Beggar Bride (37 page)

‘It was working very well. I didn’t know it would work…’

‘And then those bloody, filthy, scummy letters. How I wish I could find out who sent them.’

‘You’ve changed your mind about Ffiona then?’

Ange sits up, her hair awry, her face pale and tear-stained, looking like a battered child, vulnerable, lost, as she sits on the edge of the sofa, doubled almost in half with the pain. ‘I just don’t see how Ffiona could have found so many things out, even with an army of private detectives. Some of the things written there are so bloody personal, and Honesty seems so certain her mother isn’t up to doing anything that involves any planning, or even thinking. Having met her, I think I’ve got to agree.’

‘Then who?’ asks Tina, pausing briefly as she passes Ange, moving on to look out of the next tall window she comes to.

‘God only knows. But you’re right, whoever wrote those sodding letters would never make such a mistake, they seem to know almost everything about Jacob and Archie, just as if they are here with us,
watching over us day by day.’
And Ange shivers violently.

They are right though, whoever it is is right about her lost childhood. She hated it. She hated herself in those days. Moving on, getting used to one place, getting to know the roads, the shops, the routes, the people, their likes and dislikes, and then on again, somewhere else, nobody ever asked her, was it her fault?

She must be a very wicked child.

She started testing, the minute she felt she might relax, she started testing the waters at school and at home, taking money, lying, skiving off school, nobody ever passed the test and then, when Mrs Wilson found her in bed with her two teenage boys something must have been put on her record because things changed from that moment on. People talked to her differently, looking at her strangely, as if they were trying to peer inside the pretty wrapping, untie the knots, cut the ribbons and get to her very soul.

They must never find her soul, that was the one thing she could control, that was where she kept her innermost secrets and the silvery bits. Her body and brain might not be precious, they could treat those as they liked, but they had to leave her soul alone because it was so tender.

She had not seduced those gangly boys, lured them into her bed like some Lolita kind of siren, stripped herself naked and encouraged them to do the same. It was not as they told it at all, it was quite the opposite, she went to bed, they undressed her against her will, but of course Mrs Wilson was bound to believe their story, any mother would believe her own children. When you’re only a foster child even a game of doctors and nurses is suspect, the psychiatrists step in with their warped minds…

Not that Ange can complain. She was never cruelly treated, she never went hungry, she was never cold or lacking for new shoes or books to read, she never had an empty house to come home to.

And Sandra Biddle, who was there from the start like a settled rock, always told her, ‘Children who have a difficult childhood often turn out the most interesting. The last thing you want is to cruise through those early years with no hurdles to jump at all.’

Hurdles? Shit. Well, Ange must agree to differ. She’d been determined that little Jacob, and Archie, too, would always feel safe and cherished, she wanted them to come to her with all their little problems, real or imaginary, she’d do anything in this world to make their childhoods happy. Who cares if they turn out boring?

It must be nice to be boring.

Safe. To clean your car on a Sunday. To Hoover your fireplace. To spend your money on double-glazing. To go to Jersey on holiday. To use a fold-up silver Christmas tree and put it in the attic exactly twelve days after Christmas to avoid bad luck.

But now look.

Oh God, oh God.

Now look what has happened to her child.

The afternoon crawls along, nobody knows how to pass the time. The four o’clock deadline looms large. Ange spends her time between the great hall and its silent, sombre, expectant assembly, the British stiff upper lip brigade, and the nursery with its more natural hysterics where nothing is expected of her, one moment convincing herself that all will be well, the next unable to breathe, gasping, vomiting, fearing the worst.

Billy and Ange gaze forlornly, desperately at one another.

For how can anyone trust the word of a person who would commit such a heinous crime, there can’t be a worse crime in the book than kidnap. They’re not mad. They’re not deprived. They are cunning, conniving and wicked, they know exactly what they’re doing. Kidnappers ought to be shot. They ought to be slowly tortured first.

‘They’re not going to hurt him,’ says Ange, almost to herself, so white that even her lips don’t show, ‘they only want the money.’

‘I know,’ says Billy gently.

‘Shush… there’s somebody coming,’ says Tina suddenly, open-mouthed and astounded. ‘Up the back stairs. Can’t you hear them?’

