Robert Goddard - Borrowed Time

“This is a surprise, I must say.”

We were in the factory yard, only a few yards from the spot where he’d waylaid me in June. The rain and low cloud were hastening the dusk, but it wasn’t yet dark, as it had been then. And Paul’s mood was utterly different. He moved and spoke slowly, as if his brain distrusted his commands and subjected each of them to scrutiny before putting it into effect.

“How are you?”

“As I am,” he mumbled.

“What can I do for you?”

“Listen to me. That’s all. Somebody has to.”

“Well, I…”

“Can we go somewhere?”

“Er… Yes. Of course. Where would you-”

“Anywhere. It doesn’t matter.”

“There’s a pub down the road. We could-”

“No. Somewhere we can be alone.”

“All right. But-”

“Just drive me somewhere. Out of town. In the open. Where I can breathe.”

In view of what had happened the last time we met, I should have felt nervous about being alone with him. But his manner somehow overcame all such concerns. He seemed so weary, so utterly drained, that it wasn’t possible to be afraid of him. Quite the reverse. I pitied him, sensing the grief and despair that had dragged him down to this shabby shuffling mockery of the confident young man I’d first encountered in Biarritz. I wanted to help him. And I knew I could trust him.

We drove out through Steep, past Greenhayes and up the zig-zag road to the top of Stoner Hill. Before we reached the summit, I pulled into one of the lay-bys beneath the trees, where the wooded depths of Lutcombe yawned beneath us through the branches. Night had all but fallen now. Only the dregs of daylight hovered above the hangers. Raindrops fell in random percussion on the roof of the car. Headlamps glared and slid across the windscreen as vehicles passed us. I watched Paul wind down his window, put out his hand to wet his palm, then rub the moisture across his face.

“Are you all right?” I asked.

“I haven’t been all right in a long time. Years, I suppose.”

“Surely not years. When Rowena was alive-”

“It started before she died. Don’t you understand?” He broke off, then resumed in a calmer vein. “No. Of course you don’t. That’s why I came here. To make you understand. I’m sorry for what I did to you. I should have hurt myself, not you. But at least it solves the problem of who to tell. It means you deserve to hear it first.”

“To hear what?”

“The truth I’ve been dodging and evading all these years.”

“What do you mean?”

“I killed her, you see.”

“Nobody killed her, Paul. We can debate where the blame rests. But ultimately it was her decision.”

“I don’t mean Rowena.” I sensed rather than saw him looking at me across the gloom of the car. “I mean Louise.”

“Sorry?” I was instantly sure I’d misheard him. Or failed to comprehend some metaphor. Whatever he meant, it couldn’t be literally that .

“I murdered Louise Paxton. And Oscar Bantock too. At Whistler’s Cot. On the seventeenth of July, nineteen ninety.” An approaching pair of headlamps lit up his face in pale relief. He was staring straight at me. With a solemnity that somehow forced me to believe him. Even though I didn’t want to. Even though I hardly dared to. “I’m the man who should be serving the life sentence passed on Shaun Naylor. I’m the real murderer.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“Oh yes. I’m serious. The lies are over now. I’m done with them. With Rowena dead, there’s nothing worth lying for . So I may as well tell the truth. And face the consequences.”

“You really mean this?”

“Yes. I mean it. Shaun Naylor didn’t murder Louise. Or old Oscar. I did.”

“But… you can’t have.”

“How I wish you were right. But I did. Worse still, I let an innocent man go to prison in my place. I told myself he didn’t matter. Some low-life petty criminal society was well rid of. My conscience was up to that. But Rowena was different. I married her because I thought, if I could take care of her, if I could make sure nothing bad ever happened to her again, that would somehow compensate for depriving her of her mother. But I didn’t take care of her, did I? I just made it worse. So much worse she couldn’t face the future shackled to me. And was prepared to go to any lengths to escape it. You said I didn’t kill her and, technically, I didn’t. But in every other sense I did. I should be grateful, really. It proves there is something my conscience can’t bear. I’ve wrestled with it these past few months. I’ve lain awake night after night trying to find some other way out. But there isn’t one. I’m certain I’ll have no peace until I’ve confessed to the crimes I’ve committed. And paid the penalty. It’s as simple as that.”

I couldn’t find any words to express my reaction to what he’d said. Everything I’d assumed-everything I’d deduced-about Louise Paxton’s death had been overturned in a matter of minutes. A man claiming to have killed her was sitting next to me on an isolated hillside as a wet September night closed about us. If I believed him, I should have been afraid for my own safety. And I did believe him. Not because of the note of sincerity in his voice. Rather because of the unmistakable impression of relief conveyed in his manner and bearing. And that’s also why I wasn’t afraid of him. He sat beside me, hunched and defeated, a man whose store of lies and evasions was long since exhausted. All he seemed to want to do now was speak freely about himself. He was no longer a threat to anyone.

“The police won’t believe me at first, of course. They won’t want to. I’ll be an embarrassment to them. But they’ll come round in the end. When I’ve told them the whole story, they’ll realize it’s true. But before I go to them, I’d like you to hear it. All of it. So you can tell Sarah and her father before they read about it in the newspapers or see it on television. I haven’t the courage to face them myself. I thought I might have, but I’ve woken up every morning this week meaning to go to Sarah and then failing to. It can’t go on. That’s why I’ve turned to you. Not quite a friend. Not quite a stranger. Perhaps that makes you the perfect confessor. If you’re willing to listen, that is.” He paused. I saw his head droop in the shadows. Then he pulled himself upright and sighed. “Are you?” he asked huskily.

“Yes,” I replied. “I’ll listen.”

And so, as the rain spat at the windscreen and the dark damp smell of the night crept in around us, Paul Bryant began his story. I listened to him in silence. And long before he’d finished, I realized nothing would ever be the same. Now his confession had been heard.

My parents met in the bank where they both worked. Dull decent ordinary people. Never been abroad. Never committed adultery. Never sworn in public. Never dreamt of being more than they were. My sisters and I were all conceived in the same bed in the same room in the same semi-detached house in Surbiton. Made in our parents’ unaspiring image. So they must have thought, anyway. If they ever did think about such things. And I suppose they were right about my sisters. A few holidays in Majorca and one divorce between them doesn’t change an awful lot, does it?

“I always wanted more, though. More travel. More culture. More company. More variety. And it turned out I had the brains to get what I wanted. Winning a place at Cambridge didn’t just round off a good education and enhance my employment prospects. It got me out of the stifling tedium of my suburban adolescence. Cambridge had more than its fair share of poseurs and idiots, of course. But it gave me something I’d never had before. The conviction that life contained limitless possibilities. The belief not only that I could have whatever I desired if I put my mind to it, but that I deserved to have it. Elitism. Egotism. Supreme self-confidence. They came in the water. And I drank of them deeply.