The Cruellest Game (29 page)

Slightly woozy, I buried my head in the pillows, pathetically grateful for the warmth and comfort of a proper bed, but I slept only fitfully. It seemed like only an hour or so later that there
was a loud hammering on the front door. I guessed I must have been asleep then, and awakened by the hammering, as I’d heard no sound of a vehicle pulling into the yard.

I looked at the digital radio on the windowsill. In standby mode its display panel featured an illuminated clock. The time was just before 7 a.m. I got up and walked to the front of the house
and peered through the landing window. It was still dark but the security lights had come on. I could see a car parked in the yard, but whoever was banging on the door was standing inside the porch
out of my eyeline.

I wondered who would be calling at that hour, and for a moment was anxious that my mystery tormentor may have returned. But I reminded myself that he or she was not in the habit of knocking.
Then I heard the rattle of the letter box and a powerful male voice calling out.

‘Come on, Mrs Anderson, open up. Now.’

Of course it must be the police, I thought. The car outside was not a marked patrol car, but the voice had that note of accusative authority about it that I was beginning to get used to.

I made my way downstairs, using the remote control fob to deactivate the alarm system, then unlocked and opened the old oak door.

An angry-looking young woman stood on the doorstep flanked by two young men. The woman began to shout at me and one of the young men immediately started taking photographs.

I blinked in bewilderment. Bizarrely, I wondered what I must look like. I was wearing my pyjamas and had merely thrown my dressing gown over my shoulders as I left the bedroom. My hair was all
over the place. I knew that I had dark hollows beneath my eyes, in contrast to the deathly pale of the rest of my face. And my cheekbones now jutted out almost as if they were razor blades beneath
my skin and might break through at any moment. I never carried much weight, but I had become painfully thin, far thinner even than Marti Smith.

‘You’re wicked, wicked!’ shouted the young woman. ‘You’re a monster and you should be locked up. What are you doing out on the streets? You should be in jail. They
should throw the fucking key away after what you’ve done. You’re a fucking monster, a fucking monster . . .’

And so it went on for what seemed like a very long time while I just stood in the doorway and took it. I think I was still slightly befuddled by my bedtime cocktail of drugs and alcohol.
Whatever the cause, I had no way of dealing with this. Fleetingly, I even wished I hadn’t sent Robert away.

Eventually I started to function again and tried to close the front door. The second young man, carrying a notebook instead of a camera, stepped forward and looked as if he might be about to
push his way into the hall.

‘Can’t we just have a word, Mrs Anderson?’ he enquired. ‘Wouldn’t you like to respond to Mrs Macintyre, give us your side of the story?’

Light dawned. Mrs Macintyre. The mother of the little boy left tied up in the stable. Of course it was Mrs Macintyre, whom I had seen on television, accompanied, apparently, by representatives
of the Great British press.

I found my voice at last.

‘No, I wouldn’t,’ I said.

Then I remembered how Marti Smith had dealt with the press.

‘And I should remind you that you are on private property,’ I continued as calmly as I could manage. ‘I want you to leave. Please leave now.’

Rather to my surprise they backed off almost immediately. Well, I suppose they had got their story. And their pictures.

The young reporter asked over his shoulder if I was quite sure I didn’t want to say anything.

‘Please leave,’ I repeated.

They climbed into their car, manoeuvred a three-point turn in the yard and retreated up the lane.

I had a feeling they may have operated against the law, in more ways than one. But I knew from the Joanna Yeates case in Bristol, when the murdered young woman’s innocent landlord
Christopher Jefferies was hounded unmercifully by the press after being wrongly arrested, that a significant flaw in Britain’s judicial system is that the laws of sub judice only come fully
into force after a suspect has been charged.

In any case what did it matter? I wasn’t going to do anything about it, was I? I didn’t have the strength. I stood watching their tail lights disappear around the bend at the top of
the lane. Then I closed and locked the door and slumped against it.

The urge to break down in tears again was almost overwhelming. But I was determined not to let myself. I really had to start fighting back, somehow. I knew what I needed to do. And the first
thing was that I could not allow myself the luxury of collapsing in a heap. Not any more.

