Crying Out Loud Read online

  ‘That he was married; they had Alex. He wasn’t desperately unhappy but he didn’t think he and Heather would stay together in the long run, though she would probably want to.’

  I’d already formed an impression of Libby. I believed her for a start; she was honest, direct. She had an energy about her, focused, contained and I could imagine her being practical and always busy.

  She placed her hands on her knees again. ‘I’d never thought I’d date a married man. Seemed like a mug’s game. Plus he was a fair bit older than me – thirteen years between us. He was no oil painting, either,’ she smiled, ‘beer belly growing and his hairline shrinking, but we saw each other a couple of times a week throughout that summer. In the November we had our first weekend away – Venice.’ She paused, her grey eyes growing distant as she picked through the memories. ‘By the following summer, last year, we both knew it wasn’t just a fling.’

  ‘What was he like?’ I asked.

  She took a deep breath and exhaled with the weight of trying to sum him up. ‘He made me laugh. We laughed so much. He’d a real quick wit; he could see the daft side of anything. And he’d clown about, too. Ring me up and put on funny accents, spoof emails.’ She thought for a moment, her head craned to one side, her hand stroking her ponytail absent-mindedly. ‘He was a very kind man – nothing was too much trouble. The number of times he’d be late because he’d helped someone who’d broken down or he’d run an errand for a mate – that sort of thing. Good company. Some men, they’re tense, wound-up, you know?’

  I thought of Ray, who was exactly like that given half a chance.

  ‘But Charlie was pretty laid-back,’ she went on. ‘The only time I ever heard him get steamed up was in the car. If we got stuck behind a tractor or some Sunday driver then you could see the steam coming out of his ears. He was like a different man in the car. He’d overtake when there was barely room to get a bike past. Nerve-shattering. I hated driving with him.’ She paused. ‘He was bloody brilliant,’ she added, her voice creaky and her eyes glistening. She blinked hard and looked down at her hands, rubbing at the polished nails. I felt the lurch of sympathy.

  ‘So.’ She cleared her voice. ‘We talked about wanting to be together and Charlie said he didn’t want to leave until Alex had finished high school. It would mean waiting another nine or ten months and he asked me if I’d do that.’ She gave me a sideways glance. ‘No-brainer. Charlie already had the cottage by then. He and Heather got it as an investment property. It didn’t even have a roof when they first bought it. They were doing it up to sell on. Then Charlie thought it might be somewhere for us, eventually. Heather could keep the family home and he’d take the cottage. I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to give up my little house. I’m a city girl – Manchester’s the only place I’ve ever lived – but in the meantime we could use it as a getaway. That was the plan. Then Heather found out about us,’ she said flatly. ‘I don’t know what made her suspect but she checked his phone.’

  ‘When was this?’ A prickle of suspense spread down my back.

  ‘Last October. First I knew he rang me at work. They’d spent half the night talking; Charlie’d told her he was leaving and she was devastated.’ Libby winced. ‘Heather agreed they needed to keep it from Alex until his exams were over. But she made Charlie promise not to see me in the meantime. He accepted. So there was this awful charade going on: them sharing a bed and me in purdah.’

  Jealousy is a powerful motive but I assumed Heather had a firm alibi or she’d be a prime suspect. I asked Libby about it.

  ‘Rock solid,’ she answered me. ‘I never knew the ins and outs – the police don’t tell you everything – but she was with a friend, Valerie Mayhew.’

  ‘Were there any other suspects?’

  ‘Apart from me?’ she sounded bitter. ‘No.’ Then she hesitated and backtracked. ‘Though there was a guy that Charlie had been in business with: Nick Dryden. He was a piece of work – had his fingers in the till for months, apparently. When Charlie found out he pursued him through the civil courts but Dryden declared himself bankrupt and Charlie never saw a penny. Dryden climbed into a bottle and lost his wife, his kids, his home. The crazy thing was he blamed Charlie. He was the only person I ever heard Charlie slagging off. But that all happened six, seven years ago. Ancient history. I think he went to Spain.’

  ‘So, you never met him?’

  ‘No – before my time.’

  ‘And you were a suspect?’

