Murder... Now and Then (51 page)

‘I think I understand why,' said Inspector Hill. ‘You can give us a written statement if you prefer.'

Catherine shook her head. She and Max had known that this would happen, that they couldn't keep fending off the inevitable, and he would have preferred it if they had just told the police; she had begged him not to. But it would get easier with each telling, and telling was much more likely to make them understand than words on paper. And they had to understand.

‘Your stepfather abused you when you were a child, didn't he?' the inspector said her voice gentle.

Catherine smiled a little. ‘My stepfather abused everyone he ever came into contact with,' she said. ‘He sexually abused me, yes.'

‘Was it after your mother became paralysed?'

‘No,' Catherine said with a sigh, looking down at her hands, consciously keeping them loose in her lap. ‘You think you understand, but you don't, because you never knew Victor Holyoak.'

‘Help me to understand,' she said.

Catherine looked up at her; she did want to understand. That was something. The truth, Max had said. When they do talk to you, tell them the truth, Catherine.

‘Holyoak married my mother to get me,' said Catherine, simply. ‘He met us when I was visiting my mother in hospital. She had had a stroke, but she was recovering. He couldn't have been nicer. He came every day, he brought presents, he made her feel good. When she was allowed out, he took us to all sorts of places. He always made sure my mother was warm and comfortable and not too tired. And he'd think of things that would entertain me, and it was all wonderful.'

Inspector Hill wasn't taking notes this time. The machine was doing that; she was listening. It had been so hard, telling Max. But it was easier now. Better though, if she didn't look at her. She looked back down at her hands. Loose. Keep them loose.

‘I was staying with friends of my mother until she left hospital. And one day Holyoak came and told me that he would like to marry my mother, and did I have any objections. Of course I hadn't. It was a lovely idea. But things would be different when my mother got home, he said. She wouldn't be able to do all the things that mothers usually did. That would be my job.'

Now she looked up, her face reddening. ‘I thought he meant cooking and cleaning! I was twelve years old!' She looked back at her hands, clenched into fists, and carefully, deliberately, relaxed them. ‘But he paid people to do that for him.'

‘It's all right, Catherine,' said the inspector. ‘You don't have to justify yourself.'

‘And he said that I would have to do what he told me to do. Of course, I said. Homework, washing the dishes, that's what I thought.' She took several deep breaths. ‘And he said that we had a bargain. He'd look after my mother to the very best of his ability, give her the very best that he could afford, and I would do what I was told. It started right after they got married.'

The inspector reached into her bag, and took out a little packet of tissues, tearing it open, handing it to Catherine. That was when she realized that she was crying.

‘He came into my bedroom. I asked what he was doing there, and he said, ‘‘ We have a bargain, Catherine.'' ' She closed her eyes. ‘I can't tell you how many times I've heard those words. We have a bargain, Catherine. He had married my mother because he wanted me, he said, but people wouldn't understand. He didn't want my mother – she had had another man, and he wanted to be sure—' She broke off as the tears became too much.

‘We don't have to go on right now,' said Inspector Hill. ‘You can have a break.'

She used a tissue, and took a deep breath. She didn't want a break. ‘ I tried to shout but he told me I mustn't make a sound, or my mother would hear, and she would come and find us. She wouldn't understand either, and the shock could kill her. You don't want to kill your mother, Catherine, do you? So … so I didn't make a sound, and I didn't tell anyone.

‘It went on for eighteen months; once, he told me he'd made a will. That he had provided for my mother – the very best of care until the day she died, and I got everything else that he owned, providing I remained unmarried, and was not cohabiting with anyone. Because I must never let any other man do what he did to me.' She shuddered. ‘Then one night, he really hurt me, and I screamed. My mother did hear, she did come, and she did have another stroke.'

There was silence. Catherine looked at her hands, clasped so tightly that white marks showed when she pulled them apart

‘But she didn't leave him,' she said, her voice light with tears. ‘She didn't take me away from him.'

