The Cheesemaker's House (15 page)

This morning is happening to two Alice's at the same time. There is the practical, business-like Alice, sitting in Owen's kitchen with Adam, trying to work out what we will tell the police and what we won't – and there is the totally messed-up Alice who cannot quite believe that pain can be so sudden, so intense.

Luckily the business-like Alice is winning, because it is the last term you could apply to Adam. He's all over the place – a total mess, inside and out. Unwashed, unshaven – I don't think he even went to bed, given he's wearing the same T-shirt as yesterday. His face is puffy, his eyes red-rimmed – he has been shedding enough tears for both of us.

I take command. We have to decide how much we are going to tell the police. Owen is so private he won't want them to know anything about his life. Obviously we can't breathe a word about the other Owen and there is no way I'm going to let on how Owen was about the baby in the barn. So just what are we left with as a plausible explanation for him taking off like that, and as far as they are concerned, taking his own life?

We can only come up with one thing. “The pressures of running the business,” says Adam. “The hours he puts in when he shouldn't be wasting his life fucking waiting tables.” He buries his head in his hands “It's all my fault.”

“No, Adam, it's not. It was so many things, one on top of the other, it wasn't just the row you had on Saturday and if anything it was my actions that started...”

“You did the right thing. You saw how shattered Owen was when I refused to. I should have done something weeks ago, but...”

“Listen, Adam. We can't keep blaming ourselves – it's pointless. We've just got to do what we can to protect Owen's interests now. We've got to find him, Adam – we've got to make him come back. If we just sit and wallow we'll get nowhere. Maybe…maybe the police would even help if Richard did tell them he wasn't sure...”

“Oh Alice, of course they won't. You just don't get it. They're only interested because they're looking for a body. We've got to hope they'll actually find Owen alive along the way – or some clue to his whereabouts anyway. Otherwise he's just another missing person and they'll do sod all.”

“What do you mean, some clue?”

“I…I dunno.”

But the police do find something. When they arrive to take statements from Adam and me they bring the items that the diving team took out of the river. The policewoman pulls out four little clear plastic bags and lays them on the table in front of us. In the first bag is a bunch of keys I recognise as Owen's.

“They're Owen's keys.” My voice is almost a whisper. The key to the front door of this house, the ignition key to his Peugeot, and the two little keys that look like they open cupboards or boxes. All attached to a battered York Minster souvenir key ring. I look at Adam.

“That's his phone, too,” he says, pointing to another bag.

“Lots of people have Nokia 7110s.” I don't want to believe it; I've been texting Owen on and off and I can't bear the thought that he won't receive any of my messages; then I really would have no way of contacting him.

Adam picks up the bag. “It is Owen's. See where the bottom corner of the case is cracked? He dropped it down the stairs in the multi-storey in Leeds. It fell into three pieces, but it still worked when he put it back together. He was amazed. He told me about six times...” He tails off, choking back yet more tears. He has so many memories of Owen to haunt him. I only have a few weeks' worth – he has years.

But instead of crying again he looks straight at the policeman and starts to talk. “Owen and I run a business and to be honest the money side of things isn't great– we only started at Easter and he's worked all hours...”

“You both have,” I interrupt.

“Yes, but all I have to do is bake. Owen does everything else. It's been a terrific strain...”

There is a silence and then the policewoman asks, “Did either of you think he might have tried to take his own life?”

Adam doesn't answer. Did I? Did I even consider it before? “No.” It's the truth, but my voice doesn't sound as firm as I want it to.

Once the ordeal is over I walk back down the village to New Cottage. Margaret is in the garden and she gives me a big bony hug.

“Come on,” she says, “there's plenty to do in the greenhouse.”

It is while we are re-potting spidery looking bits of green she assures me will grow into lupins that Margaret asks me whether I will be helping Adam in the café from now on. The question stops me in my tracks.

“I hadn't thought about the café,” I admit.

“Well you should. Adam can't mope at home all day and anyway, it's his and Owen's livelihood. He shouldn't waste all their hard work now, but neither can he run it on his own.”

“But how are we going to look for Owen if we're running the café?” I ask.

“How are you going to look for Owen anyway? Where would you start? He could be anywhere, Alice – anywhere.”

“But we've got to try.”

She puts her hands on my shoulders. “Alice, child. He's run away because he doesn't want to be found. Not at the moment, anyway.” Margaret is so wise, but the words hit home like hammer blows, starving me of air. Something ugly wells up behind the lump in the top of my chest; not a scream, not a howl, not a sob. Margaret takes me in her arms and rocks me. I can smell the moist potting compost, I can hear the birds singing, but I really do not want to feel.

In the evening Christopher turns up. He's wearing his dog collar under his jumper so I guess it's an official visit. He stands at the front door clasping and unclasping his hands.

