The Secret Mother

by Shalini Boland

  Ellie shakes her head as though I’m a lost cause, and a fresh plume of anger boils up in me. She’s poisoned Scott’s mind. I shouldn’t be trying to convince him that something is wrong, he should want to listen. He should be experiencing the same outrage as me, the same desire to discover the truth.

  I turn to him. ‘Scott, I was hoping to have a private conversation with you about something that I believe went terribly wrong at our children’s birth. But you obviously aren’t interested, so you may as well go, and take your floozy with you.’ It feels quite good to say the word floozy out loud.

  ‘Get some help, Tessa,’ Scott says on his way out.

  I watch them leave the room, wishing once again that he had come here without her. Maybe he would have listened to me if she hadn’t been here too.

  ‘Please, Scott,’ I call, trying one last time to get him to listen. ‘Just stop and think about what I’m telling you. There’s something else going on here. Something bad. Scott!’ But I know by the pitying look he casts over his shoulder that he isn’t prepared to listen. That he’s already made up his mind. In his eyes, the past is over and I’m the poor pathetic creature stuck there, trying to pull him back into the darkness.

  But he’s wrong. The past isn’t over. It’s catching up.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  My mind is still spinning with everything that happened yesterday – the clinic’s unreliable records and Scott’s refusal to listen to me. I’m on my own in this, but I’m not giving up. I’m not letting it go. I’ll get up, face the day – whatever it brings – and find out the truth. I feel like I’m on the verge of something. Like if I reach just a little further, I’ll be able to join the dots.

  In the wintry gloom of morning, I get ready for work, have a quick breakfast and zip up my raincoat, preparing myself for a mad dash through the downpour from the house to the car. Opening the front door, I see there’s at least an inch of water covering the front path. I’m not sure how waterproof my boots are, so I run on tiptoe to my front gate, expecting to feel water seeping through to my socks any minute. Rain races down the road in fast-flowing rivulets, skipping over the drains and gathering in the dips and hollows of the uneven tarmac.

  ‘Hey!’

  I look up at the sound of a man’s voice, and peer through the driving rain to see if it’s directed at me.

  ‘Hey! Tessa!’ A dark figure is calling across the road from outside Carly’s house.

  Hunched against the downpour, I cross over. As I draw closer, I see that it’s Vince, Carly’s brother. I walk up the short gravel pathway and join him where he’s standing under the dripping porch.

  ‘Hi,’ I say. ‘Thanks again for fixing my window.’

  ‘S’okay. You seen Carly?’

  ‘Not since Friday, when you were both at mine. But we did text on Saturday.’

  ‘She was supposed to come over last night, but she never showed,’ he says, wiping rain from his face. ‘I know she’s a busy girl, but she wouldn’t have missed Dad’s birthday. Not without ringing.’

  ‘It was your dad’s birthday?’

  ‘Yeah. We were having steak and chips at ours. Carly said she’d be there.’

  I’m hit by a small stab of worry. ‘She went to Dorset yesterday for a story she’s working on. I guess she should’ve been back yesterday evening. Mind you, the weather’s so bad, maybe she decided to stay over at a B&B or something.’

  ‘But she would’ve texted me if she couldn’t make it. I had to lie to Mum and Dad. Told them her car broke down. Otherwise they’d be worrying – you know what parents are like.’

  ‘Maybe her phone battery died, or she couldn’t get a signal,’ I suggest.

  ‘Yeah, I suppose. Anyway, I gotta get to work now. Already late.’

  ‘Me too,’ I reply, glancing at my watch. ‘If you give me your number, I’ll let you know as soon as I hear anything.’

  We swap mobile numbers and I make my way over to the hire car, too worried about what might have happened to Carly to concern myself about the fact that I’m already soaked to the skin.

  By the time I arrive at work, my anxiety over Carly’s whereabouts has escalated into a full-blown panic. I park up in the yard, turn off the engine and sit for a moment trying to harness my thoughts. Carly hasn’t answered any of my calls or texts and she’s missed her own father’s birthday. Something isn’t right. Either she’s had a car accident or… Or what? Could Fisher be responsible? Could he have done something to her? Is the man dangerous?

