I was about to ignore this as not meriting an answer, and then it nagged at my mind. “What trouble? When?”
“I said almost. Please forget I mentioned it at all.”
I might have if she hadn’t grown so abruptly unforthcoming. “What have you ever done that involved me?”
I glimpsed the flicker of a frown on her smooth forehead. She was searching for an answer, and at once I was appalled to grasp what she didn’t want to say. “You were talking about Toby, weren’t you? What have you done to him?”
The rest of the truth caught up with me, and I might have lurched across the desk at her if I hadn’t assaulted her with just my raised voice. “My God, you gave him the seizures in the first place. That’s what you were doing just now in the babies’ room.”
Her face had barely started to own up to an expression when somebody knocked at the door behind me and immediately came in. “Is everything all right, Dr Bloan?” Otis said.
“It’s very far from all right,” I protested, twisting to face him. “Didn’t you hear?”
“I heard you shouting.” He kept his heavy stare on me while he said “What do you say, Dr Bloan?”
“I’d leave it to Dr Sheldrake. Do you want to tell Otis anything, Dr Sheldrake?”
I didn’t know whether this was a taunt or just an assertion that speaking out would be pointless. “No, I’ll tell you,” I said and shoved myself out of the chair. “You and your people will never see my son again.”
“I wonder.” As I struggled not to lose control in front of Otis, Tina Noble said “I should discuss that with your wife.”
“I’ll be more than discussing it,” I declared and stalked out of the office, not looking back to see if Otis followed. I would have called Lesley from the nearest phone if I hadn’t been due to teach. I ran to my car and drove to the university, already knowing the afternoon session would feel as though it might never end.
11 - Voices Of Reason
I was in sight of home when I saw a car parked next to Lesley’s. Had Tina Noble reached her before I could? I swerved through the gateway so fast that the tyres screeched on the gravel, and then I realised that the car belonged to Claudine’s mother. The Mazda wasn’t even the same shade of green as Tina Noble’s Volkswagen. As I let myself into the house Lesley emerged from the kitchen, and her guarded reluctant look revived my apprehension. “What is it, Lesley?” I said as quietly as I could.
“Shall we leave it for later?”
“Let’s have it out now.” I could hear Toby and Claudine in the back garden, which meant they wouldn’t hear us. “Have you been talking to someone?” I said and saw she had. “What did she say?”
“Just that she thinks I’m right about Toby and his stories.”
“Who does?”
“Phoebe Sweet. I know we said we’d talk to her together but I’m sorry, I wanted to hear what she thought. She says we should encourage him to write them down so he knows they’re only stories.”
“I’m sure she’d like to persuade somebody they are.”
“Please don’t, Dominic. I can’t believe this is you. It needn’t be.”
“Has she been saying that as well?” I was instantly ashamed of the retort, but then I glimpsed a look that wasn’t quite denial. “Has anyone?”
“Dominic, I wish you’d wait until—”
“Who?”
“If you must know right now, I’ve been speaking to your writer friend.”
At first I didn’t know who she meant, and then I could hardly believe it. “Bobby Parkin? How did you get in touch with her?”
“Your address book was on your desk. I didn’t think you’d mind.”
“I don’t know if I do yet. Why did you call her?”
“I wanted to hear what she thinks about—” Lesley glanced towards the kitchen and lowered her voice. “About the business you were all concerned with when you were at school.”
“I already told you, she wishes we’d done more to save Tina Noble from her father. If we had, perhaps there wouldn’t be a situation now.”
I was far from ready to leave it at that, but Lesley looked over her shoulder again before murmuring “That isn’t what she said to me.”
“Don’t worry about Judith if she’s there. I want her to hear what I say.” All the same, I might have been less eager for Claudine’s mother to learn “What’s Bobby been saying?”
“I believe she prefers to be called Bob these days, or Roberta if you aren’t her friend.” This might almost have been a rebuke for not alerting Lesley to the preference. “I’m afraid she agrees with me,” Lesley said.
“About what?” As Lesley hesitated I demanded “About me?”
“She thinks you’re too obsessed with these people from your past. You’re better concentrating on your family, she says.”
“She wouldn’t say that if she knew what’s going on.” Not far from rage I said “She certainly didn’t tell me I was obsessed when I met her. I wouldn’t be surprised if the woman she’s with has been working on her mind.”
“Don’t you like to be judged by us women, Dominic?”
Judith had come to the kitchen doorway with a mug of coffee in her hand, which might have been displaying how severely clipped her unpainted nails were. Her face was as nearly rectangular as Claudine’s, a shape emphasised by its frame of black turfy hair. Her substantial eyebrows always seemed to be raised in a challenge, and now she pursed her lips, driving out their meagre colour and letting them admit just a hint of wryness. “That isn’t what I meant at all,” I said.
“Am I being scatterbrained or does he sound the eentiest bit defensive?” When Lesley didn’t speak Judith said “Don’t say if you’d rather not for any reason. Only I’d have thought your family would have been top of your list of priorities, Dominic.”
“They most emphatically are. I’m sorry if you thought you heard anything different. They mean as much to me as I presume Claudine does to you.”
