The Ambiguity of Murder

 

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CHAPTER 1

In the public car park, Fenella sat behind the wheel of the Rover and willed the minutes away. Every visiting day she had promised herself she would not arrive early and have to sit and wait, wishing, like a child, that the impossible would happen; every visiting day, she had failed her promise. Now she was equally early and time had slowed almost to a halt …

A man turned the corner of the nearest building and her heart shouted Harry, before her eyes, guided by common sense, identified him from his clothes as a warder. He bore hardly any resemblance to Harry … If you don't turn up soon, my love, I'll be confusing you with little green men from Mars …

Two men appeared down the right-hand path beyond the outside building, and while one of them was another warder, the second was Harry. But they came to a stop and talked … Why the hell aren't you rushing to me?… He never allowed his emotions free rein; had not, even when he knew his world was about to collapse about him … Harry, if you don't rush now, I'll scream blue, bloody murder …

He finally shook hands with the warder, walked towards the Rover, the collar of his overcoat turned up against the wind which blew out of a sullen sky that promised yet more rain in what was proving to be a real Filldyke February … You're even thinner; you're looking haggard. You need good food and love beyond satiation …

She opened the door and stepped out of the car. Unlike him, she had no intention of restraining her emotions and she ran forward. As she wrapped herself around him, she could hear a Hollywood choir.

*   *   *

As they drove along the country lane, bordered by thorn hedges and an occasional tree, she sat sideways in the passenger seat so that she could stare directly at him. He had a high forehead. Soon after meeting him, she'd joked that this denoted great intelligence. The first whisper of baldness had been his reply. He might be of the present, but he belonged to the past, to the age when a man pursued modesty. His eyes were an ever-changing blue. He claimed that that was impossible, but it was true. His nose was Roman – brave Horatius, the Captain of the Gate, must have sported such a nose. His lips were full and …

‘You've become very silent,' he said.

… And shaped for love. She briefly put her hand on his left thigh. ‘If I tell you what I'm thinking, you'll cringe at the woman's gush.'

He laughed.

‘Do you know what you do to me when you laugh like that?'

‘Tell me.'

‘You make me want to throw myself into your arms.'

‘Then in the name of road safety, I won't laugh again until we arrive.' He braked for a corner. ‘Fen.'

‘What?'

Once round the corner, he accelerated. ‘Are you sure it's sensible to go to your place?'

‘Where else can you suggest?'

‘Since my place went to Anne in the divorce settlement, it'll have to be a hotel.'

‘We celebrate in some coldly anonymous room after all you've been through?'

‘James is hardly going to welcome my appearance. Not after all that's happened.'

She settled back in the seat and stared through the windscreen, her expression strained.

‘I'd hate to cause any more trouble.'

‘He died eight months ago.'

In his surprise, he let the car drift on the low grass bank and the near-side front wheel briefly bumped along its uneven surface. As he hurriedly steered back on to the road, he said: ‘Why on earth didn't you tell me?'

‘Where was the point? There was nothing you could do. And if you'd known, it would only have made things worse for you.'

‘But…' He became silent. What she said was true. All he could have offered would have been words and they seldom assuaged pain. ‘Was it … Was he…'

‘The past is the past. We've each other and that's all that matters.'

Could one ever dismiss the past? he wondered.

*   *   *

Brakebourne House stood in the centre of a row of Edwardian houses. Three floors high and relatively narrow, it lacked good proportions and its appearance was only redeemed by the odd-shaped, stone-bordered windows, which provided a certain quirkiness.

They lay in bed in the main bedroom; he on his back, she on her side and pressed against him.

‘Well?' she said.

‘The score out of ten? Eleven.'

‘Thank goodness it wasn't a mere nine.' She moved until she could rest her breasts on his chest and kiss him. ‘When I allowed myself to dream, we made such imaginative love that I drove your pain away.'

‘You've exceeded all expectations.'

The rain increased and the wind swept it against the window with a drumming sound. He said, his voice distant: ‘When it rained as hard as this, the roof leaked and water dripped with irritating monotony on to the floor between my bed and the next one. Each time it happened, I reported it and they said repairs would be carried out, but they never were. I reckon the secret of good prison management is to make certain that nothing changes.'

