The Cruellest Game

Eight

The rest of the weekend passed in a fog of unreality. Robert and I coexisted on tenterhooks. I couldn’t trust myself to have anything more to do with him than I had to, in case I just exploded, and he seemed afraid even to speak to me.

I knew I could not face another night in Robbie’s room. I would drive myself quite mad with grief. But neither could I countenance sleeping with Robert. I moved into the guest room at the back of the house. Robert accepted my decision regarding sleeping arrangements without question. He did offer to be the one who took the guest room, but I declined. I didn’t want to sleep in the room we had so happily shared for so long, even if he wasn’t there.

On Monday morning the Western Morning News carried a front-page report of Robbie’s death. There were quotes from an anonymous school friend, and a photograph of him in his school uniform which looked as if it might have been lifted from a group picture, possibly also obtained from the school friend. Certainly I had not supplied a photo to anyone, Robbie had been far too private a boy to be on Facebook, and as far as I knew there were no pictures of him on the Net.

In the afternoon PC Cox called to tell us that the post-mortem had been completed, and Robbie’s body would now be released for burial. She explained that a preliminary inquest, just a paperwork formality at this stage, she said, had already been opened and adjourned. Rather to my surprise, it seemed we would have to wait five or six months for the inquest proper.

‘’Fraid the coroner has a bit of a backlog,’ said PC Cox.

Not that an inquest was likely to make much difference to anything whenever it was held, I thought, judging from the lack of interest shown by the police.

Over the next two or three days we received a number of cards and notes of condolence, some of them from local people whose names I barely recognized. Dad phoned every evening. The headmaster of Kelly College also phoned, and so did Robbie’s swimming coach.

Tom Farley, the village’s capable jack of all trades, and the only man Robert had ever wanted to work with him on Highrise, called round to ask if there was anything he could do. He brought with him a large steak and kidney pie, made by his wife Ellen, he told us, adding by way of explanation: ‘Missus says you won’t want to cook, but you’m to make sure you keep your strength up.’

Our local weekly paper followed up the Western Morning News story about Robbie, publishing the same picture, and one of the nationals carried a thankfully quite small piece, focusing on an alleged increase in the number of unexplained suicides among young people.

We organized the funeral for the following Friday. Or to be honest, as Robert barely seemed capable of doing anything, I organized it with the help of the local undertaker and the vicar’s wife. I was glad to be busy. I didn’t want to think any more.

None of the three of us in our little family had ever had any religious beliefs at all. I certainly didn’t, Robert had always been an equally emphatic non-believer, and Robbie had seemed to embrace our lack or faith effortlessly. Indeed, just like us, he had sometimes expressed wonderment at how, in the modern world, anyone with a modicum of intelligence could accept the mumbo jumbo of any religion. I therefore did wonder if it was hypocritical to involve the church. But it meant that Robbie could be buried in Blackstone’s little churchyard at the foot of the Dartmoor hills, a place I knew he so loved.

The secular options seemed so bleak by comparison. I’d been to a humanist funeral of a school friend’s mother when I was a teenager. It had been most unusual, and considered really not quite the thing in those days. Even then I hadn’t cared about any of that, but I’d been aware, as I suspected my friend had been, of an added sense of emptiness about the occasion. A feeling that all was not as it should be. Whatever one thought about religious institutions, funerals were probably what they did best.

Robert just nodded everything through. He seemed numb. Also, almost pathetically afraid to offend me in any way. He agreed with everything I said.

I first attempted to contact our local vicar, who gloried in the name of Gerald Ponsonby Smythe, straight after getting the go-ahead from PC Cox. My call was diverted to an answering service, so I left a message.

Within the hour there was a knock on the front door. I was taken by surprise because I’d been at the back of the house and hadn’t heard a vehicle approach. Outside stood a woman I immediately recognized as the vicar’s wife, Gladys Ponsonby Smythe.

She was pretty unmistakable — a big woman, both in longitude and latitude, with ferocious grey hair apparently quite determined to defy her attempts to tie it back from her face. She was wearing no make-up except for a prominent and slightly askew streak of vermilion lipstick. Her clothes, which were more like robes, multicoloured and hippy-like, ebbed and flowed with every roll of her ample curves.

