Almost a Crime (57 page)

mother had taken it away, some of the pages had been

falling out and she’d said she’d mend it. So it would be in

her room.

He turned the handle cautiously, looked in; she was lying

on her back, she looked rather like the Sleeping Beauty.

Only she wasn’t going to sleep for a hundred years. He

wouldn’t let her. Just till breakfast. That would be quite

enough.

Octavia had spent the night at one of the motels on the M4.

Utterly anonymous, totally uninterested in her, caring for

nothing but that her credit card should be cleared, they

gave her a room number and handed her a key for it: it was

exactly what she needed, a mindless, faceless, unpeopled

environment. She made a cup of tea and lay down on the

bed and stared at the blank television screen. The room was

absolutely silent, the double glazing forming an impenetrable

barrier against the roar of the motorway, and absolutely

dark, the thick curtains lined with some kind of plasticised

fabric, a surreal womb in which she could escape from the

world.

No, no, not a womb, she thought, sipping the tea, she

would never hear that word again without feeling terror

and nausea. A tomb, that was more like it, it was like being

sealed in a tomb, but interred by her own choice, removing

her from action, demands, decisions. Here she could and

would stay; no one could find her, no one trouble her, until

she wished to be found and troubled. At that moment,

either seemed unthinkable.

Dickon was having a bit of trouble finding the Thomas the

Tank Engine book. It wasn’t on the table by the window,

nor was it on the chest of drawers. Dickon turned, looked

at the bed. Not there, not on the bedside table. But the bedside table did have a drawer; maybe she’d put it in there.

Only, opening that might wake her. Although she seemed

very asleep.

Gingerly, he went over to the bed, eased himself

between it and the wall; his mother slept on. He was next

to the bedside table now. If he could just — Dickon reached

out to the drawer handle, and the sleeve of Benjy’s pyjamas,

much too big for him, caught on the glass jug standing on

the table. It balanced dangerously on the edge for a long

moment, then in slow motion, tipped right over and fell

off. On to the wooden floor. And shattered. Loudly.

He stood, holding his breath, waiting for his mother to

wake up and be first frightened and then cross with him.

Only she didn’t.

Janet had slept badly. She wasn’t sure why; she normally

slept like the dead, as she herself cheerfully announced

every morning if asked, but she was restless, dreaming

fitfully; at five she got up and went downstairs to make

herself tea and found she was down to the last teaspoon of

leaves; she decided to borrow some from the house. She

slipped across the yard in her dressing gown and was just

tipping a handful of tea leaves into her tea caddy when she

heard the crash from the floor above, where Louise slept.

And after the crash a long silence.

It was the long silence that seemed strange; rather like

Sherlock Holmes’ dog that didn’t bark, as she explained it

to Derek afterwards. No exclamation, no footsteps, no

creaking of the bed even, just a dead still silence.

Janet went up to investigate; and found Dickon crossing

the bedroom floor, a deeply anxious expression on his small

face, and beyond him, Louise, waxy pale, totally still, her

body looking somehow oddly collapsed into itself.

Marianne had also, and most unusually, slept badly.

Normally, she slept like the proverbial baby; although

anyone who had had a baby, she always thought, would

have known what an absurd comparison that was. But the

night had been filled with anxiety, which filtered into what sleep she had: anxiety about her children, about Octavia

and Tom, about her relationship with Nico — not of course

that it was a relationship — about Felix. Finally at six, she got

up, made herself a cup of camomile tea, and was just

climbing back into bed when the phone rang.

It was Felix. ‘Marianne, are you awake?’ He sounded

terrible, hoarsely agitated.

‘I am now,’ she said, trying not to sound petulant, the

reproachful lie rising easily to her lips. God, he was

inconsiderate.

‘It’s Octavia. She’s disappeared.’

‘Felix, what on earth do you mean?’ An exaggeration, no

doubt.

‘I mean she’s disappeared. Nobody knows where she is.’

‘Felix, you’re going to have to explain this to me a bit,’

said Marianne, pushing her hair back wearily. ‘How do you

know she’s disappeared?’

‘Tom rang me. About a quarter of an hour ago.’

‘Tom?’ It clearly was serious; Tom must have been

driven to a desperation of anxiety to have rung Felix. ‘But

why?’

‘It seems that Charles Madison rang him. They’re

desperate to get hold of Octavia. Louise has taken an

overdose. She’s been rushed to hospital. Charles seems to

think Octavia might have some idea why she did it.’

‘Oh, my God,’ said Marianne very slowly. ‘Oh, Felix.

This is very, very terrible.’

Greatly to her surprise, at some point during the long,

timeless, strangely emotionless night, Octavia had actually

slept; she woke to see something resembling light coming

through the curtains. She was fully dressed still, lying on top

of the heavy bedspread. The radio clock by her bed said it

was half past six. Half past six: Minty would be waking, the

twins would soon be up, looking for her, wondering where

she was. They would be worried about her; it wasn’t their

fault, they didn’t deserve that. She tried to use the phone in the room, but it wasn’t connected, tried her own mobile, but it was run down. Damn. It would have to be the car.

She stood up, wincing at a stiff neck, a foul mouth, caught

sight of herself in the mirror, rings of smudged mascara

under her eyes, her hair pushed into a bizarre shape, and

almost smiled. What price stylish Octavia Fleming now?

She phoned the house; Caroline answered.

‘Octavia! Where are you? We were so worried. Tom’s

been trying everywhere. Even the police. He wants to

speak to you. And your father’s terribly—’

‘I can’t stop,’ she said quickly. ‘Tell Tom I’ll call again

later. And my father that I’m fine. And tell the children I’ll

probably be back tonight.’

