I Made a Mistake

by Jane Corry

  Or did I? Maybe I was ‘transposing’ my own emotions onto you. That can happen. We covered that in one of my OU psychology modules too. Perhaps, I told myself, you’re just being suspicious because of your own experience. So I did something terrible. I checked your phone when you were in the bathroom one night.

  At first I thought there was nothing there. But then I remembered the part of my IT course that taught us how to hide texts and then open them again. And there they were. Horrible messages from this man called Matthew! But the worst was that picture of the two of you together in bed …

  I can only imagine that you’d kept them in case you needed them as evidence of his behaviour. But as our tutor had warned us, it’s a huge privacy risk. If my Stuart saw that picture, it would have broken his heart. He might even have filed for divorce.

  Then Coco went missing. I rang you, if you remember. ‘Did she say what this man looked like?’ you asked.

  You let out a little gasp when I gave you Daisy’s description. I felt in my gut that this Matthew was responsible. I had to help you. I had to keep our family together.

  I just didn’t know how.

  33

  Poppy

  Just as I’m about to leave Dad’s, a terrible storm whips up followed by an amber weather warning on the radio. ‘I don’t want you driving in this,’ says Dad as if I am a teenager. I can also see that he doesn’t want me to go at all, but I am torn. The dog has gone missing. Daisy has been followed. I need to get back to my family to make sure this crazy maniac isn’t going to do something worse.

  ‘Sorry, Dad,’ I say. ‘I have to.’

  But I don’t even get as far as the outskirts of town. The roads are flooded and police are turning everyone back. There’s no option but to return to Dad’s.

  We spend the evening watching some mindless television programme while I’m silently agonizing about what’s going on at home. ‘No sign of Coco yet,’ texts Betty.

  It takes until the following afternoon for the A24 to become passable. ‘You will be back soon, won’t you?’ says Dad.

  ‘Come with me,’ I say.

  ‘I’m not leaving my home,’ he retorts. We’ve had this conversation before. He expects us to make the move down here. But it’s simply not practical with the girls’ education and our jobs.

  When I finally get home after a terrible journey through floods, Daisy is hysterical. ‘Coco will be cold and hungry,’ she weeps, flying into my arms before I’m even through the front door. ‘We have to find her, Mum. Please!’

  I shoot a ‘What are we going to do?’ look at Betty. Stuart isn’t back yet. According to the text I received on the drive back, my husband is having to work late because his assistant is off with flu.

  ‘If you hadn’t been on your phone, Daisy, it wouldn’t have happened,’ says Melissa. Pretty rich coming from her, I have to say. She’s always on hers.

  ‘I know,’ weeps my youngest daughter. ‘But I was taking a picture of something so I could sketch it afterwards.’

  ‘Have you called the police?’ I ask.

  Betty nods. ‘They say they’ll keep an eye out. I’ve been emitting lots of positive thought waves too. So has the rest of my meditation class.’

  Fat lot of good that will do, I think. But I bite my lip.

  Then my mobile rings. ‘Maybe that’s the police,’ says Daisy excitedly. ‘We gave them your number too.’

  But it’s Sally. I run up to my study for some privacy.

  ‘We’ve been given thirty-six hours to settle,’ she says grimly.

  I try to swallow the lump of panic that has stuck in my throat.

  ‘The thing is, I might not have that five thousand now,’ I say. ‘Something’s come up and I have to use it for something else.’

  ‘I could use my divorce settlement to help,’ Sally says slowly. ‘But that will leave me with very little.’

  ‘That’s very kind, but no,’ I say firmly. ‘This is my mess. I’m not going to involve you.’

  ‘The only problem is that there’s something else.’ Sally’s voice – usually so calm and sensible – falters. ‘An arts journalist rang me. His paper has got wind about Doris and the fact we weren’t insured at the time. Someone tipped them off, apparently, and they’re including it in an investigative piece about extras and the do’s and don’ts of choosing the right agency. They want a quote from us.’

