maybe he can cut short his trip and help organise the repairs.’
‘What a good idea. Men are so good at that sort of thing, aren’t they?’
‘Absolutely,’ I agreed through gritted teeth.
I was just getting ready for bed when the phone rang again. Calls late at night always make me panic. Had my ex-husband escaped? Had Brian been taken really ill? Had Will—I couldn’t complete the sentence even in my thoughts.
But I simply wouldn’t let my voice quiver.
It was Joy again. ‘Jane, I’m so sorry. But I’m really worried about the tree next to the house. I’m so afraid. I think it’s going to come down.’ Her voice was rising in a crescendo of panic – and why not? ‘On top of the house!’
What could I do? Go and prop the damn thing up? But she was right to worry. I would, in her situation. ‘Listen, Joy: pack a bag quickly and come over here for the night. Just in case. I’ll air the spare bed. No, don’t argue.’
To my amazement she didn’t.
I was even more surprised when she brought in her own towel, pillow and duvet. ‘I don’t want to put you to any trouble …’ In fact, she didn’t. We had a companionable glass of single malt and headed to bed. The wind seemed to ease. I slept like a log.
To my relief, Joy declined my invitation to stay for breakfast. I might have been working on the computer since before six, but that didn’t mean I could afford half an hour to be sociable over toast. We left the house together, tutting at the debris all over the road, and thanking goodness that neither car had been damaged. Waving cheerfully, we set off in opposite directions.
I’d barely switched off the Wrayford School alarm when my phone rang.
Joy again.
‘You’d better come over,’ she said. ‘Straight over.’
CHAPTER TWO
Her tree. Her responsibility. Joy said it over and over again.
Damage to my house.
Actually, not to very much of my house. Some of the roof had been swiped by the branches as the great tree descended, but the harm seemed to my untutored eyes to be fairly superficial. The media were gathering already, of course. And departing. It seemed they wanted footage of damaged homes to add to footage of other damaged property, which would be shown on the lunchtime news. One to miss, then. At least, as one of the reporters pointed out, I was lucky – there had been at least one death and several injuries as the wind had beaten up other innocent premises.
I had to agree to the interviewer’s suggestion that I was more than lucky, especially as two of the builders working on the place hove into view. Paula and Caffy: PACT – Paula and Caffy’s team – was their all-woman business. I knew they always made early starts but this seemed above and beyond the call of duty.
‘He’s right. You’re not just lucky but very lucky indeed,’ Paula said briskly, donning her hard hat. She wasn’t officially the boss but always behaved like one. ‘We can see what’s what as soon as someone’s dealt with the branches, but I’d say that though you won’t be able to move in at Easter it should be possible early in the summer.’ She seemed to have lost interest, and was pacing back the length of the tree to where it lay on the garden fence – which had fetched up several metres into my patch. Stepping carefully over the detritus she came to a halt by the great crown of roots, inspecting them arms akimbo.
‘Why your neighbour didn’t put the poor tree out of its misery years ago, goodness knows,’ Caffy said.
‘I’ve an idea it was protected,’ I ventured.
‘By someone who didn’t know his acorn from his elbow. OK, I’ll draw up some estimates so we can have a happy haggle with your neighbour’s insurance company. And then we’ll be off – we’ve got a church roof, two cottages and three garden rooms to assess,’ she said.
‘Sounds like part of a Christmas song, doesn’t it?’
‘I’ll let you know if we come across any calling birds. Hello, what’s Paula found?’ Caffy donned her hard hat too, holding up an authoritative hand when I attempted to follow her. Almost at once she was back, darting into their van and returning with two more hard hats, one of which she threw to me by way of an invitation.
The other was for Joy, who was arguing with Paula – generally a futile exercise, as I knew to my cost.
‘I can’t possibly move out. Possibly. Whatever would Ken say?’
‘That you should.’
‘I have to say, Miss—’
‘Paula. I have to say this, that this property is unsafe. You can’t stay in it. I shouldn’t even let you go in to collect a suitcase, but I can’t stop you if you insist. Put this on first. Jane – look at that!’
I looked. There was a huge hole – the depth and circumference of the roots. Bigger. It started well under the foundations, which already had one big crack spreading up into the front wall of the house. It had reached a window, dodged round it, and was continuing upwards. As we watched, the frame moved, shattering the glass.
