Underbelly (27 page)

Grey sat with Chris Shearer, a barrel-chested builder, and his elderly maiden aunt, Trixie, at Chris’ humble home in Carthage, Missouri. He had been invited in by Chris and made very welcome as he had introduced himself as a friend of his late son, Chris Junior – Grey found that this tended to guarantee access to any property, pretending that his acquaintance with their loved one was in life. He had not talked to Chris Junior for long, his release swift, and he had only just had time to pass on two messages for his father. Grey used his discretion not to pass on the first message, Chris Junior having discovered his mother in bed with her stepbrother and he regretted not telling his father, mainly for fear of his father ending up in prison. There were dozens of pictures hung up but there was no sign of any pictures of her around the place, no wedding pictures save for that of a young man in army issue with his bride who Grey assumed was Chris Junior’s brother, Bill. This led Grey to believe that the Shearers might already be separated, but he was uncertain, only spotting one picture of Chris Senior, clearly in his younger days, posing with a boxing belt. Whether they were separated or whether Chris Shearer was still a cuckold, Grey chose not to enlighten him, believing it would stir up trouble and only do harm. The second message was also difficult and Grey had to weigh up whether to share it, eventually deciding that it was worth following Chris Junior’s wishes. He told Chris and Trixie (whom Chris Junior had not mentioned, perhaps just visiting) how he had talked with Chris Junior and he had told him how much he loved and respected them, respect very much a key word. He told them that Chris Junior had shared a secret with him that he was desperate to get off his chest.

“
Wait up, wait up. You said that Junior said this on his deathbed, but my other boy, Bill, was with him when he died and he says that Junior died instantly. My son knows how much I hate liars and I doubt he would lie to me, even to save my feelings, so you wait right there and we’ll get to the bottom of this,” Chris said, keen to sort out the misunderstanding. He was not angry, believing that it could be a case of mistaken identity, which could be quickly resolved as Bill lived nearby.

After Chris had left Grey felt very uneasy, his sense of malaise noticed by Trixie, who had been as still as a corpse for the duration of his visit and suddenly sprung forward and said, “What are you doing here?”

“
Just passing on a message. I am fairly busy and I can’t wait. Can you tell Chris that I’ll call back?” he said, realising that he had to make a hasty exit before his lies were completely unravelled.

“
I won’t stop you. I should, because vermin like you deserve to get what’s coming to you, but if I tried you’d probably beat an old woman and I don’t want my family getting into trouble for doing decent society a favour.” She spoke contemptuously, believing him to be the lowest of the low, some sort of parasitic vulture. Perhaps he had grown complacent, as he had passed on many messages so smoothly – the relatives would be upset, which was understandable, but it generally seemed to be cathartic for them, which was his intent.

“
I apologise for any distress, Mrs Shearer,” he said humbly as he left with his head bowed, realising he should have said Miss Shearer, a small mistake next to the bigger one he’d made. He’d got away with the lie of hearing deathbed confessions for a while and it was time for him to re-evaluate how to tell them. If he started going ahead with his shows, as he planned, nervous as hell about it but excited and keen too, then it was perhaps time for the absolute truth.

He told Germaine about his narrow escape, which preyed on his mind. Germaine wanted to leave town immediately, while Grey hesitated. Running away like a scalded cat left a bad taste in his mouth and he believed that it was better to come clean with the Shearers rather than leaving the matter unresolved. As he lay in bed next to Germaine he told her that he was going back to see them and tell them the truth.

“
James, don’t! Think about how my mother was with you – grown men will be worse. They’ll already think that you’ve tried to trick them,” Germaine said, fretting as she thought of him coming to harm.

“
I can’t leave it like this. It would bug me if I was in their position. I’d sooner have the full story, no matter how implausible, rather than a frustrating riddle.”

“
You could send them a letter,” Germaine suggested. “You don’t have to put yourself in danger.”

“
This isn’t dangerous. The worst I would come away with is a black eye,” he said optimistically.

“
You’re underestimating grief and anger.”

“
I know I’m going to get a hostile reception. I have to do this for my own self-respect. I told the lie and I have to face the consequences.” He had lied to protect their sensibilities, which he had always viewed as the right thing to do – doubt crept into his mind, his deception seeming somewhat ignoble all of a sudden. Was he really telling the lie to preserve their well-being or was it primarily to make his life easier?

“
Do you truly think it will achieve anything? James, they won’t be…their minds will be closed to you, they’ve decided that they think they know what you are,” Germaine said, refusing to give up trying to persuade him not to go. He was apologetic but resolute and returned to the Shearer house at seven pm (he waited until then, believing that Chris would be working during the day). He knocked lightly and saw Chris Shearer look through his front window, his expression thunderous as he raced to his front door and grabbed Grey by his lapels, dragging him into his house and holding him against the hallway wall.

“
Mr Shearer, I understand that you’re upset…”

“
Upset! You came here to slander my son’s memory. Bill told me that he’d never heard of you, and when I came back and saw you’d done a runner I didn’t need to be a genius to work out that you’re a con man. How were you going to try and fleece me, then? What was your angle?” he said bitterly, tightening his grip on Grey, about to punch him when his son came through from the sitting room, alerted by his father’s shouting, and he intervened.

