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  ‘Get me some blankets for the sofa, would you? I’ll freeze in there otherwise.’

  That was neatly done, she thought later. A considerate man. The kind who was gone before breakfast and so diplomatic he could assess the furniture of your soul and not show he found it lacking, the kind who could dispel fear with pragmatism and who always seemed to know better. Which did not mean that he could begin to understand the pressures and realities of her kind of existence: you had to live it to know it. Before Isabel had started this chapter of her life, she had been sick of other people always knowing better. She still was.

  She brought him a duvet, glad of his presence in the house but not wanting him closer. Thanked him with grave politeness not designed to wound, and having exactly that effect.

  ‘Oh, by the way,’ she said at the door, ‘Mother might wander during the night. She does, a bit. I never try to stop her.’

  Such a beautiful room. Estate agent’s dream for the family with everything, including money. A house, which should have rumbled with laughter, rows, warmth and the presence of children, settled into silence so complete it made Andrew listen to the sound of his own breathing. An hour passed in sleepless contemplation that owed less to the effect of weak coffee than to the slow ebb of adrenalin. Words paraded through his mind like soldiers marching on display, up and down, down and up. Surely there was more than madness in this house: there was jealousy and hatred.

  When he heard the echo of the grandfather clock announcing the second hour after midnight he got up and turned on lights for the sake of sanity, beat his arms across his chest for warmth, and sat at Serena’s desk, which he opened without a tremor of guilt and no anticipation but to indulge his own curiosity.

  It was tidy inside, pigeonholes stuffed with paper in apparent order, leaving a clear surface. ‘Dear Andrew,’ he recited in his mind. ‘Don’t you know that Isabel Burley has sucked more cocks than you have had hot dinners, as well as doing it with her father? If you go on doing it with her you’ll catch something nasty. Your balls will drop off into her mouth and she likes holding them, doesn’t she?’ Two paragraphs of this puerile prose had made him recoil in horror a dozen years before, as much for the recognition of Isabel’s own fair hand in the construction of the writing as for the content. She had never been particularly clever with words: the letter had been a boast of achievements. You and who else, it said. John Reilly, Rick Murray, David Mason, Jim Partridge, a whole fucking football team. It might have been a child writing in the third person. It was as if she were not writing about herself, sticking in the rude words for effect, but it was more than enough to insult his own manhood, even though the description bore no real reflection of the somewhat shy nature of their own coupling. The shyness and inhibition were more his own than Isabel’s, he had to admit, and that alone lent some veracity to the written word. Isabel had become, in his imagination, the writer of poison-pen letters, an unstable and unstoppable sexual fantasist who was not even articulate beyond four-letter words, a neurotic motivated by malice. He had never wanted to see her again.

  The desk was commodious, containing correspondence that Andrew supposed predated his own birth, let alone adolescence. The pigeonholes to the right were full of scraps of paper less yellowed by age, folded neatly in halves and then in quarters, reminding him of childish games played with paper, aeroplanes constructed on winter afternoons. Serena’s pages were densely covered with words. Bollocks, he read, fucking bollocks. Life is a bitch and God is a cunt. Outpourings of frustrations on to the pages, rude words plastered on to the backs of envelopes, poison-pen messages to self. All in the small but legible hand her daughter had tried to emulate.

  Andrew replaced the papers. He considered whether he would ever be able to tell Isabel what her mother had done to that particular fledgeling affair of her younger life, wondered if her Mama had done the same to every hopeful young man Isabel had ever brought home. Written them the kind of letters that would insult vanity, destroy affection and make the recipient either despise her daughter or laugh at her.

  He nodded to sleep, debating without much logic the character of a mother motivated by the desire either to destroy or to protect, moved by either jealousy or the kind of love he could not comprehend, glad on the whole that his own mother had died in his own infancy. He thought at the same time how eavesdroppers hear no good of themselves, and how his discovery tonight reflected badly on the self-centred youth he had been. And should he tell Isabel; deciding not. If Isabel lost the illusion that her mother loved her, her life would be untenable.

  And then he would lose her too.

