‘So much for your evidence, Mr McFee,’ he murmured, and wondered why the advocate defending Laura hadn’t brought up the existence of the lane during the trial.
5
Laura smiled as she read Stuart’s letter. He clearly thought that all letters to prisoners were vetted very carefully, and that maybe she wouldn’t get the letter at all if there was any reference to the crime or people involved in the trial. He mentioned ‘my jaunt around Fife’ as if he was touring around on holiday. But she knew when he said he’d met a blonde barmaid called Gloria that he’d been in Cellardyke, and that the ‘faded rose’ in a guest house had to be Belle.
She was a little puzzled when he mentioned standing by a farm looking at the view, considering where the narrow lane might lead to, but after a few moments she suddenly realized what he was trying to tell her.
She had no idea where that lane led to, she’d never been down it, but clearly Stuart saw it as a possible way for the real killer to have got in and out of the farm without being spotted. He asked too how her writing was coming on, and that he hoped she was finding it cathartic.
She had always sniggered at that word. It made her think of losers sitting around in group therapy discussing their addictions. She had once looked it up in a dictionary in the library and found it actually meant ‘purging’.
Stuart using the word made her laugh out loud. She imagined that writing down her past history would act like a dose of laxative.
Yet she had written about her childhood, and the reasons why she made up a new one for herself. Just yesterday she’d posted it to Stuart. She guiltily wondered how he would react if he knew she nearly didn’t send it as it crossed her mind he could sell it to the newspapers.
She half smiled at herself, thinking that perhaps it had been cathartic after all, for she could now see that the real damage Vincent had done to her was leaving her with the inability to trust implicitly.
Yet writing about that part of her life was the easy bit; she was, after all, just a sad kid who tried to rub out the areas of her past which hurt. It was going to be far more difficult and painful to study the adult Laura, for she had done things which were inexcusable. But to examine Jackie’s big role in her life, and the forces and reasons they both turned out as they did, she felt she must look back and write it all down. She didn’t have to show it to anyone, and perhaps by being totally honest with herself, she’d find some kind of consolation.
In the New Year of ’62 Roger and Steven drove over to Muswell Hill to take Laura and Jackie out for a drink at Jack Straw’s Castle on Hampstead Heath. It began to snow heavily as they were on their way to the pub, so the date was cut short as the men were afraid they might not be able to get home later.
As they left they promised they would come over again at the weekend. Laura’s seventeenth birthday was on the Saturday, and Frank and Lena bought her a second-hand record player, something she’d wanted ever since she moved into her bedsitter. But Roger and Steven didn’t phone or turn up, which completely spoiled the day for her.
They didn’t ring until the middle of the following week, just when the girls had given up hope of ever seeing them again. They invited them to a party at their flat on the Saturday evening, and Roger suggested they should stay the night because the party would go on till the early hours.
Both Laura and Jackie were so excited that they couldn’t eat or sleep and they had endless discussions about what they should wear and whether the invitation to stay the night meant the men expected them to sleep with them. Jackie took the view that it was high time she lost her virginity anyway, and as Roger was such a good kisser he’d probably be a good lover too.
Laura pretended she felt the same but inwardly she was quaking with fear. The memory of Vincent’s erect penis had stayed with her, and the fact that she liked Steven made no difference to her – she was quite sure that sex with any man would be disgusting.
It was bitterly cold on the day of the party and Jackie decided she was going to wear jeans and a jumper rather than a party dress. ‘I doubt anyone will dress up when it’s so cold,’ she insisted. ‘We’ll just look silly and we’ll be miserable if we’re shivering all night.’
Jackie, with her vivid red hair and green eyes, would never be overlooked even if she dressed in a sack, but Laura felt she looked insipid unless she displayed her legs and cleavage. She intended to look sensational in her new slinky red dress with bootlace straps and peep-toe high heels, and despite Jackie’s advice she went ahead and wore it.
As they came out of South Kensington tube station the icy wind tore at her hair. She’d put it up in a beehive the evening she met Steven, but that was an amateurish affair achieved only with endless backcombing and hair lacquer. She’d spent two hours in the hairdresser’s this time and they’d teased fat curls into a work of art, which was now being ruined. Her thin coat was no protection from the cold and her teeth began to chatter.
Chubby Checker’s ‘Let’s Twist Again’ was blaring out as they arrived at number 220 Cromwell Road. The street door was open and a group of men were carting crates of beer up the stairs.
The flat was on the second floor and to Laura’s disappointment it wasn’t the kind of elegant pied-à-terre she’d imagined, but three rather squalid rooms, and a bathroom shared with other tenants.
From the moment they walked in through the open door of the flat, Laura knew she should have followed her friend’s advice as everyone else was casually dressed in warm clothes. Roger greeted them warmly and as he took Laura’s coat he said she looked lovely, but she felt he only said so out of faint embarrassment.
Steven was busy setting up a bar, and shouted over that Roger would introduce them to everyone. It seemed the only drinks were red wine, beer or cider, none of which Laura liked, but even more worrying was that Steven didn’t come over to her.
