The Last Anniversary (22 page)

I nearly did it.

Grace trips and clumsily rights herself and keeps on walking, her arms swinging heavily, her legs stodgy. Grace? Grace? What sort of name is that for someone like her? She thinks of the way Callum automatically handed Jake over to Sophie when his phone rang today. They already looked like a family.

I nearly threw him.

Sophie must occupy the house.


Sophie must repaint the house to suit her own tastes.


Sophie must have Veronika over for dinner within a few weeks of moving in. Cook my Honey Sage Chicken for her, Sophie, page 46 of the Blue Book. She’ll soon stop her sulking. Tell her she never liked my house much in the first place.


Sophie must take her turn at the Alice and Jack tours. (Grace must be responsible for Sophie’s training.)

‘I
thought
I
was a control freak,’ Ian, the Sweet Solicitor, had commented, when he was explaining the terms of Aunt Connie’s will to Sophie (before he’d asked her out and turned into a potential boyfriend).

‘I don’t mind any of the conditions,’ Sophie had said. ‘Although I don’t know if Veronika will come to dinner. You know she wanted to contest the will? It’s amazing that Connie could tell that was going to happen. Although, not so amazing, I guess.’

‘I think I’ve convinced her to drop that idea. There are no possible grounds. Anyway, Veronika, Thomas and Grace all received substantial bequests from Connie. She was a very wealthy woman. I don’t think you’ll have any more problems with Veronika.’

He’s right. When Sophie feels resilient enough to make the call, Veronika says yes, she will come to dinner, in a tone of voice that suggests it’s about time she was asked.

‘You know what I read on my desk calendar yesterday?’ she asks Sophie.

‘What?’ Sophie is cautious. Veronika sounds quite genial, almost whimsical, which is frankly terrifying.

‘“If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance,”’ quotes Veronika. ‘George Bernard Shaw. I’ve decided it’s time to make our family skeleton dance. And
you’re
going to help me.’

Sophie speaks in a careful, neutral voice, as if she’s negotiating the release of a hostage from a mad terrorist. ‘Gosh, Veronika, that sounds intriguing.’

‘Yup,’ says Veronika. ‘I don’t suppose you need me to bring anything, do you? And obviously I don’t need your new address. I’ll stay the night, shall I?’

Sophie recoils as if she’s been shot in the stomach. She silently bangs her fist against her forehead and says, ‘Of course. We can have breakfast together.’

‘Maybe,’ says Veronika in an if-you’re-lucky tone. ‘But I should see Mum and Enigma and Aunt Rose while I’m there on the island. And Grace and the baby of course. Anyway, if I can fit in breakfast with you I will.’

‘That’s all I can ask,’ says Sophie faintly.

‘Gotta run! See you next week!’ shouts Veronika, as if she’s run off somewhere and is calling back over her shoulder. She slams down the phone.

Making the family skeleton dance, thinks Sophie. Oh dear, Veronika. Something tells me it’s not meant to dance for you until your fortieth birthday.

Veronika brings a housewarming present when she comes to visit. It is a sculptured abstract figure of a woman raising her hands in consternation as if at some new puzzle of life. It’s both beautiful and funny.

‘Oh Veronika, I just absolutely love it,’ says Sophie truthfully, feeling quite overwhelmed with gratitude in the circumstances.

‘Of course you do!’ Veronika has a very bad cold. She sucks ferociously on a cough lolly. ‘I knew you would. I bought it for you the same day I was really angry with you. Very expensive too. That’s the thing about you. You make people want to please you. It’s not a compliment, by the way. No need to blush.’

‘I’m not blushing,’ says Sophie. Veronika is the only person Sophie knows who not only doesn’t look away when Sophie blushes but actually provides a running commentary on progress. ‘Oh, look, it’s reached your forehead. I wonder if your
scalp
blushes?!’

‘So, you haven’t changed the place much, I see.’ Veronika marches through the house like a nosy landlord, opening cupboards and drawers, even ripping back the shower curtain in the bathroom. Sophie trots behind her, full of pride and pleasure as they enter each room.

‘Are there any of Aunt Connie’s old papers or anything still here?’ asks Veronika suspiciously when they get to what used to be Connie’s office.

‘No, your mum cleaned out the whole place before I moved in. The house was sparkling. She’s so lovely, Margie. And she works like a Trojan, doesn’t she?’

‘Well, she obviously finds time to eat.’

‘She’s lost ten kilos so far at Weight Watchers! She’s doing very well.’

