‘Seed grew up in the Culver Valley on a council estate-that
‘Did they start quite so young in those days?’ said Charlie glumly.
‘Mary Trelease bought 15 Megson Crescent only two years ago. Who else has lived in that house? Who’s died there?’
Charlie stared at him. ‘Bloody hell,’ she murmured.
‘We’ve been focusing on the name instead of the other details. Like the house.’
‘But…’ Charlie was shaking her head. ‘Why offer a full confession-complete with an address, a description of the scene, the method of killing-and lie about the victim?’
‘I can’t answer that. Yet,’ said Simon. ‘It might not be as crazy as it seems, though. Some truth, some fiction: that’s the mixture that makes for the best lies. Mary Trelease’s death is the fictional part. She’s alive-we know that.’
‘And the true part…’ Much as Charlie would have liked to laugh at his theory, she couldn’t help wondering if there might be something in it. There wasn’t a bed in the front bedroom of 15 Megson Crescent now, but before Mary moved in there might well have been. Most people put beds in their bedrooms.
‘Aidan Seed killed someone in that house,’ said Simon. ‘Someone who used to live there. Years ago-just like he told Ruth Bussey.’
21
‘Aidan and I used to paint in this room,’ says Mary. ‘Together. For hours at a time, without speaking. After Martha died, I had a key cut for him, for the cottage. He often stayed overnight.’ She turns to me. ‘He slept in the spare room, where you slept last night.’
I make sure to keep my face neutral. There’s something I don’t feel quite right about in this room, but I’m not sure what it is. I stare at the pile of ruined paintings in front of me, barely able to believe it’s real.
‘Do you mind that I didn’t tell you?’ It dawns on me that Mary is talking about Aidan, the spare bed. ‘It’s only a room. I don’t believe rooms retain memories of the past. There’s no such thing as an atmosphere-it’s in people’s minds, like everything of any interest.’
‘You had a key cut for Aidan?’ Suddenly, it seems important to check all the facts. ‘But it’s not your cottage. You don’t own it.’
Mary shrugs this off. ‘So? I’m the one who uses it.’
‘How did Martha’s mother feel about Aidan staying here?’ If I had a daughter who’d hanged herself after being treated badly by a man, I’d want him nowhere near me or any house of mine.
‘I didn’t tell Cecily,’ says Mary. ‘I didn’t tell anyone.’
‘Why didn’t Martha’s parents give up the cottage after Martha died?’ I ask. ‘Why do they carry on paying the rent so that you can use it-someone who’s not even related to them?’
‘I’m a leftover from Martha’s life.’ Mary smiles. ‘Cecily doesn’t think much of me, but she wants me around even so-a dog-eared souvenir of her precious daughter.’
My eyes return to the mound in front of me. ‘How many paintings did you cut up to make… this?’
‘I didn’t count. Hundreds.’
‘Whose were they?’
‘Mine. I painted them and I owned them. Though for a while I thought I’d sold some of them to other people.’
I wait for her to say more.
‘Aidan used to tell me when my paintings weren’t good enough. He was always right, which made it worse. Eventually, with his help, it happened less and less often. He doesn’t find it easy to give praise, but the criticisms stopped. One day he asked me if I felt ready for my first exhibition. He mentioned a gallery I’d never heard of, said he knew the owner. If I didn’t mind, he said, he’d take my pictures to London for this guy to look at.’ Mary barks out a laugh. ‘Of course I didn’t mind. I was thrilled. Aidan took the pictures-eighteen of them, there were. Came back the next day with the best news-the gallery wanted me. They wanted to give me a show.’
I watch the happiness and excitement drain from her face as she remembers what happened next. ‘I don’t know why I didn’t ask to go to London with Aidan, see the gallery for myself-I did none of that, asked for nothing. Aidan kept saying, “Leave it to me,” and I did. When I asked him when the private view would be, he told me there wasn’t going to be one. This gallery never did them, he said. Now I know there’s no such thing as an art gallery that doesn’t do previews-they’re crucial for sales, and publicity. At the time, though, I was new to the art world. Aidan was the experienced one, the one who’d had a sell-out exhibition and residencies at Trinity College, Cambridge and the National Portrait Gallery. I believed what he told me. I said I wanted to meet the gallery owner who’d liked my work, but Aidan advised against it. “They hate it when artists hang around,” he told me. “Better to stay away, use me as a middle-man to communicate any messages.” He said the gallery owner was intrigued by the idea of me, and we needed to keep it that way by making sure I kept my distance. Like a fool, I fell for it.
‘He brought me back an exhibition catalogue. Nothing fancy, just a few sheets of paper folded in the middle and stapled. But it had the titles of my paintings, the dates of the exhibition, some biographical notes about me. I was so proud of it.’ Mary blinks away tears. ‘Aidan went back and forth to London-or I thought he did-to check on how things were going. Well; it was going well, that was what he said whenever he came back. He seemed genuinely pleased for me. My pictures were selling-I couldn’t believe it. One day Aidan came back and told me they were all sold. He even…’ Her face screws up in agony. ‘He had a sales list, so that I could see who’d bought what. There were nine names on it. I don’t need to tell you what they were.’
I have no idea what she’s talking about. How could I know who had bought her paintings?
‘The first was Abberton,’ she says softly. ‘Don’t say the others, please. I can’t bear to hear them.’
A shiver runs the length of my back.
‘Aidan took me out for dinner that night, to celebrate the sell-out. That’s when I betrayed Martha.’
‘You spent the night with Aidan.’ I’d prefer to say it myself rather than have her tell me.
‘No.’ Her face sets in a mask of displeasure. ‘Aidan and I have never had sex. Martha slept with him, and I knew what a failure that had been.’
‘How did you betray Martha?’ I ask.
‘I told Aidan that if I had to choose between a happy, fulfilling personal life and my work, I’d choose the work. My painting. He smiled at me when I said it, and we both knew what it meant: that we were the ones, that Martha had never been like us. We’d discussed it, you see-Aidan told me Martha had admitted to having lied to the journalist who interviewed them.’ Mary squints at me. ‘Did I tell you about that?’
I nod.
‘She pretended she’d choose her writing, when really she’d have given it up like a shot if she could have kept Aidan. He despised her for lying. He despised her shallow attitude to her work-he didn’t want to be with someone like that. Martha didn’t deserve Aidan, she never did.’ Mary presses her hand against her mouth.
‘Tell me about the exhibition,’ I say.
‘The day after our celebratory dinner, once I came back down to earth, I started to ask questions: when would I get the money? Was the gallery empty now, if my paintings had all sold? Aidan teased me for my ignorance, explained that the show stays up until the end of the final day, as planned. Buyers collect after take-down and that’s when they pay. He’d made me inflate the prices in order to be left with a decent whack once the gallery had taken its commission. He joked about taking commission himself, since he was the one who set it up. I never stopped to wonder why he’d want to help me to that extent. He was spending more time on me and my exhibition than he was on his own paintings. If I’d thought about it, I’d probably have decided it was down to my talent, which
