The House on the Cliff

by Charlotte Williams

  When the water cleared, I peeled off my outer clothes, which were heavy with water, and looked up at the jetty. Somehow I kept hoping, each time I went down, that I’d come up and realize this was just a bad dream. But each time, Arianrhod was still there, her dark head outlined against the sky.

  “Please, God,” I whispered to myself, “help me.”

  I could no longer feel my toes or my hands, and the aching cold was spreading from my head into my torso and limbs. If I didn’t get out of the water soon, I knew, it would freeze me to death. It was only a matter of time.

  I swam up to the jetty again, as close as I dared.

  “You can’t do this, you know,” I shouted. “You’ll go to prison. . . .”

  She wasn’t listening. She probably couldn’t hear, with the wind whistling in our ears. But I persevered all the same.

  “I can explain what happened with Evan. Just let me come in. We can talk. . . .”

  She gazed out to sea, ignoring me.

  I stayed out there, a safe distance away from the jetty, treading water, for what seemed like hours. I felt the cold begin to freeze my body, first my feet, then my legs, then my hands and arms.

  It’s just a matter of time, I told myself. But time was on her side, not mine.

  It was then that I looked up, into the distance, and saw a tiny figure standing at the top of the steps of the cliff. I looked away. What if I’d imagined it, like some parched traveler dreaming up a mirage in the desert? But when I looked again, the figure was coming down the steps, toward the jetty. From the way it moved, it looked like a man.

  I didn’t cry out. The man was too far away to hear me. And I didn’t want to alert Arianrhod. I didn’t know who it was, or whether he had come to help me, but I knew that, whatever happened, when he reached the jetty there was a chance I could scramble out and survive. Time was on my side once more.

  So I stayed where I was, treading water. Three times the waves hit me, submerging me. Each time I came up, I feared that the man would be gone. But each time he was still there, coming nearer and nearer, until at last he was on the jetty.

  I saw Arianrhod turn in surprise.

  It was Gwydion.

  When I saw him, my heart leapt. How or why, I wasn’t sure, but I knew that he’d come to save me.

  He reached the end of the jetty. I couldn’t see clearly, but Arianrhod seemed to fall into his arms. They seemed to be embracing. A sudden panic ran through me as I wondered whether I’d been wrong. Perhaps Gwydion hadn’t come to my rescue after all. Perhaps he and Arianrhod were in this together. Perhaps he’d come to help her drown me. Or to gloat.

  I began to cry. Not proper tears, but the kind of theatrical whine a child makes when it doesn’t get what it wants. This was too much, I told myself. First, the promise of hope. And now . . .

  I watched as the embrace turned to a struggle. I heard snatches of shouting, carried on the wind. Then Gwydion ran forward. He came to the end of the jetty and bent down, holding out his hand toward me.

  I swam forward. By now my legs were completely numb. So I pulled my body along using my arms, until I reached the edge of the jetty.

  As I did, Arianrhod came up behind Gwydion. She was screaming at him, pulling at his shoulder. But he ignored her cries, pushing her away.

  I reached out my hand and caught his. I saw his look of shock as he registered the cut on my face.

  “Leave her there, the whore.” Arianrhod was beside herself now, shrieking in his ear. “She’s been sniffing round your father, the bitch, like all the rest of them.”

  I felt Gwydion start as she spoke the words. He looked straight into my eyes, and I looked back into his. He didn’t ask me anything, and I didn’t say anything, but I knew he knew that there was some truth in what she’d said.

  He hesitated for a moment, but his grip on my hand didn’t loosen.

  If I’d had the presence of mind, I would have lied. Told him I’d never been anywhere near his father. Anything to get out of that icy water. But I didn’t. Instead, I cried out, “Help me, Gwydion. Please, help me.”

  He reached out his other hand toward me. I grasped it and, in one swift move, he pulled me out of the water.

  Once he’d got me out on the jetty, he carried me in his arms, staggering slightly, and laid me down gently on the boards. My body felt like a dead weight. Water was streaming from my clothes. My head was spinning, and I wondered for a moment whether it was too late, whether I was now going to die.

