Without Consent (18 page)

He pushed her gently into the deeper shadow of the church wall. She put both hands against it, feeling the cool stone scratch at her palms. He was behind her now, her buttocks supported against his thighs. Both hands fondled her breasts; then, bracing himself against her, he felt inside her thighs, parted the lips, slid his long fingers in and out, rhythmic and strong. Lovely, lovely cunt, he was murmuring, kissing her neck, feeling her legs slacken until she almost sat in his lap, the skirt round her waist, the G-string panties snapped, her breath ragged, her mouth forming,
no, no, no, without making a sound, letting him do what he did. Legs straddled wide, coming round his fist in a writhing spasm and oh, God, no fucking with Derek was ever as safe or as dangerous as this.

She pressed her thighs together, trapping his hand for a moment, then relaxed with a shuddering sigh. It was at times like these, anger forgotten in a strange exhilaration, that she wanted to round on him, do something in return, fumble for the penis she had never felt and never seen, pleasure him somehow if only to even the score of need, or pleasure, or something. Other times, she would go home, practically howling for Derek and a straightforward unimaginative fuck to finish the business. Oh yes, he was safe. No risk of Aids or babies with this man. Safe enough to share with friends.

There was low laughter from him, as if from a man satisfied. She could not understand him, nor did she want to. One of her friends, Becky, hadn't liked whatever he had done, the silly cow. Now he was talking to her, his body shielding her from view while his hands stroked her buttocks, held them apart, kneaded them. In a minute, she would want it again.

‘I think it must be gravity,' he murmured. ‘Blood rushing to the right place. Something to do with the fact that we might still be meant to go round on all fours.'

She leant back against him.

‘Would gravity, or whatever, pull this baby out?'

‘No.'

‘You said you'd help. I helped you. I don't want it… I don't want it and Derek would never let me … When will you get it out of me?'

‘Next week, at the clinic. No hurry.'

He smoothed the skirt over her behind. Her panties were on the floor, she picked them up and stuffed them in her handbag. It always amazed her the way they could walk and talk, like a couple discussing what to have for tea.

‘Last time I came to the clinic, you weren't there.'

‘Sorry.'

‘And you weren't here yesterday.'

‘Sorry again.'

‘I can't go on like this.'

‘I know.'

Fear paralysed her. Fear of not going on like this, with this occasional, insane, sick-feeling excitement.

‘I don't quite mean that. Oh, I don't know what I mean.'

She was shaking, hanging onto his arm.

‘Next time,' he said, ‘I'll make it all all right. Promise. Now you've got to go home.'

Her face hardened. She was not ready yet for a pat on the head and being dismissed.

‘Monday?' she said. ‘Monday? Talk to me. Talk to me, or I'll talk.'

He held her gently, a soft kiss, like a continental greeting, to each cheek.

‘No, you won't. Promise. Anyway, what would you say?'

‘M
y man', said Helen West, always confused as to whether she should refer to Bailey as her partner, boyfriend, or anything as simple as a lover, ‘is in a state of grief and confusion. He mutters in his sleep about treachery and chocolates. And what haunts him, poor soul? Another man. Do I have a problem?'

The nurse laughed. ‘Oh dear. And where is it you're getting married. In church?'

‘Nope. Register office.'

‘Oh. The one in Highgate's very nice.'

‘Is it? I only know the one in Finsbury, on account of being married in it once before. I thought he said Finsbury.'

There was something disconcerting about the way she found herself chatting in the surgery, as if she were anxiously ill, instead of guarding against an impending change of status by the superstitious precaution of a medical check-up. Getting the body scanned: heart, cigarette-stained lungs, hearing and sight, just so she would know,
within the usual inexact parameters, the state of her health. Ready to present for duty, sound in mind and limb, as if matrimony were a mountaineering expedition. Chronic illness and the wedding was off. The medical practice at the end of the road was small and valiant. Helen could feel herself becoming apologetic as soon as she crossed the portals and heard the sound of coughing. Even this cursory examination made her feel foolish and more than a little exposed; there was a certain, in her case, garrulous, vulnerability in being half dressed, even in such a clinical atmosphere. A feeling of putting the body up for judgement, as if either doctor or nurse was going to add some scathing aesthetic verdict to the general diagnosis. (Thin here, floppy here, and OK, what does this corpse think it's doing getting married at its age?) The most embarrassing thing in the end was how idiotically talkative she became.

