The Unheard

by Nicci French

  I went downstairs again and Ronnie was still sitting hot and stiff on the chair, nursing his coffee and gazing steadfastly in front of him.

  I went into the garden, which I had neglected recently. I put birdseed in the feeder and crouched down with a trowel and dug out the ground elder, a stubborn weed with thin deep roots. I deadheaded the roses, then sprayed the buds with soapy water to keep the bugs away. I tipped out the rainwater that had gathered in the little paddling pool, rinsed it out with a couple of buckets of water. I got rid of the ash in the barbecue.

  I understood that I was thinking nothing, feeling nothing. I was waiting. Behind me in the conservatory, Ronnie waited too.

  Just before midday, I saw him get to his feet and move heavily towards the stairs, so I rinsed my hands from the outdoor tap and went back inside, just as he came back down again, with a figure behind him.

  It was Ross Durrant. He strode into the conservatory as if he was on his way somewhere else, then came to an abrupt halt just in front of me. I could see a small tic in his temple and realised that he was angry.

  ‘Well?’ I asked.

  He rested his eyes on me. I felt he was looking at me the way I looked at a snarl in the thread when I was sewing.

  ‘I am here to take you to the police station,’ he said and I felt a trickle of dread run through me. Had something gone wrong?

  ‘Why?’

  ‘To make a statement.’

  ‘What’s happening?’ I asked. ‘Did you find the things I told you you’d find?’

  ‘We did.’ His mouth snapped shut.

  ‘What were they?’

  ‘There’s a car outside for you.’

  ‘I was right, wasn’t I?’

  ‘All right,’ he said, unsmiling, ‘you can have your moment of triumph.’

  ‘I don’t feel any triumph.’

  ‘I’m not going to apologise, if that’s what you want.’

  ‘What I want is for Aidan to be put away where he can’t harm me or my daughter.’

  ‘It looks like you’ll get your wish.’

  I picked up my denim jacket and bag, took my keys from the table.

  ‘A small silver goblet with Skye’s name engraved on it.’ His back was to me; I couldn’t see the expression on his face but his shoulders were square and unyielding. ‘A christening or a naming mug, I imagine. And an old copy of a poetry book that Peggy was awarded as a school prize for best improvement or something in 1986. It has a bookplate inside its front cover with her name on it and she’s scribbled in the margins.’

  ‘Is it enough?’

  ‘We’re about to turn his life upside down. There’s nothing we won’t know about Aidan Otley by the time we’re done. But it doesn’t really matter. We’ve already got enough to charge him with double murder. Which we will be doing imminently.’

  ‘Good.’ My hands were trembling; my stomach felt hollow. I felt as if I was very hungry or about to throw up. ‘That’s good.’

  Ross Durrant looked at me with a more humane expression.

  ‘And all because your little girl saw something or heard something and put it in a picture.’

  ‘That’s right. Poor little thing.’

  ‘Any idea where it happened?’

  ‘I’ve gone over and over it. She barely spent any time alone with him. It might have been in the park or Skye may have come to the flat one day when I was out at the shops, or maybe at night after I was asleep. Looking back, I can see that Poppy didn’t want to be alone with him after that. I think in her way she was trying to protect me.’

  ‘Can’t you just ask her?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘She’s been asked about it so much, there’s nothing real left. That picture – that was her memory: a girl falling from a tower.’

  SIXTY-FOUR

  Poppy marched up to me like a soldier going into battle. She looked cross and hot and full of the importance of what she had to say.

  ‘I did cry at Jake’s,’ she said.

  I squatted down. ‘Why did you cry, my darling?’

  ‘I wanted Teddy.’

  ‘You had Teddy. I put him in your bag.’

  ‘I wanted my special mug. I wanted Sunny. I wanted my unicorn tee shirt. Gina brushed my hair.’

  I took her hand. ‘Let’s go.’

  ‘Just me and you.’

  ‘Just me and you.’

  ‘We can dig for worms,’ said Poppy with satisfaction.

  ‘OK.’

