Текст книги "Bones in the Nest"

Автор книги: Helen Cadbury

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Текущая страница: 3 (всего у книги 18 страниц)

CHAPTER FIVE

Doncaster

The low ceiling of the corridor outside the Divisional Inspector’s office had a fluorescent light which flickered as Sean waited, like a schoolboy outside the headteacher’s office. Maureen had ironed every inch of his uniform. She’d even offered him one of her sleeping pills to make sure he got some rest, but he said no. He needed a clear head. When he got in from his dad’s he went for a run to tire himself out and, by some miracle, fell asleep not long after midnight. He’d had five or six hours, but his right eye was twitching. Or was it the light? He couldn’t tell.

The door opened.

‘Come in PC Denton.’

He phoned Gav as soon as he came out.

‘Well?’

‘It was OK,’ Sean said, still not quite believing it himself. ‘What I said, how I described it, tallied with what you told them and as there were no independent witnesses. Basically, that was it.’

‘Good lad. Right, let’s celebrate!’

‘I’m not sure …’ He was thinking of his dad and the promise he’d made to help clean up the flat.

‘They’ve got a nice guest ale on at the Red Lion,’ Gav said.

‘Sorry, mate, I’ve got stuff on.’

Sean didn’t tell him the other part of what they’d said, Wendy Gore grinning at him through over-done lipstick that had smeared on the lip of her coffee mug, the bit about young eyes seeing things that others might overlook, that his previous work as a PCSO, especially in the investigation of a senior officer, hadn’t gone unnoticed. He had the feeling that they were asking him to spy for them. The only bit that made any sense was the warning to stay away from Saleem Asaf.

‘That shouldn’t be difficult,’ Sean said.

‘Except that he lives at an address on the edge of the Chasebridge estate, Denton, where I believe you have family.’

The Divisional Inspector couldn’t have made it sound worse if he’d actually come out and said ‘a drunk for a father,’ but Sean let it pass.

Sean sat on the side of his bed and unfolded the crumpled page with the estate agents’ logo and the colour photo of the ‘fabulous studio apartment’. He would be back on the night shift tomorrow and by the time he got round to viewing it, it was sure to have been let out. He screwed the details into a ball and threw it in a neat arc, straight into the wastepaper basket by the door.

‘Goal!’

He could hear the television. Maureen must be watching a comedy because the canned laughter came up through the floor at regular intervals. When he went downstairs, one place was laid at the table and a cup of tea was waiting for him.

‘I was at my dad’s yesterday.’ He let it sound casual, as if it was the most normal thing in the world.

‘Oh.’ She was at the cooker, stirring a pan of baked beans. She didn’t look at him.

‘He’s packed in drinking.’

‘Why would he bother doing that? It’s like air to him.’

‘Because he had to.’

Maureen tipped baked beans onto two waiting slices of toast and scraped angrily at the saucepan with a wooden spoon.

‘Bloody idiot. He’s ruined everyone else’s life and been killing himself for years, so why give up now?’

‘It’s serious. His liver’s packing up.’

She turned to him for a moment before flipping a piece of bacon out of the frying pan onto the mountain of beans and putting the plate on the table in front of him.

‘I really should eat a proper vegetable once in a while, shouldn’t I?’ Sean said, trying to change the subject.

‘You going to see him again?’ she said.

He didn’t reply.

‘Sean, love, it’s none of my business, and he is your father, but what good’s going to come of it?’

Sean shrugged and poked at the beans with his fork. Maureen went through to the front room and the sound of a game show filled the silence.

When he’d finished eating, Sean found a carrier bag under the sink and helped himself to a bottle of anti-bacterial cleaner and a couple of cloths. This wasn’t going to cut very deep into the built-up grime of Jack Denton’s home, but it was a start. He put his head round the door of the living room to say goodbye to Maureen. She waved her cigarette but kept her eyes fixed on the screen. He could tell she was annoyed, but it wouldn’t last long.

