Thursday's Children (9 page)

When Becky opened her front door she gave a look of surprise that was almost comical.

‘Have you come all the way here to check up on me?’ she said.

‘I come from here, remember?’ said Frieda.

‘But I thought you hated this area with a passion.’

‘I’m just visiting. I’m showing a friend where I grew up. And while I was here I wanted to see how you were. I really expected to see your mother. I thought you’d be out with friends.’

‘What you mean is that I
should
be out with friends.’

‘I just wanted to say hello.’

Becky thought for a moment. ‘Shall I make you a cup of tea or coffee?’

Frieda smiled and shook her head. ‘I’ll be five minutes and then I’ll go.’

Becky led Frieda through the tiled hallway to a rustic kitchen with copper pans hanging from a rail above an Aga. ‘Let’s go into the garden,’ she said. ‘It feels easier to talk out there.’

At the back of the old Georgian terraced house there was a large walled garden, and behind the far wall, a wood rose away so that the house felt overshadowed. The beds were raked, the bushes pruned, everything stripped down and bare for the winter. Becky gestured vaguely around. ‘If
Mum was here, she’d tell you what all these bushes and trees are. She finds that sort of stuff interesting.’

Frieda looked at her. The girl was still pale, dark around the eyes, but there was more of a spark about her. ‘How are you feeling?’ she asked.

For the first time, Becky looked her full in the face. ‘It sounds strange, but I’m a bit better.’

‘I was going to say that you looked better. Except that I find it can be irritating when people say it to me.’

‘Why would they say it to you?’ said Becky.

‘We all go through difficult times.’

‘And why does it irritate you?’

‘You’re good at asking questions.’

‘And you’re really good at avoiding answering them.’

‘You’re right,’ Frieda said. ‘I think it’s irritating when people pretend to know more about how you’re feeling than you do yourself. And sometimes when people tell you that you’re looking fine it’s because they’re not looking hard enough.’

‘Well, I’m not fine, but I’m better than I was.’

‘The fact that you can even say that is encouraging.’

‘And there’s one thing more. Well, two things. Even though I’m feeling a bit better, I’m going to talk to someone about this.’

‘That’s good.’

Now Becky paused, pushing her hands into the pockets of her jeans. Suddenly she looked hunched up, as if she were protecting herself against something. When she spoke it was in little more than a murmur. Frieda had to lean forward to make out what she was saying.

‘I’ve been thinking of going to the police. What do you think about that?’

‘Have you told your mother?’

‘Yes.’

‘What did she say?’

Becky pulled a face. ‘She didn’t seem to like the idea. But I want to know what
you
think.’

Now it was Frieda’s turn to hesitate. ‘I don’t like giving advice.’

‘I thought that was what you did for a living.’

‘No. I try to help people be clearer about what they want. Look, Becky, I’m not going to lie. If you go to the police, things won’t be easy. It’s too late for any physical evidence. I’m not sure how much they’ll be able to do. But the fact you’re thinking of doing that is a positive sign. It shows you’re taking control.’

Suddenly Becky gave a shiver, as if a cloud had covered the sun. Looking at her, Frieda almost felt cold herself.

‘Taking control?’ Becky said. ‘That’s the problem. I keep getting these thoughts, of him and me. I don’t even want to say the words. You can’t imagine what it’s like.’

Frieda looked hard at Becky and thought, Would it be of any possible help to her to say, ‘Yes, I can imagine what it’s like’? No, she decided. It wouldn’t be right. But it made it even clearer why Becky would have to find someone else to talk to about this.

‘I’m proud of you,’ Frieda said. ‘Remember that you’ve got my number. You can ring me any time, if there’s a problem. But let me know how things are with you.’

The two of them walked back into the house and Frieda heard the front door closing, a clink of bags and a bunch of keys being put down. Maddie came into the kitchen and saw her. She was still wearing her fawn overcoat. Her expression
changed to surprise, then from surprise to anger. ‘What are you doing here?’ she said.

‘I was in the area,’ said Frieda. ‘I dropped in to see how Becky was.’

‘What are you playing at?’

