Natasha jotted directions in her notepad, and hung up.
Bethany’s father had sounded nice, normal. Yet she had been so upset when Adam mentioned him, and never talked about her family. Why? It would be good to know before she had to meet them.
She stared at her notes. Eleanor’s grandson had died young, like Harry Leyburn. What was it Katherine had said about Bethany? When people come in for wreaths for the graves she’d be almost in tears.
On automatic pilot, almost against her will, Natasha found herself going back to the registers, sliding in the fiche for the 1980s death records. She scrolled through the Wildings. Slid in another file, searching again.
Then Elaine Wilding’s name, Bethany’s mother’s name, was staring back at her.
She had died in summer 1985. Fifteen years ago, when Bethany would have been four years old.
Natasha rang Will.
‘How you doing? Not great by the sound of it,’
‘Listen, Will. Do me a favour can you? Check the local Stratford-upon-Avon rag for a coroner’s report for Elaine Wilding, summer 1985.’
‘The girl’s mother, right?’
‘Right.’
Natasha couldn’t face another coffee, opted for tea instead, plenty of sugar.
You’ve opened one large can of worms this time,’ Will said when he rang back. ‘Forget the coroner. There’s a front page article. Elaine Wilding died while she was swimming, it says. Wouldn’t it be easier to say she drowned?’
‘Just read it will you?’
‘OK, OK. No need to bite my head off. I quote: “A dreadful blow to a family still recovering from the tragedy of losing their eldest child, Charlotte, who also died suddenly just last year, a few days before her thirteenth birthday. Andrew Wilding, father of Charlotte and wife to the recently deceased, Elaine, is helping police with their enquiries.”’ Will paused. ‘Which is a polite way of saying they think he did it, isn’t it?’
Natasha couldn’t find her voice.
‘Explains a lot,’ Will commented.
No it doesn’t. Andrew Wilding’s voice. Nice, normal.
‘Haven’t found any follow-ups as yet,’ Will said. ‘No details of conviction or acquittal or whatever. Not as dramatic as a speculative story no doubt, so it’s probably tucked away on the back pages somewhere. I’ll keep looking.’
Natasha called Adam, told him she needed to see him. He didn’t ask what for, just said that he’d come up to Snowshill. She was about to give him directions, but he said he didn’t need them.
This remark came back to her later, when she walked into the car park and saw the Celica parked two rows down from the Alpine, a figure with a baseball cap pulled low over his face, sitting in the driver’s seat, cigarette smoke curling from the opened window.
Enough was enough. She marched towards it, was perhaps ten car-lengths away when the Celica pulled out at some speed. The tyres made an abrasive crunch on the gravel as it did a sharp turn and roared away through the exit gate. Natasha memorized the full registration number, went back to sit in her car and called Broadway Police Station. She asked to speak to PC Walker.
‘I think I’m being followed. In fact I’m certain of it.’ She told him what had happened, gave him the registration.
He told her he’d call her back after he’d checked the database.
She was almost at Toddington. ‘I’m not supposed to tell you anything, data protection and all that. Unless you’re in danger.’
‘Is it likely you’d be followed and not be?’
She’d hoped very much he’d deny that but he didn’t. ‘Name of Jake Romilly mean anything to you?’
It came as no surprise at all.
Thirty-Eight
SHE CUT CROSS-COUNTRY and headed back into Oxford.
Her mobile rang with a voice message. ‘Peter Deacon. Oxford Times. We’re running a feature on a photographic exhibition at Exeter College. Have a few questions for you.’ I’ve got plenty of questions of my own thanks very much.
She held her finger on the buzzer at the studio. No response. She felt like kicking the door down. She stood back in the street. The slatted blinds were down in the architects’ office, but she could see figures moving about.
She rang the bell.
The door was opened by a plump, grey-haired woman. ‘Can I help?’
‘I wondered if I could have a word with Christine?’
The woman let Natasha into the vestibule.
