Blood & Baltazar
Page 18
She passed the crescent of logs where all the chaos had begun, now tied off with a flimsy white string which failed to hide the puddle of blood which stubbornly lingered on top of the soil. She received the usual smiles of greeting as she walked, a system of people passing from one job to another along the length of the village, each aware of her involvement but respectfully staying quiet as they shuffled the bags of wheat through the pathways. She walked nervously onwards, past buildings indistinguishable to unfamiliar eyes but each subtly characterised by the type of flower the owner chose to plant on the doorstep, by the different patterns of mould that spread across the panes of glass.
Lylith found her own home by the notches around the lock where she’d stumbled from work drunk with exhaustion and had entirely failed to slide the key into the slot. A pattern of icicles slowly formed above her head as droplets fell in the bitter cold. She breathed deeply on her doorstep, hoping and praying that the woman inside would have changed in the days she been absent. She doubted it: her Aunty had begun looking after her when she was eight, and the way she spoke to her hadn’t changed since.
Lylith pulled a rusty old key from her pocket and slotted it into place first time, unlocking the door and hoping at least her home would be empty. She already knew it wasn’t. The cat was tied to the post as it always was when her Aunty Eloise was too tired to allow her to roam. A rota of chores for the week was pinned to a severely punctured notice board on the wall, with Eloise White’s column a noticeable few inches shorter than her own.
The hut itself was as modest as its exterior, with only a few rooms painted a flat white and containing just a couple of tables and chairs. A thin carpet was pinned over the floorboards, masking the damp that was slowly setting in. The only light was the pale glow cast from the windows, and so in the dim cloudy light the hut looked even more drab than usual. Her Aunty prided herself on her tidiness, and the building was indeed pristine, with not a single out of place item on the shelves. That was to the untrained eye however. Lylith herself had watched as Eloise obtained the image in a few quick minutes as she swept everything from them floor and shoved them all in the tiny cupboards, now bursting at the seams and held shut only by a few worn cuttings of string.
A familiar clumping echoed from across the hut as soon as Lylith had let the door swing shut, the tiniest sound calling the bitter woman to attention. Eloise White soon appeared in the doorway to the living room, a tired and accusative look creasing her brow beneath a bush of curled blue-rinse hair.
“It’s your turn to do the washing up.” She muttered, before turning back into the room and dropping to the sofa.
Lylith sighed and followed her, trailing behind but receiving in return not a modicum of attention. “Aren’t you going to ask where I’ve been the past few nights?” She asked disappointedly.
“I wasn’t planning on it, but I’ve finished my Soduku so you might as well.”
“Great.” Lylith groaned, expecting to have to put her lie in action rather more abruptly. “I’ve been staying over a friend’s house.”
Eloise snorted. “What friends?”
“I have friends.” Lylith replied defensively.
“People you work with aren’t your friends Lylith; they’re just people who smile to make the whole thing less insufferable. I know, it happened to me my whole working career.”
“I can imagine.” Lylith muttered.
Her Aunty continued. “I know where you were. You were with a man. It’s all the same these days, no decency: just smut.”
“You had affairs with five different men before you and Uncle Ricky split up!” Lylith protested to which she received only a shrug. “Okay, so yes; I was with a man.” She had anticipated in her mind the admission would be a little more dramatic. “Not in that way though, I was just helping him out. He’s an amateur detective. Of sorts. And a rather insensitive one as it happens, but he’s working with the Detectors about those paralysed bodies found in the village. I was there…”
“Yes, I’ve heard about them.” The older, more abrasive woman interrupted. “Apparently they were done in by these animal rights protestor types, mauled them to death with their dogs I heard.”
“Okay, for a start I said paralysed not dead and…mauled. Who told you that?” Lylith quizzed.
Eloise pumped her chest out with pride. “The Neighbourhood Community Committee as it happens.”
Lylith smiled to herself. “And when you say ‘Neighbourhood Community Committee’, do you mean Mr Donovan down the road?”
