Hanging Hill (30 page)

31

‘What’s the matter?’ Kelvin had brought a bottle of cider up from the kitchen. He was standing at the window that looked out to the side of the house, unscrewing the bottle and pouring the contents into a cloudy glass. He lowered his chin and gave Zoë a long, measured look. ‘What’s the matter with you? You look weird.’

She lay in a curl against the bed head. She could no longer breathe through her nose: it had filled with compacted blood. Just like Lorne’s had. She kept thinking about that pile of bodies in Iraq. She kept thinking that if Kelvin had seen things like that on a day-to-day basis then Lorne’s death would have seemed like nothing.

All like her
…

He knew Lorne as a stripper or topless model. The same way he’d known Zoë. Neither of them would matter much to someone this insane. They’d be just links in the sequence. The superintendent had laughed, and said, ‘You’re telling us there’s a pile of bodies somewhere?’ but Kelvin wouldn’t see any difference between a pile of dead women and a pile of dead Iraqi insurgents. And to fight it she had nothing. Clever, clever Zoë. Spiky and cold, yes, but you couldn’t take the clever out of her. Except now. When she just couldn’t find a clever solution to this.

‘I’m …’ she began.

‘What?’ He looked up sharply. ‘You’re what?’

She hesitated. If she told him now she was police it could go either way. It could scare him into releasing her, or it could make him finish the job off even quicker.

‘You’re what?’

‘I’m cold. Can I have my sweater back?’

He grabbed it from the floor and threw it at her, then sat down and drank the glass of cider in one gulp. He lit a cigarette and smoked for a while, his eyes on the wall, as if he was lost in thought. She clutched the sweater round her shoulders. Gave a small shiver. ‘I have to go now.’ Her voice was coming out a bit thick when she spoke, making her sound as though she was deaf. ‘My husband’s going to call the police – he’ll be worried about me. I want to see you again. I’ll come back.’

‘You’ve said that already.’

‘I meant it.’

He poured more cider, screwed the lid on the bottle and raised the glass, as if he’d lost interest in her. She dropped her head back and breathed slowly through her mouth. She’d noticed in the last ten minutes that the window-frame was weak. Maybe – maybe …

‘You made me angry.’ Kelvin didn’t turn to her. ‘You made me angry and you made me do it. There’s a line, you know.’ He tapped the cider glass rhythmically. ‘A clear line. And once you cross it, once you’ve stepped into that other world, you have to accept the consequences. You have to take special measures.’

‘I’ll come back.’

‘Shut up. I’m thinking.’

She lay in silence, her eyes going from him back to the window-frame. Magpies sat in the branches of the tree outside, the way they had outside Lorne’s house. She wanted to shout to them, tell them to fetch someone, as if they could help her. Kelvin drank some more. He pulled up a chair and put it next to the chest of drawers, sat with his elbows on it, as if it was a desk. Lit another cigarette.

‘Can I have some water?’

He lowered his chin and turned his eyes to her, his face serious. ‘What?’

‘Water? I’m thirsty.’

‘Are you?’

‘Please?’

He shrugged, pushed the chair back. ‘Did you like me fucking you?’

She clenched her teeth.

‘I said – did you like me fucking you?’

‘Yes.’

He cocked his head, cupped his hand to his ear.

‘I liked it. Kelvin.’

‘Good. Then I’ll get you some water.’ He got up. Halfway to the door he took a sudden sharp step towards her, his hands coming up as if he was going to attack. She jolted back into the headboard, her arms flying up to protect her face. Then she saw he was smiling. Cautiously, she lowered her hands. ‘Don’t be so jumpy.’ He smiled. ‘We’ll get through this, babe.’ He came back to the bed and squeezed her leg reassuringly. ‘We’ll get through this together.’

32

When he’d gone she worked fast. She pulled on her trousers, her sweater. No time for knickers. It seemed to take for ever to get the boots on to her numb feet. Downstairs Kelvin turned on the tap in the kitchen. The water pipes in the walls knocked and groaned. The condom she shoved into her back pocket. She’d been thinking hard. The frames between the panes in the french windows were fragile – little more than beading holding the glass in: she’d be able to fit through the hole made by three frames in a vertical row. The moment the first pane went he’d hear, though, so she’d have to do it fast. Bam bam. Like the karate experts she’d once sat and watched in a Japanese park at dawn. Like Uma Thurman in the yellow jumpsuit in that film years ago.

