Disturbing Ground (5 page)

And now they had a diversion. Bianca Rhys found drowned in a pond little larger than a child’s paddling pool. Megan chewed her sandwich thoughtfully and pictured Alun wading in to recover the body. His trousers had only been wet to the knees. Even if Bianca had fallen
in she could have stood up and climbed out. Megan frowned. So it was not like the Hood poem,
In
she
plunged
boldly
-
no
matter
how
coldly?
Neither had it been the accidental drowning of Clementine,
Hit
her
foot
against
a
splinter.
Fell
into
the
foaming
brine.

She smiled. Even with the most poetic imagination the Slaggy Pool could hardly be described as “foaming brine”.

She finished her sandwich and opened the packet containing her flapjack just as her mobile phone rang.

She fished around for it in her bag. “Hello?” She was never at her best responding to it when the number display read Anonymous. She liked to know to whom she would be talking and always answered with a cautious, “Hello?”

“Doctor Banesto?”

“Yes.” The voice was unknown.

“Franklin Jones-Watson here.”

The name meant nothing to her. “Yes?”

“We haven’t met before …” A soft, educated, Cardiff voice. “I’m the pathologist here at The Princess of Wales Hospital. I’ve just finished the post mortem on a patient I believe was yours who drowned earlier this week. The police said you were first on the scene.”

It was as though a stone had been thrown into the deep, dark waters; ripples forming on its surface. “We are talking about Bianca Rhys, are we?”

“Yes. I understand from the Coroner’s Office that she had a bit of a medical history.”

“She was a schizophrenic.”

A pause.

Her turn to ask a question. “How long did you think she’d been in the water for?”

“Hard to say. About twelve hours, I think.”

“But I’d have thought her body would have …”

“Floated? It was near the surface but according to the police the dress was caught in an old pushchair that had been dumped. And there was some stone thing in the pocket.”

“Her body was weighted?”

“Well - yes. No - not really, the stone wasn’t that heavy.”

“You’re telling me you think she might have drowned herself? Deliberately?”

“Hard to say. I’ve sent some serum for barbiturates. Hit her head nasty on something in the bottom of the pool too.”

Megan felt a tightening of the muscle at the back of her neck. “She had a head injury?”

“Done at round about the point of death.”

“But you’re not suspicious about it?”

“Good gracious me no. No … No I don’t think so. I mean you never know with these people what they’re going to do next. Talk about unpredictable. Gets hard for us to work it out. How can we ever know what is in the mind of someone who is psychotic?”

“So you’re saying …?”

“Balance of mind was disturbed. I can call it accidental death. Easier for the relatives, you know. No need to call it suicide. She might have collected the piece of stone out of interest or as a talisman, or even because she thought it was the currency of Llancloudy.” He laughed. “Who can know? Anyway. Poor woman. Died quickly. Dry drowning. Not a drop in the lungs at all.”

“She didn’t even draw breath?”

“No. Usual vagal inhibition. Shock really.”

Megan didn’t know whether to be relieved Bianca hadn’t drowned or concerned as she said goodbye to the
pathologist. She put her phone back in bag, gathered up her things and returned to her car.

And so through tacit agreement between GP and pathologist the verdict was passed.

The coroner would not argue.

Schizophrenics can be so tantalising, sliding in and out of the truth. Fantasising with the assurance of sane fact, yet terrified of water. And yet Bianca’s most irrational delusion had turned out to be rational after all.

Touch
her
not
scornfully

Think
of
her
mournfully

The words of the poem were still echoing round her mind as she returned to the surgery that afternoon. Bianca’s death was still provoking her curiosity so instead of walking straight into her consulting room for her evening surgery, Megan went upstairs to the practice library, selected a pathology book from the shelf, found the chapter on “dry drownings” and started reading.

“
15-20
%
of
all
drownings
are
so
called
“dry”
in
that
there
is
no
deep
inhalation
of
fluid.
Many
of
these
deaths
are
very
sud
den
and
show
no
evidence
of
a
significant
struggle
by
the
vic
tim.
The
precise
mechanism
of
death
remains
speculative.
One
proposal
is
that
the
sudden
inrush
of
fluid
into
the
mouth
and
throat
results
in
laryngospasm
with
consequent
asphyxia.
”

Megan closed the book with a feeling of bleakness. So that was how Bianca Rhys had died. Simple asphyxia.

It fitted.

Her terror at finding herself falling into the filthy pool would have been enough to cause paralysing fear, laryngospasm and death. She would not have dared draw breath.

Only one aspect of Bianca’s death did not fit quite so neatly.

What had she been doing up there in the first place?

