Sculptress

NINETEEN

Olive regarded Roz with deep suspicion. Contentment had brought a glow to the other woman’s usually pale cheeks.

“You look different,” she said in an accusing tone as if what she saw displeased her.

Roz shook her head.

“No. Everything’s the same.” Lies were safer sometimes. She was afraid Olive would regard her moving in with the police officer who arrested her as a betrayal.

“Did you get my message last Monday night?”

Olive was at her most unattractive, unwashed hair hanging limply about her colourless face, a smear of tomato ketchup ground into the front of her shift, the smell of her sweat almost unbearable in the small room.

She vibrated with irritation, her forehead set in a permanent scowl, ready, it seemed to Roz, to reject anything that was said to her. She didn’t answer.

“Is something wrong?” Roz asked evenly.

“I don’t want to see you any more.”

Roz turned her pencil in her fingers.

“Why not?”

“I don’t have to give a reason.”

“It would be polite,” said Roz in the same even tone.

“I’ve invested a great deal of time, energy, and affection in you. I thought we were friends.”

Olive’s lip curled.

“Friends,” she hissed scathingly.

“We’re not friends. You’re Miss Wonderful making money out of doing her Lady Muck bit and I’m the poor sap who’s being exploited.”

She splayed her hands across the table top and tried to get up.

“I don’t want you to write your book.”

“Because you’d rather be treated with awe in here than laughed at outside.” Roz shook her head.

“You’re a fool, Olive.

And a coward as well. I thought you had more guts.”

Olive pursed her fat lips as she struggled to rise.

“I’m not listening,” she said childishly.

“You’re trying to make me change my mind.”

“Of course I am.” She rested her cheek against one raised hand.

“I shall write the book whether you want me to or not. I’m not afraid of you, you see. You can instruct a solicitor to take out an injunction to stop me, but he won’t succeed because I shall argue that you’re innocent, and a court will uphold my right to publish in the interests of natural justice.”

Olive slumped back on to her chair.

“I’ll write to a Civil Liberties group. They’ll support me.”

“Not when they find out I’m trying to get you released, they won’t.

They’ll support me.”

“The Court of Human Rights, then. I’ll say what you’re doing is an invasion of my privacy.”

“Go ahead. You’ll make me a fortune. Everyone will buy the book to find out what the fuss is all about. And if it’s argued in a court, whichever one it is, I shall make damn sure this time that the evidence is heard.”

“What evidence?”

“The evidence that proves you didn’t do it.”

Olive slammed a meaty fist on to the table.

“I did do it.”

“No, you didn’t.”

“I did!” roared the fat woman.

“You did not,” said Roz, her eyes flashing with anger.

“When will you face up to the fact that your mother is dead, you silly woman.” She banged the table in her turn.

“She’s not there for you any more, Olive, and she never will be, however long you hide inhere.”

Two fat tears rolled down Olive’s cheeks.

“I don’t like you.”

Roz continued brutally.

“You came home, saw what your precious lover had done, and went into shock. And God knows, I don’t blame you.” She took the mortuary photographs of Gwen and Amber from her bag and slapped them on the table in front of Olive.

“You adored your mother, didn’t you? You always adore the people who need you.”

Olive’s anger was enormous.

“That’s crap, bloody fucking crap!”

Roz shook her head.

“I needed you. That’s how I know.”

Olive’s lip trembled.

“You wanted to know how it felt to kill someone, that’s all you needed me for.”

“No.” Roz reached across and took a large, soft hand in hers.

“I needed someone to love. You’re very easy to love, Olive.”

The woman tore the hand away and clamped it across her face.

“No one loves me,” she whispered.

“No one’s ever loved me.”

“You’re wrong,” said Roz firmly.

“I love you. Sister Bridget loves you. And we are not going to abandon you the minute you get out. You must trust us.” She closed her mind on the insidious voice that murmured warnings against a long-term commitment she could never keep and against well-meant lies that could so easily rebound on her.

“Tell me about Amber,” she went on gently.

“Tell me why your mother needed you.”

A sigh of surrender shuddered through the huge frame.

“She wanted her own way all the time, and if she didn’t get it she made life hell for everyone. She told lies about things people did to her, spread awful stories, even hurt people sometimes.

She poured boiling water down my mother’s arm once to punish her, so we used to give in just to make life easy. She was as nice as pie as long as everyone did what she wanted.” She licked the tears from her lips.

“She never took responsibility, you see, but it got worse after the baby was born. Mum said she stopped maturing.”

“To compensate herself?”

“No, to excuse herself.” She twined her fingers in the front of her dress.

