The Mysterious Miss Mayhew

by Hazel Osmond

  He really had to watch these lies; that wasn’t even a white one.

  Fran was still staring at the sad-looking cakes and it seemed to be making her sad too.

  ‘No, I’m sorry,’ she said, finally. ‘It wouldn’t be wise.’

  ‘Wise?’ he asked and then couldn’t help adding some swear words as the noise of the mower grew louder again. Vasey had obviously discovered they had moved from the sitting room.

  ‘Oh, for goodness sake,’ Fran said, closing the back door. ‘Not only an annoying man, but such a difficult one to get rid of.’

  ‘Perhaps you should have thought about that before you invited him round to cut your lawn,’ Tom shot back, the discontent at her point-blank refusal to help him finally spilling over. ‘Now he’s going to want some kind of payment.’

  He opened the back door again, even as her, ‘I did not invite him round, he just turned up,’ bounced off his back.

  He kept on walking, watching Vasey travel the width of the lawn. When Vasey spotted that Fran and Tom had emerged, he changed his route to get closer.

  ‘Are you listening to me?’ Fran was behind Tom. ‘He just turned up. Un. In. Vited. And why wouldn’t I ask him to cut the lawn? It should have been done before I moved in. Goodness me! I’m surprised at your suggesting that making a simple request to mow a lawn is asking for trouble. I had no idea you’d be one of those men. Not a very nice message to be sending your own daughter.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said slowly, turning to face her. He felt he was being told off by someone much older than he was. That back was as straight as an ironing board.

  ‘It seems to me,’ she started again, ‘you’re peddling that sexist rubbish about a woman being the one at fault if a man decides to make a nuisance of himself.’

  ‘That’s not what I meant.’

  Vasey had stopped and looked as if he was trying to work out what was going on.

  ‘What did you mean, then?’ Fran asked. ‘And, before you answer, can I just point out that you have, yourself, turned up uninvited, too. Is that also my fault?’

  ‘Now hold on. First, I resent being lumped together with all those prats who think just because a woman accepts a drink, or dresses in a certain way, it’s an invitation to … to …’ Looking down into her face he was unable to say the word ‘sex’. It was too fresh, like something just picked off a tree.

  He tried a different approach, ‘And stop acting as if this has just dropped on you out of the sky. Haven’t you tried to manipulate Vasey to get your rent reduced?’ He shook his head like an irritating know-it-all because he figured it would annoy her even more. ‘Well, you have no idea who you’re dealing with. Vasey sees a weakness and exploits it. You’ve poked a wasps’ nest and now you’re moaning that the wasps are trying to sting you.’ He wasn’t quite sure that was the analogy he wanted, but it certainly stirred her up.

  ‘I see.’ She waved a hand towards Vasey. ‘So, if they find my dismembered body tomorrow, it will be my own fault?’

  ‘Dismembered body?’ He laughed. ‘Oh he’s not likely to dismember you. Not unless you decide it’s less horrendous to throw yourself under the lawnmower than him.’

  The sound of the mower died. Fran closed her mouth and there was a shift of her eyes towards Vasey.

  ‘Well, it’s been a pleasure as always,’ Tom said. ‘Hope you have a good plan B.’ He walked away, ignoring Vasey lumbering in his direction and skirted back round the bungalow and to his car. He felt the rush of heat as he opened the door and gave it a couple of minutes for everything to cool.

  He still wasn’t getting in the car. Should he really leave her on her own with Vasey? The guy was a bully, he treated women like a Neanderthal.

  Not his problem.

  He fast-forwarded the years and saw Hattie walking home one night by the side of the road, nobody kind bothering to stop, just leaving her for the psychopath to scoop up.

  It was his problem. Every good man’s problem.

  With a sigh he closed the car door again and retraced his route to the back garden. Nobody about. He went towards the door and heard Vasey grunting. A groan. Fran’s voice, urgent, a pleading tone.

  And that was it, all the anger still sloshing around from 1995 was sending him charging through the door, hurtling through the kitchen, screaming, ‘LEAVE HER ALONE, YOU GREAT BIG FUCKING BULLY …’

  Two faces looked up at him, expressions astonished. And then they turned back to what they had been doing before he careered in on them.