  Someone tipped them off? No prizes for guessing who that was. ‘Did you give them one?’

  ‘The lawyer advised me not to. But not saying anything makes us look even worse, doesn’t it? When you read things like this and someone says “no comment”, they look underhand.’

  She’s right.

  The doorbell goes as I put the phone down. What now? What else can life possibly throw at me? Then I hear Daisy cry out with happiness. ‘Coco!’

  I come tearing down the stairs. In the open doorway is that white ball of fluff, already in Daisy’s arms, licking her mistress with such love that I want to cry.

  And next to them is Matthew. He eyes me with an expression of triumph.

  This is it, I tell myself. It’s over now. He will say something. In front of the children.

  ‘How dare you take my dog!’ spits Daisy furiously. I’ve never seen my youngest so angry before.

  Matthew crouches down to her level, a smile on his lips. It’s all I can do not to grab her and slam the door in his face. But that might lead to more problems. ‘I was worried you’d think that,’ he says. ‘The thing is that this little fellow ran off and I chased after him to get him back for you.’

  ‘But you just disappeared,’ snaps Daisy. ‘And Coco’s not a boy. She’s a girl.’

  He shrugs. ‘Apologies. The thing is that your dog scampered into that woody part of the park. Eventually, I managed to catch him by his lead, which was trailing in the mud, but then I couldn’t find you.’ He wipes his face with his sleeve. ‘I had to take it home with me for the night. Then I came back and have spent hours looking all over the place for you and asking people if they know anyone who owns a little white dog. Thankfully I struck lucky and bumped into one of your neighbours, who told me where you lived.’

  He looks up at me. Now his eyes appear strained. Concerned. I almost feel like congratulating him on his performance. Once an actor, always an actor, I remind myself.

  ‘Is this your mum? I hope I didn’t scare you.’

  ‘A bit,’ sobs Daisy. ‘But thank you for saving Coco. I’m so grateful.’

  Our youngest daughter is now crying with relief, her face buried in the little dog’s fur. Of course he meant to scare her, I realize. Not actually cause harm. But to put the pressure on. To make me give in to his blackmail.

  ‘Take Coco into the kitchen,’ I tell her. Betty is upstairs with Melissa, rehearsing her lines for the new school play.

  Just to make sure she can’t hear me, I go out onto the doorstep, check the door is on the latch and pull it shut behind me. ‘What do you think you’re playing at?’ I hiss. ‘First you push Dad down the front step and make him twist his ankle …’

  ‘Pops! How could you think I’d do such a thing?’

  ‘A neighbour saw you arguing.’

  He actually laughs. ‘I was trying to persuade him not to see me off at the door when I left and to stay sitting down. But he said it would be rude not to.’

  ‘Then you kidnap my daughter’s dog …’

  ‘It ran off,’ he protested. ‘You were lucky I saved it before it got to a road.’

  ‘I don’t believe you. You took her home by your own admission. And then you came all the way back from your place to here, pretending you had found her.’

  ‘What a vivid imagination you have!’

  ‘You’re trying to destroy my family.’

  ‘I’ve no intention of doing so, Pops. Just as long as you hand over that fifty grand. In cash. I’ll be outside Waterloo station at six p.m. tomorrow night. As soon as I have that money in my hand, I will delete that rather to
uching picture of you in my arms and get out of your life.’

  ‘But how can I be certain you’ll stick to your word?’

  He takes my hands. ‘You’ll just have to trust me, Pops.’

  I push him away. ‘I hate you.’

  He shakes his head. ‘I don’t think so, Pops. I think you still care, deep down. I was your first real love.’

  ‘I was stupid then,’ I say through gritted teeth.

  ‘First love,’ he continues, as if he hadn’t heard me, ‘never goes away. Does it, Pops? Seeing you again has reminded me of how much you meant to me too. I’m sorry. I really am. Believe me, I wouldn’t be doing this if I had any other choice.’

  Does he mean it? Of course not. And yet, his words still make me feel unsettled.

  Then he’s gone, heading down our path and disappearing behind the hedgerow.

