The House of Women (39 page)

‘
For what?’ Edith asked, frowning. ‘Press for what?’

‘
Imprisonment, Mama,’ Annie said.

‘
Some cases are better resolved with probation and an order for psychiatric treatment,’ McKenna said.

‘
All the treatment in the world won’t make her understand the devastation she caused,’ Edith said. ‘She’s like her father!’ Then she shook herself angrily. ‘Oh, God! I’m passing the buck, just like him.’

‘
Come on.’ Annie let go of the newel post to take her mother’s arm. ‘You’re going for a bath, and I’ll make some cocoa.’ She began to tow Edith up the stairs. ‘D’you mind if Phoebe shows you out? I expect we’ll see you again soon, in any case.’

‘
I expect so,’ he agreed, his heart lurching on its moorings. Phoebe waited on the half-landing, papers drooping from her fingers, until Annie and Edith disappeared, then came down and handed the essay to him. ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘I won’t break my promise.’

She opened the front door, and crunched beside him down the drive, their shadows falling over the gate and into the road, the night-scented stock sweet and nostalgic in the cool air.
‘Why d’you want it?’

‘
I have a need to read it again.’

She scuffed the toe of her sandal on the pavement.
‘You must have found the pictures of the slaves, then. The old ones with the bond numbers.’

‘
We found everything you and George told us about, and you should take great care of those engravings. They could be valuable.’

‘
Anything connected with Uncle Ned is priceless.’ It was a statement of certainty. ‘And George’ll be over the moon. I’ll ask Mama to let me ring him tomorrow.’

Unlocking his car, he said quietly:
‘Try not to hate Mina too much.’

‘
I can’t hate her, can I?’ She folded her arms, and leaned against the wall. ‘She’s my sister, well, my half-sister, and I’ve always known she’s stupid, but now I know why.’ Above her head, a breeze began to snatch at the leaves. ‘And I feel sorry for her, like I would if I’d heard about something awful happening to someone I don’t know and can’t help, but I don’t really want to go down that road, even though it might be easier than admitting at least half of me is blood kin to a psychopath.’

‘
Which road, Phoebe?’

‘
Pitying her. Uncle Ned said pity amounts to arrogance. He also said it lets the other person off the hook, and it lets you off the hook of having to feel kinship for them.’

‘
I see.’

‘
And I agree with him,’ she added, pushing her body away from the wall. ‘So I’ll no doubt have a few nightmares about her before I come to terms, or whatever the saying is, and I’m absolutely sure I’ll find it very hard to stop myself giving her a dose of her own medicine.’

‘
As long as that remains a dream.’

‘
And I really hope Jason rots in hell,’ she added, her voice hard with intent. ‘But there’s a problem with that ending, too, because Minnie’s so besotted she’d happily go to hell with him.’

14

McKenna’s street was overhung with an acrid pall of smoke, as Bangor Mountain burned once again, flames crackling and leaping through the trees, sparks bouncing down roof tiles all along the terrace. He put his briefcase and Ned’s relics on the parlour table, closed the windows on the shouts of fire-fighters and the sizzle of water on flame, then went to the kitchen to feed the cats, who appeared to have spent the afternoon and evening without the company of friends. A large brown moth fizzed round and round inside the parlour lampshade, and another had flattened itself against the outside of the window, eyes red, underbelly caterpillar-furred.

He made a pot of tea, opened his last pack of duty-free cigarettes, and sat in the kitchen reading the paper. The name discs on the cats
’ collars pinged against their dishes, reminding him of the tolling bell-buoy in Dun Laoghaire harbour, where only last week, waiting for the ferry home, he had watched the huge catamaran come in to dock, its wash setting the old South Rock lightship heaving against its mooring. The lightship occupied a well-thumbed place in the internal library of his childhood memories, and he still half believed the rusting hull was where the Irish marooned the pox-ridden and mad, like the smallpox boats which once bobbed on the Thames, or the Ships of Fools cast out on the oceans of history.

Scanning newspaper storylines, he was struck by coincidence to find an article about the late Iris Bentley
’s lifelong fight to clear her brother’s name, and realized his own internal narratives had been dominated all week by women, and looked set to continue that way. The letter from Denise’s solicitor demanded a response, and, noting how the stain in front of the cooker was creeping back, he knew there could be no freedom from the haunting, threatening misery of her and their marriage unless he released himself from bondage.

