“Max has been burgled.”
“I wondered who it was on the phone.” Linda had her back to Charles and couldn’t see the look on his face. “You were a long time. Was it bad?”
“Pretty bad. Apparently Monika heard something and went downstairs to investigate and they hit out at her. She’s OK but badly shaken.”
“Should I go round? Is there anything I can do?” Linda spoke as she wiped her hands on the dishcloth and went to turn around. She was shocked at the vehemence of Charles’s tone.
“No. Absolutely not.”
“Why not? What’s happened?”
In the five months since Linda had returned to the Wirral and had taken over the reins of the Donaldson household she and Charles had been regular, if infrequent, visitors to Sandhey. She didn’t quite know what to make of the middle aged lady who lived with Max. Monika had always been friendly towards her when they had all spent time at Sandhey in 1975 and 1976 when she and Charles were working together to build up their business but her attitude was very different now. ‘She thinks Holly left you because of me’ she had suggested to Charles as they left after a particularly frosty tea. He had argued Monika must have known there were months between Holly’s going to Canada and her arrival but once the idea had been planted in his mind he thought she was probably right. If Monika thought they were living together as man and wife, which she obviously did, that would explain her attitude and the distance she put between them.
Charles had always been close to Monika, he had once believed that he loved her and would look after her all his life, but he had met Holly and realised what love should be. As he had courted Holly he had noticed similarities between her and Monika. There was a possibility they were related. In one of his more perceptive moments he understood that her anger at no longer having Holly close would have turned Monika against him. He understood, also, that she would be poisoning Max’s mind against them as his greetings were now rarely friendly. He was just beginning to realise how much had changed when Holly left him.
“What’s happened?” Linda repeated unable to even hazard a guess why Charles should look so angry.
“Max thinks it was the boys.”
“What!”
“Max accused Jack and Al of being involved in the robbery.”
“But why? What could possibly make him think something like that?”
“Monika said she heard one of the robbers talking, he called one of the others ‘Pod’. She is prepared to say our boys were with him.”
“Oh dear.”
“Not ‘Oh dear’ at all. Even if one of the little bastards was Pod and another was Brickie why would that mean Jack and Al were involved? They haven’t hung around with them at for months now. Why would they be involved now?”
“They couldn’t be.”
“Of course not.” Charles was absolute in his confidence.
“But Max thinks they are?”
“Yes. Monika said they were and so he was very sure. He was very rude.”
“What on earth did you say?”
“I told him he was wrong. Quite strongly actually. I told him he was a prejudiced suspicious old man who didn’t know what he was talking about.”
“Oh dear.”
“Actually I said a lot more. He was being so unfair. He hasn’t bothered to understand how they’ve taken responsibility for Bill and how much time they spend with him. He just hasn’t bothered to get to know them. As far as he’s concerned they’re Parry scum. That’s what he called them ‘Parry scum’. I could hear Monika in the background saying I should never have taken them on, if I’d not taken them on Holly would still be … well she’d still be here. I was so angry with both of them. I probably said a lot of things I shouldn’t.” Charles finished rather lamely.
“You were right to defend them.” Linda put her arm on Charles’s shoulder to comfort him. “Did he say what was taken?”
“Not really, not in much detail, pictures, books. Nothing of real value he said.”
“I didn’t think Max has anything ‘of no real value’ in the house.”
“I didn’t believe him either.”
“Anyway they don’t seem the things an opportunist thief would take, especially lads, surely they’d take the television and things they could easily sell? Why would they take pictures?”
“I wondered that too. There’s a lot more to it than just a couple of youngsters trying to make a few quid for nothing.”
“Did you say that to Max as well.”
“I did, but he was adamant. He kept repeating that Jack and Al had to be involved. He’s calling in the police. He still has a lot of influence with them.” Charles wasn’t going to worry Linda by telling her how much influence he knew Max had, not only with the police, but with less visible powers behind normal law and order enforcement.
“How did you leave it?”
“Not very well I’m afraid. He reminded me of certain obligations I had towards him and he said I must hand them back to their family and the police will deal with them.”
“But they had nothing to do with it! Hasn’t he any sense of justice? He’d condemn them without even checking the facts?” Linda was incredulous and angrily defensive of the children. “I’m going round. I’ve got to tell him he’s wrong. He’s being so unfair, so … Oh I can’t find the words. Surely he must understand you can’t condemn people without any evidence, no trial, no opportunity to prove their innocence?”
“I don’t think that would be a good idea. He included you in the exodus. You were to go away and leave me in peace so Holly will return and we will all be together again. Monika has influenced him about many things, the children, you, me, us all. She hates us therefore now so does Max.”
“The man is senile.”
“I pretty much told him that too.”
Max had been unambiguous. Charles must return the children to their proper family. He must send Linda packing. He must affect a reconciliation with Holly. Only then would he be accepted back into the family. Charles was to make a choice between loyalty to Max, his friend and protector for many years, the man who had supplied him with the funds to establish himself and enjoy his life the way he had wanted to, or loyalty to Linda and the children.
