The Birthday Girl

by Sue Fortin

  ‘Our children.’

  ‘Zoe Coleman says she heard the two of you arguing. What do you say to that?’

  I can feel the heat rise up my neck and am sure my cheeks are on the verge of glowing red. ‘It was nothing – a difference of opinion about my son, Alfie.’ I take a second to swallow the lump of guilt that rises in my throat. ‘I walked off in the end.’

  I steal a look at the DCI as he takes a moment to contemplate my statement so far. He offers no comment but nods as if he has drawn some conclusion. ‘When you and Andrea Jarvis left the croft to get help, Mrs Jarvis says you got into an argument with her. Is that right?’

  ‘Er … yes. It wasn’t a big argument though.’ I’m thrown by the sudden change in direction.

  ‘How would you describe it? Petty?’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘And what did you and Mrs Jarvis argue about?’

  ‘Is this necessary? How is that relevant?’ The words burst out before I have time to check them. ‘Sorry. I’m finding this all rather difficult.’

  ‘Yes, I can imagine. But I do have to ask these questions, I’m afraid,’ says Chilton. He genuinely sounds sorry. ‘So, if you wouldn’t mind answering …’

  ‘Our children. We argued about our children.’ I sound almost sulky as I say the words. I’m aware that this is not winning the DCI over to my side. ‘I’m sorry, I’m just really tired,’ I say, trying to recover lost ground.

  ‘I’m sure you are. I have a few more questions and then I’ll leave you in peace,’ says Chilton. ‘When Tris Aldridge turned up at the croft, what made you run away from him and Zoe Coleman?’

  ‘When I returned to the croft to get help for Andrea, Tris was there, with Zoe. It was a very strange atmosphere. Nothing felt natural. I wanted to go back to help Andrea and I tried to get Zoe to come with me, but she couldn’t. Tris didn’t say anything, but he had his hand on her shoulder, stopping her from getting up. She mouthed the words get help and run at me.’

  ‘And that’s when you ran away?’

  ‘I went in the garden to get some climbing rope and Tris followed me out,’ I explain. ‘I’d grabbed a walkie-talkie from the kitchen on my way out and tried to contact the park ranger – or at least, what I thought was the park ranger. Turned out it was Tris all along.’

  ‘Mr Aldridge tells me that it was a joke. Something his wife had set up.’

  I shrug. ‘I don’t know. It could have been, but by this time I was scared, I …’ My voice trails away. I feel ashamed for leaving Zoe behind, even though I know she wouldn’t have been able to run as fast as I could.

  ‘So it was then you ran away?’ prompts Chilton.

  I compose myself and reply. ‘Yes. Up to the forest. I knew I’d be able to out-run Tris.’

  ‘I see.’ I’m not sure what he sees, but he carries on before I can say anything else. ‘Did you know Tris Aldridge had arranged with his wife to come up to the croft that day?’

  I shake my head. ‘She never said anything to me. I thought it was supposed to be only the four of us, but Joanne did like surprises.’

  ‘Why do you think she asked Tris to come up?’

  My shrug relays my inability to answer the question. Chilton cups his hands together and rests his elbows on his knees. ‘Mr Aldridge says his wife was nervous about the weekend. Especially since you and she had fallen out recently.’

  ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, he would say that, wouldn’t he?’ I catch myself again. ‘Joanne and I were fine.’

  ‘You hadn’t fallen out?’

  ‘No. Not recently. We had a disagreement a while ago, but that was all sorted out.’

  ‘Would this have been the disagreement concerning her daughter and your late husband?’

  My mouth drops open in true goldfish style. Tris must have told him; how else would Chilton know? ‘That was all a misunderstanding. Their daughter had a crush on my husband, who was a tutor at the college where she was studying. Nothing happened between them. And the Aldridges and us, we were fine afterwards.’

  ‘Let me get this straight. You had a history with Joanne Aldridge since this business with her daughter, you had an argument with Joanne this weekend, you were the last person to see her alive. You also had an argument with Andrea Jarvis, again, about children. You also had an argument with Tris Aldridge. There seems to be a common denominator here. Do you always argue with your friends?’

  ‘No! You’re making it sound worse than it is.’

