by Will Carver
‘Hinton Hollow is a pond. The woods are the spot where a stone has been dropped and we are all feeling the ripples.’ Mrs Beaufort wasn’t doing the best job of convincing the detective with her fable.
Liv saw the detective to the door.
‘By the way, Mr Pace…’ He turned around on the doorstep, even a few inches down he was taller than Liv Dunham. ‘That last question. I wanted you to know that I never did anything to encourage Charles Ablett. And I never acted on any of his advances. I couldn’t do that. And that is the truth.’
‘Thank you, Liv. That is very helpful.’
‘Really?’
‘Really.’
He turned his back and headed back up the path to his car, pulling his coat together with one hand to protect his chest from the wind and the rain, which was now pummelling down on the town’s roads and pavements.
Liv Dunham had told the detective exactly what he wanted to hear. She had never been with Charles.
And he knew that she was telling the truth.
Unlike Mrs Beaufort. Pace thought her talk about the Hinton Hollow woods was mumbo jumbo. Folklore. Urban legend.
Faith could be a good thing.
Blind faith was always evil.
KIDS CAN BE CRUEL
DAY FOUR TROUBLES
I was everywhere.
And it was exhausting.
The baby screamed close to lunchtime and Catherine Raymond did not care.
She cared that her child was crying, she simply had no concern for herself about being awake. Because that is how she had felt for the few weeks before: pissed off that she was conscious.
By no stretch was it everything she required but she felt incredibly refreshed. And that gave her the one thing she had been missing. The ability to cope. The small things that had been dragging her down – the tears, muddy footprints on the carpet, the never-ending mound of washing – would now pass her by, at least for a short while, and it would take a lot more to make her snap. She even smiled to herself.
She was sick of hearing all the stories of famous historical figures who lived on three hours of sleep each night and still managed to run a government or invade a country. But did they do that with a newborn stuck to their chest? She imagined that even those thoughtless comments wouldn’t faze her that day.
‘Shh shh shh,’ she spoke softly, looking the little boy in the eyes, ‘Mummy’s here. It’s okaaay. It’s okay.’
Catherine dug her hands beneath her baby and scooped him towards her. She relaxed back in the chair and adjusted her top to start breastfeeding. She had tried and tried for months but could not get the hang of it.
The damn thing won’t latch on. If he’s that hungry… she had cursed the day before when trying it in the chair that had been specifically placed in the nursery for that very reason.
It had been the same with Ben. She just could not do it. She tried every day. Her husband seemed to think that she was doing it wrong and that it should be natural. All her friends had apparently found it that way.
So beautiful. So bonding.
It just made her feel guilty about wanting to give it up and resort to bottle-feeding.
I can work wonders with a feeling of inadequacy.
That Thursday, she tried it again. It didn’t work. Her baby became frustrated and more agitated than he had when waking up with an empty stomach. On that Wednesday, she would have persisted to the point of madness then broken down, heated a bottle and wept at her maternal ineptitude.
It’s surprising what a few uncomfortable hours of shut-eye can do.
She stood up with him and ambled into the kitchen, all the time shh-ing and talking in calming tones while she one-handedly prepared a bottle of warm formula to pacify and satisfy her son.
He was quiet with the milk. Catherine studied his face, pulling out all the features that were clearly from her side of the family. She was looking to see if he was like his big brother but they seemed very different. He would grow into his features.
She placed him on the rug with some colourful, stimulating toys and sat back in the chair to watch him. She almost felt good. Relieved, even. Maybe it was a turning point for her. She was finally getting hold of the situation. Reclaiming a little bit of herself. Small victories.
Catherine reached down the side of the chair and picked up the laptop that had been charging. She went online, purchased two tickets to the film that Ben wanted to see – apparently everybody else had already seen it – and she printed them off.
She was going to take them with her when she picked Ben up. Show him that she meant what she said and that she could keep her promises. She pulled the warm sheets of paper from the printer, which was hidden, wirelessly, in the cupboard beneath the stairs, folded them and placed them in her bag so that she wouldn’t forget them.
With her head cocked to the side, Catherine glanced down at her son. His cheeks were red for a moment but faded back to their normal colour. He grinned, cheekily. She knew what that meant before the smell found its way up to her height.
‘You did that on purpose, didn’t you?’ She laughed. She actually laughed. ‘Didn’t you, little man?’ And she rubbed his stomach affectionately like he’d just done something incredibly adorable.
Her second child may have come as a complete shock to her. She may have been done at one, thank you very much. The poor child may have been referred to as a mistake on occasion. But it did not mean that she loved him any less than she should, any less than Ben.
She was a mother.
And, that day, after a decent nap and another failed breastfeeding attempt, she felt unbelievably lucky.
NOBODY
Nathan Hadley wanted to leave Hinton Hollow. He wasn’t feeling himself.
The night before had been fuelled with anger and alcohol. He tried to tell himself that he couldn’t remember it all but that was a lie. He knew what had happened but it hadn’t given him the sense of closure he had been expecting.
