Rough Cider

by Peter Lovesey

  I said inanely, “What?”

  She waited for it to sink it.

  Meanwhile I was eyeing the stack of ketchup bottles on the shelf, each with its red deposit caked around the cap. Anyone who contemplated a night in this place had to be desperate.

  “Why, for God’s sake? It’s a hole.”

  “I can see that.”

  “Is it me? Something I said to upset you?”

  “No particular thing.”

  “What, then?”

  The food arrived, dried-up fish and undercooked chips without vegetables or garnish, slammed in front of us, followed by one of the ketchup bottles.

  I said with all the consideration I could muster, “Alice, I’d like to know what this is about.”

  She tightened her mouth and said nothing.

  I told her, “I’m not going to leave you in a dump like this without a very good explanation.”

  She pushed her plate aside. She hadn’t touched the food.

  I said across the chasm that had opened between us, “Don’t you think I’m entitled to be told?”

  Something disturbingly akin to contempt flickered across her face.

  I wasn’t giving up. “This relates to something you asked me earlier, doesn’t it?”

  A response at last. She nodded.

  I said, “About what happened in the hayloft?”

  She mouthed the word yes.

  So we were back to the rape.

  She must have seen the muscles tighten along my jawline.

  She gave me a warning look, narrowing her eyes.

  I said, “Has something prompted this?”

  “Sure. What we just heard from Harry.”

  “Harry? He was lying through his teeth.”

  After an interval to sharpen up the sarcasm she asked, “How did you get to be such an infallible judge of character, Theo? Is it intuition, sixth sense, or just refusing ever to trust a Yank?”

  I smiled ironically. “Harry?”

  “Not only Harry. My daddy too.”

  “I trusted him.”

  “Not when he said things you didn’t want to believe.”

  “Such as?”

  “The way he really felt about Barbara. There was never anything serious between them.”

  I frowned. “He said that?”

  “In court. On oath.”

  “He was confused.”

  “Theo, it’s on record. I read it in one of your books. There was nothing serious. He said it.”

  I commented offhandedly, “Depends what you mean by serious. I’d say her condition indicated something serious.”

  She scraped back her chair and said witheringly, “Is this the garbage you were trying to peddle to Harry? Are you seriously suggesting my daddy got her pregnant?”

  She had every right to feel defensive about Duke. I loved him, too, and the truth hurt. “Someone did, Alice. She wasn’t promiscuous.”

  “I’m not questioning that. I question the assumption that my daddy was responsible.”

  I leaned back in my chair. “Who do you think was the father, then?”

  “Cliff Morton. You told me it was him.”

  “I told you what the gossip was in 1943.” I leaned forward. “She was two months’ pregnant when she died at the end of November. She’d been going out with Duke since September.”

  Alice clicked her tongue and looked away, as if it were futile listening to me.

  I took a mouthful of the pale chips and chewed them, letting her brood on what I’d said. After an interval I said, “I expect you’re thinking of the incident in the apple orchard, when Morton was given his marching orders. You think he may have made her pregnant then? It’s true that she was pretty upset and so were the Lockwoods. She had love bites on her neck and shoulders. But as for full sex, no, that doesn’t fit the facts. They would have treated it more seriously. Everyone would have. I had the impression there was some grappling in the long grass, a few snatched kisses, not much more.”

  “With Barbara’s consent?”

  I felt my blood run cold. “Of course not.”

  Alice’s eyebrows jutted above the level of her glasses. “Why not?”

  She was either incredibly wide of the mark or trying to goad me. Deciding to treat it lightly, I gave a laugh that was exhaled more than voiced. “She despised the man. He had a bad reputation. No regular work. He dodged the call-up. The entire family despised him.”

  “They employed him to pick apples.”

  “Force of circumstance. Men were in short supply.”

  She felt for her plait and traced one of the strands with her fingertip.