  We eye each other in an unspoken stand-off. I don’t like the way this interview is going or the angle the DCI is approaching it from. ‘I swear to you, I never did anything to harm Joanne. She was alive when I left her.’

  ‘OK, let’s move on to what happened on the river. You and your son decided to take the kayaks. Why was that?’

  Again, I’m thrown by the change in direction. I can’t help thinking this is a ploy to catch me out. I force myself to concentrate, despite the headache that is brewing. ‘I was worried Tris might catch us if we took the road on foot, and we didn’t have any other means of transport. No phones. Nothing.’ I dip my head and smooth my hands across the blanket draped over my knees, trying to dry my sweaty palms.

  ‘You genuinely thought Tris Aldridge posed a threat to you?’

  ‘Yes. Like I said, Zoe told me to run. I was scared of him. I was frightened about what he’d do to Alfie. He had already tried to … tried to get me. I think he was going to hang me and make it look like suicide.’ The last few words are practically a whisper. After everything that has happened since then, I’ve hardly had time to process what Tris had wanted to do to me. Since then my main aim has been staying alive and rescuing Alfie.

  I feel a sudden weight of reality settle on me. Tris Aldridge had wanted not only his wife dead, but me too, so he could pin her murder on me and pass off my suicide as an act of remorse. I swallow hard and blink away the tears.

  ‘Take your time,’ urges Chilton. ‘When you’re ready, tell me what happened once you and Alfie were in the kayak. Were you in one kayak or two?’

  ‘We were in one, but we took the other one with us so that Tris couldn’t use it. We were going to cast it adrift further down the river.’

  The memory of the gushing waters, the noise of the current and the coolness of the wind returns. I close my eyes for a moment. I don’t want to be transported back there. I need to keep a distance. I can describe it but I can’t relive it. ‘Sorry, this is so difficult … OK, it was all going fine until we rounded a bend in the river. There were rapids. The current was picking up speed, churning up as it hit the rocks and boulders. We couldn’t get out of the current and were being swept along.’ I pause and count to myself while I rein in my emotions. One … two … three … breathe. I can do this. I must.

  ‘Were you in the front or the back of the kayak?’ asks Chilton, his voice soft but firm. A voice that can’t be ignored.

  ‘I was in the front. Alfie in the back. He’s stronger than me.’ My stomach gives a roll and I think my breakfast is going to make a return journey. Once again, I call on the techniques I have learned to control the anxiety that is building up inside me. ‘We had no choice but to sit tight and hope for the best. I don’t know what happened next. I remember the noise. I could hear Alfie shouting but I didn’t know what he was saying. Then suddenly there was a drop. It was like being on one of those log flumes at the amusement parks. We were airborne for a second, before dropping back into the water. We must have hit a rock because suddenly, I was thrown out of the boat and went under.’

  ‘Did you have a life jacket on?’

  ‘No. Those were stored in the croft. We didn’t have time to get them.’

  ‘Were you knocked unconscious at any stage?’

  ‘I don’t know. It’s all a blur. I remember feeling I was being pulled down by the current and carried along underwater. I thought my lungs were going to burst. I was buffeted against rocks. I totally lost my bearings. And then, somehow, I was propelled to the s
urface. I looked round for Alfie but I couldn’t see him. It was all I could do to stay afloat as I was swept along by the current …’ I pause. My chest feels tight. I want to cry. I want to let out all the emotion, all the pain, both physical and mental. It is so hard to keep it under control. I fumble for another tissue, but the box slides on the Formica top. Chilton takes hold of the box and tugs at the contents. He hands me a tissue.

  ‘Take your time. You’re doing great.’

  I wipe my face and nose several times before I feel able to continue. ‘Then I saw Alfie, face down. The water was pushing him towards me. I managed to grab on to a rock to stop myself from being carried further along and as he went by I caught his sleeve. I nearly lost him, but somehow I managed to drag him out of the current.’

  Again, more memories flood my mind. Snapshots. None of them joining together to make one complete narrative, but fragments jumbled up, all in the wrong order.

  ‘How did you manage that with a bad wrist?’ says Chilton.

