The Tangled Web
Page 2
He wrote off to the Register Office for details of both his birth and Amanda’s, explaining that he wanted replacements for lost birth certificates. His own certificate duly arrived but not that of Amanda’s. So far as was known, the letter said, there was no registration of his sister’s birth. They suggested he had the date or the name wrong and said he should make further enquiries. If he wrote again with more information they might be able to help.
So the old woman had been right. But how had she known? Was it possible that by sheer coincidence he had tried to rob a house in the actual village where he and Amanda belonged? For sure he wouldn’t go there again. The old woman was probably ga-ga and was talking nothing but a load of rubbish! But she didn’t look ga-ga in the way she held that gun, she seemed to know exactly what she was doing. He shuddered every time he remembered that gun.
* * *
Weeks passed and Amanda began to accept that he was there for the forseeable future.
‘I know the wages he earns makes it impossible to survive on his own,’ she said to Gillian. ‘But Edmond and I have started seeing each other again and, well, it is difficult. Edmond makes it clear that Roy’s charm fails to work on him.’
‘Give him a little longer. I’m sure he’ll get a better job once he’s proved his honesty.’
‘Oh, I’m not complaining. I rather like having him around. He’s my brother, after all, my only relative, and as long as he behaves himself I’ll go on helping him.’ As with all the other times, she hoped this would be the last and that all the criminal behaviour was behind him.
‘Have you met his friend, Dave?’ Gillian asked one evening when they were in the library after school. ‘He seems very nice. Mam and I really think Roy’s avoiding the riff-raff and making an effort, don’t you?’
A few days later Amanda met Dave and, seeing his short hair and light tan, guessed where he and her brother had met. Gillian must have guessed too, she thought, so she is drifting into an acceptance of Roy’s life like other girls before her, believing she can change him into a perfect husband.
Dave was quite a lot older than Roy, probably middle thirties, Amanda guessed. She wondered if any of his family still supported him. He was looking for lodgings, so apparently not. He was easily persuaded to stay to supper, which was salad, potatoes and sliced spam. After they had eaten and Dave had helped with the dishes, Roy asked, ‘Would it be all right if Dave stays tonight?’ Although she wasn’t keen, she agreed.
Dave stayed several nights during the weeks that followed and each time he and Roy went out at about nine and didn’t return until long after midnight. Even then she couldn’t sleep. She didn’t really trust her brother, and with Dave there her doubts increased. She stayed awake long after retiring, listening for signs that Roy and Dave were leaving the flat. She dreaded having to be his alibi and hoped he would avoid returning to his thieving ways at least until he found somewhere else to live. If he ever did!
Then they both stayed out all night and the following day she found a pair of binoculars that were obviously expensive. When she faced him, he denied stealing them and stormed out.
‘He’s stealing again, I know he is,’ she said to Gillian.
‘The binoculars are mine, Amanda. Roy said he wanted to watch birds in the wood at the back of the hill. Seen a nightingale, he says.’
‘Oh, I thought—’
‘There’s nothing to worry about. But he isn’t helped by knowing you don’t trust him.’ Gillian sounded piqued. ‘His own sister, his only relation. Your suspicions will drive him straight back to prison.’
‘That’s ridiculous. He was out all night!’
‘They were both with Mam, Dad and me, for heaven’s sake! Playing cards we were. It got to be after midnight so the pair of them slept on our floor instead of walking back. Afraid of being stopped by the police they were.’
Sighing with relief, Amanda nevertheless warned her brother about not staying where the Probation Officer expected him to be.
‘Don’t get your ’air off, Mand, I couldn’t resist it,’ he grinned. ‘Dave left about nine but Gillian persuaded me to stay on, till after her Mam and Dad went to bed. Very persuasive she is, mind, that Gillian.’ He winked and Amanda was angered by his lies and her friend’s dishonesty.
Edmond rarely visited the flat. When they met she was asked to meet him either at the cinema or at the restaurant. He never brought her home, just left her where they had parked the cars and drove away with a haste that suggested relief. When they were together his arm was rarely there and his kisses became less loving and more a formal salute to an aged aunt, she told an amused Gillian. Sometimes she blamed Roy but mostly she was honest enough to admit that if it hadn’t been Roy it would have been something else.
* * *
It was June before she knew for certain she was being tricked by Roy. She woke very early one morning desperate for a drink and went into the kitchen to make a cup of tea. The dining room door was open slightly and, peeping in, prepared to apologise for disturbing him, saw at once that his room was empty.
He returned at four-thirty to find her sitting in the pre-dawn waiting for him. As he closed the door behind him she switched on the light.
Apparently unperturbed, he asked, ‘Hello, Mand. What you doing up? Couldn’t sleep? Me neither. I’ve been for a walk.’
‘What’s that you’re carrying?’ she asked quietly.
‘What, this?’ He patted the bag, hidden under his coat but causing a bulge her sharp, suspicious eyes couldn’t miss. ‘Oh, just something I picked up at the park gates. Someone must have dapped it down and forgot it. The street light’s broken just there so I thought I’d bring it home to see if it’s valuable.’
