Hidden Power

by Judith Cutler

  ‘Well?’ she greeted him icily when he at last came downstairs.

  ‘Well what?’

  She pointed.

  ‘Shit!’ He picked up the fag end, and crushed it into the sink.

  Great. ‘It’d be better flushed down the loo, I’d have thought,’ she said. He retrieved the by now soggy mess and sloped off.

  She waited. There was nothing to be gained by laying into him as she wanted—not until whatever he’d put into his bloodstream was completely out again. Then they might have a rational conversation. Meanwhile, she had to eat, and there was some salad left in the fridge. Enough for two? Who the hell cared! As for his portion of stir-fry, that had better join the fag end in the sewerage system.

  The afternoon was fine enough for her to continue her explorations of Dartmoor. First she went to Tesco, where she bought tights and, planning another attack on Vernon’s computer, a special anti-static duster for TVs and computers. She also picked up fifty pounds in cash. Then she headed out again. This time she picked her way north on the A382: an A road, this steep and narrow? The Midlands road network must have spoiled her. At last, needing a loo, she pulled into a car park in Moretonhampstead. Whether it was the wind or the light, up here it felt quite autumnal. Perhaps she should turn round and go straight back. But she might as well see the place first, even buy something from one of the village shops. That was what she and Craig ought to be doing: buying local, not diving into Tesco for every last morsel. Except that was what Kates and Craigs did. Today, though, she’d pick up local cheese and a couple of bunches of wallflowers ready for planting. And then a sign to a second-hand bookshop summoned her: almost anything would be better than those gossip magazines. What would Kate Potter buy? How about a selection of crime and romance? A couple of Mary Wesleys? Yes. More interestingly, the bookshop also doubled as a pottery outlet. She could smell wet clay, so presumably it was made on the premises. And nice stuff it was too highly individual, but reminding her in shape and texture of the Ruskin Rod lusted after. OK, Potter wouldn’t have bought it, but Power couldn’t resist a vase some ten inches high, crystalline blue-mauves merging into a cream background. The potter knocked a couple of quid off for cash, too. She’d ride home extra carefully: the vase must reach the sanctuary of her wardrobe. Then she could give it to Rod this weekend.

  Except she wouldn’t be able to. Almost as if someone had punched her stomach, she knew he wouldn’t make it. Something would crop up, if it hadn’t already. He’d be stuck on a messy case.

  The potter, clay still grey under his fingernails, looked at her under bushy eyebrows: ‘You all right there?’

  She managed a smile. ‘Someone just walked over my grave.’

  He nodded seriously. ‘Watch yourself on the way home. People think these roads are racetracks, come rush hour.’

  Rush hour Here? But he meant the commuters zapping home from Exeter and Newton to their desirable country dwellings, didn’t he And he was right to warn her. Suddenly her bike had become invisible, its red paint merging with hedge or tarmac Give her the M6 any day at least she dealt with that with the full-body armour of a car.

  The call she knew was due came through at ten thirty. She took it in the kitchen A vagrant had been kicked to death in Cotteridge.

  Rod sounded as upset as she felt. ‘I just can’t leave everything to the squad. Oh, I know technically I could, but—Oh, Kate, I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Of course you must be there. I do understand. I promise you I do. There’s next weekend. But keep in touch Please.’

  ‘Of course I will I spend all day wondering when it’ll be OK to call you Kate’ The tone of his voice said far, more than any, words. ‘And I worry about you. Undercover’s never easy. I’ve tried to pick Sue’s brain, by the way, but she’s very cagey. So do take extra care. Especially with that bugger as your partner.’

  She responded in kind. ‘You mustn’t worry about me. It’s all very quiet and normal. The only espionage has involved the theft of a memo about office plants.’

  ‘Office plants!’

  ‘Drugs, do you think?’ No, she mustn’t pour out her frustrations and irritations. She must sound positive. Except it was hard to sound positive when you were telling someone how much you missed them but they mustn’t shirk at their end.

  Craig pretended to vomit in the waste-basket. ‘God, all that bloody billing and cooing. Turns your fucking stomach.’

  She should come up with some riposte. Put him in his place. But nothing came to mind. She turned to leave the room.