“Children get away with behaving badly so Amber went on behaving like a child. She was never told off for getting pregnant. We were too afraid of how she would react.” She wiped her nose with the back of her hand.

“Mum had made up her mind to take her to a psychiatrist. She thought Amber had schizophrenia.” She sighed heavily.

“Then they were killed and it didn’t matter any more.”

Roz passed her a Kleenex and waited while she blew her nose.

“Why did she never behave badly at school?”

“She did,” said Olive flatly, ‘if people teased her or took her things without asking. I used to have to get quite angry to stop them doing it, but most of the time I made sure no one got on her bad side. She was a lovely person as long as she wasn’t crossed. Really,” she insisted, ‘a lovely person.”

“The two faces of Eve.”

“Mum certainly thought so.” She took the cigarette packet out of Roz’s open briefcase and stripped away the cellophane.

“I used to keep her with me when she wasn’t in class. She didn’t mind that. The older girls treated her like a pet and that made her feel special. She had no friends of her own age.” She pulled some cigarettes on to the table and selected one.

“How did she hold down a job? You weren’t there to protect her then.”

“She didn’t. She never lasted anywhere longer than a month.

Most of the time she stayed at home with Mum. She made Mum’s life a misery.”

“What about Glitzy?”

Olive struck a match and lit the cigarette.

“The same. She’d only done three weeks and she was already talking about leaving. There was some trouble with the other girls. Amber got one of them sacked or something. I can’t remember now.

Anyway, that’s when Mum said enough was enough, and she’d have to see a psychiatrist.”

Roz sat in thoughtful silence for some moments.

“I know who your lover was,” she said abruptly.

“I know that you spent Sundays at the Belvedere in Farraday Street and that you signed in as Mr. and Mrs. Lewis. I’ve had his photograph identified by the owner of the Belvedere and by the receptionist at Wells Fargo I think he abandoned you in a hotel the night of your birthday when you told him you had aborted his baby, and that he went straight to Leven Road to have it out with Amber and your mother whom he regarded as jointly responsible for the murder of the son or daughter he had always wanted. I think your father was out of the house that night and that the whole thing got out of hand. I think you came home a long time afterwards, discovered the bodies, and went to pieces because you thought it was all your fault.” She took one of Olive’s hands in hers again and squeezed it tightly.

Olive closed her eyes and wept quietly, her soft skin caressing Roz’s fingers.

“No,” she said at last, releasing the hand.

“It didn’t happen like that. I wish it had. At least I’d know then why I did what I did.” Her eyes were curiously unfocused as if they were turned inwards upon herself.

“We didn’t plan anything for my birthday,” she said.

“We couldn’t. It wasn’t a Sunday and Sundays were the only days we could ever be together. That was when his sister-in-law came over to give him some time away from his wife. They both thought he spent the day at the British Legion.” She smiled but there was no humour in it.

“Poor Edward. He was so afraid they’d find out and turn him off without a penny. It was her house and her money and it made him miserable. Puddleglum was such a good name for him, especially when he wore his silly wig. He looked just like a marsh wiggle out of Narnia, tall and skinny and hairy.” She sighed.

“It was supposed to be a disguise, you know, in case anyone saw him. To me, it just looked funny. I liked him much better bald.” She sighed again.

“The Silver Chair was Amber’s and my favourite book when we were children.”

Roz had guessed.

“And you signed in as Mr. and Mrs. Lewis because it was C. S. Lewis who wrote it. Were you afraid of Mrs. Clarke finding out, or your parents?”

“We were afraid of everyone but mostly of Amber. Jealousy was a disease with her.”

“Did she know about your abortion?”

Olive shook her head.

“Only my mother knew. I never told Edward and I certainly didn’t tell Amber. She was the only one who was allowed to have sex in our house.

She did, too. All the time. Mum had to force her to take the pill every night so she didn’t get pregnant again.” She pulled a long face.

“Mum was furious when I fell. We both knew Amber would go mad.”

“Is that why you had the abortion?”

“Probably. It seemed the only sensible solution at the time.

Iregretitnow.”

“You’ll have other chances.”

“I doubt it.”

“So what did happen that night?” asked Roz after a moment or two.

Olive stared at her unblinkingly through the smoke from her cigarette.

“Amber found the birthday present Edward had given me. It was well hidden but she used to pry into everything.” Her mouth twisted.

“I was always having to put things back that she’d taken. People thought I was the snooper.” She encircled her wrist with finger and thumb.

“It was an identity bracelet with a tiny silver-chair charm en it. He’d had the tag inscribed: U. R. N. A. R. N. LA. Do you get it? You are Narnia, Narnia being heaven.”