  She looked at me suspiciously. ‘No bath,’ she said.

  ‘We’ll think about that.’

  ‘And it can thunder and lightning and I will see a fox and Sunny will sleep with me.’

  ‘I can’t promise the weather.’

  I bought us each an ice cream on the way back and we sat on a bench to eat them, the sun on our backs. Then we went back to the flat, hand in hand, and Poppy played in the paddling pool, dug for worms with intense and scowling concentration, told Sunny a story about a girl called Poppy who could fly, and I watched her. I watched her and marvelled.

  Soon enough, the news about Aidan would be public. It would be in papers, on news channels, online. More to the point, everyone in my life would know, would look at me differently, look at me hungrily, would talk to each other about it in appalled and revelling tones. Did you hear? Did you know? Isn’t it awful? Not yet, though, not this evening, which was so warm and luminous and peaceful. Not while Poppy splashed in the paddling pool, throwing handfuls of water into the air, and ran in her knickers round the garden, muddy and enthralled, and the birds came to the feeder and the light fell through the leaves and left rippling shadows on the ground.

  I didn’t know what to tell her and what to leave alone. Should I simply let time wash away her memories and her bad dreams, or should I say to her: you witnessed horrible things, but they are over now? You were confused and scared, but now you don’t need to be. I let a bad man into our home, but he will never come again. Your world is safe once more.

  But the world is never safe, not for a little girl who is unfiltered and wide open, who sees everything, hears everything, lets everything move through her; is like a wind chime that the lightest breeze will set chinking.

  ‘Bedtime,’ I said.

  ‘Stories,’ she replied. ‘Till I say stop. Owl babies and the tiger at tea, and little bear and the moon and the cow jumped over it and this little pig. All the way home.’

  SIXTY-FIVE

  The next day, Jason was waiting outside school when I emerged with Poppy.

  ‘When were you going to tell me?’ he asked.

  ‘How did you hear?’

  ‘The police called me. They assumed I already knew.’

  I was about to reply that he had forbidden me from contacting him, but I felt Poppy’s warm hand in mine and I stopped myself. I didn’t want to be that woman anymore. He was Poppy’s father; I had let danger into his daughter’s life.

  ‘I am really sorry you had to find out like that,’ I said. ‘You’re absolutely right. I should have told you at once. It was just that everything was—’ I stopped. My eyes were hot with tears and I didn’t want to cry in front of Poppy. I didn’t want to cry in front of Jason either. I wanted to lie in a dark room and let tears course down my cheeks and into my pillow, weep with anguish and guilt and relief.

  ‘Where do I be now?’ asked Poppy, looking up at both of us.

  ‘With me tonight,’ I said. ‘You’re with Daddy tomorrow. Today is Tuesday and tomorrow is Wednesday.’

  ‘I can do it, I know it: Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday,’ she yelled in a frantic sing-song voice.

  ‘Brilliant,’ I said. Then to Jason, ‘Can we have a little walk, the three of us?’

  He nodded and took Poppy’s other hand. I couldn’t read his mood. He was a handsome stranger.

  ‘Swing me,’ commanded Poppy as she always did, sinking down so her bottom was almost on the pavement. ‘Swing me high.’

  So off we
went, Mummy and Daddy and our little red-haired daughter swooping up between us.

  ‘Aren’t you going to apologise?’ asked Jason.

  ‘Yes, I am.’

  ‘You pretty much accused me of murdering a woman. You set the police on me. And then it turned out to be your boyfriend all along. It was all happening under your own roof.’

  ‘Again! Again!’

  ‘One, two, three, up! For the rest of my life I will have to live with that. I was wrong. I was looking in the wrong direction. I didn’t see what was right there – in my own home, as you say.’

  And in my bed, I thought, and that familiar nausea rose in me.

  ‘So from the bottom of my heart, I apologise. I’m sorry I suspected you of being connected with Skye’s death. I’m sorry that I trusted someone who turned out to be a murderer. I’m sorry that all the time I thought I was protecting Poppy, I was in fact putting her in danger.’

