Out of Sight (19 page)

‘I'm sorry. I've tried, but I can't come up with any conscious memory of before I started work.'

‘What about your father?' asked Belinda in disbelief.

‘Well, they were here, I'm aware of that.'

‘But the way he behaved!'

When Belinda stared at him, he turned to Cutler. ‘Dad can be a bit abrasive,' he said with a shrug. ‘Probably why he never got where he wanted in life.'

‘How could you forget it?' cried Belinda.

‘What?' Patrick was genuinely puzzled

‘Him telling you to get rid of Daniel!'

Patrick saw Cutler glance involuntarily at Beverley, who immediately wrote something in her large notebook. He felt clammy and sick.

‘Let's just go back a bit first, shall we, Mrs Hinde?' said
Cutler. ‘Your parents-in-law had been staying the weekend?'

‘Yes,' answered Belinda. ‘We had a nice enough time with them.' She glanced sideways at Patrick, who was staring at the floor. ‘I have Monday off,' she continued, ‘so they spent the day with me. They went off yesterday when we both left for work. Agnès got distressed when she realised that' – Belinda took a steadying breath – ‘realised that Daniel went to a childminder.'

‘Agnès is your mother?' Cutler asked Patrick. ‘Mr Hinde?' he prompted when Patrick appeared not to have heard.

Patrick nodded.

‘And she was unaware of your childcare arrangements? Why was that? Were they deliberately kept from her?'

When Patrick made no move to answer, Belinda explained. ‘No. They live in Geneva, so we don't see much of them. But now Geoffrey's retiring, and they're over here house-hunting.'

‘Where were you both when your father-in-law said these words?' Cutler asked.

‘I was in the hallway, putting on Daniel's shoes,' Belinda answered promptly.

‘And you, Mr Hinde?'

‘I'm not certain.'

‘You're not able to recall the moment?'

Patrick shook his head miserably. ‘Not really.'

‘Then would you mind going on, Mrs Hinde? How were your in-laws travelling? By car?'

‘Yes. They were all packed, ready to go.'

‘But Agnès became upset?'

‘She's a very anxious soul. Obsessive compulsive. That's right, isn't it?' Belinda turned to Patrick, who was staring wildly at the door. He dragged his gaze back to the watching faces and managed to nod. ‘Geoffrey can't stand it when she gets like that. I haven't spent a great deal of time with them, but when she starts to obsess about something, he just loses it.'

‘So what happened?'

‘She didn't want us to leave Daniel with the childminder; a stranger, she said. Then Geoffrey just grabbed Daniel, shoved him at Patrick, and told Patrick to get rid of him.'

‘Is what your wife says correct, Mr Hinde?'

Shamefaced, Patrick nodded. ‘It must be.'

‘And what did you do?'

‘I remember hugging him. Holding him, waiting for them to go.'

‘You didn't mention this yesterday.'

‘I'd forgotten it.'

‘But you remember it now?'

‘I remember being a bit upset.'

‘Angry?'

‘Sure.'

‘At Daniel?'

Patrick was uncomprehending. ‘Daniel? No,
never
. At—' Patrick stopped, defeated. ‘Oh what's the point? He can't help it. It's not his fault.'

‘Not whose fault?'

‘Dad. There's no use getting angry at him. It's not going to change anything. You just have to go along with it until you can escape.' He shook his head wearily. ‘I just wanted them to go away.'

‘But surely this is the heart of it?' Belinda appealed to Cutler and Beverley. ‘It's stuck in my head all night, going round and round, Geoffrey telling Patrick, get rid of him!' She turned to Patrick, who shrank back into his chair. ‘He said get rid of him. That's why this happened!'

‘No,' groaned Patrick. ‘No, it's not their fault. It's nothing to do with them. Don't start that. Don't. Please. Don't bring them into it. It's my fault. I'm the only one responsible. There's no one to blame but me.'

‘But—'

Cutler held up a hand and Belinda, accepting his authority, held back her words. Heavy tears began to run down her cheeks, and she wiped them aside as if they were some irritation unconnected with her. ‘We will need to talk to your parents.' Cutler ignored Patrick's cry of protest. ‘If you could write down their contact details and where they're staying.'

‘Have they been told?' asked Belinda, looking to Patrick.

He took a deep breath. ‘Not yet.' There was silence as everyone looked at him. ‘They're in Weybridge.' He thought for a moment. ‘There'll be a train, I suppose.'