According to her daughter the pond had been one of the places Bianca had avoided like the proverbial plague. She would not have strolled around it on a sunny afternoon. Let alone on a damp evening. Megan sat very still for a while. It could not have been on a sunny afternoon
anyway. Not Sunday. Someone would have seen her. Throughout the day there were always people milling around the place - walking dogs, sitting, gossiping - whatever the weather. And Sunday had been fine. Like the well in Biblical times, the Slaggy Pool had become something of a meeting place, even if it sprouted with urban rubbish - abandoned pushchairs and old Tesco’s trolleys - and its grounds were simply a small, well trodden patch of grass with two, tiny, non-productive flower beds. Vandals never allowed the council plants to grow. They dug them up and transplanted them to their own gardens or simply urinated all over them after a night out, poisoning the flowers.

So Bianca had fallen in the pool under cover of darkness. On Sunday night, according to the forensic evidence. Megan sat with her chin cupped in her hand and tried to picture this scenario too - and again ran into a problem. Bianca’s paranoia had been deep rooted enough to ensure that she rarely left her house after dark. And it wasn’t solely the result of psychotic imaginings. The strange figure, with her vivid pink hair, thin enough to have posed for one of Lowry’s stick women was a bizarre enough sight. But hunched up, muttering to herself and moving in jerky steps had made her an obvious target for the drunken gangs of mouthy youths which walked the streets of Llancloudy. Once she had been physically attacked - a bottle thrown in her face leaving her with a scar which pulled up the corner of her right eye to add to her bizarre appearance. She was too instantly recognisable as different. To be different is to be noticed. And to be noticed can, in some circumstances, be dangerous.

So it was unlikely she would have wandered near the pool and after dark unless she had a specific reason for going. The trouble was a “reason” to Bianca might be just
about anything. The voices might have ordered her to go there, or she might have believed the pond was filled with money or the gateway to another world. It was even possible that “the voices” had made her more frightened of staying in the house with Esther than leaving it. Or she might simply have become confused and wandered to the pool without knowing where she was. Maybe the best thing would be to speak to Esther Magellan and the next door neighbour.

Megan smiled, closed the pathology book and wished her mind would stop asking unanswerable questions. The police would surely have followed up these lines of enquiry. It wasn’t really any of her business. Her responsibility towards Bianca had finished. She headed back down the stairs and threaded through the packed waiting room.

But as she worked her way through the evening surgery only half her mind was concentrating on her patients. The other half was dipping in and out of Bianca’s mind, as though she should not yet abandon her patient. It was almost as though Bianca had some access to her mind and was claiming unfinished business. It was probably because she could not quite banish Bianca from her thoughts that she was not surprised when, at the end of the surgery, the receptionist buzzed through to say that Carole Symmonds had rung, wanting to speak to her. Feeling as though subconsciously she had been waiting for the call Megan took the message and closed her door. She did not want the receptionists eavesdropping.

Carole answered on the first ring. She must have been sitting over the phone. She launched straight in.

“The police have told me about the post mortem.” She sniffed and Megan was acutely aware of the depth of Carole’s grief for her mother. She was touched.

At the same time she was wondering exactly what the police had told Carole.

“They told me my mother didn’t suffer,” she started. “That she died before she hit the water. She didn’t really drown.”

“Ye-e-s?”

“But I’ve been thinking, doctor, and there’s some things I don’t understand.” She sniffed again and Megan knew she was crying.

“Go on,” she prompted.

“Mam wouldn’t have
drowned
herself. You know what she was like about water. She couldn’t have done it. I’ve told them about Mam hatin’ water and then they suggested she’d accidentally fallen in and what with bein’ frightened and her clothes catching on the rubbish in the pond …” She stopped. Megan heard a few more sniffs before Carole started again. “I’ve got an idea, doctor, of what might have happened and I sort of wondered whether you thought it was possible.” Carole hesitated and Megan sensed her embarrassment. “Go on,” she prompted again.

“Well - you know what Mam’s voices were like. Sometimes they told her to do daft things. And even though she didn’t want to she couldn’t argue so she’d do anything to try and make them shut up. She told me once they screamed in her ear. Other times they’d whisper. Sometimes they’d sing. Other times they’d hum, tuneless like, like those monks chanting. She had to give in to them. The policeman said they found something a bit strange in her pocket. A bit of a statue - or something. If they said to get it - I mean - Mam did collect things.”

“Collect” was a polite word for frank kleptomania. Bianca had been charged with shoplifting on numerous occasions; the empty video cases she was so fond of touching, sweets and other items from the long suffering
Co-op. Usually objects she could have no possible use for, babies’ nappies, bars of slimmers’ chocolate, bags of anything - potatoes, dog food, bird nuts, guinea pig straw - stuffing it all in an ancient brown vinyl shopping bag. The shop owners took her to court, attempted to ban her from their store. But she sneaked in and filled her pockets. She always got off on the same defence so what really was the point? It merely clogged up court time. But although the shop keepers were not unsympathetic to Bianca’s diagnosis they were true to the notices pinned up in the front of their shops. They prosecuted every time. And what struck Megan now was that the defence plea which had been trotted out as often as a seaside donkey was exactly the same phrase as was being used now to explain her death. “Balance of mind disturbed …” It was not only an apt phrase to account for aberrant behaviour in a schizophrenic but a very useful phrase which could be used to explain any occurrence, including now her death.

