Unnatural Relations

by Mike Seabroook

  ***

  At about the same moment Angela Turnbull was staring at her friend and temporary house-guest in alarm. The bell had chimed and Annabel had answered it. There had been voices, which had faded, and she had heard the door of her little-used dining room closing. A few minutes later the voices had been raised somewhat. A door had opened and closed, violently. Then the front door had opened, and there had been the sound of a car starting up and moving away, followed by a tremendous slam of the front door. Now Annabel had swept back into the room, in a positive fury.

  "That bastard!" cried Annabel Potten. "That absolute, bloody bastard!" She stood in the middle of the room, clenching and unclenching her hands by her sides, almost spitting as she uttered the words. "I'll kill him." She whirled round and marched across to the neat little bar in the corner, almost sweeping occasional tables and standard lamps down as she went. She seized a glass, which happened to be a brandy balloon, sloshed a huge measure of whisky into it and drank half of it, all in the same motion.

  "Annabel, whatever's happened?" she said. Her voice seemed to rouse the other woman from a trance. She swung round on her and glared furiously down at her. Angela observed that her knuckles were white round the big glass. "Careful with that, my dear," she said quickly, "those glasses cost fifty quid apiece. Now calm down a bit, and tell me what's happened. Was that David?"

  Annabel looked down at her glass, as if surprised to find it in her hand, and relaxed her fierce grip on it a little. She opened her mouth, but whatever emotion had her in its grip had her so tight that she could not speak for a moment. She went for a short walk round the room instead, draining her glass en route and coming to rest by the bar to pour herself another one. This seemed to calm her, and she walked more slowly back and sat down beside her friend. "It wasn't David," she eventually said. Her voice sounded as if it was being filtered through ground glass. "Not in person. No, it was an envoy. The police." Her voice rose. "He sent the police to find me."

  "The police?" queried Angela. "Whatever's happened now, then?"

  "Oh, nothing very much," said Annabel bitterly. "That stupid, crass, block-headed imbecile of a husband of mine's only gone and got himself arrested. That's all." She took a long pull on her drink and sat, breathing heavily and staring into vacancy. Her friend waited for her to go on in her own time.

  "The great big dummy," she eventually spat out. "He's only been round to this other boy's house, this Christopher's, beaten him up and his father as well, from what I could gather, and been arrested for assault and battery or grievous bodily harm or some bloody thing or other. Then they've started asking questions, and it's all come out into the open about those two having this ridiculous adolescent love affair. They've charged the other kid with seducing him - it seems they're going to throw him in the tower and chuck the key away, and bloody good riddance to him, as far as it goes. Now they want to interview James as well, with a view to possible charges against him. They want me to go to the police station and make a statement, about my own son. That was a policeman wanting to know where he was living. Dear God!"

  Angela Turnbull sat, slightly stunned. "Jesus Christ," she breathed softly. "What a mess. The poor kid. We'll have to see him right away. You didn't tell the copper where he was, I suppose?" She looked at her friend's face and saw the answer there. "You didn't, did you?" she said, in dawning horror. "Christ, you did. Annabel, what in God's name possessed you? You could have given him a breathing space, so we could get to him first..."

  Annabel Potten remained sitting, staring into the middle of the room, while Angela tapped her foot and looked at her impatiently. Suddenly, as if she had just thought of something original, Annabel looked round at her and said, "It'll be all over the papers, you know. That bloody awful local rag will think it's their birthday. Can you imagine what this will do us? I shan't be able to show my face. God, what a thing to do."

  Angela gazed at her friend in something approaching amazement. "Are you more worried about your local reputation, or what they're doing to your unfortunate child?" she said acidly. But she was a practical and masterful woman, and saw immediately that there was nothing in talking but waste of precious minutes. "Come on," she snapped. "Drink that quickly and we'll get going. We might just be in time to stop them from interrogating the kid around the kidneys. I'll drive - you've had enough to melt their bloody breathaliser. Come on," she said again, "move, woman. You and your bloody husband have done enough damage between you.

