Untold Story (25 page)

There were times when it would be upon her suddenly, a surge inside her, like an electric current with no place to discharge. The enormity of what she’d done, the pain of losing her children, the pain that she had caused them.

She sat in the Sport Trac outside Carson’s house and leaned her forehead against the steering wheel. If she could break open her rib cage with her bare hands, she would rip out her heart. If she could drive a knitting needle through her skull, she would mash up her brain. If that would stop the memories from coming unbidden, then she could be peaceful now.

A single image had floated into her mind. Her youngest in his high chair, with his fat cheeks and downy hair and his vague little yet-to-be defined eyebrows. His brother’s eyes shining with pride as he turned for her approval because he had just fed the baby with puréed carrot from a plastic spoon.

She thought about Lawrence, how he’d worried that she would be upset when she saw her boys growing up happy without her. Even Lawrence, who understood everything, didn’t understand about that.

Carson’s house smelled of cedarwood. He’d made a new handrail for the staircase a few months ago. When he’d bought the house several years back, it had been a wreck. It was an old house, older than the town, cross-gabled and wood-shingled, with a grand Palladian window on the upper floor that let in the wind. The shingles regularly fell off the walls and roof and Carson kept patching them up.

“When are you going to sort out the curtain?” said Lydia.

“I’ll get around to it,” said Carson.

“Says the man who doesn’t like to leave a job half done.”

He raised an eyebrow at her. “It’s functional, isn’t it?”

“Carson,” said Lydia. “It’s a sheet.”

He looked at the sheet in question as if the observation had taken him by surprise. “When I found this house and fell in love with it I knew none of my old stuff would look right here. I didn’t have that much. It was a modern apartment and it was pretty minimalist.”

“So’s this,” said Lydia, looking around at the sparse furnishings.

“Mostly I worked on the house. I redid the guttering, repaired the eaves where they were crumbling, worked on the antebellum plumbing, needed some help with that in the end. It was satisfying, anyway. And I wanted to get some furniture that looked right. First thing I started with was the couch.”

“It’s very nice.”

“Maybe, but it took me so long to find it, it was so much effort, and then once you’ve got it, you sit on it and you never think about it again. What’s the point?”

She laughed and walked over to the Ping-Pong table that was folded against the wall. “Least you’ve still got room for this. I’ll give you a game.”

“I’ll go easy on you,” he said.

“You better not. I’ll know if you’re letting me win.”

They played three games and he didn’t let her win. He tried to teach her how to spin the ball by slicing it. She was watching his eyes more than his hands. She was examining the hollow of his throat, the way it always looked a little sunburned. She was looking at the freckles on his forearms.

“I’ve got to have a rest,” she said.

“Yeah,” he said, “you wore me out.”

She hit him on the leg with her paddle. “What was the job you had?” she said. “Where did you go?”

He sprawled on the couch with his thumbs through his belt loops. “It was a burn job. A house in Alabama.”

“Didn’t they have someone more local?”

“It wasn’t even my company. I was just helping out.”

“Why? What happened? I mean, is that normal?”

“That sheet’s not so bad, is it? If I start looking for curtains I know it will drive me nuts. I won’t know what to get.” He actually looked worried.

“Leave the sheet up,” she said. “It’s fine. You were saying about the job?”

“This guy’s house burns down in the middle of the night and he puts in a claim. His insurer checks through his history. You do that as a matter of course. Anyway, the adjuster sees he’s got two previous, both with my company.”

“You make it sound like a criminal record.”

“Some people have a run of bad luck. They say lightning never strikes twice. You work in this job long enough you know that’s not true.”

“But three times?” said Lydia.

“I turned down his second claim. The first one was before I joined the company and on the forms he said he was intending to rebuild but he didn’t. That always gets my interest.”

“I like your neck,” said Lydia. “I’ve been meaning to tell you that. But carry on. I am listening.”

“Thank you,” said Carson. “It’s nice to have my neck appreciated. So, Stevenson, this guy, the next house he has burns down too. It’s all around the town that he’s torched it for the insurance. This is Roxborough, it’s a hardscrabble town, and all the bars that Stevenson goes drinking in, I hear the same story, how he’s been boasting about the money he’ll get.”

“That doesn’t mean he was guilty, necessarily. Maybe he just liked bragging. Maybe a lot of people didn’t like him. You had to prove it another way.”

“I couldn’t,” said Carson. “I couldn’t actually prove it. Couldn’t locate the cause of the fire, no actual witnesses. I couldn’t prove it, but I could turn him down, and I did. In my view he was lucky he wasn’t in court for arson. He didn’t see it that way.”

“Was he angry?”

“Just a bit. Gave me some flack.”

“What sort?”

“Abuse, you know, calling my house in the middle of the night, that sort of thing. The difficult part was, even though I knew I was right, there was room for the tiniest bit of doubt. What if he was really the hapless victim, and I was making his life hell? This third house two years later laid that to rest.”

“How stupid must he be?” said Lydia. “Wasn’t it going to be obvious?”

“He moved state, he switched insurers. Lot of people don’t realize we access each other’s records.”

“Aren’t you concerned,” said Lydia, choosing her words carefully, “that he might find out you’ve rumbled him a third time? The guy sounds a bit . . . unstable.”

“He probably won’t know that. And even if he does, I’m not going to lose any sleep over it.”

“What if he’s, you know . . .”

“Crazy? Comes after me with a shotgun?” He took her hand. “Look at it from his point of view. The first time everything is plain sailing. No one dies, no one gets hurt, he gets his money, no one loses a thing. As far as he’s concerned the insurance company can afford it. Then I come along next time and mess things up. He was responding. He was pissed, but I never thought he was a nut job.”