“I just wondered how you are?” he ventures.

“I don't know,” I answer truthfully.

“No news about Owen?”

I look into his anxious face and remember that he and Owen are good friends. I shake my head, “But come in, I shouldn't keep you on the doorstep.”

I lead him through the chill of the dining room and into the kitchen. “I was just going to have a glass of wine – will you join me?” Actually, I'd been going to have about half a bottle of gin so perhaps Christopher's arrival has saved me from myself.

I give him the bottle to open while I find the glasses. He looks at the label.

“Owen liked this one, didn't he? He'd often bring a bottle over if he had an evening to spare.”

“It is one of his favourites, yes.”

“He was quite knowledgeable about wine. We used to talk about all sorts of stuff,” Christopher carries on. “He was one of the few people who never lost the art of conversation.”

It is only then I realise Christopher is talking about Owen in the past tense. I set the glasses on the table and turn to face him. “Owen isn't dead,” and as I say it I pray for it to be true.

“He's not? You said you hadn't had any news.”

“We haven't. Well, they haven't found
him
. They've…they've found his keys and his phone – but not Owen.”

“Alice, I don't want to take away your hope, but in the long term it might be better to face facts.”

“There are no facts.”

“Margaret said someone saw him jump off the bridge. If that's the case...”

“They were wrong.”

“Alice...”

I don't hear what he says because it suddenly occurs to me how I must sound given Christopher doesn't have the full story. But how would he react to the whole story? He might still think I am deluding myself…but it's worth a try.

“It was Richard Wainwright who saw it happen,” I interrupt, “but we now know he was mistaken. The person…whatever…he saw, was wearing a light shirt. Owen wasn't.”

“So you're saying Richard saw someone else?”

“Or something.” So once again I embark on the tale of the other Owen, finishing my story with a rather limp, “I don't expect that sort of thing fits in too well with a Christian view of the world.”

“That's where you're wrong. As a Christian I have to accept there are many things we don't understand; how echoes reach us from another time or place, for example. To be honest the idea fascinates me.”

“Echoes from another time or place? That's a good way of putting it. Maybe that's even what the crying is.”

“The crying?”

So I start again, this time with the story of the sobbing. How I first heard it, then how Richard did, and how it came back with a vengeance just after the baby's body was found. But then I grind to a halt and pick up my glass, swirling the wine round and round, watching the legs form and drain away.

Christopher is looking at me quizzically and finally he asks, “Do you feel able to tell me the rest?”

I gather my thoughts. “Owen is a great believer in the power of your prayers.”

“That's comforting to know. Especially as I will be saying a lot more of them until he's found.”

I take another slug of wine and plunge on. “Remember the prayer you said for the baby on Friday night? Well on Saturday I heard the crying again. Well, I had on Friday too but I didn't say anything to Owen but I think, looking back, maybe he had as well, I can't be sure…But anyway, he said he was going to the barn and I begged to go with him and he made us both kneel by the grave and he just said your prayer over and over, like a man possessed…I should have known something was badly wrong then, but I…well, I really let him down.”

I am amazed how much of a relief it is to say the words out loud. Perhaps because Christopher is a priest I feel his knowing might give me some sort of absolution.

“I'm sure you didn't,” Christopher murmurs.

“I'm sure I did. I was just so…I don't know, shocked isn't the word, or scared…by what he was doing, once he'd said Amen and let go of my arm I just crawled out onto the lawn. After a while he came and picked me up. And he was totally himself again, worried I'd get wet with the dew, but I couldn't handle it at all. He wanted to hug me, but I wouldn't let him. I…I had to force myself to take his hand to go back inside. I…I don't think we even spoke. But I should have known. I should have talked to him, not let my own fears get the better of me. He must have thought I'd abandoned him too.”

“Too?”

“He'd had a row with Adam. He didn't tell me about it, though. But now Adam's beating himself up and I'm telling him not to, while all the time…Listen, Christopher, I know this isn't completely my or Adam's fault, but...”

“You can't help the way you feel. It's natural, under the circumstances.”

“I know that too.” I try to smile at him. “Anyway, tomorrow we're opening the café again so with any luck we'll be too busy to dwell on it.”

“That's a brave thing to do, Alice.”

“Margaret talked us into it. Said it was no use moping and Adam needs to make a living. I thought Adam would be dead against it, but he seems to think it's the least he can do – to make sure there's a business here for when Owen comes back.”

“I think he will come back, Alice. When he's got things straight in his mind.”

Assuming that his mind is capable of getting straight, of course.

It is just as well Adam and I turn up early to open the café. I peer through the picture window as Adam unlocks the door. The tables are clear of crockery but I can see mug rings on the nearest one and cake crumbs on the floor. A newspaper hangs off the seat of a chair.