  It took a moment for Tom to work out that Vasey was lying flat on his back, mouth an open clench. Fran, kneeling by his side, appeared to be trying to persuade him to sit up. ‘Come on, lean on me.’

  ‘Aah, ahhh, ahhh,’ Vasey went with every tiny movement towards a sitting position.

  ‘Could you just push that chair behind his back, Tom?’ Fran asked, and Tom did so as if in some kind of dream where he was a hospital orderly and Fran was Florence Nightingale.

  ‘There,’ Fran said with satisfaction when Vasey was propped up. She kept her hands on his shoulders and lowered her head to look in his eyes. ‘Just keep breathing in, slowly and rhythmically.’ Her voice was calm and reassuring. ‘You went down with quite a thump, probably winded yourself when you fell.’

  ‘Over what?’ Tom looked around. Had Vasey fallen over his own feet? Or some stray air?

  ‘Who knows?’ Fran replied as if the whole thing was a mystery. ‘The important thing is that he doesn’t try to get up too soon, isn’t it, Greg?’

  Vasey looked up from under his brows at Fran and nodded and she smiled at him as if rewarding a good boy. ‘Five minutes and you’ll be as right as rain,’ she assured him.

  It was more like a quarter of an hour before Vasey could be helped to the car.

  There was now more than a hint of ambulance about the Imperial Storm Trooper and Tom had to give Vasey a shove to help him up into the driver’s seat.

  Vasey was very subdued, and Tom sensed it wasn’t just because he was in pain. When Fran said, ‘Ah, is that the new contract there?’ Vasey gingerly reached out for the papers on the passenger seat. A pen was located and first Vasey signed both copies, using the middle of the steering wheel as a rest, and then Fran signed them. When she handed him back the top copy, he didn’t even look at it, just let it drop into his lap and started up the car.

  After he had driven away, not in a particularly straight line, Tom asked, ‘What did you do to him?’

  She was still looking up the track. ‘I could show you, but it’s a manoeuvre I can only do properly when cornered. And absolutely livid.’

  ‘Does that happen a lot?’ He was remembering the disagreements they’d already had.

  She turned to him and her eyes were infused with light, as if she wanted to laugh but was being polite. ‘Do you realise that’s the second time you’ve asked me if I get into a lot of fights?’ she said.

  ‘And you’ve avoided answering the question both times.’

  The light in her eyes was animating her whole face. ‘No, Tom, I do not get into a lot of fights. That is only my third.’

  He didn’t know what to say to that and because she might at any minute bring up his embarrassing re-entry into the bungalow, he thought it best to go. This time he didn’t wait for the heat trapped inside his car to dissipate, but he did put on his sunglasses because she was watching him and they made him feel less self-conscious.

  As he drove away, she continued to watch him.

  ‘No, don’t thank me for trying to help,’ he said as he speeded up and couldn’t work out if he was relieved or aggravated that she hadn’t.

  CHAPTER 18

  Friday 16 May

  1) That saying is right. Men are like buses and you can wait and wait and then two turn up at once. Except I do not recall that I was waiting for a man this afternoon. Or a bus.

  2) It is surprisingly difficult to make a Victoria Sandwich cake.

  3) I need to be careful how I use the words ‘pl
ease mow my lawn’. It is obviously as provocative as asking someone to ‘come round the back and trim my lady garden’.

  4) You can fit an awful lot of testosterone in a small room. Especially when there appears to be ‘history’ (unspecified) between two of the people in that room.

  5) Tom is not a very good liar – I cannot imagine Mrs Mawson being pained by anything. Other than socialists running the country. It will take more than that to persuade me to break cover.

  6) Some people have no manners.

  7) Some people should not attempt to touch your breasts unless expressly invited to.

  8) Mr Yakamito would be pleased to know that I remembered everything he taught me about unarmed combat. Shame I can’t say the same about chemistry and maths.

  9) It is annoying when a man has almost Victorian views about how women should behave.

  10) It is not annoying when the same man does an extremely spectacular reenactment of a knight trying to rescue a damsel in distress. It is, in fact, quite touching. Almost as touching as his embarrassment.

