Chain Reaction (35 page)

Tucking into the egg fried rice that Vernon agreed to go and fetch because there was no other food in the house, Jody makes sure to keep an eye on Vernon’s every move. The man’s not hungry; so far he hasn’t touched a thing or expressed the slightest interest in the programmes on the telly and who can blame him, there’s nothing on in the summer. But when the local news comes on Vernon lurches forward in his chair with his ears pricked. It doesn’t look all that riveting, just a nosy crowd in the road watching the police and ambulance people staking out a small block of flats… Some old woman has blocked herself in and everyone’s going barmy about it.

Vernon drops his fork with a bang onto his plate and stutters, ‘I don’t believe this. I think that’s the flat we’re buying. Hang on, hang on, let me get another look. Yes,—it
is
the flat.’ He turns round to where Jody sits slightly behind him on guard in the second chair, amazement in his voice. ‘That’s the one, that’s Albany Buildings, and they’re saying the Queen is somehow involved. What on earth is going on—and where does this leave us?’

‘What do you mean?’

But Vernon, glued to the screen, ignores Jody’s question. The journalist, keen-featured and well-tailored, is telling the tale in low reverent tones. Like a parrot, or someone under hypnosis, Vernon slowly repeats nearly everything he says. ‘She’s refusing to come out until they say she can stay there! Mrs Peacock, the old lady, is refusing to come out of her flat and her friend there is saying she has been treated abominably by the Council and the social workers and her own family, apparently. That must mean the woman who showed us round, that Mrs Rendell, the old lady’s daughter. My God! Has the whole world gone mad?’

This means little to him. Jody is unimpressed. He shrugs his shoulders and carries on eating. Luckily Vernon remembered to bring some Cokes home, too. In a weird way Vernon appears to enjoy the lad’s company, although he’d probably never admit it. ‘They’ll get her out in the end. It’s one of those nine-day wonders, only local stuff so far. It shouldn’t make any difference to you.’

‘But there’s helicopters on the scene, and arc-lights, as if it’s a national emergency.’

‘Well, I suppose it is, if she’s that old. But you didn’t know her so what does it matter?’

‘But what’s the Queen got to do with it?’

Funny. Vernon is really taken up with this, the first thing in which he has demonstrated any real interest since Jody arrived. Showing signs of life at last. Genuinely concerned about what he is seeing, and worried unduly. ‘You’ll have to wait and read about it when you get to work in the morning. They won’t do anything more now. Come on, finish your bean sprouts or they’ll go cold.’

It is just before they are settling for bed when the doorbell chimes. Jody stiffens and feels instantly sick. This is all he needs, and Mum, who likes her privacy, will go mad living here with neighbours visiting day or night. ‘Who’s this likely to be at this time?’

Vernon looks equally dumbfounded. Still pale and haggard with worry he resembles a terrified rabbit on guard, standing on the landing in his socks and underpants. ‘What should I do?’

‘You’ll have to answer it. It might be some emergency. Go and tell them you were on your way to bed. Just remember, this is far more important to you than it is to me and don’t panic, just be casual. I’ll stay up here and look out of the window.’

Jody hears Vernon’s heavy footsteps treading down the stairs. He clicks the hall light on, then opens the door as far as the chain will allow. ‘Yes, who are you?’ Vernon says.

‘This is important, Mr Marsh,’ says a confident male voice. ‘I’d just like to have a few words—’

‘But it’s late,’ argues Vernon, and Jody imagines him glancing at his watch.

‘It won’t take a moment, sir.’

And then Jody hears the chain click off the door.

‘I’m just checking up on some information given to me today,’ says the voice. ‘Would I be correct in thinking that you are the punters who are proposing to buy number one, Albany Buildings, from a Mrs Frankie Rendell? Would that be right, mate?’

‘Well yes, I am. I was…’ starts Vernon. ‘But this recent business has nothing to do with me.’

‘Are you aware that this flat morally belongs to a seventy-five-year-old lady who is being forced to sell against her will?’

‘No, of course we weren’t aware of that. We weren’t aware of anything. We just liked the flat, it suited our needs, and we just went along with it, like you do. Who are you, anyway?’

‘When you say “we”, Mr Marsh, is that your wife you’re referring to?’