Behind the house, he looked at his moped and thought better of it. He’d rather walk than leave it up at the flats. Along the road, a group of teenagers was hanging around the front gate of one of the gardens. Sean wasn’t a fighter, never had been. As a kid, he’d learnt to dodge rolled up newspapers, swinging belts, fists and feet, and he’d learnt to run. As a police officer, running away wasn’t an option any more, so he’d joined a gym to build muscles he hoped he wouldn’t have to use. Sean clenched his fists and felt his biceps harden but the teenagers didn’t even look round as he passed.

At Eagle Mount One Jack opened his front door cautiously.

‘Who’s that?’

‘Me. I thought I’d have a go at a bit of cleaning,’ Sean held up the carrier bag.

‘Come on in.’

Sean looked round the kitchen. He wished he’d bought some rubber gloves. Yesterday’s mugs and soup bowl had been added to a sink that was full of thick grey water, where the edges of crockery stuck up like the tips of icebergs. He held his breath and plunged his hand into the chilly slime to find the plug. A memory of his mother came to him. He must have been very little, standing on tiptoes to get his hands over the edge of the sink. She was wearing pink Marigolds. Her fingers looked long and elegant, as if they were dressed up for a party. She let him put the gloves on and he danced round the room. It made her laugh.

He ran the tap and waited for some hot water, but none came. He filled the kettle and put it on to boil. Jack was lingering in the doorway watching him.

‘How are you feeling today?’ Sean said.

‘Like shit.’

‘Sorry to hear it.’

Jack sighed. ‘I’ve been a bugger. I know it.’

‘Leave it, Dad.’

‘I should have been there for you, after your mam died.’

Sean rubbed at the murky window with his thumb. The view from this side of the block was away from town. Cars streamed by on the ring road, and beyond was the dark outline of the woods. He could see himself, a boy of ten or eleven, sitting against a tree, head back, mesmerised by the leaves of the upper branches waving against a blue sky, the rush of the wind drowning out the sounds of the road and the estate beyond it. He sometimes fell asleep and woke up shivering, dry-mouthed, with the light beginning to fade. He always went home in the end, not because he was afraid of the woods, but because he feared what his father would do if he stayed out any later.

‘I should have taken you to football and that,’ Jack said.

‘I don’t think so.’

There’d been occasions when Jack was in a good mood, the right side of drunk for a joke and a laugh, but Sean never really understood what the jokes were about and just laughed along to keep things sweet. Then there were the times he’d had to help his father home, paralytic and covered in vomit.

‘We should do something together, father and son, while …’

The cough caught his words and Sean was left to finish the sentence in his own head. He didn’t want to turn round and be reminded that Jack was only a man, not a monster. The kettle rattled to the boil and he poured a splash of boiling water onto a cloth and scrubbed away at the sink.

‘You said you might come to the meeting, what’s-their-name? They’ve got this thing, this group,’ Jack said.

Sean put the plates and cups back into the sink, squeezed in the washing up liquid and poured the rest of the kettle water on top.

‘Clean Up Chasebridge?’

‘Aye, that’s what they call it. They’ve got a bit of fire in their bellies, these lads. Haven’t seen much of that since Arthur Scargill.’

Sean rubbed away at a stubborn deposit of greenish-white mould at the bottom of a mug.

‘CUC. Clean Up Chasebridge. Good name, in’t it?’ Jack said. ‘Brings all the issues together.’

‘Right.’ The bottom of the mug was gradually turning white again and Jack was staring into space.

‘Aye.’ It was like a motor starting up. Jack nodded, blinked and licked a bit of spittle from the corner of his mouth. ‘Good lads, getting this place in order. Chasing out the undesirables. Chasing them out of Chasebridge! D’you get it? I should write the bloody slogans, me!’

