‘He wasn’t having an affair with Mrs Coulthard,’ Ramsay said gently. ‘She was a friend, someone to talk to.’
‘But he could have talked to me!’ It came out as a cry. He was reminded of David Coulthard in the middle of a temper tantrum. She gave a little sob. ‘ Did he tell Mrs Coulthard about me?’
‘I think he probably did. He felt very guilty about the way he treated you.’
‘It wasn’t fair. He thought I was a baby. Not that you could blame him. Look at me. No decent clothes. No make-up. Do you know what Mummy called him? The baby-snatcher.’
‘Why did you tell your mother about him?’
‘I was angry.’ He could already see that she was subject to rages. Usually they were hidden by politeness and good manners. Occasionally they would be uncontrollable.
‘Why?’
‘Dad had gone up to the Coastguard House to discuss doing magic at the party. He saw them there together. He said when he got here she was half-naked. Are you sure they weren’t having an affair?’
‘Quite sure.’ Because he had already discussed this with Mark Taverner. Mark was sitting still in the Interview Room at Otterbridge police station. When they’d brought him in he hadn’t stopped talking. Ramsay supposed that someone with his background would be into confession.
‘Couldn’t you tell anyone else about this?’ he’d asked.
‘I told Emma about Marilyn, and the letter I got from Mrs Howe. She promised not to tell Brian. She didn’t want to. She thought it would upset him to know I’d done something like that.’ Mark had lowered his voice, forcing himself to come out with the words. Confession again. ‘ That I’d seduced a schoolgirl… Then after Kath Howe died she wouldn’t see me.’
‘Did she suspect you of killing Mrs Howe?’
‘I don’t know.’ He was shocked by the thought. ‘Perhaps she did.’
‘Why couldn’t you talk to Brian Coulthard? I had the impression you were very close.’
‘I tried. Several times. It was as if he didn’t want to know.’
He believed you were having an affair with his wife, Ramsay thought but did not say, and he wanted you to be happy so he didn’t stand in the way.
Mark had looked up from the varnished table which was scratched with graffiti like one of the old desks at school.
‘I think Marilyn’s been following me. When she threatened the kids I believed her.’
In Mrs Howe’s overheated room in Ferndale Avenue Marilyn waited impatiently for more questions.
‘What did you tell your mother?’ Ramsay asked. ‘Everything?’
‘Don’t be silly. Of course not.’
Of course not. Because if Kath Howe had known what had gone on in the teacher’s car she’d have rushed up to the school immediately, accusing him of rape, demanding his prosecution and immediate dismissal. And because kids never told their parents everything.
‘What exactly did you tell her?’
‘That Mr Taverner fancied me. That he’d given me a lift home and kissed me. That as soon as I left school we’d live together.’
The fantasy.
Marilyn continued. ‘ I didn’t mean to tell her. I was angry and it all came out.’
‘So she wrote to him, threatening to tell the authorities.’
‘I couldn’t understand why she made so much fuss. There was the same age gap as between Claire and Dad and she put up with that.’
There was a silence broken by Mrs Howe’s snoring. Her head had tilted back and her mouth was open. The cat jumped from her knee to be closer to the fire but she didn’t wake.
‘I think we should go to the police station now,’ Ramsay said. It wasn’t only that he wanted a watertight case. It was because he wanted her to plead guilty. He couldn’t bear the idea of her going through a trial.
‘No!’ she screamed. She flung her arm in front of her like a Nazi salute. Warning him to keep his distance, threatening to push him away if he should try to move her. A gesture again of the furious child. ‘ I want to tell you how I did it.’
And in the end it was easier to sit back and listen. In the stuffy room he’d run out of energy. If she had a tantrum he didn’t want to have to drag her away.
‘I didn’t plan it,’ she said more calmly.
‘No.’
‘But she was driving me crazy. It was bad enough before. Never letting me out of her sight. Always wanting to know what I’d been up to. After I told her about Mr Taverner it was a hundred times worse. She’d sent him the letter. You’d have thought that would be enough for her.’
‘But it wasn’t.’
‘That Saturday morning she wanted to come to school with me. She said she’d sit in the back of the hall. Check that nothing was going on. Can you imagine what the others would think? What he would think? I just couldn’t allow it to happen.’
‘So you didn’t walk together to the bus stop?’
‘No.’
Her eyes were bright and feverish.
‘What did happen, Marilyn?’
‘We had a row.’
‘In the house at Cotter’s Row?’
She nodded. ‘Claire had gone to work. Dad was upstairs. I don’t suppose he noticed.’
They both looked at Bernard. His eyes were open but he was staring into space. Perhaps he was dreaming of a perfect illusion. Doves, silk scarves, a vanishing woman.
‘I told Mummy she couldn’t come with me. I’d be a laughing stock. She said in that case I wasn’t to go either. I could resign from the choir. She said it was a shame but perhaps it was better all round. She wasn’t unsympathetic to Mr Taverner. He’d been through a terrible time. It was probably better not to put temptation in his way. Then she took off her coat and sat down at that dreadful spinning wheel. She pumped at the pedal with her foot and round it went, making the whining noise. Clack, clack, clack. Horrible. Like a bird. So I couldn’t argue with her.’
She paused.
‘I could see then that it would always be the same. She’d never let me alone, even when I was grown up. She’d always be at my shoulder, telling me what to do. Clack, clack, clack. I’d be different and lonely and frumpy. Always a Bill.’
‘So you killed her.’
‘I fetched the knife from the kitchen and stuck it into her back. I pushed it right in up to the handle. There wasn’t as much mess as you’d think.’
‘Did she cry out?’
‘Not really. A little gasp. I don’t think she realized what was happening. When she was quite still I pulled her into the shed. I didn’t want to look at her.’
‘Weren’t you worried that someone would go in there to fetch coal?’
‘No. Claire was at work.’ She nodded towards her father. ‘And he was practising for a performance. It wouldn’t have occurred to him. I banked up the fire and left a bucket of coal by the hearth.’ She stretched and gave a clever little girl smile. ‘Actually it all happened very quickly. When I looked at the clock I saw I still had time to get to choir.’
‘But you missed the bus.’
‘Yes. There was a train coming. A man in a red car had been forced to stop too. He saw I was upset and offered me a lift into town.’
Paul Hooper. If he’d come forward immediately they’d have cleared up the case weeks ago. But he’d had his own reasons to be frightened of the police.
‘And after choir you persuaded Mr Taverner to bring you home. You told him what you’d done.’
‘I told him I’d done it for him. That was true in a way. Mummy wasn’t a threat to his career dead, was she? We waited until after the party. Bernard and Claire were searching for her in the dene. Though I don’t suppose they were looking too hard. We loaded the body into the boot of the car and threw it off the jetty.’ She looked up at him. ‘No one cares much that she’s gone, you know.’