Charity Read online

  Charity felt no bitterness. Each time she looked in the mirror it was a reminder that she could have killed those two other people. Fortunately their injuries hadn’t been as serious as hers and they’d been discharged from hospital within a week.

  Ten minutes later she came out of the bathroom and hobbled over to the window to draw back the curtains. The windowsill was just the right height to lean on with her good arm and the slight stretch seemed to help the pain in her back.

  It was a beautiful morning. Dew glistened on the grass, a lilac bush was in full bloom, the many rose bushes in the biggest flowerbed were just budding and she could see the Thames beyond the garden wall.

  Holly Bush House was in Walton-on-Thames, a large and gracious 1930s house with sunray designs on the front windows, and a wide central staircase and imposing hall. Rob had arranged for her to come here to convalesce.

  Rob’s visits were the most important thing in her life now; sometimes, she felt, the only thing. Gradually, as the days went past Charity began to feel as if a heavy burden was being lifted from her shoulders. Day after day, she and Rob sat, putting pieces into the jigsaw.

  The day she told him about Daniel he sat very quiet and still, his legs crossed, listening attentively.

  ‘Hugh has become the sort of man you wouldn’t like,’ he said carefully. ‘I believe he really did love you, Charity, but he loved himself more. I’m so sorry about Daniel. I wish I could take away the hurt.’

  She told him how low she sank after the adoption, then moved on to lighter things, about how she had met up with Dorothy and Rita again.

  She knew she was glossing over other areas in her life. When she talked about sharing the flat she made no mention of the escort service. She spoke of the fire which killed her parents, but couldn’t bring herself to explain to him why she didn’t grieve for them. Yet she longed to confide in him.

  There were many times after these sessions that she wondered about Rob. She wanted to build up a picture of his life, of where and how he lived, but once Rob had taken her on as a patient, he became very skilful at keeping her as the main subject. Charity didn’t know whether this desire to know about him was just her natural curiosity, or a wish to redress the balance. After all, he knew so much about her.

  She liked his sensitivity, the way he could turn things she’d said around and make her laugh about them. But there was something tantalisingly untouchable about him which intrigued her.

  It worried her slightly that she spent so much time dwelling on him. Once or twice she’d even lapsed into imagining how it might have been if she’d fallen for him that summer, instead of Hugh, or indeed if she’d run into him before this breakdown began.

  The door opened behind her.

  ‘Good morning. Charity! How are we feeling today?’

  Charity turned and smiled at the nurse coming in with her breakfast.

  Molly Burke was her favourite nurse, a West Indian woman with a wonderful sense of humour and a delightful singsong voice. She was tall and slender, with curly hair like a fuzzy halo, huge dark brown eyes and a wide, wide smile.

  ‘Pretty good,’ Charity said, picking up her stick again and making her way over to the small table where Molly was putting her breakfast.

  ‘Well that’s good,’ Molly said. ‘Because I’ve got a surprise for you.’

  ‘Give us a clue?’ Charity laughed. Molly liked to play games. She often kept meals covered until Charity guessed what was under the lid.

  ‘Tall! Beautiful enough to make most of us give up.’

  ‘Not Dorothy!’ Charity’s eyes lit up and her smile almost split her face in two.

  ‘The very same.’ Molly giggled. ‘She turned up late last night, but you were already asleep. She’s checked into a hotel and unless I’ve read her wrong, she’ll be rushing back here any minute.’

  ‘Oh Molly.’ Charity’s spoon stopped halfway to her mouth. ‘She came all this way just to see me?’

  ‘Eat that breakfast,’ Molly commanded. ‘Then we’ll attempt to wash your hair.’

  The hair washing was finally accomplished between bouts of helpless giggling and groans of pain.

  ‘This is like some medieval torture,’ Charity gasped. ‘Do I really need clean hair?’

  ‘Where’s your pride, you floozie?’ Molly reproached her as she pummelled away at her scalp. ‘Cleanliness is next to godliness, so my aunt used to say. If you could see the filth coming out of your locks you’d be ashamed of yourself.’