I hadn’t met her before, but I’d seen her photograph many times in the press. I’d always somewhat dismissed her, both from her demeanour and the nature of her press presence, as a somewhat flamboyant churchy do-gooder, intent on being a tower of strength, and probably rather bossy and pleased with herself.

She introduced herself and expressed her deepest sympathy over Robbie’s tragic death. The first surprise was the way she spoke. Gladys Ponsonby Smythe had a strong Liverpool accent.

‘We didn’t know anything about your awful news until you called,’ she said. ‘I just had to come straight away. I hope you don’t mind, Mrs Anderson.’

I did rather, but I could hardly turn her away. In any case I needed the woman.

The Reverend Gerald Ponsonby Smythe was old-school high church, and steeped in classical Latin. Again, something I’d learned from the local press. I’d also spotted him once or twice walking round the village in a long black frock. All right, a cassock. But I didn’t think it was very usual for clergy to wear that kind of garb any more, certainly not outside their churches.

I remembered when I’d first seen both their names in a local paper how I’d thought that nobody could really be called Ponsonby Smythe, and that at the very least they had to be clichés on legs. I still didn’t know about him. But she certainly wasn’t that. Gladys, as I was instructed to address her, swiftly proved to be not at all what I had expected. Except, of course, in the tower of strength department! More than anything else, Gladys Ponsonby Smythe was a Scouser with attitude.

I found myself apologizing for not having met her or her husband before, and for asking to arrange a funeral in their church when I’d previously never been inside it. The Church of England was surely well accustomed to that sort of behaviour, as for so many people churches were only for weddings, christenings and funerals. But it was somehow as if I needed to clear the territory ahead before burying my beloved son.

‘I hope you don’t think I’m a hypocrite,’ I said.

‘You don’t need to worry about that, chuck,’ Gladys responded swiftly. ‘Not half as hypocritical as a considerable number of our regular congregation at St Andrews, I can tell you. Only I never said that.’

She had me smiling in spite of myself. For a start I didn’t think anyone, from Liverpool or anywhere else, actually said ‘chuck’, except Cilla Black.

I invited her in, trying not to let my reluctance show. After all, I really did need her.

She stepped into the hall but made no attempt to move further into the house.

‘Look, I’m not staying, not this time,’ she said. ‘I just wanted you to know that I’m here to give you all the help I can with the funeral and anything else. I’ll come back to sort out the details.’

I thanked her and said I appreciated having a bit more time.

‘If you’d rather pop out for a bit and come to the vicarage or go to the pub or something, just let me know,’ she said as she left.

I didn’t believe in anything that she stood for, but I did feel very slightly less bereft after her visit.

Ultimately I called her the next day to say I was ready to talk about the details of the funeral, or as ready as I’d ever be, and I would like to meet at the vicarage. I just wanted a break from the sheer bloody misery of Highrise.

Blackstone Vicarage, built right next to the church, was an ugly Victorian pile in dire need of a major facelift outside and in. It boasted few of the comforts of life which I took for granted. The Reverend Gerald, a distracted man several years older than his wife, I thought, who wore wire-framed spectacles balanced crookedly on a large pointed nose, greeted me in the hall before retreating to his study, saying he would ‘leave Gladys to it, then’, which I somehow thought was his habit.

Gladys made instant coffee in an orange Formica kitchen dating back to the 1970s, I guessed. She sat me at the Formica-topped table, plonked half a packet of chocolate digestive biscuits before me, then got down to business. First she asked what hymns I would like. I didn’t think I knew any appropriate hymns, except ‘Abide with Me’, which I definitely didn’t want because it would be sure to cause me to totally break down. Other than that I had only a distant memory of hymns I used to sing at school and I couldn’t even remember what they were.

‘Would you like me to choose, luv?’ she asked.

I nodded my agreement. She suggested ‘All Things Bright and Beautiful’, which, of course, even I had heard of, and ‘Be Not Afraid’, originally an American Catholic hymn, which I hadn’t.

