Ann Cleeves - Hidden Depths

‘Who else would have known Laura took this path to get the bus?’ Vera stooped to pick a bit of straw from her sandal, tried not to make too much of the question.

‘I don’t know. The other kids, I suppose.’

‘Geoff? Kath?’

‘She might have mentioned it. I can’t see it, though. She hasn’t exactly been chatty lately.’

So it was planned, Vera thought. They knew that anyway because of the card, but this confirmed it. Someone had waited and watched, followed the family’s movements. Not from the street. That would have been noticed. Perhaps from here on the edge of the wood, where you had a view of the village. A good pair of binoculars and you’d see inside the houses.

Then she thought that whatever the reason had been for the first murder, the killer was now enjoying himself. Or herself. It had become a game, an obsession. A piece of theatre. Not just in the staging of the body, but in the events leading up to that. She hoped the killer would want to make the pleasure last. She hoped it meant that Laura was still alive.

The morning Laura Armstrong disappeared, Felicity Calvert walked back from dropping James at the school bus and tried to come to terms with the news that Peter had been Lily’s lover. She supposed she should feel betrayed. Not by Peter – what right did she have to judge him? But by Samuel. She was convinced that Samuel must have known about Peter’s affair with Lily Marsh. Probably all four of the men who were there when James found the body had known. Peter would have wanted to boast about the conquest. It was quite impossible that he would have kept something like that to himself and he confided in Samuel about everything. Perhaps that was why Samuel had seemed so weird lately, so wound up and tense.

Peter had told her about his relationship with Lily when he’d returned from the police station. He’d arrived back at the mill in a taxi, looking drained, rather vulnerable. By then James was in bed. The boy seemed to have accepted the story that the police needed to talk to his father as an expert witness and had gone to his room without a fuss. The house seemed remarkably quiet as she waited for Peter’s return. Usually she had the radio on or listened to music, but tonight she could face neither. She had opened the windows and could hear the water of the mill race, very distant.

Felicity had watched Peter climb from the taxi and gone out to meet him. He’d taken her hand, as if they were teenagers, and led her inside. Without saying a word he’d lifted a bottle of wine from the fridge and opened it. This quiet was so unlike him that she was scared. He should have been raging against the indignity of his imprisonment, the impudence of the police in carrying him off. She almost believed that he was going to admit to murder. But he was free, wasn’t he? It couldn’t be that.

He poured two glasses of wine and sat at the kitchen table. The kitchen was her space and he seldom sat there in the evening. He preferred the comfort of the sitting room or the privacy of his office. To sit with her was an apology in itself.

‘Are you hungry?’ she said. ‘Can I get you something?’

‘Perhaps later.’ He sipped his wine, met her eyes. There was another moment of silence, then he said, ‘I was having an affair with Lily Marsh.’

She didn’t say she’d worked that out. There was a more pressing question. ‘Did you kill her?’

‘No!’ Horrified. He reached out and took her hands. She found herself excited, thrilled by the touch. In their everyday routine – the family, the house, even the sex – they seemed to slide away from a real encounter. This had the charge of being touched by a stranger.

‘She was very beautiful,’ she said. ‘I can see how you might have been tempted.’

‘I was flattered.’ He paused, drank more wine. ‘Do you want me to tell you about it?’

She thought about that. Did she want all the details? How they’d met? Where they’d made love? She worried she might find that exciting too. ‘No,’ she said. ‘That’s your business.’

‘Would you like me to move out?’

‘I don’t know. No. It never even occurred to me.’

‘Lots of women would.’ He seemed puzzled that she was taking his revelation so calmly. Was he disappointed, even, in her lack of response? ‘It would be their first reaction, at least.’

‘Perhaps an affair doesn’t seem so important with two people dead.’

‘I didn’t kill her.’

She stroked the top of his hand with her finger. ‘I believe you.’

Now, walking back from the bus in the shade of the elder hedge, she thought that in this short, taut exchange there had been more communication than they’d had for years. Unbidden there came into her mind a possible headline for one of the women’s magazines she only read at the doctor’s and the hairdresser’s: My husband was suspected of murder – And it saved our marriage!

Even the night before, sitting opposite him, she had found the exchange melodramatic and faintly ridiculous.

‘It was over,’ he said. ‘Ages ago. I wasn’t still seeing her.’

‘Who finished the relationship?’ More mag speak.

‘I did. Lily was unbalanced. I should have realized no normal pretty young woman would fall for me.’ Perhaps there was a hint of a pause while he waited for contradiction. She kept quiet. At least his adultery meant she didn’t feel obliged to play games with him. ‘She’d become obsessed. She turned up at work. Phoned me.’

‘I think she called here,’ Felicity said. ‘Several times when I picked up the phone, it went dead.’ She remembered the roses in the cottage, the sound of footsteps in the hall. ‘She might have been here too.’

‘She seemed convinced that I’d leave you to marry her. I never promised her that. I didn’t promise her anything.’ He got out of his seat to fetch the wine from the fridge again, filled her glass then his own. ‘I told the police that we’d parted amicably. I didn’t want them to think I had a reason for killing her. But it wasn’t true. It’s been a nightmare. She was stalking me. I never knew where she’d turn up next. She must have arranged the placement in the school in Hepworth, so she could get to me through James. And then that charade, turning up here, pretending she needed to rent the cottage.’

‘I don’t think,’ Felicity said, ‘that you can expect me to sympathize.’

He was apologetic again. ‘No, no, of course not.’ And suddenly she felt ashamed and exhilarated at the same time, because her secret was still intact. Should she confess too? About her and Samuel? There was something addictive in the rawness of the conversation and she wanted that to continue. She felt as she had when she was a student, sitting late at night with her friends, the room lit by candles, something gloomy on the record player. Then, every discussion had the intensity of the confessional. But reason took over, a sly realization that while the balance of power had shifted between them she should make the most of it. Insist that James go to the local high school, for instance, rather than being shipped off to the institution in Newcastle which had screwed Peter up. In this penitent mood, he’d agree to anything. Besides, she told herself, this wasn’t her decision to make. Samuel wouldn’t bear it if their relationship became public knowledge. It would kill him.

Later that night they’d made love, with the windows open so she could still hear the water outside. Afterwards they stood together looking out towards the lighthouse. I’ll finish it with Samuel, she thought. No one need ever know. It’ll be as if it never happened.

The next morning they got up as usual, Peter left for work early while James was still having breakfast. The boy had been full of questions about the police and the CSIs. Peter had been patient, looked over James’s head to give her a wry smile. He kissed her on the lips before he drove away. It would soon be James’s summer holiday and she walked up the lane with him to meet the bus, making the most of their time together. Next year, she knew, James would insist on doing it on his own.