From the balcony the drop was ten feet. If she didn’t land well she could forget it – her legs and feet were weak enough already without an injury and her only hope was to recover from the drop instantly and run straight into the forest before he could follow. Even when he had realized what the noise was it would take him time to get from the kitchen to the front of the house. The front door was locked – he’d have to find the key or go out of the back and round the cottage before she had time to reach the far trees.

The sound of him opening and closing the fridge door came up clearly from the kitchen. She heard him filling a kettle – doing what? Making tea for himself? He was so fucking calm that he was happily making tea, as if this was a normal Thursday for him. She flexed each muscle, checked it was working, wouldn’t let her down. Then she linked her hands into the iron bed head to brace herself, lifted her right knee up to her chin and kicked. The glass broke instantly, falling outwards, tinkling on to the balcony. The cross brace above it needed a second thump. It splintered, taking the pane above with it. Another kick and the final pane toppled outwards from the frame. The hole was almost three foot deep.

Kelvin’s footsteps were in the hallway; she heard him on the stairs, bellowing, ‘
Bitch! Bitch!
’

Good. Coming upstairs would cost him more time. With the sleeve of her sweater pulled down over her hand, she punched out the remaining slivers of glass and pushed her feet through. Then her hips. She heard Kelvin in the room, shouting and swearing, but she was gone, over the railings of the balcony, slithering down until she was dangling underneath it.

‘Do it,’ she hissed, looking at the ground, which seemed a million miles from her feet. ‘Do it.’

Through the broken window she saw him appear in the doorway, his face contorted with rage. She let go of the railings and dropped. She landed on the weed-cracked concrete, her ankle twisting painfully under her. She stumbled, her knees making awful cracking noises as they hit the ground. But she was OK. She pushed herself up and ran. Kelvin was yelling somewhere inside the house, throwing furniture around in his fury. She pictured a shotgun being chambered as she flung herself into the trees, heading aimlessly into the forest.

The trees didn’t quite have their full summer growth on them, and she could see a long way ahead. She could see the zigzaggy green splash of lawns. Maybe the edge of the estate that neighboured Goldrab’s. She pushed her wobbly legs on, breathing through her swollen mouth, crashing through dead wood and leaves, waxy green carpets of wild garlic in the corners of her eyes. Eventually the wood gave out to a sweep of grass so clipped and green it could have been a golf course. Beyond it she saw a pale Cotswold chippings driveway and a spectacular stone mansion basking in the sun, with turrets and stone urns on the parapets. A Land Rover stood in the driveway. She ran to it and tugged at the doors – locked – continued, breathing hard now, past another car, past cold frames and a walled garden where white peonies and early roses grew, each neatly labelled. The front door had a huge old knocker – a Jacob Marley – and she hammered on it, the noise echoing through the house and out across the grounds. She glanced anxiously over her shoulder up the lawn. There was no sign of Kelvin in the trees.

‘Hello?’ She opened the letterbox and yelled through it. ‘Anyone home?’

No answer. She limped along the front of the house, catching sight of tasselled curtains inside the leaded windows, her reflection moving across them – hair all over the place, her nose swollen to twice its normal size. She rounded the corner and made her way past dustbins, a pile of sawn logs, two cans of oil. She hammered on the back door, put her hand up to shade her eyes and peered through the windows. She saw an elegant painted kitchen, a central island, an Aga. No lights or sound. She went back to the corner of the house, and as she did she saw him. Just a blur in the trees, his red and black shirt a patch of moving colour – running down to the lawn with his arms out at his sides. She turned and began to head towards the front of the house, to the driveway that led to the road. Immediately she saw her mistake – she’d be in the open on the driveway. She hesitated. There was a wheelie bin next to one of the dustbins. She opened it and looked inside. It was almost empty – just one tied carrier bag of rubbish at the bottom – and it was solidly placed against the wall. It didn’t move as she swung in one leg, then the other, landing in the bottom, reaching above her head to pull the lid closed.

It was dark and warm in the bin. She couldn’t hear anything outside, just the hot percussive in and out of her own panting bouncing off the plastic walls. She wiped the sweat off her forehead and carefully lifted the carrier bag to her knees, silently using her fingernails to slit a hole in the plastic. Inside were the remains of a kid’s packed lunch – a couple of squashed drinks packets, a screwed-up ball of silver foil with crumbs on it, a wad of napkins printed with blue dinosaurs – and three baked-beans cans. She pulled the lid out of one of the cans and put it between her knees, crushing with all her might until it folded into two. Then she reversed it and folded it again. She did it three times before it split along the folded edge. She held it against her fingertip – sharp. It would work if she got the right angle.

