The Shortest Journey (19 page)

‘You’d better sit down. Here’ – he took my arm gently
– ‘sit down on the seat until you feel proper.’

I found that I was shaking – shock, I suppose – and
clenched my hands tightly to pull myself together. The man looked
at me with some concern and the dog sat close by my feet as if in
sympathy. After a while I felt more myself and said, ‘The lady who
is buried over there – do you know anything about her?’

He pulled at his beard, considering the question
before he replied and then said, ‘The funeral were about a couple
of weeks ago. She were the lady staying with that foreign gentleman
and his sister in the holiday cottage up on the Meend.’

‘Foreign?’ I asked. ‘What sort of foreign?’

‘That I couldn’t say. Foreign. Talks funny. Proper
English, but funny, you know what I mean. Not that I saw him more
than a couple of times and never saw the sister at all – an
invalid, that Molly Phillips in the Post Office says, though I
don’t know how she knows, because I don’t reckon she’s ever set
eyes on her, nor on this lady either.’ He gestured towards the
grave. ‘Nobody did. The ladies didn’t go out at all and the
gentleman, he only went into Coleford in the car to get the
shopping.’

‘Didn’t anyone see them?’

‘No. Nobody goes up there much, it don’t lead
nowhere. Reg Lydden might have seen them when he went up on to the
Meend to see to his sheep. But he didn’t say nothing about it. He
don’t say much about nothing, do Reg Lydden.’

‘Is the foreign gentleman still here?’ I asked.

‘That’s right, still here, him and his sister. Won’t
be for long, though. Said he’s going away next week. Give me money
to keep up the grave, though I didn’t want none. I like to see the
old graveyard look nice. He asked the vicar to see to the stone.
Can’t put up no stone until the ground’s settled. That’s why it’s
marked, you see.’ He indicated the wooden peg.

‘Yes, I see. Tell me, do you know his name?’

‘His name?’ The man looked surprised at my question.
‘I don’t rightly recall it – it were a foreign name. Van
something.’

‘Van!’

‘That’s right. Foreign.’ he explained patiently,
‘like I said. I’ve got it writ down, he put it on a bit of paper
for me. I’ve got it somewhere in the house.’

‘Can you tell me how to get to the cottage where he
lives?’ I asked.

‘You want to go up there?’

‘Yes, I – I’d like to ask about my friend.’

‘Yes, well, it’s not far. You go along this road for
about half a mile and then you’ll see a narrow lane going off to
the right. Real steep, it is. Follow that on for another half mile
and you’ll see Brooks Cottage on the left, right on the top of the
hill. You can’t miss it, nothing else up there. Miserable place in
winter. Old Jackie Brooks used to be snowed up half the year when
he lived there.’

‘Thank you so much,’ I said. ‘You’ve been very
kind.’

I felt in my handbag and found a five-pound note.

‘Please take this,’ I said, thrusting it into his
hand. ‘No,’ I continued when he protested, ‘I’m so glad you’re
looking after her grave. If you like, get something for your little
dog, some extra biscuits or something. She’d have liked that. She
loved animals.’

I stood for a moment looking down at the grave and
then walked quickly back to the car.

I found the lane and drove up the steep slope and out
on to what I decided must be the Meend. It was rough common land,
mostly covered with bracken and with a few scattered windblown
hawthorns and elder bushes. Several defeated-looking sheep strayed
across the road, unconcerned or unused to traffic, and a few were
drinking at one of the pools of dark, brackish water beside it. In
front of me on the top of the hill I saw a cottage, standing on its
own, silhouetted against the sky.

I stopped the car. Everywhere was very quiet and
still. There was no birdsong, no wind, no sound of any human
activity. The Meend stretched away for some distance on either side
and far away to the left I could see the vague greyish shape of the
Welsh Black Mountains which seemed to melt into a greyer sky. Now,
having got so far, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to go on. Van – it
seemed incredible. I had been so sure that Marion had nothing to do
with Mrs Rossiter’s disappearance. My mind was confused and I
didn’t seem able to think properly. I sat for a few moments, unable
to make any movement, forward or back. Then Tris, excited by a
sheep moving beside the car, uttered a sharp bark and I started the
car again and went on up the hill.