  Now it's time to see if we can put some of it right."

  "I wonder if David's still there," murmured Annabel, even as she obediently finished her drink and got up to go. "You can leave him to me, if he is," said Angela tartly. "All this situation needs to turn it into a full-scale diplomatic incident is for you and him to have a punch-up on the bloody police station doorstep. "I'll send him packing. Now come on, let's go."

  ***

  The 'incident' had already reached impressive proportions when the two women ran breathlessly into the front office of the station. The inspector, who was now Station Officer for that night, was speaking to a tall, grey-haired and authoritative man in his fifties as they arrived, while at the same time attempting to deal with a very angry woman who kept interrupting with imperious demands that he allow her to do the talking. Three pairs of eyes turned on the newcomers. "Ah, you've arrived. And not before time," snapped the woman. This," she said, turning back to the inspector, "is the boy's mother."

  Annabel looked at them, and suddenly flushed. She opened her mouth, then closed it again. Angela Turnbull took in the couple in one rapid glance, and took charge. "You're the boy's headmaster?" she enquired. "Doctor... "

  "Lane, madam," said Lane coolly. "And you will be Mrs Turnbull, no doubt. Thank you for coming so promptly. One gathers that officers were dispatched to find Jamie's whereabouts from Mrs Potten. All quite unnecessary, I find, since the other wretched boy had already told them where he could be found. Under pressure, or the spurious promise of some favour that has not, in fact, been forthcoming, it appears."

  "That's not true," put in the inspector sharply. "Now, all of you, please calm yourselves. The officer in charge of the case will come down shortly and speak to you in turn. Now, if you'd all just take seats in the interview room, I'll tell you the moment there's anything to tell." He sighed, and indicated a door beside the counter. Reluctantly they filed in and sat awkwardly round it in an electric silence.

  ***

  Detective Sergeant Bly finished talking and looked at Robert and Audrey Rowe expectantly. He thought they had taken it all too calmly, and waited apprehensively to see what form the explosion, when it came, took. It didn't come. After he completed his outline of the facts, which was succinct but nonetheless lengthy, they sat looking at him for a long moment. Then they looked at each other. The father, he noted, was showing some distress. The mother seemed very calm. She was the first to speak, and her voice, too, was level and apparently normal. Delayed shock? Bly wondered to himself.

  "So our son is to be charged with a serious offence, then, sergeant?" she said.

  "I'm afraid so, ma'am," he replied, feeling increasingly uncomfortable. This was the last reaction he had expected. He waited.

  "Will he be convicted?" she asked. "I don't think there's any doubt of it, ma'am," Bly said. "He'll plead guilty, I should think. He's admitted everything to us, and made a statement. The other boy confirms what he's said in every detail. We'll be bailing your son out to you very shortly, after he's charged. He'll have to appear at the local magistrates' court. Then they'll commit him to appear for trial at the Crown Court. If he pleads guilty it'll all be over and done with very quickly."

  "And what'll happen to him, assuming he pleads guilty?" Robert Rowe spoke for the first time since Bly's outline of the evening's events. His face was a little haggard, but his voice too was even. The effort of holding himself in was more visible in him than in his wife.

  "I can't tell you for sure," admitted Bly. "I wish I could
, but this is a very rare offence - or at least, we don't get many cases round here. I've been here fifteen years and this is the first of this kind I've had to deal with. I can tell you what the maximum possible sentence is..." He hesitated. They sat forward, expectantly. "Before I do tell you that," he said "I would ask you not to get agitated. I told your boy himself this and he practically passed out on me. You can take it from me that he won't receive the maximum, or anything like it. So long as you realise that..." They nodded. "Go on," muttered Rowe.

  "It can carry, in these circumstances, life imprisonment. That's one reason why it must be tried at the Crown Court."

  Robert Rowe drew in his breath with a hiss. His wife sat bolt upright, eyes wide and her mouth trembling. "They wouldn't..."