  She hesitated. ‘Yes, I’d found Charlie. And they had to “rule me out of their enquiries”, as they put it. They went over and over the same ground. Had we rowed? Did Charlie decide he was staying with his wife? Before they interview you, they ask you these medical questions so I had to tell them I was pregnant and they tried to use that.’

  I looked across at her, startled. ‘Really?’ It was a fact I’d not come across in any of the media reports.

  ‘Had we argued about the baby? I told them time and again that Charlie didn’t even know about the baby.’ Her voice began to shake. ‘That was why I arranged to meet him; it meant he’d break his promise to Heather about not seeing me but I was desperate to tell him about the baby. I’d only done the pregnancy test that week. It was a total surprise – an accident really, but I was over the moon and I knew Charlie would be as well. The baby was due in June and by then the whole mess would be sorted out. We’d be together.’ She sighed and leant forward, bracing her arms. ‘If I’d only got there earlier,’ she said quietly. ‘Saturday’s always a big day at work: weddings and parties and festivals. Although we get the tents up on Friday, so there’s plenty of time to dress them, there can be last-minute glitches. I’m on call most of the day. Then I’ve errands to run: the dry-cleaners, grab something nice to eat. I was supposed to be at the cottage around five but when I knew that was pushing it, I texted Charlie to say I was running late. It was just after six when I got there.’

  She rubbed at her face and took a deep breath. She looked straight at me, her grey eyes stark with emotion. ‘And it was too late.’ There was a tremor in her voice. ‘He never knew about Rowena, our baby, and she never met him. So this . . .’ she pointed at the envelope, ‘ . . . please just find out what the hell they think they’re playing at.’

  FOUR

  That first night with baby Jamie was terrible. Enough time had elapsed since Maddie was born for the memories of looking after an infant to become smudged and hazy. And Maddie was my baby. This was a stranger and that added to my anxiety.

  Even though Jamie slept for three hours after an eleven o’clock feed, I didn’t. As soon as I turned out the lights the worries crowded in on me. What if Ray was right? What if something happened to her while she was in my care? Cot death! I snapped my bedside light back on and checked that she was still lying on her back. The room was cool but I got out of bed and opened the window a little wider. Back between the covers, I turned the light off and tried to distract myself by concentrating on what I wanted to get out of my forthcoming meeting with convicted killer Damien Beswick.

  I couldn’t hear Jamie breathing. Dread stole through me. I turned the light back on and crossed to the travel cot that I’d borrowed from the neighbours across the road. Peering closely at her chest, I held my own breath, as if stilling my body might magically animate hers. And it did. An almost imperceptible shift – so slight that I had to measure the movement by contrasting the motion of the popper on her Babygro with the static pattern of yellow ducks on the navy material of the cot.

  Jamie jerked in her sleep, her arms flew akimbo and her eyelids fluttered open. Startled, I almost squealed as the kick of surprise shot a spike of adrenalin into my heart and sent tendrils of it snaking down my back.

  It was ridiculous. She slept on, her eyelids slowly closing and her mouth moving in an imaginary suckle. But I was shot to pieces. Too tense to sleep, I sat up in bed and opened my book. But even the magic of Kate Atkinson couldn’t soothe my chattering mind. I’ll explain later. How much later
? I had half expected the doorbell to ring while we were having tea. A friend or acquaintance to be standing there, apologizing for the melodrama, explaining how she’d been taken ill and had to get to A&E, or how her baby-minder had cried off and she was desperate for that interview.

  But of all the excuses I could think of, nothing really seemed plausible. What would drive you to abandon your baby without explaining at the time? How long would it have taken to tell me what was going on? Another five minutes. Why so cloak and dagger? Ringing the bell and disappearing before I could see her. She’d had time to write a note, time to pack nappies and formula, so there had been some foresight.

  Where was she now, the mother? Awake somewhere, fretting about her baby? Sick with anxiety, fearful that something might have gone wrong? Struggling with the enormous pain of separation? The baby was so small, so young and still at an age where it’s hard to separate mother from child: physically, emotionally still bound together. When Maddie was that tiny I’d been overtaken by a dark, panicky and crippling sense of looming disaster whenever she was away from me, even for an hour or so. Perhaps it’s a response hardwired into us to keep us caring for our young ones, or maybe I was a bit paranoid, or depressed, struggling on my own with a patchy support network and coping with my first baby. Whatever, I couldn’t imagine Jamie’s mother was resting easy tonight.

