The Mill on the Shore (29 page)

Later Molly sat on the bed in Rosie’s cell-like room and read the letter which the girl had been writing two nights before. It still lay, face down, on the dressing table:

Dear Mum,

This afternoon I went for a walk along the shore to the place where we used to go on Sunday afternoons for a picnic. Do you remember? Dad built a fire with driftwood below the tide line and we’d cook potatoes wrapped in foil. They were still hard as stones when the time came to go home and we always ended up chucking them into the water, seeing whose would go the furthest. Dad’s always seemed to go for miles, up into the sky and beyond Salter’s Spit. Halfway to Scandinavia we used to say.

I’m sorry you’ve been feeling a bit low lately. I’ll bring you back to Mardon as soon as I can. We’ll find a little house, just big enough for the two of us with a view of the river. You say I’ve deserted you but you know that’s not true.

Did you see the pictures of James Morrissey’s memorial service on the television? You said you’d get better if James Morrissey paid. I did it, just like you always told me to. I did it for you.

The letter was unsigned, unfinished. At that point Rosie had been interrupted by Molly and Jane and the bottle of wine. Molly replaced it on the dressing table. The police would find it and use it in evidence at Rosie’s trial. Molly hoped that a skilful defence lawyer would make use of it too.

She was roused by the sound of the distant dinner bell. Meg was obviously determined that the ritual of the Mill would go on.

They sat for dinner at the same single table as on the night when George and Molly had arrived at the Mill. Jane had set the table before she had heard of Rosie’s arrest and the neatly arranged cutlery, the empty glass held their attention. The younger children kept glancing surreptitiously towards the place before picking again at their food. They ate in silence. Only Meg seemed insensitive to the general mood of sadness.

‘So it was Rosie!’ she said brightly, speaking rather loudly because of her position at the head of the table. ‘I can hardly believe it. She was a good enough worker. And to think we always treated her as one of the family! She must have been unbalanced, deranged. What can one expect with parents like that? It’s in the upbringing of course.’

She seemed to bear the girl no malice for killing her husband, only for taking them all in. Now that she had got used to her role as widowed mother she was starting to enjoy it. It would always elicit sympathy and she no longer ran the risk that her marriage would be exposed as less than perfect. Molly saw that life would be more convenient for her in many ways without James around.

Meg had come in to dinner still carrying the typescript of an article she had been correcting. It was entitled ‘Coming to Terms with Bereavement’. Molly thought Meg had lost no time in sharing her experiences with the nation’s women and supposed she would be even more in demand as a contributor to women’s magazines after the publicity surrounding Rosie’s trial.

‘I saw that dreadful man Porter arrive to take her away,’ Meg went on in the same conversational tone. ‘I could see it wasn’t the time to intrude but I shall insist on an apology from him for not taking my allegations more seriously. Perhaps I should write to the Chief Constable. What do you think, George? I’m so grateful that you proved me right in all this.’

George said nothing. He found Meg’s righteous indignation almost unbearable.

‘Are you all right?’ Molly said quickly to Jane. The housekeeper was red-eyed, drawn. She made no attempt to eat.

‘I wasn’t much of a friend to her, was I?’ Jane said abruptly. ‘All this time and she couldn’t trust me enough to tell me what was bugging her. I knew she wasn’t happy but I could never persuade her to talk. I should have seen how angry she was. I could have stopped her …’ She paused. ‘Now she’s ruined her life and there’s nothing I can do to help. She wouldn’t even let me go to the police station with her. Perhaps she thought I’d make a fuss. She probably thought I’d be useless.’

‘She wouldn’t let anyone go with her,’ Molly said. ‘She wanted to see it through on her own. It had nothing to do with you.’

‘Besides,’ Meg interrupted, ‘Jane, my dear, that would have been quite unsuitable. The police station! What would your mother say? It’s bad enough as it is. Poor Celia. She sent her daughter to me for safekeeping and you became friends with a murderer!’

‘We were friends,’ Jane said quietly to Molly. ‘ Whatever she’s done somehow that’s still important.’

‘I think I’d better phone Celia and explain before she reads about it in the press,’ Meg continued, as if Jane had not spoken. ‘I suppose there will be a lot of press coverage.’ She seemed lost in thought for a moment and Molly guessed uncharitably that she was picturing headlines like ‘ Brave Widow Fights Police Indifference. Justice at Last’. ‘I hope Celia doesn’t expect me to send you home to her, Jane. I don’t know how we’ll manage as it is if we’re opening for business again next week. Rosie was a competent cook. One must give her that. I must say it will be a relief when we get back to normal.’

Ruth looked at her mother with astonishment. How could she talk so glibly about things returning to normal? She was tempted briefly to make a grand gesture. She could walk out, leave home, tell Meg that she could not stand the hypocrisy and pretence any longer. She could live with her father or find a flat of her own. But she knew she would never do it. In the end she did not feel strongly enough. She would stay here, one of the children, pretending to be a dutiful daughter. She would read bedtime stories to Tim and Em, prevent Caitlin’s wilder excesses, be polite to the students. She would even answer the visitors’ questions about Aidan Moore.

‘Yes,’ she would say. ‘Of course we knew Aidan. It was a terrible tragedy. He was a brilliant artist. And a good friend.’

Eventually she would go away to college but even then she would return, every holiday, to the Mill. That was how most families worked. And perhaps it was healthy, the detachment, the dependence on show and form. Look at Rosie after all. Look what a close and loving family did for her.

It was left to George and Molly to make the grand gesture. When the meal was over they stood up and said that they were leaving.

‘Surely not, George,’ Meg said, ignoring Molly. ‘ Not at this time of night. At least stay until tomorrow.’

‘We’ve done what we came for,’ George said. ‘We’ve no more reason to stay.’

‘I was hoping to entertain you in the flat this evening, to say you know, thank you for all your help.’

‘There’s no need for that,’ George said. Then, brutally: ‘We’ll send our bill in the post.’

He saw his rudeness had got through to her but she would never have been impolite in return. Not in front of the children. She turned away and composed herself, not allowing her irritation to show.

‘Well if I can’t persuade you …’ she said. ‘Perhaps we’ll see you at the Mill again in happier circumstances.’

George said nothing. He knew they would never go back.

First published in 1994 by Macmillan

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