That hymn began with the verse: You shall cross the barren desert, But you shall not die of thirst, You shall wander far in safety, Though you do not know the way. It’s chorus was: Be not afraid, I go before you always, Come follow me, And I shall give you rest.

I was moved by the words. It made me think of Robbie not knowing the way and seeking rest, and it reminded me of how I had almost always been moved by the Bible whenever I encountered quotations or readings. Even though I didn’t actually believe a word that was in it.

‘But can you have a Catholic hymn at a C of E funeral?’ I asked.

‘Oh, Gerry doesn’t worry about stuff like that, chuck,’ responded the vicar’s wife cheerily. ‘In any case he’s so high church there’s some round here think he secretly is RC!’

I smiled and told Gladys those two hymns would be fine.

She then asked if either Robert or I would like to speak about Robbie at the service. I shook my head vehemently. I knew I would not be able to do so, and I really didn’t feel I could sit and listen to the husband I now knew had deceived me for so long eulogizing about the son he had also grievously deceived.

Gladys suggested that if I told her a little about Robbie then her husband could give a short address.

‘He’s surprisingly good at that sort of thing, is Gerry. Still, plenty of practice, I suppose,’ she remarked.

She also said that if I wanted to lay on a little ‘do’, as she called it, after the service, I might prefer to use the village pub, the Lamb and Flag, rather than have a load of people descending on Highrise.

I agreed to that with alacrity. I would have preferred nothing at all, but if there had to be a ‘do’, and I supposed that there did, then the pub was definitely the best alternative.

‘But I doubt there’ll be a lot of people,’ I said. ‘We’ve never mixed much in the village, you see, and we don’t really have many friends...’

I finished the sentence lamely, letting it trail away. Of course we didn’t have friends. Robert had seen to that. Friends might have found him out, I supposed.

Gladys had begun to speak again. I tuned in halfway through.

‘. and you can be quite sure there’ll be more than you think. There’s a tradition in this part of the world to turn out for the funeral of one of their own. All the regular congregation will be there, you can be sure of that, and goodness knows who else...’

I drifted off once more. The very thought made me feel sick. Would I be expected, then, to make polite conversation with total strangers? Was this the price I had to pay for ensuring my son had a decent burial and was laid to rest somewhere that was special to him?

Gladys did have a bossy side, as I’d suspected, and a conviction that she was in the right. Although I also suspected that she probably was, more often than not, I considered challenging her. Or even just backing out of the whole thing. But I didn’t. I just went along with it.

On the day of the funeral, Friday the 11th of November, eight days after Robbie’s death, it was tipping down with rain. From the windows of Highrise only a veiled curtain of water and mist could be seen, effectively masking the moors from view. It seemed appropriate.

My father drove up from Hartland that morning. I had managed to keep him at bay until then and I’d asked him if he’d mind driving home again after the service as we didn’t feel able to cope with having anyone to stay right then, not even him. I felt guilty but I had no choice. Apart from anything else, the more time he spent with us the more likely he was to pick up on the atmosphere between Robert and me and to start asking questions I couldn’t deal with.

I dressed in the navy-blue suit I’d bought for my gran’s funeral all those years ago, navy chosen because she’d so hated funereal black. Rather miraculously, it still fitted me, more or less, but I knew I had already lost some weight since Robbie’s death. There was a navy hat, a kind of trilby, to match, and, coincidentally, my best raincoat, which was certainly needed that day, was also navy. I couldn’t wear the black patent court shoes which would have been my first choice because my burned feet continued to pain me, but in any case sensible brogues were rather better suited to the weather.

The service was scheduled to begin at 2 p.m. At 12.30 Robert was still sitting slumped at the kitchen table, unshaven and dishevelled, looking every inch the rough and ready rigger I now knew him to be.

‘You’re going to be late,’ I told him sharply.

‘I wasn’t even sure that you wanted me to come,’ he mumbled.

‘What, to our son’s funeral?’ I snapped. ‘Have you completely taken leave of your senses? Whatever happened last week, that boy worshipped you. Though, with what I now know, I rather wish he hadn’t.’

