The Healers

Chapter Fourteen

It was Saturday, a week after Stephen Ramsay had walked with his lover in the hills and Ernie Bowles had dressed up to meet his date in the town. Lily had been invited to supper with Magda Pocock. Magda, the famous rebirther who despite her wealth lived very simply on the job in a flat built into the roof of the Old Chapel.

Lily was working and Magda had come into the shop, ostensibly to buy groceries but hoping to find Lily there. She was still wearing her smart conference clothes, looked very much the professional woman.

“Lily,” she said. “My dear. What time will you finish work?” There was still the hint of the accent she had picked up from her mother.

Lily told her.

“Come and talk to me,” she said. “Stay for supper. I’m worried about all these dreadful things that have been happening.”

And she was worried, Lily could see that. She wasn’t curious or excited like most of the customers who came into the shop to discuss the murders. Magda’s anxiety troubled Lily more than all the other unsettling things that had been going on. It wasn’t like her.

From the beginning Magda had taken Lily under her wing and Lily had become dependent on her.

“A mother substitute,” Sean said derisively, usually when he was jealous about the time Lily spent in Magda’s company. And Lily supposed that was true. Certainly she would have preferred Magda as a mother than Bridget the politician. She almost said as much at one of the groups, but Magda had pushed the idea aside.

“You can’t blame your parents for your unhappiness,” she had said. “You’ve left them behind. You must take responsibility for your own life now.”

But it seemed to Lily that it was harder to leave her parents behind than Magda supposed. Even last Sunday, at the Voice Dialogue workshop, when she’d been working with Val, a particular incident from her childhood had intruded. She’d had to live it again. She still remembered it quite vividly.

Her mother had been a workaholic, driven by political ambition and seldom there. Her father was an actor of sorts, but by the time Lily was a teenager hardly ever seemed to be in work. He drank like a fish and found his companionship in pubs and bars. Quite often he picked up friends there and brought them home to carry on drinking.

That was what had happened on the evening Lily remembered. She had got out of bed to go to the bathroom and almost fallen over a strange man who had collapsed at the top of the stairs. He had caught her around the waist and said in a thick Bristol accent:

“My, you’re a beauty, a real bobby dazzler,” and pulled her towards him to kiss her. She could still remember the smell of the whisky on his breath. She had screamed and screamed until he’d let her go and all the other men rushed out to see what was happening. Her father, shocked into sobriety by the noise, had been in turns defensive and apologetic. Why had she made so much fuss? he said. Then, pleading: there was no need, was there, to tell her mother.

Lily never discussed the incident with her mother, partly out of loyalty to her father and a kind of embarrassment, partly because she had so many late-night sittings that she was never there. But Bridget had found out somehow and Lily was never left alone in the house with her father after that. Strange girls were employed to ‘keep her company’ or she was sent to friends’ homes to sleep. She thought it was probably a relief all round when she packed her rucksack and left them to it.

“You’re very quiet tonight,” Magda said. She was setting the table, polishing heavy silver with a white napkin.

“I was thinking of Val,” Lily said. “The last time we met.”

“Ah yes,” Magda said. “Poor Val.”

“Did you talk to her on Sunday?”

“Only briefly.”

After a week of sunshine it had begun to rain very heavily and there was thunder. Magda’s flat had sloping roofs and windows you needed to open with a pole and the water seemed to be all round them. It was only eight in the evening but already quite dark. The room was lit with scented candles. “To help me relax,” Magda said. “What a week I’ve had.”

It seemed to Lily that Magda had made too much of an effort. Usually she was so calm and un flustered Tonight she fussed over everything; the food, the table, where Lily should sit. It made Lily uneasy.

Nothing important was said until they sat down to eat. Even then the conversation was careful, like one of those elaborate peasant dances where you go round and round in a circle. Magda started it off. She spooned food on to Lily’s plate and said: “The police are coming to see me tomorrow. They wanted to talk to me today but I said no.”

“You could have seen them this evening,” Lily said. “To get it over with. I wouldn’t have minded.”

But she would have minded really. She was glad to be here in Magda’s warm and comfortable flat. She felt she couldn’t have faced another evening of Sean mooching around the caravan. Especially in the rain. It made a terrible din, like stones rattling around in a tin bucket. It really got on her nerves.

“No,” Magda said. “I need time. To decide what I’m going to tell them.”

“What do you mean?” Lily said, startled. “What do you know about the murders?”

“Nothing. Of course. Nothing.”

“Well then?”

“I wondered if I should tell them about Juniper. Val was there, after all.”

Then Lily realized that was why she was here. Magda wanted to ask her advice. Magda, usually so confident and competent, who told them all what to do, had turned to her.

“I don’t see that it’s relevant,” Lily said. “Faye died of natural causes, didn’t she?”

Magda did not reply.

“Well? Didn’t she?”

“I’m not sure,” Magda said quietly.

“What do you mean?”

“I found her diary,” Magda continued. “She was very unhappy. It could have been suicide.”

“But not murder!”

“No,” Magda said sharply. “Of course not. But now… Mr. Bowles could just have been a coincidence. But Val…”

“Have you talked to Win about this?”

Magda shook her head. “She’s unhappy enough, don’t you think?”

“Daniel?”