He cooked two slices of Welsh rarebit, eating at the kitchen table and looking forward to a day without mail, then stacked dishes in a bowl of hot sudsy water, the sights and sounds and scents of Edith
’s kitchen potent in his mind. A fresh pot of tea to hand, he slumped on the worn chesterfield in the parlour, cats by his feet, and finished reading the paper. Struggling as usual with the crossword, he found himself writing ‘FE’ and ‘EF’ in the margins, Mina Harris in mind, any compassion he might find for her blighted by the thoughtless destruction she had brought about. He scribbled over the rough letters, the clue resolved, sure that in the last cataclysmic moments of life, Ned betrayed her, scoring his nails across blistering skin to write the first letters of the Welsh words for ‘Eddie’s daughter’.

Filling another space in the half-completed grid, he wrote
‘cataclysm’, thinking that Mina, like Ned, had already experienced her own, while for Edith and Annie and Phoebe, and perhaps even for Solange, the nightmares were yet to come. Edith’s would be the most devastating, he decided, when she learned that her carelessness had provided Mina with the God-given opportunity to poison Ned. When Phoebe’s pain grew less excoriating, she would write about her sister, transforming chaos into something lucid and explicable, but until then, he would willingly foster her nightmare, but not to access her wonderful dreams. Iolo Williams would find no peace or redemption because he stole another man’s dreams, counterfeiting the whole currency of their world, and writing ‘degenerate’ on the empty line in the middle of the grid, McKenna wondered if the professor’s whole persona were a fabrication from which he was unable to extricate himself. Take away the unbelievably unremitting nastiness, and what was left but a brittle shell?

Newspaper slipping off his knee, he dozed, thoughts disintegrating into sleep as a personality might scatter into confusion, without certainty of awakening, either literal or metaphorical.

15

For Solange, true pity for Mina came to outweigh futile pity for her husband, and she lingered at the hospital until the girl fell into a deep, untroubled sleep, then clipped along quiet corridors, down staircases to the softly lit reception area and its empty banks of strawberry pink seats, and out through the ever-revolving door. Standing amid more discarded cigarette ends, she looked across the car park for a taxi, then, sighing, returned through the swishing door to ask the night clerk for change for the payphone.

Call made, she went back outside, and feet amid the litter, smoked another pungent cigarette, shivering occasionally from fatigue, and the dreadful nagging disquiet which grew as relentlessly as the earth turned under the glare of the moon. She started as a figure spilled through the revolving door; another woman, older than herself, and graceless in anxiety.

Panting slightly, the woman nodded, and Solange wondered why the women of this country so despised their bodies, and hid them inside ugly garments as if they were the source of deepest shame.

‘Are you waiting to be picked up?’ the woman asked.

‘
I wait for a taxi,’ Solange said.

‘
My husband’s coming for me,’ the other woman replied. ‘He should be here soon.’

‘
You are visiting at the hospital?’ Solange asked, blowing a plume of smoke into the night.

‘
My daughter.’ The woman coughed, scrabbling in her handbag for tissues.

‘
What is wrong with her?’

‘
She was expecting a baby,’ the woman said, staunching tears, ‘but she lost it. She nearly died.’ She gulped. ‘Still, they say she’s over the worst. My husband wept when I told him.’

‘
Ah
,
quel
dommage
!’ Solange patted her arm. ‘But there will be other babies.’

‘
She isn’t married.’

‘
So?’ Solange shrugged. ‘It happens all the time. It is nature.’ She dropped her cigarette and ground it to shreds as a taxi came into view, light winking on its roof.

Only a few yards behind, indicator blinking, Edwin Evans
’s car rounded the corner.

Author’s Note

This novel was inspired by the story of Edward Jones (1752-1824), born in Llandderfel, Meirionydd. Henblas, his family home, still stands as a working farm.

A gifted harpist, Edward was in the service of the Prince of Wales (later George IV) from 1775, and is generally known by the title
Bardd
y
Brenin
(King’s Bard). Apart from music, his abiding passion was the collection and preservation of the relics of Welsh culture, and he became an important antiquarian scholar. His first significant publication was
The
Musical
and
Poetical
Relicks
of
the
Welsh
Bards
(1784).

He died, unmarried, on Easter Sunday 1824, and was buried in the churchyard of St Mary-le-Bone, London.

If you enjoyed reading
The House of Women
you might be interested in
Shrine to Murder
by Roger Silverwood, also published by Endeavour Press.

Extract from
Shrine to Murder
by Roger Silverwood

Chapter One

14
CREESFORTH
ROAD
,
BROMERSLEY
,
SOUTH
YORKSHIRE
,
UK
0200
HOURS
SUNDAY
,
24
MAY
2009

The
sky was as black as fingerprint ink.

A
man in white placed a ladder under the window of a bedroom on the first floor of the detached house. He looked round then climbed rapidly up it. A few moments later he opened the window to its fullest extent and climbed inside.

The
only sound to be heard was the heavy, even breathing from a big man in a large bed. The intruder could just make out the outline of the sleeping figure, on his back with his head on the pillow and covered with blankets up to his chest.