  Gwydion bent over me, holding me by the shoulders as I began to retch, dredging up the seawater from my lungs.

  I hung my head, clutching it with my hands, hoping that the spinning would stop. But it went on. Then I started to shiver violently.

  “We’re going to have to get her back up to the house.” He spoke sharply to Arianrhod. “Come on, give me a hand here.”

  Arianrhod didn’t reply.

  Gwydion tried to pick me up, but I signaled to him to wait. I was feeling too sick to be moved. So instead, he took off his jacket and wrapped it around me.

  I heard him get out his mobile phone and dial a number.

  “Yes, and police,” he said, in response to someone on the other end of the line. Then he began to give them directions as to where we were.

  I don’t know what happened next. I seemed to drift in and out of consciousness, seeing nothing in front of my eyes but water, and rocks, and sea, and sky. I felt so sick and aching that I wanted to die, wanted to slip peacefully away into the blackness that was waiting to claim me.

  Then I heard a distant roaring sound. I looked up, barely able to raise my head, and saw a great fat insect buzzing in the sky. It was still far away, but it was bearing down on us. As it came nearer, I realized, dimly, that it was a helicopter. And that it was coming to help us.

  That was when I heard a cry, and then a splash. I looked over my shoulder and saw that Arianrhod had dived off the end of the jetty, and was swimming out to sea.

  “Gwydion,” I said. My voice seemed to have disappeared somewhere into my chest, and all that came out was a croak. “Do something.”

  But Gwydion didn’t move. Instead, he stayed beside me, shielding me from the wind, as the blades of the helicopter whirred above us, coming closer and closer down to land.

  22

  It doesn’t take long to get used to being in hospital. I’d only been there a week, but already I was looking forward to my midmorning cup of tea, fretting about what to tick on the menu for lunch, and being nosy about the other patients’ visitors. I was becoming institutionalized, I realized. It was time I got out. There wasn’t much wrong with me, and my lungs had cleared, but they weren’t letting me go till I got my strength back. I was fine in bed, but when I got up, I was weak and shaky on my legs. And I was sleeping through large chunks of the day—though I could have done that better at home, I reflected, what with all the noise, and comings and goings, and constant interruptions of hospital life.

  A nurse approached my bed. I closed my eyes, pretending to be asleep. I didn’t want any more medication. I was getting fed up with going through the day, and the night, in a fog.

  “Someone to see you,” she said. I assumed it would be Bob, who’d been visiting me every day, usually with the girls in tow, but when I opened them, I saw Mari standing at the end of the bed.

  “Hi,” I said. I waved toward a chair beside the bed. “Take a pew.”

  Mari came over and enveloped me in a hug.

  “How are you, caridad? I wanted to come in before, but Bob said you weren’t up to it.” She looked slightly put out.

  “He’s just fussing. I’m fine, really. I’ll be out of here soon, I think.”

  She sat down on the chair, fished in her bag, and brought out a small box of chocolates, wrapped up in gold paper and yellow ribbon, with a yellow paper flower on the top.

  “Oh.” I reached over and took the box. “Thanks.”

  “Artisan, darling,” she said, a note of self-mockery in her voi
ce. “Arm and a leg.”

  I slipped the ribbon off the box, opened it, and took a chocolate. I couldn’t be bothered to choose which one. Then I handed it to her.

  She studied the guide carefully and chose her chocolate. It was a white one, with tiny frosted rose on the top.

  We sat in silence for a moment, sucking our chocolates. I was enjoying mine, although it was making me feel slightly queasy.

  “So.” She tilted her head on one side as she spoke. I realized that, for once, she was choosing her words carefully, trying her best to be tactful. “You’ve been in the wars, then, I hear.”

  “Mmm.”

  “Want to talk about it?”

  “I suppose so.” I swallowed the last of my chocolate. “I’ve been a bit of an idiot, to tell the truth. I didn’t know Arianrhod Morgan was such a . . .” I hesitated for a moment, realizing that I didn’t actually want to discuss all this. It brought back frightening memories, memories that gave me crazy dreams at night, nightmares about being blind and deaf and dumb, and floating upside down in water, and watching my fingers falling off my hands, and being unable to breathe.

