The Murder of Graham Catton

by Katie Lowe

  She turns to me, enormous designer sunglasses blinding in the sunlight. Still, I can see, in her appraising scan, swift and brutally efficient, that she’s already determined my worth, and found me wanting. She turns back to Darren. ‘I was hoping to talk to you about Lucie. She says she’s making progress, but … well, look at her.’

  I almost laugh. This girl – ‘Sophie Wexworth’, her visitor’s badge reads – addressing Darren with such open dislike … I can’t help it. I’m already rooting for her in this fight.

  ‘I assure you,’ Darren says, with a toady smile, ‘your sister is getting the very best clinical care. But if your family has concerns, I’m sure you understand that this is a conversation it would be more appropriate for me to have with your parents.’

  ‘My family don’t.’ Her voice is clipped, sharp. ‘But I do. She’s been here for two months, and I don’t see her getting any better. I think, if anything, she’s getting worse.’

  A pinch of red appears on each of Darren’s cheeks. ‘Ms Wexworth—’

  ‘I just feel like you’re not giving her the attention she needs. Every time I visit she’s just there, sitting in front of the TV, or staring into space with her headphones on. I’ve been here every week and it’s the same each time. I don’t see how that’s progress.’

  ‘It’s rather more complicated than that.’ He’s ruffled, his tone sharp through a clenched jaw. ‘I don’t think you quite grasp the complexity of your sister’s illness, or the time it takes to treat it.’

  She purses her lips. When she looks at me again, I’m struck by the force of it. ‘What did you say your name was?’

  ‘Dr Catton.’ I extend a hand. ‘Hannah Catton.’

  She takes it, and smiles. ‘Are you better than whoever’s looking after her at the moment?’

  I laugh. ‘I don’t think—’

  ‘Dr Catton is very good,’ Darren says, coldly. ‘Just like every other member of staff we have working here. But we have a process that we follow to make sure every client is allocated the most appropriate therapist for their care, and—’

  ‘Well, her current therapist has done nothing to help her so far. He’s an old man who keeps asking her if she wants to fuck her dad. Allocate Lucie to this one instead.’

  ‘Ms Wexworth, I’m afraid it doesn’t work like—’

  ‘It’s fine,’ I say, the words spilling out before I can contain them. I want this case, now: I want to prove that I can help her. It’s ego, pride swelling out of control – I know that. But knowing doesn’t make it any less true. ‘If Dr Andrews and Lucie’s current doctor are happy for me to do so, then … I’ll meet with Lucie. Fresh eyes, and all that.’

  For a moment, no one speaks. Sophie smiles.

  ‘I’ll have to discuss this with her current care team,’ Darren says. ‘But if they’re fine with it, then …’

  ‘Great.’ She pushes the door open. ‘Thank you.’ She disappears before either of us can say another word.

  Darren turns to me, and my confidence evaporates. ‘Good luck with that.’ His tone is withering. ‘For the record, in this clinic, we don’t undermine our fellow clinicians. And we don’t take on cases based purely on misguided hubris.’

  ‘I wasn’t—’

  He raises a palm. ‘Hannah – don’t. I don’t want to hear it.’ He looks back at Sophie, taking a seat beside a girl with thick brown curls. ‘You know, she’s a mad little cunt, that one. You probably deserve each other.’

  ‘Darren, come on—’

  ‘If you want her, have her. Just … go back to work.’

  He turns and walks away. I walk back across the gardens, the eyes of the patients – the clients – fixed on me. I’m betrayed by the tears I try to blink away; by the shaking of my hands, clenched in fists. Only the Wexworths do me the kindness of not watching as I pass. They’re absorbed in conversation, Lucie listening, rapt, as Sophie tells her what she’s done.

  29

  Derbyshire, 2018

  ‘Whoa, whoa – hang on a minute.’ The rapid click of footsteps trail me, the soft gasp of the doors opening behind. ‘Where do you think you’re going?’

  I turn, stuffing my swollen hand into my pocket. ‘Sarah, I can’t – I …’

  My voice cracks. In the absence of a text after the last episode, I’d begun to assume the worst. That she’d given up on me. That she, too, had been convinced of my guilt.

  But it’s fine. She still believes me. Nothing’s changed.

