‘You heard.’ Marcus waved his hand again. ‘Step aside.’
Jake stepped aside and stared at Marcus, unsure whether to leave so he could have some time alone. He decided that it was a good idea, so he turned to go. Outside in the main gardens, just beyond the hedge, Jake stopped abruptly. ‘You’re a bloody fool,’ he admonished himself. He took a deep breath and retraced his steps.
Chapter 39
Jake approached the garden bench. ‘May I sit?’
‘You can do what you like,’ Marcus replied without looking up.
‘Would you rather be alone?’
Marcus slowly turned his head to look up at Jake. ‘I am alone.’ He looked across at the memorial stone in the centre of the garden.
Jake hovered, unsure what that response was meant to mean.
He sat. Jake didn’t know whether Marcus wanted silence while he sat there, but Jake desperately wanted to say something. He turned to look at Marcus’s profile. ‘Back in the house, in the cellar, I wanted tell you something,’ Jake began.
‘Don’t talk, Jake – please.’
Jake had known it was a bad idea. He got up to leave.
Marcus reached for his arm. ‘Don’t go.’
Surprised, Jake sat again.
Marcus turned to him. ‘Will you do something for me?’
Jake looked over at the stone, feeling absurdly guilty all of a sudden. ‘Sure, anything you want – just name it.’
‘Will you look at the contents of the envelopes?’
‘But …’ Jake stopped short. Marcus was probably right – this wasn’t the time or place to talk about what had happened on thatmountain.
He was surprised by Marcus’s question though. ‘Why are you so bothered about those?’ He imagined it was because his father’s name was on one of the envelopes.
‘For starters, I know you,’ said Marcus. ‘You’ll just feel as guilty as hell if you don’t at least look at them for a dying woman. Oh, and I think you’ll find them quite interesting.’
Jake raised an eyebrow. Marcus had piqued his interest. ‘All right. The envelopes are in my coat pocket. I left them in the car.’
Marcus nodded. After a time, Jake left Marcus alone in the garden and made his way back to the car. He sat motionless in the car, staring at the house for a while before gathering up his coat from the back seat and taking out the crumpled envelopes from his pocket. He looked at them. He did not feel in the mood to get involved in other people’s issues. He had enough of his own. But for some reason, Marcus thought it was important for him to see them.
Jake opened an envelope, fishing inside with his fingertips for the letter. Strangely, he couldn’t feel a sheet of paper inside. He turned the envelope over. A single photograph fell into his lap. He picked it up. A child, a boy of not more than five years old, stared back at him with a remarkable likeness to himself. He was holding a ball in a playful pose, suggesting he was about to throw it at the photographer as soon as the picture was taken. With the other hand, he was brushing a mop of blond hair out of his blue eyes.
It must have been this that had got Marcus’s attention; it was unmistakably Jake in the photo. Jake wondered how this picture had come to be in the hands of a complete stranger. He examined the photo carefully, trying to ascertain whether he was looking at a childhood photo of himself or not. He didn’t recall the photo being taken, or indeed ever having seen it.
He turned the photo over. ‘Ralph,’ he said, reading the singleword scribbled in the upper left-hand corner. ‘Then this can’t be me in the photo.’
He recalled that during his visit to see Arnold and Martha, Arnold had mentioned that Martha had said the nameRalph. Jake had suggested that perhaps it was someone from her past, maybe a previous husband, even though Arnold was adamant that this wasn’t the case.
A tap on the car window startled Jake. The red-headed young gardener was peering in at the window. Jake hastily put the photo back in the envelope. When he looked back, the lad had stepped from the car and was standing a few feet away, the rake he had been carrying now lying on the shingle drive.
Jake reached for the car door handle. He got out of the car. ‘Marty, isn’t it?’ Jake extended his hand and discovered that the lad, on closer inspection, was a little older than he’d first thought; perhaps twenty.
‘Mr Campbell-Ross.’ Marty leaned forward to take his hand. He had a mobile phone in the other hand. ‘Gayle texted me, said you might be popping round.’
Jake nodded, not surprised. Gayle probably knew he nipped in the house for a drink and a break, and didn’t want him getting into trouble if Jake caught him. She didn’t realise that Marty wouldn’t be in trouble – far from it.
‘I’m sorry for growling at you this morning.’ Jake glanced in the direction of the hidden garden.