He went to walk away but she held his arm, a fierce glare in her eyes. ‘Then we’ll look together, shall we?’
‘Sis!’ he said reproachfully. ‘You don’t trust me. And here’s me thinking you understood my determination to go straight.’ She held out a hand for the bag and he gave it to her, sad-eyed with reproach, and watched while she unpacked a thermos flask – one of her own – and a half-eaten sandwich. She looked at him coldly as she also removed a short crowbar with curved ends, some metal objects she recognised as skeleton keys and a small claw hammer.
‘I didn’t do nothin’,’ he insisted. ‘I just carry the stuff sometimes to remind me of what ruined my life. Like an alcoholic having an unopened bottle of scotch. I can easily chuck it if a policeman appears, and there’s nothing suspicious about an insomniac out for a stroll, is there?’
‘Roy, you’re on probation.’
‘Well, who’s going to see me? Careful I am. I know how to avoid the police, Mand.’
‘Sorry, Roy, but I can’t cope with this any more. You’re my brother and I love you, but it’s time you left, found a place of your own.’
‘Love you too sis, and I understand. Don’t think I’m not grateful. Lucky I am to have you. I’ll try to get somewhere, I’ll really try, but we won’t lose touch will we? Proper choked I’d be if that happened, Mand. You’re all I’ve got in the ’ole wide world.’
She sat up for what was left of the night feeling wretchedly guilty. She wanted to help him but didn’t know how. He was her brother and, as he had reminded her, the only person in the world belonging to her. Giving him a roof over his head wasn’t enough. The next day she said nothing more about him leaving and things continued as they were for another week.
Then she was again disturbed at night, and this time it was the now familiar loud banging on the door and the call, ‘This is the police.’ More banging and, ‘Open the door, this is the police.’
* * *
As she watched the police search her flat it became less and less her home. Every room was ransacked and as it was pulled apart, all feeling of security and comfort faded. She had to find a new place, a single room, a bedsit. She would hate it after this once pleasant flat, but knew that if she stayed and tried to rebuild the ambience she had once enjoyed,
she would be too soft-hearted to refuse Roy a bed when he was once again free.
The worst part of his recent string of robberies was Gillian’s involvement. She had been flattered and instilled with the sense of adventure, and, taking advantage of her adoration, Roy had left her to explain the presence of a few pieces of jewellery, some cheap watches and cigarette cases in a rarely used shed. Stuff he had intended to dispose of.
The police eventually believed she knew nothing, but she left her job and avoided Amanda completely. She must hate me, Amanda reasoned, for introducing her to my charming and untrustworthy brother. As she had forseen, Roy had cost her another friend.
She believed that she and Roy were alone in the world. Her mother had left them at a police station. How ironic that was, she mused, when you think of the time Roy had spent in one since!
She had been six months old and Roy had been about two. When she was old enough she had searched the area around the Children’s Home for a family called Clifford, but no one wanted to own to being even a distant relation. That was why it was so difficult to refuse to help Roy. There was no one else and if she let him go out of her life she would be completely alone. A thief he undoubtedly was, but he was also her brother.
* * *
Amanda began to imagine she was being followed. An unknown man had knocked at a neighbouring house and asked about her, and twice she saw someone at the school apparently staring at her as she took her turn supervising the children at play and practised netball with them. On another occasion, she sensed rather than saw someone darting into a shop doorway when she turned suddenly. Most surprising of all, a man took her photograph before hurrying off down a side-street.
She was irritated rather than frightened. It had to be something to do with Roy. Really, his intrusion into her life with his criminal ways was becoming a serious nuisance. She did have a shiver of apprehension when she thought it might not be the police, but someone whom he had crossed in some way. But surely she wasn’t in danger from his activities? It was just as well she was moving. Perhaps she would see an end to it once she found somewhere else to live.
* * *
To everyone’s surprise, Roy was found not guilty of the robberies. Gillian and her parents, feeling sorry for him and believing he had been tricked by Dave, had given alibis for him. It was Dave who returned to prison and Roy who walked free. That Gillian had lied, Amanda was certain. The reason she had changed her job and stayed away from her was probably not because of any regret for being introduced to Roy, but because of guilt over having perjured herself. Either way, Gillian no longer considered her a friend.
* * *
Roy was ecstatic. As well as the money he had acquired, he had Dave’s as well, and what with the police finding the few worthless oddments they had left in Gillian’s garden shed, they wouldn’t expect to find the rest. He knew people often didn’t know with any certainty just what had been stolen and their haziness encouraged him to think that the police would accept that the money would never have been found.
He chuckled as he remembered the old woman with the gun. She probably didn’t report the burglary and she didn’t even ask for the money he’d taken. He kept that three pounds ten shillings and sixpence as a sort of lucky charm in the back of his wallet. What fools people were.
Dave would know, of course, and he could be dangerous when he was crossed. But why worry? He would be long gone before Dave came out and started to look for him.
