Chain Reaction (39 page)

Frankie has spent hours standing outside pleading by megaphone, feeling like a fool, despised by the world, able to offer nothing for barter because there’s just no way Mother can come and live at home, not that she’d even want to. As far as the flat is concerned, it is already sold to the Marshes from Milton; the contract is about to be signed. The Council cannot go back on their policy just in Mother’s case. If they backed down now, all hell would be let loose. The aged and infirm would come crabbing out of all the Rest Homes in the land, intent on reclaiming all those lost properties once again.

And the Queen should know better. Frankie is furious with the Queen. It’s all very well for her, her mother would have been put away long ago but for the army of servants employed to keep her going in the style she has been used to. And her kids would have probably gone into care, by the sounds of it. If only it were so sodding simple for everyone else. How dare the Queen take sides when she doesn’t know what she’s talking about?

One last try. The flustered Chief Constable insists upon it. ‘Mother!
Mother!
I know you can hear me! Come out! Come out of there at once before this goes much too far. You have made your point, now let’s all get together and talk about it, for goodness sake!’

‘Dear me,’ says the elderly reporter from
Woman’s Own,
moving like a bat in her crocheted cape, snaking out from the shadows and into the limelight, adjusting her half-moon glasses and peering up at the harassed Frankie. ‘Couldn’t you try
a little more sympathy,
dear? I must say, you sound quite aggressive. No wonder your poor mother’s gone to ground quite unable to face you. No wonder the poor soul has been forced into such harrowing devices.’

At her wit’s end, Frankie grips the megaphone and rams it down on the silly woman’s head. And this, of course, is the picture which will appear in the morning papers.

S
O. POOR OLD VERNON.
He has failed in this, as in everything else he has ever attempted in his life, and it is with weary resignation that Vernon Marsh watches the police march up his garden path.

If Joy was alive today she would be screaming about the neighbours watching. It only takes a couple of police cars, an ambulance or a fire engine to bring all the residents of the cul-de-sac rushing to the front doors of their houses but, Vernon supposes, he mustn’t be bitter. It’s only that feeling of ‘Thank God it’s him and not us’ that brings them that kick of pleasure.

He watches their approach with a shaking heart. What should he say? How should he play it? Will they caution him first? Will they lead him away in handcuffs with everyone watching? Does it matter any more? His life has been turned into a constant hell anyway. Since Jody Middleton arrived last night Vernon had known his time was limited but he never expected the young fellow to turn him in so quickly. A decent kind of lad in a way, he felt they had more in common than they knew. He’d been surprised to wake up and find him missing after the interesting conversations they’d got into last night—everything from football to the keeping of hamsters—but he must have got up early and decided to go straight to the law. And who can blame him for that? This morning started badly anyway, as soon as he opened the paper he saw himself on the front page highlighted there amongst the sensational pictures of the siege which has captured the nation. As soon as Vernon saw that, he knew it was going to be a bad day. And look, they even blame him for agreeing to buy the old woman’s flat, as if there was something unkind behind it, as if he already knew she was being hassled into a Home by the authorities against her will. My God, they’ll use every trick in the book to make an innocent person look guilty, he’d thought when he’d read it. How they would curse if they knew the truth.

By tomorrow the whole world will know. He might have the front page to himself and not even have to share it with that household name, Mrs Irene Peacock.
Ding, dong bell.
He can see the headlines now. How they will relish it when they hear he hid his dead wife in a well.

‘Mr Vernon Marsh?’

Vernon stands at the open door and awaits his fate in a cloud of shame. ‘Yes, I am Vernon Marsh.’

The policeman, not unfriendly, gets out his notebook and unravels a daily paper. ‘I am here after our Lancashire branch faxed us over a message just now regarding the man at your window here who resembles an absconding prisoner.’

Vernon studies the paper as if it’s the first time he’s seen it, so astonished is he. And there is Jody’s face at the window, staring, horrified.
‘Wanted?’

‘Jody Middleton to be precise. He is wanted to stand trial for rape, Mr Marsh. This is very probably not he, but would you mind identifying the person who was standing above us last night when the photographer took this picture?’

