The Truth-Teller's Lie (17 page)

You walked a perfect straight line towards me, with your free arm behind your back. I only noticed you properly once you were standing beside my table. I was aware that the tray in your hand wasn’t the same kind as the ones that were all over the food court—discarded on tables and in a tall pile in front of the counter where Doherty was still serving his lethal slop. Your tray was real wood, not wood-effect plastic.

On it was a knife and fork wrapped in a white cloth napkin, an empty glass and a bottle of white wine. Pinot Grigio: your favourite kind. This, like the coincidence of our meeting at the service station, sowed the seeds of a tradition. We have never shared a bottle of wine that wasn’t Pinot Grigio; we meet at the Traveltel—even though you say it’s not romantic enough, even though we could find somewhere much nicer for the same price—because Rawndesley East Services is where we first met. You have the mentality of an anxious collector, eager to preserve everything, to lose nothing we once had. Your love of tradition and ritual is one of the many things that has endeared you to me: the way you seize on anything pleasurable or good that happens by chance and try to make a custom out of it.

I tried to tell the police this—that a man who insists on drinking the same wine in the same room on the same day of every week would not suddenly break his own devout routine by disappearing without notice—but all they could do was look at me with stony indifference.

You picked up the tray Doherty had given me and placed it on the adjacent table. Then you put your tray down in front of me. Beside the napkin and cutlery was a china plate with a dome-shaped silver lid. You removed this without saying anything, smiling proudly. I was amazed, confused. As I told you later, I thought you were Doherty’s boss; somehow you’d heard about what had happened, perhaps from another member of staff, and you were here to make amends.

But you weren’t wearing the red-and-blue uniform or a name badge. And this was no ordinary amends. This was
Magret de Canard aux Poires.
You told me the name the next time we met. To me it looked like slices of tender duck breast—brown at the sides and pink in the middle—arranged in a neat circle around a peeled, cooked whole pear. It smelled as if it came from heaven. I was so ravenous I nearly burst into tears.

‘You’re supposed to drink red wine with duck,’ you told me matter-of-factly. Those were the first words I heard you speak. ‘But I thought white might be better, as it’s the middle of the day.’

‘Who are you?’ I asked, preparing to be angry, hoping I wouldn’t have to be, because I was desperate to eat the food you’d brought. Doherty was watching, as mystified as I was.

‘Robert Haworth. I heard you yelling at that tosser.’ You nodded in the direction of the hot-food counter. ‘He’s obviously never going to give you a lunch that’s edible, so I thought I would.’

‘Do I know you?’ I asked, still mystified.

‘You do now,’ you said. ‘I couldn’t let you starve, could I?’

‘Where did this meal come from?’ There had to be a catch, I thought. ‘Did you cook it yourself?’ What sort of man, I was wondering, hears a stranger wrangling over a bad meal in a service station and rushes home to cook her something better?

‘Not me. It’s from the Bay Tree.’ Spilling’s most expensive bistro. My parents took me there once and our meal, including wine, cost nearly four hundred pounds.

‘So . . .’ I stared at you and waited, making it clear that further explanation was required.

You shrugged. ‘I saw you were in trouble and I wanted to help. I rang the Bay Tree, explained the situation. Put in an order. Then I nipped down in my lorry and picked it up. I’m a lorry driver.’

I thought you must want something from me. I didn’t know what, but I was on my guard. I wasn’t prepared to eat a mouthful, even though my stomach hurt and my mouth was watering, until I’d worked out what your agenda was.

Doherty appeared beside us. There was a large fat stain on his shirt, roughly the shape of Portugal. ‘I’m afraid you can’t—’

‘Leave the lady in peace to eat her lunch,’ you said to him.

‘You’re not allowed to bring food—’

‘
You’re
not allowed to sell food that’s inedible,’ you corrected him. Your tone was quiet and polite throughout, but I wasn’t fooled and neither was Bruce Doherty. We both knew you were going to do something. Astonished, I watched you pick up the plate with the chicken, chips and peas on it. You pulled open the neck of Doherty’s shirt and tipped the food into the space between his uniform and his chest. He made a disgusted noise, halfway between a wail and a groan, looking down at himself. Then he walked unevenly out of the food court, spilling peas from his clothes. Some rolled on the floor in his wake, some he crushed with the soles of his black shoes. I’ll never forget that sight as long as I live.

