Two Women

by Martina Cole

  He pulled himself free.

  ‘Well, send them then. I’ll go and see me mum.’

  ‘You cannot go and see your mother unless it is a designated visit. I explain this to you fifty times a day, child. Your mother gave up the right to see you when she was naughty and the police took her away. Now do you understand that much?’

  Her voice was rising though she was trying as hard as she could to control both it and her temper.

  Barry still locked his gaze on her and this time he didn’t answer.

  ‘Do you understand, Barry?’

  He sniffed. A loud, noisy, snotty sniff that made Mrs Eappen’s stomach turn and caused her face to pucker up in disgust.

  ‘Fuck off, you. I want me mum.’

  It was said quietly and with conviction. His whole body seemed to be on red alert as he stared at her hard.

  Alana came into the room then and laughed.

  ‘Barry, stop swearing! Mum would give you a smack if she knew.’

  She came over to him and tidied him up in seconds. Mrs Eappen watched with despair written all over her pinched face.

  ‘He learned to swear here, Miss. We wasn’t allowed to swear at home unless we was too small to know what we was saying and even then we got a good hiding if we kept it up.’

  ‘Quite.’ Mrs Eappen’s whole body was stiff and unyielding and as she stood up to her full height she looked down at the two children as if they had just climbed out of a sewer before sitting down at her dinner table.

  ‘Well, Alana, you look lovely. Look after Barry and see he’s good for the Simpsons. They’re very kind . . .’

  Alana interrupted her then, half smiling.

  ‘I know, Mrs Eappen. We should be very grateful and we are, okay? Very, very grateful.’

  Mrs Eappen knew when she was beaten and made a hasty retreat. As she remarked to her husband that night, how could you take a child seriously when she was named after the wife of a bloody rock star!

  But Barry and Alana went out for the day, played with their sister, and were completely unaware that soon Rose would be taken from their orbit. Would be a Simpson, and never again a Dalston.

  Never again the dote of a house full of children and scuffed furniture, and a mother who had lived permanently on the edge of disaster. Where despite their father, lack of money and lack of luxuries, they had all been so very, very happy.

  Geraldine walked into Zilli’s and smiled a smile that took in everyone, from Colin sitting in the corner to every waiter, waitress and customer.

  Colin was impressed. She knew the stir she created and gave everyone a little bit of her so she could relax then and enjoy herself. He had wondered all afternoon what it must be like to be that attractive. To be that wanted.

  As he had showered and put on his only good shirt and trousers, he had wondered what people would think of him sitting down and eating with her. He hoped they would assume they were together, but knew that no one in their wildest imagining would really think that.

  Geraldine smiled as she sat opposite him and he smiled back. Sod the world. She was here and he was here, that was all that mattered. Even if people did think he was a younger brother or a client.

  ‘Sorry I’m late.’

  ‘That’s okay. I’ve been enjoying myself sitting here. I was early.’

  Geraldine grinned. ‘I thought you might be. You look the early type.’

  He wasn’t sure if she was laughing at him.

  She ordered a good bottle of wine and they drank it together, chatting about nothing.

  ‘I needed that. Shall we order our food now or have another drink first and relax?’

  Colin just smiled and she took control again. Ordered for them both, had the waiter at the table in seconds and then they were together again without any intrusions whatsoever. He thought he had died and gone to heaven. She was exquisite, even more so than he had first thought.

  ‘So, what’s the goss on Matilda Enderby then?’

  Geraldine’s words were playful but he knew she was being serious and thought for a few moments before he answered her.

  ‘Matty was only his secretary when I worked there, though there was talk about them even then. One of the women in the office returned late to finish an affidavit and caught them in a clinch.’ He grinned. ‘Actually it was more than a clinch. She caught him tied to the chair with Matilda’s stockings and Matilda sitting on his lap. I leave the rest to your imagination. Funny thing was, Victor went up in everyone’s estimation after that. Until then he had been seen as a brilliant lawyer but a bit of a damp squib.

  ‘She certainly brought him out of himself, I can tell you.’

  Geraldine didn’t answer him for a while, lost in her own thoughts.

  He waved at her and smiled.

  ‘Remember me? We were having dinner together and chatting?’

  She shook her head and laughed.

  ‘Sorry, I was miles away there.’ She gulped at her wine. ‘What did you think of her? You met her, I presume, chatted to her?’

  Colin ran his hands through his hair and sighed.

  ‘I never liked her much. She was pretty, lovely really, and she dressed sexily in a sort of school marmish way.

  ‘I think she went through most of the men in the firm before settling on poor old Victor. I mean, he was an accident waiting to happen. He had looked after his mother for years, he was shy and retiring. You know, if you saw him in court you’d never have believed he was the same bland man you knew at work. It was really strange.’

  She nodded.

  ‘I saw him once or twice, he was bloody good. Tore a witness to pieces in minutes. Yet he never raised his voice, not once. Brilliant.’

  ‘You know what I mean then. But where she was concerned he was besotted. I mean, think about it. This young, very young, good-looking girl is all over him like a rash. It was laughable, really. A more experienced man would have had her and dumped her, like others in chambers did.

