‘Please, I don’t want to hear any more,’ Matlock slurred.
‘I’ve only just begun,’ Justin said.
Matlock held up one hand. ‘Listen to me. Perhaps you’ve harboured some kind of deep-seated hatred against me, understandable from what you’ve said, but I was just a youngster, and I was paid to allow some other writer to do that book. I had nothing to do with it, believe me. I suppose if I had, you and your sister’s faces would have been imprinted on my mind. It’s what they call a ghost-writer, do you understand? I didn’t write that book.’
Justin watched Matlock as he drank. He knew he had to be lying, not that it mattered. If it hadn’t been for him they would never have been hounded. ‘Did you coin the phrase “Devil’s Children”?’
Matlock drank again. ‘I don’t recall.’
Justin repeated the phrase, then leaned close and touched the man’s knee. ‘Maybe it was a fitting description. Maybe it wasn’t.’
‘Listen, son, if this is about money—’ Matlock’s head cracked back against the combing as Justin punched him in his face.
‘I’m not your son, and this isn’t about money. Don’t you understand what this is about? This is about me confronting you, my devil. There is no way off this boat, no way you can make it back to the island without me. You are my prisoner, and by the time this is over, you will understand what fear means, understand that you must be punished for what you did to Child A and Child B, like everyone else who hurt them. You are going to die.’
Matlock wasn’t sweating any more, he felt icy cold. Justin’s face became a blur. ‘Dear God, you’ll never get away with this.’ He tried to stand, but fell back into his seat.
Justin laughed, picked up the empty glass and tossed it overboard. He turned back to stare at the frightened man. This was the culmination of years of secret planning. In some ways it had been Matlock who had helped him to survive all along; without doubt, the idea of destroying him had given Laura the focus she needed to keep her sanity. He had promised they would play this scene together, rehearsed it so often between them. But she had always balked at the killing, and Matlock was the prize that Justin had lived his life hunting.
William had to wait a considerable time before he eventually got through to Dahlia. She confirmed that she had carried out his instructions to the letter, but still had not heard from Matlock or Justin. William placed a second call to the coastguard. They had sent out a launch. William felt relieved enough to leave it in their hands and he hurried to the hospital.
James was on oxygen and a glucose drip, and was linked up to a heart monitor. At this stage they were unable to ascertain if he had suffered any permanent damage. His temperature was stable and a dialysis machine was standing by in case his kidneys failed. His pale face was like a sleeping child’s, his arms out straight, like a soldier’s, resting on the white sheet. The air-conditioning ensured the room was cool and a ceiling fan turned overhead, making a soft grating sound. Could Justin have had something to do with this? Could he have engineered it? He turned as the door opened, and a nurse ushered Angela in. ‘I want to take him home,’ she whispered.
‘He mustn’t be moved,’ said the nurse. ‘He’s still unconscious. We’re doing all we can.’
Then Angela saw William. He drew up a chair for her to sit beside the bed. She was twisting a tissue round and round in her hands. ‘I asked them to contact my husband,’ she said to the nurse. Then she looked pleadingly to William. ‘Can you make sure he gets here as soon as possible?’
‘Yes, it’s being taken care of right now. He’ll be here, I’m sure, Angela.’
When the nurse had gone, she said, ‘He is so like you, my husband. The only difference is he married me, while you betrayed me.’ She threw the torn tissue into the bin. ‘You seemed to gain such pleasure from hurting me. You are the most destructive, heartless man.’
‘I don’t think this is the right place to discuss—’
‘No? Funny how there never is a right time, is there?’ William shifted his weight from one foot to the other as she stood up and faced him. ‘I loved you, you said you loved me. You made me believe you had every intention of marrying me, but within two weeks of making promises, two weeks, you took up with that whore! You replaced me in your affections and in my job! I’d had that job for years. You left me when I was ill. You took everything away from me.’
William wished the ground would open up and swallow him. ‘It was a long time ago.’ He could not believe she was launching such a venomous attack at him while her son lay in a coma beside her. ‘You must have hated me,’ he said lamely.
‘Hated you?’ She gave a bitter laugh. ‘I tried to kill myself. All I could think about was dying. You almost killed me. I was broke and mentally sick, my mother was suffering from Alzheimer’s and I had no one.’ She gave a shrill laugh then looked at him. ‘But life has a funny way of dealing the cards. My husband’s mother was in the hospital too, and that was how we met. Like I said, he reminded me of you — not in looks, just manner. I didn’t marry him for that reason. I married him because I thought I loved him. I never did. I tried to make him be like you but he wasn’t and then to be used by him with his other women... One day I decided that, no matter how long it took, I would have my pound of flesh because I blamed you for my being married to him. I wanted to cause you pain, William, as much as you had caused me.’ Her eyes, usually so submissive, blazed. ‘Well, I paid you back, William Benedict. You couldn’t have had the slightest idea where I was, let alone that I could have been instrumental in...’
‘It must have been tough harbouring such deep resentment for so many years.’
She was silent for a few moments, then plucked a clean tissue from the box. He could not take his eyes off her hands as they shredded it. ‘I never slept a single night without thinking about you. In the end it became second nature, like a ritual.’
‘Sleeping cruelty,’ he said softly.
‘You deserved all you got. Maybe you always were a queer. Maybe that’s why you doted on that boy Maynard. You certainly made a big fool of yourself over him.’
William understood it all now. Suddenly he didn’t feel any anger towards Angela any more, only sympathy and guilt. Guilt because he had cared for her, and never loved her.
‘To begin with my husband always wanted to please me, but gradually I saw through him; I was just a useful appendage. I was afraid he would leave me and take James. It wasn’t till I discovered how to control him that I got the upper hand. He was terrified that someone would turn the tables on him. If I divorced him and threatened to feed dirt about him to his competitors he would have been devastated. And believe you me there was plenty of dirt. If you think your little forays with prostitutes made headlines, you should have seen what my beloved husband got up to! He didn’t write the articles about you himself, of course, he’s above all that now. My husband’s only interested in circulation — or money. Rather like you. As I said before, you two are very similar.’
‘And you fed him all the inside information about my life to create one scandal after another? My wives, my children?’
‘Correct.’ She smirked. ‘I had always followed your career, William, and your marriages. For God’s sake, you even invited me to your first wedding. Can you imagine what that did to me?’
He wanted to explain why he had never loved her or any other woman, but there was no point now.
She looked at the boy in the bed. ‘Perhaps now I will have to pay for it.’ She was silent again for a moment. ‘Why are we here? I didn’t want to come, nor did Humphrey. But he changed his mind. Did you organize this? Did you find out it was me?’ she asked softly. She turned to him. ‘Did you want me here to hurt me again? Well, if my son is the price, you’ve won the game. But I don’t understand. I believed you never gave me a second thought.’