Christine’s careful professional smile dimmed when she saw Natasha. She was dressed more glamorously than before, as if she was planning on going out later. Short black skirt and shocking pink top, matching lipstick and dangly silver earrings. Natasha pictured her in a ring of fire.
‘Know where I might find Jake?’
Christine shook her head, cagey now.
‘You do know something?’
‘I know who you are, what you’re doing. I know you got me into trouble. Jake had a real go at me for letting you in last time. I don’t want to get involved, OK?’
She turned to go. Natasha grabbed her arm. ‘Jake’s been following me. I think he broke into my house. I’m pretty angry and I’m also quite scared. If you have any idea what’s going on tell me, please.’ She felt the girl hesitate, relaxed her grip. ‘Look. I’ve not had lunch yet, do you get a break?’
* * *
They found a wine bar round the corner.
Christine said she didn’t want a drink. Natasha ordered a bottle of house white and two glasses in any case.
Christine sat chewing the inside of her lip. ‘All I know is what I overheard them saying.’
‘Who?’
‘Jake. And one of the others?’
‘Adam?’
‘I think so, yes. He was certainly there that afternoon. I saw Alex – you know, who also uses the studio – in the morning. I saw him leave.’ Natasha tried to be patient. ‘I went out with Jake for about three months. That night I was working late, waiting for him to come back so we could go clubbing. I saw him go down to the studio. It was pouring outside and I didn’t want to ruin my hair so I used the back stairs, planned on banging on the door until they opened up. I heard Jake’s voice. He was talking really loud, panicky, to whoever was down there. Adam, or Alex maybe, like I said.’
Natasha waited a second. ‘What was he saying?’
Christine shifted on her stool, lowered her eyes, started gnawing her nails, nails that were already chewed back to the quick. She looked up. ‘He said, “She was just lying there. Like she was dead.” He said, “I swear I didn’t do anything.” He said that a couple of times. “I hardly touched her.”’ Natasha felt as if she’d been kicked in the stomach. ‘Adam, or Alex, said “Christ.” Then asked Jake if he’d felt for a pulse or whatever. Jake said he wasn’t thinking straight. He thought she was still breathing but he couldn’t be sure, and what happened if she stopped? He asked if they should go back but whoever it was said no way.’
‘Go back where?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘When was this?’
‘Before Christmas. About ten days before.’
After the Ophelia shoot, then. Around the time Adam said Bethany had left. ‘You think they were talking about Bethany?’
‘Jake was seeing her when … before … me. Alex likes to stir it. Like I said, I saw him that morning. He said Bethany had left Adam. She’d come round to the studio to pick up some of her things. Jake had been there and said he’d buy her a coffee before she went. She said no but he followed her…’ Her voice cracked. ‘I met her at the studio once or twice. I didn’t talk to her ever. But I could see why Jake liked her. She was perfect for the photographs they were doing. Sort of sad-looking.’ She looked up imploringly. ‘I didn’t know what to do. He said she was breathing so I thought…’
‘Have you told anyone else?’
‘No. I…’ Christine looked close to tears.
Natasha put her hand on the girl’s arm, pushed the glass of wine ne
arer. ‘It’s OK.’
‘I didn’t want … my parents would hate me … mixing … with people like Jake. I didn’t want them to find out.’ Christine started gnawing at her thumb now. Natasha couldn’t help feeling a twinge of pity for her. ‘It wasn’t really that I liked being with Jake, but I liked being with myself when I was with him, know what I mean? The photographs he took of me. Not just a nine to five office girl whose best offer to the world is the fact that I can type at ninety words a minute and know how to operate Excel and Windows and PowerPoint. I thought how I’d invite everyone from the office to the exhibition, all my bosses. I couldn’t wait to see their faces. It’d give them all something to think about next time they gave me their coffee orders. Going out with Jake was better than girls’ nights out and office parties and all that stuff that everyone else does.’
Natasha paid and they went outside.
‘What are you going to do?’ Christine asked.
‘I’m not sure.’
