Crossed Out

by Malcolm Hollingdrake

  “Cut! You’re supposed to explode after you’ve eaten it remember.”

  He laughed again.

  “Take two!” She put her hands together and opened them like a clapperboard before changing their shape to mimic a movie camera as she brought them to her face pretending she was now filming.

  Once he had regained his composure he leaned over and collected the potato. “Beautiful meal. Thank you.”

  Julie allowed the pause in conversation to linger longer than normal before she asked. “What do you want to talk to me about, Cyril?”

  Cyril nearly choked again. He looked across the table.

  “Cyril, I know you. Something has been eating away at you recently. You’re not the only one with detective skills. It’s called intuition and women have it in bucket loads.” She stretched out her hand and rested it on his reassuringly.

  Cyril felt in his breast pocket, withdrew the envelope and handed it to her. “I’ll go through to the lounge whilst you read that. There’s no rush and no need to comment but I’d appreciate it if you give it some thought.” He collected the bottle of red wine, topped up Julie’s glass and went through to the lounge. He felt his anxiety return.

  Within five minutes, she came in and leaned over to kiss him on the head. “Why didn’t you tell me about this before?” She sat opposite.

  “It’s always made me so angry, Julie. The past, him, her, the way someone’s trust can be so badly and cynically abused.” He sipped some more wine as if trying to find the courage for which he was searching further down the glass. “I knew about it when I was too young, too frightened and too naïve to tackle the situation. My silence seemed to signify and to suggest my acceptance when what I should have done was refused to tolerate what I could see was clearly going on. I should have stayed at home and not been forced off to boarding school, protected her especially when she started with her illness. I should have fought my mother’s corner, but then, I knew nothing of the onset of her illness, that was kept from me until it was too late. The information I received as a child was extremely doctored and besides, at that age I had little say in any domestic matters.” Cyril paused and stared into his glass. “And when I was old enough, it was too late.”

  The letter had given a brief and almost apologetic potted family history. “How did you know your father was having an affair?” Julie’s tone was measured.

  “During a summer holiday I’d gone to the local airfield to watch the aircraft land and take off. You could get right under the flight path. I’d cycled there. I remember it as if it were yesterday. I’d gone because I’d heard that the de Havilland Mosquito was going to land there. Christ was I excited to see it!” Cyril paused as if replaying the memory.

  For the first time, Julie saw the child in Cyril’s eyes, she could see the pools of vulnerability and innocence that she knew would soon be sullied and felt a flush of love for the vulnerable man sitting before her.

  “Goodness, Julie, when it took off and flew above me no higher than this ceiling, the Merlin engines at full chat, I wept, I tell you. I took two photographs on my Fuji Instax, an instant camera so that I could relive the moment immediately the plane had disappeared over the horizon. There were no digital cameras then. Excitedly, I started the journey home, eager to tell all who’d listen about the Mossie. Cycling was a pleasure and I was, in my mind at least, flying home, not cycling, making all the accompanying aircraft noises. Any German car seen was a clear target for my imaginary guns. I didn’t shoot down many.” He laughed out loud at the memory.

  Suddenly his facial expression changed. “It was then that I saw him, my father or, should I say, my father’s car. He had an immaculate maroon Bentley, you’d never miss it. It wasn’t new, more a classic, but he used it every day. It was down a farm track. Innocently I thought I’d get a lift home but there was no one in the car. Leaning my bike against the hedge I went to see if everything was all right. It might’ve been a Bentley but there was more than one occasion when it came home on the back of a recovery truck. I heard before I saw. The animalistic sounds quite frightened me, especially the female’s high-pitched gasps. Sounded as though she’d hurt herself.” He looked at Julie. “As I said, I was young and naïve. Only when I saw them did I realise what was going on. She was on all fours and he was behind. Both had their eyes closed but I could see them clearly. I realised it wasn’t Mum, it was one of her closest friends. Why I took the photograph I don’t know, probably because my camera was with me, around my neck. I don’t know. That day was suddenly sullied, shot to pieces, a maelstrom of confusion. I remember the torment in my mind as I cycled home oblivious to my surroundings.”