Robert winced, as if in pain.

‘Of course you must come,’ I commanded. ‘Just go and get ready. Quickly.’

He left the room and reappeared half an hour later, clean-shaven, hair washed and slicked down. He was wearing the beautiful black suit he’d bought for our wedding. That still fitted him pretty well too and, of course, had barely been worn since. He was carrying his Burberry raincoat over one arm. His shirt was bright white and crisply pressed. I’d always enjoyed looking after Robert’s shirts and presenting them to him in the best possible order. Not any more, I thought. He could iron his own damned shirts.

Then I noticed his tie. It was Robbie’s county swimming tie, of which our son had been so proud. Indeed, the only tie he had ever really wanted to put around his neck.

I felt a lump in my throat. In spite of myself I was affected by Robert having thought of and chosen to wear that tie.

I reached out and touched it lightly. He lifted a hand towards mine, and I knew it was his intention to wrap his fingers around my fingers. The way he’d always done before. We both withdrew at the same time. Those days were over. For now anyway.

‘Shall we go?’ I asked. He nodded.

Dad was waiting alone in the sitting room, as if unsure what to do. He glanced up as I put my head round the door. Robert had let him in when he’d arrived earlier, and Dad had quite obviously been shocked by his appearance and demeanour. He looked relieved when he saw Robert now, smartly dressed and reasonably composed, standing by my side.

‘We’re ready if you are, Dad,’ I said.

If he’d noticed that Robert and I were not as we should be together, Dad had so far made no comment. But then, we’d just lost our only son and Dad his only grandson. Amidst the grief and despair of that one dreadful reality he was probably unlikely to have noticed anything much else that might be amiss.

‘I thought you’d like some time on your own,’ he said. Dad was not a big man and he seemed to have become smaller since I’d last seen him. He was in his mid-sixties, and the thin hair which barely covered his head had turned grey many years previously. His face also seemed grey that day. He too had loved Robbie dearly. Yet he could still be thoughtful and considerate. Which is more than I had been able to be in my behaviour towards him since Robbie’s death.

Even then all I could manage was a brief ‘Thanks’. Followed by: ‘The funeral car is here.’

Gladys had arranged that too. I’d said I’d drive. There were only ever going to be the three of us setting off from Highrise, and I’d told her we didn’t want any fuss or ceremony.

‘You won’t want to drive, though, you really won’t feel able,’ she’d said. ‘Trust me, luvvie.’

I’d thought she’d been showing her bossy side again. But, of course, she’d turned out to be absolutely right. As our sad little threesome left Highrise on that terrible day, the day when Robbie was to be buried and reality could no longer be denied even for a second, I didn’t feel as if I could have unlocked a car door and started its engine, let alone actually driven the thing.

Gladys was also right about the turnout.

The church was packed.

Dad, Robert and I walked in behind Robbie’s flower-strewn wicker coffin. It had been made not far away by craftsmen on the Somerset Levels, the undertaker had told me.

I’d thought Robbie might have liked that, and that it would seem less grim than a wooden box. But I couldn’t even look at his coffin. I knew if I did I would break down.

To me, the congregation was just a sea of faces upon which I could not properly focus, but I did become aware that there were a lot of young people in the church. Robbie’s schoolmates and fellow swimmers, I assumed. Although it was obvious, I had not even thought of them being present.

Gladys had told me that there would be someone taking down names and I would be given a list of mourners so that I would know who’d attended.

‘You’ll not be able to take it in on the day,’ she’d said.

At the time I hadn’t given a damn. Now, even before the service began, I found that I really wanted to know who had bothered to come out on this dreadful wet and windy November day to mourn my beautiful boy.

I began to think about him, which I had tried not to do all morning. The tears welled up behind my eyes. I felt myself stumble.

A strong arm grasped mine and gave me support. It was Robert. I turned and looked up at him. There was such anguish etched on his face.

‘I loved him so much,’ Robert whispered. ‘And you, Marion. Whatever else you doubt, never ever doubt that.’

