HE STOOD THERE and took in the scene – Annie in his chair, the opened file, the negatives on the floor, the scattered papers – and he exhaled very slowly.
‘You found the pictures,’ he said calmly.
‘How could you?’ she asked.
He cleared his throat and pulled at the collar of his shirt. He looked exhausted and dishevelled. The knuckles of his right hand were bruised and bloody.
‘How could you get someone to spy on me? How could you do that to me?’
William turned away. He went to the LP records lined up alphabetically in the shelves above the stereo and he ran his fingers along the spines.
‘With all due respect, Annie, you were the one who was being unfaithful. I think having you followed was the lesser crime.’
‘If you wanted to know, you could have asked me. You could have confronted me. I would not have lied. We could at least have preserved our dignity.’
‘I think our dignity disappeared when you began sleeping with that man.’
‘Tom,’ Annie said. ‘His name is Tom.’
William sighed. He pulled a record from the shelf and held it square in his hands.
‘Where is Tom now?’ Annie asked. ‘What’s happened to him?’
William ignored her question. He shook the record out of the sleeve, held it carefully between the palms of his hands, so that his skin was only touching the outer rim of the disc, blew across its surface. ‘You could have been more careful, Annie,’ William said. ‘If you really cared about me, then you could have tried a little harder to be discreet. I saw you with him, with Tom Greenaway. The day of Johnnie’s accident.’
‘You were in Sheffield.’
‘No. The meeting was cancelled and I was driving back through Matlow.’
He held the record up to his eyes to check it had not distorted. Annie sank down into the chair and covered her face with her hands.
‘I stopped at the florist’s on Occupation Road to buy you some flowers,’ William said. ‘I bought yellow roses, the scented ones, the kind you love. I bought a dozen roses with dark green leaves and I had the florist wrap them in cellophane and tie the bunch with a ribbon. I was imagining the look on your face when I gave them to you. I wanted to show you that I knew you, that I knew what you liked. I wanted to make you happy.’
‘William …’
‘And I came out of the florist’s and there you were. You were standing on the other side of the road, and you were smiling. You looked beautiful. I’d never seen you look more beautiful. And I called your name, Annie, I called you but you didn’t hear. The door opened and there he was, that man; there he was, on the doorstep, and you put your arms around his neck and you kissed him. You kissed him, and then he took your hand and he led you inside and the door closed and I was standing there, with the flowers in my hand. I was standing there …’
‘What did you do?’ she whispered.
‘I went back to work. Paul said there’d been an accident on Crossmoor Lane.’
‘Johnnie’s accident?’
William lifted the lid of the stereo system and dropped the record onto the spindle. He spun it a couple of times with the flat of his hand.
‘I didn’t know it was Johnnie. All I knew was what Paul told me: that a young lad had been knocked off his bike by two officers in a patrol car.’
Annie pushed herself up in the chair. ‘That’s not right, William. You told me the officers found Johnnie. You never said they caused the accident.’
‘They ran into the bike on a blind bend. They weren’t local, they didn’t know the road. There was nothing they could have done to avoid it.’
As he spoke, it was as if the world was shifting beneath Annie, sliding away from her. She frowned as she pieced this new version of events together in her mind, replayed the story.
‘If what you’re saying now is true—’
‘It is.’
‘Then you lied before. You, William.’ Annie stood up now. She reached out for her husband but he shook her off. He lifted the arm of the record player and moved it back to set the mechanism that spun the turntable in motion. ‘Why?’ she asked. ‘Why would you do that?’
William was leaning over the record player, with his back to her. She could see the wrinkles and folds of skin on his neck, the mole on his jawline, the stubbly grey hair, shaved very short, at the nape. He did not turn to face her.
‘Imagine, Annie, what would have happened if word got out that a miner’s son had been injured by police brought in on overtime. That he’d been hit by a car driven by two officers who’d done a twenty-four-hour shift, who were perhaps going a little too fast on a road they didn’t know. Think what the newspapers would have said about that. The NUM. Scargill. The political capital they’d have made from it? Whichever version was made public, it wouldn’t make any difference to the lad. The officers gave him first aid and saved his life. Paul persuaded me that they didn’t deserve to lose their careers over an accident.’
