Chapter Thirty-Six I can’t be sure, but it looks like the black notebook I found in the cellar. The one I hid under the cabinet in the living room. The notebook that mentions Rachel and her various psychoses and treatments. It disappeared and now here it is again on my dad’s bedside table.
I slip off my shoes and creep across the floor towards it.
‘Catherine?’
I jerk round so fast, I twist my ankle again and cry out in pain.
It’s Dominic.
‘Bloody hell, woman,’ he says, almost angrily. He hurries across the room to grab me in his arms, taking the weight off my leg. He looks down at my bare foot. ‘Are you hurt? You said your ankle was better.’
‘It is better. I was just—’
‘Trying to do too much before it’s properly healed.’
‘Obviously.’
‘You’re going to end up back in hospital if you’re not careful.’ He glances round at the empty room. ‘What are you doing here anyway? I thought you were going straight up to bed?’
Before I can think of a credible excuse, my parents appear in the doorway, looking at us in complete bemusement.
‘Yes, Catherine,’ my father says, an edge to his voice. ‘I’d like an answer to that question too.’ He thrusts his hands in the wide pockets of his dressing gown and does not move from the doorway, effectively blocking my escape. ‘You know my room is out of bounds. I bring official papers up here sometimes. Maybe not top secret, but sensitive documents all the same. What were you doing in here?’
I hesitate, my face flushing with embarrassment as they all stare at me.
‘I wanted . . .’
‘Yes?’
‘To find Rachel’s ashes.’ It’s the only reasonable excuse that comes into my head, so I blurt it out. ‘You said once that you kept her ashes in one of your cabinets. Or maybe I saw her urn in here when I was a kid.’ Except that was in his downstairs study, I realise too late, but press on regardless. ‘I can’t remember now. But the door was open, so I thought . . .’
‘You thought you’d do some bloody sleuthing,’ Dad says sharply.
I nod, trying not to look back at the notebook.
Mum is pale and staring. In a plain white nightie with a high buttoned collar, she looks oddly prim and Victorian.
‘Your father showed me your letter, darling,’ she says, glancing from my father to me. ‘What . . . what on earth do you want with your sister’s ashes? Is this because of what you said in the letter?’
I say nothing, but look pleadingly at Dominic.
‘I get the feeling Catherine wants to see Rachel’s ashes,’ Dominic tells them, ‘because she needs to be sure that her sister really is dead.’ He nods at me, his voice carefully neutral. ‘Am I right?’
‘Spot on,’ I say huskily.
‘You can’t have missed how much stress Catherine’s been under lately,’ Dominic continues, looking at Mum and Dad, ‘with all the odd things that have been happening. Plus the feeling that perhaps you haven’t been as open with her about how Rachel died as you might have been.’
I see Dad’s eyes narrow.
‘I know it sounds strange,’ Dominic says, ‘but it’s actually very simple. If Catherine could see Rachel’s ashes for herself, maybe even scatter them somewhere, I think she would be able to finally accept that her sister is at peace. And her life could go back to normal.’
Dad looks unconvinced, but Mum leans against the door frame, giving me a broken smile. ‘Oh, darling, you should have said something before. If that’s all it is, of course you can see your sister’s ashes. Can’t she, Robert?’
My father hesitates, then gives an abrupt nod.
‘Now?’ I ask, deeply surprised.
‘In the morning,’ Dad says firmly. He points at his digital alarm clock. It’s after two o’clock. ‘Her ashes aren’t up here. They’re in my study downstairs. But it’s rather late to go rummaging about looking for funerary urns,’ he says. ‘Especially on Christmas morning. We all have a busy day ahead. And in fact, I believe your husband is working a shift at some point tomorrow.’
‘I am indeed,’ Dominic says ruefully.
‘Well then.’ Dad kisses Mum on the cheek. ‘You’d better go to bed, Ellen. I’m sorry I woke you. I’ll see you at seven, all right?’
When she has gone, my father steps aside to let us leave his room. He smiles at me in passing, but I can tell he’s not happy. It’s just an act. There’s a strain in his face that wasn’t there before. Like he’s been holding a string taut, using all his strength, but is about ready to give up and let go.
‘You two have a good night. We’ll talk more in the morning.’ He pauses. ‘Please try not to upset yourself, Cat.’
Cat.
He hasn’t called me that in years.
Upstairs on the top floor, pale moonlight streaming through our bedroom window, Dominic kisses me on the lips in a languorous fashion, and then sits me down on the bed and starts to help me undress. His hands are cool on my body, first checking my ankle, which is less swollen, and then working his way slowly upwards.
‘There you go,’ he whispers in my ear. ‘You’ll see Rachel’s ashes tomorrow. Maybe even get to scatter them. How’s that for a Christmas present?’
‘It’s pretty ghoulish, as Christmas presents go.’
He pulls back to look at me, frowning. His eyes glitter in the moonlight. ‘What’s the matter? I thought this was what you wanted. To know for sure that Rachel’s dead.’
‘Yes.’
‘But you’re still not happy. I don’t understand.’
‘It’s not that.’
‘Okay.’ He kisses my throat hungrily. ‘What then?’
I consider how to answer that. I’m still thinking about the notebook, wondering how I’m going to get access to it again without Dad finding out. Whatever’s in it, he doesn’t want me to know. Which means I must read it.
I haven’t mentioned the notebook to Dominic. I should do. It feels so deeply personal that even talking about it out loud could be dangerous, but he’s my husband. He deserves to know.
Yet even as I open my mouth, caution makes me change what I was going to say. ‘That man tonight,’ I whisper. ‘The one who died.’
Dominic stops trying to unbutton the front of my dress. ‘For God’s sake . . .’
‘I can still see his face. His hat.’
‘Don’t think about it,’ Dominic says soothingly. ‘It wasn’t your fault, baby.’
‘I know it wasn’t my fault.’
He gives up on undressing me. ‘So what’s up?’
‘He knew me too. I saw it in his face. He looked at me tonight, on the platform before the train came in, and he recognised me.’
Dominic sucks in a harsh breath. ‘Darling,’ he says, ‘it hurts me to hear you talking like this. You didn’t know that guy, and he didn’t know you. And no amount of soul-searching is going to bring the poor bastard back to life. It’s only going to torment the hell out of you.’
I search his face in the darkness. ‘You think I’m imagining it? That this is all just . . . I don’t know . . . guilt, because he went under the train right in front of us?’
‘Don’t you?’
I close my eyes, suddenly uncertain. Could I have made a mistake? Was he the same man I saw outside the food bank, or not? I picture his face behind the wheel of the silver Jag, then try to match it to the man in the tube station.
My uneasiness grows.
‘I’m not sure of anything anymore.’
‘Darling, it was a perfectly natural mistake to make. He looked at you, yes?’
‘Yes.’
‘So you made eye contact with this guy. You made a connection. Then a few seconds later . . .’
I put my hands to my face. ‘Don’t, please.’
‘You’re not to blame. So you can stop thinking it’s your fault.’
‘My fault?’ I stare at him.