Falling (45 page)

‘She said a lot more about him; it was clear that he was a monster and that she was frightened of him.

‘I asked where Charley was now, and she said that after Derek died she was able to help her, and now Charley had a safe place to live. I asked her what she meant by safe, and she burst
out, “You can’t imagine what that poor child went through!” She said Charley had been “very naughty”, but she was head over heels in love with “that man”.
It was he who made her write to her father, and when that wasn’t answered, to her. That started about three months after she’d left. By the end of the year she sounded desperate. She
said she was going to have a baby and that Harry wouldn’t marry her unless she was reconciled to her parents. Charley told her she was feeling very ill, poor child, and she went to see her.
She never told her husband, and begged Charley not to tell him. Apparently it was a horrible place, a very nasty, damp basement flat – “Only two rooms and my Charley used to the best of
everything,” she said. They’d been living off selling her jewellery. Harry was out a lot but he didn’t seem to earn much money and Charley was desperately hard up. Of course she
gave her what she had, but it wasn’t much – only about twenty-five pounds. Harry wasn’t there, and she asked Charley not to say she’d been there, was afraid he’d write
to Derek. A few weeks later, she rang her mother from a call-box, asked her to ring back as she had no money. She arranged to meet her under the clock at Charing Cross. She was so shocked when she
saw her, said that Charley looked awful and seemed unable to stop crying. She’d had a miscarriage – had been taken by Harry in an ambulance to hospital, and that was the last she saw of
him. When she came out, and went back to the flat, it was empty: he’d taken his things and gone, and she couldn’t stay there because there was a lot of back rent to pay.

‘Her mother had thought she was in such a state because Harry had left her, but it hadn’t been like that at all. She was terrified of him. It was then that it all came out about how
he used to beat her up: she’d been twice to hospital saying she’d fallen downstairs, walked into a door – all those things. But when she told him she was pregnant, thinking that
this would change everything, he made her go up a step-ladder and then knocked her off it. So she lost the baby. That was what she really minded. She’d wanted to have children all her life,
but after that they said she couldn’t have any more. She got a council flat in a big block, but she didn’t know anyone and she was afraid to go out. Of course she had to go out to buy
her food and that was when the real trouble started. She used to see these prams with babies in them and the mothers would sometimes leave them while they filled their trolleys. At first she used
just to look at them, she said, but then, one day, she simply took a baby and walked home with it. Of course it didn’t last; she knew she was wicked and she took it back and there was a fuss
and she had to go to court and was given a warning. But she did it again, and that time she went to prison. She wasn’t herself at all, you see: she was demented and she had nobody to turn to
except her mother, who was too much under her father’s thumb to be of much use. She used to go and visit her, Mrs Mead said, but it was very difficult. It all changed, she said, when she
found out about Derek having an affair with his secretary. It had been going on for years.

‘That, Mrs Mead said, was the end of his bullying either of them. She divorced him and got a large settlement, including the house, and at last she could look after Charley.

‘I asked whether Charley was in the house, and whether I might see her, but Mrs Mead said, oh, no. Nothing would induce Charley to live in the house. She didn’t feel safe. She was
obsessed with the idea that Harry would come back one day and kill her. So Mrs Mead bought her a little house quite near and that suited Charley. She had ever so many cats, her mother said. They
were always having kittens, and Charley loved kittens. It being a small house, she could make it quite safe. It was a job ever to get in or out of it – the place was like Fort Knox.

‘Apparently Charley doesn’t go out. She has all the animals’ food delivered and she doesn’t eat much. Which was funny, because she’d become quite heavy, her mother
said. She ended by saying that she’d gone to see the prison doctor about Charley. He was a psychotherapist, and he said something shocking about Harry, which she had been unable to get out of
her mind. “He said that men like Harry Kent had nothing between the head and the genitals.” Again, she said, “Excuse the expression, but that is what he said. Your friend
shouldn’t let him into the house.”‘

‘Could I have a glass of water?’

When she had drunk a little – she found it difficult to swallow – she said, ‘And I suppose you tracked down Hazel, who is supposed to be his wife. Or isn’t
she?’

