Till We Meet Again

  ‘I couldn’t let Rose see me like this,’ her mother said, dabbing her bruised face with the wet cloth and wincing with the pain. ‘She’d blame your father.’

  ‘Well, it was him, wasn’t it?’ Beth said. ‘He’s mean and cruel. I hate him.’

  ‘You mustn’t say such things,’ her mother exclaimed in horror. ‘He’s your father.’

  That made no sense to Beth. But she tucked a blanket round her mother and said she would make her a cup of tea.

  After Beth had put the kettle on she went out into the stable yard and sat down on a bench to think about what she should do. Her father’s old rusting Humber wasn’t there, and that meant he’d probably gone into Hastings and wouldn’t come back until late that night.

  Everything about her parents and her home life was a puzzle to Beth. Seen from the end of the gravel drive, with pasture land railed off on either side, Copper Beeches looked very splendid, especially in summer when the rows of beech trees almost met and formed an archway. The house had wide steps up to a large studded front door, and with its long arched windows, tall chimneys and the stable block to one side and a conservatory on the other, it looked like the home of very rich people.

  But once you were half-way up the drive it soon became apparent that this wasn’t so. The stucco on the house was falling off, the window-frames were crumbling, and many panes of glass in the conservatory had fallen out years before. Weeds grew between the cobbles in the stable yard, and the roof was sagging. Her mother struggled to try to keep the lawn cut and the flower beds tidy, but as she so often said to her children, it was a house that had been built to be cared for by a team of servants, and it was as much as she could do to keep the inside clean and tidy.

  None of Beth’s friends at school lived in such a big house, but they all had better clothes and toys than her. Their houses might be tiny in comparison, but they were mostly much nicer. Copper Beeches was dingy, it smelled of damp and mould, and everything, from the furniture and carpets to the bedding, was worn out.

  In every other family she knew, fathers went to work, but not hers. He didn’t cut the grass or mend things, he just pottered about, tinkering with his car, or sat in the library reading. In the evenings he mostly went into nearby Battle to the pub. Beth was pretty certain too that no one else at her school had a father who hit their mother.

  He was always saying, ‘I have a position to maintain,’ which sounded to Beth as if this was supposed to be a reason why he didn’t work, but it made no sense to her. She had once asked Robert to explain, but he just laughed and said, ‘His position is the joke of the village.’ That didn’t make any sense to her either.

  Serena, however, had spoken more plainly when Beth asked her about it. She said, ‘It means our father is a terrible snob, and a parasite. A parasite is something which lives off something else. Like a flea. Father lives off rent he gets from tenants. He’s too lazy to do a hand’s turn himself.’

  Beth wished either Robert or Serena was here now to consult. But Robert only popped home now and then while he had this farm job, and Serena was working in a restaurant for the summer, so she wouldn’t be home at all. Telephoning Aunt Rose seemed the most sensible thing to do.

  So she went back into the house, made her mother some tea, and found some change and her aunt’s telephone number. Then, once she felt she could leave her mother for a while, she rode her bike down to the phone box in the village.

  After Beth had blurted out how she’d found her mother, Aunt Rose had said she and her husband would get there as soon as they could. ‘Don’t tell Mummy you’ve rung me,’ she said warningly. ‘I don’t want to give her time to think up excuses, or your father an opportunity to prevent her leaving. Just go home and look after her till we get there.’

  So that was exactly what Beth did. And now, two days later, Rose and Eddie were here, just as they’d promised, so Beth couldn’t understand for the life of her why her mother called her ‘heartless’. Surely if she’d done nothing, that would have been heartless?

  Beth came out of her reverie, a little shocked that after all these years that incident still stung. It seemed to her that her mother should have praised her for being cool and level-headed. A more emotional child would have run screaming to a neighbour, and then everyone would have known what a brute Monty Powell was. But then, her mother wasn’t blessed with much common sense, that was evident in the way she stuck by her husband, however badly he treated her and his children.

