Veil of Darkness (37 page)

Candice has one date to go on, and that is 1913, the date when
Magdalene
was supposedly published. She might as well start there, but she is prepared for a daunting task which might take her days, or even weeks. Candice will bide her time hiding in here, waiting for the scandal to break. Her mobile is firmly switched off.

‘Ellen Kirkwood… died 1913. Plymouth.’

She jumps as the name leaps from the page. Could this be the same Ellen Kirkwood? If so, she died the year the book came out. That is extraordinary and, for the author, presumably most unfortunate.

She has nothing more to go on. So Candice moves back to the local reference sections. She ploughs through them all afternoon only stopping for an apple and a Marmite and cucumber sandwich around three o’clock. On screen she flicks through tomes about local dignitaries till her eyes ache, reformers and performers that drive her silly. Pages and pages of ancient newspapers all harping on about threatened war, politics, crime and punishment—the
Western Morning News
, the
Evening Herald
…

An unnatural hush gathers round her.

The bang of a door makes her start.

She suddenly hears clocks ticking where there was silence before.

‘Kirkwood apprehended for vile murder.’

‘Sensation, more bodies found in Kirkwood case.’

‘Kirkwood shows no emotion in court.’

‘Kirkwood sentenced to death by hanging.’

The police soon realized they were dealing with, not the ignorant ladies’ maid they’d assumed, but a woman of high education and exceptional ingenuity…

Ellen Kirkwood was a privileged child brought up by a professional and Christian family. Educated at St Jude’s Roman Catholic Academy for Girls until she was expelled for stealing, and disowned by her family at the age of fifteen, Miss Kirkwood then quickly descended through society’s ranks until she ended up in the gutter, a fallen woman, where the Salvation Army found her and offered a helping hand. Eventually, being well mannered and well spoken, she found employment as a lady’s maid at the home of eminent politician Sir Michael Geary, and it was from this innocent gentleman’s house that she started a life of chronic deceit, setting off on nocturnal wanderings, the violent and gruesome consequences of which ended up with cold, premeditated slaughter, the details of which were explained in court for all to hear.

It is still not known how many young men met their deaths at this evil murderess’s hand.

Throughout her trial, Miss Kirkwood displayed an iron calm, an astonishing self-control, a power to hide all feelings.

Ellen Kirkwood’s just punishment for her ghastly and wicked crimes was delayed for two months to allow for the birth of her illegitimate child. She was buried in the precincts of the prison where she was last confined.

Jesus Christ Almighty.

So—Candice Love runs a hand through uncharacteristically messy hair—
Magdalene
, the masterpiece, was possibly never published. The copy she has in her hand is most likely one of a tiny number—under such sorry circumstances the publisher, Bryant, must have scrapped the print run once they discovered the appalling crimes of their author. Murderers were not in vogue then, just one or two copies must have scraped through. That could be why the novel is not listed anywhere in this vast and comprehensive library.

How different reactions would be today. How they would gather, vultures at a feast, if this killer offered her story today: How the public would clamour for more, how hungry most of us are for our shy little glimpses of evil.

But we no longer hang those who founder, and we don’t consign losers to the gutter. Well, not happily anyway.

There are no rights to
Magdalene
?

1913, so it’s out of copyright.

The book could still be published and what a story the deception would make.

But what happened to Kirkwood’s child? There could be trouble from that quarter.

There is more delving to be done before Candice Love has all the answers. But the place she must start is the Burleston Hotel, the nest from which this masterpiece hatched, the locality of its unhappy conception.

W
ORN OUT BY A
wasted night on the tiles drinking alone in a Plymouth pub, Avril fumes on. Nobody had come to sit beside her no matter what she did with her eyes, nobody seemed to be impressed by the shortness of her skirt, the fishnet tights, the tinted eyelashes, the scarlet lipstick or the come-and-get me look which she had rehearsed to perfection beforehand.

She had caught sight of herself in a mirror and stared stupidly at it. She nearly looked like a man in drag. She was now the sort of woman she would have crossed the pavement to avoid, the very prototype of all mother’s warnings: loose, immoral, fallen. Only one man showed any interest and he was over fifty, unshaven, shabby and stank of urine.

