Chapter Twenty-eight
Monday 28th July
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‘Son was wrong,’ said Thelma.
Pat and Liz looked at her. ‘That’s what Annie said. That the truth was important, love doesn’t excuse us and there have to be limits – then she mentioned the memorial service for Davey, quoted from that sonnet Bun Widdup read out, and finally that – those three words …Son was wrong.’
There was a frowning pause as the three considered.
‘What bit of the sonnet did she quote?’ asked Liz eventually.
Thelma got out her green mark book, even though she knew those muttered words by heart. ‘“Golden lads” and “fear no more”,’ she said.
‘It sounds like she was leading up to saying something,’ said Pat. ‘But never got to what it actually was.’
‘What she said – it doesn’t make sense.’ Liz shook her head in frustration.
Thelma sighed. ‘It did to Annie. After she’d spoken … she looked peaceful – as if she’d got something off her chest.’
‘But what though?’ said Liz.
‘Son was wrong,’ mused Pat. ‘Wrong aboutwhat?’
‘This is Son, Davey Fletcher’s partner?’ said Liz.
‘Who else could she have been meaning?’ said Pat a trifle impatiently. ‘There’s no one else called Son in the mix and no one else had children – any sons – not Neville, or Caro or Davey Fletcher or even Annie—’
‘Chloe has children,’ said Liz. ‘A child rather.’
‘A daughter,’ said Thelma. ‘Not a son.’
There was a pause. Pat sighed, shook back her hair. It felt like straw in this hot weather. How she longed for cooler days, so she could return to her baggy tops. She was sick of sundresses and T-shirts were only really good for the Tiffanys of the world. She stopped, with a jolt of feeling. Soon Tiffany would be needing to wear tops as baggy and loose as her own.
‘So, what did he say?’ Liz’s voice cut into Pat’s reverie, bringing her back into the here and now. ‘You saw him.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Pat. ‘I was miles away. What did who say?’
‘Son Masters,’ said Liz. ‘When you saw him. Did he say anything he might have been wrong about?’
Pat frowned, recalling that amiable, sad figure in Jemima’s Pantry. ‘He said he was at the memorial service,’ she said counting the memories off on her fingers. ‘He said he was away on a book event when Davey set out on his drive in the blizzard. And he said how Davey was in a bad place about the report coming out.’ She frowned again, looking into space. ‘My main memory,’ she said. ‘My overriding impression is that he didn’t seem to bear Neville Hilton any particular ill will. Which felt a bit strange, seeing how it was Neville’s Ofsted report that caused Davey to drive off that day.’
‘Of course, Son could have been pretending,’ observed Thelma.
‘He could well have been pretending,’ said Liz, more forcefully. ‘Remember he has a criminal record for GBH.’
‘I know that’ said Pat. ‘I just don’t think he was lying to me. He was one of those people who wears his heart on his sleeve.’
‘But if he was hiding his anger,’ said Liz, a skip of excitement in her voice. ‘That’s what Annie could have been referring to. Son was wrong. Meaning he was angry and he confronted Neville.’
‘Only …’ Thelma frowned as she stirred her coffee.
‘Only what?’ said Pat.
‘Only that’s not how you’d say it,’ said Thelma, frowning up at the ceiling fan. ‘“Son was wrong” implies a mistake – a wrong choice or decision – not that he was lying about something.’