So they’re not here to take him away!
They don’t know anything about the murder! It’s Jody Middleton they’re after. Vernon is totally confused, almost speechless. His brain races madly in his head. ‘There was a boy staying with me last night,’ he agrees quickly. ‘And yes, he did introduce himself as Jody Middleton, said he was a member of the family who were buying this house and asked if he could have a bed for the night as he was touring the West Country. Well, I thought it was rather odd, but felt I couldn’t really refuse. I had a spare bed and my wife is away…’

‘Where is Middleton now, sir?’

‘I really don’t know,’ says Vernon truthfully, helplessly shrugging. ‘When I got up this morning, he was gone. No word of explanation or thanks…’

‘Would you mind, sir, if we came in to have a quick look around?’

‘No,’ says Vernon helpfully. ‘Come in, do whatever you have to. I never imagined for a moment the boy was on the run.’

‘It was a bit silly,’ reproves the second policeman, removing his hat on the stairs, ‘to invite a total stranger to stay overnight.’

Vernon scratches his head and readjusts his glasses. He goes on with studied carelessness, ‘But he wasn’t a total stranger, Inspector. As I said, he told me he was the son of the people who are buying our house.’

‘Even so,’ says the Inspector, moving on. ‘These days…’

‘I realise that now,’ says Vernon, going back to his coffee and cigarettes at the kitchen table, only to find that he cannot sit down and is forced to wander to and fro. He longs for them to go so he can be alone with his crazy questions. Menace seems to be everywhere. If the lad is on the run and manages to keep going there’s a good chance the police will never find out about Joy, but when they catch him, and they’re bound to catch him, the murder will be the first thing the boy starts to blab about. What a malignant trick of fate that such a distasteful person should catch him about his gory task, then that the camera should catch
his
face at the window, that he should then disappear, so that even if he never gets caught, Vernon will never again feel easy. What has his life descended to now—dependent on a rapist to stay free?

This situation is almost worse than being charged and convicted. At least that way he would get it all over. But no, no, not when he thinks about Tom and Suzie. Anything rather than destroy his children’s lives in misery and shame like that.

So this explains the strange behaviour of the couple who came with their nervous daughters to view Joyvern, it seems like years ago now. That explains why they never bothered to barter over the price of the house, and didn’t seem particularly bothered about much anyway. Their son was on remand for rape. Having met Jody, Vernon is very surprised, but then he manages a wry little smile. How can you tell what people are capable of by their behaviour, by how they look? Nobody in their right mind would think him capable of a brutal murder. His awful circling thoughts go round and round again. Tick tick tick goes Joy’s kitchen clock on the wall, designed to resemble a fresh green apple. Is it ticking his moments of freedom away?

‘Coffee?’ he asks the returning policemen, while trembling inside.

‘We’d better not, sir. We’d better get back, thanks all the same. If this man is in the area it is imperative that we catch him, bearing in mind the sickening nature of the crime. Someone will be back to take a statement from you later.’

‘Yes. Absolutely. That’s fine,’ agrees Vernon, his disloyal eyes straying to the place on the kitchen floor where Joy had fallen, where he had beaten her head to pulp.

The hours go by so slowly when you are expecting trouble, when every passing footstep might represent the end of your freedom for ever, every cruising car, every shadow on the wall. He hates being alone doing nothing, for this allows him to think too much. Driven by his need for action, any action, it no longer much matters what, Vernon is compelled to telephone the Middletons in Preston, half-wanting to discuss the matter of their absent son and his likely whereabouts, and half-wanting to know if the house sale is still going through according to plan. In spite of the fact that Vernon’s world has gone all twisted and awry, everyday life must go on. Mr Mycroft at the bank must still be satisfied, the lease on the shop must be paid.

‘Oh,’ Mrs Middleton sounds most surprised to hear from him. ‘Mr Marsh. Yes, certainly everything is going through on our side, and as far as we know some people called Smedley are still buying ours. The solicitors seem quite happy, anyway, there have been no snags that we know of. Why? Is everything all right your end?’

So Vernon proceeds to explain about last night’s extraordinary visit.

