Wilt in Nowhere (15 page)

Two days later Wilt was sitting in a chair explaining what it felt like not to know who
he was to a doctor who seemed to find Wilt’s symptoms quite common and of rather less
interest than Wilt himself.

‘And you really don’t know who you are? Are you quite sure about that?’ the psychiatrist
asked for the fifth time. ‘Are you absolutely certain?’

Wilt considered the question very carefully. It wasn’t so much the question as the way
it was put that concerned him. It had a familiar tone to it. In his years of teaching
confirmed and convincing liars he had used that tone himself too often not to recognise
what it meant. Wilt changed his tactics.

‘Do you know who you are?’ he asked.

‘As a matter of fact, I do. My name is Dr Dedge.’

‘That’s not what I meant,’ said Wilt. ‘That is your identity. But do you know who you
are?’

Dr Dedge regarded him with a new interest. Patients who distinguished between
personal identity and who they were came into a rather different category from his
usual ones. On the other hand, the fact that Wilt’s notes mentioned ‘Police inquiries
following head injuries’ still inclined him to believe he was feigning amnesia. Dr
Dedge took up the challenge.

‘When you say ‘who you are’ what exactly do you mean? ‘Who’ surely implies personal
identity, doesn’t it?’

‘No,’ said Wilt. ‘I know perfectly well that I am Henry Wilt of 45 Oakhurst Avenue. That
is my identity and my address. What I want to know is who Henry Wilt is.’

‘You don’t know who Henry Wilt is?’

‘Of course I don’t, any more than I know how I came to be in the ward.’

‘It says here that you suffered head injuries–’

‘I know that,’ Wilt interrupted. ‘I’ve got bandages round my head. Not that that is
proof positive but even the most overworked NHS doctor would hardly make the mistake of
treating my head when I’d broken my ankle. At least I don’t suppose so. Of course anything
is possible these days. On the other hand, who I am is still a mystery to me. Are you sure
you really know who you are, Dr Dredger?’

The psychiatrist smiled professionally. ‘My name happens to be Dedge, not
Dredger.’

‘Well, mine is Wilt and I still don’t know who I am.’

Dr Dedge decided to go back to the safer ground of clinical questions. ‘Do you
remember what you were doing when this neurological insult occurred?’ he asked.

‘Not offhand I don’t,’ said Wilt, after a moment’s hesitation. ‘When would that be,
this neurological insult?’

‘When you suffered the head injuries.’

‘Bit more of an insult being beaten over the head, I’d have thought. Still, if that’s
what you call it…’

‘That is the technical term for what occurred to you, Mr Wilt. Now do you know what you
were doing just before the incident?’

Wilt pretended to think about the question. Not that it needed much thinking about. He
had no idea. ‘No,’ he said finally.

‘No? Nothing at all?’

Wilt shook his head carefully. ‘Well, I can remember watching the news and thinking
how wrong it was to stop Meals on Wheel to those old people in Burling just to save on the
Council Tax. Then Eva–that’s my wife–came in and said supper was ready. I can’t remember
much after that. Oh, and I washed the car some time and the cat had to go to the vet again. I
can’t remember much after that.’

The psychiatrist made a number of notes and nodded encouragingly. ‘Any little thing
will be of help, Henry,’ he said. ‘Take your time.’

Wilt did. He needed to find out how far back his memory would have been affected by a
neurological insult. He’d nearly fallen into a trap when he’d said he didn’t know his
own name. Clearly that didn’t fit the pattern. Not knowing who he was, on the other hand,
still had some mileage to it. Wilt tried again.

‘I remember…no, you wouldn’t be interested in that.’

‘Let me be the one who decides that, Henry. You just tell me what you remember.’

‘I can’t, Doctor, I mean…well…I just can’t,’ he said, adopting the shifty whine he had
heard so often in the Disadvantaged Single Sex Seminars he had been forced to attend as
part of Ms Lashskirt’s Gender Affirmation Awareness Programme. Wilt was using that
whine to his own advantage now.