  I put my hand against my throat. My whole body felt raw and sore; my eyes stung. I waited.

  ‘I could ask for custody, you know,’ he said.

  Here it was, what I had feared.

  ‘Again!’ cried Poppy imperiously.

  Up she flew, our red-headed daughter.

  ‘I’d fight you every inch of the way,’ I said. ‘Why not run to the corner, Poppy?’

  We waited while she raced away from us.

  ‘I was wrong about you and Skye, but I wasn’t wrong about you.’

  ‘What the fuck is that supposed to mean?’

  ‘It’s true you didn’t kill anyone,’ I said in a low voice. I turned to face him. ‘But you bullied me, you cheated on me, you lied to me and when we split up you made me think it was something we were doing together in a civilised way. And now you’re doing it to Emily and to other women as well, even people who work for you.’ I saw his startled look. ‘Yes, I know things about you that you really don’t want anyone to find out. It wouldn’t look great in court, would it? And you’ve let Poppy witness your treachery. You’re not a murderer, I was wrong about that, but I wasn’t wrong about you. And I think any judge, given the evidence, would see that I was foolish, but I acted in good faith, whereas you – you were faithless.’

  ‘So that’s how it is.’

  ‘Jason, I want us to behave in a civilised way together, for Poppy’s sake. I don’t want us to be enemies for the rest of our lives. But I swear I won’t be civilised if you try and take Poppy away from me.’

  He stared at me. I could see tiny red veins in the whites of his eyes and a faint speck of spittle at the corner of his mouth. Then something shifted in his expression.

  ‘We used to be good together,’ he said. ‘What’s happened to us?’

  ‘We were never good together. I was young and foolish. But we can try to be good parents.’

  We caught up with Poppy, and I took her hand.

  ‘Home,’ I said.

  SIXTY-SIX

  Months later, it was a cold February day and I was on my own, walking through Covent Garden and I saw him, walking in front of me. I could recognise him even though I could only see him from behind, just as I’d seen him from behind that first time, sitting next to Peggy Nolan at the inquest. I speeded up my pace, caught up with him and tapped him on the shoulder.

  Charlie stopped and looked at me with surprise and then with obvious dismay.

  ‘It’s been a long time,’ I said.

  He only mumbled something in response.

  ‘You don’t have time for a coffee?’

  ‘I don’t think that would be a good idea.’ He looked around. ‘What are you doing here? I didn’t think we’d ever meet again.’

  ‘It’s all right,’ I said, trying to sound soothing. ‘I’m sorry if I gave you a shock. I wasn’t following you.’

  He looked suspicious. ‘Has something happened? Did someone tell you where I was?’

  I held up my hands in protest. ‘Honestly. I’m meeting a friend.’

  We looked at each other for a moment.

  ‘I was surprised you weren’t at the trial. When I was giving evidence, I looked for you in the public gallery.’

  ‘I couldn’t face it. Obviously.’

  ‘And then afterwards. I tried to get in touch. I thought you might want to talk. Maybe you didn’t get my emails.’

  He leaned forward and spoke in a hoarse whisper so that I could barely hear him against the traffic.

  ‘I got them,’ he said. ‘And I pretended I hadn’t seen them. What would I want to talk about? About breaking into your boyfriend’s flat and hiding the mug and the book that Peggy gave me? Is that something we’re meant to have a chat about?’

  ‘You didn’t break in. I gave you the key.’

  ‘It’s still a crime. You know, I’ve never even taken a pen home from my office if it didn’t belong to me and now I’ve helped frame a man for two murders.’

  It was my turn to look around and see if any passer-by might have heard what Charlie was saying.

  ‘Do we have to have this conversation in the street?’

  ‘I don’t want to have it at all. I just know that I committed a crime.’

  I put out a hand to him and he seemed to flinch from it.

