Judy is surprised when the boss says that he isn’t going to work at the weekend. They are still meant to be investigating the Avril Flowers case and Judy expected Nelson to be at the station every day, chivvying and chasing every last scrap of information. Instead, he told her, when she was leaving for the day, that he was going to take Bruno to Jan’s house and ‘have the weekend off’. Why is Nelson choosing this moment to slacken off from work? It’s not as if he has anything else to do. Has he?
Nelson has been strange ever since he got back from the halls of residence, thinks Judy. He kept ranting on about some student who had pictures of Ruth plastered all over the walls. They tried to trace this boy, Joe McMahon, but to no avail. Besides, as Judy ventured to say, it’s no crime to have someone’s photo on your wall. She’s never been a student but her bedroom at home had been a shrine to Michael Praed as Robin of Sherwood. Come to think of it, that probably explains a lot, from her son’s first name to her relationship with Cathbad.
Judy should be happy at the idea of having some free time. She, after all, is driving home to a house full of people. Cathbad will have cooked supper. Michael and Miranda will want to tell her about their day. Maddie will be on hand for some heavy-duty Grey’s Anatomy viewing later. But Judy knows that, some time over the weekend, she will be looking over the files on Avril Flowers. And on Samantha Wilson and Karen Head.
The family are all in the garden. Judy goes into the downstairs loo to wash her hands several times and then she goes out to join them. Maddie is tapping at her laptop, protected by a parasol. Michael and Miranda are digging their vegetable patch and Cathbad is siphoning recycled rainwater into a watering can. It’s such a peaceful scene, the air smelling of grass and newly turned soil, that Judy almost wants to stand and observe it without anyone seeing her. But Thing notices her immediately and rushes over to welcome her. Cathbad follows more circumspectly.
‘Good day?’
‘OK. Strange. I’ll tell you later.’ She doesn’t want to discuss Joe McMahon or the Lean Zone breakthrough with Maddie in the background, probably online to the Chronicle at this very moment.
‘We’re making a bug hotel,’ says Miranda, pointing at a ramshackle collection of boxes in the middle of the lawn.
‘It’s more like a bug homeless shelter,’ says Cathbad.
Judy thinks of Nelson’s description of the UNN halls of residence. ‘Like a hotel in a war zone.’ She is very glad, once again, that her children are still at home with her, surely too young to be traumatised by this weird limbo-like time. For them, right now, it seems more like paradise than limbo.
‘And we’re going to have a worming,’ says Miranda.
‘A worm bin,’ corrects Michael. ‘I’m going to grow peas and broad beans in my bit of garden.’
‘I’m going to grow an enormous tree,’ says Miranda, determined to outdo him. ‘With silver bells and cockle shells. Like the rhyme.’
‘That’s about torture,’ says Maddie. ‘The silver bells are thumbscrews. I read it somewhere. “Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary”. Mary is Mary Tudor.’
The boss had mentioned a poem too, Judy remembers. Stone walls do not a prison make. Nor iron bars a cage. It had been on Joe McMahon’s wall, alongside the pictures of Ruth. She realises that Cathbad is watching her and forces a smile.
‘Has anyone made banana bread? I’m starving.’
Banana bread, followed by a delicious supper, white wine and several episodes of Meredith Grey saving lives all put Judy in a better frame of mind. On Saturday morning they go for a walk on Wells beach, revelling in the miles of sand and the complete absence of tourists. I’m so lucky, thinks Judy, watching Thing run to collect a piece of driftwood. Imagine being locked down in London, or even Norwich. Surely you would go mad without this stretch of blue, this healing space between you and the horizon.
In honour of her work/life balance, Judy has left her phone at home. When she checks it, she’s irritated to see that she’s missed a call from Tina Prentice, Avril’s cleaner. There’s a voice message, somewhat breathless.
‘Hallo, er . . . Judy. You did say to call if I remembered anything. Well I’ve just remembered that I did see someone at Avril’s house that day. Can you give me a ring back?’
Judy does so and leaves a message. Later that afternoon, when the children are watching The Lion King on DVD, Judy rings again and, to her surprise, someone answers. It doesn’t sound like Tina. This voice is younger. More anxious.
‘Hallo? Who is this?’
Judy explains.
‘Mum’s been taken ill. This is Denise, her daughter. She’s gone to hospital.’
‘Oh, I’m so sorry. I hope she’ll be better soon.’
Judy does not like to say the C word but Denise does it for her. ‘They think it’s Covid,’ she says.
So, this is what it’s like, thinks Ruth. This is what it’s like to wake up with Nelson, have breakfast with him and discuss what they’re going to do all day. And, at times, when they are all sitting in the kitchen, eating bacon sandwiches and laughing at Flint’s attempts to ignore Nelson, it really does seem like the purest happiness. At other times, when Nelson turns on the television – without asking – and seems mesmerised by some football programme, it’s less delightful. It’s not even a recent match. There’s no live football, or any other sport, because of the pandemic.
‘Let’s go out for a walk,’ says Ruth.
‘I want to watch the football,’ says Kate, sitting next to her father on the sofa.
‘Who’s playing then?’ asks Ruth.
‘It’s . . .’ Kate stares at the screen. ‘Mun and Ack Milan.’
Nelson laughs. Ruth looks at Flint and is sure that the cat raises his eyebrows.
‘Well, we should go out when this fascinating match is over.’
In the end, they walk over the sand dunes to the sea. The haunted landscape is looking at its best today: the marshes are bright with secret expanses of water and flocks of birds rise up into the pale blue sky.
