Don’t Cry For Me Aberystwyth

Chapter 18

THE DESK DIARY said today was the shortest day: the moment the tide of light changed from ebb to flow, the highwater mark of night. It must have been tough working it out in the days before desk diaries, but nothing was more important. They had good reason to fear the dark, huddled together for warmth in their wooden halls. It was full of terrors. The evil men who had been cast out from the bosom of society and lived in the dark forests grew leaner and more desperate; travel was treacherous. Malevolent spirits, incorporeal, came out at night and waltzed through the wooden walls and locked doors and took away whoever they wished. No one was safe, but the old people, those whitebeards over twenty-five, had most to fear. They sat awake at night, too frightened to close their eyes; sleep, the one balm, now a Judas. They huddled together and threw great logs of oak onto the fires and licked the grease from their fingers. They put their best priests on the task of measuring the lengthening night; augurers who divined the year’s pulse in the sweat of the gravedigger’s brow, and the fat on the ribs of his children. When they pronounced the moment had arrived, the morning after the longest night, it meant the worst was over; the time had come to bring in the Yule log, and to wassail. You had passed the halfway mark, there was hope. You could maybe make the long run in till spring. All you had to do was get to the end of the shortest day. Piece of cake.

* * *

Myfanwy was leaving.

She stood in the middle of the office, as if reluctant to come in too far, anxious not to make it last longer than necessary. She did not want a cup of tea.

‘I think it’s best this way.’

‘Uh-huh.’

‘I’ll be leaving on the bus to Shrewsbury tonight, after the carol concert.’

‘OK.’

‘I’ll stay with my auntie. Maybe I can help out in the shop – you know, start a new life.’

I sat at the desk, resting my head on the palm of one hand. I felt grimy and unwashed, unshaved; mouth filled with old beer; teeth gritty with old rum and not enough food. My head ached. I dragged my head up from staring at the desk and said, ‘Help out in the shop? That’s a great idea.’

‘Don’t make it difficult, Louie.’

‘You’re a singer. Your place is in Aberystwyth . . . singing. We need you.’

‘I just don’t feel I can do it any more.’

‘You can’t go.’

‘Please don’t try and stop me; you said you would never stand in my way—’

‘When did I say that? I never said that.’

‘In the caravan.’

‘I said I wouldn’t stand in Calamity’s way.’

‘Because you love her?’

‘Yes.’

‘So you don’t love me.’

‘Myfanwy, what’s happened?’

‘Tadpole has explained everything. I—’

‘Tadpole!’

‘Please don’t make this harder than it is. You needn’t try to explain.’

‘There’s nothing to explain.’

‘No one’s to blame, these things happen. It’s not a crime to fall in love.’

‘It ought to be if this is what you have to deal with.’

‘I hate it when you get like this.’

‘Like what?’

‘Bitter and dark.’

‘You’re walking out on me, what did you expect?’

‘I think that’s a bit rich in view of what you did. Oh, don’t say anything, please! I don’t want it to be like this. I didn’t come here to end in recrimination. It’s not your fault, I know. She told me. Told me how it was, and that you never meant it to happen.’

‘Myfanwy, this is all fantasy. She only joined the nursing home a few weeks ago. She’s a screwball.’

‘Is she? I think she’s been very brave.’

‘Brave? Climbing onto the caravan roof?’

‘She let you go, Louie.’

‘How did she manage that?’

‘If only you knew how hard it was for her. You were the first man she ever loved, did you know that? If only you’d seen her, Louie, how noble she was to let you go like that, if you’d seen how much she cried.’

‘I’ve seen her cry. She does it all the time.’

‘But of course I wouldn’t hear of it.’

‘What are you talking about?’

Her cheek muscles quivered. ‘It’s no good, Louie. I love you and always will but I’m going to leave because it’s for the best.’ She turned her face away, towards the window, the drab morning light causing her eyes to glisten. ‘We can’t argue with the iron laws of fate.’

I stared, mesmerised, at the edges of her eyes, two soft lanterns in the darkness of my life. Pure, soft translucence. ‘Did she tell you that?’

‘Oh it’s too hard, I can’t . . . I can’t . . .’ She wiped her hand roughly across her cheek, as if swatting a fly. The tears ran unheeding.

I sat, unable to think of the words to say, that might make her stay.

‘I just wish you hadn’t . . . I could forgive everything but that . . . just wish you hadn’t given them to her. That’s all.’ She turned to the door, with her knuckles digging into her eye.

‘Given her what?

‘M . . . my records.’

‘Huh?’

