The White Room (38 page)

He had met Monica because of her insistency. He had recognized her straight away: Ralph Bell's whore, as photographed by Ben Marshall. Then the Ben Marshall / Brian Mooney supposition. Too audacious. He had dismissed it.

He stood still, tried to bring his body under control.

Household bleach. Critical.

Write a letter, he had said. Tell him you mean no harm.

Too late for that now.

He began pacing again. What could he do? Would it be him next? How could he keep Joanne and Isaac safe?

His first instinct: run. Gather them up and get out of Newcastle. But that wasn't possible. They had lives in Newcastle. They couldn't just run without somewhere to go.

An anonymous phone call to the police. Too risky. He was already compromised over Ralph's death. Ben Marshall was a well-connected man in the city. If it was traced back to Jack that would be at least fifteen years of his life gone. Plus Joanne and Isaac.

Do nothing. His head throbbed. His head would always throb if he did nothing. Not an option any more.

He stopped pacing, ran his hands through his hair, sighed.

He knew what he had to do. Find out if Ben Marshall was really Brian Mooney. And if that was the case, tell him to leave the three of them alone. Tell Ben he had written it all down, kept it safe as proof. If anything should happen to him, it would be made public. That was it. The only plan he could think of.

But first he needed proof.

The next day Jack was down at Central Library, waiting for it to open.

He had spent the previous evening in a distracted state. Joanne had been concerned, asked him what was wrong. He had sat down on the sofa with her after putting Isaac to bed. The fire was on, the lights subdued. The room felt warm, safe. It was a lie. Nothing, nowhere was.

Jack sighed.

‘Why don't you go to bed? Have an early night?'

Joanne's concern nearly broke his heart. She was sitting next to him, hand resting on his shoulder. He nearly gave in at that moment. Nearly told her.

But he didn't. Because that would have been the end of everything.

‘Look …' he said.

Joanne listened, waited for him to say more.

‘I might have to … sort something out.' His head was down. He spoke to the Oriental rug.

‘What kind of thing?' said Joanne, her face bent forward, eyes trying to see into his.

He sighed again. ‘Something to do with … the old firm.'

She looked at him, frowned. ‘You mean my dad's old firm?'

Jack nodded.

‘What kind of thing? Is it something to do with my dad? With his disappearance? Is that it?'

‘I don't … I don't know,' he said, his eyes still downcast, not meeting hers. ‘It's something … that should have been sorted out years ago.'

He looked up. Saw nothing but concern in her eyes, felt nothing but deceit in his own.

‘What kind of thing? Jack, what's going on? Are you in some sort of trouble?'

‘No,' he said quickly. ‘No, I'm not. But it might be …' He sighed. ‘Look, I think you should go away for a while. Take Isaac. Just till … this blows over.'

Joanne's hand dropped from his shoulder. She stood up and stared at him, incredulously, hands on hips. ‘What's going on, Jack? What's so terrible that we have to get away from it? Tell me.'

Jack shook his head. ‘I'm really sorry, Joanne. I honestly can't say yet. All I can say is it's something I have to get cleared up. Once that's done we'll be fine. You'll be able to come back in about a week or so.'

A week?' Joanne's anger was building. ‘What the hell is going on, Jack? What have you got into?'

‘Nothing,' he said. ‘I've done nothing wrong. But I have to get this sorted out.' He felt his head begin to throb. ‘I can't rest until I do.'

They looked each other in the eye. Jack felt points of contact dissolving. He didn't want that to happen.

‘Joanne, sit down. Come on, sit next to me.'

Joanne moved, reluctantly at first, until she was sitting next to him. She kept separate from him, her body still rigid with anger.

‘Joanne …'

‘We've never had secrets from each other, Jack.'

‘And we haven't now …' His eyes dropped again. ‘It's just something I have to find out. It might be serious, it might not. But it's best not to take chances.'

He stretched out his hand, touched her shoulder.

‘Please, Joanne. Please trust me on this. I wouldn't ask if it wasn't important. Please. I'm only asking you to go away because I don't want you dragged into it. I care about you both.'