I stood for a moment at the gate, looking up at the
cottage. It was built of grey stone, probably a miner’s cottage and
quite small, but an extension had been built on to the side and
there had been some attempt to make a garden at the front with
shrubs and paved flagstones. As I looked, I thought I saw the
curtains in the downstairs window moving, as if someone was looking
out from behind them. I thought of Michael’s warning about plunging
into things and of what I might find, and I hesitated. Then I took
a deep breath and knocked on the door. My mind was a complete
blank. I had no idea what I was going to say to Van and whoever
else was there; I would just let things happen.

I waited for what seemed like ages and then I knocked
again. It was, I noticed, a black iron knocker, old and worn
underneath – the original, I supposed, and not a modern
reproduction. The door was suddenly opened, not by Van, not,
indeed, by anyone I had ever seen before, but by an elderly
man.

He was tall and very thin, his face deeply suntanned
and with eyes that were still a clear, bright blue. He stood
looking at me without speaking, his gaze steady and enquiring. I
found myself talking quickly and not very coherently.

‘Oh, I’m sorry to bother you. I’m looking for someone
who can give me news of Mrs Rossiter. Mrs Edith Rossiter. I believe
she’s been staying here. I’m an old friend – Sheila Malory – we’ve
been so worried...’

He opened the door wider.

‘You’d better come in,’ he said.

His accent was strange; I couldn’t place it. I
followed him into the cottage and he shut the door behind me.

‘Please sit down, Mrs Malory.’

Trying to look relaxed and unconcerned, I sat down in
one of the small chintz-covered armchairs on either side of the
fireplace. The room was pleasantly furnished in a cottagey sort of
way and there were several beautifully arranged bowls of flowers
set on small tables or on the broad window-sills. These I found
somehow reassuring. People, I told myself, who had committed
unspeakable crimes would not, surely, spend time arranging
flowers.

‘Can I get you some tea, or coffee, perhaps?’ the man
asked politely.

‘No. No, thank you. I’ve just had lunch, really.’

There was a silence while I tried to think how to put
the questions I had to ask. Suddenly the man smiled. His rather
austere face was transformed; it was a warm, open, friendly smile
and I found myself instinctively smiling back.

‘So you’re Sheila,’ he said. ‘I’m really glad to meet
you at last. My name’s Christian Vanderlinden.’

‘Christian...’ All sorts of bells were ringing in my
head.

‘Edie always calls – called – me Chris.’

‘You’re South African?’ I asked.

‘Born and brought up there. I worked there until just
after the war, then I went to Canada. I’ve lived there ever
since.’

That explained his strange accent. My eye was
suddenly caught by an object on one of the small tables, something
I recognised.

‘The gazelle!’ I exclaimed. I went and picked it up,
holding it in my hand as I had done many times since I was a child,
feeling the smoothness, the warmth, almost, of the ivory. ‘So she
did take it with her!’

‘I gave it to Edie on her eighteenth birthday.’

‘Then you—’ I broke off and sat down. ‘Please, will
you explain what has happened? I’m so confused.’

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I’ll explain, but first I will pour
us both a glass of wine. Yes, I know it’s the wrong time of day,’
he smiled again, ‘but we will both feel more at ease with glasses
in our hands.’

He went into the kitchen and I got up and looked out
of the window. From the cottage, high on the top of the hill, the
view was magnificent, hills and valleys rolling away into the
distance. The sun had come out from behind the clouds now, bathing
the landscape in soft autumnal light, so that it looked like a
painting by Richard Wilson. Christian Vanderlinden came back with
two glasses and a bottle on a tray and poured us each a glass of
white wine. He was right; we both relaxed, almost like old
acquaintances.

‘Edie’s father,’ Christian said, ‘was a rich man. He
didn’t think I was a good enough catch’ – here his voice grated
harshly – ‘for his daughter. He was right, I suppose, in worldly
terms. I was a young engineer, just starting to make my way. But I
loved Edie and she loved me. For another father that might have
been enough, but not for him.’

‘What about her mother?’ I asked.