Footsteps sounded on the gravel. Kelvin. She held her breath, raised the tin lid in both hands above her head. He went past getting so close she could hear his breathing, a raspy, deep-barrelled noise. He wasn’t fit in spite of his job and his army background: the drink and the cigarettes had taken their toll. She could have outrun him, could have got to the road if she’d just had the confidence. She heard him go round the house twice, circling like a buzzard, passing so close to the bin she felt his clothing brush it. Then his footsteps disappeared towards the road.

After a long time she dared to look out. The long, sun-baked drive led to two stone newels, the gates standing wide open. She was just in time to see him exit and stand in the lane, looking up, then back down the hill. He hesitated, then turned and began to walk in the direction of his cottage.

When she was sure he had gone, she clambered out of the bin. She stood for a moment, unpicking the wad of dinosaur napkins, then carefully cleaned out the inside of a second beans can. She rinsed it under the garden tap, dried it with the napkins, pulled the knotted condom out of her pocket and dropped it in. She secured it by wadding a couple of napkins on top. Then she rinsed her hands again, splashed some cold water on her face, and began to hobble down the driveway towards the road. It was early afternoon. The sun had just begun its long descent from the top of the sky.

33

Sally sat at the open kitchen window, an untouched cup of coffee at her elbow, and stared out across the fields. The Caterpillar opposite Hanging Hill had its new leaves on, and the outline it cast against the midday sky was thick. One day it had been a line of skeletons, stretching their hands to the sky, and the next they’d fattened into trees. Just like that, summer was on its way.

She picked up the phone and looked at it. No messages, no texts. Steve had already gone to the gate for his flight home. She unfolded the wet wipes, now dry, and flattened them on the table, tracing her fingers across the words.

Evil bitch
.

There was a way of dealing with this. There was. She just couldn’t see it yet.

The doorbell rang and she sat bolt upright. She hadn’t heard a car. There definitely hadn’t been a car. Hurriedly she folded the tissues, went to the window and leaned out. Standing on the porch with her back to the window was a woman, filthy dirty and dressed in torn jeans, hair straggling down her back.

‘Hello?’

The woman turned, looked back at her without a word. Her face was bruised, her nose swollen; there was dried blood in her hair and on her face. Her eyes were dead black holes.

‘
Zoë?
’

She shovelled the wipes into a drawer, slammed it closed, went into the hallway and unlocked the door. Zoë stood with one arm against the wall, her shoulders sagging, her head drooping. She gazed at Sally as if she was looking at her across a great, shattered expanse of desert. As if she’d found herself in a world so terrible that no one, no one, could ever adequately describe it.

She tried to smile. A twitch at the corner of her mouth. ‘People keep telling me I should ask when I need help.’

Sally was silent for a moment. Then she stepped on to the porch and put her arms around her sister. Zoë stood there stiffly. She was shivering.

‘Give me a bath, Sally. And something to drink. Will you? That’s all. I need a little money to get home, but I’ll pay it back.’

Sally shook her head. She held Zoë out at arm’s length, studying her in the sunlight. Her nose was a bloodied ball. There were rivulets of blood running down her chin and her lips were swollen. She couldn’t meet Sally’s eyes.

‘Please don’t ask. Please. Just the bath.’

‘Come on.’

She guided her inside, kicking the door closed, and helped her down the corridor. Zoë limped painfully along, grunting slightly with each step. In the bathroom Sally turned on the taps, then collected the towels Millie had left lying around that morning, and dumped them in the laundry basket.

‘Here.’ She put a clean towel around Zoë. ‘You’re shivering.’

‘I won’t outstay my welcome. I promise.’

‘Shut up.’ She switched on the heated towel rail, and brought flannels and clean towels from the airing cupboard. While the bath ran she went to the kitchen and prepared a tray with a tall jug of mineral water and a pot of coffee. Even as a child Zoë had drunk loads of coffee. Black and strong.