  "No, ma'am, they won't do that," the detective said unhappily. "I can't promise you much, but I can promise you that much. They won't send him to prison at all, I shouldn't think. If they do, it'll be for a very short term, it'll be youth custody, which isn't as bad as prison, and it would almost certainly be suspended. As I say, I doubt..."

  He fell silent, watching the misery pass across their faces. "He's of exemplary character up to now, Mr and Mrs Rowe," he resumed, trying to offer them some comfort. "Also, the other boy has fully admitted that he was a consenting party, indeed he was the prime mover in the whole affair. He wants to tell the court that it was all his fault, that he pushed your son into it against his will." He mused for a while, rubbing his moustache. "He's lying, in part at least. Your son admits that he was a fully consenting and instigating party. But in the circumstances, with the younger boy insisting on taking his part of it, I very much doubt if Christopher will get anything much more than a suspended sentence, maybe even a con-dis - a conditional discharge," he elaborated, seeing their blank looks. "He's a game little sod - sorry, ma'am, shouldn't've used that expression. But he's got a lot of guts, this kid. I wish..." He left the thought unspoken.

  The telephone on his desk rang, shattering the quiet and making them all jump. Bly picked it up. There was a squawk from the other end. "Yeah. Oh, right. Okay."

  "Governor's been raked out of bed. He's coming up to see me now," he said, replacing the receiver.

  "Who's the governor?" asked Rowe.

  "Superintendent, sir. In charge of this station. He's what we call the late senior. He gets called out if anything big crops up. This is big, for us. Here he is," he said, as the double doors into the CID office opened. A welcome draught of cold air blew into the stuffy office, followed by a big, florid man with sandy hair. He was wearing civilian slacks and an orange sports jacket, with a thin tie that had obviously been tied in a hurry, the knot loose and somewhere under his right ear. He came in and surveyed the three of them. Bly stood up and introduced him. "Superintendent Goodfellow, Mr and Mrs Rowe. These are the parents of the older boy, guv. I've been explaining what'll be happening."

  "How d'ye do," the new arrival said perfunctorily, in a broad Scottish accent. He hardly looked at them as he said it, and was already walking Bly to the far end of the big open-plan office before the words were properly out of his mouth. They sat and watched as he and Bly perched themselves on two desks. Then they waited for twenty minutes while the two men went into a huddle. Bly was doing most of the talking. At one point he got up off the desk and came back towards them, but it was only to fetch a heavy legal-looking book from where he had been sitting while he talked to them. As he picked it up from the desk, his back turned to the superintendent he raised his eyes at them and mouthed "Not long now" to them. "He's quite a nice man, really," whispered Audrey Rowe to her husband. He grimaced, shrugged and went back into a private contemplation of his own.

  Eventually the two policemen came back to the Rowes. "I gather ye've no complaints about the way Detective Sergeant Bly has been dealing with the case?" the superintendent said brusquely. It wasn't really a question.

  "It's not exactly a case to us, Mr - ah - Goodfellow," said Audrey Rowe. "This is our son you're dealing with, and we're desperately worried..."

  "Aye, aye, of course. But ye're happy with the way Sergeant Bly is handling it."

  "Mr Bly has been very kind," said Robert Rowe. "As far as it goes, we have no complaint to make. But we are terribly worried, as my wife just said, and we don't yet know what will happen to Christopher. We don't even know precisely what he's going to be charged with. As far as I can see, the other boy was the..."

  "There's no going to be any charge just now," said Goodfellow, swinging round towards the double doors leading to the stairs, on his way.

  "What?" cried Audrey Rowe. She leapt from her chair, the first tears of relief already gushing, and ran after Goodfellow's burly figure. She reached him as he was half-way through the doors and clutched his arm. "You mean you're going to let him go?" she said, eyes shining.

