A Lesson in Dying (11 page)

Without a word she stood aside and let him in.

She took him into the kitchen and he chose a chair with his back to the sea. He felt safer that way. She must have been shopping because there was a cardboard box waiting to be unpacked on the table. She thought he might at least have waited to be invited to sit down and she remained standing, looking down at him, to make the point. He felt her hostility and realized that her privacy was important to her. Perhaps after all it would have been better to talk to her at school.

‘Have you seen the newspapers?’ he asked.

She nodded. ‘Poor Kitty Medburn,’ she said. ‘They’re making her out to be some kind of monster.’

He felt in his pocket for the comforting packet of cigarettes, but realized it would not do to light one.

‘I don’t think she killed Medburn,’ he said. ‘She wasn’t that sort of coward.’

Irene Hunt raised her eyebrows. ‘I think we would all have been capable of killing Harold Medburn,’ she said.

‘Was he blackmailing you?’

There, he thought, and I meant to be tactful.

She did not answer directly. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said coldly. ‘I don’t understand what business this is of yours.’

‘Kitty Medburn’s a friend,’ he said. ‘I’m going to prove that she’s innocent.’

He thought for a moment that she was going to laugh. After all, who could blame her? He was a school caretaker, a retired miner with no education or skill. But she did not laugh. She turned away from him and filled a kettle with water.

‘Wouldn’t it be better to leave it to the police?’ she asked.

‘The police think Kitty killed him.’

Her back was still turned to him. She spooned tea into a pot.

‘Was he blackmailing you?’ Jack asked more gently.

‘Yes,’ she said. She sat slowly in a chair by the table. Her face was blank with thought.

‘There was a woman who came to the church looking for you,’ he said. ‘Did that have something to do with it?’

She looked up suddenly, surprised, impressed perhaps that he had found out so much. She nodded.

‘That was my daughter,’ she said. ‘My illegitimate daughter. She was born while I was still very young. I was seventeen. My parents persuaded me to place her for adoption. Then an act was passed which allowed adopted children to trace their natural mothers. Anne came to Heppleburn to look for me. She went to the church. I suppose she thought she could go there with confidence. And she met Harold Medburn.’

‘Would it have been so dreadful,’ Jack asked, ‘if people knew that you had an illegitimate child?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘Of course not. Not at that time. It would have been awkward and unpleasant but not so dreadful. I could have dealt with that. But he wasn’t threatening me. He was threatening that he would tell Anne’s family. Her husband hadn’t wanted her to look for me. I’m not sure why. Perhaps he thought I must be a wicked woman who would bring depravity and destruction into his happy home. She had come to Heppleburn against his wishes and without his knowledge. The marriage wasn’t a happy one but she was determined to sustain it because of the children. She confided all this to Harold Medburn on her first visit to the church. He told me that he would inform her husband that she had found me unless I paid him.’ She looked seriously at Jack. ‘I had betrayed my daughter once,’ she said. ‘I couldn’t do it again.’

‘And you’ve been paying him ever since?’

She nodded, and gave a sad, unnatural laugh. ‘Do you know what’s so ironic?’ she said. ‘ There would have been no need to pay him any more. She had decided to separate from her husband. Her children have grown up so she doesn’t feel the need to pretend any longer. I’d decided that I’d made my last payment and then he died. I missed the satisfaction of telling him he wouldn’t get more money from me.’

He knew she would want no sympathy.

‘Can I speak to your daughter?’ he asked.

‘No,’ she said. ‘ I’ll not have her involved in this. You’ll have to trust that what I’ve told you is true.’

Jack tried to remember when Miss Hunt had first come to the school. The village had been more isolated then and he thought it must have been a big event, the arrival of an attractive young woman. He could not picture her, but could remember the gossip that surrounded her, the excitement she had generated. She had spoken differently from them. In post-war austerity her clothes had been expensive, the envy of all the local women.

‘You aren’t local,’ he said. ‘ You didn’t come from the north-east.’

‘No,’ she said bitterly. ‘ My parents banished me from the civilized world.’

‘Who was the father of your child?’

He realized at once that he had made a mistake. She was white with anger. ‘ That’s an impertinance!’ she cried. He was a child again, reprimanded for a rudeness he had never intended. ‘The father of my child has no relevance to this. He would never be mixed up with anything so sordid.’