‘She wouldn’t have stopped us getting married, but
she had nothing to do with it. The poor wretched little creature
couldn’t call her soul her own, didn’t like South Africa, just
wanted to go back to England to live like they used to in the old
days before he made his money. She was frightened of him – they
were all frightened of him, her and both the girls. He used to fly
into these terrible rages, there was no reasoning with him.’

I thought of Alan.

‘He flew into a rage with me when I went to tell him
that Edie and I wanted to get married. Shouted the place down, said
we must never see each other again, turned me out of the house –
called the servants to say that they must never let me in if I
called. It was brutal and humiliating.’

His eyes were cold and I saw that he was
unconsciously clenching his hands as he remembered. After a moment
he continued.

‘We managed to meet secretly a few times. Poor little
Edie, she was so terrified that he’d find out. I begged her to come
away with me, but she wouldn’t. It wasn’t because of the money.’ He
gazed at me earnestly. ‘She never cared anything for that; she
would have happily starved with me. She was afraid that he’d come
after us – she wasn’t twenty-one – and she couldn’t bear the scenes
and his violent temper. Not just for her, but the old man would
have taken it out on her mother and her sister, too. She said their
lives wouldn’t be worth living.’

He got up and went over to the window, leaning on the
sill. His back was to me and his voice was muffled.

‘I was young, too, and I was very bitter. I said that
if she wouldn’t come with me then she didn’t love me, that she only
cared for wealth and position. I said a lot of stupid things. And
she cried. I remember how she cried.’

He turned round and faced me.

‘So,’ he said, ‘I went away. Off to Rhodesia, to the
Copper Belt. I did well, made quite a bit of money, quite a name
for myself as an engineer. When I got back to Durban they’d gone.
He’d taken them back to England. I asked around and found their
address and wrote to her. The letter came back, marked “Return to
Sender”.’

‘How cruel!’ I exclaimed.

‘He was an expert. Not violence – he never hit them –
but worse, he ruined their lives and destroyed their spirit. I
didn’t give up, though. The next year I had to go to England on
business, so I went to find her. They were living in this great old
house in the country, and I put up at the hotel in the nearest
village – Dulverton, it was called, I remember – and made some
enquiries. It wasn’t difficult to find out; people down there
seemed to like a bit of gossip and it was all still fairly fresh in
their minds. Edie had been married just a few months before. From
what I gathered she hadn’t wanted to marry the man. He had a bad
reputation, another evil-tempered man – everything she dreaded. He
was one of those newly poor landed gentry, so they said, who only
married her for her father’s money.’

‘He was a horrible man,’ I said. ‘I hated him.’

‘You can imagine how I felt. I had to see her. I went
off for a walk through the woods, trying to work out what to do for
the best, how to rescue her. I walked a long way. It was about this
time of the year, but cold and misty. I heard a dog barking; it
sounded in trouble so I went towards where the sound was coming
from.

‘He was lying on the ground, his gun half underneath
him and his poor dog – a spaniel – standing beside him, barking its
head off. It was him, Edie’s father. I just stood there looking
down at him. There was a lot of blood and not much left of his
face, but I knew it was him; it was a face that had been in my
mind’s eye for too long for me to be mistaken. He was dead. I’m
sure he was dead.’

He looked away from me again and repeated, ‘I’m sure
he was dead.’

Abruptly he left the window and sat down in his
chair.

‘I thought I heard noises and I ran away. I thought –
well – that if anyone found me standing by his body, they would
think I’d killed him. God knows I had good cause. But, you see, the
awful thing was, I ran right away, I didn’t try to find Edie. I
didn’t beg her to leave that man and come away with me. I just ran,
right the way back to Durban. I let her down.’

‘No,’ I said. ‘She wouldn’t have gone with you,
however much she wanted to. She wouldn’t have broken her marriage
vows. That wasn’t her way. It would just have been more anguish for
her.’

‘I guess you’re right. She’s – she was that sort of
person. So,’ he continued, ‘I stayed in South Africa and then after
the war I moved to Canada. My sister Olive had lost her husband in
the war so she came to keep house for me.’

‘You never married?’ I asked.

‘No. It was only Edie for me. If I couldn’t have her,
then I didn’t want anyone else. Does that sound silly?’