Silent Voices

and the river. The water had gone down, but still there was a feeling of being on an island, of being cut off from the rest of the world. The place was almost empty. In a far corner an elderly couple sipped coffee in silence. At a table near the door a businessman was spooning soup into his mouth and reading the Telegraph.
    ‘Tell me, Joe, how did you let Simon Eliot get away?’
    They’d finished eating. Vera had insisted that there’d be no talk until after the meal. And they’d drunk a lot of wine. Vera had said the taxis home would be on her. Or, she said, winking at Joe Ashworth and Holly, who seemed to be getting on better this evening than she could remember, they could stay the night here if they preferred. Charlie had just gone outside for a cigarette. They could see him in the security light on the terrace, his hand cupped round the flame as he tried to light it. He must have seen them looking, and waved at them through the window to wait until he got inside before they started talking.
    Vera was teasing Joe, a habit she’d probably never get out of. Even if he became her boss, which wasn’t beyond the realms of possibility, she knew she’d still have a go at him. Her resolution at the pool not to bait him was completely forgotten.
    ‘So come on!’ she said. ‘All that back-up, the cars and the chopper, and he could just ring his mam and you let him drive away.’
    Joe, mellow on Merlot and a brandy with his coffee, didn’t allow himself to be provoked. ‘You told us he spent every summer camping out there. He knew all the places to hide.’
    ‘Banged up now, at any rate,’ Vera said. She’d taken Eliot to the police station herself, breaking every rule in the book yet again, letting him sit beside her in the Land Rover. Hannah she’d left in the care of Hilda. ‘He’ll plead guilty. No need for Jenny’s daughter to appear in court. That was what I was afraid of, that was why I wanted to wait.’
    They sat for a moment, and Vera knew they were all thinking about Connie and Alice and what might have happened if Joe hadn’t got there on time. Charlie appeared in the doorway and walked across the polished wooden floor to join them.
    ‘So talk us through it then, boss,’ he said. He was already unsteady on his feet, but he poured himself another glass of wine. He’d already told them he didn’t do spirits: the slippery slope. ‘Beginning to end.’
    Vera had been waiting for the invitation. She’d have given them the story anyway, but it was much more gratifying to be asked. She sat back in her chair at the head of the table, a glass in her hand, and began. She spoke slowly. This wasn’t for rushing.
    ‘The beginning was simple,’ she said. ‘A frustrated middle-aged woman fancying a good-looking young man. And a student choosing experience over innocence. Or wanting his cake and eating it. It happened one night when Hannah was out. Simon came to visit her, but she’d been held up and Jenny asked him in to wait. Offered him a glass of wine.’ She shrugged, held up her glass. ‘Terrible stuff, alcohol.’
    She looked round the table and saw that she had them hooked, like bairns listening to a bedtime story.
    ‘Simon kissed her,’ she said. ‘Nothing else then and he apologized, but that was the start of it. Jenny became obsessed with him and an affair developed. He was flattered by her attention, I think. Why wouldn’t he be? She was still lovely. They met every week in Durham. Jenny wanted to see Mattie anyway to get information for the book. She went first to see Mattie. The prison visits were short. Jenny was there as much to make herself feel better about screwing her daughter’s man as to collect information for her great work of literature. Really she was desperate to spend time with the boy.’
    She paused, topped up her glass, and imagined herself as Jenny Lister, counting off the hours until she could spend time with Simon Eliot in his student house. ‘Then guilt set in, as it always does.’ Again she looked at Ashworth. ‘It’s a terrible thing, guilt. Not everyone can cope with it.’ Another grin.
    ‘So why did Simon Eliot kill her?’ Charlie could understand the sex part, Vera saw that; it was the violence he didn’t get.
    ‘Eh, Charlie man, give a woman the chance to tell a story in her own time.’
    Vera had asked Taylor to leave the whisky bottle on the table and tipped a little more into her glass. Bugger the doctors and their healthy living –