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I didn’t mean to upset you.’ He longed to take a cigarette from the packet in his coat pocket, but was afraid of provoking her to more anger. He saw then that she had begun to cry.

‘I loved him,’ she said. ‘There hasn’t been a day for forty years when I’ve not thought about him.’

How sad, he thought, how pathetic to be so obsessed with the past.

‘Then you’ll understand,’ he said, ‘ why I need to help Kitty.’

‘Yes,’ she said softly. ‘I suppose I understand.’

She stood up briskly and dried her eyes on a large white handkerchief. She brought a teapot and two mugs to the table. The admission that they had something important in common encouraged him. He took it for granted now that she would help him. She unpacked the brown cardboard box of shopping until she found a fruit cake. She cut two slices and handed one to him on a brown earthenware plate.

‘When I first came to Heppleburn I tried to make friends with Kitty Medburn,’ she said. ‘Harold was assistant master at the school then and we were a similar age. But she seemed suspicious of me. She made it clear that I wasn’t welcome in their home. I found it hurtful. Everything here was so strange and I felt completely alone.’

‘That would have been Harold,’ he said. ‘Kitty wouldn’t have meant to be unkind.’

‘Perhaps.’

He wanted to make the most of her new cooperation and refused to be distracted by her memories.

‘Did you go into Medburn’s room on Saturday afternoon?’ he asked.

She thought. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I needed more Sello-tape to put up the decorations. He always kept a hoard in his desk.’

‘Did you see the gown there?’

‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘The police have asked me that and I can’t remember.’

‘Did you notice if anyone else went into the office?’

She shook her head. ‘How was he killed?’ she asked suddenly. ‘I don’t understand what happened.’

He shrugged. ‘I don’t know,’ he said helplessly.

‘Why don’t you ask Ramsay?’

‘I don’t like to.’

‘That’s ridiculous!’ she said, turning into a teacher again. ‘You won’t get Kitty free with that attitude.’

‘I don’t think I’m very good at this,’ he said. ‘ Perhaps I should leave it to the police after all.’

‘Don’t give up,’ she said. She felt sorry for him. She had never realized before how sensitive he was. He had been a little man in a brown overall who mended the school’s central heating. But she could not believe that his investigation would produce a result.

‘Come on,’ she said. ‘I’ll drive you to the bus stop.’

She led him out to the farmyard. A small boy with a dog was driving cows in to be milked. The sun was a big orange ball low over the Cheviots. She drove him to the main road and left him, stranded in the countryside, in the magic orange light.

Angela Brayshaw had planned her day meticulously. It was the only way she could live. She was frightened by chaos and the unexpected. She would take the bus to Whitley Bay to shop in the morning, bake in the afternoon and later she would take her daughter to the firework display on the recreation ground. She was still in her dressing gown when Paul Wilcox telephoned. The whispered phone call, his desperate entreaty to meet her, disturbed and irritated her. It was upsetting because it was so unexpected. It had been a long time since she had been alone with Paul Wilcox. She had thought the affair was all over. In these matters she was always the passive partner. It never occurred to her to wonder if she loved. To be loved was important. To be the object of adoration was to be in a position of power. Paul Wilcox had never adored her but had seemed to need her, he had been physically attracted to her. Then his conscience had got the better of him. More recently, whenever he saw her he looked timid and ashamed.

‘I’m not sure I can see you today,’ she said. ‘ I’m very busy.’ She was irritated because she might have to rearrange her plans. Besides, she knew he would insist on meeting her.

‘Please,’ he said. ‘Hannah will be out this afternoon. I was going to take the children to the park. I could meet you there, as if by chance …’

‘I don’t know,’ she said. But she was flattered by his attention and desperation. It occurred to her suddenly that he might be of some use. He could lend her money, so she could pay at least some of what she owed to her mother. She was convinced that she only had to buy time, that there would be no need now to join her mother in the old people’s home. She was already deciding which clothes to wear, what make-up to use.