‘Mum –’ Becky began.

‘Leave this to me.’ She jabbed her finger towards Frieda. ‘I don’t know what you’ve been saying to my daughter and I don’t want to know. But I came to you for help and all you’ve done is fill her head with strange ideas and, frankly, stir up her hysteria rather than cure it.’

‘I wasn’t here to tell Becky anything,’ said Frieda.

‘Really?’ said Maddie, her voice becoming louder. ‘You just happened to pop by? I come and see you and ask you for help and you tell me that you haven’t been home for twenty years. And the next time I see you, you’re in my kitchen. What a coincidence.’

‘I’m sorry you feel that,’ said Frieda. ‘I was just leaving.’

‘Don’t let me stop you.’

Frieda nodded a goodbye to Becky and walked out of the kitchen towards the front door. Maddie was behind her, still talking, and Frieda felt as if she was being washed out of the house by a strong current. As she stepped back out on to the pavement, she heard the front door slam behind her.

She had arranged to meet Sandy in the large old church that was in a square behind the high street. He had found a little local guidebook in a newsagent’s. ‘It’s got a very old font,’ he’d said. ‘Thirteenth century. And a famous rood screen. Whatever that is.’

Frieda walked back towards the church, replaying the scene with Maddie in her head. She thought of Maddie as
she had seen her in London – pleading, affectionate – and the angry woman she’d just left. She was so distracted by these thoughts that when someone spoke to her she didn’t respond at first. But then she heard the voice again, saying her name. She looked around. A woman was standing beside her. She was in her late thirties, with pale freckled skin and striking red hair tied up in a messy bun. She was dressed in a long brown skirt, slightly ripped at the hem, sturdy walking boots and a large scarf draped around her like a blanket.

‘Aren’t you Frieda?’ the woman said again. ‘Frieda Klein?’

Frieda nodded but couldn’t think of what to say.

‘My God. Frieda! I can’t believe you’re here. Have I changed that much? I’m Eva. Eva Hubbard.’

And then Frieda looked at the woman: the wrinkles smoothed from around her eyes and mouth, her figure became slighter, her red hair shorter and spikier, and then she recognized her old school friend. Eva stepped forward, threw her arms around Frieda and hugged her.

‘I can’t believe this,’ said Eva. ‘For years I thought you’d vanished off the face of the Earth completely. And then I read some things in the paper about you, really amazing things.’

Frieda thought about those things: violent deaths, accusations of professional incompetence, kidnappings. ‘You shouldn’t really pay attention to what you read in the newspapers.’

‘Even if one tenth of it is true, then it’s pretty amazing. What are you doing here? Have you moved back?’

Frieda found it oddly difficult to answer. What, really, was she doing down here? ‘I came to see my mother.’

‘I thought you’d lost touch.’

‘We had.’

‘If you’re here, why don’t you come over to my place? There’s so much to catch up on. I could give you dinner.’

‘That would have been lovely,’ Frieda said, ‘but I’m literally just setting off back to London. Some other time.’

‘Definitely. I’ve got a card.’ She fumbled in her purse and took out a card that she handed to Frieda.

Frieda looked down at it. ‘Eva Hubbard. Fifty Shades of Glaze. Pots and Pottery Classes’. ‘You’re a potter,’ said Frieda.

‘For my sins. But the next time you come down, you must absolutely come and see me. Promise?’

‘Yes, I promise.’

‘Lewis,’ said Eva.

‘What?’

‘I remember you and Lewis.’

‘I’ve got to go.’

When she met Sandy he was standing outside one of the church doors, looking up at a relief sculpture of a sheep over the archway.

‘I like this,’ he said. ‘To be honest, I’m not sure why the rood screen was so famous. But this sheep I like. I’ve read about it in the guidebook. It’s not so much the Lamb of God. It’s the wool from the sheep that earned the money to pay for the church. But enough of that. How did it go?’

‘We can talk in the car. I’m done here. But I need your help.’