  Beth didn’t really believe that character was passed on genetically. She’d grown up with siblings who were considerably older than herself, so she’d learned from them rather than from her parents. Seeing her mother’s weakness from an early age had shown her that stoic acceptance only brought grief. Likewise, her father’s laziness had instilled the work ethic in her. They were perfect examples of how she didn’t want to be.

  Beth sighed, flicking through the files on her desk, not really reading them. If only her mother had listened to Aunt Rose that summer and filed for divorce. But she wouldn’t, she was too worried at leaving Robert at home with his father, and perhaps too she believed that even a brutal, lazy snob of a father was better than no father at all.

  It seemed strangely ironic to Beth that the same summer she realized how dysfunctional her own family was, she was introduced to the Wrights and decided they were the exact opposite. Indeed, she’d taken the images of their perfect, happy family with her right through to adulthood.

  She could still picture the Wrights’ house, The Rookery, as clearly now as if she’d seen it just a few days ago, a mysterious-looking place, almost invisible from the road because of the thick bushes and trees surrounding it. It had tall chimneys and latticed windows, and the garden ran down to the river, lock and weir. She remembered now that Susan had said there were no rooks in the trees any more, as her father always shot them because he couldn’t stand the noise they made.

  Susan had taken her in to get a picnic that first summer and she’d thought it was the most marvellous house she’d ever been in, not a bit creepy as she’d expected. Beautiful polished old furniture, a hall with wood panelling and carved newel posts, a kitchen kept warm by an Aga, and Susan’s mother, plump and jolly, making fairy cakes which she let them eat still hot. Then there was the glorious huge garden. Parts of it were kept almost wild, with flowering shrubs and trees, there was a small pond tucked away, a summer-house, dozens of fruit trees and a lush green lawn that sloped down to the river Avon, flanked by beautiful flower beds.

  Beth didn’t see Susan’s grandmother because she was taking a nap, but she saw her friend’s pretty bedroom and her collection of dolls with exquisite clothes made by her mother. There were no dank, gloomy rooms in that house, no hideous old oil paintings or broken furniture. And Susan had a father who worked in an office. Beth never met him either, but she’d seen a photograph of him that day and remembered he was handsome, smiling, and she knew without a doubt that he never hit his wife or children.

  During subsequent holidays Susan didn’t ever take her into her house again, but there had never seemed anything odd or sinister about that as there was no real reason to. If it was fine weather they went out on their bikes, if it was wet they hung around the shops in Stratford, or went to the pictures. And as Beth had never had friends home to play with her, it didn’t really occur to her that other children did that. Yet there were, looking back, oblique hints that all was not well. Susan did mention that her granny was a trial, that she made nasty smells and was always breaking things. She always seemed to be mentioning hanging out the washing for her mother too.

  Beth could surmise from that now that the old lady was suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, that she was incontinent, and that Mrs Wright was run ragged caring for her practically twenty-four hours a day. But she’d known nothing of such things back then, what young girl would unless they’d experienced it in their own family?

  Beth wondered now whether Susan didn’t tell her about it because
she was ashamed. Or whether she felt she’d said quite enough for Beth to understand, and thought her hard-hearted too because she never commiserated with her.

  Likewise, when Mrs Wright had her stroke, Beth didn’t really know what that meant. Susan did relate in her letters that she was partially paralysed, with her speech impaired, but she gave no graphic descriptions as to what the implications in caring for her would be. Besides, Susan seemed only too happy to look after her mother, in one letter she’d joked about it being a good way of getting out of real work.

  In Beth’s imagination Mrs Wright was still the smiling, plump woman she’d met, the only difference being that she now sat in a wheelchair and directed Susan to make the cakes and cook the dinner. As Beth’s own home life was so awful, she even envied Susan. She visualized her sitting companionably by the fire with her mother on a cold afternoon, or Susan taking her for a walk in her wheelchair when it was fine.