  Charity was sitting in a chair when she heard Dorothy’s voice wafting along the landing outside her door. She felt a hundred times better in clothes and with her hair washed. As long as she didn’t try to move or look at her plastered arm, she could almost pretend she was her old self again.

  ‘Hallo babe!’

  The resonant contralto voice brought back so many images from the past. Charity couldn’t even attempt to get up; instead, to her embarrassment, tears filled her eyes.

  ‘It’s so good to see you, Dot,’ was all she managed to get out.

  ‘Now don’t start blubbing,’ Dorothy said as she paused in the open doorway, ‘or I’ll be on the next plane back.’

  She looked harder and thinner than Charity had noticed when they were in Florida, but still sensational in a cream silk maxidress, deeply tanned and with her hair in a chignon.

  For a moment the two girls just looked at one another, then Dorothy moved swiftly to her side, dropped down on to her knees and enveloped Charity in a hug.

  ‘You poor darling,’ she whispered and to Charity’s surprise her friend’s heavily mascaraed eyes were swimming with tears. ‘But I’m here now and I’m not leaving.’

  Charity had almost forgotten that the bond between them was still so strong. Just one telephone call and Dorothy had abandoned her lovers, her social life in Florida, and jumped on a plane.

  Rita had brought Dorothy up to date with all the news last night. Although Charity had been the police’s main suspect at first, a petrol receipt found amongst the wreckage of her car proved that she had stopped at a garage on the Abingdon Road, miles away from Studley, at around the time of Stephen’s murder. But because of her disturbed mental state and lack of memory, they still hadn’t ruled Charity out entirely as an accessory. Toby was another strong suspect, but he had a cast-iron alibi: he’d been drinking in the mess in Germany with at least six other officers. Prue and Nurse Giles had been struck off the police list but they were still vigorously investigating every avenue from ex-employees with a grudge, to random burglary.

  At Charity’s request Rita had rung friends, Lou and Geoff, Martin and Marjorie to ask them not to visit because she wasn’t up to it, but they had all sent flowers and cards. Both Dorothy and Rita were puzzled as to why there had been no enquiries, cards or flowers from Toby or Prue.

  Dorothy had never been diplomatic or subtle. The only way she knew how to tackle things was head on. She talked about her work in America, made Charity laugh with heartless tales about her lovers, examined her friend’s scars, but all the time she knew she had to strike at the real issue.

  ‘Come on, Chas,’ she said. ‘What brought all this on?’

  Charity shrugged.

  ‘You do know,’ Dorothy insisted. ‘You might not remember the events just before the accident, but Rita said you were moping about for weeks before that night. She said the last time you were your old self was when you and she went out for a drink together, soon after you came back from Florida.’

  Charity felt as if she was being cornered. She did, of course, remember only too clearly what had started it all, even if she couldn’t recall the hours before the accident.

  Shielding her brothers and sister was so deeply ingrained in her, she couldn’t bring herself to admit to Toby and the drugs. The thought of him being thrown out of the army or, worse still, police involvement terrified her. On top of that was the deep sense of shame she felt, for herself and Toby.

  ‘I can’t remember,’ she said. ‘I
t’s all hazy.’

  Charity had never been a good liar. Dorothy was pleased to see she wasn’t as transparent as she’d once been, but all the same she wasn’t quite convincing enough.

  ‘Don’t lie to me,’ she said reprovingly. ‘We’ve always been honest with one another. I think this must have something to do with Toby.’

  Charity knew she’d have to say something or Dorothy would keep on and on.

  ‘We did have a row,’ she admitted.

  ‘About what?’

  Dorothy had never liked Toby; he was too sly, too sparing with the truth. Last night Rita had told her a story gleaned from one of the office girls and if it was even partially true, Toby had some explaining to do.

  ‘He said I was a prostitute.’

  Dorothy wanted to laugh, but she didn’t dare.

  ‘That’s ridiculous,’ she said. ‘Are you sure he wasn’t getting you mixed up with me?’

  ‘But I was, Dot.’ Charity’s eyes dropped and a blush stained her face. ‘How do you think I got the money to buy the agency from Carmel?’