Later that morning, at the more respectable hour of 10 a.m., Gladys Ponsonby Smythe turned up. In spite of the horrors of that dawn visit I remained determined to keep my
resolution to find out the whole truth about all that had happened in my life, and the importance of maintaining my strength was pretty obvious. I knew that I had to at least try to eat properly. I
also needed to slow up and calm down. I wasn’t going to get anywhere rushing around like a headless chicken. If I didn’t watch it, I was going to end up in prison for a very long time
for an offence I hadn’t committed. So I was in the kitchen making myself eat boiled eggs and toasted soldiers when she knocked on the door.

‘Do you realize there are photographers wielding cameras with giant lenses at the top of your drive?’ Gladys asked.

I confirmed that I did.

‘Well, they should be moved on. Do you want me to call the police?’

I shook my head, glad that she knew nothing of my dawn visit from Mrs Macintyre, accompanied by a duo of so-called journalists. I didn’t think I could have coped with Gladys’s
reaction to that.

‘Apparently, if they are not actually on my property, there is nothing I can do about it,’ I said. ‘And the police don’t seem to be my biggest fans right now either. The
more pressure I’m put under the better as far as they’re concerned, I reckon.’

‘Well, we’ll see about that,’ said Gladys. ‘How’s Marti Smith shaping up?’

‘She seems great,’ I said. ‘But it’s early days. I’m waiting to hear from her about what happens next.’

‘Right.’

Gladys seemed, unusually for her, unsure of exactly what to do or say.

I offered her tea or coffee, saw her glance switch to my mercifully undamaged espresso machine, and remembered that she’d never been properly inside Highrise before. Even in its reduced
circumstances the old house remained impressive.

‘I’d love a cappuccino, chuck,’ she said.

‘Of course.’

She watched me make the coffee, a double espresso for me, and took a first appreciative sip of her cappuccino before speaking again.

‘I really came to see if there was anything I could do to help,’ she said. ‘Not to drink your coffee. But this is a treat, I must say.’

She took another sip. She may not have bothered with or, for all I knew, been able to afford too many of the niceties of life at home, but she appreciated them all right when abroad, it seemed.
I studied her thoughtfully. There could be no more casual dismissals of the few people who were prepared to help me.

‘Well, there is something,’ I said. ‘The police still have my car and they don’t seem in any hurry to return it. Florrie’s in police kennels somewhere. I
don’t even know yet what I have to do to get her back, but she’s sure to need to be collected. If you could do that, it would be really great. I miss her.’

‘Of course I can do that. In fact, just leave the whole thing to me. I’ll call the police and check out the form, then I’ll pick her up for you as soon as possible.’

Gladys looked delighted to have been asked to perform a task, and I already knew she would do it with speed and efficiency.

‘Anything else, luvvie?’ she asked. ‘Do you need any shopping done?’

I shook my head.

‘I’m all right for a bit. Not hungry anyway.’

I gestured at the empty eggshells on my plate.

‘Had to really force these down,’ I said.

Gladys took another sip of her coffee. ‘So you’ve no idea how long the police will keep your car?’

I shook my head again. ‘At least until they’ve decided whether or not they’re going to charge me, I should imagine.’

Gladys grunted. ‘Bloody fools,’ she said. ‘Well, you have to have wheels, don’t you, living out here?’

‘I suppose so,’ I said.

‘Do you have a plan?’

Marti Smith was proved right yet again. The vicar’s wife was totally practical. Far more intent on ensuring life carried on as it should than gathering in souls.

‘Not really. I suppose I thought I’d wait a day or so to see what happened, then rent a car if I need to.’

‘You don’t want to do that, chuck,’ she told me firmly. ‘Costs a fortune and you might need every penny you have if the police carry on playing their bloody stupid
game.’

She glanced around the kitchen and through the windows providing sweeping views across the garden, towards and beyond the old stable which had been the purveyor of so much grief for me, then out
over the moors.

‘Owning this house alone will prevent you getting legal aid,’ she continued.

I hadn’t thought about that. Money had never seemed to be a problem for Robert and me. And Robert had already seemed to indicate that he would be willing to pay my legal fees. But, of
course, everyone knew that these fees could be crippling. I also realized that I actually had no idea how our family finances stood. Robert had handled everything. I did now know, however, that my
husband was not a highly paid engineering executive in the oil industry, but a glorified labourer, and it was sixteen years previously that he had won the lottery, since when we had lived lavishly
in an expensive house and wanted for nothing, and our son’s school fees, albeit aided by his swimming scholarship, had been a substantial and largely unexpected expense over the last few
years.

