The Doll's House

by Tania Carver

  ‘Partly,’ said Gwilym. ‘Glenn McGowan was an extreme case, even amongst the transgendered community. He hated himself. Loathed and despised who he was. Or who he had once been.’

  ‘The Glenn side.’

  ‘The Glenn side. Very good, Mr Brennan. Exactly right. Very astute. Psychologically.’ Gwilym locked eyes with Phil, gave a secret smile. It unnerved Phil slightly. Angered him. He tried not to let it show. Gwilym continued. ‘Glenn suffered from a very extreme form of gender dysmorphia. He hated his body. Or parts of it. He wanted those parts taken away.’

  ‘Which parts?’ asked Sperring.

  ‘The parts to do with his gender,’ said Gwilym. ‘His genitals.’ He smiled, enjoying the reaction. ‘Not as uncommon as you might think, you know. You’d be surprised how many extreme castration fantasies I’ve encountered over the years. I’ve even met some individuals who have gone through with it.’

  ‘And that’s what Glenn McGowan wanted?’

  ‘Yes and no,’ said Gwilym. ‘He wanted much more than that. He was only happy when he felt nothing. When he was numb. He enjoyed living as Amanda so much more than living as Glenn. He was much happier doing that.’

  ‘His wife might disagree,’ said Phil.

  Gwilym shrugged. ‘Wives, eh?’ he said, eyes glittering with that secret smile once more. ‘You just can’t trust what they say, can you?’

  ‘She seemed pretty insistent when I talked to her,’ said Phil, feeling his hackles rise.

  ‘Oh,’ said Gwilym, laughing. ‘They’re always insistent. Wives.’

  Phil had been undecided before. But now he had made his mind up. He definitely disliked the man.

  ‘So this book,’ said Sperring, his eyes metaphorically on the exit. ‘Free will, yes?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Gwilym, turning to him. ‘As I said. But more than that. It examines how we have the right to live our lives as we want to. As we choose to. This might be despite – or because of – the way society views those who want to do that. Who want to transgress. Deviate. Be deviants. It also examines – in detail, I might add – what lengths some of those deviants will go to to do just that.’

  ‘Right,’ said Phil.

  ‘It also examines, through the case studies, the boundaries and barriers that those who want to live that way might – or do – encounter. Social, economic, moral, whatever.’

  ‘So it’s about living your life as you want to,’ said Phil.

  ‘That’s right.’ Gwilym nodded.

  ‘And dying as you want to,’ Phil said.

  Gwilym became uncomfortable. ‘Well, that was… that was part of the… that was one of the reasons behind the book. Of course.’

  ‘Because Glenn McGowan was murdered, Mr Gwilym,’ said Phil.

  ‘Professor, actually.’

  ‘Professor Gwilym. Murdered. We have reason to believe the murder was planned and premeditated. We also believe Mr McGowan freely invited his murderer into his home. And that he was complicit in his own killing.’

  Gwilym was looking suddenly uncomfortable once more. ‘I don’t know what you’re —’

  ‘Suggesting?’ Phil leaned forward. ‘I’m suggesting that if you had prior knowledge that a murder was going to be committed, you had a duty to inform the police.’

  ‘Otherwise you could be an accessory after the fact,’ said Sperring.

  ‘Exactly,’ said Phil.’

  Gwilym’s face reddened. ‘May I speak freely, Mr Brennan?’

  ‘Please do. And it’s Detective Inspector.’

  ‘The people I have interviewed were all extreme cases. Some were fantasists, happy to define their boundaries and live within them. One, as I have just discovered, actually went further than that. He acted out his fantasy.’

  ‘So you knew about it?’ said Phil. ‘It was there in the interview?’

  ‘Yes, it was in the interview. It was his ultimate fantasy. His ultimate desire.’

  ‘So why didn’t you —’

  ‘What? Try to stop him? Talk him out of it? Why should I do that? Doesn’t it negate the whole point of the book? Which is, of course, that we all have free will to do whatever we want to with our own lives.’

  ‘Not reporting it was illegal,’ said Phil. ‘Not to mention immoral.’

  ‘But that’s the whole point!’ Gwilym was off his seat, gesturing. Phil stayed where he was. Stared at him. Hard. ‘What about those people who take their terminally ill partners off to Switzerland and help them to die? Is what they’re doing illegal? Immoral? Is it?’

