Fragile Cord (14 page)

A baby would seal our happiness.

Tracey’s fully formed infant
with its face peeled back.

Alex didn’t recall knocking
over her wine glass. All she remembered was swallowing bile and the
mist that descended when Carl played his final card.

Besides, you’re not getting any
younger……

That night they’d slept in
separate rooms.

Shrugging, Alex walked out of
the office. Unable to face another scene, she decided she’d call
him later.

Given the size of the detached
houses along the stretch of road where the Kavanagh’s lived, the
neighbouring properties were some twenty yards either side of the
executive-style home, separated by a bank of trees. Cherry Blossoms
added a pink sugary coating to the picture postcard frontage. The
blue and white police tape and uniformed officer on the Kavanagh’s
doorstep was the only blight on the horizon, an ugly reminder that
wealth doesn’t equal happy.

A couple of
reporters were camped at the bottom of the drive. Coupland
recognised two of them from the local paper. A news van had pulled
up too – Look North TV. The driver hurried round to the back of the
vehicle and began to unload AV equipment. The news reporter leaned
against the side of the van, sipping from a bottle of water, a
mobile phone stuck to his ear. Moving on quickly before the
reporter glanced up and spotted him, Coupland pulled up outside the
neighbour’s house, keeping his face from view as he headed for the
door.

The front of
the house was similar to the Kavanagh’s, only instead of red brick
the first floor was finished with white facia boards with green
panelling to give it a Tudor-style effect, and the garage was on
the opposite side of the house. The cars on the driveway were just
as big, German built. He had time to tap the door once before it
opened and a plump woman in her mid-fifties greeted him. Her hair
was cut into a short style and devoid of any colour so that it was
a shock of white – platinum almost - against her suntanned skin.
She wore calf length trousers and a white linen shirt, a pair of
gold coloured sandals revealed salon-painted toe-nails.

‘Mrs White? I’m Detective
Sergeant Coupland.’ He offered up in greeting.

She smiled
sadly at him, ‘You’re the one in charge then?’ she asked, followed
by, ‘Your colleague said you would call – the woman detective?’ He
nodded, held up his warrant card, which she didn’t bother to look
at.

‘
I expect
you’ll want to see Angus?’ she asked, closing the door behind him,
turning on her heel while he followed.

‘
Can I get
you anything Sergeant? Tea? Coffee?’ she turned to him again,
looked disappointed when he shook his head. They were at the far
end of the hall; about to enter a set of double doors leading into
a sitting room similar to the Kavanagh’s in shape, although the
taste in décor was that of an older couple: flowery walls and
curtains, a large chintz three piece suite facing into a mahogany
coffee table. A matching cabinet in the corner contained a display
of crystal ornaments and framed graduation photographs of a young
man and woman Coupland took to be the couple’s
offspring.

‘I thought we could go through
to the conservatory?’ Mrs White asked.

Coupland
nodded, following her through the sitting room to the patio doors
and into a sunlit conservatory containing two cushioned sofas, a
small table and several large tomato plants.

‘
Ripens them
up nicely doesn’t it?’ she said to the man reading a newspaper on
one of the sofas, eyes half closed as he scanned the business
pages. The man nodded in agreement, although Coupland was certain
he hadn’t heard what his wife had just said. Anything for a quiet
life.

‘
This is
Detective Sergeant Coupland, Harry,’ the woman informed him,
‘Sergeant Coupland, this is my husband Harry.’ The men looked at
each other.

‘Ooh,’ the woman gushed, barely
stopping for breath, ‘I didn’t introduce myself! I’m Diane.’ She
held out her hand formally, when Coupland shook it he noticed the
top of her cheeks turn a deep shade of pink.

Harry folded
his newspaper and lay it down on the wicker table top. ‘You’ll be
wantin’ to speak to Angus?’ he asked, and Coupland feared they were
about to repeat the whole conversation he’d just had with Diane. He
looked from husband to wife but neither gave any indication of
intending to move. He tried not to let his irritation show: ‘If one
of you wouldn’t mind letting Angus know I’m here…’

Diane’s hand
flew to her mouth in a flurry of embarrassment, ‘What must you
think of us?’ Flustered, she hurried out of the room leaving
Coupland standing in the middle of the conservatory, still on his
feet. He turned to look out onto the well-stocked garden, nodding
towards the immaculate borders. His eyes slid over to Harry, noted
that he wasn’t quite retirement age.