Roger gave both girls a glass of cider, and then, taking Jackie’s hand, he led her off to meet the other guests, while Laura tagged along behind. To be fair to Roger, he didn’t leave her out in his introductions, but everyone had posh voices, and the way they looked at Laura made her feel as if she was wearing no clothes at all. It didn’t help that all the light bulbs had been replaced with red ones, she supposed to try to create a more intimate atmosphere, and when she glanced in a mirror she was horrified to see it made her skimpy dress looked even brighter red and gave her bare shoulders and arms a sickly pallor. Worse still, she didn’t look sensational at all, only tarty, and she wished the floor would open up and swallow her.
Jackie was in her element. Not only was she dressed like everyone else, but she was well used to meeting all kinds of people at her parents’ parties. Within minutes she was chatting away to people as if she’d known them all her life.
Laura quickly downed her cider and turned to a blonde girl standing by her.
‘Do you live around here?’ she asked.
‘In the flat upstairs,’ the girl replied. ‘I share with them,’ she added, pointing out two girls who were dancing together. ‘And you?’
There was something about the crisp way the girl spoke which unnerved Laura still further. Despite her jeans and sweater, lack of makeup and hair that looked as if she’d just got out of bed, she was very pretty, with wide blue eyes, long lashes, and a plump, pouty mouth. Laura immediately felt she was’ competition and after Steven.
‘I have a flat in North London,’ she said trying to speak and sound like the other girl. ‘Jackie and I met Steven and Roger in the City after an office party at Christmas.’
‘Steven told me about you,’ the girl said. ‘But I didn’t expect you to be so young.’
Feeling she’d been slighted, Laura didn’t even attempt to carry on a conversation and went back to the bar to find Steven. But he was roaring with laughter at something one of a crowd of men around him was saying, so she just topped up her glass and drank it quickly.
Steven did come over to her several times during the evening, but he kept darting off to
pour drinks and change records, and Laura became convinced that he wasn’t really interested in her, and she’d only been invited because Roger didn’t think Jackie would have come without her.
Each time she looked at them, they were kissing or dancing cheek to cheek, and it was quite obvious that Roger was totally smitten with her friend. So Laura kept topping up her glass with more cider and tried to hide her mounting panic that she wasn’t wanted by anyone.
By eleven the flat was so crowded with people that she could barely see Jackie amongst the dancers, and she couldn’t see Steven at all. All at once the room began to spin, and she realized she was going to be sick. When she found the bathroom occupied, she stumbled down the stairs out into the road.
After vomiting violently several times she sobered up, but chilled to the bone because she had no coat, desperate to go home but unable to unless she went back to the flat and got her coat and bag, which would mean she’d have to explain herself, she sat down on the front steps and began to cry.
A warm hand on her bare shoulder startled her. She looked up to see Steven looking down at her with real concern. ‘Laura! What on earth are you doing out here?’ he asked. ‘You’ll catch your death of cold.’
‘The cigarette smoke was making my eyes sting,’ she lied.
‘You’ll get pneumonia if you stay here,’ he said, and pulling his thick sweater off over his head, he popped it over hers. ‘Come in and sit on the stairs, it’s warmer there,’ he added, pulling her to her feet.
Once inside the hall, he took her hands between his and rubbed them. ‘I don’t think it’s the smoke that made your eyes run. You’ve been crying,’ he said reproachfully. ‘Why, Laura? Did you feel left out because I couldn’t be with you all evening?’
She felt warmer now with his jumper on, and his gentle tone made her want to admit that was exactly how she felt, that she knew she’d worn the wrong clothes, everyone was too posh for her, and she got drunk to deal with it. But he was a sophisticated man about town, he wouldn’t want a silly young girl who didn’t know how to handle herself at parties. She had to come up with something that would make her look more adult.
‘No, of course not. I understood you had to look after all your guests,’ she said. ‘It was just that I had a terrible experience earlier today. It shook me up.’
He cuddled her then and asked her to tell him about it.
‘A man followed me home from the shops this morning,’ she lied. ‘I thought he lived in one of the other flats when he came up the stairs behind me, but he didn’t. He came right into my room and tried to push me down on the bed. I think he was going to rape me.’
‘God! How awful!’ he exclaimed in horror. ‘What did you do?’
‘I screamed and kicked him hard. It stopped him in his tracks, but he grabbed my handbag and ran off with it.’
She began crying again, almost believing her story. She said her wages were in the bag and a month’s rent for her flat, and she was afraid the man would be lying in wait for her another day.
‘Did you call the police?’ Steven asked.
Laura was thrilled that he looked so horrified as that meant he really cared about her.
‘No, I didn’t. I wanted to but I knew if I did they’d take me down to the station to make a statement, and I’d be there for hours. It was Jackie I was worried about. She was so excited about coming to the party, I didn’t want to let her down.’