  A knock on the passenger window startles me. I look up to see Ben’s face. He opens the car door and slides into the passenger seat, closing the door behind him. I try to ignore the butterfly wings in my stomach at his close proximity.

  ‘Monsoon season in Barnet,’ he says.

  ‘Crazy weather,’ I agree.

  ‘Not sure if it’s even worth opening up today,’ he says. ‘Who in their right mind is going to come to the gardens on a day like this?’

  ‘A good day for me to catch up on planting, I guess.’

  ‘Yeah, exciting stuff.’

  ‘I don’t mind. You know I enjoy it.’

  He smiles. ‘That’s why Jez is always singing your praises.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘He calls you conscientious, and says you’ve got your head screwed on right.’

  ‘Glad someone thinks I’ve got my head screwed on. Personally, I think it needs at least another quarter-twist.’ I put my hand up to my neck and pretend to lock it into place.

  He shakes his head and smiles. ‘How did things go with Scott yesterday? You manage to speak to him?’

  I place my hands on the steering wheel, gripping it tightly as I think back to our conversation. ‘The less said about that the better.’ My blood pressure soars at the mere thought of him and Ellie last night. At how patronising and insensitive they were.

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ Ben says. ‘I probably shouldn’t have suggested it.’

  ‘No, it’s okay. I would have ended up having to speak to him anyway.’ I let go of the steering wheel and rest my hands on my lap. ‘At least it’s out of the way now, and I know his opinion.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘That I’m insane and need professional help.’

  ‘Jeez.’

  ‘Yeah. But right now, I’m more worried about my neighbour.’

  ‘Your neighbour? Why?’

  ‘You remember Carly?’

  ‘Carly?’

  ‘You know.’ I cringe, remembering how Ben saw me arguing with her. ‘That embarrassing scene in the café last week.’

  ‘The journalist? The one who was hassling you? She was a right piece of work.’

  ‘Yeah, that’s her. Well, we’ve kind of come to an arrangement. A truce, if you like. She’s helping me find out what’s going on with Fisher. But now I think she might be in trouble.’

  ‘What’s happened?’

  I quickly tell him about Carly coming over to my house with her brother to fix my broken window, and how she then persuaded me to work with her.

  ‘Wait a minute. Back up,’ Ben says. ‘She let herself into your house?’

  ‘Yes, but it’s not as bad as it sounds,’ I say, wondering why I’m defending Carly’s actions when I was absolutely furious with her at the time. ‘Thing is, we used to keep an eye on each other’s places whenever we were away. She knew I kept a spare key under the plant pot.’

  ‘That still doesn’t give her the right to—’

  ‘I know, I know.’

  ‘Tessa,’ Ben says, the tone of his voice injecting me with fresh worry. ‘If she can get into your house, did you ever stop to think that it could have been Carly who put that boy in your kitchen?’

  ‘What? No!’ I bring my hand up to my mouth, start chewing my thumbnail. ‘That doesn’t make sense.’

  ‘Who else could have let themselves in?’ Ben says. ‘And she has a motive.’

  ‘What motive? Why would she…?’ And then the penny drops, an
d I push the tips of my fingers into my forehead. ‘For a story?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘I don’t know, Ben.’ Would she really do something so awful? ‘She does have serious financial worries. She told me that if she doesn’t get a lead soon, she might lose her house.’

  ‘There you go,’ Ben says. ‘And she looks like the type who’d sell her own grandmother for a story.’

  ‘Shi-it.’ What if I’ve been going after the wrong person? What if Fisher really is nothing to do with this, and it’s all Carly’s doing, using him and his son to fabricate an outrageous story? ‘I need to speak to her, don’t I? But she’s not answering her phone. She’s gone AWOL.’

  ‘Since when?’

  ‘She was supposed to have gone to Cranborne yesterday, but I haven’t heard back from her since. I think I need to go and visit that housekeeper again. She’s the only person I know who might actually have some useful information.’

  ‘Go and see her now.’

  ‘I can’t. I’ve got work.’

  ‘You can carry on with the planting any time. This is important, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, but—’

  ‘So, go. I can come with you if you like.’