In front of him Dr Dedge softened noticeably. He felt safer with that whine. It smacked
of dependence. ‘I’m interested in anything you have to say,’ he said.

Wilt doubted it. What Dr Dedge was interested in was finding out if he was shamming.
‘Well, it’s just that I’m sitting in this room and suddenly I feel like I don’t know why I’m
here or who I am. It doesn’t make sense. Sounds so silly, doesn’t it?’

‘No, not at all. This is a not uncommon occurrence. Does this sensation last
long?’

‘I don’t know, Doctor. I can’t remember. I just know I have it and it doesn’t make any
sense.’

‘And have you discussed it with your wife?’ Dr Dedge asked.

‘Well, no. Can’t say I have,’ said Wilt sheepishly. ‘I mean, she’s got enough on her plate
without me not knowing who I am. What with the quads and all.’

‘Mrs Wilt…? Are you telling me you have quadruplets?’ asked the psychiatrist.

Wilt gave a sickly smile. ‘Yes, Doctor, four of them. All girls. And even the cat’s
neutered. Got no tail either. So I just sit there and try to think who I am.’

By the time Wilt went back to the ward, Dr Dedge had no doubt that he was a deeply
disturbed man. As he explained to Dr Soltander, the neurological insult had resulted in
the emergence of partial amnesia as a complicating factor to a preexisting
depressive condition. And a bed had become available in an isolation room because the
previous patient, a youth on a drug charge, had hanged himself. Dr Soltander was glad to
hear it. He had had enough of Wilt and more importantly he had had far more than enough of
Mrs Wilt who had been besieging his ward and disturbing the terminally ill patients.
‘Best place for him and those bloody policemen.’

‘He’s in Psychiatry, is he? Well, I can’t say I’m surprised,’ Inspector Flint said when
he found Wilt was no longer in Geriatrics 3 next day. ‘If you ask me, he should have been
certified years ago when he stuffed that inflatable doll down the hole. All the same, I
don’t think he’s half as sick as he’s making out. I think he’s holding something back. I
didn’t like the way he was acting when I was there.’

‘In what way, sir?’ Sergeant Yates asked.

‘Pretending he doesn’t know who he is and he’s never seen me in his life. Bullshit,
Yates, pure Grade A unadulterated bullshit. And he doesn’t know Eva Wilt either? My eye
and Betty Martin he doesn’t. He could have had half his brain removed and he’d still
remember her. Mrs Wilt isn’t someone even a brain-damaged coma case would be capable of
forgetting. No, our Henry was having her on. And me. Why, Yates, why? You tell me.’

But the Sergeant couldn’t. He was still having trouble with that ‘brain-damaged coma
case’ and trying to work out how one could be in a coma without having some sort of brain
damage. Didn’t make sense. But then half the things Inspector Flint said these days didn’t
make sense to Sergeant Yates. Must be getting old or something.

‘Any new suspects out at New Estate?’

The Sergeant shook his head. ‘The place is loaded with junkies and hooligans. All those
empty tower blocks. It would take a week or more to search them all. Anyway, they could have
moved on somewhere else.’

‘True,’ said Flint and sighed. ‘Probably stoned out of their minds and don’t even
remember doing him over. What beats me is why he wasn’t wearing trousers.’

‘Could be he was looking for a bit of–’ Yates began.

The Inspector stopped him. ‘If you’re suggesting Wilt’s gay, don’t. Not that I’d blame
him if he was with a wife like Eva. Can’t be much fun having it off with a woman that size.
We’ve checked with the staff at the Tech and, if what I’ve heard is true, he’s reckoned to be
practically a homophobe. No, you can forget that idea. There’s something weird about
this case. Anyway, that phone call from Oston gives us a line on what he’s been up to. I got
the impression that this case isn’t a simple case of our Wilty being mugged. That Super
spoke about Scotland Yard being called in which means they’ve got bigger fish to fry. Much
bigger fish.’

