A Place of Execution (1999) (52 page)

This time, the nurse’s voice softened. ‘He’s what we call critical but stable. The next twenty-four hours will be crucial.’ Catherine walked back to the lifts in a daze. Being in the hospital brought George’s personal catastrophe home to her in a way that Sandra’s words hadn’t. Somewhere behind those closed doors, George was wired up to machines and monitors. Leaving aside what was happening to his body, what was happening to his brain? Would he remember sending the letter to her? Would he have told Anne about it? Should she act as if nothing untoward had happened? Not just in her own interest, she rationalized, but also to keep the family from one extra worry? Catherine found the coffee bar and settled herself at a corner table with a mineral water. She was so preoccupied with her thoughts, she didn’t see Paul until he was practically on top of her. Today, his resemblance to George was spooky. She’d spent so much time staring at a photograph of his father at almost the same age, it was as if the image on her wall had come to life and swapped a mac and trilby for a pair of faded jeans and a polo shirt. He dropped into a chair as if his legs couldn’t hold him up any longer.

‘I’m really sorry,’ Catherine said.

‘I know.’ He sighed.

‘How is he?’

Paul shrugged. ‘He’s not good. They’re saying he had a massive heart attack. He hasn’t recovered consciousness yet, but they seem to think he’ll come round. Oh God…’ He covered his face with his hands, obviously overcome. Anxiously, Catherine watched his shoulders heave with deep breaths as he struggled to regain control. Eventually, he recovered enough to continue. ‘His heart stopped in the ambulance, and I think they’re concerned there might be some brain damage.

They’re talking about doing a scan, but they’re being very noncommittal about the prognosis.’ He stared down at the table. Catherine covered his hand with hers in a simple gesture of sympathy.

‘What happened?’ she asked gently.

He sighed again. ‘I can’t help feeling it’s our fault. Mine and Helen’s, that is—’ He broke off. ‘Do you mind if we go outside? It’s so oppressive, this hospital atmosphere. My head feels like it’s stuffed with cotton wool. I could do with some fresh air.’

They were silent in the lift down. Catherine pointed out a row of benches on the far side of the car park. They sat down and stared unseeingly at a regimented square of rose bushes. Paul tilted his head back and breathed deeply. ‘Why would your father’s heart attack be your fault?’ Catherine asked eventually.

Paul ran a hand through his hair. ‘When we went to Scardale, something happened that made him really agitated. I don’t really know what it was, exactly…He didn’t say anything, but I could see he was getting really wound up when we arrived at Jan’s. Then when we went indoors, I almost thought he was going to faint. He went pale and sweaty, the way people do when they’ve got a terrible headache. He seemed distracted. He hardly said a word to Jan, he just kept looking around him as if he expected ghosts to start coming out of the woodwork.’

‘Did he say anything about what had upset him?’ Paul rubbed the bridge of his nose with his finger.

‘I think it was just the trauma of going back to Scardale again. It’s been on his mind so much, obviously, with all the work the two of you have been doing on this book.’ His shoulders drooped.

‘This is all my fault. I should have realized he wasn’t making a fuss over nothing when he said he really didn’t want to go to Scardale.’

‘There’s no reason why you should have thought it would make him ill, though,’ Catherine said gently. ‘You mustn’t blame yourself. Heart attacks don’t just happen overnight—it takes a lifetime for the conditions to build up. In your dad’s case, years of irregular hours, too many cigarettes, too many greasy-spoon meals eaten on the hoof. It’s not your fault this has happened.’

Paul’s face was bitter. ‘Taking him to Scardale was the trigger.’

‘Not necessarily. You’ve already told me you didn’t notice anything in particular that made him especially upset.’

‘I know. And I’ve been through it again and again in my head. We all had lunch out in the garden.

He hardly ate anything, which isn’t like Dad at all. He blamed the heat, and to be fair, it was warm.

After lunch, Jan took Mum round the garden. They were ages, comparing notes, arranging to swap cuttings, all that sort of thing. Dad went for a stroll round the village green, but he was only gone about ten minutes. Then he just sat there under the chestnut tree, staring into space. We left around three because Mum wanted to drop in on the craft fair down in Buxton, and we were home again by six.’

‘And George didn’t say whether anything special was bothering him?’ Paul shook his head.