  He slept through the sound of slow, uncertain footsteps on the stairs and the changing of dark into the beginning of day. Woke to the rumble of the dustbin van, removing two sacks of rubbish and a dead cat before reversing back down the drive in a hurry, covering with their own the marks on the grass left by the big white van.

  George had a bedroom window that faced west, dark in the mornings and light in the afternoons. Dark as all hell whenever he was in it. It was a blurred room, featureless. Once inside he felt and behaved like a mouse, nesting tidily inside his own stretch of skirting board, never requiring the prompting of light or noise to wake him. In the last hour of sleep he descended into a deep, dark pit out of which he sailed with the ease of a cork on water.

  Into that darkness came a voice, carried on a thick breath.

  ‘Georgie boy, wake up. Wake up, fuck you.’

  Stale, sweet smell of alcohol decomposing; sweat crystallized on a cold body, giggle in the voice. George felt his hair being pulled, his ear tweaked, his shoulder shaken, all in a parody of affection. He never locked his bedroom door. The locks were no great deterrent to a shoulder: better to have nothing worth the taking.

  ‘Give us a cuddle, George. Naa, all right then, forget it.’

  George had formed his body into a ball, hands over head, knees to chest. In the manner of a baby waiting to be born and a man who knows what to do when faced with a kicking, it was a pose he adopted by instinct.

  ‘Talk to me, George. That’s all, talk to me. Why won’t you talk to me?’

  The bantamweight of Derek, sitting on the edge of the single mattress, made the bed tilt slightly. George kicked him on the hip, and in one movement sprang upright, hurled the duvet over Derek’s head and leapt out of bed. Threw himself at the duvet-covered lump and hit it. Derek yelped; George hit him again, lightly, tightened the duvet over his face and then let go.

  Derek lay halfway up the bed, face pink, breathing deeply, legs straddled over the end. He still carried the bottle of double-strength lager, held it to his chest like a religious symbol. George turned on the light, reached for the threadbare sweater on the chair, pulled it on over his pyjamas and stood over Derek with one fist raised.

  Derek began to cough.

  ‘S’all right,’ he said, raising the bottle feebly. ‘Wannad a thingy to take off the thingy. So’s I can drink it, see?’ He raised himself on one shoulder.

  ‘Sorry about that cat,’ he said distinctly.

  In an odd kind of way, drunken talk resembled Serena Burley talk. Without any rationale, George knew instinctively where Derek had been. He had known it would happen. Come to think of it, Derek looked like Serena Burley’s cat. Big eyes, pink nose, ginger fur poking out where his shirt rode up over his pink belly. George clawed his own hair. He did not look like that. He had dark red hair and was sallow, a different creature entirely.

  ‘What cat?’ He asked quietly. He had told Derek about the cat, and the dog which did not bark. A million years ago. Derek rubbed his eyes, sat up slowly, still clutching the bottle. The big eyes disappeared into slits as he laughed. An unhealthy wheeze that turned into spasmodic coughing that went on and on until Derek’s skin turned from pink to purple. Angry though he was, wishing Derek dead as he did, George was alarmed, banged him on the back and watched with concern until the din ceased. When it did Derek sat and shivered. The stupid boy never spent money on a d
ecent sweater for winter, nor on food, and the cloying warmth of the rooms seemed unable to penetrate his bones. George put a jacket round his shoulders, resentful of his own solicitude.

  ‘What have you been up to, you daft bugger?’

  The boy was in that state of drunkenness where further inebriation was impossible, although fervently desired to dull the feelings of depression, nausea and general seediness. It was in these maudlin states that Derek came closest to the desire to tell the truth, simply for the sake of it, or simply to pass the time by shocking himself.

  ‘We went to call on your princess. A social visit.’

  He wanted to mock and to boast, but the words stuck in his throat. George looked frightening. Ridiculous in sweater and pyjamas, but the big fists bunched by his sides resembled a pair of monkey wrenches. The mist cleared. Derek began to think very clearly indeed.

  ‘And I’ve been sent to say, why didn’t you come with us?’ He articulated the words slowly, careful to stress the regret.