‘Torching a manor house is big enough. I know Wilt’s not right in the head but I can’t see
him doing that.’

‘He didn’t. That’s out of the question. Wilt wouldn’t know how to light a bonfire let
alone a bloody great house. That’s definitely not on. And as for leaving his gear behind
too. Not even Wilt would do that. Still, it does give us some sort of lead on where he’s
been.’

The phone rang again in the next office. ‘It’s for you,’ Yates told him.

Flint went through and took it. Ten minutes later he returned with a smile. ‘Looks as if
we’re off the case. They’re sending two CID men up from London to interrogate our Mr Wilt.
I wish them luck. They going to need it if they think they can get any information out of
the lunatic.’

‘This blasted business is getting out of hand,’ the Chief Constable told the
Superintendent at Oston. He’d driven over in his wife’s small car to convey this
message unostentatiously. The disappearance of the Shadow Minister for Social
Enhancement had aggravated an already difficult situation. The media had returned
in force and were encamped outside Leyline Lodge in even larger numbers than before.
‘I’ve had the Home Secretary on the line asking where the precious Shadow Minister has
got to and the Shadow Cabinet are practically hysterical at the adverse publicity
they are getting. First Battleby and the arson and paedophile charges, then the ghastly
woman with those damned bull terriers and now that idiot Rottecombe’s disappeared.
They’re sending someone up from Scotland Yard or MI5. I have an idea there’s something
else. Has to do with the Americans but hopefully it’s not our pigeon. Now then, I want
those media blighters out of the way when you pick her up. But it’s got to be done
tactfully. Any ideas?’

The Superintendent tried to think. ‘I suppose we could create some sort of diversion
and get them away from the house for a time,’ he said finally. ‘It would have to be
something pretty sensational. Ruth the Ruthless is the one they’re after. And I can’t
say I blame them. She’ll make good headlines.’

They sat in silence for a few minutes, the Chief Constable considering the damage
the wretched Shadow Minister for Social Enhancement and his sadistic wife had
inflicted on the county.

The Superintendent was more preoccupied with his idea of a diversion. ‘If only
some lunatics would let off a bomb. The Real IRA would be perfect. The media horde would be
off like a shot…’

The Chief Constable shook his head. One gaggle of media hounds was bad enough, a second
swarming over the place would only bring more awful publicity. ‘I can’t take
responsibility for anything like that. Besides, where the hell could you get a bomb?
You’ve got to come up with something less complicated.’

‘I suppose so. I’ll let you know,’ he told the Chief Constable who’d got up to go.

‘What we don’t want is anything that’s sensational. You understand that?’

The Superintendent said he did. He sat on in his office thinking dark thoughts and
cursing the Rottecombes. An hour later a Woman Police Sergeant came in and asked if he’d
like a cup of coffee. She was slim and fair-haired and had good legs. By the time she’d
fetched the stuff they called coffee he’d made up his mind. He crossed the room and locked the
door.

‘Take a seat, Helen,’ he said. ‘I’ve got a job for you. You don’t have to take it but…’

By the time he had finished the Sergeant had reluctantly agreed. ‘What about those two
bull terriers? I mean, I don’t want to be torn to bits by them. What they did to those two
reporters wasn’t funny.’

‘We’ll have taken care of them. Dropped some doped meat into the garden from a
helicopter. They’ll be snoring their heads off in no time at all.’

‘I certainly hope so,’ said the Sergeant.

‘We’ll go in this evening when those fellows down by the gate are taking it in turns to go
to the pub.’

Inside Leyline Lodge Ruth Rottecombe was expecting the raid. She’d been phoned a
number of times by the police asking her to go to Oston to answer some more questions and
had, after the first call, simply not bothered to answer the phone. She took only those
she could identify on the LCD panel. She’d also been bothered by a great many calls from
the Central Office demanding to know where the Shadow Minister for Social Enhancement
had got to.