  ‘But Victor wasn’t really part of their enclave, if you like. He was respected but not a man who socialised with anyone or was part of the bigger picture. He was a great barrister but he went straight home afterwards. He didn’t womanise, didn’t have a joke with anyone, kept himself pretty much to himself.

  ‘I think Matty knew that and fixed her sights on him. Of course, after the wedding, she wanted them both to be part of that world. Theatre, dinner, the works. I shouldn’t imagine the marriage was a great success. She wasn’t liked by anyone. Especially the wives. I think they saw through her and she knew it. Even Victor wasn’t that thick-skinned, he must have guessed. But then, I suppose he loved her.’

  Geraldine stared at the young man before her. He had put his finger on it, she was sure. It seemed with Matty you either loved her or loathed her.

  Victor had loved her.

  Was that his downfall?

  The food arrived then and they were a few minutes getting settled again. ‘I hate to say this,’ Geraldine confided, ‘but I feel there’s more to Matty than meets the eye. All this poor little me and how she suffered, yet there’s not one shred of evidence except a visit to the doctor a week before the killing. Matty apparently gave him a story about marital cruelty and how bad her nerves were. Even the doctor seemed sceptical.

  ‘She never arrived at work marked. Was never seen marked by anyone. But even though it sounds implausible she said Victor liked a bit of bondage and you’ve borne that out by what you said earlier. So I’m back where I started, really. You see, I don’t much like her either and that bothers me. As a professional I shouldn’t like or dislike people though before Matty I’ve never actually disliked anyone I’ve defended. But she troubles me. Really troubles me.’

  Colin nodded. ‘I know what you mean. I feel the same about Susan. Only I like her too much. Even though she tried to strangle me today, I understood why she went berserk. I know how she feels for her kids and I certainly know how they feel for her. She kept that family going, no matter what happened t
o her.

  ‘Barry Dalston was a piece of shit. He beat and degraded her. I have access to her medical records and listen to this. Her first child died because he gave her VD on her wedding night. Whether it was the fright of finding out that caused the stillbirth isn’t known but it set the tone for the whole marriage. She gave and he took. Finally she hit him with a hammer over one hundred times. His face was gone, there was nothing left to say what he had looked like, what he had experienced before death, nothing. She walked in while he was unconscious and she killed him. Then she phoned the police and made herself a coffee. She was still covered in blood, brain and bone when they arrived. Now why did she kill him like that? Why did she take away his identity, if you like? It was as if she wanted to obliterate him completely so there was nothing left of him for anyone.’

  He looked at Geraldine, who was staring down at her lovely chicken liver salad, and sighed.

  ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t think.’

  Geraldine looked suspiciously green around the gills and he felt awful.

  ‘It’s just that it intrigues me, you know? Can a person take so much that when they finally flip, they flip for us all? For every slight, every punch, every hurt? Do they become so upset that rationality goes out of the window and they have to kill then? But it seems so premeditated. Did she walk into the room, see him lying there and decide to take him away from her world, her kids, her home? What made her do it then? He had hit her about five days before so she can’t use that as an excuse. Why didn’t she kill him the night he attacked her? Why wait? She had been on a night out and she was drunk. But according to her friend Doreen she’d had a great time and enjoyed herself. Susan admits that too. She says she came home and just decided to kill him.

  ‘I don’t believe her. I just don’t. She took more than anyone else would take and she protected her kids. She would never have left them unless she had to. She worships those children, they are her life. So why did she all of a sudden decide she would do something that would take her from them? Leave them in care. She knew what her family were like. Lowlife scum, out for a few quid. She didn’t want her own children in their care even if they offered. It just doesn’t add up.’

  ‘Perhaps it was the drink? It could have made her violent.’

  Colin ran his fingers through his already untidy hair until it stood on end and made him look like a little boy.

  ‘I don’t think so. I don’t think it was drink. I don’t think it was anything we can rationalise.’

  ‘What then? Why did she do it?’

  He sighed.

  ‘I don’t know. I really don’t. But one day, please God, I will find out.’

  Geraldine studied him. She saw how tortured he was by Susan Dalston, could see how much he liked the woman, respected her even. She could feel his disapproval too, the feeling that somehow she had let her kids down by putting herself in a situation where she could no longer be there to protect them.

  She thought he was very sweet and idealistic. If a little naïve.

  ‘Maybe Susan Dalston just saw her chance - a chance to get him out of their lives once and for all?’ Geraldine suggested. ‘Perhaps the drink had done that to her. Spurred her on to take advantage of the opportunity before he awoke and the whole dreadful cycle started again. Maybe, seeing him like that, drunk, unconscious, she just saw opportunity. No other thought, nothing, just a chance to get rid of him.’

  Colin heard the resonance in her words. She really knew what she was talking about. She understood the need that could come over someone, the need to make someone or something just disappear.

  ‘Maybe she just wanted him to leave her alone.’

  Colin saw the earnest expression on her face and felt as if he had been given a glimpse of the real Geraldine O’Hara. The Geraldine beneath the designer outfit and the well-styled hair. And what he saw he couldn’t believe. He saw a frightened girl inside a very desirable woman.