‘That was kind of you, but she’d have understood,’ he said, wiping her eyes tenderly with his handkerchief. ‘If you’d rung me I would have come right over and taken care of you. I would even have postponed the party for another night.’
‘I couldn’t have let you do that,’ she said, sniffing back her tears. ‘I wouldn’t have wanted to spoil anything for anyone. I didn’t even tell Jackie what had happened because she was looking forward to coming here so much. Please don’t tell her now, it isn’t fair to burden her with this. And don’t tell Roger either because he’s bound to pass it on.’
Steven wanted to take her to the police right away, but Laura deftly pointed out they would only tell them to go to the police in Hornsey tomorrow and it would spoil his party.
For a spur-of-the-moment lie it was a huge success. Steven spent the rest of the evening glued to her side, while she played the brave victim, selflessly keeping her troubles to herself.
People began drifting off around two in the morning and Jackie disappeared into Roger’s room with him. Finally everyone left and Steven cuddled her on the sofa.
‘You sleep in my bed, I’ll stay on here,’ he said gallantly.
Jackie lost her virginity to Roger that night. Whether this was because she couldn’t help herself, or because once in Roger’s bed she couldn’t back away, she didn’t say. But Laura felt rather superior because Steven hadn’t put her under pressure to have sex with him, not even when she asked him to share the bed with her because she was afraid to sleep alone.
That, and because the next day he gave her £20, the money she was supposed to have had stolen, fixed it in her head that being sweet, brave and chaste was the key to holding on to him.
Two days later she rang Steven after work and said she’d been to the police to report her attacker and he asked if she would like to come over to his flat. Once again she stayed the night in his bed, but wouldn’t allow anything more than kissing and cuddling. Despite having made up her mind that she was going to let the tragic fictional story of her childhood die, she ended up telling it to Steven.
His sympathy was wonderful. He even apologized for being so tactless in going on about his family and praised her for being so capable and strong. ‘I have to be,’ she said with a shrug. ‘There isn’t anyone to fall back on so I have to manage living alone. But since that man followed me home I haven’t felt very safe there.’
She played that card again and again in the following weeks, especially when she knew Roger was taking Jackie out and Steven was in alone. Once at his flat she would cook for him, wash and iron his clothes and clean up, and though she would’ve preferred it if he asked her out properly as Roger did Jackie, she felt sure he was falling in love with her.
Often as she took the tube to work she asked herself if she loved him. She could reel off plenty of reasons why she wanted to be with him – that he was handsome, had a nice car and money – yet she didn’t feel any of the heart-tugging stuff that people spoke of when they were in love. He was really quite dull, very serious and career-minded, and if Jackie wasn’t spending all her spare time with Roger, she wasn’t even sure she’d want to be with Steven. But it made her feel good having a real boyfriend, someone she could boast about at work, and she liked staying at his flat and having him fussing round her.
She felt no guilt about stealing a couple of pounds from his wallet here and there; after all, she saved him money because he rarely took her out. She often told him lies to make herself look smarter, braver or more vulnerable. She told him once that a male friend of her Aunt Mabel had tried to force her into having sex with him when she was thirteen, and that was why she was afraid of having sex with him.
But as time went on and she saw Jackie head over heels in love with Roger, and he with her, Laura began to feel aggrieved. She missed their girls’ nights in together, meeting up after work, going to the shops on a Saturday, and the family meals at Muswell Hill on a Sunday. She might still see Jackie all the time in the boys’ flat, but it wasn’t the same. Jackie was becoming like all the girls in Kensington – polished, poised and too wrapped up in Roger even to notice her best friend.
Sometimes when the pair of them burst into the flat, laughing and glowing with happiness, and disappeared into the bedroom together, Laura resented it so much she wanted to spoil things for them. They did all go out in a foursome occasionally, but even then it wasn’t much fun as Jackie and Roger spent the evening whispering together, and shutting her and Steven out.
Steven also began to lose patience with her refusal to have sex with
him. He was becoming increasingly grumpy, often saying he wanted a night in on his own, and as Laura sat in her own bedsitter, imagining him going down to the pub and finding another more willing girl, she panicked.
When Roger took Jackie home to his parents for the weekend at the end of April, Laura decided that now was the right time to give in to Steven as they’d be alone in the flat. She was very nervous when she arrived straight from work on the Friday evening, but perhaps Steven sensed she was weakening as he’d changed the sheets on the bed and tidied up.
‘Why don’t you have a bath while I make us something to eat?’ he suggested. ‘I’ve got you some Babycham too, and we’ll have a cosy evening by the fire.’
No girl could have had a better lover than Steven for her first time. He caressed and played with her, kissed every part of her body, telling her how beautiful she was. By the time he did enter her, she wanted to do it as much as he did. It did hurt a bit, but not as much as she’d expected, and when it was over he said such wonderful, loving things that she cried.
In the morning it was even better, and they stayed in bed nearly all day, only getting up for food and cups of tea. They had a bath together, he washed her like a child and cuddled her dry, and to her this seemed like true love.
Faith Page 13
