‘Robin, there’s no need,’ I began. I wasn’t sure I could cope with him yet.
‘Don’t be ridiculous, darling,’ he said. Why was everybody telling me I was ridiculous all of a sudden?
‘Julia may have some bizarre bloody ideas about me, but I know what she means to you,’ he continued. ‘I’ll be there as soon as I can.’
I said nothing. There was a pause.
‘By the way,’ he asked casually. ‘Can she remember what happened?’
‘Not a thing,’ I replied.
Did I imagine the quick intake of breath. ‘How absolutely terrible,’ he said.
I replaced the receiver and tried to tell myself, with mixed success, that I was being stupid. Robin was in Ireland. He could not possibly have had anything to do with the fire in Julia’s flat. And in any case, how could I really think that the man I loved could be capable of that, or of the death of Natasha Felks, come to that. How could I even consider that Robin was that wicked?
Sometimes, as I veered from believing or fearing one thing to accepting the complete opposite and back again, I came to the conclusion that the only really wicked person around was me.
Good as his promise, Robin arrived home the next morning. He flew this time, from Cork into Bristol. And when he walked into the house the first thing he did was to take me into his arms. But I was determined at least to confront him with every detail of my terrible anxieties. I was quite possibly even more confused than poor Julia, I reckoned.
Resolutely I shook myself free of him, struggled to collate my muddled thinking and endeavoured to speak calmly and clearly.
‘I was on my way to visit Julia when I heard on the car radio the news of the fire,’ I began.
‘Poor darling,’ he said, his voice full of concern.
‘You haven’t asked why I suddenly decided to go to see her?’ I said bluntly.
‘Rose, she’s your best friend, I was going to be away for several days, why should you have to have a reason?’ he asked reasonably.
I persevered. ‘Julia had a letter to show me, a letter from Natasha to Sir Jeremy Cole,’ I said.
He looked almost as blank as Julia had in her hospital bed.
‘Rose, why do you want to tell me about a letter my late fiancée wrote to her former lover?’ he asked. ‘I’m not interested.’
I made myself not be put off. As succinctly as I could I told him about Julia’s pretend interview and about the letter and how Julia had taken it away with her.
When I had finished Robin’s face seemed to have paled considerably.
‘You can’t ever forget you are a police officer, Rose, can you? Not for an instant?’
I could see that he was hurt. More than that I could not fathom.
‘Not the investigating officer,’ I said. ‘There is one again though.’
His eyes opened wide in wonderment. ‘You’ve reported it all, haven’t you?’ he said, and there was absolutely no expression in his voice. ‘All this nonsense. And you’ve pointed the finger at me. How could you, Rose?’
‘I’m sorry,’ I responded, and I was too. Although I would have done the same thing all over again, it is impossible to describe the torment I had caused myself by doing so.
‘Surprising then that I haven’t been arrested yet, or at least given the third degree by the new national crime squad,’ he said, his voice heavy with sarcasm.
‘Todd Mallett has already checked up on your whereabouts,’ I replied quite formally, almost as if I really were on duty and dealing with a suspect. ‘And I am sure he or one of his team will question you sooner or later.’
‘Really,’ Robin said, still sarcastic. ‘Good job I have such a perfect alibi, then. Or do you think I beamed myself off the train or over from Waterford to London in order to despatch your barking mad bloody friend? Is that it? Have you gone quite barking too?’
He had raised his voice almost to screaming pitch, something I had so rarely known him to do. I said nothing. His eyes narrowed.
‘Has this letter been found?’ he asked.
I shook my head. ‘Julia’s flat was almost totally destroyed along with everything in it,’ I told him.
I was aware of Robin watching me closely, as if my behaviour were somehow curious.
‘What does this Jeremy Cole chappy have to say about it all now, then?’ he continued. ‘I presume he has been questioned.’
I nodded. ‘He says there was no letter and his interview with Julia was entirely about his new TV show,’ I said flatly.
Robin smiled, and for once I did not find his smile attractive at all.
‘So the allegedly incriminating letter no longer exists if it ever did, poor Julia cannot remember anything about it nor even interviewing Cole, and he denies everything,’ he finally remarked coldly. ‘Bit of a cock-and-bull story, wouldn’t you say?’
For a fleeting moment I almost hated him. It was the first time I had ever felt like that. Great passion and great loathing are often not far apart, I suppose. But I couldn’t really hate Robin. Not even now.
He stood up, strode across the room and caught hold of me by the shoulders. Not roughly, not even then, but firmly, as if by physical contact he might emphasise his point. And he spoke to me in the way that an exasperated parent might address a silly child. Not the first time he’d done that I remember thinking, and I wasn’t sure which of us that said most about.
‘Rose, I didn’t even know Julia had gone to see Cole. How could I have known? I went to Ireland. I was on the overnight train on the way there when her flat caught fire. You know that.’
He wasn’t being so patient now. After all this was the second time that I had confronted him with the unspeakable.
He was angry. He still had hold of me by the shoulders and just very slightly shook me. I could feel the frustration in him. For a moment I thought he was going to lose control. But he didn’t. Instead he let go of me and stepped back. When he started talking again his voice was by then quite quiet and somehow very chilling.
‘I can’t believe I am being interrogated by my own wife,’ he said. ‘And I can’t believe what you seem to be trying to accuse me of.’
I bowed my head. I’d had to have this out with him, I remained consumed with doubts and fears, but he had already succeeded in making me feel a bit ashamed of myself.
‘Are you determined to destroy our marriage?’ he asked even more coldly.
‘No, no, oh, I don’t know,’ I stumbled. ‘I don’t know what I think, or what I’m doing any more. I am so confused.’
I saw his face soften.
‘You don’t really believe such awful things about me, do you, Rose?’
He just sounded sad then. I looked into his eyes. All I could see was pain, the so familiar pain.
‘No, I suppose I don’t, I can’t really, can I?’ I heard myself say. And yet such a short time previously I had half-convinced myself that he really might be guilty of almost unimaginable crimes. What I told him next was the absolute truth. ‘If I believed it, I couldn’t stay with you.’
He reached out for me again, but this time quite tenderly.
‘You have to stay with me, Rose,’ he whispered. ‘We are so good together.’
It still felt right, absolutely right, there was no doubt about that. My body softened to his touch.
‘But you must stop doubting me, Rose, you really must, I just can’t take any more of it. You keep opening up old wounds, don’t you, digging in places where there is nothing to dig for. It’s like some kind of obsession. It has to stop.’
Then he softened his words by smiling the old to-die-for smile.
I was no longer entirely blinded by the white mist of my love for him, and maybe I never would be again. But still I could not see clearly. And it was in that moment that I realised with devastating clarity that while I couldn’t quite quell the terrible suspicions which haunted me, I would continue to belong to Robin Davey until there was absolutely no doubt left at all about his guilt. Perhaps even then I would not be able to break the hold he had over me.