  “Was that this Wendy?” Julie held up the letter.

  Cyril nodded and topped up his glass again. “I put the camera away, never used it again that summer. The photograph, I just kept looking at the photograph. I hid it and then I took it with me back to boarding school. It was later that same summer I found out that Mum was ill. Within a year she’d be dead. Mum was nursed at home for as long as possible. It was only later did I discover that Wendy came and stayed at our house to look after her as Dad was working. She had cancer nurses coming in but she refused to leave. I believe that she knew what was going on and in some ways, considering my mother’s kind-hearted nature, she probably condoned his behaviour, believing in her heart that my father wouldn’t cope with being alone.” He looked up, his focus indeterminable. “She knew more, she probably thought that I’d need a mother, that she wouldn’t be there for me. That was the type of woman and mother she was, she always put others before herself. It was so brave of her, so very brave.”

  Cyril downed the remaining wine in the glass, went to the cabinet and poured a brandy. He was so immersed in the past that he ignored Julie. It was as if she were not there. He appeared to be talking to the past about the past. She said nothing.

  “The only consolation for me,” he continued, “was that he waited a respectable period of time after Mum’s passing before he married Wendy. The whole thing challenged for me my perception of relationships, of man and wife, of love and marriage.” He mumbled afterwards, “Go together like a horse and carriage.” His mumbling stopped. “Why? Why make the commitment? Why promise this and that? I couldn’t wait to leave home. I resented her, Wendy, my stepmother, she was the bitch, the schemer, she was my father’s bit on the side, my mother’s so-called best friend. Even though she tried to be kind to me I despised her.

  “After this I couldn’t wait to return to school, to get away from those who’d betrayed my mother. It was when I was away that I spoke with my housemaster. He could see that I was a troubled soul and I told him everything. It was only much later did I find out that my father had been to see him so that he was fully aware of my circumstances. However, my housemaster was sensitive and told me a story and it’s that story that brought total confusion and made me truly think about fate and coincidence, to discern fact from fiction. Maybe, the very reason, the very point in my life where I was determined to become a copper.”

  Julie stood, collected the brandy bottle and poured herself a glass before topping up Cyril’s. She sensitively touched the two glasses together, smiled at Cyril and settled down without uttering a word.

  “You saw the envelope?”

  Julie smiled. “Cyril V Bennett. A man with a secret!” Two words immediately sprang to mind, victorious and valiant and as quickly two words replaced them, vulnerable and victim.

  “Vaughan,” he paused. “after my mother’s favourite composer, Ralph Vaughan Williams. My mother was a violinist, a very good one too. She'd play for me as far back as I can remember until she was too ill to play but then she’d listen to music. Fantasia was her favourite, The Lark Ascending mine; I see her face every time I hear it. It’s usually a bittersweet moment, Julie.” He paused and hung his head.

  Julie knew better than to interrupt, to break the moment of reflection.

  “She even tried to teach me… hell’s bells… I proved
to be as musical as a stone trough.” He laughed briefly, breaking the heart-searching for a welcome moment. “That’s not the story but you needed to know that; without that information nothing else would make any sense. The housemaster told me that Vaughan Williams was happily married and later fell in love with a much younger, married woman, forty years his junior. When Vaughan Williams's wife fell ill, his lover helped nurse her and as a consequence she became close friends with his ailing wife. The scenario was almost identical. The only difference, Julie, that’s critical in this, Vaughan Williams had no children to torment mentally with his tangled relationships.”

  “Torment, Cyril?”

