Water Gypsies (40 page)

She felt torn, as if on a rack, between all her family’s emotions. And, stretched across the middle of it, she forced herself to remain numb in order to be strong.

The police came several times. They had visited Janet Lambert and now believed that the two murders had been committed by the same man. They had no idea of the identity of the other young girl found in Norman Griffin’s cellar. The only clue was her long blonde hair. On Maryann’s advice they visited Mrs Biggs, her mother’s neighbour, who had been to the funeral. She admitted that Norman Griffin had been to visit Flo a number of times before she died. But they had no idea where he had disappeared to now. Neighbours had been asked to watch his house. So far, he had not returned.

‘Where can he be?’ Joel kept saying, with more and more pent-up frustration as the days passed. His ignorance of the city, of anything but the cut, only added to his sense of angry helplessness. It was against all his habits to sit still like this, on these calm days in early summer which were ideal for trips, while strangers were working his boat and he couldn’t get a load on and get ahead. How much longer would they have to wait?

After a few days Sally seemed a little improved. She had slept a lot and began to eat a bit more. On a sunny morning Rose came to her and asked timidly if she wanted to come and play out and Sally nodded. Maryann felt a leap of hope inside her. Tears came to her eyes as she saw Nance’s little girl take Sal’s hand and lead her into the bright light, along the towpath to where the others were waiting. Maryann got on with her chores, and about an hour later Sally came back, slipping down the steps into the cabin.

Maryann followed her in and found her sitting on the side bench, her face pale and drawn.

‘ What’s up, bab? Don’t you feel very well?’

Sally shook her head. ‘I wanted to be inside for a bit.’

Seeing the fear in her eyes, Maryann gently put her arms round her. She knew those feelings; the sense of fear, of panic suddenly taking her over.

‘That’s a good idea,’ she said, kissing the top of Sally’s head. ‘It’s nice and cosy in here, isn’t it?’

She felt Sally nod. They sat in silence for a few minutes while Maryann rocked her frightened little girl back and forth.

‘Sally,’ she said very gently, ‘you know when we found you? Had you been in that place for long?’

The child shook her head. Into Maryann’s chest, she said, ‘He’d just put me there – just before. I was somewhere else before. He left me there, then you came – straight after. He took me there in his moty car … I had to lie down in the back …’

As she spoke Maryann felt the hairs stand on end all over her body. She pulled back and looked into Sally’s face.

‘You mean – when we found you he’d only just left you there?’ She heard again in her mind the sound of the car engine starting up in the street as they stood at the back of the factory. Seeing Sally nod, she whispered, ‘ Oh, my God!’ A shudder passed through her. He had been there behind the factory as they arrived at the front! As they felt their way down one side of the works he must have been creeping along the other. How was it he always seemed to be invisible, to move like a shadow that no one could find or catch?

Holding Sally close again, she whispered, ‘It’s all right, my lovely. We’ll never let him near you again.’

Days passed and still the police were making no progress. Sylvia and Dot brought the
Esther Jane
back, as arranged. Joel was feverish with the need to get going again, however overwhelmingly he wanted to see Norman Griffin caught.

Maryann had hoped to see Sylvia and Dot off in style when they left the cut – at least to have a little goodbye celebration. As it was, there was too much grimness and worry to occupy everyone and the two women didn’t want to intrude any further on the family’s problems.

‘ We’re going back down to the Grand Union to be allocated new boats,’ Dot said. The children were all very sad to see them go. Rose cried heartbrokenly when she heard that Sylvia was leaving.

‘Never mind, darling.’ Sylvia hugged her tightly. ‘I’ll see you whenever I can. And one day I’ll have a home where you can come and see me.’ Maryann was touched by Sylvia’s bravery. Her future was very uncertain. Who knew how she was going to make a life when she had to leave the cut?

Both of them hugged Maryann and even Dot was tearful when the time came to depart.

‘This is certainly a time I’ll never forget,’ she said.

‘You’ve been so good to me,’ Maryann told them. ‘I shall miss you both – all our chats and that.’

