Absent Light (4 page)

She put on her clothes, put one hand on her hips and surveyed her tall, slim reflection. Even with her colouring, she looked pale. Her eyes were ringed with shadows. Reaching for her make-up, she blended foundation into her olive-coloured skin, brushed highlighter onto her brow-bones to accentuate her dark eyebrows, swished eyeliner over her heavy lids, and applied black mascara onto her upper eyelashes to open up her eyes, not forgetting a smudge of deep cherry-coloured lipstick on her small but full mouth. Instantly feeling better, she decided to get some fresh air before it got too dark. Wrapping herself in one of her father's old jackets, she slipped down the stairs and outside.

It was bitterly cold, the icy air punching tears from her eyes and, just for a moment, she had a horrible recollection of the night before. She'd never been afraid of the dark but she wasn't keen on open water, canals in particular. She found them deeply threatening. Unlike rivers and seas, which were moving, organic expanses, canals were static, weed-infested places, with steep sides, impossible to escape from. She'd literally only given it a cursory glance and then she'd been pushed. At least, she
thought
she'd been pushed. In the beginning, she'd been certain. With hindsight, she couldn't be sure. It seemed as if time had robbed her of judgement. When she thought what might have happened to her, the slow asphyxia as her air passages, lungs and stomach filled with water, she felt shards of panic. And what had happened to Freya, she thought? Why hadn't she phoned?

She wasn't sure of Freya's age but reckoned she was around the twenty-five mark, roughly eight years younger than herself. They'd hit it off from the moment she'd walked into the studio. Helen guessed a part of the attraction was that Freya reminded her of how she used to be a long time ago, before she'd had her confidence stamped on. Sparky and fun, Freya had an unstoppable quality, something Helen admired, yet there was also loneliness in her eyes. She seemed vulnerable. And the city preyed on people like that. Especially at Christmas.

Keepers had several acres of landscaped gardens, including a tennis court and a wild, spirited area of natural woodland. As Helen walked across gently sloping lawns, childhood memories flooded her mind. She thought of warm, sunny days sprawled out in the grass, listening to the drone of bees and steady clunk of ball on racquet. She remembered hiding in the greenhouse, with its aroma of vines and geraniums, the magic of hearing rain against the glass. It was quite an isolated upbringing. Her dad always seemed to be at work, her mother in a world of her own. Helen wasn't ignored but the focus was always on her mother, or rather her mother's drinking. For this reason, and for as long as she could remember, she was wary of taking friends home. She couldn't bear them to notice that her mother, and by reflection herself, were different. She couldn't endure the embarrassment. She supposed deep-down she felt ashamed of her mum, which, in turn, made her feel ashamed of herself.

In spite of it all, she pretended that life was fine, that her mother was more often happy than sad, that it didn't matter if they weren't particularly close, didn't get on. She tried not to think of the time her mother shut her out in the rain, or got drunk at a summer party and fell over while dancing, breaking her ankle. She tried to forget four years before, when she'd hidden herself away from prying cameras and baying newspaper reporters.

She returned to the house as the light was fading. A police car was outside. She removed her boots in the porch and walked into the drawing room where Harmon and Wylie were drinking tea with her parents in front of a blazing log fire. Her mother had that instantly recognisable slightly pissed look on her face. Both C.I.D. officers stood up as Helen entered. Her father took charge.

“D.S. Harmon and D.C. Wylie were wondering whether you can remember anything else about the attack last night.”

Helen lowered herself into a plumply furnished chair. “Not really.”

“Pity,” Wylie said, eyeballing her in a way that made Helen feel uncomfortable. If she wasn't certain before, she was now; he knew about her past.

Helen looked at Harmon. “No leads?”

“Nothing. Witnesses have been hard to come by. It seems most people were keeping warm indoors.”

“What about the bloke who hauled me out?”

“Hasn't come forward yet.”

Helen guessed it wasn't that unusual and it was still early days. “You were going to check the CCTV.”

“We did,” Harmon said, looking awkward.

“And?”

“Wasn't productive,” Wylie intervened snappily.