  CHAPTER 19

  Tom was meant to be looking at the proofs on his desk, but his mind was still kneading away at the problem of Charlie’s pages. When the phone rang, he was glad of the interruption.

  ‘Just wondered if you fancied some lunch?’ his brother asked.

  ‘Yeah, why not? A change of scene might give me some inspiration.’

  ‘Thought we could have some sandwiches. I’ve already bought them … Got you something cheesy. Couple of bottles of water …’

  There was a pause, during which Tom instinctively got up and wrestled the door shut. If he had to pick one word to describe Rob’s voice, it would be ‘wobbly’.

  He kept his own tone light. ‘So, where do you want to meet?’

  ‘I’m in the cemetery.’

  Tom’s light tone went out the window. ‘You’re in the cemetery?’

  ‘Yeah. Nice and cool here. Trees.’

  Did that make any kind of sense?

  No it didn’t. Who had their lunch in the cemetery, besides flesh-eating zombies?

  ‘I’ll come straight away.’ He looked at his watch. If he took the car, could he get there quicker? Probably not, traffic lights on the way, streets full of tourists …

  ‘No need to rush,’ Rob said. ‘I’m talking to Dad.’

  Tom nearly dropped the phone and had to do some juggling to prevent it from falling on to the desk.

  ‘Dad?’ he repeated, the phone back to his ear. ‘Dad? Rob, what are you talking about? Dad’s not there.’

  Silence. Tom took the phone from his ear to confirm what he already knew; Rob had ended the call.

  Tom should have seen this coming. First there was Rob’s barely concealed hysteria after the visit to the hospital, then his reaction when Tom had broached the subject of skiing at Christmas. As usual Kath and his mum thought Steph had a nerve stirring everything up, but they understood the compromise Tom was trying to reach. Rob hadn’t said much, but later he’d come up to Tom out of hearing of the others and said, ‘It would have been good to have a child round the place at Christmas.’ When Tom had shot back, ‘You will have – your own,’ Rob had screwed his mouth up and walked away again.

  Tom managed the quickest exit from the office ever, barely stopping to give Liz a garbled outline of where he was going.

  Talking to Dad! Their father’s ashes had been scattered in the sea up the coast, over fifty miles away. If he could hear Rob from up there, he must have pretty good hearing in the after-life.

  Outside in the square, the heat was building and the message coming off the tourists trying to find some shade was that they’d rather flop and forget the sightseeing.

  Tom turned for the bridge and, as he crossed, looked down at the river to take his mind off what he might find in the cemetery when he got there. At this time of the year the water was wide and placid and dotted with small islands you could wade out to. On the one directly below him, a couple of women were sitting on a rug, a picnic spread around them while an assortment of children, some just in underwear, paddled and splashed and screeched. He remembered similar picnics with Hattie and a day much further in the past when he and Rob had jumped in with their school uniforms still on.

  Thinking about Rob jumping in the river made him speed up. He was over the bridge and past the car park and could already see the village cemetery, bordered by a low wall. Today, in this heat, it seemed much further away than he remembered.

  He realised he was doing a kind of half run, half walk and slowed down. No point in looking as if he was panicking.

  He went in under the massive stone arch and passed between the two small chapels. Yes, definitely cooler here, with the trees creating great blocks of dappled shade. He scanned from left to right, his gaze snagging on the showy obelisk adorning the Mawson family tomb, before making progress past weeping angels and rugged crosses.

  Rob was over by the far wall on the seat that faced away from the tombstones and looked out to the hills.

  ‘Here you are,’ he said, cheerily when he got nearer and Rob gave a start as if he had been somewhere else in his head. He scooted along the bench to make way for Tom.

  ‘You look a bit hot,’ Rob said. ‘Here, have some water.’ The bottle and some sandwiches were handed over.

  Tom took great slugs of the water and tried to let the tranquil mood of the place get inside him – the sound of the breeze in the sycamore trees, the odd car going past just on the edge of his hearing. But he felt his brother’s face didn’t look right, as if he was working hard to make it appear normal, but bits of it kept drifting out of his control.

  ‘Nice spot,’ Tom said, unsure if it was better to talk or stay quiet.

