Deep Water, Thin Ice (42 page)

*

Getting on the train at Paddington, Alex had been keen to get home; by the time she arrived at Totnes station she was feeling less certain, unsure how she would react to being back in the house again. She had pre-arranged a hire car and drove the last few miles nervously. Passing the Lodge on the way up the lane to Hillen Hall, she automatically glanced sideways, expecting to see Sarah at the window. There was no-one there.

Once inside the Hall she walked slowly round, room by room, making absolutely certain it was empty. Having been away, the last few days at the Hall already felt unreal, like something from a bad dream. Even though she’d seen Theo’s body she pushed each door open with a nervous hand, imagining him appearing round a corner, or bounding up the stairs behind her. ‘Julian?’ she called several times too but the house was warm, the doors still. There were no footsteps on board or stair. If he ever had been there, he wasn’t now. In the drawing room she paused in front of the grandfather clock, untouched and silent since before the flood. She wound it up and set it going again. It ticked reassuringly.

She took a couple of days to sort herself out and got Tim Prentice to help her remove Theo’s belongings to one of the outbuildings till they could be sent back to the Lodge. ‘Or wherever,’ Alex muttered. With the remaining suspicion hanging over Bob Geaton in mind, and despite Erica’s warnings, she went to the police and told them her story. They listened politely, asked after her health and looked pointedly at the marks on her head. ‘They’d make some enquiries,’ they said, and she left them to it. It was their problem now.

Sarah hadn’t returned to the Lodge. Local opinion had it that she would never leave care; she had already been moved to a home intended for long stay residents. Talking gibberish, it was said; doesn’t
know what day of the week it is, keeps asking for Theo and gets agitated every time she’s told again what happened
.
So why bother to tell her, thought Alex. Why not leave her in the fantasy world she’s been living in for years already? Alex didn’t bother to go to visit her; she didn’t even consider it.

But she did visit Minna and took her flowers. Harry’s widow looked shrunken and grey. ‘I should have kept a closer eye on him,’ she kept saying. ‘I don’t know how he found the key. And I didn’t think he’d go off again that day. I thought he’d sleep.’ She had a lost air and kept glancing at the door as if she thought Harry might walk in at any moment. Not Harry as he’d been in recent years, but the Harry of old, vigorous and cheery, who would come in from a day’s work, pop his cap on the hooks near the door, and grab Minna by the waist to give her a cuddle before asking what she was cooking for dinner. Alex could read it all in her face and knew better than to give false cheer. She sat with her a while, promised to call again, and left.

The River Kella now bubbled peacefully back down its own channel but the village still bore the ravages of the flood. Mud was caked over gardens and roadsides and piles of ruined carpets and furniture were thrown in heaps outside houses. Many were uninhabitable for the foreseeable future, businesses ruined. The necessary work to restore them would be a project of months and years rather than weeks. The Stores had been scrubbed out, its substitute shelving sparsely stocked, its ruined fridges and freezers removed and temporarily replaced by one new chiller cabinet. Behind the synthetic air-freshener scent a rank, damp smell still hung in the air. ‘Only just got this place usable,’ Lyn Causey said bitterly. ‘Had to throw everything. Be months before any insurance comes through…’ She snorted. ‘If ever.’

The place Alex most wanted to visit however, she left till last, scared of what she would find, unsure what her reception would be. Mick was still living in his carriage by the Grenloe, Liz Franklin had assured her. ‘But I don’t know what the state of his home is. The carriage was washed up by the water and dumped on its side. The rescue services brought some lifting gear to try to move it for him but I hate to think what it must be like there.’ There was suspicion that the bar had been interfered with, Liz went on to say, which had made the whole tragedy so much worse. ‘But who’d do a thing like that?’ she asked, incredulous. Alex was sure she knew.

The tide was out on the morning Alex went to see the reserve for herself. She went the long way round, walking the quay to the bar where engineers had put up temporary barricading to prevent the sea causing further damage, and turned inland on the familiar path. Twice she had to change her route. The old track had been made soft and unstable by the pounding sea water and had disappeared in places. She could still smell the salt in the air and see the sand and seaweed that had been deposited in its wake. Shrubs and small trees had been completely uprooted and now lay haphazardly abandoned by the retreating water. She kept expecting to hear Susie’s bark and to see her coming towards her, her tail wagging a welcome. But Susie didn’t materialise and Alex wondered if Liz was wrong and Mick had left after all. She wished she had never gone away; she should have stayed.

When she reached the clearing, the carriage was back in the same place. And it all looked much the same, even to the washing on the line. She shouted Mick’s name and went round to the sheds but he wasn’t there. She shouted again, louder this time and hurried back to the clearing, wondering which way to go to look for him.

Then she saw Susie walking slowly towards her and Mick following close behind, a spade in his hand. The dog reached her first and Alex bent to pet her. Susie was thin and frail; clumps of her fur had fallen out. Alex looked up at Mick who was standing a couple of feet away, watching her. She straightened up.

‘Susie looks ill. What’s the matter with her?’