  George sat down on the bed next to him, keeping his distance, his fists still clenched. Derek sensed an immediate danger had passed, cursed himself for a fool and longed, suddenly, for breakfast. He put a tentative hand on George’s arm. George let it remain.

  ‘You could have done, you know,’ Derek suggested.

  ‘What? Go and rob an old lady on her own?’

  ‘Is she on her own, George?’

  George gave up. The room had the stench of fear. ‘No, she’s not. You know damn fine she’s not. There’s this girl …’ Derek nodded, dropped the bottle and fumbled in his trousers for a fag. ‘Yes Georgie Porgie, I do know. And I’m surprised at you, thinking we were calling up there to rob an old dear. What’s she got worth having? A lot of old furniture? No market for that, this side of Christmas. No, it’s just Bob being curious. He likes girls, does Bob. Dick likes ‘em even more.’

  ‘Get out, Derek. Leave me alone. I’m on my way round to the police, tell them all about it. Soon as I’m dressed.’

  Derek stood, his groin level with George’s face as he tucked his flapping shirt-tail into his trousers.

  ‘Naa, you won’t do that, George. ‘Cos we didn’t do any harm and we decided we wouldn’t go back unless you came with us. Think about it, George. Think about it, is all I ask. Bob just wants to take that girl for a ride in his car …’

  ‘Get out,’ said George.

  By the time he got to town it had begun to snow. Flakes twirled like manic dancers, melting on the pavements. Snow without conviction; not the genuine kind which tipped itself out of the sky like a blanket off a rooftop, hushing all protest, but snow designed for the mere creation of misery and nuisance, cold feet and muddy footsteps trailing in shallow brown puddles that had the appearance of gravy. Two weeks into November and the first signs of seasonal paraphernalia marked the beginning of the only time of year when George could properly equate himself with men of violence, on account of a desire to kick out at Christmas decorations and bellow above the saccharine sound of carols. Early days yet: it would only get worse.

  He sat in the hideous lights of Littlewoods’ cafeteria, watched the early-morning assembly into trays of hot lunches that would congeal before they were eaten, stirring a cup of milky coffee. When he picked it up, he left fingerprints around the rim, the way he must have left fingerprints all over Serena’s house. If Bob and Co. did go back to that place, he would probably end up being blamed anyway. He had left traces there, like a spoor. Derek would say he had set it up: Derek had already made him a conspirator. All he could do was stand back and hope. Derek said they wouldn’t go back. Derek might be telling the truth, although Derek rarely did except by accident. Derek might be right in saying that all Bob wanted was the girl. He clutched at that thought; knew it to be a false hope and allowed himself to massage it into a real one. Let them frighten Isabel Burley half to death, then; just let them. She might take the hint and go home and …

  George wandered round the shops with the aim-lessness of a stranger unsure of the way and too embarrassed to ask. Something for Serena, a single item lurked among all these goods with the sole purpose of helping her with the words and making her happy.

  He found the tape recorder he had long since decided to buy. Gazed at it, full of wonder, his heart contracting with love. He could talk to her on this; she could talk back. In the nether regions of the night they could leave messages for one another. Not a lot to say. I miss you, I miss you, I miss you, put coal on my fire and let me be. Love me like your plastic flowers.

  If Isabel was chased away, George would get a gun and guard the princess with his life. He stood holding the dictaphone until a stern sales assistant asked if she could help.

  She frightened him. He put the display model down and walked away.

  CHAPTER NINE

  ‘Shall we get a new cat, Mother? A nice little kitten? What do you think, George?’

  ‘I dunno, don’t ask me.’

  Isabel turned in appeal to Doc Reilly, who sat at the kitchen table as if he had been born there, feet enclosed in his favourite thick socks of an indeterminate blue. He was known to joke that the state of a man’s socks said much about the state of his marriage.

  ‘What do you think?’ Isabel asked. ‘She’s been going round hunting for that cat for two days. Even accused me of killing it, haven’t you, Mother?’ She spoke in the direction of Serena, who sat smiling at George as George fed the dog. Toying with a mouthful of cereal, Serena seemed able to eat only if he so instructed.

