The Judge's Daughter (31 page)

Agnes kept a close eye on both her companions. Louisa, still quiet at the start of their holiday, was beginning to eat more regularly, while Helen was a strange mixture of calm and alertness. It
was all tied up with the death of Mabel Turnbull – of that Agnes was certain. But she asked no questions, because the judge’s daughter needed as much rest as anyone.

After three days, Louisa showed signs of her old self. As it was raining, she insisted on games of Monopoly and cards, even showing elation when she won. Away from her husband, she started to
thrive, often cheating at dominoes and palming cards when she thought no one was watching. They were watching, each glancing at the other with relief in her eyes.

He came. Agnes saw the expression on Louisa’s face when he kissed her on the cheek. It was as if a darkness had fallen over the woman’s skin, a stain applied by the very man to whom
she had entrusted her life.

Denis, who was on driving duty, followed his master into the house. If there was going to be any argument, he wanted to be there to protect his wife. The judge had damned and cursed his daughter
for days, so there could well be a battle in the house.

Denis found the women seated in three chairs at a dining table across whose surface were scattered playing cards and dominoes. The judge had taken up a position of superiority near the
fireplace, chest and stomach pushed outwards, hands clasped behind his back. There was a deafening silence in the room.

The big man cleared his throat. ‘Are you improving, Louisa?’

‘Yes, thank you, dear.’

Helen shook her head so slightly that the movement was scarcely noticeable.

‘The air will do you good,’ pronounced the embodiment of authority.

‘We are all well, Father,’ said Helen.

The judge did not look at his daughter. ‘We have done a little sailing, Denis and I. It’s quite easy once one grasps the basics. Denis?’

Denis hated the yacht. ‘Yes, not as difficult as I thought.’

‘We’ll make a sailor of you yet,’ promised Spencer.

There followed another silence. Helen folded her arms and stared hard at her father. ‘We are better here than at Lambert House,’ she said. ‘There’s been a dreadful
atmosphere there just lately.’

The judge shifted his weight from foot to foot. Had she spoken to Louisa, to Denis’s wife? Were these two women aware of the preposterous meanderings of Mabel Turnbull? What an ungrateful
wretch that woman had been. He had kept her for years, had made sure that her dotage had been comfortable. Women were all the same – even when dead, they continued a torment.

‘We shall be eating soon.’ Helen’s tone was soft. ‘Unfortunately, we cannot ask you to stay, because we have not catered for company.’ She glanced at Louisa, whose
downcast eyes and sad expression spoke volumes about inner misery. ‘Louisa needs to eat at regular intervals. In Morecambe, she will get well.’

He glowered. She was ordering him out of the house, was in charge of his every move. He needed those letters. A plan, half-formed thus far, was taking shape in his mind. There was always a way,
he told himself. His treatment of Harry Timpson, which would be lenient, was going to pay off soundly. He could use a man capable of breaking and entering a well-locked jewellery store.

‘Please go,’ said Helen.

‘You haven’t won yet, madam,’ mumbled her father.

Helen’s cheeks glowed with anger. She wanted a blunt instrument and a chance to use it, needed to pound away at him until he died. The death sentence was still on the statute book in her
personal legal system, and she was the only one qualified to apply it in this instance. The room was fading. She had promised herself that this would never happen again, but here it came, prompted
by no dream, no sound, no warning. ‘I know what you did,’ she cried. ‘I know all of it.’

He staggered back. ‘Quiet, woman!’

But she saw him and only him. There was a long staircase, darkness, dragging, crashing. A woman bade her come away, but this time, she did not come away. ‘Eileen Grimshaw,’ she
whispered.

He made for the door.

‘How much did you pay to be rid of her? What contribution did you make to the upkeep of your other daughter?’ Helen blinked, cleared her mind and focused on the present.
‘Agnes, I am so sorry.’

Agnes had slid down in her chair. ‘No,’ she whispered.

It was too late. Helen, knowing that she was doing damage, had no way of taking back what she had said. At least she remembered the episode this time, but that was no compensation for the harm
she had done to her half-sister. ‘Meet your daughter, Father. I intended not to tell you until after the birth,’ she said to Agnes.

Agnes shot out of her chair, reached the judge in two strides, raked her nails down both sides of his face. Denis grabbed his wife and pulled her away into a corner. ‘Stop it, love,’
he begged. ‘Come on, this is doing you no good at all.’

