The Endings Man (15 page)

Curle was sitting over the remnants of his breakfast when he heard the outside door being opened. A moment later, Liz came into the kitchen.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘Nothing.’ She pulled out a seat on the other side of the table and sat down.

‘Kerr’s gone to school?’

‘Yes!’ She made a gesture of impatience. For once, it seemed that didn’t matter.

He sat in silence taking her in. She had left her coat in the hall or the car. She had on a dark grey skirt and a white blouse, the outfit she wore to work. He saw that she was wearing her hair longer, almost to the shoulders, dark almost black hair, thick and shining from regular brushing. She was tall, almost as tall as he was, with long legs and finely shaped breasts pressing against the fabric of the white blouse. She had a strong face, the nose a little large, the mouth wide, not pretty at all, handsome perhaps, you couldn’t be in any doubt looking at her that she was intelligent. It seemed as if he was seeing her properly, really looking at her, as he hadn’t done since Mae had been killed. There had been a time when he had loved her more than anyone in the world.

‘I’m so sorry,’ she said.

‘What would that be for?’

‘For not being here when you needed me.’

‘To give me an alibi? You think I need one? Anyway, you told them I was here all night. I appreciate that. You lied for me.’

‘It wasn’t a lie! I know you were here. Where else would you be?’

‘Question is, where were you?’

‘You don’t need to believe this, but when I woke up yesterday morning I was worried about you. I imagined you going crazy when I didn’t come home. I thought, he’ll have phoned the hospitals. I thought you’d have phoned the police.’ She stopped abruptly. ‘You didn’t phone the police?’

‘No.’

‘Thank God for that.’

‘So where exactly would that be, where you woke up yesterday?’

She put her hand over her mouth. Her eyes above it seemed enormous.

‘I woke up in a hotel bedroom. I can’t believe I’m saying that.’

‘Alone?’

‘Yes. A place called the Smiddy, over by the zoo. There wasn’t anything wrong with it. I mean, it wasn’t squalid or anything, just an ordinary hotel room in an ordinary hotel.’

‘I wish you’d take your hand away from your mouth. It’s what liars do, cover their mouths.’

Somewhere under the surface he felt surprise when she did it. She wasn’t a meek woman. Her submissiveness fed his anger unreasonably.

She brushed at her face as if unconsciously clearing away strands of fog. ‘It was dark and at first I didn’t know
where I was, and when I did it was hard to believe. I got up when it grew light and sat in a chair. I went to work because I couldn’t think of anything else to do. I was still wearing the clothes I’d worn to the shop the day before. I couldn’t face coming home.’

‘Home,’ he said, and felt his mouth twist as if he were going to have a stroke.

‘We’ve been angry with one another for so long. But when I learned about your mistress, I wasn’t angry. It was all mixed up with her being killed. How could you be angry with someone who was dead? I wasn’t angry, I was ashamed. When he asked me to dinner, that was all it was supposed to be.’

‘In a hotel?’ he asked bitterly. And then he realised that he hadn’t asked the obvious question. Hadn’t asked because he knew the answer. ‘Who the hell are we talking about?’

‘Brian Todd.’

‘That bastard.’ Anyone in the world but that bastard.

‘He was kind. He seemed kind. He’d come to the shop and taken me to lunch. He talked about you, when you were at school together. What a swine he’d been. How he wished that he could go back and be different. He’d read your books. He admired you. I needed someone to talk to about how I felt. And he understood that. And then he asked me to dinner and Kerr was away, there wasn’t anything to take me home. I said yes.’

‘And then you went to bed with him.’

‘He’d booked a room. I could have walked out, but you’ve no idea how natural he made it seem.’

‘You’ve got that right. I’ve no idea.’

‘We went up to the room. He’d got them to send up a bottle of champagne in an ice bucket. I took off my clothes
and then I went to the bathroom. When I came out, he’d put his jacket back on. I was standing there naked, and he had his coat over his arm. He looked me up and down slowly and then he said, “Enjoy the champagne.”’