She smiled self-consciously.

“I thought it was wonderful.”

“He was very fond of you.” It was a statement, not a question.

“I made him feel young again.” Tears squeezed from between the bald lids.

“We really didn’t harm anyone, just conducted a quiet little affair now and then on Sundays which gave us both something to look forward to.”

The tears flowed down her cheeks.

“I wish I hadn’t done it now but it was nice to feel special. I never had before and I was so jealous of Amber. She had a lot of boyfriends.

She used to take them upstairs. Mum was too frightened of her to say anything.” She sobbed loudly.

“They always laughed at me. I hate being laughed at.”

What a dreadful household it must have been, thought Roz, with each one desperately seeking love but never finding it.

Would they have recognised it, anyway, if they had? She waited until Olive had composed herself a little.

“Did your mother know it was Edward?”

“No. I told her it was someone at work. We were very careful. Edward was my father’s best friend. It would have devastated everyone if they’d known what we were doing.” She fell silent.

“Well, of course, it did devastate them in the end.”

“They found out.”

The sad head nodded.

“Amber guessed the minute she found the bracelet. I should have known she would. Silver chair, Narnia. The bracelet had to be from Puddleglum.” She sucked in a lungful of smoke.

Roz watched her for a moment.

“What did she do?” she asked when Olive didn’t go on.

“What she always did when she was angry. Started a fight.

She kept pulling my hair, I remember that. And screaming. Mum and Dad had to tear us apart. I ended up in a tug of war with my father gripping my wrists and tugging one way while Amber tugged my hair the other. All hell broke loose then. She kept yelling that I was having an affair with Mr. Clarke.” She stared wretchedly at the table.

“My mother looked as’ if she was going to be sick nobody likes the idea of old men getting excited about young girls I used to see it in the eyes of the woman at the Belvedere.” She turned the cigarette in her fingers.

“But now, you know, I think it was because Mum knew that Edward and my father were doing it as well. That’s what really made her sick. Makes me sick now.”

“Why didn’t you deny it?”

Olive puffed unhappily on her cigarette.

“There was no point.

She knew Amber was telling the truth. I suppose it’s a kind of instinctive thing. You learn a fact and lots of other little bits and pieces, which didn’t make sense at the time, suddenly slot into place.

Anyway, all three of them started screeching at me then, my mother in shock, my father in fury.” She shrugged.

“I’d never seen Dad so angry. Mum let out about the abortion and he kept slapping my face and calling me a slut. And Amber kept screaming that he was jealous because he loved Edward, too, and it was so awful’ her eyes welled ‘that I left.” There was a rather comical expression on her face.

“And when I came back the next day there was blood everywhere and Mum and Amber were dead.”

“You stayed out all night?”

Olive nodded.

“And most of the morning.”

“But that’s good,” said Roz leaning forward.

“We can prove that. Where did you go?”

“I walked to the beach.” She stared at her hands.

“I was going to kill myself. I wish I had now. I just sat there all night and thought about it instead.”

“Did anyone see you?”

“No. I didn’t want to be seen. When it got light I hid behind a dinghy every time I heard someone coming.”

“What time did you get back?”

“About noon. I hadn’t had anything to eat and I was hungry.”

“Did you speak to anyone?”

Olive sighed wearily.

“Nobody saw me. If they had I wouldn’t be here.”

“How did you get into the house? Did you have a key?”

“Yes.”

“Why?” demanded Roz sharply.

“You said you left. I assumed you just walked out as you were.”

Olive’s eyes widened.

“I knew you wouldn’t believe me,” she howled.

“No one believes me when I tell the truth.” She started to cry again.

“I do believe you,” said Roz firmly.

“I just want to get it straight.”

“I went to my room first and got my things. I only went out because they were all making so much noise.” She screwed her face in distress.

“My father was weeping. It was horrible.”

“OK. Go on. You’re back at the house.”

“I let myself in and went down to the kitchen to get some food.

I stepped in all the blood before I even knew it was there.” She looked at the photograph of her mother and the ready tears sprang into her eyes afresh.

“I really don’t like to think about it too much. It makes me sick when I think about it.”

Her lower lip wobbled violently.

“OK,” said Roz easily, ‘let’s concentrate on something else.

What made you stay? Why didn’t you run out into the road and call for help?”

Olive mopped at her eyes.

“I couldn’t move,” she said simply.

“I wanted to, but I couldn’t. I just stood there thinking how ashamed my mother would be when people saw her without her clothes on.” Her lip kept wobbling like some grotesque toddler’s.

