Creeping Ivy (20 page)

‘Look, while you’re thinking, Emma, would you like to move in here? Only until you make a decision, of course, but if you need somewhere to tide you over …’

Emma put her glass on the floor, got up and flung both arms around Trish, laying her head on Trish’s shoulder for a second, before standing back to say, ‘You are the kindest and the best, Trish. And if it comes to it, I’ll take you up on your offer. I can’t tell you how much it means. I’ve been waking up out of nightmares about sleeping in a cardboard box in the Strand for days now.’ She tried to laugh. ‘I’d better be off now before I start snivelling. I’ve done too much of that these last few months as it is. What are you going to do next? Apart from asking Ben Weblock what he was doing in Charlotte’s park?’

‘I’m not sure.’

‘Trish?’

‘Yes?’

‘Why haven’t you already asked him?’

Feeling her cheeks heating, Trish shook her head.

‘I have in a way, but his wife was listening on the extension and I felt I couldn’t press it. Then this morning, I suppose I hoped you’d discover enough from Nicky so that I wouldn’t have to. I’m not sure if it’s that I’m terrified of what I might hear, or that I don’t want to upset him by suggesting he’s capable of …’

She looked at Emma and saw that she understood.

‘I was vile to him when he sacked Antonia nearly five years ago, and he looked so hurt when he thought I’d gone to ask if he knew where Charlotte is, I was wary of wading in again without better evidence. You’ve now provided it and I’ll have to bite the bullet.’

‘Fair enough. Although couldn’t you just tell the police? After all, it’s not exactly your responsibility to chase up suspects, is it?’

‘No.’ Trish sounded doubtful. ‘But I want to do everything I can, for all sorts of reasons.’

‘Like what?’

‘It’s absurd, but since this started, I’ve been feeling almost as though she were my child. It’s partly because I like her so much, and partly because I’ve seen quite a lot of myself in her, too. Everyone says she’s inherited the family temper, like me. And she hasn’t got a father, either. If Ben’s … If he’s hurt her, then I have to know.’

There was a pause until Emma said lightly, ‘Trish, I don’t believe you’ve ever been bad-tempered.’

‘Then I must’ve got better at hiding it than I knew. Thank you for that, Emma.’

‘It’s true. Good luck with Ben. And don’t forget you know him well. You were sure at the beginning that he hadn’t touched Charlotte. Robert’s always sounded much more likely. This new evidence can’t have changed that completely.’

‘Maybe not. It’s a pity Robert’s so bloody elusive. I know the police keep grilling him because Antonia’s told me so, but I’d be happier if I’d managed to talk to him myself.’

‘Why can’t you?’

‘Because I have no official position. If he were ever there at the house when I rang up, I could have a go, but I don’t see how I could make him talk to me if I rang him cold at the office. I’d drop in one evening if I thought I’d get anywhere, but Antonia seems determined to keep me away from the house now.’

‘D’you think she realises what you’re afraid of?’

Trish nodded. ‘She’s much too intelligent not to. But she’s either convinced that Nicky’s guilty or desperately trying to make herself believe it. Anyway, she hasn’t admitted to the slightest hint of suspicion of Robert. Maybe that’s because she knows I think she should’ve stayed with Ben. Perhaps she thinks I might crow.’

‘If she does,’ said Emma, picking up her bag, ‘she doesn’t know very much about you. Goodbye, Trish, and thank you. For listening as well as for your offer of asylum.’

Trish stood at the top of the iron steps, waving as Emma walked to her yellow car. She thought how much more they had in common than she had ever had with Antonia, even in the early days.

Trying to get rid of the feeling of disloyalty, Trish went to the kitchen to scuffle among the out-of-date food packets in the fridge in case there was anything edible. After a while she fetched a black bag and scooped the whole lot into it before dumping it in the dustbin and taking the car to Sainsbury’s. There she stocked up with enough nourishing provisions to satisfy even her mother.

Once everything was stowed, she ate a watercress-and-goat’s-cheese sandwich, drank some health-giving cranberry juice and settled down to a solid afternoon’s work on the book before finding enough courage to do what she knew must be done.

There was no answer to her knock at Ben’s door at four o’clock, and so she sat in her parked car, waiting. At about quarter to five she heard mad Daisy’s barking and got out to meet him.