  ‘Charlie, the reason I wanted to contact you is that I wanted to thank you. Aidan killed the woman you loved and he killed the mother of the woman you loved. You know it wasn’t the mug and book that got him convicted, it was a wealth of evidence. They found his prints at Skye’s flat; there were several people who had seen him with her in that bar. We just made the police look in the right place, which is what they should have done anyway. If you hadn’t done what you did, then not only would he have got away with killing Peggy and Skye, but at some time he would have killed me and he would have killed my little girl. I’ll owe you that for ever.’

  ‘It was you,’ said Charlie. ‘I just collected the key and…’ He hesitated. ‘Well, all the rest.’

  ‘Yes, all the rest. And I owe you my life for it.’

  ‘Yes, all of that is right. But will God forgive me for it?’ said Charlie. ‘For the lying, for the law-breaking.’

  I was stunned by the question. For a moment I couldn’t think of anything to say.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘I don’t know much about God’s forgiveness. I don’t know much about God. But I know that I was in a dark place and everybody I turned to had let me down. Except you.’ I thought for a moment. What could I say that would comfort this man? ‘Maybe that’s what makes it good. It would be too easy if you were just doing what you were meant to do. To help me, you had to go against what you believe and you had to break the law. To do right you had to do wrong. That was a real favour because it was so difficult. I’m sure God will see that.’

  Charlie gave a slow smile. ‘You think that’s what God will think?’

  I managed a smile as well. ‘I don’t know. I’m just trying to make you feel better.’

  His smile faded. ‘You know he’ll get out one day. What then?’

  ‘He made it pretty clear what then, that day in court. But the judge said he should serve a minimum of thirty years. He killed two women and both murders were premeditated. By that time, it’ll be Poppy’s turn to look after me.’

  He nodded, shifted from foot to foot. ‘Well, it’s over at least.’

  ‘I suppose we won’t meet again.’

  ‘I suppose not,’ said Charlie. ‘Unless you’re wearing a wire.’

  I smiled. ‘I’m not wearing a wire. And you should be proud of what you did for Skye and Peggy.’

  ‘Maybe,’ he said, but I wasn’t sure he was convinced.

  SIXTY-SEVEN

  On a cool and blustery Sunday in May, I took Poppy to Alicia’s fifth birthday party. I looked back to Alicia’s fourth birthday party. I remembered how Poppy had worn the tulle skirt I had run up on the sewing machine, and the golden witch’s cloak I’d made, which now lay abandoned and shabby with over-use at the back of a drawer. I couldn’t bring myself to throw it
away.

  Today she wore faded jeans, desert boots and a bomber jacket Jake had grown out of. Jake had shot up in the last six months, all gangly limbs and clumsiness; Poppy was still little, one of the smallest in her Reception class. Her red hair seemed even redder; her pale skin more freckled. Her eyes gleamed; she crackled with energy.

  ‘If we were driving in your car—’ she said.

  ‘I don’t have a car.’

  ‘Yes, but if we were in it, and I shouted and jumped out of the window and did a somersault over the pavement and then ran to the seaside, what would you do?’

  ‘I suppose I’d have to stop the car and follow you.’

  ‘All the way to the seaside?’

  ‘Of course, if you got that far before I reached you.’

  ‘But what if I can fly and you can’t fly?’

  ‘That doesn’t seem fair. If you can fly, why can’t I?’

  ‘Grown-ups can’t fly. Only children.’

  We reached Alicia’s house and I handed the birthday present we’d brought to Poppy and rang the doorbell. Alicia’s mother opened it; she already looked exhausted. Behind her, I glimpsed a jumble of excited children.

  ‘Have a lovely time,’ I said to Poppy, but she didn’t move. Her hand gripped mine tightly and she stared up at me.

  ‘I’ll be back soon,’ I reassured her.

  ‘Promise till your crossed to die heart?’

  I resisted the urge to pick her up and hold her tight against me.

  ‘Yes. I cross my heart.’

  She let go of my hand and stepped over the threshold.

  ‘Good luck,’ I said to Alicia’s mother.

  ‘I got crayons for you!’ Poppy was yelling as she charged into the little crowd. ‘Open it. All colours of crayon.’

  * * *