  His words jolt me from my thoughts. I look at him blankly. How did I do that? I shrug. ‘I have no idea. I can’t remember feeling any pain. I suppose the mothering instinct in me, the one that puts their child’s life above everything else, must have taken over. All I remember is dragging him backwards through the water and on to the riverbank.’

  ‘It was a shallow bank on that side. You were very lucky.’

  Lucky? Lucky to be alive? I suppose I am, but that doesn’t necessarily mean I am lucky in any other respect. I now have to live with what happened. That’s not lucky.

  ‘Have the doctors spoken to you about Alfie?’

  I turn my gaze away and look at the treetops through the window. My heart is somewhere near the floor, the weight of the unhappiness within almost too great an encumbrance to bear. ‘They have,’ I manage to reply.

  ‘He took a big blow to the head,’ says Chilton. ‘On one of those rocks in the rapids, no doubt. Did you see it happen?’

  I move my gaze slowly across the window, turning my head until finally I am facing the DCI. ‘There were rocks everywhere. He could have hit his head on any one of them. Everything happened so quickly …’ My voice tails off as the tears make an unexpected comeback. The tissue in my hand is soft and wet, I close my fingers around it, so tightly that at first I don’t register the pain. My nails are digging into the palm of my hand, but it’s not until I feel the warm liquid of blood on my skin that I look down and see what I’ve done to myself.

  I let out a cry of alarm, throwing the tissue away from me. It brushes across my knees and falls silently to the floor. A bright red crumpled ball of blood.

  ‘Hey, hey, Carys. Are you OK?’

  I flinch as something touches my arm. I look up and realise it’s the detective. He is leaning over me, his hand resting gently on my arm. I look down at the tissue. This time I see no blood, only a white crumpled piece of tissue.

  ‘I … I thought …’ I look again at Chilton, then the tissue. I inspect my hand. No blood anywhere. ‘Sorry, I’m not feeling good.’

  ‘I know this is difficult, Carys, but I need to establish a chain of events.’ He gives me a sympathetic smile. When he speaks, his voice is soft and full of compassion. ‘If there’s something that you remember, don’t be scared to tell me. In my experience, people in extreme situations do extreme things. Things they wouldn’t ever contemplate under normal circumstances. It’s frightening, I know, but if you can remember anything more, it would help me immensely.’

  This time I look Detective Chief Inspector Matt Chilton straight in the eye. ‘Sorry. I don’t remember anything else.’

  Chapter 33

  DCI Chilton has been gone for about twenty minutes now. I watched from my hospital window as he left the building and crossed over to the car park. It’s only a momentary respite. He’s going to send someone over later today to take an official statement from me. I’ve been asked not to leave the area, in case he needs to ask me any more questions. I can read between the lines. I’m the chief suspect and he is biding his time while he gathers more evidence.

  I’ve asked Seb to buy me a cheap pay-as-you-go mobile phone. My own one has been found at the croft and is currently being analysed. Chilton tells me it’s standard procedure and the other phones are also being looked at. I’ve not been singled out, apparently.

  From behind me, I hear the door to my room open. I turn, expecting it to be the mid-morning cup of tea, so am surprised when a big bouquet of flowers appears large enough to obscure the gift-bearer’s face. My first thought is Seb and my spirits lift a little, but as I take in the jeans and the men’s trainers, I realise I don’t recognise either.

  ‘Hello, Carys,’ comes the voice. He lowers the bunch of flowers and smiles. ‘Surprise.’

  ‘Tris!’ I want to leap from my chair but the drip in my arm prevents me from doing so.

  He walks over and, without a moment’s hesitation, drops a kiss on my cheek. If he notices me recoil from his contact, he makes no reference to it. ‘Good to see you,’ he says, with such ease I have to remind myself of the events of the past weekend. ‘How are you feeling?’ he continues, as he goes over to the sink and pops the plug in, before filling it with water and resting the flowers there.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ I say, finally finding my voice.

  ‘I need to talk to you.’ He takes the seat that Chilton occupied less than an hour ago.

  ‘I don’t want to talk to you. Go away. Now.’

  Tris remains seated. ‘I know you think I had something to do with Joanne’s death, but I promise you, I didn’t.’

  ‘Why should I believe you?’ I retort, glancing over to the door, wishing Seb would walk through it right now.

  ‘Because you know me better than that.’