He grasped my arm a little tighter. For the first time since I had learned about his double identity I did not pull away. He was my man and Robbie’s father. Whatever might come next, I told myself, on this day of all days, that was all that mattered. If I needed to cling to anyone, then it would be to Robert that I would cling. There was, after all, no one else.

The funeral itself was a blur. I was only vaguely aware of the hymns being sung. I didn’t really listen at all to Gerald Ponsonby Smythe’s address. After all, that man had nothing to do with my Robbie. He’d never even met him as far as I knew. But people told me later that the vicar had done Robbie proud, whatever that meant.

When we gathered at the graveside I could hold myself together no longer. The tears began to flow. I was aware that Dad was crying too, and that made me worse. When Robbie’s body, in its quite flimsy-looking wicker casket, was lowered into the ground I broke down totally. I would have collapsed onto the mud and wet grass surrounding the newly dug grave had Robert not held on to me.

‘Come on, girl, we’ll get through this together,’ he whispered in my ear. Just the way he’d always done whenever we’d had any kind of problem. But, of course, we’d never really had any bad problems before. This wasn’t a problem. This was Armageddon.

I found myself holding on to Robert, my tears staining the strip of white shirt exposed where the raincoat he’d slipped on as we’d walked through the churchyard had fallen open. He seemed strong again, grateful, I supposed, to be allowed to look after me. Just as he had always done before, or at least as I’d thought he’d always done before.

We both threw clods of earth onto Robbie’s coffin, me half carried by Robert to the edge of the grave. The rain still poured from a leaden sky, swirling around the churchyard, and a good strong gust of Dartmoor wind hit me full in the face as we moved forward. My hat was blown from my head and would probably have landed in Robbie’s grave had not a young man I vaguely registered to be one of the village lads leapt forward like a limited-overs cricketer and taken a smart catch.

Robert took the hat from the boy and helped me replace it, then he led me away to the far end of the graveyard, dabbed at my eyes with his hanky, told me again how much he loved me, and asked me if I was sure I wanted to go to the ‘do’ at the pub.

‘It’s your choice. If you want us to go straight home that’s fine with me,’ he said.

I thought about how determined I’d been that Robbie should have a good send-off and be laid to rest in the right place. I had Gladys Ponsonby Smythe to thank for making that happen, and even at that moment my innate good manners kicked in and I felt I shouldn’t let her down. Nor the ‘load of people’ she’d promised, who had indeed turned up. They’d come to pay their respects to Robbie. Now I had to show my respect for them. He would have wanted that. He’d been a polite boy. We’d brought him up that way.

I blew my nose loudly.

‘I want to go,’ I said. ‘I can’t explain, really, but I do.’

‘Fine,’ he said. ‘We’ll go then. And I shall be by your side, right through it, and ready to take you away just when you want.’

I nodded. It felt good, even on this day, or maybe particularly on this day, to lean on Robert again, to let him take over.

The funeral car took us to the Lamb and Flag. Robert held my hand as we drove through the village, and I didn’t stop him from doing so. Just this day at least, I told myself, just this day it had to be right that we, Robbie’s parents, were together, were united. Outside the shop a farmer, or perhaps a farm worker, I didn’t even know by sight, was climbing down from a tractor connected to a trailer full of ewes. He removed his cloth cap as we passed and bowed his head. I was touched. He was just a young man. But Blackstone was that sort of place, as were its people: old-fashioned and steeped in the traditions and ways of some bygone age.

The pub was full of people I didn’t know, or knew only vaguely, coming up to me and offering their condolences. I peered around me, remembering suddenly that I hadn’t seen Bella at the church. I switched on my phone. There was a text from her waiting for me: So sorry, Marion. Daughter fallen off bike. Concussion and prob broken arm. Taking 2 hospital. Sorry not to be with u. Send love and thoughts. X.

I found that I was curiously disappointed and was about to tell Robert, but he was talking to the landlord about whether or not extra food should be provided as even more people than Gladys had expected had turned up. In any case he wouldn’t have been interested.