Amanda was looking for a new home. Roy knew this and began his own plans. He had a feeling that Gillian would persuade her parents to take him in. What a comfortable billet that would be. In the meantime, he had the remaining tenancy of Amanda’s flat, on which she had paid the rent.
* * *
Searching for new accomodation took time and it was during the big summer break from school that Amanda eventually found a room. It was small and would necessitate selling most of her furniture, but with a growing determination to make a fresh start, she offered it to a colleague who was getting married and used the money to buy herself a comfortable bed-settee. With room for one person only, she felt guilty but determined to make Roy find somewhere else to stay.
* * *
In the village of Tri-nant a pair of cottages were welcoming new tenants. And from one, a steady stream of letters and photographs went forth to a town several hundred miles to the north east of it, where an old woman lay dying. When her enquiries were completed and she was satisfied she had achieved her aim, the old woman paid off the investigator and the following day, changed her Will. When death finally claimed her she was at peace. She had done what she could to right a wrong.
* * *
Amanda spent the first weeks of the summer holiday decorating the room and finding small items to make the place her own. During the rest of the time, she prepared for the new school year, designing and making displays and games to develop early skills. The room looked very overcrowded as she painted and sewed and knitted fresh toys for the new intake of children. She hoped her determination to make Roy stand on his own feet hadn’t forced her to make a mistake. The room wasn’t exactly comfortable.
When the new term began she was filled with her usual excitement at the prospect of a new group of children who would come to her as babies and leave her proudly carrying reading books and with the beginnings of all the main subjects already sown in their lively minds.
It was October when the letter came and she didn’t open it until late in the evening, when, abandoning her work, she was relaxing with a cup of coffee and settling to watch the television. She reached over and sifted casually through the morning’s delivery. The envelope looked official and at once she thought it was something to do with Roy. What now? More trouble?
The letter was from a solicitor and told her that her Aunt Flora had died and left her a cottage in a village called Tri—nant. A map showed her it was about eight miles away. She read the letter twice, then studied the envelope, convinced it had been intended for someone else. The name was right; Amanda Gwendoline Clifford. The address was her previous one and had been forwarded by her former landlord. She frowned, then put it aside. It would be easily cleared up the following day with a phone call to the firm of solicitors.
There was no mistake. An aunt about whom she had known nothing had left her a cottage in her Will. The Will explained that Clifford was not her family surname but that the real name of her father was not known. She waited, hardly daring to breathe as she hoped for more revelations, some information that might lead her to members of a family she didn’t know she had. But there was nothing further. The bombshell came at the end, in a codicil. Aunt Flora asked that the man calling himself Roy Clifford, a regular offender, should not be allowed to live at the cottage with her.
‘A man calling himself Roy Clifford?’ She puzzled over the wording, then remembered that their name wasn’t Clifford, only the name of the family who had adopted them.
At once she wanted to protest but the words died as she saw the solicitor frown. ‘Your aunt wanted you to have the house for the rest of your life, Miss Clifford, and I think she was afraid that should your brother share it, he might do something which would cause you to sell it. You can’t ignore this reasonable request. I’m sure your brother, whatever his morals and behaviour, wouldn’t wish that for you. He is after all a convicted and repeat offender.’
Although the words were true, hearing them said put her on the defensive. ‘He’s foolish, but not bad!’ she protested at once.
‘I’m only passing on her wishes, Miss Clifford. Like your aunt, I wish you well.’
‘Thank you.’ She smiled then. ‘I don’t know whether I’m sorry or pleased about him not being allowed to stay, and if I’m pleased, whether I shouldn’t be feeling more guilty than I do.’
‘Don’t waste energy on guilt, Miss Clifford. It’s such a useless emotion. Especially when it’s undeserved. Enjoy the cottage.’
‘I will. I’m so excited at owning a place
of my own, and knowing I might have family somewhere near is added pleasure.’
‘Oh, there’s one more thing. You have a tenant.’
‘A tenant? I thought this meant I’d move in to my aunt’s home?’
‘Your aunt hasn’t lived there for a long time, apart from visits between tenants, and she requests – only requests, she doesn’t insist, you understand? She requests that you allow Mrs Falconbridge a year from when you accept the place before you ask her to vacate the property. And to be generous if it takes a little longer.’
‘I’ll willingly agree to that. I’ll have a year to savour it all.’ She smiled at him as she began to rise. ‘A year in my tiny bedsit will make me appreciate it all the more!’
* * *
Amanda was nervous driving down to see the property after writing to arrange it with her tenant. She was prepared to meet an irate woman demanding to be left in peace and, as the miles slid under the wheels of her second-hand Austin, the woman grew in size and fury.
What about the condition of the place? The solicitor didn’t say anything about that and she hadn’t thought to ask. It was probably a ruin. A tumbledown barn. And she wouldn’t be able to afford the repairs. After all the excitement, she might have inherited nothing more than a garden plot heaped up with rubble!
Stopping outside Firethorn Cottage, she forgot her fears and her heart beat loudly in excitement as she looked at the place she would one day call home. It was a beautifully kept, white-painted thatched property. Not the ruined and neglected sight she had half expected.