The Black Path (16 page)

‘C’mon,’ says Siân. ‘Get it down you.’

Helen places the pill on her tongue and takes a gulp of water.

‘Good girl. Now, where’s your overnight bag?’ Siân scans the room. ‘It’s okay. Got it.’

She hauls the small suitcase down from on top of the wardrobe, unzips it and places it open on the bed. ‘Now, what do you need?’

Helen tries to think, but her head is spinning. She doesn’t feel drunk anymore. This is a different kind of dizziness – sober and more terrifying.

‘Don’t worry,’ says Siân. ‘Leave it to me.’ She opens the chest of drawers and begins scooping underwear into the case. Then she moves down to the next drawer, and the next, grabbing neatly folded piles of clothes – tops, T-shirts, a pair of jeans.

Numb with shock, Helen watches as Siân methodically fills the case. She recalls the last time she used it. It was her birthday, and Owen had surprised her with a weekend away in Pembrokeshire. It rained all day Saturday and the best part of Sunday – the kind of grey, drizzly rain that reminded them they hadn’t left Wales. ‘The green, green grass and grey, grey skies of home,’ Owen had joked. But none of that mattered. They were together. They were happy. And they were safe from harm.

‘Almost there!’ Siân flashes a smile before leaving the room. From across the hall, Helen hears her open the bathroom cabinet. Moments later, she returns with a toilet bag and places it in the case.

‘There,’ she says. ‘All done.’

‘Thank you.’ Helen feels her eyes prickle.

‘No problem.’ Siân stares at her. ‘You’re going to be okay, y’know. Whatever happens, I’ll be there for you.’

Helen blinks back tears. Only two people have ever really been there for her. One is dead and the other is lying in hospital. ‘I don’t know what I’d do if –’

She shudders and clasps her hand to her mouth, afraid to even say the words.

‘Hey,’ says Siân, perching next to her on the bed and gripping her tightly by the shoulder. ‘You heard what the captain said. He’s not dead. Where there’s life, there’s hope. That’s what people say, isn’t it?’

‘I suppose.’

‘There you go, then. Now, is there anything else you need?’

Helen shakes her head.

‘Right,’ says Siân. She stands and zips up the case.

Captain Davies calls from downstairs. ‘Mrs McGrath? Is everything alright up there?’

Siân opens the door. ‘Hold your horses, Captain!’ She turns to Helen. ‘Ready?’

‘I just need the loo.’

In the bathroom, a strange feeling of calm washes over her as she splashes cold water on her face and studies her reflection in the mirror. She looks pale, but that’s nothing new. Her eyes are a little glassy, but that’s probably from the wine. Other than that, she looks remarkably composed. She half expects her features to contort with fear and her mouth to form a silent scream, but none comes. Maybe it’s the shock. Or maybe it’s the certainty of knowing that Owen is alive. She doesn’t know how badly he’s been hurt, but at least he’s not dead.

Siân is waiting for her on the landing. Her bag is slung over one arm. In her other hand she holds the small suitcase. ‘We need to go.’

‘Right,’ says Helen. It suddenly dawns on her that Siân doesn’t have a change of clothes of her own. ‘Sorry. I should have asked. Do you need to borrow something? Some underwear at least?’ She moves towards the bedroom.

‘No!’ Siân steps in front of the door, her eyes glittering in the dark. She smiles and hoists her bag further up her shoulder. ‘Don’t worry about me,’ she says, patting the bag. ‘I’ve got everything I need right here.’

Statement from Mark Yardley

Aged 51

Relationship to the victim – none

It now appears that, apart from his wife, daughter and whoever was responsible for his murder, the last person to see Richard Thomas alive was a passer-by.

On the day in question, Mr Mark Yardley had been visiting his mother at Glanrhyd Hospital. Situated on the outskirts of Bridgend, roughly a mile from where Richard Thomas lived with his wife and daughter, the hospital provides a range of inpatient mental health facilities including respite care, rehabilitation and long-stay beds. The hospital is easily reached by car or the nearest bus stop on Tondu Road. It is also linked via the Black Path to the street where Mr Thomas lived.