  I shake my head, and resettle my bag on my shoulder. ‘I’m sorry. I just …’ Another frisson of anger runs through me. ‘That fucking bitch.’

  ‘Jesus, Hannah.’ She glances around the empty corridor, scouring for open doors, bored patients listening, eagerly, for some interruption to their day. ‘Not here. Do you want to get a coffee, or …?’

  ‘No. I’m fine. I just … Would you mind if I took the day off? It’s all starting to get in my head a bit. I just need some space.’

  ‘Is this because of Mrs Barker?’

  ‘Got it in one.’ A hot swell of tears rises, filling my throat. ‘She wants to know how you – not just you, in fact, but the NHS as a whole – can justify letting an accused murderer work with her daughter. She’s probably beating down your office door as we speak.’

  ‘Oh, bollocks.’ She’s trying for flippancy, but there’s a flicker of something else in her expression. No doubt she’s already trying to work out how to solve the issue; what she’ll have to say, the promises she’ll have to make, to calm Mrs Barker down. ‘Well, in that case – yeah. Go home, sleep it off. I’ll sort it. I’ll call you later, OK?’

  I nod, with a weak smile of thanks. ‘I’m so sorry,’ I say, again, as the doors whoosh closed.

  She shakes her head, and says nothing.

  And all at once, my confidence fades. Something has changed, I realize.

  She believed me – once. But now, she’s not so sure.

  I pause as I see the black bonnet of the car on the driveway, and the figure inside: head bowed, her long, dark hair glossy in the bright screen of her phone.

  It’s Darcy. Outside my house. She looks up, and throws the phone on to the seat beside her as I pull in and climb out.

  ‘I’m so sorry.’ There’s a glimmer of tears in her eyes. ‘I didn’t want to ambush you, but … I came to drop some papers off, and then I saw what had happened, and … I just imagined how you’d feel if you arrived home to that, on your own.’

  My heart leaps against my ribcage. ‘To what?’

  She gestures to the cottage, and my gaze follows. Across the windows, the door, and the garage, the red streaks look like blood.

  MURDERER, the words say. WHORE.

  My legs buckle. I feel Darcy’s hands gripping my arms as she steers me into the front seat of her car. ‘There you go – there. It’s all right. It’s fine. Take a deep breath, now.’

  I ball my hands into fists, my swollen fingers sparking with the pain. ‘I can’t do this.’

  ‘Shhh,’ she says, running a hand through my hair as she crouches beside me. ‘You can. You’re OK. I’ve just been reading about how to get it off, so if you give me your keys and tell me where your scourers are, I can make a start.’

  ‘It’s fine. I’ll …’ I take a long, shuddering inhale. ‘Thank you. You’re so sweet to offer, but … I’ll sort it.’

  She reaches over me, into the glove box, and pulls out a crumpled cigarette packet. ‘Do you mind if I …?’

  I shake my head. ‘No.’ She teases one from the pack. ‘Actually, would you mind if I …?’

  She hands the open packet to me. ‘I didn’t think you smoked.’

  ‘I used to, but …’ I trail off. I can’t explain. Not now.

  She lights my cigarette, first, then hers. ‘Well, if there were ever a situation that demanded it …’ She scans my face. ‘Has this happened before?’

  ‘No. But …’ I think of the newspaper headlines, of Graham’s affair; of Mrs Barker’s vicious grin. Of Am
y’s disappointment in me; Sarah’s too. ‘Since the last episode, everything seems to have … spiralled. I knew it would be bad, but …’

  She sighs. ‘I did listen to it.’ She catches the expression on my face. ‘Oh, don’t worry. I think it’s absolute trash. You really should talk to a solicitor, you know. It seems to me like they’re skirting the libel laws pretty closely.’ She flicks the ash from her cigarette. ‘You’re sure you don’t want me to help you clean up?’

  ‘No, don’t worry.’ I’m suddenly aware of myself, sitting in Darcy’s car, smoking her cigarettes, taking up her time. ‘I’m sorry. Thank you for being so sweet, though.’

  ‘It’s fine, really.’ She pauses. ‘This is a bit of an awkward segue, but … I actually did come here for a reason.’

  I feel a jolt of anxiety, like a reflex. I look for some cause for concern in her expression, but there’s nothing there.

  ‘You said about your gran staying at Hawkwood – Margot, right?’