‘My mother died,’ she screamed. ‘And my Pop and Nan were left to bring me up. They were poor. You left them poor. God, I’d rather have anyone but you as a father.’
Did Pop know? Surely not. Surely, he would not be making a scaled-down copy of Lambert House if he knew that the customer was the one who had fathered his granddaughter? Silly little thoughts
tumbled about in her mind, a million questions seasoned by fury and loathing.

Helen was sobbing. ‘I wanted to protect you, Agnes. I’ve known about this for only just over a week.’ She raised her head. ‘And I know the rest, Father. There’s
enough there to send you to prison for life. Remember that. Remember and leave us alone.’

The judge wiped his bleeding face on a snowy handkerchief. ‘Let’s go, Denis,’ he muttered.

But Denis held on to his wife. He placed her in the chair she had just vacated, strode across the floor and punched Zachary Spencer on the nose. The man fell back, his head striking a wall.
Dazed, he struggled to his feet, eyes watering, face creased by fear.

Denis threw the keys on the floor. ‘Drive yourself home,’ he wheezed. ‘Stay away from me and mine, or, God help me, I’ll not be responsible for my own actions. Scarred
lungs or not, I’ll beat the living shit out of you.’

The unwanted guest opened his mouth as if to speak, snapped it closed almost immediately. His cheeks continued to bleed, as did his nose. He retrieved the keys before continuing to mop his
bloodied countenance. Unfit to drive, he stumbled from the house and sat in his car. She had won. The damned woman had won – unless he could retrieve the letters. If he could get his hands on
those, Helen might be disposed of quite easily via the mental hospital – who would listen to her there?

Who would listen? The doctors would. No matter what, he was almost cornered, but he could, at least, make an effort to retrieve those papers from Henshaw & Taylor. Harry Timpson was his best
chance. God, he hoped his face would heal before the session.

Inside the house, Agnes rocked back and forth in her chair. The baby, too, was mobile, as if the shock had affected the space in which he or she lived. She could not believe it, would not
believe it. His skin was under her nails and his blood ran in her cold veins. Nan and Pop had laboured all those years to provide for a child whose father was one of the richest men in Lancashire.
‘I have to wash my hands.’ Agnes fled.

Denis’s breathing righted itself after a few minutes. He was angrier than he had ever been in his whole life. That thing was Agnes’s father. His knuckles ached from the blow he had
delivered to the nose of a High Court judge. The job was gone. Agnes had to be cared for, as did the unborn child. Agnes needed more than money. He followed her path to the bathroom.

She was staring at herself in the mirrored front of a small cabinet over the basin. ‘I don’t look like him.’

‘No, you are beautiful.’

Agnes turned. ‘I hope my mother went with someone else as well as him. I hope my dad’s out there somewhere sweeping up or weaving sheets. I’d rather be the daughter of a
criminal . . .’ She was the daughter of a criminal – Helen had just said so. Helen was her sister. ‘I always wanted not to be an only child,’ she said. ‘But him? Why
him? Why did my mother go with a brute like that one?’

‘We’ll never know, sweetheart.’

‘Rape?’ she asked.

‘No way of finding out.’

‘Nan and Pop always said my mam wasn’t cheap, that she seldom went out of the house and seemed to have no boyfriend.’

Denis nodded.

‘We have to look after Helen now, Denis. She’s family. What will Pop say?’ She sank onto the toilet seat. ‘Pop doesn’t deserve this.’

‘He doesn’t need to know. Remember the stroke? News like this would put his blood pressure at the top of Everest. You know what he’s like, love. He gets himself worked up even
when he’s having fun – imagine what this could do to him.’

She nodded.

‘I’ve got a feeling I lost my job today.’

Agnes stared into the near distance. ‘Lucy was right. We should have kept away when she told us to.’ She lifted hands reddened by scrubbing. ‘I’ve nearly worn the nail
brush out,’ she said. ‘But I can’t rub him out. I’ll never be able to rub him out, because he’s in me.’ She swallowed hard. ‘I came from that
pig.’

‘So did Helen.’

‘She’s used to it.’

Denis perched on the edge of the bath. ‘We haven’t read the letter. I’m not saying that Helen is lying deliberately, but she does get confused.’

Agnes shook her head. ‘Not any more, she doesn’t. What she gets now is angry. She has his temper.’