‘
You have the
same gardener as the Kavanagh’s, Sir?’ he asked. Puzzled by his
question, Harry gave Coupland an odd look before answering, ‘It’s
possible,’ he said, ‘Diane would know.’ Harry offered Coupland a
seat but he refused, preferring the freedom of moving around. An
awkward silence fell between them.

‘
Look, we’re
all in shock here.’ Harry informed him. ‘My wife’s not been able to
sleep just thinking about what’s happened.’

A pause.

‘
It was the
girls that were friendly,’ he said by way of explanation. ‘Diane
had Tracey over for coffee once a week, brought the little kiddie
along as well, before he started school. Our own children have
flown the nest, not a grandchild in sight. I think Diane saw them
as a surrogate family, though she’d kill me if she heard me say as
much.’

His face
drained of colour as he realised what he’d said. ‘That was in bad
taste.’ He said, ‘I wasn’t thinking.’

‘
It’s OK.’
Coupland reassured him.

They lapsed
back into an uneasy silence and Coupland wondered what it was that
weighed heavy on the older man’s shoulders. He didn’t have to wait
long to find out.

‘
Thing is,’ Harry blurted out. ‘We’re still not clear…. about
what happened. Angus has said so little, ‘cept that the house
hadn’t been broken into, and we didn’t want to press him. The other
detective…..well, she didn’t seem to be looking for anyone in
connection with the murders. It’s just that….’ He looked away
awkwardly, then levelled his gaze slowly on Coupland, lowering his
voice, ‘We’re not harbouring a criminal are we? I
mean…….has
Angus
done this?’

Just then there was a gasp, and
they turned to see Diane standing in the doorway covering her mouth
with a hand, beside her their neighbour, a look of incredulity
etched onto his face.

Harry leapt
to his feet. He made a move towards Angus but the look he received
for his trouble left him rooted to the spot.

‘
Angus!’
Red-faced he ushered for him - and again Coupland - to sit
down.

‘Angus I didn’t mean for you to
hear it like tha-’

‘
You haven’t
told them?’ Angus challenged Coupland, who wondered if Diane’s
habit of constant questioning had worn off on him, then chided
himself for being uncharitable.

‘
I’ll take it
as a ‘No’ then.’ Angus quipped. It was the most he’d uttered in the
past two days and all three of them looked at him in
surprise.

‘Angus,’ Coupland began, ‘we’re
still carrying out tests, obtaining medical reports-’

‘
For God’s
sake,’ Angus interrupted angrily, ‘Why don’t you just spit it out,
man, put them out of their misery.’

He glared over at Harry, who’d
been wondering how much Angus had heard before flinching when he
uttered: ‘I’m sure you’ll all sleep much easier once you realise
that I’m not the fucking culprit.’

Diane
blanched at his use of coarse language, then looked back at
Coupland as though expecting him to put them straight. Coupland
struggled to gather the right words in his head, to find the
appropriate vocabulary. Diane saved him the trouble. She’d been
watching Angus as he collapsed into a chair, burying his head in
his hands. She spun round to Coupland and caught her breath as the
horror of the situation began to dawn.

‘No!’

Her hands flew back up to her
mouth again as the truth she’d been avoiding loomed before her,
larger than life.

‘
Are you saying
Tracey
did it?’ she whispered, ‘
Tracey…
killed that beautiful little
boy…then herself?’

Coupland
cursed under his breath. He assumed Alex had been through all this
with them, but then why would she, when she didn’t believe Tracy
was capable of this crime either.

‘Mrs White,’ he began, ‘We’re
conducting a series of enquiries which I’m sure you understand I
cannot comment on right now, but I can confirm that two days ago
Mrs Kavanagh took her own life.’