Sylvia put her arms round both of them and they stood together in a tearful huddle, until Dot broke away. ‘We’ll miss our train if we carry on like this,’ she said.

‘We’ll see you whenever we can!’ both of them promised.

The family waved them off as they disappeared across the wharf, bundles of belongings in their arms; they turned at the last moment, each managing to free an arm to wave. Maryann thought of the night they’d first arrived, how strange, how alien they’d seemed. She could see especially how Dot had changed. Even the way she wore her hair was softer, her fringe had grown again and was no longer a hard line across her forehead. She knew them both so well now, knew that whatever their upbringing, their class, and however seldom they might be able to meet, they were friends for life. She blew them a kiss to answer their last wave, then looked up at Joel beside her. It was just the two of them now. Bobby was working the Grand Union and they wouldn’t get him back for a while. She was so happy to have Joel back, yet she felt very distant from him, as if shut in on herself, frozen inside. She felt a sudden pang of dread at being alone with him again.

The next day they untied their pair of boats from Tyseley and slipped quietly away from the wharf, heading south in the cool, quiet morning with a load for Banbury.

Later that day, in a Birmingham street, a blackout curtain moved at an upper window. Had anyone been looking they might have caught sight of a face peering cautiously out. It was a face which did not dare venture out into the light of day. The face of someone whose features were so distinctive, so disfigured, that for the moment hiding in an upper room was the only way left to live. The face turned a little from side to side, looking up and down the street, as if waiting for someone. Then the curtain fell back and it disappeared into the darkness.

Forty

The
Esther Jane’s
engine coughed, then jumped into throbbing life in the dawn, scattering alarmed moorhens towards sanctuary in the reeds. The Bartholomews had tied up the boats for the night on a remote stretch of the Oxford cut, and woke to find themselves still alone, no other boats nearby. The water was a deep, muddy green, lightly veiled by shreds of mist.

From the back of the
Theodore
Maryann watched Joel, ahead of her on the
Esther Jane,
catch the rope flung to him by Ezra, who then scampered expertly back aboard before Joel poled the boat off the mud close to the bank. Maryann fixed the helm in place while Rose untied the
Theodore
from its mooring pins. They were in a good position to move off, she noticed with the small part of her mind that was paying attention. The routine of morning departure was so familiar as to be automatic. She steered out behind the
Esther Jane,
smelling the churned-up mud. Ahead of her, Joel stood at the tiller, cap on his head, looking resolutely in front of him.

When we were first married, he kept turning round, waving at me,
she thought.
As if he couldn’t stop looking, couldn’t believe I was really here. And I was the same. Not now, though.
She gave a sigh out of her deep sadness, watching Joel’s implacable back, which was turned firmly towards her.
God help us,
she thought.
What’s happened to us? How did everything get like this?
Here they were again, Joel with the boys on one boat, her and the girls on the other. That was how it was now – separated by night as well. And, in the daytime, barely speaking. Nothing had been right since Joel came back. The initial shock of events had brought them close for a while, but ever since they had seemed to grow further and further apart.

Distracted by a sound from the cabin, she peered through the hatches to see if the kettle was boiling yet. Sally was trying to wipe over Ada’s and Esther’s faces and Ada was squawking and fighting her. The twins were a handful, but Sally was managing.

It was her fault, Maryann knew, but she couldn’t help it. She wanted Joel close to her, to feel the comfort of him, yet she couldn’t bear it when he came near her. At first they’d had Sally with them in their bed, keeping her safe, trying to comfort her. After two nights they had moved her onto the side bench so they could reclaim their marriage bed, and Joel was so hungry for her, so insistent. He was her husband, of course he was – what was wrong with that?

She lay frozen in the roseate light, hearing his sighs of pleasure as his hands moved over her, caressing, pulling her close against him so she could feel how urgently he wanted her.

‘Oh, that’s better.’ She felt his breath against her ear. ‘Oh, my bird, I’ve missed you. I know I’m home now.’