“I felt so ill. I wanted to sit down but there wasn’t a chair.” She held her hand to her mouth and swallowed convulsively.

“And then Mrs. Clarke started banging on the kitchen window. She kept screaming that God would never forgive my wickedness, and there was dribble coming out of her mouth.” A shudder ran through the big shoulders.

“I knew I had to shut her up because she was making it all so much worse. So I picked up the rolling pin and ran across to the back door.” She sighed.

“But I fell over and she wasn’t there any more anyway.”

“Is that when you called the police?”

“No.” The wet face worked horribly.

“I can’t remember it all now. I went mad for a bit because I had their blood all over me and I kept scraping my hands to clean them. But everything I touched was bloody.” Her eyes widened at the memory.

“I’ve always been so clumsy and the floor was slippery. I kept stumbling over them and disturbing them and then I had to touch them to put them back again and there was more blood on me.”

The sorrowful eyes flooded again.

“And I thought, this is all my fault. If I’d never been born this would never have happened. I sat down for a long time because I felt sick.”

Roz looked at the bowed head in bewilderment.

“But why didn’t you tell the police all this?”

She raised drowned blue eyes to Roz’s.

“I was going to, but nobody would talk to me. They all thought I’d done it, you see.

And all the time I was thinking how it was all going to come out, about Edward and me, and Edward and my father, and the abortion, and Amber, and her baby, and I thought how much less embarrassing it would be for everyone if I said Ididit.”

Roz kept her voice deliberately steady.

“Who did you think had done it?”

Olive looked miserable.

“I didn’t think about that for ages.”

She hunched her shoulders as if defending herself.

“And then I knew my father had done it and they’d find me guilty whatever happened because he was the only one who could save me.” She plucked at her lips.

“And after that, it was quite a relief just to say what everyone wanted me to say. I didn’t want to go home, you see, not with Mum dead, and Edward next door and everyone knowing. I couldn’t possibly have gone home.”

“How did you know your father had done it?”

A whimper of pure pain, like a wounded animal’s, crooned from Olive’s mouth.

“Because Mr. Crew was so beastly to me.”

Sorrow poured in floods down her cheeks.

“He used to come to our house sometimes and he’d pat me on the shoulder and say: “How’s Olive?” But in the police station’ she buried her face in her hands ‘he held a handkerchief to his mouth to stop himself being sick and stood on the other side of the room and said: “Don’t say anything to me or the police, or I won’t be able to help you.” I knew then.”

Roz frowned.

“How? I don’t understand.”

“Because Dad was the only person who knew I wasn’t there, but he never said a word to Mr. Crew before, or to the police afterwards. Dad must have done it or he’d have tried to save me. He let me go to prison because he was a coward.” She sobbed loudly.

“And then he died and left his money to Amber’s child when he could have left a letter, saying I was innocent.”

She beat her hands against her knees.

“What did it matter once he was dead?”

Roz took the cigarette from Olive’s fingers and stood it on the table.

“Why didn’t you tell the police you thought it was your father who had done it? Sergeant Hawksley would have listened to you. He already suspected your father.”

The fat woman stared at the table.

“I don’t want to tell you.”

“You must, Olive.”

“You’ll laugh.”

“Tell me.”

“I was hungry.”

Roz shook her head in perplexity.

“I don’t understand.”

“The sergeant brought me a sandwich and said I could have a proper dinner when we’d finished the statement.” Her eyes welled again.

“I hadn’t eaten all day and I was so hungry,” she wailed.

“It was quicker when I said what they wanted me to say and then I got my dinner.” She wrung her hands.

“People will laugh, won’t they?”

Roz wondered why it had never occurred to her that Olive’s insatiable craving for food might have been a contributory factor in her confession. Mrs. Hopwood had described her as a compulsive eater and stress would have piled on the agonies of the wretched girl’s hunger.

“No,” she said firmly, ‘no one will laugh. But why did you insist on pleading guilty at your trial?

You could have made a fight of it then. You’d had time to think and get over the shock.”

Olive wiped her eyes.

“It was too late. I’d confessed. I had nothing to fight with except diminished responsibility and I wasn’t going to let Mr. Crew call me a psychopath. I hate Mr. Crew.”

“But if you’d told someone the truth they might have believed you.

You’ve told me and I’ve believed you.”

Olive shook her head.

“I’ve told you nothing,” she said simply.

“Everything you know you’ve found out for yourself.

That’s why you believe it.” Her eyes flooded again.