Frieda was relieved to be back in London, with tarmac and not mud underfoot, in a city where it was never dark and never quiet. But she wasn’t there for long. On Monday morning she rose early, had breakfast at the café her friends ran, Number 9, and walked to her consulting rooms. She saw two patients. The first was a middle-aged woman called Sarah-Jane whose youngest son had jumped off a tall building nine months ago; she no longer wanted to be alive but she had two other children so felt she had no right to die, or even to want to die. The other was a violently sarcastic young man who had recently been referred to her. After he left, even the air felt bruised.

Frieda drank a tall glass of water, then checked her messages. There was one from Sandy: ‘Hi, Frieda. Bobbie Coleman is free tomorrow at a quarter past eleven. Let me know if that’s fine.’

‘She sounds perfect,’ Frieda said, when she called him. ‘I’ll cancel my patients and go down there.’

There was also an email from Becky, saying that Maddie had been very angry after Frieda had left, but that she was still intending to go to the police; she just needed a few days to pluck up courage. And she asked Frieda for advice about a therapist she could see.

Frieda wrote back to her at once. She gave Becky three names, two women and a man (although she said a woman
might be easier to talk to about rape), and their phone numbers. ‘Mention me,’ she wrote, ‘and tell them that I’m very happy to talk to them about your situation if that would be helpful. Remember, Becky,’ she went on. ‘You mustn’t see someone you would feel awkward with or don’t take to. It’s very important to be able to say no if necessary. These three people are good, but they might not be good for you. Call me if you need more advice, and do please let me know how things go.’

Then she rearranged her three patients of the following day and called her mother, telling her she was going to visit her in the morning, at about ten. A voice in her head told her that she was treating her mother like a child, trying to control her. She agreed with the voice, but ignored it.

She had two more patients that afternoon, then a longed-for evening at home. She had told Sandy she needed to be alone and, indeed, when she closed the door of her little house and stood in silence, the cat at her ankles purring, she felt a relief so strong it was as if a heavy weight had been lifted from her shoulders. She closed the shutters, lit the fire, boiled a kettle for tea, sat in her armchair by the flames with a book, loving the patter of rain outside and the warmth and comfort within.

Maddie Capel let herself back into her house, slightly tipsy and fumbling with the key. It was after midnight and she’d been away since the early morning, visiting a friend in Norwich. They had been on a shopping spree, then had a meal in a little French restaurant and drunk rather too much wine, flirted with the waiter and talked about errant husbands and difficult children. At first Maddie had been a bit anxious
about going. She didn’t know if she ought to leave Becky alone. But her friend had been insistent that she needed a break, and Becky hadn’t seemed to mind. They had argued about her intention to report the rape to the police, and then about Frieda, and Becky had seemed almost relieved to get her mother out of the house. Maddie had to admit that she felt better, in spite of her headache. It was good to escape sometimes; necessary.

She left her bags of shopping in the hall. She would put them away before Becky got up in the morning. She didn’t want her daughter to see everything she’d bought: the red shoes and the skirt that was probably too short for her, but who cared?; the cloche hat she’d fallen in love with in the shop but knew now that she would probably never wear.

There was a faint, unfamiliar smell lingering in the air. In the kitchen she saw from the empty dishwasher that Becky probably hadn’t eaten anything. But, then, she wouldn’t have eaten anything if Maddie had been there, trying to persuade her. Her daughter was a stubborn young woman. Stubborn and angry and wretched. Her friend had reassured her that it would pass. ‘They don’t understand what they put us through,’ she had said.

The smell was slightly stronger as she went up the stairs. Becky’s bedroom door was shut and the house was very quiet, just the drip of a tap coming from the bathroom. Maddie wasn’t sure why she pushed at the closed door. It swung open with a small creak, then stopped against something. She put her head around the door and for a moment stood gazing into her daughter’s room. She saw the soft toys heaped up on the windowsill, she saw the postcards pinned
on the board and the bookshelves and the schoolbooks. And her daughter hanging from the beam, as thin and slack and dead as a person can be. One of her shoes had fallen off. Her eyes were open.

Maddie screamed. She crumpled to the floor, still screaming, hiding her face from the terror above her. She screamed until a neighbour who had a spare key woke with the noise and let herself in to see what the trouble was. Still she went on screaming, until her voice was hoarse, and until the blue lights and sirens came down the street.