‘Yes, we have, and yes, she is. She’s a physiotherapist at a hospital in Northampton. She’s been married to him for nearly fourteen years. She’s a bit older than
he is, and she met him soon after her parents died. They left her a bungalow and about twenty-five thousand pounds. She let the bungalow and they moved to a rented flat for her to be nearer the
hospital. He took charge of her legacy, and eighteen months ago she discovered that it was all gone. He tried to make her sell the bungalow, but she refused and they had such rows about it that
they split up. She wants a divorce, but his terms are half of everything she has got and she’s struck at that. So – yes, they are still married. She didn’t know where he had gone:
he gave her a
poste restante
address.’ Anna paused, drank some of the cold coffee before she added: ‘She’s afraid of him too. He went to a place to dry out – she
still loved him then – but he left it almost at once and began drinking on his way home. She’s been afraid of him ever since he backed their car suddenly into the garage doors when she
was opening them. He said he thought he was putting his foot on the brake, but she never felt sure.’

‘Did she think he was trying to
kill
her?’

‘She said,’ Anna spoke carefully, ‘she said that she thought he was trying to hurt her. It made her have to accept that he didn’t like her at all. She had a bad time
because she said he was the only man she’d ever loved: she’d never looked, or even been looked at, by anyone else. She said she still felt that somewhere inside him there was a good man
trying to get out. Oh, Daisy darling, that’s enough, isn’t it? He’s got no moral brakes at all. He’s a psychopath. He can never see any reason for not doing what he wants to
do.’

Daisy felt, rather than saw, that they looked at her and then looked away.

‘Oh, there was one more thing that Hazel said. She did manage to turn him out of the flat by threatening to get the police. She says he’s always been afraid of the police.’

‘I should think with good reason,’ Anthony said grimly.

‘Is that all? The lot?’

‘Oh, Ma! Surely it’s more than enough!’

‘So, he never actually loved – cared for me at all?’ She sounded as though she was trying to remember or sum up something very difficult.

Katya, who for some time had been trying quite hard to suppress tears, said, ‘Ma, I’m sure he was – very fond of you!’

Anthony put a hand on her arm; she glanced at him and was silent. ‘But – why
me?
I’m not young and I’m not an heiress.’

‘You were there,’ Anna said. ‘You had the appalling misfortune to be there.’

‘Thank you for taking so very much trouble.’

‘We love you very much.’ But the moment he’d said it, Anthony saw that it was too much for her. ‘Anna! Didn’t you say you had some soup?’

Anna went to get it, and Katya followed her. Anthony stayed.

‘I expect it sounds mad to you, but I find it very difficult to take all this
in!
I mean, it seems so . . .
against
how he is – was – with me. How could I be so
easily taken in?’

‘It wasn’t a question of easy at all. He’s a con man, and he wouldn’t be one if he couldn’t do that. They go about like other people, only slightly better. He
really worked on you.’

‘And the others!’ She looked up with streaming eyes. ‘Those poor girls, and that tragic old lady.’

‘And there are probably others – in fact, almost certainly. One of the curious things,’ he was continuing in an ordinary voice; she was in too much pain for sympathy,
‘about that kind of person is that they not only lie to everyone they meet, but they lie to themselves, and a good deal of the time they take themselves in as well. They live in a kind of
desert of deceit, their landscape dotted with mirages. The first person I fell in love with was one of them. A too, too charming man who made a living out of finding people like me for clients. One
gets over it, you know,’ he said gently. ‘One can get over absolutely anything. And you are a survivor.’

‘It’s very difficult to stop loving somebody – quickly – just like that.’ She reached for a box of tissues that suddenly was on the table.

‘It’s impossible.’

Anna and Katya returned with trays.

‘I think Daisy might like a drink. Have you got any brandy?’

Anna opened a cupboard under one of the bulging bookcases. ‘There’s some left in this.’

Anthony poured it out. ‘Want a fag with it?’

‘I’ve run out.’

None of the others smoked. ‘I’ll get some,’ Katya said: ‘Gauloise, isn’t it?’

‘Don’t bother.’

‘No bother at all,’ and she almost ran out of the room.

‘She wants to do something,’ Anna said. ‘She’s terribly upset for you. She even thought that if she was here, you might blame her for all the detective work.’