He knew it was true and almost choked on the fury of his anger with her.

‘You stupid, stupid bitch. It wasn’t about you. He did it to hurt me. Were you too stupid to know that?’

She put her hand over her mouth and took it away at once as if not wanting to offend him.

In a voice almost too quiet for him to hear, she said, ‘I didn’t kill Mae. You’ve never stopped blaming me. Why do you blame me?’

It was then he felt something in his chest, some old barrier, shatter into pieces that would never be put together again. As he shook his head helplessly over and over again in denial, tears poured down his cheeks.

It was coming to the time of year when he wouldn’t fill the nut holder any more. Held by a length of twine, it hung from a branch of the tree in the garden and during the months after Christmas there would always be little birds dabbing at the nuts with their blunt beaks, right way up, or like acrobats head down. Some woman neighbour had told him, talking from a ladder as she sawed off a branch intruding over her fence, that once you started feeding the birds you had to do it all year round. It’s become one of their food supplies, she’d said. It seemed to him, though, that if birds couldn’t forage for themselves in the summer something was wrong. He got a good feeling from doing a kind deed in the winter, but filling the holder all summer would make him feel as if they were taking him for some kind of fool.

At the moment, though, after the emotional storm with Liz, who had taken refuge from it all by going into work, feeding the birds was soothingly mindless. He stood on the bench and unhooked the holder from the tree branch. From the garden hut, he fetched the plastic Tesco bag full of nuts that hung on a hook behind the door. He’d set the holder upright on the slats of the bench and now he lifted the cap off and started to pour in handfuls of peanuts. When it was almost filled, he got down on hands and knees
and gathered as many as he could of the nuts that had fallen through the slats, on the theory that feeding birds was fine, but feeding vermin was a bad idea.

It was like that, down on hands and knees, that he heard the garden gate bang back against the fence. His first thought was that it couldn’t have been properly fastened, his second that there was no wind to blow it open. He looked over his shoulder and saw Brian Todd striding towards him.

‘You cunt!’ His face red to match the colour of his hair, the shouting was instant and combustible. In a long Crombie coat, seen from below he seemed like a square of darkness blotting out the sky.

Curle scrambled up, but as he got to his feet a hand in his chest sent him staggering back.

‘How dare you?’ The tirade continued on a single breath. ‘How fucking dare you? What the hell did you think you were doing?’

In a state of shock, Curle opened and closed his mouth, not able to speak or make any response. After it was over, though in his heart he knew a better man would have met anger with anger, he would try to comfort himself that it had all been too sudden.

Rage seemed to have congested Todd’s face, laid thick strips of flesh around the eyes and mouth. Flecks of spittle gathered at the corners of his lips.

Curle had no doubt the man was out of control and was about to attack him with his fists.

‘I should beat the shit out of you!’ he screamed, the swollen face inches from his victim.

At that moment, from the other side of the six-foot wooden fence, a clear voice floated up like a blessing from an unseen neighbour. ‘Is something wrong?’

Todd leaned even closer and whispered, ‘Things never change, do they? That bitch Harriet Strang at school. And you’re still hiding behind a woman’s skirts.’

‘Is something wrong, Barclay? Should I call the police?’

Curle found his voice. He called, ‘It’s all right, Jill. He’s just going.’

Todd took a half step backwards. In a conversational voice, which somehow made worse the fierceness of his words, he said, ‘Don’t come to my house again or I’ll hurt you. My wife is out of bounds, understand?’ He poked Curle in the chest, three times for emphasis. ‘Don’t you ever, ever, ever, speak to her again.’

He turned as if to go, but then swung round. ‘Remember that bitch at school? Remember her? She got upset because I slapped your face. Like this.’ He struck Curle across the cheek, and stood for a moment before showing his teeth in a parody of a smile. ‘Nothing ever changes,’ he said.

When Jill the neighbour appeared, Curle was sitting on the bench under the tree.

‘I hope you didn’t mind me interfering.’

He looked up at her dully. With an effort, he said, ‘Not as bad as it sounded.’

