Death in Elysium

by Judith Cutler

  ‘He certainly didn’t take any drugs here, not after the aborted spliff,’ I said, stung. ‘As for it being a symptom of something more serious, I didn’t even realize what was wrong with his mother, did I?’ I protested.

  ‘I need you to remember everything – anything – you might have known about his mates. Was he the sort of lad to show off the camera to them? One of them might have … well, maybe I’m getting ahead of myself.’

  Theo said, ‘I’ve got friends in the Salvation Army – far better than the police for running missing people to earth. I’ll phone them now.’

  I needed something to do too. ‘And I’ll go and talk to Violet. I know Sharon Hammond was only distantly related to her, but even so … I’ll ask her if she knows anything about Burble’s absent dad while I’m at it.’

  Dave nodded approvingly. ‘And I’ll talk to an old mucker of mine – but I think I’ll do it face to face. I’ll have to tell him about your camera, Jode,’ he said, almost apologetically.

  ‘I know just what he’ll say. I was daft to hand it over, and Burble’s just done a flit with it. But you know something,’ I said rather too loudly, ‘I don’t believe he’s nicked it. I really don’t.’

  Dave shook his head kindly. ‘Know what I think? We find the camera and we find Burble.’

  ‘It’s just surprising she lasted so long, to be honest, God rest her soul,’ Violet said briskly, in response to my murmured words of sympathy. ‘As for Bernard – Burble – she used to say he was born to be hanged. You know, his own mother says something like that! So God alone knows where he is, and He isn’t telling. If only the lad had met someone like you a bit earlier – if only he’d got a few exams behind him.’

  ‘Did no one ever try to improve his life? Social Services? I’d have expected them to worry about his living with a drug addict.’

  She looked genuinely shocked. ‘How would they have known? No one from the village would have let on – and look at all the mistakes they make, anyway, these social workers.’

  I wasn’t at all sure which sentiment to tackle first, so ended up giving a feeble – possibly feeble-minded – smile. Yes, I was ashamed of myself. At least I managed, ‘I don’t suppose you know what happened to his father.’

  ‘Si? Drank himself to death long since, I’d imagine. Or drugs. Total waste of space. We all heaved a sigh of relief when he left the village. Ten years ago it must have been. Maybe longer.’

  So poor Burble had been on his own with his mother since then.

  ‘And no one kept in touch with this Si?’

  ‘Why should they?’

  If Theo had the Sally Army, for all my ignorance when I saw a real drug user face to face, at least I had a few contacts in drink and drugs rehab: there was one charitable trust I supported that might provide information that wouldn’t necessarily reach the authorities. So I fired off a few emails.

  When I could drag the kids from the TV they’d colonized, I floated the idea of school. If either was interested, I’d phone their head teachers myself. Sian grumbled, but secretly, I think, was relieved. I left her tweaking the website while I made the call. She didn’t need to know the choice words I said to the headmaster about his staff’s failure to recognize her IT skills, though she might have been impressed that it was possible to make a strong point without raising one’s voice or using a single swear word.

  As I’d feared, Mazza had no school to return to, so I was glad when Theo lent Dave his car so they could head off to a coastal path to walk their boots in; Theo retired to his study to pray. Borrowing Dave’s newly arrived large-scale maps, I went for a drive in my new toy. But not just any drive, of course.

  At one level I was doing what I ought to have done long ago – I was exploring what everyone agreed was one of the most beautiful counties in the country, the Garden of England, no less. Parts of the coast gripped even me, not just the stirring White Cliffs, but places more subtle in their appeal, like the shingle banks round Dungeness. Today, however, I was staying much nearer to home. I picked my way purposefully through blossom-filled lanes, narrow and narrower still, around the steep-sided valley the other side of what I was coming to think of as ‘my’ hill. To my uneducated eye, there was nothing to show that anything other than farming might be taking place, and plenty to show what I assumed was proper agricultural behaviour. There were picture-book sheep in one field, and horses, all in their own taped-off mini-fields in others. I couldn’t pick up any birdsong over the rumble of the low-profile tyres, but I was sure that if I’d stopped and rolled down the window I’d have heard a veritable pastoral symphony of avian melody.