“So what if I do? He’s a nice man Mr Donovan; he has fingers in a lot of pies.”
Lylith laughed. “I know, I’ve seen him try to squeeze through our front door. He’s fat, he’s an idiot. You know he reckons Hitler was an actor don’t you?”
“That’s plausible.” Eloise White mumbled reluctantly as her niece headed off into the kitchen, smiling to herself as she went.
“He’s a mental old man Aunty Eloise, he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. What would animal rights campaigners want with rabid dogs anyway?”
She turned to the kitchen and was instantly taken aback. It was a small room, bathed in a thin green light glowing from the tiles on the walls and the olive carpet on the floor. Each wall was covered in a stretch of cupboards and above the counters sat rows of shelves, with pegs jutting from the front of the wooden panels to hold the pots and the pans and the cracked china plates. Except today all but one of them was vacant as every item of cutlery and apparatus was stacked like a mountain in the sink, swaying and buckling under its own weight but held together by the sticky layer of stale gravy and custard still staining the metals.
“What’s going on?” Lylith murmured in disbelief.
“It’s your turn to do the washing up.” Eloise repeated from the living room.
“But when you said that I wasn’t expecting…Have you cleaned a single thing while I’ve been gone?” She asked.
“I did a teaspoon.” Her aunty sighed in response. “I had to stir my G&T with something. We were out of cocktail sticks and I’d worn down my toothbrush.”
“Christ, you do realise I have to be back somewhere before dark.” Lylith groaned. “I only came here to see if you were alright and grab a bit of dinner.”
Eloise White grunted with the whine of the springs as she pushed herself out of the sofas clutches and padded through into the kitchen on the way to a dirty old fridge. “You don’t have to check up on me, I’m not a kid, I’m not…needy. I’ll cope quite alright on my own thank you.” She yanked the door open with a creak of dry hinges and started rummaging inside through the clinical silver light that bathed the glass shelves. “But I bet you were more interested in the dinner, am I right?” She smiled gently, her withered lips curling at the edges.
“I can’t say I wasn’t just a little torn.” Lylith too smiled lightly, peeling back her sleeves and twisting the tap between her sweaty palms. “What’s on the menu today anyway?” She turned back as her Aunty pulled out a small, brown Tupperware box and flipped it over so the label was illuminated by the light.
“We’ve got June 2nd through 6th. That’ll be just on the turn so you’d better eat fast.” She lifted the lid slightly and sniffed at the congealed mess within. “It’s a nice batch from summer in there so there’s some spinach leaves, mashed potato, curried liver and dried turnips...”
“You ate dried turnips in summer?” Lylith White tutted as she reluctantly took a sponge to the first plate and began to rub at the stubborn stains hiding the floral rim. “I don’t know how you generate such a turnover of leftovers considering that’s all we ever eat.” She said.
“Lunches Lylith!” Aunty Eloise exclaimed. “I have to eat while you’re out don’t I? And don’t complain because I know they do nice buns down your Mill.” She put aside the lid and dropped the box on the table in the centre of the room. “Get stuck in before you clean and you can stick it with the rest. Oh, and you might want to wash yourself a spoon.”
Baltazar raced to the middle of the carpet, suddenly leaping from the wall, his eyes shaking frantically. Then before he knew it or had chance to process it he was racing towards a door at the far end of the hall, his rubber soles tearing at the carpets stitching, his mind racing and blood boiling. He gripped the handle of the door and shoved it open, bursting into a small silent room occupied only by his wife and daughter, idly sketching on paper and leafing through the pages of a book the size of a doorstop.
“Where is it Lucy? What have you done with it?” Cedric bellowed at his lover, the woman sharply removing her glasses and looking to him inquisitively. “You’re going to have to give me some more information…” She twitched.
“You know what I mean!” He snapped. “Give it back Lucy…” He spotted the small girl crouched on the carpet in the corner of his eye, sitting and staring as he drowned in his sweat a few feet above her. “Can you leave please, Jessica sweetheart?” He smiled awkwardly, ushering towards the door.