‘Octavia, please speak to Tom. He’s—’

‘I can’t. Sorry.’ She snapped the phone back on its hook,

switched it off, and went back into the motel.

She supposed she ought to go home but she couldn’t

face it. She wanted to run away, disappear, never be seen

again by anyone who had ever known her; start again, with

a new identity, a new life.

Given the impossibility of that, she pulled out of the

service station and turned down the M4 in the direction of

Somerset and the cottage.

Tom was also on the M4: driving to Gloucestershire and the

hospital where Louise lay. Mad, beautiful, radiant Louise,

whom he had come at one point most dangerously near to

loving, and whom now he feared and dreaded beyond

everything. He would have said, indeed, that he hated her

now; but since Charles’ phone call, hearing his voice raw

with fear and misery, he realised that was far too

straightforward, too simplistic an emotion. What he felt for

Louise now had no name: there was hatred in it, to be sure,

but there was tenderness too, and remorse and regret, and

revulsion and desire. He kept seeing her face as he had

slammed the car door shut, driven away from her: distorted

with misery that he had once again refused her, refused

what she wanted, and at the same time, with an ugly elation

that she had finally touched him, hurt him with the story of Octavia and the baby she had discarded.

‘Leave me alone,’ he had shouted, the last thing he had

said to her. ‘Stay out of my life.’ And then, very slowly, ‘I don’t

— love — you. Understand that. For Jesus Christ’s

sake.’

For Jesus Christ’s sake. Amen. Was that the next thing he

would be saying to her? Or rather to her coffin? Was she

dying, was she dead? And if she was, then was it his fault,

his fault alone? Or could he at least share that guilt with the

demons she lived with, who had invaded her lovely body

and her tortured spirit? Should he have told someone,

sought help for her when he had begun to fear for her

sanity? He should; he knew that very well. Cowardice had

held him back, the fear of the consequences of going to

Sandy, or to Charles, telling them what he knew, revealing

how he knew it. Cowardice and hope. Hope that she

would come through, accept what he had told her she must

accept, see what he had struggled to make her see.

But he hadn’t; and the sweet, intense flirtation that had

begun with a dance at a party, extended to lunch, to wild,

winging afternoons in hotel rooms, and thence to magically

lovely stolen nights and days, had slowly darkened into

tears, dependence, demands, protestations of love, of need,

and finally declarations of hatred, and of revenge: and now

of the ultimate vengeance, laying her death at his door.

Barbara Dawson came through on his car phone.

‘Tom, where the hell are you? You have a meeting with

Bob Macintosh like now. He’s come down from Birmingham,

and—’

‘Tell Aubrey to see him. I can’t get back,’ said Tom.

‘Look, I’m dealing with a — a domestic emergency. Please

tell everyone that. Okay? Unless my wife rings. In which

case, find out where she is and get her to ring me on this.

Or my mobile. I don’t want to speak to anyone else.

Anyone at all.’

Sandy had been enjoying a bowl of milky coffee and a pain

au chocolat when his mobile rang, preparing himself for a

meeting with the manager of a big chain of autoroute cafes.

If he pulled this one off, he would be able to do some of the

things he had been dreaming of; buy a better house, a

decent car, put Dickon down for Eton, take Louise away

for a holiday. Somewhere sunny, somewhere glamorous,

the Caribbean or the Bahamas. A couple of weeks in the

sun would see her right; and then the promise of a move, of

being able to use her talents as an interior designer. She’d

cheer up in no time. No time at all…

This might be her now; he lifted the phone, smiled.

‘Hallo. Sandy Trelawny …’

Dickon was sitting on Janet’s knee in the kitchen when his

father phoned; he had hardly spoken all day. The terrifying

events of the early morning, seeing his grandfather holding

his mother like a limp doll, trying to force water into her

mouth, the ambulance arriving, sirens screaming, the men

rushing up the stairs, and then moving down swiftly, so

swiftly they seemed to be flying. Seeing his mother on a

stretcher, and being put into the ambulance and the

ambulance driving off again, hearing the siren moving out

of earshot. And then his grandfather hurling himself into his

own car, driving off, his mobile telephone held to his ear. It

had all been so horrible, exactly like a bad, bad dream. And

now he was afraid, so afraid, that she would die too, and

join Juliet and his grandmother. Janet kept saying that she

wouldn’t, that she’d be fine, but he was terribly afraid.

Dying was what seemed to happen to everyone he loved.

‘You mean you knew? Or you suspected it was Louise?

And you said nothing, nothing to me, or to—’

‘Felix, I didn’t think I should say anything to you. For

the hundredth time, it’s nothing to do with you. Or me for

that matter.’

‘I rather beg to differ, Marianne. If you had told me

might have been able to do something about the whole

thing.’

Marianne looked at him; thinking what an appalling

force for danger he was. He was pacing up and down her

drawing room, energised by rage and anxiety, gnawing at

his knuckles. He always did that when he was distraught.

‘Really?’ she said, surprised at her own courage. ‘And

what would you have done?’

‘Oh, for God’s sake. Spared her some of the shock at

least.’

‘You’re sure she knows?’

‘Oh, yes, she knows. Tom told me. God, that man has a

great deal to answer for.’

Marianne said nothing; but she thought of Louise lying

near to death, if not dead, in hospital, and of Octavia, hurt

and doubly damaged by this new deadly betrayal, and of

three — no, four children, desperately hurt, Dickon most of

all; of Charles Madison, who deserved no more pain at all;

of Sandy who deserved none either; and she agreed with

him. Tom did indeed have a great deal to answer for.

‘Felix,’ she said, putting her hand on his arm, trying to

defuse his rage just a little, ‘Felix, let’s try to think calmly

about this. About what we can do to help now. Rather than

what we should have done.’

‘What you should have done, you mean,’ he said, shaking