  A dozen nappies; we’d already changed Jamie twice. At a rate of six a day there was enough for two days. Was that significant? Would her mother be back then? But there was only one change of clothes – which suggested she hadn’t planned to be gone so long.

  The questions came at me all night long; a perpetual quiz with no answers. When I did drift off, just before three, Jamie woke up, crying for a feed. No doubt there are devices you can buy to keep a night bottle warm but we hadn’t got them. Instead I was forced to try mixing a bottle while I jiggled her on one arm and felt the cold steal round my ankles and my neck.

  I fed her in bed. My eyes were dry and tired and I closed them as much as I could. She became dozy towards the end of the feed and I was tempted to just lay her back in the cot but her nappy felt heavy and damp and was starting to leak out of the edge on to her clothes. I winded her first, the air escaping in a watery gurgle. I wondered if her crying had woken Ray and wished he was here giving me some moral support. Highly unlikely given his objections to the whole enterprise.

  Jamie complained when I wrested her out of her Babygro – not loudly but the night was silent and so every noise was magnified. It’s rare that things are so quiet in south Manchester, with the trains passing quarter of a mile away, the roads busy, aeroplanes in the day and, most of the year round, students having fun late into the night. But this night was still. The city slept. Even the wind was resting.

  Nappy changed, I remembered the old trick of putting my fists through the Babygro and drawing it over hers. The jumpsuit was barely damp and would last till morning.

  ‘There we go.’ I lifted her up, her face level with mine. She smiled and for a moment there was a connection there, person to person; for a moment she wasn’t a puzzle or a burden or a cause for concern, but a little human being smiling at me.

  ‘Back to bed.’ I drew her close and moved to the cot. She convulsed once and threw up all down my neck.

  And I tell you this – way more liquid came out than ever went in.

  Night bled into day and by then Jamie was wearing a hastily adapted roll-neck T-shirt of Maddie’s in black and white stripes. Très chic. The kids got up at seven thirty and joined us in the kitchen, followed shortly by Ray.

  ‘Did you hear her?’ I asked him.

  ‘Loud and clear.’ He clattered around, pouring muesli and slicing bread. A small, irrational part of me resented the fact that he had left me to it. That he hadn’t sought me out and shown a bit of solidarity. But I understood the way he worked, too. Ray saw this as my problem; he thought I was handling it the wrong way so he would stand well clear, palms front, arms out to the side in a hands-off gesture and watch me sink or swim, eager for an ‘I-told-you-so’ opportunity.

  I was still amazed and very grateful that he had agreed to look after her while I went to the prison.

  ‘Like the outfit.’ He nodded at Jamie’s stripes.

  ‘My new range,’ I said. ‘We need to get her some more clothes. She was sick over her spare set. They might have some in the charity shops.’

  He gave a sigh. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘No, that’s all. If you can’t find any, text me and I’ll call somewhere on my way back.’ There was a Children’s World in Ancoats en route from the prison.

  ‘When’s your meeting?’ He buttered toast.

  ‘Nine thirty. I can take them first.’ I nodded at Maddie and Tom, who were trying to get Jamie to talk.

  ‘And when will you be back?’

  I began to clear the table. ‘Say about one to be on the safe side. There’s often a lot of waiting about.’

  I was fibbing, buying time so I could fit in a bit more work before taking over from Ray. It was fair to assume that he wouldn’t be prepared to look after the baby any more; he’d only agreed because it was an appointment I couldn’t reschedule. I’m a lousy liar so the table clearing meant I could avoid his eyes and mask any increase of colour in my cheeks.

  ‘I want to hold her,’ Maddie said.

  ‘Does she like Crispies?’ Tom asked Ray.

  ‘No, she’s too little. Just baby milk for now,’ Ray told him.

  Jamie gave a gummy grin and Tom yelled with laughter.

  ‘You two: do your teeth and get your bags ready,’ I said.