  ‘Do I?’

  ‘Of course you do.’

  ‘Then why did you want to kill me?’

  He gives an incredulous laugh. ‘What the fuck? Kill you? Jesus, Carys, where did you get that idea?’

  ‘You chased me. Through the fucking forest, Tris. You tried to hunt me down like some animal. Then you threatened me, saying if I didn’t come back, something would happen to Alfie.’

  ‘Have a word with yourself,’ says Tris; the incredulous look remains. ‘I was chasing you because I was worried about you. I could tell you had lost it, got all paranoid. Running off into the forest like that, I was worried something would happen to you. That’s why I was chasing you.’

  ‘No. No, that’s not true,’ I say, replaying the events in my mind. He had definitely chased me and it wasn’t for my own well-being. Was it?

  ‘Carys, think about it. When did I threaten you? What did I say?’

  ‘You had the walkie-talkie, you pretended to be the park ranger and said you were going to help us.’

  ‘Yeah, I did, but only because Joanne told me to.’

  ‘Then why answer me that final time, when you came out into the garden?’

  Tris pulls a pained expression. ‘Sorry about that. Bad taste. I don’t think I was thinking straight.’ He runs a hand through his hair. ‘You do know it was all Joanne’s idea, me pretending to be the park ranger? But I swear to you, I didn’t know what had happened the first time you called. I genuinely thought it was part of the game. Joanne told me to go along with whatever was said. I was doing as she asked. Or so I thought.’

  ‘What?’ I shake my head. Tris is throwing doubt on my thoughts. ‘But you were going to harm Alfie.’

  ‘When? I promise you, Carys, I would never harm that lad. God, he’s been through enough already. You know how much I think of him. I was only letting you know he was there.’

  ‘You’re lying!’

  ‘I am not! Think about it, Carys, when did I ever say I was going to harm Alfie?’

  I dredge up the conversation we had over the walkie-talkie. I can’t pinpoint the exact moment Tris threatened Alfie. Why is that? I plough deeper into my mind but come up with nothing. I cannot remember Tris making th
e threat, not in so many words. The little ball of doubt is growing in momentum, increasing in size as I try to locate the point of threat but fail. ‘You said something, I can’t remember. You’re confusing me.’

  ‘You can’t remember because there’s nothing to remember,’ says Tris, with a calm sincerity that only serves to increase my anxiety. I am sure he can see the despair and uncertainty in my eyes. He raises his eyebrows in question. ‘I didn’t threaten you, did I?’

  ‘You’re messing with my head,’ I say, frustration coating every word. I sit taller in my seat. ‘Get out of here. You need to leave. If you don’t, I’ll call the nurse.’

  ‘Don’t get yourself stressed,’ says Tris. ‘It’s not good for you.’

  ‘I mean it,’ I say, ignoring his supposed concern. I reach for the call buttons on the table next to me but Tris is quicker and moves the table out of my reach. ‘What do you want?’ I say, searching his face for any clues.

  ‘I want to make sure you’re OK. You suffered a nasty shock at the weekend, and a nasty bang to your head too, so I’m concerned about you.’ There’s a lack of sincerity to his words.

  ‘Bullshit,’ I snap.

  ‘You need to stay calm. Don’t get yourself worked up … again.’

  ‘What do you mean, again?’

  ‘Like you did when you saw me at the croft. I know what you’ve been through and … the destabilising effect it can have.’ Tris presses his lips together and tips his head to one side in what is supposed to represent a sympathetic gesture. ‘Seeing a friend dead like that can mess with your mind. Especially when you’ve a history of mental health problems.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Oh yes you do. When Darren hanged himself, you weren’t too good then. I recall Joanne, God rest her soul’ – he makes the sign of the cross – ‘telling me how you were on antidepressants afterwards.’

  ‘That’s none of your business,’ I hiss, trying to hide the hurt I feel, knowing Joanne had betrayed my confidence. I hadn’t told anyone else, not even Andrea, that I was on antidepressants. Joanne only found out by accident. The tablets had fallen out of my bag one day and she had spotted them. She had quizzed me about them and I had felt compelled to tell her. At the time, it had been a relief, but now I wish I hadn’t been so trusting. It was naïve of me.