  Of course she knew now that she should have read between the lines of Susan’s letters and realized that the reason she didn’t seem to know anything about rock music or current books and films was because she had no time or opportunity for these things. When Susan apologized for her letters being very short and dull, Beth should have cottoned on that she was over-tired and got no stimulation to write anything jollier.

  But at that time Beth was in the sixth form, struggling with her own problems. It was enough for her that in almost every letter Susan kept urging her not to give up her dream of being a lawyer, and reminded her that she was clever enough to sail through all the exams and shine at the end of it. If it hadn’t been for that, Beth might very well have abandoned school where she felt like a pariah, left the home she hated and found some dead-end job.

  ‘You owe her a lot,’ she muttered to herself, and felt a stab of shame that she’d purposely let their friendship wither and die when she started at university.

  Maybe her reasons were sound. Cutting herself off from everyone who knew the old Beth was the only way to create a new one. She remembered how she spent what seemed a huge chunk of her first grant cheque on new clothes – a red velvet maxi-coat, long black boots and a dramatic black hat. It was vital to look sensational, that way she could banish for ever the memory of shabby hand-me-downs, of ridicule from her peers and pity from neighbours. In that outfit she didn’t need Susan to tell her she was clever, she knew she was. No one would dare humiliate a girl who looked that way.

  ‘It wasn’t the way you looked that did it,’ Beth murmured to herself. She knew now it was the defences she’d built round herself that stopped them. And she would never know what good things she kept out, along with the bad.

  Chapter eight

  Steven Smythe was very surprised by Susan Fellows when he made his first visit to her the following day.

  He knew of course that people in Dowry Square had thought she was a wino, therefore he expected her to look rough, with wild hair and perhaps some teeth missing. Yet the most outstanding thing about Susan Fellows was her very ordinariness: she was the kind of woman Steven would expect to work in a cake shop or a supermarket.

  She was in fact an almost exact opposite of Beth in every way, small, dumpy and nervous, and Steven’s first impression was that she was a little dull-witted too. It was hard for him to see how the implacable Beth Powell could have ever struck up a friendship with her.

  But no sooner had he got over that surprise than Susan gave him another. She said she was worried she’d upset Beth by dismissing her as her solicitor. Steven was amazed, he wouldn’t have expected someone charged with a double murder to give a jot about anyone else’s feelings. He’d barely got into the interview room at the prison and introduced himself before she launched into an anxious explanation.

  ‘Don’t worry, you haven’t upset her,’ he replied. ‘She understands your reasons completely, and that’s why she sent me in her place. But she does hope you’ll let her visit you now and again, as a friend.’

  Susan clearly hadn’t expected that, for her lower lip trembled and her eyes swam with tears. Steven had read in the police report that she’d showed no emotion on her arrest, so this was a break-through as far as he was concerned. Or else Beth meant far more to her than he’d been led to believe.

  ‘Is that allowed?’ she asked.

  ‘Well, we’re from the same law firm. The prison officers have no way of knowing whether or not we are both really working on your case,’ he said with a smile. ‘Beth’s lost a lot of sleep over you. She needs to see you, to know how you are coping. We both hope you will finally come round to agreeing with us how you should plead at your trial.’

  ‘I don’t see how I can plead anything but guilty. I’ve admitted what I did, there were witnesses,’ she said almost wistfully. ‘Surely it’s all cut and dried?’

  Steven heard that note in her voice and was pleased. It was quite common for first offenders to believe they deserved harsh punishment, especially a woman who’d taken another’s life. Yet after a couple of weeks in prison most changed their views, and their pleas.

  Steven sensed she was basically a very honest woman. It was in her face, and the way she spoke. After hearing from Beth about the awful room she lived in, he was quite convinced that she’d been through hell since her daughter died. All he had to do was discover exactly what kind of hell.

