Midnight is a Lonely Place

Ten minutes before, a message had come on the constable’s mobile phone that a police car was on its way to pick him up. The young man helped himself to a piece of bread from the basket and spread it thickly with butter. ‘As soon as the car comes, I’ll go back and report what we found. I can take you with me, Mr Cutler, if you like – and anyone else who wants to leave.’ He looked from one to the other.

‘You go, Anne.’ Kate said quietly. ‘You can’t afford to be away any longer.’

‘I am not leaving you here.’ Anne met her eye with determination.

‘Don’t worry about Kate. I’m going to look after her. She’s coming back with me,’ Jon said firmly.

Kate shook her head. ‘I’m not coming back to London, Jon. Not yet.’ She was too muddled, too shocked by everything that had happened to make decisions. ‘Or at least, I’ll come to Bill’s funeral, then I thought I would go to our parents’ for a while. I was going there for Christmas anyway.’

‘Kate -’ Jon looked at her in sudden panic. ‘Please – ’

‘Stay here, Kate.’ Greg put in softly. ‘At least until the cottage is dried out. It won’t take long.’

‘She’s not going back there!’ Jon interrupted. ‘After all that’s happened. You must be mad – ’

‘She agreed to take it for six months.’ Greg’s voice was very calm.

‘Things have changed since that agreement,’ Kate shook her head. ‘I’m sorry, but I can’t stay there, Greg. Not now. Not after Bill – ’

A sudden imperious crackle from Bob Garth’s mobile phone cut through Greg’s growing anger. Unclipping it, Garth raised it to his ear. Glancing from face to face he listened to the message intently, then he grinned. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘That’s good news. The Farnboroughs are going home. Mrs Farnborough has two cracked ribs and young Susie is suffering from exhaustion, but that’s all. Mrs Lindsey is going to stay in hospital with young Alison overnight. They think she is all right, but they are going to do a brain scan just to be sure.’ He stood up. ‘Well, who is coming with me? Have you made up your minds?’ He couldn’t wait to be off.

‘Go, Anne.’ Kate said after a moment’s pause. ‘I will wait to collect my stuff as soon as they will let me in the cottage, then I’m going to Herefordshire. Allie’s gone. The grave’s gone. There’s no more danger. I’ll be all right.’ She shook her head ruefully. ‘I know you’re worried about work – and besides, there’s C.J. You go. Only don’t get lost this time.’ She gave a wan smile.

Anne grimaced. ‘If we can be dropped off at the end of the track, Pete has suggested that he drive in front of me, at least on these lanes, to check I don’t get lost!’ She glanced at the taxi driver mockingly.

‘That’s right.’ He bowed. ‘And I’m going to buy her a slap up meal in Colch to send her on her way thinking a bit better about this part of the world! So don’t you worry about us, folks. Just you look after yourselves.’

‘I hate to leave you here.’ Anne pushed back her chair. She put her hands on Kate’s shoulders and hugged her. ‘What are you going to do about Greg and Jon?’ she asked softly. She could hardly have missed the conflict between them.

Jon did not give Kate the chance to reply. ‘She’ll be all right, Anne,’ he said. ‘I’ll make sure of it.’

Anne looked him in the eye. For a minute she was silent, then she smiled. ‘Make sure you do.’

When the car finally arrived, Patrick went too. He had not argued when Greg suggested that he go to Diana at the hospital and keep her company.

Kate glanced at Jon and Greg as the police vehicle disappeared up the track. Greg had turned away to throw more logs on the fire. Outside, the garden lay very still beneath the thawing snow. She bit her lip. The silence in the house had become suddenly threatening.

Greg straightened. His face was pale and strained. ‘You’ll have to stay for Dad’s funeral, Kate. He would have wanted you to.’

They all glanced towards the door. Someone was coming later to pick up Roger’s body and take it to the mortuary.

‘I don’t know, Greg.’ Kate bit her lip. ‘Please, give me time to think. Perhaps I can come back just for the day.’

‘Just for the day.’ Greg’s voice was heavy with irony. ‘How jolly.’ He stiffened suddenly and stared round. The temperature in the room was falling swiftly. ‘He’s come back,’ he said. ‘Can you feel him?’

‘Marcus?’ Jon moved across to put his arm around Kate.

‘Marcus,’ Greg confirmed. He sounded almost pleased.

Kate shuddered. She looked round. ‘Where is he?’

‘Here.’ Greg could feel the anger; the hatred. But this time the mood was different. It had changed. This time it was accompanied by fear. That was strange. Why should Marcus be afraid? Greg felt himself shiver.

For a moment no one moved, then almost defiantly Greg picked up a candle and limped to the door.

The study was very quiet and cold. His father’s body lay on the bed, covered by a clean white sheet. He stood, looking down at it. Was it Roger Marcus feared? Or something – someone – else?

He turned away and picked up his last painting of the woman in blue. Claudia. It had haunted him for so many months, this beautiful enigmatic face. He stared down at the huge oval eyes. They radiated hatred. He could feel it, directed straight at him. He frowned, touching the paint with his little finger then he walked back into the living room, taking the picture with him.

‘Well, what do you think?’ He propped it on the chair so Jon could see it.

Jon squatted down on his haunches so that he was level with the face. ‘Powerful stuff.’ He frowned. It was the first time he had smelt it: jasmine. Very strongly, coming from the canvas. He sniffed cautiously. It was heady, overpowering, sexy.

Greg was watching his face. ‘At last. He understands.’ His voice was very soft.

Kate crouched beside Jon. ‘It’s a very fine painting, Jon?’ She stared at him. ‘Are you all right?’

‘What?’ He looked at her vaguely and then he focussed his gaze once more on the picture.

‘The earth is cover’d thick with other clay,

Which her own clay shall cover, heap’d and pent,

Rider and horse, – friend, foe – in one red burial blent’

he quoted softly.

‘Jon – ’

‘Leave him.’ Greg’s voice was a sneer. ‘Poor Kate. You have a rival. You see what she can do? The whore. Her power is infinite.’

‘Shut up, Greg!’ She rounded on him furiously. ‘Jon! Jon, what’s the matter?’

Jon looked at her. His eyes looked straight past her; through her. He did not see her.

LXXV

He knew he was dying. Lying on his low bed, his wife sitting at his side, he watched the servants scurrying silently to and fro with coals for the brazier. He was cold, so very cold even though it was still summer. His eyes strayed to the shadows. They were there, waiting. Nion and Claudia. Her dying curse had after all done its work. The web was spun. Already the sticky threads entangling him reached out to the farthest corners of time. But he would evade her; somehow he would evade her – as long as there was no evidence of his crime no man on earth would censure him and, before the gods, he would take his chance like a Roman warrior, wandering the corridors between worlds where she would never find him.

He felt his lungs falter, the breath labouring suddenly in his chest, and a stab of panic went through him. Not yet. He wasn’t ready yet. The tablets. He had the wax tablets under his pillow. On them the priest had written the words which would protect him and guide him to places where they would never find him. He had given orders that he be buried without cremation; that would anchor his spirit more closely to the earth. The servants had gone now. The room was empty. Hazily, he could see that his wife was dozing, her head resting on her arm. It must be midnight. The loneliest time. The loneliest place. Through the door, open to allow a draught to stir the heat from the brazier he could hear the water from the fountain in the atrium. It had a pleasant, soothing music to it; a music echoed by the stars he could not see, blazing up there in the midnight sky where, before the dawn began to dim their glory, he too would be wandering, lost in the immensity of time. He tried to move his head a little as on the table beside him the lamp flame flickered and dimmed. Suddenly the room was full of the scent of jasmine.