She ended up boss-eyed and sick, and went to sleep with her caravan room spiralling around her and Kirsty, of all people, nagging on about bad influences on the children.

And now look, that scheming actress Bernadette has stolen Avril’s thunder by resorting to hysterical dramatics over her so-called fiancé’s ‘accident’. The agent is in intensive care, hovering on the brink of death with tubes up every orifice, according to Bernie, who has decided to return to Cornwall because she can’t take the strain any more.

‘Just when I was so happy,’ sobbed Bernie on the phone, hysterical. ‘And I’ve got something else to tell you. Something worse, oh Jaysus…’

Kirsty, who ought to be concentrating on Avril and her coming ordeal—the inquest into the fire is tomorrow—has been taken in by Bernie’s charade and is collecting her from the station. They are going to view the cottage together, but why should Bernie be included? Bernie certainly will not be invited to join the select little family. Oh no.

So much for the godlike Rory Coburn and his influence over Bernie’s accountants, his assurances of assistance to Bernie throughout her difficult publicity campaigns, so much for a shoulder to lean on. Bernie probably made it all up, she probably got obsessed with the guy and ended up making a fool of herself, just as she did over Dominic Coates. Some women seem doomed to such trauma—loving too much, the experts call it.

And if Kirsty thinks Avril is a bad influence on her precious children, maybe she should look closer at Bernie.

Poor Avril is never at rest these days. The pressure of her pent-up anger has not been assuaged by the tragedy—Avril, who four months ago wouldn’t have dared say boo to a goose. It’s a complete reversal of character, and sometimes the force of it makes her feel sick and she actually has to vomit—the colour has started to worry her; could she have some terrible disease. For apart from the contents of her stomach there are unidentifiable patches, like growths, attached to some of the chunks.

She flushes it away in a state of denial, trying not to look. And she sometimes calls out in her dreams and wakes Kirsty.

The children, the children, the bloody children. Everything centres round Jake and Gemma, spoilt little brats who want their heads knocking together. Guilt makes Kirsty overindulgent; she is trying to compensate for their experiences, selfishly making herself feel better but ruining the kids for life. They need a much firmer hand, they ought to be forced to finish their food, stick to a certain bedtime, wash and tidy up after themselves, and there’s no need for Kirsty to read them a story every night whatever their behaviour.

Avril watches all this as pulses hammer behind her forehead. Sometimes her fists are so tightly clenched that the veins in her wrists stand out with the pressure of her fury. Let her get her hands on these kids, she’d soon teach them about respect, good manners, gratitude and subservience.

‘You look like a Christmas tree, Avril,’ Gemma had the nerve to say the last time she got in her evening taxi heading for the bright lights.

‘You’ve got a big fat
bum,’ said Jake soon after. ‘If that
bum was mine I’d try to hide it, not show it off in those striped leggings.’

‘You mind your own business,’ said Avril, fiddling with a large glass earring.

But Kirsty, who should have curbed them with a good slap across their faces, merely gave a sorry shrug and said something silly like, ‘Kids, what can you do?’

You can do a great deal, thinks Avril. There’s something to be said, after all, for Mother’s attitude to children.

Kirsty even suggested allowing the children a day off school to let them look round the cottage—why the hell should they have a say? Avril reminded her that they might get too excited and be disappointed if it fell through. So Kirsty changed her mind. Thank God.

Imagine the shambles those kids would cause. Chatter chattering in the car, dashing about the cottage and embarrassing them in front of the owner, jumping on the beds and rolling around on the sofas and chairs. What makes Kirsty so blind to the unattractiveness of her children?

If they don’t get shown some discipline soon they are going to end up off the rails and in real trouble, like Graham.

‘Clear up your own toys,’ said Avril to Gemma one evening when Kirsty was out. ‘Don’t think for one moment that I’m going to do it. I’m not as silly as your mother.’

‘OK,’ said Gemma artfully, wary of falling foul of Avril.

‘And you, don’t just hang around so slyly trying to get out of doing your share. There’s all that washing-up in the sink,’ Avril said to Jake.

‘I’ll make a cup of tea when I’ve finished,’ said the cunning boy, turning on the charm.

I can see through you, sweetheart.

She wanted to slap his leg hard.