  ‘Eat up, Mrs Burley, there’s a dear,’ he murmured. She ate, obediently. Doc Reilly watched her surreptitiously. She turned her smile on him, and waved the spoon.

  Doc Reilly thought with a touch of horror of Serena’s large hands clutching a kitten. He shook his head.

  ‘You’d be better off getting another dog,’ he volunteered. ‘One that barks.’ The retriever, food finished inside thirty seconds, ambled across to him and put a large sticky muzzle on his lap. ‘No, Petal,’ he said. ‘Not instead of you. Alongside you. So, what happened to the cat?’

  ‘George thinks a ferret got it. Don’t you, George? I think so too.’

  The doctor nodded. ‘You’d have to keep a kitten indoors then, wouldn’t you? No point raising animals to feed ferrets, is there?’

  George echoed his laughter politely. So did Serena, who laughed when it seemed apposite to do so. Isabel did not. The Doc turned to George.

  ‘Well, it’s lucky something’s guarding this house. Even if it is only a ferret, for God’s sake. Do you ever think of stopping over the night, George?’

  ‘No,’ said Isabel quickly. ‘George has his own home and he does far too much for us already.’

  Oh, dear, a bit of an atmosphere. Doc Reilly got the clear impression he was treading on toes, curled his own under his chair and sipped his coffee. No love lost here, he could tell, and he should have kept his mouth shut.

  ‘Anyway,’ Isabel continued, ‘Mother and I refuse to be scared by silly talk of burglars. Mother’s never been burgled yet. Why should it happen now?’

  Pride, the Doc could see it. The sort which might come before a fall and would tolerate no interference. He admired it. Ah well, the nights had fully drawn in: burglars needed daylight and they despised the cold. Isabel was probably right. It was long summer evenings and school holidays like the half-term break, which was when he had last seen the kids; those times were the worst threat. In the meantime he had two dozen patients making strenuous efforts to die and he lumbered to his feet in anticipation of poorer houses than this.

  ‘Look after that cough, George, won’t you? There’s a lot of it about.’

  ‘Aren’t you well, George?’ Isabel asked with genuine concern. ‘I thought you looked a bit pale.’

  He winced under her scrutiny, shrugged his shoulders. Sympathy from Isabel was not something he solicited; receiving it sent an arrow into his conscience.

  ‘He’s very fine, aren’t you, George?’ Serena volunteered,
nodding in his direction. It might have been a comment on his health or his physique, difficult to tell. Isabel followed Doc Reilly out to his Volvo.

  He stood by the door of the car, reluctant to leave. She wanted to ask him something and he wasn’t sure he wanted to answer.

  ‘Thanks for coming out,’ she began.

  ‘She’s doing well,’ he said robustly. ‘Getting worse, of course, but still much better than most.’

  She held the door. ‘Doc, you’ve been around for ever. Longer than me. You listen to things – people, gossip, I mean. You have to. Can you tell me what it was that made me so unpopular before I left? Can you remember that far back?’

  Twelve years was nothing; a mere fifth of his sixty. Out of the blue like that, the question took him by surprise. He had thought she was going to ask something equally awkward, but rooted in the present, like the true prognosis of her mother’s illness. He decided on a version of the truth, delivered rapidly.

  ‘Nothing, really. You were just the prettiest girl around, and for a couple of years the most precocious. Your Aunt Mab told me she thought you were a bit wild, you know. Someone circulated rumours that you’d given a couple of the young men the clap. Anybody’s for a halfpenny.’

  She nodded. ‘So I heard. Written rumours? Only Andrew mentioned something about letters.’

  ‘Yes. Childishly vulgar. I saw only the one, mind. My son James, remember him? He got one. He was a stuck up little brute then. He’s better now, I promise …’

  ‘Who wrote them, Doc? Who would do that?’

  ‘I don’t know, love. Somebody jealous. Long forgotten now.’

  ‘Somebody must have hated me,’ said Isabel. ‘And no, things like that are never quite forgotten, are they?’

  ‘Sure they are,’ he said reassuringly, although, even to his own ears, his voice was a trifle hypocritical.