‘Talk some sense into her, Jane. I’m getting some plant moved here in the hope we can underpin it and stop the whole place collapsing.’ As she tapped her phone, she said, ‘Caffy – will you try Herbert’s? After Big Sid they’re our best hope. Jane – make sure she stays the far side of the house. OK? You’ve got ten minutes absolute max. And put that hard hat on straight, Joy – this isn’t the time for looking cute. Ah, Sid—’ She made little shooing gestures at me.
I obeyed her instructions: ‘There’s no point in arguing, Joy. We do as she says and scarper. Thank goodness your bedroom’s the other side.’
‘But my cases – they’re in the attic.’
‘Then we’ll bundle everything into sheets or towels. No marks for being neat and tidy. No time, more to the point.’ We were upstairs by now. ‘You grab what you need: jewellery and any other precious items first – your insurance will cover clothes and such, if necessary. Throw me some towels and sheets and I’ll stow the stuff you pass me.’ Did I hear creaking as the house settled? I told myself I was imagining it. But maybe I wasn’t.
I’d never have expected Joy could act so quickly and deftly. Soon we had three good bundles which I dropped gently out of the window. Then some smaller ones.
‘Address book? Insurance contact details?’ I prompted.
‘Ken has those in his den. At the back. Downstairs.’
We ran down. Definitely there was creaking. The den was the same side as the crack. ‘Two minutes – what you can’t find you leave,’ I said, channelling Paula. ‘I’ll be outside, loading the cars.’
‘What we do now is this,’ I said firmly, taking her arm as if she was an old duck rather than a Mercedes-driving woman whose chic Brian had noted. ‘We go back to my place and have a cup of tea and a biscuit. You phone Ken and tell him what’s happened. Then he can come and look after you.’ The words stuck in my craw.
She stared at me in apparent disbelief, shaking her head. ‘He can’t. Didn’t you listen to the news? The Severn Bridges are both closed because of the wind. Even if he drove north to come south, there’s been a pile-up on the M40. Two overturned lorries are blocking the M4. God knows what’ll be happening on the M25. He’s stuck, Jane. And not just him: the storm has wreaked absolute havoc. All over the country.’
I promise I didn’t sigh. I didn’t even think of consigning her to a hotel. ‘It’s a good job you’ll be safe and sound at mine, then.’ On the other hand, she was now shaking with either cold or, more probably, shock. ‘You’re sure you’re OK to drive? OK. Let’s go. Follow me.’
Joy looked around bleakly as I set the heating to override.
Putting on the kettle, I confessed, ‘There’s nothing much in the way of food.’
‘No problem,’ she said briskly, though I suspected a lot of effort was going into her can-do demeanour. ‘I’ll do a supermarket run.’
‘That’d be wonderful. But—’
I’m sure she didn’t catch me checking my watch, but she said quickly, ‘Jane, you have a school to run. Two schools. You know what those posters say: Keep calm and carry on. That’s what we both have to do. Oh, a key!’ She pocketed the one I threw to her. ‘Now, off you go.’ She actually spun me round and gave me a gentle push.
I couldn’t have argued anyway. Come hell or high water I needed to be in Wray Episcopi School to take assembly before a day of wall-to-wall meetings. Not to mention checking on both schools’ fabric.
Then, after a full day’s work plus some, I’d come home to find a visitor in situ. I was shuddering already. But not visibly, I hoped.
I checked the building, which looked in one piece; thank goodness I’d authorised expensive repairs last term. Now I could safely leave Tom, more head than deputy since the school seemed to run quite well without me, to take the Wrayford assembly. Because it was Open the Book day, he had nothing to do except look on appreciatively. Every week a team from the village church came along to enact a Bible story. Homespun and amateur they might be but the kids – and, yes, the staff – loved their presentations. Sadly, there weren’t yet enough of them to extend their activities to Wray Episcopi School, but they assured me they were working on the problem: it was one thing, they assured me with kind firmness, that I didn’t have to worry about.
At last I bustled, with more haste than dignity, into the Wray Episcopi school hall, firing glances at any child with the temerity to fidget, saving a particularly hard stare for a girl looking ostentatiously at her watch. Then I recalled it was her birthday the day before.
‘Was that a present, Cecily? Can we all see?’
Clearly it wasn’t. Cecily subsided.
