by Sarah Ward
*
‘Can I stay at yours tonight?’
Connie stared open mouthed at Palmer. Whatever she had been expecting it wasn’t this. ‘You’re kidding, right?’
‘Come on, Con. It’s just for one night, so I can get my head straight.’
‘You live with your fiancée. She’s going to love the fact that you don’t come home a week before the wedding.’
‘We’re not staying together this week. I’m sleeping at my mum’s until the wedding. Her mum and dad have moved in with her and her sister’s arriving this evening. It’s part of the problem. I’ve got too much time to myself to think about all this.’
‘And what good will sleeping at mine do? It sounds like you’ve a perfectly fine bed at your mum’s.’
‘She’s out tonight at her singing class. Don’t laugh, she has group singing lessons every Friday.’
‘I’m not laughing. I’m just shocked you think that kipping at mine will help things. What if Joanne found out? And what would your mum say? I’m going to the wedding next Saturday and I would like to be able to look people in the eye.’
‘So it’s a no?’
‘It’s a definite no.’
Palmer looked at his watch and then downed his brandy in one go. ‘I’d better be off, then. I’ll see you at the wedding.’ Without looking at her he left the pub. Connie looked at her own watch. Only six – could she clock off for the night?
She was back at her flat by quarter past and, without taking her coat off, flopped down on the sofa. Her bladder was full and she really needed the toilet but the conversation with Palmer had drained her of all energy. What had he been thinking of? She didn’t think the request had been about sex. He genuinely seemed not to want to go home. But he was a colleague, and the repercussions if either his family or her workmates found out would be disastrous.
Her phone was vibrating in her bag. She hoped to God it wasn’t Palmer. The number was a landline she didn’t recognise.
‘Connie. It’s Sadler. Where are you?’
‘I’m at home. We decided there was no point staying late. Nothing new came in this evening.’
‘Palmer’s gone off on leave now, hasn’t he?’
‘Yes.’ It sounded a little abrupt but she couldn’t think of anything else to say.
‘I’m just calling to let you know I had a chat with Rachel about her father. I think she took it OK, but she’s going to do some digging herself I can guarantee it. We need to get there before she does.’
‘Do you think we’ll be able to find someone who was around in 1970? Did she say which of her mother’s friends or relatives were still alive?’
‘She couldn’t think of any. She seemed to be in shock. Will you get onto it, Connie? The strands of this case aren’t coming together yet and I need something a bit more concrete. I need to feel that we’re making progress. Get onto it in the morning.’
*
Sadler needed to hear some music and he scrolled through his iPhone playlist, looking for inspiration. The jazz records that he had bought as a teenager with his pocket money had sat gathering dust in his sister’s garage and it was only recently he’d rifled through them and memories of his teenage years had seeped back to him. But he’d also become acclimatised to the purity of the digital sound, first on CD and then on his iPhone, so he’d packed up the records and sold them on eBay. They’d fetched a decent sum, proof that there was still a market for the old vinyl, but he didn’t miss them. He liked the accessibility of his iTunes list and the possibility of change. There was no emotional attachment to that digital list and songs came and went as he wanted. He selected Miles Davis’s Sketches of Spain and let the sounds drift around the house.
He had some of the files from the office with him but felt reluctant to open them and instead sat back on the sofa and forced his body to relax. His conversation with Connie had, as usual, unsettled him, although it was equilibrium that was usually most damaging to his thought processes. He allowed himself to wonder about Connie’s personal life. He knew virtually nothing about her, although he had heard a rumour at the station that she had recently moved to a new flat.
Next Saturday they would both be going to Damian Palmer’s wedding. He’d been given an invitation for himself ‘plus one’ but he had accepted on his behalf only. He’d never felt comfortable in these situations. While he could appreciate that it was a happy occasion for those closely involved, for colleagues, who were generally invited to these things more to satisfy form than from any close acquaintance, it would be a day of small talk and superficial chatter. He wondered if Connie was also dreading the event. He doubted she would be bringing anyone either but he hadn’t liked to ask. And she certainly hadn’t mentioned it to him.
He heard footsteps on the flagstones outside his cottage, a tip-tapping sound that suggested high heels. Sadler frowned; only two of his neighbours were female and he couldn’t remember either of them ever in heels. It must be Christina, although God knows how she had found her way here in the dark, as he’d never invited her to his house. He heard a knock next door and for a moment thought he had been mistaken. But he could hear his neighbour Clive redirecting someone to his house and the determined steps he now recognised as his former girlfriend’s.
He opened the door before she could knock and she came into the house without speaking. ‘You should have called first. That path is lethal at this time of night.’
She was looking around her, eyes curious as she took in his furnishings and the work spread out over the table. ‘I always wondered how you lived. All the time that we were together. And now I’m getting to see it just as we split up.’
Sadler suppressed a sigh. ‘I’m sorry. I just don’t feel that we’re going anywhere. I thought you must feel this same. You have a family, after all.’
‘Must I?’ She walked through his living room and poked her head through into the kitchen. ‘Is there anyone else here?’