‘Of course I wouldn’t. No!’

‘Well, tell her that.’

The brandy was doing her good, they both noticed. She’d looked pretty ill when she’d arrived, but the news had really knocked her out. At one moment, Anna had thought that she was
going to faint.

Time passed. Anthony opened a bottle of wine; Anna produced the soup. She sat, pressing her fingers through her hair at the side of her head. Katya returned with the cigarettes. She opened the
packet, took one out, then put it on the table in front of her.

‘Have some soup,’ Anna said. ‘You probably didn’t have time for breakfast.’

She shook her head.

‘Have some, Ma. It will do you good.’

‘Don’t be too kind to me.’

But she did have some of the soup. Anna said that there was cheese, and Katya said she would get it.

‘Finish the brandy,’ Anthony said, ‘and then I can pour you out a glass of wine.’

She did as she was told: she still seemed stunned. When Anna was clearing away the soup bowls, she said, ‘I suppose I ought to have known—’

‘You would have, in the end. Better to know now.’

She watched them eat the cheese. Katya said smoke, and she did. Nobody said anything while they were eating. She became aware that her head ached and that she felt sick and went to Anna’s
little bathroom in case she was. She retched once or twice but it only brought tears to her eyes. Very faint, repetitive thoughts churned slowly round. It couldn’t be true: how could he
– how could
anyone
– continuously, successfully lie? There must be a mistake somewhere: he had done awful things, but people could change. But she felt the bruise again on the
side of her head and knew he could not.

She heard the murmur of them talking, but when she went back they fell silent.

‘I must do something.’

‘Yes, we must.’ It was Anthony who spoke. ‘Let’s talk about it.’

‘Go back there, I suppose, and face him.’ She realized, as she said it, that the thought terrified her in several, quite different ways.

‘No, I don’t think so. I don’t think you need to see him at all.’

‘Just – ring him up?’

‘No,’ Katya said, ‘that’ll warn him. He’ll ransack the place or set fire to it or something.’

Anna said, ‘Anthony – well, all of us, really – thought it would be best if he went down, with someone else, and turned him out. Put him on a train and changed the locks on the
cottage and asked the police to keep an eye on it. And you stay away from the cottage for a bit.’

She picked up the glass of water and drank some. Her mouth had felt full of ash, and the water left a bitter taste.

‘I don’t want to go back there at all.’

Then she said, ‘It’s my mess. I ought to deal with it. There are things I should say to him!’ And seeing no agreement to this: ‘I need to
ask
him
why?’

‘But nothing he said to you would mean anything. It would be more lies.’

‘You mean – nothing he has
ever
said meant anything?’

Before Anna could answer, Anthony said, ‘We can’t know that. What we do know is that he has lied so much of his life that nothing he said now would have any value. Dearest Daisy,
you’re not the kind of person who takes to accepting the worst in anyone, but this time that’s how it is. There’s something wrong with him. You remember what that doctor said to
Charley’s mother? “Nothing between the head and the genitals.” A total absence of heart. That’s not for you.’

This made her able to cry.

She slept heavily in the afternoons – the long, hot siesta time when everything was stilled. They had been there in Anna’s little house on the island for three days
now, but each time she woke it was as though she was lost in some unknown place: there were those mysterious moments when she had no memory, either – was nobody, a lightness, a kind of bliss.
And then who she was, what had happened, came rolling over her with the speed of molten lava down a mountainside. An ageing woman who had actually believed that a man had loved her when he had done
nothing of the kind. A common enough situation, perhaps, but what difference did that make to any particular recipient? Awake, she had to think about it: jagged little pieces of memory and
information crowded in, no one piece fitting with any other, no sense that could be made of what she had experienced and had thought she’d understood.

They filled her days for her, her kind friends: they took her swimming in the clear warm sea, they made picnics which were eaten in the shade of rocks at one side of the bay with the retsina
slung on a rope in the water, after which they would climb the hill slowly in the burning heat, up the white dusty track to the cool of the house that had a terrace each side of it – one for
breakfast and one for watching the sunset. They would all sleep: she would cast herself on the small hard bed and almost at once become mercifully unconscious.