‘Be careful, Andy,’ Merrily said, for no good reason, knowing she wouldn’t be careful in a situation like this.
‘Airy-fairy sort of feller, apparently – writes poems and publishes them hisself.’
‘Who?’
‘The witness. I’ll mabbe go see him. Got time now, ennit? Got time to be the busybody pain-in-the-arse uncle. Nobody bothered about the kid when he was alive, except for one ole woman.’
‘Andy, I’m hardly the person to be disparaging it, but if she does think she’s been given this information by a… by Robbie…’
‘Could be something he told her days before, ennit? Before he died. Something that’s suddenly clicked. I been agonizing about Robbie’s death for three weeks now. Thinking, leave it till after the funeral, wait for the inquest. Now even Mam’s on at me to do something. Why din’t you stop her? Where the hell did she get that from, Mrs Watkins?’
On the edge of the car park, Mumford’s dad had picked up his carrier bag and he and Saltash had started back towards the house in the wake of Saltash’s all-concealing smile.
‘Andy.’ Merrily beckoned Mumford into his parents’ tiny front garden. ‘I think we should try and deal with this… Go back in. But not with him. Think of something.’
7
I’ll Be Waiting
THERE WAS ANOTHER clear reason why the implications of retirement were terrifying Andy Mumford.
His dad.
Reg Mumford was taller than his son and held himself stiff-backed and upright, but it was hard to believe now that he’d ever been a policeman. Still wearing his fishing hat, he was standing with his hands on the shoulders of his wife’s chair, as if it was a wheelchair. Merrily’s feeling was that this was because he didn’t want to look at her.
‘I reckon they’ve started watering the beer again, Andrew.’
‘You said.’
‘Have you found that?’
‘No, Dad.’
‘Always start doing it this time of year when the tourists come.’
‘I don’t think so.’
‘Prices goes up, too. Don’t seem two minutes since it was one and six a pint.’
‘Before my time, Dad.’
‘Hee, hee!’ Reg Mumford pointed at Andy, who was standing uncomfortably up against the sideboard near the picture that was turned to the wall. ‘You en’t gonner be saying that for long. Now you’re retired, see, time’s gonner speed up, time’s gonner flash by, you mark my words, boy.’
‘Mrs Watkins would like to talk to you again,’ Mumford said.
‘I’d be delighted to talk to this young lady, Andrew. Shall we go out for a drink, the three of us?’
‘She wants to talk to Mam, Dad.’
‘Won’t get no sense out of her,’ Reg said. ‘I can tell you that much.’
Merrily, still standing by the door, glanced at Andy Mumford, watched his lips retract, a sign of extreme frustration. They were getting nowhere here. Nigel Saltash had suggested lunch in one of the splendid new restaurants which, he said, now made visits to Ludlow such an unexpected pleasure. At least she’d got out of that, saying that she had a sermon to write, and then Mumford telling Saltash he had to pick his wife up in Dilwyn, not far from Ledwardine, so he could give the vicar a lift back.
She came over from the door and knelt on the rug in front of Mrs Mumford’s chair. Mrs Mumford contemplated her for a while and then began to nod, light graduating into her eyes as if the action of nodding was powering a small dynamo.
‘Now then. Now. I know who you are. I was a bit confused, the way that man kept smiling at me, but I know who you are now, my dear.’
Merrily smiled back. Somehow she didn’t think Mrs Mumford was going to get this right.
‘You were at the funeral, weren’t you?’
‘Erm…’
‘You’re the teacher. Yes. Robbie’s teacher. You was his favourite, you’re…’ Mrs Mumford started to prise herself up. ‘You’re his… history teacher!’
‘Well, I—’
‘’Course you are.’ Reg Mumford was leaning over the chair from behind and pointing a forefinger at his own head, making screwing motions. ‘And we’re very glad to see you, aren’t we, Phyllis?’
‘He loved history,’ Mrs Mumford said.
‘Yes,’ Merrily said. ‘Yes, he did.’
‘Much bloody good it did him.’ Reg snorted. ‘Should’ve been out playing football. If he’d played football like a normal boy he’d still be alive. I’ve always said that.’
‘Dad, for Christ—’
‘Andrew, we gotter face facts. We’re all terrible sorry ’bout what happened, but it en’t no use blamin’ ourselves for ever and a day, is it? Boy was a bloody dreamer, head in the clouds, no gettin’ round it.’
‘All right, Dad,’ Mumford said, desperate. ‘We’ll go to the pub, you and me, eh? Half an hour, Mrs Watkins, will that be all right?’
Merrily nodded, grateful.
‘Now, I know I had something to show you,’ Mrs Mumford said. ‘Where did I put it?’
Merrily had made tea for them both. The kitchen wasn’t as clean as it might have been; she’d wondered if there was a home help. Mrs Mumford didn’t seem to be disabled, but she was very overweight.
‘Look in that top drawer, would you?’ She seemed to be accepting Merrily, now they were on their own, but not as a priest; she wouldn’t be ready for that. ‘No, no, not that one… the long one… that’s it.’
‘This?’ Merrily opened the drawer and found a hard-backed sketch pad inside.
‘There it is. Will you bring it over?’
‘Phyllis… why’s this picture turned to the wall?’
‘Eh?’
‘The picture.’ Merrily touched it.
‘No! You leave that alone!’
‘OK.’ She drew back, took the sketch pad to Mrs Mumford who put it flat on her knees. Merrily pulled up a dining chair. An envelope fell out of the sketch pad and she caught it and put it on the chair arm.
‘Don’t know what that is,’ Mrs Mumford said. ‘Now, look at these. He spent hours on these. You’ve got to be careful not to touch them or it’ll all come off. He had a spray, he did, but it still comes off.’
They were charcoal sketches. The first one was clearly of St Laurence’s Church, but its size was exaggerated so that the townhouses seemed like dog kennels. The second had been drawn from directly below, so that the tower resembled a rocket about to blast off. The perspective looked, to Merrily, to be spot on. There was light and shade and he’d smudged the charcoal to produce mist effects.
‘He was very talented, Phyllis.’
‘Sit there for hours, he would, drawing pictures of the church and the black and white houses. The others… we never sees them, they never comes to see their ole gran. Only Robbie.’
‘He loved being here with you, didn’t he? What’s this one? Is that what they call the Buttercross? With the little clock tower on top.’
‘Town council meets there. That one’s the Feathers Hotel.’
Mrs Mumford was much calmer now, leafing through the drawings, some identified underneath: Castle Lodge, The Reader’s House, the Old College.
‘Did he sit outside with his sketch pad?’
‘Too shy. He went out, see, and he looked at the old houses for a long time and he’d walk all round them and then he’d come back and he… you know… what do you call it?’
‘Drew them from memory?’
‘That’s it.’
Either Robbie had had a photographic memory or he’d really studied these buildings, come to know them intimately. Whichever, it was remarkable. Merrily said this to Phyllis, and Phyllis began to cry silently, the tears just coming, her cheeks swollen and shiny like the pouches that fed hospital drips, and Merrily held her hand, and Phyllis said, ‘He’s dead,’ looking up at her, as if pleading for a contradiction.