“
You’ve got some explaining to do,” Bill said to Grey, as angry as his father though better at containing it. Chris pushed Grey through to the sitting room where they all sat down.

“
You’re right, I do owe you both an explanation. You know that I didn’t serve in your unit,” Grey said to Bill.

“
We had a Jim Grey, but he died,” Bill said, this fact making what his father had told him especially confusing.

“
Shame it wasn’t this one,” Chris said. “Assuming, of course, that is your real name.”

“
It is. I lied to you on my last visit and I apologise for that and swear that I won’t lie again. What I am about to tell you might make you believe me a liar…”

“
You already are a liar,” Chris said, making it difficult for him.

“
I knew you’d be furious with me and I came back because you deserve the truth. I never met your son, Mr Shearer, yet we did talk. I’m a spiritualist medium and Chris communicated with me.” Grey paused, expecting one or both of the men to dispute this vociferously, their silence throwing and unsettling him a little. “Now I know that you have no reason to believe that to be true, but Chris gave me a message for you, Mr Shearer, about you, Bill. Chris wanted to get it off his chest. He’d felt bad about it for years and wanted to right the wrong. In ’39 you found a wallet and watch in your sons’ shared bedroom and Bill took the blame for stealing them and the consequences.”

Chris Shearer was still, listening to his words coldly – Grey suspected that this apparently detached state would not last long and once he’d gone through the formality of letting him try to justify himself his anger would re-emerge and it would turn physical again. Bill Shearer was also still but Grey could see that he was engrossed – he already knew the secret that Grey was going to reveal, and he wondered how Grey knew it. Bill had been lucky, his younger brother stealing from a family member, their mother’s stepbrother, and when his father had demanded that he own up to the theft, to his step-uncle and the police, his step-uncle had not wanted to take it further. His father punished him enough, taking the strap to him and keeping an eagle eye on him for over six months, making him work for him on a couple of properties in his free time.

“
Bill didn’t do it, Mr Shearer, it was Chris Jr.”

“
You came here to tell me that!” Chris said furiously, rising to his feet and ready to teach Grey not to play games with people’s feelings.

Bill put out his arm, blocking his father from getting to Grey. “Dad, calm down.”

“
What do you mean?” Chris said, staring down at his son. He saw something in his son’s expression he didn’t like and he said, “I want you to tell me that he’s lying. You stole from your uncle but you were just a kid, not a lying bastard of a man who’s dead meat.” Chris Shearer didn’t wait for his son’s answer, too incensed – it was bad enough that Grey besmirched his dead son but it also enraged him that he brought up his son’s only misdemeanour, an incident that they never discussed. Bill blocked his renewed attempt to get to Grey, drawing his father’s attention back to him. “Tell me he’s lying.”

“
I think he is lying about being a medium. He’s right about Junior – he did the burglary, not me. Don’t think any less of him, he tortured himself enough about it.”

Chris broke away from Bill and completely lost his cool, repeatedly slamming the door shut until he damaged it at the hinges before he stormed upstairs and did the same to his bedroom door. Bill went to him, pausing just to say to Grey sternly, “Don’t go anywhere. I want to know how you know that.”

“
I’ve said…go to your father,” Grey said. A thorough explanation could wait. The banging continued for a while after Bill Shearer went upstairs before things quietened down, though Grey heard raised voices every couple of minutes, usually Chris’. After half an hour Bill Shearer came down alone and told Grey to spill his guts.

“
How’s your father?”

“
That’s my concern, not yours.” He was unable to resist telling him and he said, placing the blame entirely on Grey, “You’ve tarnished Junior’s reputation. He’s staying upstairs because he knows he won’t be able to control himself if he sees you. Now answer me, and no bullshit this time, how did you know that?”

“
I hear spirits, and if you need further proof then I can prove it. I’m talking to a spirit who knew you now and you can ask him any question you want. The spirit’s Dennis Erlandson.” If his abilities had been as random as they had been just a year ago he would not have contemplated putting on shows, but now he could draw relevant ones to the fore with ease. He reached out and Dennis was there without any effort.

“
So you read the papers and found out about his accident. I only worked with him, we weren’t good friends.”

“
He’s telling me that you work like a Trojan for the first six hours and then – his words – do fuck all for the rest of the shift.”

“
A lot of people could tell you that,” he said, remaining unconvinced.

“
That’s why I want you to think of a question that you want to ask him, that way you know it’s not information I’ve already gleaned.”

“
That wouldn’t prove it.”

“
It depends how private the information is.” Grey realised that he wasn’t going to convince him through Dennis and he said, “Chris was adamant that I do this.”

“
If what you say is true then he wasn’t thinking straight. I have questions for him that no one else would know the answer to if you’re determined to prove yourself.”

“
He’s no longer with me, he’s at peace.”

“
Ain’t that a surprise,” he said cynically. “I want you to promise on your mother’s life that this is true.” While he wanted to disbelieve it, he knew that Chris Junior was unlikely to have shared his secret with anyone and he knew that Grey had never met him.

“
I promise on my wife’s life, and that means more to me, my mother’s too if you want that vow.”

“
All right.”

While Bill Shearer was beginning to believe him, there was very little left to say and while Grey did try and put his mind at rest (‘your brother’s at peace now’, etc.), Bill was very incurious and made little attempt at conversation. Grey found himself repeating things he’d already said and eventually suggested going up to see his father.