“No call to presume. That’s what her father did too much of.”
“I wasn’t, and I need to talk to you about her.” I saw Lesley make to intervene, but I slipped past Judith and headed for the garden, Toby and Claudine were swooping past each other on the lawn, arms stretched wide. I could have fancied they resembled figures flying off a pair of crosses, a notion Lesley would have taken to confirm how obsessed I was. “We’ll just be talking for a few minutes,” I told the children and shut the door.
I turned to find both women in the kitchen, watching me more closely than I thought was required. “Shall we all sit down?” I said.
Lesley hesitated before sitting next to her friend, opposite me across the table. “Judith,” I said, “will Claudine have told you about any strange dreams she’s had?”
“She tells me everything. We’re best friends.”
“So forgive me, are you saying yes?”
“If you insist on bringing it up, then yes.”
Since I didn’t understand her reaction, I could only persist. “What kind of dreams?”
“The kind Toby gave her by telling her stories.” As I let out a syllable more like a grunt Judith said “Lesley knows I wasn’t one of the parents who complained. They don’t seem to bother Claudine, so I’d no reason to.”
“I hate to say it, but that’s why you should be concerned.”
Judith lowered her head like a boxer and peered hard into my eyes. “Lesley, what’s he saying about me?”
“I’m sure he doesn’t mean it that way. Dominic—”
“That’s right, it isn’t about Judith. I’m saying Toby didn’t cause the dreams.”
“I think he did, even if he is your son. Lesley told me he picked it all up from some book you wrote. Please don’t try to say he didn’t give those children dreams. I can well understand you may feel guilty yourself.”
“I’m only talking about Claudine.” I was frustrated not to have time to deal with all Judith’s remarks, but I needed to address the crucial issue. Try
and think back,” I said. “Could she have started having her dreams before she met Toby at Safe To Sleep?”
“I’ve no reason to think so. She would have shared them with me if she had.”
I was nervously certain that Judith was wrong. “I’d like to ask her, or you can.”
“I don’t need anyone’s permission to talk to my own daughter, Dominic.”
“You surely can’t think I meant it that way, but we need to establish the truth for the children’s sake.”
“For your son’s, you mean. I’m afraid I can’t see how—”
“For all of them. Will you ask her, please?”
“You’re rather fond of shouting women down, aren’t you?” Once her stare had kept me quiet for several seconds Judith said “I’ve heard no reason why I should.”
“Because I know you’ll find the dreams started as soon as she had her first seizure.”
Lesley made to speak, but Judith was faster. “I’m glad if you’ve seen how bright she is, but do you honestly imagine she can remember that far back?”
“Maybe not, but I’ve a feeling I know somebody who can,” Barely in time I saw it would be unwise to say so. “The first one she remembers, then,” I urged instead.
“I’m not going to remind her of her problem. I won’t risk undoing all the good they’ve done at Safe To Sleep.”
“Then we’ll get the truth from Toby. Leave Claudine outside if you like, I but I want you and Lesley to hear.”
“No, you mustn’t,” Lesley said. “You heard Judith. I won’t have Toby disturbed either.”
She looked as concerned as Judith did in her own way, and it felt like confronting a monolith. “Doesn’t anybody want to hear the truth?”
“What are you calling the truth?” Judith said.
“The whole thing is a front for Christian Noble,” I said and kept my eyes on Lesley. “It isn’t just his daughter. He’s involved as well.”
“I’ve no idea what any of that means,” Judith said.
“Yes, you have.” It was plain that Lesley preferred not to say any more, but as Judith produced a grimace like the start of a remark, my wife said “It’s the business we were talking about earlier. He means Chris Bloan.”
Judith’s understanding look provoked me to demand “Is there anyone you haven’t discussed me with, Lesley?”
“Maybe there’s someone she ought to,” Judith said.
For the sake of the children I suppressed a retort. “Are you in touch with any of the other parents who use Safe To Sleep?”
“A few of us know each other.” At once Judith added “Why?”
“I’d like to speak to as many people as I can.”
“If it’s the kind of thing Lesley was telling me about, I should think the fewer who hear it the better.”
“She doesn’t know anything like everything.” Desperation had started to make off with my control. “I’ve found out more since.”
“Frankly, Dominic, I don’t want to hear if it’s anything like what Lesley was telling me.”
“Not even if it protects your daughter?”
“I don’t see how you could believe undermining Dr Bloan and her reputation can do anything of the sort.” Before I could respond Judith said “I really wonder if you’ve got some problem with empowered women. Lesley was saying you believe you know who Dr Bloan’s father is and you think he’s been putting some unscientific nonsense in her head. You must be thinking of two other people, because I don’t know many women who are as sure of themselves as she is. I wish I did.”
“That’s how the Nobles work. Whatever they need to seem to be, they convince everyone that’s what they are.”
“Everyone except you, Dominic?” Judith said and stood up. “I hope you can keep a rein on this, Lesley. If you need any help—”
“You aren’t leaving already.”
I’d meant only to hope that she wasn’t, but Judith gave me a piercing look. “You’re interrupting again, and I really don’t care to hear any more.”
