Kate Atkinson: Started Early, Took My Dog

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ he said.

‘Coward! Your daddy’s a cowardy custard!’ she said to the boy when she ran back on to the beach.

‘Don’t call me that,’ he said irritably, ‘I’m not his father.’ He had taken the boy to one side and said, ‘Don’t call me Daddy. Or Dad. Don’t. OK? I’m not your father. I don’t know who your father is. If your mother doesn’t then why the fuck should I?’

She had been unpredictable, embarrassing to be out with in public, he had realized. ‘Larger than life, me,’ she said, but it was more than that. He thought that perhaps she had some kind of mental illness.

She’d brought a camera with her, a cheap second-hand thing, and insisted on taking photographs all the time. He’d tried to avoid her snapping him but had finally agreed to one to shut her up.

‘Let’s see if we can find somewhere that’s open for ice creams.’ It was early March, out of season and freezing, nobody ate ice cream by the sea in winter. ‘Or chips!’ she said, getting excited. ‘Let’s all have chips!’

He was holding the girl in his arms, trying to protect her from the wind. ‘Come on, I’ll race you!’ she shouted at the boy but he was intent on digging a sandcastle in the wet, muddy sand. Carol ran off towards the pier. The wind seemed to bowl her along. He wished it would take her away altogether.

‘Like a real family,’ she said, running her hands over the photos, squinting at them through her cigarette smoke. She had begun to talk about them being ‘a proper family’, hinting that he could leave his wife. She was completely deluded.

It seemed to go on from there. She said she would go round and see his wife and take the kids with her and shame him on his own doorstep. He said, ‘Be quiet, you’ll wake the whole neighbourhood.’ She began to hit him, flailing at him with her fists. He hit her back hard, an open-handed slap to the face, he thought that would be enough to stop her but instead she became hysterical, screaming her head off. She had her claws out and the next thing he knew he was chasing her into the bedroom and had his hands round her throat. And if he was honest it felt good. Just to shut her up for once. To stop her.

It was over in seconds. She was such a force of nature that he hadn’t expected she would suddenly go limp like that. He knelt down and felt for a pulse and didn’t believe it when he couldn’t find one. He hadn’t meant to kill her. He glanced up and saw the boy standing in the hallway, staring at him, but all he could think of was getting out of that place. He ran down the stairs, couldn’t wait for the lift, got into his car, drove into town and sat in a pub where he downed a double malt. His hands were shaking. His whole life in ruins before him. He would lose his job, his marriage, his reputation.

He stayed there drinking. It took a lot to get him drunk. He lost count of the time.

‘One more for the road, detective?’ the barman said and he said, ‘No,’ and went to the Gents and threw up.

There was a phone box round the corner and he found refuge in its cold white light. He phoned the only person he could think of who might get him out of this mess, he phoned Eastman. ‘Sir?’ he said. ‘It’s Len Lomax here. I’ve got myself into a spot of bother.’ He didn’t mention the boy.

Ray handed him the photos the next day and said, ‘We’re even. Don’t ask for another favour ever, OK, Len?’

‘She was definitely dead, was she?’ Len asked. He had spent the rest of the night tossing and turning next to Alma, imagining Carol Braithwaite coming to, pointing an accusing finger at him.

‘Yes,’ Ray said. ‘She was dead.’ He looked disgusted. ‘I took the girl to the Winfields. They’re not going to question anything, trust me.’ Ray didn’t mention the boy because he didn’t know about him.

The Winfields had been Eastman’s idea. ‘I’ll get Strickland to take the kiddy round,’ he said. ‘You’re in no shape to do anything. Get yourself home to Alma. Do you have keys? To her flat?’

The next day Eastman invited Len for a game of golf. ‘You’re not a bad man, Len,’ he said, practising his swing. ‘A bad thing happened to you, that doesn’t mean that your life should be destroyed, not on account of one dead whore. And that kiddy of yours has gone to a wonderful home, think of everything she’ll have.’ Len still didn’t mention the boy.

He expected Carol to be found. That’s what happened, people died, other people found them. Then time went on and nothing happened. It began to seem unreal, it began to seem as if it had never happened at all. He’d had a cousin, Janet, still had her but nobody in the family talked about her much any more. Aged fourteen she gave birth in her bedroom at home. Nobody even knew she was pregnant, everybody just thought she was getting a bit fat. When her mother asked her why she hadn’t said anything, Janet said she’d hoped that if she ignored it, it would all just go away. That was how Len felt. He never thought about whether the boy was alive or dead, never really thought about the boy at all.

‘What are you brooding on?’ Alma asked.

‘Nothing,’ he said, gave her some flim-flam about stress at work.

When they got the call it was a shock, like a body blow, like some bugger running into him on the rugby field. ‘Woman’s body discovered in the Lovell Park flats, uniforms in attendance.’ Still no one mentioned the boy. Len wondered if he really had disappeared. Melted into thin air.

‘Jesus,’ Strickland said. ‘This is going to be difficult. Her body’s been there for weeks.’

Eastman caught them before they got in the car. ‘Now then, steady, lads, steady,’ he said. ‘Keep your heads.’

Len finally mentioned the boy.

‘You daft bastard,’ Eastman said. ‘You should have said something, I could have helped you clear up the mess a lot sooner.’

It never struck him that the boy might still be alive. He’d expected they would have two bodies on their hands. Couldn’t believe it when he saw the boy in that WPC’s arms.

The boy was a witness, of course. Eastman ‘had a word’ with the social worker. Neither Len nor Ray knew what he said. Threatened her with losing her own kiddy probably. He was a good man to have on your side but a very bad one to have against you. Ray followed up for him, caught her coming from the hospital and took her for a drink in the Cemetery Tavern. ‘She’s sound,’ he reported back to Len. ‘She’s terrified. Eastman said the Drug Squad would “find” hard drugs in her place.’

Eastman got a gagging order ‘to protect the boy’, his name was changed and he was put into a Catholic orphanage. Len never heard anything more about him. The Winfields got new papers for Nicola, that bad bastard Harry Reynolds organized it, and then they buggered off to New Zealand. New Zealand might as well have been Jupiter or Mars as far as Len was concerned. It had all been a nightmare, he told himself, a terrible nightmare. A hole that opened up in front of his feet and then closed over again.

Eastman phoned him, gave him his instructions. Pick up the girl from the Lovell Park flats, lock up behind you. Eastman gave him a set of keys. ‘Forget about what you see inside.’ He told Ray to take the girl to the Winfields. ‘We’re doing the right thing here, Ray,’ Eastman said. ‘It might not be the letter of the law, but it’s a moral imperative. Giving the kiddy a good home instead of her ending up who knows where. I phoned Ian Winfield, he knows what to expect but he’ll pretend to be surprised. For the wife’s sake, you know, she can get a bit overwrought.’

When they arrived at the Lovell Park flats three weeks later, Ray said to Len, ‘I can’t go in there again, Len. I can’t face what we’re going to find in there.’ They had argued before they had gone up in the lift. ‘Band of brothers,’ Len said, thumping him on the shoulder, more aggression than affection. ‘All for one, one for all.’ Eastman’s motto.