When Banks got home to Newhope Cottage later that evening, the rain was still pouring down, and Gratly Beck was close to full spate. Normally a steady, soothing trickle of water over the terraced falls outside his cottage, tonight it roared down the daleside, swollen with the flow of countless becks, burns and rills from higher up in the hills, flecked with foam that caught the light of the half moon like whitecaps out at sea. But the beck was deep and its banks were high. He knew he would be safe from flooding here, so far up the side of the valley, but Helmthorpe and The Leas below might have serious problems. It wouldn’t be the first time. The worst his cottage had ever suffered from protracted wind and heavy rain was a leak where the conservatory joined the older part of the building, which he had caulked the previous spring, and a little dampness had managed to seep its way through the thick stone walls to darken the bedroom wall in patches. After the previous winter, he’d had one of the local handymen around to fix a few gaps in the flagstone roof and spray the back wall with silicon, which was supposed to seal the porous limestone against the elements. The way things were going, he would soon find out whether it worked.
The cottage felt more welcoming than it had on Saturday night, with smoke coming out of the chimney, a light visible from the entertainment room and Ray’s ancient Honda Civic parked outside. As soon as Banks got inside, he could hear Billie Holiday singing ‘Lover Man’. Even though it was his own home, he tapped gently on the entertainment room door before entering, so as not to surprise Ray if he happened to be asleep or lost in thought.
‘Alan, nice to see you,’ Ray said, rising and shaking hands. ‘As you can see, I’m making myself at home. I do appreciate this. I’m not a particularly large man, but I must confess that in Annie’s place, I felt rather like Alice when she was ten feet tall after taking that pill.’
‘No problem.’ Banks dropped his keys on the sideboard beside an open bottle of Laphroaig. Ray must have bought it, he realised, as he hadn’t had any in the house for ages. Ray had also managed to light the wood stove, and the room felt warm and cosy.
‘Why don’t you join me?’ Ray said, pointing to the bottle. ‘Nightcap.’
Banks hesitated. He had lost his taste for the peaty whisky since he had come to associate it with a fire at the cottage, but he had tried a drop now and then over the past couple of years, and his tolerance was improving. Besides, after the day he’d had, he felt he needed a drink or two to help him unwind. He helped himself to a wee dram and topped up Ray’s glass.
‘Slainte,’ Banks said, clinking glasses.
‘Slainte. Hope you don’t mind the music.’
‘Billie? Never,’ said Banks.
‘They said she could tell a story in a song, but as far as I’m concerned she can tell a story in just one note.’
‘She had what it takes,’ Banks agreed.
‘Frank Sinatra said he’d once kissed her as she ought to be kissed,’ Ray mused. ‘I’ve often wondered what that was like.’
Banks flopped down in his armchair. ‘Perhaps a mixture of bourbon, gardenias and cigarette smoke.’ He tasted the Laphroaig, and it burned nicely as it went down. Billie Holiday was singing ‘Solitude’ now in her husky, booze-soaked late-career voice, the one Banks loved best, the one that expressed clearly in every broken note how much she had lived and loved and suffered, but also how she had come through, survived. He inhaled the peat and iodine fumes from his whisky and revelled in the music.
‘Tough day?’ Ray asked.
‘Yes, it was tough.’
‘Want to talk about it?’
It was strange having someone else in the house. Banks knew Ray reasonably well from previous visits, but he wouldn’t say they were especially close friends. And he wasn’t one for talking things through. Oddly enough, though, he felt like talking to someone tonight. ‘And I was at a funeral on Saturday,’ he said, ‘just before... well... before the shit hit the fan up here.’
‘That must have been hard. Someone close?’
‘No. Not for years. That’s the thing. I can’t seem to stop thinking about her, even with all this chaos going on up here. We went out together for a while when we were kids back in Peterborough. You know, just a bit of necking on the back row, reaching for a blouse button and getting your hand slapped. That sort of thing. Then we met up again quite by chance a few years later, when I was at London Poly and she was at the university. It was the early seventies, and we were both away from home for the first time, footloose and fancy-free.’
‘Exciting times. And it developed into something serious?’
‘It did. Yes. But for Christ’s sake, that was over forty years ago, and I haven’t seen her since. My children are older now than Emily was when I knew her. It just all came rushing back at the funeral.’
‘Doesn’t make it any easier, though, does it, the passage of time?’
‘You were pretty young when your wife died, weren’t you? Annie’s mother. That must have been hard.’
Ray slugged back some whisky. ‘Hard? I was thirty-seven, and Annie would have been about seven. I don’t know how we made it through those first few years, to be honest. The colony, I suppose. People took care of each other. Without the others... I don’t know. I do know Annie’s never got over losing her mother.’
‘You never thought of remarrying?’
‘Me? No. Oh, maybe once or twice.’ Ray grinned. ‘Fleetingly. I’m not saying there haven’t been other women, but I’ve never been able to give myself to any of them the way I had with Judy. I’ve always held something back. The part of me I probably shouldn’t have held back if I wanted any sort of meaningful relationship. The part that won’t let you get close to anyone ever again because you know you’re going to lose them, and you know how bad it feels. Because they’re going to die.’ He waved his glass. ‘Maybe that’s why I’ve been a bit distant from Annie over the years, too. Not because I associate her with Judy’s death, or blame her, or any of that psychological claptrap, but because I don’t know if I could take that sort of blow again. When she got shot... well, you remember what it was like. Lovers leave you, and it hurts, of course, but you can get them back, sometimes, if you try, if you want to, if you know how. But death’s the final thing. At least, I think it is. I don’t know about you, maybe you’re religious, but I don’t believe there’s anything after death. I reckon you should think about your first serious girlfriend. It’s a major emotional turning point in your life. Remember her. There’s not a day goes by when I don’t think about Judy, no matter how many years have passed. But if you can take a bit of advice from an old fool like me, save your best efforts for the living, because one day they’ll be dead, too, and you’ll end up feeling guilty for neglecting them while they were alive. That’s the paradox. Damned if you do and double-damned if you don’t.’
‘It never stopped you from loving Annie, though, did it, all this fear of one day losing her?’
Ray grunted. ‘No. I suppose not. But she’s my daughter. It’s different.’ He knocked back his whisky and laughed. ‘Listen to me. Sorry, mate. What a fucking old bore I must sound talking about lessons learned. And me a guest in your home. Must be the whisky talking. Much more of this and you’ll be kicking me out on my arse before I’ve even spent a night under your roof.’
‘Don’t worry about that,’ said Banks. ‘I’m glad of the company, to be honest.’
‘Thanks. I appreciate that. I was worried about being a burden. Fancy a quick spliff?’
Banks smiled. ‘No, thanks. Better not.’
‘Maybe I’ll go outside later. You won’t arrest me, will you?’