Caedmon’s Song (14 page)

‘. . . late. Let’s go . . .’

‘. . . a minute . . . peaceful . . . give me . . .’

‘No! . . . cold . . . Come on!’

Then there was more laughter, and the boy started chasing the girl back towards the steps.

Martha breathed out. It was quiet again. Just to make sure that no other revellers were going to come and spoil her work, she waited, hardly breathing, for about fifteen minutes. When nothing
else had happened by then, she pulled the body forward into the patch of moonlight near the cave’s entrance to make sure he was dead.

Grimley’s body crunched over the dead and dried-out shellfish that gleamed like tiny bones in the moonlight. Strands of dry seaweed crackled under Martha’s feet, and the smell of
sea-wrack, salt and rotten fish was strong in her nostrils. A small, dark shape scuttled over the sand back in the shadows. She shuddered. Outside there was only the even, quiet rhythm of waves
breaking and retreating.

First, Martha washed the paperweight in a small rock pool, dried it off on her shirt and put it back in her bag. She checked her hands and clothing, but could see no blood. She would have to
look more closely later, when she got back to her room.

Lastly, she forced herself to look at the body. Blood veiled one side of his face, where his eye bulged from its socket and seemed to stare right at her. His left temple was shattered. In
horror, Martha put a finger to it and felt the bone fragments shift under her touch like broken eggshell. The second blow had caught the top of his skull, and she could trace the deep indentation.
Again, the bones had splintered, and this time her finger touched something squelchy and matted with hair. She shivered and a cry caught in her throat as she began to heave. Kneeling beside him,
she vomited on the sand until she thought she would never stop.

The ancient, rotten sea smell stuck in her nostrils, and the blood and brain matter were smeared all over her fingers. When she could catch her breath again, she washed her hands in the rock
pool and knelt there gasping until she had controlled her heartbeat. She couldn’t bear being close to the body any longer. Crawling to the mouth of the cave, she listened for a few moments.
It was all quiet on the beach, except for the crash and hiss of the waves. Martha slipped out of the cave like a ghost in the moonlight and set off back to the guesthouse.

KIRSTEN

‘You’ll have to expect a bit of pain now and then,’ said Dr Craven, writing on her prescription pad with a black felt-tip pen. ‘Traumatic injuries often
cause extreme pain. But don’t worry, it won’t last forever. I’ll prescribe some analgesic. It should help.’ She sat back and handed the slip of paper to Kirsten.

Behind the doctor, a brusque woman in her early forties, with severely cropped grey hair, steady blue eyes and a beak of a nose, Kirsten could see the small Norman church and the village green,
with its two superb copper beeches, rose beds, little white fence and benches where the old people sat and gossiped. She could even hear the finches and tits twittering beyond the open window.
Brierley Coombe. Home.

The previous evening she had managed to keep the pain from her parents. She had simply claimed tiredness after the journey, then taken four aspirins and a long, hot bath before going to bed. The
pain receded, and she had actually slept well for the first time since the attack.

Dr Craven leaned forward and tapped a blue folder. The stethoscope around her neck swung forward and clipped the edge of the desk. ‘I’ve got all your details, Kirsten,’ she
said, ‘and I’ve been on the telephone to Dr Masterson at the hospital. If anything at all bothers you, please don’t hesitate to come and see me. And I’d like you to drop by
once a week anyway, just to see how you’re doing. All right?’

Kirsten nodded. Dr Masterson? She hadn’t even known his name, the man who had probably saved her life. One of her benefactors, anyway. She didn’t know the name of the person who had
so fortunately been walking his dog on the night of her attack either. But Dr Masterson? She remembered his dark complexion and his deeply lined brow, how he always looked cross but acted shyly and
kind. She had even invented stories about him to pass the time. His father must have been an army officer serving in India, she had decided – a captain in the medical corps, most likely
– and he had married a high-caste Indian woman. After independence, they had come to England . . .