‘What about Robert?’ Gladys asked suddenly. ‘Hasn’t he come home yet? You’re going to need as much help as you can get, and surely that’s what husbands are
for. Where is the man?’

I pulled a face. ‘He came yesterday evening,’ I said. ‘Just as Marti and I arrived here. I’m afraid I told him to go away.’

‘Oh dear.’ She looked genuinely distressed for me. And I realized she expected an explanation. After all, absolutely nobody knew the truth about the rift between Robert and me.

‘We’ve been under such stress since Robbie’s death,’ I said. ‘It’s my fault really, I just want to be on my own.’

‘I see,’ she said, looking as if she did anything but see.

‘I expect it will all blow over,’ I lied. ‘But at the moment I’m pretty much on my own. I don’t even know where Robert is.’

‘I see,’ she repeated, then went again into that practical mode in which she was at her most impressive.

‘Right. First things first. Wheels will have to be down to me then. Just let me think about it and have a word round the village. I have an idea already. I’ll get back to you later
today.’

She left straight away, enlivened by her new sense of purpose. One shouldn’t mock the Gladys Ponsonby Smythes of this world, I’d come to realize. She really did want to help, and
when given the opportunity was extremely effective.

I made myself another double espresso after she’d left and did some more thinking.

I tried to call Sue Shaw again. I had no mobile, of course, but fortunately her number, scribbled on that petrol receipt, was pinned to the cork noticeboard on the wall in the kitchen by the
house phone. I thanked the God I’d never believed in for my long-time Luddite habit. But Robbie’s girlfriend wasn’t answering her phone. Of course, her father could still have
control of it.

I considered for a moment calling the landline at the Shaw family home, which I knew from my Internet search was listed on directory enquiries. But while I was still thinking about this the
house phone rang and Sue’s number flashed onto the screen. I answered eagerly. Unfortunately the caller turned out to be her father.

‘I’m sorry about this, Mrs Anderson, but I’m going to have to ask you to stop calling my daughter,’ he said. ‘She was having a bad enough time dealing with the way
your son died and then losing the baby before all this other stuff. I’m sorry, but I really don’t want her speaking to you. So please don’t call again.’

His manner was courteous and his voice level-pitched, but I suspected at once that it was an effort for him to maintain control.

‘I-I only wanted to talk about Robbie,’ I stumbled. ‘I know we both miss him and—’

‘It’s a bit late for that, Mrs Anderson,’ responded Michael Shaw sharply, his underlying anger quickly getting the better of him. ‘Not only did you come to my home
uninvited and bully my daughter, but it seems you set the cops on me, not only over how your son died but also over the abduction of that child. Are you out of your mind?’

I mumbled something wimpish. So Jarvis and his team had conducted further inquiries as promised. At the very least it would seem that they had interviewed Michael Shaw. Only at the moment, that
did not appear to be helping my case very much.

‘What the hell were you thinking of?’ Shaw continued, and he was shouting at me now. ‘Do you think I’m as barking mad as you are, is that it? Do you think I’d go
around snatching innocent children in order to get some sort of perverted revenge on you and your precious son? Don’t you fret, Mrs Anderson, anything I want to do or say to you I’ll do
it direct, only I’m probably too decent a bloke to give you what you really fucking well deserve. You’re quite crazy enough to have taken that child, I’m dammed sure of that, and
I hope the police throw the fucking book at you. I hope they lock you up and lose the fucking key . . .’

Luke Macintyre’s mother had already given me much the same message in much the same language. I couldn’t listen to any more of it. In any case there was little point. I ended the
call and took a deep, deep breath. I asked myself what else I could expect. Of course Michael Shaw was furious. He would be furious whether or not he was responsible in any way for Robbie’s
death or Luke Macintyre’s abduction. But the latter did seem unlikely, I had to admit. And either way, it seemed clear that the Shaw family were now totally off the radar to me. I had to sort
out the whole ghastly mess for myself.