  “Torment, mental angst, confusion, add whatever title you want. It’s the questions, questions that can never be answered that are the worst. Questions I failed to ask my father. He became the man I despised then and the man I despise now. Did my mother know this about Vaughan Williams’s life? Surely yes, without a doubt. Did my father meet Wendy Swann before I was born? I don’t know. Did the knowledge of my father’s illicit relationship bring about my mother’s illness? I can’t answer that. Did my mother condone the relationship so that I might have the security of a mother’s love when she passed away? I’ll never truly know, Julie, but I’m sure all this turmoil has plagued my life and my relationships with women, has made me the man you see today, good or bad. It’s made me the career copper, a Detective Chief Inspector, hopefully good at his job, but it’s also made me the man who shuns permanent, personal commitment just in case…”

  She put her glass on the table. Kneeling before him she took both his hands and kissed each tenderly. A tear rolled down her cheek. “I’m so sorry to hear about your father. Wendy says the doctor has given him three weeks at most.” She squeezed his hands. “It’s so kind of her to find you and tell you so that you have time to make a decision. You are, my darling man, who you are, made up of a plethora of parts. Your parents are only a small element of the complex person you now are. You hold your mother’s memory close and so you should, she wanted the very best for her boy as any mother would. If she could see the Cyril Vaughan Bennett that I see and know, she would be an immensely proud mother, just as proud as I am, knowing you and loving you.” Julie turned his hands over and kissed his palms. “I love you, Cyril Vaughan Bennett and don’t you ever forget that.”

  26

  Cyril’s phone vibrated and danced across the bedside table until it crashed in the void between the bed and the table. His uncoordinated, searching hand failed to stop its Icarus flight. He pulled himself onto one elbow and the pounding in either temple suddenly attracted more attention than the phone. Leaning down he managed to retrieve it.

  “Bennett,” he announced with a whimper.

  “Good morning, sir. Lovely morning.”

  Cyril had not yet managed to open his eyes fully. He had tried but even the semi-darkness proved to be a hurdle. All he felt were the hammers pounding above his eye. “Owen.” He moved the phone away from his ear. Owen sounded far too loud and far too jovial.

  “Well done, sir. You received my text?” There was a long silence.

  “Text?” Cyril groaned trying to comprehend what Owen was talking about.

  “You were right about Fella. Caner is convinced it’s not suicide just as you thought. Beautiful morning. It’s so good when the sun shines and…” He failed to finish.

  “Owen, I don’t want a weather forecast. Is everything all right?”

  “I’ve had a thought.”

  Cyril groaned. “I’ve warned you about those before. Have a brew and it’ll pass.” Cyril hung up. His head crashed back onto the pillow. Even with his eyes closed the room seemed to be rotating. The phone vibrated again.

  “What do you want, Owen? It’s the middle of the night.”

  “It’s just past eight, sir, according to my watch but then it’s only a cheap, plastic digital. Just letting you know I'll be in Clipton until about eleven.”

  It was Owen’s turn to hang up abruptly. He turned to April, who was driving. “Bloody bear with a sore head today. Not like him at all. Let’s hope he’s found his inner calm before we get back.”

  April turned and smiled. “He always seems so measured, so in control.”

  “He can’t have got out of bed on the wrong side as I’m sure he was still in his pit… or Julie’s!” He turned and winked at her. “Remember, April, careless talk costs lives.” She giggled.

  The churchyard was quiet. “No Grim Reaper this morning?”

  “What?” Owen asked as he watched the wet grass soak through the front of his shoes.

  “When I was here last time I was surprised to see a woman cutting the grass using a scythe, made me think of the Grim Reaper.”

  Owen plodded on mumbling something about wet socks. He had failed to respond; why should he? She had assumed correctly that he had no religious belief, only a fleeting, professional curiosity about Christianity and he would, she believed, only be interested in enough to help solve this case. He looked at the church clock. Just after eight-thirty. “Where’s the pyramid grave?”

  “Beautiful church, Owen.”

  He turned and looked at her. “It’s lumps of stone, one on top of the other. Does nothing for me apart from tell the time.”

