flare.
They retraced their steps past the great wall with the shattered columns.
‘Father, when I was diving on the Barrier Reef,’ said Nick, ‘I watched fish getting washed by a plant. It was wonderful. They lined up and took it in turns. Somehow, they just knew what to do. There was no need for any instructions.’ He looked aside at the troubled monk. ‘Maybe my mother thought you were in the same queue, that you’d understand without thinking. Don’t worry if you can’t help in the way she wanted.’
When they reached the table in the herb garden Father Anselm picked up the case; from there they walked to the car park where the yellow Beetle seemed to quiver against the purple canopy of plum trees. Fruit lay splattered on the windscreen.
A mad Gilbertine idea,’ said Father Anselm awkwardly. ‘We forgot that fruit falls when it’s ripe.’ It sounded like a warning. He asked for time to understand the contents of the case and for Nick’s telephone number; and he concluded, ‘Don’t turn over old stones. Let them lie where they were placed.’
Nick drove down the lane of loitering oak trees, away from Larkwood and the smell of aromatic plants. And as he did so, he reflected, painfully, that he’d never been able to share his mother’s deep faith. He leaned more towards his father, who, while adherent, was passive, his true fervour lying in the open fields. When cross, Elizabeth had called him a heretic; in better tempers, she settled for pantheist. Nick had grown up beneath the quirky arch formed where these two types of belief met. He eventually crept away, not quite making sense of the open sky At university he saw the chaplains and the students, half resenting the consequences of his own choice (if that is what it was), for he would have liked to belong. He eventually found a working credo in science – the purity of facts and verification. His mother had quietly grieved. They’d argued – hopelessly, because he didn’t ask her questions, and she didn’t want his answers. He could follow loose talk about God, but not to the point where all that type of thing mattered- at the meshing of life and ideas.
Shortly before Nick had gone down under, she’d said, ‘We should settle on beliefs that are worth the hazards of the race.’
Mildly irritated, because they were watching Ben Hur and it was the exciting bit when the chariots were crashing into each other, Nick said, ‘Would you fight for yours?’
‘I really don’t know.’ She spoke as if the crowds were waiting, but this was St John’s Wood not the Colosseum.
Thinking now of his mother on the edge of the sofa, eyes glued to the screen and worried, Nick decided to ignore the parting advice of a monk. He pulled into a lay-by and fished out Mr Wyecliffe’s business card. It was stained with oil from the cashew nuts. He dialled the number on his mobile. The solicitor’s surprise was forced and his charm predatory, as if he smelled business. An appointment was made for the next day and Nick resumed the journey home, wondering about the relief of Mafeking.
11
It was odd, but George could remember in his sleep. Sometimes his dreams were like the old films shown at Christmas. He watched with recognition. So when George was slipping away, he would try to switch on what was lost to him while awake. Most of the time it worked. But when he snapped upright it was with the horrible fear that he’d made it all up.
With the sharp stone, George scratched another day of waiting upon the wall. It was early evening. Sheets of polythene wrapping flapped in the corner. He turned on his pocket radio and Sandie Shaw sang ‘Puppet on a String’. He became drowsy, drugged by the waiting and the cold. Elizabeth’s voice rose in his memory. They’d often sat in Marco’s listening to the radio echo from the kitchen. Songs like that were always being dug out. Quite deliberately, George held himself at the line between sleep and wakefulness.
Elizabeth bought more cocoa and toast. ‘You really have changed. I barely recognised you.’
‘You keep saying that.’
‘I’m sorry.
Elizabeth picked up a triangle of toast with dainty fingers.
After the trial Riley sold Quilling Road.’
‘Did he?’
‘Yes. And he left the Isle of Dogs. In fact, he was sacked. With the money from the sale he set up a house clearance business.’
‘Did he?’
‘Stop asking if he did something, when I just said that he did.’
‘Fair enough.’
Elizabeth licked her thumb and forefinger. ‘He set up two companies. One of them is a shop run by his wife, Nancy, whom you saw at court. I don’t suppose you met?’
‘No,’ said George. ‘It wasn’t that type of party.’
Elizabeth dabbed the corners of her mouth. ‘The second business is Riley’s own concern. He runs it from a transit van, selling odds and ends at fairs and bazaars.’
‘Stuff from the house clearances?’
‘Yes. So when he buys a job lot, everything is somehow or other divided between this shop and his van.
‘So what?’ George wasn’t interested in Riley’s commercial habits.
‘Aren’t you ever inquisitive?’
‘Not really’ His eye fell on the last triangle of toast. ‘How do you know all this?’
‘He has to file accounts at Companies House. I’ve read them.’ Elizabeth pushed the plate towards George, as if it were a donation. She said, ‘I’m reliably informed that this business isn’t what it seems.’
George threw down a crust. ‘You’ve just said that he’s gone straight.’
‘No I didn’t. I said he’d gone into business.’
‘What’s the difference?’
‘All the figures add up perfectly’
George couldn’t understand lawyers. How could they see a weakness that wasn’t there? Mind you, that was what the other one had done. How had he known to ask about David Bradshaw? Duffy was his name. He’d got lots of pages all to himself in book thirty or so.
Elizabeth said, ‘To find out what he’s really doing we need to see more than a balance sheet.’
‘We?’
‘Sorry,’ said Elizabeth with a smile. A slip of the tongue. But now you mention it, I’ve an idea.’
‘Have you?’
Elizabeth glowered at him. ‘Yes. Both companies are registered at Nancy’s shop.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘It’s their official business address. Riley is obliged by law to keep all financial records for seven years. I doubt if he keeps a filing cabinet at home.’
‘So what do you suggest?’
‘Nancy is the key. She must have turned aside from so much to have seen so little.’
‘Your idea… it wouldn’t be me knocking on the door and introducing myself?’
‘Not far off, George. Imagination and subtlety would have taken you the remaining distance.’
‘Would it?’
Elizabeth glowered again and refused to answer.
A loud flap from the polythene nudged George into wakefulness. The present moment gathered density, becoming prickly; he had pins and needles along one arm. The conversation was still complete, like an echo. He listened to the aftershock, understanding – for that moment of rebounding – all that had happened over the following months. But then an awful doubt came over him: had it all been a dream? With a torch held under his chin, he fumbled through his notebooks. He turned the pages quickly, his mind growing dim, Elizabeth’s words fading… until he paused to smooth out a dog-ear at the beginning of book thirty-six. There was the heading. It brought back her voice: ‘George, this is what you are going to do.’