‘My wife, Joy, yes. She’s not here at the moment…’ and Vernon tries to close the door.

‘Pity. I would have preferred the two of you together.’

Jody listens from above, his gnawing anxiety growing. As they grew used to each other, as the evening wore on, Vernon had proved how desperately anxious he was to discuss his crime. He seemed relieved that Jody had come; he was able to unburden himself of something he found too heavy to carry. And Jody was interested. Jody listened. Let’s hope that Vernon doesn’t risk involving anyone else, some nosy parker who’s come to the door to borrow a cupful of sugar. Vernon, with his dressing gown only half on, splutters, ‘Sorry? What? Where did you say you were from? What did you want to know?’

‘I’m Bob Simmonds from the
Daily Mirror
newspaper, Mr Marsh, and this is my photographer who would like to take—’

There’s no time for choice. Before Vernon can step back inside, before he even realises what exactly is going on here, a shadow steps out of the flower beds and a brilliant light flashes in his face.

While directly above him, Jody Middleton shivers convulsively because he knows without any flicker of doubt that when they develop that photograph, they will be able to see his face staring between the curtains with frightened, hunted eyes…

‘H
EY, HEY. STAND BY
for developments.’ Jacy’s excited voice barks over the answerphone. ‘Make yourself ready. He likes us.
He loves us.
We’re gonna be big. And what do you think of the name “Haze”?’

Arabella and Belle stare at each other, incredulous. So it worked! Against all the odds it actually worked! Sugarshack is dead and buried and Haze is about to rise from the ashes. ‘I’m not so sure about the name. I thought it was a lavatory spray.’ They can hear some kind of raucous celebration going on in the background and Cyd is trying to be crude in order to upset Belle. Jacy must have pushed him off because the message goes on, ‘Can’t stop now, more sessions to be getting on with. You can count on a quick wedding, my darlin’, so get your glad rags on. I’ll catch you later. Byeee.’

Peaches gives a rueful smile. ‘You should have gone with them, shouldn’t you, Tusker? I bet you wish you had. You could have been celebrating now, instead of being stuck here with me.’

‘What nonsense you do talk sometimes, Peaches,’ says Belle, meaning it, but interested to find herself back in her old role of protector of Peaches once again. It was a role Peaches seems to urge unconsciously on those around her, just like she did at school, as if she didn’t possess the necessary weapons to defend herself. It is a useful trick which Belle, ever perceived as capable, would love to perfect. When does it come? In childhood, because of what you look like, petite and defenceless like Peaches, or dark and argumentative, a show-off, like herself and capable of anything, or is it triggered later as a result of a real failure to cope with the slings and arrows of life? She says, ‘It would be worse than a nightmare to be around any of that lot at the moment. I’m quite happy to wait until they get home, when their bragging will be quite excruciating enough.’

‘He says he’s going to marry you, Tusker!’ And Belle’s pretty face is alight with joy. ‘I think he means it.’

‘He is going to marry me because this man Mathews must think it’s a good idea as far as the new group’s image goes and for no other reason. Believe me, I know him too well.’

‘You’re so cynical! You always were, even at school. You never looked on the positive side.’

‘From where I stood there wasn’t one.’

‘Oh, Tusker! He really must love you—and I think you know that deep inside.’

‘Hell’s bells, Peaches, I wish you’d dry up with your silly little-girl romantic theories. Why must you always view the world through rose-coloured spectacles. Haven’t you learned your lesson yet?’

‘What if he comes home and needs you here?’ Peaches is poring over the map of Scotland. She is stretched out on the floor chewing a pencil in the very same way she used to fidget over her scruffy prep at school. She fiddles with the silver chain round her neck as once she fiddled with her crucifix during the glorious religious phase they all went through together. ‘Perhaps you should stay here and wait for Jacy’s next call. If everything is so imminent, he might well need you…’

‘He doesn’t need me,’ says Belle, listening to her own dry hopelessness with some surprise because she has always been so reluctant to admit this to herself, let alone to anyone else. ‘No, and he never has. It was me who needed him. I got my kicks through him, I suppose, feeding off his energy but protected from the effects of the constant party by my self-assumed motherly role.’ The capable one, the one with the mental First Aid box with the sticking plasters cut to size, forever up to date and handy. What she says is quite true. And when Peaches was called empty-headed at school, it had to be Belle who led the walkout and got sent home in disgrace. She must take up other people’s issues and fight on their behalf, whether they want her to or not. She got expelled in the end for doing exactly that. ‘I wanted excitement. I wanted notoriety, too. But I didn’t dare go out and get them for myself. I knew jolly well I couldn’t have put up with the grief. There was the other side of the coin, too: the worse he got, the more I felt needed. Listen to me, boring you to death with my woes—and I sound so disgusting, don’t I? Like a leech. Like a parasite!’