In front of a somewhat diminished gathering – no doubt some of the lanes the kids would use to get to school were blocked by trees and other debris – Medway class were doing a presentation about courage. Since they’d soon be going out into the big wide world of secondary education, I thought they’d need some. They talked about the pictures they’d drawn; Hettie read a poem; Jason talked about how he felt every time he faced an opponent when he was a goalie. We bowed our heads and closed our eyes while Hannah read a prayer she’d written about children being forced from their homes. My amen was especially fervent. I was so proud of them all. If only I could spend time in the classroom with them – but I was already late for the first meeting of the day, which Hannah might have cued in: planning for the integration of refugee children in mainstream schools. With luck, debris on the local roads would have thrown up enough problems to make my colleagues late too.
I was just starting my car when a text came through. The roads were so bad the meeting had had to be postponed. Good news, bad news: I didn’t think we needed a meeting to agree that we all wanted to help, that we all wanted to welcome kids who’d seen more suffering in their short lives than anyone deserved – but we needed the finances to support language specialists, classroom assistants and counsellors. But my frown soon evaporated. Young Zunaid, an unaccompanied refugee child who’d simply turned up in school one day five months ago, came swiftly up to me as I strode back to my office: ‘How can I help, Ms Cowan? You look so sad.’
That’s what teaching is all about. That and hiding your face when your tears are battling it out with your smile. And being amazed that despite all the trauma that had afflicted him he was already leading his class in maths and speaking English fluently with a hint of a Kent accent. Currently he was living with trained foster parents, but we all hoped he’d soon be able to move in with Pam, one of our dinner ladies, who loved him almost as much as he adored her.
‘You know what, Zunaid, you’ve made me feel better – just by asking.’
What had I said? His eyes narrowed, as if he was looking into the distance; he said wonderingly, ‘My dad used to say that. Back home. Not home here. Home there.’ He gestured at some invisible horizon. ‘“All I can do to make them better is ask how they are,” he said.’ Then he focused on me again, and I knew he was going to ask the question we’d all dreaded. ‘Do you think I will see my dad again before we meet in Paradise?’
‘What do you think?’ It seemed a supine response, but was one we’d been advised to give.
‘I think you would tell me the truth.’
I folded myself down to his level, so I could look him in the eye. ‘I know that your dad is looking for you. People here in England are looking for your dad. We are all doing everything we can to get you back together. I promise.’ Should I leave the rest to the experts who from time to time would question him delicately about his past? I didn’t want to ask anything that might upset him.
‘When they blew my mum up, Dad said we’d meet her again in Paradise,’ he said matter-of-factly.
‘Dads never lie about things like that,’ I said as if I believed it absolutely.
‘That’s what he said.’ He smiled and suddenly reached up and kissed my cheek. ‘You’re like my auntie,’ he added radiantly.
An auntie: this was the first time he’d mentioned any relatives. I risked a gentle question. ‘How am I like your auntie?’
‘You frown like her. And you can be fierce and frightening, like that dragon we read about.’ He snarled and made claws.
Me, an old dragon! That was encouraging. But we were laughing together.
‘And you both smile with much love.’
‘Is your auntie a teacher?’
He shook his head. ‘She works in a hospital, which makes her very tired. She is a doctor and tries to make people better. Like my dad.’ He stared into my eyes with sudden urgency. ‘Ms Jane, what if my auntie is in Paradise too?’
I had to sidestep that. ‘Can you remember her name?’
‘Auntie Noor. She has another name, but I can’t remember it.’
‘The moment you do, come straight to me, and we’ll start looking for her as hard as we’re looking for your dad.’ I cupped his face gently: it would have been lovely to give him a proper hug, but I’d been told to leave that to Pam. ‘Off you go.’
He started with a carefree skip, but suddenly recalled the school walk-don’t-run rule and switched to a proud march instead.
Ms Jane. I liked that name.
Yes, we needed that postponed meeting. We must make things happen, whatever difficulties we had to overcome.
Meanwhile I had an urgent if less fundamental problem. All our gutters had slipped their moorings and were littering the furthest reaches of the playground. There were a couple of cracked tiles. I left a few messages on what were probably overfull answering machines and moved the debris into a tidy heap, which I weighed down with some sacks of compost I’d set aside for the kids’ new garden: I dared not risk any rubbish coming loose and hurting a child – or a colleague, for that matter. Oh, for the dear dead days of on-site caretakers …
It was lunchtime before I could text Brian. He might prefer to hear real speech but he wasn’t going to get that luxury when I was scrounging a few leftovers from the school canteen. Zunaid’s best friend Pam was on duty. She knew my tendency to forget breakfast and lack of time to prepare a packed lunch. She also knew that I regarded salad with an enthusiasm still lacking in too many of the kids.