  ‘No, she’s really nervy. If she sees the two of us, there’s no way she’ll let us in. I don’t think she’ll even talk to me.’

  ‘Worth a try, though.’

  ‘Are you sure you don’t mind?’

  ‘Wouldn’t have suggested it otherwise.’

  ‘I’ll make up the time,’ I say.

  ‘No worries.’

  I lean across and plant a kiss on his damp cheek without thinking. It feels like the most natural thing to do. Ben takes my hand and grazes my knuckles with his lips. Then he replaces my hand on my lap and gets out of the car back into the streaming rain.

  ‘Let me know how you get on. And be careful,’ he calls out to me before closing the door with a dull thunk.

  ‘Yes, sure.’ I give him a wave, but he’s already a blur through the window.

  The more I discover, the more confusing and conflicting everything seems. Could Ben be right? Could Carly be behind the whole thing? I guess it’s a possibility, but I just don’t know who to trust…

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Here I am once more, outside Fisher’s ex-housekeeper’s flat, only this time she hasn’t answered the buzzer. It’s almost 9 a.m., so she’s probably at work, although she was home last Friday around this time, so maybe she’s up there but just not answering. I press the buzzer one more time and wait. Still no response. I’m worried Vince will call the police if he doesn’t hear back from Carly soon, and that will open up a whole new can of worms.

  I step back down onto the sodden pavement and gaze up at the bay window where I saw Merida Flores the last time I came. Icy rain splashes onto my upturned face, clinging to my eyelashes and running down my neck. I pay it no attention. Her curtains are open today. The room beyond is dark. My guess is that she’s out. I should leave, head back to work and trust that Carly will call me when she’s ready. If Ben’s theory is correct, my devious neighbour could be avoiding me on purpose.

  Before I go, just in case Flores is in there and can somehow see me, I stare up at her window with my palms pressed together as though in prayer, pleading. One last attempt to get her attention. To let her see my desperation. My heart jumps a beat as a shadowy figure comes into view. It’s her. She’s there. Our eyes lock for a brief moment. She gives a quick nod and then disappears. Does this mean she’s going to let me in?

  I step back up to her front door and ring the buzzer, holding my breath. This time she answers.

  ‘Tessa Markham,’ she says, like a statement of fact.

  ‘Hello,’ I say, trying to think of something non-threatening to add, something that will make her more likely to speak to me. ‘I need your help,’ I say. ‘Can we talk? Just for a few minutes?’

  The door buzzes, vibrating on its hinges. I give it a push and it swings inwards, revealing a surprisingly bright and welcoming communal hallway, the smell of lemon furniture polish emanating from the woodwork. The place is cleaned to within an inch of its life, not a speck of dirt anywhere.

  As I walk up the steep carpeted staircase, one of two doors opens at the top and I spy the diminutive figure of Merida Flores – and that’s saying something given my own vertically challenged state.

  ‘Hello,’ I say, excited and nervous to finally get to talk to this elusive person who might well hold the key to what’s been going on in my life.

  If I were to guess, I’d say Merida Flores is in her early forties. Her dark hair has been pulled back in a severe low ponytail, and she’s wearing black jeans and a dark red sweater. Her hand clutches at a plain gold cross hanging from a chain around her neck.

  As I reach the top of the stairs, she steps back into her flat and gestures to me to come in. I take a breath and do as she bids, following her through a small, dim hallway into a living room with a large bay window, beneath which sits a dark wooden table and two chairs. It’s the same window through which we stared at one another moments ago. Like the entranceway, the flat smells of furniture polish.

  With the heavy black clouds and the rain streaming down outside, it’s almost dark enough to feel like night in here. Flores clicks on the light switch, but that only makes the atmosphere worse, as strange shadows from the lampshade slide across the room. The two of us stand facing one another, awkward, our arms folded, her slim fingers still fiddling with her pendant.

  ‘Thank you,’ I finally say, ‘for letting me into your home.’ I find myself speaking slowly, carefully, not too sure how strong her English is. I’m still surprised that she actually allowed me in – I thought there’d be more resistance after all the other times I saw her and she was so keen to get away. But I don’t ask why; I don’t want to give her the opportunity to change her mind.