He laughed and coughed his way into the next room where he collapsed back on the settee and lit up a cigarette, hands trembling. Sean stood in the doorway of the living room and watched him struggling to catch his breath. When Sean turned back to the kitchen, he half expected to see it how it was before, when his mum was alive, and the floor tiles were still bright green. Through the window he watched a blue light flashing down the dual carriageway. It looked like an ambulance. If it was an RTA, who’d be attending? Maybe it was an attack. Every case started somewhere. Suddenly, a wave of relief flooded over him. The Saleem Asaf business was over, as quickly as that, and tomorrow night he’d back in uniform with Gavin telling his rubbish jokes in the battered squad car. Fuck it, he thought, it wouldn’t hurt to spend one evening with Jack.

‘When’s the meeting, Dad?’

CHAPTER SIX

York

Chloe follows Taheera’s instructions: right out of the hostel, down a street of terraced houses, punctuated by the dark eye sockets of bin alleys. The mid-morning streets are quiet and she tells herself that nobody’s watching her, but still she feels exposed out there on her own. She could have taken the bus but she needs to save her money. When she turns onto the main road, she can see she’s going in the right direction. The tower of York Minster is ahead of her, its sandy-grey bulk against a dark purple sky, long windows like the eyes of a bloodhound. There’s a flicker and she blinks. She’s seen it again: a human shape, from this distance no bigger than a feather, falling through the air.

She picks up speed, the blood pulsing in her temples and tries to concentrate on something else, to wipe the image from her mind. There’s a row of shops ahead. As she gets closer, she sees that there are two charity shops and a dry-cleaners. In the window of the first charity shop there’s a set of crockery: white with a pattern of blue irises around the rim of each plate and cup. She won’t be at Meredith House forever. Taheera keeps reminding her they’ll be moving her on to a place of her own in a few weeks. Then she’ll come back and buy these plates and cups. She’ll invite Taheera round for tea to show her how well she’s settling in. She’ll invite Emma too, but not the others. Only people she can trust will see her new home.

She needs to hurry now, walking is taking longer than she thought. The sky’s threatening rain and she wishes it would get on with it. Her skin is sticky with sweat. She pulls the appointment letter out of her pocket. Mrs Hildred, 11.45 a.m. She’s going to have to run to get there in time.

She arrives out of breath and waits on a hard chair by a reception desk. A fan turns slowly on its stand, like the head of a sunflower, turning towards her and away, towards and away. She’s so mesmerised she doesn’t hear her name being called. A woman with a badge announcing ‘Specialist Advisor’ is standing in the doorway, her wide hips filling its frame.

‘Pleased to meet you, call me Sally.’

She’s not sure she’ll be able to do that. There’s something about her that reminds Chloe of a teacher she had in primary school, soft-edged and cardigan-clad. She definitely looks more like a Mrs than a Sally. They go through to a small room in the back of the building where faded prints of flowers hang on magnolia walls. The armchairs are meant to be comfortable, but Sally Hildred has some difficulty lowering herself into one. She picks up a pen in chapped fingers and smoothes the paper of the notebook on her knee. She’s an eczema sufferer. It’s on the back of her hands and disappears inside her sleeves. Chloe looks at her pen poised above the clean sheet of paper. Her heart sinks at the thought of another test. There will be right and wrong answers and she will have to guess which is which.

‘How are you settling in to Meredith House?’

‘Fine. Yeah, I feel right at home.’ She doesn’t say she can’t bring herself to sit in the TV room, or that most of her possessions are still in her bag.

‘Good,’ Sally Hildred says. ‘I expect you’re looking forward to getting into work.’

Smile. Meet her eyes. Don’t fiddle with your hands. Sound convincing.

‘Yes.’

It’s warm in the room and Mrs Hildred takes her cardigan off. The eczema on her hands has reached up her arms and formed livid patches on the insides of her elbows. It must be so tempting to scratch at it and exhausting not to give in. She must be the queen of self-control.

‘Now, I’m sure Taheera has explained; I’m here to help you with your job search.’ Sally is frowning. Chloe pulls her gaze away from the sore skin and tries to look as if she’s been listening. ‘It’s not always possible to get exactly what you want, not straight away. You may have to compromise.’