‘This is so weird,’ Peaches says, ‘because you could have all the excitement you wanted. Here you are, a top model, enough money for a good lifestyle, attention, publicity, open a magazine and there you are inside it, ride down the Tube and you’re there basking beside the escalator, you had it all. I often saw you and thought that and envied you, Tusker.’ She frowns, turns the map around as if she’s been studying it upside down up till now, which knowing her she probably has. ‘Tusker, you’re miles from Scotland!’

‘I told you that, you fool! At least five hundred to Aberdeen. Have you even found Aberdeen yet, Peaches? Come on, give it here.’

‘I have found Aberdeen but I can’t find Ballater anywhere, or Craithie Church. Whatever, it looks as if we’re going to have to stay the night up there.’

‘Well, of course we are, and we’re going to have to leave now if you want to be there for the morning service. I still think it’s the most reckless thing you could ever do and I’m not going to change my mind about that. This is not a sensible option, Peaches. Are you absolutely sure he’ll be there? I couldn’t stand to think we might make a journey like this for nothing. I would never, ever forgive you.’

‘He’ll be there. I checked in the Court circular they do in
The Times.
There was one opposite my seat on the train and he is definitely in Scotland although they don’t put what they’re doing when they’re on holiday. And you’re right, it’s crazy, but crucial. It’s something I
have
to do,’ says Peaches, with that martyred Joan of Arc expression on her face again. Dammit, if Belle had known Joan of Arc she would have volunteered to burn for her. ‘I don’t care what happens to me after that. I have to confront Jamie and it’s now or never.’

Yes. This whole thing is quite fantastic. Poor Peaches. But what in the name of heaven is Belle doing involving herself in this sort of madness? Why oh why does she always end up submerged in the dramas of other people?
What is the matter with her?
Why does she never have any battles of her own worth fighting? ‘You could be walking straight into a trap. You could even end up losing your baby and I don’t consider the Jeep much of a getaway car. That’s if it gets us there in the first place, which I seriously doubt.’

‘I’ve already answered that. How many times must I say this? If Jamie honestly doesn’t want me then I really don’t care. They can go ahead and kill me, if that would suit their purposes.’

‘You don’t really mean that.’

‘Oh, but I do, I do,’ says Peaches with a courageous smile.

‘Clachan Keep. Bed and breakfast. H&C in all bedrooms.’

‘And I should think so too. We are on the eve of the twenty-first century.’ A mile this side of the village and the Jeep splutters with an evil wind as they turn from the main road to follow the sign and take a steep track twisting between heather and bracken, bramble and thorn, up towards the wind-blown pines that stand out against the sky.

‘My God,’ Peaches exclaims, looking out with a shiver and gripping the edge of her seat. ‘I thought The Grange was desolate.’

The worst part of the journey is over and if they can only endure just another few yards they will be safe, until morning anyway. Higher and higher they climb, the track becoming narrower and rougher and the woodlands stretching on either side, pale birches and dark firs amongst the crags and boulders. Apart from the roaring of the vehicle the air is filled with silence. They are high enough now, if they turn their heads, to see the long arc of the Grampian Mountains, dark and sombre, rising and disappearing into the ghostly mists of nowhere and an isolated rowing boat puts out on the lake below them, slight as a bug on a garden pond.

Belle is completely exhausted. It has taken them ten hours to get here with the minimum of stops and it is now eight o’clock. At least they are nearer than they expected to be, according to the map. The short morning journey to Craithie should take them less than an hour. They both agreed they’d be better staying somewhere out in the sticks just in case their invisible pursuers are on their trail. The bright red Jeep does tend to stand out in a crowd.