mind as if displayed on an imaginary autocue. ‘How well did you know Stella?’; ‘What kind of person is she?’; ‘Did she ever discuss her relationship with her husband with you?’
Stella’s evidence against him in his trial for Patsy’s murder had ensured his conviction. He had spent ten years in prison because of Stella, the woman who had sworn on the Bible to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but. As if anyone living in The Limes even knew what the truth was.
Yes, she had walked into the hallway that day and had been open-mouthed with horror to see him kneeling next to Patsy’s body. Though she had only seen what she wanted to see – she had assumed that because he held a knife in his hand, he was responsible. Charlie was a lot of things, but he’d never been a killer.
In his mind’s eye, he could see the wounds even now, great, savage rents spewing out torrents of blood. If he closed his eyes, it was still there, red pools of it, blossoming on the tiles like a sea of overblown poppies. Blood and more blood soaking into his clothes, clinging to the knife, puddling around his knees. The acrid, metallic tang of it still haunting his nose.
Only one person had witnessed the truth of what happened that day. A ten-year-old kid who had epilepsy. A child who couldn’t be believed. A child who, according to her mother, was a fantasist and a drama queen. The child of a woman who had despised Charlie for years.
Valerie had described Rachel as a problem child to the police, a problem child with an inappropriate crush on an older man. Valerie had blamed herself of course, telling them that it was her fault that Rachel followed Charlie around like a lap dog. As a witness, she had told the jury she hadn’t realised it was a problem until Rachel was prepared to bend the truth for him and cover up his crime. To think that it had gone so far that her child was prepared to lie for him!
Valerie had turned out an Oscar-winning performance as she’d told the twelve good citizens that she saw Rachel’s weaknesses as an indictment of her own poor parenting. She had testified that Charlie was a devious and charming man, and she had no doubt he had coerced Rachel into falsely defending him.
All Rachel had told them was that Charlie had pulled the knife out, not stuck it in, and that he had found Patsy there, in the hall, after she had been stabbed. The police had said that she would, wouldn’t she? The child was terrified of Charlie Jones, so of course she would lie. The jury had shaken their heads at the picture Valerie had painted for them and had looked at her with a mixture of pity and disdain.
Perhaps, that was where it all really began for Charlie. That single moment when he’d realised that the only person in the world who truly trusted him had been Rachel, a geeky ten-year-old kid.
***
Now the adult Rachel watched Charlie warily; that muscle in his jaw was tensing. A bad sign that meant he was in a place where no one else was invited. It was difficult for Rachel to remember a time when she hadn’t felt some form of love for him. An image of Charlie’s smile was one of her oldest memories. Charlie had never brushed her off, never told her to go away, never told her to be quiet and stop pestering. Back then he been like a big brother, fourteen years her senior and awe-inspiringly estimable in her eyes.
When Delia was working in the house Charlie could often be found in the garden, hacking at the undergrowth in a vain attempt to abate its creeping bid for dominance. Then in later years, when he had begun working for Roy and had started to bring the lascivious Patsy with him to The Limes, he had always, without fail, spared time to say something nice to Rachel. What a pitiful little kid she must have been, so grateful for such meagre crumbs and hero-worshipping the cleaner’s boy because he had been kind.
Frances had been the one with the real crush, but Charlie either hadn’t seen the looks she gave him, or hadn’t noticed the efforts she made. Frances had even tried to emulate Patsy, by plastering on make-up and cutting off her skirts, until Valerie had slapped her face and called her a slut. She had backed off then, and had treated Charlie with condescending contempt ever since. His conviction for the murder Rachel knew he hadn’t committed had made Valerie’s day.
Rachel had been the first one into the hall the day Patsy died. She had raced away from Stella, running up the drive and into the house, panting for breath, cheeks rosy from the chill winter air. The hall had been strangely silent, as if time was holding its breath as she had hung her scarf and coat on the hallstand. Only when she had turned towards the kitchen had her mouth sagged open and her feet turned to lead. Patsy had been lying on the floor in a crumpled, bloody heap. A blood-streaked bubble of spit popping on her lipstick-slicked mouth as the life ebbed out of her.
Rachel had been transfixed, rooted to the spot. When Charlie had strolled into the hall from the kitchen, immediately issuing a guttural, almost primeval cry at the sight of his broken wife, he had thrown himself down onto the floor, instinctively pulling the knife from her chest, staring in horror as a pool of blood crept silently, still warm, towards his knees.
Though she could picture it vividly, Rachel couldn’t remember how many minutes the old grandfather clock had marked before Stella walked through the door and something other than death had begun to happen. It had felt like an aeon.
Charlie maintained that he had walked into the back of the house having come from the park, using the small gate that gave the residents of The Limes private access. However, there were no witnesses. The prosecution postulated that Charlie could have been in the house for any amount of time. No one else was in, so no one could corroborate his story. No one except Rachel, but her evidence was inadmissible and at best purely circumstantial. Ten-year-old children were not reliable witnesses.
Rachel knew Charlie hadn’t stabbed Patsy. She had heard that cry. It echoed in her memory like the sound of nails being dragged slowly down a blackboard – a screeching, penetrating sound that made every fibre of her being sing with pain. Most of all it was the memory of the hollow devastation in his eyes that assured her of his innocence both then and now.
If she told him now, told him the true reason she had walked away from him and Amy, she would see that look again. Not just the shadow of it reflected back at her when she looked into his eyes, but a full-blown re-creation of the moment his world had fallen apart for the first time.
Patsy. The woman who had brought them together, and the woman who still stood between them.
Patsy had been a magical creature, the only person Rachel remembered in colour. On the rare occasions she allowed herself to look back at her childhood, everyone else either appeared in black and white, or materialised as a faded, jaded representation of their younger selves.
The Seventies had been like that: dull, and leached of colour. But Patsy had been vibrant and alive, like a bird of paradise among a flock of lesser creatures. When Patsy was in a room she’d had the effect of magnifying everyone else’s mundanity. Stella had become smaller and dowdier; Valerie became more pinched and bitter and even more like an indignant bird of prey than had been usual. Frances’s arrogance became whiningly petulant and Roy had puffed himself up like the peacock he pretended to be.
Rachel had felt even more insignificant in Patsy’s presence, like a drab cuckoo chick in a borrowed nest. Only Charlie hadn’t changed. Charlie never changed.
Rachel’s thoughts were still consumed with the memory of Patsy lying on the hall floor like road kill when Charlie finally broke the silence. ‘So here we are, pulled together again by your damned family. Like always eh? And you haven’t even asked me about your daughter. Remember her? Amy – in case you’ve forgotten. For what it’s worth she thinks you’re dead. I never had the heart to put her straight and tell her she wasn’t wanted and you walked away towards the money. Her life’s been hard enough without having to know her mother
