In the Spider's House

by Sarah Diamond

  Hanging out some clothes to dry on Monday morning, I saw her gardening across the fence. ‘Morning, Liz,’ I called, ‘how’s it going?’

  ‘Hello, Anna, dear—another lovely day. I’m not sure all my plants like the heat as much as I do, but I know I shouldn’t grumble.’ She smiled, setting her watering can down on the grass. ‘What are you up to today? More research?’

  ‘Not today. I’m off to London tomorrow, interviewing a psychiatrist who treated Rebecca in the young offenders’ home; I’ve got a feeling he’ll have a lot to say.’ I suddenly envisioned a casual, chance exchange between Liz and Carl in the front garden. ‘I’d really appreciate it if you didn’t mention that to Carl. It’s a bit complicated, but I haven’t told him. He’s not that wild about me spending so much time with the research, and I thought it’d be best if he didn’t know.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I understand perfectly. Not a word.’ Her voice was cheery, creating a wonderful illusion of light-heartedness—secrecy took on the temporary feel of harmless mischief, St Trinian’s rather than John le Carré. ‘I do hope it all goes well.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said, ‘fingers crossed.’

  ‘I’m sure he’ll have no end of things to tell you.’ She paused for a second, listening out. ‘Isn’t that your phone?’

  ‘It is—damn. See you later. Do pop round for a coffee this afternoon, if you’re free.’

  After the dazzling sunlight, the inside of the house took on an odd bluish edge. I hurried towards the phone with far less trepidation than I’d have felt if Liz had been at work. Her presence outside seemed comforting, as if no true threat could coexist with her watering her plants; lifting the receiver, I felt only a second’s fear. ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hello, is that Anna Jeffreys?’

  An elderly male voice, cracked, quavery, uncertain—a voice I was ninety percent certain I’d never heard in my life. ‘Speaking,’ said, ‘can I help you?’

  ‘I thought I might be able to help you. I heard you were writing a book about Rebecca Fisher, and you were researching it. Is that true?’

  Actually, it’s just loosely based on her, it’s not true crime—I slammed the brakes on that sentence just in time. This man sounded nervous, as though he was talking with a gun to his head; I found it too easy to imagine the abrupt apology, the severed connection. ‘It is,’ I said. ‘Did you know her?’

  ‘Not her. The couple who adopted her…Rita and Dennis Fisher.’ I heard him take a long, shuddering breath. ‘I can’t give my name, or anything like that. My family mustn’t know I’ve talked to you about this. I’ve never told them anything about it.’

  I felt utterly alert, agonisingly cautious, like a butterfly collector sighting the rarest of rare species on the edge of a leaf, trembling with the threat of imminent flight. The world had contracted to a single necessity: not to startle, to proceed slowly while my instincts screamed at me to rush. ‘That’s not a problem,’ I said quietly, ‘anything you tell me is in the strictest confidence. You don’t have to worry about that at all.’

  A moment’s pause, tense as an elastic band stretched almost to breaking point—I saw the wings stir again, edged closer with my heart in my mouth. ‘How did you know the Fishers?’ I asked.

  ‘I was their gardener for nearly two years. Before they adopted Rebecca,’ he said. ‘I left some time before they took her in.’

  I still had no idea why he seemed so desperate for secrecy, and struggled to suppress my own curiosity on the subject, hunting for an innocuous, factual question. ‘Why did you leave?’

  ‘It’s a long story.’ A second inhalation; tense, resigned, purposeful, as though he was on the brink of something he dreaded but had to do. ‘The whole story, really…but I suppose I’ll have to start at the beginning. I was eighteen when I went for the job. I didn’t actually expect to get it. I knew I’d be up against a lot more experienced men, but it didn’t stop me. I’d been out of work for a good five months and, well, I was living at home…money was tight, and it made things difficult for all of us that I wasn’t bringing in a wage of my own. I’d heard that the Fishers paid well, and the job came with accommodation, a little gardener’s cottage. Nothing fancy, but I’d just about have killed for it, at the time. Just to get out from under Mum and Dad’s feet. You know.’

  ‘I can imagine.’ I could, only too well—I’d stopped worrying that he was about to hang up unexpectedly, and the edge of caution had left my voice, unnoticed. ‘So your interview went well?’

