Ann Cleeves - Burial of Ghosts

Ronnie knew where Thomas lived, I thought. Marcus had told him. But only just before Thomas died. By then Joanna had woven her intricate fiction to entrap me. Dickon had said she was good at stories.

‘If you were so hard up, how could you afford the £10,000 in cash for me?’

‘What?’ Now the impatience was directed at me. It was as if I were quibbling over a few pence change. I wondered then just how much she had ripped off the Consortium. ‘Oh, Stuart saw to all that. He was devoted to Philip. He believed in Thomas as Philip’s son and in Philip’s request to give you work. He knew I didn’t have the money. And at that point he was trying to protect me from the knowledge that Philip had a racy past. I’d set it up for Stuart to find the instruction himself, along with a lot of other papers. It wasn’t hard to get Philip to sign it.’

‘Stuart’s devoted to you.’ He must have known she was involved. The meeting with Ronnie in Whitley Bay had been to discuss damage limitation. They’d suspected she was a murderer but still they had tried to protect her.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I suppose he is.’

‘But not so devoted that he’ll take the blame for two murders. He won’t be prepared to sacrifice himself.’

‘Not two murders,’ she said, offended, as if I’d accused her of being some kind of monster. ‘Only one.’

‘What happened to Marcus?’

‘He was a sweet boy. He had rather a crush. The older woman thing. He never really knew his mother.’

‘He came to see you the night he died.’

‘Mmm.’

‘And?’

‘He was getting a bit flaky about the money, a bit anxious that he’d be implicated if the police started sniffing around the office looking at Thomas’s things. He didn’t believe I could have killed Thomas. Of course not. Like I said he had a bit of a crush. But he might have worked it out eventually.’

‘You got him drunk?’

‘He got himself drunk.’

‘You can’t have known he’d drive himself over the bridge.’

She didn’t answer but she looked smug. She wanted me to know how clever she was.

‘Did you tamper with the car?’

‘I followed him down the Spine Road. Got a bit close to him. Got him scared. He lost concentration. She looked up from the empty glass and gave me her seductive, I’m your best friend in the world smile. ‘I didn’t mean to kill him. Of course not. I just wanted to warn him that it wouldn’t be a good idea to talk to his father or the police about any financial irregularities. It was an accident. These things happen. Young drivers…’ She shrugged.

‘Is that what will happen to me when I leave Wintrylaw tonight? I’m already over the limit. Will I have an accident too?’

‘Of course not.’ She was hurt that I could contemplate such a thing. She was good. Really, she was very good. She paused, then continued, choosing her words carefully, knowing that I’d understand their significance. ‘I think we have an understanding. You know I had no option but to kill Thomas. Any good mother would have done the same. Think about it. Philip had just died. I was all that Flora and Dickon had in the world. If Thomas revealed where our money had come from, if I went to prison, there’d be no one to look after them. They’d have had to go into care. Can you imagine what that would have done to them? Just after their father’s death?’

Of course I could imagine, and she knew fine well I could. She’d found out all about me. Philip had told her.

‘What will happen if you go to the police now? It would be much, much worse.’

Her words were relentless. I felt I’d been beaten to a crumpled heap on the floor and she was kicking me, one blow after another until my mind and my body were numb.

‘There’d be publicity. Would foster parents want the children of a murderer in their own homes? The kids’ friends would find out. Imagine the taunting and the bullying at school. And then there’d be the prison visits. Flora might be able to cope with that, but I’m not sure about Dickon.’

I knew she was manipulating me. I wasn’t even sure she cared that much about what would happen to Flora and Dickon. But she was getting to me and she knew it.

‘It’s not as if I’m a danger to society,’ she went on. ‘It’s not as if I’d do anything like that again. If you talk to the police, it wouldn’t be me you’d be punishing, it would be them.’

‘I’d look after them myself.’ OK, crazy I know, but she’d driven me to it.

‘Come off it!’ All the pride and arrogance that she’d hidden under those soft, relentless words suddenly flashed through. ‘You’re mad. You stabbed someone. You’re no better than me. Worse, because there was no reason for it. You could have killed him. Do you think social services would give any kid to you?’

I wanted to tell her that there was a reason for it. I’d been taken hostage and seen a boy killed. I wasn’t in my right mind. But that would have turned me into a victim again and it was time to let that go.

We stared at each other across the table. The fat candle spluttered then recovered its flame. I got up. She must have thought she’d won, because she didn’t try to stop me. I found my way to the big front door and let myself out that way. I wasn’t a member of this family and I didn’t want to be. I looked up to Dickon’s window but the curtains were drawn and it was in darkness.

I drove back carefully, very slowly, aware that I was in no fit state to be on the road. It wasn’t just the wine. I knew that if I had any sense I’d stop at the first phone box and call Farrier and tell him everything I knew. But I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t do it to Dickon. I couldn’t put him through everything I’d had to survive. I decided I had to give it a few days. I thought some event, some deus ex machina in the shape of Ronnie Laing or Stuart Howdon, might arrange things for me. Ronnie was mad enough to kill her. The kids would still have to go into care, but they could hang on to their picture of their mother. They wouldn’t need to know she’d killed a young lad. Or she might suddenly develop a conscience and shop herself. Or kill herself, leaving a note to say she couldn’t live without her husband. They’d go for that.

When I got to Sea View, Jess was on her way to bed. She was wrapped up in the dreadful mauve candlewick dressing gown that looks like a toilet mat and has lost all its threads.

‘Hello, pet,’ she said. ‘Did you see the badgers?’

‘Na,’ I said. ‘They weren’t playing tonight.’

‘You think too much,’ Farrier said.

I don’t know how he could tell what I was thinking. He came to see me while I was waiting for the miracle to happen – for Joanna to die or disappear. He came to tell me she’d been arrested. I hadn’t expected that. Not without my help. It was the pride again. I’d thought I was the only person capable of putting her away. While I was waiting, the flashbacks had returned, more frequently than ever, but somehow I wasn’t so troubled by them. I didn’t let them get to me in the same way.

‘What’s happened to the kids?’

‘They’re with foster parents in Heaton. A really nice couple. A big house backing onto the park. I asked. I thought you’d want to know.’

Heaton. Where Philip had come from. There was something reassuring about that.

‘You don’t seem surprised about Joanna,’ he said, probing.

We were on the white bench outside Sea View. Jess had gone to Asda. Ray had taken her in the van because she had to do a big shop. She’d arranged a party, a big do. I thought she and Ray were intending to announce their engagement and I was so exhausted, so wrung out and emotionally dead, that I didn’t care any more. I’d move on, find somewhere to stay. There was always Absalom House.