The morning was beautiful, still and fresh. Pitt hesitated, looking up at the trees. He always took a moment when he first stepped outside in the morning. To taste the day. The morning was always the best time, regardless of whether it was warm or cold or wet or fogbound. The smell of the new.
Ju stood still beside him, wondering what his intentions were for her, imagining nothing other than complete and instant dismissal. As he stood looking up at the trees, wondering how long it would be before they would be in a position to expect the return of the birds, Ju walked slowly past him, heading for the drive.
She had nowhere to go. She would walk down to the end of the drive, and face the decision she had faced the previous Saturday. Turn left and she could head out into the world. What then? And what would Chen Yun do to her family if she ran away? That was the fear that would make her turn right at the bottom of the lane. Walk to the village. Wait until the next bus arrived, then travel to Bristol.
Her thoughts stalled at that. What would she do once she had arrived at the bus station? She could not even go to the house, the place which she dreaded more than anywhere in the world. Its location had always been kept from her. She would have nothing else to do but walk the streets of the Bristol suburbs until she found it. And if she could not, then the following Saturday she would make her way back to the bus station to wait to be collected.
It is all I deserve for having failed my family, thought Ju.
She turned at the sound of Pitt’s footsteps on the gravel. He was not walking after her, but around the side of the house. She stopped to watch him for a second.
He came to the door at the side that led down to the cellar. Ju had noticed the door, and had once seen Pitt emerge from there in the afternoon; she had thought about it, thought about the layout of the house, and presumed it to be the cellar.
Pitt opened the cellar door and turned back to Ju. They looked at each other, now thirty yards apart, on a chill early morning in late summer. With no birdlife and no breeze, and with the buildings and the trees around them, there was the dull silence of heavy fog or thick snow.
He wanted her to go with him, into a dark room underneath the house. After what she’d had to endure through her horrible summer of weekends, the claustrophobic nightmare of a room with no natural light, the thought could have chilled her or numbed her or made her limbs immobile, or sent her down the driveway, running to whatever freedom she could find.
Yet it did not. Not with Pitt a few yards away, solid and honest, a certainty to cling to. She did not even remotely understand him, but she knew she could trust him.
She turned her back on the driveway, turned her back on the uncertainty that it held, and followed Pitt to the cellar door.
They walked down a narrow flight of steps, illuminated by a small bare light bulb. Usually, Pitt did not even turn on the light. At the bottom, he opened another door and walked into the cellar. There was an array of light switches on the wall to the right. The cellar had been wired up so that it could be very bright, but Pitt only ever turned them on if a distributor or wine merchant had come to call.
He turned on one light, a dim overhead bulb at the back of the large and open cellar, then walked towards it. Ju hesitated as she entered the room, and then began to follow Pitt. She looked at the wine barrels large, stacked in rows, with no comprehension. She had never seen anything like it before, and so it was not within her understanding, and she did not try. She was nervous but had no sense of fear.
At the far end of the cellar, away from the light, behind the final row of barrels, there was a small hard wooden seat. Pitt collected it and brought it over to the other side of the cellar, close to where the bulb was illuminating a small corner.
The floor was immaculately clean, the walls sheer brick, neither dusty nor cobwebbed. The barrels looked polished. The light above her head was shaded and of low wattage. To the left there was another door. There was nothing against the walls. Between the last row of barrels and the wall there was a gap of around eight or nine feet.
Ju was being brought to the small area to hide. She did not understand, she could not ask, but she had such innate trust in Pitt that she would automatically accept what was being done.
Pitt walked to the wooden door to the left, opened it and turned on the light. It was a small room, just big enough for the toilet and wash hand basin. Everything was white and immaculately clean, emphasising the brightness of the light. Having shown Ju the room, Pitt immediately turned off the light and closed the door.
Now he faced her, in the dim light of his cellar. His decision to bring her down here had been taken in the middle of the night. He had no idea how long she would need to stay, or of the logistics of it. She had water and a toilet. The cellar was cool but not cold. He would need to bring her food, and bedding of some sort.
He would lock the door so that no one else inadvertently came down here, but it meant, in effect, that he would be making her his prisoner. It had the most awful connotations, a young woman, already being forced to work in the sex trade, being kept locked in a cellar. Society, the great animal that he so abhorred, would not view him kindly, or with any sympathy or credulity.
It was this thought that had kept him awake through the night. He had made Ju’s bed, but he could not let her lie in it for too long.
He nodded and walked quickly past her. Did not want her thinking that he was about to take advantage of her. It was his intention to free her from the life she had come to, but he had no idea what she was thinking. She could have feared that having discovered her dark Saturday evening secret, he was now going to lock her away and keep her for the same purpose. That this was what Ju might come to think troubled him far more than the idea of society in general heaping opprobrium upon him.
He walked out quickly, leaving her alone. He did not turn back at the door. Closed it, walked up the stairs, closed the door at the top and locked it, slipped the key into his pocket. Round the side of the house and into the kitchen. Glanced at the clock, still well before six. The morning remained fresh, the day yet to happen. He stood still in the middle of the kitchen listening to the sound of the house. There was nothing. No floorboards, no sound of running water or creaking pipes. Usually when someone was abroad, there would be some rumour of their actions. In an old house, it was hard to conceal movement.