‘See! You thought I wouldn’t find out, didn’t you?’

‘But, Myfanwy, I d-didn’t. I’d never do such a thing!’

‘Don’t make it worse by lying, Louie. She’s got them all. And you’ve scribbled my name out and written hers on the l-l-label.’

Myfanwy ran out the door, slammed it behind her. High heels clattered down the bare wooden stairs. I stared at the closed door. I sat there strangely inert, drained of energy. I looked out at the garret across the road. The Pieman’s light was still burning. Maybe he would know what to do about Myfanwy. I put on my hat and coat. The phone rang.

‘I’ve named an inlet after you.’

‘Lucky me.’

‘In Greenland. Louie Knight Sound. Just below Van Hoegafhgaaerden’s Land, a hundred and fifty miles south of Ultima Thule. That’s what I do, you see. Name inlets.’

‘That sounds like my kind of job.’

‘Trust me, you wouldn’t like. There are so many of them, the whole coastline is perforated like the edge of a postage stamp.’

‘Couldn’t you have named it Louie’s Gulch?’

‘What’s a gulch?’

‘I don’t know, but all the tough guys get one named after them.’

‘It doesn’t sound very Greenlandy.’

‘Not to worry. I’m not feeling very tough today.’

‘How’s the case going?’

‘Oh, pretty good. It’s largely solved, just tidying up a few loose ends. I was going to send you a report in the new year.’

‘I’ll look forward to it. Any chance of a heads-up?’

‘It’s all very complicated and not easy to reduce to a few sentences, but I think we have narrowed the field of enquiry down to a couple of main theories. Theory 1: the dead Father Christmas was a former Mossad agent gunned down because of historical links with Odessa and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Or . . .’

‘Yes?’

‘Or theory 2: he was just an unemployed guy who took a seasonal job and happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and got gunned down; and all the rest is moonshine.’

‘Hmmm. Quite different sorts of theory. You seem to have covered both ends of the spectrum.’

‘It’s a special technique I’ve devised. Start with two theories, the mundane and the outlandish, then work inwards. Never fails.’

‘Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid eh? I loved that movie.’

‘We all did.’

‘Sure hope that part of the theory comes good.’

‘We’re all keeping our fingers crossed on that one.’

‘Must go now, I’ve got “thank you” letters to write. I’ll send you some more money for what you’ve done, and we’ll talk after Christmas.’

‘OK. Thanks for the inlet.’

‘It’s nothing.’

The line went click. I replaced the receiver with exaggerated care, anxious not to disturb the silence with an upsetting clack of Bakelite. I don’t know why. There was no one here to disturb. I sat and thought about that other guy I pity, the twin of the one who was weaned. He’s lying there staring at a bare ceiling. Nothing to look at except discolouration in the distemper. A strange word that means a dog’s disease and cheap municipal paint. His teeth are in a glass on the bedside cabinet, next to the panic button. They keep him drugged because it’s cheaper than pictures or ornaments. Everything would be fine but for one thing: he’s not stupid. They haven’t found a drug that will do that yet. Or, rather, the ones that do can induce unacceptable side-effects such as euphoria and happiness. When the nurse puts her head round the door every morning he knows it’s only to see if he’s still alive. He can feel the impatience, like the chambermaid’s when you stay in your hotel room past noon. In front of other people she adopts a phoney cheery tone of voice, is nice to him in a patronising way. But it’s different when they are alone.

He feels like a dog being given a bath by a technician in an animal lab. In the periods of clarity he thinks of how things were many years before in Ynyslas. He digests the honeycomb of happiness gathered long ago and stored in his heart; subsists on it like a chick in the egg devouring the rich protein of the yolk; except he will never break out of this shell. Will fade away and dissolve to nothing in the sea of albumen. Sky, dunes, marram grass . . . A train like a tiny blue and green caterpillar far off crawls across the estuary, over a bridge of lollipop sticks and treacle; the estuarial waters glistening and sliding. The train glides without sound as in a silent movie towards Barmouth, along the coast, round the gentle curves, so close to the water you could lean out of the window and catch a fish. The train ducks into a tunnel and as it emerges into the bright summer sun the sea glitters and a party of heliographers in the lead carriage flash their mirrors in unison. He thinks of these things before the drugs kick in and the lids fall. He thinks of the sand dunes, the estuary, a girl with chestnut hair, chasing into the sharp, cold sea; hot breath of an embrace in the foam, her hair wet and sticky, goose bumps flickering along her salty arms . . . He winces at the sweet agony of remembrance, the gathered honeycomb of a life. She was a nightclub singer, the one whom the whole town loved, but whom no one loved more deeply than he did . . . What was her name, now? The last ceiling he’ll ever see; the last human touch, visits from Nurse Tadpole. She comes in one day with a marker pen and unbuttons his pyjama top. She’s giggling, he can smell liquor. He watches, too frail to intervene, as she holds the thick pen like a child and draws on his old white belly. A smiley. Then buttons him up and walks out snorting with suppressed laughter. Is that how it ends? At least I’ve got an inlet. Myfanwy is leaving. It’s time to talk to the Pieman.