  ‘Your bloke pulled the plug on this weekend? Can’t blame him. God, it must be like fucking a bloody hedgehog, you’re so bloody prickly. There must be fucking loads of eager beaver if you’re a Super. I might try for promotion myself.’

  ‘That’d be a good idea. A spot of study would be good for you: better than sitting on your arse smoking pot.’ She shut the door quietly behind her.

  ‘Kate!’ Gary Vernon greeted her on Friday morning, as if genuinely pleased to see her. ‘Any more computer tricks you could teach me?’

  ‘Oh, I never was an expert,’ she demurred, fingering the duster she’d bought. ‘Not a geek. Never even finished my CLAITS course.’

  ‘Of course: your wrist. What’s the problem? You’re looking a bit down.’

  Was she? Hardly surprising, given the amount of sleep she’d had: her disappointment over Rod apart, Craig had seen fit to make as much noise as he could, slamming out late, slamming back in even later, and using the bathroom and bedroom doors as percussion instruments. She would tell him a half-truth. ‘Shows that much, does it? Sorry, Mr Vernon, you don’t want a miserable face in your office Always leave your troubles at home, that’s what my gran used to say.’

  She applied herself to the windowsill.

  ‘What’s the problem?’

  To think she’d once thought him a mean bastard. ‘The usual: my Craig Supposed to be going out tomorrow we were, only now he’s gone and fixed something with his mates. So Cinders won’t be going to the ball If,’ she added, managing a rueful grin as she moved the remaining pot plants, ‘you can call a disco in Paignton a ball. Goodness, is that fern still in the loo? It’ll have drowned, poor thing—I’d better get it.’

  The soaking had done it good: that much was clear. She pulled off the dead foliage, popped it back in its pot, and took it back to the office. ‘There. Not out of the wood yet, but we might save it. And the others: they’re not so bad, are they? I suppose your budget doesn’t run to some Baby-Bio or Phostrogen?’

  He laughed. ‘Petty cash might. Come back at the end of your stint: I’ll see what I can do. If you can postpone your swim, that is?’

  There was no one in Vernon’s room, but the computer was still switched on. Another chance. Grabbing her duster, she clicked the mouse. More stuff about office plants. Yes!

  ‘Kate! What the hell—!’

  ‘Oh, you didn’t half make me jump, Mr Vernon.’ She flourished the anti-static cloth. ‘Only I was giving your computer a bit of a clean. There. Better?’ Despite her smile, she was shaking. Thank God for a bit of forethought.

  He clicked irritably to clear the screen. ‘Dirt or no dirt, you must wait till the computer’s off. It’s all confidential, woman.’

  ‘I’m sorry. But I saw these cloths in Tesco and thought of you straightaway. And the Betterware lady says she’s got special little brushes for cleaning keyboards.’

  ‘Hmph. So long as you use your sense. Damn it, you could—you might wipe stuff if you start messing!’

  Yes, she’d rattled him. She must be more careful. But that would mean standing still. And the sooner she made progress, the sooner she’d be back with Rod.

  ‘The point is—’ he started. But the phone interrupted him.

  So as not to appear to be listening, and to maintain her image, she fished another cloth from her pocket, and attacked the tops of some books, taking care to put everything back in order. And to listen carefully, especially as she was almost cer
tainly the topic of conversation. Extra weekend hours? A real bonus on so many counts: the money to pay off her credit card, time away from Newton Abbot and a chance to grab more information. But then she froze.

  ‘After all, she’ll be a familiar face,’ Vernon said, as if to clinch the matter. It took seconds for common sense to click in. The voice at the other end was a woman’s: his wife’s? So what was he suggesting?

  ‘OK,’ he said, terminating the call with nothing more affectionate word-wise than, ‘talk to you later.’ But the way his face softened confirmed it. He turned to Kate, laughing. ‘You and that duster really are inseparable, aren’t you? Look—am I right in thinking you’re really at a loose end this weekend? Because—well, I wouldn’t have asked you except—you know…’

  ‘The weekend shift, Mr Vernon?’

  ‘Oh, no. That’s all dealt with-by the agency. No, my wife and I were wondering if you’d consider baby-sitting our kids. She’s ever so keen on music and we’ve been offered tickets for some concert in Exeter Cathedral. So it wouldn’t be a late finish—no after midnight bonus, I’m afraid!’