He still had some time before he was joined by the bitter collective.
He had watched Ju, knew the kinds of things she might eat. Simple food. Fruit, uncooked vegetables, rice, some plain bread. He quickly gathered a few things together, nothing elaborate. Lifted a small cotton bag from a drawer, placed them inside. Bag packed, he stopped again and listened. Still nothing.
She would need bedding, and perhaps there would be no better time to take it than this early, with no one else around, but he did not want to take too many chances. He moved quietly to the back door, and once more went through the furtive and silent routine of going back down to the cellar, wondering if she would fear the sound of the door every time.
She was sitting on the small wooden seat. The light still on, she was holding the handles of her bag, while the bag sat on the floor. She looked small and vulnerable and beautiful. He tried not to look at her.
He approached her with a strange uncertainty and placed the bag at her feet. She looked at the ground. He hesitated another second, and then turned and walked from the cellar.
34
Pitt had never before felt blood on his hands, and this morning was no different. He had a list of things to do, and the murder of Chen Yun had been an item on that list. At the time he had not hesitated, had felt neither pity nor remorse, regret nor doubt; just an absolute certainty that the man had had to die. It had been the only way to release Ju from her bond. No reasoning ever would. Perhaps money would, but Pitt did not have the money. In any case, he doubted that a man like Chen Yun could be trusted. The actions of the untrustworthy are only certain once they are dead. Even now, he was unsure of th
e extent of Chen’s empire, and whether anyone would be looking for him.
He could have ridden out to find Jenkins on one of the quad bikes, but Pitt preferred the walk. The sun was shining, the morning warm, and Pitt did not need to be wearing the green oilskin jacket. There was unusual heat in the light breeze on his face.
He found Jenkins attending to a vine in the very middle of the yard. Under the nets, flat on his stomach, examining the lowest hanging leaves for signs of mildew. Jenkins was aware of the approaching footsteps, recognising the gait of the boss.
Pitt stopped a few feet short of him and waited. Looked out over the vines that ran away from him, heading south. Looked at the sky; gauged the weather, where it was coming from, what it would be bringing. As Jenkins crawled backwards from under the net and stood up, Pitt had turned round and was gazing up the slight hill to the top of the vines.
As the morning had progressed, he had come to accept that he would be leaving. He felt nothing. Thirty years of work would be gone – for him, at any rate – but it did not seem to matter. In the space of a few days he had placed his life’s work firmly in the past. Now there was something else he had to do, and, in the previous few hours, he had made the decision that he could not combine the two.
Jenkins stood up and dusted himself off. Pitt turned back and held his gaze for a short time. He had been working with Jenkins for over twelve years. The vineyard would be in capable hands; as long as Daisy did not interfere.
‘Maybe we could get rid of the nets now,’ said Jenkins ‘How many weeks has it been since the birds disappeared?’
‘Leave the nets,’ said Pitt abruptly.
‘If you’re sure.’
‘It won’t look good when DEFRA come back. It’ll look like we’re not expecting the birds to return, like we’ve planned for them not to be here.’
Jenkins nodded. As usual, when they started discussing the birds, he found himself looking at the sky, and into the row of alders that acted as a windbreak through the centre of the vines.
‘Besides, they’ll be coming back,’ said Pitt. ‘Soon. It’s not the birds we have to worry about.’
Jenkins kept looking at the sky; finally brought his gaze back down to Pitt.
‘How can you be sure?’
Pitt didn’t look at him, and was aware that he could not explain how he knew. The birds would be back, that was all. It did not matter to him if Jenkins got the impression that, in some way, he knew why the birds had gone in the first place; that he had been responsible for it.
‘I called the bank,’ said Pitt. ‘Going in to see them shortly. They put me in touch with these TV people. You know, the documentary series, the life of a vineyard.’
Jenkins looked surprised.
‘You been drinking straight from the barrels, boss?’
Pitt was not going to share in Jenkins’s amused surprise.
‘They’re checking their schedules and they’ll let us know when they can come round. They’re looking at three or four vineyards in all. I gave them your name, thought it might be better if you dealt with them. You can be the contact point.’
Jenkins was taken aback, immediately liked the idea. The men had been talking about the possibility of the documentary when Pitt hadn’t been around.
‘You want to be on TV?’ said Pitt.
‘Who doesn’t?’ said Jenkins, smiling.
Pitt started to walk away. A few paces. Had something else to ask; a more uncomfortable topic of conversation. Not because of the request, but because he was going to ask Jenkins to keep the secret. He turned back. Jenkins was still watching him curiously. Recognised that there was something different in Pitt, even beyond the fact that he was willing to invite a television crew into his vineyard.
‘You always say you can get anything,’ said Pitt. ‘Fix anything. Like you know all sorts of people.’
‘Usually,’ said Jenkins.
His curiosity deepened; something peculiar in Pitt’s tone. This was possibly the first time in twelve years that he could remember any kind of inconsistency in his behaviour.
