Cath Staincliffe: Go Not Gently

The rest of the room was dusty but reasonably neat, shabby carpet, painted filing cabinet, a set of three dining chairs. A stack of reference books on a shelf, phone and answerphone, a pretty ceramic plate wall clock the only personal touch.

I tidied up the desk, switched the answerphone on and prepared to leave. I was at the Dobsons’ front door when I heard my office phone. I clattered down the stairs, flung myself at the desk and yanked the answerphone connection out of the socket, interrupting my recorded voice in mid-greeting. Pressing the off button never does any good; it’s one of those slow response – maybe I’ll do it this time maybe I won’t – models.

‘Hello. Sal Kilkenny Investigations, Sal Kilkenny speaking.’

‘Oh.’ Confusion at the other end of the line. ‘Erm, I just thought…’ Laugh. Young, male, nervous. Either the answerphone, or the fact that I was a woman, had thrown him. Most people think Sal’s a man. My Yellow Pages ad is carefully worded. It says female detectives available but doesn’t imply it’s a one-woman show. No point in advertising for abusive calls and attracting all the headcases.

More nervous laughter.

‘How can I help?’ Not ‘Can I?’ but ‘How can I?’. Make the client confident you can do the job.

‘Well, it’s my wife. Do you…look, I’ve never…I haven’t any idea what you charge or even if…’

Wish he’d spit it out. ‘I can offer an initial appointment, no obligation. You can discuss the matter with us, find out the sort of services we can offer and take it from there. Or I can offer free advice now if you want to talk about it over the phone.’

‘I see. Erm…well. Oh, shit, sorry.’ He hung up. Caught in the act, I’d guess.

I plugged in the answerphone again hoping it wouldn’t take revenge at sudden disconnection by playing up and taking half-messages again, refusing to playback or to play the announcement, confusing people with uncomfortable silences and sequences of beeps. I sometimes spent hours searching for fragments of communication, whizzing the tape back and forth. I suppose the answerphone matched the window blind really. Crap. And not a true reflection of the quality of work I could offer.

Positive thinking.

After all, two clients in one day can’t be bad, even if one did ring off.

The drizzle looked set to run for days, the sky was dense and sullen. I did my best to ignore it as I walked up to school to collect Maddie and Tom.

‘We had wet play again,’ Maddie complained. ‘I hate wet play.’

‘But you play inside, don’t you? Games and things?’

‘No we don’t,’ she said scornfully. ‘We do drawing or read a book.’ On a par with waiting for a bus by the sound of it.

‘Hold this.’ She thrust her lunch box, book bag and PE things at me.

Maddie was always the pits after school.

I turned to Tom, who was wrestling with his coat, and sorted him out.

‘We did puppets.’ He held up a navy sock with felt eyes and ears glued on to it. The ears were triangular. There were no other distinguishing features.

‘Is it a cat?’

‘No,’ he grinned, ‘it’s a sock monster.’ Of course.

‘Come on,’ Maddie yelled, ‘I’m getting soaking here.’

We were all soaked by the time we got back. I hung clothes on radiators to steam and provided warm drinks and crumpets. I left the kids with theirs in front of the telly while I went to chop vegetables: carrots, onions, turnips, beans. We’ve a big kitchen – the whole house is big, a Victorian semi, redbrick and stained glass. But originally there’d been a dining room and a scullery-size kitchen. The owner of the house had knocked the two together. In the centre there’s a huge oval table, soft light wood. Ray made it. His pride and joy. I seem to spend half my life at that table. Sun streams in the kitchen most of the day in the summer. In mid-February it doesn’t. I drew the blinds and turned on the lamps and lights.

A gentle snore from under the table told me Digger the dog was still alive. I returned to my chopping and sifted through people I could usefully talk to about Lily Palmer before I went to see Homelea for myself. I came up with two. I set some of the vegetables to simmer and tried the phone.

Rachel, the social worker who was a friend of a friend, was away on a training day. I dialled the other number.

Moira answered the phone with the same brusque voice that had alienated so many potential patients. Those who’d stuck it out beyond first impressions discovered a dedicated GP with a genuine concern for their wellbeing. She’d a healthy mistrust of drug companies and unnecessary medical intervention. She often referred people to alternative therapies, sent them off to the homeopathic clinic in Manchester or to try acupuncture. She was not popular with the medical establishment. Her surgery was always full to bursting. She never bothered with appointments, her method of actually listening to people and giving them space to talk put paid to any notion of time-management. We didn’t mind waiting. It was worth it.

‘Sal,’ she barked, ‘how are you? Well?’

‘I’d like a chat. I need to do a bit of research for a case I’m working on. When are you free?’

‘I’m on call tonight, that do you?’

‘Fine. It shouldn’t take that long.’

‘Half-eight?’

‘Yes.’

I knew that could mean any time from half-eight till half eleven. Moira always intended to be on time and made precise arrangements, never acknowledging that the demands of-her practice frequently played havoc with her social plans.

‘Need any books? What’s the general area?’

‘Geriatrics, Alzheimer’s, that sort of thing.’

‘OK.’

‘Oh, and drugs, stuff about side effects.’

‘Hah!’ she snorted. ‘Give me a few weeks. Later.’

‘Later’ was Moira’s version of goodbye.

I fried onion, cumin and ginger, chilli, coriander and turmeric. While the spices sizzled I set the table. I added the veg and a tin of tomatoes to the pan and stirred the lot. Left it to cook.

Ray got in just as I was draining the rice. Digger emerged from under the table and went apeshit for a few minutes. Ray joined in. Prancing about and grabbing folds of the dog’s loose coat and wriggling it about, letting the animal lap at his moustache with his broad pink tongue. Greeting ritual over, Digger slunk back under the table.

‘It’s ready,’ I said. ‘Tell the kids.’

Teatime was relatively peaceful, an inkling of what might emerge as the kids matured. But at five and four respectively Maddie and Tom were still barely civilised at the table. All too often food became an area for defiance. I’d long since given up trying to get Maddie to eat a balanced diet. As long as she treated what was on the plate as something to eat rather than modelling clay, ammunition or paint I was happy.

Ray takes the same tack with Tom. We’re both single parents and we have to agree on ground rules for the kids to avoid their playing us off against each other. Ray and I share the house and the childcare but never a bed. Some people seem to find it hard to believe; I don’t know whether it’s the shared childcare or the asexual relationship that gives them the most trouble. It’s the latter as far as Ray’s mother is concerned. She thinks we’re lying about it.

By eight o’clock the children were asleep, the pots washed and the kitchen clear. I sat in the old overstuffed armchair by the bay window, feet up on a chair, and browsed through the evening paper. ‘Council Freezes Repairs’, ‘Triple Wedding at Hacienda’, ‘School Will Sell Land’, ‘Man Held in Shooting’. My head nodded as I settled in. I jerked awake to the sound of the doorbell. Quarter to nine. Not bad.