The
man approached the bedside.

Suddenly
the sleeping man’s eyes clicked open.

The
intruder saw the man’s eyes reflect what little light there was. He rushed forward and put a hand across the man’s mouth.

‘Quiet,’
he snapped. ‘Not a sound, Redman.’

The
man in the bed saw the glint of a shiny dagger blade in the intruder’s other hand. His eyes shone like a frightened cat in headlights. His pupils travelled from right to left and then back again.

‘
Listen to me, Redman,’ the man in white said. ‘You’ve done very well for yourself these past twenty years. Made yourself a nice little packet. This place here and your villa in Spain. Two sons both doing well. Both married. Given you three healthy grandchildren.’

Redman
’s arms came out of the bedclothes and grabbed hold of the intruder’s wrist.

‘
No you don’t.
It
’
s
payback
time
,
now
,’ the intruder said, then he brought the dagger down and stabbed Redman in the chest.

The
old man cried out. His heart exploded. Hot blood spurted out over his neck and chest. His eyes centred on the ceiling and stayed there for two seconds; then his eyes closed and his limbs loosened for the last time.

The
intruder looked down at the bed, his eyes glowing like cinders. A volcano raged in his chest. His breathing was noisy, his head as light as a champagne bubble. He stared down at the body and smiled. After a few moments, he withdrew the dagger and wiped it on the bedclothes.

*

DI
ANGEL
’
S
OFFICE
,
BROMERSLEY
POLICE
STATION
,
SOUTH
YORKSHIRE
,
UK
0830
HOURS
TUESDAY
,
26
MAY
,
2009

‘
Come in,’ Angel called.

It
was Police Constable Ahmed Ahaz.

‘
Any signs of that new sergeant?’

‘
No, sir,’ Ahmed said.

Angel
sniffed.

A
new sergeant was due. The appointment had been made to replace the irreplaceable Ron Gawber, the much missed man who had been Angel’s sergeant for ten years and had recently left Bromersley force for a position in Lyme Bay. The move had come about because his wife wanted to be near her father since her mother had died of cancer just before the previous Christmas. Their two sons had both left home to attend further education. There was a vacancy in the local police force down there so Ron Gawber applied for the post and had got it.

Angel
wasn’t at all pleased, but he knew Gawber’s wife was as masterful as his own wife, Mary. But in his case, he was absolutely certain in his own mind that he wouldn’t move away from Bromersley until he was retiring age, whatever scheme Mary concocted.

Anyway,
Ron Gawber’s replacement was due that morning.

‘
His name is Carter,’ Angel said. ‘Show him in as soon as he arrives.’

‘
Right, sir,’ Ahmed said and went out.

Angel
reached for the mornings post still untouched on his desk.

The
phone rang.

He
looked at it and frowned then snatched it up. It was a young constable on reception. ‘There’s DS Carter arrived here, sir. Asking for you.’

Angel
looked at his watch. ‘About time. Have somebody show the new DS to my office, lad. And make it quick.’

‘
Yes, sir. Right, sir.’

He
replaced the phone.

He
stood up, turned round and looked in the mirror. He adjusted his tie. Then ran a hand over his hair. It wasn’t necessary, but he wanted to look his best. He expected his plainclothes staff always to look smart even though they were not in a formal uniform. There were no jeans and T-shirts with slogans (unless the staff were under cover and it was absolutely necessary) on his team. After all, first impressions and all that. He wanted the new man to understand that he was joining a smart, hard-working, no-nonsense, tightly run investigative team dedicated to fighting crime and committed especially to solving murder cases. He had already missed the presence of Ron Gawber. Carter was going to have one hell of a job to come up to his standard of police work, comradeship and perhaps, most of all, dependability.

There
was a knock at the door.

Angel
turned to face the door.

‘
Come in.’

The
door opened, a uniformed constable put his nose in and said, ‘DS Carter, sir.’

‘
Thank you, lad,’ Angel said.

‘
There you are, Sarge,’ the constable said. Then he pushed open the office door and dashed off up the corridor.

As
the door swung open, it revealed a pretty brunette in a dark suit and white blouse.

‘
DS Carter reporting for duty, sir,’ she said sweetly with a smile.

Angel
’s jaw dropped. His face went as white as the padre’s knees.

After
a moment, Carter said, ‘May I come in, sir?’

Angel
blinked and said, ‘Yes.’

She
closed the door and went up to his desk.

‘
I’m afraid there must be some mistake,’ he said.

‘Oh?’
she said, eyebrows raised.

He
screwed up his eyes. ‘Well, you’re a woman,’ he said.

‘
You noticed, sir,’ she said with a smile.

Angel
wasn’t in any joking mood. His face was as hard as Dartmoor stone. ‘I was expecting a Detective Sergeant Carter.’

