Burial of Ghosts

Chapter Twenty

My first solo trip in the car was back to Wintrylaw. It was a compulsion. Something I’d been planning at the back of my mind since the interview with Farrier. My memory of Philip’s funeral glittered, sharp and hard-edged as cut glass. I remembered the silhouette of Dickon wading out from the empty beach towards the horizon, Joanna’s foot on the spade in the churchyard, Stuart Howdon’s face as he mouthed the words of unfamiliar hymns in the little dusty church. But according to Farrier my memory was unreliable, tricked by the chemicals in the brain. I needed to check that the details of the place were as I imagined them, that the wild flowers in the wood, the house with the slate roof tiles and tall chimneys weren’t a fiction I’d created.

I decided to take a picnic. That seemed enough to keep Jess off my back. Perhaps she thought a woman who took the trouble to make a pile of cheese and pickle sandwiches was unlikely to get into mischief. I couldn’t see the logic myself, but it convinced her.

‘Will you be back for your tea?’ she asked. She was expecting Ray for the afternoon and I thought the question wasn’t prompted so much by concern for me but because she wanted to know how long they’d have on their own together.

‘No.’ I was feeling generous. ‘I’ll stop on the coast somewhere. That place in Amble maybe. Get some fish and chips.’

I hadn’t told her I was intending to go back to Wintrylaw, but she must have had some last-minute premonition that this wasn’t just a day out because she shouted after me when I was halfway across the yard, ‘Just take care.’ Guilty, perhaps, because she’d put her enjoyment ahead of my safety for once.

It was a Saturday. The weather still and hot again, like the day of Philip’s funeral, and it was probably the sunshine which had prompted me to make the trip. I couldn’t expect Wintrylaw to match up to my memory in mist or rain. I’d started off in jeans and T-shirt but just before leaving went upstairs and changed into the white dress. It was loose around my hips and I thought I must have lost a little weight. It’s good for the figure, being the suspect in a murder inquiry.

I wanted to find the back road into the estate, to take the secret, unused track between the stone pillars and through the wood. Ray would have pointed out the spot on the map but he still hadn’t arrived and once the picnic was packed I wanted to be off. The map wouldn’t mean much to me and I thought once I was in the area I’d recognize the landmarks – the overgrown hawthorn hedges and the way the trees came right down to the lane.

In the event I must have approached the house from a completely different direction. I suppose it was the road along which Howdon had driven me to Morpeth, but we’d gone so quickly then that I’d not taken in any features of the countryside. And on that day the route had been deserted; all the other mourners had left before us. Today, the lane was packed with traffic, all moving slowly in the same direction. I followed a silver Range Rover, then turned a corner and had to brake sharply behind it and a queue of cars. There was nothing to do but wait and inch forward with the flow. None of the other drivers showed any curiosity about the hold-up. There was no resentment. No blaring of horns. Almost there was a carnival atmosphere. From my wound-down window I heard distant music. In the Range Rover two little girls were strapped in the back. They turned to wave down at me. They had pink ribbons in their hair and sparkly make-up. Even they seemed resigned to wait patiently for the traffic to clear.

Eventually the cars began to move. We turned another corner and there was a view of the house, caught in full sunlight, framed on one side by the church and on the other by trees. In my memory I always saw it from another angle, but it was the same place. A little shabbier and not quite so grand perhaps, but don’t we always enhance the pictures in our heads over time? There was no fiction, here at least. I could see now what had caused the queue: all the cars were turning into the drive and at the gate stopped to pay an entrance fee. Wintrylaw was hosting some sort of event or open day. At least it provided an excuse for my being there and wandering around the grounds. It couldn’t have worked out better.

As I approached the gate myself I realized it was the church’s summer fair. A notice painted onto a piece of tarpaulin and strung across the drive explained it. In aid of St Bede’s roof repair. £5.00 per vehicle. The woman collecting the money apologized for the steepness of the entrance fee. ‘We were hoping to encourage car sharing. Joanna’s idea. Philip was a great environmentalist. And it does include tea.’

She had cropped grey hair and was wearing a loose jacket of velvet patchwork, strangely exotic for the occasion. Her voice was familiar. I thought she was the elderly woman I’d heard discussing Philip’s Cornish garden at the funeral. I drove on and was waved into a parking space by a teenage lad with a scowl and acne. He had a power complex and made me reverse and come in again close to the neighbouring car. So close that I had to squeeze out, holding the edge of my door. I didn’t want chipped paint this soon. There was an immediate smell of crushed grass which took me back to school sports days and the Newcastle Hoppings, so I forgot the hassle with the teenage lad and felt like a kid again.

In Newbiggin, St Bartholomew’s has a summer fair. They hold it in the primary school hall. There’s a ten-pence entrance fee and the Brownies run a lucky dip with sweeties and pencils and lollipops as prizes. The other stalls play a variation on the theme of jumble – white elephant, bric-a`-brac, toys and books. The Mothers’ Union provides tea in plastic cups and fairy cakes with thick white icing and hundreds and thousands. I get dragged along by Jess because one of her Asda friends is Brown Owl. They’re pleased if they make fifty quid.