Mr Yardley previously cared for his mother at home and now lives alone in Wildmill – ‘the top end, not the part where all the druggies hang out’. After leaving the hospital, he was making his way home on foot.

‘I usually take the bus,’ he said. ‘But it was such a beautiful day, I decided to walk back instead. I thought some fresh air would help clear my head.’

Mr Yardley said he left the hospital at around noon.

‘Normally I stay for lunch, but I could tell that Mum didn’t want me there. She has days like that. Most of the time she enjoys the company, but sometimes it’s as if the sight of me is enough to set her off. So I had a quiet word with the nurses and slipped out. I went and sat by the river for a bit. It’s nice there, by the old railway bridge. I’m not sure how long I sat there – fifteen, twenty minutes, maybe? Then I headed over to the Black Path.’

Mr Yardley said he had been walking along the path for ‘no more than five minutes’ when he heard raised voices up ahead.

‘I thought it was just kids messing about at first. Then I heard an older man’s voice. He was shouting, something about his wife and how people should mind their own business. And then I heard some lads yelling back. One sounded really angry. But it was hard to make out the words. They were all shouting over each other.’

It was only when Mr Yardley approached that the shouting stopped. Mr Yardley saw a man he now identifies as Mr Richard Thomas.

‘There were three lads with him, aged between fifteen and seventeen. I didn’t get a good look at their faces. They were wearing those hoodies, and they had their heads turned away. Mr Thomas was holding a fleece – cradling it front of him with both arms. It looked heavy, like there was something wrapped inside it. He smiled and nodded at me. His face was very red. Maybe he was hot, or feeling a bit sheepish. Perhaps it was all that shouting. I said “hello” but nobody said “hello” back. They just stood there – him smiling, the lads looking the other way. I didn’t stop. I felt a bit awkward, to be honest. So I just kept walking. As soon as I’d passed by, I could hear them start up again.’

Mr Yardley explained that he couldn’t hear what was said as he was now walking away from the source of the commotion.

‘I just kept going. I didn’t look back. Part of me wanted to, but I was worn out from seeing my mum, and it really wasn’t any of my business. Of course, if I’d known then what I know now…’

Mr Yardley was approaching the end of the path when he heard hurried footsteps behind him.

‘The next thing I knew, he came barging past. Mr Thomas, I mean. He almost knocked me over. He didn’t stop to say sorry or anything. He just kept running. And I noticed then that he wasn’t carrying that fleece. Maybe it wasn’t his. Maybe it belonged to one of those lads he was with. It didn’t seem important at the time. I wish I’d tried to stop him, and find out what was going on. Perhaps I could have helped. But you never know, do you?’

Asked why he hadn’t come forward earlier, Mr Yardley insisted that he hadn’t made the connection between the man he saw on the Black Path that day and the one he later read about in the
Gazette
.

‘It was only when I saw the police appealing for witnesses on the evening news that I put two and two together.’

Mr Yardley stressed that, prior to this, he had never met Richard Thomas. And Mandy Thomas?

‘Never met her either. But I remember thinking it was odd that she wasn’t on the TV with the police, appealing for witnesses. They usually have the wife on there, don’t they? You’d think the wife would show some concern when her husband has just been murdered.’

***

PART TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY

He’s not the man she married. That man had been strong, vibrant, full of life. When he held her in his arms she’d felt safe, as if no harm could ever come to her. But that sense of security is little more than a memory. This man is nothing like that. It’s not just the lateness of the hour or the anxiety brought on by another bout of insomnia. Something has changed.

Sitting up in bed, she watches as he lies there snoring, sleeping off the pints of lager and whisky chasers he’d been drinking all evening. She can still smell the alcohol on his breath. Frank Powell – the life and soul of the Conservative Club. He must have spent the best part of a hundred pounds at the bar tonight. Good old Frank, always first in line with the next round, always so flash with his cash – and always ready with the excuses.

‘But it’s a cheap bar, Amanda. I can’t see what your problem is.’

Always
her
problem, never
the
problem or, God forbid,
his
. It would never occur to him that his drinking was becoming an issue, or that it triggered memories she’d tried so hard to suppress.