  I nod. ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Look behind you.’

  I glance into the rear-view mirror, and I see it. One of the archive’s cardboard boxes, overstuffed with pages. ‘I found her files,’ she says. ‘I haven’t read them – honestly, I’m not sure you’re going to be able to make them out without an interpreter, the handwriting’s so bad, but … they’re yours if you want them.’

  ‘Oh my God, Darcy …’

  ‘Don’t. It is the least I could do. You saved my life, after all.’ There’s a joke in her tone here, but she squeezes my arm, tenderly. I feel a rush of gratitude for it; for her.

  ‘Well, thank you. I do appreciate it. Everything, in fact. You’ve been so … lovely.’

  She stands, groaning for effect. ‘You give me far too much credit. This is all part of my grand plan to lure you away from the NHS. Come on.’

  She pulls open the back door as I sit, for a moment, stunned. ‘Darcy …’

  ‘I’m not going to press you on it right now. Just … planting a seed,’ she says, with a wink. Her eyes catch on my bandaged hand. ‘Oof … what have you done to yourself?’

  I feel my cheeks flush at the memory of it: my momentary loss of control. ‘Oh, I … I lost a fight with the car door.’

  ‘You really are having a week of it, aren’t you?’

  ‘You could say that, yeah.’

  ‘Well, look – open up and I’ll carry these in for you, so you don’t do any more damage.’

  An acute shame nips at me, imagining Darcy’s eyes scanning the cottage’s smallness, its constant mess. I remember the same feeling as a student, Graham suggesting we visit my home town one empty weekend. The tired streets and weary suburbs that had once been home seemed, now, horribly grim – and I felt myself lessened in his eyes, by association. We never spoke of the trip again, once we returned to the democratizing uniformity of our student halls, where it was easier for both of us to pretend we were equals, in everything.

  Still, there’s no avoiding it now. ‘You’ll have to excuse the mess – everything’s a bit mad at the moment.’

  She follows me inside, while I kick Evie’s discarded football boots out of her path. ‘Oh wow,’ she says. ‘It’s adorable. Like a proper home.’

  I laugh. ‘That’s one way of putting it.’

  She slides the box on to the kitchen table, her eyes scanning the room: the rack of drying clothes, the breakfast dishes still filling the sink. ‘I mean it. It’s so, so lovely.’

  There’s no trace of a lie in her tone; it doesn’t seem, at least, like mere politeness. I remember her saying, at Hawkwood House, about her mother’s tales of ‘ghosts passing through’; about her family’s wealth, mentioned flippantly, taken for granted. I wonder if all that makes her envy this: the cottage’s lived-in cosiness, the way it really feels like home.

  ‘Do you want to stay for a bit? I could put the kettle on …’

  She seems to consider it, briefly. ‘I would love to, but … I’ve got to get back. I’ve got a meeting at my hotel in …’ She glances at the kitchen clock. ‘Oh – thirty minutes. And it’s forty-five away.’

  ‘Oh, God, that’s my fault. I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Ah, they’ll wait. That’s the perk of holding the purse strings, I guess.’ She turns to leave. ‘You’re sure you’re OK?’

  ‘I’m fine. Really. But thank you.’ I follow her to the door. ‘Where are you staying, anyway?’

  ‘The Blakemore. Which I’m aware is a ludicrous expense, but … I started out in a Travelodge, and after a week I thought I was losing my mind.’

  ‘I don’t blame you,’ I say, and I mean it. I feel the dingy hotel carpets under my feet, my dead husband’s ghost on the foldaway bed. And another memory too – not quite a memory, but a thing I’ve vividly imagined: a bloodied hand hanging over the rim of a cheap hotel bath.

  The thought of it destabilizes me. I force a smile. ‘Well, have a good meeting. And thank you again.’

  She leans in and enfolds me in a hug. ‘If you need anything – call me, won’t you? Don’t suffer in silence.’ She slips back into the car, and waves into the wing mirror before driving away.

  I glance again at the words on the windows, the door: MURDERER. WHORE.

  I step inside, the slam of the door echoing behind me.

  30

  It’s not quite dark, the sky a deep, low blue outside. Graham called it ‘the gloaming’, once, and I’ve resented him for it ever since. Because now, every time the sky’s like this, he’s there in the shadows, a reminder.

