‘I said I’m busy.’ I pull into the fast lane, and speed up, until I’m going faster than he would like. It’s petulant, but it makes me feel better. I shouldn’t have accepted his call, but the guilt got to me for a moment.
‘The UK can’t be the nicest place to be with that headline.’
‘At least I didn’t make the front page. Somebody got killed in the riots yesterday. I’m page three.’
‘How apt,’ he says. He always did have that sort of sense of humour. ‘Seriously, I’m worried about you. Come and stay for a bit. I’m out all day working, so you won’t see that much of me. You’re not doing anything, are you? Your film’s done.’
‘It’s not my film. It’s Max’s film.’ I indicate, slow down, and pull into the inside lane. The exit for Swindon is coming up fast.
‘Yes, bloody Max,’ he says. He was so jealous of my friendship with Max; Max’s death didn’t seem to change Howard’s dislike of him. ‘Do you hear yourself? Why do you make out you’re still a teenager and I’m your dad? I’m not trying to make you do something you don’t want to do, but you seem to go out of your way to piss me off. And you make me feel really old in the process.’
Now he’s annoyed, I feel better. A switch flips in my head, and I can relax. ‘You are really old,’ I tell him.
‘I’m thirty-seven and you forgot my birthday. Again. It was last Thursday.’
‘Sorry. Many happy returns.’
‘You idiot,’ he says, but I can hear his smile. ‘If you want you could talk to Nicky. She’s in London at a convention. Get together, do drinks, or something. Distract her from her serious academic life.’
‘I will, but I’m not in London right now, okay? I’ll phone her when I get back and she can bore me for hours about romantic fiction in the 1800s or whatever.’
‘Okay, cool. It’s probably a good idea to be out of London for the time being.’ There’s a pause. I swear I can hear him thinking. ‘Maybe you should give me an address for where you’ll be staying, just in case, because I’m going to get our solicitors and media team to just look over—’
I make crackling noises at the back of my throat. ‘Sorry Howard… going through… a tunnel…’
‘Mik, phones don’t even do that any more. You’ve seen too many old films. Just hang up like a normal person.’
‘Can’t… hear… you…’
I end the call, and smile to myself all the way to Lyneham.
UNDERNEATH.
The people living in Petra’s old house know nothing about its connection to her. They are a quiet couple, living and growing together in a way that probably makes them look older than they are, and they have likeable, open faces as I stand on their doorstep and question them on this hot Saturday afternoon.
The house is one of a row that overlooks the long fence that runs around the laboratories. An RAF base once, my online searching informed me that it was bought at a rock-bottom price by Suscutin six years ago, and revamped for:
That was what their website claimed, anyway.
‘All the houses around here are owned by employees, now,’ says the man. ‘It’s convenient, that’s the main reason we bought. Plus the company has a private security force that does the rounds out on the estate sometimes as well as inside the wire, which is good. They drive round twice a night.’
‘Why? Is there trouble?’
‘No, it’s just because of the protestors, particularly this time of year,’ says the woman. ‘Petra Cross really used to live here? We bought it at auction. No wonder she tried to burn the laboratories down, if they moved in just next door to her and she hated them so much.’
‘She could have moved,’ the man points out.
‘Why is it so bad at this time of year? With the protestors?’ I ask.
‘Usually they keep to camping along the back fence, although the farmer keeps trying to get them moved off, and they aren’t much bother,’ says the woman. It sounds like a very British form of resistance, with an annoyed farmer, camping and everybody determined to make their point without inconveniencing each other any more than necessary. ‘But a lot more turn up come the anniversary of the arson attempt, and they stay in the village. They can get a bit loud in the pub, and mess up the churchyard. Excuse me for asking, but aren’t you Mickey Stuck?’
So that explains why they’re being so loquacious, so helpful. They feel they already know me in some way. There are strange benefits to fame that pop up in the most unexpected of places.
‘I am, yeah. It’s been lovely to meet you, and thanks for your help.’
‘Are you okay?’ says the man. ‘Do you need to come in and call someone?’
They must have seen the paper; it laid it on thick about the state of my mental health. Or perhaps they think celebrities shouldn’t be out, wandering around, unsupervised. Their concern touches me.
‘I’m really fine. I’m researching a new film.’
‘That’s right, you’re producing them now, aren’t you? That’s brilliant,’ enthuses the woman, and I’m glad I’ve ticked all their boxes and given them a good story to tell their friends.
‘I only wish…’ the man says, hesitant, then presses on, ‘that it had been around for you guys. The Six. Suscutin.’
‘It was so sad when you broke up,’ says the woman.
‘It was. Have you two been together long?’
‘Eight years,’ she says. ‘Still going strong. Still in love.’ She glances under her lashes at him, a little unsure to speak for him in such a way perhaps, and he takes her hand and squeezes it. They are adorable. What a gift they have – ongoing love, with no expiration date. It’s impossible to understand why people want to shut down the laboratories, destroy the drugs, when it can offer this.
Then I think of Gwen: her papery skin, her pain.
‘That’s amazing,’ I say. ‘Thanks, guys.’
‘You’re sure you don’t need anything else?’
I shake my head. ‘Do you mind if I leave my car parked here for a bit? I’d like to walk into the village and take a look around.’
They are delighted to be of further help. They give me extensive directions, tilting their heads in time as they talk of the path to take.
It’s a short walk, and the fence runs along the length of the path for most of the way. Just before I reach a minimarket, the first shop of the village from this direction, the fence takes a ninety-degree turn and heads off across the Wiltshire fields. I can see a sparse strip of weed-ridden land in the distance that must have been a runway. The main laboratory buildings are hidden from view. There are a few warehouses I can see, but it’s impossible to tell if they are from the RAF days or are a new addition.
I carry on past the minimarket, and reach a crossroads that I suspect is the closest thing the village has to a centre. There’s a bus stop, a pub, a Chinese takeaway. One of those little shops from which the faintest whiff of incense leaks, with dream catchers and tie-dyed dresses in the window. There are wind chimes hanging outside it, and they make no tinkling noise in this hot, dry afternoon: nothing stirs.
So much for hordes of protestors, getting loud in the pub and destroying the churchyard.
The act strikes me as incongruous – why would they choose the churchyard as their target? I see the short square belfry in the distance, on my left, and walk in its direction. It’s a pleasant stroll to St Michael’s sturdy walls. Sinking into the grass around it, at skewed angles, are old gravestones with lichen filling their grooves, making most of the names unreadable. I see no signs of obvious disturbance or vandalism as I take my time, weaving amid the stones. Why are the dead so restful? Soon Gwen will be dead, and quietened, serene, against her will. She was never meant to be such things.