Empty pie boxes were strewn outside his door. I knocked and waited. I knocked again, listened, pressed my ear against the door and listened harder. I went in. A small attic room. Bare floorboards, a reinforced iron bed, a chamber pot filled with yellow liquid, an incident board, a camera on a tripod, and various darkroom paraphernalia. And a fat man was staring out of the window with his back to me. The incident board was similar to ours except for one significant detail: it looked like someone had thrown a fruit pie at it – raspberry or strawberry. But when I looked more closely I saw it was not a fruit pie but the Pieman’s brains. One side of his head was missing and on the other side, corresponding to it, was a hole. I was no expert but I’d say he’d been shot. At close range. I touched his clammy skin. It was colder than a bathroom floor in winter. A floorboard creaked and I spun round. Erw Watcyns was standing in the doorway.

He smiled. ‘Lousy weather we’re having, isn’t it?’ He walked into the room and looked around. ‘I’m glad I found you. I’ve been looking all over.’ He wandered round and pretended to be taken by surprise at the mess on the board, but he said nothing. It was too droll for words. He bent forward, peered at the dead Pieman and said to me, ‘What’s up with him?’

‘I don’t know. He hasn’t said a word the whole time I’ve been here.’

‘He’s probably shy.’

‘That’s probably it. I knew there’d be an explanation.’

‘Some folks are like that, they clam up in company, they don’t feel at ease in social situations. You shouldn’t hold it against him.’

‘I don’t.’

‘It’s psychological.’

‘That’s OK by me. A man has a right to remain silent if that’s the way he feels.’

‘That’s about the way I see it, too.’

‘Most people don’t understand. They encounter a silence and they can’t resist filling it. They don’t care what they fill it with as long as there’s some noise.’

‘You and me, we think alike. I’m a quiet type. I reckon if you don’t have anything worth saying it’s better to hold your peace.’

He peered closely at the hole in the Pieman’s head. ‘Yeah, I sure do like a man who can keep his peace.’ He touched the hole with his finger. ‘So what do you think you’ll be doing for Christmas? Going anywhere special?’

‘Oh, I hadn’t really thought about it. The usual, I suppose.’

‘Stay at home? Yeah, that’s the best. Get a few bottles in, stoke up the fire, watch the Queen on the telly.’

‘Why did you want to see me, anyway?’

He shrugged dismissively. ‘Oh nothing much, just paperwork, really. Someone tried to fence a stolen library book – it came from the police library. It’s probably a case of mistaken identity, you know how it goes, but you have to follow these things up.’

‘Library book? That sounds serious – you could throw the book at me for that.’

Erw Watcyns became convulsed with fake laughter. ‘Hey, that’s very funny! You should be on the TV. Oh yes, ha ha! Throw the book at you.’

‘I’m always happy to oblige the police.’

‘I’ve noticed that.’

‘Anything they want, I’m there to help.’

‘You’re a model citizen. I wish there were more like you.’

‘The thing is, I really don’t remember taking out any library books.’

‘To tell the truth, we don’t think it was you. We think it was your father. As I say, it’s purely routine.’

‘This wouldn’t be a book about the Pinkertons would it?’

‘Yes, I think it might be.’

He walked over to the incident board and examined it. ‘You’ve got a board like this in your office, haven’t you?’

‘Ours doesn’t have the fruit pie filling all over it.’

‘Is that what this is?’

‘I’ve no idea. What does it taste like?’

He ran his finger through the goo and tasted it. ‘It tastes like that stuff coming out the side of his head. It’s not fruit, more like meat. Do you prefer sweet or savoury pies?’

‘I can go either way.’

‘Me, too. Depends on my mood. You know, there’s something about all this that isn’t quite right.’

‘Really?’

‘I can’t put my finger on it but I have this strange feeling – call it intuition if you like – that I’ve seen a man who was strangely silent like this before. Only I can’t recall where.’

‘I hate it when that happens. It’s on the tip of your tongue, but the more you try to recall, the more it eludes your grasp.’