He was certainly attentive to me, though. Throughout the afternoon, just as he’d promised, Robert barely left my side. And Gladys continued to be a tower of strength, right from the moment she’d greeted us at the pub door to say she’d reserved a little corner table so that we had somewhere to sit where we hopefully wouldn’t be too overwhelmed by the gathered throng.

I introduced her to Dad, then remembered she and Robert didn’t know each other either and introduced them too.

‘Oh, so this is your husband,’ she responded quickly. ‘We have met, of course.’

I glanced at Robert. Had he turned even paler than usual again, or was that my imagination?

‘Perhaps, but just in passing,’ he said.

I studied Gladys. Was she looking puzzled? Or was that my imagination too?

I was considering questioning her when a young woman, who looked as if she had only recently stopped crying, approached us.

‘I just wanted to introduce myself,’ she said. ‘I’m Sue Shaw... Robbie and I, uh...’ She hesitated. ‘I... we swam together.’

Immediately I forgot all about Robert and Gladys. After all, this was a small village and there could have been many innocent occasions when Robert might have encountered the vicar’s wife, even though he had always been reluctant to leave the house any more than he had to.

I stared hard at the pretty blonde standing before me. Could this be Sue S., the girl Robert had written about in his diary? The one he had wanted to take to his friend’s birthday party. The one he’d described as ‘well fit’. I felt sure it must be her. But I didn’t want to admit that I’d been reading Robbie’s diary. Not even after his death.

So I merely said, ‘Hello,’ and ‘Thank you for coming.’

‘Yes, thank you for coming,’ repeated Robert without a lot of interest. But then, he had not read Robbie’s diary.

‘I’m so sorry...’ she told me, half turning away. Then she turned back, a determined look on her face, as if she had made a decision.

‘I just wanted to tell you, I don’t think you know, I was Robbie’s girlfriend,’ she blurted out.

‘I didn’t know,’ I said.

She blushed.

‘He was going to tell you,’ she said quickly. ‘We’d only been going out for a few weeks. He said he was going to tell you and he wanted me to meet you. And his dad...’

‘Girlfriend, but he was only fifteen...’ began Robert.

‘Well, I never,’ said Dad.

‘Don’t,’ I said, sensing that Sue Shaw was already uneasy.

I touched her arm. I could find no words. So this had been Robbie’s girlfriend. I wondered what the term meant for them. Had they been lovers? She looked so young and fresh-faced. I found myself rather hoping that they had been lovers. That my son had at least known the joy of sex with someone he cared for before he had died, even though he had been so very young.

Sue Shaw began speaking again, oblivious it seemed to Robert’s and Dad’s interruptions.

‘He was always talking about you, you know,’ she continued. ‘Some of the boys don’t even mention their parents. They think it’s soft. But Robbie did. He was so happy, you see, at home and everything...’

She stopped as if realizing what she was saying.

‘So you thought he was happy too?’ I asked.

‘Of course he was happy,’ said Robert.

I ignored him. So did Sue Shaw. She nodded.

‘But do you know anything, anything at all, that might have made him do...’ I paused. ‘Do what he did?’

She shook her head. ‘No,’ she said quickly. ‘Of course not.’

‘Of course not,’ I repeated.

Her colour deepened, and she began to back off again.

‘It’s my dad, I have to go, he doesn’t know I’m here... he didn’t approve, you know, of Robbie and me...’

I put a restraining hand on her arm.

‘You mean he knew about you two?’

Her face was quite red by then.

‘Yes, well no, not until... until just before Robbie died. I have to go. He’ll kill me.’

She seemed to realize she’d made an inappropriate remark. ‘I mean... I mean, he wouldn’t approve,’ she tailed off lamely.

I tried to reassure her with an attempt at a smile. Then I asked if she’d be kind enough to give me her phone number.

‘I would just like to talk about Robbie sometime,’ I said. ‘That’s all.’

She nodded and rattled off the number, but I could tell that my request had made her even more uncomfortable. She scurried off in the direction of the exit. I found a pen and an old petrol receipt in the front pocket of my handbag and scribbled the number down, hoping my short-term memory remained as good as it always had been.