In the afternoon he was at the park before her. There were more people than she had expected: dog walkers, bored teenagers, rowdy children. If Wilcox had been hoping for privacy he would be disappointed. A group of boys was hovering around the bonfire. They were as fascinated as if it were already alight and prodded it, and threw bits of wood onto the top of it. Paul Wilcox was pushing his little girl on the swing. The boy was on the climbing frame absorbed in some game of his own. As she approached she thought derisively how pathetic Wilcox was. What sort of a man was he? He allowed his wife to dominate him, to go out to work, to take all the decisions in the house. Even when he was employed he had been a nurse, which was women’s work. Harold Medburn had been more of a man than him. But perhaps now Paul had come to his senses, she thought. He had decided how much he needed her. Well, she would make him pay for his pleasure.

Paul Wilcox had been looking out for her, but pretended not to notice her until she came quite close to him.

‘Hello,’ he said. His voice was so falsely cheerful that even the child in the swing turned round to see what was wrong.

‘What a surprise,’ she said, leaning against one of the metal supports of the swing, ‘to see you here!’

Her voice was softly seductive but she found it impossible to keep the sneer from it. His reaction surprised her. She had considered him humiliated, crawling back to her to ask for her favours, but he was angry, accusing.

‘You told Harold Medburn about us,’ he said. ‘It was a despicable thing to do.’

‘Why?’ she said. ‘Are you ashamed? You seemed to enjoy making love to me.’

‘Be quiet,’ he said, looking anxiously at his daughter, his anger collapsing with embarrassment.

‘I was lonely,’ he said. ‘Frustrated. You took advantage of that.’

It was her turn to pretend to righteous anger.

‘I don’t remember it that way at all,’ she said. ‘You asked me into your house for a cup of coffee after a Parents’ Association meeting. I accepted. You didn’t tell me that your wife was working away. It wasn’t my fault that I never drank the coffee.’

‘I’m sorry,’ he muttered. ‘You’re right. I’m to blame for the mess.’

She looked at him in disgust. It was astonishing now to believe that she’d had such hopes of the relationship. He had been kind, touchingly eager to please. And he had lived in such a beautiful house. She would have done almost anything to live in a house like that. But he had never really been her type. Almost immediately after they had begun to meet regularly he had started to discuss his wife. It had irritated Angela intensely. He still loved Hannah, he said, more than anyone else in the world. What a bastard he was to carry on like this! She had hoped he would lose the romantic obsession with his wife, but it had come as no surprise when he stopped inviting her back for coffee after the meetings, stopped dropping into her home during the day when Lizzie was at the toddler group. There had been no explanation. Fortunately there had been no emotional scenes. She had taken the rejection philosophically and turned her whole attention to Harold Medburn.

‘You didn’t tell me it was supposed to be a secret,’ she said, trying to provoke him to anger again.

‘I thought it was obvious!’

There was a silence. ‘Let’s not argue,’ she said then. She stood close beside him and touched his arm. The attempt to excite him was habitual, given purpose now by her need for money. ‘We used to be such good friends. Tell me what Harold did to upset you.’

‘He tried to blackmail me,’ Wilcox said. He was too humiliated at first to say that Medburn had succeeded. The little girl screamed to be let out of the swing. He lifted her out and watched her run off to play with the other children. Wilcox continued speaking, becoming more heated and confused as he talked: ‘It seemed incredible. He was a headmaster. I couldn’t believe it. He told me that he was going to tell Hannah about you and me. He thought it was his moral duty. When I said there was nothing to tell, he said he had proof. It might be possible to come to some arrangement, he said. I could support one of his charities. It was ridiculous but I believed in his charity at first. He was a church warden, after all. Then he wanted more money and when I refused he threatened to talk to Hannah. He was going to see her at the Hallowe’en party, he said. He’d have a little chat with her then.’

For a moment she said nothing and the lack of reaction made the rush of words seem ludicrous.

Angela Brayshaw smiled unpleasantly. ‘Perhaps you had better tell the police,’ she said. ‘If he were blackmailing you, you had a reason to kill him.’

‘No!’ he was shocked.

‘I bet you were relieved when he didn’t turn up at the party.’

‘Of course,’ he said, ‘but that doesn’t mean …’ He lapsed unhappily into silence again, then said suddenly: ‘ Could he have had proof? You wouldn’t have given him my letters, the poetry I wrote for you?’