A Ghost in the Machine (49 page)

This visiting business, Roy told himself, was no big deal, right? Right. Yet somehow he had come to the decision that none of his clothes would do. They had looked OK before but they definitely didn't look OK now, so he and Karen had earlier taken the bus to Causton and gone round the charity shops. They found two smart shirts and some khaki chinos at Oxfam. Plus a polo-neck declaring: “Look Out World Here I Come!” in the disabled shop.

Roy had carefully ironed one of the shirts, turning the temperature up a bit at a time so it wouldn't burn. He had put on clean underwear and socks and his new trousers and was brushing his newly shampooed hair for the umpteenth time. Bringing his face close to the mirror over the washbasin he was convinced the ring holes in his nose and around the rims of his ears were definitely a little bit smaller. He knew that eventually they would close up completely because a girl had told him who'd had hers pierced. But there was nothing he could do about the tattoo around his neck. How he hated it – that dotted line saying “Cut Here.” He'd thought it brilliant at the time, a real laugh. Worth the agony. Now he could see it just looked stupid.

Roy was not looking forward to going to the Crudges'. Actually that was a bit of an understatement. When he thought of all the things he could say and do wrong, his heart stuttered and jumped with nervousness. The moment Doris had left the other day, his brief happiness, the disbelieving joy in being not just accepted but held and rocked and stroked, evaporated. He recognised that, briefly, he had been comforted but also understood that it was probably nothing personal. Women were just like that. You cried or got upset, they gave you a bit of a cuddle. Boys at the home were always boasting it was a sure way to get a screw. Maybe Doris fancied him?

One thing he simply must not do for his own safety was to confuse the experience with…Roy buried the word. The four-letter word. The worst, the blackest, the dirtiest. None of the others could compare in terms of cruelty.

From the time he could put a name to it he had seen examples everywhere. Leaving school, little kids waving drawings would run through the gates to be hugged and kissed by their mothers. The drawings were crap but you'd never know the way the mothers went on. Later, teenagers in pairs, arms round each other wandered past, smiling and gazing and dreaming into each other's faces. He'd assumed at the time this happened automatically when your voice broke and your balls dropped. Not to him. Oh – girls were available if you had money or dope or fags and even sometimes if you hadn't. But the smiling and gazing and promising and dreaming – all the stuff that mended you when you were broke – forget about it.

So this going round to the bungalow would, in the long run, prove to be just another con. Or maybe even in the short run. She was probably just a bit sorry for him. Still, he'd go along with it. A cup of tea, a bit of cake. What had he got to lose? But if there was any sign, the tiniest hint, the faintest suggestion that he wasn't wanted, he'd be off like a shot. A boy called Toad had put him right on that one. Dump them before they dump you. At that stage Roy had still believed, in spite of all previous evidence to the contrary, that he would eventually be found wantable. What, he had asked, if they don't dump you? Man, Toad had replied, they always dump you.

“Are you ready, Roy?”

“In a minute.” He took off the new shirt and decided to wear the poloneck. This would hide the tattoo and the slogan would give him confidence. He brushed his hair again, slapped on some cheap aftershave and wished he was taller.

“Roy! You look lovely.”

“Look Out World,” said Roy. “Here I Come.”

Earlier in the day there had been a brief shower but now it was hot and dry again. Karen's feet, skipping, running ahead, running back, kicked up puffs of dust on the pavement. Doris and Ernest's bungalow, just five minutes away, was called Dunroamin'. The front garden was strange, made up of four large triangles of coloured stones and a pot with a spiky green plant placed in the exact centre. Barbie rang the bell, Karen lifting her up and pressing her astronaut's fingers against the button. Soft chimes echoed inside the house. Doris opened the door. Karen danced inside and Roy, adopting a slight swagger and already sick with nerves, followed.

It was a lovely tea. A marmalade cake and three sorts of sandwiches so small you could eat two or three at once and never notice. Not that Roy did. He seemed to be on what Doris described silently to herself as “his best behaviour.” This was not quite the case. Roy only had one sort of behaviour. What he was on now was a frozen awareness of pending disaster.

