Bill Shefford grinned wryly. ‘And sometimes it’s better if you keep your trap shut. No point in burdening other people with your problems. Though, on the other hand …’
He ground to a halt. Carole quickly posed to herself the what-would-Jude-do-in-these-circumstances question. And came up with the answer: nothing.
Her silence was rewarded by a slight shift in the expression on Bill’s face. He fixed his gaze on her. His eyes, she noticed for the first time, were a surprising, almost innocent, blue.
‘Sometimes in life,’ he began slowly, ‘you get into a position where there’s nothing you can do that isn’t going to hurt someone. There’s a decision you have to take and, though you know some people will be very happy with what you’ve decided, some other people are going to be absolutely devastated.’
‘And that’s the position you’re in at the moment?’
He nodded pensively. ‘So, it’s a kind of balancing act. A profit-and-loss account, if you like. Is the happiness I’m going to bring to one lot of people worth the pain I’m going to bring to the other lot? Not easy.’
‘No,’ Carole agreed very softly, afraid to break the fragile atmosphere of his confessional mood.
‘And also,’ he went on, ‘you never know how people are going to react, do you?’
Another scarcely breathed, ‘No.’
‘If you upset someone, what lengths will they go to … to be revenged?’
Silence again. Carole wasn’t certain what Bill was referring to, but her mind was teeming with possibilities. Was he talking about the fate of Shefford’s Garage, whether he should pass it on to Billy, as everyone expected? Or did he have plans to sell the site? It was a significant lump of real estate in Fethering, with space for a surprising number of new dwellings to be built on it. Yes, there might be an initial problem with organizing change of use, but the local planning authorities were very biddable when there was a prospect of more residential property becoming available.
‘And when you have thoughts like that,’ he continued finally, ‘you can feel very vulnerable …’
Yet another pause. Carole hung on his words. Bill Shefford opened his mouth as if for further confidences. But then he changed his mind. Abruptly, he said, ‘Anyway, I’ve got to remove a gearbox’, and went through to the workshop.
It seemed to be taking an unconscionably long time for Billy Shefford to change the windscreen wipers on the Renault. Carole felt she should go through to the workshop to chivvy him up, but somehow she couldn’t. Her role at Shefford’s had always been that of the supplicant, the woman who knew nothing about cars and needed help. Playing that role ruled out the assertiveness she displayed in other areas of her life.
And she did need the new wipers. She’d noticed recently, particularly if driving after dark in the rain, that she couldn’t see very well. It was even worse when facing oncoming headlights. She hoped it wasn’t her eyesight, so she’d opted for a change of wiper blades before she made an appointment with the optician.
Was it age catching up with her? Eyes … and, of course, the knee. As soon as she thought of it, she felt a twinge and shifted her position on the plastic chair.
As ever, to avoid the ignominy of looking purposeless, she had The Times crossword with her, but she couldn’t settle to it that morning. Bill Shefford’s gloom seemed to have infected her own mood. She looked across at the coffee machine, wondering if it might now contain something drinkable. But, deep down, she knew that such miracles didn’t happen.
Suddenly, from the workshop, she heard a heavy metallic thud which coincided with a scream of pain. She rushed through the door from the office.
Billy Shefford and Frankie (whose hair was now jet black) were looking down with horror into the inspection pit, above which a substantial car crouched. Over their shoulders, illuminated by the pit’s sidelights, Carole could see the body of Bill Shefford, crushed by a large metal object.
Billy’s next words identified it for her. ‘The gearbox,’ he said in a voice taut with shock. ‘It fell on him. He’s dead.’
SEVEN
What happened next was something of a blur for Carole. Billy Shefford didn’t want to stay with his father’s body. Almost catatonic with shock, he sat silently on the threadbare sofa in the reception area, incapable of any action. It was Frankie who made some calls, presumably summoning an ambulance, though it was obvious that it would be doing the service of a hearse rather than of life-saving transport. Her voice was steady, but unnoticed tears smudged her mascara and made dark runnels down the thick make-up of her face. Carole had the inappropriate thought that, with the jet-black hair, they made her look like a Goth.
As well as the emergency services, Frankie must have made other calls, because fairly soon after, Shannon arrived at the garage. She immediately went to her husband and threw her arms around him. He did not react, still isolated by trauma. Getting no response, Shannon went through to view the crushed body of her father-in-law.
She was absent some ten minutes, then returned. Her eyes were bright with tears. She went to sit on the sagging sofa next to Billy, cradling him like an unresponding baby.
A short while later, Malee entered from the forecourt. Shannon showed no signs of having seen her. Bill Shefford’s wife went straight through to Frankie’s office. She closed the door, so that Carole could not hear what the two women said to each other. It was a short conversation, then Malee emerged and went into the workshop.
Like her daughter-in-law, she spent some ten minutes with her husband’s corpse. Then she came back into the front office and sat on the remaining plastic chair. Nobody said anything.
Still pretending to toy with her crossword, Carole looked covertly sideways at Malee. It was impossible to read what emotions lay behind the impassive, but rather beautiful, Oriental face. Certainly, there were no tears.
Carole now realized there was no role for her to fulfil. In fact, there hadn’t been since the accident had happened. With unacknowledged waves to Billy and Frankie, she went out by the front doors. She told herself she didn’t go out through the workshop out of respect for the recently deceased, but the real reason was squeamishness. The single glimpse she had caught of Bill Shefford’s body in the inspection pit had been quite enough for her.
The Renault was still out the back, exactly where she’d parked it. The new windscreen-wiper blades would have to wait for another day.
‘So, he was killed by a falling gearbox?’
‘That’s what Billy said. And Bill himself told me he had to go and remove a gearbox, so it makes sense.’
‘And what might cause a gearbox to fall?’
‘Don’t look at me, Jude. I know absolutely nothing about mechanics.’ The thought struck Carole for the first time that she had now lost her go-to man for such services. Would Billy be as tolerant of her ignorance as his father had been? The thought of not having somewhere to take all her anxieties about the Renault was a worrying one. But she did not voice her anxiety.
‘Desperately sad.’ Jude sighed. ‘From all accounts, Bill had been in a bad way since his first wife died and that’s what? Seven years ago. Then he’d just got his life back on track with Malee …’
‘The “Mail Order Bride”,’ was Carole’s kneejerk interjection.
‘I wish you’d stop saying that,’ said Jude sharply. ‘It’s deeply insensitive.’
Carole was used to Jude disagreeing with her, but rarely with such overt criticism. She was subdued by the attack.
They were in an alcove near the welcoming open fire of the Crown and Anchor. Carole had felt disoriented when she returned from Shefford’s and had immediately rung Jude. (Going round and knocking on her neighbour’s door was not Carole’s way. To her, such behaviour had something Northern about it, like the worst excesses of Coronation Street.) Jude had suggested lunch at the pub and Carole, who always had to justify everything to herself, thought she deserved it after the traumas of the morning.