Simon Beckett - Owning Jacob - SA

It struck him with a painful clarity how alone he was.

He wondered why he didn’t move to somewhere smaller. The house was far too big for him, and the empty rooms only reminded him of what he’d lost. He felt no sentimental attachment to it. It was part of the life he’d had with Sarah, but that life had ended. It made more sense to sell it and buy a flat, big enough to have a darkroom, not so big that felt lost in it. Time to move on, cut his losses and get on with building a new life instead of living in the shadows of the old.

So why don’t you?

He couldn’t answer that. Any more than he could explain why he had held on to the old toys and clothes of Jacob’s that the Kales hadn’t wanted instead of getting rid of them as he had Sarah’s belongings. He knew that the two issues were connected, but he wasn’t ready yet to face up to them.

Not at seven o’clock in the morning.

Make that five past, he thought, glancing at the clock.

Hours yet before he had to be at the studio. Fuck it.

He went upstairs to get dressed.

It had grudgingly lightened when he set off for Tunford, as though the day felt as unenthusiastic about starting as he did. He turned on the car heater full to drive away the chill as he set off. With luck he’d miss the heaviest of the rush-hour traffic and shave something off the one-and-a-half-hour run.

He would have three-quarters of an hour there at best, and might just catch the Kales at breakfast. He knew there was no real point to the journey, but the town had become his magnetic north. He swung to it automatically when there was no other draw on his attention.

The sleepless night had made him gritty-eyed and irritable. He yawned as he moved into the motorway’s inside lane for the Tunford exit There were flashing red lights up ahead. The slip road was walled off by a line of orange cones, clustered with workmen and earth-shifting machinery.

“Fucking great.”

He could still get to Tunford from the next junction but it would take longer, cutting into the time he could spend there. His mood deteriorated with each mile, and dropped still lower after he took the next turnoff and found there were no road signs. He consulted the map. He would have to come in from the opposite direction to usual, joining the road that linked Tunford and the next town at the halfway point. Tossing the map on to the seat in disgust, he set off again, sure now that Kale and Jacob would have left by the time he arrived.

Although Sandra would still be there, perhaps still in bed.

Ben had never seen her getting up.

It took him ten minutes to reach the connecting road. He pulled up at a give-way sign, waiting for a gap in the traffic.

One of the cars approaching was a rusting Ford Escort. That’s like Kale’s, he thought, a moment before he recognised Kale himself behind the wheel. Jacob was next to him.

The car shot by in a blat of exhaust. He briefly considered the possibility that Kale might be taking his son to school, but somehow he knew he wasn’t. There was a fleeting regret that he wouldn’t see Sandra getting up after all, then he flicked the indicator the other way and went after them.

He hung back, keeping other cars in between himself and the Escort as he followed. He was already certain where they were going even before the scrapyard’s barbed-wire-topped wall came into sight. He drove past after Kale’s car had disappeared inside, then made a tight U-turn and parked a little further down the road.

From there he could see anything that came in or out of the tall gates. He felt a tight anger at himself for not realising sooner what Kale was doing. All this time he’d never given a thought to the fact that when Kale was at work, Jacob wasn’t around either. He remembered the smudges and oil stains he’d noticed on Jacob’s clothes and wondered how he could have been so stupid. He should have known that Kale didn’t want anything coming between him and his son. Including school.

Still watching the gates, Ben took out his mobile and found the number of Jacob’s social worker from his address book. A woman told him that Carlisle hadn’t arrived yet. He rang off and tried ten minutes later, then ten minutes after that, ignoring the woman’s growing irritation until finally Carlisle himself answered. The social worker sounded wary. So you fucking should.

The question boiled out of him. “Jacob’s been missing school, hasn’t he?”

There was a hesitation. “Who’s told you that?”

“Never mind who’s told me. It’s true, isn’t it?” Ben counted to three before the social worker answered.

“There has been some problem about attendance, but—”

“Some ‘problem’? He isn’t going, is he?”

“Mr Murray, I don’t—”

“Is he?”

Again there was a pause. “The situation is being monitored.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

“It means exactly that. And I don’t think there’s any call for being abusive.”

Ben took a deep breath. “I apologise.” He waited until the desire to scream at the man faded. “How long’s this been going on?”

“That’s something I really can’t discuss.”

“Look, if you don’t tell me I’ll ask the school myself!”

“I’m afraid I’m not—”

“Has he been at all since he’s been living with Kale? He hasn’t, has he?”

He could hear Carlisle’s reluctance. “Er... well, actually no, I don’t believe he has.”

Ben didn’t trust himself to speak.

“There’s been some confusion over whether or not Jacob’s been well enough to attend,” Carlisle said, defensive now. “Mr and Mrs Kale — well, Mrs Kale, really — claims that he has a virus. We’ve warned them that we need to see a doctor’s certificate, and that it’s illegal to keep Jacob off school without one.”

And I bet that made a lot of difference. Ben stared across the road at the scrapyard. “Kale’s been taking him to work with him. That’s why he isn’t at school, not because he’s got a ‘virus’.”

“How do you know?” The officiousness had crept back into the social worker’s voice. He sounded more annoyed than anything.

“Because I’m outside the yard now. They’re still in there, if you want to check yourself.”

“You’ve actually seen them?”

“That’s right.”

He could sense Carlisle trying to juggle this information into an acceptable package. “Perhaps there’s no one to look after him at home.”

Ben’s patience ran out. “Oh, for God’s sake. If he’s well enough to go to a scrapyard, he’s well enough to go to school! There’s nothing wrong with him! Kale just doesn’t want him to go!”

“I’m sorry, Mr Murray, but I can’t see how you can be such an expert on Mr Kale’s motives. And even if he has taken Jacob to work today—”

“He has.”

“—even if he has, we can’t jump to conclusions on the basis of an isolated occurrence.”

“Of course it isn’t isolated! His wife’s been feeding you this ‘virus’ crap to keep you off his back, and you’re letting him get away with it!”

“We’re not letting him get away with anything, Mr Murray—”

“Then why don’t you do something?”

“If it’s felt there’s a need then we will, but a heavy-handed approach isn’t going to help, and we don’t feel it’s currently called for. It’s an extremely sensitive case, and we don’t want to be seen to be—”

“Don’t want to be seen? That’s the bottom line, isn’t it? You’re frightened of getting bad press!”

Carlisle’s voice had a quaver of suppressed anger. “I don’t need telling how to do my job, thank you, Mr Murray. And if you don’t mind I’d like to get on with it now.”