Next of Kin

by Welfare, Sue

  When Sarah heard the knock on the door a few minutes later she almost jumped out of her skin. Her first thought was that it had to be Josh, but when she looked round it was Mrs Howard, her next door neighbour, peering in, her hand cupped round her face as she looked in through the glass.

  ‘Sarah?’

  Sarah got to her feet and opened the door. ‘Hello.’

  Mrs Howard’s eyes filled with tears and she bit her lip. ‘Oh, Sarah. I just wanted to say very how sorry I am about Ryan. It must be terrible for you. I only saw it in the paper last night or I’d have been round sooner. Why didn’t you come and tell me? You should have come round.’ The old lady paused long enough to pull a handkerchief out of her sleeve and dab her eyes. ‘Although I suppose you’d got other things on your mind.’ As she spoke she pushed a card into Sarah’s hand. ‘I remember him when he was just a little boy,’ the old lady began before tears cut her off.

  Sarah felt her own lip begin to tremble, the tears pressing hard behind. ‘Thank you,’ she muttered. ‘I’d invite you in for tea but I don’t think that I’ve got any milk.’

  ‘That’s all right, dear. Do you want to borrow some?’

  Sarah shook her head. ‘No, I’m fine, thank you. I’m going shopping later.’

  Mrs Howard peered round the untidy kitchen. ‘It must be terrible for you. Your mum and dad and now Ryan. If there is anything I can do to help? Anything at all? Washing up – or a bit of ironing.’ She paused. ‘I really don’t mind.’

  ‘No, I’m fine. I’m just about to get dressed and make a start, but thank you for the offer.’

  The old lady nodded. ‘If you’re sure. Thank goodness you’ve got Woody.’

  Sarah managed a thin smile. ‘Thank you for coming round,’ she said, moving towards the door.

  The old lady took the hint. ‘Well I won’t stop. I can see you’ve got things to be getting on with. You will let me know when the funeral is, won’t you?’ Mrs Howard hesitated to leave. ‘Actually, I was rather hoping to see Woody while I was here. Is he in? I just wondered how he got on. Did it help?’

  ‘Sorry, I’m not with you?’

  ‘He brought some things round for me to sign and witness the other day.’

  Something about the way she said it piqued Sarah’s interest. ‘What sort of things?’

  The old lady shifted her weight, obviously slightly uncomfortable. ‘I’m not sure to be honest. I suppose I should have read them really. They say that, don’t they? Read before you sign. But Woody said he was in a bit of a hurry and had to get them in, and he just needed me to sign and date them. You know, witness them.’

  ‘Them?’

  Mrs Howard nodded. ‘There were quite a few. He said it was just a formality. I felt sorry for him; all those forms. And I didn’t like to pry.’

  ‘Can you remember what they were?’ Sarah asked, making the effort to smile. ‘Were they about his right to remain application?’

  The old woman screwed her mouth up in an effort to concentrate. ‘I’m not sure. I mean, I’ve signed quite a few things for him since he moved in, but I’ve always thumbed through them before.’

  ‘And this time?’

  ‘Well, it was obvious he was in a bit of a hurry, so I didn’t bother. I think I had to witness one and sign some others.’

  Sarah nodded, keeping the smile in place.

  ‘He said it was really important that I saw him signing the papers. Keep it all legal and above board, he said. He said he didn’t want there to be any problems over his signature. I mean you never know when it comes to legal things. Better safe than sorry.’ She smiled. ‘He is such a nice boy, you’re so lucky to have found him, Sarah. It must be such a weight off your mind having him around dealing with all those kind of things.’

  Something dark shifted in Sarah’s head and she had a momentary flash of the sheet of paper she had found in Ryan’s jacket pocket, the page of signatures, with Woody’s name written over and over again. What if it wasn’t Ryan who had been practising the signatures, but Woody.

  Sarah stared at her. ‘What kind of things were they?’

  ‘Official papers, forms; to be honest I’m not a hundred percent sure. Silly really.’

