A Game For All The Family (45 page)

No thirteen-year-old girl could hold a thirteen-year-old boy outside a window in order to drop him a few seconds later, or even a second later. A small dog, on the other hand, a dog roughly the size of a Sealyham terrier, would present no problem. I think you use the word “drop” when you tell the story because you’re picturing Perrine holding Malachy with both hands, her arms outside the window. I think you’re imagining her looking him right in the eye, savoring that moment when there’s nothing but her hands and her power between him and certain death. Do you torture yourself by acting out in your mind those seconds during which she might have decided to save him?

Is it a test for Stephen, Fleur and George? To see if they’re as clever as you think they ought to be? Because you don’t truly trust anyone, you test people constantly, setting yourself up as judge. You haven’t told your husband and children that Malachy is a dog, but you’ve given them all the clues—including your careful use of the word “drop” whenever you tell them the story, and I bet you repeat it and discuss it often. They haven’t guessed yet. Does that satisfy you or frustrate you? Do you think you’re capable of having any interaction with another human being that isn’t entirely manipulative?

It’s not only the word “drop” that gives the game away. When everyone is invited to Speedwell House at the end of the story, the mother of Perrine’s third victim, David Butcher, says to Malachy Dodd’s “mother,” “Will you pipe down? Do you
know
who my son was?” At first I thought, “Snooty elitist mother of Cambridge college organ scholar,” but, really, what mother would say that to another woman in the exact same position as her, when they’ve both lost their sons? I don’t believe anyone would, not even the snobbiest person in the world, and they certainly wouldn’t follow it up with: “Are you even a
tiny
bit embarrassed about how much airtime you’re taking up today?” (See, Anne? The oral tradition is alive and well. I have the whole story, as if from your mouth.)

It makes far more sense if Malachy is a Sealyham terrier, doesn’t it: Mrs. Butcher thinking, “This is unbelievable! People have died, and she’s playing the part of Chief Tragedy Queen when all she’s lost is a bloody pooch!”? Because so many people don’t understand, do they, that you can love a dog as much as you love a person?

Talking of love . . . there is more evidence in the Ingrey story to suggest Malachy is a dog. Lisette and Allisande loved Malachy, or so the story goes. Loved? Do teenage girls generally love teenage boys who are younger than them? Do they love teenage boys who are not relatives, or when no hint of romance or sexual attraction seems to be involved? Malachy made Perrine cry, though. This, I believe, is a direct reference to your real sister Sarah’s allergy. Did Perrine have the same allergy, Anne?

In the story, Malachy’s regular visits to the Ingrey house are “a compromise” between Bascom and Sorrel, your fake parents. In what way, though? Did one of them want him to come around regularly while the other didn’t? I know the defining characteristic of Bascom and Sorrel as a couple is that they disagree about most things, but why would either of them not want Malachy to come around? From the rest of the story, there’s nothing about either parent being against friendships for their daughters, or disapproving of visitors to the house—at least not before the attempt on Perrine’s life during the rounders match led to a complete hunkering down.

There is, however, a reference to Sorrel wanting to fill the family home with cute, furry pets, while Bascom is determined not to have even a goldfish under his roof. Aha!—all of a sudden, this “compromise” makes perfect sense. Malachy is the “pet compromise.” He’s not an actual pet, but, rather, a regular animal visitor.

Because, let’s face it, if he were a teenage boy of Perrine’s age, would he really be allowed to spend time with her up in her bedroom, with no one else around? Especially by Bascom, who, we are told, would never have let Malachy Dodd cross his threshold in an ideal world?

Let’s pause for a second to reflect on the workmen you refer to as “the bumcrackers”—those poor men who were forced to sleep on buses because Bascom was so worried that they might molest his daughters: “One could never tell,” with strangers. Would that same Bascom Ingrey allow a teenage boy to stroll on up to his youngest daughter’s bedroom with impunity? I doubt it. An elderly thirteen-year-old dog, on the other hand, would not pose the same deflowering risk. Bascom expresses approval for Malachy at one point in the story—why, then, does he not want him at Speedwell House? Because, of course, Malachy is a dog and Bascom is one of those people who doesn’t want animals anywhere near him, however cute or well behaved they might be.

