The Long Kill Page 15

  No, not a bad place to live, nor a bad place to die, either. The fancy occurred to him suddenly that really he was the target and down there in Naddle Foot, which he had once thought to threaten and claimed now to protect, they were drawing a bead on him and just waiting for a clear shot to make the kill.

  Well, at least today he was sure no one was taking a shot from up here. And it would have to be from up here, unless Jacob got hold of a rank amateur. High Rigg itself offered very little cover, was a popular area for casual strollers who’d been visiting the curious little church of St John’s which gave the valley its name, and allowed a clear line only into the rear garden of the house which Jimmy alone seemed to use.

  The only possible hide in the valley itself was a ruined barn alongside a small stand of trees where the ground began to rise from the beck to the fell. The upper storey of the barn gave sufficient elevation to look into both the front and the rear gardens of the house at a range of about seven hundred metres. But again it was a side-shot, though the short distance made it feasible. Escape was across open pastureland, however, and what really put it out of the question was a ‘For Sale’ notice where the track joined the road. His house-hunting cover had served him well, permitting him to check out the barn openly. But it meant that others, either attracted by the sign or sent by the estate agent, might come bumping along the farm track at any time. Not that the ‘property’ attracted many viewers. Ripe for the conversion was the come-on phrase. But the shell of the barn, which under local planning restrictions would provide the property limits, was small, there were no services laid on, and the asking price was exorbitant.

  Nevertheless any risk of interruption was unacceptable.

  Now he scanned the old building with his glasses. Others might accept risks he wouldn’t take. There was no sign of life except for a magpie which came floating down in a flutter of black and white to settle on the barn. He watched it for a moment. It showed no alarm.

  Satisfied, he swung back to the house. Anya had vanished from the window. He searched other windows for her without success. He willed her to reappear. So, it occurred to him, he had often willed targets to appear when their dilatoriness was distorting a carefully planned schedule.

  Angrily he put the thought out of his mind, but it had already tainted the clear air between his lofty vantage point and the lovely old house. Friendly no longer, its walls and windows now seemed to mock him, blank as a human brow and human eyes behind which unreadable thoughts pulsed their dangerous secrets.

  Chapter 17

  ‘Hello,’ said Anya. ‘Had a good day?’

  She looked deliciously domestic, with a flowery apron round her waist and a floury smear on her cheek, standing in the kitchen surrounded by the birthday baking whose sweet smell filled the air.

  ‘Fine. Sorry I’m late.’

  ‘Late?’ She sounded surprised. ‘Late for what? Dinner will be an hour at least.’

  He found himself rather hurt not to have been missed.

  ‘Where did you walk?’ she asked.

  He answered vaguely. His precise route wouldn’t have made much sense to a seasoned fellwalker like Anya.

  ‘How’s the patient?’ he asked.

  ‘Dr Menzies was pleased with him, but they’re old allies, those two. I’ll wait to see what they say when he goes back to the hospital on Monday for his check-up. Pappy seemed a bit down at lunch, but Jimmy’s with him now and that should dispel the gloom. A six-year-old on the eve of his seventh birthday’s got enough joy to spread out over half the world.’

  ‘And enough food too by the look of it! Want an impartial sampler?’ said Jaysmith, reaching his hand out to a trayful of lemon curd tarts and withdrawing it rapidly as Anya cracked it hard with a wooden spoon.

  ‘Jesus!’ he said, blowing on his knuckles.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said, looking abashed. ‘Pure instinctive reaction, I’m afraid. Pappy and Jimmy have both got fighter’s knuckles.’

  ‘I can believe it. If this is what joining the family means, I may not apply for admission.’

  She went very still, and he was angry with himself for having so unpreparedly come close to what in the old days was called a declaration. Putting aside all question as to whether he had a right to, this was certainly not the time or occasion for it. But there was no way of going back.

  ‘Jay,’ said Anya in a suddenly strained voice. ‘What is it that you want from me?’

  The lounge door burst open and Jimmy erupted.

  ‘Jay!’ he yelled. ‘We played football today and I scored three goals. Come and play football and I’ll show you. Are you any good? I bet you are. Come and play, please!’