  ‘That’s a different issue,’ said Phil.

  ‘No it isn’t,’ said Gwilym. ‘It’s exactly the same. That’s the whole point of the book. To stir things up. Shift attitudes.’

  ‘Or manufacture controversy and shift units,’ said Phil. ‘If you want to be cynical about it.’

  Gwilym stared at him. Anger in his eyes.

  ‘We’ll need to look at the book,’ said Phil standing up. He looked directly at Gwilym. ‘And we’ll need that list of your assistants and researchers and access to the taped interviews as well, please.’

  Gwilym stared back at him. ‘I’m not sure I want to do that, Detective Inspector. Maybe I do need my solicitor after all.’

  Sperring stood also.

  ‘I’ll see you out,’ said Gwilym. He walked them to the door. Phil and Sperring were crossing the threshold when he spoke again. ‘Oh, I did enjoy having your wife the other night.’

  Phil turned, stared at him. Gwilym had a smile of triumphant self-satisfaction on his face.

  ‘What? What did you say?’

  Gwilym’s eyes widened. ‘Your wife. Had her for dinner the other night. We’re in the same department at the university. The Christmas dinner? I was with her.’

  ‘Really?’ Phil felt his hands start to shake, his anger build. He wasn’t sure why. ‘She didn’t mention you.’

  ‘I’m surprised. We had quite a time together. Goodbye, Detective Inspector.’

  The words sounded like both an insult and a threat.

  Phil walked straight to the car, started it up. He almost didn’t wait for Sperring. He drove away not looking back.

  He knew Gwilym would be standing there laughing.

  44

  M

  arina ran towards her daughter, terrified she would speak again. She knelt down beside her, held a finger to her lips. ‘Ssh…’ Eyes wide, imploring.

  Josephina, confused by her mother’s reaction, did the same. Marina smiled.

  ‘It’s… it’s a game, sweetheart,’ she whispered, as quietly as she could.

  ‘Does Daddy know we’re playing it? Where’s the man? Is he playing it?’

  Marina flapped her arms, tried to get her daughter to shut up. ‘Ssh… please, Josephina, you have to be quiet. Or it’ll spoil the game. Right?’

  Josephina, finger on lips, nodded.

  Marina smiled, nodded. ‘Good. Now you just sit there as quietly as you can, OK?’ Relieved, she went back to the door, tried to listen.

  Again, she could hear the tone of the voices but not the actual words. She tried to pick up what was being said. It was difficult, but she tried to work out rhythms and cadences and from them make educated guesses as to what the speakers were actually saying.

  Gwilym was showing off with his knowledge. That, Marina would have thought, was a given. This went on for some time. She heard Phil’s voice once more and looked over to Josephina to check she still had her finger on her lips. She did. The little girl smiled, enjoying her game. Marina returned the smile but it didn’t stay on her face for long.

  She listened as intently as she could. There seemed to be some kind of argument going on. Or certainly the makings of one. Then she heard movement and stepped quickly away from the door.

  But the movement was in the opposite direction. Phil and his associate – Sperring, she assumed, although she had never met the man – were leaving. Gwilym was showing them out.

  She waited, breath unconsciously held, until t
he front door closed. Then let out a sigh of relief.

  ‘You can come out now,’ Gwilym shouted from the living room. ‘Hubby’s gone.’

  She opened the kitchen door, turned the baby buggy round.

  ‘Is the game finished?’ asked Josephina.

  ‘It is darling, yes.’

  ‘Can we see Daddy now?’

  ‘Not just yet, sweetheart. We’ll see him later.’

  She wheeled the buggy into the living room. Gwilym stood in the centre, hands on hips, like he was the lead actor in a bad play and this was the set.

  ‘Well, that was interesting,’ he said.

  Marina said nothing. Not wanting to give herself away.

  ‘Yes,’ Gwilym continued, clearly too excited to keep quiet. ‘Very interesting.’ He crossed the room, stood in front of her. ‘You lied to me. Didn’t you? Lied.’

  Marina tried to move the baby buggy past him and out of the room, but he blocked her path.

  ‘Let me go, please,’ she said.