  Flores gives a small nod.

  ‘My name is Tessa, although you already know that.’

  ‘My name is Angela,’ she says, her voice low and accented.

  ‘Angela? I thought your name was Merida. Merida Flores?’

  ‘Yes, I am Angela Merida Flores. In Spain we have two last names – the mother and the father’s name together, yes?’

  ‘Oh, okay, I didn’t know that.’

  ‘Please, sit.’ She gestures to a green fake-leather sofa, which creaks alarmingly as I perch myself on the edge. She takes a seat on the closer of the two dining chairs by the window.

  ‘I need to ask you some questions,’ I begin.

  ‘You said you wanted my help.’

  Although I’m no longer sure of Carly’s motives, I decide to start off by asking about her disappearance. ‘Yes, my neighbour is missing. She went to see Dr James Fisher yesterday.’

  At the mention of his name, Angela pales and begins shaking her head. ‘It’s not good,’ she mutters.

  ‘Not good?’ I repeat. Carly may not be my favourite person, but now I’m really starting to worry for her safety. ‘Why is it not good? Could Fisher have hurt her? The doctor, Fisher, is he dangerous?’

  ‘Dr Fisher? Dangerous? No.’

  ‘So why did you say “not good”?’ I ask. ‘When I mentioned his name just now, you looked scared.’

  ‘I’m not scared of Dr Fisher. I don’t think he would harm anyone,’ she says.

  ‘You used to work for him, didn’t you? Are you sure he wouldn’t harm anyone? My neighbour…’ – I can’t bring myself to call Carly a friend – ‘she went to see him and now I can’t get hold of her. She’s not answering her phone.’

  ‘Dr Fisher is a serious man, but not violent. Not dangerous. He wouldn’t hurt your neighbour, I am sure of it.’

  ‘Why have you been following me, Angela? I saw you a few times, but you ran off.’

  She covers her face with her hands. Is she thinking? Crying? I can’t tell.

  ‘Are you okay?’ Suddenly something clicks in my brain. I rise to my feet and take a step tow
ards her, a sudden chill sweeping my body. ‘Harry said an angel brought him to me. Your name is Angela. Was it you? Did you bring Harry to my house?’

  She takes her hands from her face and stares down at her knees, her expression one of dark turmoil. ‘Harry’s mother, she used to call me her angel. God rest her soul.’ She makes the sign of the cross. ‘Harry would copy her and call me his angel, too. It was a sweet joke.’

  ‘So it was you!’

  ‘Mrs Fisher was a wonderful woman,’ Angela continues. ‘I was so sad when she died. It was such a terrible thing for the boy to lose his mother like that.’

  ‘But why did you bring him to my house?’ I ask, staring down at her. ‘It was you, wasn’t it?’

  ‘You’re right. It was me who brought Harry to your house.’

  I’m astounded by her admission and utterly confused. ‘Why? Why would you do that? And you’ve been following me since then, maybe even before this all happened. It’s something to do with Dr Fisher, isn’t it?’

  Angela finally looks up at me. ‘Tessa, I’m sorry. I didn’t know that the newspapers would say all those things about you. I didn’t know that bringing Harry to you would cause so much trouble. But she wanted me to do it. I promised her I would do it.’

  ‘Who? Who did you promise? Is this something to do with Carly? Did she offer you money?’

  Angela’s hand flies back to the cross around her neck. ‘All right, please sit back down, and I will tell you.’

  So I do as she asks and sit back on the creaky sofa, my heart thumping wildly, wondering just what it is this woman is about to reveal.

  Chapter Thirty

  ‘Dr Fisher and his wife, they used to live in a house not too far from here, in London,’ Angela begins. ‘I started working for them as a housekeeper when she was pregnant. After their son Harry was born, they moved to the country, to Cranborne in Dorset. They moved because of Dr Fisher’s work and because they wanted Harry to grow up in the countryside. I went with them and I worked for them for almost six years. Also, I looked after Harry when Mrs Fisher was working. She worked on the reception at Dr Fisher’s clinic. Then, earlier this year, Mrs Fisher got very, very sick. Her doctor say she is not gonna make it. They knew she had very little time. It was cancer.’