While he was talking she leaned in and rested her head against him. She could feel the vibrations of his voice from his chest to her temple. At night when the light was off and he spoke to her as they lay in the dark she felt as if that was all she needed, as if it would be possible to live suspended in a space where the only things that reached her were the touch of his breath on her shoulder and the sound of his voice in her ear.

She looked at Rufus, lying on his back on the rug, exposing and offering his soft belly to the world. He was always at home here. Esther would say that he was acting how she was feeling. Esther, just possibly, was right.

Carson took Madeleine and Rufus out for a stroll before bed. When he came back he lifted the sheet at the living room window and peered out at the front lawn.

“What’s out there?” said Lydia.

“Nothing,” he said.

“Admiring the view?”

“Did you hear Madeleine barking?”

“I did. I thought maybe she saw a squirrel, a raccoon.”

“She went for something in the oleander. I had to pull her away. I don’t know what it was.”

“Not a claimant?” said Lydia.

“Sadly,” said Carson, “I don’t think I’m important enough to have acquired a stalker of any kind.”

Chapter Twenty

Did the boyfriend know? Grabber was in the sitting room of the bed-and-breakfast, the parlor, as Mrs. Jackson called it. In less than an hour Lydia would be arriving. Mrs. Jackson was out getting a Brazilian wax or hiring an orchestra or something. It was difficult to imagine what more preparations she could be making. The entire day so far she had been scurrying around the bed-and-breakfast preparing. Five times, no less, she had apologized for disturbing him in his room. If only she knew who she was actually receiving she would self-combust on the spot.

Did the boyfriend know? Grabowski kept asking himself that question. Last night he’d had the notion that maybe he’d glean something by staking out the house. Somebody had to have helped her. Maybe it was him. He didn’t remember seeing the guy in the days before she “died,” but she had a lot of people swirling around her and that didn’t mean anything. A bodyguard who’d been on the yacht, maybe. It wouldn’t be her first time for that.

He didn’t even manage to get a shot of them together. He got a shot of her resting her head on the steering wheel as she sat outside. Clearly a lot on her mind. He remembered the day she had driven alone to Eton and sat just like that in her car before getting out. A private moment of reflection. Well, private if he hadn’t followed her there. At lunchtime the radio news announced the divorce. She’d been gathering herself before seeing her son, so he would be forewarned.

Last night the front door was unlocked and she went straight in. Later, the boyfriend went out for a walk and Grabowski was still in the bushes, watching the house. He wasn’t exactly sure what he was hoping to learn. He wasn’t going to use his flash even if they came out together. Then the hound went for his foot and he’d thought that the game was up.

But the boyfriend pulled his dog away and left it at that. He’d raised the curtain at the window after he’d gone inside and taken a cursory look. Grabber decided he’d learned something after all. If the guy knew anything, he’d be protecting her. He’d be on the lookout. No way he’d be leaving his door unlocked, even after all this time he’d be on his guard.

Now he had to concentrate on the task at hand, before Mrs. Jackson came bustling back. How could he set it up?

There was one thing he needed to achieve at this meeting, but he had to work out how.

He looked around the sitting room again. There were two mirrors, one over the fireplace and the other on the wall to the right of Mr. Jackson. If he stood just here . . . But there was bound to be a preliminary fanfare at the door when Lydia arrived, so having his back still turned when she came in would seem unnatural.

Mr. Jackson stirred in his sleep. His hands twitched on the armrests. This man could sleep for king and country. Perhaps he was nocturnal. Grabowski doubted it. He probably simply transferred from chair to bed. He looked older than his wife, his old man’s trousers high above his waist. His forehead melted over his eyebrows, and his eyebrows over his eyes, his nose drooped over his top lip, and his chin cascaded down his neck, a fleshy cascade of features trickling ever down.

He needed some kind of prop. If he could sit right here—he placed a chair at an angle in front of Mr. Jackson—then he could see in the mirror that reflected the doorway. He needed to look as though he was absorbed in something. What could he use? He hunted around the sitting room. If he printed out some of his small town photos he could lay them on this card table. He shifted the card table too. But it was too late to get anything printed. He could be playing cards, solitaire. No, a card game with Mr. Jackson. That was it; otherwise why would he be sitting in such close proximity to him anyway? Now he had to find a pack of cards. And wake up Mr. Jackson. Both tasks appeared challenging.

“Mr. Jackson?” he said. He tried again and louder this time. “Mr. Jackson?”

No sign of life. If he died in that chair how long would it be before anyone noticed?

Grabowski shook the old man’s shoulder. “Mr. Jackson?” he shouted.

“Exactly,” said Mr. Jackson, sitting bolt upright.

A lifetime of pacifying your wife, thought Grabowski. That’s how you end up, agreeing in your sleep.

“Mr. Jackson,” he said, deciding it was better to collude in the fantasy that the old man had been awake all along, “I was wondering if you would like a game of cards.”

“Don’t play cards,” said Mr. Jackson, placing his feet back on the carved turtle that served as his stool. “Never have, never will.”

“That’s a pity,” said Grabowski.

“I’d play you a game of chess.” Mr. Jackson made an attempt to smooth his straggly white eyebrows. “These need a trim. Hardly see a damn thing. Take my advice, never get old.”

Mr. Jackson told him where to find the chess box and Grabowski set it up. He practiced keeping one eye on the mirror without lifting his neck so it appeared he was concentrating on the board. He had a clear view, and all he needed was a few seconds. It would prove it to him either way.

Twenty minutes to go.

Grabowski made his opening move.

“Son,” said Mr. Jackson, “what do you say to a little whiskey? See that cabinet over there? Use the teacups. What she don’t know won’t hurt her, if you get what I mean.”

Grabber decided he could use a drink, just one, he was getting a little jangly.