‘I want to work in a garden.’

‘What I’m saying is, you may have to cut your cloth.’

It’s a phrase she’s heard so many times before. It goes along with you’ve made your bed, now you have to lie in it. Those were her mum’s words. Cut. Don’t go there. Rewind. You may have to cut your cloth. The truth is, Chloe is forever cutting her cloth. There are great holes cut out of the fabric of her life. Chloe unfolds the CV she’s had in her back pocket and hands it over.

‘Oh, how lovely,’ Mrs Hildred opens it on her lap. ‘You have got a lot of gardening experience.’

‘And qualifications.’ She begins to list them, but Sally holds up a hand to stop her. Her fingers are soft and one of them is pinched by a gold wedding ring. Chloe wonders what Mr Hildred looks like and whether he minds the eczema.

‘Great, yes, great,’ Mrs Hildred says. ‘It’s all on here. You don’t have to, you know, prove yourself. Don’t worry, Chloe, I’m on your side.’

On her side of the fence, her side of the wall. She’s still getting used to being on the same side as people like Mrs Hildred. Would Mr Hildred think they were all on the same side? She wonders if they talk in bed at night about the special clients his wife sees at work.

I met a girl today. Interesting case. She’d been away a long time, I was wondering if she’s that one who …

Sally Hildred is reaching into a folder and shuffling through sheets of paper. Chloe’s CV slides off her lap and lands on the carpet. She hesitates to pick it up in case she collides with Mrs Hildred’s knees.

‘Perhaps, as you’re a little further along the journey than some of our clients, if there’s something available … Yes, here we are. Right up your street.’

Chloe reads the page upside down.

Halsworth Grange, Trainee Gardener, full-time.

She’s looking for a pound sign and some numbers to go with it. She can’t wait to be earning her own money, but Mrs Hildred has moved on to an application form and is telling her that the closing date is very soon, so if she’s interested they’ll need to be quick.

‘How much are they paying?’ she asks.

‘It’s an apprenticeship, Chloe. It’s just £2.73 an hour while you’re training.’

‘That’s not even minimum wage. And I’m already trained. I’ve got …’

‘Yes. No. Ah, well, I mean, I know you have your certificates but with you being’ – she runs a finger up the inside of her arm and pulls it away – ‘out of the job market for such a long time.’

The eczema rash has deepened to a livid scarlet and the rest of her skin is pink. Chloe wonders why Mrs Hildred is so embarrassed. She might as well say it. It’s clear she knows exactly where Chloe’s been.

‘It’s OK,’ Chloe says. She can’t watch the poor woman suffer any longer. She dodges the knees to pick up her CV and gives it back to Mrs Hildred. ‘I’ll apply.’

‘Wonderful! I’ll go and scan this and we can get an email off to them straight away.’

The next morning Chloe stands under the shower. She’s been awake since six, to be sure of getting in the bathroom first. Mrs Hildred phoned the hostel shortly after Chloe got back and said she needed to be at Halsworth Grange the next day for an interview. Taheera has offered to take her in the car. It’s tiny, like a creamy white toy car with a burgundy roof and seats to match. It’s beautiful and Chloe doesn’t want to stink it out, so she scrubs herself hard and when she’s dry, she sprays herself all over with Icy Mist.

She stands in the lobby of Meredith House waiting for Taheera to finish her handover to Darren, the assistant residential officer. Taheera’s got a few days’ leave and is going to see her family. She says Halsworth Grange is on her way and at least Chloe won’t have to worry about being late. She’s helped her to look up her return journey: bus, train, bus. It’s going to take a while, but it’s OK. Chloe is looking forward to the ride. The times and numbers are all printed out and she’s grateful for that. She’s no good with computers.

The office door opens and Taheera’s there. There’s no sign that she’s done a night shift. Her make-up is perfect. The black kohl around her eyes rings the green like pools of water. She’s wearing pale pink leggings and a green tunic with a pattern of peacock feathers. Chloe can’t get over how beautiful she looks.