Pitt did not immediately respond. Held Jenkins’s gaze for a moment, and then looked down the length of the vines. Despite the fact that the course of action he was taking would inexorably lead him into leaving the vineyard, he viewed the scene with neither regret nor longing.
‘I need you to get a passport for Ju.’
He didn’t look at Jenkins as he spoke, aware of the fact that he was unsure of himself for the first time in so many years that he could not recall. It was a strange feeling, like those that had been unearthed by Hardyman’s death; basic emotions that had, for years, been covered up by the walls he’d constructed to protect himself from the rest of society.
He finally turned round; the look on Jenkins’s face had not changed. The right eyebrow perhaps had lifted slightly.
‘She doesn’t have one?’
‘Do you have that kind of contact?’ asked Pitt. He was putting himself in Jenkins’s debt, but he was not going to enter into any unnecessary discussion.
‘It’s not something I’ve had to do before, but I can probably dig someone up. No questions, I presume?’
Pitt nodded. He lowered his head, dragged his foot backwards through the dirt. He had other things to ask Jenkins, but not all at once. The television crew and the fake passport would be enough for the moment.
He glanced at his man, then nodded and started to walk past him. The nod was all the thank you that Jenkins was going to get, all that he expected.
‘Do you have a photo?’ asked Jenkins.
Pitt stopped, momentarily closed his eyes. Here he was, blundering into unknown territory, missing things, not thinking clearly. That was what happened when you ventured outside the confines of your own personal compound. You were surrounded by people with guns and shot down.
‘I’ll get one,’ said Pitt.
‘You want me to?’
‘No.’
Pitt started to walk away quickly, stopped himself after a few steps. Turned back to Jenkins; didn’t immediately speak.
‘Not in front of Mrs Pitt?’ said Jenkins. Pitt nodded. ‘Or the lads.’
Pitt gave another small nod, then turned and left his foreman standing in the bright sun of a warm July morning.
Jenkins watched him go, knowing that he would not look round. Everything about him was the same. The thick, unnecessary green jacket. The old brown boots, the only thing that Jenkins had ever seen on his boss’s feet. The slightly stooped shoulders. The head bowed, either looking at the ground as he walked, or taking in the vines, noticing every leaf and every piece of fruit.
Yet, there was something different today that he had not understood until Pitt had made the request on behalf of Yuan Ju.
At last, it seemed that something had got under his skin in the way that only the vineyard had before.
35
Pitt felt uncomfortable. A small, plain office, bright sun through slatted blinds. On the wall a framed poster from an amateur performance of A Streetcar Named Desire. On the desk, a posed photograph of two children; fourteen and twelve, a boy and a girl. The boy smiled naturally; the girl looked like she was being held at gunpoint.
The chair across the desk from him was empty, as McKendrick Arnold had gone off on what he’d said would be a brief errand shortly after Pitt had been shown into the office. Pitt sat still, his hands resting on his legs just above the knees, his shoulders slightly hunched. Staring out of the window. Thinking about Ju and everything that had to be done over the following couple of days, the way he would previously have thought about the vineyard or the harvest or the bottling or shipping of the wine.
The door behind him opened again and McKendrick Arnold came and took his seat opposite Pitt. He laid a thin file before him and read it in silence for a couple of minutes. Pitt sat perfectly still, neither the position of his hands changing, nor his gaze out of the window.
Everyone had an angle; everyone had a game. Was Arnold
trying to assert some sort of dominance over the meeting by making him wait, by keeping him guessing? Pitt did not know how people thought. Usually did not care. In this instance, he certainly did not. Arnold could prevaricate as long as he wanted; he was intimidating no one.
‘Perhaps it’s time to invest some of your own personal wealth in the vineyard,’ said Arnold suddenly, looking up. ‘I hadn’t realised, when we chatted last week, that you had your own means.’
Pitt was not sure what he meant, so he did not reply. Stared at Arnold from the other side of the desk, and, within seconds, the banker had succumbed to the feelings of inadequacy that Pitt had induced in him the pervious week.
Leaving Pitt to stew for a while had not helped him.
‘Your own personal wealth, Mr Pitt,’ said Arnold. ‘In the vineyard.’
‘What personal wealth?’ said Pitt. His tone was non-committal, flat, leaving Arnold unsure as to the reasons for Pitt’s apparent ignorance. Was he genuinely unaware, or was he trying to be funny in some way, trying to steer the conversation away from the issue of his own substantial investments?
Arnold uncomfortably held his gaze for a moment and then looked back at the file. He turned over a few pages, although there was not too much at which to look. Raised his eyes, while his head remained pointing at the paper, as if the file was what really held his attention.
‘Well, we know you lost your accountant a couple of weeks ago,’ said Arnold, in a tone that suggested Pitt had lost his wallet or his parking spot. He did not reply. Arnold coughed.
‘Can I assume, then, that Mr Hardyman took control of all your personal business?’
‘Yes,’ said Pitt uncomfortably. Found himself unaccountably moved at the thought of Hardyman. He had not been thinking about him. Did not want to think about him, as it made him feel so wretchedly sad.
‘You had no idea of the state of your accounts?’
‘Accounts?’ said Pitt.
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