  ‘When’s she going home?’ Maddie asked. ‘Can she stay the weekend?’

  ‘We’ll see.’

  When the children had gone upstairs, Ray stooped and picked Jamie up. He ran his hand across her head, stroked her baby quiff then cradled her skull in his palm. I loved the sight of them like that: the baby so tiny next to him, his easy confidence as a carer; Ray’s dark curls, the stubble peppering his jaw, his moustache contrasting with the baby’s soft smooth skin.

  ‘What if the mother shows up while you’re out?’

  ‘Get her to call me.’ I thought again. ‘No, I can’t take my mobile in with me. Don’t let her leave without a good explanation. I want to know who she is and where the fire was. And it had better be good!’ I tried for jokey but he wasn’t amused. As for me, the night had taken its toll and I was becoming more edgy about the baby.

  Driving towards Strangeways later that morning to see Damien Beswick, I reran my visit to his sister Chloe, almost a week earlier. She had been my first port of call once I’d agreed to look into the case for Libby.

  Chloe worked on the tills at the big Asda supermarket in Wythenshawe but was at home when I called her on the phone to arrange a meeting. At first she seemed to think I was offering to run the campaign for her brother’s release. It took me a couple of goes to explain who I was and my role in it all. Chloe spoke quickly with a flat Mancunian accent, tinged with the cultural twang that the nation’s urban youth seemed to have copied wholesale from young black kids.

  ‘Yo better come ’n see us, then. Yo got the address?’

  Leeson Close was on the council estate to the north of Wythenshawe Park. Taking the road which skirted the park, in the shade of the large forest trees, I spotted more signs of autumn. The silver birch leaves were already yellowing and the big bunch-of-five leaves on the chestnuts were curling and crisping. Many of the chestnuts were sick, their familiar conkers not developing and there was talk of a virus, like Dutch elm disease, at work. It was a still, bleak day. Clouds grey as dirty linen muffled the sky and the threat of rain hung brassy in the air.

  Chloe’s house was a simple semi-detached, brick built, dating from the post-war years. It had been refurbished with double-glazed windows in stubby plastic frames and a new roof. The front garden was tarmacked and a lone black and white wagon wheel, like a prop from a pioneer western, leant against the fro
nt wall; the only adornment.

  Chloe opened the door with a baby on one hip and a toddler at her side. She led me into the living room, placed the baby on a play mat and told the toddler, a little girl in pink tights and a purple dress, to watch the telly. A Charlie and Lola cartoon was on and the child settled happily on her tummy a few inches from the screen, her chin on her hands, angled up at the telly. It was a flat screen with a group of dodgy pixels at the left-hand side and a yellow cast to the colours.

  The room was cool and sparsely furnished. A shiny sofa slumped against the back wall and there was a bamboo coffee table and in one corner a PVC box of toys.

  The kitchen was off the sitting room and Chloe left the door open so she could hear the children. She didn’t offer me a drink, as most people would do, but sat and waited for me to talk.

  Chloe had incredibly pale skin, almost translucent, and large pale ginger freckles across her forehead and cheeks. She wore thin black eyeliner which made her look hard, mean even, and pink frosted lipstick. Dressed in a close-fitting navy vest and trackie bottoms, with an open zip-up hoodie in red, she had painted her nails to match her lips but her fingers were stained nicotine yellow. A tattoo of a butterfly nestled in the hollow of her throat. She toyed with a throwaway lighter.

  ‘Tell me about Damien.’ An open-ended question to get her started.

  ‘He’s my half-brother: same dad, different mam. He came to live with us when he was about eleven. She’d gone off the rails, his mam.’

  I looked at her for more.

  ‘Druggie.’ She shrugged. ‘She did some time. Damien never went back.’ She turned the lighter over and over, marking time to the story.

  ‘Is she still around?’

  ‘Nah. She went down south, someplace. No one knows how to find her. She dun’t know he’s inside, prob’ly dun’t care. Damien breathes trouble – he’s no sense. Not wicked just . . . dense, innit.’

  I kept my face straight at the ‘innit’, though it always sounded such a parody to me after being lampooned by so many comedians. Would Maddie start using it when she reached her teens? Or the equivalent slang for her time? No doubt.