Harmon flashed him an exasperated look. “It was useless, I'm afraid,” she told Helen.

“Don't tell me,” Helen groaned, “they forgot to put a tape in.”

“The tape was in, all right,” Harmon said, “but it had been used that many times, the quality was awful. We just got a load of grainy images.”

Helen wasn't that surprised. In spite of the searing clarity in high profile locations, the general quality of CCTV was so poor you'd have a hard time recognising your own parents on most footage.

“A bloody outrage,” her father growled.

“I can see where you're coming from,” Wylie said stiffly. Actually, he had no idea, Helen thought, mildly amused, as her father blistered on about incompetence, accountability and the need to
catch the bastard.
“He ought to be done for attempted murder,” her father ranted, “never mind mugging.”

Harmon smoothly reasserted her authority. “In the absence of witnesses, that might be difficult to prove, sir.”

“We're doing all we can,” Wylie chipped in, though Helen suspected that, in his own mind, he'd probably already wrapped up the case and moved onto another. It was to do with priorities. This wasn't a courtesy call: it was a kiss-off. And, actually, she didn't really care. She just wanted to forget all about it and get on with her life. She looked across the room. Her mother's eyes were rheumy with booze and emotion. Her hands were shaking, and she was twisting a small lace handkerchief round and round her fingers. Helen could see the knuckles gleaming shiny and white.

“That's it then,” her father said, in a clipped voice. He got to his feet, indicating that the interview was over. Harmon turned to Helen, reiterating that she'd be in touch.

“We've given your bag to Mrs Powers,” Wylie told Helen, his lip curling as he glanced over in her mother's direction. Helen read the contempt in his face and instantly felt on the defensive. How many times had she registered the disapproval of others? People could be remarkably prissy about women who drink. Blokes were just being blokes.

“It's upstairs,” her mother said, rising unsteadily to her feet, “on the landing.”

“It's all right, Mum. I'll get it.”

While her father saw the police out, Helen went upstairs, picked up her bag and returned with it to the drawing room. She vaguely noticed that something was different, though she couldn't quite put her finger on it. It wasn't the Christmas decorations. Wasn't the cards suspended from the beams, the wreath hanging over the fireplace, or the tastefully dressed Christmas tree.

“You've had a change-around.”

“What?” her mother said muzzily.

“Things look different, somehow.” The furniture and furnishings were the same. Everything in the usual places, but…

Helen stared at a tall vase of large purple-headed tulips that spilled over the rim like a clutch of hissing snakes. The only departure from the soothing surroundings, Helen didn't know why she hadn't spotted it immediately. And it flagged up something else.

“That's it,” she said brightly, “it's the Royal Worcester.”

Her mother gave her a befuddled look.

“You know, the porcelain arrangement of birds. It's not where it usually is.”

“Oh,” her mother broke into a smile. “I've sent it off to be cleaned.”

“Well, that's that,” Helen's father said, stalking back into the room.

“Let's hope so,” Helen's mother smiled tightly. “Sun's over the yardarm. Anyone fancy a drink?”

Dinner was a tense affair. Bit by bit, Helen watched her mother slide into an alcoholic stupor. The irritation in her father's eyes was clear. Although he adored her mum, he'd never been able to completely cope with her drinking. Most of the time, he pretended not to notice, glossed over it, made excuses. Not this evening.

“Popped in to see Gran on Boxing Day,” Helen said, trying to make conversation.

“Don' know why you bother,” her mother said thickly, pushing food around her plate with no interest. Her bottom lip and teeth were black, stained from wine.

“Makes her happy,” Helen said simply.

Her mother rolled her eyes. “Doesn' know you from Adam, dear. Jus' a shell.”

Helen looked down at her plate. She wasn't Gran any more, she wanted to say, but she was still a person. “She appreciates visitors.”

“Never used to,” her mother said in a detached fashion, taking a pull of her drink. “She was too obsessed with herself to have time for others.”