‘Godforsaken dump,’ mutters Nelson, but his heart isn’t in it.
‘Godforsaken,’ repeats Kate, enjoying the sound of the word.
Ruth misses Cathbad who would surely say something about sacred spaces and liminal zones. But she can’t suggest meeting them for a socially distanced walk because then Judy would see that Nelson is with her.
Kate cheers up at the sight of the sea and runs along the sand, arms outstretched like a toddler pretending to be an aeroplane. Ruth thinks of the moment, twenty-one years ago, when they discovered the timbers of a Bronze Age henge on this same beach. Erik, her mentor and then friend, had fallen to his knees in the centre of the sacred circle. Eleven years later, a child’s body had been found buried in that exact spot.
‘I still think about her,’ says Nelson. ‘Scarlet. Do you?’
Ruth is rather taken aback by this Cathbad-like clairvoyance.
‘Yes,’ she says. ‘I think about her a lot. She’d be fifteen now.’
Ruth never met Scarlet Henderson in life, but she imagines her now, a laughing teenager, striding along by the water’s edge. Cathbad’s daughter, Maddie, was Scarlet’s half-sister. Ruth wonders how often she conjures this same image.
‘It’s a lonely place,’ says Nelson, looking out towards the sea. ‘A lot of bad memories too. Do you ever think of moving?’
Ruth hesitates. This is dangerous ground, more dangerous than the shifting quicksand of the marsh. ‘Sometimes,’ she says. ‘Now that Kate’s growing up. But I love it here.’
‘I know you do,’ says Nelson, his tone implying that this reflects badly on her judgement.
‘My mum hated it,’ says Ruth. ‘But, when I was going through her belongings, I found a picture of my cottage.’
‘She must have liked it a bit then,’ says Nelson.
‘It was dated 1963,’ says Ruth. ‘That was written on the back, “Dawn 1963”.’
‘It’s a mystery,’ says Nelson. ‘I know you like those.’
‘So do you.’
‘I’m a policeman. I hate mysteries.’
Ruth thinks of the photograph from Peter. The two kittens sitting on her shoulders. Sparky is buried in the back garden. Nelson actually dug the grave. Can she bear to leave those memories behind? And what memories did her mother have of the house, some thirty years before Ruth ever lived there? But, before she can say more, or argue with Nelson – she thinks he likes detection more than he admits – Kate comes galloping over to show them a mermaid’s purse. Concentrate on the present, Ruth tells herself.
Nelson, too, has always imagined this day. What would it be like, in a parallel universe, to be married to Ruth? Restful, is one answer. Ruth doesn’t feel the need to tidy up constantly – she has left Monday’s Guardian on the table all week – and she seems to have no particular agenda for the weekend. Of course, all the places Michelle would frequent – gym, garden centre, shops – are shut but Nelson gets the feeling that they wouldn’t figure in Ruth’s plans anyway. They have a leisurely breakfast, eating bacon sandwiches and drinking coffee. Nelson tries to lure the demon cat with a bacon rind, but the animal simply turns its back on him. Katie laughs so much that orange juice comes out of her nose. Ruth laughs too, and it’s pure joy to hear mother and daughter enjoying themselves so much, even if it is at his expense.
Ruth seems less happy when he settles down to watch the football, as he always does at home. She forces them to go out on a walk, across the dull, flat landscape, pitted with treacherous streams, all the way to the dull, grey sea. Nelson calls it ‘godforsaken’ and Ruth gives him one of her sideways looks. They have quite an interesting talk about Ruth moving house. Although she stamps on the notion, it’s the first time she’s ever admitted that it might be a possibility.
Back at the cottage, Nelson offers to make fish finger sandwiches for lunch and is astounded that Ruth does not stock this essential foodstuff. They have cheese on toast instead. Afterwards, Nelson helps Katie construct a Lego house. He’s forgotten how much he likes this sort of thing, fitting the little grooved bricks together, looking at the baffling Danish instructions, searching for that elusive corner block. He asks Katie what they’re making and she says ‘Hagrid’s hut’ so he’s none the wiser. Ruth sits at the table by the window working on her laptop but Nelson notices her looking over towards him several times. He asks her if she’s had any more sinister messages and she says no. He’ll look into it on Monday. He doesn’t trust Joe McMahon, not one inch. The boy is obviously obsessed with Ruth and now he’s God knows where, plotting God knows what. Nelson does not approve of suspects being where he can’t see them.
Ruth cooks a curry for supper. She does it in a rather haphazard way, with a book propped up on the work surface and Radio 4 tuned to some interminable play about the end of the world, but the curry is surprisingly good. Nelson and Katie wash up (after Nelson spent several futile minutes searching for the dishwasher) and Nelson makes coffee. Then they settle down to watch The Princess Bride. It’s a film Nelson’s daughters loved so, for the first time today, he feels slightly uncomfortable. Katie is sitting very close to him and keeps telling him the plot but, even so, after half a bottle of wine with supper, he feels his eyes starting to close. Ruth, the other side of Katie, is surreptitiously checking her phone. Is she worried about more Grey Lady messages? Or is someone else calling her? That horrendous David from work, perhaps?
‘Dad,’ says Katie. ‘Your phone’s buzzing.’
Nelson’s phone is on the table. He picks it up. Laura. Instantly, the sleepiness and content fall away and all that is left is guilt. Nelson takes the phone and goes into the kitchen where Flint is sitting on the table hoovering up crumbs.
‘What is it, love?’
Laura is crying. ‘It’s just so awful here, Dad. I can’t cope. Can I come home?’