‘Come on, then!’ Taheera laughs as she speaks. ‘Are we going?’

Chloe nods. She holds her carrier bag tightly in her hands. Inside is a folder with all her documents, including a letter sealed in a brown envelope, which she must not lose. As they head towards the door, Emma comes out of the TV room.

‘Good luck, pet. Knock ’em dead!’

Chloe manages half a smile but she can’t speak.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Halsworth Grange

Halsworth Grange is up a long drive. She asks Taheera to drop her at the gate. She wants the last few moments to clear her head, to think a little. In the car they listened to the radio. Taheera was happy to be going home and Chloe tried to be happy for her. There’s a mum and a dad and a brother there, Taheera said, and an older sister who’s left home but who comes back all the time with her baby son. Every now and then, Taheera gave her little pieces of advice about how to answer questions and to remember to smile and look interested.

Chloe practises the smile as she walks up the hill, but it feels strained. She is wondering if Taheera will be seeing Mo, the young man with the tag on his ankle. It’s none of her business, she knows that, but it doesn’t seem right. She stops at the top of the drive where a car park drops away to her left. There’s a grey-haired woman in a little hut selling tickets and brochures. Chloe looks back at the way she’s come taking in the sweep of lawns, dotted with trees, like something from a TV drama.

Her appointment is with a Mr William Coldacre. He’s a big man, both tall and wide. He looks old, but she can see he’s still strong. They sit opposite one another across a table. There’s not much to look at in the small brick potting shed, except a newspaper with a crossword half done and a screwed up paper bag. Someone has scattered flaky crumbs on the table. Mr Coldacre doesn’t meet her eye and she realises that he’s almost as nervous as she is.

‘So, um, Miss Toms,’ he looks at her CV and her application form. She has taken her folder out of the carrier bag and fingers the envelope on her lap, waiting for the right time to hand it over, to practise the lines she’s been learning for this moment.

‘I don’t usually do the interviews. I’m more of a plantsman myself, but Giles, he’s the land manager, he’s off with the flu, so he’s left it up to me.’ He runs a large forefinger round the top of his ear. ‘Tell you what, Miss, uh – can I call you Chloe?’

‘Yes, that’s fine. Yes.’

‘Right, well, why don’t we have a look around the garden and we can talk about what you’ve done before and I can see what’s what? That would be the best way, I reckon.’

‘OK.’ She’s still holding the letter, not sure how to do this if they’re walking about outside. ‘I have to give you this,’ she says. ‘In case, well if you were to offer me the job, I have to– I mean, you have to read it.’

He nods towards the sealed envelope with a grunt and puts it in his pocket.

‘Aye. I know the score. You’re not the first from the Probation, so don’t worry about that. I’ll pass it on to the boss.’

She silently prays that he’ll keep it safe and deliver it to Giles, or whoever’s in charge. It’s her disclosure letter, explaining about her criminal record. She pictures him pulling out a hanky and the letter flying free, blowing along the paths between the clipped edges of the lawns, being picked up by a visitor and opened. That person would get straight on the phone to the tabloids and then the whole pack would appear.

‘If you’re lucky,’ Taheera said to her in the car, ‘people won’t remember.’

Chloe hopes she’s right. She’s sure she looks quite different. Her hair’s lighter and longer and she’ll never go back to where it happened; she’s not allowed to anyway. But the law says she has to tell her employer and, even though it’s supposed to be confidential, she knows that confidential isn’t a wall or a fence that keeps you safe. It’s just a word, and it’s not a word that Chloe sets much store by.

An hour later, William Coldacre (call me Bill) says they’ll let her know and wishes her a safe journey. He didn’t ask her much, except some plant names and about what tools she’d used before. She walks back down the drive. There’s a monkey-puzzle tree, its geometric branches standing out among the softer shapes of beech and ash. She stands still and listens to the birds. She can’t quite believe she’s here and she hopes, she prays, she’ll get the job and she’ll soon be coming back.