‘Was it very terrible? Or don't you want to talk about it?'

Several seconds passed before he said: ‘There's the old chestnut that if you've suffered public school, prison's a piece of cake. There's a little truth in that. But when one's an adult, it's difficult to accept stupidity in the name of discipline … Still, it was a loose regime compared to a closed prison and the only real problem was successfully defending one's virtue.'

‘What were the staff like?'

‘The mixture one meets anywhere; some good, some bad, some indifferent. I was lucky. One of the screws had a secret liking for romantic poetry.'

‘Why secret?'

‘In such a regime, that sort of passion is regarded with the deepest suspicion.'

‘How did you discover he liked it?'

‘Shortly after I arrived, he told me to weed one of the flower beds. Being facetious, to try to keep my spirits above freezing, I said, “A host, of golden daffodils; beside the mess, beneath the trees.” Instead of bawling me out for insolence, he assumed I was a Wordsworth fanatic and had me posted as assistant librarian. From time to time he discussed poetry with me and since he knew far more than I could remember, I had to do a lot of surreptitious revision. It paid off. He was usually ready to give a spot of advice and more than once enabled me to avoid trouble.'

‘What sort of trouble?'

‘As it's an open prison, in theory all the inmates are nonviolent, but people's concepts of what constitutes violence varies. For some, knocking hell out of someone is no more than horseplay and I'd probably have been well on the receiving end because of my obvious background if he hadn't advised me how to act when things started looking dicey.'

‘You'd have been badly hurt?'

‘More than likely.'

‘Bastards!'

‘On the face of things, yes. But most of them have led rough lives so their values are completely different.'

‘I meant the lawyers.'

‘You can't blame them…'

‘I can! Why do you have to be so bloody forgiving?'

‘It's supposed to get you to heaven quicker.'

‘You're hiding the truth, aren't you? You're being facetious to cover the fact that every moment was pure hell, made far worse because you weren't guilty.'

‘That certainly didn't help.'

She kissed him with passion, trying to drive past hurt from his mind and fear of the past from her own. In the nature of things, she succeeded in doing both for a while.

Later, when the rain had eased and objects seen through the window were distorted rather than a meaningless blur, he said: ‘Did James ever…' He came to a stop.

‘Understand?'

‘I suppose that's as good a word as any.'

‘He couldn't.'

‘He still thought it was because of his illness, not despite it?'

‘I tried and tried to make him understand … For God's sake, why do I keep on using that word when it's meaningless since I can't understand myself even. How did it happen? I've always considered myself loyal. But we're asked to a party, James isn't up to it, but persuades me to go because he says I must have a break from illness; I'm standing by the fireplace thinking how odd it is to see people able to lead normal lives and you're introduced … And I throw loyalty out of the window!'

‘Sometimes, one just isn't in control of one's own life, however hard one tries to be.'

‘That's merely excusing weakness.'

‘Perhaps. It's also true.'

‘If Anne hadn't been having another affair, would you have been so eager?'

‘It was nothing to do with attitudes, all to do with pheromones. They're irresistible. Female moths release them and in no time at all they're surrounded by ardent males.'

‘You make it sound as if I hadn't bathed properly.'

‘I'm saying that we couldn't have stopped its happening.'

‘Not even if we'd known the pain it would cause?'

‘I said, they're irresistible.'

‘That's a weasel.'

‘Sometimes it helps one to see the truth to weasel.'

They were silent for a while.

‘Don't you think we ought to get up?' she finally asked.

‘Why?'

‘I'm sure you were brought up to believe it to be decadent to be in bed during the day unless one's ill.'

‘Since the only decadence available to me until now has not been to my taste, I say, decade on.'

CHAPTER 2

The sky was cloudless, the sun hot. Orange and lemon trees were in fruit and blossom, fig trees were showing green tips; tomato and sweet pepper plants were already making good growth; the first strawberries were in the shops. Spring had come early to the island.

Karen collected up the shopping bag and her handbag from the passenger seat, opened the driver's door and stepped out of the car. Emilio stood upright in the middle of the nearest flower bed.

‘Good morning, señora,' he said.