‘Hi, Trish!’ he said, kissing her cheek and then having to pull back to restrain Daisy. ‘I suppose I expected you. Come in.’

She followed him into the kitchen and watched him fill the kettle.

‘Tea? Proper PG Tips, I mean, not Bella’s iced stuff.’

‘Thanks.’

‘Great. I’ll bung Daisy in the garden and then we can talk undisturbed.’ She watched him unlock the back door. Daisy was out like a rocket, bucking and leaping and barking as though she had not been allowed even to smell the air for weeks.

‘There,’ he said, coming back to wash his hands at the sink and then putting tea-bags into two large mugs.

‘So what’s the problem?’

Trish breathed carefully and stood up straighter.

‘Ben, I want you to tell me what you were doing in Charlotte’s park on Wednesday afternoons when you were watching her and Nicky Bagshot in the playground. And what you were doing there on Saturday.’

He blushed. That was what was unbearable. He didn’t say anything. He didn’t move. He just stood there, blushing. And he would not look at her. The kettle boiled and the steam must have burned his hand for he winced and moved sharply back, but even then he didn’t say anything.

‘Ben?’

At the sound of her voice, he did look up. She was shocked to see shame in his eyes.

‘Ah, Ben. No. Please.’

‘It’s not what you think, Trish,’ he said with difficulty.

‘How do you know what I think?’

‘I know that you must think I’ve hurt her, but I haven’t. I promise. And you know that I never promise what isn’t true, don’t you, Trish?’

‘Then why did you lie to me, Ben? And about something so important. How could you?’

‘I didn’t lie.’

‘You told me you’d never seen her,’ said Trish angrily.

He shook his head. His full but beautifully shaped mouth, which had always been his most expressive feature, twisted. Trish could not persuade herself that there was not a hint of satisfaction in the grimace. She felt that she could not bear to discover that Ben – gentle, decent, intelligent, kind Ben, whom she had thought she could have loved – was none of those things.

‘What I told you,’ he said, was that I no longer see Antonia and that I’ve never even met Charlotte. It’s what I told the police, too. I suppose I knew I might one day have to come clean and so I was particularly careful with my words.’

It was almost impossible to ask the question, but Trish knew she could not avoid it. She leaned on the edge of the worktop and looked at him, willing him to meet her eyes. At last he did so and she thought she could see misery in his and fear, but also enough shame still to make her worst fears seem stupid.

‘Come clean about what, exactly?’

‘That I have been there, watching her, every Wednesday for the past six weeks. It’s my half-day, Wednesday. I’ve taken Daisy there instead of to the common.’

‘That was why I knew you’d been there. I doubt if anyone would have noticed you if it hadn’t been for Daisy barking her head off.’

‘But you must see that I had to have her with me. A dog is the only reasonable excuse for a middle-aged man to be hanging about in a park full of children.’

‘Ben, don’t! Sorry, I didn’t mean that. Why did you go?’

‘Here. Tea.’ He found some bags and a carton of milk and proceeded to make the tea so slowly that Trish was almost screaming by the time he pushed one mug towards her. ‘It was when the results of Bella’s last tests finally came through. She can’t ever have a child naturally. And we’re both too old for fertility treatment to be a reasonable option. I …’

He looked at Trish, his mouth moving but not producing any sound. Seeing that he was in real difficulty, she reached over the wide worktop to touch his hand. He turned his palm upwards so that he could grip hers. That seemed to make it possible for him to speak.

‘You know how much I’ve always wanted children,’ he said, not making a question of it. ‘So, being you, you’ll understand. I’d always told myself that Charlotte wasn’t mine. There was so little chance of it, wasn’t there? You know, given what Antonia had been up to. But I … I began to want her to be. Even though I wasn’t ever going to try to have anything to do with her …’ He stopped and looked so self-conscious that Trish removed her hand.

‘Sure about that, Ben?’

‘Almost,’ he admitted. ‘You see, what I wanted most was to know that there was a child of mine alive in the world. I thought I’d know if I saw her … If I could see what she looked like, hear her, watch her playing, then I’d know if she was anything to do with me.’

‘And did you?’