‘Whoever he was, he sounded like a madman.’ A ruddy-cheeked widow, full of surplus energy and missing the intrigues of the boarding house she’d once run, curiosity made her more animated than he’d ever seen her. ‘Just as well I was cleaning out the shed.’

‘Just a misunderstanding. He apologised and left.’

‘Did he say something about his wife?’

‘No. Why would he do that? He was – a writer – I did a review – and he took exception to it. As I said, all sound and fury.’

‘Ah…’ Something in her tone told him that she had him down now as an adulterer. Before he could try again, she exclaimed, ‘Oh dear, did you knock them over?’

Following her gaze, he saw that the holder was lying on its side and that spilled peanuts were piled under the bench.

‘Let me help you to gather them up.’

‘No!’ he said more sharply than he’d intended. ‘No… Really, I’ll manage.’

He waited her out, but even after she’d gone he sat motionless staring at the nuts scattered on the grass, his hands trembling too badly for him to attempt to pick them up.

I’ve fallen in love with my wife and had my face slapped,
Curle thought, and it’s not twelve o’clock yet.

He got up slowly from the garden bench. Going back into the house, his legs felt stiff as if he’d aged thirty years. Behind him, the nuts still lay where they’d fallen, but he didn’t care. It was good to feel irresponsible. Let the rats eat them.

The need to get away from his own thoughts drove him out of the house. It was one of those days when the cloud cover shone with a cold pearly glow. The air stung his cheeks as he walked down to the bus stop. After a bit, he began to move more briskly, swinging his arms, with the air of a man in charge of his life.

At the end of his journey, the same deceptive energy took him up the stairs to Jonah’s office at a run. The personal assistant, Alice, was at her desk, her door open.

Panting after the effort, he said, ‘I’m getting too old for that stuff.’

‘Walking up stairs?’

‘Running!’ he protested. And added as his breathing eased, ‘I wouldn’t mind a word, but if he’s busy it doesn’t matter.’

‘He’s gone for lunch.’

‘Already?’

She flipped open a desk calendar. ‘He’d an appointment at twelve, but he cancelled it when Mr Todd phoned.’

‘Brian Todd?’

She smiled. ‘You know him? He came in last week. He’s a charmer, isn’t he?’

Curle managed a smile. ‘For you, maybe.’

‘I think most women would think that way.’

It had never struck him before that she might be stupid.

‘So they’re having lunch?’

‘At the Centotre. You know, in George Street?’

He walked up to St Andrews Square and along George Street. He’d heard of the Centotre, a new Italian café-bar and restaurant, but hadn’t been there and, having chosen the wrong pavement, almost missed the entry, muted on the façade of a fine Georgian building. Having come that far, pacing along like a man late for an appointment, his steps faltered to a halt. Stopping was a mistake. Better to have gone with his body’s momentum and let it march him up the steps. What can he do to me in a public place? he thought. And then, If he so much as looks at me the wrong way, I’ll stab him in the eye with a fork. And gathering his self-respect, he went inside.

The agent looked up in surprise at his approach. He was alone at the table.

Curle rested his hand on the back of a chair.

‘Alice told me you were having lunch with Todd.’

‘Did she, indeed? I’ll have to smack her wrist. Not that it isn’t always a pleasure to see you.’

‘She must have thought Todd was pleasure as well. Not business, I mean.’

Jonah frowned.

‘Why don’t you sit down?’ he said. ‘Join us for lunch.’

‘Why not?’

They drank a glass of wine and twenty minutes passed. Fidgeting with his napkin, Jonah suggested that they should order. Curle, whose mind wasn’t on food, followed his choices so that they both had chicken broth and broiled fish.

‘You’re being very quiet,’ Jonah said as they pushed their plates away.

Curle looked around. The group around the nearest table was getting up to go.

‘I was waiting for Todd to come.’

‘Coffee?’ Jonah signalled to the waiter. ‘I doubt if he’ll be coming now.’

‘I did want to talk to you.’ Curle tried for a smile and felt it quiver and fade.