  Dorothy was shocked now. She never felt guilty about her own past: it was something she’d done, and she saw no point in agonising over it. But Charity! She always seemed so pure, so unworldly.

  ‘That night the man beat you up,’ Charity whispered, ‘I didn’t come home – remember? I was with Ted Parsloe, I got him to pay me two hundred pounds.’

  Dorothy bit back the desire to cheer anyone getting so much.

  ‘So what, Chas! We were all a bit wild then.’

  ‘But I came back and laid into you, didn’t I? I was such a hypocrite.’

  ‘If you hadn’t laid into me, I’d probably be touting my diseased fanny around Soho now.’ Dorothy’s voice wobbled. ‘You know I’ve done far worse and boasted about it too.’

  Charity was crying now, big tears rolling down her cheeks, and Dorothy was at a loss as to how to comfort her.

  ‘Oh Chas,’ she caressed her friend’s scarred cheek tenderly, ‘can’t you see that brother of yours is poisonous? Why do you go on letting yourself be hurt by your family?’

  ‘Because I love them, because I haven’t got anything else.’ Charity swiped at her tears with the back of her hand and tried to smile. ‘Maybe now I’ve told you it will help.’

  ‘And Prue? Where does she fit into this?’ Dorothy asked.

  ‘You know how starchy she is,’ Charity said bleakly. ‘I expect Toby told her and she’s ashamed of me.’

  ‘Let me try and rustle up some coffee.’ Dorothy stood up and smoothed down her silk dress. ‘Then we’ll have a chat about jollier subjects, like this dishy shrink Rita keeps raving about.’

  It was just after nine that night when Dorothy stepped out of a taxi in Greek Street, Soho. She had changed her silk dress for a beige linen trouser suit and her hair was tied back at the nape of her neck with a wide brown velvet ribbon.

  Daylight was just fading and all around her neon lights were being switched on, but it was a little early in the evening to be really busy. A bunch of American tourists were outside a strip club. One man in a white suit was posing next to a lifesized cutout nude girl, one of his hands on her breast, while his wife was taking his photograph.

  Dorothy felt distaste, not just at them but the whole sordid scene. It had been some years since she was last in Soho and it all looked so dirty and seedy. There were far more sex shops and strip clubs than she remembered and though it was too early for prostitutes to be out and about, every doorway seemed to be covered with cards offering the services of girls upstairs.

  The worst of it was, she might have ended up like that, putting out a card offering ‘French Lessons’ or ‘Strict Tuition’. It had all seemed such a joke seven or eight years ago when she thought her beauty and youth would last for ever. She had Charity to thank for stopping her running over that particular clifftop.

  Dorothy hurried on up the dingy staircase. Scuffed cream paint, the stairs littered with scraps of paper and balls of fluff. At the top a steel-plated door bore the sign BAYLISS ENTERPRISES in black lettering. She knocked and waited.

  She felt rather than heard someone looking through a spyhole at her. The door opened.

  ‘Hallo, George,’ she said. ‘Remember me?’

  George had been one of her first escort dates. He stuck in her mind because he’d informed her he didn’t normally pay to take a girl out, but he needed someone classy with him that night because he was out to impress a guy he was going to do a deal with. After that night she was given similar excuses by many men, but George was the only one she ever really believed.

  His slight frame, thinning hair and small greying moustache made him an unlikely candidate to run a string of clubs in Soho. But what he lacked in physical presence he made up for in his clothes. His suit was silver grey, a four or five hundred pound hand-tailored job, and he had enough gold jewellery to buy a house in the suburbs.

  ‘As if I could forget a face like that!’ He smiled. ‘It’s Dorothy! What on earth brings you to my door?’

  His firm handshake and the instant recognition gave Dorothy new heart. She hadn’t really expected him to be around Soho still. She’d also thought he’d be much seedier and older by now.

  He led her into an inner office. After the dingy staircase it seemed almost palatial, with leather chairs and a mahogany desk. If it hadn’t been for a view through the small window of chimneypots, dirty windows and tiny yards packed with beer crates, she might have thought they were in Mayfair.