  Sarah forced a smile. ‘Thank you for coming round, I’m really sorry but I need to be getting on, getting dressed.’

  ‘Of course.’

  Ryan’s jacket was still upstairs in her bedroom where she had taken it off.

  ‘And tell Woody that I hope it helped.’

  ‘I will,’ Sarah said, feigning gratitude, wanting the old lady gone.

  Mrs Howard stepped outside into the porch ‘Anyway, if there is anything you need. Any help, anything at all. All you have to do is ask. Have you got any idea when the funeral will be?’

  Sarah shook her head. ‘No, not yet. I’m waiting for the hospital to ring.’

  ‘Oh yes, of course,’ said the old lady. ‘Well I better be off, but you know where I am.’

  Sarah nodded.

  The moment Mrs Howard was out of sight Sarah locked the back door, slid the bolt across and hurried upstairs. Safe in her bedroom with the door locked she unfolded the sheet of paper from Ryan’s pocket, carefully flattened it out and tried to work out exactly what it meant and what it told her. The signatures were written in black ink and were evenly spaced with a line or two between each attempt in two columns, one down each side of the page. It looked like the page had been torn from an A4 notepad. There were probably thirty attempts at Woody’s signature, all very similar, all slight variations on a theme, but nevertheless each gaining in confidence.

  Staring down at the paper Sarah wondered what it was that had needed signing and needed witnessing? And, assuming from the jottings on the back, that this paper originated from Woody and not Ryan, why would he need to practise his own signature?

  She flipped the paper: on the back were some phone numbers and a website address just made up of a series of letter that meant nothing to her: www.inwol, but all of them were most definitely in Woody’s handwriting, so where and why had Ryan got it?

  What was it Woody had been signing that needed to be witnessed? What was going on? Sarah wanted to know. Maybe if she could find the pad that the page of signatures came from, and check out the website. She had no idea how long she had before Woody would be back. From experience it could be ten minutes or all day but if she was quick and careful. The idea hung in the air.

  Quickly Sarah pulled the tin with the spare keys out of the dressing table drawer, tipped them onto the bed and began to scrabble through them. The spare keys for each of the bedrooms had a loop of ribbon through them. The one for the attic room was midnight blue.

  Sarah snatched it up out of the pile and headed towards the attic, her heart thumping like a drum in her chest. She hesitated before sliding the key into the lock, pausing for a moment, every molecule of her body straining to pick up the sounds from the house. She had to be sure that Woody was out. Seconds passed but all she could hear was the steady ticking of a clock and the distant hum of traffic.

  Sarah took a deep breath and with shaking hands slid the key home.

  Barely halfway in it met resistance. For a moment Sarah thought she’d got the wrong key and tried again, but still it wouldn’t go more than half way. Bending down to look Sarah could see there was something wedged in the keyhole. She pushed harder until whatever it was gave way, and then she unlocked the door and pushed it open.

  Sarah wasn’t quite sure what she had expected to find inside but this wasn’t it. Sunlight flooded in through the dormer windows onto the rugs and the bare board floor. The sunlit attic was as tidy as a monk’s cell, with not a thing out of place. Nothing stirred in the still morning air. The bed was made, the blinds were open and straight, the desk bare except for a jar of pens and pencils. Textbooks and novels were neatly arranged in the shelves, along with a row of box files and another of ring binders. There were no clothes, no shoes, nothing personal in sight. Leaving the door ajar Sarah wonder
ed where to begin looking, a decision made all the harder by the fact she had no idea exactly what it was she was looking for.

  She thumbed through the books. There seemed to be nothing there that caught her eye, they were all mostly business text books, a little law, some on accountancy, a couple of dictionaries. The novels were mostly classic English literature. Should she take them out and shake them, search through every one, and how long would that take? The box files on the shelf below were numbered and contained collections of course work and cuttings. The course work pieces were all printed and bound. They were so beautifully presented it made her think again about why it was that Woody had decided to drop out when it was obvious he was a diligent and conscientious student. What had changed?