  ‘A couple or three hours would suit me grand, Mr Vernon. So long as they wouldn’t mind: they’re not exactly babies, are they?’

  ‘Needs must when the devil—no, sorry. Didn’t mean it like that. Like I said to my wife, they’ve seen you before.’

  ‘Only in the c—the sweets aisle.’ Hell, she’d nearly said confectionery. ‘But they were nice: no doubt about that. And ever so well behaved.’

  ‘Five quid an hour! For farting round all evening in someone’s cosy little house. Bloody hell.’ Craig fished a glass from the kitchen cupboard and poured himself the rest of what should have been tomorrow breakfast’s fruit juice.

  ‘Depends how vile the kids are,’ Kate said, as off-hand as she could make it, adding juice to the shopping list she was scribbling on the back of an envelope.

  ‘Suppose I came too: I could give the place a right going over while you sort the kids.’

  She turned to him, arms akimbo. ‘Forgotten part of the plot, have we? You’re supposed to be having a night out with the lads, remember. That’s why I’m free on my precious Saturday—and after you’d promised to take me to a disco and all.’

  ‘For fuck’s sake, I change my mind, don’t I?’

  God, was there nothing between his ears? ‘And the story that we’re off each other—the one I’ve carefully been nurturing at work? No, Craig isn’t going to turn up to keep Kate company: he’d be more likely to go to the disco on his own and pick someone up.’

  ‘You know, I just might. I just might.’ Either he was a superb actor or he really thought he might make her jealous.

  ‘Fine. So long as you remember all the story, even when you’ve got a headful of pot.’

  ‘We could do three in a bed, you and whatever cunt I pick up,’ he sniggered. ‘After all, that bloke of yours’ll be on the town himself, won’t he, looking for a quick shag? Lot of talent in Brum, is there? Three in a bed himself, most likely.’

  The thought of Rod propped up against a noisy bar eyeing up the talent at a disco! She suppressed a smile. And if Rod ever wanted three in a bed, she had an idea the third wouldn’t be a girl from a club: it would be her, him and a good book.

  ‘No, he wouldn’t need to pick anyone up, would he? He’d find some other WPC looking for easy promotion,’ he pursued. ‘Do you have to do it in black stockings? Or handcuffs?’ He came to stand over her, leering.

  She took a pace back, but only to look him up and down. ‘Don’t judge others by yourself, Craig. He doesn’t need silly gear to turn him on.’

  ‘What are you implying?’ Time to exit.

  As she closed the kitchen door behind her, she permitted herself a loudly muttered, ‘Silly little prick.’ Let him take it how he would. With all this wonderful countryside around them, why should the Vernons have chosen to live in suburbia? Oh, it was very nice, Exeter-type suburbia, but the only views were of other houses, back and front. And Exeter wasn’t all that convenient for Cockwood, either: he could have got a house like this within walking distance, almost, just down the coast in Starcross. The village even boasted its own railway station, and had a ferry across to Exmouth. But no, he’d chosen to live perilously close to Exeter Crematorium. Perhaps it was to do with the location of good schools: that was what seemed to preoccupy most of her colleagues when they bought houses. Well, if—and it was a big if, still, of course —if anything ever developed between her and Rod, then maybe they should consider her house: you couldn’t be much better placed in a school’s catchment area than she was, just fifteen yards from Worksop Road Junior School. But she couldn’t imagine Rod being torn from his present, elegant abode for the doubtful pleasures of morning and afternoon parent-induced traffic chaos.

  She locked her bike, and chained it to the only vertical thing she could see—a drainpipe. Removing from her pannier her spoils from a morning rooting in charity shops in Teignmouth, she presented herself at the front door, punctual—thanks to ten minutes’ bird watching out on the Exe estuary at Powderham—to the minute. Early baby-sitters must be nearly as big a pain as late ones, if you were flapping round half-dressed, half-made-up, and trying to explain where everything was.

  The Vernons, at least, seemed quite ready. Mrs Vernon—Julie—was taut about the mouth when she opened the door, but relaxed into a friendly, if relieved, smile. Kate stepped into a square hall: perhaps the house was more spacious than it looked.