Back in the bathroom Zoë had peeled off her clothes and was climbing into the bath. Sally put the tray on the window-sill and watched her. It was strange enough to see another woman’s naked body in her bathroom, but to see her own sister’s. To see all the skin and muscle and flesh that Zoë walked around in, the covering that she lived in day to day and was so used to she didn’t even look at. Not so different from Sally’s, with the dimples and the small pouches and sags and records of life, except that Zoë was so tall and slim. And something else – she was covered with injuries. Welts and cuts and bruises everywhere. Some looked old, some new. She winced as she settled in the bath, soaked a flannel and held it to her face. The nails on her right hand were broken and black with blood.

‘You’re so beautiful,’ Sally said. ‘More beautiful than I ever was. Mum and Dad always said you were the beautiful one.’

There was a silence. Then Zoë began to cry. She pressed the flannel into her face, leaned forward and took long, convulsive breaths, her shoulders shaking and shuddering. Sally sat on the edge of the bath and put a hand on her sister’s naked back, looking at the vertebrae standing white and sharp under her skin. She waited for the spasms to slow. For the awful, racking sobs to fade.

‘It’s OK now. It’s OK.’

‘I was raped, Sally. I was.’

Sally took a deep breath, held it, then exhaled. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘Tell me.’

‘The man who killed Lorne Wood. He raped me – I got away. I’m supposed to be dead.’

‘The man who killed
Lorne
? But I thought Ralph Hernan—’

Zoë shook her head. ‘It wasn’t him.’

Sally didn’t move for a few moments. Then she reached for the towel. ‘You shouldn’t be in the bath. Get out. They have to test you.’

‘No.’ She pulled her knees up to her chin and hugged them. ‘No, Sally. I’m not going to the police.’

‘You’ve got to.’

‘I can’t. I can’t.’ She dropped her forehead on to her knees and cried some more, shaking her head. ‘You think I’ve been strong and independent all my life, don’t you? But that’s wrong. I was stupid. When I left school I was stupid. All the money I got to travel the world? I told Mum and Dad I’d got a magazine to pay for it – that I was working for them.’

‘The travel magazine.’

‘Oh, God – it never existed. I got the money from doing stupid stuff.’

‘Stupid stuff,’ Sally said hollowly. She was thinking about the way Millie had got her money, from Jake. That had been stupid. ‘What stupid stuff?’

‘Nightclubs. You know the sort of thing. The sort of place David Goldrab would have hung around. It was the stupidest thing I’ve ever done and I regret it. Oh, Christ.’ She wiped her tears with the back of her hand, avoiding touching her nose. ‘I’ve spent the rest of my life regretting it. The
rest of my life
.’

‘You took your clothes off? Stripping? Or pole-dancing or something?’

She nodded miserably.

Sally frowned. ‘But that’s – that’s
nothing
. I thought you meant something really serious.’

Zoë raised her tear-stained face, puzzled. Sally opened her hands apologetically. ‘Well, I can think of worse. It’s just …’ She faltered. ‘
You?
It seems so …’

‘I had to make some money fast. I had to get out of the house – you know why.’

‘But it’s the sort of thing someone would do if they …’ Sally groped for the word. ‘Well, if they didn’t much like themselves.’

There was a beat of silence. Zoë’s face was rigid. Then Sally got it.

‘But, Zoë – how could you? I mean … you’re beautiful and brave and you’re clever. So
clever
.’

‘Please stop saying that.’

‘It’s true.’

‘Well, I’m not very clever now, am I? I’ve been raped and I can’t do a thing about it.’

‘You can. We’re going to report it.’

‘No! I
can’t
. I can’t go and report this bastard to them because …’ She shook her head. ‘He knows me, this guy. From the clubs – he used to work in one of them as a handyman. He gave me the creeps, the way he was always watching me. He’d use it in his defence. I’d have to stand up in the witness box and his fucking brief would point out to everyone that I used to …’ She wiped her eyes angrily. ‘I can’t tell them. I can’t say a thing.’

Sally tapped her mouth thoughtfully with her fingernails. ‘There has to be a way. Who is he?’

‘You know him. You won’t remember him but we were at nursery school together, can you believe? Kelvin Burford. He—’

She broke off. Sally had sat forward and was gaping at her, her mouth open. ‘You’re not joking? Are you?’

‘Of course I’m not jok— What is it?’

‘Good God.’ Sally stood up. ‘Good God.
Kelvin?
’

‘Yes. Christ almighty, Sally.’ Zoë rubbed the tears off her face and stared at her sister. ‘What the hell have I said?’