  ‘It did. It was very strange, as a matter of fact. I’d expected their housekeeper would deal with all that sort of thing, but the first time I went there I didn’t even see her. Dennis Fisher showed me in himself. Interviewed me himself, in the living room. The house struck me as odd, too…at the time, I thought I was just ignorant, that I didn’t know what rich people’s houses were supposed to look like. But, thinking back, it still looks wrong to me. Big and plain as a box from the outside, no fancy touches at all. Inside, though, it was a different story—frills and flounces everywhere, lacy curtains, everything done in pastel colours. Like it was two different houses, rolled into one.

  ‘The interview took much longer than I’d expected—you’d have thought Mr Fisher was looking for someone to manage his factory, not a gardener. He didn’t seem to just be interested in what I could and couldn’t do, he was trying to decide what sort of person I was. There was one particular question I remember him asking: “What does confidentiality mean to you?” I haven’t got the least idea what I said, I was so nervous. But I suppose it must have been the right answer, looking back.’

  ‘Had you met Dennis Fisher before then?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh, no. Everyone knew who the Fishers were, but they weren’t prominent in the community at all. Kept themselves to themselves, everyone said. We all guessed they’d mix with wealthy families in other towns; they were really the only one in Teasford. And their house was so remote, nobody saw much of their comings and goings. Of course, the people who worked at Mr Fisher’s textiles factory—my mum was one of them—saw him now and then, but he didn’t have anything to do with the staff from day to day. He certainly wasn’t the kind of employer who treated his business like a family, for all it was so important to him.’

  ‘So what did you think of him?’ I asked curiously. ‘When you met him for the first time?’

  ‘I was a bit overawed, like I was with the house. Anything that struck me as odd, I told myself I didn’t know any better; it was just what posh businessmen were like. But if he’d just been a workmate of my dad’s, I’d have thought he was a cold bit of work. Hardly ever smiled, and even when he did it was like he was making an effort, like he knew he was supposed to smile sometimes, to put me at my ease. And he didn’t look like I’d expected him to, either. Thin man, he was, forty or so, thick glasses, dark hair. Neatly dressed, but in the same way a town clerk might have been. I’d heard about rich men getting their suits made specially for them, but I couldn’t imagine Mr Fisher doing that. I knew next door to nothing about tailoring, and even I could tell his was off-the-rack. He didn’t have a big gold watch or gold cufflinks, either, nothing that you’d have expected. He just looked ordinary.’

  It was perfectly in keeping with everything I’d heard about Dennis Fisher so far—I felt my mental image of him set and harden like clay.

  ‘Still, I was more than happy to work for him,’ the old man went on quietly. ‘He seemed as though he’d be a good employer—fair, decent, not the sort of man who’d make ridiculous demands and throw his weight around all the time. When the letter came to tell me I’d got the job, I was over the moon. I think my mum and dad were, as well. We had a bit of a celebration that night, and I moved my things into the gardener’s cottage the week after.’

  ‘How did you take to working there?’

  ‘Like a duck to water—at least, I did at first. My duties were all perfectly straightforward, just keeping the grass short and trimming the bushes back regularly. The gardens had
to be kept pin-neat, but were just as plain as the house was from the outside. Not a flower in sight, apart from the daisies and dandelions I had to get rid of. The sort of job you dream of, when it comes with good money and your own cottage. The housekeeper was a nice lady, as well, a widow in her sixties. She had part of the house to herself, but I saw quite a lot of her coming and going—we talked in a friendly sort of way for the first month or so, very much on the surface. About the weather and the area and suchlike, you know the kind of thing. It would all have been as easy as pie. If it hadn’t been for Mrs Fisher, anyway.’

  ‘Why?’ I asked, startled. ‘What did she do?’

  ‘Not very much, to begin with. She called round at the cottage on my second day—I’d say popped round, but it was much more formal than that. She was very gracious, in a distant sort of way—a patronising way, I’d say now, looking back. I daresay I’d think it quite offensive today, the way she carried on. She actually said, “This must all be very new to you,” meaning the cottage, as though I’d never been anywhere clean and tidy with running water before—like some grand Victorian lady visiting the workhouse. She was dressed like she was off to some big society event, dripping with jewellery at half-eleven in the morning—hair all swept up, made up to the nines.’ A brief, reflective silence. ‘It’s funny that I thought she was so glamorous. If I’d seen her in ordinary clothes down the pub, I’d have thought she looked like the back end of a bus. But I suppose you’re impressionable at that age, when you’ve lived in a shabby little terrace all your life. When she left, I was quite disappointed she’d gone—a real lady, I thought she was.