Charles had found the decision surprisingly easy.
“Isn’t there anything we can do? We’ve got to just sit here waiting for the police to call and take the boys away?”
“Police? What’s going on?” Bill had wheeled himself into the kitchen.
Linda and Charles looked at each other and Linda pursed her lips, shrugging, trying to say that they must be open and not try to hide anything. So Charles told him the bare bones. Although he trusted his belief in Al and Jack some words of corroboration from Bill might remove any worries he might have had. “Someone has had their house broken into and they think Jack and Al are involved somehow.”
“That’s what I said.”
“When did this happen?”
“Late last night.”
“Well it couldn’t have been them. We were all here weren’t we? Playing space invaders.”
“It might have been some friends of theirs.”
“Who?”
“Pod.”
“Oh him. They haven’t seen him for ages, nor Brickie. We don’t have time to hang around them any more. We decided ages ago that we didn’t much like them. Al said he was afraid of them and once they tried to push me over. There was a bit of a ruck and we haven’t seen them since.”
“When was that?”
“Ages ago. May. June. Early in the summer anyway.”
“And you haven’t seen them since?”
“No. Wouldn’t want to. Who did they rob anyway?”
“Sandhey. Max and Monika.”
“That figures.” Bill knew from the expressions on their faces that neither Charles nor Linda was prepared for his answer.
“Go on.” Charles spoke firmly.
Bill had spoken without thinking. Now he would have to explain that he had been wondering about why the smartly dressed man had spent so much time with the gang, and what he had really been after.
“Just after I came home we saw Pod and Brickie around, we saw them in the street when we were going to the gym. It was good because then they just didn’t think that I was there and could hear them. They never looked me in the eye and just talked above my head, probably believing that I couldn’t see and was deaf and dumb as well.” There was such unfamiliar bitterness in his voice that made Linda think it wasn’t only Pod and Brickie who had acted like that. “Anyway I wasn’t deaf and I wasn’t blind though I could play dumb when it suited me.” Linda and Charles looked at each other wondering what else he saw and heard. “There was this funny bloke who turned up now and again. He seemed too old and too well off to have anything to do with them. He wasn’t fuzz, I mean police, he wasn’t anything like that. He was coloured, you know Pakistani or something.” Linda shuddered and Charles made an involuntary protective movement putting an arm on her shoulders. “He gave them money sometimes, said he’d tell them when he was ready to make them earn it. I reckoned it was drugs and they were getting stuff for him but I soon realised it was the other way round. He was giving them money and drugs. He wanted them for something.”
“Why are you telling us this now?”
“I saw him. The man. The Paki or whatever he is. He was here yesterday.”
Linda shuddered. “Apart from being coloured was there anything else about him?” she asked very deliberately. “Was his hair long or short? What was he wearing? Did he speak well or with a heavy accent? Did you ever hear his name?” She knew who it was, so did Charles, but they needed confirmation to extinguish any hope that they might have been mistaken.
“He was quite tall, but shorter than Charles. He spoke well, you wouldn’t have known he wasn’t English. He was well dressed, jeans but they were smart …”
“And pressed with a clear crease down the front.” Linda finished for him.
“Yes. How did you know?”
“I just know.”
Charles looked down at Linda who had gone very pale. “Bill, can you leave us for a few minutes? Don’t tell your brothers for the moment. Don’t worry, we’ll tell them everything later. No secrets. We promise.”
Bill skilfully turned his chair and left the room, closing the door behind him.
“Do you think he’ll tell Al and Jack?” Linda tried to put off the moment she would have to accept that the man who had been her husband had been so close, had possibly spied on her, had watched her and was doing his best to destroy any happiness she had achieved.
“Of course he will. But it doesn’t matter.” Charles understood her reluctance to face up to the inevitable but knew the name had to be spoken. “I wonder what Ramesh is up to?”
“Why can’t he leave me alone?” Linda was close to tears, the pain of humiliation surfacing. It had probably not been buried too deeply.
“Forgive me but I don’t think it is you he’s after. He’s undoubtedly behind the robbery and he will have told them exactly what to take and they will have given him what they stole. His interest in the family goes far beyond you, I’m afraid.”
“So he has some pictures and books. So what? Why?”
“He actually has probably got a lot more. Pod and Brickie got into Max’s safe, they didn’t break in, they didn’t force the lock, they knew the combination. Max said I was the only other person to know it and they must have heard it from me. They didn’t steal anything, they put a piece of paper inside which contained a message Max really did not want to get.”
“A note?”
“He didn’t say what it was, or who it was from. He just said it proved someone he hoped was dead was not.”
“But why has Ramesh gone to such lengths to do that?”
“I haven’t a clue, but I bet we’ll find out one day.”
In the years that followed Charles thought many times about the last time he saw Max, every time he tried to explain to himself where it had all gone so wrong.