He shook his head. ‘Sometimes I’d think she was and then sometimes I’d be certain there was nothing in her I recognised as being mine at all. She was a quick child, Trish, bright and clever and she made the other children laugh. I loved that. She was a real entertainer and popular, too. Nothing like me, you see.’

Oh don’t, thought Trish. Don’t go all weedy and self-critical on me, Ben. It’s just about the only one of your moods I’ve never been able to stomach.

‘Didn’t you think she was like that, Trish?’

‘Yes,’ she said, noticing that he was using the past tense and hating it. ‘Look, you must have watched the nanny as well. How did she strike you?’

Ben shrugged. ‘She seemed nice enough. I never saw her hit Charlotte, or even shout at her, if that’s what you mean. In fact, she always seemed remarkably gentle, always there if Charlotte fell over – or any other child, come to that. I’d believe this story she told about the other child falling off a swing. It’d fit with everything I saw during those six weeks.’

‘But you must have seen that too, since you were there on Saturday,’ said Trish angrily. ‘Don’t play games with me, Ben. This is much too serious.’

‘I’d gone before that happened, Trish, if it did happen. I got there at about five to three, just as they were arriving. Charlotte was pushing her toy pram and chattering away to Nicky. I didn’t stay longer than about five minutes. It seemed too risky.’

‘OK. Then what about other people? Did you ever notice anyone else hanging about, watching?’

He shook his head. ‘Trish?’

‘Yes?’

‘What are you going to do about this?’

‘You mean, am I going to tell the police?’

She looked straight at him and thought she could still see traces of most of the qualities she had once believed he possessed.

‘Only if you don’t,’ she said as gently as she could. ‘You must see that they’ll have to know.’

‘OK.’ He breathed heavily. ‘But you know what I’ll be risking, don’t you? As far as my job’s concerned.’

She shook her head. ‘Not if you’re innocent.’

‘Don’t be naive, Trish. You know how it goes. Someone in the police station rings a mate in the press and there are snide little articles, full of innuendo, not enough to sue on, but enough to put a blight on any primary teacher’s career.’

‘I think you may be being unfair to the police, Ben. And you must see that they have to know. Look, I’d better go. I can’t … When it’s all over we can talk properly, can’t we?’

‘If we can ever trust each other again.’

By that stage Trish was beyond wanting to know what he meant. She found that she could not see properly and stumbled as she went up the three steps to the hall. He was behind her, very close. She tensed in case he touched her and hurried towards the door. Her hands were slippery as she struggled to turn the knob of the Yale lock, but she got to grips with it eventually and managed to escape without having to look at him again.

Chapter Sixteen

At six-thirty the following morning Trish was pulled out of yet another nightmare by a tremendous banging sound. With the echoes pushing away the remains of her dream, she realised that she had not really been dragging Charlotte’s bleeding, mangled body out of a cellar. The banging came again, and a shrill ringing with it. She tried to get out of bed but found her legs were tangled up in the duvet.

‘Open up! Police! Open the door!’

She kicked herself free, thinking of film footage she’d seen of the police battering their way into suspects’ flats on the evening news. Out of bed, swaying a little, she reached for something to cover her long legs. In her hurry, she could not find any kind of dressing gown and so she wrapped a bathtowel around her waist. She was still tucking in the free end of the makeshift sarong as she opened the door.

‘You took your time,’ said a man, who flashed a card at her. ‘Constable Herrick.’

A peculiarly unpleasant smile widened his thin lips as he looked at her. Noticing the direction of his gaze, she glanced downwards and was not sure whether his prurient smile had been aroused by the sight of her breasts pushing out the thin cotton of her T-shirt or by its slogan. She was relieved she had changed the one about the honey and was now sporting nothing more surprising than:
I suppose you want me to be assertive. Well I’m not going to, OK?

‘Yes?’ she said. ‘How can I help you?’

‘We’d like to ask you some questions, Miss Maguire. This is Sergeant Lacie.’

Trish, who had not been able to focus on anything except the stout young constable’s unpleasantly leering expression, looked behind him to see a tall, well-dressed woman about five years older than him. The woman’s expression was one of faint distaste. Her smoothly pressed clothes put Trish at even more of a disadvantage, with her tousled hair and crumpled nightshirt.

‘You’d better both come in,’ she said, standing back to let them walk past her into the flat and almost tripping over the towel. ‘I’ll just get some clothes on.’