  But Mazza, Dave and I had all seen alien activity in that valley. Seen it. Industrial, not agricultural activity. I needed to investigate further. However, I couldn’t just drive up the tracks in the right direction, could I? I couldn’t press the entryphones of Double Gate Enterprises or Elysian Fields to enquire about illegal building activities. Could I?

  Not without someone to watch my back. And not, come to think of it, with all those CCTV cameras ready to take snaps of anyone crossing their path. They’d probably taken mine already, come to think of it. Reversing cautiously, as if I’d simply taken a wrong turn, I headed whence I had come, embroidering the mime a little more by pulling over and peering in furious disbelief at the satnav screen.

  On the way home – and funnily enough I found myself checking my rear view mirror just in case, though I never admitted to myself what it was just in case of – I called in to see Mazza and Sian’s mother, Carrie, a woman of about forty whose plumpness owed more, I suspected, to the wrong food than simply to too much. I’m sure Merry would have known exactly what to say. And bring. Of course, I hadn’t got a cake or anything. Should I have done? Or would bringing one have seemed patronizing? We smiled at each other appraisingly as I introduced myself.

  ‘I was just wondering if Sian is OK, Mrs Burns? And Mazza, of course,’ I began. Give me a PowerPoint presentation to make to a CEO any day. ‘After last night.’

  ‘They could have called me. Should have. You’d best come in. Cup of tea?’

  ‘Only if you’re making one.’

  I braced myself for the sort of cliché that some of the media tell you to expect in social housing homes, or even the Dickensian poor-but-honest converse. In the event it was neither foul with unwashed pots nor so clean you could have eaten your supper off the floor. There weren’t many books, true, but neither was the living room dominated by a huge TV. There was one, but it was smaller than ours, and she switched it off as she moved a pile of freshly ironed sheets from the sofa and asked me to sit.

  The ensuing conversation was no more inspiring than the opening lines, but we somehow established a mutual trust. She was afraid her kids were bothering me; I assured her they weren’t, that I really liked their company. We talked a bit about Mazza’s running; she worried about clubs and the cost of shoes and so on. Clubs! He really had got the bug then. Lying through my teeth I told her most clubs had sponsors who paid for the gear for talented members; I made a mental promise to keep him in footwear wherever Theo’s job might take us. As for Sian, I could reassure her that the girl had academic and technological ability the school must develop. I suspected, I said, that she’d only played up so much because she was bored.

  We parted with a cautious hug. It was only as I headed down the path to the car that she said, ‘That Burble. Any news of him yet? Only I hear on the grapevine that one of the local dealers has taken off fast.’

  ‘Burble deals?’ I asked, too horrified to keep my voice down.

  ‘Not that I know of,’ she said, motioning me back to the house. ‘I’m just worried – you know what they’re like, these bastards. If they thought he couldn’t pay, or that all this time he spends at the rectory means he’s going to blab … Well, you never know, do you?’

  ‘Did you see much of him?’

  She gave a crooked smile. ‘Too much, sometimes. But before I got this job, there were times – well
, to be honest, I couldn’t always put food on the table. And he brought all sorts of strange foraged stuff. A lot of it went in the bin, mind you, but it was the thought, wasn’t it?’

  ‘It was indeed. When did you last see him?’

  ‘Let me think … A week ago? And him not knowing about his mum. Not that he’d care much, I dare say.’

  ‘Did he ever talk to you about her?’

  She pulled a face: what was she about to say? But then she looked beyond me, and I turned to see Sian, in what I can only call a vague approximation of school uniform, coming round the corner. ‘Look at that muck all over your face, my girl – I’m surprised at the school letting you in like that. You go and get yourself cleaned up, missy, or I’ll know the reason why. And before I go to work we’ll go to Tesco’s and buy a skirt that’s halfway decent.’

  Now was obviously not the time to ask Sian about her afternoon – but I sensed a great deal of love in that ongoing rebuke.

  NINE

  Tonight there was to be the follow-up PCC meeting about the shop’s move to the church. We had an early supper, because I suspected that the meeting might run very late. Once again it would be held in the rectory dining room.