  Goodfellow swung round on her and let the door go. "Bly'll be telling you about it. I said we aren't charging him just now, and I normally say what I mean." He stared at them irritably for a moment, then appeared to notice Mrs Rowe's face, tearful but now also utterly confused, and his face softened just a little. "Madam, my home is thirty-one and a half miles from here. I'm now going to return to it. That makes a drive of sixty-three miles, to come in here and point out an elementary matter of law to my officers, any one of whom ought to have known it without having to drag me from my bed. Sergeant Bly will explain. Good night to ye." He strode heavily to the doors and they heard his footsteps receding down the stairs.

  The Rowes turned to Bly, who was looking mildly embarrassed. "He's not the most polished governor we've ever had. Good copper," he excused. The Rowes made similar snorting sounds simultaneously. "What did he mean, Mr Bly?" asked Robert Rowe.

  "I'm afraid he was having a dig at me," said Bly, pulling a wry face. "He was quite right, as a matter of fact." He broke off, musing to himself for a moment. "There is a point of law that I failed to notice. I'd've seen it later on, but... well, that's my problem.

  "Now, I'm a bit hesitant about mentioning this, because I don't want to raise any false expectations in you..." He broke off, seeing hope instantly flaring into life on their faces.

  "There may - I emphasize, there may be - some hope for you." He sat and watched them for a moment. "But please, don't let yourselves get too optimistic about it... what Mr Goodfellow meant was that there is another step to be gone through." Once more he paused. "Please, tell us, what is it?" pleaded Audrey Rowe, looking beseechingly at him.

  "Well, as he said, we shan't actually be charging your son tonight, Mrs Rowe. We'll be letting him go as soon as I've talked to you. That'll be in a few minutes now. The reason for the delay is that nobody remembered enough of his training to recall that in these circumstances, where the parties both consented to the acts and are under 21 years of age, no proceedings may be taken without the consent of the Director of Public Prosecutions.

  "What that means is that for now we're going to bail Christopher out. Nothing to that, just straight bail in his own recognisance of fifty pounds. That means simply that he'll forfeit that sum if he doesn't observe the conditions - mainly that he come back here when we tell him to. That'll be a week or ten days, I guess, when the Director's had a chance to see the papers and make his decision."

  "And we'll know then if Chris is to be..." Robert Rowe choked suddenly.

  "Yes, Mr Rowe, you'll know then," said Bly gently. "You'll know as soon as we can tell you. We shan't keep you worrying a moment longer than we can help. Now, let's get you downstairs and see your boy."

  He looked keenly at them for a moment. "One thing. You'll be on your son's side in all this, will you? I mean," he said, seeing their puzzled expressions, "the other poor kid seems to have a pretty strange pair of parents. The father doesn't seem to give a damn if the boy lives or dies, and the mother's only interested in whether it gets her name in the paper. The only people who seem to care a curse about him are the headmaster of his school and his wife. He's living with them for the moment, an
d lucky he is, by the look of things. I'm pretty sure I know how you'll react to your boy, but he'll be needing all the support he can get just now." Once again he peered closely at them. "I just thought I'd better be sure," he said awkwardly, seeing their indignant looks. "Of course I can see what kind of parents you are. But..." He let it go. "Come on, let's get you downstairs and on your way home."

  "You've no need to worry, Mr Bly," said Robert Rowe slowly, a dawning respect and even liking for the scrawny detective beginning to form. "We've both been shocked by what we've heard - we had no idea that there was anything... that Chris was... as he is, and it's come as a great shock. But we're with him, of course. I don't pretend to understand what can have made him like this, or brought it on, but obviously we shall stand by him, whatever happens. Whatever happens," he repeated to himself, under his breath.

  He stood up and gave his wife a hand up also. He turned to Bly and said, "Thank you for being so considerate, Mr Bly." Bly stuck out a hand. "Nothing to that, Mr Rowe," he replied, a little awkwardly, rubbing his moustache. "I hope it all turns out right for you. In any case, I'll be seeing you in a week or so's time, when the DPP's made his decision. I'll keep my fingers crossed for you."