She looked up. ‘That’s the one. Why, friend of yours, is she?’ she asked sarcastically.
‘Not exactly, but I’m pretty sure I know who you mean. She’s lived in Stourton for as long as I can remember. Used to own this place in fact.’
Debbie fixed him with a stare. ‘This place? You mean the café?’
John nodded. ‘I used to come in here when I was a kid. She was always behind the counter.’ Debbie stared at him, wide-eyed, impatient to hear more. ‘She owned it with her husband, but then one day he disappeared, did a runner—’ John stopped mid-sentence, realizing that he had unwittingly echoed the letter’s accusation against Debbie. ‘Anyway, according to town gossip, he’d run up huge debts: gambling, I think. The café was in their joint name, so when the bailiffs showed up, she had no choice but to sell. After that she seemed to take it upon herself to make other people’s lives miserable. She was always making complaints, writing letters, reporting people to the police for no good reason. After a while no one took her seriously – everyone just ignored her.’
‘Well, I can’t ignore her, can I?’ Debbie cut in sharply. ‘The café nearly went under, thanks to her interference. I thought we were going to default on the mortgage. Sophie and I could have been homeless.’ She swallowed a sob. ‘And now she’s played her trump card by scaring you off. I’ve got to hand it to her, she plays a good game.’ She turned her head towards the window so that John could not see her tears.
‘Who said anything about her scaring me off?’ John replied quietly.
‘Well, isn’t that why you’re here?’ Debbie shot back defiantly. ‘That’s what “We need to talk” usually means. This is a small town. You couldn’t risk getting involved with someone with my reputation.’ She picked up the letter and waved it towards him. ‘There’s no smoke without fire, after all – isn’t that what you think?’
I had never seen Debbie like this before, not even in the heat of an argument with Sophie. Her lips were white and, although she was crying, she looked like she was seething with rage. I held my breath, praying that John would see through her hostility and recognize the hurt that lay underneath. I willed him to say that he didn’t believe what was written in the letter, that the old woman was crazy and that he trusted Debbie completely. But he didn’t say anything. He was looking down at the table, seemingly in no rush to put her out of her misery.
‘I know you don’t get on with Sophie’s dad,’ he began slowly, ‘but that’s all I know. To be honest, it’s never felt appropriate to ask. Your past is your private business—’
‘Not any more, apparently,’ Debbie interrupted, curtly.
John sighed and I saw his shoulders drop. The thought flashed through my mind that he was giving up, that he was about to take his coat and leave. The hairs on my back prickled in frustration. Surely they could see that this mutual distrust was exactly what the old woman had hoped to achieve, and that if John walked out now, she would have won? I wished I could do something to rescue the situation, to make them realize that they were on the same side. But I knew that, on this occasion, there was nothing I could do but watch.
‘Look . . .’ When John finally spoke, his voice was conciliatory. ‘For what it’s worth, I don’t believe a word of this letter. Like you said, this woman has clearly had it in for you for a while. But maybe’ – Debbie breathed in sharply – ‘maybe it is appropriate for me to ask about your past. Not because I’m suspicious of you, but just because I’m interested.’
John sat back in his chair to show that he had said his piece. His words had sounded good to me, but Debbie’s face remained stony. Outside, the storm had swept in, blowing sheets of rain horizontally along the parade and rattling the café door in its frame. The sky had darkened to an ominous steel-grey, leaving Debbie and John sitting in near-darkness. I felt my pupils dilate as my eyes adjusted to the low light.
‘Well,’ she said at last. ‘Since you’re interested . . . ’ Her chin dropped and her eyes rested on the table between them as she spoke. ‘Sophie’s father and I ran a business together in Oxford – property management. He did the hands-on maintenance stuff, and I kept things ticking over in the office at home: answering phone calls, speaking to tenants, that sort of thing. It was my contribution to the household while Sophie was little.’ She took a deep, shuddering breath, as if girding herself to continue.
‘Andrew decided we should buy a place, rent it out and manage it ourselves. He said managing other people’s property was a mug’s game, that the real money was made by the landlords. I wasn’t sure – property in Oxford’s not exactly cheap, and we could only just afford our own mortgage – but he was adamant. He said it would be an investment, a nest egg for our future. He’d already found a place, a repossessed house that was up for auction. The plan was to convert it into flats . . .’ Debbie’s voice cracked, and her eyes stayed fixed on the table.
John had remained completely motionless while she spoke, listening intently.
‘Anyway, we bought it, but the renovations seemed to go on forever. It turned out the property was a wreck: subsidence, damp – you name it. Andrew became obsessed, spending all his time there. Sophie and I hardly ever saw him. Meanwhile I was trying to hold things together at home. The phone was ringing off the hook, tenants complaining that repairs hadn’t been done, and landlords saying the rent hadn’t been paid. And I told all of them that everything would be okay, that we were on top of it, there was nothing to worry about.’ Debbie’s face crumpled. ‘But there was more to worry about than I realized.’ She hung her head, and I could see tears drop into her lap. ‘He’d been keeping the rent money,’ she said, her voice almost a whisper. ‘Taking it from the tenants, but rather than paying the landlords, he’d been pumping it into that money-pit of a house. I only found out when one of the landlords turned up on our doorstep.’ Her shoulders shook as she sobbed silently.
‘That must have been horrific,’ John said.
‘That wasn’t the worst of it,’ Debbie continued. ‘When it all came out, the police got involved. Andrew claimed that he knew nothing about it, that I’d been responsible for the company finances and he had no idea what had been going on. We were both charged with obtaining property by deception.’
Debbie had slumped low in her chair. She looked broken, distraught, and I was desperate to comfort her.
‘It didn’t wash in court, of course,’ she went on. ‘The bank had evidence that he’d handled all the money transfers. He got nine months, suspended on the basis that it was his first offence. He was liable for court costs and compensation and, because everything was in our joint names, we had to sell our home.’ She exhaled a long breath and lifted her chin. ‘Of course that was when he decided to tell me that he’d met someone else.’
‘The bastard!’ John said. Debbie mustered a rueful smile and pulled a tissue out of her pocket to wipe her eyes.
‘So there you have it,’ she concluded. ‘That’s my dirty laundry, now aired in public, thanks to a bitter, lonely old woman. Yes, I was once investigated by the police, but my name was cleared. The question is: What are you going to do about it?’
34
Jo and Debbie were in the café kitchen a couple of nights later, preparing for their Friday night takeaway. Jo was reading the letter with a look of growing horror, while Debbie separated the slices of their pizza with a knife.
‘The evil witch!’ Jo tossed the letter onto the worktop in disgust. ‘Please tell me John wasn’t taken in by it?’