by Adam Baron
‘So,’ she said. Bright and bitter. ‘What do you think?’
‘About…?’
‘Jack. The police are pretty certain, I could tell. Yesterday they went through this place like a bunch of archaeologists. And they were all so amazingly nice to me. The poor little wifey. I know he went there, you know? That night. He told me.’
I nodded, slowly. ‘I know that too.’
‘But did he – ‘ she found it hard to say it, and she took a sharp breath – ‘did he kill her? Did he, Mr Rucker? Did…did the man I married kill someone? Kill them with a knife, like that? I didn’t want to ask the police. I didn’t want to say anything.’
‘What do you think?’
Her eyes had been wide open to me, but now they withdrew, like a schoolgirl being asked why her homework was late. ‘I don’t know.’ She shook her head, looking down at her lap. ‘He’s never been violent, he’s never hit me, anything like that. Not all footballers’ wives can say that. Believe me. But what if he had? What would that show? I keep telling myself that of course he couldn’t have done it, and then it dawns on me yet again that that’s what every wife must say. But you’re on the outside. Tell me, honestly, do you think he did it? You must have an opinion.’
I closed my notebook. I couldn’t see any point in lying to her. ‘I did,’ I said. ‘Yes. Now, I don’t know. He would have had to have been pretty quick. But everything points to him. Motive, opportunity, a probable sighting by a police officer. But I can’t know. I’d like to know what the forensics people come up with – and I might be able to find out if I’m lucky. One thing I am sure of is that if he stays in hiding everyone’ll be convinced that he did it. The police, especially. So if you speak to him…’
‘Don’t worry. I told him to give himself up. But he’s never done anything I’ve said. He’s never done anything anyone’s said. And somehow, I don’t think he ever will,’ she added.
Louise hugged her arms together and drew her legs up onto the sofa, tucking them beneath her. She didn’t look any less tense, though. I couldn’t help thinking about Nicky. Nicky had been assaulted, beaten up and left for dead. I hadn’t seen him today but I knew he’d be in a hell of a state when I did. Well, the same thing had happened to Louise Draper. Last week, in spite of the problems she was having, she had been, essentially, fine. Whole. And then her world had come down, knocking her not only sideways but every other direction too, sending fragments of herself spinning off her, fragments she’d never get back. She, too, was being held together by vinegar and brown paper and the signs that she’d been through the mill were as easy to see as the bruises and bandages that adorned my friend.
I turned round to face my new employer and gave her a look that was meant to prepare her for the conversation we now needed to have. She sat very still, staying very attentive to me. Over the next half hour I asked her a lot of questions: how she’d met her husband, whether he had ever been unfaithful to her before, places she thought he might be hiding. I tried to pitch my voice very evenly, lacing it with cotton wool without overstuffing it, keeping my body still and calm. Louise remained tense at first but gradually began to relax, settling into the sofa. It made it easier to focus on her and sometimes, when her answers began to untangle at the ends into strands I couldn’t use, I found that I was doing that rather than listening to her.
On first glance Louise had the body of a teenage girl, but when you looked further you saw the added strength young mothers often display, in the arms and neck, along with a weightier, fuller quality that was all about the way she sat, and moved. My mother had a couple of phrases that would have described her perfectly, better than fit or cute or beautiful or sexy: she was easy to see, my mother would have said. Easy to see or soft on the eyes. I told my eyes to stick to more difficult things. I concentrated on my notebook, focusing on Louise’s voice, backed by the sounds of the street; cars driving past, an occasional siren, a helicopter throbbing heavily in the air. The room took on a deep, sombre quality, matched by the dim grey light. Louise sat opposite me, small and alone.
She told me about the letters she’d received. She spoke of her feelings when she’d seen the mess on her door. She answered my questions methodically, taking her time, weighing her answers so she could be of most help. Even when I asked her things that were obviously painful she seemed to accept that they were things I had to know. After a while I took her through the night of the murder. Jack hadn’t told her about Alison after meeting me in Fred’s. Louise confirmed that she hadn’t argued with him about an affair – she knew nothing about it – but over his inaction concerning the letters she was getting, and the cat’s head.