At the bus stop she doesn’t have to wait long before she’s on a little single-decker, winding through a succession of old pit villages towards the station. When she gets off there are no proper station buildings, only a shelter on each side of the track and a narrow footbridge over it. The sign says: ‘Trains to Goole, Hull and York: Platform 1’ and ‘Trains to Doncaster: Platform 2’. She stares at the sign. She can’t understand how she missed it on the way here in the car, how she’s got this close without realising. She wonders how many miles it is to Doncaster. She looks around her, like a child who’s wandered into a room where she’s been forbidden to go, then hurries towards Platform 1.

A woman with a sticky toddler in a buggy is fanning herself with a free paper. Chloe shrinks back into the shadow of the metal fence. When she was released from prison, her licence clearly stated that she must not go within ten miles of where it happened. She waits for the York train, willing it to hurry up, while she imagines what she’ll say to Darren back at the hostel. If she’s breached her licence, she’ll go straight back to prison and she won’t see Taheera or Halsworth Grange again.

The road map is on the table between them. Darren purses his lips and traces his finger along the road that leads from Doncaster to Halsworth Grange.

‘It looks OK to me,’ he says and shrugs.

Darren mostly shrugs. Chloe reckons he comes to work half-stoned. She wishes Taheera was here, but she’s still on leave.

‘Mr Coldacre says I can start on Monday, but I’m not going down there just to be pulled by the police and end up back in jail for breaching my licence.’

It comes out in one breath and Chloe hears her voice leap up to a high-pitched whine. Control. Get it under control. Darren doesn’t notice. He twists his fingers into his hair and plucks a long, greying strand.

‘Here.’

He tightens the hair between his fingers and lays it on the map, curving it round each bend in the road. It straightens on a stretch of the A1(M), and bends off again into the town.

‘Not the centre,’ Chloe says. She points to a mass of dark shapes towards the M18. ‘There.’

Darren stretches the hair to where Chloe’s pointing and lifts it carefully, keeping the measurement precise. He lays it along the scale rule in the corner of the map and folds it back on itself three times.

‘Fifteen miles,’ he looks up at Chloe and smiles. ‘Your licence says you must stay ten miles outside the location of your offence, so you’re fine. Just make sure you don’t get on the wrong train home.’

‘No chance.’

Chloe sits back and lets herself relax. Her stomach’s been so tight it aches to let go. She thinks of the lawns at Halsworth Grange and the monkey-puzzle tree zigzagging across the view. Soon she’ll be going there every day.

‘Does Taheera know you’ve got the job?’

Chloe shakes her head.

‘Phone her from here if you like. She’ll be pleased.’

He dials from the office phone, hands her the receiver and soon Taheera’s voice is whooping in her ear, congratulating her.

‘Amazing! Oh my God, I love that place. I knew you’d get it.’

Chloe holds the phone a little distance away to protect her eardrum.

‘The trees are lovely in the spring. We used to go for picnics when we were kids.’

‘Oh,’ Chloe manages. ‘That’s nice.’

Of course it’s a place that means something to someone else. It hasn’t been magicked up just for her benefit, and it’s cool that Taheera loves it too.

‘If you’re starting Monday, then maybe I could pick you up and give you a lift back to York on your first day,’ Taheera says. ‘I’m back at work on Tuesday.’

‘If you’re sure it’s not out of your way,’ Chloe says.

‘Not at all. I go past the door and it’ll my make my mum happy if I stay on another night. She wants to cook a family meal on Sunday night and my sister’s coming over with my baby nephew, he’s so sweet!’

Chloe pictures Taheera’s family as a mass of colour, with a mum in a bright pink and gold sari, their home like a Bollywood film set, everyone dancing and laughing. She hands the phone back to Darren and beyond the soundtrack in her head, she hears him telling Taheera that everything’s fine at the hostel, there are no problems and she should enjoy her time off.

‘Stay safe, Miss T,’ he says and puts the phone down.