The Skeleton Man

It’s frightening how quickly we forget the dead; all I wanted to do was escape. No one had seen me, the path was deserted, and then the clock in the church chimed seven. So I ran quickly to The Dring, and then down to the New Ferry Inn. I bought people drinks and something clever in my brain cut out the memory of what I’d done. And I thought that if I stayed with them, part of the village that night, I’d be safe when they found her body. I’d be safe as long as I was one of them. And I wasn’t alone, I wasn’t the only outsider.

And then the hours passed, measured only by the fact that she wasn’t there. I talked, shouting through the alcohol, trying to feel a part of what was happening, trying not to think of her lying in the dark now, growing cold.

There was a fight in the pub – the Smith brothers. Mark wanted to pool the money, set up a building firm in Peterborough. Matthew wanted to set up a business with Paul Cobley, the kid who ran the taxis with his parents. They’d always been friends. Mark said he knew why his brother wanted to be with Paul.

He let the accusation hang in the air. There were sniggers, a crowd forming, smelling blood. I didn’t want to join in but I had to, I couldn’t stand out, not then.

We spilled out into the back yard – Ken Woodruffe pushed us out – the fight whirling with Paul trying to keep the brothers apart. I don’t know how it would have ended but it stopped when they dragged little Peter Tholy into the bar. When I saw Jimmy Neate’s face I knew he’d found her, there was death in his face. And George Tudor had the boy’s neck in the crook of his arm, twisting, smearing blood from cut lips over his skin.

‘It’s Tholy. Peter Tholy’s killed Kathryn,’ Jimmy said. And there he was, Laura, pathetic Peter, his thin arms shaking with fear and yet proud, he said, to have been the father of her child.

‘I’ve got money,’ he said, trying to stop it happening. We laughed, enjoying the torment. Penniless Peter. He said he hadn’t done it but we didn’t listen, trusting George because he’d always been Peter’s big brother, his champion when the bullies had circled.

So I said nothing. Nothing when we took him down into Woodruffe’s cellar. Nothing when Jimmy kicked away the stool.

Next day we met at Orchard House, all of us, all twelve. We got our stories straight. Walter Neate said they’d buried Kathryn with her son and replaced the stone. George Tudor promised he’d cover Peter Tholy’s tracks, make sure there were no questions. And we left the boy hanging, the cellar sealed up. Then we had a drink, swearing silence, and I felt ashamed that for the first time I felt part of it, Laura, part of Jude’s Ferry.

And I thought that was the version of my life I’d have to live with until I died. A life in which I killed Kathryn Neate and let an innocent boy hang for the crime.

And then Jimmy Neate rang me. They’d found the body in the cellar, so he was making sure we were all going to toe the line. He had names, people we could put in the cellar; the guilty men, names plucked from tombstones. I met Jimmy on Cuckoo Bridge, because I said I thought it was time to tell the truth. And I was scared, scared that if they asked questions – the police – I’d let them all down. I just couldn’t do it. And Elizabeth would know, she’d sense that I hadn’t told her, hadn’t told her why I didn’t want children, which was the one thing she did want.

Jimmy hit me from behind, but I was conscious when I went into the water, and I saw him above as I floated away.

And then, at last, God did smile on me. Thank you, Laura, for those e-mails. It’s always the innocent detail that saves us. You were telling me about the Skeleton Man, telling me what Philip had told you, what the grave robbers had found in Peyton’s tomb. The chipped ribs, the silent knife wound.

A wound to the heart of Kathryn Neate.

So there is someone I have to see before I die because there are two questions now. Why did he kill her, and why did he take Jude’s bones away?

When I have answers I can die. I’ve remembered too much to think about a life now. So I won’t see you again, and now, at the end of my life, that’s the saddest thing.

I’m going to bury my son.

Jason

‘There is someone I have to see before I die,’ said Dryden. ‘Because there are two questions now. Why did he kill her, and why did he take Jude’s bones away?’

Dryden thought of the body hanging on the wire. Had Jason Imber taken his questions to Neate’s garage?

He rang Humph and met him on Market Street. The cabbie was half out of the car, sweat in wide wet horseshoes under his arms. ‘There’s something up at the unit – when I dropped Laura at the doors there were coppers everywhere. Security bloke says one of the patients has done a hop from a ground-floor room. Police are all over it like a horse blanket.’