‘I begged him to go to the police,’ she insisted. ‘I couldn’t understand why he wouldn’t. It drove me mad, so I left him. I was just scared, of being here. Of what might happen next, especially with Tommy in the house. Jack went on about his career, not getting the wrong profile, but it didn’t mean anything to me.’ She gave a short, harsh laugh. ‘Then, when I saw the paper the next day, I knew why he didn’t want anyone following him around.’
Louise told me that she’d spoken to Jack twice since then. He called her at her sister’s in Fulham, later that night, where she’d gone with her child. He’d told her about his affair with Alison.
‘He said how sorry he was. Then he told me he was going to disappear for a while. When I asked him why, why wasn’t he coming over to beg my forgiveness, beg me to have him back, he told me what had happened.’
‘And what was that? According to him?’
‘He said he went round to end it.’ Louise laughed. ‘That he knew it was a mistake. He said he drove over to Hoxton Square, and when he got there she was dead. And he knew they’d think it was him. Everyone would. He knew they’d tie him to her. I was hysterical. Then he just broke the connection and was gone. I couldn’t believe it. It was like a sick dream. Even now it’s hard to believe it. Jack, out there, wanted for murder. Me, in here, those leeches waiting to suck my blood.’
I hadn’t given a thought to the men outside but now I did. Louise disappeared back into her coffee and shivered. I looked up at her and put my notebook down.
‘Were you surprised?’
‘Oh, just a little. I wasn’t exactly expecting my husband to call me in the middle of the night and tell me he’d just found a corpse and was going into hiding…’
‘I mean, surprised – ‘ I took a breath – ‘that he had a mistress?’
‘Oh,’ she said. ‘That. Is that relevant? I mean, to whether he killed her?’
‘No. Not really, I suppose. I’m sorry. I’m just trying to build a picture…’
Louise waved away my concern and gave a long, bitter sigh. ‘No, no, that’s okay. Don’t worry. I don’t even care. Not now. I’ve ceased to understand why women do care actually, after the initial shock. I just feel so totally stupid.’
‘But you weren’t surprised?’
‘No,’ she admitted. Her hand went to her ring once more but she took it away immediately. ‘No. Jack, screwing someone? I mean, I tried to make it seem like it was, to Jack, when he phoned, but I was only going through the motions. It wasn’t a shock.’ She gave that laugh again, metallic and hard. ‘I’ve known Jack a very long time. I’ve never exactly found out before, but I’ve known a couple of times. That’s something you should know, Mr Rucker.’
I tried to smile. ‘Billy, please. If you’re Louise, I’m Billy.’
‘That’s something you should know then, Billy. We can always tell. Always, even when you think you’ve got away with it. We pretend we don’t know, to you, to ourselves. We let you get away with it because it’s too much to face. We don’t want to feel shit about ourselves. But you’re pretty damn transparent, you know. All of you.’
Louise glanced up at me as she said that, a knowing look underlined with something like loathing. There was a silence in the room that hung like a guillotine. Then she laughed, another short, ironic flurry.
‘And the other
reason why I couldn’t really be surprised was that when I met him he was practically engaged. She may have even had a ring, the poor girl. At first it was just sex, for both of us. We saw each other for six months before he broke it off with her. She was devastated apparently, kept calling and calling. I can hardly claim to be surprised that he liked to screw around, when he did a lot of it with me, can I?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘He was still single, wasn’t he? It’s you he chose to marry. I think you could have expected him to be faithful, even if he wasn’t before.’
‘Do you? How old-fashioned.’ She looked at my left hand. ‘You’ll make someone a lovely husband. You know what is ironic, though?’
‘Tell me.’
‘Well, Jack was practically married when I met him, and I didn’t think twice about screwing him five nights a week, even once in their flat. But now I hate that bitch.’
‘Alison.’