  She thumbed her way through the next file. There were pages clipped together and filed from magazines and the financial pages of newspapers, all were business orientated. Sarah had just opened the second or third on the shelf when she heard a noise downstairs. For an instant she thought it might be someone knocking at the door, and remembered that Josh was meant to be coming round. Maybe he could help? It took her a second or two longer to realise that it was the sound of someone unlocking the front door.

  She leapt to her feet. Working quickly Sarah slipped the bundle of papers back into the box file, slid it back in its place on the shelf and hurried across the attic, pulling the door closed behind her. Turning the key in the lock Sarah ran downstairs and across the landing to her bedroom. She had barely reached the bedroom door before Woody called up from the hallway.

  ‘Sarah, where are you?’

  ‘I’m up here,’ she said; the duplicate bedroom key still in her hand.

  ‘The back door was bolted,’ he snapped.

  ‘I know. I was worried that someone might come in while I was upstairs,’ she said, thinking on her feet, after all it was the truth. ‘Those men.’ She paused. ‘Didn’t you say you thought Ryan had borrowed more money?’ Wondering for an instant as she said it if it was true and if that was a more credible and more terrifying reason for Ryan ending up in the river. ‘I was afraid they might come back,’ she said, with a genuine tremor in her voice. ‘I was just going to have a bath and then get on with the cleaning.’

  ‘Did you make a list?’ he asked.

  Sarah slipped the key surreptitiously into the pocket of her dressing gown. ‘No, not yet. I was going to do that after I’d had a bath.’

  ‘I have some business I need to take care of. I’ve just been down into Ryan’s flat to start clearing it out. It stinks down there. The fridge is going to need sorting.’

  Sarah felt her stomach do a back flip; while she had been searching his room Woody had been two floors below. ‘I didn’t realise you were down there,’ she said unevenly.

  ‘We’re going to need to clean it out,’ he said. ‘The fridge, the freezer. The whole place.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, although no part of her wanted to contemplate the idea.

  ‘I’ll make a start when I get back,’ Woody said.

  ‘Are you going out again?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes.’ He smiled slyly. ‘You can leave the back door bolted. I don’t want you feeling nervous. I’ll come in the front.’

  Sarah nodded.

  ‘I just came back to get my coat,’ Woody said.

  Sarah froze, as the realisation dawned that she hadn’t put back whatever it was that Woody had so carefully pushed into the keyhole. The door had been locked from the outside. He had to have put the plug in place after he left the room; did that mean he was checking up on her or that he was just cautious by nature? And where was his coat? Sarah waited and watched as he strode across the hallway, wondering if he would turn to come up the stairs. Her pulse quickened.

  When Woody got to the bottom of the stairs he took an overcoat that was hanging over the newel post. Sarah tried hard not to show her relief.

  ‘Will you be long?’ she asked casually.

  He looked up. ‘I don’t know. Why?’

  ‘I need to sort out the arrangements for Ryan.’ She couldn’t bring herself to say funeral.

  He nodded and then he was gone, slipping on his coat, heading out the door.

  As soon as he had closed it, Sarah spun round and hurried into her bedroom. She made a note of the web address and the phone number on the back of the piece of paper she had found then carefully refolded it and put it back into Ryan’s jacket. Sarah needed to know more about what it was she was looking for before she went searching again.

  Josh

  ‘The traffic on the way to Sarah’s was awful, there was an accident, a lorry shed its load on the Milton roundabout. The whole thing was snarled up and I got caught up in the tailback. It took me forever to get back into the city. Back to Sarah’s.’

  ‘And your plan was what?’

  ‘I’m not sure I had much in the way of a plan. I just thought I’d go round there and talk. The previous conversation we had had on the phone, and the things that Anessa said had made me think that there was a chance that she might see me. To be honest I was getting pissed off with the whole mystery. I wanted some straight answers.’

  ‘And so what happened when you got to Sarah’s place?’

  ‘That’s just it; I didn’t get there. I was coming through the traffic lights where you turn off towards her street when I saw Woody’s car a little way along the road. He was parked facing towards me and pulled into the kerb. He was picking up a woman.’