He had been given a day’s grace due to the extreme nature of the crime but he was expected to go and visit the morgue. See the bodies. Say goodbye? He wasn’t entirely sure. He was certain that he did not want to see his family in that way again. He’d caught a glimpse of each of them on the pavement of Stanhope Road but it had been Aaron that had stuck with him. Perhaps because his face was still intact. It could have been that he seemed so small as a dead boy because he was so much larger while alive.
Deaths had to be registered and arrangements made for a service that the entire town would, no doubt, want to attend. Though the funeral parlour was unusually busy that week and Father Salis would probably have to check his diary.
Nathan wasn’t even sure he wanted anything at the Church of the Good Shepherd but that is what everyone in Hinton Hollow would be expecting. Rachel would want him to stand his ground.
But all he wanted was to get out. Get away, if only for a while. He wondered how Owen Brady was handling his situation. They had never been that close and it was uncomfortable to think that they could somehow be united through a patch of such unholy common ground.
He threw some clothes into a bag. Nothing that he’d thought about. A few things from each drawer and a spare pair of shoes. He didn’t know where he would go or even if he would; it was just something to do that didn’t involve facing up to the life he had been left with.
He felt alone. For a town that was so small and had such a close community, Nathan Hadley could think of nobody that he could call on. There was nobody around him that could help. He had nobody. He had nothing.
DAMN FINE COFFEE
‘Come on, Charles. This is getting ridiculous now. It’s lunchtime and you’re still not here. I really don’t care who is in your bed or how good she is, you need to slap her on the backside and tell her to get out because you have to get to work.’
Roger Ablett was talking on his mobile phone as he walked to his car. It was the sixth message he’d left for his brother that day.
‘I’ve had to leave Ellie
in charge of the shop for an hour while I get out for a bite to eat. Only God knows if it’ll still be there by the time I get back. But you’d bloody better be. I don’t care if the building is on fire, I want you at your desk making calls. That new detective is an easy rental, so close it down.’
He stopped at the end of the parade and rubbed his chest. He was slightly out of breath because he’d been walking and talking at the same time. It wasn’t easy for a man whose heart wore cholesterol like a mink coat.
‘I’ll be at RD’s for the next hour. I’d better see you after that.’
He hung up the phone and took a few huffs, and made a few puffs. To his left was the side of the building. On a concrete slab there sat hundreds of spitty, little cigarette butts that the ignorant smokers, like Ellie, had discarded without a care.
He tutted loudly then walked over to the spot he referred to as cancer corner, though it wasn’t really a corner at all.
On the floor beside the orange tubes, some kissed by red lips, was the green mug from his kitchen. There was coffee-drenched tobacco floating at the bottom. He recognised it immediately as Detective Sergeant Pace’s drink. From its location, he knew that he had been speaking with Ellie Frith.
CHEAP SHOTS
Kids can be cruel. And Ben ‘The Bully’ Raymond was, unusually, on the receiving end of the punishment that lunchtime.
The atmosphere had been odd at school all day. Classes were half empty and felt colder as a result. His thoughts even echoed. He felt that everything was aimed at him. The teachers were only looking at him. All the kids were avoiding eye contact with him. Like he had been the one who killed the Hadleys.
He’d kept himself to himself during the first break time. He’d told his mother that he’d stay out of trouble and the easiest way to do that was to be nowhere near anybody. That was his plan.
THREE THINGS THAT WOULD THWART THAT PLAN
A tennis ball.
Passive-aggressive gay bashing.
Words about his mother.
But he couldn’t do that for an entire hour. Eating the lunch his mum had packed took up fifteen minutes of his time – he even ate the satsuma that he didn’t want – but two of his four minions had been made to come to school that day just as he had. He could see them talking by the fence. One of them had a tennis ball in his hands.
Ben made his way over sheepishly, avoiding the glare of other children, older and younger. His two friends caught a glimpse of him heading in their direction. The tennis ball disappeared inside a coat pocket.
‘Hey, guys. What’s going on?’ Ben trembled. He didn’t want to and that made it even more obvious.
‘Hello, killer,’ Dean – the taller of the two – said, raising his eyebrows. The smaller boy laughed. Ben knew that laugh. He’d heard it before. Boys around him that were scared, plumping up his ego though his comments held little true humour in their eyes.
‘Come on, Dean. That’s not right.’ Ben took the higher ground.
‘What’s wrong, killer,’ he nudged his little sidekick as he uttered the insult once more, ‘not feeling so tough today?’
Dean pushed Ben in the chest. It hurt. Ben didn’t fall over but he stepped backward. He did not retaliate. At first.
‘No girls to push around today, eh?’
Ben felt bad about that immediately after, but Jess’d had a way of pushing his buttons.
It took everything he had to walk away, his head hung low.
Dean called after him. ‘Yeah, you walk off. We all saw you get decked by that gay-boy’s son, Benjy. Wouldn’t want that happening again.’ He laughed, not realising that he had inadvertently just called his own father homosexual.
This was not me at work. It was not the woods whispering ideas into Dean’s head – I could not go near the children, I could not touch them directly. Dean was just a little shit who saw an opportunity not to be pushed around any more. Instead, he would be the one who did the pushing.
