False Tongues (36 page)

‘It's very kind of you to come,' Liz said, sitting down across from Jane. ‘As I said, I just didn't know where to turn.'

‘Do you want to…talk about it?' Jane invited obediently.

Liz gulped down about half a glass of her wine. ‘It's Tom,' she said. ‘My son. Our youngest. He's been so…depressed…lately. Distracted. Upset. Withdrawn. He broke up with his girlfriend recently,' she explained. ‘Becca. Such a sweet girl. I'm not sure what happened between them. But he's taken it so badly. And then his good friend Sebastian was killed. Murdered,' she added, frowning. ‘Since then he's been even worse. He won't talk to me or his father. He just says it's none of our business, and he's dealing with it.'

‘How old is Tom?'

‘He's sixteen. Just—as of last week.' With her head she indicated the birthday cards on the mantelpiece.

‘Young teenagers can be very moody,' Jane said reassuringly, remembering it very well. ‘My boys were the same. Simon, especially. He's a very sensitive boy, and something like losing a girlfriend can seem like the end of the world.' Now he was barely nineteen, and coping with the prospect of fatherhood before he hit twenty. Jane pushed the thought away from her; she couldn't afford to be distracted by that worry just now. ‘I'm sure he'll come through it eventually. Just give him time.'

‘That's what we thought, at first.' Liz finished off her glass of wine and moved to refill it. ‘Even though our older two were just fine—no problems with them at all. But with Tom it just gets worse and worse. And tonight—he won't even come out of his room. I called him for supper, and he told me to go away.'

‘He'll come out when he gets hungry enough,' Jane predicted. And it probably wouldn't take long. Her boys were bottomless pits when it came to food consumption; she couldn't imagine them passing up a meal for any reason. If their legs were broken, she was certain that they would crawl to the table.

‘I'm not so sure.' Liz shook her head, a worried frown line between her drawn brows.

‘Maybe you should take his supper up to him,' Jane suggested.

Liz knocked down another half a glass of wine. ‘I tried,' she said. ‘I tried his door. It's locked. From the inside. And now he won't even answer me.'

Jane felt a faint twitch of real unease. Was she out of her depth here? This sounded like more—much more—than a teenage strop.

The doorbell rang; Liz started. ‘Who could be out on a filthy night like this?' she wondered, heading for the door.

The voices carried into the sitting room. ‘Mrs Gresham, we're really sorry to bother you again, but it's very important that we talk to Tom.'

‘Now?' she said, her voice rising. ‘But you've talked to him already. Twice. And now's not a good time,' she added. ‘Can't you come back tomorrow?'

‘I'm afraid not,' said a determined Irish voice—a man. ‘We need to talk to him
now
.'

‘But he won't come out of his room. Not for me, and certainly not for
you
.'

‘Then we'll go to him.'

‘We'll leave our brollies here,' said another male voice—Cockney this time.

Jane had a brief glimpse of the two men as they went past the sitting room door toward the stairs. Liz, following them, paused at the door for a second to catch Jane's eye and mouth the word ‘Police.'

Without even thinking about it, Jane went after them.

At the top of the stairs, the two men looked at Liz for guidance. She indicated a closed door with one trembling finger.

‘Tom?' said the Irish one, putting his face close to the door. ‘This is Detective Inspector Stewart. We need to talk to you, mate.'

There was no reply.

‘It's important,' he said, a bit louder.

Still no reply.

He tried the doorknob. It didn't budge. ‘Do you have a key, then?' he asked Liz.

She shook her head, her eyes huge with shock. ‘It's on the inside.'

Turning to his companion, he raised his eyebrows in silent communication, then addressed Liz again with an apologetic shrug. ‘Sorry about this, Mrs Gresham.' He stepped aside; the Cockney policeman put his shoulder to the door and slammed it, hard.

After the fourth slam, the door frame began to give way; two slams later, with a splintering of wood, the lock was ripped from the frame and the door flew open.

The Irish policeman was through in an instant, while his Cockney companion rubbed his shoulder in the corridor, grimacing in pain.

After that, everything happened so fast. ‘Tom!' the Irish policeman shouted, then, ‘Oh, dear God!'

Liz pushed past the Cockney policeman, who put out his arm to stop her.

‘He's taken something,' called the Irish policeman in an urgent voice. ‘He's unconscious. For the love of God, Sid, call an ambulance!
Now
!'

***

Callie came out of the dining hall before the general exodus. The wine was still flowing freely, and many people were still partaking of it, but she felt a bit tired after the late night before and wanted to finish her packing before she went to bed. And if it wasn't too late, she would ring Marco one more time.

Fortunately, it wasn't raining. But her heart gave a little lurch when she saw someone standing, quite still, under one of the arches in the courtyard. A man who looked as though he'd been rained upon rather thoroughly.

