The Killing Club (10 page)

He found himself breathing hard. Looking down at the dog, he saw her back away. His heart contracted. He made his voice calm and soft. ‘Here, lass. Come here. There’s nowt to be frightened of.’ He squatted down on his haunches and the dog came slowly up to him and sniffed his fingers. He reached out to stroke her and the feel of her solid warmth under his fingers steadied him. ‘I have to leave now, lass,’ he told her.

Carrying his plastic bag in one hand he stole down the hallway. The door was on a simple latch, no chains or keys needed to open it. He slipped through and pulled the door shut so gently that it made only the tiniest scratching click. He walked down the long path leading to the road. There were squares of lawn on either side of it, one of them still containing a child’s wood-framed swing. Keep walking, he told himself, wincing at the thought of getting to the main road and the busy pavements.

It was not yet 7.30, so there were not many people about. There was drizzle in the air and the people he passed kept their heads bowed, concentrating on withstanding the morning chill and dampness. He kept his own head well down, walked close to the wall and counted his steps under his breath.

He came to a shop. People were walking in, so he followed on. He walked down the rows of newspapers and magazines and birthday cards. On past the pencils and exercise books; they were like they’d had in the prison when they went for reading and writing lessons.

He kept looking around, but no one was taking any notice of him. Maybe he wasn’t as famous as Blackwell had said. He came to a row of shelves stacked with little bars wrapped in shiny paper – red and blue and silver. Rows and rows of them. He stared at them, recalling memories from long ago. They had sweet stuff in prison, but not these rows and rows stretching on and on. He reached out and took one in his hand, turning it over, screwing his eyes up.

A voice called out. ‘Can I help you?’

His nerves screeched. He turned towards the voice. There was a woman behind the serving counter. She was tiny with bright sharp eyes. She was smiling, but he wasn’t sure if she meant it.

‘Do you want to buy one?’ she asked.

He looked at her, dumb and helpless. She came out from behind the counter and moved towards him. Instinctively he moved back and stood very still, the bar still in his hand.

‘Did you want to buy that one?’ Her eyes bored into him.

He shook his head. ‘Dunno.’

‘That one’s coconut,’ she said. ‘But if you wanted you could have one with biscuit in it, or toffee cream. Or just a plain bar of chocolate.’

She wasn’t mad at him. She was helping him. He broke into a smile.

She smiled back. She took the bar in his hand and put it back on the shelf. ‘Here,’ she said, offering one in a red and silver wrapper. ‘A Kit-Kat. Everyone loves a Kit-Kat.’

He got out the money in his pocket and felt the panic rising again. ‘Have I got enough?’

She reached out and took some coins from his hand. ‘Come to the till and I’ll give you change,’ she said. When she’d given him the change, she said, ‘Bye then.’ And smiled at him.

Outside the shop he unwrapped the bar and bit into it. He smiled again.

There were notices pinned to a board at the side of the shop door. He started reading them. Stuff for sale: computers and bikes and lawn-mowers. All sorts. Nearly all of them had a picture to show what you were getting.

And then there were jobs. Child-minder wanted for two days a week. Cleaner wanted, must have references and own car. Kitchen worker needed for busy pub – apply to the manager at the Coach and Horses. He stared, concentrating so hard that the letters began to glow and shiver.

Ruth walked Harriet to her car. Harriet threw her leather holdall into the boot and pushed the lid down. She smiled at her mother. ‘Mum, are you going to be all right?’

‘Why shouldn’t I be?’ Ruth asked.

‘Well, Christian’s death has been a real shock for you. And I’m sorry if I wasn’t as sympathetic as I should have been.’

Ruth smiled. This was always the pattern. She and Harriet maintained a suspenseful truce when they were together, moments of peace punctuated by outbursts of irritation from Harriet and the occasional spark of retaliation from Ruth. And then as they said their farewells, Harriet would relent. And yet Ruth knew that if they went back into the house, there would be yet another round of mother/daughter fencing and her daughter’s hidden resentment would start up all over again. ‘I know. And I’m so pleased there was no fallout for you and Charles to worry about. Truly, I am.’

Harriet offered herself for a brief hug and Ruth managed to land a kiss on her cheek.

‘And don’t fret about Craig,’ Harriet said, settling into the driving seat and clicking her seat belt into the plastic receptacle. ‘He’s not your responsibility. And he’ll cope.’