  I said, “You won’t make me believe that Barbara allowed Cliff Morton to… to…”

  “You can’t even bring yourself to mention it, can you?” said Alice in a voice that mingled pity and contempt. “Theo, you idiolized that girl. She was sweet to you, and you turned her into a saint. I don’t blame you. I had crushes on people myself when I was a kid. Only you’re not a nine-year-old boy anymore. For God’s sake let’s talk about this in an adult fashion, because I think you’re way off-beam over Barbara. I think she loved Cliff Morton.”

  “Impossible.”

  “Will you let me finish? Let’s start with some facts of life. Simple mathematics. Barbara was found to be two months’ pregnant at the time of her death, right? When precisely did she kill herself?”

  “On the Sunday. November thirtieth.”

  “So she conceived in late September or very early the following month.”

  “Presumably.”

  “And it was late September when my daddy first came to the farm.”

  “True.” At least there were some facts we could agree on. I took a fish bone from my mouth and parked it at the edge of my plate. I had a glimmer of where this was leading but only a glimmer. A man isn’t so habituated to counting weeks and months.

  She added, “If I got it right from you, they didn’t spend any time together until the Columbus Day concert.”

  She’d fanned the glimmer into a spark.

  “Columbus Day is October twelfth. These days we observe it on the second Monday in the month, but in the war it was always the same.” She watched me without emotion as she repeated, “October twelfth, Theo.”

  I stared at her blankly. Why hadn’t I worked it out for myself? I took a deep breath and admitted with as much dignity as I could salvage, “Duke couldn’t have been the father of her child.”

  “Thank you.” She looked over her glasses. “But somebody must have been.”

  I said with loathing, “That bastard Morton. He did rape her in the apple orchard.”

  Pointedly, she commented, “You told me just now it doesn’t fit the facts.”

  “It has to,” I blustered. “I was mistaken.”

  “No,” said Alice. “You were right. You’re not going to like this, Theo, but Barbara and Cliff were sweethearts.” She put up a restraining hand. “Before you hit the roof, will you answer me this? When was the first time you noticed Cliff?”

  “That morning in the orchard, I suppose.”

  “Would you try to recall it precisely, please?”

  I gave a sharp sigh of impatience. The way she was addressing me was strikingly reminiscent of the cross-examination she’d made of Harry Ashenfelter. Well, if she wanted me on the witness stand, she’d find that I had a poor regard for her latest theory. I reminded her coolly, “I think I told you this before. It was during the break when Mrs. Lockwood brought out the tea. Quite a few of the people there were strangers to me, but I noticed Morton because he collected a mug of tea for Barbara and sat beside her. It proves nothing.”

  “You were just a little put out because it cut across your plans as a matchmaker. That’s why you noticed him, isn’t that so?”

  I wasn’t letting that pass unchallenged. “A matchmaker, no. I never actively promoted the friendship between Duke and Barbara.”

  She rephrased it. “They were both special people in your eyes,
and you hoped they would link up.”

  I accepted that.

  Alice said, “Let’s move on to that afternoon. If I understood you right, Barbara quietly went missing in some remote part of the orchard.”

  “Quietly?” I objected. “That puts a whole different emphasis on what happened, as if it were furtive.”

  “Was she dragged screaming into the woods, then?”

  “Well, no, but…”

  “And you heard no screams later? Isn’t it possible that she slipped away of her own volition to meet Cliff?”

  “Possible,” I conceded, making it plain that the possibility was extremely remote,

  She was undeterred. “You’re pretty sure the Lockwoods didn’t like Cliff?”

  “On the couple of occasions he was mentioned, they spoke disparagingly of him.”

  “So if Barbara took a shine to him, they wouldn’t have been over the moon about it?”

  I frowned. “What are you getting at?”