‘Is something wrong?’

‘I have to talk to someone.’ He fell silent as the plates were cleared away.

Jonah looked at his watch. ‘Half an hour enough? I’ve got a pile of stuff back at the office.’

‘It’s not easy.’

‘
In media res,
’ Jonah said. ‘Jump right in. Good rule, if you want to tell a story.’

Curle had wanted to talk about Todd. He’d intended to tell how he had come to his house that morning. Not smooth, not smiling, not the man they’d been meeting after a lapse of so many years. How had his neighbour described it? Like a madman. But as he braced himself to start, he realised that there was no way in the world he could confess to this old friend that it had happened again. For the second time in his life, Todd had slapped his face. For the second time, he had taken it and done nothing. The crucial difference being that this time he had done nothing not as a boy, but a man.

‘Well?’ Jonah smiled and raised an eyebrow.

‘The night before last—’ he began.

‘I know!’ Jonah exclaimed. ‘I saw it in the papers!’

‘What?’

‘That woman being killed in the flat under Ali Fleming’s. Such a grotesque coincidence.’

Curle made a gesture as if sweeping something aside.

‘The night before last, Liz didn’t come home,’ he heard himself saying.

He told the story from when he had sat in his car waiting to follow her, through the journey to the hotel, seeing the two of them in the bar, taking a room, wakening in the morning, finding her car gone. Jonah listened attentively, interjecting a question or comment at intervals. ‘You watched her car?’ in a tone of mild outrage. ‘Brian? Brian was with her?’ sounding shocked. ‘You just sat in the room all night?’

‘No, I got into bed and slept for some of it,’ Curle said sullenly. Telling the story didn’t make him feel good about himself, he regretted having started it.

When he’d finished, Jonah said censoriously, ‘I have to say you deserved all you got.’

‘I’m not the bloody adulterer!’

‘Best not to know,’ Jonah said. ‘Wouldn’t you be happier if you didn’t know that Brian had fucked your wife?’

‘He didn’t!’

‘Didn’t?’

And Curle repeated what Liz had told him about Todd laughing at her and leaving.

‘Not an adulterer then,’ Jonah observed. He broke into a smile. ‘That’s an enormous relief. Must be. For you, I mean.’

‘Just a bastard! I don’t think he’s sane.’ And he thought
again of how Todd had looked as he burst into the garden that morning; and again couldn’t bear to speak of it.

‘Oh, I don’t think it’s a mad thing to do. You wouldn’t have to be insane, just very very malicious. Appallingly malicious, in fact. It’s very troubling.’ Smile gone as quickly as it had come, he chewed on his knuckles and thought for a moment. ‘The thing is, he must hate you. I can’t think why. After all this time, it’s very strange. I believe we must make an effort to find the reason.’

As soon as the word had been used, Curle understood that, yes, it must be that he was hated. Hatred, he had felt it not as an abstraction, but palpable as flesh meeting flesh. Now it was all around, a mist darkening the air, a foul taste in the mouth. It changed the world and made it unbearable. In the end, the rats got everything.

In the end, the rats got everything.

He must have said it aloud.

‘Don’t start thinking like that, for God’s sake. That kind of talk is bollocks,’ Jonah responded. ‘Great swollen sodding writers’ bollocks.’

With an exclamation, he looked at his watch. The half-hour he’d offered had stretched to more than twice that length.

‘Oh dear, another appointment missed. And I’m due to meet someone in the next ten minutes.’ Catching the eye of a waiter, he scribbled on the air in the universal sign of wanting a bill. ‘I really am sorry. We could meet later?’

‘No,’ Curle said. ‘I have to get back anyway. Kerr will be home from school.’

‘Tomorrow then, if you want. Ring me. I’ll make time.’

They walked back to Jonah’s office in silence, each lost in his own thoughts.

As they parted at the street entrance, Jonah asked, ‘Are you sure you’re all right?’

‘I’ll manage,’ Curle said.

Time to go back and wait for his son to come home.