‘No, it’s real life, Mrs Gadd,’ Cara retorted. Then, as if realising that showing attitude would not win her over, she dropped her shoulders and lowered her voice. ‘There’s stuff going on in this city that would frighten you.’
Paula crossed her arms, realising how defensive it looked. She leaned back against the worktop and said nothing, hoping her expression said ‘convince me’, but she feared instead it betrayed the sick terror of what she might hear.
‘Did anything happen in your life around two years ago? Did anything change? Did your husband start to act a little more strangely?’ Cara asked.
Paula’s lips tightened as the words hit. She felt a hiccup at her throat as if she was releasing a bubble of grief.
‘Can you think of something? Anything?’ asked Cara.
‘Something that would make him go and murder someone?’ Paula demanded, after taking a moment to get her emotions under control. ‘No. Absolutely not.’
‘Were you guys happy at that point?’
Paula drew herself up, tightening her arms around her. ‘Why on earth would I discuss my relationship with my husband with you?’
‘I met a guy.’ Cara looked at Paula and paused as if calculating how best to carry on.
‘You met a guy?’
‘I’m an advocacy worker. I support people … in one o’ the roughest parts of the city.’ She looked around herself. ‘Compared to here, it might as well be on the moon, as opposed to just a couple of miles down the road. Anyway. This guy. His weans were in trouble at school. His wife was refusin’ him access and unlike a lot o’ the wasters around there, he was actually keen to spend time with them.’
‘What has any of that got to do with Thomas? Or with me?’
Cara made a face, as if she was thinking, What a self-centred bitch. But then, to Paula’s surprise, she held out her hand. ‘Please, I’m getting there. But I have to put it into context or you won’t believe me.’
Paula slumped in her seat and shook her head, overtaken by weakness. ‘Okay. Sorry. Please, go on…’
This appeared to mollify Cara somewhat and she offered Paula a smile of truce before continuing. ‘When this guy heard my surname – Connolly – he got all funny. Asked me if I was Sean’s sister. Said he could see the resemblance.’ She bit her lip, as if forcing down a surge of emotion. ‘Then I remembered him, but the drugs had changed him so much I couldn’t match up the man with the boy in my head, you know? Anyway, he told me how it went down. He ran about wi’ Sean for ages. Was in the car that night Chris was run down. And he was there the night Sean was eventually tracked down by Tosh Gadd.’
Paula started at the name: Tosh.
Despite herself, she murmured, ‘His brother called Tom ‘Tosh’ when I first met him.’ She was almost speaking to herself. ‘Apparently that’s what they called him when they were kids.’
She looked up, to see Cara’s eyebrows were raised, her mouth turned down.
But Paula couldn’t have it. ‘Oh, for goodness sake,’ she said, rebelling. ‘What rubbish. An old name, a crackhead and you’re convinced about this unbelievable story? He probably told you all of that to try and win you over, so you’d help him.’
‘He told me all of that after I helped him. I already got him visits with his kids. There was nothing in it for him by then. He was telling me the truth, Mrs Gadd.’
10
‘Bless me Father, for I have sinned.’
‘Paula, there’s no need for you to come to the confessional box.’ She heard the smile in Father Joe’s voice. ‘I’ll do you a home visit.’
‘I’ll have to get one of them voice modifier things so you don’t recognise me next time.’ Then, because this was a regular thing between them, ‘And, anyway, I’m not sure I’d ever get used to confessing to you face to face.’
‘Voice modifier? You’ll sound like that scientist fella, Stephen Hawkeye.’
‘Hawking.’
‘Who’s the Hawkeye guy then?’
‘Isn’t he in those Marvel movies?’
‘Is his first name Stephen?’
Paula smiled despite herself. She knew he was joking. Knew this was Joe trying to help her – to tell her they could still play, that they didn’t have to change their relationship because Thomas was gone. But it all felt like a huge effort to her.
