In one of them, beneath his rolled-up scarf, was an old carton of milk, a loaf of greenish bread and some tins. This wasn’t his bag. He checked the other and immediately understood. He’d picked up Nancy’s shopping, misled by the sight of his scarf. He must have put it on top, not noticing. And that meant that he’d left behind volumes one to twenty-two. With growing dread, George checked number twenty-three, to locate himself in his own story. There was no doubt about it. He’d left behind half his life: a childhood in Harrogate, hitching to London in his teens and, of course, his tangled relations with Graham Riley.
The wind moaned and wrested with the bins and sacks. George grabbed his sleeping bag and the carrier that held the other half of his life. He ran to Marco’s and took a seat in a far corner, beneath one of the heaters. Without his having to ask or pay, a plate of toast presently appeared, alongside a mug of hot chocolate.
12
Anselm had forgotten the plan on the A to Z, so at Waterloo Station he went looking for another newsagent. He studied the map, committing to memory the rights and lefts. Then he nipped back into the rain.
Five minutes later he surveyed Trespass Place: its towering walls; its back doors without handles; its signs that read KEEP CLEAR. He walked towards a mammoth fire escape at the far end. To thwart the burglar the bottom section was raised on a cantilever — a measure defeated by the attachment of a long chain that twirled slowly on its axis. Beneath this shelter stood a queue of green plastic sacks with yellow ties. Cardboard was propped against the wall. A shopping bag lay open. The milk was clotted and the bread was furry with mould. Anselm checked the sell-by dates. This lot had been bought before Elizabeth died. George Bradshaw hadn’t waited long at all. And who could blame him? Anselm looked at the drainpipes, the tangled tape and the wheelie-bins. A client had once told him that hell was Sunderland Magistrates Court. He was wrong. Anselm moved under the raised steps and pulled back the cardboard. Upon the wall, neatly scratched, was a block of short vertical lines.
Anselm walked briskly out of the courtyard, his head bowed against the rain. Further up the road he saw the bright lights of a café He ran and sheltered in the doorway, wondering what to do next.
13
One of the great things about Marco’s was the style of electric wall heater. They were high up and old-fashioned — orange bars against curved shining metal. They hummed while they worked, like Marco himself.
George sipped hot chocolate, wondering what to do about his missing books. It would be impossible to roll up, take his bag and disappear again. No, he couldn’t see Nancy not until it was all over — when Riley had been arrested. Then George could explain why he’d vanished, and why he’d deceived her. But that left open the possibility that she might leaf through volume twenty, where her husband made his first appearance. It was a risk he’d have to take. She wouldn’t look, though.., she wasn’t like that. She’d been well brought up.
The windows were grey and streaming with condensation. Through the glass door George saw a dark figure swaying left and right in the cold. George stirred milky froth and thought of Graham Riley.
It had been one of the stranger things about the whole trial. Jennifer Cartwright — she’d been a detective sergeant back then — had quizzed him very carefully about Quilling Road. He’d drawn a plan of the house. He’d described the wallpaper. He’d labelled each room with numbers and names. He’d told her of Riley’s strange manner.., his never going up the stairs, his insistence on meeting everyone near the bottom step. And DS Cartwright had written it all down, smoking incessantly Months later he’d had a meeting with a CPS solicitor called Miss Lowell. This time there’d been typed-up depositions and a colour-coded floor plan. George had told his story all over again. The details were cross-referred to other witness statements, confirming their coherence with the broader picture. Finally there’d been a conference with a barrister called Pagett, a tall fellow in a morning suit — the kind of thing you got married in. George could almost recite his statement by now Again, he went over what he’d seen and heard, and what he knew of Riley’s idiosyncratic behaviour. But the strange thing was this: neither DS Cartwright nor Miss Lowell nor Mr Pagett thought to ask George if he had met Graham Riley before. None of them wondered why George had been so prepared to help these three girls in the first place. They weren’t like the barrister Riley had on his side — the one who’d asked, ‘What did David do that George wanted to forget?’ If he’d been at the conference with DS Cartwright and Miss Lowell, he’d have rumbled George, of that there was little doubt.
The figure at the door swayed side to side. It had the bulk of a man. George wondered why he didn’t step inside. The heaters were just out of this world.
14
Anselm’s predicament illustrated the perils of the monastic path. Cyril had given him just enough to cover the cost of public transport. So Anselm, freezing and wet, had enough money to buy what he wanted, but only at the expense of what he needed. A cup of restoring coffee was there, behind his back, but only if he walked to his lodgings in the rain.
Anselm brooded over the choice but finally surrendered his thoughts to a more serious problem. Elizabeth had failed to anticipate something far more basic than Anselm’s delay in using the key. She hadn’t given any weight to the reasonable expectation that a man with half a memory might wander off and leave his dinner behind, never mind his role in her scheme. How could he even begin to know where to look?
A flame of protest made Anselm restive. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, as if he were ready to leave his corner and fight. He recalled Mrs Bradshaw when she dropped the paintbrush, mouth open and appalled at the thought that her husband might come home. Her hope had become too terrible to contemplate.
Anselm blinked at the sodden sky. It was getting worse. He ran to the Underground, dodging puddles and rivulets. In a livid fancy, he grabbed Cyril’s remaining arm and chained it to a drainpipe.
15
Beneath Marco’s humming heater, George wrote of waiting, a storm and a restless man at the door. (Once George had committed the past to paper, Nino had told him to gather up the present moment. ‘It keeps you in the here and now’) When the rain became fitful he made his way back to Trespass Place.
The recollection of Nino’s words made his stomach turn. There was something foolish in what George was doing: sitting beneath a fire escape expecting a monk to appear around the corner. It was like pretending that Elizabeth hadn’t died, or that her death would have no consequences. In the here and now, Elizabeth was dead. His recollection of all they had done together was a kind of grieving, but also a running away because it lay back there in the past, when she’d been alive. He shivered with cold and anxiety as if a harsh truth were creeping across Trespass Place: accepting Elizabeth’s death meant accepting that Riley would get away after all. They were the two sides of the one coin. Spinning it in the air day after day was just an illusion.
Wrapping his arms around his legs, he remembered that Elizabeth’s optimism had been without limit. And it worked backwards as well as forwards: she’d said the past is up for grabs.
16
When evening came, Nick went to the Green Room and opened The Following of Christ. On account of the hole it was impossible to read the first page, or indeed, most of the following chapters. Why cut out the heart of a book, unless you knew it by heart? While he tried to complete a broken sentence by guessing the missing words, the telephone rang. Father Anselm was in London, and wanted to meet him that evening. He said, ‘I now have at least one of the answers you were looking for.’