Megan swallowed a smile. “Yes - she did
collect
things. You’re right.”

Carole laughed. “Empty beer cans, bottle tops, video cases. You name it, doctor. She collected them all. You know what her house was like. And the piles of newspapers. Well - it was ridiculous. Boxes of them. Some dating back to the 1960s. Her place was a fire hazard. And a health hazard. I told her so. So I suppose I shouldn’t be that surprised that she had a stone in her pocket.” She paused to breathe in and exhale in a long sigh. “But it still feels all wrong, see?”

Megan did see, only too clearly. The trouble was she could not picture any other way it could have happened. Bianca’s death must have been an accident. No one would have wanted to murder her, not in such a hit and miss, cold blooded, calculated way as to first of all lure her to
the Slaggy Pool, risking being seen, hit her on the head and push her in. Particularly when she
could
have paddled out of a three foot pond. But on the other hand the drowning bore none of the hallmarks of a random mugging, apart from the “head injury”. Megan found herself nodding vigorously in agreement with Bianca’s daughter and was relieved she could not be seen.

It
did
not
do
to
plant
doubts
in
the
minds
of
grieving
rela
tives.
Grief
alone
was
enough
without
asking
questions
no
one
would
be
able
to
answer.
So she gave a non-committal, “Ye-e-es,” realised she was not being much help or support and waited for Carole to continue.

But Carole was answering her own questions. “She must have wandered up there and fallen. Just chance she had the bit of stone in her pocket. There’s no other way it could have happened.” She still sounded dubious and she had not finished.

“There’s another funny thing, Doctor. No one saw her on the Saturday. Not all day. And that’s really peculiar - don’t you think?”

“Ye-e-s.”

“I’ve asked around. She wasn’t at any of her usual haunts.”

“Did you speak to Esther Magellan?”

Carole’s laugh was explosive. “You know what she’s like. Still expects Mam to walk in. It hasn’t sunk in at all that she’s not comin’ back.”

“But did you ask her about the weekend?”

“She doesn’t know what day of the week it is, let alone when she last saw Mam.”

“Well, what about Doris Baker?”

“She gave Mam her medication Saturday morning and never saw her again. She says she put it out Sunday but Mam wasn’t around. Monday when she saw the tablets
were still there she was going to ring the police but then she heard the news and they rang her instead.”

“So you don’t really know whether your Mum was home over the weekend or not.”

“Not for sure. But you know Mam. Hung around the shops for her entertainment. She went there every day. That’s why they noticed that she wasn’t there Saturday or Sunday. I spoke to the girls at the Co-op. They hadn’t seen her. I asked at the chippie and I went in the video club. Not one of them had seen her. Not all day Saturday and not on the Sunday either.”

But she had not died until Sunday night. After dark.

“She could have stayed in the house all day.”

“She didn’t used to do that.” Surprisingly Carole laughed. “She didn’t do that even if the weather was awful. Used to say stayin’ in all day with Esther drove her mad.”

Megan found herself joining Carole’s daughter and laughing too with wry humour.

But when they both stopped Carole’s voice was still troubled. “And I can’t see her going up to that pool after dark. You knew my mam, Doctor Banesto. She
never
went out at night. Barricaded herself and Esther in as though they were under siege. She wouldn’t even let
me
in after dark. So why did she go out?”

Megan had met all this before, this pondering over questions that never would be explained. Sometimes it was a necessary part of the grief process.
Why
had
they
gone
out?
Why
hadn’t
they
worn
a
seat
belt?
Why
had
they
had
that
one
last
drink?
Why
had
they
made
that
final,
fatal
mis
take?
At other times it delayed recovering from grief because it was a pointless, round and round and round again thought process, which lead nowhere but back to the beginning.
Why?

So she fed Bianca’s daughter with the empty truth that
they would probably never have answers to these questions and Carole Symmonds wound up the conversation. “Ah well, doctor. I just wanted to go over these few things that have been bothering me, to thank you again for all you did for my mam. She thought the world of you, you know.” Another sniff. “The funeral’s set for next Thursday. Two o’ clock at the church.”

“I’ll be there, Carole.” It was the final courtesy that could be paid to her ex-patient, one that would be noted and approved in Llancloudy. Funerals were important to the valleys folk.

“She wanted to be buried but she didn’t want a tombstone, you see. Didn’t like ‘em. Said she worried what we’d put on it.”

Megan smiled at the strange request, at the same time almost sympathising with Bianca’s suddenly sharp perception. Not wanting a stone of her own must surely be the final anomaly of Bianca’s life and death. As she put the phone down she was still smiling. Why should she be surprised at the unusual circumstances of Bianca’s death and interment when everything about the woman had been unexpected, unexplained.