A Game For All The Family (30 page)

The doorbell rings. And carries on ringing. There’s an index finger pressing hard. It stops after nearly five seconds of solid noise. Figgy, who was asleep under the kitchen table, starts to bark ferociously and scoots out of the room toward the front door.

“Early-morning harassment,” grumbles Alex as I get up to go and see who it is.

I have to find Figgy’s leash and attach it to his collar before I can open the door, or else he’ll be off and we might never see him again. This takes several minutes, during which time there are two more short rings of the bell.

I find a policeman in uniform on the doorstep. He’s middle-aged with a scrawny neck, stick-thin legs and a fat middle section in between. His face is red with dozens of small purple flecks from broken veins. It reminds me of a terrine.

“Well, it was a toss-up which was going to happen first,” he says. “Me calling on you or you calling on me. I’m glad I beat you to it—saves you the bother, too. I’m here now.” His Devon accent is stronger than I would have believed possible. He bends down and pats Figgy on the head repeatedly. “Hello, little fella!”

Figgy lowers his head and slides out from under—a sensible reaction to being treated like a drum by an irritating stranger.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say. “If DC Luce has delegated me to you, please tell him I don’t find that acceptable.”

“Euan Luce?”

“Yes. Has he sent you? About the phone calls I’ve been getting?”

“Ah, you know Euan then, do you?” He seems to think this is a pleasing coincidence. Fancy that: me, a person, knowing DC Luce, another person who probably lives less than a mile away—who’d have thought it?

“What phone calls are you talking about, Mrs. . . . ? Mrs. . . . ?” He turns his head and offers me his ear, as if I’m trying to tell him my name and he can’t hear me.

“If you’re not here about phone calls, why are you here?”

“About the signs.” He nods as if he’s said something profound and makes the shape of a square with his fingers.

“What signs?”

“ ‘What signs?’ says she! You ought to know, since you’ve got one yourself. I expect you’ve not been out yet this morning, with it being so early. If you’d care to step outside, you’ll see what I’m talking about.”

“I’ve got nothing on my feet. Can you please explain what you mean?”

“You don’t have to come far. It’s right here.” He points at the wall in front of him, next to the front door. He must mean the stone plaque with the house’s name on it. Does he really want me to come outside and inspect it? I know very well what my own home is called.

“Wait a second,” I say. None of my shoes are near the door. My flip-flops are nowhere in sight, even though I left them right here last night. Moving necessary footwear to untraceable locations is Figgy’s favorite hobby. There’s a pair of green boots—Alex’s. I pull them on and step out into perfection that even the policeman’s presence can’t spoil: the dew-soaked grass sloping down to the ranks of leafy evergreen trees; the gorgeous winter sun; the sound of oars brushing water aside; the smell of the sea.

For a moment I forget what I’m doing out here with the policeman. Then I remember and turn and look at the house sign. Over the words “Speedwell House,” someone has stuck a colored, shiny plastic . . . thing. I don’t know what to call it. A sticker, I suppose: big and square. The background’s purple and the writing on it is turquoise. It says “
Tide Glider,
” and completely covers the house’s name.

“You’ll want to peel that off,” says the policeman. “Yours is the only one this side of the river, far as we can work out, but you should see ’em over Dartmouth side. Houses on the boats, boats on the houses. Imagine if your doggy got lost and someone read his little silver medallion to see where to bring him back to—you don’t want them delivering him to a dinghy over by the jetty, do you? I’d be peeling right now, if I were you.”

This man might have many talents, but using words to convey meaning is not one of them. “Can you please tell me what you’re talking about in a way that makes sense?” I say. “
Tide Glider
is . . . the name of a boat, I assume?”

“Oh yes. Last night, while you and I were getting our shut-eye, someone was awake playing silly beggars. They must have planned it, cuz I’ve seen nearly thirty of those big plastic sticker things so far, and that’d take time to do. Seen ’em on houses and seen ’em on boats, I have. Swapped! House names on all the boats attached to the jetty this morning, with the signs covering up the boats’ proper names—including your one,
Tide Glider
.”

“I don’t have a boat called
Tide Glider
,” I tell him through gritted teeth. “I’ve never owned one, sailed in one or heard of one. Never heard the name until I read it just now.”