‘Numbers are a bit down,’ she said cheerfully, adding a little pasta to a plate of mixed greenery. ‘So there’s even a slice or two of garlic bread.’
‘Yes, please. I promise I’ll clean my teeth before the next meeting!’
She grinned. ‘Shall I get Zunaid to bring some fruit salad along in a few minutes?’
Who could resist? Bad manners though technically it might be, I could text and eat simultaneously. And think about the after-school meeting about one or two problems amongst Stour class’s older pupils.
Brian didn’t respond immediately, which gave me a niggle of worry, since he was usually very prompt. But I told myself he was probably having a nice business lunch, and I applied myself to the fruit salad – with crème fraiche, no less – that Zunaid placed carefully on my desk.
I checked my phone between meetings, but there was still no reply. At last, as I waved the last child off home, I tried a phone call. Straight to voicemail.
Now I was concerned. No, I wasn’t. That’s the word everyone uses as a euphemism for worried. I was worried. Very worried indeed.
CHAPTER THREE
Was my relationship with Brian one that meant I could simply pop round to his house and ask how he’d fared at the hospital? On the whole, I thought not. For all sorts of reasons, mostly involving my violent ex, Simon, currently safely in Durham jail for his savage assaults on our dog and indeed on me, I found it very hard to trust alpha males on a personal level. It was one thing to exercise authority over them when I umpired village cricket matches, quite another to put myself in a personal situation with them. I might eat with Brian occasionally in public at the Jolly Cricketers, but knocking on his door with nothing except a possibly intimate enquiry was—no, I couldn’t do it. I reasoned (spuriously, as I knew quite well) that staying at my house I had a guest to whom I ought to return: she’d had a terrible shock and might not be as resilient as I’d been in tough situations. Though she was incredibly chic and used the gym, she was older than Brian, and might have health problems I knew nothing about. I often stayed at school till eight or nine, especially on Tuesdays like this one when I nipped back to Wrayford to teach the after-school ball-skills club. Tonight, I must make an effort to get back at an hour Joy would no doubt call civilised.
But I had to pass Brian’s house on the way home. I ought to call in. Perhaps all I needed was an excuse, such as some paperwork he needed to see. But in a country battered by Storm Emlyn, as the gales were now officially called, very few people had troubled themselves with high-level policy meetings generating controversial outcomes. No crazy government edicts either – apparently all the ministers who might have made our job even more tricky were either commiserating with their constituents’ housing damage or plotting knavery so foul that they didn’t dare risk a public announcement for fear of middle-class revolution.
Tom hadn’t flagged up any problems for me to worry about. So I was left with my conscience. Even as I turned the car for home I was still undecided. What if Brian took my concern as a sign that I was developing a personal interest in him? Once or twice he’d hinted that he found me attractive. I didn’t reciprocate, not one smidgen, especially as I had first-hand experience of his capacity to bully, and didn’t want to do anything that might be construed, in the sort of words Joy might use, as leading him on.
His car wasn’t in the drive. Apart from the light he always left on when he was out – a good clue to a would-be burglar, that! – his house was in darkness.
All the same …
My mobile told me the signal was good out here. I tried calling him again. I didn’t bother with voicemail. Home to Joy, then.
I’d always quietly sneered when women described themselves as homemakers, but seeing my place when Joy had spent a few hours in it made me understand that the role might have some value after all. It took me a while to work out what she’d done – subtle changes like moving around the table lamps in the living room. There was also a delicate, subtle perfume from thick candles. Dropping my bags in the small room I used as my study, I headed for the kitchen. There I was greeted by more smells, wholesome and quite strong: two casseroles occupied the oven, the controls of which I’d never quite mastered, and a fresh loaf sat on a rack. Yes, it was still warm. There was also a pile of biscuits.
The author of all these miracles? The sound of her careful footsteps on the stairs reminded me that for all her energy she wasn’t young, despite the jeans and cashmere top that showed her gym-using figure was as good as any fifty-year-old’s.
I put back the biscuit guiltily.