The cottage is charming. It smells of woodsmoke. It stands on its own just outside a village. The floors are slate and covered with rugs, the furniture is shabbily comfortable and there is a Rayburn in the kitchen.

The jumped-up Bernie stands out like a sore thumb in the middle of the country, in her pink suede jacket, her long black boots and her fluffy hat. She looks like a Russian ballerina and surely everyone’s staring.

She should have stayed where she was in London.

Kirsty and Avril don’t want her here.

‘What sort of accident was it?’ asks Kirsty, all silly concern as they circle their way up the small staircase. ‘It must have been bad to put Rory in intensive care.’

‘He took something.’

‘What?
On purpose
?’

‘By accident. He took too many sleeping pills, B–b–but there’s worse than that, I have to tell you…’

‘You mean he tried to top himself?’ Avril, certain that Bernie is lying, is determined the truth should come out.

‘Why would he want to do that?’ Bernie pleads, with that silly little-girl-lost look on her face. ‘He adored me. We would have got married and then none of this would have happened.’

‘You still can, can’t you?’ Kirsty is going along with the farce. ‘And what d’you mean, none of this?’

But Bernie seems unable to answer. Instead she sobs, ‘Bentley found him,’ as they go round the three upstairs bedrooms. Avril hopes she realizes there is no spare bedroom for her. ‘He was unconscious. They say he was near the end.’

‘Some accident,’ says Avril tartly, knowing that this larger, sunnier, more airy room will be offered to the children.

‘And then there’s the attic,’ says Mr Pratt, the owner, leading the way.

‘Oh what a brilliant playroom,’ cries Kirsty. ‘Isn’t this lovely, Avril? It would be perfect!’

‘I would like this room as a study,’ says Avril.

‘A study? Whatever for?’

How patronizing that they should ask. ‘Any work I might decide to take on,’ says Avril aggressively. ‘And I might like a sitting room of my own where I can entertain friends. I don’t want to have to share everything with your family,’ she tells Kirsty briskly. ‘I need my own space, you know.’

Kirsty hesitates, seemingly surprised that Avril should have strong views of her own. ‘Well, yes, of course, if you feel that way, Avril.’

‘Well, I do,’ says Avril firmly.

Into the tension Bernie blunders, ‘I hope you’ll be able to afford it.’

Kirsty and Avril turn round, baffled, and Bernie goes on before they can ask her. ‘We might have to give it all back.’

‘What are you saying?’ asks Kirsty, frowning.

‘Give what back? The money?’ cries Avril.

‘No, no, I’m joking, don’t take any notice,’ wails Bernie distraughtly, her face turning ashen. ‘But now Rory’s in hospital and I just don’t know what’s going to happen. You see, I was depending on him.’

‘That’s your trouble,’ says Avril tartly, sounding so like her mother that even she recognizes the echo on the ether. ‘You’re always dependent on somebody else.’

Bernie, faced with the magnitude of her betrayal but still able to pay for a room at the Burleston, invites the others for an evening meal at which she will break the terrible news, the demise of
Magdalene
and her part in it. The death of their hopes and dreams. The betrayal of her friends. She is terrified of Kirsty’s reaction. She feels sick and shaky and blind with panic.

‘But surely you don’t include Jake and Gemma in the invitation?’ says Avril quickly.

‘Oh, Avril, they’d love it,’ says Kirsty. ‘They’ve never been inside a really posh hotel before.’

‘Kirsty,’ spits Avril with horror, ‘they wouldn’t know how to behave! They’d be all over the dining room, shouting, squabbling, showing us up.’

‘Of course they wouldn’t,’ says Kirsty, colouring. ‘What sort of kids d’you think they are?’

‘If they go I’ll stay at home,’ says Avril, ‘and that’s flat.’

‘Well, if you really feel so strongly,’ but Kirsty seems totally bewildered. ‘I had no idea you felt this way. Gemma and Jake love you, Avril, they see you as one of the family, and it’s horrible that you don’t like them.’

‘The Balls will babysit,’ says Avril, refusing to be drawn. ‘Jake and Gemma can stay with them until we get home.’

‘OK,’ says Kirsty, cut to the quick, but it’s about time someone told her the truth. ‘If that’s the way you feel, Avril.’

‘There’s something wrong with Bernie.’