by Val McDermid
‘Busy night, then. Are you OK? Did you hurt yourself?’
‘I bruised my shoulder, that’s all. It was scary. Like he was coming straight at me. Lucky I knew the road better than the lunatic behind the wheel. I only had a split second, but I knew where to jump.’
‘Thank God for that. Bloody teenagers, getting their kicks out of scaring people. So, how did you get on with Bossy Barbara?’
Jane pulled the sheaf of papers in front of her. ‘More family trees than you can shake a stick at.’ As Judy came back in with a leg of lamb, Jane said, ‘Bossy Barbara came up trumps, Mum. Thanks for putting me on to her.’
‘I’m glad, love. We all want you to do well, you know.’
While Judy busied herself with the meat, Jane passed some of the papers to Dan. ‘I thought we could go through them, put them in order of likelihood based on the primogeniture principle.’
Dan looked at her as if she’d suggested going down to the village to catch a small child to spit-roast for lunch. ‘I don’t think I could read without throwing up. Actually, I was thinking of going back up to the cottage to crash out. If that’s OK with your mum.’
‘Of course, I wasn’t thinking. You could stay up there till you go back, if you like.’
Jane tried to hide her relief. It wasn’t that she wanted to be rid of Dan for himself. But after the night before, she needed freedom of action without anyone asking where she was going or what she was doing.
Dan swallowed a mouthful of tea and shuddered slightly. ‘Maybe I could manage some toast,’ he said without confidence.
While Judy fussed around him, Jane began to sort through the information she’d been given by Barbara Field. She began to sift it into piles, making notes as she went. It was a slow and complicated process and she soon came to realise that it was easier to accomplish with one than two. She glanced up at Dan, tentatively munching toast with strawberry jam while Judy watched him anxiously. ‘Oh, and I thought I might try to talk to the forensic anthropologist who’s dealing with the bog body. Suggest she might want to get some DNA samples from Fletcher Christian’s direct descendants to see if it’s a match.’
Dan stood up. ‘Good idea. I think I’ll head down to the pub to pick up my car. Then I’m going back to bed.’
‘I’ll drop you off on the way to church, if you like,’ Judy said.
‘It’s OK,’ he said. ‘I think I need the fresh air.’ He pulled Jane into his arms in a tight hug. ‘I’ll be better by the morning. Then we can start doing the interviews.’
She kissed his stubbled cheek. ‘Thank you. I’ll work on the list.’ She walked as far as the farm gate with him, waving him off as he walked slowly down the hill. But instead of heading back to the kitchen table, Jane crossed the yard and cut between the long barn and the shearing shed.
She emerged into a small field with a square stone building in the corner furthest from the house. A line of oblong frosted-glass windows ran around it two courses of stone below the eaves, almost like a decorative border. The metal door was painted a dull green, fastened with a strong lock. Her father had renovated it a dozen years ago when EU regulations had made it impossible for him to slaughter his own sheep for sale to the local butchers. The old slaughterhouse was further up the fell and Allan had converted it into a holiday let called Shepherd’s Cott, an occasion of much mirth in the village pub. But Allan still wanted somewhere he could butcher his own meat for his family’s consumption, so he’d transformed the tumbledown outhouse, providing it with running water and electric light. He’d even added a tiny toilet and shower cubicle to avoid trailing blood and guts into the house.
Jane walked across the field, pausing apparently to enjoy the view, but in reality to check she was unobserved. As sure as she could be that the coast was clear, she quickly unlocked the door and slipped inside, softly calling, ‘It’s me,’ as she did so.
Tenille was sitting on one of the stone benches, insulated from the cold by the sleeping bag Jane had dug out of the cellar the night before. A book was carelessly thrown down beside her and her eyes were wide with fear. Seeing it was Jane, she pulled her earphones out, allowing the unmistakable sound of hip-hop to leak out tinnily into the still air. ‘All right?’ she said.
‘I’m fine. How about you? Did you get much sleep?’
Tenille shrugged one shoulder. ‘Yeah. Took me a while to, like, settle. But once I was off, man, I was out for the count.’ She managed a lop-sided version of her usual grin. ‘Mus’ be that country air, huh?’
‘Have you got enough to eat?’
Tenille gestured at the scones and the sausage rolls Jane had filched from her mother’s freezer. ‘I ate all the apples. So it’s a bit monotonous, know what I mean? But it’s OK.’
‘I’ll get you some stuff tomorrow in Keswick. My mum knows to the last tin of tomatoes what’s in her cupboards and her fridge, I don’t want her to notice there’s anything missing and start wondering what’s going on. Is there anything in particular you’d like?’
Again the half-shrug. ‘Chocolate biscuits? Crisps? Like, maybe some sandwiches? Not tuna or prawn, though, I don’t like fish much. A toothbrush would be good too. Oh, and batteries for this,’ she added, gesturing to the MP3 player.
‘I’ll see what I can do.’ Jane perched on the bench beside Tenille. ‘You thought any more about going to the police?’
Tenille shook her head, obstinate to the core. ‘It’s not going to happen, Jane. There’s no way I can live with myself and do that.’