This summer fair was in a different class. I stood for a moment to get my bearings and wondered if my mind was playing tricks after all. It was as if I’d wandered into one of those bizarre, dreamlike television ads which win all the media prizes. A sinister white-faced man walked past on stilts. A woman in a leotard and a bowler hat rode a mono-cycle down the drive. The theme for the event was circus and everyone had bought into it. The two little girls from the Range Rover were dressed in pink tutus and spangled tights. They walked away from me, hand in hand with their mother, who had a boa of pink feathers. The boy with acne wore clown’s trousers and braces. Everywhere there were acrobats and lion tamers and ringmasters. I turned slowly, letting my skirt spin out, taking it all in, impressed by the grandiose folly of it, by the effort which had gone into creating the spectacle.

Of course there were stalls. This was all about raising money. But they were decorated with bunting and they sold homemade sweets, plants and paintings. This was a classy craft market with street theatre thrown in. I wondered briefly if Dan was here, in one of his disguises. It would be his sort of thing. Beside me a band began to play. They were of all ages and wore red waistcoats and red bow ties and played that rumpy-tumpy, brassy music you get on a fairground. I would have been glad to see Dan. Now I was here I wasn’t sure what I hoped to achieve, and the music and the costumes were disturbing and left me disconnected. The cars kept coming and the crowds were getting thicker. I walked past the stalls at random, picking up objects every now and again to appear interested, and to stave off the panic. There was a milk jug with a blue luminous glaze which I’d have liked to buy for Jess but I’d spent so much to get in that I couldn’t afford it.

They were serving teas in a large striped tent shaped like a big top. I was making my way towards it, thinking I would have my free tea then escape, when I came to a stall run by the Countryside Consortium. They weren’t selling anything, but they were handing out leaflets, car stickers and helium-filled balloons with SAVE OUR COUNTRYSIDE in big black letters. And they were recruiting members. That seemed to be their main pitch. They were doing a roaring trade too. While I waited, three people filled out forms and cheques. I watched from a distance for a while. It was possible that Ronnie was there. Perhaps he had first met Philip at an event like this. Apart from an interest in country affairs, I found it hard to think what else they might have had in common. The thought of bumping into him again made my heart race. I told myself it was ridiculous, but it did no good.

After circling for a quarter of an hour I sauntered over. I didn’t think Ronnie was manning the stand, but it was hard to be sure. The Consortium workers all wore animal masks – shaped-paper cutouts held on by elastic which hid the tops of their faces except for their eyes. A bear peeled away from his position at the back of the table and came to stand beside me. I pretended not to notice him and studied a leaflet about the importance of field sports to the traditional English countryside.

‘Can I help you with anything?’ The voice was young, well educated. I turned and looked at him. He wore khaki shorts and a white polo shirt. Sandy hair was caught up in the thin elastic of the mask, but I couldn’t get any impression of the shape of his face. His eyes were brown. I didn’t think I’d know him again. Pinned to the shirt was a green badge – Marcus Tate, Volunteer. Marcus had shared a house with Thomas in Seaton Delaval. He’d worked for the Consortium during his gap year; now he was back, helping out. Filling a space left by Thomas? If he hadn’t been murdered, would Thomas have been here, working in the house where his father had lived?

He was waiting for me to speak. ‘Just curious.’ I paused, then confessed, ‘I’m a townie myself, actually. Interested but ignorant.’

‘A lot of our members live in towns. Their support is vital.’ He had the enthusiasm of the evangelical Christians who came to the door occasionally to convert me, though they didn’t dress up as bears. Jess always invited them in and gave them tea, so I’d have noticed. I smiled encouragingly and waited for him to go on, but he was too clever to push it. ‘The facts speak for themselves,’ he said. ‘Take the literature and come back if you’re interested.’

‘What would I be signing up to?’

‘As much or as little involvement as you wanted. The membership fees support our work. We’re grateful for that.’ He smiled, acknowledging that the money was what they were after. His teeth were straight and even. ‘Your membership buys certain privileges too – discounts at country house hotels, restaurants, camping shops, that sort of thing. Since foot and mouth, things have been tough for rural businesses. If you wanted a more active role – helping out on farms, supporting our research in a practical way – that would be welcome, but it’s not a condition of joining.’

‘And fund-raising?’

‘Of course. Every charity is always on the scrounge. There’s no obligation to dress up, though.’ The smile again. ‘And in fact we’re very fortunate. We have a number of generous corporate sponsors.’

‘Can I think about it?’

‘Sure.’ If he was disappointed he was too professional to show it.

‘And you’ll be here all afternoon?’

‘No. I’ll have done my stint soon. Someone else will be here to help you. Or if you’d rather…’ He took one of the brochures I was holding and scribbled in the margin. ‘That’s my mobile number. If you have a credit card I can join you up over the phone.’ His voice was insistent and it seemed an odd thing to suggest. I wondered if he knew who I was and wanted an excuse to talk to me without an audience. Someone else wanting ghoulish details about knives and blood. But how could he? There’d been no photograph with the newspaper reports of my discovery of Thomas’s body and I wasn’t wearing my name on a badge. Perhaps there was a competition among volunteers to see who could recruit most members. He could even have been on commission. There was another queue to get into the tea tent. When I looked round from my place in the line he’d gone, disappeared into the crowd.