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Authors: Rebecca Tope
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him. He’d already lost most of his marbles by then. Anyway, I got the last train home. I saw something going on in a field. Looked like people burying something or someone.’
Jim laughed scornfully. ‘You were dreaming,’ he said. ‘Besides, you can’t see outside a train at night.’
‘The carriage lights had gone out. To be honest, I thought I might have been dreaming, too. Maybe I was. It was a bit like a dream. Two people, with something lying on the ground. A big dark shape, it was. It could have been a person. I could see a spade, and a torch—’
‘Hey! What if Mum saw them burying this woman!’ cried Jason. ‘She’d be famous! Where was it, Mum?’
‘Somewhere between Taunton and Exeter, that’s all I know. Where’s this place you’re talking about, Jim?’’
‘North Staverton,’ said Jim, his hands resting immobile beside his plate. ‘Right beside therailway line. Good God, woman – why didn’t you say something at the time?’
She shrugged and sighed. ‘I forgot about it,’ she said. ‘Once you get off a train, you don’t think about it any more. It’s as if it all happened in another world. And you know how woolly headed I am these days, anyway.’
‘You’ll have to tell the police,’ said Jim, with rising excitement. ‘Go and phone them now.’
She shook her head. ‘I’m no good with the phone. I’ll get all tongue tied. I’ll pop in tomorrow and see if they’re interested. But really, I haven’t anything very useful to tell them, have I? They already know she was buried there. All I can do is give them a date – if it’s the same place.’
‘A date can be very important,’ Jim told her seriously. ‘Very important indeed.’
Simon Gliddon got up that morning with a sense of foreboding thick in his chest. It was the anniversary of his wife’s death. A year ago today, she had been shot down, without any chance of escape, while minding her own business on an innocent holiday tour of Egypt. Simon had insisted on seeing her body when it was eventually shipped back to England. There was no other way that he could ever have believed the truth of the story he had been told. As it was, it hadn’t looked muchlike his wife. Her skin had darkened to the colour of his in-laws’ mahogany sideboard; her hair had been brushed into a cloud around her head, instead of tied back in the ponytail she always wore. Only the wide plump shoulders, the stubborn jawline and the beautifully embalmed hands wearing the wedding ring he had put on her finger, had convinced him that it was really Sarah. The image of how she had looked had remained with him constantly, only slightly dimmed after the passage of a whole year.
He had intended to go to work as usual, hoping to drown the memories and the sudden flashes of rage in the routine tasks he would have waiting on his desk, but he decided he couldn’t face it. Perhaps he owed it to Sarah to remain at home, trawling through the past, wondering how he might yet ensure justice for his dead wife and punishment for those who were at fault.
The house still bore many signs of Sarah’s existence. He had changed almost nothing – the kitchen still had mugs and ornamental plates and recipe cuttings exactly as she’d left them; the bathroom had her shampoo and body lotion on a shelf in the cabinet; the cupboard on the landing was full of her dressmaking materials. Only her clothes and shoes had disappeared, collected by her mother and disposed of in the early weeks. There was a small box of jewellery in one of thedrawers, which Simon fingered from time to time, imagining the unborn daughter who had died with Sarah inheriting the objects if she had been allowed to live.
He would never marry again – of that he was certain. His father, currently on his third wife, found this inexplicable. ‘She wouldn’t have wanted you to be lonely, son,’ he said repeatedly. ‘There’s no law says you have to mourn her forever.’
Simon didn’t
Jim laughed scornfully. ‘You were dreaming,’ he said. ‘Besides, you can’t see outside a train at night.’
‘The carriage lights had gone out. To be honest, I thought I might have been dreaming, too. Maybe I was. It was a bit like a dream. Two people, with something lying on the ground. A big dark shape, it was. It could have been a person. I could see a spade, and a torch—’
‘Hey! What if Mum saw them burying this woman!’ cried Jason. ‘She’d be famous! Where was it, Mum?’
‘Somewhere between Taunton and Exeter, that’s all I know. Where’s this place you’re talking about, Jim?’’
‘North Staverton,’ said Jim, his hands resting immobile beside his plate. ‘Right beside therailway line. Good God, woman – why didn’t you say something at the time?’
She shrugged and sighed. ‘I forgot about it,’ she said. ‘Once you get off a train, you don’t think about it any more. It’s as if it all happened in another world. And you know how woolly headed I am these days, anyway.’
‘You’ll have to tell the police,’ said Jim, with rising excitement. ‘Go and phone them now.’
She shook her head. ‘I’m no good with the phone. I’ll get all tongue tied. I’ll pop in tomorrow and see if they’re interested. But really, I haven’t anything very useful to tell them, have I? They already know she was buried there. All I can do is give them a date – if it’s the same place.’
‘A date can be very important,’ Jim told her seriously. ‘Very important indeed.’
Simon Gliddon got up that morning with a sense of foreboding thick in his chest. It was the anniversary of his wife’s death. A year ago today, she had been shot down, without any chance of escape, while minding her own business on an innocent holiday tour of Egypt. Simon had insisted on seeing her body when it was eventually shipped back to England. There was no other way that he could ever have believed the truth of the story he had been told. As it was, it hadn’t looked muchlike his wife. Her skin had darkened to the colour of his in-laws’ mahogany sideboard; her hair had been brushed into a cloud around her head, instead of tied back in the ponytail she always wore. Only the wide plump shoulders, the stubborn jawline and the beautifully embalmed hands wearing the wedding ring he had put on her finger, had convinced him that it was really Sarah. The image of how she had looked had remained with him constantly, only slightly dimmed after the passage of a whole year.
He had intended to go to work as usual, hoping to drown the memories and the sudden flashes of rage in the routine tasks he would have waiting on his desk, but he decided he couldn’t face it. Perhaps he owed it to Sarah to remain at home, trawling through the past, wondering how he might yet ensure justice for his dead wife and punishment for those who were at fault.
The house still bore many signs of Sarah’s existence. He had changed almost nothing – the kitchen still had mugs and ornamental plates and recipe cuttings exactly as she’d left them; the bathroom had her shampoo and body lotion on a shelf in the cabinet; the cupboard on the landing was full of her dressmaking materials. Only her clothes and shoes had disappeared, collected by her mother and disposed of in the early weeks. There was a small box of jewellery in one of thedrawers, which Simon fingered from time to time, imagining the unborn daughter who had died with Sarah inheriting the objects if she had been allowed to live.
He would never marry again – of that he was certain. His father, currently on his third wife, found this inexplicable. ‘She wouldn’t have wanted you to be lonely, son,’ he said repeatedly. ‘There’s no law says you have to mourn her forever.’
Simon didn’t
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