‘Now, a nice gin and tonic,’ she declared, opening a fridge that bulged with unaccustomed goodies. ‘And if you tell me what time you like to eat I’ll see to it that supper is ready. It looks as if you’ve had a bit of a day.’
‘Not as dramatic as yours, though, Joy.’
She smiled and shrugged. ‘Your building friends are angels, aren’t they, though it’s such a strange occupation for women. Paula and Caffy? So very different from each other. Like, like …’
‘Like ice cream and hot chocolate sauce?’
‘Exactly! Or Baked Alaska! Between ourselves, I’ve never dared cook that. Have you?’
Me? I shook my head. ‘But what have Paula and Caffy been up to?’ A great deal, most of it with kindness, judging from my own experience.
‘They just took over. I dropped in at one point to see what was going on, so I could report back to Ken. I told him to stay where he was until the roads were better, but he’ll set out first thing tomorrow. If you’re sure about my staying here tonight, of course. Ken’ll sort out a place for us both – and all our furniture, of course – when he gets home. Assuming Paula and her team have managed to stabilise it sufficiently. Oh, Jane – my pictures! All the photo albums.’ She tried hard not to let her voice crack, but the sip of gin became a veritable gulp.
I gave her a silent hug.
I’d had to learn to travel light. I’d never managed to keep all the domestic impedimenta that had graced Joy’s home. Furniture? Simon had smashed a lot. Photos? He’d stood over me and made me shred them. Now my life involved a very few books, some clothes and two teddy bears, Nosey, the larger, a very conventional teddy who reminded of one that Simon had torn apart, and a small floppy one left to look after me when I’d been ill last summer – Lavender, so-called because he was. One day, maybe, I’d fill my new home with treasures. Maybe. I didn’t want hostages to fortune. But Joy didn’t need to hear any of that, lest it imply a criticism. I’d better be careful when it came to asking any questions, too, because it was clear she was finding it hard to focus on anything specific – perhaps it was too painful.
Yes, I’d been there.
‘Have you been in touch with your insurance company?’ I asked, ashamed to sound so prosaic.
‘Ken always does that sort of thing,’ she said. ‘I don’t even know who we’re insured with.’
‘Why don’t you call him and ask while I have a quick shower? Or make sure he’s on to it,’ I added, as I headed off upstairs. It was only as I towelled myself off I realised what a bad host I was being. I was dressed and downstairs within three minutes.
She was staring despondently at her phone, but straightened and stowed it in her bag as soon as I appeared. ‘He says he’ll do it after dinner. But isn’t it urgent? I should have done it!’
I’d better avert her tears. ‘I forgot to show you how to use the washing machine,’ I declared contritely. It had taken me weeks to master.
‘Oh, I hope you don’t mind my using it,’ she added anxiously.
This was the strong, assertive woman who’d once tackled me head on when the state of my garden had annoyed her. But disorientation and grief could do that.
‘Actually, I’d quite like a lesson. And on the oven, too. I’m a bit of a technophobe,’ I said, with some, if not complete, truth. After all, I could reheat or microwave precooked meals with the best of them. I’d soon learnt which washing programme creased clothes the least, and managed to set the tumble dryer quite competently, so long as I read the little pictures on the dial. But it gave her something to bustle about doing, and I was as happy to learn as when one of my year four pupils showed me how to master a new app. The downside was that it made me feel even more like a guest in my own temporary home.
‘There you are – I told you it was simple, didn’t I?’ she said triumphantly, as without prompting I found the setting best for cooking flans without soggy bottoms. Which I might do, one year. One decade.
‘You did. Thank you. Now – you’ve sorted the cooker and pointed out that the microwave is far cleverer than I’d imagined. Maybe you can fill me in on all the other things I don’t know. My neighbours, for instance. I might wave at one or two of them, but unless they’re parents or are involved with the church or the cricket club, I certainly don’t know them properly.’
‘Funny you should say that,’ she said, leaning against a work surface, ‘because something odd happened. Twice. So maybe that means it’s not odd. But I checked – the house numbering’s really easy to follow and once you’ve worked out that there are a few little cul-de-sacs off the main run, then it’s all straightforward. Like the edge of an oak leaf. Isn’t it nice, the way no house actually directly overlooks another? And that nice green space in the middle for children to play on? I went to a barbecue there once. You know they planned to build eighty properties but one of the local councillors wanted to live there himself and insisted they could only build forty-five? Anyway, when I was leaving the house I saw a white van going really slowly as if the driver was looking for somewhere. Then he saw me – no, maybe I’m imagining it … It just seemed as if he didn’t want anyone to see him. He accelerated away. Quite fast, actually.’
