Later, my mother and I in my trailer, and two women from the Social Services dressed in corduroy and polyester shirts, both smelling of cigarettes, and my mother saying, ‘Tell them, Stella, tell them what you told me. Tell them he touched you, he’s always had a funny way about him, he’s always been a creep’, and I don’t think I said a word, she did it all for me. All I had to do was point.
‘You said I molested you.’
‘I know.’
‘I had to leave the show. Move house. My parents got hate mail for twenty years. You know someone put a firework through the letterbox? The whole place nearly burned down. I didn’t work again for ten years.’
‘I know.’
‘Why did you do it, Stella?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You know it’s on my Wikipedia page? It gets brought up in interviews every goddamn time.’ His hand makes a fist and he thumps the arm of the chair he’s sitting on. ‘It’s followed me my whole life. It’s a curse.’
‘You slapped me.’
‘You were hysterical.’
‘I know.’
He toys with the cuffs of his shirt, won’t look at me. ‘I suppose you saw the story in the papers?’
I think back. I have a vague memory of Marco showing me an article on Joey Fraser when he’d first come back to England. Was that in the spring? What had it said?
‘Sexual harassment.’
He nods. His lips are set in a grim, bloodless line.
‘She was a make-up artist. I met her on set. She liked me – or she had seemed to. I thought she did. Guess I misread the signals, huh? That’s not a crime, is it? To ask a woman out?’
I shake my head.
‘You can’t even— I mean, I never touched her, Stella, I swear. Not once.’
‘Okay.’
‘Anyway. She’s dropped the charges.’
‘Oh yeah?’ I don’t know where this is going.
‘Yeah. It’s a relief, I’m not going to lie to you. Even my lawyer said as much. Because with what’s been said about me in the past – about what you and your mum claimed I did – well, it wasn’t going to look good for me. Makes me look like a predator.’
We look at each other across the room.
‘And I’m not. And you know I’m not, don’t you? Don’t you?’
I nod.
‘Say it. Please, Stella. It’s been over twenty years, and I’ve never stopped thinking about this. For a long time, I thought maybe I did do it, maybe I did and I just don’t remember. Why else would you say I had? And it went round and round in my head, until I believed that I’d assaulted you. What other explanation was there?’
‘I’m sorry, Joey.’
‘Just tell me. Just this one thing.’
He fixes me with his pellucid eyes.
‘You – you didn’t do it. You were mean and you were unbearable and a bully, but you never did the things my mother accused you of.’
I can see something cross his face, a ripple over dark water. Is it relief? Happiness? I don’t think so. Not quite. But all the same I see the way he inhales, eyes closed. I step towards him and he says, ‘Christ, please get that phone, it’s driving me crazy.’
I stumble into the kitchen, my head reeling. I snatch my phone from the table, not looking at the caller ID.
‘Hello?’
‘It’s Marco, Stella. I just don’t know what to do to help you anymore.’
I am silent.
‘You’ve been going behind my back. I know about the photos you were sent. The ones you lied to get. I can’t stand it. I can’t bear dishonesty.’
I snap then. ‘Dishonesty? When were you going to tell me about Ellie, Marco? When you moved down here? After the wedding? When? Don’t you talk to me about deception, Marco, don’t you fu—’
‘Don’t swear at me. Don’t raise your voice.’
‘Why did you do it, Marco? Just tell me that. Why?’
Silence. I can hear the huff of his breath. Then: ‘You’ve been so on edge. Unpredictable. I haven’t wanted to upset you. I don’t think you have any idea how hard this is for me.’
My heart twists in my chest because deep down, of course, I believe him. I swallow, fighting back tears.
‘Stella? Stella?’
‘I’m here.’
Through the window the sea is glassy and green and cold. I wonder what it would be like to walk into it and just keep on walking.
‘I’m sorry too,’ I say. ‘I shouldn’t have lied about the photos. I was just interested, I suppose. But you should have told me. You should have told me about Ellie.’
‘Ellie isn’t important anymore. I’ve got you now. So you need to hold on, Katie. Just hold on. I’ll be there soon. I’ll be there.’
I heard it. My heart is pounding as he hangs up the phone. He called me Katie. I don’t think he even realised he was doing it.
Chapter 29
As I am walking back into the sitting room I remember a party Marco had taken me to last year. It had been a hazy day, stiflingly hot. We had driven out to an affluent suburb in Essex and the dress I had been wearing made me itch and sweat. It had rustled when I’d walked, prickly beneath the fabric. I’d been nervous that day. Anxiety spreading through me like the roots of a tree. The party was boring – Carmel would have described it as the Whitest Party In The World – and I’d found myself wandering through the landscaped gardens. At one point I’d caught sight of my reflection in the kidney-shaped swimming pool. She looks familiar, I’d thought. I’d leaned out over the cobalt-blue water to get a better look at myself. You ever peered into the mirror and seen someone you don’t recognise? I have. It’s terrifying. I’d looked in the water, and I hadn’t seen Stella Wiseman. I’d seen Katie Marigold. Marco had found me there, kneeling over the lip of the water. He had been black-suited, scissor-legged and stiff as the Reaper. I’d done something, I think, to make him angry. And then, olfactory memory, that smell of burning, roasted meat.
My God.
I lean against the doorframe, and Joey stands as though to catch me.
‘I’m fine,’ I tell him, ‘but you have to go.’
The Reaper is coming. And I have to be ready.
I walk the narrow lane which threads like an artery through the landscape towards Tyrlaze. I walk in the places where the pavement disappears and the hedgerow crowds in. I walk past silvery cobwebs like garlands, heavy purple fruits just turning rotten. My hair snags on brambles, pulling at my scalp like ghost fingers as I approach the house, the one with the eggs outside it.
I am not expecting her to answer the door, beady eyes looking me up and down, taking in every detail. The hallway floor behind her is littered with feathers, white and delicately speckled brown.
‘You again.’
‘Hello, Beverley.’ I speak slowly, so she can understand. ‘I’m looking for Penelope. Is she here?’
She looks at me blankly. I notice she is wearing lipstick, bright red. It bleeds into the cracks at the edges of her lips. Her cheeks are rouged, her hair pinned. It looks like she is getting ready to go somewhere. I wonder what it is like to be in her head.