“But Daddy…” His daughter began.
Her father’s voice shattered her words. “Just go Jessica! Now, please, leave.”
The little girl soon picked up her drawings with trembling hands and fled; her tiny skirt trailing as she disappeared behind the wall. The Patriarch shuffled guiltily, muttering a quick ‘thank you’ when his girl was already too far to hear him.
“Now look what you’ve done.” Lucy Baltazar snarled. “I’ll be sleeping in her bed tonight now I presume… I hope it was worth it.”
“Nothing’s more important.” Cedric nodded sternly. “The file you took from my safe, I need it back now. Michael Prince will be here any minute, and I promised him I would keep it safe. He’s the only thing keeping me at the top of the polls, if the public vote without him there pulling their strings then Christ knows what will happen to me, to you, to the house...”
“I don’t know what file you’re talking about.” Lucy sighed. “I stay away from the politics. Besides, I thought you preferred me hanging about by the rest of the ornaments, dusting the shelves, looking pretty when you have your powerful clientele round for tea and biscuits…”
“It’s no use playing the innocent with me my love.” He rummaged in his back pocket and pulled out a small black square, a grey crack scored down the middle where Michael had thrown it to the ground. “I found this. A bug, to spy on me.”
“And who’s to say I put it there?” Mrs Baltazar shrugged.
“Didn’t you?”
She sighed, slouching back in her leather armchair as if she was doing the crossword. “Like I said, you don’t like me getting involved in your affairs, but there’s only so little you can keep from me. I needed to keep an eye on you Cedric, for the sake of the family. This business can make you take risks…”
The Patriarch snorted ironically. “I found a form from the bank last week, just a routine slip and you’d filled it in, ready to post. You signed your name as Lucy Creed – you haven’t used that for six years now. You’d filled in Jessica’s slip, and you’d signed for her with the same surname, so don’t pretend this is still a family. You aren’t on my side anymore, you planted that bug to find out my plans and you stole that file for the exact same reason.”
“I haven’t got it Cedric; I don’t care about your war games…”
“You think it’s me you’re hurting but there is far more at stake here. If the details of Operation Naked Wrath get out then everything is at risk, all of this…” There was desperation to his voice now, his anger pleading.
He was aggravated more as she responded merely with an annoyed sigh. “I can’t give it back if I don’ know where it is…”
He fumed suddenly, lurching forward and swinging up a clenched, reddened fist. “I want it now!” He screamed, four rigid knuckles halting just a few centimetres from her jaw. For a moment she started at him in a horror, but as he stood panting her open mouth closed to a smile.
“I’m sorry…” She gently mocked. “…what, what was that? Were you about to punch me then? Were you actually going to hit me? Oh my God you’ve cracked.” She rubbed her hands together in glee as he withdrew, hanging his head in shame. “One dodgy file and you’re over the edge! Christ you’re not safe.”
He shook his head as he backed away to the door, his skin blooming a deep red, sweat dripping from his nose. “I had to get it back…” He stammered.
“So you went to hit me?” Lucy Baltazar snapped. “Who else would you do that to? Your staff, your daughter?”
“No, I would never…” Cedric groaned with guilt, pulling the door to and slipping through it. “If you find it you know where I am.” He muttered almost silently as he left, fleeing from the room and disappearing as fast as he could.
Lucy exhaled through exasperation once she was left alone, her heart pounding in her chest as the battle was won. She turned around and slumped back into her seat.
For a few hours Lylith White had scrubbed at the dishes, reverting to a Chamois leather as her previous tool became more food than sponge. She’d enjoyed bathing in the silence, the trickling of water the only interruption as she worked her way through the pile, her Aunty Eloise gently drinking herself to sleep in the room next door.