“Won’t you at least let me tell you why you should take Claudine away from Safe To Sleep?”
“Especially not that,” Judith said as she opened the back door. “Claudine, we’re going home now.”
Frustration and dismay let my words loose. “Well, Toby won’t be there tomorrow.”
Lesley cleared her throat so hard it sounded painful. “He most certainly will.”
“That’s the spirit, Lesley. Don’t let yourself be bullied.” Twice as loud Judith said “Claudine, we’re leaving right now.”
Having raised a token protest, the children came in readily enough. As the two of them made for the front door Judith lingered to murmur “If you need to get in touch for any reason, Lesley, you know where I am.”
Judith was following the children when Lesley sent me a whisper as sharp as her glance. “None of this in front of Toby, Dominic. Not a word.”
I said none while we saw Claudine and her mother off, but when Claudine called “See you tomorrow, Toby” I sensed how tense both women grew. The impression persisted once I was alone with my wife and son, and it revived whenever silence fell. It joined us for dinner and for Toby’s favourite television programme, which showed stars apparently fleeing into the depths of space. It loitered in his room while he read to us about Wonderland, giggling at the mouse’s tail that described a tail on the page, though I couldn’t find much amusement in the sight of words trying to embody a physical shape. When he fell asleep Lesley reached for the book as I did, and I had the dismaying suspicion that she might prefer me not to touch him. I eased Alice out of his small limp hands and returned it to the shelf full of books beside his bedroom window. Lesley led the way down to the front room, and I’d barely closed the door when she said “So what have you been up to now, Dominic?”
She might have been addressing a delinquent child and despairing of him. “I saw Tina Noble,” I said, “and she didn’t bother hiding who she is.”
“What do you mean, you saw her?”
“I confronted her at the hospital. She was—”
“Confronted her how? Was anyone else there? Have you made any trouble for her?”
“There was just a security man, and he couldn’t see she was up to no good.” Lesley’s concern for the woman had thrown me. “Believe me,” I said, “she was.”
“You’re saying you made her call security.”
“No, he was there when I found her. She sent him off before she owned up. Does that sound like someone with nothing to hide?”
“I think it might, yes. You already said she wasn’t bothered by it.” Before I could argue, Lesley demanded “Did she say anything about Toby?”
“Not in so many words, but—”
“You haven’t made it awkward for him to go to Safe To Sleep, because if you have—”
“I’m sure they’ll still want him, but that isn’t the point. Tina Noble and the rest of them aren’t the cure, they’re the cause.”
Lesley sat back in her armchair. Perhaps she was simply bracing herself, but I could have thought she was recoiling from me. “What do you mean, Dominic?”
“I caught her in the neonatal unit. She was performing one of their rituals over the newborn.”
“I thought you said security was there.”
“She managed to convince him she was praying. I told you and Judith, that’s how the Nobles operate.”
“Oh, Dominic.” While Lesley looked as though she might want to take my hands, she stayed where she was. “It’s his job to be observant,” she said. “Don’t you think it’s more likely he was right?”
“Not where the Nobles are concerned. Lesley, I think they’re using the children the same way they tried to use the dead.”
“That means less than nothing to me, Dominic.”
“You read what Christian Noble wrote. They try and send them places they wouldn’t dare to go themselves.”
“You can’t be saying that’s what they do at Safe To Sleep.”
“I wish I didn’t have to but I’m sorry, I’m not wrong. I saw Christian Noble there. I think he’s living in that house.”
Lesley seemed increasingly reluctant to speak. “When do you think you saw him?”
“Yesterday, when my students were watching the film. Don’t worry, I made sure it was shown.”
As I grasped this might be the least of her anxieties Lesley said “How could you have seen him?”
“I bought some binoculars. They’re in the car. I got into the field behind Safe To Sleep, and I saw him with the children in the sleeping room. I’m sure he was performing another of his rituals. I’ll swear I heard him.”
Well before I finished I could see that Lesley wished I would. “You think Phoebe Sweet would be involved in anything like that,” she said.
“She has to be. She must be in his cult.”
“I wondered if you’d get round to using that word.” As I made to respond Lesley said “I’d give anything not to have to say this, but it feels to me as if you care less about Toby than all this nonsense from your childhood.”
“I only wish it were nothing but nonsense. I care about it because I care so much about him.”
“Then just let him carry on with, the treatment that’s helping him.”
“Haven’t you understood anything I’ve said? We don’t know what they may be doing to him, and we need to ask him. Not now, when he wakes up.”
“Not then either. We know exactly what they’ve done to him. He’s told us and we’ve seen. It’s you who doesn’t understand, Dominic, and let me tell you—”
“Don’t you believe anything I’ve said?” When Lesley didn’t answer I pleaded “How can we let him go there if there’s even the slightest risk that he could be involved with a cult?”
“Maybe we shouldn’t care what they believe so long as they’re helping him.” As I struggled to tone down my response to this Lesley said “I’m starting to think you’re more like your father than you’d want to be.”
This silenced me, because I felt it might be as accurate as it seemed unfair. “I’m sorry,” Lesley said at once. “I shouldn’t be saying that while he’s in hospital.”
Born To The Dark Page 11
