Ann Cleeves - Telling Tales

“You can’t really have believed that,” Vera said. “Because you followed Emma out.”

“I wasn’t sure. I didn’t want Emma to find Abigail and be alone. I suppose I thought I might have killed her.”

“You never told Robert?”

“He didn’t realize I knew he was seeing her. He thought it was a big secret.”

“Weren’t you angry that he was making a fool of himself over her?” Emma asked. “Jealous?”

“He couldn’t help himself,” Mary said. “And he had so much to give. So much good work still to do.”

There was another silence. Vera knew she should move on. It was one of the rules she’d passed on to Ashworth. Don’t let them get to you. Whatever they’ve done, you can’t take it personally. You’d go crazy. But she allowed herself one unnecessary question. “How could you let Jeanie go to prison?”

“I couldn’t think about it. I had Robert to look after and the children. They wouldn’t have survived without me. She was young, strong. I thought she’d be out in a few years.”

Vera said nothing. She thought of the prison on the top of the cliff, Jeanie Long protesting her innocence, facing the parole board and refusing to play the game which would have got her released.

“If you had children,” Mary said, ‘you’d understand.”

“Did Christopher see you out in the field that afternoon?”

“No. No one saw me!

“Why did he have to die?” “He didn’t have to die. Of course not. Do you think I wanted to kill him?”

“I don’t understand. You’ll have to explain.”

“That summer, he was obsessed by Abigail Mantel too. It was as if she’d cast a spell over the whole family, over Emma and Robert and Christopher. I was the only one who could see through her. That first day, when we’d ridden our bikes to the Point and we were eating ice creams, and she turned up with her father in that fast car, I could tell then that she resented us. We had a closeness that she missed. Her father was out with different women, tied up with work. She wanted to be like us but she couldn’t and so she had to spoil things.”

She was a child, Vera thought. Screwed up and miserable. But she let Mary go on.

“Christopher saw Robert and Abigail together. He didn’t say anything then. Perhaps it didn’t mean much at the time. He’d had the afternoon off school. A dentist’s appointment. He saw them together in Crill. Then he watched her. I think there were other occasions.”

“Did he ask you about it?”

“No. Of course not. He was a secretive boy and children seldom confide in their parents.”

“How do you know, then, that he saw Abigail and your husband together?”

“He told me when he came here last week.”

“The day that he died?”

“Yes.”

“The day that you killed him?”

There was a long pause. “Yes.”

“Did he phone you that morning?”

“Robert had left for work. I started later in the library, and I was on my way out when the phone went. It was Christopher, calling on his mobile. He sounded dreadfully upset, almost incoherent. He was in that derelict farm near the parish cemetery. He was accusing Robert of killing Abigail. He said he should have realized, said something at the time. I didn’t know what to do. I thought we were safe. Robert was working hard. He’d put the nonsense of Abigail Mantel behind him and nothing of the sort had happened since. We had a new family, Emma and James and the baby…”

“More people for you to be responsible for.”

“Yes,” Mary said gratefully. “You see, you do understand.”

“Did you go to see Christopher at the farm?”

“No. I needed time to consider what I should do for the best. I told him I’d ring him later, that we could meet. I hoped he’d get bored with waiting. He was very easily bored. I didn’t think he’d make a scene in public. I hoped he’d just go back to Aberdeen and forget. Later, when I’d had time to put together a proper explanation, I’d go to visit him and make him see. I understood then why he’d been so reluctant to visit us, to be a part of the family. I thought if I had time, I could make it right. That we could be close again.”

“Easy-going,” Vera said. “Relaxed. Like other families.”

“Yes,” Mary said. “Exactly.”

So the second set of fingerprints at the farm hadn’t belonged to the murderer. Another false lead. Vera thought there was probably little forensic evidence connecting Mary to Christopher. But now they had a confession. And she wouldn’t go back on that, whatever her lawyers would tell her. The role of martyr suited her.

“Was killing him one of the options you considered?” “Of course not.” She was horrified. “He was my only son.”

“What did you do with his mobile phone?” “It’s upstairs. In my drawer in the bedroom.” Vera knew she should be triumphant, but looking at the dumpy woman with the untidy ponytail, she only felt sick. No doubt Mary would end up in Spinney Fen too. She would be a model prisoner. She’d volunteer for the groups to tackle offender behaviour. Robert and Emma would visit. Robert wouldn’t be able to work there any more, but the probation service was supposed to be compassionate. They’d find him something else.

“Why did you arrange to meet him in the lane outside the Mantel house?”

“I didn’t. He must have made his way here. Hoping to make a scene perhaps. Some sort of confrontation. James and Emma must have mentioned the fireworks. When he came here and the house was empty, he crossed the fields to the Chapel.”

Taking the path Abigail had used ten years before. “When I went to fetch my coat, he was waiting by the car. It was a terrible shock. It was as I told you. I switched on the headlights and there he was. He was very cold. He’d been waiting for a long time. He looked like a tramp. I hardly recognized him. He said his father had killed Abigail. I told him that was ridiculous, that it wasn’t true. He got out his mobile and said he was going to phone the police. I had to stop him. Of course I didn’t mean to kill him.”

Didn’t you? thought Vera, no longer convinced. Was it really another accident? Like Abigail? It’s much easier to love a dead son, than a live, inconvenient one.

“He was your son,” she said, forgetting again the rule about staying detached. “Yet afterwards, you kept to your story. When we talked to you the next day you were very calm.”

“It was the greatest sacrifice a woman can make,” Mary said. “I did it to protect Robert, to keep the rest of the family together. I couldn’t let the sacrifice be in vain.”

Bollocks. You panicked and you did it to protect yourself. “What did you hit him with?”

“There was a torch in the car. Long, very heavy. He turned away to make the phone call. I hit him. He fell into the ditch. He fell awkwardly. All you could see was that horrible anorak. I moved him so that he looked more peaceful. He wasn’t breathing. I checked. There was nothing anyone could do to save him. And he wasn’t happy any more. He wasn’t happy as he’d been when he was a boy, living with us.”

“What did you do with the torch?”

She seemed surprised by the question. “It had blood on it. I wiped it on his anorak. That was dirty anyway. Then I put it back into my bag.”

And I let you carry it away, Vera thought. I knew we’d have to search your car, but we didn’t search you. I thought you were too distressed to bear it. How long will I have to live that one down? She was already wondering if there was some way that could be left out of the final report.

She realized then that Emma was crying. She wasn’t making any noise, but tears were rolling down her cheeks.