So, what do you think of my evidence, Anne? I think it’s pretty conclusive. I think you should sit Stephen and the kids down and tell them, before I do: “Malachy Dodd was a dog. My sister Perrine’s first murder victim was canine, not human. A Sealyham terrier.” Or maybe you’d like to make him a different breed in the story, maintain a bit of emotional distance? Remember, though: choose a small breed, for dropping-out-of-the-window plausibility.

Then you can go on to explain to your husband and children that the whole story is a lie. You can tell them about the real Malachy, the genuine threat you believed your parents and sister posed to your well-being, even if it was only emotional and involved no death threats. Did you cry and beg them to let your dog stay? Did they ignore you? Tell you to stop being so silly?

Describe to Stephen, George and Fleur whatever it was that you went through that made you believe it was safer to retreat into fantasy and avoid the facts altogether. Admit to George that the reason you can’t stand the idea of his friendship with Ellen is because of your buried fear and repressed trauma from childhood. Admit that it has fuck all to do with Ellen being the daughter of Allisande Ingrey, your avenging sister.

Admit to your family that there is no rational reason for the four of you to batten down the hatches and hide, as if you’re in danger of imminent attack. Explain to them that you aren’t in danger, but that you can only feel happy and safe if you have total control of your children and can guarantee that they aren’t subject to any influence apart from yours. Then tell them you know how screwed up that is, and promise to get help before you ruin all of their lives and what’s left of yours.

George’s name is George Donbavand, not Urban Ingrey. Fleur is Fleur Donbavand, not Garnet Ingrey. They have the right to know this. Why did you feel the need to give them secret names, secret identities? Do you believe no one can survive in the world if they are seen for who they truly are?

As you can hopefully see, I have become obsessed with you and your fake biography, Anne. You’ve made me part of it and I want a resolution. I’d like to know who murdered Perrine Ingrey. It’s a tribute to your creative skills that, despite knowing she isn’t real and never was, I still want to know who killed her and why.

Yours sincerely,
Justine Merrison

From:
[email protected]

To:
[email protected]

Dear Ellen,

It’s George here. I am missing you more than usual. I think it’s because I know you’re not at home. Isn’t that peculiar? When you’re at Speedwell House, I can at least see the building that contains you, even if I can’t see you. I hope you come back soon. I am devising a flashing-light code that will allow us to communicate properly. It’s quite complicated and will take you a while to learn, but once you have, it will enable us to have proper conversations.

All my love,
George xx

From:
[email protected]

To:
[email protected]

You don’t have to start every email with “Dear Ellen, It’s George here”!! I know it’s you! Mum’s switched over to a different email address now anyway. Your code sounds amazing!! I’ll learn it v v quickly. I can also write it down and have a manual to refer to in case I get stuck (which I won’t!!) I can’t WAIT to get back to Speedwell House. I’m basically living in a kennel here. The dogs all stick their tongues into my cereal bowl while I’m trying to have brekkie—so gross! I wish you could come and live here with us. Failing that, I wish I could tell you where I am, but Mum says it’s important I keep it secret. You wouldn’t ever tell anyone, would you?

Hugs and kisses and LOVE, Ellen xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

From:
[email protected]

To:
[email protected]

I wouldn’t dream of telling anyone your confidential location, of course, but you still shouldn’t tell me, much though I yearn to know. I would feel so much happier if I just knew where you were, but I can’t promise that my mother won’t find this phone. Call me a pessimist, but I suspect that one day she will. This situation of being able to converse with you whenever I want to (albeit by machine) is too good to be true, and my fourteen years on this planet have drummed into me that things which are too good to be true don’t happen to me. Apart from meeting you, that is.

