The Other Half Lives aka The Dead Lie Down

used it. You can’t make a story come to life without naming the characters.

‘So what if the painter in the article’s Mary Trelease?’ Simon demanded. ‘So what if Trelease and this Martha Wyers woman were part of the same colour supplement feature in 1999? So fucking what?’

‘Liv’s trying to help, Simon.’ To her sister, Charlie said, ‘A connection between Martha Wyers and Mary Trelease doesn’t really help us. If we need one, we’ve got it already: they both went to Villiers School. They were contemporaries there.’

Olivia looked angry, then puzzled. Then she laughed. ‘You both seem to be assuming that the young visual artist The Times chose was Mary Trelease.’

Simon moved towards her, ready to snatch the papers she was holding from her hand. ‘Was it or wasn’t it?’

‘No, as a matter of fact.’

Charlie pursed her lips. ‘Liv, whatever you’re…’

‘We’ve pissed about enough here already,’ Simon called over his shoulder, halfway to the door. ‘Let’s go.’

‘It was Aidan Seed,’ said Olivia, holding the printed-out article for Charlie to take. ‘Now do you want to see this? Yes,’ her face set in a hard smile as she watched Simon’s about-turn, ‘I thought you might.’

15

Wednesday 5 March 2008

‘When did Gemma die?’ I ask.

‘The police wouldn’t tell me much, but from the questions they asked, it must have been Monday night,’ says Mary. ‘They wanted to know my movements.’ She walks over to the window, opens it, flicks ash out. The cows are still moaning in the fields, as if they’re in pain.

Forty-eight hours ago, Gemma was alive.

‘Why did the police speak to you?’

Mary tucks her hair behind her ears. It springs back, like dark thunderclouds enveloping her thin face. ‘I didn’t believe Charlotte Zailer when she told me you were Aidan’s girlfriend. I thought, no. Can’t be. When I had it confirmed by First Call, my heart nearly stopped. Once I’d got myself together, I drove to Aidan’s workshop, waited outside in my car. A bit later, Zailer turned up with another cop I recognised-DC Waterhouse. He’d been round to see me on Saturday, also about Aidan. The two of them went inside.’

‘I was there,’ I tell her.

‘They stayed for a while, then left, except Waterhouse didn’t go far. He sat in his car and waited at the top of the road. A few minutes later, Aidan came out, got into his car and drove away. Waterhouse followed him, and I followed Waterhouse. The three of us drove to London in convoy. To Muswell Hill.’ She watches me for a reaction. ‘I started to have a feeling, then, that I knew where he was going, except it made no sense.’

‘Where?’ I ask, breathless. All those times Aidan was away, when he told me he’d been in Manchester, working for Jeanette Golenya. Lies, every time.

‘I knew Stephen Elton and Gemma Crowther had been paroled. My First Call guy-he’s thorough. He’d given me their new address, details of their new jobs…’

‘What jobs?’

Mary frowns. ‘Do you really want to know?’

‘Yes.’

‘Stephen Elton works for the Ford dealership in Kilburn. He’s some kind of mechanic. Gemma Crowther works… worked for an alternative health centre in Swiss Cottage called The Healing Rooms. My friend visited her there. She gave him a hot-stone massage.’ She’s talking about the man with the red bobble hat and the dog. Someone I used to know. I’ve hired him before-that’s what she said. Finally, those words filter through. ‘Proud as punch, he was, when he told me that. Said it was a perk of the job-charged me for his treatment, cheeky sod.’

‘Stone,’ I repeat blankly.

Mary opens her mouth, says nothing. It hadn’t occurred to her.

Gemma Crowther, a healer. ‘Stephen was a chemist, a pharmacist, ’ I say. ‘She was a primary school teacher.’

‘Yeah, well, obviously they’d have had difficulty getting similar jobs after what they’d done. And not so much difficulty getting taken on by a garage, or some quack outfit like an alternative healing centre. Some places check out prospective employees’ backgrounds more diligently than others, presumably. ’ Mary throws her cigarette butt out of the window and rubs the small of her back with both hands.

‘Their new address-it was in Muswell Hill?’

She nods. ‘23b Ruskington Road. That’s where Aidan was going on Monday.’

‘But he didn’t know about…’

‘Yes, Ruth. He knew.’

Nothing will make me believe it. Aidan, seeing Stephen and Gemma behind my back? No.

‘When he turned on to Ruskington Road, Waterhouse overshot and carried on down the main road. By the time he’d realised his mistake and come back, Aidan had parked outside number 23. Right outside it, as if the space belonged to him. Waterhouse didn’t see me-and he was too busy concentrating on Aidan, who by this point was walking back to the main road. Neither of them saw me.’

‘Why?’ I blurt out. ‘Why would he park outside the house and then walk away?’

‘I’ve no idea,’ says Mary impatiently. ‘All I know is, Waterhouse followed him.’

‘Did you follow them?’

‘No. On foot, it was too risky. My hair’s hard to miss. Once they were gone, I went for a snoop. The bell for Gemma and Stephen’s flat had their names on it. Surnames only: Crowther and Elton, like the newspapers called them.’

Dong. Their doorbell at Cherub Cottage was called Dong.

Disgust warps Mary’s face. ‘Underneath the names, in tiny writing and in inverted commas, was the word “Woodmansterne”. ’

I clear my throat. ‘They lived on Woodmansterne Lane. In Lincolnshire. You mean…?’

‘If I had to guess, I’d say they decided to call their rented flat after their old street name.’

‘Yes. They’d do that. She would.’

‘I rang the doorbell,’ says Mary. ‘I was bloody amazed at my own nerve. Don’t ask me what I’d have said if someone had answered. I had no idea-it was an impulse thing. No one was in, though.’ She fumbles for another cigarette, lights it. ‘There’s a bay window to the right of the front door. Through it, I saw a framed photo of the happy couple, one of the ones you described in your letter: him kissing her cheek.’

Bile rises in my throat. That picture. Standing in Cherub Cottage’s pristine white sitting room, Stephen trying to kiss me…

‘I knew it was them. First Call had sent me press cuttings from the trial, photos, the works. I recognised their faces. Easy to see why you made it your mission in life to save him from captivity-that little-boy-lost look.’

‘They’re still together. He testified against her, she tried to pin the whole thing on him, and still they’re together, with those pictures on the walls.’ As if I never happened.

‘Tacky studio photos weren’t all they had up on the walls,’ says Mary with venom in her voice. ‘I saw something else go up.’

‘What do you mean?’ She made me write that letter, reliving everything I went through, when she knew. She already knew.

‘I waited, on the street. In my car. I’d gone as far as London-I wasn’t giving up that easily. After a while Simon Waterhouse came back.’

‘Did he see you?’

Mary shakes her head. ‘He was only interested in Crowther and Elton’s house. He had a snoop around, then