‘I
know
she’s going to Weight Watchers! You don’t need to tell me about my own mother. It was my present to her for Christmas. I’m sick of hearing Dad tease her about her weight. He treats her like a dirty doormat and she acts like one. It makes me sick watching them. I don’t know what I’m going to do about that.’

‘Maybe losing weight will give her new confidence to stand up to your dad?’

‘I hope it gives her enough confidence to leave him.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes,
really.
’ Veronika puts on a prissy voice to mimic Sophie. ‘We don’t all have a fairytale mummy and daddy like you.’

Oh this was going to be such a fun night.

‘My parents send their love, by the way.’

‘Are they proud of the way you got your hands on this house?’

Sophie breathes deeply. She is Audrey Hepburn in
The Nun’s Story.

‘I hope you’re hungry. I’ve cooked your Aunt Connie’s recipe for Honey Sage Chicken.’

‘I’m not actually that hungry.’ Veronika marches into the kitchen. She opens the oven door and peers inside. ‘It looks ready to me. Don’t overcook it.’

‘Her instructions were very firm about cooking for exactly fifty minutes,’ says Sophie. She had felt Aunt Connie’s presence peering over her shoulder the whole time she was cooking.

‘You’ve got to follow your own instincts when it comes to cooking, you know, Sophie.’ Veronika slams the oven door shut and sits down at the kitchen table. She taps her fingers rapidly. ‘Did the recipe call for a spoonful of arsenic?’

‘Not that I noticed.’ Sophie rather desperately opens the fridge to look for the white wine she’d bought to go with the chicken.

‘I wonder what poison she used to murder my great-grandparents.’

Sophie gapes at Veronika over the fridge door. ‘You don’t seriously think your Aunt Connie killed Alice and Jack. She was only nineteen!’

‘Oh and nineteen-year-olds aren’t capable of murder. Ha, ha!’ Veronika gives Sophie the tired look of a hardened crime investigator who has seen many a brutal sight you couldn’t even imagine, young lady.

Sophie finds two wine glasses and pours their wine. ‘All right then, well, what was her motive?’ It’s rather enjoyable using words like ‘motive’ in casual conversation. It makes her feel like one of those tough, resourceful forensic experts on TV shows like
CSI
. Sophie flicks her hair back, squares her shoulders and sticks her breasts out. Those women always have very confident breasts.

Veronika takes a gulp of her wine while still chewing on her cough lolly. Sophie winces. It is doubtful that the cough lolly is contributing much to the chardonnay’s buttery undertones.

‘Well, obviously Connie was having an affair with Jack Munro,’ says Veronika. ‘His wife had probably lost interest in sex, you see, after Enigma was born. Men always feel neglected after their wives have babies.’

‘Oh I see,’ says Sophie. She wonders if Callum feels neglected. Just a little bit? She hopes so.
Oh, stop it, you foolish, idiotic girl. You don’t even mean it. Some crime-scene investigator you are.

Veronika continues with her explanation. ‘So Jack keeps promising Connie that he’ll leave Alice and he never does. You know, the way they always promise they’ll leave their wives and they never do.’

‘So I’ve heard.’ Sophie feels suitably chastised.

‘Connie finally realises this. She goes mad with jealous rage, poisons them both and helps herself to the baby.’

‘Why not just poison the baby too?’

‘She wasn’t a
complete
monster.’

‘And what happened to their bodies?’

‘Chopped up, I expect.’ Veronika smacks her lips. ‘Did you know that Connie and Rose’s father was a butcher?
Very
handy for body removal. I don’t know for sure, of course, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the bones are buried in those big flowerpots with the busy lizzies all along Scribbly Street.’

‘And what about Rose?’ asks Sophie. ‘Was she in on it too?’

‘Accessory after the fact,’ pronounces Veronika. ‘Helped with the cover-up.’

Sophie thinks about that day at Grace’s house when Rose said, ‘
We’ll tell you the truth about what happened to Alice and Jack.
’ It is extremely tempting to reveal this information to Veronika, just for the satisfaction of telling her something she doesn’t know, but Sophie has never broken a promise, especially not one made to an old lady with fervently pleading eyes.

‘It seems a bit odd to make a tourist attraction of the crime scene.’ Sophie raises a wry, detective-like eyebrow at Veronika.

‘The woman had balls,’ agrees Veronika.

‘Really?’ Sophie widens her eyes. ‘Gosh. How did Jimmy feel about that?’