  I stopped for a moment, unwilling to pursue the conversation. Mari offered me another chocolate, but I refused.

  “What happened to her, anyway?” she asked, taking another one herself.

  “She drowned. The police found . . .” I paused, unable to continue.

  “The body?” Mari spoke in a low tone, registering my hesitation.

  “It was washed up on the beach, the next cove round from the bay.” I paused. “She couldn’t have swum around there, the police said. It was too far. And the water was so cold, she’d probably have . . . succumbed . . . quite quickly.”

  For some reason, I couldn’t say the word “died.” “Succumbed” wasn’t a bad alternative, though. Ernest Jones used it whenever one of his patients kicked the bucket as a result of his ministrations. One of Freud’s friends “succumbed” when he recommended extra-large doses of cocaine to buck him up. I’d never heard it used to describe drowning, but it was a useful euphemism in general, I thought. I might employ it more in future.

  Mari sucked her chocolate pensively, drawing in her cheeks. “Well, thank God for that,” she said. “Bloody psychopath. She could have . . .” She was about to say more, but checked herself, noticing the look on my face.

  There was a short silence, and then she asked, “What happens now?”

  “Well, it’s a question of picking up the pieces, I suppose.” I paused. “All the charges against Evan Morgan have been dropped. And Bob’s been in touch with the girl’s mother, Solveig Lindberg, to tell her what happened. You see, when . . .” I petered out again, lost for words. “When I was at the jetty with Arianrhod, she told me that she’d . . . well, she confessed that Elsa’s death was her fault.”

  My voice shook a little as I spoke. Mari noticed and controlled her curiosity, sensing that I wasn’t ready to go into details.

  “How did the girl’s mother take the news?” she asked, changing the subject.

  “Solveig? She was very emotional, apparently. But it’s laid the whole thing to rest for her. After all these years.”

  “Have you spoken to her?”

  “Not yet. I will do, though. And Bob says she’s going to come over and visit when I get out.”

  Mari reached over and squeezed my hand.

  “Well, at least something good has come out of all this, then,” she said. “And Gwydion? Bob told me he’d come to your rescue at the beach.”

  I hesitated a moment. “Yes. He must have known I’d go down to see Arianrhod, after what he’d told me. And that she wouldn’t . . . respond very well. He was devoted to her, but I suppose he realized there are limits.” I paused. “He’d grown quite attached to me, you see.”

  There was a short silence, and I wondered whether Mari had guessed there’d been something between us.

  “How’s he coping now?” she said, eventually.

  I didn’t know a great deal about Gwydion’s state of mind. For obvious reasons, I’d avoided bringing up the subject with Bob. I’d also avoided the subject of Evan, for similar reasons. But Bob was helping Evan in the aftermath of the case, and had reported that Evan had been very attentive toward Gwydion after his mother’s death. As a result, Gwydion was making a remarkable recovery.

  “Pretty well, I think, considering,” I replied. “He’s out of The Grange, so I hear. And Evan’s been coaching him for a new TV part he’s got coming up. There’s been a bit of a rapprochement there, I think.”

  I smiled, and Mari smiled back. Then I sighed and laid my head back on the pillow, suddenly tired.

  “There are so many bits to this puzzle,” I said. “The trouble is, I can’t think straight at the moment.”

  “You don’t need to, Jess.” Mari’s voice was unusually gentle. “Everything’s fine. Just concentrate on getting well.”

  There was another lull in the conversation. I was having trouble keeping my eyes open, but I did my best to hide it. “Another chocolate?”

  Mari must have noticed my fatigue. “No, no. They’re for you. And anyway, I’d better be going.” She got up. “We can talk more another time.”

  I would have liked her to stay longer, but I felt too weak to argue. So she kissed me good-bye, and I watched as she walked out of the room, giving me an airy wave as she left.

  It was nice of her to stop by, I thought. I closed my eyes and began to drift into sleep.

  Moments later, I opened them to find Bob standing over me.