And then he spoke, almost tentatively. ‘
Cara Mia
?'

Marco. Her heart lurched again as she moved toward him as quickly as her high heels would take her. ‘Marco? What on earth are you doing here?'

He spoke at the same time. ‘
Cara Mia
! You look amazing! I hardly recognised you!'

Callie stopped short, suddenly self conscious. The dress. The underwear, for heaven's sake. She went hot all over: what would he think? He'd never seen her dressed like this.

But his expression, as he examined her from top to toe, was far from disapproving.

‘What are you doing here?' she demanded again, to cover her embarrassment. ‘I'm going home tomorrow, you know.'

‘I had to see you,' Marco said. ‘I just couldn't wait till tomorrow.'

‘But…why?'

Concisely, he told her. ‘I had a row with Serena. I told her that if she's not prepared to accept you as part of my life—as my
wife
—then I don't need her. And I mean it,
Cara Mia
. I've been so…blind. I've let my family boss me about, and I've put them first, instead of trusting my own instincts and looking after my own needs. Instead of cherishing
you
.'

He stopped for breath. She stared at him wonderingly.

‘But you're the best thing that's ever happened to me,' he went on. ‘And if you'll forgive me for being so…so stupid, then I'll spend the rest of my life making it up to you. Making you happy, my darling, darling Callie,' he said as he crossed the few steps between them and wrapped his arms round her.

He was as wet as he looked. Callie remembered, inconsequentially, how Bella had knocked him over in the middle of his proposal of marriage. It had rather spoiled the solemnity of the moment. This was a bit like that, but she didn't mind.

‘You're all wet,' she said, against his sodden shoulder.

Marco laughed joyously. ‘I came out without my brolly. I couldn't wait to see you.'

‘But you've been waiting…?'

‘It's seemed like hours,' he said. ‘The porter wasn't amused at being called out, and he took a great deal of persuasion to let me in. Even when I told him I was your fiancé. I don't think he believed me.'

‘Then he's not going to want to find a room for you, at this hour of the night.' She twisted her head to smile at him.

He spoke quietly, but without hesitation. ‘In that case, I suppose I'll have to share your room.'

‘There's only one bed.' Callie swallowed hard, feeling suddenly breathless. ‘And it's not very big.'

Marco's hands slid from her back to her waist, then moved farther south. ‘I think we'll manage,' he said.

Chapter Twenty

It wasn't that Neville didn't get to bed at all on Friday night—it only felt that way. Especially when his phone rang, very early, on Saturday morning.

The night had seemed endless: the rush to the hospital, then sitting there for hours with Tom Gresham's mother and the vicar's wife, waiting for the news that he was going to pull through after his drug overdose.

That news had come in the wee hours of the morning, along with the doctor's verdict that the police wouldn't be allowed to see Tom until the next day. After that Neville had gone home, only to find that Triona wasn't there. According to the note she'd left for him, she'd got tired of waiting for his return, and had gone to visit her friend Frances, where she would probably stay the night.

Put out at the time, Neville was now grateful that she wasn't there as he groped for his phone on the bedside table. Triona didn't deserve to be waked up at six-something on a Saturday morning.

Neither did he. Not after the day he'd had yesterday. Not after a night at the hospital.

Probably Evans, he thought with a mixture of resignation and trepidation as his hand connected with the phone and he brought it close enough to his face to see the display.

It wasn't Evans. It wasn't even Cowley—Sid, who had left the hospital hours before he did, to keep his Friday night assignation.

It wasn't a number he recognised at all.

Squinting, he punched the little green button. ‘Hello?'

‘Mr Policeman?' whispered a small voice.

‘Yes…?'

‘It's me. Georgie.'

Lexie's little sister. Neville sighed. ‘What can I do for you, Georgie?'

‘You gave me your number,' she reminded him. 'You said I should ring you if I thought of anything. And I did.'

Something that wouldn't wait until daybreak? ‘I'm listening,' he said, deliberately patient.

‘I'm ringing early, before Lexie and Mum get up,' she explained. ‘I even set my alarm. It's something I thought you'd want to know about. And Lexie wouldn't like it if she knew I was telling you.'

That sounded promising; Neville tried not to get his hopes up. ‘Okay,' he said. ‘Tell me.'

‘Did you know that Lexie fancies Tom?' she whispered.

In spite of himself, he felt a twinge of disappointment. ‘Yes, I knew that.'

‘Oh. Well.' She sounded a bit deflated. ‘Did you know that Tom broke up with his girlfriend, Becca?'

He hadn't known it until the night before, when, sitting in the hospital, he'd had to listen to Mrs Gresham going over and over the reasons for Tom's apparent suicide attempt. Was it significant?

