On a wet evening in early December, Hilary presented herself warily at the Quantrill’s door. It was opened by a Douglas who looked thinner and older than the man who had been pursuing her before his son’s accident; his eyes were darkly underhung with evidence of sleeplessness, the lines on his face were much more deeply scored.
He gave her a slightly shamefaced greeting, avoiding her eye. Then, taking her coat and dripping umbrella, he added rather too loudly and brightly – and greatly to her relief – ‘We’re very glad you could come, aren’t we my dear?’
His wife emerged from the sitting-room. Molly’s anxiety over Peter had clearly made her turn for comfort to food. She had put on all the weight her husband had lost, and more. Hilary recalled her as a small, healthily plump woman with ample evidence of the prettiness she must have had in her youth, but now she seemed ungainly. He cheeks were pastry-pale and her eyes still had the staring appearance of residual shock.
‘How’s Peter, Mrs Quantrill?’ Hilary asked immediately.
‘Comfortable now, thank you. At least, as comfortable as he can be with both legs in plaster, and all those weights and pulleys …’ Molly’s voice rose, its stability threatened by lurking tears.
‘He’s a lot better than he was, anyway,’ said Quantrill thankfully. He followed the women into the living-room, and uncorked a bottle of sherry that stood in solitary state on the sideboard in the dining area. Hilary, sitting in an armchair that must have been bought for its appearance as part of a suite rather than for its comfort, saw with private dismay how unsuitable the cramped modern house and its obviously feminine choice of furnishings was for a man of Douglas’s size and character. How could Molly expect him to be happy in such a pastel-coloured room, with toning framed prints on the walls and an imitation-log electric fire in the imitation hearth?
‘In fact,’ Douglas continued, taking a stand in front of the fire and seeming more at home now that he had an engraved pewter beer mug in his fist, though he still couldn’t look at Hilary, ‘Peter’s so much better that we thought we ought to give him a change from family company. His mates have been asking after him, and as they can’t go to Yarchester except at weekends, we decided to let them do the visiting today. They’re good lads, and he’ll be glad to see them. He needs a bit of cheering up.’
‘He’s going to be lame, you see,’ said Molly, her voice almost out of control. ‘Even if his legs mend properly, one will be shorter than the other. And he’s had to have a lung removed. He was such a fine, strong boy … and now his life’s been ruined …’
Her husband put down his mug and went to her immediately, sitting beside her, taking her hand, and reassuring her in a way that was so effective that he clearly must have had a great deal of recent practice. Hilary sipped her sweet sherry and glanced at a handy copy of Woman and Home; but observing the couple covertly, she saw that it was Molly who would most easily be able to cope with their son’s disablement.
Once she had recovered from the shock and the anxiety, and as soon as Peter was safely back at home, Molly would set to with vigour and help the boy adjust to his handicap. Molly would be all right. And there seemed to be no reason why Peter shouldn’t in time lead a more or less normal life.
But Douglas, with his lowered eyes and guilt-stricken face … how was he going to come to terms with the responsibility he had accepted for his son’s accident? Did he intend to tell Molly that when he had seen Peter riding the borrowed motor bike he had tried, in anger, to make him stop? And, whether he confessed it to her or not, would their marriage hold together under the strain?
If it came to that, would Hilary’s working relationship with Douglas still hold? Burdened as he was by the additional guilt of knowing that he wouldn’t have been at the roadside to cause Peter’s accident if he hadn’t deliberately parked there, while on duty, in order to proposition his sergeant, there was little wonder that he couldn’t look her in the eye. But if he couldn’t find some way of doing so during the course of this evening, it really would be best for both of them, Hilary decided, if she were to ask for a transfer to Saintsbury.
Molly rapidly recovered her composure. She sat up, and smoothed her hair with dignity. ‘I’m sorry about that,’ she said to her guest, smiling the apology. ‘I know it’s silly of me to be upset over Peter’s injuries, when he might so easily have been killed. How we’d have coped with that, as some poor parents have to, I really don’t know … We’ve a lot to be thankful for, haven’t we, Douggie?’ She patted his tweed-clad knee. ‘Let’s have another glass of sherry, dear. After all, we invited Hilary so that she could join us in a small celebration!’
‘So we did,’ said her husband heartily, rising to fetch the bottle.