‘Jody actually called at your house? He insisted on staying the night? I must say it was good of you to have him.’

Vernon smiles at her little game. ‘He would have stayed longer, I believe, but for the fact the newspapers sent their photographers round and the police picked up his trail.’

She is silent for a moment. ‘You know?’ she whispers with horror. ‘You know about Jody?’

Vernon feels a spasm of pain. He’s a sentimental man, a believer in mercy and forgiveness—how many times has he forgiven Joy her reckless behaviour in the past? He imagines how terrible this mother must feel in her innocence, not only her but her whole family.

‘The police told me this morning.’

‘But he’d gone?’ She is desperate for reassurance. ‘He’d gone before they arrived?’

‘Yes, Mrs Middleton, he’d gone. I think he probably left some hours before.’

‘And how was he? How was the cut in his poor chest?’

What can he tell her? That the lad was tired? Immature? Homesick? A young man of some intelligence with tousled hair and a couple of earrings? ‘He never mentioned a cut to me. He seemed well. He ate a good supper. We shared a Chinese meal and watched the news. I am surprised the police haven’t contacted you yet.’

‘The police tell us nothing, nothing at all. It’s a real eye-opener to be at the wrong end of the law, you soon stop saying how wonderful they are. And so this siege which is hogging the news at the moment is at the very flat which you were supposed to move into? That is why the press came round? How terrible for you and your wife.’

Vernon pauses for a planned few seconds. He might as well start the ball rolling. ‘Actually,’ and it’s easier to start with a stranger, ‘I haven’t seen my wife for some days now. She walked out after an argument and she’s never been back. I am quite worried, to be honest. She has been behaving rather oddly of late.’

‘Oh no, how awful for you!’ The woman’s concern is genuine. Perhaps all women are naturally sympathetic when they hear about one of their number gone over the edge, although they say that these days men are quickly catching up, especially young men. And the suicide rate is growing. ‘Have you informed Missing Persons?’

‘Not yet. She would be most upset if I told them and she had just decided to go off for a while to cool down.’

‘I suppose so, yes, but I know how worrying it is to have a relative missing and be unable to get in touch. I do wonder, Mr Marsh, if Jody is in the area, whether I might pop down that way to do some measuring for carpets and curtains, just in case…’

‘I doubt that he’d come back here now.’

‘No, but just to be in the area, just to know I was near him would make me feel better. Do you understand how I feel?’

Vernon, who fully understands, says kindly, ‘Of course I do. Has he got friends around here?’

‘No, it was my idea he went there, actually. Safer than hanging around his old home.’

Vernon the murderer cannot help but feel shocked. ‘You helped him? He evaded the law and you helped him do it?’

‘I am his mother, Mr Marsh. I might be foolish, but I believe my boy when he swears to me that what he did to that girl was not rape at all, and I hope you realise he hasn’t even been tried yet. But when you’re suddenly accused of something as sickening as rape, I’m afraid that no matter what sort of person you were everyone believes the worst of you.’

Vernon silently thinks about this. He must discover as much about Jody as he can and this is his only chance. ‘A good boy, was he?’

‘A son to be proud of. This has broken his sisters’ hearts, and mine, and his dad’s.’

Overindulged, most likely. ‘I understand. It would be unendurable if something like this ever happened to our two children.’

‘They must be terribly concerned about their mother’s disappearance.’

‘Oh they are, they are.’ His next job, and one that he’s dreading, is to tell them. ‘So you have no idea at all where Jody might be now?’

‘None, but I do feel the urge to come down there. I need to take these measurements anyway, and have some discussions with you about what you are prepared to leave. I take it you are still intending to go, even though your flat, at the moment, seems to belong to the media? I’m sure the whole business will soon blow over, and hopefully your wife will be back.’

‘Oh, I’m still leaving,’ says Vernon, ‘don’t worry about that. If necessary I will put our things into storage. And if my wife doesn’t return I don’t think I’ll bother to buy, I’ll rent…’

‘Don’t dwell on the black side, Mr Marsh. I know how easy that is, to let that darkness take you. You
must
believe that all will be well. You must have faith…’