“It’s like Aldershot?”
“It’s like home, that’s what it’s like. I’ve just looked out of the window and it’s all happening, there’s the living and there’s the dead, there’s your mum reeling down the road with a squaddie on her arm, and they’re heading for hers to do the unmentionable.”
“But they’ve demolished those houses, Mrs. Etchells. You must have been past, you only live down the road. I went past last year, Colette drove me. Where my mum used to live, it’s a big car showroom now.”
“Well, pardon me,” said Mrs. Etchells, “but it’s not demolished on this side. On this side it looks the same as ever.”
Alison felt hope drain away. “And the bath still in the garden, is it?”
“And the downstairs bay got a bit of cardboard in the corner where Bob Fox tapped on it too hard.”
“So it’s all still going on? Just the way it used to?”
“No change that I can see.”
“Mrs. Etchells, can you have a look round the back?”
“I suppose I could.” There was a pause. Mrs. Etchell’s breathing was laboured. Al glanced at Colette. She had flung herself onto the sofa; she wasn’t hearing anything. “Rough ground,” Mrs. Etchells reported. “There’s a van parked.”
“And the outbuildings?”
“Still there. Falling down, they’ll do somebody a damage.”
“And the caravan?”
“Yes, the caravan.”
“And the dog runs?”
“Yes, the dog runs. Though I don’t see any dogs.”
Got rid of the dogs, Al thought: why?
“It all looks much the same as I remember,” Mrs. Etchells said, “not that I was in the business of frequenting the back of Emmeline Cheetham’s house, it wasn’t a safe place for an old woman on her own.”
“Mrs. Etchells—listen now—you see the van? The van parked? Could you have a peep inside?”
“Hold on,” Mrs. Etchells said. More heavy breathing. Colette picked up the remote and began to flick through the TV channels.
“The windows are filthy,” Mrs. Etchells reported.
“What can you see?”
“I can see an old blanket. There’s something wrapped up in it.” She chuckled. “Blow me if there isn’t a hand peeping out.”
The dead are like that; cold-blooded. Nothing squeamish left in them, no sensitivities.
“Is it my hand?” Al said.
“Well is it, I wonder?” Mrs. Etchells said. “Is it a little chubby baby hand, I wonder now?”
Colette complained, “It’s like this every summer. Nothing but repeats.”
“Don’t torment me, Mrs. E.”
“No, it looks like a grown-up woman’s hand to me.”
Al said, “Could it be Gloria?”
“It could at that. Now here’s a special message for you, Alison dear. Keith Capstick has got his balls armour-plated now, you’ll not be able to get at ’em this time. He says you can hack away all bloody day, with your scissors, carving knife or whatever you bloody got, but you’ll not get anywhere. Excuse my language, but I feel bound to give you his very words.”
Alison clicked off the tape. “I need a breath,” she said to Colette. “A breath of air.”
“I expect there’ll have to be a funeral,” Colette remarked.
“I expect so. I don’t suppose the council will agree to take her away.”
“Oh, I don’t know. If we doubled her up and put her in a black bag.”
“Don’t. It’s not funny.”
“You started it.” Colette made a face behind her back. Alison thought, I have seen, or I have dreamed of, a woman’s body parts wrapped in newspaper. I have seen men’s hands smeared with something glutinous and brown as they unloaded parcels from the back of the van, wobbling packages of dog meat. I have heard a voice behind me say, fuck, Emmie, got to wash me hands. I have looked up, and where I thought I would see my own face in the mirror, I saw the face of Morris Warren.
She went out into the garden. It was now quite dark. Evan approached the fence, with a flashlight. “Alison? We had the police out earlier.”
Her heart lurched. She heard a low chuckle from behind her; it seemed to be at knee height. She didn’t turn, but the hair on her arms stiffened.
“Michelle thought she saw somebody snooping about your shed. You had that tramp, didn’t you, broke in? She thought it might be him again. Take no chances, so she called them out. Constable Delingbole came in person.”
“Yes? And?”
“He checked it over. Couldn’t see anything. But you can’t be too careful, when you’ve got kids. That type want locking away.”
“Definitely.”
“I’d throw away the key.”
“Oh, so would I.”
She stood waiting, her hands joined at her waist, the picture of patient formality, as if she were Her Majesty waiting for him to bow out of her presence.
“I’ll be getting in, then,” Evan said. But he shot her a backward glance as he crossed his balding lawn.
Alison turned and stooped over a large terra-cotta pot. Bending her back, she heaved it aside, managing only to roll it a few inches. The gravel beneath appeared undisturbed; that is to say, no one had dug it up. She straightened up, rubbing the small of her back. “Morris,” she said, “don’t play silly beggars.” She heard a scuffling; then the chuckle again, faintly muffled by the soil, coming from the very depths of the pot.
twelve
Next morning, when she was eating her lo-salt cornflakes with skimmed milk, Morris put his head around the door. “Have you seen Keith Capstick?” he asked. “Have you seen MacArthur? He has a false eye and his earlobe chewed off, and he wears a knitted weskit? Have you seen Mr. Donald Aitkenside?”
“I think I’d know them if I saw them.” The skin of her entire body crept at the sight of him, as if there were a million ants walking under her clothes; but she wasn’t going to let him know she was scared. “Have you forgotten who you’re talking to?” she said. “Anyway, why the formality? What’s this about
Morris puffed up his chest, and tried to straighten his buckled legs. “Aitkenside’s got made up to management. Aren’t you informate with our new terms of employment? We’ve all got our training under our belt and we’ve all been issued wiv notebooks and pencils. Mr. Aitkenside’s got certificates, too. So we’re supposed to be foregathering.”
“Foregathering where?”
“Here is as good as any.”
“What brings you back, Morris?”
“What brings me back? I have got a mission. I have got a big job on. I have got taken on a project. You’ve got to retrain these days. You’ve got to update yourself. You don’t want to go getting made redundant. There’s no such thing anymore as a job for life.”
Colette came in with the post in her hand. “Usual catalogues and junk mail,” she said. “Mayan calendar workshop, no thanks … . Shamanic requisites by return … . What about mixed seeds from Nature’s Cauldron? Henbane, wolfsbane, skullcap, hemlock?”
“Some might blow over to next door.”