“I did try at the beginning, when I first came to prison. I told the Chaplain but he doesn’t like me and thought I was telling lies. I’d confessed, you see, and only the guilty confess. The psychiatrists were the most frightening. I thought if I denied the crime and didn’t show any remorse, they’d say I was sociopathic and send me to Broadmoor.”

Roz looked at the bent head with compassion. Olive had never really stood a chance. And who was to blame at the end of the day? Mr. Crew?

Robert Martin? The police? Poor Gwen even, whose dependence on her daughter had mapped Olive’s life. Michael Jackson had said it all: “She was one of those people you only think about when you want something done and then you remember them with relief because you know they’ll do it.” It had never been Amber who set out to please, she thought, only Olive, and as a result she had grown completely dependent herself. With no one to tell her what to do she had taken the line of least resistance.

“You’ll be hearing this officially in the next few days but I’m damned if you should have to wait for it. Mr. Crew is on bail at the moment, charged with embezzlement of your father’s money and conspiracy to defraud. He may also be charged with conspiracy to murder.” There was a long pause before Olive looked up.

The strange awareness was back in her eyes, a look of triumphant confirmation that made the hair prickle on the back of Roz’s neck. She thought of Sister Bridget’s simple assertion of her truth: You were chosen, Roz, and I wasn’t. And Olive’s truth? What was Olive’s truth?

“I know already.” Idly Olive removed a pin from the front of her dress.

“Prison grapevine,” she explained.

“Mr. Crew hired the Hayes brothers to do over Sergeant Hawksley’s restaurant.

You were there, and you and the Sergeant got beaten up. I’m sorry about that but I’m not sorry about anything else. I never liked Mr.

Hayes much. He always ignored me and talked to Amber.” She stuck the pin into the tabletop. Bits of dried clay and wax still clung to the head.

Roz arched an eyebrow at the pin.

“It’s superstitious rubbish, Olive.”

“You said it works if you believe in it.”

Roz shrugged.

“I was joking.”

“The Encyclopaedia Britannica doesn’t joke.” Olive chanted in a sing-song voice: “Page 96, volume 25, general heading: Occultism.” She clapped her hands excitedly like an over boisterous child and raised her voice to a shout. ‘“Witchcraft worked in Salem because the persons involved believed in it.” She saw the frown of alarm on Roz’s face.

“It’s all nonsense,” she said calmly.

“Will Mr. Crew be convicted?”

“I don’t know. He’s claiming that your father gave him the go-ahead, as executor, to invest the money while the searches were made for your nephew, and the bugger is’ she smiled grimly ‘if the property market takes off again, which it probably will, his investments look very healthy.” Of the other charges, only the conspiracy to defraud Hal of the Poacher had any chance of sticking, purely because Stewart Hayes’s brother, a far weaker character than Stewart, had collapsed under police questioning.

“He’s denying everything, but the police seem fairly optimistic they can pin assault charges on both him and the Hayes boys. I’d give anything to get him for negligence where your case was concerned. Was he one of the people you tried to tell the truth to?”

“No,” said Olive regretfully.

“There was no point. He’d been Dad’s solicitor for years. He’d never have believed Dad had done it.”

Roz started to gather her bits and pieces together.

“Your father didn’t kill your mother and sister, Olive. He thought you did. Gwen and Amber were alive when he went to work the next morning.

As far as he was concerned, your statement was completely true.”

“But he knew I wasn’t there.”

Roz shook her head.

“I’ll never be able to prove it but I don’t suppose he even realised you’d gone. He slept downstairs, remember, and I’ll bet a pound to a penny you slipped out quietly to avoid attracting attention to yourself. If you’d only agreed to see him, you’d have sorted it out.”

She stood up.

“It’s water under the bridge, but you shouldn’t have punished him, Olive. He was no more guilty than you are. He loved you. He just wasn’t very good at showing it. I suspect his only fault was to take too little notice of the clothes women wore.”

Olive shook her head.

“I don’t understand.”

“He told the police your mother owned a nylon overall.”

“Why would he do that?”

Roz sighed.

“I suppose because he didn’t want to admit he never looked at her. He wasn’t a bad man, Olive. He couldn’t help his sexuality any more than you or I can help ours. The tragedy for you all was that none of you could talk about it.” She took the pin from the tabletop and wiped the head clean.

“And I don’t believe for one moment that he would ever have blamed you for what happened. Only himself. That’s why he went on living in the house. It was his atonement.”

A large tear rolled down Olive’s cheek.

“He always said the game wasn’t worth the candle.” She held out her hand for the pin.

“If I’d love him less I’d have hated him less, and it wouldn’t be too late now, would it?”