The Grave Tattoo. Val McDermid
far less any relationship between them. He had never done any of the things that even the most hopeless of absent fathers occasionally managed. Never turned up on Christmas Eve with an armful of badly wrapped, expensive but inappropriate presents. Never slipped in to the back row of a school nativity play. Never taken her to a movie or McDonald’s. The long and short of it was that he’d never shown the slightest interest in her.
And that made it all the more unlikely that he’d do anything to defend her from Geno. After all, what would it say about him if he did? It would be as good as shouting from the top of D Block that she was his daughter. He might suddenly decide he wanted to start doing the rest of the things that a father was supposed to do, like making sure she went to school and all that shit. Tenille really didn’t think she wanted that pressure in her life.
On the other hand, she sure as hell didn’t want Geno in her life either. And if the Hammer didn’t do something about it, she wasn’t sure how she was going to manage that. It wasn’t like she knew anybody who would weigh in against Geno, and she couldn’t afford to hire any of the local thugs to sort him out. She swore under her breath and turned on the computer, determined not to think any more about it.
I set this down as it was told to me, in the words of my friend:
I had sailed with Lieutenant Bligh before I signed on the Bounty and found him a man whose moods were impossible to predict. When all was going well with the voyage, he would be charm itself. I had reason to know this more than most, for on that first voyage he kept me close, often inviting me to dine with him in his cabin. But if anything chanced to go wrong on board ship, he was choleric and intemperate, always seeking around to cast the blame on another. Never was any occasion of blame laid at his own door. He was also jealous of his position, demanding as of right that respect which a captain needs must earn. Bligh squandered his opportunities to command the good opinion of the men by reason of his vitriol. Sailors are not known for their nicety of expression, but even below decks in the most vile conditions I have never heard language so foul as Bligh would pour out in his expressions of scorn and rage. But he was a fine navigator, and I knew that I could learn much at his side, and so I was willing to forgo my misgivings & to accompany him again, most particularly on such a long voyage.
The air even tasted different, Jane thought as she swung down the platform at Oxenholme. She caught sight of her father near the exit and waved cheerily. Allan Gresham raised his hand slightly in response, the small gesture of a modest man more at home on the fell with his Herdwick sheep than he would ever be where people congregated.
Jane dropped her bag and threw her arms around him, brushing a kiss against his rough cheek. ‘Thanks for coming, Dad,’ she said.
‘You can’t rely on the buses,’ he said, picking up her bag with a surprised grunt as he felt the weight. ‘What’ve you got in here? Gold bricks?’
‘I wish. It’s books, papers. A few clothes.’ Jane fell into step beside him as they made for his Land Rover in the car park.
Once they were clear of the station lights and their faces were obscured by early evening darkness, Allan cleared his throat. ‘You’re not in any kind of trouble, are you?’
‘Why would I be in trouble?’ Jane’s voice betrayed astonishment.
Allan hefted her bag into the back of the Land Rover and gave a helpless shrug, hands spread at his sides. ‘I don’t know. It’s just…It’s the middle of term. You’ve got a job to do. Students to teach. I didn’t think you could up sticks with no warning.’
‘I haven’t, Dad. This is official. Study leave. Something’s come up that I need to pursue right away, and my boss has given me a couple of weeks off.’
They climbed aboard and Allan started the engine. He raised his voice to be heard above the rhythmic grunt of the diesel. ‘I thought you did dead poets? How can that be urgent?’
‘It’s the body in the bog, Dad,’ Jane said.
He chuckled. ‘Fletcher Christian, eh? I wondered how long it would take you to convince yourself this was your man.’
‘It might not be him,’ Jane protested. ‘I never said it was. And chances are it’s got nothing to do with him or the Bounty. But it’s given me a peg to hang my theory on, and that’s good enough to buy me some time to look properly into something I turned up last summer.’
‘You’ve always had a talent for persuasion,’ Allan said, resigned echoes of old conflicts in his tone. ‘So if this is your man, how did he end up dead in a Cumberland bog?’
‘I haven’t a clue. And to be honest, that’s what interests me least. I’ll leave that to the historians.’
Her father nodded. ‘Any road, I’m glad there’s no trouble.’ He snatched a quick sidelong glance at her. ‘We cannot help worrying about you, all the way down there.’
It was, she knew, a coded way of asking about Jake. The familiar familial habit of talking about things without actually mentioning them. ‘I’m all right, Dad. What can’t be cured maun be endured. And I’m good at enduring.’
‘Some folks can’t tell the difference between sugar and shite, right enough.’ They fell silent, an easy quiet broken only by the swish of the wipers on the windscreen.
‘How’s Gabriel?’ Jane asked as they turned off for Fellhead.
‘He’s grand,’ her father said proudly. ‘A big strong babby. Started crawling. Your mother said to Diane, “Now your life’s really over.”’ He chuckled. ‘I mind when you got going. You would set your heart on getting somewhere and nothing would stop you. Funny, you were that different from Matthew. He was into everything. You couldn’t take your eyes off him. But he never had that single-minded determination you had, even when you were tiny. So I reckon we’ll get a taste of what Gabriel’s going to be like now he’s off.’
Jane knew the story. It was one of many that always made Matthew scowl. ‘It’ll be nice to see Gabriel. They change so quickly when they’re that small. Does he still look like Granddad Trevithick?’
‘Aye. Your mother says it’s only because he’s bald and round in the face, but I reckon she’s only saying that to keep Diane’s mum happy. She reckons he looks like her brother at the same age. He’ll end up looking like himself, whatever.’
‘I wonder if he’ll get the Gresham curls?’ She reached over and rumpled her father’s thick hair.
‘He won’t thank us if he does. It’s all right for lasses, but us lads don’t like looking as if we’ve spent all day at the hairdressers.’
Jane peered out of the window as they reached the outskirts of the village. Every cottage was imprinted on her memory. She could have picked any of them out of an identity parade. Most were picture perfect, but there was always the odd one whose owner either didn’t care or couldn’t afford to keep it in good repair. Locals dreaded the death of those inhabitants more than any other because the houses always went to outsiders who were taken with the romance of having a holiday cottage in the Lakes and loved the idea of a bargain they could remake in their own images. Their wallets had pushed even semi-derelict properties out of the reach of most of those who had to subsist on Lakeland wages. Jane’s heart sank at the sight of a new For Sale sign. ‘What happened to Miss Forsyth?’ she asked.
‘She had another stroke. Couldn’t manage the house any more so she’s gone into a home in Keswick,’ her father said succinctly as he swung the Land Rover into the narrow lane that led up to their farmhouse on the edge of the village.
‘So I suppose that’ll be another holiday cottage,’ Jane sighed. In the short span of her life, she’d seen almost a third of the homes in the village change hands from families who could track their ancestors