The Kind Folk (13 page)

"Maybe he knows we're talking about him." Less whimsically Freda adds "Well, I hope I've helped."

As Sophie gazes at him Luke says "Thanks, Freda. We'll see you soon."

He can see this won't do for Sophie. He ends the call and stows the phone in his pocket before saying "I think I know what happened. Nothing else seems to make sense. Terence swapped us at the hospital."

Sophie's eyes glisten. "Why do you say that?"

"He knew Freda and Maurice were desperate and he must have thought their baby wasn't healthy enough. We don't know how strange a state his head was in with the drugs."

Luke suspects the journal makes that plain. It doesn't matter what Terence came to believe, and Luke might well rather not know; his misgivings feel too close to the dreams he had as a child—too much like a threat of reverting to the condition he was in. He would rather ask "How were the press?"

"They're going to print the interview as well as broadcast it, and it'll be on national radio too." Her enthusiasm fades as she says "But Luke, what's bothering you?"

"I just feel I don't know enough about myself."

"I know plenty, and it's all good."

"I thought you'd say that. I'm not saying you shouldn't, but I wish—All at once he realises the Arnolds aren't the only people who might help. He retrieves the mobile and brings up the list of dialled numbers and pokes the key to recall one. He knows what to ask now, but it seems to be too late. The mobile responds with a harsh drone and displays a red spot like a childhood disease. "That's not possible," he protests, only to grasp how it could be. "She's changed her number."

"Who has, Luke?"

"The nurse who phoned. I'm sure she knows what really happened at the hospital."

"Would you like me to try for you?"

"Try what? We can't call her. I don't even know her last name."

"No, but you know where she lives. Maybe if she sees me she'll talk," Sophie says, indicating her midriff. "How about right now? Let's use my car."

The Clio bleeps to greet her, and the echoes scurry into the corners of the basement. The downtown streets are swarming with pedestrians, though it's too late for lunch and too early for dinner. The way to Green-bank Park leads past Amberley Street, and as the jagged Christ teeters out from the wall of the church Luke remembers his impression of the multitude of windows swarming with a single face. He could imagine that the vision is reaching for his mind and reluctant to let go. "Straight on," he blurts, though Sophie doesn't need to be told.

In five minutes they're at the park. The trees seem to be empty of life, and the leaves are as still as the stout trunks. A repeated squeal like the noise of a rusty hinge accompanies a figure that keeps sailing into the air beside the lake. She's on a swing, and the playground is crowded with children. When Luke indicates the house where Eunice lives Sophie parks in front of it. "Stay in the car," she says. "Let me have a look."

She examines the names beside the doorbells before pressing the topmost button. She steps back at once, gesturing behind her back for Luke to remain where he is. Having gazed up at the house for a while, she gives the doorbell twice the push, but when this earns no response she eases herself in beside Luke. "At least we know her name," she says. "It's Eunice Norden."

"Let's see if she has a land line." The mobile shows him that she has, and almost as soon as a bell starts to trill at his ear a phone imitates it above him in the house. The sounds add a counterpoint to the squeals of the swing until Luke eventually breaks the connection. He's planting the mobile on top of the dashboard when someone strides out of the house.

The man's grey lightweight suit is hardly large enough for him. His midriff isn't much less prominent than Sophie's. His broad face is clenched with determination, and the corners of his thick lips look dragged down by the weight of all his chins. He stares at Luke before marching in front of the car to scowl at the registration number, which he mouths while he scribbles it on a notepad. He flourishes the pad at Luke as he tramps to the passenger window. "It's you again, is it?" he says in a voice that seems squeezed falsetto by his girth. "What do you want now?"

"Where do you think you know me from?"

"You needn't think I didn't see you and your friends the other night in the park."

"They weren't my friends. I've no idea who they were or what they were after."

"Ah, so it was you." The man takes a moment to enjoy his triumph, planting his hands between his hips and stomach. "Are you going to answer my question?"

"We're looking for Eunice Norden."

"And why might that be, may I enquire?"

"It's a private matter," Luke says very much in the fellow's manner.