‘We'd like you to be interviewed by a forensic psychologist, Mr Hinde. I'll get in touch as soon as we can set up an appointment.'

Cutler and the social worker got to their feet. Cutler assured Belinda that she could call him at any time if there was anything she wanted to ask; that they would keep her informed of everything that was happening; and that, probably the day after the post-mortem, they would be able to spend time with Daniel if they so wished, and could make funeral arrangements as soon as his body had been released by the coroner. Patrick sat on, immobile, an image of his mother's face turning to him in distress playing repeatedly in his head.

As the others prepared to leave, he finally found a voice. ‘I can't do it. You don't understand. It's impossible to speak to them.'

When Patrick raised his head, he saw the three of them regarding him with varying degrees of baffled pity. Suddenly he was a small boy again, at the start of the summer holidays, alone at his bedroom window, one hand clutching the dusty linen of the
toile de Jouy
curtains as he looked out at his mother's taxi driving away.

Patrick sat down beside Agnès, tolerating the wait while Geoffrey made a business out of ordering him a soft drink. It had been a short walk from Weybridge station to the hotel, which he found to be just the kind of place he'd expect his father to select; once presumably a coaching inn, it was now trying too hard to appear modern. He was glad he had been able to prepare himself for this task alone. Immediately after Cutler's visit, Grace had come
downstairs carrying Belinda's overnight bag, and soon afterwards had taken Belinda away to stay with her. Now he had found his parents in the small lounge area. Allowing himself the cowardice of a contained public space in which to release such news he had chosen not to suggest that they go upstairs or out for a walk. Taking his mother's hand, he began his explanation.

‘Maman, Dad, there's no other way to tell you. Something's happened to Daniel.' Agnès' manicured nails dug into the flesh of his palm. ‘He's gone,' Patrick said quietly. ‘He died.'

‘Is that why you didn't call us back?' demanded Geoffrey. Patrick closed his eyes. When he opened them again, he could see that Geoffrey regretted his words but had no clue as to how he might recover himself. Patrick leant across and patted his father's arm.

‘It's all right, Dad. I guess you've been worrying. I'm sorry.'

Geoffrey nodded like some Chinese mandarin toy, trying gruffly to compose himself. Patrick turned to his mother, ready to soothe and reassure. Yet, though her eyes had widened in alarm, they remained clear: always anticipating catastrophe, now it had struck, maybe she would not after all lose control. ‘My poor boy,' she said, and Patrick realised with a terrible inward collapse of resolve that she meant him, her own son. ‘
Mon pauvre
Patrice. To lose your little one. I understand how you must feel. But you must tell us the rest when you are able.'

His mother's sympathy, so seldom available to him throughout his life, was sad and disorienting. He forced himself to stick to the words he had rehearsed during his journey in the tawdry, litter-strewn train. ‘I have to tell you now, Maman. There are other people who will want to speak to you.'

‘Why? What happened?' Geoffrey's voice was harsh.

‘You'll have to decide for yourselves. I left Daniel in the car. I forgot he was there.' He ignored Agnès' cry and ploughed on. ‘The cause of death was heatstroke and dehydration. I am solely responsible.'

Geoffrey sagged into the plush hotel armchair, looking suddenly old and frail. ‘We're due back in Geneva next week,' he said.

‘Yes, I know.'

‘So what about the funeral?' Geoffrey persisted.

‘Apparently there has to be an inquest or something first.' Patrick heard his own words as squalid and sordid, but kept going. ‘We were warned it might be weeks. Or even longer.'

Geoffrey stared at him aggressively, and Patrick recognised this as a symptom of shock. Agnès rose uneasily to her feet, her expression bleak. ‘We don't need to discuss this now, do we?' she asked her husband, who nodded his agreement with apparent indifference. ‘Not here, like this.' Unused to following his mother's lead, Patrick rose too, and she gave him a short, fierce hug, the kindness of which made him tremble.

‘Who is it we have to see?' asked Geoffrey, levering himself out of his chair with unaccustomed difficulty.

‘A Detective Inspector Cutler. He's been very decent.'

‘When is that likely to be? We'll need to be told if we're to change our travel arrangements.'

‘Soon, I suppose. I'll let him know your plans.'

‘We'll be ready.' Geoffrey drew himself up, and Patrick could picture his father preparing himself, brushing the jacket of his good suit, straightening his silk tie, pulling out his shirt-cuffs, doing all he could, thought Patrick poignantly, to save his train wreck of a son.