  Jaysmith held Anya’s gaze till the strain began to dissolve.

  ‘To be going on with,’ he said, ‘a lemon curd tart will do nicely.’

  ‘Help yourself,’ she said.

  ‘Mum, can I have one?’ demanded Jimmy.

  ‘You can have half of mine,’ said Jaysmith. ‘Your mum’s conceded quite enough for one afternoon. Never push your luck, son. Now I reckon I can spare ten minutes before I get cleaned up to see an action replay of your three goals. With your mother’s permission, of course.’

  ‘Granted,’ said Anya. ‘But not a second more.’

  ‘Agreed,’ said Jaysmith. ‘But not a second less either. I’m a man for full measure.’

  Chewing his half of the tart and with Jimmy’s hand firmly clamped around three fingers of his, he let himself be pulled into the garden.

  At dinner that night, Jimmy’s bubbling anticipation of his birthday joys set the mood. It wasn’t till Anya had persuaded him that sleep was the most rapid route to the promised land and led him off to bed that Bryant showed any sign of the depression of mood his daughter had mentioned.

  Nursing his balloon of plum brandy, he said abruptly, ‘I rang Donald Grose this afternoon, just to check on things at the office. He said everything’s going ahead full steam on your job.’

  ‘Yes. It’s remarkable how fast the law can move when it has to,’ said Jaysmith, gently mocking.

  ‘You’ll be living at Rigg Cottage alone, I gather,’ said Bryant.

  Jaysmith was beginning to understand what had happened. Dr Menzies during his visit had expressed a natural curiosity in the stranger who had somehow installed himself at Naddle Foot. This outsider view had brought it home to Bryant just how little he actually knew about his guest. It might even be that he was feeling guilty. It couldn’t have escaped him that Jaysmith’s concern for the Bryant family was focused on Anya. Perhaps it had crossed his mind that the best solution to the problem of his own visits to Poland would be for Anya to be safely settled in a good second marriage.

  And suddenly the doctor’s remarks had brought it home that this man he had invited into his home and by implication his life was indeed a stranger.

  First thing had been to check that at least he was irrevocably committed to the purchase of Rigg Cottage. And now he would want to fill the blanks in. He could either try subtlety or go for the direct approach. Jaysmith guessed the latter.

  ‘Yes, I’ll be alone,’ he said. ‘I’ll need to get someone to “do” for me, I suppose.’

  ‘No wife and family waiting to descend on you then?’

  Jaysmith smiled to himself at his good guess.

  ‘Not even an aged parent,’ he said.

  ‘It’s a largish place for one, even if they do call it a cottage,’ said Bryant.

  ‘Miss Wilson lived there by herself quite happily,’ replied Jaysmith. ‘Except when her nephew was with her. He did grow up there, didn’t he?’

  ‘Why do you ask?’

  ‘I was wondering about the associations the place might have for Anya.’

  That was returning directness with directness!

  Bryant was silent for a while as though considering his next move in a game of chess.

  Finally he said, ‘Yes, Edward spent a lot of his childhood there. James, his father, is some kind of civil servant
, Trade and Industry I think it is. When he was widowed it must have seemed to make sense to let the boy be brought up here rather than in some London flat.’

  ‘You don’t sound as if it made sense to you.’

  ‘Don’t I? Perhaps I believe a boy needs a man. Muriel Wilson’s a decent enough old stick but old’s the operative word. She’s about twelve years older than her brother and absolutely rigid. She knows nothing outside Grasmere. Nothing! Mind you, I don’t blame her. Soon as the boy was old enough he was off to boarding school and, when his father could manage him, he would spend at least part of the holidays in London.’

  ‘You sound as though you feel his father neglected him.’

  ‘And you sound as if you think you’ve got a pretty sharp ear for nuances, Hutton!’ snapped Bryant. ‘Perhaps I do think his father neglected him. It wouldn’t have been my way. But perhaps my way left something to be desired too. Anyway, I saw his father shedding tears at the funeral, and that’s something I shan’t forget. Begetting children is man’s greatest act of creation, Hutton, but after that it sometimes seems like destruction all the way!’