‘You don’t, though. You’re nothing like him.’

‘No, but I am carrying his grandchild.’

‘Agnes, you can’t be sure of that.’

But she was sure. She continued sure for the rest of the day, even after questioning Helen very closely. ‘It fits,’ Helen informed her firmly. ‘Miss Turnbull had nothing to
gain by nominating your mother as one of his conquests. She herself was another victim, though she can’t have borne a child or she would have mentioned it in an effort to secure some
inheritance for it. No, she was simply recording the facts – it has to be true.’

Evening found them in the living room, all thoughts of board games abandoned. Louisa, who had eaten a good meal, was the first to speak. ‘He’s not hurting this baby,’ she
declared. ‘I’m going to eat everything that gets put in front of me, because the child must be strong.’

Helen nodded. ‘What do we do about you and Denis?’ she asked her newly acquired sister. ‘The half of your rent will be paid – I’ll see to that.’ She raised a
hand to stop any argument. ‘I’ll see to it,’ she repeated.

‘I’ll help with George’s barn,’ said Denis.

Agnes had little to say. Stunned, she merely sat, hardly hearing the conversation. She thought about her poor mother, knew that Eileen had gone right through a pregnancy with no husband and
little financial support. Pregnancy was not much fun, but Eileen had been forced to endure it without the comfort of a partner. Agnes thanked God for Denis, for Pop and for Nan.

Denis, too, seemed lost in thought. He was chewing his nails – a habit he had lost in his teens. He had clouted a judge.

Helen was the one who brought sense to the situation. ‘Look, none of this is new. Life is much the same as it was yesterday, except that we now have a little more knowledge. That can be
said of any day – we learn as we grow. He didn’t suddenly become your father, Agnes. Denis – you’ve never liked him. Louisa – you’ve lived with your mistake for
months – what’s changed? I have a sister and a brother-in-law – I shall be an aunt in the spring. We can’t let him win. There is more to that letter than your mother’s
name, Agnes – a great deal more. But that’s my problem – you all have enough of your own. Let’s have our holiday. Denis – you phone George and tell him you’ll
take the job. Go by bus to work, or borrow my car. Agnes – just learn to live with it. Sorry to sound harsh, but nothing matters beyond your own family.’

‘You’re my family,’ Agnes whispered.

Helen smiled. ‘So it would seem. Louisa, do your best. You are the one who is forced to be close to him. For the baby, play your part. We’ll rethink after the birth.’

No one slept well that night. But each realized that Helen was right – life had to continue alongside him and in spite of him. Helen rested better than the others. Her anger was too deep
to be allowed near the surface, so she lay sleepless, though not in pain. Retribution had not yet begun . . .

He did not remember the journey, partly because he had been unfit to drive, mostly because his mind was filled by the dreadful scene in the house he had visited. What had that
damned Turnbull woman written and what had she seen? Yes, he had known her in the biblical sense, but had the quiet, compliant woman been a witness to something he had sought to hide? That letter
had to be retrieved from the offices in town.

Kate Moores was just leaving. She saw him, but asked no questions about his scarred face. It seemed that she was yet another member of his daughter’s coven. How much did Helen know and
what had she told the other witches?

Eileen Grimshaw. He threw his hat in the general direction of the coat stand. She had been about as much fun as a burning orphanage. He remembered her tears, recalled her coming to his office to
speak of her pregnancy. He had dragged her outside, had told her to keep her mouth shut, as he would deny everything. Who would take the word of a mill girl over that of a rising lawyer? She must
have come here, to the house, must have told her tale of woe to Mabel Turnbull. Mabel Turnbull had seen fit to record the incident along with . . . The big man shivered.

He dropped into a chair. Bolton was the biggest town in England, yet the Makepeace woman had found her way to Skirlaugh Fall and into his house. Her grandfather’s surname had not
registered – it was not a common name, but there were too many Grimshaws in Lancashire to merit undue concern. In truth, he had forgotten about Eileen Grimshaw until today.

His face hurt from twin track marks made by an illegitimate daughter, while his nose, victim of his son-in-law’s punch, throbbed with every beat of his heart. He had lost Denis. He
realized that the loss of Denis was no small matter, because Denis had always listened, and seldom replied. He was a good gardener, an excellent driver and a man on whom the judge had come to
depend.