  ‘Few things in the legal profession are entirely cut and dried,’ he said. ‘There is always a loophole somewhere, but to look for that I have to know everything about you. Now, why don’t we just talk generally today? I’d like to get to know you at least as well as Beth does.’

  Susan’s head jerked up. ‘She doesn’t know me at all. We were only fifteen when we last met in Stratford. We probably didn’t exchange much more than twelve or fourteen letters after that.’

  ‘Why did you stop writing?’ Steven asked gently. ‘Just grew out of each other? Or was it something else?’

  ‘Beth went off to university, and I was stuck at home taking care of my mother,’ Susan said with a shrug, as if that explained it enough. She paused, perhaps realizing it didn’t. ‘There were no hard feelings on my part. I must have been a very dull pen pal in the last couple of years. I expect I’d have thought there was something wrong with her if she persisted, with all those student parties, dances to go to, and boyfriends.’

  Steven had always been good with female clients. He had been told by some of them that they never noticed they were being questioned, it had just seemed like conversation to them. He hoped he could make Susan feel that way.

  ‘Because all you had to write about was the cooking and cleaning?’ he asked.

  She nodded, then began describing an average day. There was no bitterness in her tone as she explained how her mother needed help with everything – dressing, going to the lavatory and being wheeled around to where she wanted to be. It sounded exhausting, for there wasn’t just the nursing care, but the housekeeping too. ‘I was lucky if I got into bed by twelve at night,’ she finished up. ‘Then Mother often rang for me during the night. I had a struggle to find time to write to Beth, let alone search around for something interesting to tell her.’

  ‘And you were so young,’ Steven said sympathetically. ‘You must have felt bitter sometimes, everyone else your age doing the whole Sixties bit, whooping it up, the peace revolution, the wild clothes and music, while you were playing Mum to your own mother. How long did this go on for?’

  ‘Eighteen years,’ Susan said with a sigh. ‘But I wouldn’t say I was bitter, that’s far too strong. I loved Mother and I wanted to take care of her. But there were moments when I questioned the fairness of it. I was standing down the garden watching the river one day,’ she went on with a half-smile. ‘I saw the river as my life going by, with me just stuck there watching. It made me feel so sad. One day, I shortened a skirt, just to look like everyone else then in their minis. Father told me to let it down again. He said it was incongruous for someone taking care of an invalid. I must have been the only gi
rl in the Sixties wearing knee-length skirts.’

  ‘Was he often like that?’

  ‘Well yes, I suppose he was.’ She sighed. ‘I think he stopped seeing me as his daughter, or even a real person. I was just the one who looked after him and Mother.’

  Gradually Steven got her going, and she began telling him how as the years went by her father began to come home later and later, how she never had Saturdays off as promised, how isolated she was from the real world. Steven was appalled, for he had no doubt that what she’d told him was the truth. He even suspected she was playing down the grimness of it out of loyalty to her mother. It was almost like one of those Victorian melodramas, a young girl locked away from the world for eighteen long years.

  ‘I would never have wanted Mother to go into a home,’ Susan explained. ‘But I did start to blame Father because he wouldn’t pay for more help. He said he couldn’t afford it, but I knew that wasn’t true, and it hurt to find he wasn’t the generous man I’d always believed he was. He didn’t seem to care either that I was so cut off. Television was my only real link with the outside world, but it was also torture as it showed me everything I was missing. Do you remember Pan’s People who used to dance on Top of the Pops?’

  ‘I loved them.’ Steven beamed.

  ‘So did I, they were so beautiful, so sexy and graceful. But I hated them too because they were everything I wasn’t, they had the whole world at their feet. Whereas I wore slippers all day.’

  Steven found that almost unbearably sad, for just the mention of Pan’s People whizzed him back to his student days. He could remember lolling on the floor of the flat he shared, a bottle of beer in one hand, a joint in the other, arguing with his mates about which girl was the most gorgeous.