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66
‘Welcome home, Henry.’
I hold the door ajar, somewhat petulantly, and let DI Owusu into the apartment. It had been quite a shock to my system, I can tell you, to see his face on the intercom screen a moment ago, this man who I had last seen on a laptop in an interview room in Chicago, this man who I thought I had dispensed with on Friday, this man who really should have just shut up shop now and found a new and more thrilling case to investigate, a case in which he might experience some semblance of success. But no, here he is again, and on a Sunday morning of all the godforsaken times for an overly persistent detective to descend upon a person.
‘Thank you,’ I say and let him into my apartment, apologising for the mess, chucking cushions back on to the sofa as I say, ‘What can I do for you today, Detective?’
‘Actually, Mr Lamb, I have come to you this morning withsome sad news. I wanted you to be the first to hear this, before it hits the newsstands, because, Mr Lamb, I’m afraid this is very much about to hit the newsstands in a big way. You may wish to sit down.’
I blink slowly. I have genuinely no idea what it is that Detective Owusu is about to tell me. All the people I love surge through my head in one go: Lucy, the children, Libby, even Miller Roe. I sit down slowly and stare at the detective. ‘OK.’
‘So, on Friday I went to Wales to talk to Justin Ugley – or Redding, as you may have known him as a child.’
I nod, and gulp.
‘Well, unfortunately, Mr Lamb, Justin was found dead on Friday night, by one of his neighbours. He had, I’m very sorry to say, taken his own life.’
‘Oh my God.’ I clap my hands over my mouth and feel a genuine sucker punch of sadness in my lower gut.
‘He left a note and I thought it right that you should see it, as it concerns you. Would you like to read it?’
‘Oh. Yes, yes, I suppose I would.’
The detective passes me a printout of the note and I unfold it. The handwriting is immediately and overwhelmingly familiar – it is the same handwriting that was in all the notebooks we once pored over together in the garden, the neatly inscribed Latin names of all the plants and herbs and fruits we grew together, the seasonal planting plans. Justin’s lovely handwriting.
I start to read:
To whoever finds me like this – please, first of all, know that I am so sorry. It is of course a selfish act that will result inpain for whoever is first to get here. Please be assured that I am happy now, or at least that this was not an act of violent desperation, but an act of spiritual release. I have been very unhappy for a very long time. I have made bad decisions and dreadful choices. I have hurt people. I have let people down. I am hollow and what you see of me now, the empty husk that remains of me, is all I have been anyway for the past twenty years. I have been haunted now, for so long, by what I was witness to back in the late 80s and early 90s in that house in Chelsea, the terrible child abuse I saw being perpetrated by David Thomsen and Birdie Dunlop-Evers, and not only that but their embezzlement of the Lambs’ money and personal possessions, under the guise of ‘saving their souls’ but, in reality, to line their own pockets. The things that happened behind the closed door of that house were appalling, and like a coward, I did a flit. I left them to it.
But the guilt overwhelmed me and ate away at me. I thought about those children all the time. In particular, I thought about Henry. Henry was the black sheep in that house. The girls had higher status and Phin was the alpha boy, son of the alpha male. Henry was at the bottom of the pile, desperately looking for whatever human connection he could find. Such an interesting little boy. So quick to learn. Such a strong sense of right and wrong. More than anyone else in that house Henry knew where the moral high ground should be and was constantly begging the grown-ups to try to find it. But to no avail.
One day in 1994 I came back to London. I’d written numerous times to Henry, but never heard back from him and I wanted to make sure that everything was OK. I rang the bell, but nobody answered. So I came in through the back gate, via the house behind, and I saw Henry through the kitchen window. He looked so thin. So weak. So broken. I saw David and Birdie and they were laughing. Henry caught my eye through the glass, and I gestured to him to come into the garden. He told me terrible things. I said I would tell the police. That I would get them out of there. I was going to rescue them, that’s what I told Henry, and he held on to me, sobbing, and at that moment, Birdie appeared, and a tussle began and I’m afraid that in the course of that tussle, Birdie died.
We hid away her body, Henry and I. That was wrong. I know that now. I wish I’d called the police and confessed to my crime; the children would have been saved and their lives would have been so different. And so I suppose that when Henry – if it was him, and I suppose that is something we will never know – moved Birdie’s remains, it was to save me, to protect me. So please, if you find Henry, know that he has done nothing wrong. Please tell him that he is and always has been the best of boys. And that I am so sorry I let him down. For that, more than anything, I will never ever forgive myself. But I hope that one day maybe he will find it in himself to forgive me.
Yours,
Justin L. Ugley
PS: Please call my mother on this number to let her know what has happened. She is very elderly and may not remember who I am, but I suppose someone should be informed of what I have done.
I reread the last two paragraphs, to be sure of what they say. It is all a lie. Of course it is a lie. But I must not let the detective know. He must assume that all I have just read is a true and accurate retelling of real-life events, and so I look up at him with tear-filled eyes – to be truthful, the tears are real; Justin was a jolly nice man, a golden spot in those dark, dark years, I am very sad that he has taken his own life, I am very sad that his life held so little value to him that he was prepared to sacrifice it to save me – and I say, ‘I can’t believe this. I can’t believe he’s gone. He was my best friend. My only friend. And he tried so hard to rescue us. Poor, poor Justin.’
And then I realise, inside a sickening tidal wave of knowing, that Justin has sacrificed himself for me. That he has given himself tosaveme. Me. Henry Lamb. Pathetic loser that I am.
But for some reason he thought I was worth his own life. And only then do I cry proper tears. Tears of wonder and gratitude, and also tears of relief, because even though the letter is a lie it also could be true. Quite easily. Just as I have recalibrated my own personal history to rewrite the part where I grew deadly nightshade in the garden of 16 Cheyne Walk and used it to poison to death my parents and David Thomsen and have come almost to believe that they really did kill themselves in a suicide pact, then so too in a parallel world maybe Justindidsend me letters that I never received, maybe he did come to London to rescue us, and maybeit was him, not me, who bashed Birdie on the head with an elephant’s tusk and robbed her of her life. Why not, I think, why ever not? And immediately the nuts and bolts of the story shift and fall into new places in my head and within moments I have recalibrated everything, the whole fucking thing, and Idid notkill Birdie, but I might have moved her bones, and really, would that be such a crime, to protect a man like Justin? A fine man. Really?
‘Does this match up with your memories of events?’
I nod, pathetically, and run my hand under my snotty nose.
‘Yes,’ I say, in a teeny tiny voice. ‘Yes. It does.’
DI Owusu sighs and leans back into his chair. He stares at me. ‘We went back to the garden at Cheyne Walk,’ he says. ‘The gate in the back wall you told us about. We found it. But it is still grown over with wisteria branches. The branches are mature and intact. There is no way that anyone would have been able to access the garden on number sixteen Cheyne Walk through that gate within the past few years. It is impossible. So, Mr Lamb, I have to ask. Was it you? Did you move those bones?’
I nod, pathetically. Then I glance up at the detective and say, ‘Are you going to arrest me? For what I did with Birdie’s bones?’
‘I don’t know, Mr Lamb. Do you think that I should?’