  ‘Why didn’t you thank that man?’ says Daisy when I go and find her in the kitchen. ‘If it hadn’t been for him, we wouldn’t have got Coco back. Perhaps you should have given him a reward.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ I snap. ‘And you shouldn’t have spoken to a stranger in the park. I’ve told you how dangerous it is. If you see him again, you’re to ignore him and come and find one of us. Do you hear me?’

  Daisy gives me a strange look. ‘You wish Coco had got lost, don’t you? You’ve never wanted her.’

  ‘That’s not true,’ I begin.

  But her eyes swim with tears. ‘Yes it is. I know when you’re lying. Well, Coco means everything to me. More than my own family at the moment.’ And then she stomps up the stairs.

  At any other time, I’d have gone running after her. But I’m too exhausted. I can’t take any more risks. I have to meet Matthew outside Waterloo tomorrow evening. My life has become like a piece of knitting which has started to unravel after a dropped stitch. Faster and faster.

  Soon I fear there will be nothing – and maybe no one – left.

  Unless I can think of something to save us all.

  34

  Betty

  I overheard every word. I was helping Melissa learn her lines but had left my glasses in my bedroom. So I went to get them and that’s when I heard you talking to someone on the doorstep below. I’d opened my bedroom window earlier to clear the incense smell. It’s right above the front door.

  ‘You’re trying to destroy my family.’

  My ears pricked up. Then I heard a deeper voice. I knew instinctively it must be him.

  ‘I’ve no intention of doing so, Pops. Just as long as you hand over that fifty grand. In cash. I’ll be outside Waterloo station at six p.m. tomorrow night.’

  I could barely believe my ears. This man wanted your money? How dare he! Oh, what a fool you must have felt, Poppy. Briefly, I considered telling Stuart. But I knew he wouldn’t see it the way I did. At least, as it turned out, Coco was safe.

  It would have looked too obvious to have followed you. So I got to Waterloo early at 5.30 that Friday evening and tried to look inconspicuous. It wasn’t difficult. There were loads of commuters and it was raining so I hid under my umbrella and hung around by the woman giving away free papers outside. Maybe, I hoped, you wouldn’t turn up.

  But you did. There you were, looking so pretty in that yellow spring coat of yours. With a package under your arm. Instinctively I knew it contained that money. Then this dark-haired man emerged through the crowd. You talked for a bit – I couldn’t hear what you said – and I noticed he kept rubbing his jaw as though it irritated him. Then he snatched the package from you. Immediately, he marched away briskly, up the steps and into the station.

  You stood and watched before bowing your head and walking slowly away. I wanted to shake you. Tell you what an idiot you’d been to fall for a man like Matthew Gordon. To be furious with you for threatening my son’s happiness. He’d be devastated if he knew you’d had an affair. And where had the money come from? Of course, I’d no idea how much you had in savings. But I could only hope you hadn’t taken it from the joint account without telling Stuart.

  Yet even though I was cross, I also wanted to put my arms around you in comfort and love. I know I’ve said this before but it’s important to me. You’re the daughter I should have had. The child who was so close to making the same mistakes as me. Somehow I had to save you.

  So I ran up the steps after this man and followed him into the main station, down the escalator and towards the Tube. Then he went through the barriers and down another escalator towards the Bakerloo Line.

  I could almost touch him.

  Central Criminal Court, London

  It’s taken its time but the case is nearly at its end now. The defendant is clearly exhausted. Witnesses have come and gone. The barristers have done all they can to persuade the jury one way or the other.

  The jury is still out, deliberating. Everyone, including those in the public gallery, is fidgeting, as if wondering when it will return. The lawyers are noisily shuffling their papers. There’s a general air of tight expectation, rather like waiting for exam results.

  Then there is a stirring. The jury, puffed with self-importance, is re-entering. Have they reached a decision? ‘We have, My Lord,’ says the foreman.

  Light glints from the judge’s glasses.

  ‘Do you find Betty Patricia Page guilty or not guilty of the murder of Matthew Gordon?’