Bailey did not only talk in his sleep, these days; he talked when he was awake. Expounding Ryan's idiocies; what little Sally Smythe could tell him about Ryan's theories. Ryan and other forms of gaol bait wandered through his dreams. Her bridegroom.

The marriage had not been discussed. Most of the time, she liked it that way.

A
nna Stirland laughed, a great big uproarious laugh which Helen remembered from their first meeting and had not heard since.

‘Talk a lot? Patients? Oh, yes, all the time. To be encouraged, if only they weren't apologetic about it. Why else would I do it if I weren't so curious about other people's lives?'

A drink after work, a chat about anything, a little people watching; turning out to be a good idea. ‘Yeah,' Anna had said into her phone, not even cautiously enthusiastic. ‘Yes, do me good. But one condition, mind.' A deep breath. ‘Can we talk about anything other than my … attack? Honestly, it's weeks now, I'm much better, got my mind in gear.'

‘What are you giving our Rose for a wedding present?'

‘Wisdom?' said Helen.

‘Not mine to give,' said Anna.

‘Not mine, either. Impossible to wrap, anyway. A laundry basket, I thought, with a year's supply of all that boring cleaning crap: Jif, bleach, dusters. Then I thought I'd add in extravagant underwear. Not his and hers, only hers.'

‘I thought I'd make them window-boxes. Evergreens, late-blooming things. It'll be autumn when they come back,' Anna mused.

‘Rose doesn't look after plants,' Helen remarked, remembering the cause of the last Rose and Michael quarrel.

‘No more does anyone, given some boiled root azalea or a drooping palm for the living room. She'll learn. You learnt with your garden.'

‘Not really. I fiddle about, talk to it sometimes. Try and stop things throttling one another.'

‘That's taking care. Michael will do it.'

‘Was he a sweet child?' Helen asked.

‘Oh yes, funny little squinty-eyed boy, went round with a bandage and specs, teased to death, then started to grow and grow. I met him out of school once; watched the other lads around him, baiting him, not even noticing how he'd
grown. Michael picked one of them up, very gently, mind, lifted him into a rubbish skip and walked away. Never one to overdo revenge. I don't know Rose half as well. Didn't approve at first; love her to death now. I thought she was a gorgeous little slut; ever so glad I kept my mouth shut.'

‘Gold dust,' Helen murmured. ‘Hope the past doesn't come back to haunt her. Haunts me, and it isn't mine.'

‘Should it?' Anna asked curiously. ‘Colourful, I knew. but…'

‘Sexual abuse from a dad who probably murdered her mother – I shouldn't have said that.'

Anna nodded, as if receiving information on the weather forecast. ‘What privileged and lucky lives we lead,' she said crisply. ‘Will she make a good lawyer?'

‘I hope not,' Helen said vehemently. ‘I do hope not.' She paused. ‘Kills your fire in the end, see? If you believe in it, it makes you cold. All this objectivity. As bad as the form filling. Never being able to do anything well.'

‘Like nursing,' Anna said neutrally.

‘Even being a midwife? All that new life?'

‘Even that,' Anna said, blushing furiously. Somehow, the evening died and they were no longer easy with one another. Anna looked at her watch.

‘You've lost weight,' Helen observed.

Anna smiled, shrugged.

‘Decided not to sell my house after all. I've worked hard enough for it. Besides, people want me to be better, so I thought I'd oblige them. Oh, it was all a silly episode,' said Anna, forgetting her own request not to mention it. ‘Some throwback from his team sporting days, best forgotten.'

R
yan found the park again at about nine in the morning. No car, this time. The suburban train spat him out with the early commuters; he walked from that station to Euston. The air was as fresh as it could be in King's Cross; the park was sanitized by darkness and dew, the scrubby grass discernibly greener than in the afternoon. A man swept leaves, twigs and papers from the paths, moving with deliberate sloth, extending the task, enjoying it. The same old lag was sprawled on the same bench in a patch of sun. On a morning like this, the life of a drunken vagrant could seem almost romantic. Ryan trod by softly, noting, as before, the premature age of an old face with younger limbs.