Frank isn’t a violent drunk. Nor is a secret drinker – not like her first husband. He doesn’t hide bottles of vodka in hard to reach places or lock himself away for hours on end. He doesn’t lie to her or force her to lie for him. He isn’t deceitful. So why does she feel such a crushing sense of disappointment?

She’d spent the evening nursing a glass of lager and lime and making small talk with his friends, Peter and Sheila. Like Frank, they enjoyed a drink and saw no shame in getting completely wasted.

Amanda had refused the offer of another lager.

‘But it’s Saturday night,’ Sheila had said, leaning against her husband, her voice slurred after a few too many vodka and tonics. ‘What else are you going to do?’

There are many things Amanda would have preferred to be doing. Watching a film at the local cinema. Or enjoying a nice meal at that restaurant in Cowbridge, the one where she and Frank used to go, back when they were first married. But those days are long gone. There are no trips to the cinema now and no fancy meals in posh restaurants – just TV dinners and nights out at the Conservative Club.

The only time Amanda feels that she has anything approaching a proper family life is when her daughter joins them for Sunday lunch. But even those occasions are fraught. Helen makes no secret of the fact that she isn’t fond of Frank. This isn’t entirely his fault. Helen has always worshipped her father. No man, however perfect, could ever compete with memories forged when she was Daddy’s little girl, too young to know any better. Amanda has lost count of the number of times she’s been forced to hold her tongue. So what if her daughter’s memories aren’t entirely accurate? It’s bad enough that she lost her father. To rob her of her illusions would have been unnecessarily cruel.

As for Frank, he finally seems to have given up trying to win Helen over. Looking down at him, Amanda’s expression softens. It can’t have been easy for him, trying to be a good father to someone else’s daughter and having it thrown back in his face. But where does it leave her? In the unenviable position of peacemaker, constantly trying to smooth things over while her husband and daughter take pot shots at each other.

The mattress creaks as Frank shifts, grunts and turns over in his sleep. She waits until he settles and his breathing becomes regular before quietly slipping out of bed and padding down the hallway to her daughter’s old room. Hidden in the back of the bedside drawer is a blister pack of sleeping pills. Her doctor was reluctant to prescribe them at first, given her history of dependency on anti-depressants. But it’s not as if she takes them every day. They’re just for occasional use, for nights like tonight, when she can’t sleep and her mind is plagued with nagging doubts about the life she’s chosen for herself. She pops a pill out of its foil and plastic packaging, places it in her mouth and gulps it down.

For a few minutes she stands staring around the room, at the books and posters Helen left behind. She was always such an introverted child, even before she lost her father. She rarely brought friends home. For years, Amanda worried that she’d never find a husband. There was never any talk of boys. Amanda and her own mother had often talked about the kind of man she hoped to marry. But she doesn’t have that kind of relationship with her own daughter. Helen doesn’t confide in her. She never has. So when she announced that she and Owen were getting engaged, Amanda was as surprised as anyone – surprised and more than a little relieved. The first time they met it was clear to her that Owen was a decent man. He would take good care of her daughter. What more could a mother ask for?

Amanda sighs, switches off the light and heads back to bed. Frank is in the same position as before, face down, with his arm spread across her side of the mattress. Gently, so as not to wake him, she lifts his arm and slides beneath the bedclothes. She lies there for what seems like hours, listening to his steady snoring and the beat of her own heart. Finally her body gives in and she slips into a cold, black tranquilizer sleep.

The Black Path, Bridgend

– Wikipedia entry

The Black Path is a footpath which runs from the top of the Wildmill estate to an unnamed road close to the McArthur Glen shopping precinct (known locally as The Pines). It’s a remnant of an early nineteenth-century horse-drawn tram road, built to carry coal and iron ore from the Maesteg area to Bridgend. The path runs for about half a mile alongside the River Ogmore and is separated by a narrow field from the railway line. Roughly halfway along the path is the site of an old blast furnace. The location is easily identified by a raised mound, marked by a large tree with a bald patch where the bark has peeled away. All that remains of the furnace is some broken brickwork.