  “A plausible explanation of what happened that afternoon. Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t this how you described it? Mrs. Lockwood noticed Barbara was missing in the tea break and sent her husband to the other side of the orchard to look for her. Some time after, Cliff emerged from there and marched off-sorry, cycled off-into the sunset without speaking to anyone. Then you saw Barbara in tears and with her hair unfastened, coming from the same direction, with her father following. She ran right past her mother to the farmhouse.” Alice paused. “Wouldn’t you agree that Barbara’s behavior was more indicative of someone caught out than someone who was the victim of an attack?”

  I was unable to reply. As Alice had pointed out, I’d said myself that rape didn’t fit the facts. Her explanation did-if you could swallow the grotesque suggestion that Morton was Barbara’s lover.

  The manager came back to collect our plates and see if we wanted the peach melba. We opted for coffee. I needed that moment’s distraction.

  “Out of a bottle, no doubt,” I remarked to Alice.

  She nodded automatically, impatient to press on. Her eyes were dilated-I suppose with the excitement of defending her daddy. “Now let’s talk about that remark of Sally’s that we’d got it all wrong about Barbara and the apple pip. Sally was Barbara’s closest friend, yes?”

  “Yes.”

  “So if anyone knew about Barbara’s love life, it was Sally. If I understand it right about the business with the apple, the girls believed that the number of pips would tell them what kind of man they would marry. Now, when Barbara cut the apple in half, she got two pips: tinker, tailor. She cut one of the halves and got no more pips, so she cut the second half and found one: soldier. Will you listen, Theo? The soldier pip was severed and Barbara was pretty upset, because it was a bad omen. I think you said someone actually saw her crying in the afternoon.”

  “It’s understandable,” I said. “They take their superstitions seriously in Somerset. Strangely enough, it could have been a premonition of tragedy if you believe that Duke was already a doomed man.”

  “Not Duke,” said Alice.

  I stared at her without understanding.

  She said, “Cliff Morton.”

  I gaped.

  She said, “Cliff was the doomed man.”

  I shook my head. “Duke was the soldier.”

  “Not the one Barbara had in mind. Cliff had just received his call-up papers. She was thinking of him. She was about to lose him to the draft. Her lover. And when the apple pip was cut, she took it as a sign that he’d be killed in combat. Don’t you see, Theo? She wouldn’t shed tears over my daddy. She hardly knew him yet.”

  I couldn’t fault her logic. If you assumed a relationship between Barbara and Cliff, it was a convincing explanation. Looking down, I found that I’d torn the plastic tablecloth.

  “Do you see now why Sally told us we got it all wrong?” said Alice to underline the point.

  “All right,” I said, switching to the offensive, “but if Barbara was so attached to Morton, how do you account for her going to the concert with Duke?”

  “Bluff. She used it as a decoy, to reassure her parents. They disapproved of Cliff. They may even have banned her from seeing him after the incident in the orchard. So she pretended she was taking up with one of the GIs.”

  I had her now. She had a good brain, and up to this point she’d concocted a plausible version of events, but I knew she was wrong over this.

  I said with mild irony, “Pretended?”

  ‘That’s right, Theo. Like Harry said, there was never anything serious between them.”

  “Barbara didn’t confide in Harry. She confided in me. That evening you were talking about, her first evening out with Duke, she came to my room afterwards and talked to me about it.”

  She sighed and looked at her fingernails. “You told me.”

  I wasn’t having it brushed aside. “She was radiant with excitement.”

  “Okay, she had a good time at the concert. I figure a girl didn’t get much entertainment in wartime.”

  I said in the hectoring voice I sometimes used with difficult students, “Alice, I’ve done you the courtesy of listening to you. Now you can do likewise. She wasn’t simply talking about the concert. She confided her thoughts about Duke. She said she was bursting with pride when he went on the stage to sing. She liked him: the way he treated her, his quiet manner, so different from the expectation she had of an American soldier. He was shy but with a gentle sense of humor. She told me she’d be seeing him again.”

  “She was using you,” said Alice tersely.

  “Come off it, that’s unfair.”

  “She wanted her parents to get the idea she’d transferred her interest to my daddy, so she fed you this slush.”