‘My brother lost his arm!’ Annie cried. ‘He almost died and you let Paul persuade you to cover it up?’
She pulled at his arm to make him face her but again he pulled away. She dropped back down into the chair and sat there numb with confusion.
William placed the arm of the record player carefully on to the edge of the record and watched it revolve. The arm bumped up and down. There were a few whispery crackles, like the sound of shallow breaths, and then the first, very quiet, strains of music began to play. It was a violin concerto.
Annie tried to grasp hold of something that she knew, for certain.
‘You don’t cover things up, William,’ she said. ‘You don’t tell lies or bend the rules about anything, ever. I can’t believe you would do that.’
The music was mournful. William closed his eyes to listen.
‘Put yourself in my shoes,’ he said. ‘Your father was stirring things up at the colliery. The men were laughing at me, talking about me behind my back. I was losing control. I knew it and they knew it. And you, you were with Greenaway.’ He grimaced. ‘I was lost, Annie. I didn’t know which way to turn. The only person I could trust was Paul. He stood by me. He showed me how I could win back the respect of my men. All we did was alter the details of the story to save the lads in the patrol car. Paul paid Seth Friel to dispose of the bike. It was easy.’
‘And none of your colleagues objected to this? Nobody tried to stop you?’
‘They patted me on the back, Annie. They bought drinks for me. I’d nailed my colours to the mast, I was one of them again. They showed me that loyalty is sometimes more important than truth. I persuaded myself that it didn’t matter; it didn’t change anything.’
‘It changed you.’
‘Yes,’ William acknowledged. ‘Perhaps it did.’
Annie tried to think back to that day, that time. She remembered how things had been different afterwards. She had not seen what was happening; she’d been so tied up in her own thoughts, her concern for Johnnie, her longing for Tom. She could not bear to look at her husband. The music waxed and waned, the violins like ghostly, whispering voices.
‘Did you talk to Paul about me?’ she asked.
‘He already knew. He’d seen you with Greenaway, put two and two together. He said he had it all in hand, that he’d sort it out, like he had the first time.’
‘What does that mean? “Like he had the first time”?’
William rubbed his forehead with his fingers. ‘I didn’t know until tonight. I didn’t fully understand the strength of his loyalty to me.’
Annie had felt dread before, but not like this; not on this level. She looked at William’s hand, swollen now and raw about the knuckles. He had hit Paul – Paul, who he loved like a son. He’d hit him hard enough to break his nose. She made herself look at his face and she saw how grim and old it had become. It was not the face of the man she had married, but the face of someone she hardly recognised. She saw something in his eyes that she had not seen before; it was shame.
She knew then what William had meant.
‘Paul framed Tom, didn’t he? He framed him for Mrs Wallace’s death?’
William said nothing but she knew it was the truth by the blankness in his eyes and she realised, too, that it was not the worst of it.
‘What else has he done? What else?’
William hunched over. He seemed to lose a little more of his dignity.
‘The murders,’ he said.
She did not understand, not at once. ‘He’s covered up the murders?’ she asked, stupid with fear, and William shook his head.
‘He killed the women. He killed them for me.’
‘Oh God!’ Annie doubled over as if she had been punched. It seemed impossible, and yet there was a terrible logic to what William had told her, if it was the truth.
‘So that Tom would be blamed?’ she asked in a whisper.
‘Yes.’
‘Both of them?’
‘In Paul’s mind everything was all right while Tom Greenaway was in prison. Paul was the only person who knew the truth. And then Tom came back.’
‘So Paul killed Jennifer Dunnock?’
‘She looked like you. He knew Tom would be blamed. But that didn’t work, so he killed someone else to make sure.’
Annie looked at William and saw the despair in his eyes, and she knew it was true.
‘Oh God, he’s mad!’ Annie gasped. ‘He’s completely mad. He’s sick in the head.’