Inside it is no better. Cups and plates are piled high in the kitchen and there are stale grounds in the coffee machine. The first thing I do is open all the windows. Adam stacks the dishwasher before he starts to bake while I haul Henry the hoover across the floor. This is the easy bit; smiling at customers will be much more difficult.

But I cope. I am familiar with the coffee machine and the till so I navigate the early morning rush with little problem. When people ask why we weren't open yesterday I apologise and blame a failure to our power supply. It's the story Adam and I have agreed. Everything is fine until one of the elderly regulars says:

“No Owen today, pet?”

I try to smile while my stomach churns. “Not today,” I answer, “But you tell me just exactly how he makes your coffee and I'll do the best I can.”

“Mainly milk, please, with just a little bit of that espresso stuff. I don't like it too strong.” She sounds worried, so when the milk is hot we pour the coffee in together, a tiny bit at a time until it is just right, and I find I am over the bad moment. I can't stop myself from wondering how many more bad moments there will be.

The worst one comes late in the afternoon when a skinny man of about my own age comes in. He is wearing jeans, an open necked shirt, and a rather worried expression.

“What can I get you?” I ask, giving him my best new customer smile.

His reply is a question of his own. “Is this Owen Maltby's café?”

“Yes, it is.”

“Is he around?”

“No, but his co-owner is.” I turn to call Adam from the kitchen.

The visitor persists. “Is he not around because he's who the police have been searching the Swale for all weekend?”

“Who are you?” I try to sound arsy, but fail.

“Colin Smith, Yorkshire Post.”

Before my jaw can hit the floor I hear Adam behind me. “Get out of here, you little shit.”

“I'm only doing my job.” Smith looks nervous; unsurprisingly given Adam's bulk looming over the counter.

“Get out before I throw you out.”

The half dozen customers sitting at the tables begin to look around.

“Don't you touch me...”

Adam pushes past me so I grab his arm.

“No – Adam – he'll have you for assault.” But Smith is making for the door, just as fast as his long legs can carry him.

As the door clangs shut Adam collapses into me and starts to sob. Most of the customers go back to their coffees and cakes in a typically English display of embarrassment, except for a Kirkby Fleetham farmer who leaves his wife at their table and makes his way across to the counter.

He taps Adam on the shoulder. “Come on lad, pull thyself together. Come and sit with Mother and me for a bit. I'm sure lass here will make you a nice cup of tea.”

And Adam goes with him, docile as a lamb.

Instead of making a cup I get out one of the large teapots, then turn the sign on the door to closed and slip the catch. I can't face any more today. Two young mums with pushchairs hurry past me, which only leaves the couple by the window and the farmer and his wife. I fill the pot, load some parkin and flapjacks onto a tray, together with four clean cups and a jug of milk, and make my way across to the table.

Adam is calmer, listening to the farmer who is in full flow.

“...rumour in the village that it was young Owen they were looking for, but nowt was actually said. These things will get out though, in a place like this. It's not Leeds, lad.”

I pour the tea and sit down next to the farmer's wife, offering cakes around as though it was a tea party.

The farmer starts up again. “So it is right then, it were Owen they're looking for?”

Adam nods. “He left Alice's place to go for a walk very early on Sunday morning and no-one's seen him since.” It is a reasonable approximation of the truth.

“And Dick Wainwright saw him jump off the bridge.”

“We think Richard was mistaken,” I tell him, but I don't elaborate and he doesn't ask me to. Instead, his wife chips in.

“He's a good lad, Owen, always doing something for someone else. So cheerful about the place too, you'd never think...”

“He was very tired,” I venture.

“I don't doubt it, pet,” the farmer's wife continues. “When our Erica had shingles he were round every night to put on a poultice, but it fair took it out of him – looked so pale when he'd finished. His gran were the same; after our Paul were born and I had such a bad time, she were the only one to ease me, but she were always worn out afterwards.”

“He worked too hard in the café too,” Adam adds. “He shouldn't be doing it – he should be making his living from curing people – it's a rare talent and he shouldn't waste it.”

The farmer shakes his head slowly. “Charming is a gift, lad, not to be used for gain. Wouldn't be right. Owen knows that – he was born into it.”

This kindly couple know an awful lot about Owen, as most folk around here seem to. I am learning that lives are still conducted very much in public in these rural communities – there is little place for secrets. Which makes a total mockery of Owen being so chary about telling me.

“We just want to find him,” I burst out.

“Don't you think lad from the Post could've helped?” asks the farmer. “Look, if you won't speak to him, he'll only go digging around and talk to other people. Just tell him what you've told us and be done with it. He'll get a quote from the police too, and that'll be that.”

“But it won't be, will it? He'll dig around anyway.”

“Well what's to hide?”

There is a brief silence then Adam says, “Nowt,” very firmly.