The ease with which she could make up stories about people on so little evidence always surprised her. It was a skill, or a curse, that she had had since early childhood, when she had filled
notebooks with stick drawings and family histories of invented characters. If she could make up lives for others, she thought, then she could probably do the same for herself. That would certainly
be preferable to telling the truth to everyone she met. Already, on her way to the doctor’s surgery that morning, she had noticed neighbours – people who had known her since childhood
– giving her those pitying looks. What was worse was that one of them – Carrie Linton, a stuck-up busybody she’d never liked – had given her a different kind of look: more
accusing than pitying.

‘Kirsten?’

‘What? Oh, sorry, Doctor. I was daydreaming.’

‘I said make sure you eat well and get plenty of rest. The healing process is doing very nicely, or Dr Masterson wouldn’t have approved your coming home, but you’re still
convalescent, and don’t forget it.’

‘Of course.’

‘And if you have any difficulty at all in adjusting to your condition, I can recommend a very good doctor in Bath, a specialist.’

Adjusting? Condition? Good Lord, thought Kirsten, she makes it sound as if I’m pregnant or something.

‘I mean psychologically and emotionally,’ Dr Craven went on, her eyes fixing on the diagram of the human circulatory system on the wall. ‘It might not be an easy road, you
know.’

‘A psychiatrist?’

Dr Craven tapped her pen on the desk. ‘Only if you feel the need. They can help, you know. There’s no stigma attached these days, especially . . .’

She’s embarrassed, Kirsten thought. Just like all the rest. They don’t know what to do with me. ‘In cases such as mine?’ she offered, finishing the sentence.

‘Well, yes.’ Dr Craven seemed to miss the irony in Kirsten’s voice. The corners of her lips twitched in one of her rare, brief smiles. ‘You are rather unique, you know.
Few women, if any, have ever survived an attack from such a maniac.’

‘I suppose not,’ Kirsten said slowly. ‘I hadn’t really thought of it that way. Like Jack the Ripper, you mean? Did anyone survive him?’

‘I’m afraid I don’t know. Criminology isn’t my forte.’ She leaned forward. ‘What I’m saying, Kirsten, is that there may be some resultant emotional
trauma. I want you to know that help is available. You only have to ask for it.’

‘Thank you.’

The doctor sat back in her chair and peered at Kirsten over the top of her half-moon glasses. ‘How
do
you feel?’ she asked.

‘Feel? Not so bad. The pain’s eased a little now.’

‘No, I mean emotionally. What do you feel?’

‘What do I feel? I don’t know really. Just blank, numb. I can’t remember anything about the attack.’

‘Do you keep running over events in your mind?’

‘Yes, but I still can’t remember. It keeps me awake sometimes. I can’t concentrate for it. I can’t even sit down and read a book. I used to love reading.’

‘The amnesia may only be temporary.’

‘I don’t know if I
want
to remember.’

‘That’s understandable, of course. As are all your feelings. You’ve suffered a tremendous shock, Kirsten. Not just to your body but to your whole being. All your symptoms
– emotional numbness, bad dreams, inability to concentrate – they’re all perfectly normal given the circumstances. Awful, but normal. In fact, I’d be worried if you
didn’t
feel like that. You feel no anger, no rage?’

‘No. Should I?’

‘It’ll come later.’

‘I suppose I do feel that I’d like to kill him, the man who did this to me, but it’s more of a cold feeling than an angry one, if you can understand what I mean.’ She
shrugged. ‘Still, I don’t imagine I’ll get the chance, will I? I wouldn’t know him from Adam.’

‘No. But let’s hope the police find him soon.’

‘Before he can attack anyone else?’

‘Such people don’t usually stop at one. And the next victim might not be so lucky.’ Dr Craven stood up and held out her hand. ‘Don’t forget what I said. Take good
care of yourself, and I’ll see you next week.’ Kirsten shook her hand and left.

Outside, the sun was shining in a clear blue sky. The rounded hills that fringed the village seemed to glow bright green with some kind of inner light, as if they formed the backdrop to a
painter’s vision. Kirsten put her hands in her pockets and ambled along the High Street. Not much there, really: a pub, the village hall (an 1852 construction, the newest building in Brierley
Coombe), the shops (converted cottages, most of them) – post office, grocer’s, butcher’s, chemist’s, newsagent’s.