She felt her knees ache on the hard wood of the knee stool. Trust the Catholic Church to make confession physically, as well as mentally, uncomfortable, she thought. She shifted slightly and leaned back to look at the crucifix on the wall above the meshed window through which she and Father Joe were talking.
The silence lengthened between them as Paula wondered what to say. How to say it. She replayed the knowing look on Cara’s face – the one that said, You know something was wrong back then, don’t you? And should she tell him about the phone calls and the computer-hacking incident? She discounted doing that. He had enough on his plate.
‘Too soon?’ Father Joe asked, his voice heavy with sympathy. From his tone, it was as if he wanted nothing more than to move across to her side of the cubicle, rest his chin on the top of her head, allow her to burrow into his chest and share a soothing hug.
‘For humour?’ answered Paula. ‘That was always how you Gadd boys said you loved each other. A round of comedy and cutting insults. I might not be strong enough right now to keep up with the jokes, Joe, but if I ever lose my funny bone, please just put me in a box and tip it into a big hole.’
‘Want anything in the box with you?’
‘A bottle of that fine gin you brought over the other day, and a straw.’
‘The straw will come in handy, you know, when the oxygen starts to be depleted.’
Paula started to cry. Leaned forwards and pressed her forehead against the knuckles of her clasped hands. Through the mesh she heard Joe join her.
‘It’s tough, eh?’ she managed to say.
A sniff. A cough. And then through a tight throat, Joe managed to say, ‘Aye.’ One syllable that wore several octaves.
‘Is it bad that I hate him, Joe? Is it awful that I’m so bloody tired of crying all the time?’
‘Do you hate him, or are you angry with him?’
‘A little of both,’ Paula said without thinking. ‘I’m furious at him for dying. For leaving me here. How silly is that? But there’s something else … something I could hate him for … I heard something today that makes me think my marriage might have been, well, not what I thought it was.’ And Paula was back in the kitchen with Cara, listening to the girl speak, unwilling to take it all in, but nevertheless hearing the truth in the girl’s tone and seeing it in the cast of her eyes, the shape her body made as she spoke. Quick words. Clipped. Each with the power to wound.
‘My husband wasn’t a saint.’ Paula had said to Cara. ‘But that doesn’t make him a gangster.’
‘No, that’s where the intimidation and murder come in.’
Paula read it in the young woman’s eyes: Thomas had killed her brother; she was convinced of it.
‘Don’t listen to gossip, Paula.’ Joe’s voice interrupted her thoughts. ‘That way madness lies.’
‘Maybe I have to get through the madness before I can deal with all of this,’ she replied.
‘Do you want a side of Hail Marys to go with the insanity thing?’
‘Throw in a couple of Our Fathers and it’s a deal.’
And they were both back on a temporary even keel.
Paula stood up and the stool protested at the movement.
‘Hey,’ said Joe. ‘I’ve got a very large frozen pizza that I need to share with someone. Want to join me? Or are you rushing off?’
‘Thanks, Joe, sounds like an offer a lady shouldn’t refuse, but there’s something I need to do.’ She needed to be on her own to consider Cara’s words, and work out if there was any truth in them. The young woman believed them. That certainty was stamped through everything she said. And she hadn’t been accusatory, attacking or bitter. She had been firm a
nd controlled. Genuine. It had moved Paula in a way that vicious words wouldn’t have.
She left the cubicle and walked to the church foyer, her footsteps ringing in the hallowed air like an announcement. Here she comes. Here she comes. Refusing to face the truth.
Other footsteps joined the echo of hers. More rapid. Heavier.
Joe reached her at the door and placed a hand on her arm.
‘Is that it?’ His eyes searched hers. ‘You came all this way to confess you’re angry with Tommy?’
Paula managed to meet his gaze, and thought, you’re far too clever for your own good, Joe Gadd. She debated telling him what she’d learned, but he looked like he needed a few days under his duvet. Or a few weeks. His skin was grey; his eyes looked as if just opening them caused them to ache.
Instead of saying anything more she reached up onto her tiptoes. He read her movement and leaned down, she pressed her lips against the scratch of his cheek.