The following morning, Frieda was up very early and at Liverpool Street station in time for the eight o’clock train, going east against the thick flow of London-bound commuters. She got a cab from the station and well before ten was once more knocking on the door of her mother’s house.

‘Well, well,’ said her mother. ‘I should probably say something about buses.’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘You know – you wait for twenty-three years and two come at once. Except, of course, you’re not two buses, you’re one.’

‘Could I have some coffee?’

‘As long as you don’t ask me any more questions about what happened here on a night too long ago to remember.’

‘I won’t.’

The wine bottle was still in the centre of the hall. The kitchen still gleamed. It looked as if nothing had been moved or touched since Frieda’s visit on Sunday. Juliet Klein made coffee in silence. Outside, the day was grey and damp.

‘So,’ she said, putting a mug in front of Frieda. ‘Why have
you come back? Did you suddenly realize how much you’ve been missing me?’

‘I’ve booked a cab to come and pick us up here at half past ten. You’ve got a hospital appointment at eleven fifteen.’

‘No, I haven’t.’

‘With Professor Roberta Coleman. She’s organized a brain scan for you.’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘I think it’s necessary.’

‘Is this some kind of joke?’

‘No.’

‘Good, because it’s not making me laugh. You’ve come here to take me to hospital because you think there’s something wrong with my brain?’

‘Sometimes changes of behaviour are easier for an outsider to notice.’

‘Is this some kind of psychological revenge? Because if so …’

‘It’s just a precaution,’ said Frieda.

‘When your patients come to you saying they’re unhappy, do you send them off for physical examinations?’

‘If they need it. Are you unhappy?’

‘I wish you’d never come back. David was right. I was better off without you.’ She glared at Frieda, her mouth a tight, straight line. ‘So, what are these changes in my behaviour?’ she asked.

‘They sound insignificant.’

‘Remember, I was a GP for nearly forty years. You can’t patronize me with your medical knowledge.’

‘You drink out of the corner of your mouth. You make
sudden facial expressions that I don’t believe you’re aware of.’

‘That’s it?’

‘I noticed that you haven’t opened your mail for several months.’

‘Detective Klein. That falls into a different category.’

‘Yes, you’re right.’

‘It probably makes you think I’m depressed – while my tea-drinking and face-making makes you wonder if I have a brain tumour.’

‘It’s worth checking.’

She put her coffee down on the side. ‘I don’t think I want to drink this in front of you. You’ll be scrutinizing the way my mouth works, or doesn’t.’

‘Will you come to the hospital?’

‘Why not? A nice morning out with my daughter.’

It was hard for Frieda not to respond ironically to her mother’s incessant irony.

‘Good,’ was all that she said. ‘You should take off anything metal. That way you’ll probably be allowed to stay in your own clothes. I’ve brought some earplugs with me. It gets noisy in the MRI machine.’

Thank you, Doctor.’ The tone was brittle but, just for a moment, Juliet Klein looked anxious.

‘The cab will be here any minute.’

Frieda sat in the waiting room and read her book until her mother returned from her scan.

‘All right?’ she asked.

‘Slightly unnerving,’ her mother replied.

‘When will you get the results?’

‘They’ll send them to my doctor in a day or two.’

‘That’s quick. You’ll let me know?’

Juliet Klein tipped her head to one side and regarded her daughter. ‘Perhaps,’ she said. ‘But you can go home now.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes. I think I’ll do some shopping since I’m here. No need for you to hang around. I’m not dying yet.’

They looked at each other. Frieda nodded and lifted her hand in farewell, then walked from the room.

While she waited for a taxi to take her to the station, she turned on her mobile. She hadn’t checked her messages since yesterday afternoon. Two texts pinged on to the screen. The first was from Becky, sent the evening before in acknowledgement of Frieda’s email of the previous day.
Thanks!
it said, and there was a smiley face beside the word. The second was from Maddie, sent two hours ago. Frieda opened it.

See what you’ve done. I hope you’re satisfied.