  ‘How do you think it will go?’ Dave asked, as we cleared the kitchen table at which we’d eaten.

  ‘Well, I hope— drat! I’d better take that.’ Theo put down the tea-towel, and went off to answer the phone.

  ‘I think poor Theo’s got some sticky tape to cover my mouth,’ I said, squirting washing-up liquid. ‘But I’ll try to be professional and simply minute everyone else’s ideas.’

  ‘It’d be fun to make up a few, wouldn’t it?’ Dave began.

  ‘I’m afraid she won’t be able to do that this evening,’ Theo interrupted him, returning to his tea-towel. ‘That was Mrs Baker to say her arthritic hand was better, and she would be present to minute the PCC meeting. I’m so sorry, Jodie: I can imagine how much you wanted to be present.’

  I managed an insouciant shrug. ‘They’ll speak more freely without me. And no one will be able to accuse me of trying to influence any voting. So long as that poor arthritic hand of hers can manage to open the wine bottles and fill the glasses.’

  Undeceived, he gathered me into his arms. ‘I’d no idea how much you were investing in this. Not money. But will and desire. Commitment to the future.’

  I was ready to protest that I was doing it for him. But it dawned on me that I was doing it for other people too – Burble and Mazza and Sian, for instance, and all the other villagers I’d not yet met; even, perhaps especially, for those who’d never have dreamt of going into a lovely building but would now buy their stamps there. Perhaps something would, in Theo’s phrase, rub off.

  With an exhausted Dave for company, I adjourned to the living room, defiantly turned on another bar of the electric fire (to turn the central heating up might provide enough comfort to prolong the meeting) and poured rather better wine than the PCC would be getting.

  ‘I’d just barge in if I were you,’ Dave said, as I looked at my watch for the umpteenth time. ‘Your idea, your effort – you should be in on the final call.’

  ‘But I’m not a member and I’ve not been co-opted. And Theo’s got to live with the result. And with me. So if I do something to cause problems, they’ll come back not on my head but on his.’ My would-be smile might have been a grimace. ‘At the risk of sounding as if I’m changing the subject, has Mazza got any theories about Burble’s disappearance?’

  He snorted. ‘If all Mazza’s theories are as sound as the one he had about me, I wouldn’t build too much on any of them. He’s got the idea I must be gay, and possibly predatory with it, on account of not having a wife and getting on well with my cousin.’

  Swallowing the slight question mark I’d raised myself, I said mildly, ‘He’s probably not had much adult male company before – doesn’t know how to take it. Probably very few male role models in his life at all.’

  ‘Even so – how would you have felt being asked if you were a lesbian?’ He stood. The room shrank.

  ‘It would surprise me, given my married state. But it wouldn’t be a problem.’ Though I suppose it might be if you’d spent your life being a macho policeman. ‘There was one accusation that hurt, however: the villagers thought I was a banker!’

  He put his head back and roared with laughter. ‘My God, how did you get out of that one?’

  ‘Evidence: I’d already ditched the Porsche. And I told Mazza the truth.’

  ‘What? All of it?’ He frowned. ‘Your annual income, for instance?’

  ‘Hell’s bells, no – what do you take me for?’

  Before he could answer, the door opened and Theo came in. His shoulders were shaking so much I was afraid for one dreadful moment he was in tears. Perhaps he was. Tears of laughter. He leant on the back of the sofa.

  ‘Poor Mrs Baker’s hand can’t cope with the speed at which she’s required to write. I don’t suppose you’d care to help out, my loved one? Oh, bring your glass with you. We’ll be stopping for refreshments any moment now.’

  ‘Don’t go,’ Dave urged, already reaching for the TV zapper. ‘They made their bed – let them lie in it.’

  ‘I’d guess that Mrs Mountford made this particular bed – and I’ve no desire, sexual orientation apart, to share it with her!’ I darted back for my wine, which Dave had obligingly topped up, and for the pad and biro we kept beside the phone.

  ‘What was all that about?’ Theo asked, waiting for me in the hall.