‘You give yourself a day off, Father Joe,’ she said. Then she shrugged his hand off, pulled the main door open and walked outside to the chill air, blare of traffic and the ache and low drone of her conscience.
He followed her out. ‘Paula,’ he shouted, and caught her before she reached her car. ‘Hey,’ he said, ‘talk to me.’
She rubbed her eyes. ‘If you knew Thomas had been up to no good would you tell me?’
He took a step back towards the church, buried his hands deep in the pockets of his black trousers.
‘Joe?’ she demanded.
‘What?’ he forced himself to look at her.
‘Would you tell me?’
‘I loved my brother, Paula, but I’d be lying if I said he was a saint.’
11
An hour later and Paula was on her knees again. This time she was waist deep among Thomas’s suits, trousers and jackets on the floor of his walk-in closet. She touched the material slowly, lovingly, as if his energy would transmit from them through the whorls of her fingertips, up through the veins of her arms, and take residence in her heart. There. A blue tie with a little yellow fleur-de-lys design, repeated at random intervals. They’d bought it together for a charity event they were attending weeks before Christopher died. Thomas had stood in the changing cubicle wearing suit trousers that were too big, like a little boy waiting for his mother’s approval. She remembered placing the tie against the middle of his chest, judging the light blue of his shirt, tutting that the waist of his trousers was too loose, and catching him rolling his eyes at the salesman, while clearly appreciating her attention.
She ran her forefinger and thumb along the length of the tie, stopping at a worn patch that must have been the top part of the knot that would rest under Thomas’s chin, where his stubble had rubbed the silk.
Oh Thomas, she thought. You were not the man that Cara described to me.
Thinking about the young woman’s claims about him was why Paula was in this closet, among his clothes. She was curious as to what she might find among his stuff. She’d been with him all her life: did she really know him?
And then Father Joe.
I’d be lying if I said he was a saint. What the hell did that mean? He’d refused to expand, spun away from her as if he regretted every syllable and left her there by the kerbside, in silent confusion.
For hours she had tried to stop herself from going down that rabbit-hole. All she had to go on was that crazy woman’s word.
But, what if?
There was that time in the restaurant where Thomas had the poor waiter terrified. The poor wee guy had all but wet himself. Paula had never seen Thomas quite that angry in all her life.
After Christopher’s death, after the funeral, the formal grieving, the time away from work, when family had stopped arriving every day, when it was just her and Thomas, Paula was determined that they would act like a normal couple. Do normal couple things. Honour Christopher’s life in the banal. She had planned to visit the zoo, go to the cinema, go for a walk along the beach at Ettrick Bay in Bute. They had the odd meal, and otherwise Thomas was too busy.
He was always too busy, but that didn’t make him a criminal.
All that hard work – to bring them all these riches. But what else? She heard a laugh. Realised it was coming from her. And this was before she got at the gin. She felt a hit of emotion, and fought it off. She wasn’t going to start crying again. Nope. Not today. She was exhausted by her tears. Surely there were none left.
Thomas and his money. How did he do it? The hard way, with decency and scruples? Or did he bend a few rules? Which to be fair, Paula was prepared to accept.
But her Thomas behaving like – what? A gangster? No, she wouldn’t accept that, not for a moment.
She reached up from her kneeling position and pulled another suit from its hanger. This one was dark grey, with a faint pinstripe, three-piece. The waistcoat had those wee lapels she always felt looked smart; it meant he could take his jacket off if he felt too warm and still look dapper.
Her handsome man.
Before she knew it, she was holding the fine cloth to her face, breathing deeply.
Nothing.
With a note of disappointment, she tried the waistcoat pockets. Nothing. And nothing in the trousers, either. In the jacket pockets were a pen, some paper clips and a couple of paper hankies.
She got to her feet and pulled more suits and trousers down from their hangers and went through them one by one, until she was almost hip deep in expensive tailoring. With no idea of what she was looking for, she kept searching.