Lylith walked through to the living room, placing down the final plate on the coffee table. She reached for a cushion, a thin, flat lump almost thread bare in her clutches. She lifted her Auntie’s head slightly and placed it behind her hair, but as she went to let go Eloise emitted the strangest groan and her eyes began to stir. She blinked slowly and Lylith backed away.
“What time it is?” Her Aunty croaked.
“About five. It’s been a few hours; I just let you sleep…”
“Five? Do you know how early that is? You know how I need to rest!”
“Don’t pretend you weren’t asleep when I got here too.” Lylith sighed as the older woman stood unsteadily. “And it’s not like you’re nocturnal, you’re never awake when I go to work. You’re only ever mildly conscious, if slightly intoxicated…”
“Mr Donovan doesn’t get here until seven. What I am going to do until he calls? You didn’t have to wake me…”
“I wasn’t trying to wake you.” Lylith White snapped. “You saw what I was doing; I was making you comfortable, your neck will…”
“There’s nothing wrong with my neck!” Her Aunty spluttered. “I’ve told you already, I don’t need looking after.”
Her niece sighed. “You’re getting old…”
“And you’re getting on my nerves.” She scoffed. “I hope you haven’t just been waking sleeping relatives while I’ve been out cold?”
“Yes…” Lylith was annoyed at her Aunties absent gratitude. “I’ve done the washing up.”
“And you’ve hosed down the curtains too?” Eloise quizzed, to which Lylith’s face twisted with confusion.
“You never said anything about the curtains?”
“Did I need to?” She jutted out a crinkled finger to the curtains: two damp ridden rags limply hanging over the window frame. “So you might as well have been lying here next to me for all the good you did.”
“I cleaned almost every dish in the house!” Lylith protested.
“Not by choice! And then you woke me in the middle of my sherry-nap. You’re more trouble than you’re worth sometimes.” She tutted, walking over to the coffee table and picking up the discarded plate.
“And what do you mean by that?” Lylith White quizzed, following her Aunty into the kitchen.
“Just your attitude, your laziness, your disruption. I go to sleep, you wake me up - the things I expect you to do remain uncompleted: I know you didn’t have a choice what you were born into, but you’re just a little too muc
h to handle sometimes.” Eloise placed the china in the overflowing rack.
“What I was born into?” She asked quietly.
“Yes, I think Caroline, your mother - she was a little lapse in her education of some certain life lessons. I know she was sick but she could have done so much better. She didn’t have time I realise, but if she’d of had another child, I’m not sure I’d have been able to take you in. It wears me down, all this fuss Lylith.” The Aunty was rambling now, almost under her breath but just loud enough so that her niece could hear every word, so that it could brim tears in her eyes. “Of course I never understood this expected connection anyway.” Eloise White continued: “Aunties and their responsibilities - Caroline had you, but that was nothing to do with me. I didn’t sign a contract… It’s not like I was your grandmother or something, it wasn’t like I had a choice in all this: it was nothing to do with me. Caroline lived and died a separate life with me hundreds of miles away, then one day I woke and you were just left there, on my doorstep. Things were moving on and I suddenly had all these pieces to pick up.”
Eloise clumped about the kitchen a few times before deciding on her direction and heading for another room, leaving her niece standing alone next to the sofa. Her words choked in her throat.
“I’ll just go and do the curtains.”
As she shuffled across the living room though she passed the ragged strips of cloth and turned into the hall. Her hands scrabbled at her coat on the peg and as soon as she could she was bursting back out through the front door before her Aunty could return.
Outside a storm was brewing, a wind was picking up the dead, shrivelled leaves and brushing them down the pathways. The cool air stung at Lylith’s reddened cheeks, and she could only muster a gentle sob as she leant back her head against the wooden panels.
This wasn’t the first time her Aunty had been so insensitive, and as always she accepted it was the drink that was poisoning her words. But she knew deep down that whoever had said alcohol excused you of what you were saying was a liar, because people were never as honest as after a few glasses of whiskey. She grunted in frustration, at last realising that leaving a man who had at least cared for her once was far worse than running home to a woman who never had.