Ange’s eyes open wide, she sits up straight and begins to turn frantically in every direction, looking on both sides and then back, with no idea what she wants to find. Tina sticks a finger in her mouth involuntarily, like a little girl waiting to be punished as they wait for the door to open. ‘It’ll be the police, most likely, searching,’ she says comfortingly. ‘Or maybe Jacob’s found his way back!’

Honesty tumbles in.

‘He is hideous, repellent, possessing some uncanny, revolting power,’ she sobs, ‘and for years I’ve been burdened like this, by my own revolting desire. You must think me so stupid, can you begin to understand? And now I am trying, I am trying the only way I know how, trying to set myself free.’

This is a side of Honesty which nobody has seen before, nobody save Callister, and she tries to describe their uneasy relationship, sobbing violently while her expression is a mixture of pleading and horror, bubbles form at her nose and mouth and wisps of expensive, silver blonde hair stick to her cheeks.

‘… disgusting and unnatural feelings…’ Honesty goes hysterically on.

With her, very much in her wake, came a pale-complexioned, sandy-haired man with thick, rubbery lips and round glasses, dressed in quite ordinary jeans and a black T-shirt with Bloomingdales printed across the back.

‘Police everywhere, behind every tree… must be the crime squad… you must hate me now and I know you’ll hate me and you’re quite right to hate me… oh,’ she wails in a sudden, desperate frenzy,
‘oh God, I hate myself!’

The young man attempts to pat her arm, but Honesty’s too far gone for well-meaning efforts at communication, abandoned, it would seem, to eternal damnation and despair, recoiling, apparently, even from contact with her own repugnant self. Honesty’s way beyond recovery and so he tries to pick up the threads.

‘I’m Giles, you see,’ he says, gradually realising that the name means nothing to his captivated audience of three, and the two children who watch him from their play on the floor with wide, staring eyes. ‘Giles Ormerod, Rufus’s son, until young Archie was born I was to inherit this estate.’

Angela’s face twists. The muscles and the bones themselves ache from so much crying. This had better be good, this had better have some bearing on the present trauma. She’s not prepared to sit and listen to some mess that Honesty’s been and got herself into. Honesty’s either bewitched or insane, her eyes search desperately around the room for help.
Doesn’t she sodding well realise that Angela’s child is missing
?

‘And Honesty and I were going to get married.’

‘Even though I couldn’t stand him!’

‘Oh come on, it was never as bad as that,’ says Giles, in his easy American drawl.

‘Oh it was, it was, you never knew,’ says Honesty, wringing her hands. ‘I was doing it for Callister. He said that if he had use of the house and grounds and a decent income the world would be his oyster. And you…’ Honesty shoots her attention to Giles, accusing him, blaming him for her present anguish, ‘you went along with it… don’t deny it. I’m not the only one round here to be possessed! And with two fools brainwashed as we were, Callister knew that once Daddy died and he got his hands on Hurleston he would be the power behind the throne.’

Giles gives a thoughtful nod. ‘Yes, I did believe in him, that’s why I was fascinated to see, and came over when I heard about this commune in the grounds of my future home. I was travelling in Australia studying primitive religions and cultures. Callister sent me a message via the proverbial grapevine.’

Giles Ormerod looks nothing like his fellow travellers. He has neatly cropped hair, he is closely shaven, his clothes look clean and his shoes are expensive Timberlands. He wears silver-rimmed John Lennon glasses. What could he want with a man like Callister?

‘I’d resigned myself, years ago, to being disinherited, everyone in my family thought Fabian would be bound to have an heir eventually. And then, when Helena had the twins and they turned out to be girls, everything seemed slightly more hopeful. Then she died so suddenly, so tragically, and that’s when I arrived. That’s when Callister put his interesting proposal to me.’

‘You were to marry Honesty? But what good would that have done?’

‘I was to marry Honesty and Callister swore that he would protect my inheritance.’ Giles looks embarrassed. He gives an apologetic smile. ‘Oh, I know it all sounds crazy, how could one man affect the course of fate? But I was impressed by his knowledge, he’d researched the subject of voodoo extremely thoroughly. We all believed him, most folks still do.’ Giles clears his throat, aware of his doubting audience. ‘He has this incredible ability, you see, to make you believe in him and his supernatural powers, he commands a profound and mystic devotion. Hitler had the power, they say. And Jesus Christ, of course. I was fascinated, I suppose, it was my subject, I was young, and impressionable, and rebellious, I had nothing better to do with my life, and I fell in love with the way of life and I fell in love with Honesty.’ His last words sound bitter. He turns to the sobbing woman beside him and urges tenderly, ‘Don’t cry, Honesty, please don’t cry any more…’

Honesty says nothing, just fiddles with the diamonds on her fingers.