‘You can’t live here forever either.’ Before Tenille could interrupt, Jane held up a hand to stop her. ‘And I don’t mean because I’m going to tell you to go. I just mean that it’s a limited option. I have to go back to London in just over a week and I can’t leave you here to fend for yourself. Besides,’ she grinned, ‘my dad might want to slaughter a sheep one of these days.’
‘Yech.’ Tenille looked disgusted. ‘I just about managed to stop thinking about what goes on in here and you have to go and bring it up again. Look, it’s OK, I know I can’t stay here forever. But I just need time to straighten my head out without being scared every minute, OK?’
‘OK.’ Jane got up.
Tenille snapped her fingers and tutted in annoyance. ‘Hey, with everything that’s been going on, there’s something I forgot. Something I meant to tell you about.’
‘What?’ Jane tried not to sound too apprehensive.
‘Jake. He’s back. And he’s stalking you.’
Absolutely the last thing she’d expected Tenille to say. Shocked, Jane said, ‘What do you mean? He’s in Crete.’
‘No, he’s not. He came by the flat the day you left, when I was still there.’
‘You let him in?’
‘Course not.’ Tenille was scornful. ‘He just came to the door, I saw him through the spyhole. He shouted your name through the letter box then he fucked off.’
Jane’s heart leapt at the thought that Jake had come back, and she hated that he still had the power to make her feel that way. ‘That’s hardly stalking me, Tenille,’ she said, trying to cover her emotional reaction.
‘I know that. But I saw him again yesterday, when I was trying to get here. I was on the path coming over from Grasmere. And I saw him. He was on the path above the farm, looking down through binoculars. Like he was watching for you.’
Jane’s brows knitted in puzzlement. ‘He was watching the farm? Why on earth would he do that?’
‘Like I would know. He’s a creep, Jane. You deserve better.’
‘You don’t know him,’ she said dismissively. ‘But I don’t understand why he’d be spying on me. Why not just come straight to the farm?’
Tenille shrugged. ‘Maybe he wanted to make sure there wasn’t anybody else in the picture. Or maybe he just gets his kicks from keeping tabs on you. Like I said, he’s a creep.’
‘Are you sure it was him? I mean, he must have had his back to you.’
Tenille tutted again. ‘Sure I’m sure. I s
aw him coming round to yours often enough. He’s stalking you, Jane.’
Unsettled by Tenille’s information, Jane shook her head. ‘I don’t get it.’ She shook her hair away from her face as if trying to clear her head. ‘I need to go. I’ve got work I need to get on with. You’ll be OK?’
‘Yeah. Don’t worry about me. I’m chill.’
‘You know you won’t be able to have the light on after dark? Only, we can see the lights from the house.’
Tenille nodded glumly. ‘I know. I guess I’ll just have to get used to sleeping, right?’
‘Right. Look, I’ll try to come back later this evening, but no promises. It might be tomorrow. But I’ll do my best.’ Jane reached out and patted Tenille’s hand, entirely oblivious to the echo of her own mother’s behaviour. ‘Try not to worry.’
Her own words sounded hollow in her ears as she made her way back to the house. Try not to worry. Yeah, right. Like that was an option. How long, she wondered far from idly, did they give you for harbouring a fugitive from justice? Matthew would love that. Not to mention that it would give him a free run at what she was starting to think of as her manuscript.
That thought spurred her back to the kitchen table and the records of births, marriages and deaths that she still had to plough through. She was almost finished when Judy returned from church. ‘How are you getting on?’ her mother asked after she’d checked the contents of the oven.
‘Better than I expected. And the best news is that, if I’ve worked it out right, the most likely person lives just up the road.’
‘That’s the Lakes for you. Small world. So who is it?’
‘Edith Clewlow.’ Jane searched for the relevant note she’d made.
‘Edith Clewlow?’ Judy echoed, her face dismayed.
‘You know, she lives up Langmere Stile. We used to play with her youngest grandson Jimmy.’ Jane looked up and caught her mother’s expression. ‘What’s wrong?’
Judy sat down heavily. ‘She died last night. Edith Clewlow died last night.’
We left Otaheite for the last time on 23rd September. With me were Edward Young, John Adams, John Williams, William, McCoy, Isaac Martin, Matthew Quintal, John Mills & William, Brown. Also six native men & twelve women. My aim, was to find an island free from, natives, difficult of anchorage, away from sailing routes & capable of sustaining life. We travelled for some months, searching for a suitable settling place, but although we traded peaceably enough for food & water on-several islands, we could not come upon a place that sufficiently matched the measures I had laid down for our home. In the end, I realised we must leave behind the archipelagos where natives roamed freely from, island to island & find some remote spot with no near neighbours. After long study of Bligh’s charts and maps, at last, I resolved we should make for Pitcairn.
27
Matthew stared unseeingly across the tables of bent heads in the classroom. The children were quiet, working on the arithmetic problems he’d set them. He always liked to start the week by setting a task that demanded concentration, to put a clear divide between whatever anarchy had filled their weekend and the discipline of school. He’d give them a while then work through the sums on the board before moving on to the genealogy project after the morning break.