“I wasn’t saying you did.” He widens his eyes at me. “I’m saying there’s boats all over the show with their names covered up with house name stickers: The Old Forge, Lilac Cottage, The Laburnums, what have you. Speedwell House is on one of them, which is why I come here. I wondered, see. Meanwhile, there’s a fair few houses—the ones whose names I’ve mentioned, and others besides—with boat names stuck over their signs:
Oh, Buoy!
,
Watersprite
,
Wave Weaver
. Local paper’s doing a piece about it. I think the photographer’s over at the jetty now, snapping the boats. If you want to pose next to your new sign, give the paper a bell.”

I claw at the “
Tide Glider
” sticker with my fingernails but can’t prize loose a single corner. The policeman tries to help and ends up bashing his fingers into mine. I push his hands away and he shrugs as if to say, “No pleasing some people.”

“Let me get this right,” I say. “You’re honestly telling me that during the night, someone has gone out with a load of these big industrial-adhesive stickers and put boat names on houses and house names on boats? And all these names belong to actual houses and boats—they’re not made up?”

“Oh, no, they’re all real. And yes, you’ve hit it on the nail. That’s what’s happened. As to why, I couldn’t tell you. There’s always a practical joker out to commit mischief, isn’t there? I take it you heard nothing during the night—because someone was stood right here at some point, weren’t they? Sticking it on.”

Her name arrives in my head as the obvious answer: Anne Donbavand. Outside my house at two in the morning, her nasty fingers smoothing down the sticker . . .

“It might be more than a joke,” I tell the policeman.

“How so?”

“Someone wants to create confusion about which house is which and which boat is which.”

“Now why would they want that?”

Because they’re unbalanced.

Isn’t there a Bible story about houses being marked for some kind of attack? I shiver.

“You want to build a higher wall and install some security cameras, I reckon,” says the policeman, looking up at the top of the house. “As it stands, anyone could hop over into your garden and lurk here in the small hours, plotting mischief. I’ve never understood it myself: this yen rich folk have for living miles from other people, surrounded by all their acres, but no one to help them if they need it in a hurry. I wouldn’t feel safe living out here—no offense. I wouldn’t feel safe at all.”

“This is an almost indecent helping of beauty!” says Olwen later the same day. “What you need up here’s a hammock, or a big comfy armchair—right here, where I’m standing. Figgy, you are one extremely lucky pup. Oddly, I always knew that about you.”

Her enthusiasm goes some way toward dissolving the knot of misgiving planted in my mind by the terrine-faced policeman, with whom I’m still angry. What kind of person says, “I wouldn’t feel safe living where you live,” before scuttling back to his own place of safety?

Olwen says, “If you were a social climber, you could aggravate people at parties by saying, ‘Not only do I own a mansion—I can see the top of it from my own land. I can look at my own roof tiles anytime I fancy!’ ”

“Yes, well . . . anything rather than look at my own mortgage statements,” I say, not wanting her to think I’m a spoilt rich person.

She’s right, though: from the highest point in our garden, we can look down on our house from above. I knew this before today, but it’s only now, as Olwen remarks on it, that I’m struck by how unusual it is.

“So you reckon this Ingrey family lived here, then?” she asks. I’ve told her the full story, or at least the fullest version currently available.

“Possibly. Though if they did, they weren’t called Ingrey.”

“It’s odd that the surname doesn’t change from one generation to the next. On the family tree, I mean. If Lisette Ingrey married this Grevel chap, why are she and her kids all called Ingrey?”

I stop walking. “Of course. How did I miss that? I wonder if the Donbavands did the same thing—chose Anne’s maiden name as the family surname, not Stephen’s. If they did, that’s yet more circumstantial evidence the two families—Donbavands and Ingreys—are one and the same. I should call Ops and ask him to find out.”

“Ops?” asks Olwen.

“Yeah, the detective I’ve hired. That’s not his name, but his email address starts with ‘Ops.’ Short for ‘Operations,’ I guess.”

“I see. Justine, I don’t mean to be nitpicky, but I’m not sure ‘yet more circumstantial evidence’ is accurate. Is there
any
, really? I mean, absolutely, yes, Ellen’s story
might
be about George’s mother and her family, and the woman calling you Sandie on the phone
might
be Anne the professor whose sister
might
be Allisande Ingrey in the story, but isn’t it equally likely that none of those things is true?”