‘Molly and I have had some very good news,’ he told Hilary as he topped up her glass. ‘I’d have told you about it a couple of weeks ago, but what with one thing and another –’
He retreated towards the electric fire, and fortified himself from his pewter mug. Then he looked directly at Hilary. The underlying guilt was still there in his face, of course; and shame, and unhappiness too. But at the same time there was something that lightened his expression, and made him seem younger – a look almost of wondering pride.
‘It’s just a family matter, really,’ he said. ‘But because you and I, Hilary, spend so much of our working time together, Molly and I wanted you be the first person outside the family to know. Didn’t we, my dear?’
He smiled at his wife. Molly got up eagerly, and stood beside him. She was still a little shaky, but there was no mistaking the expectant happiness in her eyes. There was no mistaking, either, the genuine affection with which Douglas put his arm round her comfortable waist.
‘Thanks to our daughter Jennifer,’ he announced ‘– not to mention her husband Nigel, of course – Molly and I are looking forward to becoming proud grandparents next year. Congratulate us, Hilary!’
Postscript
2 St Mary’s Terrace
Colchester, Essex
1st January
Dear Sergeant Lloyd, Now that Matthew and I have established a permanent address, I am at last writing to thank you for the kindness and consideration you showed me after Jack’s death. I had hoped to be able to thank you in person. But I went straight to Northamptonshire with my parents after leaving hospital, and then found that I couldn’t bear to return to The Mount. My brother and sister-in-law very kindly went to Breckham Market on my behalf to clear the house and arrange for it to be sold.
Matthew and I lived in Colchester before my marriage, and liked the town very much, so we have been fortunate to find this house. It’s small but v. attractive (early Victorian). Both house and garden need a great deal of work, so I shall keep myself busy. Matthew’s school is not too far away, and he has plans to come and visit me at weekends on his motor cycle, when the weather permits. He seems to have matured a great deal during the past month, and has been a tower of strength in many ways.
I miss Jack so much –
He was such an honest, kind man that I still find it incomprehensible that anyone should have wanted to kill him. My solicitor tells me that Miss Bell has been charged – it appears that she killed Jack in revenge for his having run over her drunken brother. (But no doubt you know a great deal more about this than I do.) The most charitable thing I can think is that she must be out of her mind. As if poor Jack would have meant to kill her brother!
One of the things I am hoping to do, when I feel able to socialise again, is to meet and make friends with Jack’s daughters. I’ve written to them, but they haven’t so far replied. This is understandable, I suppose. I’m sure they must have loved their father, and so naturally they would have been upset by their parents’ divorce. I expect they think of me as the Other Woman and want nothing to do with me, and I would like to try to make amends.
I was astonished to find that Jack had left me absolutely everything in his will. A great deal of money, far more than I shall ever need. Dear Jack – we were so ab
sorbed in each other that I can only suppose he temporarily overlooked the existence of his daughters. Knowing his generosity, I can’t for one moment think that he intended to disinherit them. I know that he settled money on them when he was divorced, but I’m quite sure that had he lived he would have topped this up at intervals throughout their lives. So I’ve arranged with my solicitor for fair portions of their father’s estate to be made over to Sharon and Tracey as soon as possible, as Jack would have wished.
I mention this to you because I believe you have met the girls – you told me, when you came to see me in hospital, that you intended to visit them. So, in a way, you know more about Jack’s past life than I do! And you are one of the few people who saw us living so happily together in our lovely house at Breckham Market. This is – forgive me – my reason for writing to you at such length. Until I meet the rest of his family, you are really the only person I can talk to about Jack. And I miss him so much.
Sadly, my parents took an immediate dislike to him and refused to believe that we truly loved each other. How wrong they were! In face of their unspoken relief that my marriage was so short-lived, it has been a great comfort to me to recall that you are a witness to the happiness we shared.
With all good wishes.
Yours very sincerely,
Felicity Goodrum
Copyright
First published in 1987 by Constable
This edition published 2012 by Bello an imprint of Pan Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited Pan Macmillan, 20 New Wharf Road, London N1 9RR Basingstoke and Oxford Associated companies throughout the world
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Copyright © Sheila Radley, 1987
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Who Saw Him Die? Page 23