Helen glanced up. Her mother's face was devoid of expression. Only her voice betrayed resentment. Helen turned to her father. His jaw was grinding. His eyes were cold. In every other respect, he viewed her mother as the model wife. It was required. Expected. And although, most of the time, her addiction was in check, it was a source of huge frustration to him that he remained powerless to keep her sober. It was as if he regarded it as a personal failure. It explained why he loathed seeing her so drunk, hated seeing the crack in the apparently serene exterior.

“Gran gets quite soppy about presents,” Helen smiled, trying to smooth things over. Her grandmother had developed a sweet tooth since her illness and Helen was in the habit of taking chocolates or sweets with her when she visited. It was worth it just to see the old woman's eyes light up. Gran might be going senile, she thought, but she knew what it was to be fussed over and loved, which seemed more than her mother was capable of.

Helen's father twitched a sympathetic smile at her. “That's good, isn't it, Joan?” he said, curtly addressing his wife. “At least we made sure the old girl's comfortable.”

Helen supposed that was something. As private residential homes went, Roselea was in the higher echelons. And at least it didn't smell of pee.

Her mum eventually flaked out shortly before nine o'clock. Once Helen's father helped her upstairs, he rejoined Helen in the drawing room.

“She's getting worse,” Helen said.

Her father offered no comment. He was sick of it, she thought. They'd done this one countless times before. They'd even developed this peculiarly veiled way of talking about her mother's drinking so that neither of them had to mention the dreaded word
booze
. She guessed it was a form of denial, the result of years of putting on a perfect and united front. Her dad, if pressed on the subject, put it down to biology. Her mum's father had been a heavy drinker, driven to it, some said, by his wife. Whatever the truth of it, Helen's dad didn't want to talk about it tonight.

“You look tired, Helen.”

A classic decoy, she thought. “Not surprising.”

He agreed and chucked another log on the fire. “I've been thinking. You don't reckon there's more to this mugging than meets the eye?”

“How?”

Her father hesitated. “Could it be connected to your previous work with Scenes of Crime?”

She didn't say anything. She didn't want to think about it.

“You worked with the police, remember.” He was speaking softly, his Midlands accent more pronounced, but there was relentlessness in his eyes.

“
For
them,” she said quietly. “I wasn't a police officer. I wasn't at the sharp-end.”

“Not at the sharp end?” A quizzical smile played on his lips.

“Well, all right,” she conceded sheepishly, scuffing the pile on the carpet with her foot. I really don't want to revisit this, she thought.

Her father was speaking again. “Criminals have long memories. You were a part of the process of bringing them to justice.”

“Dad,” she laughed uneasily, “I was a faceless part of a team. An evidence-gatherer. And it was a long time ago.”

“Four years.”

She knew. Sometimes it seemed like yesterday, other times a lifetime ago. She wondered whether Adam felt the same.

“And you made enemies,” her father continued.

“Other policemen,” she pointed out with more levity than she felt. “And they're not generally in the habit of assaulting or attempting to bump off their foes.”

“Not even Roscoe?” His voice was hard.

She could hardly bear to hear his name. It seemed strange now. She adored him from the moment she clapped eyes on him in that dirty little street with the blood running into the gutter. She would have done anything for him and, in many ways, she did – until her final and very public betrayal. “Not even him,” she said softly.

He said nothing for a moment, took a pull on his drink. “Did you mention your past to Harmon and Wylie?”

My past, Helen thought, that far-away place where I betrayed my lover, confessed to my superiors, went to the press. I didn't need to, she thought, feeling vulnerable. “You make it sound as though I did something wrong, Dad.”

Her father took another pull of his whisky. Too much time elapsed before he gave the answer she needed to hear. “You did what you felt was right.”

Eventually, she thought. “I had no choice.”

“No,” he agreed.

They'd debated the subject endlessly. He'd wanted her to be pragmatic. She'd wanted to come clean. In the end, she'd done it her way. Mostly.

Neither of them spoke for a moment, each lost in their own thoughts, staring at the fire. The truth was her dad didn't understand. It wasn't his fault. She never told him the full story. Never told anyone. And, however many times she tried to explain the nature of her then employment, it was a dark mystery to anyone outside the police force.