And that’s exactly what he did. With Ben’s back turned, Dean took a charge and floored him with a cheap shot from behind. Ben heard the entire playground fall silent. The rain had stopped for a while but had returned very lightly. He stood up and brushed himself down. He wanted to cry but wouldn’t give Dean the satisfaction. Hinton Hollow kids were brave.
No. He would do as his mother said. Stay out of trouble. It was only another day of school and then it would be the weekend. She was going to take him to the cinema. If he could just keep walking away.
‘What’s wrong, Ben-der? Being a good boy for Mummy?’ He laughed again. Ben wanted to run away but that wouldn’t work either. ‘My mum said that baby’s not even your brother because your mum was doing it with the estate agent.’ He signalled for his associate to join in the mockery.
Ben ran.
But not away.
He turned and bolted towards Dean the Dickhead. He watched Dean’s face change from ridicule to shock but there was no time for it to evolve into realisation before the back of his head hit the playground floor.
Ben wasted no time scrambling onto Dean, putting his weight on his chest and unleashing punch after punch. He hit Dean in the face for saying that his brother wasn’t his brother and he hit him again for spreading lies about his mum. But he kept hitting him and hitting him because he knew that there was no way he was going to be going to the cinema with his mother on the weekend.
He was only doing what Aaron Hadley had done for his sister the day before. But nobody would ever call Ben Raymond a hero.
PART OF THE CULT
Pace felt bad about sending RD on a wild goose chase for the old witch and decided to swing by his café on the way home.
He was greeted with what was starting to become a customary head-turn. He wondered whether they did that for everyone or just him. Maybe it wore off over time.
RD was behind the counter where he belonged and began pouring a black coffee at the sight of his detective friend. It was the one place in Hinton Hollow where Pace felt local. Like maybe he belonged. Maybe one day he would turn around when somebody walked in to RD’s. Part of the cult.
His hands were held out in submission as he approached the gentle bear of a man.
‘I’m so sorry to give you the runaround, RD. I dropped her off and watched her go in but…’
‘She’s a slippery customer,’ he smiled, lifting that grey beard to his ears. ‘Mrs Beaufort is beyond us in years and even further in determination, my boy. I wouldn’t hold on to it for too long.’ He pushed the coffee towards Pace.
‘I’ll pay for this one,’ Pace confirmed.
‘You’re damn right you will.’
RD turned his back and walked away. He wasn’t angry with Pace, in fact, he was grinning as he headed to the kitchen. Pace could tell. Even from behind. He saw the beard lift then fall.
The bell rang as the door opened and Pace found himself as part of the herd, craning his neck to view the person that had just walked in.
So, it never wears off.
He was one of them.
The customer was a regular. Everybody turned back to their teas and cakes and the chatter recommenced. It was only Roger Ablett on his daily fat-intake mission. Pace gave the man a polite upward tilt of the head then turned back to his too-hot black coffee.
Seconds later, Ablett was slapping Pace on the back like they were old college pals.
‘Good to see you again, Detective.’
‘Mr Ablett.’ He continued to stare into his coffee, wishing it to cool so that he could leave. He had to debrief Anderson.
Pace pulled his phone from his pocket to check the time, forgetting that it was out of battery. The realisation put him back into the foul mood he’d been in at Liv Dunham’s house.
‘Ellie told me that you had a chat with her, too.’
She hadn’t.
‘I’m talking to everybody in town. There’s no point in drawing the lines if you’re not going to fill them with a little colour.’
‘Quite.’ Abl
ett responded as though he knew what Pace was talking about and agreed with him. He was getting impatient about his lunch order, though.
‘I’m actually looking to speak with your brother,’ Pace offered.
‘You and me both, Mr Pace.’
Neither man would look at the other. Pace left his gaze in the mug and Ablett’s was stuck on the door that RD eventually emerged from.
‘I drove by his house but there was no answer. If you hear from him then I would be very grateful if you’d let him know that I have a few questions for him.’
‘Just to add a little colour?’ Roger Ablett asked, not so secretly proud of the comment.
‘Quite,’ Pace responded, still not looking at the fat estate agent.
‘Sorry for the wait, Roger,’ RD apologised. ‘Usual?’
‘With chocolate milkshake today. I need the sugar, it’s been a long morning.’
He did not need the sugar.
Ablett bid both men adieu and found himself a table where he read the local paper until his burger arrived.
RD rolled his eyes so that Pace could see. It seemed the Abletts had a reputation for annoyance.
‘Did you find her?’ RD asked, his voice quieter, his eyes looking towards Ablett’s open ear.
‘Sorry.’
‘Mrs Beaufort.’ He spoke through gritted teeth, his lips moving slightly at the start of each word.
‘Oh, yes. She was at Liv Dunham’s house, you know her?’
‘She walked there?’ He was only concerned about Mrs Beaufort.
‘Apparently.’
‘Never ceases to amaze me. In hospital one day, attending to her civic duties the next. She needs to slow down. I’m sure Liv and Oz have everything in hand by now.’
Pace slid a couple of pound coins across the counter and thanked RD for the coffee. Before he left, RD told him that there was a town wedding on the weekend and that he needed to catch the man with the gun before more funerals were booked into the Good Shepherd.