  ‘Sarah?’

  ‘No, no it definitely wasn’t Sarah. I got a real good look at her. As I turned the corner she was standing on the pavement. She was blonde, young, maybe late teens, early twenties, in a mini skirt, and when she climbed into the car he kissed her.’

  ‘Haven’t you ever greeted your friends with a peck on the cheek, Josh?’

  ‘It wasn’t a peck. He was all over her. Then the guy in the car behind him pipped, so after a moment or two Woody pulled away.’

  ‘Driving towards you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did he see you?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘And what did you do next, Josh?’

  ‘I took the next left, turned round and followed him.’

  ‘Rather than go and see Sarah?’

  ‘I know it sounds crazy but you didn’t have to be any kind of genius to see that there was something not right going on there. I had just discovered that Woody was married to my girlfriend, and there he is all over someone else? I wanted to see where they were going. What he was up to.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘I followed him to Kirby Road, a little way back. I wondered if he’d spot me. I mean, the truck isn’t exactly inconspicuous, but I don’t think he did. Kirby Road’s not that far away from Sarah’s, but the street looked rougher. I don’t know Cambridge that well, but it looked a bit more run down, lots of bedsits, lots of student shares by the looks of it.’

  ‘And what happened?’

  ‘Woody and the blonde got out of the car and went into one of the bigger houses. They were in a hurry. She couldn’t keep her hands off him. Not that he seemed to mind.’

  ‘So they went into the house? And what did you do?’

  ‘I hung around for a few minutes and then I drove back to see Sarah. By the look of it I thought Woody was going to be busy for a while.’

  Sarah

  ‘My laptop was in the sitting room. I don’t use it that often. I’m not much of a computer person, not really, although it was useful for things like advertising the rooms when I was trying to rent them. Ryan used to call me a dinosaur, but I can do basic things like email and buying online. Anyway I switched in on, and while I was waiting for it to boot up I’d planned to ring the phone numbers that were on the back of the piece of paper that I’d found in Ryan’s jacket. The ones in Woody’s handwriting.’

  ‘Did you find out who the numbers belonged to?’

  ‘Not then, no. There was no dial tone. At first I thought there might be a proble
m with the phone, so I tried hanging up a few times and then I tried the handset in the kitchen but that was dead too, so I traced the wire for the main handset back to the box on the wall. It’s a behind a little table with the router for the Wi-Fi on top of it. I’d put the table there to protect the box and all the wires. When I pulled it away, the phone socket and the box behind had been was smashed and pulled away from the wall.’

  ‘You’re suggesting that that was deliberate?’

  ‘I don’t know for certain but yes I think it probably was. I can see that it might have been an accident if something had fallen off the table onto it, but if that was the case why hadn’t Woody or Ryan said something to me about it?’

  ‘Did you think it was Woody?’

  ‘Yes. Ryan was always using the Wi-Fi. He’d have said something.’

  ‘Okay. Presumably this meant you couldn’t get onto the internet?’

  ‘That’s right; the router was useless without a signal; I could have got onto the internet on my phone if I had had it but Woody had taken it with him.’

  ‘So what did you do?’

  ‘There was nothing I could do. I had no idea where the nearest phone box was. I was going to go back upstairs and finish getting washed and dressed. And then the doorbell rang and when I went to see who it was. And there was Josh.’

  ‘You sound pleased, Sarah.’

  ‘I don’t think I have ever been so pleased to see anyone in my life, although I was nervous too, in case Woody came back. I know what he’s like, coming back any time.’

  ‘But you let Josh in?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, I did.’

  Josh

  At first I couldn’t believe Sarah was actually there at home and was prepared to let me in. I mean, it wasn’t the first time I’d been round and tried to talk to her. And then what struck me was how thin Sarah looked, and tiny. So tiny. It made my heart ache. She just stood there in the doorway looking at me like she couldn’t believe her eyes. She was in her dressing gown and this pair of pale blue pyjamas.