‘Sorry,’ you said once he’d gone. I had the impression that you’d lost some confidence. You spoke in a more stilted way, and seemed to hunch a little. ‘Look, I just wanted to help,’ you mumbled. You seemed embarrassed, as if you’d decided that bringing me a fancy duck dish from the nearest posh restaurant was a nerdy thing to do. ‘Too many people stand by and do nothing to help people in trouble,’ you said.

Those words changed everything.

‘I know,’ I said forcefully, thinking of the men in dinner suits who had applauded my rapist two years earlier. ‘I’m grateful for your help. And this—’ I pointed at the duck ‘—looks amazing.’

You smiled, reassured. ‘Tuck in, then,’ you said. ‘I hope you enjoy it.’ You turned to leave and I was surprised all over again. I’d assumed that at the very least, you’d stay and talk to me while I ate. But you’d said you were a lorry driver. You were bound to have an urgent delivery, a timetable. You couldn’t afford to waste your whole day hanging around a service station with me. You’d done more than enough for me already.

I knew in that instant that I couldn’t let you leave. This was the turning point in my life. I was going to make it the turning point. Instead of wasting all my energies reacting to the many bad things that happened to me, I would pursue one good thing.

You disappeared through the glass double doors at the front of the service station and soon you were no longer visible. That frightened me into action. I abandoned the food and ran outside as fast as I could. You were in the car park, about to get into your lorry. ‘Wait!’ I shouted, not caring how undignified I looked, sprinting wildly towards you.

‘Problem?’ You looked worried.

I was out of breath. ‘Aren’t you going to . . . have to take the tray and the plate back to the Bay Tree afterwards?’ I said. Pathetic, I know, but it seemed like a reasonable pretext at the time.

You grinned. ‘I hadn’t thought of that. I probably ought to, yes.’

‘Well . . . why don’t you come back in, then?’ I said, deliberately flirtatious.

‘I suppose I could.’ You frowned. ‘But . . . maybe I should get moving, actually.’

I wasn’t going to let you get away. Something amazing had happened, quite out of the blue, and I was determined not to let it slip from my grasp. ‘Would you have done what you did—bringing that food and wine—for anybody?’ I asked.

‘You mean anybody who’d just been handed a plate of decaying chicken?’

I laughed. ‘Yeah.’

‘Probably not,’ you admitted, looking away like a shy schoolboy. That was the happiest moment of my life. That was when I knew that I was special for you. You did something no one else would have done for me, and it set me free. It made me feel I could be as crazy as you, that I could do anything. There were no limits or rules. I saw your wedding ring and disregarded it entirely. You were married. So what? Bad luck, Mrs Robert Haworth, I thought, because I’m going to take your husband away from you. I was utterly ruthless.

For two years I hadn’t considered getting involved with a man. The idea of sex had repulsed me. Not any more. I wanted to tear off my clothes right there in the car park and order you to make love to me. It had to happen; I had to have you. Meeting you enabled me to discard my whole history in an instant. You knew nothing about me, except that I was an attractive woman with a temper. That
Magret de Canard aux Poires
might as well have been a glass slipper from a prince. Everything was different now, all saved and redeemed. My life had changed from a nightmare to a fairy tale in the space of minutes.

An hour later we were booking room eleven at the Traveltel for the first time.

 

The doorbell rings. I run into the hall, thinking it’s Yvon.

It isn’t. It’s DC Sellers, who was here this morning. ‘Your curtains are open,’ he says. ‘I saw you were still up.’

‘You just happened to be driving past my house at two in the morning?’

He looks at me as if it’s a stupid question. ‘Not quite.’

I wait for him to continue. I am as afraid to discover that you’ve abandoned me by choice as that something terrible has happened to you.

‘Are you all right?’ Sellers asks.

‘No.’

‘Can I come in for a minute?’

‘Can I stop you?’

He follows me through to the lounge and perches on the edge of the sofa, his large stomach resting on his thighs.

I stand by the window. ‘Do you expect me to offer you a drink? Ovaltine?’ I cannot stop acting. It’s a compulsion. I craft lines in my head and deliver them in a brittle voice.