‘But wasn't she in hospital again?' said Inspector Hill, gently.

Catherine nodded. ‘And he didn't touch me, not then. I was fourteen and a half. I had read books about it, since it had started. I thought – I thought he was one of those men who wanted really young girls. I thought it was over. My mother came home – she was almost completely paralysed, but her mind was all right. I asked her why she hadn't taken me away. And she told me it was over. That he hadn't meant to do it, it was her fault – all that. I was unhappy, but at least he was leaving me alone.'

Inspector Hill gave a little sigh before she spoke. ‘When did it start again?' she asked.

‘Just after my sixteenth birthday. My mother had had to go into hospital again, and he was supposed to have gone to some business meeting. I thought I was alone in the house. I was taking a shower when he came in. He said he'd waited until I'd reached the age of consent out of deference to my mother.' She closed her eyes. ‘But I wouldn't give my consent, not any more, so he – I tried to fight him off, and I couldn't, of course. But he always used to use one of those cut-throat razors, and it was on the bath, open. I could reach it. So I did. And I slashed his face with it. He had to go to hospital himself then. And I packed clothes, took money from the safe, and ran to the main road to hitch a lift to anywhere. Max picked me up.' She closed her eyes. ‘Thank God,' she said.

‘But he found you again,' said Inspector Hill, quietly.

‘Yes. It was the day before Max closed up the office. We stayed late, talking, like we'd been doing for weeks.' She looked up at the inspector. ‘I don't know what we talked about now, but we did. And we loved one another, but Max had never done anything – he'd never made a pass, or anything. I thought … I thought I could make myself – but I never had to, because Max never asked me to. But he was going away, and I didn't want him to. I begged him to stay, and he spent hours explaining why he couldn't. Then I went home, and about five minutes after I got in, someone knocked at the door. I thought – it was silly – I thought it was Max. I thought he'd changed his mind, he was going to stay. But it was him, and I didn't have a cut-throat razor that time.'

She took a long, long time composing herself. Dabbing her eyes with the tissue, taking deep, deep breaths, laying her hands, loose, on her lap.

‘After he left, I spent all night packing everything I possessed into bags and boxes and anything else I could lay my hands on. I spent all morning finding digs, where there would be other people, and I wouldn't have to see him alone, because I knew he'd find me again. It's what I should have done in the first place, but I wanted so desperately to be on my own.'

‘And then you discovered that you were pregnant' came another gentle prompt.

Zelda must have told her. Well, she'd been going to tell the whole truth anyway.

‘I was frantic with fear and worry and – in the end, I rang Max and said I had to talk to him. I was going to tell him everything, then I realized that he didn't know where I
lived
.' She could feel again the panic that had gripped her. ‘I phoned Driver's, but he wasn't there, and I rang his wife, but she hung up on me. And then they came to try to make me go to the ferry with them. He'd brought her so that I would think it was safe. But I knew she'd be told to look the other way. I wouldn't go.' She looked up then, at the inspector. ‘When they'd gone, I went to the flat and waited, but I'd missed Max. And next morning, I got the train here, and I went to the factory. Zelda told me what had happened to Valerie.'

‘And then Max described your stepfather as a possible witness to where he had been?'

‘Yes. It was like a nightmare. I couldn't let him bring him back. He'd gone. He'd really gone. So I said that Max had been with me. But then Max had to endure all that suspicion, and questioning and … and when we married, I found that I couldn't … couldn't let him touch me. I just couldn't. I couldn't bear the thought of Max doing these things to me. And poor Max was having nightmares and he needed someone – he's always needed someone. I told him – go to Zelda. I didn't mind. But Zelda didn't want to know him, because she thought he'd got me pregnant, and I couldn't tell her any different.'

‘But things resolved themselves eventually?'

‘Yes. People forgot. Max still has nightmares – maybe not now, now that you know he didn't kill his wife. But not so often, and not so dreadful. And we were happy. We really were. Until I found out who had bought Driver's.'

