Sophie Hannah - The Wrong Mother

There was a framed poster on one wall advertising the film Apocalypse Now. Next to it was another poster, a cartoon of a black woman wearing a headscarf and holding a baby, with the caption: ‘The hand that rocks the cradle should also rock the boat’. The slogan irritated Simon, for reasons he couldn’t be bothered to think about. There was nothing else on the walls apart from Hey’s framed degree and PhD certificates and a truly repulsive painting that looked like an original, of an ugly adult’s face wearing grotesque clown make-up beneath a white, lacy baby’s bonnet.

‘The picture.’ Hey appeared in the room. He had a pleasant, plump face, and was about twenty years younger than Harbard. Simon noticed his clothes: a shirt and formal jacket with faded jeans and blue and grey trainers-an odd combination. ‘It was supposed to be an investment, but the artist sank without trace. Who was it who wrote that poem about money talking? “I heard it once-it said goodbye.” Do you know it?’

‘No,’ said Simon.

‘Sorry, I’m wittering.’ Hey extended his hand. ‘Nice to meet you. Thanks for coming all this way.’

Simon told him it was no problem.

‘I’ve been considering contacting you. I probably wouldn’t have plucked up the courage, though, which would have been lazy and wrong of me.’

Simon prepared himself to receive unwanted information about Whewell College ’s intruder alarm system or choral scholars’ cars being vandalised. A lot of civilians seemed to think that all police officers ought to make themselves available to deal with all crimes, irrespective of geography. Simon tried not to look bored in advance.

‘I’m worried about this book Keith’s writing,’ said Hey, lowering himself into an armchair. Simon instantly changed his mind about the man. ‘Keith Harbard. I know he’s been working with you. He was here just before you, actually. I tried, yet again, to talk him out of it…’

‘He’s writing a book?’ This was the first Simon had heard of it. ‘About family annihilation killings?’

‘He’s planning to use the Brethericks as his main case study.’

‘Mark Bretherick will do everything in his power to stop that from happening,’ said Simon, hoping it was true.

Hey nodded. ‘That’s the trouble, for people like Keith and me. We’re researching familicide, and we publish our research. But the women whose husbands have killed their children before committing suicide don’t want some academics coming along and writing about it. They see us as careerists, profiting from their misery.’

‘I don’t blame them,’ said Simon.

Hey sat forward. ‘I don’t either,’ he said, ‘but that doesn’t mean I’m going to stop working on the topic. Familicide’s a terrible crime, one of the worst human beings have managed to come up with. It’s important that people think about it.’

‘Especially if those people get promoted as a result?’

‘I was a professor long before I first took an interest in family killings. There’s no more promotion for me. I work on familicide because I want to understand it, because I would like it never to happen again. All my writing on the subject is in pursuit of that sole aim.’

Simon couldn’t help but be impressed by Hey’s seriousness. ‘All right. So you’re not in it for careerist reasons. Same true of Harbard?’

Hey’s face changed. He looked as if a part of his body had started to hurt. ‘Keith’s been a mentor to me my whole career. He was the external examiner for my PhD, my referee for this job. He took me under his wing from the start. I know he can be a bit full of himself-’

‘You’re defending him,’ Simon pointed out. ‘I didn’t attack him.’

Hey sighed. ‘No, but I’m about to. Much as I hate doing it.’ He hesitated. Simon tried not to look too attentive, a tactic that either worked well or not at all. ‘I’m worried he’s out of control. ’

‘Out of control?’ It wasn’t what Simon had been expecting. He saw Harbard as a man who managed his own career with a cool, clear head, more effectively than any PR could.

‘Can I get you a drink, before I launch in?’ said Hey. ‘Sorry, should have offered ages ago.’

Simon shook his head.

‘I’d really hate for Keith to find out I’d… voiced any reservations. Can you make sure it doesn’t get back to him?’

‘I can try.’

‘He’s a lovely guy. I wouldn’t say he’s a close friend, but-’

‘Why not?’ Simon interrupted.

‘Sorry?’

‘You say you’ve known him your whole career, he’s been your mentor-I assumed you were good friends.’

‘It’s always been more of a professional relationship. We don’t socialise. Although… well, sometimes Keith talks to me about his personal life.’ Hey looked slightly embarrassed. ‘Quite often, I suppose.’

‘But he never asks you about yours?’

Hey’s guilty smile told Simon he’d guessed correctly. ‘He knows the title of every book and article I’ve ever written, but he occasionally forgets my name-calls me Joshua. I doubt he has a clue that I’m married and soon to be a father of two.’

‘Twins?’ Simon felt obliged to ask, aware once again of the deadened space inside him where his feelings ought to be. Would he ever have a child? It was looking increasingly unlikely.

‘No, no.’ Hey laughed. ‘Thank goodness. No, one already hatched, the second a work in progress.’

‘Congratulations.’

‘Don’t.’ Hey raised his hand to stop Simon. ‘Sorry. I’m a bit superstitious. Accepting congratulations before I know everything’s going to be okay, you know? There’s still a long way to go. Do you believe in the idea of tempting fate?’

Simon did. He believed someone had tempted fate-on his behalf and beyond all endurance-before he was born. That would explain his life so far.

‘I feel as if I’m to blame,’ said Hey. ‘I was the one who got Keith interested in familicide in the first place. Did he tell you that?’

‘No.’ Simon resisted the ignoble urge to tell Hey that Harbard had not once mentioned his name.

‘I used to work more on the relationship between the criminal and society, on the social rehabilitation of criminals, attitudes to reoffending, that sort of thing. There was this one guy, Billy Cass, who I used to visit in prison a lot. You get quite close to these people, through the work. Well, you must find the same thing in your job.’

Simon said nothing. He’d never been close to a scrote in his life apart from physically, geographically. That was bad enough.

‘Prisons, I should say. Billy was in and out, in and out. He’s out at the moment but he’ll be in again soon. That’s life as far as he’s concerned. He doesn’t even mind it.’

Simon nodded. He was familiar with the type. Billy, he thought. William. But the surname was Cass, not Markes.

‘One of the prisons he was in, there was a man they all victimised-beat him, tortured him. The guards as well. The man was in for killing his three daughters. His wife had left him, left all of them, and he wanted revenge. He killed his own children, then tried to kill himself and failed. Imagine that.’ Hey paused, watching Simon to check he hadn’t underestimated the seriousness of the father’s actions. ‘You can’t imagine it,’ he said. ‘This man wasn’t like Billy, he didn’t like being in prison, didn’t like being anywhere. He’d wanted to die, really wanted to, but he’d botched it. Over and over he tried to kill himself in prison-knives, ligatures, the works. He even tried bashing his head repeatedly against the wall of his cell. The guards would happily have let him get on with it, except there was a new initiative. They’d been told their suicide figures were too high. It became a way of torturing him: saving his life.’ Hey frowned, stared down at his feet. ‘I’d never heard anything so horrific. That was when I knew I had to do something about it.’