She tried to respond, to lie close to him, her hands stroking his wide back, his hair, trying to desire him, to want what had to happen. Eyes closed, she tried to force her body to cooperate with the sensations of Joel’s lovemaking. His breathing became fast, excited. Maryann felt a frightening tightness growing deep within her. She She broke out in a sweat, not just from the heat of his body close to hers but from utter panic, and she found herself struggling for breath. Forcing her eyes open, she looked into Joel’s face. Why did she feel so cold and detached from him? Why couldn’t she just love him back?
This is Joel, your husband! Joel, who loves you.
His eyes were shut, his lashes rusty-coloured arcs, closed against her, mouth feeling for her with the blind instinct of a baby, wanting her, kissing, nuzzling … The tightness in her swelled and a whimper escaped from her which Joel heard as an indication of pleasure and he rolled over onto her, weighing her down with what felt an inescapable weight. And all at once, in the shadowy light, the lips reaching for hers were not his, the face breathing hotly on her in the gloom not Joel’s, but scarred and pitted, horribly distorted and the eyes boring into her with what seemed sadistic lust were Norman Griffin’s when he forced her down in the front room in their Ladywood house, heavy as a fallen statue on top of her, trapping her under him so she could not move. Revulsion and panic exploded in her and she tore at Joel’s back with her nails, kicking, struggling, letting out desperate, muffled cries under him.

‘Get off me – get off, let me out!’

She sank her teeth into his shoulder and bit hard, panting and crying and Joel reeled back from her, clutching at the deep welts she had made with her teeth.

‘ Darn it! What the—? What the hell d’you do that for?’

Through the blood pounding in her ears, she could barely hear the frustrated anger in his voice. She had curled into a tight ball on her side to protect herself and for some moments couldn’t be sure if she was inhabiting her younger self or her daughter. Sally’s suffering possessed her, wrapped itself round her tightly with her own memories. She was a child again, trapped in a dark place, terrified of what would be done to her. The horror began to choke out of her. She moaned and sobbed.

‘Maryann? Love?’Joel sounded frightened. Cautiously he touched her shoulder, but she fought him off. She was still horror struck and could not see him as he was. He was someone else, someone dangerous. She was so far down in her pain and fear that she barely knew he was there. Joel knelt, watching her, bewildered. Nothing had happened like this before. Not even in the early days, when she was afraid to give herself to him. He had known she was fragile, had suffered something, but he had been confident then that with enough patience, his gentleness and the pleasure of love would thaw her and bring her through. He knew no other way – this was what was natural to him. And it had done, he thought. He had touched her with care and respect and loved her into pleasure. He had never before seen her as she was now.

After a time her crying stopped and she lay quiet. They were both silent behind the little curtains veiling the bed. Maryann looked out from between her lashes, as if emerging from the darkness to see little chinks of soft light, and sensed Joel still close to her, heard his breathing. Her cheeks were wet with tears and she felt exhausted, wrung out. She could not look at him.

‘You don’t want me,’ she heard him say flatly.

She couldn’t bring any words to her lips to reassure him.

Eventually Joel pulled up the bedclothes with a heavy sigh, turned away from her and was soon asleep.

It had not got any better. It was a month now. In those early days when Sally was back with them, Maryann had been very gentle with her. At first the little girl wouldn’t speak at all and seemed in a trance. Day by day, though, she became more herself as the impact of the shock receded, and she began to get up and play with the others. Maryann had warned them not to ask her questions, and in any case they soon forgot their curiosity about where Sally had disappeared to and she, though quiet and seeming older suddenly, fitted in with them as before. Alone, though, sometimes Maryann tried to get her to talk.

‘Did he touch you?’ she asked her, one day in the cabin.

Sally stared back at her, wide-eyed. It took Maryann back to the day she had asked the same question of Amy and Margaret Lambert and seen the fear and shame flicker in their eyes.

‘ That man – Mr Griffin. Did he do things you didn’t like? Touch you where he shouldn’t?’ She wanted to speak calmly but somehow the words came out sounding harsh. ‘It’s all right,’ she added more gently. ‘If he did, he shouldn’t’ve done. It’s not you that’s wrong – it’s him.’

She saw her daughter’s blue eyes fill with tears. ‘ I shouldn’t’ve gone with him. He said he’d get us all some nice things – sweeties and that …’