AllFreeNovel
Share Us
‘Peter,’ she says aloud. ‘Thank God.’
By the time he gets out of the car, she is in on the front path, in tears.
‘Peter.’ She runs into his arms.
‘What’s happened?’ He holds her tight, kisses her hair. ‘Darling, what is it?’
‘It’s not going away, Peter. It’s getting worse.’
‘But you said there were no more poems. In the college, we checked.’ He follows her into the house, into the kitchen, where the folder lies on the table, the imitation poem on the top.
‘I checked,’ she says, her voice broken. ‘You checked too, didn’t you, and there was nothing untoward.’
‘Nothing.’ He pulls two wine glasses down from the cupboard. ‘And you’re saying there’s been another? Is it possible we missed it, maybe two sheets stuck together?’
She shakes her head, offers him the offending poem. ‘This time it’s definitely aimed at us. Definitely.’
Peter is uncorking a bottle, his mouth a grim flat line. ‘Take it into the living room,’ he says. ‘I need to sit down and really focus on it. I’ve been standing up for hours and the drive home was a nightmare. And light the fire, will you? It’s cold in here.’
In the living room, she waits, already a little calmer now that Peter is home. Even the clink of the glassware is comforting, the ritual of it, the familiarity. She strikes a match and holds it to the paper that Peter has laid in the grate. She should have done this earlier, got the room cosy for him, but she’s been too frazzled. The paper takes, the flames lick around the kindling. As Peter has instructed, she waits for two minutes before laying the first log carefully on top.
‘Here.’ He is sitting down on the sofa, two glasses on the coffee table, reflected firelight dancing in their ruby-red bellies. He picks up the sheet, in his expression something of the patient schoolmaster. No more than a moment passes before that expression shifts, darkens. Second by second, she watches the deepening lines on his brow, the way he pulls with one finger at his collar, the heavy exhalation, and now the reaching for the wine, the glass drained.
‘What do you think?’ she asks.
‘I think we should call the police.’
It is a Tuesday evening, nine o’clock, in Richmond. The police arrive within the hour, two officers, both men. Samantha had not expected a house call. They refuse offers of tea, coffee. One, the older of the two, somewhere in his late twenties or early thirties, sits in the armchair and takes out a notebook. Peter gives a brief history of the poison notes. Samantha interjects, awakening to the fact that she’s been sidelined in her own story. It is as if she doesn’t have a voice, or if she does, it is not one they can hear. The only answers she gives are to reassure them that she cannot have been mistaken. When she does tell them something, they look to Peter for confirmation.
‘And you recognised this Sean … Sean Worth … did you, this evening?’ the older of the two PCs asks her.
She shakes her head. ‘I wouldn’t put it as strongly as that. It looked like him. And of course he was here last week, on this street. I definitely saw him then.’
He looks to his colleague and back to her. ‘But this week you’re not sure?’
‘Not one hundred per cent, no. And I wouldn’t want to accuse someone unless—’
‘She did see this guy last week,’ Peter interjects. ‘And as I said, I checked the folder with her at the college at around ten past two this afternoon. There were eight pieces of homework, all dialogues. This poem definitely wasn’t there. If my partner says there was someone outside the house, then there was. And it’s most likely to be Sean Worth. Who else could it have been? We’re not saying he wrote the poems, but shouldn’t we get a restraining order on the guy?’
‘But we don’t know that Sean put the poem in the house.’ Samantha feels like she’s interrupting. ‘We don’t even know it was put into the folder after we got home. We could be mistaken.’
‘Come on, Samantha.’ Peter looks towards the officers. Samantha only catches his expression from the side, but there’s something dismissive in it she doesn’t like.
‘It’s a bit premature for a restraining order at this stage.’ The older officer tucks his notepad into his breast pocket. ‘I’ll file a report. That way we’ll have it on record. And like I say, keep us posted on any developments and call us immediately you see anyone near the property acting suspiciously.’
Peter shows them out. The front door bangs shut. Samantha looks towards the living-room door, expecting him to appear, but a moment later she hears him in the kitchen. He is whistling. Stravinsky, she thinks, but is not certain. She is not certain of anything. Peter helped her check the folder. She was with him the whole time. When she thought she heard the click of the door, he was at work. Is it possible she can even think he would do something like that, and if so, why? Why would she think that? Because of the pills behind the sofa cushions? She thinks of his absolute precision just now, talking to the police officers, compared to his vagueness whenever she asks about any part of his life that doesn’t, or didn’t, involve her. The school he taught at, the ex-girlfriends he never discusses, the unnamed PhD student he meets in the pub …
But his willingness to take her concerns seriously has grown naturally according to the perceived threat. His appearance at the college was the action of a loving partner. His immediate calling of the police just now was completely supportive. The cleverness of this last poem, the way it alludes to a deeply personal favourite of his – there’s no way he would use it. Why point the finger at himself? And he is desperate to marry her; why warn her off? He has always wanted to save her, from her father, the spectre of financial ruin, her fear of being left humiliated and penniless. Only the other week, he made it clear to her that he was extremely wealthy, a gesture of faith. The moment he met her, he wanted to take her home. The moment he took her home, he wanted her to stay. Why would he try to frighten her away?
‘Sam.’
She almost shrieks. He is at the doorway and he is gazing at her. The firelight casts an unflattering glow and she realises his chin is not as firm now as it was even a year ago. But the way he is looking at her makes it easy to forget that he is almost twenty years her senior. Her raging thoughts are nothing more than paranoia. And when he sits beside her and places his warm hand to her cheek in that way he does, she closes her eyes and leans into it.
‘You are my one true love,’ he says, ‘and I won’t let anyone hurt a hair on your head.’
This is the side of him that only she knows. All the academic theories, all the jargon and the published works and the culture and the house and the good looks and the car and the nonsense turn to dust. He is her Gregory Peck. He is her romantic hero. And he is as cheesy as it gets.
‘I love you,’ she says and kisses him.