‘She
has
been ill. You’d be ill too if you’d been poisoned. But she’s getting better now.’ Mick dragged his eyes away from Alex and looked down fondly at the dog. ‘I thought I was going to lose her but she’s a tough girl.’ He looked back at Alex with the suggestion of a smile. ‘No greeting then? And I notice you ask after the dog before me. I suppose that’s to be expected.’

‘So how are you then?’

‘I’ll live.’ He studied her face, his gaze settling on the scars. ‘How are you?’

‘I’m fine.’ She looked back at Susie. ‘How did she get poisoned?’

‘Some bastard dropped all the sluices a couple of nights before the flood. I saw the main channel running high and went to investigate. Whoever it was left some meat out for Susie to find. She’d already started on it when I found her. I took her straight to a vet – just in time apparently. It was more than a week before I could bring her home. Though at least she missed the flood.’

Alex bit her lip and gave Susie’s head another pat. ‘Poor girl,’ she said. She looked round the reedbeds. ‘It’s a mess.’

‘It is.’

‘So how much have you lost? Are the bitterns still here?’

Mick shook his head. ‘Nest got washed away at high tide. Most of the reed nests have gone but there are a few things have survived.’ He studied her face and then lifted a hand to gently touch her cheek with the back of his fingers. ‘I didn’t think I’d see you again,’ he said.

‘I couldn’t stay away.’

‘So are you staying?’

‘Certainly am. You’ll be needing a hand to get this place sorted out.’ She hesitated and then met his gaze. ‘I’m sorry Mick. I’ve been such a fool. I’m sure the bastard who dropped the sluices and poisoned Susie was Theo.’ She pulled a face. ‘And he really was a bastard Mick.’

Mick raised his eyebrows and slowly grinned.

‘Now, there’s something we can agree on. I’ll make coffee and you can tell me all about it. You did want coffee?’

‘Of course I want coffee.’

*

Erica finished the conversation with Alex, walked into her bedroom and tossed the phone on the bed. Ben was out and she was alone. Her sister had been back in Devon a month already. She missed her but on the phone Alex sounded happy; happier than she had been in a long time and Erica was glad.

She wandered to the window and stared out over the long, narrow back garden, its tiny concrete patio, the patchy, worn lawn and Ben’s wildlife pond. For some time a weight had sat heavily on her mind and she wondered sometimes that Alex had never realised that there was anything wrong. Perhaps she’d put Erica’s moodiness down to her succession of failed romances. And then, of course, Alex had been so upset by Simon’s death that she had blocked everything else out. But it occurred to Erica, with a pang of remorse, that Alex would never guess the truth; she was too naturally trusting as the recent past had proved. In her defence, Erica consoled herself, she had tried on several occasions to tell her sister what had happened but she’d never known quite how to phrase it.

After all, she hadn’t intended to have an affair with Simon; it had all started quite innocently. There had been a party after one of his performances and Alex had been away in Europe doing some concerts and couldn’t go. Ben had been staying with Jake so Erica had gone alone and it had been a good night. Simon had drunk too much - which for him was rare – and it had made him unusually talkative. She’d offered to drive him home and then she stayed, just talking. Simon’s naturally introspective nature had been exaggerated by the alcohol and he was full of self-doubt.  Erica was shocked; it was a side of him she hadn’t seen before, quite unlike his public persona. He said he loved Alex but they seemed to have grown apart and he found it hard to talk to her. Then he thanked Erica - rather emotionally - for listening. They arranged to meet again – just to talk, they both agreed. She hadn’t meant for it to develop the way it did but she couldn’t help being flattered by his attention and his confidences. The whole thing had just got out of hand. They’d been seeing each other for nearly three months when guilt had set in and she told him it had to stop. There was no row, no scene. He’d agreed. He was torn up over Alex too.

That had been just a couple of days before his accident. She had persuaded herself that it
was
an accident but she’d never quite shaken off the fear that the end of the affair had upset him more than she’d realised. What a relief to hear from Alex that he hadn’t killed himself.

Ironically her guilt had made her even more protective of her sister. She had to make it up to her, had to be sure she was all right. And then Theo had come along and she thought it was too soon and, in any case, he was too like Simon. There could be no future in the relationship.
It didn’t work with Simon,
she had tried to say in various ways.
You shouldn’t go that way again.
For, after all, she convinced herself, if she hadn’t had an affair with Simon, he’d only have had one with someone else, sooner or later. It wasn’t just her jealousy and frank admiration that had drawn him into it, she was sure. It was that Simon and Alex were never right together. Not really.

Erica sighed, left the window and picked up a photograph from the top of her chest of drawers. It was a picture of her with Alex when she was just nineteen and Alex twenty-one. They were on holiday together, laughing. A stranger had taken it. But Alex was happy again now, Erica comforted herself. There was no point in telling her about the affair after all this time. Theo was gone; Alex had moved on. And now they were on good terms again, she didn’t want to spoil her relationship with her sister. She idolised Alex.

Kellaford Bridge is not a real village in Devon though it has many of the characteristics of the lovely seaside villages of the county with their steep banked lanes, river cut valleys and picturesque harbours. Its particular mix of features I put together for my story, but on any trip to the Devon coast you might see – and fall in love with - just such a place. KS