‘What’s that?’
‘Clovis Fowler.’
CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE
It occurs during a stroke of serendipity; Finn insists that an auspicious pull of December’s gibbous moon grants anything that yearns to be aligned a single, perfect moment to do so.
Willa arrives home late after a long, cold day at Camden Market and a further three hours spent at her current studies. Night courses are her purlieus, where she slowly builds her endurance. If her long life has afforded her anything, it has been time to catch up, to have a better understanding of her own strengths and weaknesses. She might have benefited from seeing a counsellor, but the perils of revealing any one of her many secrets was too great; a slip of a century would court ruin. And there was another danger, that of placing herself in the hands of yet another stranger. Although a therapist may be completely trustworthy and lack any ambition of dominance, the risk was one she would not take. And so the short courses, in rooms in which she sat with anonymous others, were her painstakingly trodden paths to strength.
One course after another, lacing around the night rooms of London, she puts herself back together until finally she can remember the face of her father again. Small things, like the shadows that darkened his eyes, and the gap from a missing incisor. Then the pang of remembrances hit her full force – how much she had been loved and valued, and the bitter circumstances in which her ailing father had no choice but to leave her in Lambeth. The memory of loss became almost unbearable when she allowed it to emerge, until, after nights of silent weeping, she began to feel better, stronger, and yet lighter, relieved of a heavy yoke.
At her current six-week course she probes the psychology of criminals, to understand why people commit the crimes they do. It’s hard for her to sit still in class because her mind explodes with revelations and insights. Criminals, no matter how cunning and precise, make mistakes. It may take years, but eventually a crack will appear, she learns. Never before now has she dared hope that Clovis Fowler’s tight skin of invulnerability might be broken, nor entertained the idea that one day, Clovis Fowler might make the slimmest error.
Willa towel-dries her hair as she wends her way through the hallway on the first floor to the separate stairs that lead to her attic room. She passes the alcove, where a glass and wooden display case sits beneath a small round window. Soft, recessed lighting falls on the shelves inside the case, where a selection of Jonesy’s puppets is displayed. She notices that the head of one of the puppets is ever so slightly off-centre. Her pulse quickens. She remembers when Jonesy carved the wolf in man’s clothing; a menacing grin spreads from his exaggerated, red-painted mouth. She hears someone coming up the steps and quickly moves on to her room with her heart seemingly thumping out of her chest.
She and Finn have checked the puppets before, in fact, several times. But of course that means nothing. They’re certain that Clovis constantly rotates her hiding places because after all, a house is a limited space. She dares not check the puppets again until Clovis is safely away from the house. And she mustn’t get her hopes up. Maybe she knocked it loose when dusting. But oh mighty hell, could this be the error, the little slip?
The rain wakes her after only three hours of sleep. It beats against the window as if it is telling her a fast, furious story. There’s no way she’s going to the market today. Downstairs, Clovis is slamming the portafilter against the steel basket, emptying the thing with enough force to kill a small animal.
‘Willa! Come down here and fix this.’
‘Be right down.’ She clenches her jaw.
Downstairs, Clovis stands at the kitchen window that offers a dark clouded view onto the small patio garden.
‘I cannot believe I have to go out in this. Finn, why can’t you take the car?’
‘I have a big auction today. A heap of money at stake,’ he mumbles.
‘You can do that from anywhere.’
‘Not from the driver’s seat, I can’t.’
‘Willa!’ Clovis calls again.
‘I’m here. I’m here.’
Willa first cleans up Clovis’s mess, and then fills the portafilter with coffee. Clovis pulls on her Wellies.
‘Will you be at the market today?’ Clovis asks.
‘No. I’m working here.’
‘Come along with me to have the tyres rotated and the oil changed.’
‘I can’t, I’m working on something new and …’
‘It can wait. I’d really like to do some shopping.’
Willa places the espresso cup and saucer on the table.
‘I really can’t.’ She says firmly. Let this be the beginning.
Finn looks up from his papers, but Willa won’t meet his eyes, frightened she may give away too much. He retreats to his conservatory with no desire to enter the fray.
‘Very well. Perhaps we should review your commitments outside the home. You may be taking on too much. It disappoints me that you can’t fulfil your duties to me today.’
Ah, there is that hateful ‘Mistress voice’ again. Willa scrubs the counter, willing herself not to display any reaction, to remain calm and patient. She focuses on the toast crumbs and the grounds of coffee that Clovis has carelessly flung about. She waits for the blissful moment when Clovis and her wellies are finally out of the door.
When the car speeds away Willa watches the clock for a full five minutes. Then she runs upstairs, opens the display-case doors and carefully lifts the wolf puppet off the shelf. Sitting on the floor she removes the head and probes the small opening of the torso. Her fingers feel glass. She wants to scream, to call for help, to shout that she cannot do it. But instead, she takes a deep breath and lifts the phial out of Jonesy’s puppet. There is another.
‘Finn! Finn!