The door to the coroner's court stood open. Ryan leant against the outside wall next to it and stared up at the gasometers. If you built these now, he thought, great circular edifices of metal, the size of large buildings, composed of naked girders, some fool would call it modern art. They looked like a skeletal casing for a bomb; they invited a daredevil to climb up there and feel the breeze. They were monstrous, crouching like guardians, dominating the view, and yet he liked them; because they had always been there. Ryan straightened his tie. Wearing a suit after nothing but gardening clothes for the last days felt like placing himself in a straitjacket, but if he had not worn this uniform, which he did with an element of pleasure, he would deny himself the credibility he needed in the absence of a warrant card. No one would demand to see it, or be aware just yet of its confiscation. He had never been a regular visitor to either the mortuary or the court or unexpected death, but the officers in the back room had seen his face once or twice
before; so had the pathologist of the day. No one would question his status.

Inside the foyer, there was a desultory collection of relatives, assembled sombrely to hear witnesses repeat the facts leading to the death of Aunt Mary or brother John, then listen to the coroner's verdict. Death by misadventure; one kind of accident to which the deceased may well have contributed himself, common for a drug overdose. Suicide, which needed proof beyond reasonable doubt; accidental, which meant what it said, and, most rarely of all, rarer than anyone supposed, unlawful killing. The bereavement of these relatives was already old news: they were not in the first stage of grief, merely anxious, looking a trifle lost, waiting for someone to explain procedure, concerned to do the right thing. Ryan was not the only one wearing a suit, with the difference that at least one of theirs bore signs of moth.

The courtroom itself resembled a church with pews for seats plus the usual paraphernalia of judge's bench and witness stand. The sun glinted through the coloured windows, insufficient to illuminate an attractive restful gloom to the extent of making it possible to read small print. It was a place unconsciously designed to discourage hysteria; he found it difficult to imagine the staff even celebrating Christmas. Then he heard a shout of laughter from the office behind.

‘DS Ryan. Dr Webb here yet? She promised me a word.' He introduced himself easily, nevertheless relieved to find his presence accepted. The pathologist occupied a desk, perched on it with the air of a regular visitor; she smiled sweetly.

‘Oh, you again, Mr Ryan, with your awkward questions. What do you want this time?'

He felt as if he should be holding a hat in his hand, nervously turning the brim, like someone asking a favour from a duchess. Dr Webb was large, loud, extremely attractive and saw no reason why corpses, diseases and the inevitable fact of death should ever be discussed
sotto voce,
since she herself was congenitally incapable of whispering.

‘A rehash of what we were discussing last time,' he said humbly. ‘I seem to have lost my notes.'

She wagged her finger at him. ‘Policemen should not be writing theses,' she said. ‘And why should I mind repeating myself. Where were we?'

‘I began', Ryan said, lowering his voice, ‘by asking you if it was possible to kill a healthy young woman, leaving no traces, by the simple measure of inserting ice up her vagina. Could the shock of that cause a spontaneous heart attack?'

‘And I,' she said impatiently, ‘said no. Not unless she had a weak heart. I told you it would not otherwise be a question of the temperature of the instrument … not unless it was so cold it burnt the skin. It would be more a question of the length. A long icicle, maybe? Where would he get such a thing? No. He might cause an undetectable death, even without injury, if his instrument probed too far, against resistance – death by shock – women died this way in backstreet abortions. The cervix does not like interference. People have strange ways of having fun. Not an icicle; maybe a syringe.' In defiance of the prohibitory sign and any intimations of mortality, she lit a cigarette.

‘What I wanted to know,' Ryan asked, ‘is is there a technique a man could perfect?'

She considered and shook her handsome head.

‘What technique? Technique for homicide, you mean? What a strange man he would be. Like an abortionist, he could perfect avoiding it, but not perfect the doing of it, I think. Your sexual murderer is more likely to be obvious. He does not have much control. He strangles, he bites, he stabs.' Hand and mouth, she gestured, biting, chopping.