The policeman patted my arm and said, ‘Everybody gets confused,’ and put away his notebook. He was very understanding, although I would rather, somehow, that he hadn’t been. Miss Ambrose, for once, was lost for words. I didn’t say anything either. I didn’t say we’d been out all day, or it wasn’t me, or why don’t you ask Ronnie about it, because I knew none of them would listen. I realised I’d run right out of arguing, and so I just kept my eyes on the watch instead.
It was one of those where you can see the insides. All the little wheels, moving behind the glass, counting each second. I’d never thought about it before, how time works. It’s quite beautiful when you see it being made in front of you. All the cogs turned, one against the next, even though some of them seemed so far away from the others, you wondered how it was even possible. Once you’d realised how everything was connected, though, you couldn’t help yourself seeing it.
‘Why didn’t you say something?’ Jack closed the front door. ‘Why didn’t you say we were out all day? No one would have minded that we didn’t get permission.’
‘Because nobody ever believes me.’ I looked at both of them. ‘You don’t for a start.’
‘Of course we do,’ said Elsie. ‘Neither of us doubts you for a second.’
‘I know it wasn’t you.’ Jack sat in front of me. ‘I know with absolute certainty.’
‘How can you be so sure?’ I said.
‘Florence, I’ve been with you all day. How could it have been?’
‘I keep telling you he’s breaking in. I keep telling you he’s moving things about. No one believes me. All they want to do is sweep me under the carpet in Greenbank.’
Jack stood. He seemed more certain of himself. More definite. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘Two can play at that game.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘What I mean, Florence, is that we’re not going down without a fight. We need to stop him. Before it’s too late.’
I could feel all the tears behind my eyes, waiting to happen. ‘You can call me Flo, you know,’ I said. ‘If you like.’
MISS AMBROSE
Anthea Ambrose looked back at the box of Terry’s All Gold, which had been watching her all morning from her office shelf. A gift from grateful relatives. Grateful people always gave chocolates, never fruit. They expressed their gratitude in calories and refined sugar, and her waistband strained with appreciation each time she tried to button up her trousers. On this occasion, the gratitude was for two weeks in Lanzarote minus Auntie Ada, who was squeezed into a ground-floor flat for respite, and the size of the box of chocolates suggested how very much they were looking forward to their holiday.
People sent cards, too, and the back wall was a chorus of thank-yous. Each time she closed the office door, they applauded her in the breeze, although some of them were so old she couldn’t even picture the resident, let alone their families. But she never threw them away. They made her feel useful. Sometimes, you needed something tangible, something you could hold in your hand, to prove to yourself that your existence wasn’t a complete waste of time. She counted them once, and discovered that for each year she’d been at Cherry Tree, she’d been thanked 16.2 times. Although she wasn’t sure if this made her feel better, or slightly worse, about herself.
She had just started to count them again, when Jack tapped on the window with his walking stick.
‘Miss Ambrose, I need you to come with me immediately.’
Miss Ambrose swallowed the remains of a Vanilla Flourish. Her favourite. ‘You do?’
‘It’s a matter of the gravest urgency. I do believe we have an intruder.’
‘An intruder?’ She rubbed at the chocolate in the corners of her mouth. ‘It’s ten o’clock in the morning. It’s a bit of a strange time to be intrusive.’
‘I couldn’t think of anyone else to tell,’ he said. ‘No one here is as reliable as you, Miss Ambrose. As reassuring.’
Jack did look rather excitable.
‘Well, if you insist.’ She considered taking the last Vanilla Flourish for the road, but decided to save it for later. In the unlikely event there was a real intruder and her blood sugars were in need of a boost. ‘I’ll just get my keys.’
‘Oh, there’s no time for that.’
She dug around in her pockets. ‘It’ll only take a second.’
‘The last time I saw him, he was heading towards the Japanese Garden.’
Miss Ambrose heard the door of her office yawn open before they’d even reached the end of the corridor.
‘Well, he isn’t in here now.’ Miss Ambrose peered over the lacquered bridge, although the only thing it bridged was a collection of flat stones, due to Miss Bissell’s paranoia that one of the residents would decide to throw themselves into six inches of water. ‘Where exactly did you see him?’
Jack waved towards the bypass. ‘Somewhere over there, I think. Or it might have been over there.’ He waved in the other direction. ‘Of course, it could have been one of the gardeners.’
‘What did he look like?’
‘Average height. Average build.’ Jack kicked at the gravel with his stick. ‘I think he might have been wearing overalls of some kind.’
‘So he probably was a gardener, wasn’t he?’
Jack kicked the gravel a little more. ‘Probably,’ he said.
It was tempting to imagine Jack had arrived on this earth fully fashioned, grey-haired and stooped, and wearing a flat cap; to imagine all of the residents had jumped from birth to senility in one fatal leap. But just occasionally, very occasionally, she would notice a hint of who they used to be. A look, a laugh, a whisper of mischief, trying to escape from the pages of time, like a prisoner making a bid for freedom.
Miss Ambrose narrowed her eyes. ‘There’s something fishy going on, Jack.’
‘There is?’ He wouldn’t meet her gaze.
‘There is. It involves you and Florence Claybourne amongst others, and mark my words, sooner or later, I’ll work out what it is.’
‘You will?’
‘I will.’
Jack looked down at the stones under the bridge. ‘There are no fish here for you to smell, Miss Ambrose, I can assure you of that.’
And he smiled.
Miss Ambrose wandered back across the car park to her office. Justin was unloading the accordion from the back of a camper van, and Jack’s son sat in a Volvo eating what appeared to be a roasted-vegetable panini. He saluted her with a sliced courgette as she walked past the window.
She eyed her office with deep suspicion, but found it was just as she’d left it. Perhaps she was being overly dramatic. Perhaps she should allow the elderly their small eccentricities. She’d done it. On a course.
Increasingly peculiar behaviour, the course brochure had said.
Miss Ambrose continued to count the cards on the wall.
Can become fixated and paranoid.
Somewhere in the distance, a door closed, and she turned so quickly, the whole of the room tilted to one side. It was all well and good, but if anyone upset her azaleas, she wouldn’t be responsible for her actions. Just the thought of it made her dizzy, and she reached into the box for the last Vanilla Flourish.
But it had disappeared.
FLORENCE
A copy of the key sat on an armchair, and we all made a fuss of it, Jack, Elsie and me, as though it was a very important house guest.
‘Did your Chris not ask any questions?’ I said.
‘I bribed him with a panini.’
‘A what?’
‘It’s what they call a sandwich when they want to charge you twice as much for it.’ Jack picked up the key and held it to the light. ‘You did very well to steal the original.’
‘I’ve never stolen anything in my life,’ I said. ‘We just borrowed it.’
It had gone well. Everyone in the day room was far too busy involving themselves with Alan Titchmarsh to worry what we were up to. The only fly in the ointment was when I decided to help myself to a Terry’s All Gold. Elsie was quite adamant I should put it back, but unfortunately, it turned out to be a soft centre. Hopefully, no one was any the wiser.
‘Now all we have to do,’ said Jack, ‘is choose our time to strike.’
‘I’ve no idea if Ronnie ever goes out.’ I looked out of the window. ‘I don’t even know what he gets up to, when he’s not prowling around my flat.’
‘Every Tuesday. British Legion. Eleven until three,’ said Jack.
‘Really?’ Elsie said. ‘How did you find that out?’
Jack tapped the side of his nose. ‘Know thine enemy,’ he said, and he smiled.
I tapped the side of my nose and smiled back.