This isn’t what I want to hear.

“Humans are pattern-seeking animals,” says Olwen. “Your theory neatly covers everything strange that’s happening and ties it all together, but there are other less satisfying possibilities that are as likely to be true.”

“Such as?”

“Your malicious caller is unconnected to George Donbavand. She has mental health problems that include confusion: hence, she knows you’re Justine, but when she takes too many drugs, or too few, she gets your name mixed up with the name of her yellow Labrador, Sandie. Do you have any idea how many yellow Labs are given that name? Drives me crackers!”

“Yeah, why don’t people call their dogs proper names, like Stood a Lonely Cattle Shed,” I say, ducking out of the way when Olwen aims a pretend blow at me.

“George’s mum’s fear and paranoia might have nothing to do with the phone calls you’re getting,” she goes on. “It’s also possible that George decided to write a story about you without giving his mother’s story to Ellen to write.”

“Yes, and it’s possible that Ellen’s
so obsessed
with this story, like she’s never been about any homework ever before, for some other reason that’s not linked to George, but now I think we’re drifting into the realms of implausibility.”

“Not implausibility. Patternlessness. The two are different.”

“Anne Donbavand took George out of school because of his friendship with Ellen. At almost exactly the same time, these threatening calls started. If I’m seeing a pattern, it’s because there is one. It’s a fact, not an interpretation.”

Olwen gives me an “I don’t know how to break this to you” look. “Not to make excuses for the woman, but if George got overexcited and shared his future marriage plans with his family before Ellen shared them with you . . . well, it wouldn’t justify hauling him out of school, but I can see how a parent might overreact in the face of something so unusual.”

“That’s a point.” And something else I hadn’t thought of.

“While I’m suggesting things, I’ve got more if you’re interested,” Olwen says.

“Suggest away,” I say.

“You’ve signed over a stack of money to this Ops chap, and let’s hope he can help, but in the meantime, you’re not doing the thing that would be most useful.”

“What’s that?”

“Getting through to Ellen.” Olwen holds up a hand. I half-expect her to order me to sit. “Let’s say you’re right and her story is George’s family history—a traumatic history. It’s no surprise she’s resisting your attempts to invade what she sees as her and George’s private world. And yet it seems you do need to read what she’s written.”

“She’s writing it for school. If her teacher’s going to read it, why can’t I?”

“Justine, I’m not the one you need to convince. Children are oversensitive about their parents muscling in. Puppies are the same with their owners, at roughly the same point in their maturing. Between eight and twelve months—the teenage phase—they assert their independence in all kinds of inconvenient ways. Things they did before to please you, suddenly they won’t do. It passes of course, but . . .”

“Ellen isn’t a Bedlington terrier, Olwen.”

“I realize that. Still, though . . . I’d approach her as an equal on this, not parent to child. Is there anything you’ve kept from her since all these funny goings-on started?”

I want to say no, but it wouldn’t be the truth. There are things I could share with Ellen that I haven’t wanted to: the reason I see as little as I can of Dad and Julia; why I hate family trees.

“Whatever’s in your mind now, tell Ellen about it—all of it. Trust her with it. Once you’ve taken that leap, that’s when you ask her to level with you about the story she’s writing and to let you read it. Don’t act as if it’s your God-given parental right to know. Make her feel as if she has a choice.”

“Okay, Wise Dog Woman,” I say in a mock-resentful tone. “I’m going to put your advice to the test. If it works, the Crufts gold medal for family diplomacy is yours.”

The word “medal” snags in my mind as I say it. There’s something wrong about it. Where have I heard it recently?
Come on, brain, come on . . .

“The policeman,” I mutter.

“Which one?” Olwen asks. “Haven’t you had three?”

“This morning. He mentioned Figgy’s medallion. ‘Little silver medallion,’ he said. I didn’t take it in at the time.”

“This one? Keep still for a minute, Figgy. Here, on his collar.” Olwen bends down to inspect it more closely. “Hmph. Wrong address. Did your husband get this made? Women don’t generally forget where they live.”