  I push the bathroom window open, the steam billowing through the crack. The cool air blows goosebumps over my skin, and I pull the towel more tightly around me. For all my scrubbing, the curves of the nails of my good hand are still dyed bright red; tiny chips of paint are scattered across the white shower floor.

  I hear footsteps outside, the comforting sounds of Dan and Evie coming home. The graffiti is gone, and their chatter sounds normal, though I can’t make out the words. Dan knows that it happened – I needed him to know, for my own sanity – but as far as Evie’s aware, everything is fine.

  I hear – not hear, exactly, but feel – a laugh, beside me. As though I’m being silly, fooling myself.

  And maybe I am.

  ‘Hi guys,’ I call, brightly. ‘I’m up here.’

  As I enter our bedroom, I see him on the bed, elbows resting on his knees. The hairs on the back of my neck prickle as Dan looks up at me.

  ‘Oh my God. I thought you were downstairs.’

  He raises both palms. ‘Sorry. I thought you might want a chat.’

  My eyes catch on the knife, still gleaming on the bedside table. And in spite of everything, I laugh.

  He looks at me, blankly. ‘What?’

  ‘Just … I have had the most unbelievably bad day, and …’ I gesture to the table. ‘I swear to God, Dan, I was using that to get the graffiti off the window. I had it in my hand when I came up to shower, and …’ Another laugh ripples through me. I feel hysterical, as though I’m losing it. It’s just so ridiculous. ‘I realize exactly how it looks.’

  He looks at it, and there’s a brief pause that feels like an eternity as he puts the pieces together. He turns to me, and offers a laugh. It’s not quite genuine, but it’s enough.

  ‘You actually … Well, you have an alibi for that.’ He hands me his phone, and I blink at it, for a moment. The cottage – our cottage – blurs into view, the red paint still streaked across the windows. My figure, reaching upwards, a slip of exposed skin at the top of my jeans, scraping at the word WHORE with a kitchen knife.

  I’d been alone, then. I’d been sure of it.

  I’d let myself relax.

  It was a slip; a mistake.

  ‘Who sent you this?’

  ‘It’s on Twitter. I don’t know who took it, but Conviction is sharing it everywhere.’

  My heart clenches like a fist. ‘So Evie’s seen it?’

  He nods. ‘She’s fine, though. I told her I spoke to Will, so
—’

  ‘You did?’ I feel my heart stutter, again. Will is the village’s only resident police officer, a friend of Dan’s from school. Dan had told me he’d speak to him about it, when I called; I’d sent him the photos to share. And yet, there’s something about the idea of the two of them talking, now, that makes my blood run cold.

  ‘Yeah. Obviously there’s not much they can do, but … he’s going to keep an eye out, make a report – the usual.’

  I look at the photo again. I zoom in. Reflected in the glass, my expression is one of cold fury. I’d seen it, while I’d been working, and found it unsettling: I was her, my grandmother, again. But then, I’d thought myself unobserved. There was no reason to hide how I felt; no one around I had to protect.

  ‘How do they even … How do they know where we live?’

  ‘You’d be surprised what people can dig up if they’ve a mind to. All anyone would really need is an old photo of one of us with something in the background that they can identify. The church, maybe. Google will give them the rest.’

  The fear I’ve felt for weeks sharpens; the anonymous mass of strangers online turns suddenly – terribly – real. Any one of them could be outside the cottage right now.

  He seems to see this in my expression. ‘Come here.’

  I look at him. ‘What?’

  He pats the bed beside him.

  I sit, and he wraps his arm around my shoulders. I breathe in the smell of him, sour sweat muffled by powdery deodorant. My wet hair drizzles on his skin, warm water turning cool.

  ‘What did you do to your hand?’ His words are muffled by my hair.

  I try to remember the myth: the story of the man damned by his third lie. I wonder if I ought to tell the truth. That my ex-husband’s mistress made me do it in a fit of rage. That I’ve been grateful for the pain all day, luxuriating in it with the zeal of a martyr. But I don’t. ‘I caught it in the car door. I’m such an idiot.’

  He takes the hand, gently, in his. Without the bandages, it’s swollen to an ugly blue-black, my fingers pale and cold. They remind me of Graham’s, hanging limply by the edge of our bed.