‘Why didn't you tell your husband?'

‘I was going to,' Catherine said. ‘I kept putting it off, and off – I know what I'm like. I couldn't see how he could forgive me for putting him through all that. Because I could never tell him
why
I'd done it. I was too ashamed. I didn't want to tell him until the last minute, so that I could hang on to him as long as possible. But I went to see my mother. I told her what I thought of her.'

And now she was dying. Catherine had had to face that too, in the middle of the night with Max, when souls had been bared. But that was private guilt, private grief. Not to be seen by anyone but Max, not to be shared with anyone but Max.

‘I still thought he was a paedophile,' she said. ‘I thought I would be of no interest to him. But it wasn't like that. It was an obsession – he couldn't control me like he did everyone else. He came and told me I had gone back on my bargain by marrying Max, but he had looked after my mother because she hadn't made a fuss about what had happened. Another bargain. And he had brought photographs of Max and Anna Worthing – I wouldn't look at them. He was trying to punish me for going back on our bargain by giving me proof of Max's infidelity. He told me he knew I'd lied to the police – wasn't I worried about being married to a murderer? And I told him that Max had seen him picking up Annabel to go to Holland, and that I had lied so that he wouldn't come back. He said he wouldn't want to be in my shoes when Max found out.'

The inspector had been writing it all down. She looked up now.

‘And he'd made me believe that I couldn't face Max. So I was going to run away again. But he came back on Tuesday night because he'd found out that my marriage wasn't consummated. He said he still wanted me, and if I didn't honour my obligations, he would tell the police that my alibi was fake, and that he could prove it with his private investigator's report. He said he would deny ever being at the flats that night.'

‘But he'd picked up Anna Worthing,' said Inspector Hill. ‘She knew that he'd been there.'

Catherine nodded. ‘That's what I said. But he said that Anna would say whatever he told her to say.'

The inspector nodded her head slightly.

‘Within a month, he said, there would be a witness to say that Max left his own house at six forty-five that evening. There were any number of people he could pay or force to do that,' she said. ‘I knew he would do it. And that even if Max was found not guilty, he would have had to go through it all again, and I couldn't make him do that. Not twice. I knew I had to do what he wanted. I said I would do it but he had to make certain that no one ever found out.'

‘So you came to the opening, and then pretended you had left the building?'

‘Yes, I heard the lift, but I could hear Zelda's high heels, so I hid in the big wardrobe. Then it came up again, and it was him that time, but he'd brought Anna Worthing with him – he was going on about what a bad job she'd made of the reception, so I hid again. She was there for over an hour, and then someone came to the door. He thought it was me, so he got rid of her. It was Charles, and he stayed for almost two hours. Then I heard Charles leave, and – and … I got ready for him. I wanted to get it over with. I sat on the bed, and I told him I was there. And I did what he wanted.'

‘What went wrong?'

‘I thought it was over, because he got up and put on his bathrobe. But when I tried to get away, he forced me back. That's when I got the bruises. I thought it would never stop. But then I saw …

I couldn't believe it … it was like a dream, like an hallucination. I saw Max.'

Max. Towering above them like an avenging angel, a halo of golden light behind his head.

‘I could see from the kitchen right into the bedroom. The light was on, and I could see what that vicious bastard was doing to her. I just grabbed one of the knives, to stop him doing it any more. He moved, when I brought the knife down. It caught his arm – an artery. I just kept going until he sort of slid off the bed, and didn't move.'

Scott sat with his head in his hands, not looking up at Lloyd.

‘Catherine was … calm. As if it wasn't happening. I got her into the shower before she realized the state she was in, and I looked at my clothes. Then I remembered the washing-machine. I took my clothes off and ran cold water from the shower on to them – a lot of blood came out then. It was just thin streaks, like rain. Like red rain. I got as much as I could out, and then I put them in the machine. Catherine's clothes were all right – I found them in the wardrobe.'

And closed the door, thought Lloyd. So no one would know that she had been there.