  She drank her wine in two gulps then, excusing herself, went to the toilet. Ten minutes later, just when Colin was terrified she had left without telling him, she came back.

  She was once more the cool feminist barrister with good legs, a better brain, and that don’t-you-dare-touch-me look about her.

  He was relieved and saddened both at the same time.

  Matty awoke to sunshine and a strange feeling of loneliness. It was odd, missing someone. Especially someone like Susan Dalston. But Susan intrigued her. She found it difficult to understand someone who could be so selfless. Think constantly about other people, little people who did nothing but make demands on her. Her time, her attention, her few pennies.

  She talked about them constantly, as if they were real people with opinions and thoughts and needs. When in fact all they had was needs.

  Children needed and parents, fools that they were, provided for those needs. Without a second thought, without anything except their own need to give.

  It would never do for her. She didn’t want anyone taking from her, least of all ungrateful people. People who couldn’t even feed themselves for ages or make themselves understood. Matty shuddered at the thought.

  She wandered from the cell, bored. She walked to the rec room and tried to play a game of solitaire but someone would always try and strike up a conversation so she got herself some coffee and made her way to Rhianna’s cell.

  Rhianna was inside with a young girl called Sarah. She was tall with great brown eyes and a heart-shaped face. She looked like she should be in a passionate Fellini film full of Italian men, all hairy and moustached.

  Until she opened her mouth. Then she was broad cockney and romantic thoughts shot from people’s minds. She was suddenly a slut with a bad mouth and her beauty seemed to fade away.

  ‘Hello, mate, all right?’ Sarah had a happy-go-lucky disposition that was the envy of the wing. ‘You look like you just lost your virginity to the night screw.’

  Her laughter was deep and infectious. Even Matty had to smile. Rhianna nodded to the girl and she sloped from the cell, all legs, hair and smiles.

  ‘She’s a funny one, that Sarah. No matter what she says, I never get the hump with her.’

  Matty nodded.

  ‘It’s her disposition. Some people are like that. They never really see the shit they have made of their lives. It’s to be envied.’

  Rhianna was quiet. When Matty was like this it was best to humour her.

  ‘Are you okay?’

  Matty shook her head.

  ‘I’ve got the prison skits, as Sarah would say. I’m fucked off, pissed off, and feel like a fight.’

  Rhianna relaxed. This she knew, this she could cope with.

  ‘I’ve felt like that for ages. You have to go with it, see if it disappears on its own. If not, have a puff. Have a trip. Get out of your head. The comedown normally sorts me out.’

  ‘Do you think Susan is all right? I mean, she seemed so out of it. I’ve never heard anything like it in my life. There was such pain in her voice. Real heart-wrenching pain.’

  Rhianna took a joint from her tobacco tin and lit it, blowing the smoke out noisily. She passed it to Matty who drew deeply on it.

  ‘You know what I think? I think, Matilda Enderby, that for the first time in your life you have been affected by another person. You actually care about Susan Dalston and don’t know what to do about it.’

  She started to laugh and Matty sat on the bunk, not answering, letting her eyes roam over the cell. It was all male in here: males on the wall, males on magazine covers, male smells even. Dope, tobacco and stale sex.

  Except the sex wasn’t male though it should have been.

  ‘I care nothing for Susan Dalston actually. It’s just that I have to share a cell with her, and if she’s going mad I think I have the right to know,’ Matty said airily.

  Rhianna nodded, still laughing.

  ‘I’ve already asked about her so stop worrying. She’s fine. Back on wing this afternoon. Susan loves them kids too much to be incapacitated for a
ny length of time. She wouldn’t give anyone the chance to say she wasn’t fit. Stop worrying, Matty.’

  The last bit was said slowly, as if Rhianna could see inside her head and knew she was worried whatever she said.

  Sarah drifted back into the cell then. Her huge eyes were glistening from LSD and her body crumpled as she slid on to the other bunk.

  ‘I fucking hate this place.’

  No one answered her. There was nothing to add.

  Susan listened to the psychiatrist. The man was elderly, with dyed brown hair and watery grey eyes. She liked his voice, though. It was a low Scottish burr and brought back dim memories of happier times.

  ‘How do you feel now, Susan? How do you feel about your life?’

  She thought long and hard. What did she feel?

  ‘I feel like I did at home. When I was on top of everything. Then, just as I put in the last bit of washing, I would stand back, pleased with meself. And I’d see one sock. One dirty sock that had somehow escaped the machine. Then I would know that life was telling me there was always something or someone who got away from you. Or who ruined your routine, your life, your feeling of well-being.’

  Doctor McFadden stared at the big woman before him and smiled. He decided he liked her, she was a philosopher in her own way. A dreamer who had never had the time to realise her dreams.

  Like everyone else, though, she didn’t know that.

  ‘Do you ever think about what you did?’

  She sighed then, a long, weary sigh.

  ‘Think about it, doctor. If you was me, would you think about what you’d done?’

  He bit his lip and thought for a few minutes. Then shrugged.

  ‘It depends really, doesn’t it? It depends on whether or not you feel that what you did was wrong?’