‘This is driving me nuts. Where’ve I seen a guy like this before?’

‘Take your time, it’ll come to you. How did you know I have an incident board like this in my office?’

‘I was there a while back looking for you.’

‘I see.’

‘That’s where I saw the library book. Police property, you see, I always notice.’

‘Don’t they have a statute of limitations on things like that?’

‘Of course not. It would encourage people to hang on to the books wouldn’t it?’

‘That’s true. What made you go round to my office in the first place?’

‘I wanted to talk to you about a blood-stained photo of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid you removed from the Pier cloakroom. Whoever deposited it left some blood behind on the register; seems it matches the blood of the poor Santa Claus who was so cruelly murdered in Chinatown. Remember us discussing that case a while back?’

It was as if the temperature in the room had dropped ten degrees. People often report feeling like that when a ghost is present, and maybe one had just turned up. Or maybe it was the realisation that his question earlier about where I would be spending Christmas was the first part of a little joke which had as its punch line the sure fact that I would be spending it not watching her Majesty on TV but enjoying her hospitality. You could tell he’d spent all yesterday working it out.

‘Bingo!’ Watcyns cried in pantomime joy. ‘I’ve got it! I’ve suddenly remembered where I’ve seen a guy like this before. In the morgue. Because he was dead.’ He turned towards the dead Pieman and shouted, ‘I think he’s dead!’

‘That’s right,’ I shouted back. ‘Someone has blown his fucking brains out.’

‘Oh, look over there!’ he shouted. ‘A gun!’ He walked across to the side of the bed. On the floor was a gun. ‘Do you suppose it could be the murder weapon?’ He threw a sick smile. ‘That would be a stroke of luck, wouldn’t it?’

The temperature dropped another ten degrees. The gun was the same one, or I guessed it was, that Elijah had pulled on me and then let me take from him; and here it was with my prints all over it.

Erw bent down with that world-weary puff of air of a man who is not as sprightly as he used to be. He pressed a hand onto his thigh to support himself and took out a pencil with the other hand. He lifted the pistol by the trigger guard and put it into a clear plastic evidence bag that he just happened to have handy. ‘If we can find some prints on this, we might be able to find out who shot this man. Wouldn’t that be a stroke of luck!’

He was kneeling with his back to me. A couple of feet away was the corner post of the bed. Reinforced iron ending in a globe of steel the size of a melon. I looked at the hard metal ball, I looked at the soft flesh and bony globe of Watcyns’ head, and back at the ball. I thought about Myfanwy packing her case. I contemplated Christmas in jail. I remembered Miss Evangeline. I looked at the ball of iron and at Erw Watcyns’ head. I realised I had so much to do today, and yet it was the shortest day. I lunged forward, grabbed the collar of his coat and yanked. His head hit the globe with a mixture of sounds: a boing, a crunch and an oh! He slumped to the floor, rivulets of blood matting and darkening his hair; blood and tissue were on the bedstead. I paused. I had a number of options. I could wipe the prints off the gun, or I could simply remove it. But the sight of Watcyns’ own police-issue revolver peeping out from the folds of his jacket gave me a better idea.

I walked over to the incident board, on which the Pieman’s gore was congealing. I peered closely and, helped by the swirling patterns of splattered blood that led me to the epicentre, I located the bullet embedded in the wall. I prised it out with my door key. Then I removed Watcyns’ gun and walked up to the Pieman. I put the muzzle of the gun into the hole the first bullet had made, pulled back about six inches, and fired. There was less gore thrown against the wall this time round. But the slug went home accompanied by a plop of flesh, like a spoonful of jam catapulted by a naughty child. I stood for a second, entranced by the ghoulish abattoir on the wall, amazed at what I was doing. I could have gone a stage further and shot Watcyns with the other gun and put it in the Pieman’s hand. But that would have been gilding the lily. Besides, that would have been murder, assuming he wasn’t already dead. Whereas shooting the Pieman, a man who had already been shot and was assuredly dead, was simply a misdemeanour. This was better. The slug in the wall, which ballistics would eventually identify as matching Erw Watcyns’ gun, was a slow-burner. I took out my handkerchief and wiped the gun for prints, then put it back inside Watcyns’ jacket. I picked up the other gun and wiped it. I cast a glance down at Erw: he didn’t look very well. I had no idea what to do next so I decided to listen. There were four sounds in that room: My breathing; the tiny tick-tock of a travel alarm clock; the noise a dead man makes; and, from the door, the cough of a man who wasn’t me.