  ‘Oh, you can go,’ he said. ‘When I say so.’

  Marina felt her hands shaking as she tightened her grip on the handles of the buggy. ‘Let me go.’

  He kept standing in front of her, unmoving. Marina, seeing she had no choice, pushed the buggy straight at his legs.

  Gwilym screamed. Josephina looked back at her, confused and a bit scared.

  ‘Mummy, you hurt him…’

  ‘It’s all right, darling,’ Marina said, eyes locked on to Gwilym’s. ‘He’s not a nice man. He deserved it.’

  Gwilym barked a short, hard laugh. ‘Coming here to my home with your stories, your accusations, telling me you’ve told your husband…’ He waggled his finger at her. ‘Naughty, naughty… Beware your sins will find you out…’

  She moved the buggy round him. This time he let her go.

  ‘Liar.’

  She turned to him, hands off the buggy handles and on the front of his shirt. ‘Yes, you bastard,’ she hissed, voice low, ‘I lied to you. And what did you do? You admitted everything. Everything. You crumbled and admitted everything. Rapist.’

  ‘Oh really? Am I?’ He leaned in close to her, his mouth to her ear. So close she could feel his breath, his lips almost kissing her skin. ‘Prove it.’

  ‘I will,’ she said, pulling back from him. ‘Don’t you worry. I will.’

  ‘No you won’t,’ he said. ‘Because there’s nothing to prove. My word against yours. You’ve got no evidence, nothing.’

  ‘I’ll get some. You can be sure of that.’

  He shrugged. ‘You won’t. Because there isn’t any. And there’s something else, isn’t there? Something you haven’t thought of.’

  Marina frowned. ‘What?’

  ‘You don’t know,’ he said. ‘Not for definite. You don’t know if we fucked. Not for sure, I mean. I know you think we did, but you don’t know, do you? You don’t know whether I did it to you and you wanted me to, or whether you came on to me. Tiger.’ He winked. Laughed.

  Marina felt sick to her stomach.

  ‘My daughter’s over there,’ she said, mouth dry. ‘Mind what you say.’

  Gwilym smiled. ‘Of course. Wouldn’t want her to know that Mummy’s a nasty cheap whore, now would we?’

  Marina saw stars dancing before her eyes. Red ones. Her hands bunched into fists.

  ‘Careful,’ said Gwilym. ‘You don’t want to do anything silly in front of your daughter, do you?’

  Marina tried to compose herself. Breathed deeply. Gwilym stepped right up close to her, mouth on her ear once more.

  ‘Whore,’ he whispered.

  She slapped him. As hard as she could, right across his face.

  His hand to his cheek and eyes wide in shock, he staggered back, falling into a coffee table behind him, tripping over it and crashing to the floor. He stared up at her, eyes dancing with surprise and hatred.

  Marina turned away from him. ‘Come on, sweetheart,’ she said to a horrified Josephina. ‘Let’s leave the horrible man on his own now.’

  She pushed the buggy to the door.

  ‘Bitch,’ Gwilym shouted behind her. ‘You’ve got nothing on me. Nothing.’

  ‘We’ll see about that,’ said Marina.

  And pushed her daughter out into the cold December day.

  45

  ‘

  Y

  ou’ve gone the wrong way. Sir.’

  Phil looked across at Sperring, who, having spoken, had composed his features as impassively as possible. Phil felt anger rise within him.

  ‘Yeah, I know I’ve gone the wrong way, thanks. If you didn’t build every fucking square inch of this city out of concrete and make it look exactly the same as every other fucking square inch and put a fucking flyover and roundabout in the middle of every fucking road then I wouldn’t go the wrong way, would I?’

  Sperring said nothing. His head was angled away from Phil, looking out of the window. In the reflection Phil caught the look of surprise on his DS’s face, along with wry amusement. He knew his outburst would be straight round the office.

  Phil sighed. ‘I’m sorry. You didn’t need that.’

  ‘No problem, sir.’ Still not looking at him.

  Band of Horses was playing. Phil was sure Sperring wouldn’t like it. He didn’t care.