She sighed. The anger began to dissipate from her body.

‘All right,' she said. ‘But when we come back, I want to know everything, right?'

‘Definitely.'

‘Good.'

They made love that night, tenderly, gently. As if they were both badly bruised and scarred and didn't want to add to each other's hurt.

The library door was unlocked, opened. Jack was the first one in.

Up to the reference library, looking for the
Newcastle Evening Chronicle.
1956.

It took him about an hour, but he found it. The account of the attack on Kenny and Johnny Bell. The description of Brian Mooney.

And a photo.

It was a head-and-shoulder shot. A cut-down mugshot. Features blurred and indistinct, just able to make out the staring eyes, the snarling lip, the attempted Elvis quiff.

Jack imagined glasses. Longer hair, brushed forward. The anger controlled and directed behind a forced smile.

It could have been him.

It could have well been him.

The house felt strange without them. Like the life itself had been sucked out of it.

Jack put on the fire, subdued the lights. But it wasn't the same.

Joanne had taken the car, driven herself and Isaac to a remote bed and breakfast in the Lake District. Joanne had told Isaac it was a surprise holiday, jollying him along as if it was a big adventure, but her eyes when they met Jack's told a different story.

Isaac was sad Jack wasn't going, but Joanne told him: ‘Daddy's got a bit of work to do. We'll see him soon.'

Then goodbyes.

‘I'll call you,' said Joanne.

‘I love you,' said Jack. ‘Once this is out of the way, we'll be happy for the rest of our lives.'

They drove off.

Jack stood up. He didn't want to sit on the sofa without Joanne. He didn't feel comfortable.

He walked into the bathroom, thinking about Ben Marshall / Brian Mooney. About identity. About how image changed personality.

He looked in the mirror, saw a middle-aged man who was lucky enough to look younger. To feel younger. A father. A lover. A good man.

To do what he was going to do, to be successful, he would have to change.

He looked at his hair; saw the white poking through beneath the black. He needed his roots done. He looked closer.

No.

He found some scissors. And began cutting.

Half an hour later he was done. Black hair carpeted the bathroom floor like a falling of inverse snow. His head was now covered in short, white stubble. It accentuated his features, made his cheekbones prominent, his eyes sunken and hollow.

Like the soldier he once was.

All he needed was the dark clothes.

He felt his attitude change with the look. His resolve strengthen.

He thought of the tumour. Fuck remission: it was time to cut the cancer out.

It was time to pay a visit to Johnny Bell.

Hate and rage. Rage and hate. Sometimes Mae felt like they were her only true friends.

They were with her constantly, talking and listening to her. There were others, too, that she didn't see that often: suspicion, depression, self-pity. And fear. She used to see a lot of fear. They were inseparable at one time. But fear didn't come round much any more. They had very little time for each other. It was just a phase she was going through. Now hate was all the rage. And vice versa.

‘This'll be your room here,' her grandmother had said, pointing into a tiny boxroom that hardly had space for a single bed.

The room smelled strongly of damp and stale air. Like it had been sealed up for years. The bedding looked old, seemed festering with mildew. The wallpaper peeling. Mae's grandmother looked at the girl. She seemed to be suggesting that the room and Mae were made for each other.

Mae entered, placed her small bag of meagre possessions on the bed.

‘When can I go home?' she said.

Her grandmother looked away as she began to reply, as if she had more important things to busy herself with. ‘Don't know yet. When your mother's well again.'

‘When will that be?'

‘Oh, God, girl, I don't know. Stop askin' questions. This is your room. Just be thankful you've got a roof over your head.'

She turned, went noisily downstairs.

Mae sat slowly on the bed, felt the cold of the blankets even through her clothes. She stared at the peeling wallpaper, at the old, brown-stained pattern, tried to imagine it ever looking new and bright. Failed. Not in this house. Never in this house.

She had come in from playing with Eileen one night to find the police in her house. They told Mae there had been an accident and her mother was in hospital. Very seriously injured.