  April pointed in the general direction whilst admiring the trees’ resplendent mantle, a fresh, clean green that contrasted vividly with a small, grey cloud that was the only imperfection in a blue sky. It puzzled her as to why it should be there, an imposter, but then she looked at Owen crossing a grave with little respect and could not help but see a similarity.

  “Now that’s different!” Owen said with a newfound burst of enthusiasm. “If you want to mark your last place on earth then that’s how to do it. Mind, the old pharaohs’ tombs rather put this to shame but then this is Yorkshire where pennies are counted, unlike the Egyptians who got theirs built for free. Wonder if there are funerary objects and a sarcophagus beneath our feet, maybe wealth beyond our wildest dreams?” He turned to look at April, who stood nearby, a face that revealed enough for him to refocus his thoughts. “You’re right, probably not. That photograph on the board doesn’t do it justice. If you look, the grass has been trodden quite heavily around the base.” He believed that if Gideon continued to visit there would be some clue. “What do we know about it?”

  “The vicar told me that they get a lot of visitors to see it.” April opened her notes. “Grave of Thomas Telfer, married to Elizabeth known as Bessie. He was an explorer, engineer and architect. He inherited a fortune from his father and they travelled the world. He had a keen interest in all things Egyptian. He wrote a book on his interpretation of how the great Giza pyramids were constructed.”

  Owen walked around looking carefully for any marks that might appear new or anything concealed within the moss-covered edifice. He stopped, his eye drawn to some missing mortar between courses of stone. He quickly knelt and looked into the dark void. There was nothing. His disappointment was palpable. He stood and let his eyes wander around the churchyard. In the far corner, Owen spotted a large mesh bin, more a compost heap than a general dump, he realised after closer inspection. He wandered over and as he did, April moved and inspected the pyramid grave.

  Julie brought a glass of water and two paracetamol tablets. Cyril was hidden beneath one of the pillows, his hands folded across the top.

  “I thought that considering you consumed most of the brandy last night, you might need these. I take it that was Owen on the phone earlier?”

  Cyril groaned.

  “You can’t be a man at night and a little boy in the morning.” Julie laughed, conscious to begin the day on a brighter note than the nadir that had ensued the previous evening. No conclusion had been reached as to whether Cyril would visit his father, but considering the body language that he had exhibited and his frame of mind, she doubted it. She knew how stubborn he could be. “It’s your day off. It’s my day off. You can’t stay in bed all morning.”

&nb
sp; Cyril’s hand shot out and grabbed Julie’s arm. “There could be a worse fate.”

  Julie screamed as she fell across him and then giggled.

  Owen looked carefully at the many bunches of brown and withered flowers, all testaments to the sheer grief of losing a loved one. The only colour evident was the occasional ribbon and written card. Owen read a few: “Sweet dreams my dearest sister”, “Always remembered”, “Until we meet”… He picked up a branch that lay by the wall and lifted the upper layer.

  April also looked into the crevice between the courses of stone and, like Owen, she too was disappointed. She moved the grass from around the base to inspect the bottom course of stone. Her eye was drawn to something concealed by the corner.

  “April!” Owen’s shout made her jump. “What do you make of this?”

  She straightened and walked over to Owen who was standing by a large bin. He was holding what looked like a branch inserted into the pile of rubbish. She turned her head sideways and searched the area near the tip of the branch. There were two cards on which personal sentiments had been written. The recent rain and their location had taken its toll; the writing was smudged and the ink had leached into the card, blurring the script. He noted that none of the cards had the protective covering that he had seen on those positioned on the graves. Owen observed that it had had the desired effect on April. She suddenly became rigid and stepped back before pointing at the card. She looked at Owen but before she could say anything Owen nodded.

  She read the card out loud.

  Tracy Phillips 20 May, 1985 –3 June, 2017.

  When shadows fall and death hides you from the world, you will walk in sunshine.

  “Surely a coincidence, not the missing woman.” April read it again.

  “What have you missed?” Owen’s voice was calm and reassuring. It was clear that the name on the card had caused a degree of confusion.