  ‘Do sit down, Dorothy.’ He was as polite as she remembered, and it impressed her. ‘Can I get you a drink?’

  ‘Not now.’ She gave him a long look. Nine years ago he had seemed ancient. Now she saw he was possibly fifty, but moustaches often made men look older. ‘Maybe later. I came to see you, George because I thought you might be able to help me.’

  Dorothy’s name and her face had stayed in George’s memory for more than her beauty. She had amused him all those years ago because she was so open about being a gold-digger. George appreciated honesty; it was a rare commodity in his world.

  ‘I want you to find out anything you can about this man. I’ll pay you for the information.’

  She pulled out a photograph of Toby Stratton in uniform that Charity had once given her. George picked it up and looked at it hard.

  ‘An officer in Her Majesty’s eh? What’s this all about?’

  ‘I can’t tell you that,’ Dorothy said.

  ‘Can you just give a rough idea of what he’s done? Anything,’ George said. ‘It’s a bit like looking for the proverbial whatsit.’

  ‘I can’t, George,’ she said again. ‘All I can say is he’s a bit flash, he might use some of the clubs round here. I seem to remember you know everyone.’

  ‘The important people.’ He smiled, and for a moment he reminded Dorothy of David Niven.

  ‘Show it to them, then,’ she said arching her eyebrows delicately. ‘I’m sure I don’t have to ask you to be discreet?’

  ‘I’ll do my best.’

  To her surprise, Dorothy discovered that she found the older man rather attractive.

  ‘I want to know everything about him. Absolutely everything.’

  ‘I’ll put one of my contacts on to it right away.’

  George smiled with his eyes. ‘Where can I get hold of you?’

  ‘You can’t.’ Dorothy stood up. ‘I’ll contact you!’

  ‘And when we’ve got the full picture, what then?’ George asked.

  ‘That all depends on what you find.’ Dorothy made towards the door. ‘I’ll be in touch. And George – thanks! I had a feeling I was right coming to you.’

  Chapter Thirty

  Toby sat at the small desk in the drawing room, Nurse Giles a few feet away in a wing-backed armchair. His chequebook was in front of him and his pen, but he was trying to ascertain how little he could give to her whilst still appearing to be generous.

  In a blazer, grey slacks and a white open-nec
ked shirt he looked very much like the young Stephen in old photographs, and by the way Nurse Giles looked at Toby on occasions he guessed she wouldn’t mind offering him a little of her ‘nursing’ skills too.

  Toby felt he was walking a tightrope. He was anxious to get rid of anyone who knew the Pennycuicks and their history and this nurse knew more than anyone. But at the same time he wanted her complete sympathy, to make sure she retained some loyalty to the family.

  ‘You do understand I don’t want to let you go.’ He gave her the concerned, anxious look he had perfected with women. ‘You were so good with my uncle and I know you’ve come to see Studley as your home. But I don’t know what else to do, Dawn. You see until the estate has gone through probate, I don’t have the money to keep you on.’

  Toby had big plans. He would turn the old place into a country club eventually. But it was only a few weeks since he’d buried his uncle and until the police stopped probing and digging, he wasn’t going to do anything to raise anyone’s suspicions about anything.

  ‘I understand.’ Dawn Giles hung her head. She had been expecting this for weeks and was touched that Toby had been so kind and considerate to have kept her on with full pay all this time. But his compassionate leave from the army was up and he had to rejoin his regiment; apart from a bit of cleaning there was no place for her now. ‘You’ve been more than fair with me and I can stay with my sister until I find another job.’

  ‘The death of the colonel has left a big hole in both our lives.’ Toby sighed deeply, smoothing back his hair as if deeply concerned for her. ‘I thought he’d be around for years to guide me in my career and I feel too young for all this responsibility. I try so hard to believe in Charity’s innocence too, but she’s torn the family apart.’

  ‘You’ve got to try and put it aside,’ Dawn said, her maternal feelings aroused by Toby’s obvious grief.