The village stood on the edge of the Mendips, between Bath and Wells, and it had its share of thatched roofs and award-winning gardens. Orderly riots of roses, petunias, periwinkles, hollyhocks
and nasturtiums assaulted Kirsten’s senses as she walked by the trim fences. The place always reminded her of those picture-postcard villages in English murder mysteries – Miss
Marple’s St Mary Mead, for example – where everyone knew his or her place and nothing ever changed. But no one ever got murdered in Brierley Coombe.

Kirsten took the prescription from her pocket and walked into the chemist’s. It was only a small place, more decorative than functional, and one of the few chemist’s shops that still
kept those huge red, green and blue bottles on a shelf high in the window. The sunlight filtered through them onto Mr Hayes’s wrinkled face. He had a good dispensary, Kirsten knew, especially
for female ailments.

‘Hello, Kirsten,’ he said with a smile. ‘I noticed you’d come back. Sorry to hear about your trouble.’

‘Thank you,’ Kirsten said. She hoped he wasn’t going to go on and tell her how you couldn’t be too careful these days, could you. He was that kind of man. But perhaps
something in her voice or expression put him off his stroke. Anyway, he just looked puzzled and went to fill the prescription immediately.

With the painkillers in her pocket, Kirsten headed for the house. Brierley Coombe had been her home ever since the family had moved from Bath itself when she was six. Although the village was
equidistant from Bristol and Bath, they had always frequented the latter for shopping and entertainment. Her mother regarded Bristol – big city, once-busy port – as too vulgar, and
Kirsten had consequently only been there twice in her life. It hadn’t seemed so bad to her, but then neither had the north of England.

Kirsten had no friends left in Brierley Coombe, and the way she felt now, that was a blessing; the last thing she wanted was to have to go around explaining herself to people. Indeed, she had to
think hard to remember ever having friends or even seeing any young people there at all. That was another way in which it resembled an Agatha Christie village – there were no children, nor
could she remember any. It was absurd, she knew, as she had been a child there herself and played with others then, but there was no village school, and, try as she might, she couldn’t bring
to mind the voices of children playing on the green. Over the years, they had all drifted apart. They went to prep schools first, of course, then on to public schools as boarders, as she had done,
for there were no poor people in Brierley Coombe. After that, it was university – usually Oxford or Cambridge – and a profession in the City. Perhaps when they had inherited their
parents’ houses and made their fortunes or retired from public office, they would come home to spend their remaining days tending the garden and playing bridge.

The peace and quiet that Kirsten had enjoyed at home during the long summer and Easter holidays had always suited her after the hectic social life up at university. She was a bright and studious
girl and managed to get plenty of work done – but she was easily distracted by a good film, a party or the chance of a couple of drinks and a chat with friends. At home, she had usually been
able to catch up with her work and read ahead for the next term.

But what would she do with her time now? Her student days were over; her life was utterly changed, if not ruined entirely. She didn’t know if she would be able to pick up the pieces, let
alone put them back together again. Come to that, she didn’t know if there were any pieces left. Perhaps she didn’t even care.

She was still thinking about it when she opened the gate and walked down the broad path to the house – more of a mansion than a cottage. Her mother was in the garden doing something nasty
to the honeysuckle with her secateurs. Gardening and bridge, they were the strict borders of her mother’s existence.

When she saw Kirsten coming, she wiped her brow and put down the clippers, which flashed in the light, and shielded her eyes from the sun as she looked up at her daughter. A difficult smile
slowly forced the corners of her lips up, but it didn’t reach her eyes. It was going to be a long haul, this recovery, Kirsten thought with a sudden chill of fear. It wasn’t going to be
easy at all.

MARTHA

The seagulls were grotesquely distorted, no longer sleek, white bullet-faced birds. Their feathers were mottled with ash-grey, and their bodies were bloated almost beyond
recognition. They could hardly stand. Their wiry legs, above webbed feet as yellow as egg yolk, couldn’t support their distended bellies, which were stretched so tight that a pattern of blue
veins bossed through the grey and white markings. Their wings creaked and flapped like old, moth-eaten awnings in a storm as they tried to fly.

But mostly it was their faces that were different. They still had seagull eyes – cold, dark holes that knew nothing of mercy or pity – but their beaks were encased in long,
gelatinous snouts smeared with blood.