‘You should ask Adam,’ Christine said. Natasha remembered with a jab of dread that she’d have the perfect opportunity. He was on his way to Snowshill. ‘Ask him about The Ravens.’
Thirty-Nine
ASK HIM ABOUT The Ravens.
What was that supposed to mean?
As she drove into Snowshill, Arnold was making his way, as he did on the dot of seven every night, down past the green towards the pub. He raised his hand in greeting, in the way a police officer would stop traffic. Natasha waved back. Earlier she’d vaguely entertained the idea of wandering across to the inn for supper before Adam arrived. Now it felt as if she’d taken a wrong turning, into a nightmarish parallel universe where it was ludicrous to end the day with a simple pleasure like a drink with friends.
Ask him about The Ravens.
The Ravens. The initials TR on the photographs? Adam’s words in the pub at Little Barrington. I’ve always liked the idea of the Pre-Rapaelite Brotherhood. Secret societies.
The Ravens was a good name for one. As good a name as any.
She was in the kitchen when she heard the clunk of the car door, didn’t go through to let him in until there was a knock.
‘Hello again.’ He was wearing a black v-neck sweater and jeans. His hair looked freshly washed, still damp at the ends, the curls a little tighter, darker. He held out a bottle wrapped in tissue paper, like a peace offering. Natasha didn’t want to touch it.
‘I thought we could go over to the pub.’
He thrust the bottle towards her. ‘And I thought we could stay here.’
She didn’t trust herself to say any more, extended her arm, indicating he go through to the living room.
She escaped into the kitchen, rested her hands palm down on the table. She could feel her pulse in her finger tips. She realized suddenly how unprepared she was for any of this. And what a ridiculously sheltered middle-class life she’d led, surrounded for the most part by straight, moral people, her only brush with criminals and murderers through yellowing coroners reports and lists of long-dead convicts.
She took a deep breath, straightened up, swept her hair away from her face, reached for the bottle Adam had brought. It was expensive French red wine. She found the corkscrew. When she went through to the other room he was kneeling on the floor, looking through the CD rack. ‘Mind if I choose something?’
‘Feel free.’ Boris, who had been sprawled out in front of the fire, now rose stiffly to his feet and nosed her hand, then ambled back to the rug and flopped down again close to Adam. Clearly no judge of character at all.
Adam slipped a CD into the machine. Nick Cave. Boatman Calls. She wished he’d chosen something else. Something she didn’t like so much. She’d never be able to listen to it again without thinking of him, or rather, thinking of this moment, how she was feeling. Angry. Confused. Scared.
‘Haven’t you forgotten something?’
He stared down at her hands. She’d not brought any glasses.
He followed her to the kitchen. She could feel him behind her, blocking the doorway. ‘Nice place you’ve got here.’ She poured the wine. Some splashed on the table. It tasted bitter in her mouth, seemed to make her tongue and lips even drier.
‘You’re wishing you hadn’t let me come? You’re suspicious of me, aren’t you?’ She didn’t reply. ‘You’re right to be.’
She pulled out a chair and sat down. Her senses were primed, buzzing, a pure still clarity in the centre of her brain. Adam sat down too. They were facing each other across the table.
‘I did doubt you,’ she said, her voice sounding ultra-calm. ‘All along I’ve had this feeling that you might be keeping something from me. But I didn’t tell you everything either. I found a note. Underneath the cover of the diary. It looked like Bethany’s handwriting. I thought at first it was a suicide note. I wonder now if you put it there.’
He forced a laugh that wasn’t a laugh at all. There was a bemused disbelief in it, as if he thought she was cracking some crass joke. Then he stared at her, looking stunned, so she started to wonder what she’d done. At the back of her mind though, she could hear his voice, giving himself the kind of stage directions he gave at photo shoots. You’ve just discovered your lover might be dead, and that someone thinks you are involved. You’re devastated, and angry, but part of you can’t accept any of it’s true.
Winding himself up to act a part. Faking it.
‘I should have told you before,’ she said carefully. ‘Only I had this crazy idea that it would be cruel. I wanted to find her for you first.’