  I glanced at the clock. Two hours had passed. This was always happening, it seemed. I had no recollection of being asleep, of dreaming, of time going by. Great chunks of the day went missing, got lost. It was getting better, day by day—but it was a slow process and I was impatient to get back my strength, and beginning to wonder if I ever would.

  He leaned down and kissed me on the cheek. Then he sat down on the bed.

  “You’d better not let the nurses see you doing that,” I said.

  “Why not?”

  “Germs.”

  “Oh, for God’s sake.” He reached over and took my hand. “You’re my wife, aren’t you. I can do what I like with you.”

  I laughed, and so did he.

  We’d made up our quarrel, more or less. We hadn’t discussed the details—that was still to come—but he’d said that once I got out of hospital he wanted us to start afresh. The whole episode had made him realize how much he loved me, how much he wanted our marriage to work. To be honest, I wasn’t altogether sure that I felt the same, though I didn’t say so; I was waiting until my brain began to function more normally before making any decisions.

  In actual fact I was feeling somewhat stunned at the repercussions of Bob’s brief fling a while back. Because I’d unconsciously projected my anger at Bob onto Evan, as the cheating husband, I’d failed to pick up on the fact that Arianrhod was trying to frame Evan for murder, let alone that she was the murderer herself. I’d also let her introduce a doubt in my mind as to Bob’s involvement with the case. Wanting to allay my suspicions, I’d allowed myself to be lured down to the beach. As a result, I’d very nearly lost my life. I’d also come close to playing a part in a potential miscarriage of justice, by giving evidence at Evan Morgan’s hearing. And all because I’d taken my eye off the ball, let Bob’s passing indiscretion cloud my judgment.

  I’m not a moralist where marital infidelity is concerned. I’ve heard enough lurid stories about it in my consulting rooms to understand that human beings are not very good at monogamy, and mostly struggle to abide by what some would see as an oppressive cultural norm. I’m generally sympathetic, not only to those who are cheated, but to those who do the cheating, too; how people manage, or fail to manage, their sexual drives is a subject of enormous complexity and contradiction, as Freud pointed out all those years ago; and nothing much has changed since his day. Indeed, I’m always puzzled by my younger clients, who may talk about sex in an offhand
, vulgar way, yet are often very judgmental when it comes to the issue of infidelity in a long-term relationship.

  So it was all the more surprising that, when the problem came into my own life, I should have reacted the way I did. And, worse, been so blind to what I was doing. I should, at least, have talked the situation over with a colleague, contacted my supervisor, got some perspective on what I was doing. Instead, I’d carried on regardless, thinking I was managing my feelings of jealousy and anger in an admirably calm, sensible manner. Sometimes I think psychotherapists have less, rather than more, insight into their own behavior than other people; we get cocky, we think we’re one step ahead, that we know our own weaknesses, and can manage them; and that’s fatal. That’s the biggest self-delusion of all. I’d learned something from my ordeal, the hard way. In future, I’d have to be more careful. More humble . . .

  Which still didn’t answer the question: What about me and Bob? His brief fling had been far from “insignificant,” as he’d described it. It had shaken up both our lives, in ways that neither of us could have foreseen. Did it matter now? Well, I’d got my own back, or at least had the chance to, with Gwydion. If Mari’s view of marriage as a power struggle was right—and, after witnessing what had happened in the Morgan family I was beginning to agree with her assessment—some equilibrium had been achieved. But did I trust Bob now? I wasn’t sure. His instincts about Evan had been right, mine had been wrong. But he’d used confidential information he’d got from me to further his career. He’d glossed over certain aspects of his past. That, perhaps, had done more lasting damage to our marriage than the affair with the translator. . . .

  “Jess, are you OK?” Bob was speaking to me.

  I realized I’d drifted off again, lost in my own thoughts.

  “How are the girls?” I said, making an effort to connect with him again.

  “Fine. They made you some choc-chip cookies. Here.” Bob waved toward a plastic container by the television table.

  “How sweet of them. I’ll have one later, with my tea.” I paused. “What about what’s his name?”