  For a moment he was uncharacteristically agitated but before Jaysmith could speak the door opened and Anya came in.

  ‘What a pleasant picture!’ she said. ‘The old men sitting round the camp fire reminiscing about their wild youth. Are we back in Poland, pappy? Or is it Jay’s turn?’

  There was a faintly aggressive note in her voice and Jaysmith wondered if she had overheard something of their conversation.

  Bryant smiled at his daughter and said, ‘No, we’re not back in Poland, dear. But yes, I do think it’s Jay’s turn.’

  They both looked at him expectantly, Anya settling onto the corner of the broad wooden fender which ran round the grate.

  He said, ‘My wild youth wasn’t all that wild.’

  ‘Nevertheless,’ said Anya. ‘Do tell.’

  He launched on a light-hearted account of his upbringing in Blackburn. They listened attentively, but they rarely smiled and he realized after a while that his attempts at light-heartedness weren’t covering up the cracks in his story and that his teenage unhappiness was seeping through.

  ‘I never went back to the house,’ he concluded, deciding to bring things to a rapid end. ‘My stepfather packed up my few things and sent them on to me. I went straight up to university after National Service and stayed there during the vacations. I got myself a variety of jobs to tide me over, and at the end of three years I got my degree and lived happily ever after.’

  He smiled and stretched and yawned to show that the narrative was finished.

  ‘Is the house still there?’ asked Anya.

  ‘Oh, yes,’ he said unthinkingly.

  ‘How do you know if you’ve never been back?’ said Bryant.

  ‘I’ve seen it,’ he said sharply. ‘I meant I’ve never been back inside.’

  ‘Ignore him,’ said Anya. ‘He always thought he should have been a barrister. What happened next, Jay? After you got your degree?’

  ‘Oh, jobs,’ he said vaguely. ‘You know, the usual progression. Office boy, filing clerk, managing director.’

  ‘And now retirement at forty,’ said Bryant.

  ‘Forty-three,’ corrected Jaysmith. ‘Don’t forget the three. After forty, every year counts twice, so they say. Mind you, under ten, every year counts a hundred times, and in anticipation of a long hard day tomorrow, I think I’ll retire early. Unless my services as beast of burden are required.’

  Anya smiled and said, ‘No, that’s OK. I’ll drag the poor old crock upstairs. Goodnight, Jay. Sleep well.’

  He left. It was a retreat, of course, but after those painful recollections of his teenage years, he did not want to be forced into the glib lies necessary to chart the period of his maturity. He paused at the door a moment and glanced back. Bryant’s chair was turned to the fire and its high wings almost completely concealed its occupant. But Anya was leaning forward, profiled by the flames, and the sight of her narrow intense face and long thin body filled him with such a rage of desire that he felt his whole person burning, and with the door closed behind him, he had to lean against the hall wall for a while till he recovered.

  He fell asleep quickly but was soon disturbed by such terrible dreams of sexual violence involving both Nguyet and Anya that he awoke. The third time this happened he rose and brought himself to a climax with his hand and after this he slept, though so shallowly that the first glimmer of dawn brought him awake once more.

  Jimmy’s birthday was a perfect autumn day. There was very little wind. The sun’s heat drew the morning mists up into a sky of cornflower blue and set the colours of woodland and fellside hotly glowing. The recent storms were now only a memory, recorded in fillets of creamy white marking the distant descent of mountain streams, and by the music of their falling waters.

  It was excellent shooting weather.

  Jaysmith got washed and dressed. As he came out of his bedroom a figure with a levelled gun leapt out of ambush on the landing. Instinctively he flung himself sideways, hitting the floor with a tremendous crash and rolling away in a vain attempt at evasion. The finger was already on the trigger, and he could only lie helpless and watch as a stream of ping pong balls hit him on the chest.

  ‘Jimmy! I told you! You must never fire at people!’ cried Anya coming out of her room.

  ‘I wasn’t going to, honest,’ protested the boy. ‘But Jay started playing and I couldn’t help it, could I, Jay?’