Stuck in a kneeling position for so long, her back started to ache, so she moved into a seated position, with her back against the wardrobe wall. Her chin dropped towards her chest. Tired. So tired. She could just sit here, hide from the world and sleep among Thomas’s suits, the clothes his body had inhabited, until this nightmare was over.
She shifted position again; the ache was in her back. The heat from Thomas’s hands would be a great relief right now. She often kidded him that he had his own internal furnace, his skin gave off that much heat. And he made good use of that when she was pregnant. She just needed to make a little face when she was hurting and Thomas would oblige. Rubbing gently the areas that she felt needed his ministrations.
Mind full of him, and imagining the pressure and warmth of his hands on her back, she idly lifted another jacket and mechanically now explored each pocket. In the inside of the jacket, she reached into one of those small pockets, where a businessman might store some cards.
She felt a little resistance. The slick of a slip of paper. She recognised the feel of it; the kind that was used for receipts that were printed off on those little automatic printers.
She pulled it out. The light was restricted where she was kneeling, so she got onto her knees again and edged closer to the door and held it up to the daylight coming in through the large bay window.
She heard a noise.
Paula got to her feet. What day was this? Could it be the cleaner?
‘Lynn?’ she called as she walked to her bedroom door. ‘Is that you, Lynny?’ This was Tuesday. What was her cleaner doing here on a Tuesday? She listened for the direction of the sound. Her study. That was where it was coming from.
Who the hell was in there?
Fearful now, she wondered if she should close and lock her bedroom door. No, it had to be Lynn. She’d forgotten the day.
She stomped out of her bedroom, across the landing and pulled open the door to see Kevin Farrell, pulling at the drawers of her husband’s desk.
‘Kevin,’ she said. ‘What the hell…?’
He looked up at her, his eyes wild, then turned away and went back to his search.
‘Kevin!’ Paula said, raising her voice and walking over to him. She caught a whiff of whisky from his breath. Or perhaps from his crumpled jacket. She stepped back.
Was he drunk?
‘Kevin,’ she tried a patient tone.
He ignored her and kept on searching.
&
nbsp; ‘Kevin?’ Same result.
‘Kevin! What are you doing?’ Her phone was on her desk; she picked it up and held it in the air. Even doing that cost her energy. She was way too tired and way too emotional for any of this. ‘Right, either you stop what you’re doing right now, or I call the police.’
That got his attention. He turned to her. Ran the stumpy fingers of his right hand through the grease of his hair. ‘Where is it, Paula?’
‘Where’s what, Kevin?’ She caught a good look at his face for the first time and noticed that the right side was red and swollen. His bottom lip was cut.
‘Oh my God, Kevin, what’s happened to you?’ Regretting her tone, she held a hand to his face as if her touch might heal him. He stepped back. Swallowed as if a pebble was stuck in the back of his throat.
‘Where’s the money, hen? We’re in serious fucking shit here.’ His voice was shaking.
‘Where’s what money, Kevin?’ Pause. ‘And how did you get in?’
He looked at her as if seeing her properly for the first time. His eyes narrowed. ‘You know fine well what I’m talking about. You two were as thick as thieves. You expect me to believe Tommy kept it all a secret?’
‘Kept what a secret?’ Her heart jumped in her chest. ‘For God’s sake, Kevin, you’re not making any sense.’
He didn’t reply, but studied her, the smell of booze and body odour drifting off him like his own personal fog.
She felt the crumple of paper in her hand and tightened her fist, she wasn’t sure why but something told her she had to keep it a secret from him. She still couldn’t make sense of what it was for. Crossing her arms, she tucked her right hand under her left armpit, as if that might offer some support and strength.
‘I think it’s time you left, Kevin. By all means come back again when you’re sober…’ And after you’ve had a good wash. ‘We’ll talk about whatever it is you think I know.’ She tried to inject steel into her voice. ‘But I’m serious. If you don’t leave now, I’ll phone the police, say you were harassing me and you’ll spend the night in the cells.’
After He Died Page 7