  I shook my head. “You’re wrong. She used to go out every evening to meet him.”

  “Do you know that for certain? Did you see them together? Ever? She was meeting Cliff.” She grasped her plait and flicked it behind her shoulder. “And before you tell me about Mrs. Lock wood spanking you, has it crossed your mind that she wanted to be told that Barbara was seeing a GI and not the local good-for-nothing? Think about that, Theo.”

  I did. Like so much else she’d said, it outraged me by challenging a version of events I’d grown up with and drawn comfort from, yet it had a sickening plausibility. I found myself remembering the eruption of strong language the morning in the cider house when Bernard Lockwood told his parents he’d noticed Morton’s bicycle on the farm. I’d been shocked by the force of their reaction.

  Two chipped cups were put in front of us, each containing clear, tepid water with a teaspoon anchored in something brown and glutinous. Stirring made no appreciable difference. We were too preoccupied to complain.

  We had different ideas of what lay ahead. Up to now Alice had made all the running. This theory that had seemed a rank outsider at the start had cleared each fence and was still looking strong. I was sure there was one barrier it couldn’t surmount.

  After a period of silence I said, broaching it with caution, “You know, if someone wanted to choose between your interpretation and mine, they might be in two minds, except for one thing: There’s no getting around the fact that Morton raped Barbara.”

  Her eyes behind the glasses were like chips of flint. She didn’t speak a syllable.

  I added less guardedly, “It makes nonsense of everything you’ve said up to now.”

  She found her voice and pitched it low, with an undertone of scorn. “Whose word have we got that this rape ever took place? Yours alone.”

  So that’s your response, I thought. A straight challenge. I said, “It was accepted by a judge and jury. Are you putting yourself above them?”

  She answered stiffly, “The judge and jury were appointed to hear a case of murder, not rape. The story of the rape was never seriously questioned. No medical evidence was given. They took the word of a nine-year-old boy.”

  I said, “I may have been nine then, but I’m twenty-nine
now, and that was rape.”

  Alice smiled faintly, not a friendly smile. “This afternoon I got you to describe minutely what you saw that afternoon in the hayloft. The way they were lying, the sounds they made, the movements. I’m not the world’s expert on sex, but I figure I know more about what a woman feels than you, because nothing in what you described to me was untypical of passionate lovemaking. You said she had her clothes rucked up. She was gasping and crying out, turning her head, squirming. Do you know what it’s like for a woman to experience a powerful orgasm, or haven’t you noticed?”

  I said, “Oh, come on. She was beating her fists on the floor.”

  Alice took a quick, impatient breath. “Theo, she’d have been trying to push him away if he was raping her.”

  She was looking at me through the glasses, entreating me to make some concession to her theory. I was intractable.

  She persisted. “As a child, it’s understandable that a sight of adults in the act of love would alarm you, but surely with maturity you can analyze what you witnessed?”

  I was in no frame of mind to analyze anything. I didn’t need to listen to her interpretation. I’d been there when it happened.

  Angered by my lack of reaction, she pushed her face closer, taunting me. “Tell me this, then. Why was Cliff on the farm at all if it wasn’t at Barbara’s invitation?”

  I didn’t respond.

  She loosed off a salvo of questions. “Why did Barbara go up to the hayloft? And when my daddy ran into the barn, why didn’t he pull them apart?”

  “The attack was over,” I couldn’t resist pointing out. “He went for the gun.”

  Her face tightened into an expression that I hadn’t seen before, a hard, accusing stare. “That isn’t true, is it? He had no motive. We heard from Harry that he was innocent. Sally told us you got it all wrong.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “Theo, I’m saying that you saw those two young people making love. Your precious Barbara was having a terrific climax in Cliff Morton’s arms. You were shocked as only a preadolescent child can be. You hated what you saw. You ran to the house and collected the gun. You knew how to use it. You went up into the hayloft and shot Cliff Morton yourself.”