Simon Beckett - Owning Jacob - SA

She glared at Ben as if it were his fault. “It was bad enough before, but when he found out Steven” — Jacob, he thought — “was still alive he started bringing back twice as much. I told him the social services would have a fit if they saw it, but he didn’t take any notice. And they never went out back anyway. They had a look round the house, but that was all. I just drew the curtains when they came in the kitchen so they wouldn’t see it. Pricks.”

There was no heat in the insult. Her skirt tightened around her thighs as she leaned against the edge of the table. “Now John’s not got time for anything else. He could get a job in any garage and earn decent money, but he won’t. And he has to pay for everything he brings home. That fat bastard he works for takes it out of his wages, as if there’s enough of them to start with. He won’t listen to me any more. He hardly even talks to me. All he cares about now is his bloody wreckage. And the kid. Won’t let his precious little son out of his sight. He’s got this idea that he can help him see what the Pattern is, because of how he is with jigsaws and things.”

“That’s stupid! A lot of autistic children are good at puzzles. It isn’t anything unusual!”

“Try telling that to John,” she said, dryly. “He thinks it all ties in. Steven’s going to help him first, and once he has he’ll be able to make Steven better. Or something like that. It’s all part of the Pattern, isn’t it?” Her tone was loaded with sarcasm.

Ben remembered how Kale set pieces of metal in front of Jacob, as if waiting for his reaction. Waiting for him to help decipher whatever he thought they held. “Oh, Christ.”

“Oh, you don’t know the half of it,” Sandra said. She was smiling again, but it wasn’t a pleasant one. “He exercises until he’s sick. He tries to work himself into a state where he can ‘see’ this fucking pattern of his. I mean, he hasn’t managed it yet, obviously, so that just means he has to go at it harder. He says he’s ‘purifying’ himself. Well, that’s what he said once. He doesn’t talk about it at all now. Not to me, anyway, but you can hear him telling the boy sometimes. As if he can bloody understand him.”

“Is that why he lifts the engine over Jacob’s head? To push himself harder?”

An expression of suspicion smoothed her face, then was gone. “I suppose so,” she said, examining her nails. “I haven’t asked.”

She still hadn’t asked how he knew what Kale did in the garden, either. Ben wondered if she didn’t want to find out what else he might have seen.

“What does he do in the shed?” he asked.

The look she gave him was a mixture of fear and dislike. It was quickly replaced by resignation.

“You can see for yourself.”

She brushed past him and went to the back door. He began to follow and walked into her as she stopped suddenly.

He stepped back, blushing.

“Sorry,” he mumbled.

“I forgot the key.”

There was a satisfied air about her as she took a keyring from a drawer in one of the kitchen units, as though she had somehow proved something to herself. Ben felt the advantage had been subtly taken from him. A gust of rain and icy air swept into the kitchen as she opened the door.

He clutched his coat around him as he went out, conscious that Sandra hadn’t even bothered to put hers on. The garden was muddy. Broken paving slabs had been embedded in the grassless soil like stepping stones. Through the rain Ben saw the encircling wall of metal. There was more of it than he remembered.

He skirted a jagged piece of bodywork that protruded from one side of the pile. The seat where Jacob had played while Kale suspended the engine over him looked wet and abandoned. In front of it sections of broken cars had been left like parts of a dismembered animal.

Sandra unlocked the padlock and opened the shed door. It tore out of her hand and banged against the wooden side.

Ben went in after her.

There was a pungency of bitumen, pine resin and stale sweat. It was dark and cramped, forcing him to stand close to Sandra. Her hair was flattened against her head by the rain. He could feel water from his own trickling over his face and neck. He blinked it out of his eyes, trying to work out what the object that filled most of the interior was.

At first he thought it was simply an exercise machine, a multi-gym of some sort. There was an impression of a steel frame, pulleys and ponderous weights. Then he took in the straps attached to the long wooden bench and dangling from cables, the oil-covered cogs of what appeared to be gear wheels. It looked like something designed to tear apart rather than exercise.

“This is why he comes in here,” Sandra said. She was shivering. “He built it himself.”

Ben was still trying to work out what it was. He thought he knew, but couldn’t quite believe it.

“What is it?”

“It’s a rack, what’s it look like?”

There were small straps for wrists and ankles, and a larger harness that had a forehead band and a chinstrap. Each was joined by cables to the weights, which hung like steel fruit at the head and foot of the bench, and were connected in turn to the heavy gear wheels. Sandra ran her fingers lightly over the frame. Her nails were bitten and ragged.

“He fastens himself into it and takes the brake off the weights. The gears stop them just smashing straight to the floor, but once they’ve gone past a notch you can’t pull them back. He’s worked it so the further they go the heavier they get. The only way you can stop them’s by that.” She pointed to a mechanism at the top end of the bench. It had a smaller set of weights, and was attached to the head harness. “It’s a clutch, or something. But you have to use your neck to lift those weights off the floor far enough for it to trip in.”

“Jesus.”

“John lets it go as far as he can, and then just holds it there. Tries to keep himself at breaking point for as long as he can. When he first built it and I came and saw what he was doing I panicked and made him lose concentration. It nearly killed him. When he managed to get out he threw up and told me never to come in here again. I thought he was going to hit me, but he didn’t. Not then.” There was a deadness in the way she said it. “I’ve never watched him since, but I can tell by how long he stays in here and what he looks like when he comes out that he’s taking it further and further. One of these days...” She didn’t finish.

Ben tried to imagine what it would feel like to be strapped into the machine. “Why does he do it?”

“To help him see the Pattern. Why else?” She hugged herself and rubbed her arms. “He thinks the pain focuses his mind. All part of being ‘pure’. Can’t be impure if we want to see the Pattern, can we?”

He stared at the sweat-stained straps. In places the edges of them were marked with what looked like dried blood. “Are you sure he isn’t just trying to punish himself?”

Sandra looked at the rack as though she were frightened of it. “I’m not sure about anything.” She turned away suddenly. “Let’s go in. I’m freezing.”

As they went out he noticed the shotgun lying on a shelf to one side of the door. He remembered what it had done to the dog’s head. At least he keeps the place locked, he thought as he watched Sandra snap the heavy padlock shut. He followed her back to the house.

The kitchen began misting up as soon as they closed the door. They were both soaked, but at least he’d had a coat on. Her clothes were stuck to her. The outline of her bra was etched under her sweater. Her nipples stood out through both layers of fabric.

“You’re dripping all over the carpet,” she told him. “If you’re going to stay you might as well take your coat off.”