‘
I
am
Detective Sergeant Carter, sir,’ she said.

He
shook his head and blew out a noisy breath.

She
lifted her head and said: ‘Thirty-four per cent of all police personnel are women, sir. But I am sure you know that.’

His
eyes opened wide briefly, then he said: ‘Aye? Oh yes? Maybe, but I manage a team who catch the worst kind of criminals, sergeant: homicidal maniacs, murderers, rapists, drug runners and the very worst kind of bully boys. I need
one
hundred
per cent of my team to be strong enough and dedicated enough to get in there and tough it out, no holds barred, whenever there’s need. Don’t you see that, missy?’ then he added heavily, ‘I can’t do with a
thirty
-
four
per cent margin.’

Her
eyes flashed. ‘I can pull my weight in any situation, sir. And I would point out that my rank is Detective Sergeant. I prefer to be addressed as sergeant. Never
missy
. If you don’t mind,
sir
!’

Angel
’s face went scarlet.

‘
Wait here, Sergeant,’ he growled.

He
crossed the office, went through the door, charged up the green-painted corridor to the top to a door marked: ‘Detective Superintendent Harker.’

He
knocked on it sharply.

‘
Come in,’ a voice called out. It was followed by a long and loud cough.

Angel
opened the door and was immediately engulfed in a cloud of menthol.

A
bald man with a head the shape of a turnip and with thick ginger eyebrows was seated behind a desk, which was heavily loaded with piles of paper and paper files. He looked up at Angel, sniffed and said, ‘What is it? I am up to my eyes, lad. I am trying to finish the first-quarters stats.’

Angel
blew out a sigh then said, ‘Carter’s arrived, sir. Ron Gawber’s replacement. It turns out
she
’
s
a
woman
.’

Harker
looked up at him. ‘Course she’s a woman. Did you think she was a man in a kilt?’

Angel
wasn’t amused. ‘It’s not right, sir.’

‘
Not right? You can’t forever dodge having women in your team, you know, Angel. You’re not
that
special. She comes with an excellent record.’

‘
I am short staffed enough, sir. You know I can’t send her in against some of the monsters we have to deal with.’

‘
You might find what she’s short in brawn she makes up for in brains.’

‘
I wanted a fully qualified, experienced,
male
sergeant. A man with resolve on his mind and fire in his belly. A man I could confidently send out to bring...to bring Jack the Ripper in, if necessary.’

‘
Well that’s hard luck, Angel.
I
’
d
like a couple of male
or
female accountants to sort out these figures for me, but the budget won’t stretch to it. You’ve got a perfectly competent detective sergeant, who happens to wear a different sort of underwear, smells of soap and always leaves the lavatory seat down. Those little idiosyncrasies will in no way affect her effectiveness as a police officer, so buzz off and get on with your work and let me get on with mine. There’s nothing I can do about it.’

Angel
stared at him hard, but Harker had turned back to his mound of papers.

Angel
went out of the office and stormed down the corridor.

‘
Thank you for nothing,’ he muttered.

He
clenched his teeth. His jaw muscles contorted his face.

He
arrived at his office and slammed the door. He positioned himself behind his desk. He looked at the determined face of DS Carter, rubbed his chin, picked up the phone and tapped in a number. It was soon answered.

‘
Send WPC Leisha Baverstock into my office straightaway,’ he said, then he replaced the phone then looked back across the desk at the young woman and said, ‘Well, Sergeant Carter, I appear to be...stuck with you...on a trial basis. You follow an excellent man who was with me for ten years. We’ll have to see how you measure up.’

‘
I am sure I’ll never be as good as he was, sir,’ she said, ‘but I’ll do my best.’

Angel
’s eyes flashed back across the desk to meet hers. There seemed to have been a sting of sarcasm in her reply, but her face gave nothing away. He learned something about her that was unusual. She could hold a look into somebody’s eyes at least as long as he could.

‘
At least he usually was able to be on time,’ Angel said.

‘
Sorry about that, sir. I did a trial run from home yesterday and it only took twenty-two minutes.’

‘
That was Sunday.’

‘
This morning, the traffic was horrendous, sir. And there were hold-ups at every traffic light.’

‘
It’s Monday. Leave home earlier.’

There
was a knock at the door.

‘
Come in.’

WPC
Leisha Baverstock came in. Up to that point, she had been regarded as the station beauty. There might be a feeling of competition now that another good-looking woman had arrived at the station.

‘
Ah, WPC Baverstock,’ Angel said. ‘This is DS Carter. Replacement for Ron Gawber.’

The
two women looked at each other and exchanged smiles.

Angel
added: ‘Show her round the station. Introduce her to Inspector Asquith. Answer any questions. Make her feel...at home.’