The air chilled around her. She stood quite still for a moment, frowning, and was about to call Maddie when she changed her mind. Instead she went to Google and entered Becky’s name, staring fixedly at the screen until the words appeared.

Even before she clicked on the story, she knew it was bad. ‘Teenage Girl Found Dead At Her Home,’ she read. The full story appeared, by a local reporter. She scrolled down, taking in the bare facts: Rebecca Capel, aged fifteen, had been found dead at her home in the early hours of the morning by her mother, Mrs Madeleine Capel. There were no suspicious circumstances; Detective Craigie confirmed
that the police were not looking for anyone else. The family were devastated by the tragedy. The head of Becky’s school, Briony Loftus, said she had been a bright, popular and talented student whom everyone would miss.

A taxi arrived and Frieda climbed into it. ‘To the police station,’ she said.

‘The one on Wolsey Road?’

‘If that’s the main one, yes.’

Detective Inspector Craigie was in her early thirties, thin and strong, with dark curly hair pulled into a tight knot at the back of her head and heavy dark brows that gave her a forbidding look.

‘How can I help you?’ she asked.

‘You’re in charge of Rebecca Capel’s case?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’m Dr Frieda Klein. I have information about her death.’

‘Well.’ DI Craigie raised her eyebrows. ‘There will be an inquest, of course, but I’m not sure how you can help in what is a very tragic death. The case is closed.’

‘The case needs to be reopened.’

Craigie looked at her for several seconds. ‘Very well. I’ll find a room for us and you can tell me what’s bothering you.’

But there wasn’t a room available. They were in the process of redecorating, she explained. So in the end she led Frieda outside, into an unexpected patch of green at the back of the station. It was in need of tending. There were thick brambles along the wall.

‘It’s where people come to have a cigarette,’ Craigie
explained. ‘Have a seat.’ She gestured at the shabby wooden bench.

But Frieda remained standing and so did the detective.

‘Becky didn’t kill herself.’

‘It’s difficult when a young person chooses to take their own life. Hard to come to terms with.’

‘Becky did not take her own life.’

‘Becky’s mother mentioned you, Dr Klein.’

‘I saw Becky as a therapist, but Maddie’s probably told you that. She must also have told you that Becky had been raped and that she was very distressed.’

‘Mrs Capel expressed some doubt about that. But there was no doubt about her fragile emotional state.’

‘There is no doubt about the rape.’

‘But she didn’t report it?’

‘She was going to.’

Craigie looked dubious. ‘What makes you think there was anything suspicious about her death?’

‘I spoke to her on Sunday and she seemed better.’

‘That’s not her mother’s opinion. But go on.’

‘She told me she had decided to go to the police to report her rape, and that she had also decided to see a therapist on a proper basis. She asked me to recommend someone, which I did, yesterday.’

‘And?’

‘Both those decisions are dynamic, assertive, forward-looking. They are not the decisions of a girl who is suicidal.’

‘I’m sure you understand things like this better than I do. But, from what I’ve been told, Becky was very upset by her parents’ divorce. She was anorexic, she was self-harming, she had got into trouble at school, she was truanting. Her
mother says that she suspects she was using drugs. She claims to have been raped.’ She held up her hands to ward off any protest. ‘I’m not saying she wasn’t. I’m simply stating the facts as I know them. According to her mother, she was vulnerable and hysterical.’

‘That’s not true. Becky wasn’t hysterical. She was remarkably resilient.’

‘Your impressions aren’t evidence.’

‘How did she do it?’ asked Frieda, thinking of the thin, anguished girl, who had sat in her room and wept so bitterly.

‘I can’t tell you that. There’s going to be an inquest.’

‘She sent me a text yesterday evening. Look.’ Frieda pulled out her phone.

‘It’s very common, as you must know, for people to feel guilty or in denial when someone they know kills themselves.’

‘That is
not
what this is about.’

‘I’m sure you had good intentions, but Mrs Capel says you encouraged her daughter in her fantasies and wouldn’t let her move on from her distress. I know it must be difficult to lose a patient, but there it is.’