But, Neville realised, Georgie hadn't known it the day before; when he'd talked to her, she'd spoken of Tom's girlfriend in the present tense. ‘How did you find out?' he asked.

She gave a soft chuckle. ‘Lexie would kill me. She sleeps really soundly, you know? Sometimes I sneak into her room in the night and pinch her laptop. I log into her Facebook account. Just so I can see what she's been up to, and her mates as well.'

Neville was scandalised by her behaviour and her forthright admission, though in his reaction there was also a sneaking admiration for her resourcefulness: Georgie would make a bloody good detective.

‘You know her password and everything?'

‘'Course,' she said scornfully. ‘Anyway, there was loads of stuff on Tom's Facebook page. About breaking up with Becca and stuff like that. And then there was a really weird post, last night. He said how sorry he was for everything, and there was no other way out.'

A suicide note, via Facebook.

Neville tried to get his head round it. Why not? This was the Facebook generation; they lived their lives on the Internet. They did their bullying on the Internet, for God's sake. Why not post their suicide notes as well? It was efficient, notifying all of their friends at once, and forestalling the possibility that a note would be overlooked or not found.

And this pretty much proved that Tom's overdose on his mother's prescription medication
was
a suicide attempt, and not just an accident.

‘Thanks, Georgie,' he said. ‘That's really helpful. Thank you for ringing.'

‘Don't you want to know what I remembered?' she put in quickly. ‘The reason I rang you?'

‘That wasn't it?'

‘No. I was just telling you
why
I remembered.'

‘Then carry on,' he said, bemused.

Her voice dropped back to a barely audible whisper. ‘It was Sunday night. Late. I was in bed in my room, playing with my Nintendo DS. Dad got it for me for my birthday. I usually would be asleep by then, but there was no school the next day.'

‘And?'

‘I heard some voices in another room, near the front door I thought, and some other noises. I looked out of my window, and saw someone coming out of the flats.'

‘Who was it?'

‘I was pretty sure it was Tom,' she said. ‘'Course it was dark, but I thought it was him. 'Cause he's tall. I wondered whether he and Lexie were…well, you know. I thought maybe he was cheating on Becca, and since Lexie fancies him something rotten…'

Sunday night.

Neville forced himself to keep his mouth shut, not to press her to get to the point.

‘Anyway,' she went on, ‘the next morning I spilled some juice on the tablecloth. Mum was furious, and said I'd have to put it in the washing machine myself.'

Where on earth, he wondered, could this be leading?

‘So I did. But there was already something in there, wet. Ready to be put in the tumble dryer. So I put it in the dryer. And you know what? When I went to treat the juice stain before I washed the tablecloth, the Vanish stain remover was completely empty. Not a drop left.'

‘The stain remover?' he repeated, baffled.

‘All gone.'

Neville could contain himself no longer. ‘So what was it? The thing that was in the washing machine?'

‘Didn't I say?' Georgie paused, clucking at her oversight. ‘It was Tom's grey hoodie. His Superdry one.'

For a second Neville forgot to breathe. ‘Tom's? You're sure it was his?'

‘'Course,' Georgie asserted. ‘I've seen him wearing it like a million times. Trust me. It was his. Do you think it's important?'

***

After a second dose of her sedatives, Margaret slept through the night. She woke early, feeling much better than she'd expected—headache-free and rested.

She still couldn't make sense of the events of yesterday. What was she to make of Hanna's allegations about Keith? If John Kingsley were to be believed, there was no truth in them, and she should feel ashamed of herself for giving any credence to her secretary's tales rather than having faith in the man she was beginning to fall in love with.

Hanna had seemed so sure, as if there were no shadow of a doubt. But why would John Kingsley tell her anything other than the truth? And he was in a position to know. He had been Keith's training incumbent; they'd been friends for many years.

Margaret put on her cassock and went downstairs to her office. There would be things to catch up with, having been away from her desk all day yesterday, and as it was Saturday, Hanna wouldn't be coming in. It would be good to get an early start; she wanted to be available to say goodbye to the deacons as they left, and especially to speak to Canon Kingsley before he went.

Efficient Hanna had opened her post and left it stacked on her desk. Margaret sat down and began to go through it systematically, forcing herself to concentrate on the business at hand.

But it was with a certain sense of inevitability that she heard a soft knock on her office door. Before the door opened, she knew who was on the other side of it.

‘Come in,' she called, keeping her voice as calm as she could, though her heart had begun to pound more quickly. ‘It's open.' She didn't stand up. Suddenly she wasn't at all sure that her legs would support her.

Keith wasn't smiling. He walked over to her desk, facing Margaret, put his hands on the desk, and leaned over to look into her eyes. ‘This isn't the first time I've said this,' he stated. ‘I seem to have been sidetracked. But there's something I want to tell you.'