It took me every ounce of willpower not to show my terror. However, much I knew he was locked away in a far-distant part of the country, I was still afraid my ex-husband would find me and deal with me, as he would probably put it. As casually as I could, I asked, ‘And did you see anything of him?’
‘Young. Twenties or thirties. Very dark hair. Bit of a beard. Olive skin – a bit pockmarked as if he’d had bad acne as a boy. Put a cutlass between his teeth and he’d look like a pantomime pirate!’ It was good to share a laugh. But her face straightened. ‘The strange thing is, later on I was having a bit of a gossip with Marie – do you know her? Number 26? – and Tess from number 27. Ken’s Lodge’s Ladies’ Nights,’ she added. ‘And we saw another similar van, also driving slowly round. Definitely not the same driver – this one was older. It was as if he was looking for something too. Somewhere, I should say. Tess actually started to walk across to ask if she could help, but he went and drove off in a great rush. Tess said she thought he was casing the neighbourhood – seeing who was in and who was out and who left windows or gates open. She wrote down his number, actually, in case there were any burglaries in the next couple of days and she had evidence that might help.’ She registered my expression. ‘What?’
‘I’m just wondering if it might have been worth her calling 101 with the information. In case the number’s on file.’
‘I’ll phone her now!’ She bustled off.
There was only one hope in my selfish head – that these might be nice common criminals only interested in nicking garden furniture: there’d been an outbreak of that in the autumn, supplemented by a raid on planters, some complete with winter pansies. Even taking garden benches only constituted low-level crime, my friend PC Lloyd Davies insisted. No violence, no injury, nothing the police had time to tackle. Just call your insurance and wait for the hollow laughter.
A Neighbourhood Watch group had sprung up. No, I wasn’t involved, because it always met on staff meeting night. I stared down at my empty glass as Joy returned: I’d drained it without even noticing. Damn! It wasn’t often I got a G & T as good as this, and I daren’t have another, not with all I had to do.
And it seemed that Joy was expecting us to drink wine with our meal.
How did she stay so svelte?
Huge portions of baked potatoes and boeuf bourgignon. Cuisine neither nouvelle nor minceur. Classic. Filling. Heart-warming. Amazing with the Cahors black wine she served at just the right temperature.
It dawned on me: I needed a wife.
And now cheese. Her choice was Chaource just the right side of liquefying. A fresh baguette. Another glass of wine. Sod the preparation for tomorrow’s meeting. I’d have to wing it.
So why was Joy putting her coat on?
‘Just a little evening ritual, Jane. When Ken and I had Toby we always had to take him out last thing in the evening, of course.’
Ah. They’d had a dog, as I once had – much loved, till Simon had killed him before my eyes. Ironically, it was the decision of the RSPCA to prosecute him for animal cruelty that alerted the police to his violence towards me, and probably saved my life.
‘And then, when he wasn’t there any more and we decided not to have another dog because we wanted to go on more holidays further afield, we still kept up the walk. Ken’s big on astronomy, of course. What he’ll say when he hears I left his telescope behind goodness knows.’
‘If he has any sense he’ll thank God you got out safely and let the insurance worry about the rest. In any case, I should imagine Paula and Caffy have got the site secured very efficiently, and everything will be safe and sound till it can be rescued. Give me a minute and I’ll come with you.’
We walked briskly, using torches. Most of the drives were occupied by cars, large and shiny under the intruder lights that clicked on as we passed. Some people had left their curtains open, living their lives for all to see.
Joy said, ‘Letting all that heat out!’
‘And showing passing strangers you’ve got a nice new shiny TV.’
She paused. ‘I noticed you gave the curtains an extra twitch when you came in – but while it’s a nice enough holiday let, and I know this makes me sound really ungrateful and I promise you I’m not, I’m just talking about your landlord, really, the furniture and equipment aren’t really state of the art, are they? The place needs a refurb, if you ask me.’
Which probably explained why I got it at a discount, of course. ‘To be honest with you, Joy, it’s not Brian’s knick-knacks that I’m worried about. It’s more my violent ex.’
