Cold Is The Grave

“That’s no reason. Why? Why did she do it? Why did she hate us so much? Didn’t I do my best for her? I didn’t have an abortion. I gave her life. How the hell was I to know her adoptive parents would turn out to be religious fanatics?”

“You weren’t.”

“So why does she blame me?”

Ruth’s last words still echoed in Banks’s mind from that afternoon: Because they took her back. She broke their hearts and they took her back. “Because Ruth sees everything from her own point of view, and only that,” he said. “All she knows is how things affect her, how things hurt her, how she was deprived. In her way of looking at the world, everything was either done for her or against her. Mostly it was against her. She doesn’t know any different, doesn’t recognize people’s normal feelings.”

Rosalind laughed harshly. “My daughter the psychopath?”

“No. No, I don’t think so. Not as simple as that. She enjoyed exercising power over people, inflicting pain, yes, but she didn’t have the detachment of a psychopath. She was obsessed, yes, but not psychopathic. And she knows the difference between right and wrong. You’d have to ask a psychiatrist, of course, but that’s my opinion.”

Rosalind got up and fixed herself another drink. She offered Banks one, but he refused. He still had a quarter inch in the bottom of his glass, and that would do him nicely.

“Will she be put in a mental hospital?” Rosalind asked.

“She’ll be sent for psychiatric evaluation, for what it’s worth. They’ll determine what’s best done with her.”

“There’ll be a trial? Prison?”

“I’m afraid so.”

Rosalind shook her head. “Emily’s dead. Jerry’s dead. Ruth’s a murderer. Before Emily died she lived with the man who left me pregnant with Ruth more than twenty years ago. Then I find out that my daughter, my abandoned daughter Ruth, led her into it on purpose, just to humiliate us all in her eyes, so that she could be the only one to know we were all living a lie. Then she killed her. I had two daughters, and one murdered the other. How do you expect me to put all that together? How can I possibly make sense of it all?” She took a long sip of gin and tonic.

Banks shook his head. “I don’t know. In time, perhaps.”

“Remember the first time we met,” Rosalind said, crossing her long legs and leaning back in her chair so that a smooth white stretch of thigh showed. Her voice was a little slurred.

“Yes.”

“I was obnoxious, wasn’t I?”

“You were upset.”

“No, that’s not it at all. I was obnoxious. Jerry was upset. If anything, I was annoyed, irritated by Emily’s irresponsible behavior, worried what impact it might have on Jerry’s political ambitions, on my future. I didn’t want Emily back. I couldn’t handle her.”

“You wanted to protect the world you’d made.”

“And what a world that was. All style and no substance. All glitter and no gold.” She waved her arm in a gesture at the room and spilled some gin and tonic on her jumper. She didn’t bother to wipe it off. “All this. It’s strange, but I was thinking about it when you arrived, while I was packing. Funny, it doesn’t mean very much now. None of it does. You were right to despise me.”

“I didn’t despise you.”

“Yes, you did. Admit it.”

“Maybe I resented you a little.”

“And now?”

“Now?”

“Do you despise me now? Resent me?”

“No.”

“Why not? I’m the same person.”

“No, you’re not.”

“How profound. But you’re right. I’m not. All the money, the status, the power, the thrill of political ambition, the whiff of Westminster… it all used to mean so much. It means nothing now. Less than nothing. Dust.”

“What does have meaning for you now?”

Rosalind paused, sipped some more gin and tonic and stared at him, her eyes slightly unfocused. Outside, the wind continued to howl and rain lashed against the windowpanes. “Nothing,” she whispered. “Not yet. I have to find out. But I won’t give up until I do. I’m not like Jerry.” She got unsteadily to her feet. “Stay and have another drink with me?”

“No. Really. I must be going.”

“Please. Where do you have to go to that’s so important? Who do you have to go to?”

She had a point. There was Annie, of course, but he wouldn’t be going to Annie so late. Another small drink couldn’t do any harm. “All right.”

The drink, when it came, wasn’t small, but he didn’t have to drink all of it, he told himself.

“I’m sorry there’s no music,” Rosalind said. “We never did have music in the house. I remember your little cottage, how cozy it is with the fire, the music playing. Maybe I’ll find somewhere like that.” She looked around bleakly. “There was nothing like that here.”

Banks wanted to point out the grand piano, but he had a feeling it was just for show. Emily had been forced to take piano lessons, he remembered, because it was part and parcel of the Riddle lifestyle, along with the pony, the proper schools and the rest. Some people managed to be happy with those things for their entire lives, then there were people like Rosalind, who caught Tragedy’s wandering eye and got to watch it all come toppling down around them.

“I should never have put her up for adoption.”

“What else could you do?”

“I could have had an abortion, and then Emily’s killer would never have been born.”

“If we all knew the consequences of every decision we made, we’d probably never make any,” said Banks. “Besides, it wasn’t your fault that you had to give Ruth up for adoption. Your parents played a part in that. Does that make them responsible for Emily’s death, too?” He shook his head. “It doesn’t make any sense, Rosalind. You were young. You couldn’t have cared for a child properly, especially without the father’s help. You thought she would have a better life. It wasn’t your fault that the adoption agency thought they had found Ruth a home with decent people who turned out to be strict religious types. And it wasn’t even the Walkers’s fault that Ruth turned out the way she did. I’m sure they did their best in many ways. From what I’ve gathered, they weren’t intentionally cruel, just thoughtless and strict and cold. No. You can keep on assigning blame here, there and everywhere, but when it comes right down to it, we’re responsible for what we do ourselves.”

Rosalind stubbed out her cigarette and tossed back the rest of her drink. “Oh, you’re right. I know. It’ll pass. Everything’s just too overwhelming at the moment. I can’t seem to take it all in.” She went to refill her glass and bumped her hip against the corner of the cocktail cabinet. Glasses and bottles rattled.

“I’d really better be going,” Banks said. “It’s getting late.”

Rosalind turned and walked toward him, swaying a little. “No, you can’t go yet. I don’t want to be alone.”

“I can’t help you anymore,” said Banks.

Rosalind pouted. “Please?”

“There’s nothing more I can do.”

“There must be. You’re a nice man. You’ve been good to me. You’re the only person who has.”

Banks walked toward the front door and opened it. He felt the cold wind around his hands and bare head. Rosalind leaned against the wall, drink in her hand, tears in her eyes.

“I’m sorry,” said Banks, then he pulled the door shut behind him and dashed toward his car. Sorry as he felt for Rosalind Riddle, he didn’t want to be part of her life any longer. He wanted to put as much distance between them as possible. Gratly would do for a start, and Barnstaple would be even better.

Before he could get into his car, he heard the crystal tumbler shatter against the door behind him.