“You all right…um…?”

“Roy.” He smiled nervously across at Doris's old man. “It's French for king.”

“That right?” Ernest smiled back. “I'm not very up on the parleyvoo, myself.”

He seemed a friendly old tosser. When Roy arrived he was watching the football, which meant at least there'd be something for him and Ernest to talk about. Assuming, that is, Roy stayed long enough. He had already let himself down. A sandwich had gone and slipped through his fingers on to the carpet. When the others were all talking Roy picked it up and stuffed it into his pocket.

“Would you like some salad, love?”

“Yes, please, Mrs. Crudge.” Why had he said that? He hated salad.

“There you are then.” She had dished out a large helping including beetroot. Now everything was stained dark red. Roy took the plate, which looked as if it was bleeding. “And you can forget the Mrs. Crudge. It's Doris.”

“Aunty Doris,” insisted Karen.

That rang a sharp bell. Roy flipped back to the morning Ava died. The ambulance men. The policemen. How afraid he had been. Still was. What had they said – he and Karen – to save themselves from homelessness and separation? An aunty was coming. Her aunty. That night. Tomorrow morning. Any minute now. Soon. Definitely.

What if someone from the council checked up? He could fob them off once or twice maybe, but once they'd got a grip they'd keep coming round. But if he and Karen could actually produce one, and not just any old aunty – a grown-up, quite old aunty who was reliable and kind and living just a few minutes' walk away – what a difference that would make. All the difference in the world.

“D'you know,” she was saying now, “I think this beetroot's a bit off.”

“Tastes all right to me.” That was Ernest.

“Sour, vinegary.” She put her knife and fork down. “Can't eat that. Roy?”

Roy, mute, disbelieving, handed back his huge pile of salad. What a stroke of luck.

“How about a bit of cake? Take the taste away.”

Roy had two slices of cake plus a few more sandwiches. Ernest said: “I like a man who knows how to eat.”

After tea Karen and Doris cleared away and the men went out the back. Roy didn't know what to make of the aviary. Ernest went right inside. Just stood there with the birds flying all round him, small brilliantly coloured tornadoes. And they didn't half squawk. Even the tiny ones made peeping noises.

“This is Charlene.” He took a small, pale yellow bird into his hand. “She's been a bit poorly.”

“Sorry to hear that, Mr. Crudge.” Roy tentatively approached the cage. The birds fluttered even more wildly and he stepped back.

“Not to worry, son,” said Ernest. “They'll soon get used to you.”

A treacherous warmth spread across Roy's solar plexus at this hint of not one but many future visits. He gave it five, then said casually, “'Spect they will.”

Inside the house Doris and Karen were washing up. Doris washing, Karen rinsing and stacking. Doris's thoughts were full of what she would always regard now as the two children. Roy had been a bit withdrawn today and she totally understood why. Breaking down like that – in front of a woman too – he'd regret it afterwards. He'd backtrack, perhaps even pretend it had never happened. That was fine by Doris. However it was with Roy she wouldn't change and sooner or later – probably quite a long while later – he would start to trust them both.

“You're doing a grand job there.” She was taking such trouble, Karen. Holding the big plate with both hands under the cold tap before placing it carefully in the plastic rack. Doris had to slow down to keep up with her. This was not a cause for irritation. In fact, she had never been so happy. She felt like one of the women in those telly adverts for washing powder, smiling and shaking her head at the little ones coming in from play all dirty.

Then she noticed the child was frowning and squinting. Screwing up her eyes as if in pain.

“Are you still having them headaches?” Karen looked frightened. “It's all right, my lovely. What's the matter?”

“Nothing.”

“Put that down.” Doris gently took a cup away from the child and dried her hands on a tea towel. There was a battered old armchair next to the cooker. She sat in it, drawing Karen close. Then, burning her boats: “You know I'm going to be looking after you, now?”

Karen nodded vigorously, tightening her arms around Doris's waist. “Don't go away.”

“I shan't never go away. But if I'm going to be responsible you'll have to help me.”

“I will, I will.”