  ‘Aye,’ Rob replied. ‘Gives you space to think.’ He put his half-eaten sandwich down on the bench between them.

  ‘And what are you thinking about?’ Tom asked, looking at the sandwich.

  ‘I’m thinking: I can’t do this. I just can’t do it.’ Rob was swallowing as if some of the sandwich hadn’t gone down properly.

  If this had been Hattie looking so sad and lost, Tom would have simply put his arm around her shoulders and pulled her in close. That probably wasn’t going to work with Rob – a manly punch on the arm was the closest they got to bodily contact if they weren’t the wrong side of a couple of beers. He pushed the remains of the sandwich on to the grass and chanced closing the gap between them.

  ‘Has something in particular made you feel like this?’ he asked, lowering his voice so that Rob would look at him. ‘I mean, other than the worry over how Kath’s getting along? The consultant hasn’t said anything?’

  Rob shook his head and appeared to be concentrating on the hills as if his sanity depended on it.

  ‘The trip to look round the hospital …’ Tom tried. ‘Has it …?’ He was avoiding saying “scared you?”’

  Rob filled in the missing words anyway and shrugged. ‘Bit, maybe. But I can see it’s a good set-up they’ve got there. She’s going to get the best care.’

  Another period of hill watching.

  ‘The classes then?’

  Suddenly Rob was pressing his lips tightly together and then they were opening and he said, all in a gabble, ‘So much to remember. Pain relief, breathing through contractions, the after-birth, stitches …’ Rob’s own breathing sounded not only too fast now, but wrong. As if he was taking in too much air and not pushing it all back out again.

  ‘Hey, take it easy.’ Tom did actually put his hand on Rob’s leg then. ‘Look, Kath’s history means she’ll get a lot of attention. And the medical staff will help you with all that stuff.’

  There was nodding from Rob. ‘I know, I know,’ he said, ‘but it’s not just that. It’s about seeing Kath in pain. About needing to be strong for her. And then what about afterwards? How will I know what to do about anything?’ Rob’s voice had been getting steadily louder, his breathing more ragged and on ‘anything’, Tom felt the muscles in h
is brother’s leg bunch and he was struggling to his feet. ‘Me and Kath, we’ve never got this far before,’ he said, and it came almost like a wail and the sadness of it got inside Tom and scrabbled about in his chest.

  Sod it.

  Tom got up too and before Rob could object, pulled him close. He tightened his grip, feeling his brother’s belly against his own and not caring. There was a small flare of resistance from Rob, before Tom felt him slump into him, and if Tom hadn’t been the bigger of the two of them, they might have ended up half on the ground and half on the bench.

  ‘There’s so much to go wrong,’ Rob said into Tom’s shoulder, sadly. ‘Do I lie the baby down on its front? On its back? How do I tell a cold from something more dangerous?’

  ‘You learn as you go along.’ Even as he was speaking, he registered that his brother’s hair smelled of sawdust. ‘You’ll be fine. You just need to be there for Kath.’ What did that platitude mean? He tried to be more direct. ‘She doesn’t need you to be strong. Bloody hell, she’s a strong woman herself and you know she doesn’t like to be fussed over. All she needs you to do is stay calm and not give her anything else to worry about.’

  Was he getting through to Rob, or just smothering him?

  ‘And just remember, everyone’s hopeless at the start.’ Tom discovered he was now rubbing Rob’s back with one hand as if he were some oversized baby. ‘I’ve told you what happened when I had to bathe Hattie for the first time in hospital?’

  He repeated the story in the hope it would calm Rob.

  ‘The nurse said to me, “Mind your watch,” and I said, “It’s OK, it’s waterproof.” And she said, sharply, “Mr Howard, I was not worried about damaging your watch, I was worried about the baby getting scratched.” See, that’s how hopeless I was.’

  Rob started to push away, not violently, but with enough determination to make Tom let go. ‘I know all that, mate,’ he said, ‘but what if Kath’s brilliant at this and I’m not and she starts resenting me?’

  ‘Kath? I don’t think so. And listen, Rob, you and her are rock solid, you’ll find a way through together. The pair of you are potty about babies and look how brilliant you are with Hattie.’