They had been friends for years. Max had made Charles his heir, had always treated him as his son. Whatever it was he wanted to do with his life, whether it was writing and broadcasting about birds or setting up a business with Linda or marrying Holly, Max had always encouraged him. Their friendship had been tested at times, Max had secrets he wanted to disclose to no one and gradually Charles had learned some of them. Every time he had learned something there had been a temporary cooling in their friendship but, until the week after the robbery, their relationship had always been strong enough to survive.
There had been no knock on the door, the police had not come to arrest the boys or even question them, but equally Charles hadn’t made any move to break up his home. Ten days after the robbery, during which time Linda’s nerve had been stretched to breaking point, Charles had driven to Sandhey determined to convince Max of Al and Jack’s innocence. He had to tell Max how Ramesh was involved and find out if Max could tell him why.
Monika was silent as she had let Charles into the house, she didn’t welcome him with a smile and a kiss on both cheeks as she always had, even in recent months. She had nodded towards Max’s study and Charles had taken that as an instruction.
They were never anything other than polite but it became increasingly obvious to Charles that Max was to be persuaded of nothing. Charles was a married man. Holly might return. Linda had to go, as did the children. Holly must be given the opportunity to return. It was insufferable to him and to Monika that Charles’s obduracy had led to their loss of Holly. Max’s anger was quiet and Charles knew it was genuinely felt but couldn’t help wondering at the extent to which Monika had influenced Max’s thinking.
Charles had stood up when it seemed the conversation could not go any further. He had proffered his hand in a final gesture of mutual respect but Max had ignored it. “There will be many things you will regret in your life Charles. I’m very afraid that this conversation will be one of the worst mistakes you will ever make.”
Charles always remembered the words as Max never made idle threats. People who crossed him or harmed people he loved had been imprisoned on what Charles knew were false charges, had died in what Charles knew had not been accidents or had simply disappeared.
“In choosing that scum and that woman over your responsibilities and your history you have turned your back on me so I turn my back on you.” And he did.
As Charles drove out of the gates of Sandhey, turning left to take the long straight road that ran alongside the golf course Charles was aware that this was the last time he would make this journey as long as Max lived. He would have to leave the town where he had lived all his life. His house would be sold, he would repay Max the money he had given him on his 21st birthday.
Max had made him choose, and he had made his decision.
“What about the bowmen?”
“There’ll be other clubs, other groups to join.”
“But we’ve all been getting on so well, and we’ve got so many friends there.”
“You’ll make other friends. And you’ll probably meet up with them at competitions anyway.”
The thought of leaving when they had been making such good progress had worried both Charles and Linda. They explained something of the reasons, leaving the children in no doubt that there was no choice. Once they realised the move was going to happen they all joined enthusiastically in the discussions about where they would go.
“Somewhere nice…”
“With a choice of cinemas, I’m fed up with only having one flea pit.”
“The house has got to have a large garden, we’ve got to be able to set up the bosses and backstop netting.”
“We’ve got to work out where the house is going to be first.”
“This is impossible. We could go anywhere.”
“It’s always more difficult to make a decision when there’s absolutely no restriction.”
“Well let’s start listing things we want and things we don’t.” Ever the organiser, Linda firmly drew a line down the middle of a sheet of paper. “Right. Seaside? OK. No. we’ve done that and we want something completely different. Countryside or Town? OK. Town in the middle of countryside, or city? OK. Not city. North or South? OK. South.”
It was Josie who achieved some focus in the discussion. “I’m going to be working in London. If you were within commuting distance I could live at home and that would be cheaper.”
“Great that’s 40 miles from London, near a railway station.”
“House prices will be cheap there then.” Charles could just be heard to mutter. He was not used to thinking about money and the knowledge that he would have to borrow to move to a house large enough for everyone in the most expensive area in the country did not make him comfortable.
Living with Holly, he had never even thought that the income from his investments wouldn’t be enough to support them. The house was bought and paid for and their needs hadn’t been great. But things had changed since he had the children and there had been months when his expenditure was greater than his income. He wanted to pay Max back, at least something of what he had been given. He didn’t like the prospect of having to spend more of his capital in buying a new house, reducing his income at the same time as his expenditure was likely to go through the roof. For the first time in his life, there was a need to think about, if not yet worry about, money. He was very conscious that the high interest rates that had caused Linda so many problems had been good for him.
His depressing turn of thoughts was interrupted by Linda.
“I know exactly where we should go.” She blurted out, surprising herself with the certainty. “We should go back to Kent.”
Charles looked at her as if to ask how she could want to do that so she continued rapidly “No problem. Look, I’m going to have to do something, bring in some money, and there I know people who will help me do that. I know which are the best areas and which wouldn’t be good at all. It would be an awful risk to go somewhere completely new where we didn’t know anything. If we all moved to Kent we’d have a head start.”
“It makes sense in a funny sort of way.” Charles sounded doubtful.
“Look, Ramesh is thousands of miles away.”
“Except when he’s here.”
“Exactly. It doesn’t matter where I am does it?”
And so, on the day that Susannah and Jonathan Smith returned from their honeymoon in India, it was decided that her brother’s disparate family would move south.
Charles never saw Max again.