“So, are you still having the headaches?”

“Don't tell anybody.”

“'Course I won't.” Doris, disturbed, way out of her depth, tried to sound calm. “But we've got to do something to make you better. Find a doctor—”

“No!” The child twisted out of her lap. “I can't. I mustn't…”

“Come on, you've been to the doctor's—”

“I never.”

“Now Karen—”

“Honestly, Aunty Doris.”

“You were probably too little to remember.”

“No. She wouldn't let me. It was for my own good.” She recited the last few words in a flat, monotone as if they had been drummed into her many times. “Ava said…she said they'd…”

I wish I'd got that woman here, thought Doris. I'd wring her bloody neck. Karen looked terrified. Doris reached out and coaxed her close again.

“Tell me, sweetheart.”

Karen shook her head but climbed back into Doris's lap.

“Whisper then.” Karen shook her head. “Go on…I won't tell anyone.”

“Promise?”

“Faithful and true.”

Karen whispered.

Doris felt dizzy and knew it was her blood pressure. When able to speak, her voice trembled. She said, “That's a wicked lie. And you mustn't ever believe it again.” She kissed Karen's forehead, rocking her gently. “Me and your Uncle Ernest – we'd never let such a thing happen.”

Trying to keep the anger that flamed in her heart from marking her face, Doris eased the child into a more comfortable position and kissed her again. How to handle this? Doris's own doctor was on the point of retiring. She had been with him for almost thirty years and he had seen her through countless illnesses and minor operations. He was a kind man and very good at guessing what was really wrong, which was not always what you'd said. There would still be time to make an appointment and ask his advice about Karen. Perhaps he'd agree to make a home visit and talk to the little girl. As a family friend like, just dropping in.

If she really wasn't registered anywhere it should be sorted straight away. Dunroamin' would do as an address. And themselves, she and Ernest, as nearest relatives or next of kin. Better say they were officially fostering; all the details could be sorted later. Doris, for whom the word “respectable” could have been invented, found herself ready and willing to spin as many lies in as many highly coloured variations as the occasion might demand. A child who was lost had been found, and must never be lost again.

 

The stifling weather had broken. After lunch it had rained, releasing the fragrant scent of flowers. The grass on the croquet lawn still sparkled and pollen dust floated through bars of sunlight.

Observing herself and Polly, in their long summer dresses and straw hats resting under the great cedar tree, Kate thought they must appear like characters from a novel set in the early twentieth century.
Howard's End
, perhaps. Or
The Go-Between.
Certainly the atmosphere was fraught and wretched enough to occupy either. There was a tray of lemonade, which Benny had made while they were out, but no one was drinking.

The journey back had been extraordinary. All of them had sat, silent, carefully upright, fearfully prescient, like people in a tumbril. Once home, Polly got out of the car and wandered into the garden, and Mallory followed. But Kate, already sensing great unhappiness to come and knowing the action to be pathetically childish, went into the house for her lucky beekeeper's hat. She found a frayed old Panama of Carey's in the back porch for Polly.

Now Mallory, who had been pacing about since they first arrived, suddenly stopped dead in front of Polly and said, “Aren't you going to tell us—”

“Yes, I am,” said Polly. She was shivering with nerves. “I was going to. I was actually on the point of it. I knew I must. Then the police arrived. I'm sorry.”

“Come and sit down, Mal.” Kate tugged a garden chair closer to her side. “Looming over her like that.”

Mallory sat down but his energy and attention, unfaltering, continued to stream in Polly's direction. He didn't even feel Kate's hand on his arm. When Polly began to speak he listened intently while his world and everything in it fell slowly apart.

 

The aftermath was terrible. The gradual unravelling of how he had been deceived cut Mallory's joy and pride in his daughter into bleeding ribbons. When she had finished he sat, humiliated, his gullibility exposed in the market place. A fool for love.

All the lies. How many he would never know. That was almost the worst part of it. Because now so many memories, right back into her childhood, were tainted. How could he have deceived himself that the mocking, self-centred and ruthless girl the world knew as Polly Lawson wasn't really Polly? Not his Polly.