‘Go now,' said Agnès, pushing Patrick from her. He was amazed that the expected collapse had not materialised. He glanced across at his father who, thinking himself unobserved, was shaking his head in despair. ‘You'll be tired,' Agnès went on. ‘I understand the tiredness. Go now, Patrice. Look after yourself, and Belinda.'

Geoffrey mumbled his farewells, his gaze fixed on the carpet. Ashamed at preferring this resigned fatalism to one of his father's impotent rages, Patrick made his way out of the hotel. He walked back to the station with his shoulders bent stiffly forwards, shielding his heart, afraid to straighten his spine in case he jarred the brimming pain.

Belinda came back unannounced from her sister's the following day. The principal at the school where she taught had assured her that, with so few days of the summer
term remaining, there was no reason for her to return before September. She had offered to take it on herself to cancel Belinda's private lessons, if she so wished.

At home, Belinda and Patrick moved around one other in as diplomatic and courteous a way as possible; while she had been in London, he had moved all he needed into the spare room, which she accepted without comment. They continued by tacit consent to share mundane tasks, staring like zombies into the fridge or putting clothes into a washing machine whose simple controls had morphed into indecipherable hieroglyphics. Only their inability to comprehend fully the finality of their bereavement got them through the empty days together. Belinda overheard his instructions to the local garage to pick up their Renault as soon as the police released it, to repair the broken windows and then drop it off for sale at a car auction, but said nothing, just as she wordlessly absorbed his unspoken resolve not to get in a car even as a passenger, although she remained willing to take a taxi or accept a lift from friends.

Patrick did not care to investigate whether his gratitude was for her absence of comment or because she accepted his avoidance. The one comfort he allowed himself was to take long baths, sometimes two or three a day. He would lie, relieved of all effort of will, watching his naked limbs float in the tepid undemanding water as he tried – and failed – to submerge his consciousness in the featureless element.

Although friends arrived unannounced to drop off home-cooked meals, averting their gaze and hurrying away, eventually Belinda and Patrick had to draw up a list for the supermarket. They struggled to imagine future needs; once there and faced with a plethora of choices, they stared helplessly at the packed shelves, not knowing if they wanted all of it or none. As they moved along the aisles, they crafted their faces to hide their confusion from those pushing trolleys alongside them, people who seemed to feel no absurdity in belonging here, in making precise choices among varieties of crispness, flavour or scentedness. Patrick marvelled how he had ever viewed this neon-lit, air-conditioned realm as mundane. Their mutual bewilderment bonded them, gave them something to share, and they sat beside one another on the bus home, embracing bags of fruit, milk and loo rolls on their laps, feeling the comradeship of strangers in a strange land.

When his nightmares began, they were not about Daniel. The hours of darkness when he was able to bring Daniel back, could re-live his intoxicating smell, his laugh, his sturdy limbs, the absolute trust with which his son had allowed himself to be carried in his father's arms – those nights provided fleeting moments of serenity, almost of happiness. He knew they were just dreams, waking reveries, but he didn't care. So long as he didn't open his eyes and could imagine Daniel's warm breathing presence beside him, then some vital morsel of his soul felt less bereft. The nightmares came when he was most deeply asleep.
Though he was often awoken by his own screaming, he was certain that they were not about the discovery of Daniel's body – he re-lived those minutes in the yard behind his office every single day when awake. All he could recall was how appalled his inner sleeping self had been by the ravages of destruction unleashed by his despotic nightmare self, but the task of delving further into his subconscious seemed insurmountable.

Privately he celebrated the terror they inspired. He deserved to suffer; until he was told what his punishment was to be, he yearned to be shunned, cast out, banished. He could not bear it when people were kind to him. He had been amazed by the polite tolerance of relative strangers, how they would tiptoe around, mouthing well-meant platitudes when he would not have blamed them for showing all the disgust he was convinced they must feel. He secretly cherished Grace's open condemnation, and was sure that sometimes he caught Belinda, too, looking at him as if trying to divine what truly lay concealed inside him. He shrank from her inspection before admonishing himself that he had no right to consider himself. Believing that his own feelings no longer mattered, he did his best to hide evidence of his grief from her, as she mostly did from him. If, on entering a room, he came upon her weeping noisily, her mouth ugly and twisted, her eyes blind and swollen, oblivious to his existence, he would quietly close the door and go away, believing that because he was the cause of her agony, he had no right to offer comfort.