‘Yes.’ William closed his eyes. He rubbed his temples with his fingers. ‘But in his skewed mind it all made sense. It was the most straightforward route to putting things right.’ He gave a sardonic little laugh. ‘He’s so utterly corrupt, Annie, that he doesn’t see that he’s done anything particularly wrong. He said he was only trying to protect me. He did it for me, for Christ’s sake, he wanted to please me.’
Annie felt light-headed. It was the music and the horror of all this, the brightness of the room, the darkness of the night outside, William so close, so different now in her eyes, and trying to rethink all that had happened in a different way, and still she did not know what had happened to her lover.
‘Where is Tom?’ she asked again. ‘What’s happened to Tom? Tell me, William.’ She didn’t care any more if William saw the depth of her love for Tom, all she cared about was knowing where he was, if he was still alive. ‘What has Paul done to him?’
‘You know we’ve had men looking out for Tom since he went missing,’ William said. ‘Today Gunnarson spotted him on the edge of the moor. He called Paul and Paul joined him and together they followed Tom up the moor. At last they’d got him exactly where they wanted him.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Keep up, Annie. They needed him to be somewhere remote before they attacked him because it was supposed to look like suicide. In Paul’s mind that tied everything up nicely. Greenaway would be gone and the murders would stop. There’d be no need for a trial, no picking over the details. You and I would go off on holiday and have another baby. Everyone would be happy.’
‘What have they done to Tom?’
‘Paul thought it would be easy,’ William said. ‘He had Gunnarson with him. They jumped Greenaway on the moor. It was supposed to be all over in seconds. They hadn’t counted on a couple of local lads hiding up there in the dark. They were out lamping.’
Annie imagined it, the darkness, the desolation of the moor at night, and Tom all alone. She imagined the footsteps behind him, the fear, him running over the bracken, tripping maybe, stumbling, his heart beating too fast, the cold air in his lungs; then the thump of a fist in his belly, shouts and then what? Other voices, other fists and feet and shoulders; dogs, lights, the two police officers realising the only way to save their skins was to run before they were recognised.
She remembered Paul earlier, the state of him; the panic.
‘What did they to do Tom?’ she asked again.
‘“Tom this, Tom that,” you’re like a stuck record, Annie,’ William said. ‘Is he all you care about? Is he all that matters to you?’
‘Please, William, tell me.’
He rubbed his temples. ‘They left him there; wounded but alive. He’s with the lampers. I imagine they’ll have taken him to a hospital by now.’
‘Oh thank God,’ she whispered.
‘And what of us now, Annie?’ William asked. ‘What do we do now?’
Behind William the study door slowly swung open.
He felt the movement and turned. Ethel stood framed in the doorway with the light of the hall behind her. She was wearing her nightgown, long and white, buttoned up at the neck, and her dressing gown trailed behind her. She looked like a ghost-bride, a stooped old bride with her white hair framing her tired face, her pale blue eyes, her skin soft as powder and the yellow nails of her toes peeping out from the lacy hem of her gown.
‘Mother.’ William straightened himself. He cleared his throat, made an effort to compose himself. ‘What are you doing? You should be in bed.’ He covered his damaged hand with the one that was still intact as if he didn’t want his mother to know he’d been fighting.
She looked at them both, William and then Annie.
‘What’s going on?’ she asked.
‘It’s nothing, Mother,’ said William.
‘But it’s not nothing. You used to be so happy together, but these last weeks everything’s gone sour. You think I’m too doolally to understand, but I can see what’s going on.’ She held out one shaky hand and touched her son on the shoulder. ‘I heard you talking earlier. I heard what you said to Paul, that he will go to prison and that baby of his will grow up without a father. It’s so sad. And what about you, William? What will happen to you?’
Annie thought of Georgie Segger, her eagerness to chase a story, and of all the other journalists, how they would hold the events in Matlow up as an example of corruption, of bad management, of everything that was morally wrong with the police. She thought of the miners and their supporters and how they would use every opportunity to stick their political knives into William. She thought of the re-written police statements that he didn’t even know about yet. The only incorruptible copper in England. She thought of how the people of Matlow would jeer at him, how they’d relish his downfall, how they would laugh at him, pity him, despise him. And the man he had trusted most, the man he had loved like a son, was the one who had destroyed everything.