  Phil sighed again. Gwilym had rattled him. Making veiled but lewd comments about Marina, saying things that didn’t tally with Marina’s version of the events of a couple of nights before. And Phil had risen to it. Bitten back, even. Unprofessional, especially in front of Sperring. But he hadn’t been able to stop himself.

  ‘So where am I now, then?’ he asked.

  ‘Ladywood.’

  ‘Right. And I can get back to the office from here?’

  ‘Course you can. Just follow the road round. I’ll direct you. If you get lost.’

  I’m sure you will, thought Phil. And love doing it.

  He looked out of the window. Edgbaston, at the other side of Five Ways roundabout, had been a vast stretch of well-maintained houses sitting behind high brick walls on streets lined with mature trees. Gwilym’s house had been one of them. But the other side of the roundabout, the area they were now travelling through, couldn’t have been more different. On both sides of the road were stunted, warren-like estates of tiny red-brick boxes, managing to look simultaneously spread out and cramped together, separated by patches of bare, sparse ground. The whole place looked sullen, desolate.

  ‘What did you think of Gwilym?’ asked Phil.

  Sperring turned, coming out of his reverie. ‘Gwilym? An odd one. But these academic types often are.’

  ‘Hiding something? Cagey?’

  ‘Could be,’ said Sperring. ‘Worth looking into a bit more.’

  ‘Yeah, I think you’re right. Something about what he said wasn’t adding up.’

  Sperring frowned, as if deciding whether to speak. He did so. ‘Can I ask you something, sir?’

  Phil knew what he was about to say.

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Cheers. What was all that he was saying about your wife? Sir. Gwilym. If you don’t mind me asking.’

  Phil hesitated. He did mind. And if it wasn’t something that had a bearing on the investigation, he wouldn’t talk about it. Certainly not with Sperring, a man he couldn’t trust. But he had to. If Marina had lied to him and was close to Gwilym, and if Gwilym became more interesting to them, then that would become a conflict of interest and he would have to declare it and step down from leading the investigation.

  And if I do talk to Sperring, it might bring us to a better understanding of each other. He shook his head. He sounded like a teenager.

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘Honestly. I asked her about him and she said she barely had anything to do with him. She’d seen him around in the department but never really spoken to him, spent any kind of time with him. Always at a distance.’

  ‘That wasn’t what he was implying.’

  ‘No,’ said Phil, looking at
the depressing landscape around him and wondering where he was. ‘I didn’t think so either.’

  Sperring leaned in closer, as if the two of them were sitting in a pub and he wanted to keep what he was about to say private. ‘She been different lately? Your missus?’

  Phil didn’t answer. His hands gripped the steering wheel harder; he pushed the accelerator down further.

  ‘Bit off? You know what I mean. In my experience there’s only one reason a woman – a married one, I mean – would play down knowing someone… You know what I’m saying? Happened to me. That’s how I found out. Then it was bye bye, Mrs Sperring, don’t think you’ll get a penny out of me, you cheating bitch. And she bloody didn’t. I made sure of that all right.’ His lips curled into a cruel smile at the memory.

  Phil slammed on the brakes. A roundabout had appeared before him. He smacked the steering wheel in frustration. ‘Where the fuck do I go now?’

  ‘Turn right. Heading into the city centre. You’ll get the hang of it. If you’re staying around here.’

  Phil didn’t reply. Just drove where he was told to drive. Office blocks and towers appeared. Concrete loomed high on both sides of the road. Cars came at him, seemingly from all directions, knowing where they wanted to go better than him. Negotiating the underpasses and dual carriageways of Birmingham city centre made Phil feel like he was taking part in some futuristic, post-apocalyptic gladiatorial combat. Autogeddon.

  ‘You know you’ll have to step aside,’ said Sperring. ‘If it turns out Gwilym was telling the truth.’

  ‘I’m well aware of that,’ said Phil, turning the steering wheel sharply to avoid a Fiat that had decided to change lanes, seemingly on a whim.

  ‘Can I say something else?’ said Sperring. ‘Since we’re, you know, speaking freely and all that.’

  ‘Go on then.’

  ‘The boy Khan. Nadish. He’s a good lad. Got a lot of potential. I know you maybe haven’t seen eye to eye and he’s probably not the sort you get on with, but don’t ride him so hard. Sir. He’s not had an easy start but he’s got all the makings of a good copper.’