“There we go. That’s better.”
Jacob glanced up. He reached out and tentatively touched Ben’s cheek, then his own. He regarded his fingers. “Wet.”
Ben gave a shaky laugh. “Yeah, that’s right. We’re both wet.” He stood up and hoisted Jacob on one arm. “Come on. Let’s make some tea.”
After that, Ben felt he had stepped into a bubble of calm. It was as though he’d come through a high fever and been left drained but in a state of fragile peace. The fact that he hadn’t heard from the detective no longer gnawed at him. It wasn’t that he was holding out any false hopes, simply that there would be time enough to deal with that, and its consequences, later.
The weekend seemed to exist by itself, and he accepted the respite gratefully, all the more so because he knew that it was only a respite.
The pain left by Sarah’s absence was still there, but at least now it was uncluttered with resentment and anger. He hadn’t even realised he had felt any of those things until they had gone, and if the keenness of the hurt was undiminished, he would rather have that than the maddened, confused rage which had mocked everything he and Sarah had been together.
No matter what she had done he still loved her, and missed her. It was almost a relief to recognise that.
On the Saturday he took Jacob swimming. It was always difficult to know which activities he would enjoy, and which would either leave him indifferent or, worse, would bewilder and agitate him. Swimming had been a surprising success from the start. To begin with Sarah had been worried that he would not understand the concept of water, would try to breathe with his head submerged or drown himself in some other offbeat way, but her fears proved groundless. Jacob splashed about as enthusiastically as any other child his age, and although he didn’t know how to swim he was safe enough in a pair of water wings. He looked all head and ribs in his swimming trunks, and Ben felt a surge of protectiveness towards him. He’s mine as much as Sarah’s, he thought; and then, We’re a family. We’ve only got each other now.
But that was too sombre a mood, belonging to the week ahead, not the present. Turning away from it, Ben took Jacob down the easiest water slide, and was rewarded with a beaming grin. The problem then became convincing him to stop while they still had some skin left on their legs and behinds.
They went to a pub with a beer garden for lunch, and as Ben watched Jacob carefully shred his paper napkin into strips he reflected that at least the boy’s condition made him different to the charms of McDonald’s. There was always a light side, he thought, wryly.
Jacob was yawning before they reached home. Ben knew he would want to go to bed early, but there was a brief flurry of rebellion at bath-time, when he refused to get into the tub.
“Orange. Orange,” he repeated, brushing away the orange juice and fruit he was offered. Ben was at a loss, until he made the connection with the water. With his Dayglo armbands on, Jacob got happily into the bath and let himself be washed.
Ben had been dreading the prospect of another Saturday night spent alone, with nothing to hold back the cold truth that Sarah wasn’t there to share it with him. But the buffer of calm that had sustained him all day didn’t desert him now.
Tinged with sadness, it let him get through the hours easily enough, a bottle of wine and the occasional joint helping, until he began to doze on the couch during a late-night horror film and took himself off to bed.
Maggie had been tartly surprised when he had declined the offer of Sunday lunch. Instead the next day he took Jacob to the river near Henley. It had been a favourite picnic spot of Sarah’s, and he’d wondered if going there now was a good idea. But somehow it seemed the right thing to do. They walked along the riverbank, Jacob’s hand small and warm in his.
Jacob was ti-ti-ing a tuneless song, a sign that he was enjoying himself. He fell silent as they approached the familiar nest of willow trees that hung over the water. His eyes were big and solemn as they flitted over the two other groups of picnickers already there, and Ben felt his throat tighten as Jacob turned to look behind them, as though expecting to see someone following.
We shouldn’t have come.
But the boy’s quietness didn’t last long. By the time Ben had spread out the picnic blanket, Jacob was humming softly to himself again as he plucked the seeds from stalks of grass and arranged them in a line on his bare leg. Ben had packed hard-boiled eggs and ham-and-tomato sandwiches, cut into the thin strips that Jacob liked. After they had eaten he brought out a football, but Jacob wasn’t interested. Sometimes he would play with it, sometimes he wouldn’t. Now he was more interested in the ripples his trailing hand made in the slow-moving water.
Ben watched him tilting his head to catch the light sparkling from them and quietly took his Nikon from the bag.
Storing up your memories in advance. The thought came without warning. He lowered the camera, feeling the balance he’d held all weekend begin to disintegrate. But the movement attracted Jacob’s attention. He rolled over on to his back and smiled upside down through splayed fingers. Ben grinned back, glad once more that they had come.
They stayed until the heat had gone out of the sun and all the other picnickers had left. Jacob had fallen asleep, and Ben had to wake him when it was time to go. When he was bathed and in bed, Ben took a chair and sat out in the small back garden, watching the sun set behind the sycamore tree at the bottom.
If I could hold on to things like this I’d manage, he thought. It wouldn’t be as good, but I could cope.
But he knew that was only a weekend mood that would disappear just as quickly. And when he woke up the next morning the heaviness was waiting for him, ready to be put on again like a pair of dirty jeans. He grabbed for the serenity he’d felt the day before but it had gone, already as faded and insubstantial as a childhood holiday.
He took Jacob to school and went to the studio. At eleven o’clock Quilley called to say he had found the Kales.
Chapter six
The girl looked as tired as the last time Ben had seen her. She greeted him as unsmilingly as before. You can go straight in.”
He went to the door and tapped.
Quilley’s voice came from inside. “Come in.”
The detective was sitting behind the desk. The small room was still thick with stale cigarette smoke, but at least the pneumatic drills outside were silent. Quilley motioned Ben towards the spare chair without looking up from what he was writing. “Take a seat, Mr Murray. I won’t be a moment.”
Ben sat down. He stared at the top of the detective’s head and wondered if he went through the same rigmarole with every client. He felt an irrational burst of dislike for the man.
Quilley put down his pen. “There we go.” He sat back. “And how are you keeping?”
“Fine.” Get on with it.
“Locating the Kales was a bit more complicated than I’d thought it would be. It involved... well, quite a lot more digging around, shall I say, than I expected.” His smile was blandness itself.
He opened a cardboard folder. “Right, here we go. John Kale. Currently lives with his wife in a place called Tunford, which is a small town halfway between Northampton and Bedford. Kale’s from the area originally — he was brought up in an orphanage, don’t know if you knew that — and moved to Tunford when he left the army four years ago. He was discharged after he was wounded in a border incident over in Northern Ireland. Leg injury. That was after his first wife was killed, so perhaps—”