  Jaysmith sat up and leaned back against the wall.

  ‘No,’ he agreed. ‘You couldn’t help it. But your mother’s right, Jimmy. You mustn’t fire at people.’

  ‘Are you all right?’ enquired Anya, coming towards him. He reached up his hand. She took it and began to pull. For a second he resisted. He knew – they both knew – that if the boy had not been there, he would have drawn her down to join him.

  ‘I’m fine,’ he said, rising in an easy movement.

  ‘You look a bit shook up to me,’ she said, examining him closely. It was true. He could feel in himself a slight nervous reaction to the incident.

  He said, ‘I’m not used to holding hands with pretty girls.’

  She drew her hand away sharply and said, ‘You mean you’re too old to be flinging yourself around like an all-in wrestler.’

  Jimmy who had been recovering his ping pong balls said impatiently, ‘Come and see my presents, Jay.’

  ‘All right,’ said Jaysmith. ‘But hold on. I almost forgot.’

  He went back into his bedroom and returned with a gaily wrapped parcel, which Jimmy with youthful impatience and despite his mother’s protests ripped open immediately. It contained a large box of licorice allsorts and a pack of trick playing cards. Jaysmith had been tempted to buy something much more expensively impressive, but had decided that such ostentation from a newcomer to the family circle would be at best vulgar, at worst distasteful. He was rewarded now with Jimmy’s unbounded enthusiasm and Anya’s approving smile.

  The new presents were added to the horde already strewn across Jimmy’s bed. They included a highly colourful children’s encyclopaedia from Bryant and, most impressive of all, a complex of video games from his paternal grandfather. Anya saw Jaysmith studying this and said as if in explanation, ‘Grandpa Wilson would have liked to be here himself.’

  Jaysmith had to show Jimmy how to use the trick cards and it was only Anya’s force of will and a solemn promise that he would join the boy in some target practice later that got him into the kitchen for breakfast.

  ‘Jay, could you do me a favour?’ asked Anya as he drank his fourth cup of coffee.

  He looked at her quizzically and said, ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘That’s a little short of enthusiastic,’ she said.

  He said, ‘I’m not a man who makes commitments lightly.’

  ‘It’s only a form of speech,’ she said in irritation. ‘I mean, even if you say yes, and then find you can’t, it’s not a breac
h-of-promise case, you know.’

  He didn’t speak but regarded her with such unconcealed affectionate amusement that she flushed and said, ‘All I wanted to ask was if you could pick up Aunt Muriel this afternoon and bring her to the party. Pappy can’t, of course, and I’m going to be rather busy …’

  ‘It’ll be a pleasure,’ he said.

  The telephone rang in the hallway. Anya went out, closing the door behind her. After a few moments he heard her running lightly upstairs, presumably to tell her father to take the call on his extension. On her return to the kitchen she poured herself a cup of coffee and offered Jaysmith a refill.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘I’m fully awake now, I reckon. What’s the drill this afternoon?’

  ‘It will be something between The Lord of the Rings and The Lord of the Flies,’ she said. ‘Hobbit appetites modulating to atavistic savagery. Between two and three, a dozen or more delighted mums and dads will dump their rapacious offspring here and drive rapidly away to enjoy a few hours of peace.’

  ‘Mixed offspring?’

  ‘Oh no,’ she said, shocked. ‘When you’re seven, it’s very infra dig to let a mere girl anywhere near your party.’

  ‘You sound very expert,’ he laughed. ‘Of course, you must have a few of these do’s under your belt.’

  She shook her head and said, ‘In fact, not. Edward didn’t much care to have our house in Borrowdale “infested", as he put it. We used to take Jimmy to Rigg Cottage more often than not and Aunt Muriel would run a little celebration there.’

  This was practically the first time she’d referred to her husband so openly. He knew instinctively he must not treat it as an opening.

  He said, ‘And now Aunt Muriel comes here. Is she the only adult help?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘And I don’t want to overtax her, of course. I was relying rather heavily on pappy to help organize games and things …’

  She let her voice tail off and he stared at her until she flushed once more and looked away.