"I'm in no doubt of that." With an effort the man stoops to peer at Sophie and notices her condition. "Good God," he mutters, "is the woman up to that as well?"

"I've no idea what you—" Sophie breathes hard as she understands. "We'll be keeping our baby," she says, "if that's what you mean."

"Then perchance you'd care to tell me what you're doing here."

"We're waiting for a word with Eunice."

The man straightens up with a grunt. "You'll have a considerable wait. I suggest you take yourselves elsewhere," he says and turns towards the house.

"Why?" Luke says loud enough to halt him. "What's happened?"

"See if you can think what might have."

"I really couldn't say." Luke feels close to imitating the man's language. "I've never met her."

"She worked at the hospital where Luke was born," Sophie says. "That's why we want to talk to her."

"I doubt you would have got much sense from her," the man says. "Until very recently we weren't even aware she'd been a nurse."

"But you are now," Sophie points out.

"Only because she was under the influence. I'm not saying which, but I know what I think."

Luke is more concerned to learn "What did she say about being a nurse?"

"Very little of significance. We thought she was trying to regain our respect after we'd been forced to raise her behaviour with her."

"What kind of behaviour, do you mind my asking?"

"Making a commotion in the middle of the night. Crying out and shouting heaven only knows what nonsense at people who weren't there. All about how she could have stopped something if she hadn't been afraid to. And," the man says louder to forestall any interruption, "there was the matter of the kind of person she attracted to the house."

Sophie twists towards him on her seat. "Weren't you saying Luke was one?"

"I'm prepared to accept I was in the wrong to that extent, since you assure me that's the case." Having pursed his lips while he gazes at her, the man says "But I'll hear no argument about the undesirables who were in the park when your partner was. We'd already seen them loitering after dark, and that night was the last straw."

"You didn't tell me about them, Luke."

"I didn't think there was anything worth telling." Luke senses the man is offended by this, and so he says "Did they do something else?"

"Far too much." With a frown that may be aimed only at the memory Eunice's neighbour says "They managed to find their way into the house."

"You saw them."

"The lady on the ground floor did. She saw one crawling up the stairs, the creature was in such a state. I would have dealt with them in no uncertain terms, I promise you. She was afraid to draw their attention, and so she didn't call the police or even tell me at the time."

With some reluctance Luke says "What state?"

"You must have seen them in the park. Too busy taking whatever they take to bother putting flesh on themselves. And let me add," the man says as if he's tired of the interrogation, "I may not have seen them in the house, but I heard them well enough."

Luke hopes he'll welcome learning "Was there much to hear?"

"Scrabbling about on the stairs to begin with. I thought someone had brought an animal in, quite against the rules. I was in bed or I would have investigated." With a look that warns his listeners not to think him inadequate the man says "Miss Norden must have let them in. She was being surreptitious enough about it, but I heard them talking in her room."

"Did you hear anything they said?"

"They kept insisting she could. I don't think that needs much interpretation." After a pause that challenges anyone to disagree the man says "They said it so often it sent me to sleep. If I'd gathered who they were I would have gone up to have the situation out with her."

Luke is searching for any response when Sophie says "But why do you think she's gone away?"

"I fancy she must have realised we knew what was afoot. If she hadn't left she would have been asked to do so."

"You wouldn't happen to know where she's gone," Luke says.

"None of us here would or would want to." The man's lips wince downwards at the squeals in the playground, not just of metal. "Now you really must spare me," he says. "I was having a rest until you started ringing all the bells. There's more than enough unnecessary noise in the neighbourhood."

As he plods into the house Sophie says "Maybe I should leave the searching to you, Luke."

Luke swallows in order to ask "Why's that?"

"It sounds as if I brought us here for nothing," she says and starts the car. "Eunice wouldn't have been any use if she's how he said."

"You've enough of your own to do without trying to help me," Luke says and is glad she's watching the road rather than his face. At least he has been given the excuse to continue investigating by himself. Whatever is to be learned, he has a sense that he's best doing so on his own. He doesn't want to risk disturbing her in her condition, that's why—it must be. He won't even let her read Terence's journal.