Ruth nodded. As she went back into the house, duly fretting about Craig’s sudden departure, she picked up the mail which had arrived earlier. There was a gas bill, a flier from a recently opened Chinese takeaway and a letter from her firm of solicitors asking her to contact them as soon as possible. Informing her that they wished to speak to her on a matter of some urgency concerning the issue of Mr Christian Hartwell’s estate following his recent death. It was like some kind of summons, and a few hours later she was climbing the steps to Barley and Knight Solicitors, the firm who had advised both her and her husband for the past forty years. Not that they had been troubled much by the Hartwells, who had inherited the
Old School House
from Ruth’s father-in-law and lived there happily ever after, thus never requiring the services of the conveyance department. In fact, the only major contact Ruth had had with the firm had been following her husband’s death when she had sought their advice about his oversight in making a will. She recalled the courteous, elderly man who had helped her, but the name she had been given to ask for at reception today was Emma Varley, and clearly not him.

Barley and Knight’s offices were situated on the second and third floors of an old Victorian house which would once have required a fleet of servants to clean and run it. The décor was reminiscent of the seventies, with much beige and brown in evidence. The receptionist was a plump motherly person with a wavy perm. Her apparel fitted in nicely with the décor – a knee-length brown skirt and a beige cardigan with mother-of-pearl buttons. Ruth smiled at her, feeling rather raffish in her swirling ankle-length skirt, with her silver hair piled on her head. She introduced herself. ‘I’ve come to see Emma Varley.’

‘Ah, yes, Mrs Hartwell,’ said the receptionist, smiling kindly. ‘Just go through the door on your left. She’s waiting for you.’

Ruth had the impression the receptionist was watching her as she walked towards the flush dark-wood door, that there was some kind of concern in her whole manner. Maybe she was like that with all the clients.

Emma Varley was standing rather stiffly beside her desk, a young woman neat in a navy skirt and a pale cream sweater. Ruth heard the same concern in Emma Varley’s voice as she had heard from the receptionist.

‘Mrs Hartwell, do come in and sit down.’ Emma Varley sat down behind her desk. ‘I’m one of the trainee solicitors here,’ she said, with a faint tinge of apology in her voice.

She was about to continue but Ruth made a soft interjection. ‘You sound as though I might object to your junior status.’

Emma glanced down at her desk and cleared her throat. ‘I have to make it clear. Some of our clients prefer to deal with the partners.’

‘Ah, yes. The top man syndrome,’ said Ruth. ‘Well, so far I’m very happy to be advised by you.’ As she spoke, Ruth noticed tiny sparkling earrings shaped like butterflies beneath the sweep of Emma’s hair. She found herself warming to the young lawyer.

‘First of all, Mrs Hartwell, I’d like to offer you my sincere condolences on your recent loss.’ She opened the file lying on her desk. ‘I’ve invited you here on the instructions of Christian Hartwell. The late Christian Hartwell.’

Ruth stiffened, experiencing a stabbing chill of surprise and shock. ‘Go on.’

‘He made an appointment to see me the week before last. He wanted to make a will. He also gave me a packet for you, asking that, in the event of his death, we should make contact with you and give you it in person.’ She pushed a padded envelope across the desk.

Ruth looked at it, recognizing Christian’s spiky handwriting on the front. The envelope was firmly stuck down and as a further precaution sealed with a tiny piece of melted red wax. She glanced across the desk to Emma Varley. ‘I’m assuming you don’t know the contents of this envelope?’

‘No. It has been left unopened, as he instructed. You don’t need to open it now, Mrs Hartwell,’ she added, kindly.

‘Right.’ Ruth stared down at the envelope. ‘This is completely unexpected.’ She was uncertain whether to open the letter immediately and ease the tension which was rising within her, or wait until she was alone.

Emma Varley was speaking again. ‘I also have to tell you that Mr Hartwell named you as his next of kin. And he’s left you his apartment, some money, and all his effects – books, papers, photographs.’

‘His apartment!’ Ruth exclaimed, thinking of Christian’s dull little flat in a purpose-built block on the outskirts of Burley-in-Wharfedale.

‘Yes.’ Emma consulted the file again. She looked across at Ruth. ‘Mrs Hartwell, he’s left you everything; there is no one else named as a beneficiary.’

Ruth closed her eyes for a moment. ‘Why would he do that? It’s crazy – I’m thirty years his senior.’

The solicitor nodded sympathetically.