‘This isn’t funny. She
murdered
my great-grandparents and she got away with it! She probably laughed all the way to her grave!’

Veronika blows her nose noisily and Sophie feels remorseful, because if Aunt Connie
did
kill Alice and Jack she’d find it more intriguing than dreadful. Murders that happened over seventy years ago don’t seem quite as serious as murders that happen today. After all, the victims would be dead by now anyway, so the point seems sort of moot. But Veronika acts as if it all happened last week.

‘Would you prefer a hot lemon drink to the wine?’ Sophie asks Veronika.

‘No,’ snuffles Veronika. ‘The wine is OK. Look, I want you to help me prove that Aunt Connie killed Alice and Jack. Then I’m going to write a book about it. I’ll mention you in the acknowledgements, of course. You owe me. You wouldn’t have got this house if it wasn’t for me.’

‘But how could I help you?’ Sophie is aghast. It doesn’t seem good etiquette to help prove someone a murderer after they’ve left you a house and a selection of potential new boyfriends.

‘You can talk to my family. Rose and Enigma. Even Mum and Dad,’ says Veronika. ‘They’re all hiding something. I know it. I’ve always known it. I used to hear comments all the time. Once I overheard Mum and Dad fighting and he said, “I could blow this whole Alice and Jack thing sky-high at any time,” and Mum just laughed and said she didn’t mind, it would be Aunt Connie he’d have to face. I confronted them of course, and they just laughed at me. It happened when I was about fourteen. I keep forgetting about it for years at a time and then remembering and getting angry. It’s a cover-up! My own family is involved in a cover-up and
I don’t know the truth
.’

Sophie thinks about how hurt Veronika would be if she knew what Enigma and Rose had said to her. Now Sophie is involved in the cover-up too. Even though she has no idea of exactly what she’s covering up. It’s quite exciting.

‘I really think you should ask them yourself.’ She tries to sound soothing and not patronising.

‘Oh, you think I haven’t? Like a million times? My family likes you better than they like me!’ Veronika drains her wine glass and pushes it towards Sophie for a refill. ‘Not one of them would back me up about Aunt Connie’s will. They didn’t want to help me contest it. They didn’t want me to have the house. They wanted you to have it. They’d rather have you living here than me. I annoy them. I’m fundamentally annoying. Are we going to eat soon? Do you think you should check that chicken again?’

Veronika crunches her cough lolly between her teeth and looks meaningfully towards the oven, seemingly determined to prove that she is indeed fundamentally annoying.

At that moment the oven timer shrieks like a fire alarm and they both jump.

‘I think Aunt Connie might be cross with us,’ jokes Sophie a touch nervously as she opens the oven for the chicken.

Veronika shakes her fist at the ceiling. ‘I’m going to prove you did it, Aunt Connie! You always told me I needed to focus; well, I’m focusing all right. I’m focusing on you!
Murderer
!’

Sophie puts the chicken on top of the stove, noting hopefully that it smells delicious, and watches Veronika curiously. ‘Are you OK? You look a bit pale.’ And you’re acting even nut-tier than usual.

‘I guess I shouldn’t be drinking when I’m taking antibiotics.’ Veronika’s words are softening at the edges. ‘Also, I think I forgot to eat today. Oopsie!’

And at that point her eyelids droop and the top half of her body tips forward in slow motion until her forehead rests gently on the table.

The next morning Sophie leaves Veronika sleeping in Aunt Connie’s spare bedroom. She is lying flat on her back, breathing snuffily through her mouth, one thin arm thrown dramatically across her eyes as if she can’t bear the sight of something. It’s strange to watch Veronika sleeping; she’s so rarely quiet. Watching someone sleeping, thinks Sophie, is a bit like sneaking through their house when they’re not home. Sophie notices for the first time that Veronika has elfin, pointy-tipped ears and she feels a rush of motherly affection for her, so much so that she even considers tucking the blanket under Veronika’s chin, except she doesn’t want to risk waking her and feeling her affection evaporate.

After stealthily leaving a cup of tea, a glass of water and some Panadol next to Veronika’s bed, she tiptoes out of the house. It’s Sunday, and Sophie is meeting Grace for her first training session on the Alice and Jack tours.

She reaches the Alice and Jack house via the paved private footpath that snakes along the island shore. It still gives her a thrill to ignore the friendly but firm signs saying, ‘
Sorry! Only Scribbly Gum residents past this point!
’