  Gary Vernon, emerging from a downstairs loo, smiled too. ‘Elly? Peter? Here’s Kate!’ He stepped to close the front door behind her. ‘Now, we’ve made a list of where everything is, and this is my mobile number—of course I can’t have it on during the concert but I’ll switch it on in the interval. Elly knows it anyway. And it’s programmed into her phone. Imagine, a kid of nine having a phone… Anyway, I’ve left the answerphone on, you see.’

  ‘Just like at work,’ she agreed. ‘So I can dial out—not that I’d need to, I’m sure.’

  ‘Yes. But not take incoming calls.’

  ‘No problem there, either. Now, what time did you expect to be back? Just so I can have a good old worry if you’re late.’

  ‘Oh, by ten. Unless we decide to go on the razzle: that’s up to Julie.’—‘So how will I know? If the answerphone’s on?’

  ‘Have you got a mobile?’

  She shook her head. ‘You could leave the machine off and I could take messages?’ Or she could phone him at nine thirty, but she wasn’t about to suggest that.

  ‘No.’ Surely his response was far too swift. He smiled as if to correct himself: ‘You’d never hear the phone, the racket the kids can make. No, if we’re not here by ten, assume you won’t see us till midnight.’ He might almost have been issuing an invitation to search the place. It was one she’d be most discreet in accepting.

  Chapter 12

  ‘There’s never anything worth watching on TV on a Saturday night,’ Elly declared. She’d make a wonderful headmistress one day. Or even a Thatcherian Prime Minister. ‘Nothing but football and stuff about war.’

  ‘That’s why I brought this along,’ Kate said, producing her carrier bag of cheap goodies.

  Peter, who’d been messing with some collapsible car—pressed in the right places it became some fearsome robot—perked up. ‘Sweets and things?’

  ‘I thought you might have had enough sweets—didn’t your dad treat you in Tesco the other day? No, this is something quite different: you may never have seen anything like it before.’ She dipped in and came up with a battered flat cardboard box.

  ‘Oh, is it magic? Like Harry Potter?’

  ‘No. Not magic. But you might enjoy it anyway.’

  Peter grabbed it.

  Elly barked, ‘Be careful!’

  ‘Yes: we don’t want to lose anything. And you’ll need this board too. It’s a game. From the days before all your games were on computer.’

  ‘Funny writing,’ Elly remarked,
opening it.

  ‘What’s it say?’ Peter demanded.

  ‘“Sorry”, silly!’

  ‘What are you sorry for?’

  ‘It’s the name of the game,’ Kate intervened. ‘The game’s called “Sorry”! What you have to do it this…’

  The kids took only minutes to grasp the principle: all they had to do was to get all four little wooden pieces out of an oblong marked ‘Start’ and into another marked ‘Home’. There were cards instead of dice They were frayed and greasy with age, and hard to shuffle, but the typeface had its own-charm. Soon the children (and Kate) were sliding and knocking each other’s pieces off squares and sending them back to Start with noisy abandon. What Kate insisted on was what Aunt Cassie had insisted on, all those years ago: the courtesy of saying ‘Sony’, however gleeful you might feel.

  It was after eight when they surfaced, Kate realising that is was long past the time the children should have had their snack—pure fruit juice, and an assortment of nibbles. It was also close to Peter’s bedtime. He’d never settle to sleep if he was as excited as this, blowing bubbles with his juice straw and trying to shove crisps down Elly’s neck.

  ‘Right,’ Kate said carefully, ‘we can have one more game—with only two men each, not four. And then a story. Or no more “Sorry” and two stories. Which is it to be?’

  She’d expected bickering and got it. The carrier bag again. This time she produced another find, a book so old it must surely have been undervalued at fifty pence. It took her straight back to her childhood, right back in the earliest days. Her own copy of the book must have been lost or given away: her mother had had the instinct of generosity, but at other people’s expense, especially Kate’s. Old toys and books, put aside till the next day off school with a cold, simply disappeared. They might be mourned, loudly, genuinely, but they had gone, probably, given her mother’s passion for the minister, to the church jumble. Kate reeled: all that from a tatty copy of Milly-Molly-Mandy.