For a moment Ruth was tempted to say he was probably holed up with a rent-boy but Harold
still had his uses if only she could find him. The journalists besieging the Lodge made
it impossible to leave the house. She’d been up to the skylight to check and had seen
something else that scared her. Two uniformed policemen in the field across the old stone
wall. They weren’t hiding, either, just making it obvious she was under surveillance.
But why? It had to be something to do with what the forensic men had found on the floor of
the garage and taken away in plastic bags. That was the only explanation she could think
of. Bloodstained earth from the man’s head wound. That had to be the answer. She cursed
herself for not having scrubbed the floor. As the sun began to sink in the West Ruth the
Ruthless sat in her husband’s study and tried to think what to do. About the only thing she
could come up with was to lay the blame on Harold. After all, his Jaguar had been parked over
the patch of oil and blood and there was nothing to indicate she had moved it there.

She’d just reached this conclusion when she heard the sound of a vehicle coming up the
drive. It wasn’t the usual police car but an ambulance. What the hell was an ambulance
doing outside the house? And where on earth were Wilfred and Pickles? They usually went
into the hall when a car arrived. She found them in their baskets in the kitchen, fast
asleep. She prodded them with her foot but they didn’t stir. That was strange but before she
could do anything to wake them the ambulance had turned in the driveway and had backed up
to the front door. For a brief moment Ruth Rottecombe thought they must have found Harold.
She opened the door and a moment later had been hustled into the back of the ambulance by
two hefty policewomen dressed as nurses and was being held face down on a stretcher. Four
constables had entered the house only to return carrying the bull terriers, still
sound asleep in their baskets. They joined her on the floor. Ruth tried to turn her head but
failed.

‘Where are the keys of the Volvo?’ a woman asked.

‘Don’t know,’ Ruth tried to scream but her face was pressed against the canvas and her
words were muffled.

‘What she say?’

For a moment they lifted her head and this time Ruth called them fucking bitches before
being shoved down again.

‘Don’t worry. I’ll find them,’ the Woman Sergeant called Helen said and got on the
walkie-talkie. ‘Just see you open the gate when I come down in the Volvo and clear that mob
out of the way. I’ll be moving fast.’

As the rear doors of the ambulance were slammed shut she went into the house and the
ambulance drove off at high speed. Ten minutes later she emerged wearing Ruth
Rottecombe’s skirt and twin set. She had the keys of the Volvo and was driving very fast
when she swung through the open gate, nearly taking a reporter with her. As he leapt to one
side she turned to the left at speed and took a side road to Oston.

‘Which hospital they going to?’ a cameraman who had taken refuge in the hedge asked
one of the cops on the gate.

‘Blocester, I’d say. That’s where emergency cases go. Wouldn’t be anywhere else. You
turn right on the main road,’ he said and padlocked the gate. The media mob ran for their
cars and set off in pursuit. The leading car was stopped by a patrol car a mile further on
and the driver was threatened with dangerous driving. Behind it the other cars skidded
to a halt. A mile ahead the ambulance turned left, slowed down and waited in a lay-by for
the Volvo. By the time the reporters’ cars reached the T-junction and were heading for
Blocester, Ruth Rottecombe had been transferred to the Volvo. And at Oston Police
Station she was taken through to a cell that had been occupied by a drunk who had puked the
previous night. It still stank of vomit. Ruth had slumped on to the metal bed bolted to
the floor and with her head between her hands was staring at the floor. Outside, the empty
ambulance had turned and was moving at normal speed towards Blocester. After three
hours she was escorted to the Superintendent’s office, demanding to know why she had
been treated in this outrageous fashion and promising her husband would be making
official complaint to the Home Secretary.

‘That’s going to be a little difficult,’ came the answer. ‘You want to know why?’

Ruth Rottecombe did.

‘Because he’s dead. We’ve found his body and it looks very much as though he was
murdered.’ He paused to let this news sink in. As Ruth sagged in her chair and was
apparently going to faint he went on. ‘Take her back to her cell. She’s had a tiring day.
We’ll question her in the morning.’ There was no sympathy in his voice.