‘Nothing. He said he had a letter to write and he went upstairs. Helen and Mum put a salad together for the tea and I mowed the lawn. He came downstairs after about half an hour and said he was going to the main post office in Matlock because he wanted to be sure of this letter catching the post and there’s no local collection in the evening. I thought it was a bit strange, but he’s never been one for putting things off.’

Catherine took a deep breath. It wasn’t fair to leave Paul guessing about the letter that had been so important to his father. ‘The letter was to me,’ she said.

‘To you? What on earth was he writing to you about?’ Paul was clearly baffled.

‘I don’t think he wanted to deal with me face to face,’ she said. ‘I don’t think he was up for the argument he knew he’d get.’

‘I don’t understand what you’re saying.’ Paul frowned. ‘Your father wanted me to cancel the publication of the book. With no explanation at all,’ Catherine said.

‘What? But that doesn’t make any sense.’

‘It didn’t make sense to me either. That’s why I came down to Cromford this morning. Then the next-door neighbour told me what had happened.’

Paul glared at Catherine. ‘So you thought you’d come and hassle him here? Very sensitive, Catherine.’

She shook her head. ‘No, you misunderstand me, Paul. When I heard what had happened to George, my first thought was for him, for all of you. I wanted to offer my help, my support.

Whatever.’ Paul was silent, thinking over what she’d said, his eyes dubious.

‘I’ve grown very fond of your parents over the last six months. Whatever the problem with the book is, it can wait. Believe me, Paul, I’m more concerned now about how your dad’s doing.’

Paul began drumming his fingers on the arm of the bench. He clearly lacked his father’s gift of stillness. ‘Look, Catherine, I’m sorry I snapped at you, but it’s been a tough night. I’m not thinking straight.’ She put her hand out and touched his arm. ‘I know. If there’s anything I can do to help, just tell me—please?’

Paul sighed deeply. ‘You can do something for me. I want to know what set this off. I want to know what happened yesterday to trigger this heart attack. If I’m going to help him, I have to know what’s behind it. You know more about my dad’s involvement with Scardale than anybody else, so maybe you can figure out what the hell happened to get him so worked up that his heart packed in on him.’

Catherine felt some of the tension slip away from her shoulders. To have the course of action she’d already decided on endorsed by Paul made her feel easier. ‘I’ll do my best,’ she said. ‘Nothing else happened last night that might have upset him? After he’d been to the post, I mean.’ Paul shook his head. ‘We all went down to the village pub. They’ve got a garden out the back and we just sat out there with our glasses of beer and talked about nothing much.’ He paused and frowned. ‘He was edgy, though. A couple of times, I had to tell him something twice because he just wasn’t tuned in to the conversation.’

‘Does Helen think there was anything odd in the way he was behaving?’

‘She agreed with me, that he seemed to have slipped a gear. She reckoned he’d been like that since we arrived in Scardale. She’d noticed, but it probably wasn’t obvious to anybody that didn’t know him. If her sister was offended by Dad’s silence, she certainly didn’t say anything to Helen…’

‘George wouldn’t have done anything to offend Janis,’ Catherine said.

‘No matter how upset he was. He’s such a kind man.’ Paul cleared his throat. ‘Yes. He is.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘I’d better be getting back.’

‘When do you have to be in Brussels?’ Catherine asked, getting to her feet.

He shrugged. ‘We were supposed to be going home the day after tomorrow. Obviously we won’t be leaving now. I’ll have to wait and see how he is.’

‘I’ll walk you back.’

As they approached the hospital, Paul exclaimed, ‘That’s Helen!’ and broke into a panicky run.

Helen swung round at his approach, a can of Coke halfway to her lips. Her face lit up in a smile but he was oblivious to that. ‘Has something happened with Dad?’ he demanded.

‘No, I just needed some fresh air.’ She reached out and put an arm round his waist, pulling him to her in a gesture of support. ‘Any news on George?’ Catherine asked.

Helen shook her head. ‘Still the same. Paul, I think we should try to persuade your mum to go and have a cup of tea and a bite to eat.’ She gave Catherine an apologetic smile. ‘You know Anne—she hasn’t left his side since they brought him up to intensive care. She’s going to wear herself out.’

‘I’ll let you go,’ Catherine said.

Paul took her hand. ‘Find out what he saw. Or heard. Or remembered,’ he said. ‘Please?’