‘Are you aware of the relationship between me and Christian?’ Ruth asked. ‘You do understand that he is not my son, nor any blood relation of mine.’

‘Yes, he mentioned that he had lived with you and your family for some years and that you had been a mother figure for him. And I did point out that he needed to take the age difference between himself and you into consideration when making a will. But he insisted there was no one else he wanted to have his possessions and money.’

‘Oh! This is just so sad,’ Ruth exclaimed, rubbing the back of her neck in consternation and loosening some long silver strands from their anchorage in her topknot.

Emma left a tactful silence.

‘I mean, to have no family to whom he could leave his estate,’ Ruth elaborated.

‘He was clearly very fond of you, Mrs Hartwell,’ the solicitor offered.

Ruth nodded. Tears welled up. ‘Oh, Christian!’ She thought of him, so alone, with no wife or partner, no children. Seemingly no family or close friends at all.

‘Regarding Mr Hartwell’s apartment,’ Emma Varley said, her voice once again tinged with apology. ‘His effects need to be gone through and cleared. The landlords are pressing to have the apartment emptied. So they can re-let it.’

‘His effects! Are they my responsibility?’ Ruth asked, her heart sinking at the thought of going through Christian’s things. Anybody’s things for that matter.

‘Well, unless you want the landlords to do it.’

Ruth sighed. ‘I’ll do it.’

‘There isn’t very much, from what we can gather.’

‘It’s OK,’ Ruth said. ‘It’s the least I can do for Christian.’ She suddenly felt like crying, blinked a few times and swiftly put a stop to it.

Emma Varley opened the top drawer of her desk and pulled out some keys on a round of hairy string with a paper tag attached. ‘Flat 3, 56 Calverley Street.’ She handed over the keys to Ruth who accepted them with a marked lack of eagerness.

‘There is quite a lot of money,’ Emma Varley mentioned gently, sensitive to her client’s unusual reticence in accepting the property and guessing a windfall of money might be equally problematic for her. ‘His aunt died recently and left him a gift of two hundred thousand pounds.’

Ruth shook her head in disbelief. ‘I’ll think about that later,’ she said, putting the keys to the flat in her bag, but feeling the need to clutch the white envelope in her hand. She stood up. ‘Thank you for your help, Emma. I think I need to go away and try to digest all you’ve told me.’

The solicitor gave a small sad smile. ‘I think you do, Mrs Hartwell.’

When Ruth got home there was still no sign of Craig. She placed the unopened envelope on the kitchen table and laid the keys to Christian’s flat on top. She made herself a cup of hot, strong coffee, then took Tamsin for a walk in the park at the end of the road. It was a bright summer day, with a pleasing tinge of freshness in the air. Little children sat in the kiddies’ swings, shouting to their parents or carers to push them higher and higher. The wind lifted the leaves of the trees, and the full-blown roses glowed with ruby colour.

On arriving back home, she heated up some soup and debated whether to open the envelope without delay and get whatever surprise was waiting for her over and done with. Her hand hovered over the small red seal. On impulse she stuffed both envelope and keys into a kitchen drawer and pushed it firmly shut. She got out cleaning materials, put on her rubber gloves and set about cleaning the oven with a will, a task which occurred at less and less frequent intervals as she got older.

A polite rapping on the front door was a welcome interruption. It’s Craig, she thought and a spark of happiness sprang up. She peeled off her gloves and walked lightly to the front door.

Her visitor was about as different from Craig as could be imagined. He was a small, slightly built man, wearing neatly pressed grey trousers and a dark-green sweater over a white T-shirt. He had well-trimmed mousy hair and rimless glasses. She instantly assumed that he was a local, with some petition about street parking or the cutting down of trees.

‘Hello,’ she said, her voice light and friendly. She was about to make a further welcoming remark when she stopped. There was something about his eyes which pulled her up short. They were cold eyes, empty and without sympathy.

‘Mrs Ruth Hartwell?’ His voice was soft, with no hint of a regional accent.

She had a sudden desire to deny it, to let him believe she was the cleaner, that Mrs Hartwell was on a six-month cruise in the Caribbean. ‘Yes,’ she said. She felt a pricking sensation around the back of her neck, and then a hot trembling feeling spreading to her arms and her throat. She guessed it would be because she was tired and stressed as a result of the recent events. She heard Tamsin come up behind her. The dog looked at the visitor but made no attempt to greet him. She placed herself beside Ruth, who felt the animal’s support and tried to get a better grip on herself.