The music was softening now. It wreathed around her husband like smoke. He could not hold her eyes.
‘Oh William,’ she said softly.
Ethel groaned then, as if she were in pain. ‘Will somebody take me upstairs?’ she asked. ‘I’m so tired. I’ve had enough of all this.’
‘I’ll come with you,’ Annie said. She put her arm around Ethel. She could feel her ribs through her nightgown, could feel how frail she was and Ethel leaned against her and she was as light as a bird. ‘Oh you poor thing, you’re freezing,’ Annie said. ‘Let’s get you tucked up into a nice, warm bed.’
‘Annie?’
‘Yes?’ She turned to look at William. He was standing with his arms at his side and his eyes were bloodshot. There was the air of a man completely defeated about him; a man who knew he was finished. His shoulders slumped and his face had become slack. His left hand was bruised and swollen, there were blood spatters on his shirt. The integrity that had held him upright had been broken. He was ruined. ‘What is it?’ she asked.
‘It’s over, isn’t it?’ he said. ‘You and me. Whatever happens next, we are over.’
‘Yes,’ she said very quietly.
‘Are you going to leave me?’
‘I’m going to find Tom and I’m going to be with him.’
‘Is there anything I can say, or do, to stop you?’
‘No, William,’ said Annie. ‘I don’t think there is.’
Ethel trembled beside Annie. Every step was an effort. Going up the stairs was taking forever and Annie was worried about the old woman. She was so cold. She rubbed the hand that she was holding, but the hand was like ice.
‘Gerry will be wondering what’s happened to me,’ Ethel said. ‘He’ll be looking out of the window, watching out for me.’
‘I know,’ Annie said. ‘I know.’
‘He hates to be apart from me. He says he needs me to be close so that he knows where I am.’
‘Do you want to stop here for a little rest? That’s right. Catch your breath, Ethel.’
‘Don’t be too hard on William, will you, dear. In his own way, he loves you very much.’
‘I know he does.’
‘He was never very good at showing his emotions. But then some men are like that, aren’t they? I’m all right now, Annie, I can go a little further.’
They reached the top of the stairs and stepped onto the landing. Annie heard William go into the kitchen; she heard the click of the lobby door. ‘Do you need the bathroom, Ethel?’ she asked.
‘No, thank you. I just want to see Gerry. He’s waiting for me. I miss him so much.’
‘I know you do. This way. I’ll put on the light. Wait here a moment, Ethel, let me turn down the bed for you.’
From downstairs she heard the strains of the concerto winding up from William’s study. She heard the study door close.
‘Isn’t it cold,’ Ethel said. ‘Hasn’t it turned cold all of a sudden.’
‘You’d never know it was summer.’
‘But that’s England for you. Always lulling you into a false sense of security.’
Annie reached down to switch on Ethel’s electric blanket. As she smoothed the undersheet, the music followed her into the room and wrapped itself around her. It pulled and pushed at her, it tugged and strained as if it were trying to tell her something. William had the volume up loud – too loud, Annie thought. It would wake Elizabeth. Annie felt the music vibrate through her; she felt it in her heart, she felt it was becoming part of her.
‘Here you are, Ethel,’ she said. ‘You sit on the bed, gently now. Is that all right? I’ll lift up your legs … there, you make yourself comfortable. Now I’ll cover you over.’
And the music grew louder and louder. Annie looked at Ethel, but the old lady seemed oblivious as she lay back on the pillow dreaming she was in the arms of her dead husband. Annie reached across her to turn on the bedside light and the music billowed up; it was drowning her – and suddenly she knew what was going to happen.
‘No!’ she cried, and she leaped up, raced out onto the landing. ‘No!’ she screamed. ‘William! NO! NO! NO!’ but the shot rang out before she had reached the top of the stairs.