  ‘Anyway, I didn’t think about her much for the next few weeks. I hardly ever saw her coming and going, and didn’t have any reason to go into the house. Then, one day, I’d just started trimming back the bushes by the front windows, when I heard voices coming from inside. I couldn’t make out what they were saying, but I could tell that they were angry. Furious. One of them was Mrs Fisher’s. I couldn’t place the second.

  ‘I had no idea what to do—Mr Fisher was at work, and I’d seen the housekeeper leaving for the shops a good hour ago. I didn’t want to interfere, far from it, but from what I could hear, things were turning quite nasty in there—anything could be happening, I thought, she might have surprised a burglar or God knows what. Then I heard something breaking, china or something, and I knew I couldn’t just pretend I hadn’t heard that. The voices were coming from a long way inside, towards the back of the house. So I went round to the back door. It was half-open. I let myself in as quietly as I could, and followed the voices from there.

  ‘The living room door was half-open, too. When I reached it, I just stopped dead. There was Mrs Fisher, half-naked—she was just wearing her skirt and stockings, not a stitch else—screaming abuse at a man not far off my own age, who was buttoning up his shirt in one hell of a hurry. I could see an ornamental plate on the floor, smashed to splinters. I guessed she’d thrown it at him and missed. It was then that something else hit me. She was roaring drunk. Her hair was all over the place, and she could hardly stand up.

  ‘“Go on then,” she was screaming, “fuck off back to your wife,”—excuse my language, but that’s word-for-word what she said. The man mumbled something, started moving backwards, towards the door. I ran for it. They’d never have heard over all the noise she was making. I went straight round to the front and started trimming the bushes like my life depended on it. I don’t think I’ve ever been so shaken in my life—well, not until much later, anyway. And that was thanks to the Fishers, as well. I suppose I’d led a bit of a sheltered life, up to then… I’d never known ordinary people could carry on like that, never mind rich ones.’

  He fell silent. I felt every bit as shocked as he must have done at the time, struggled to find some way of kick-starting his monologue again. ‘My God,’ I said, ‘what did you do?’

  ‘Well, there was nothing much I could do. I certainly wasn’t going to tell her what I’d seen, never mind her husband. Something told me I’d be out on my ear if I did any such thing. I just kept it to myself for the next week or so. I’d have liked to tell my mates on my day off, but something just stopped me. Partly, I was afraid it would get back to the Fishers, what I’d said…there was more to it than that, though. What Mr Fisher had asked me at the interview, about confidentiality—I did understand it, perfectly well. Looking back, I’m quite sure that’s why he hired me in the first place.

  ‘The next Saturday, though, the housekeeper came round to my cottage for a cup of tea and a chat—how I was taking to the job, that sort of thing—and I knew there’d be nothing indiscreet about confiding in her. She wasn’t surprised at all, far from it. “Well, I suppose you had to find out sooner or later,” she said, “I’ve known what she’s like for a very long time. And in strictest confidence, so has Mr Fisher. It’s a very odd sort of marriage they’ve got, always has been. A marriage of convenience in every sense of the word; there’s no love there at all.”

  ‘Her name was Mrs Brown, the housekeeper. She told me she’d worked for Mrs Fisher’s family in her younger days, knew just about all there was to know about them. She’d always been a wild one since childhood, Mrs Brown said, only got attention when she misbehaved. Her dad had been a self-made man, rich as Croesus, and he’d married a real society beauty. Rita Fisher was a big disappointment to both of them; they’d wanted a pretty little princess and, as I mentioned before, she wasn’t much in the looks department. She was spoilt rotten financially, but her mum and dad hardly even saw her—she was packed off to boarding school the second she was old enough to go. Hated every minute there, Mrs Brown said.

