Nathan blinks rapidly. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘I killed him.’
Nathan continues to stare at me. His eyes flicker as the conviction he’s held unequivocally for all these years disintegrates like ash in the wind. Watching him wrangle with what I’ve told him gives me a strange sense of satisfaction.
Then I look at my son and his look of childlike bewilderment as he faces everything I’ve fought so long to shelter him from skewers my heart.
‘Hannah. I don’t think—’ Cam starts to speak, but I interrupt him.
‘No, Cam. No more lies.’ I try to reassure Alex with a smile. ‘A man died. Nearly sixteen years ago. He went missing and his dingy was found on some rocks the next day. Everybody saw him drinking. They assumed he got drunk and took his boat out. That he fell overboard and was drowned.’ I pause and take a breath. ‘But that’s not what happened. He didn’t drown. He was killed. And…’ My voice trembles. ‘It was me who killed him.’ I pause to gather myself. Each of them seems about to speak so I force myself to continue. ‘I didn’t mean to.’
Sharp fragments of that night attack me. A recollection of the creeping horror which seeped into me as I realised what was going to happen. My utter helplessness. A flash of pain as I tried to push him off me. A moan which sounded like pleasure. The billowing sickness when he thanked me and the eerie thud as he fell on the deck.
Then the worst bit of all.
The terrifying stillness.
‘He…’ I hesitate, my voice no more than a whisper. ‘He forced himself on me.’
Shame sweeps over me. I’ve fought this shame ever since he appeared out of the shadows on the jetty. Accusatory voices in my head hounding me constantly. Why did you wear such a short skirt? And your top left nothing to the imagination. You drank too much. Dancing and flirting like that? Well, what else did you expect? But now I’m able to push them away. It wasn’t me. It was him. It’s taken me years to realise that he was the monster. What ifs plague me. What if I’d stayed at home with Cam? What if I’d left when Cam wanted to leave?
What if Davy Garnett hadn’t attacked me?
‘I had a knife,’ I continue. ‘It wasn’t mine but it was in my bag. He came at me again. I told him to keep away. But he didn’t…’
Cam is agonised, as if each of my words is a dart. I hear his voice repeating the same thing over and over as we lay in numbed silence in his car at Lamorna.
I shouldn’t have left you.
I’m so sorry.
I stare at Alex. I can see from the look on his face he has finally pieced it all together, and now, standing on the landing in this hateful house, he knows exactly who his father is.
I open my arms to him but his eyes well with tears and he shakes his head. ‘The man,’ he says flatly. ‘Who is he? Does he have family here?’
I think of Martin and Sheila Garnett. Sheila – lovely, stoic, gentle Sheila – who passed away from breast cancer a few years ago. I heard the news from Vicky, whose mum was one of her closest friends.
‘It’s so sad,’ Vicky had said to me. ‘She never got over Davy’s death.’ Then she’d lowered her voice, preparing, I knew, to deliver syrupy gossip. ‘You know, Mum told me a few days ago that he didn’t quit the army at all. He was thrown out. Apparently he assaulted one of the girls who worked in the barracks kitchen. Sheila only told her quite recently and swore her to secrecy. They didn’t want anybody to know. Well,’ Vicky said, with a sad sigh of understanding, ‘I suppose you wouldn’t, would you? It’s not exactly the type of thing you broadcast around a small town. To be honest, there was a look about him; I didn’t trust him at all. Still, poor bugger, shouldn’t talk ill of the dead.’
‘His mum died a few years ago,’ I say. ‘His father is alive. He still lives in Newlyn. He was badly injured in an accident on a fishing boat.’ I glance at Cam who looks at his feet. ‘The community is kind to him.’ I think about the times I’ve seen Martin Garnett. Thin and gaunt, moving trollies at the new supermarket, his one empty sleeve pinned up as if pledging allegiance to an American flag.
‘Let me get this straight.’ Nathan makes an exaggerated expression of trying to understand. ‘While you were with me and carrying on with him,’ he gestures in the direction of Cam, ‘you screwed someone else?’
Cam takes a step forward and Nathan raises his eyebrows and shakes his head disdainfully. ‘Oh, here we go, coming to beat me up again, defending the honour of a cheap slut.’
There is an deafening shriek as Alex runs at Nathan. I try and grab at his arm but he yanks it out of my grip. He hurls himself at Nathan, teeth gritted, one balled fist raised to hit him. ‘Don’t talk about her like that.’ His voice rumbles like distant thunder. ‘Never – ever – again.’
Nathan’s features settle into an amused snarl. ‘You’re going to hit me? Perhaps you really are Cameron Stewart’s son.’
Alex draws his arm back a little further, a fire blazing in his eyes.
‘Alex, it’s OK,’ I say. ‘We all need to calm down and talk about this.’
Alex hesitates and blinks hard. Then the tension leaves his body and his arm lowers.
‘All of us. Together.’ I look first at Nathan, then Alex. ‘OK?’
Alex shakes his head. ‘It’s not OK though, is it? It’s the opposite of OK.’ His eyes are reddened and brimmed with tears. ‘And no amount of talking can change that.’
Then he pulls away from me and tears down the stairs. I call his name and run after him. Beg him to stop. But he’s out of the front door and away from me before I’m even off the staircase. From the doorway I watch him haring out of the gate, which bangs shut behind him and swings repeatedly against the catch. My stomach churns as I scream his name. I run down the path, lean over the gate, and see his lithe figure disappearing down the lane. I shout for him again, but he ducks to his right, jumps over the drystone wall into the field, and is gone like a dog from the traps.