‘I’ll do my best,’ Catherine said. She watched them walk back into the hospital, glad that she had something to do that might possibly ease the burden of guilt that Paul had assumed. That it would also serve her own interests had become a secondary consideration, she suddenly realized with surprise. George Bennett had clearly become more important to her than she had previously acknowledged. That made it all the more important that a book that would do him justice would eventually be published, she told herself firmly. And that was one service she could certainly provide.

August 1998

W
hatever had happened to change George Bennett’s mind, it had happened in Scardale. Catherine felt certain of that. He’d seen something, but what…? How could so brief a visit have produced so seismic a response? Catherine could have understood it if he had decided she needed to make some changes to her draft in the light of a fresh realization, but what could have been so extraordinary that it derailed the whole project? And if it had been so portentous a moment, how had it passed unnoticed among the rest of the family? In the shimmering heat of an August afternoon, Scardale was hardly recognizable as the grim winter hamlet she had first revisited in February. Because the summer had been so wet, the grass was lush, the trees more shades of green than any painter could capture. In their shade, even the undistinguished farm labourers’ cottages of Scardale looked almost romantic. There was no sense of gloom, no trace of the sinister events of thirty-five years before.

Catherine pulled up outside the manor house, where a five-year-old Toyota estate car sat in the drive. It looked as ifJanis Wainwright was at home. She sat in the car for a moment and pondered.

She could hardly walk up the path and say, ‘What happened to George Bennett yesterday that made him want to scrap our book? What was so terrible about his visit to your house that he collapsed in the night with a massive heart attack?’ But what else would work? She thought about asking Kathy Lomas if she’d seen George the day before. She turned in her seat towards Lark Cottage, but Kathy’s car was nowhere to be seen. Exasperated, Catherine got out of the car. When all else failed, she could try the trusted journalistic technique of lying through her teeth. She walked up the narrow path to the kitchen door and raised the heavy brass knocker. She let it fall and heard it echo through the house. A full minute passed, then the door suddenly opened.

Dazzled by the sunlight, Catherine could barely make out the woman’s shape in the dark interior.

‘Can I help you?’ she said.

‘You must be Janis Wainwright. I know your sister, Helen. My name’s Catherine Heathcote. You were kind enough to arrange for me to see round the manor house to help me with a book I’m writing about the Alison Carter case?’ She couldn’t have sworn to it, but Catherine sensed the woman withdraw at her words.

‘I remember,’ she said tonelessly.

‘I wondered if I might have another look around your house?’

Catherine’s eyes were beginning to adjust to the dimness of the kitchen.

Janis Wainwright definitely seemed startled, she thought. ‘It’s not convenient. Another time. I’ll arrange something with Kathy,’ she said quickly, her words running together in her haste.

‘Just the ground floor. I won’t be in your way.’

‘I’m in the middle of something,’ she said firmly. The door began to shut. Instinctively, Catherine moved closer so Janis would stop closing it. Then she saw what George Bennett had seen the day before. She didn’t so much step back as stagger. ‘Speak to Kathy,’ Janis Wainwright said. As if from a great distance, Catherine heard the lock click, then the crash of bolts being shot home.

Dazed, she turned and walked back to her car, stumbling blindly like a sleepwalker.

Now she thought she understood why George had written the letter. But if she was right, it wasn’t something she could readily explain to his son. And it wasn’t something that made her want to abort the book. It made her realize that there might be a deeper truth behind the Alison Carter case that neither she nor George had so much as guessed at. And it made her even more determined to tell the truth that she had so cheerfully toasted with Paul that night in London.

Catherine sat stock-still in the car, oblivious to the sweltering heat. Now the first moment of shock was past, she could hardly bring herself to credit what she’d seen. It made no sense, she told herself. Her eyes had lied to her. But if that was true, George Bennett’s eyes had also lied. The resemblance was remarkable, uncanny even. If that had been all, she could almost have written it off as bizarre coincidence, but Catherine knew that there was no resemblance in the world that stretched to include scars.

She had learned from her reading and her interviews that the one distinguishing mark Alison Carter had possessed was a scar. It was a thin white line about an inch long that ran diagonally through her right eyebrow. It touched the edge of her eye socket and cut up into her forehead. It had happened the summer after her father died. Alison had been running across the school playground with her bottle of milk at playtime when she’d tripped and fallen. The bottle had shattered and a piece of glass had sliced through her flesh. The scar, according to her mother, had always been most prominent in summer when she had a bit of colour from the sun. Just as Janis Wainwright had.