‘I hate her. I know I have no right to – it’s almost like a punishment, don’t you think? – but I do. And it’s made worse because she’s dead. I try to imagine what she went through, how scared she must have been, but it doesn’t do any good. I hate her. I hate her for sleeping with my husband and if he killed her I hate her for that too. I hate her for being in my life, for those wankers outside, for the way I feel.’
‘You don’t know what Jack told her. You don’t know what she felt for him. You don’t know enough to blame her.’
‘Who said blame? I don’t blame her and I don’t blame Jack, not really.’
‘Who then?’
‘Me, I suppose. I had ample knowledge of what he was like. And I still married him, didn’t I? So I know enough not to blame her. It’s deeper than that. Maybe only a woman could understand. The woman who had my man. He didn’t want me, you know? Ever since Tommy. My sister says it was because he was there when Tommy was born, and it was a bit gruesome. I thought it was true about strikers and sex because after Tommy was when he started scoring. But it’s not. He was seeing her. Her. I hate her. I see her body, her Page Three body in her leopardskin bikini, and I see it covered in blood, all stabbed and dead and it makes me feel so terrible, and so guilty and so mean. Because I still really hate her.’
I left a moment for Louise to collect herself, the rhythmic snuffles of her baby’s sleeping coming through the monitor the only sound in the room. I didn’t know what to say about the things she was feeling, but I did feel sorry for her. She may have hurt someone once but that didn’t mean she’d asked for any of this. Wanting to get to the end of my questions I asked her about the book Jack was writing. She told me that the only person who knew about it was his agent, so it must have been him who gave it to the Standard. The agent or Jack himself. I asked her why he hadn’t published it before.
‘Jack was waiting,’ Louise said. ‘If his career ended, or if it looked like he was going to be staying in the lower leagues, then he said he’d publish it, he’d take the money. If he carried on, got in a Premiership side, then he wouldn’t. Not until he retired. I was dead against it from the start. I told him not to show it to Jeff—’
‘Jeff?’
‘His agent.’ I remembered his picture, in the Daily Mail. ‘I thought that was why we were getting hassled, because someone had found out what was in Jack’s book. Jeff had let something slip at a party or something. I still think that’s what happened. I never liked Jeff. He’s a flash git. He was always taking Jack to parties, never remembered to ask me. I bet Jack met Alison through him. Other players he looks after have been in the tabloids after having affairs. He’s flash, he takes them out, he doesn’t care what happens to them. If someone did find out about Jack’s book, and tried to shut him up, I bet it was Jeff mouthing it round to publishers that got it out.’
‘Do you have a copy?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘The police took our computer.’
‘Did you ever read it?’
‘Yes. Not that I needed to. I lived through it. The transfers that never came off, the months of misery while he was injured. The people he pissed off. I knew you’d ask. I’ve written a sort of précis for you. You can have it before you go.’
‘Great,’ I said. ‘That’ll be very helpful.’
Louise stood up and walked over to a chest of drawers with a beech veneer, opening the top one and pulling out several sides of A4, torn from a spiral-bound pad. She stood for a second, reading them. An empty delivery van rattled by, silencing a blackbird for a second or two before it piped up again. Louise set the pages down in front of me and sat down again. She ran her right hand down the length of her left arm and waited for my next question. The room was very quiet. I didn’t have anything else to ask. I was about to tell her so, and thank her, when a light squall from the baby monitor took her attention. Louise picked it up. She waited a second then turned it off and set it on the sofa beside her.
Louise didn’t excuse herself, simply standing up and walking to the foot of the stairs. Faintly, from up above, I could hear the child, his plaintiff cries a perfect match for the face turned suddenly towards me. Her small mouth, the slight tremor again. I watched as Louise walked up the stairs, not hurrying, not looking back at me. I watched her feet disappear, listening to her footsteps on the landing.
