She fumbled nervously at her cigarette packet. 'She'd have been lying if she had.'
I shook my head in contradiction. 'Alan gave me a tiny wooden statuette which he told me he'd carved himself from an old table leg as an end-of-year present. I believed him because it's very primitive, and looks like something a child might do, but I'm certain he stole it from Annie.'
'You can't prove that.'
'No,' I agreed, 'but I can certainly prove he never carved it. It's been analyzed by an expert. It's a representation of an Aztec god, called Quetzalcoatl, and was cut from pine, probably around the turn of the century, in a style common to natives of Central America. Annie's father made a collection of Central American artifacts during the '30s and '40s, so the circumstantial evidence suggests that the Quetzalcoatl in my possession once belonged to her. The only question is, did she give it to Alan, or did he steal it?'
Maureen leaped at the bait. 'She gave it to him.'
'How do you know?'
She thought for a moment. 'He ran an errand for her ... it was her way of saying thank you. Matter of fact, I was the one who made him pass it on to you. He kept on about what a nice lady you were, and how you'd kept quiet about the time you caught him thieving from your wallet. 'One kindness deserves another,' I said, 'and Mrs. Ranelagh's more likely to appreciate a wooden statue than you are.' '
'Why did he tell me he'd carved it?'
She caught my eye briefly. 'I expect he wanted to impress you.'
I laughed. 'I'd have been more impressed if he'd told me he earned it running errands for Mad Annie. He used to shout 'daft nigger' after her in the street. She turned on him once with a growl and grabbed at the sleeve of his jacket. He was so terrified he took to his heels and left the jacket in her hand.' I paused. 'She'd never have asked him to run an errand for her. And, even if she had, she'd have cut off her right hand before she rewarded him with one of her treasures. She disliked him even more than she disliked Derek. The little brute never left her alone ... He was always on the lookout for her...' I fell silent before anger made me strident.
'That's lies. You're inventing things to suit yourself. All you're saying is that Alan played in the street a lot. It doesn't mean he was on the lookout for Annie.'
'He was an abused and neglected child, Maureen, who was too frightened to take on his father and saw Annie as easy meat. He learned that bullying worked and put it into practice on the most vulnerable person he could find.' I gave a humorless laugh. 'I wish I'd known how you and Derek were treating him. I wish I'd had him prosecuted when I had the chance. Most of all, I wish he'd been taken away from you and taught some decent values when it mattered.'
'You were just as responsible as us,' she muttered. 'You were his teacher. Why didn't you say something to him when he called her a 'daft nigger'?'
It was a good question. Why hadn't I? And what sort of excuse was it to say I was frightened of a fourteen- year-old? But I was. Alan was a huge child for his age, tall and heavily built, with a low IQ and little understanding of anything except aggression, which both emboldened and scared him. Had there been no Michael Percy to take the flak, then I think Alan's problems would have been more obvious and he might have attracted sympathy instead of dislike and disgust. As it was, most people avoided him and, in the process, turned a blind eye to the way he and his gang terrorized Mad Annie. It seemed an even contest, after all. She was bigger than they were, crazier than they were, older, bulkier and perceptibly more aggressive-particularly when she'd been drinking- and she had no compunction about lashing out when their teasing became intolerable.
'I've spent twenty years regretting my silence,' I told Maureen. 'If I'd been a little braver, or a little more experienced'-I gave an uneasy laugh-'maybe I wouldn't feel so guilty now.'
She shrugged. 'I wouldn't fret about it. Alan wouldn't have listened to you even if you had taken him to task. The only person he paid any mind to was his father.'
'Until he turned on him with a baseball bat.'
'It was bound to happen one day,' she said indifferently. 'Kids grow up. It was Derek's fault anyway. He didn't realize Alan wasn't up for a thrashing anymore.'
I looked again at the cluster of empty bottles on her windowsill. 'Do
'Why should I?'
I gave her a copy of Michael Percy's letter, detailing how her children had stolen trinkets from Annie. She was more amused than fazed by it for, as she said herself, I'd have a job proving it. 'No one's going to believe Michael,' she pointed out, 'and he wouldn't talk to the police anyway, not while he's in prison. It's more than his life's worth to be known as a grass.'
'They might believe Alan,' I suggested.
'He'll just deny it. He's got a family now ... doesn't want something he did as a kid coming back to haunt him this long afterward. And Danny doesn't even remember his dad, let alone who lived next to us twenty years ago. He asked me down the phone what Annie was like and why I've never mentioned her.'
'What did you say?'
'That she was a fat bitch who made our lives hell, and he didn't ought to believe anything you said because you had about as many screws loose as she did.'
I smiled at her as I pulled a manila envelope from the bottom of my rucksack and put it on the table in front of her. 'He'll probably believe this, though. I made this copy for you. When you've read it, give me a call. My number's on the front.'
'What is it?'
'An affidavit from a jeweler in Chiswick who bought several items off a woman called Ann Butts. It took me and my father about two hundred letters to find him after Michael suggested you'd sold the ring you took off Bridget. We started with jewelers and pawnbrokers in Richmond and radiated out until we hit pay dirt in Chiswick. He's still in business and keeps a record of every item that passes through his hands ... together with the name of the seller and purchaser.'
