The Other Side of the Door, Nicci French [new reading .TXT] 📗

that it was hard to speak, and when I did my voice sounded unfamiliar—low and hoarse in my ears. ‘What if I did? What if I had a crush on him? What if I loved him, wanted him, couldn’t keep away from him? What if I feel I’ll go mad with missing him? It’s not about that, it’s not about my feelings and it’s not about whether Hayden was a good man or not, whether he behaved badly. No—it’s about a life that’s been stolen. A life, Sonia. A whole life taken away.’

I stopped. The air throbbed around me. ‘Are you going to tell me what happened?’ I asked more quietly. ‘What Hayden said to you?’

‘Nothing happened.’

‘OK. I’ll tell you, then, as much as I know. It’s obvious enough now. Miriam told Hayden about you, and he must have told you. I’m sure it wasn’t blackmail. Hayden couldn’t be bothered with something like that. But he’d mention it just to take you down a peg or two. Hayden didn’t care for hypocrites.’

‘That’s enough!’ At last her voice had a crack in it.

‘That was bad enough for you, but you knew it would get worse. He wouldn’t be able to resist talking about it. He would probably have told me, wouldn’t he, for a start? And then no more deputy-headship, no more moral high ground, no Amos, no way out of this nasty little flat. So what did you do? Maybe you went round to tell him it wasn’t true and that he mustn’t tell anyone.’

‘This is all a fantasy.’

‘If you did, he would have laughed. Stuck-up Sonia, trying to cover her tracks. He’d have found it funny. Or perhaps you knew all along you were going to kill him. That’s what I think. The more I think about it, the more certain I am that you knew in advance you were going to kill him. He was a threat to you and your precious plans. You came to that rehearsal knowing, didn’t you? You were efficient and nice; you cleared up my flat for me; you sang “Leaving On Your Mind” more beautifully than you’d ever sung it before; you did everything impeccably. And all the time you knew what you were going to do. Then you left before anyone else and you went to his flat and you picked up the vase and cracked him over the head with it. Not manslaughter. Murder. Cold-blooded murder. You’re a killer.’

Sonia’s face was deathly pale, except for red spots on her cheekbones. ‘If I were you, I’d stop right now.’

‘Or what?’

‘Or I’ll go to the police and tell them I was your accomplice in taking away Hayden’s body.’

‘That’s fine,’ I said, ‘absolutely fine by me. I don’t care. It would be a relief to my conscience, actually—you know, that strange little voice in the head that torments you when you’ve done wrong. You tell them what I did and I’ll tell them what you did.’

‘They wouldn’t believe you. It’s all conjecture.’

‘Try it and see.’

‘Even if you’re right, Neal and you and I destroyed the evidence.’

I sat back and folded my arms against my chest. I felt hard and desolate. ‘You’re right,’ I said. ‘But there’s still Miriam Sylvester and the document you signed.’

‘So what’s the point of all this?’

‘You leave the school at once. You leave the teaching profession and never return. And you leave Amos.’

There was a deep silence.

‘That’s a lot of leavings,’ she said at last.

I almost smiled. It was like watching a great, indomitable, unshakeable performer. ‘You still don’t get it, do you? Have you ever heard of contrition or guilt? You killed someone. You planned it in advance and then you went and did it. The fact that I happened to know him and care about him isn’t the point now. You didn’t kill him to protect me or out of self-defence or by accident. You planned it and you did it because you didn’t want your nasty, ugly little secret to be discovered. You put that above a life. So, no, that’s not a lot of leavings, Sonia.’

‘Is there anything else you have to say?’ She was white-faced and her mouth was thin and fierce, but she remained in control of herself. What would make her crumble?

‘Yes. Yes, there is. First of all, if it ever looks like the police are about to charge anyone else, I’ll tell them everything, without a blink of hesitation. And, second, I’ll be watching you, don’t think that I won’t. If you don’t stick to my conditions, I’ll know. I won’t let it go.’

‘Right. Now, you can make your own way out, I think.’

‘You have to say you agree to my conditions before I leave.’

I saw her jaw clench and unclench and her nostrils flare slightly. Then she said, in a stony voice, ‘All right. I agree.’

‘Right.’ I got up from the chair. ‘Goodbye, then.’

‘Goodbye.’ Then she added, ‘I only did what you should have done. What you didn’t dare to do.’

For a moment, I saw what it would be like to kill someone out of hot, futile rage. I felt the pressure build in me like a gale until it throbbed behind my eyes and filled my throat and clenched my hands into fists. ‘You disgust me,’ I said. ‘Hayden was worth a hundred of you. A thousand.’

I turned away and walked out of Sonia’s kitchen. As I closed the door behind me, I heard a violent screaming and then a terrible sound of breaking glass, of objects crashing against surfaces. The screaming went on, like an animal sprung in a trap. I stood there for a few moments, listening to the woman who had once been my dearest friend howling like a creature in agony. Then I walked away.

Before

I took my time, walking up the road to Liza’s flat slowly, as if in a dream. People flowed past me and they seemed to belong to a different world, one full of purpose and certainty, of rules to keep