Liz Nugent - Lying in Wait

‘Karen doesn’t like nightclubs very much,’ said Laurence.

‘Very sensible,’ she said, smiling.

‘My dad isn’t signing on any more. He got a job a few months ago.’

‘Isn’t that just wonderful? Where is the new job?’

‘He’s a hospital porter.’

I could see Laurence stiffen.

‘Is he? He must be a very kind, caring man to do that kind of work. I think it’s admirable, don’t you, Laurence?’

‘He’s a very nice man, Mum. You’ll meet him sometime.’ Laurence smiled at his mother and she put her hand on his, I think to reassure him.

While she filled our wine glasses and cleared the plates away into the kitchen, refusing any help, I said to Laurence, ‘I don’t know what you were worried about, she’s lovely.’

‘I know, I can’t believe it. She’s certainly on her best behaviour.’

Lydia re-entered the room. ‘I am so silly. I forgot to get another bottle of wine. It was on my shopping list and I’ve just realized that I never crossed it off. I’m so sorry.’

‘Don’t worry, Mum. We’ve had enough.’

‘Oh, but I wanted us to relax in the drawing room and hear all about Karen’s travels. I wanted to buy Italian wine to remind you both of Rome.’

Laurence and I exchanged a quick glance.

‘I’m not stupid, darling. Anyway, Karen might just inspire me to jet off somewhere.’

I offered to pop out to the nearest off-licence, but Lydia wouldn’t hear of it. I suggested that Laurence should go, but he was reluctant. ‘Please, Laurence, I’d love to tell your mum about Paris and Milan. I think she’d love Paris in particular.’

He looked uncertain, but agreed. ‘I’ll be as quick as I can.’

His mum looked at him, smiling broadly. ‘Darling, you needn’t worry, I adore her! And try to get a Chianti?’

After Laurence had left, she allowed me to help her a little in the kitchen. We chatted as I dried some serving dishes.

‘Look out there, can you see? There used to be an ornamental pond there when I was a girl.’

I put my face up against the glass and could just see a raised stone platform on the grass with a small stone structure on top. ‘What’s that?’ I asked.

‘It’s the old bird bath that used to be in the pond. About five or six years ago, Laurence took a notion that he was going to build up a platform and cement over it. I don’t know what got into him. He never showed any interest in the garden before that, but nothing could stop him that time – and it was winter too, around this time of year, I think. Doesn’t it look odd?’

I laughed, agreeing it did look odd. ‘And do you know that from the day it was finished, he hardly ever set foot in the back garden?’

We went into the drawing room and sat in the glow of the fireplace in upholstered armchairs, slightly frayed at the corners, though you could tell the fabric had been expensive.

‘Would you like to see photos of Laurence as a child?’

I readily agreed, and she came and sat on the arm of my chair with leather-bound photo albums. She turned the pages and pointed out what an adorable baby he was, and indeed he was extremely cute, waving his spoon at the camera, crawling out from under a table. There was a photograph of him at about five years old, wearing a hat that was way too big for him.

‘That was his grandfather’s trilby. You know, Laurence wore it all the time, even when he grew up. He was very attached to it. I must ask him what happened to it. I haven’t seen it in about six years now. But I suppose it is very unfashionable these days.’

Lydia turned more pages and I gasped at a photo of Laurence, quite obese, standing with Lydia beside a navy vintage Jaguar. I knew every make and model of Jaguar from that era. I kept my voice steady. ‘Where was that taken? Who owns the car?’

‘That was my husband’s. A 1957 Jaguar Sedan. God knows, he poured so much money into keeping it on the road for Laurence.’

‘For Laurence?’

‘Oh yes, Laurence begged Andrew to teach him to drive when he was seventeen years old. Laurence was absolutely obsessed by that old car. They had terrible rows about it. Laurence didn’t even have a driving licence at the time. Didn’t he tell you about it? One day, after Andrew died, he sold it, just like that, as if it had never mattered. I should warn you, Laurence is adorable but he does have his peculiarities!’ She grinned at me. ‘If you could have seen him, driving around in that car wearing his grandfather’s old hat. Hilarious!’

I had only had a glass of wine after my gin and tonic, but I felt hot and cold and confused and sick. Lydia noticed.

‘Are you all right, dear? You are very pale. Shall I fetch you a glass of water?’

These things are perfectly normal, I told myself. Of course Laurence would never have told me that he had driven that car or worn a hat like that. He knew it would have upset me. I regained my composure. Lydia returned with a glass of water and a cardboard box.

‘Here you are, drink up, you poor thing. Are you sure you’re all right?’

‘I’m fine. Just a passing headache, thank you.’

‘By the way, I found this stuff in an old hidey hole in Laurence’s bedroom. It’s probably just old junk, but he may want to take it to the cottage.’ She placed the box on my lap and exited the room again to fill the coal scuttle.

There were photographs face downwards, and I gingerly turned them over to find that they were photographs of me. I felt better. I shouldn’t have, but I delved into the box again and found pictures of me cut from magazines, and then underneath there were yellowing newspaper cuttings. I lifted them out and opened them up. They were dizzily familiar. The cuttings were dated November and December 1980. All of the reports about my sister’s disappearance. Laurence was certainly dedicated in his search. But then I stopped and thought how could he have got these? I’d only met him last year. It didn’t make sense. There was something else. A matchbox wrapped in tissue paper. My hands shook as I pulled it open, all regard for Laurence’s privacy gone.

I turned the broken identity bracelet over in my hands. The engraving was there: Marnie. One end of it was broken, but I could see that the clasp was stained crimson red where Annie had picked it up before her nail varnish had dried on the day I had given it to her.

I jumped up from my seat, knocking the items on to the floor. I tried to rationalize all the thoughts that were zooming around my head, but there was no way Laurence could have got that bracelet from anyone except Annie. He had the car; he had the hat, the bracelet; he had cut out newspaper reports about her. The cogs turned in my head as Lydia returned, but I couldn’t hear what she was saying, couldn’t believe all the evidence that surrounded me. I tried to remember how he had come into our lives, Dad telling me that this guy in the dole office had taken special care of him, long before I met Laurence. He hadn’t written the Annie letters to comfort us, but to throw us off track.

Annie’s killer wasn’t dead. Laurence killed her. Laurence killed my sister. I ran, pushing past Lydia, ran for the front door, down the driveway to the gate. As I reached the gate, Laurence drove in. I stopped dead in my tracks.

‘Where are you going? What’s happened? Are you OK?’

And then I began to run again, as fast as I could. He jumped out of the car, calling after me, and then he began to run too, but he was still quite heavy and I outran him. I ran and ran until he was out of sight, and then I ducked into the nearest phone box and dialled 999.

Laurence threw me across the room. I never knew he had such a temper. Though I suppose he must have inherited it from Andrew.