  ‘I’ll tell you later. Or better still, Dave will.’ I kissed him before following him into the dining room. Taking the tediously apologetic Mrs Baker’s place, slightly behind George Cox, who was chairing the meeting, I prepared to become demurely secretarial.

  There was a loud knock on the door, Dave putting his head round it simultaneously. ‘Theo, I’m sorry to interrupt but the police are on the phone – won’t let me take a message, of course.’

  Theo went white. His eyes held mine: this was going to be really bad news, wasn’t it? He put a hand on George’s shoulder. ‘Just carry on.’

  It was hard to concentrate, let alone take notes, although it was clear that the meeting was going what I still thought of as my way. A glance at Mrs Baker’s beautiful if shaky writing – unlike my scrawl, vile and shapeless after years of using nothing but some sort of keyboard or another – told me that at the start it looked as if Mrs Mountford’s cohort had the edge, despite the absence of Ted Vesey, who’d sent apologies. What on earth could have kept him from what he knew was a very important meeting? Now, however, wasn’t the moment to speculate. But as each report was presented, from Violet’s impassioned plea to the calm tones of the diocesan office, it was clear that more and more people wanted to have an open church. And if accommodating the much-needed shop was the only way forward, so be it. Any moment now, George ought to wrap things up by calling for a vote – but he wouldn’t want to do so without Theo. On the other hand, he probably wouldn’t want to lose impetus by adjourning the item and moving on to the matter of the website, a late addition to the agenda.

  Theo’s return resolved the situation before it could become a crisis. His face showed both relief and exasperation. He raised a quizzical eyebrow in my direction before asking George’s permission to speak.

  ‘Goodness knows why the police needed to speak to me in person: they only needed to tell me that they thought they’d found my old bike. And a couple of others, so brace yourselves for “urgent” calls too.’ He gestured ironic quotation marks. As he sat, he produced a weary smile. ‘OK. Where have you got to?’

  ‘I was just about to call for a vote, Theo – if we need such a formal measure.’ George smiled around the table, making sure he included me, to whom I’ll swear he added a wink.

  I suspect Theo was going to suggest that we did, but someone else was louder and quicker.

  ‘I certainly want my opposition put on record,’ Mrs Mountford declared, glaring at those w
hom she suspected of changing sides. ‘So perhaps Mrs Welsh would be kind enough to note not just the numbers but also the identities of those voting.’

  ‘Overruled,’ George declared. ‘We are a committee; we behave as a committee; we take committee responsibility. Just a show of hands, please. All those in favour? Against? Abstentions?’

  As I dutifully wrote down the results, trying to suppress the smile of triumph on my face, George leant back in his chair. ‘As if anyone ever bothers to read the minutes, apart from us, that is. And sometimes, when we’re asked to approve them at the next meeting, I really doubt if any of us has read them.’ He knew as well as I did that minutes were a legal requirement, but I took his point.

  He returned his attention to the rest of the committee, saying, ‘And now item twelve on the agenda: the village website. I’d like to thank and congratulate all involved in getting St Dunstan’s on to it. I thought the wording of the appeal for the fabric was particularly effective against the vivid pictures of the cracks.’

  ‘I don’t recall our giving permission for any of this,’ Mrs Mountford said.

  ‘Julie Cole and the parish council authorized the village site; it only took a phone call. As to St Dunstan’s presence, how could we have a village site that didn’t mention the church?’ Theo asked, quite deliberately avoiding the question, which was a valid one, after all.

  ‘It seems …’ began a middle-aged man whom I saw so rarely it took a moment to recall his name. Tim Robins, that was it, breaking his apparent vow of silence. ‘It seems terribly sad that to access the St Dunstan’s pages one has to go to the village site. Our own might just have been preferable.’

  ‘It was cheaper to have just the one,’ I said. ‘And quicker. If you’re prepared to authorize funds for a second domain, I’ll happily separate them. Unless you happen to think that the church should in fact be at the heart of the village?’

  Jackie Simmons, the normally silent treasurer, suddenly emerged from behind her sheet of hair: ‘Could someone remind me when we approved payment?’