Magda’s voice hardened. “No,” she said. “I’ve discussed nothing with Daniel.”

They sat, looking at each other. A flash of lightning close to the roof made Magda jump so she knocked over her glass.

“Well,” she said. “Lily, my dear. What would you advise?”

Don’t ask me, Lily thought. I can’t even take decisions for myself. She forced herself to be rational, practical.

“Don’t say anything,” she said. “Not yet. Most murders are cleared up very quickly, aren’t they? The police might already know who they’re looking for. If you tell them your suspicions about Juniper they’ll have to re-open the case of Faye’s death, won’t they? And even if they decide that she died of natural causes there’ll be lots of bad publicity. Just at a time when you want people to accept the idea of an Alternative Therapy Centre at Laverock Farm.”

“That’s another thing,” Magda said. “I’m not sure we should take on Laverock Farm. It’s not right to profit from murder.”

“That’s ridiculous!” Lily said. She had her own ideas about Laverock Farm and her place in it. Usually she would not have dared to speak to Magda like that but today she seemed so vulnerable and uncertain. “Nobody would accuse you of murdering Ernie Bowles to get your hands on the farm. You’re healers.”

“I’m not sure what to think. Besides, I don’t like the idea of accepting a gift from Mr. Bowles, even indirectly. He was such a dirty old man.”

He was that all right, Lily thought, remembering the face pressed up against the window-pane, only partly hidden by grey net curtains. But I suppose that’s no reason for being glad that he’s dead.

“You wouldn’t really turn down the chance of Laverock Farm, would you?” she said. “It’s such a brilliant opportunity. Think what you could achieve.”

“Tell me, dear,” Magda said. “Why are you so interested?” And Lily realized that even now, when she was so stressed up, Magda was the most perceptive person she had ever met.

There was no point pretending. She shrugged. “I suppose I hoped there’d be a place for me there. You’d need someone living in to keep an eye on everything.”

It needn’t be much, she thought. A flat like this and I’d be as happy as a pig in muck.

Magda smiled suddenly. “Why not?” she said. “If we do decide to go ahead, why not? I see you as a sort of lady of the manor. You would be magnificent.”

Lily thought she was being teased but Magda seemed quite serious.

“But what about Sean?” Magda continued. “Do you see him having a place at the new Laverock Farm?”

The question made Lily suddenly feel very tired. Thoughts of Sean always made her feel like that. She had a picture of him in the caravan, restless, waiting for her to come home. He seemed to have stopped his wandering lately. She did not know which was worse never knowing where he was or having him cooped up with her in the caravan.

“Well?” Magda said gently. “How are things between you and Sean these days?” There was something hypnotic about her voice. Lily felt the old compulsion to talk. Magda put so much into her listening and was so wise. Perhaps she would help her sort things out with Sean. That would be a relief. To come to some conclusion about where they stood. But she sat up straight in the bent-wood chair and she could not catch Magda’s eye.

“Fine,” she said in a brittle voice. “Well, as fine as they’ve always been.”

Then she sat back with a sigh and watched Magda carry out the dirty plates and return from the kitchen with a blue glazed bowl of purple grapes and a cheese board. Magda would know that things weren’t really fine but she wouldn’t push it.

They sat for a moment in silence.

“What are they like then?” Magda asked at last.

“Who?”

“The policemen in charge of the case.”

“The inspector Ramsay’s not bad really. For the fuzz.” In her travelling days Lily had met plenty of the other sort of policemen. “Quite sensitive, I think. I don’t know about the sergeant. He’s a bit cocky, arrogant…”

She looked up from her cheese.

“Have you decided? Will you tell them about Faye and Juniper?”

“I don’t know. I suppose I’ll sleep on it. Or not sleep probably. It’s Win I’m worried about’

“Of course,” Lily said and hoped Win knew how lucky she was to have a mother who worried about her. She wanted to comfort Magda as she had been comforted in the past. She leaned forward across the table so her face was lit from underneath by the candle. “I’m sure it’ll be all right,” she said.

“Are you?” Magda’s voice was bleak. “I expect you’re right.”

She stood up suddenly. In the distance there was a rumble of thunder. Rain was still washing over the windows.

“I’ll give you a lift home,” she said. “You can’t cycle in this.”

“Are you sure? I can stay if you like. I’m in no hurry.”

“That’s very kind, my dear, but I think now I have to be alone.”

They hurried through the rain to the car which was parked in the street. It spluttered before it started as if water had got into the engine. The windscreen wipers couldn’t clear the screen. Magda drove with her head pushed forward over the steering wheel, peering into the gloom. When they pulled into the farmyard Magda switched off the engine so they could hear the rain bouncing off the roof. They kissed as they always did, lightly on each cheek.

“Take care,” Lily said, and she sprinted away through the meadow to the caravan.

Sean was waiting for her. She threw herself into the caravan. She was drenched to the skin. He was holding a big white towel. He wrapped it around her and took off her wet clothes and dried her as if she were his baby. Then he sat her in the corner and made hot chocolate and told her he would look after her. It was like the old days, when they had first met up. Somehow he was old self again.

“I’m sorry I’m late,” she said. “Magda wanted to talk.”

“Tell me about it later,” he said.

He blew out the paraffin lamp and they made love to the sound of the rain.