‘So Archie comes along and changes everything,’ says Billy. ‘Callister is exposed for the fraud that he obviously is.’

‘No, not all at once. It was getting very oppressive, and stranger and stranger, dabbling in stuff I didn’t like. Drinking blood. Sacrificing animals. Bizarre sexual practices. I was getting fed up, unwilling to hang around any longer in spite of the financial inducements—Honesty’s money was giving us all a carefree, easy life—eager to get back home to my folks although we are not a wealthy family by any means. I confronted Callister with my doubts a few days ago and he went quite crazy. “Don’t you think I’ve got it all worked out?” he stormed at me. “Oh thou unbeliever…” and that sort of crap.’

Honesty breaks in, her voice high and hysterical, ‘And that’s why we think he’s gone off on his own, with Archie, realising that it’s not going to work, Giles told him he’d had enough, and now Callister is determined to squeeze as much as he can out of Fabian before he is forced to quit.’

‘Well, he’s not quite on his own,’ Giles reminds her. ‘He’s taken Demelza with him.’

‘Don’t make it worse. Don’t rub it in. D’you think I don’t know that?’ And Honesty leans against Giles for support, her muscles quivering and aching as if some lethal poison has been poured into them.

This is terrible, worse than anything Ange has imagined, it’s a nightmare of everything she has ever dreamed or despised. Some fanatical madman, some sinister shaman has taken her child, and God knows what he’ll do if he finds himself thwarted.

‘Daddy mustn’t know.’ Honesty starts crying again. ‘If Daddy knew how we’d planned and plotted he’d think we were all waiting for his death.’

‘And weren’t you then?’ asks Ange, feeling her legs collapsing under her, faced with the immediate threat of falling weakly to the floor. ‘And it’s obviously only jealousy that has brought you here today.’

Round and round the problem they go as time rushes on.

Is there any way of contacting Callister and telling him that the child he has is not the true heir? Threatening him with the fact that if Fabian was told the truth there would be no money coming his way, only the police with a full description of not only himself, but the weird Demelza, also.

‘Can’t we just wait and let Fabian pay the money?’ cries Ange. ‘Wouldn’t that be simpler and safer?’

Giles says quietly, ‘I don’t think there’s any hope of Callister handing the child back alive.’

‘But why not?’
Angela shrieks. She cannot believe this. She listens in pain and sickening confusion.

‘It’s just the sort of person he is. He’s fanatical. He’s insane. OK, he wants the money, but he wants vengeance, too. As he sees it, he’s wasted all these years hanging around waiting for an eventual fortune and now that has slipped from his grasp. Apparently Helena told him straight out that if she bore his child she would confess all to Fabian, so that put paid to his blackmailing plan. No, we have to contact him somehow. And as quickly as we can.’

Billy, puzzled, argues, ‘But he must have known, as soon as Archie was born, he must have seen that you would never inherit, Giles. So why didn’t he give up there and then?’

‘Callister is not the sort to give up. He’s a man obsessed with his own imaginary powers. And when Helena went and conveniently died as a result, he thought, of his own sick spells and incantations, he fooled himself into believing in his own infallibility. Her death, he said, could not be a coincidence. He’d made a doll, you see, a witch-doll, out of clay and bits of Helena’s hair and an old boot he found in the grounds. Within a few days Helena was dead. Callister honestly believed he’d done it. He thought it would work on Archie as well. Given time.’

Ange gasps incredulously. ‘Oh no! The man’s mad. Did he make a witch-doll of Archie?’

‘Yes,’ Honesty admits. ‘But I never believed in any of that. No, I suspected he’d killed Helena with his own bare hands, I believed they must have argued…’

‘And you still worshipped him? Believing that?’
Ange is aghast. Fresh tears spill down her face. ‘Didn’t it ever occur to you that this maniac might kill Archie one day?’