Reginald Hill: Recalled to Life

The bloody reality of the removal almost overwhelmed her, but strength returned as Mickledore urged the danger Jamie was in and told her of his own efforts to make the death look like suicide. If mere friendship could make a man act so nobly, how much further should love be able to go? She had wanted to go in with him to Jamie, but he insisted this would be madness. Any hint now of a connection closer than employer and servant could be fatal. She had returned to her room and borne the police questioning on Sunday with the strength of love.

But on Monday morning after another sleepless night, she knew she could not face them again. She had paddled out to the island with the children and hidden there under the shading willows till she heard her name booming like gunfire across the shining waters and knew she was being summoned to betray her lover. After Emily's death, everything changed. Now she knew that there could be no limits to what she must do to protect Jamie, and at the same time she knew there could be no reward. It had taken a whole afternoon to work out precisely what it was the police superintendent wanted her to say. Every form of confession she made, he painstakingly copied out, then read it to her and asked if it was true. Each time she answered, 'Yes,' he tossed it aside and told her it was worthless. 'What do you want me to say?' she screamed at him finally. 'The truth. That you were Mickledore's mistress, that you and he planned and carried out the murder together, that there was a false key which you threw in the lake…' 'Yes yes yes!' she cried, sobbing with relief. 'That's true. That's true. I'll write it!' That Mickledore should be willing to die for his friend, and that Jamie should have allowed him to die, was no problem. He had betrayed his friendship by sleeping with Pam and this sacrifice was a fitting atonement. Hers was the harsher penalty, the longer pain, and she had no will to move to free herself till Jamie should give her a sign that enough was enough, the account was balanced. Madly, she had weakened when she learnt that Pip was at Beddington College. It seemed like a sign, not strong enough to make her pay for the help offered by that monstrous woman but enough to make her turn to Daphne Bush, hinting promises she had no intention of keeping. Jamie's letter had destroyed hope and with it, incidentally, Daphne's life. More guilt, more years. She had sunk beneath them once again, this time with no intention of ever resurfacing. And then had come Jay with the news that Jamie was dying. Suddenly she had known that unless she saw him before he died, this life-in-death was all she would ever know. Now she had seen him and what had altered? She heard the sound of an engine and looked up to see that the small bulldozer employed to push the earth back into the grave had emerged from behind the chapel. It paused as the driver spotted her. She also saw she was not alone.

Philip Westropp was walking towards her. Sombre-suited, sombre-faced, with a Bible clutched in his left hand, he could have been a young preacher come to offer comfort. ‘I guessed you'd be here,' he said. 'I didn't want to cause any embarrassment.' 'All those years, and you don't want to embarrass us?' 'None of you harmed me. I harmed myself.

Pip, about Emily, I was, I am, I always will be, so, so sorry…'

'That's OK. Water under the… It was a long time ago.' He smiled faintly. 'When I first understood what had happened, I used to fantasize that you saved me because I was your favourite.' She shook her head. 'You saved me,' she said. 'It was dark down there. Dim shapes and waving weeds. I just grabbed. If there hadn't been anything to grab at, I think I would never have come up.' 'Are you glad you did?' 'For your sake, of course. For my own? I can't say.' 'What will you do?" ‘Is this official?' 'It can be if you like.' 'Then the answer is, I don't know. But I'll do it quietly, that's for sure. ‘What about you? Do you really work for the CIA?' 'Why not? It's in the blood, so to speak.' 'But you're British…' 'I was born here, remember? Mom was American. And I renounced any claim I had to dual nationality way back. I prefer the American Way.' 'Because it's better?' 'Because it could be,' he said. 'You can cure sickness, you can't resurrect a corpse.' The image seemed to remind them where they were. They looked down into the grave in silence for a while. 'Did you really know him?' asked Philip. 'No,' she said, surprised. ‘Didn't you?' 'No. There was always something… a barrier…' Cissy dug into her purse. 'This was his,' she said, proffering the pillbox. 'Would you like it?' 'No,' he said without hesitation. OK.' She opened her fingers and the crested box fell into the grave. 'Goodbye, Pip,' she said. 'Goodbye.

Oh, this is yours, I think,' he added, handing over the Bible. 'We have no use for it.' She took it, opened it, read her mother's inscription with a faint smile. 'Me neither,' she said, tossing it into the grave alongside the glittering pillbox. Then she beckoned the waiting bulldozer to advance, turned, and walked swiftly away.