‘What did the note say?’
She rose, went through to the living room to fetch the diary from her desk. She handed the piece of paper to him. He seemed to take a long time, going over and over the words, or just staring at them.
‘What made you think this was a suicide note?’
‘Doesn’t it look like that to you?’
‘Not really.’
A surge of relief, mingled with acute embarrassment. Then doubt crept in again. He would say that, wouldn’t he?
‘She was always writing down things like this,’ Adam said. ‘Snippets of poetry, she’d read and liked, some of it her own.’ He was convincing, you had to hand it to him. ‘It means nothing to me.’ He looked at the note again, shook his head slowly. ‘“At last you will be mine.” I’ve been hers all along. If she wanted me.’
‘Are you sure about that?’
Adam slumped back in the chair. The atmosphere in the room was like the air before a thunderstorm. You’d hear a pin drop. Cut it with a knife. All those clichés. ‘You think I’m not to be trusted?’
‘Would I be wrong?’
He snatched his wine, drained it. ‘No. You probably wouldn’t.’
Natasha replenished his glass.
‘So tell me about The Ravens.’ He didn’t seem particularly surprised or unnerved. ‘Your secret society?’
He gulped more of the wine, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘It was my idea. At the time I thought it was bloody clever. It comes from Edgar Allan Poe’s poem, you know. ‘The Raven’? “Nameless here for evermore … dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before”?’ We adopted the line as a kind of manifesto. It seemed to sum up what we were about. “Nameless”, as in the secret society gave us and our work anonymity, like the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, of course. “Dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream”. Which seemed to have just the right hint of darkness and danger, the mortal bit a nice nod to the afterworld, let us think of ourselves as vampires, or with fame and fortune before us, immortals. And the daring dream element gave us plenty of scope for experimentation, indulging our darkest sexual fantasies.’ He took another swig of wine. ‘It all started in college. There were about half a dozen of us. We modelled ourselves on the Pre-Raphaelites, like I said. Took it all very seriously. Drew up a code of conduct and voted in members, initiation ceremonies with lots of wine. We got up to a few pranks, left a calling card with a silhouette of a raven on it, got dru
nk and stoned. Rumours got round, everyone wanted to know who we were. But we only told those we invited to take part and they were sworn to absolute secrecy. The idea was for each of us to approach the most beautiful girls and get them to pose, for all the members in turn. The girls we … recruited took pleasure in it too. We shot them in the woods at night and ruins of abbeys and castles, naked on tombstones, noirish shots in railway stations. The pictures were great actually. Only, it went further than than.’
‘The Ravens didn’t disband after you left college?’
‘For a while we lost touch, then about a year ago I ran into Jake and Alex. Who you’ve met I believe.’ She was about to say something, but he carried on talking. ‘We came up with this idea to launch the Pre-Raphaelite project as The Ravens. To create a little mystique, a publicity stunt. Only … everything got out of hand.’
‘Because of Bethany?’
He nodded. ‘It was me she chose. Jake couldn’t take that. He wanted her because he couldn’t have her. There’s always been a professional rivalry between us, healthy, you know, stimulating. But after Bethany it … turned into something else.’
He didn’t have to tell her any more. ‘Jake was the one who brought her into the circle, not you?’ Jake who, out of spite, never told Adam he knew where Bethany worked. ‘You lied to me about how you and Bethany got together.’
‘No. I did buy her a coffee, in a café, near the studio.’
‘But that wasn’t the first time you’d met?’
‘I’d seen her with Jake, watched him photographing her.’
‘And then you didn’t want to follow the rules any more? Didn’t want to share her?’
Adam shook his head. ‘He wouldn’t leave her alone, kept coming round to the flat, ringing her up, following her…’
‘You think that’s why she went away?’
‘No. She got pissed off with it all right, but … in a way I think she was quite flattered as well. Got a kick out of it.’
‘She saw herself as some kind of Janey Burden, and you two as Morris and Rossetti?’
Pale as the Dead Page 22
