He addressed Nicky. ‘We spoke to your sister’s ex-husband this morning.’
She looked at him warily and raised her chin slightly, with a touch of defiance. She let go of my hand. The light in the room fluctuated, growing darker and more riddled with shadows as the clouds lowered outside.
‘I know what you’re going to say, and it’s bullshit,’ she said.
‘What makes you say that?’
‘I know what you’re trying to do, but you’re wrong.’
‘What am I trying to do?’
‘I don’t have to listen to this.’
‘I think we both know that you do.’
She crossed her arms, stared down at the table.
I sat in a state of pure, simple shock. I knew well enough by now that you could lose your child in just a few minutes, but I was shocked into silence by the new knowledge that in a similar space of time you could also gain and lose a brother who was the image of that child, and parents who were more imperfect than any version of them that I’d ever imagined.
Clemo spoke to Nicky: ‘John Finch told us that when Ben was born, he was concerned that you might have what could be described as an unhealthy interest in Ben. Would you like to comment on that?’
‘You revolting man,’ said my sister. ‘You haven’t got a clue who’s got Ben so you’ve decided to pick on me. Easier to get to someone close to home, is it? Stops you having to do so much work?’
Clemo’s gaze never left her face. ‘Would you care to comment?’ he asked her. ‘I’d be very interested to hear what your response might be.’
‘I’m sure you would,’ she replied.
‘I expect your sister would as well,’ he said.
Nicky looked at me. ‘I’ve tried so hard, and for so long, to protect you. I just wanted you to have a life where you didn’t feel rejected. I wanted it to be straightforward for you. But you were so…’ She searched for a word, frustrated.
‘What?’
‘Difficult, and ungrateful.’
‘For what? Ungrateful for what?’
‘And irresponsible! You never understood anything. You just took it all for granted. You did what you wanted to do, when you wanted to do it. You had no burden. You had no loss to bear.’
‘I had the loss of my parents to bear.’ I said this quietly, because I understood that she’d had more to cope with, but she was angry now, and so was I.
‘You were clueless! Totally clueless!’
‘How could I have been any other way, if you didn’t tell me anything? That’s not my fault.’
She didn’t respond to that, she had more to get off her chest. ‘You never thanked me.’
‘For what?’
‘For protecting you.’
‘How could I have known?’
‘They never thanked me either.’
Suddenly she lost her momentum, as if that statement summed up the hopelessness of it all.
Clemo leaned in towards her. ‘Who never thanked you?’
‘Mum and Dad.’
‘What did they never thank you for?’ he asked.
‘For loving Charlie, for watching him when they’d had enough, for making him smile when they were too tired, when they couldn’t cope any longer.’
Her eyes were glassy with loss. His were intent.
‘Nicky. Were you jealous when Rachel had Ben?’
She snapped an answer at him as if he were running through a questionnaire.
‘Yes, I was jealous, yes.’
‘But you had the girls,’ I said.
‘I wouldn’t expect you to understand,’ she said.
‘Why were you jealous?’ said Clemo.
‘Because he looked like Charlie, right from the start. All I could see when I looked at him was Charlie.’
‘Did you feel that Rachel might not be able to care for Ben properly?’ said Clemo.
‘I was worried,’ she said simply, and she turned to face me. ‘You were so feckless, you know, so young?’
My sister spoke as if she’d rehearsed these words for years. Her speech gathered pace, as if she were confessing something.
‘You messed about for years, you never bothered with schoolwork although they said you could have done brilliantly if you’d tried. You never cared about anything, and then all of a sudden you got John. God knows how, because you were pissing your life away, partying all the time, and suddenly everything was so perfect and what had you done to deserve it? Nothing.’
‘We fell in love,’ I said, but she took no notice. She couldn’t seem to stop herself now.
‘I knew you’d have a boy the minute you told me you were pregnant. And when he was born and I went to see him and I held him, I saw Charlie in him. It was as if he was Charlie, reborn. He was so precious, and I wasn’t sure you’d be able to look after him.’
‘So you called John Finch,’ said Clemo.
‘Just to check that she was coping, that she was doing the right thing.’
‘Mr Finch says that you were rather insistent with your phone calls.’
‘Well he wouldn’t give me any information!’
I interrupted them. ‘John never said anything to me.’
They ignored me, their eyes were locked, Nicky’s gaze furious, his eyes hard like ice; their terrible dialogue unpicking yet more of the stitches that had held my life together. I was relegated to the role of spectator.
‘Nicky,’ he said, ‘did you want to have Ben for yourself? So you could look after him properly?’
‘That’s the thing,’ she said, ‘I didn’t. I didn’t want her to have him, but I didn’t want him either. He would just have reminded me every day what I’d lost, and that’s why you’re wrong.’
‘Wrong about what?’
‘For pity’s sake!’ She laughed. It was a shrill, upsetting sound. ‘Stop playing games with me! What would I do with him? Where do you think I would keep him?’
‘I think you might like to have him. I think you’ve always wanted him.’
The baldness of this, the slow, calm way he said it, made my sister pause and collect herself before she spoke again, as if she realised she couldn’t combat his accusations with emotion alone.
‘Well, you’re not sure, are you? If you’d got any actual evidence you’d have arrested me, so this is a pathetic attempt to get me to confess to something I haven’t done.’
Now she leaned across the table towards him.
‘You made me tell my sister about our family. That was low. You’re not getting anything else. I’ve told you that I’ve got nothing to do with Ben’s disappearance and that’s all you need to know. The rest is private. Why don’t you get out there and start looking for him before it’s too late?’
She got up and went into the garden, slamming the kitchen door behind her. Zhang went after her.
I was left sitting at the table with Clemo.
He cleared his throat. ‘I’m sorry to land this on you like this. I hope you understand that we have to follow everything up.’
I just stared at him, wondering why anybody would ever do a job like his and believing for the first time that he would do anything it took to find Ben.
JIM
Addendum to DI James Clemo’s report for Dr Francesca Manelli.
Transcript recorded by Dr Francesca Manelli.
DI James Clemo and Dr Francesca Manelli in attendance.
Notes to indicate observations on DI Clemo’s state of mind or behaviour, where his remarks alone do not convey this, are in italics.
FM: So if you’re happy to, I’d like to talk about your interview with Ben’s mother and his aunt.
JC: Fire away.
His manner is hard for me to decipher today. He seems more willing than usual to talk but he has a professional mask on too, he’s controlling his emotions.
FM: What an extraordinary revelation. I find it amazing that Nicky Forbes could have kept that information from her sister for all those years.
JC: It wasn’t just her; it was their aunt as well.
FM: How did Rachel Jenner react?