Dearest Ellen, don’t tell me where you are because I would smash a window and come and find you, and your mother is right: it wouldn’t be safe. My mother might find a way to get the information out of me. I wouldn’t put it past her to torture me (more than usual) and so it’s better if I’m not in on the secret. My only worry is how long this situation will go on for. I suppose it’s bearable for as long as we can email each other.

All my love,
George xx

From:
[email protected]

To:
[email protected]

Don’t worry, I think my mum’s planning to tackle the situation so that we can go back to our house—YAY! She keeps hinting she’s had THE BEST idea, and now she and the dog lady are having a whispery conversation in the garden!

xxxxxxxxxx

From:
[email protected]

To:
[email protected]

That is heartening news. I have every confidence in your mother’s brilliant idea. After all, she had you!

All my love,
George xx

16

T
hat’s my best guess,” Olwen concludes with a shrug. She throws a tennis ball for the dogs, using a plastic contraption that scoops it up off the floor so that she doesn’t have to bend down. “I can’t see who else could have murdered Perrine, but then everything I’ve said is based on the assumption that the story obeys its own internal logic. What if it doesn’t?”

“I think it does,” I say. “It might be a lie from start to finish, but it’s the life history Anne’s chosen for herself. She’s effectively swept the facts aside, substituted this story, and said, ‘This is who I am and what I’ve been through.’ She’d want it to be good. Watertight. The solution you’ve come up with is the best one. It’s the only one that works, and it’s . . . well, if it were true it would be shocking, wouldn’t it? For Lisette Ingrey, if she were real, it would be deeply traumatic.”

“Yes, and if it’s not true, it’s certainly ingenious,” says Olwen. “Though a little obvious, when there’s no other possible resolution.”

“Olwen, trust me, it’s not obvious. I worked in TV drama for years. Thirty twists a day crossed my desk. I thought I’d seen them all, but I could have read that story fifty times and I wouldn’t have gotten it.”

“I reckon you would. All the clues are there, as Ellen points out in the final paragraph. She’s a talented writer, your daughter. If you ask me, the most incredible thing about the story is that a fourteen-year-old wrote it.”

“No. Anne Donbavand wrote it—in her badly warped mind if not on paper. George learned it by heart and passed it on to Ellen, who wrote it down.” The tennis ball lands near my feet, dropped from a furry jaw. Before Olwen has a chance to scoop it up, I grab it and throw it so that it lands next to Figgy: pet nepotism in action. He wouldn’t stand a chance of getting it otherwise, with all these bigger dogs around. He pounces on it and tears off to the bottom of the garden with a triumphant glint in his eye, happily unaware that he didn’t win on merit. “I knew from the first sentence that story wasn’t Ellen’s,” I say.

“And now we know who killed Perrine Ingrey, or we think we might—”

“We do.”

“But how does that help you? The only real thing in the story’s Malachy the dog, so what does it matter?”

“If I’m going to stand a chance against Anne, I need to understand her delusions. On my own terms, I’m always going to lose. She doesn’t play by any rules I recognize. I need to play
her
game, and win. I think I can. I’m getting to understand her better.”

“She’s bonkers, Justine.” Olwen flashes me a sympathetic look as if she fears I might be too. “What more is there to understand?”

“Some lies are purely functional,” I say. “Like ‘No, Dad, I haven’t been smoking, honestly’ or ‘Yes, darling, of course I’m totally faithful.’ They serve a practical purpose, but the teller knows they’re not true. She doesn’t need them to be true in order to survive psychologically. Other lies are fully fleshed-out fantasies, chosen as preferable to the truth. Anne Donbavand
wants
it to be true that she was Lisette Ingrey, that she went through all that horror as a child.”

“Why would anyone want that?”

I sigh. “I could guess, but that’s all it’d be: groundless speculation.”