Peter Dickinson - Some Deaths Before Dying

“Thank you very much, Duggie,” she’d managed to say. “I’m sure Terry would have come if he could.”

And it was true, just as Jocelyn would have moved heaven and earth to attend Voss’s funeral, Jocelyn, who, for instance, had refused to shoot again with an old acquaintance whom he’d discovered to be behaving dubiously over the division of an inheritance. But Voss, of course, had been on the Cambi Road. That changed everything.

Finally, completing the sequence, the picture she had been taking when Tom Dawnay had photographed her, the coffin being lowered into its slot of earth, the V of the straining tapes that held it, the surrounding, almost regular patterned frame made by the lower legs and feet of the mourners.

“How sad,” said Dilys, closing the album. “But it’s wonderful what we can get over, isn’t it! Do you want another one, then, or are we finding it a wee bit tiring? How about a little rest now? A drinkie first, and then a little rest, eh?”

“Thank you, Dilys.”

“My pleasure, dearie.”

2

Horizontal again, Rachel lay and watched the rooks, but today without studying them, though it seemed a waste of a crystal morning, with every twig clear. Absurdly she felt a sense of dereliction at her failure to carry on with her self-imposed task. It didn’t even help to tell herself that what she was now attempting to do was a continuation of the task, was indeed the true task, for which the study of nest-building had been a kind of preliminary exercise. Apart from the young man’s visit she had not herself witnessed, and would never now have direct evidence of, whatever it was that had happened thirty-nine years ago, any more than she would ever be able to look directly down on a rook’s nest in the process of construction. All she had to go on in either case were the side effects, the comings and goings, the shudderings of the structure, the occasional protrusion of objects of events beyond its edge. In one case the distance was in length, in the other in time…

Anne banging in through the front, door, wholly unexpected, while Rachel was stitching up the hem of one of the hall curtains. No telephone call, no request to be met at the station. No kind of greeting now.

“Where’s Da?”

“Hello, darling. What a surprise!”

“Where’s Da?”

“In the study, I think. But please, darling…”

Anne strode past, blank-faced. When Rachel went to close the door she saw the taxi waiting in the drive. She had guessed it might be bad, but never as bad as this.

And then, of course…but there is always something worse that could happen. Mercifully you seldom get to the true worst.

Because there was nothing better to do and it was an excuse for staying nearby, she went back to the dreary job of the curtain. The study was round the corner on the way to the dining room and kitchen, and its door was solid. Jocelyn never raised his voice, spoke more softly when angry, and Anne was no screecher. The first she heard was a single, dull thud. Perhaps she felt rather than heard it, juddering up through the floor. But she sensed it, knew at once what it meant, and ran.

The door of the study opened as she reached the corner.

“Quick, Ma, the doctor. Something’s happened to Da.”

Then she was in the room.

He must have been standing behind his desk and then have fallen half sideways, heavily, all of a piece. Now he was lying almost prone, with his face in the carpet and his right arm twisted beneath him. Rachel knew nothing about medicine. She took one look, picked up the telephone, dialed 999, was answered almost at once and spoke briefly, keeping her head, to explain the urgency and give directions. Then she flung herself down beside the body and let the dry sobs shudder through her.

“Oh, Ma, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

“Not your fault, darling…Not your fault.”

“Is he dead? I suppose we’d better not move him.”

“I…don’t know…The ambulance…Go and wait for it please…”

Voices at the door. Yes, of course. Thwaite and Young Jim would be in for their elevenses in the kitchen. They too must have heard the fall. Her right arm was across his back when she felt the slight spasm. His left hand was beneath her breast on the carpet. She shifted and clutched it. His fingers moved in answer.

Somebody touched her shoulder.

“Now, Mrs. Matson…”

Ranson.

“No, don’t touch him. Wait for the ambulance men. He’s alive. Is Minnie there?”

“Here, Mum.”

“Get a bag together for him. Pyjamas. His yellow dressing-gown. His shaving kit, hair brushes…”

Things he knew. Things that were his own, part of his being. While she was listing them Rachel eased herself up, never letting go of his hand, so that she could sit nestled against his side and with her free hand gently stroke the back of his neck and head, her own touch, all she could give him to let him know she was there, with him in this pit, this darkness…

“They’re here, Ma. They’ve just turned into the drive.”

She stayed where she was, waiting. The men were competent and friendly. They let her keep hold of his hand as they eased him onto the stretcher, lifted him and carried him out.

“Do you want me to stay, Ma? I wasn’t going to, but…”

“Please. For a bit. Ring Flora. Dick, if you can find him. The aunts. Minnie’s putting a bag together. Bring it to the hospital. And some stuff for me. I don’t know if they’ll let me stay. Take the Triumph. The keys are in the hall drawer. Look in his diary and see if he’s got any appointments and cancel them if you can. Numbers in his book on the desk…”

The hospital was stupidly rigid about visitors. Outraged and distressed, Rachel came home to find that Anne, after coping well with everything within her competence, had worked herself into a pit of her own, in which she was hurled and battered by misery, rage and self-blame. She allowed herself to be held close on the morning room sofa for a while, but rose abruptly and moved away.

“I suppose you want me to tell you what happened,” she said.

“Yes, please. Anything. Everything.”

“Simon came and told me he couldn’t marry me. It was because of something Da had told him.”

“Oh, my darling!”

“Did you know he was going to do that?”

“Of course not. Only that Da was going to talk to him about his father.”

“About Uncle Fish? What…? And anyway, what bloody business is it of Dad’s who 1 marry? Of either of yours? I’m twenty-three. I can marry anyone I bloody well choose!”

“Yes, of course, darling. Simon didn’t tell you what it was about?“

“No. If you want to know there was something shifty…I mean, he was upset all right, but it wasn’t just about us. He had to get out somehow. I couldn’t understand what he was saying. We’ve always wanted each other. Always. Ever since we were little. Simon’s mine. I’m his. I don’t want anyone else, and I don’t want anyone else to have him. We’ve been going to bed for ages, whenever we got the chance. Why do you think I was so sweet as pie about putting the wedding off? Because it doesn’t make any difference, that’s why. We’re good as married already, and we can go to a Registry Office and get it made official anytime we want. You can’t stop us, Aunt Leila can’t stop us, however crazy she’s gone. When Simon showed up I thought…Oh, Christ! he just wanted to get it over.”

“Shall I tell you what Da told him?”

“If you like.”

“Fish has run off with the funds of the Cambi Road Association, as well as any of Leila’s money that’s left. He’s abroad somewhere.”

“Jesus Christ! Is that all?”

“About forty thousand pounds. Everything Da had raised to help with pensions and so on.”