Mae had looked around, thought of the house without her mother in it and laughed. Long and loud.

The police had looked at her strangely. The words ‘delayed shock' had been mentioned, nods given.

They told her she would have to stay somewhere else. She said Bert's name. But Bert wouldn't have her. Didn't want anything to do with her. So it was the grandparents.

Her heart was heavy at the thought. Her granddad.

Rage and hate. And fear made a reappearance.

And after her grandma had left her sitting on the bed, her granddad came to visit.

Made sure he locked the door first.

Mae hardly went to school. She hated the teachers, how small and dumb they made her feel. So she would persuade Eileen to play truant with her. The teachers didn't complain. Mae felt they were pleased to be rid of her.

She liked Eileen. Or liked having her around. Because Eileen never complained, always laughed and smiled, always went along with whatever Mae wanted her to do.

And because of Eileen, Mae felt she could do things she wouldn't have dared on her own. Mae felt there was nothing she couldn't do.

Rage and hate. Hate and rage.

Eileen gave tacit encouragement. Legitimized Mae's actions.

One day, when they should have been at school, they watched three little girls skipping over a rope outside on the street. They were singing a skipping song as they jumped, taking turns to operate the rope and do the skipping. Their mothers had sent them out in clean, pressed frocks. They were laughing, enjoying themselves.

Mae hated them.

She felt that hatred rise within her, turn to inarticulate rage.

‘Watch this,' she said to Eileen.

Mae walked across the street to where the girls were playing, caught the eye of the girl about to jump. She stopped, looked, smiled.

And Mae was on her.

Hands about her throat, snarling words through gritted teeth.

‘I could kill you, you know. I could kill you …'

The little girl's face began to turn blue.

Mae stopped and stood up, shaking.

The little girl climbed slowly to her feet and ran home, crying. Mae watched her go, then rejoined Eileen and kept on walking down the street.

Eileen gave out her usual simple-minded smile.

But Mae was laughing. Not joyous, humorous laughing: hateful, raging laughing.

After that, Mae was often to be found hurting and hitting little children. Sometimes she got into trouble with the parents, sometimes not. She didn't care. Afterwards, she would feel so powerful inside, she felt nothing could touch her.

But something could.

Her granddad paid regular visits to her room. Mae was used to that; she could put up with it, send her mind somewhere else. At least it was just him. At least there weren't other men hurting her in the white room with the crucifixes. That was something.

But there was still her granddad. And she didn't want to put up with it any more. She wanted him to stop.

She found a pair of scissors in a kitchen drawer, secretly pocketed them and waited with them in her hands, on her bed, waited for him to enter the room that night.

He did. And she attacked, blades pointing in front of her, aiming for his heart, his veins, his eyes, anything. Everything.

She got in one good blow, felt metal slide beneath skin, before he swatted her back on to the bed, disarmed her and held her there. He was too strong for her. He laughed.

‘You want it rough, do you?' His eyes glittered, lit by cruel, sickly light. ‘Good. I like a bit of rough.'

And he was rough with her. Very rough.

Afterwards, Mae sat on the bed, blankets covering her naked body, staring at the door, shivering.

Rage and hate, her only true friends, coursed through her.

She refused to allow in suspicion, depression, self-pity or fear.

She refused to cry. She refused to be weak. She spotted the scissors on the floor, light glinting off the blades.

She picked them up, caressed them, kissed them. Saw her granddad's blood on them, held them close.

Rage and hate. Her only true friends.

Now she had a third.

Jack slipped the key into the lock, turned it. The door swung inwardly open.

Breaking into a seventh-floor flat in the Elms. He knew how to slip in undetected. He knew where to find a duplicate key. He smiled to himself. He should know. He had built the block.

He paused before entering. Just another Wednesday. May 1967. Spring. A time of renewal. Jack, breathing heavily, keeping his shaking hands under control, hoped it would be a time of renewal for him too. Hoped he could do what he had to do then get on with the rest of his life.