Most of the rest of the time at the Lamb and Flag was a blur pretty much like the funeral itself. I stood up to thank Gerald Ponsonby Smythe and managed to knock red wine over Robert’s pristine shirt. I’d cried all over it and then thrown wine at it. It was as if I were determined to destroy it.

He said not to worry, he’d give it a scrub down in the Gents, and left my side for the first time since we’d arrived at the pub.

Dad had gone off wandering around the bar looking at the old Dartmoor prints which hung from almost every wall. Just for something to do, I imagined. Gladys was still with me. And, even though I’d told myself it was of absolutely no consequence, I continued to wonder how she and Robert had met. So I asked her. As casually as I could manage.

‘I’m afraid I know he’s never been to church, that’s for sure,’ I said, with another attempt at what passed for a smile.

‘Oh no, not this church anyway. It wasn’t here, not in Blackstone,’ she replied. ‘Curiously enough, I’ve never seen your husband in the village, and I do get about a bit, as you’re probably aware.’

Not as curious as you might imagine, I thought.

‘So?’ I prompted.

‘Oh, it was some years ago when Gerry and I had an Exeter parish. He used to sing in the choir.’

I felt as if an ice-cold hand had been placed on the back of my neck, the touch of freezing fingers seemed to be running down my spine.

Robert did have a fine baritone singing voice. The woman must be mistaken, though. Surely. I tried to make myself believe that. And to make her believe it too.

‘He used to sing in a church choir?’ I queried. ‘But he hates religion. Right through our married life he’s never gone near a church even for a wedding or something if he could help it. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be rude, and you’ve been so helpful. But that’s the truth.’

She looked doubtful.

‘Well, I’m pretty sure it was him, although, of course, I didn’t really know him. You see, it was...’ She stopped abruptly as if about to say something she’d thought better of. ‘No, well, I’m sure you’re right.’

‘He’d lived in Scotland right up until just before we met,’ I said.

‘I see.’ Gladys definitely looked puzzled now. ‘I’ve usually got a good memory for faces, but—’

‘What about names?’ I interrupted, suddenly not quite so sure of myself after all.

‘Names?’ she queried.

‘Yes, what was his name?’

She hesitated for a moment.

‘Well, obviously, if it was your husband, his name was Robert Anderson, I assume.’

‘But do you remember that?’

Now she looked plain bewildered.

‘Well, I’m not sure, I hadn’t thought...’

She paused again. I waited a moment before deciding to take the plunge. ‘Or could it have been Rob Anderton?’

‘Do you know, I think that might have been the name...’ There was yet another pause. ‘No. How silly of me. That makes no sense. It must have been Robert Anderson, if it was him at all. And it was a very long time ago. Perhaps I’ve got the whole thing mixed up. Do you know, I used to trust my own memory with anything, chuck, but nowadays, I don’t know, it’s not what it was, that’s for certain...’

Her voice was just a babble in the background. I felt sick.

I could see Robert walking across the bar towards me. His shirt front pink now rather than red.

I’d almost let him in again. It had been a relief on such a day to lean on him, to feel his love for me without drawing back from it. I think I might have subconsciously more or less decided to let the doubts and uncertainty go. Or at least to live with them. After all, Robert was still the same man. What did a name matter? And he was all I had. Now the doubt and uncertainty had become totally overwhelming again. I feared what Gladys’s innocent remark might really mean.

‘I’ve done my best,’ he remarked ruefully, screwing up his face in mock embarrassment almost like the old Robert. He came very close to me and rested one hand on my shoulder, again almost the old Robert, the old proprietorial Robert.

I could tell that he thought he had got me back, or at least was in the process of getting me back. One thing I believed totally was that, like me, he would never get over Robbie’s death. But suddenly he did seem to be coping. He even had a bit of a smile on his face as he looked fondly down at me.

He didn’t know that I not only wanted to wipe that smile off, I wanted to slap him. Hard. Just as I had when I’d first learned of his deception.

And, of course, I so feared there was more to come. Gladys had made me remember that. What else had he not told me in spite of his promises? What other lies might yet be revealed?