‘On Monday, you told DC Waterhouse and DS Zailer that if they went to Robert Haworth’s house, they’d find something.’

‘What have you found?’ I snap. ‘Have you found Robert? Is he all right?’

‘On Tuesday, you told DC Waterhouse that Robert Haworth raped you. Now you’re concerned for his welfare?’

‘Is he all right? Tell me, you bastard!’ I begin to sob, too exhausted to stop myself.

‘What did you think we’d find in Mr Haworth’s house?’ Sellers asks. ‘And how could you be so sure?’

‘I told you! I told Waterhouse and Zailer: I saw something in Robert’s lounge, through the window. It made me have a panic attack. I thought I was going to die.’

‘What did you see?’

‘I don’t
know.
’ There’s still a huge black hole in the middle of my memory of that dreadful afternoon. But I’m sure I saw something. I’m surer of that than of anything else. I wait until I’m calm enough to speak. ‘You must know that feeling. When you see an actor on television, and you know their name’s buried in your brain somewhere, but your memory can’t quite grasp it.’ I’m so exhausted I can hardly focus. DC Sellers is a blur.

‘Where were you last Wednesday night and last Thursday?’ he says. ‘Can you account for every minute of your time?’

‘I don’t see why I need to. Is Robert all right? Tell me!’

It’s always worth fighting, no matter what the cost to yourself might be. This isn’t a popular view anymore. The world becomes more languidly callous by the day, and blanket condemnation of any and all wars, even wars of liberation, is the obvious symptom. Still, it’s what I believe, passionately.

‘How can you treat me like this?’ I yell at Sellers. ‘I’m a victim, not a criminal. I thought the police had polished up their act. I thought you were supposed to treat victims sensitively in this day and age!’

‘Of what are you a victim?’ he asks. ‘Of rape? Or of your lover disappearing?’

‘I’m the one who should be asking you: of what am I suspected?’

‘You’ve lied to us, by your own admission. You can’t expect us to trust you.’

‘Is Robert alive? Just tell me that.’ Three years ago I vowed that I would never beg again. Listen to me now.

‘Robert Haworth never raped you, did he, Miss Jenkins? Your statement was a lie.’ Sellers’ rubbery face is mottled and pink; it makes me want to be sick.

‘It was the truth,’ I insist. With my defences down and my energy reserves drained to beyond empty, I resort to what’s easiest: concealment.

It was the first thing I thought of after the rape, the only thing that mattered to me once I was certain that the attack, in all its phases, was over and I’d survived: how to hide from the world what had been done to me. I knew I’d cope with a private trauma better than I could cope with the shame of people knowing.

No one has ever felt sorry for me. I’m the most successful of all my friends, all my contemporaries. I’ve got a career that I love. I sold a typographical font to Adobe while I was still at university and used the money to set up a profitable business. To the world it must seem as if I have everything: rewarding, creative work, financial security, lots of friends, a great family, a beautiful house that I own outright. Until the attack, I had no shortage of boyfriends, and although I wasn’t cold-hearted or anything, they mostly seemed to love me more than I loved them. Everyone I know envies me. They tell me all the time how lucky I am, that I am one of the blessed few.

That would all have changed if they’d found out what had happened to me. I’d have become Poor Naomi. I’d have been trapped for ever—in the thoughts of everyone I knew, everyone who mattered to me—in the state I was in when the man dumped me by the side of Thornton Road after he’d finished with me: naked apart from my coat and shoes, tears and snot all over my face, a stranger’s semen leaking from my body.

No way was I going to let that happen. I pulled off the eye mask, checked no one was around. The road was empty. I told myself I was lucky that nobody had seen me. I walked briskly to my car and drove myself home. As I drove, I took control of the situation inside my head. I began to deliver a lecture to myself, thinking that it was important to impose some sort of order as quickly as possible. I told myself that it didn’t matter how I felt—I’d worry about that later. For the time being, I would simply not allow myself to feel anything. I tried to make myself think like a soldier or an assassin. All that mattered was behaving as if I was fine, doing everything I would normally have done so that no one suspected a thing. I turned myself into a glossy robot, externally identical to my old self.