The child continued to cry for another ten minutes, during which time I sat, telling myself I should wait and say goodbye properly. I wanted to give Louise my number, tell her what to say to Jack if she spoke to him again. I folded the pieces of paper in front of me into my notebook and put it into my bag. Jack’s agent, taking his players to parties, some of them getting into trouble. That was interesting. I wrote his name down in my book and glanced around the room again, this time taking in the framed pictures of Jack in various kits, the trophy cabinet in the corner. It was a pleasant room, but somehow I couldn’t quite see Jack there. I couldn’t actually see him in this house, with this woman. It seemed a little nice, a little homely for him. I laughed. I bet he’d have settled for it now.
After another ten minutes Louise still hadn’t returned though I could tell the baby had settled. There were things I had to do. I looked at my watch and stood, then walked to the foot of the stairs.
There were three doors leading off from the landing. The first was ajar and I took a step towards it. I expected to see a cot, with a mother sat next to it. But I didn’t. The cot sat on its own and all I could hear was the soft breath of a child. I had the impulse to move forward and look down on it but I was stopped by an image of Draper doing the same thing, his big hands resting on the sides of the cot. I backed out onto the landing, my feet creaking on a floorboard, causing the baby to give a short murmur before settling down again.
The door of the second room was open and I stepped across it. The room was at the back of the house and a pale yellow slice of sunlight cut through the space between myself and Louise. Louise was sitting on the side of the bed naked, her clothes in a neat pile beside her. I stopped, dead. I couldn’t move. Louise didn’t look up, though she knew I was there in the doorway. She just carried on brushing her hair, the long tresses falling over her slim, golden shoulders. She’d found a knot, and was pulling at it. Before I could stop them my eyes ran over her like wild horses let out of a trailer. It felt so natural for her to be sitting there. For me to be watching her. I still didn’t move, not wanting to break the spell. A naked girl, pulling a brush through her hair. When she turned her eyes towards me my stomach turned over like a car that won’t start.
There was no expression on her face. She hadn’t been surprised by what she’d done. And neither had I, really. We’d both known, as soon as we’d met. Then later, that look she gave me. There was an instant understanding, a knowledge that while we’d been speaking to each other, using words to communicate, other parts of ourselves had been holding a more subtle conversation. Our bodies had been watching each other, becoming more comfortable. Our voices had lowered. Louise had heard the conversation, and accepted it. I’d pretended not to hear it.
But in the instant that I saw her there I knew I’d accepted it too.
The only sound was the scraping of the brush through Louise’s deep, endless hair. I found myself moving forward. I saw myself taking the brush from her hand, then felt myself kneeling on the bed behind her. I ran the brush through her hair, long, hard strokes, until she shivered and turned into my arms. Our mouths met. She pressed herself against me as though she was freezing to death. I ran my hand down across her back, lifting her arms, kissing the inside of her elbows, folding myself around her. For the briefest of seconds I wondered why I was doing this. An answer began to form but it was washed away before it could take.
She smelled sweet, the same as her baby. Her hands inside my shirt were cold as a running stream. I pulled it over my head and went towards her but she pushed out a hand, holding me away. I thought she’d had second thoughts but instead she lay back, her knees up, and then opened her legs. She rested her hands on the inside of her thighs, her sex open to me.
‘I’m not a psycho,’ she said. ‘I’m not going to harass you, all right? I won’t call you in the night or show up at your flat. I just need you to fuck me, okay?’
* * *
Sometime later I woke, Louise in my arms, our limbs knotted together like fishing wire. The room was a lot darker, a fine sleet whispering at the window. I hadn’t realized how much I’d needed to sleep. Louise must have done too because though I stirred involuntarily her breathing stayed deep and even. Her child did wake her though, and she slipped out of bed and went through to him. I was reaching for my clothes, just about to get up, when she brought him back into the room and fed him, sitting naked in front of me. The light was almost gone. She didn’t speak, just sitting there with her child. She looked so beautiful I didn’t speak either. In the dark like a ghost mother with her child. I wanted to run my mouth over the scar from her Caesarean, but I stayed where I was. Her baby suckled away happily and I had the impulse to stroke his head. I didn’t do that either. When he’d had enough Louise took him back to his cot.