NOT HIM

While the word that caught Luke's eye was
MAGIC,
it's unclear how it relates to the apparently haphazard list of names and references.
RICHARD DADD + ARTHUR RACKAM. RAPHEAL PAINTING, POPES HAND. MICHAEL PACHER PAINTING, SAINT SHOWS DEVIL HAND. DURER HID IN CHURCH ART. HANDS IN BAYUEX TAPPESTRY BACKGROUND. PAGANINNI + LISZT HANDS. BOSCH + BRUEGEL. IRELAND MUSIC. TOP OF CHURCH, CARVINGS YOU DONT NOTICE. BOOK OF KELLS. ILUMENATED MANUSCRIPTS. BLAKE SUPRESSED ART.
After all this Terence has written
END OF MAGIC PAGE.

Luke can't see how it's supposed to be magical. Rackham and Dadd were Victorian artists who depicted fairies. Ireland could be the name of the place or of a composer like Paganini and Liszt, but what did Terence mean about their hands? The entry seems to leave too much unsaid. When the misspellings start to resemble a reversion to an older usage, Luke abandons the journal on the hotel bed and goes to the window.

He's in Edinburgh. In the afternoon light the mediaeval buildings of the old town look preserved in luminous amber. The city bristles with chimneys and turrets, some of which appear to be trained on the castle or the hill of Arthur's Seat, above which a bird of prey is circling against the featureless blue sky. On the slopes of the city the layers of roofs are robbed of perspective, as if the houses are less substantial than they're pretending to be. Luke can't help wishing he hadn't researched Edinburgh to find local references to make tonight; the place is rather too hospitable to the kind of thing Terence seems to have liked if not believed. Every May Eve the city is taken over by an all-night Beltane festival, and afterwards young women bathe their faces in the dew on Arthur's Seat. Up there seventeen small coffins were found in a cave—coffins rumoured to belong to stolen children, however mercifully empty they proved to be. Luke's thoughts are no more reassuring than the journal, and he throws it open once again at random. He has turned a few pages when his eye is caught by the name of a town.

The entry says
DESMOND LASSITER MIDDLESBROUGH COMPASS ME.
Luke doesn't understand the last phrase, but Middlesbrough isn't far off the route to tomorrow's booking. Just one D. Lassiter is listed in Middlesbrough, and Luke calls the number before any doubts can deter him. It rings long enough that he begins to wonder what he can say to an answering machine, and then there's a protracted plastic clatter. At last a voice croaks "Who is it?"

"Desmond Lassiter? My name's Luke Arnold. I—

"It's not."

"That's what they've called me since I was born, Mr Lassiter. I—

"I'm telling you it's not."

Luke has to take quite a breath so as to ask "What would you call me, then?"

"I'd call you nothing. I don't know the first thing about you."

For a moment Luke feels as if he knows even less than that, and then he sees where he may have gone wrong. "Am I speaking to Desmond Lassiter?"

"I've told you no twice."

"I'm sorry, Mr Lassiter. I was looking—"

"Not that either." As Luke begins to feel he has lost his grasp of language the voice croaks "Not Mr anything."

Has Luke's gift for observation deserted him? "I'm sorry," he says while struggling to contain a laugh.

"Don't be. I'm not. It's the fags that do it. They can do their worst just as long as they keep me calmed down."

"Well, I'm sorry I called the wrong number."

"You've not."

Luke rises to his feet, and the hill that hid the miniature coffins appears to imitate his movement. "You mean you're ..."

"I'm Doris Lassiter. Desmond's my da."

"Well, that's something, or rather it's a lot more. Could I speak to your father?"

"What do you need him for?"

"I believe he knew my uncle. My uncle was in touch with him."

For the first time Doris Lassiter pauses before speaking. "What did you say the name was?"

"Arnold. Luke Arnold." When this prompts another silence Luke says "My uncle's name was Terence Arnold."

"Gone, has he? They all do." As though she's determined to keep any regret to herself Doris Lassiter says "I remember my da talking about him."

Luke sees the hill shiver, but it's his vision that does. "What did he say?"

"About how he sent your uncle off. He used to wonder what he found."