  ‘Well, apparently she started chasing after the boys when she was barely thirteen. Maybe she was just insecure, wanted attention. Still, it led to some trouble, all right. Her parents were more disappointed than ever… plain as a pikestaff and no end of scandal. She got herself expelled from every school they sent her to, it got to the point where her dad had to bribe the headmasters to take her. She started drinking in her teens, as well. Mrs Brown glossed over that a bit… “Well,” she said, “let’s just say she was quite unstable.” Her father was dead by the time she met Dennis Fisher, but her mother was only too glad to get her married off. Just to make her look respectable. Anyone would have done.’

  ‘Did she talk about Dennis Fisher at all?’ I asked. ‘Mrs Brown?’

  ‘I asked, but she didn’t know so much about him. Local boy, apparently, razor-sharp mind, scholarships all the way to Oxford, then he went to work as an accountant in London. Met Mrs Fisher on one of his rare trips back home. Came from a big mining family, poor as church mice, and he had next to nothing to do with any of them. Very ambitious lad, by all accounts.’ He sighed. ‘According to Mrs Brown, he only wanted her for her money. It certainly paid off for him—a year after they were married, he opened his own factory in the area, and it took off like a rocket. But he was still married to her, and there was no getting away from that.’

  ‘I’m surprised he didn’t divorce her,’ I said thoughtfully. ‘When he had what he wanted. What was to stop him?’

  ‘Oh, I didn’t need to ask that, I could see the answer for myself. You wouldn’t know it these days, but divorce was quite a scandal back then…you didn’t need to see much of Mr Fisher to see how he’d have dreaded that. Ferociously respectable man, in his quiet way; the last thing he’d have wanted was the town gossiping. Mind you, he was caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. Staying married to Mrs Fisher was quite a liability in that department. She was discreet enough with her affairs and her drinking, but you could tell he was worried that might change.

  ‘You had to see them together, Mrs Brown said, to understand what a vicious circle they were caught in—he’d sweet-talked her at first with flowers and compliments, but that all changed as soon as she had the ring on her finger. The colder and more disapproving he was, the worse she behaved…the worse she behaved, the colder and more disapproving h
e got. And the longer hours he worked. He was next to never at home, while I worked there. Mrs Brown said that was completely typical. He’d married a business, she told me. His wife was just extra baggage that came with it.’

  ‘It sounds as if she was close to Mrs Fisher,’ I said. ‘Mrs Brown, I mean. Did she ever talk to her about it all? Try to help?’

  ‘My God, no. If you’re thinking of some devoted old retainer, you’re barking up the wrong tree completely. She was a nice woman, Mrs Brown, and the soul of discretion, which was more important to the Fishers than anything else. But she didn’t care about them any more than my mum cared about Mr Fisher’s textiles factory—you did your day’s work as well as you could, kept your head down. Feelings didn’t come into it. She saved all that sort of thing for her own family. The Fishers were just the people who paid her.’

  ‘It sounds a lonely sort of place,’ I said.

  ‘You’ve got that right. To begin with, I always supposed they’d be off to parties together at the weekends—Mr and Mrs Fisher, I mean—but, after a while, I realised that wasn’t the case at all. He spent a good seven days a week at work, and she didn’t seem to have a friend in the world—I never once saw a woman coming to call on her, just the occasional boyfriend sneaking in. Whenever she went out, she always came back with armfuls of shopping bags. It seemed to be her only interest in life, buying things on her own…apart from the men, of course. And the drinking. From what Mrs Brown told me, she got drunk every day, if she didn’t go out. I don’t know, maybe she couldn’t think of anything else to do.

  ‘I never knew a couple could be that lonely—they were as cut off from everything as if they were on a desert island. They didn’t even seem to have acquaintances, and as for entertaining, nobody so much as called round for tea. Everyone in Teasford assumed they must have friends outside the area. But I can tell you for a fact that they didn’t.

  ‘And they had nothing in common with each other, either. What I said earlier about the house—how it was so different inside and outside—it was their personalities in a nutshell. He’d chosen the place, she’d had a free rein decorating it. Chalk and cheese.’ He sighed. ‘It’s hard to believe people that rich could be so isolated and miserable, but they certainly were. Well, she was, at least. He seemed far too preoccupied with his business to feel anything at all. I couldn’t help wondering what he did it all for. He must have worked harder and longer than the local miners, and he didn’t seem to enjoy anything about it. Not the wealth, or the power, or anything at all. In a funny sort of way, he reminded me of a rat on a treadmill—he knew he had to keep moving, but for the life of him he couldn’t have told you why.