***

Brian Stanford's weekly day off, on a Saturday, was sacrosanct: no meetings, no services, no calls or visits from troublesome parishioners. Any attempt at the latter would be headed off at the pass by Jane, who protected Brian's days off with relentless ferocity. So she was looking forward to the luxury of a lie-in, especially after the lateness of her return home the night before.

But she'd reckoned without Brian's curiosity. He'd been asleep by the time she got home, and this morning he wanted to know what had kept her out so late.

‘Janey?' he whispered, close to her ear. ‘Are you awake?'

‘I am now.' She rolled over and squinted at him. ‘What time is it?'

‘The church bells have just rung eight.'

She'd hoped for at least another hour of sleep. Never mind.

‘Where
were
you last night, Janey? I got home about nine and you weren't here. Just a brief note, saying you'd gone to the Greshams'.'

‘I didn't think I'd be away so long,' she admitted.

‘I waited up till nearly midnight! Couldn't you have rung?'

Ringing Brian had been the last thing on her mind, with everything that had happened. But she couldn't very well tell him that it hadn't even occurred to her to absent herself from the unfolding drama to ring her husband, so she just shook her head.

‘I was worried,' Brian admitted.

Not too worried to go to bed without her, or too worried to wake up when she crept into bed well after midnight, she thought with uncharacteristic disloyalty. Not that she'd have been capable of much discussion at the time—she'd been relieved, in fact, that she could go straight to sleep without being quizzed on her whereabouts.

‘Liz was desperate for someone to talk to, and you weren't here,' she said. Then she explained: Liz's admission of her worries about Tom, the unexpected arrival of the police. The discovery of Tom, unconscious from a suspected drug overdose. The frantic trip to hospital with Liz, following the ambulance. The hours in A and E, sitting with Liz and the policeman. ‘When the doctor came out and told Liz he was going to pull through, that's when I decided it was time for me to leave. I tried to persuade Liz to go home as well, and get some sleep, but I don't think she paid any attention to me.'

‘Drugs!' Brian said in a shocked voice. ‘I must say, that does surprise me. I don't think Liz had any idea that he was a drug user. Not from what she said to me the other day.'

Jane shook her head. ‘Not a user, probably—they think it was a suicide attempt. He'd taken some of Liz's prescription painkillers—they're not sure how much he took, but they found the bottle in his room. Empty.'

‘Good Lord.'

‘I know. It's so sad to think of a young man with all of his life ahead of him—he's younger than the twins, you know—feeling that things were that desperate. That there was no other way out. And just because his girlfriend broke up with him? I can't imagine it.'

‘We must pray for him, and for his parents,' said Brian.

***

Margaret took a deep breath, then let it out slowly. ‘I'm listening,' she said levelly.

‘This isn't easy for me,' Keith admitted. ‘I know I should have told you sooner, and I did try. But I'm not the sort of person who talks easily about myself, and it isn't a very pretty story, in any case.'

She wasn't sure what she was expecting, but it certainly wasn't the tale that emerged, in fits and starts, over the next quarter of an hour, from the man on the other side of her desk.

‘In the first place,' he began, I usually describe myself as a bachelor.'

‘And you're not?'

‘Oh, I am—in the sense that I'm not currently married,' Keith explained. ‘But most people take that to mean that I've never been married. And I have been.'

Margaret found that she wasn't all that surprised. ‘I see.'

‘It was a while ago, and it turned out to be a big mistake on my part. But at the time, no one could have talked me out of it. And a few people tried,' he added with a wry smile. ‘John Kingsley among them, though I don't suppose he'd admit to it now. In the gentlest possible way, he tried to make me see that it wouldn't work.'

Gemma, he related, had been one of his parishioners. Not a church-goer, but a troubled young woman who had come to him for help and advice. He'd fallen head over heels for her. ‘I was in my thirties, but quite naïve,' he admitted candidly. ‘I hadn't had all that much experience with women. She wasn't yet twenty, and the most beautiful creature I'd ever seen. Gemma—my gem of a girl. No fool like an old fool, they say, and it's true.'

He married her in spite of all advice to the contrary, and they moved to another parish, away from the controlling parents who had been the cause of her initial contact with him. Within the year they'd been blessed with a baby girl.

‘Flora,' he said, smiling. ‘The apple of my eye.'

Margaret still didn't see where all this was leading.

‘As far as I was concerned, we were a happy family. I had a lovely wife whom I worshipped, a beautiful and enchanting child whom I adored. Gemma never really took to being a vicar's wife, but it's not a role for everyone, and she was very young—I didn't hold it against her,' he added. ‘I suppose I convinced myself that everything was perfect, because I needed to believe it. I had to prove them all wrong—all those people who said I shouldn't marry her.'

Keith grimaced. ‘And then, quite suddenly, it all fell apart. About ten years ago, when Flora was eight.'