‘Anyone else? For God’s sake, Christina, it’s not about anyone else. It’s—’
‘Is it Connie?’
‘Connie?’ Sadler was furious. ‘Of course it’s not Connie. Please.’
She looked at him with huge dark eyes and shook her head. ‘I never even knew what music you liked listening to.’
She started to walk out of the door and Sadler put the outside lights on so she could follow the path safely to wherever she had parked her car. He had no inclination to follow her. Christina had always filled a place and after she had left he could smell her perfume and her presence still lingered. Perhaps that was why he’d always been reluctant to bring her to his house. She left her mark on everything she came into contact with.
At the start of their relationship he’d merely taken her word about the state of her home life. Both she and her husband were unfaithful and, as she’d frequently assured him, both were happy with the status quo. It wouldn’t have satisfied him, not in a marriage at least, although he had enough insight to appreciate the double standards he was willing to apply to someone else’s union. He’d been reassured by Christina’s casual approach to their relationship. No commitment expected and he was free to continue the self-sufficient life that he’d made for himself. But now, as he had felt her anger at the end of the affair, he wondered what undercurrents there had been beneath the apparently facile relationship. On her side at least. Crossing the room to the speakers, he turned up the volume.
Chapter 36
Rachel looked at her notebook and resisted the temptation to light the fire and burn it. If Sadler was right, then half of her genealogy was a complete lie and her mother had colluded in the deception. She’d nurtured Rachel’s interest in her family while knowing that the foundations on which her entire professional life was based were lies.
She walked over to the mirror at the bottom of the stairs and stared at her reflection. She looked like her mother, although about two stone heavier. Mary Jones had spent most of her life on a diet to keep herself trim, and Rachel’s
small act of rebellion had been to eat what she wanted when she was growing up. And her solid body had been one of the reasons she had avoided mirrors. But today she forced herself to look at her face with fresh eyes. What was there in her of this other man?
‘And does it have anything to do with my kidnapping?’
She spoke the words out loud and her breath misted the glass, blurring the familiar features.
If her natural father was behind the abduction, it wouldn’t make any sense to kidnap Sophie too. There had been plenty of opportunity to take Rachel alone in the 1970s, when children had seemingly unlimited freedom. Those days almost certainly came to an end with the kidnapping of Sophie and herself. Bampton’s attitude towards its children had taken a radical rethink, playgrounds had been reconfigured, after-school clubs had sprung up and the suburban roads had gradually cleared of playing children. When Rachel saw a child on its bike now it was kitted out as if it was about to enter combat, so ensconced was it in the padding and plastic. She could remember the feel of her hair flying back from her as she careered one-handed down the hill towards her house. A different world.
She walked up to her bedroom and switched on the overhead light. Her mother had lied to her for a reason. And Sadler believed that she had also suspected that her real father was involved in the kidnapping. And they were going find him first, were they? Well, not if she had anything to do with it.
She crossed to her pine chest of drawers and pulled open her sock drawer. Her socks were short and in muted shades of black, brown or grey. She lifted a pair up and untangled the knot. She felt nothing. She hurried down the stairs and opened her front door. There was no one outside her house. She turned left and walked slightly uphill to the house three doors away. The front door was identical to hers except painted a cheery red rather than her respectable grey. She rapped on the door and Jenny opened it, her large tortoiseshell glasses hiked up on top of her head.
‘Rachel! You OK? I’ve been meaning to come round all this week to see if there was anything I could do. But you know what it’s like with kids. I’m lucky if I get an hour to myself before I go to bed.’
Rachel shook her heard. ‘It’s all right, look—’
Jenny shot out her arm. ‘Don’t stand there on the doorstep. Come in.’
The house was configured as hers was and she stepped straight into the living room. It was a mess of plastic toys, half-filled coffee cups and strewn gossip magazines.
‘I won’t keep you long; I do know how it is.’ Rachel looked round the living room. ‘Look, I was wondering if I could borrow a pair of your daughter’s school socks. You know, the long white ones she wears.’
Whatever Jenny had been expecting it wasn’t this. Rachel had an excuse ready. ‘I have to do a report for a client interested in schoolchildren down the ages. I’m doing something on uniforms and I’m stuck for inspiration. I’m trying to gather a few items together.’
Jenny’s doubtful face cleared. ‘How interesting. I tell you, when I worked for the local authority nothing like this ever happened to me. It was all procedures and compliance. Hang on.’
Only a person as mild mannered as Jenny would have accepted Rachel’s bizarre suggestion so easily. Rachel looked round the living room again, wondering how a family of four could crowd into such a space. But at least it looked like a family lived there, unlike her tidy but sterile house. Jenny came down with a pair of long white socks which Rachel stuffed into her pocket. Whatever effect they would have on her, she didn’t want an audience, even one as kind as Jenny.
Her phone was ringing as she re-entered her house.
‘It’s Richard. What are you up to later?’
The sound of his voice brought a warmth to her stomach that made her want to forget about the past and flee from her obsession with the current investigation. He offered her a refuge, his comfortable home a sanctuary from everything that had come before, but, for the moment, she must resist the pull of safety.
