How would it be if I sat on the sofa chatting or watching television while Lucy spread her plastic, felt and glitter across the room? People would think I had accepted the ‘status quo’. You cannot undo the act of having a child once you’ve had one-I know this-but my endless, frenzied tidying is the closest I can get to the act of undoing (harmlessly, I mean).
I didn’t tell Mum any of this because I knew she would start ‘shoulding’ me-telling me what I should and shouldn’t think and feel. You can’t go round ‘shoulding’ other people. I could tell Mum she should be more understanding, but where would that get us? Evidently she lacks the capability.
‘Please don’t wear yourself out,’ she said. I was actually quite touched by her concern until she said, ‘I’m not trying to interfere in your life. All I care about is Lucy, that’s all. If you’re exhausted, you won’t be able to look after her properly.’
All I care about is Lucy, that’s all? Couldn’t she have packed a few more declarations of exclusivity into that sentence?
I was her daughter for more than thirty years before Lucy existed.
I told her not to phone again.
16
8/10/07
Sam Kombothekra realised he was going to have to watch his feet every time he moved in this strange, multi-level flat, or he would break his neck. There was a steep flight of stairs round every corner, and for added inconvenience the hall, landings and each individual step, it seemed, were littered with small, brightly coloured wooden balls. Sam had nearly been felled by a green one a few seconds ago.
He stared at the envelope in his hand, wondered when to say something and to whom. To Esther alone, to Nick alone, or to the two of them together? Maybe it was nothing.
He might not have looked at the Thornings’ mail at all if it hadn’t been scattered across the floor. He’d picked up the post and patted it into a tidy pile before going upstairs as a favour to Nick Thorning, who, if the state of his home was anything to judge by, was not coping well in his wife’s absence. The two children, Zoe and Jake, had been safely deposited with Nick’s mother. That had been Esther Taylor’s idea, one she’d voiced just as Sam had been on the point of suggesting the same thing.
Simon Waterhouse had been right about Esther. Well, almost. Charlie Zailer had picked her up from reception at Rawndesley nick, where she’d been fuming because no one seemed to believe people were trying to kill her best friend. Sam had now heard her long story, which revolved around an allegedly sexually frustrated childminder who thought cosmetic breast surgery was more important than saving the eco-system of Venice ’s lagoon.
Esther, despite being addicted to exaggeration, nosey and bossy, had proved helpful in many ways. Nick Thorning hadn’t been aware that his wife had given him a veiled message that she was in trouble. He hadn’t remembered where Owen Mellish worked, only that Sally thought he was a pain in the backside. It was Esther who, when she’d phoned and Nick had told her Sally had gone to Venice with Mellish, had known something was wrong. Mellish had no involvement in the Venice work. He worked with Sally at HS Silsford, a hydraulics consultancy firm. Sam had arranged to meet Mellish at Mellish’s girlfriend’s flat so that he could search it. He hadn’t found Sally Thorning, or any evidence to suggest Mellish had abducted her or killed anybody. All he’d turned up was several large Ziploc bags full of cocaine, which Mellish would do time for if Sam had his way.
He climbed the stairs to the lounge. Nick Thorning was sitting on the sofa with Esther Taylor beside him, holding his hand. Whether he wants it to be held or not, thought Sam. Simon and Charlie sat in armchairs across the room.
‘What’s going on?’ Thorning’s eyes lit up when he saw Sam. ‘Is there any news?’
‘I phoned the credit card company and then the hotel.’ Sam tried to find a patch of carpet to stand on that wasn’t occupied by a newspaper, a crayon, a bib or a nappy. ‘Esther’s right: it was Seddon Hall in York. Sally stayed there between the second and the ninth of June last year.’ Sam nodded at Simon, who had raised an enquiring eyebrow. Yes: the second name he’d given the receptionist had also checked out, same dates. Simon looked relieved, then a little bit stunned. It was the way he always looked when he was proved right. Sam tried not to think about how often Simon turned out to be right. He might be tempted to resign if he allowed himself to dwell on it.
‘Don’t take it personally, Nick.’ Esther stroked his hand with a rhythmic ferocity that looked likely to remove layers of skin. ‘She needed a break, that’s all. When the work thing fell through, she… I mean, she did it more for you and the kids than for herself.’ Esther looked round the room, trying to garner support for her claim. ‘She’d reached her limit. She needed a break in order to carry on. Don’t any of your wives work?’ She stared defiantly at Sam and Simon.
Kate, Sam’s wife, didn’t. And she was still more tired than Sam at the end of every day; he wasn’t entirely sure why.
‘DC Waterhouse’s wife works full-time,’ said Charlie. ‘But then, they haven’t got kids.’
Sam couldn’t bring himself to give her the look he knew he ought to give her. He knew she was angry that she’d been sent to collect Esther Taylor from Rawndesley-like a skivvy, she probably thought-and angrier still that there hadn’t been time to bring her up to speed.
‘Is Sally’s life so terrible?’ Nick asked quietly. ‘I thought she was happy with me and the kids.’
‘She is,’ Esther insisted.
‘If she needed a break, why didn’t she say so?’
Simon cleared his throat. ‘Miss Taylor, what exactly did Sally say about meeting this man at Seddon Hall?’
‘I told you. One night in the bar, they got talking. He pretended to be Mark Bretherick, who also lives in Spilling, so they had that in common-or Sally thought they had, rather-so they chatted for a while about… you know, local landmarks.’
‘Local landmarks?’ This sounded odd to Sam. ‘Like what?’
‘Um… well, I don’t know exactly. I live in Rawndesley, and I’m from Manchester originally, but-’
‘The memorial cross?’ Simon suggested. ‘The old stocks?’
‘I don’t mean landmarks exactly. They just talked about… local stuff.’
‘Just the once, did they talk?’
‘No.’ Esther seemed more confident now. ‘He was there all week. Sally kept bumping into him: in the bar, the spa… I think they chatted a few times.’
Sam was growing increasingly certain that Sally Thorning had done more than bump into the man they now believed had murdered four people. If some sort of sexual liaison had taken place, chances were Esther knew about it and Nick Thorning didn’t. And Esther was determined to protect her friend’s secret. It doesn’t matter, thought Sam. What mattered was finding Sally, making an arrest before anyone else got hurt. Sellers and Gibbs might already have done both; Sam hoped to God they had.
‘Sally didn’t tell me either,’ Esther was assuring Nick. ‘Not for ages. Only when all this stuff about the Brethericks was on the news.’
‘Yeah, and then she told you! She should have told me. I’m her husband.’ Nick Thorning looked around the room as if hoping for confirmation from somebody.
‘She didn’t want to worry you.’
‘She’ll be okay, won’t she?’
‘Have you seen this?’ Sam held the envelope in front of Nick’s face.