  The single word rings out.

  ‘Guilty.’

  There is a brief silence. Then everyone seems to shout at once.

  From the Daily Mail

  Grandmother-of-two pushed actor Matthew Gordon under Tube

  Betty Page, a 70-year-old grandmother, has been found guilty of murdering actor Matthew Gordon by pushing him under a Tube train at Waterloo station.

  Lengthy evidence was given during the trial by witness Poppy Page, who admitted that she had recently had a brief affair with the murdered man, an old flame, who then infiltrated his way into the lives of her husband and father. In addition, Gordon had lied about his wife being disabled to create sympathy when in fact she was already dead. Mrs Page is the daughter-in-law of the convicted killer.

  Gordon’s phone was found to contain pictures of him and Poppy Page in bed along with messages threatening to inform her husband of the affair. Gordon also kidnapped the family’s dog before pretending to have found it.

  The defence argued that Poppy Page’s evidence showed that Matthew Gordon was a ‘manipulative and possibly dangerous man’.

  On the day of the murder, Betty Page watched her daughter-in-law hand over a package to Gordon outside Waterloo mainline station. This was said to contain £50,000 in cash, which he had demanded in order to keep quiet about the affair. She then followed her victim into the Underground, where she had an argument with him on the edge of the platform and snatched the package from him. The prosecution argued that Betty Page ‘murdered Matthew Gordon in cold blood to stop him hurting her family’. The defence claimed that Betty’s daughter-in-law knew nothing of her involvement – a claim substantiated in court by Poppy Page herself, who said, ‘I wasn’t even aware that Betty knew about the relationship between Matthew and me.’

  Outside the court, several witnesses present at the time of the murder described the scene on the Underground platform. ‘There was a real crush,’ one woman told our reporter. ‘Everyone surged forward to get close to the edge. Betty Page was still tussling with that poor man. That’s when the train came.’

  Matthew Gordon was married to Sandra Wright, a former actress who died two years ago. He leaves no children.

  Sentencing will take place in six weeks’ time.

  Part Two

  * * *

  35

  Poppy

  I’ve never been inside a prison before. I have no idea what to expect. A few years ago, I was on a set where some of my clients were inmates in a comedy.

  But this is no joke, I tell myself, as I stare at the modern building in front of me. And this is no polystyrene mock jail on a set.

>   This is for real.

  VISITS, says the board outside. There is also another notice, declaring that I will be given a lengthy sentence if I am found to have drugs or other prohibited substances on me.

  Of course, I don’t. I’m not that kind of woman. Just as Betty isn’t the kind of woman to have pushed Matthew Gordon under a train. I simply don’t believe it.

  But there wasn’t a chance to show my support before she was whisked off in a van to a remand jail, where she would, I was told by the barrister, stay until the sentencing hearing. ‘Sometimes,’ she told me, ‘the accused is allowed to speak to family and relatives after the court case but I’m afraid Betty didn’t want to see anyone.’

  ‘Why?’ cried the girls.

  They didn’t talk to me, of course. They addressed their anguished question to my husband. He wouldn’t look at me either. I don’t blame them. All three of them have had to hear terrible things about me in court. Just as I’d feared, they’ll never have anything to do with me again. The sickening realization makes me want to curl up and die.

  ‘How could you have cheated on Dad?’ Melissa had yelled at me during one of the court breaks. She had her arm protectively round her little sister in a rare instance of sibling camaraderie. Stuart just looked at me as if he didn’t know me. His silence was worse. I should have come clean with him about Matthew before the trial. Instead, he had to hear the sordid truth in public.

  Now he has lost his mother and the children have lost their grandmother.

  ‘I’ll move out if you want,’ I said when we got home.

  ‘My mother’s room is free,’ he said shortly.

  Since then, the girls have been pretending not to hear me. I don’t blame them. I’ve tried talking to Melissa about the dangers of speaking to strangers online after her Facebook chat with Matthew. Again, she’s ignored me.