It’s as if my muscles are attached to his words. My hands feel weak and wobbly.
Carefully, I place my mug down on the floor next to my chair.
‘You have to understand one thing first,’ Ollie says quietly. ‘I get you at the end of this story. Paddy Stelling doesn’t. And … I really believe this: the future in which you and I are happily married already exists. We can’t make itnothappen, however hard we try. Believe me, I knowhow crazy that sounds. And it might be some bullshit fantasy. But it’s what I know to be true.’
Or want to be true.
Then he starts to tell me: all the things I wish weren’t true, but are. I sit, still and quiet, and listen to it all: everything he’s done, nearly done, refused to do; everything he’s thought and felt and feared, everything he knows.
All of it.
Apart from who killed Marianne – because, Ollie tells me, and I believe him, that’s the one thing he doesn’t know anything about.
32
Friday 3 November 2023, 2.30 p.m.
SIMON
‘Idon’t get it,’ said Sellers. He and the rest of the team had met Simon and Charlie at The Brown Cow after an urgent summons from Simon. ‘You’re saying the handwritten diary bits from 2006 were written by Marianne Upton, but she lied to Tulloch and said Jemma Stelling had written them?’Cause if it’s not that, I’m clueless.’
‘Bless him,’ said Charlie, who was on to her second gin and tonic.
Simon decided to be gallant and not mention that it had taken her a while to get it too. ‘Sorry, mate,’ he said, appreciating Sellers’s eternal willingness to admit to being stumped. ‘Marianne didn’t lie or mislead Tulloch in any way. He misled himself – completely.’
‘Meaning?’ said Gibbs.
‘Waterhouse is suggesting that the misleading of Tulloch was done by none other than Tulloch himself,’ said the Snowman in a monotone.
Simon said, ‘Marianne posted the handwritten diary pages, snail mail, to Tulloch with a note saying “Read these.” That’s all it said, apart from her initial, M. It’s in that lot somewhere.’ Simonpointed to the papers on the extra table they’d pulled up. ‘She never pretended Jemma had written the 2006 diary. Tullochassumedthat what he’d been sent were extracts from Jemma’s diary. Why? For the same reason I assumed it when I first read them. “The Tyrant”, all of that. Until you know different, it reads like a daughter, or stepdaughter, who hates her tyrannical mother – which is what Tulloch knows Jemma is. Of course he thought it was her.’
Sellers looked unconvinced. ‘How can you be sure, if the Tyrant’s not referred to as Jemma even once?’
‘She’s never referred to as Marianne either,’ said Simon. ‘Unlike the villain in the laptop diary, which Jemmadidwrite, in which the villain’s name is Marianne throughout. Now, is that alone enough for us to be certain? No. So here’s the rest, and when you’ve heard it, you’ll be as sure as I am. First of all, the easy one: cocktails.’
‘Mine’s a Negroni,’ said Gibbs. ‘Porn Star Martini for him.’ He nodded in Sellers’ direction. Both had empty pint glasses in front of them; neither had ever been seen drinking anything but beer.
‘Marianne didn’t drink alcohol,’ said Simon. ‘Jemma does. Jemma has a favourite cocktail: Mai Tai. First diary entry in the batch sent to Tulloch, or maybe second, I can’t remember – mentions that the Tyrant’s favourite cocktail is a Mai Tai.’
‘But whoever wrote the handwritten pages is evidently madly in love with Oliver Mayo,’ Sam Kombothekra said. ‘Are you thinking—’
‘That Marianne was in love with Mayo?’ said Simon. ‘No. She wasn’t. Go back over all of it, carefully, and you’ll see that absolutely nowhere in those 2006 diary pages is there anything that specifies this isromanticlove we’re readingabout. You assumed it was on your first reading, like I did and like Charlie did, because you assumedJemma was the writer.’
‘What about the part where she talks about Mayo’s great beauty, and how stunning his kids would be?’ Sellers asked.
‘Recognising beauty doesn’t necessarily imply romantic attraction,’ said Simon.
‘We all want beautiful things in our lives, don’t we?’
‘You might want to tell that to your shirt and trousers,’ Proust said. Gibbs laughed.
‘I’m not sure about this, mate,’ Sellers told Simon. ‘I still think Jemma could have written it.’
‘How about the part about speed cameras, and going for health checks?’ said Simon. ‘The gist of all that was: do things properly, don’t just pretend or do half measures. So rather than look out for speed cameras, stop speeding altogether. Instead of getting a good blood sugar result from the doctor and then celebrating by scoffing a load of doughnuts, just change your diet forever and eat only healthy foods.’
‘How does any of that prove—’ Gibbs started to ask.
‘That Marianne wrote the 2006 diary pages? Jemma Stelling’s never learned to drive.’ Simon tried not to sound too triumphant. ‘She came to the nick by cab on Monday, and Charlie had to arrange a uniform to drive her to Devey House afterwards. Which means speeding and speed cameras aren’t part of her life, never have been.’