He was still smarting from Jane’s accusation at lunch the day before. ‘When were you planning to tell me about Dorcas Mason?’ she’d demanded the moment he walked into the kitchen.
‘Today’ he said, conscious that he had the moral high ground here. ‘When you mentioned her name the other night, I thought it rang a bell but I didn’t want to give you false hope. So I went back home and checked through the kids’ worksheets. It was too late to call you, and I was out all day yesterday’
‘You’ve always got an answer, haven’t you?’ Jane said. ‘Why can’t you admit it, Matthew? You were going to try to find the manuscript yourself and claim the glory.’
‘I told you he’d been planning to tell you,’ Diane chipped in. ‘But you always think the worst of Matt.’
‘That’s because it’s usually the right thing to think,’ Jane said. ‘You showed no interest in my work until I mentioned Dorcas Mason’s name. All you’d done until then was take the piss. Then suddenly you wanted to know all about who she was, what her connection was to the manuscript, where she fitted in to my research. And not a word, not a hint that you might know something that would help.’
‘I told you: I didn’t want to raise your hopes only to dash them.’ Matthew leaned across her and poured himself a glass of wine.
‘Come on, Matthew. Tell the truth. You were planning to hijack my research and get the ultimate one over on me.’
‘Do you have any idea how paranoid you sound?’
Allan slapped his hand flat on the table with a sound like the crack of a rock breaking off from a cliff face. ‘Enough, the pair of you. If you’ve got a quarrel, take it somewhere else. You’re both far too old to behave like this.’
And that had been the end of it as far as words were concerned. But both siblings were seething, Matthew the more so since his rare generous impulse had been so thoroughly misunderstood. He burned under Jane’s contemptuous gaze and decided that, if he was going to get the kicking, he might as well commit the sin. Jane might have the academic credentials, but he had the contacts. He was the local man. He was the headmaster and people deferred to him.
Small stirrings in the classroom brought Matthew’s attention back to the present. Several of the children had finished their work; the usual suspects, Matthew thought. ‘OK. You’ve had long enough. Pencils down. Question one–who’s going to give me an answer?’ Sam’s hand inevitably shot up in the air. ‘Yes, Sam?’
‘Five hundred and seventy-six, sir.’
‘That’s right. Anybody not get that right?’ Two hands crept into the air. ‘OK, Sam, come up to the board and show us your workings.’ Matthew took the class through the list of problems, finishing with perfect calculation just as the bell rang for morning break. As the children scrambled to their feet and made for the door, he said, ‘Sam, Jonathan? Can you stay behind for a minute.’
They drifted towards his desk, Sam trying to hide his interest and Jonathan his trepidation. Matthew laid their family trees in front of them. ‘Over the weekend, I learned something very interesting. Your ancestor Dorcas Mason worked for a very important person here in Cumbria. Can you think who that might be?’
Jonathan stared mute as a heifer. But Sam was willing to hazard a guess. ‘Was it Beatrix Potter?’ he said.
‘Your timing’s a bit off there, Sam. This was when Dorcas was very young, before she married Arnold.’
Sam poked his finger in his ear while he thought. ‘Was it Wordsworth, then?’ he asked.
‘That’s right. Dorcas Mason was a maid at Dove Cottage for a few years when she was a girl. What do you think of that?’
‘Cool. We can fill that in on our family trees, that she was William Wordsworth’s maid,’ Sam said.
Jonathan fidgeted his feet. ‘Does that mean she was famous?’ he mumbled.
For once, Matthew found an intervention of Jonathan’s of some value. ‘Well, no, not really. But she probably met some people who were very famous in their time. And that’s why I was wondering if either of you have ever heard about any family papers going back to Dorcas’s time. She might have kept a diary, or letters to do with her work at Dove Cottage. She might even have kept some of the papers William Wordsworth threw away–early versions of poems, or notes he didn’t need to keep. Have either of you ever heard of anything like that?’
Jonathan looked blank and shook his head. Matthew was glad that there was rather less chance of the manuscript having passed down to the Bramleys. They’d probably have used it for shopping lists. But Sam’s family were much more on the ball. Sam himself looked disappointed. ‘I don’t remember anybody ever talking about stuff like that,’ he said.
‘Well, maybe you could both ask when you go home tonight?’ Matthew s
uggested gently. ‘If there was anything, we could make it part of the display. That would be good, wouldn’t it? Connecting our project to Cumbria’s greatest son?’
Sam nodded enthusiastically. ‘That would be so cool. I’ll ask my dad tonight.’ Then his face clouded over. ‘But maybe it’s not a good time.’ His lower lip quivered and he clamped his mouth tightly shut.
‘His great-gran died on Saturday,’ Jonathan volunteered. ‘So mebbe his dad won’t want to talk about the family, like.’
Matthew hid the quick flare of irritation. ‘Or maybe he would understand that if there were some papers from Dorcas among her things, it would be a sort of tribute to her if we included them in the project. You can ask, can’t you, Sam?’
The boy nodded bravely. ‘I’ll ask.’