Diane and
Harry were shocked into silence. After taking a moment to
contemplate Coupland’s words, Harry was the first to speak: ‘We did
wonder, what with the police and everything, and the way the news
bulletins have been worded, but with Angus so distraught it really
wasn’t our place to upset him further….’

A derisive snort from Angus
echoed around the room.

‘
But Kyle,’
Diane’s voice had risen an octave; her palm was pressed flat
against her chest. ‘Had there been some kind of accident?’ she
screwed up her eyes as though trying to see the truth of it, ‘Is
that why Tracey…..did it….because he’d been hurt?’

‘
Don’t you get it
, you silly cow?’ Angus’s head reared up, his eyes were dark
and hate-filled. ‘She was giving Kyle his bath. She pushed him
under the water, held him down...’

Diane raised
her hands to cover her ears, collapsing into the chair behind her.
Shaking her head from side to side as though rejecting what she’d
been told.

‘
No……No…….No……
.’ She said simply, over and over, as though denying it would
put it right; turn everything back to how it had been before, how
it
should
have
been.

‘
No
.’

Coupland got to his feet, walked
a couple of yards towards the end of the conservatory, looked out
onto the well-kept borders.

‘
You all use
the same gardener?’ he inclined his head in the direction of the
garden, expanded his hands to indicate the neighbouring houses. It
was Diane who answered. Red-eyed and gulping back tears she looked
out into the landscaped lawns and smiled. If she thought his
question was odd, irrelevant to the case, she showed no sign of
it.

‘
Yes.’ She
said. ‘The houses aren’t that old. When we moved in there were
dozens of business cards and leaflets pushed through the letterbox
from local contractors. We found our decorator, gardener and
cleaner from them, and when Tracey and Angus moved next door Tracey
asked if we could recommend anyone. I passed their numbers
on…’

Coupland nodded, his mind
elsewhere.

‘
Angus,’ he
said turning round, ‘I need to ask you a couple of
questions.’

He stopped, looked from Diane
to Harry and slipped his hands into his pockets, waiting them
out.

‘Oh,’ said Diane, flustered,
getting to her feet, signalling to her husband to do the same,
‘we’ll be in the kitchen if you need us.’

They slipped
out of the room wordlessly, grateful for the respite from the icy
atmosphere. Angus did not acknowledge them.

‘The toxicology reports on
Tracey’s blood were clear Angus,’ Coupland began once he was sure
they out of earshot, ‘so we can rule out that she was under the
influence of drink or drugs.’

Angus’s head
jerked backwards, his eyes levelled coldly into Coupland’s. ‘And
that’s supposed to make me feel better is it? The fact that she was
of sound mind when she murdered our son, that she
knew
what she was
doing?’

‘
No.’
Coupland shook his head. That wasn’t what he’d meant at all. ‘We
have to rule every possibility out, part of the procedure I’m
afraid.’

Angus said nothing, remained
still while he digested the information.

Suddenly,
without looking up he began to speak: ‘We were happy, you know? The
business was going well; Kyle had settled into school, we were
looking forward to….’

His words petered out but
Coupland guessed what he was referring to.

‘
Did you see
the nursery?’ Angus asked, and slowly before Coupland’s eyes he
sprang back to life again, as though someone had slipped new
batteries into his back. His face brightened at the thought of his
children, his mouth shaped itself into a grin. Only his eyes
remained empty.

‘
I’d spent
the last two weekends decorating it.’ He said. ‘Tracey wanted their
rooms to have a theme. All that stuff’s popular now, isn’t it?
Licence to print money if you ask me, but Tracey was really into it
all. Guess it’s a woman’s thing…’

He was animated now, and
Coupland knew it was because he’d blocked it out, that right now he
was just sitting in his neighbour’s house, talking about his wife
and son while they waited for him at home.

The power of delusion.

‘
Kyle’s
room’s a racing circuit.’ He enthused. ‘I painted the track on the
walls myself.’ Angus’s chest actually puffed up as he said it.
‘Tracey wanted us to get a designer in but I wasn’t having any of
it. Dad’s privilege, I told her.’