‘Are you there, Rachel? How are you?’ he repeated and she forced herself to concentrate.
‘It’s so nice to hear from you. I wanted to call, but . . .’
‘Look. It’s OK. I just wanted to check you were all right.’
Rachel hadn’t realised that she had been holding her breath until she exhaled, her spine bending to accommodate the space left behind.
‘I’m fine. You?’
The tone of the voice changed from anxiety into warmth. ‘I’m fine too. Are we OK after last time? We left the pub in a hurry and . . .’
Rachel looked up at the clock. Five minutes to seven. She fingered the rough ball of material in her pocket. ‘Everything’s fine. But I can’t chat. I have to go and see Nancy this evening.’
‘Is everything OK? I thought Monday was your day for visits.’
‘Don’t worry, I just need to drop something off.’ She clicked off the phone and searched for the charging cradle, gently laying the handset in the holder.
She immediately felt guilty. There were enough stresses in her past to jeopardise a potential future together. Did she need to magnify them by adding secrets to their present? But, then, he hadn’t been upfront with her about his visit to the woods. And, deep down, she wasn’t yet able to make that final leap of trust.
She then pulled out the white sock ball from her pocket and unravelled the two pieces. Almost immediately she felt a searing pain under her ribs accompanied by a sense of longing as sharp as the physical sensation. Her legs wobbled slightly and she moved herself to the sofa. On its arm, she laid both socks next to each other so that they formed a parallel. They were slightly ribbed with an entwining of flowers running down each leg. They were similar to ones worn by her as a child.
On impulse, Rachel picked up one of the socks and threw it on the floor under the table. The image of the one sock, sitting atop sofa’s arm brought back the longing. She tentatively reached out and touched the material and at the back of her mind images began to flicker like a dream barely remembered. She grasped at the pictures but as soon as she had them in her reach they disintegrated. Come back, she silently pleaded. Come back.
Then suddenly she had a strong image of a man. Tall with large hands and smelling of tobacco leaning over her. He was reaching out to touch her hair and smiling down at her. And behind him a woman. That woman: frowning.
*
Nancy was having the curlers removed from her hair when Rachel arrived in her room. A mobile hairdresser came and did the patients every Thursday, which was usually a good time for Rachel to telephone Nancy as she was usually in a good mood after having her hair done. Terry Cooper, who’d been coming to the nursing home for years, turned around with a hairgrip sticking out of the corner of his mouth when he heard Rachel enter the room.
‘Here she is. Give me another five minutes and I’ll be finished,’ he said through clenched lips.
Rachel sat in the wing-back chair and watched Terry tease out the curls as he carefully removed each roller.
‘You got a boyfriend yet, me duck?’
Rachel saw Nancy smirk at Terry’s direct question. ‘Maybe.’
Nancy’s eyes widened and Rachel had to stifle the urge to quickly retract the confession. Was Richard Weiss really her boyfriend?
‘Who is he?’ Nancy’s voice quivered, and Rachel, for the first time, realised how important it was to her grandmother that she had someone.
‘Richard Weiss, the solicitor. And it’s only recent, we’re taking it easy.’ It was a lie. There had been no discussion whatsoever about how they were taking things. But the less Nancy was told the better.
‘Richard Weiss? The solicitor’s son?’
‘He’s a solicitor now himself, Nan. He’s older than me. Just.’
Nancy snorted. ‘Well, bring him in to see me. I get sick of living with all these old people. I could do with some young company sometimes.’
It was a good an opening as she was likely to get. And Rachel took it.
‘Did Mum bring my dad
home to see you much before they got engaged?’
Nancy looked uninterested. ‘Not really. It was too quick, if you ask me. She met him and was engaged and married before you could bat an eye.’ She saw Rachel’s face. ‘Not that it mattered or anything. Lots of people get married quickly. No shame in it.’
Terry Cooper was looking from one to the other. ‘Don’t stop because I’m here. I’ve heard it all, believe me.’
‘I don’t have a problem with Mum being pregnant when she got married, Nan. Honestly. I just wondered if you had seen much of him before. You know, before the wedding.’
‘There was none of that. I think that other man put her off. That’s what happens sometimes, isn’t it? You bring golden boy home and then it goes sour and you’re a damn sight more careful next time around. I . . .’
Rachel’s heart was beating hard inside her chest and she could feel her innards twist into a hard knot. As casually as she could, she asked, ‘A boyfriend? Who was that?’
Nancy looked hard at her. ‘I can’t remember who it was. But I can remember Mair showing herself up again the one and only time he came around. She was as rude as anything to him. We’d made a special effort too. Hughie put on a suit and I’d bought myself a new dress that morning. Pale lemon, it was.’
Typical of Nancy to concentrate on what she was wearing, thought Rachel.
‘And there sat Mum in the corner, knitting with her elbows out like a turkey and needles clacking like a hen. And the radio blasting out hymns. I told her that it’d have to go off when Mary’s man arrived. And to be fair, as she always had a soft spot for Mary, she did sit up straight when they arrived.’
