12. FACING UP TO FACTS

A grandfather seeking his grandson and a naturist camper facing up to his own character

The old man saw two woman sauntering towards him as he crossed the road, and he noted that they were moving slowly yet purposefully, or so he interpreted their gait.

They’ll know, he thought to himself, they do look the sort who know stuff.

“Ladies,” he called to them, quietly so as not to alarm them but with enough force to draw attention to the urgency he felt deep in his bones. The barman hadn’t been able to help him, but maybe these ladies might.

“Excuse me,” he continued, “I’m asking around. Someone must know. My grandson. I’ve not heard of him in years but someone said… maybe you know him?”

“You’re out of touch?” asked Trayda, almost absently. But her experience had taught her to attend to just about everything said to her during an investigation, even if it seemed to be irrelevant, and this man seemed to have lost a grandson. Easily done, she supposed, in the chaos of life.

“Life’s been unkind,” mumbled the old man, “look, my name’s Dustin Dingbat and I had a daughter once.”

“I’m sorry. So you’ve lost a daughter? I thought you mentioned a grandson?” Trayda tried not to look impatient, but she was getting a lot on her mind, and it was all to do with a dead man not a lost grandson.

“I did. I’m sorry. I was at her funeral a few weeks ago. Mary’s funeral, my daughter’s...”

“That’s sad,” said Angela, genuinely sympathetic even though he was a stranger she’d not known existed until that moment. “Our children shouldn’t go before us,” she added.

“I know.”

Trayda looked him in the face. Was that a tear forming in his rheumy eyes? And what did it suggest about him? About his life, his loves, his fears? Even strangers can grieve…

“This grandson of yours?” she prompted.

“I heard he was this way, but the man in the pub said he didn’t know anything, just that he lived somewhere round here, an ice cream seller, I think...”

“Stop a minute!” interrupted Trayda. “Ice cream, you say? Round here? He wasn’t David Stokesey by any chance?”

“David! Yes, David! You know him?” A light seemed to shine suddenly in the old man’s eyes, illuminating hope, maybe. “Where is he? Where can I find him? I know I’ve not got long left, not long at all, and I want to end my life knowing him. Maybe show him he’s got someone sharing his blood, someone to be a friend in need...”

“Come with us,” decided Trayda, “it’s time for a bite and a drink, anyway. There’s something you must know and it will be easier talking about it in the pub seeing as there is’;t anything like a cafe near here.”

“You’d think someone would have thought a cafe might make them a bob or two,” mumbled the old man, “but I guess the pub will do.”

The two women hastened across the road and towards the Shell and Cockle, Trayda leading the old man by one arm.

“Would you like a drink?” she asked as they approached the bar, “just name your poison. I’ve got something to tell you. Something you should know, and it might not be exactly what you want to hear.”

“Just a half, please. Is something wrong?” he asked, “with our David?”

“Sit down,” suggested Trayda, and she returned from the bar with three drinks.

“You’ve come looking for him a day too late,” Angela told him when they were seated comfortably. “I’m afraid...”

“He was found this morning, on the beach, dead...” concluded Trayda.

“David’s dead?” stammered the old man, and the rheumy eyes got wetter. “Until the other day I never knew he existed. Or if I did I forgot. Then there was my Mary. I was such a fool, such a dreadful, dreadful fool and I let her down… And now her son’s dead?”

“Murdered,” murmured Angela, and Trayda frowned at her, shaking her head imperceptibly. This old stranger, shocked and miserable as he seemed to be, was a suspect as was everybody who had anything to do with the dead lad, and she knew full well that suspects can make mistakes when they’re kept in ignorance of details.

“The police will want to speak to you,” she said quietly. “And soon,” she added as Inspector Reuben Richards with his Sergeant Gingleton walked into the bar and noticed Trayda and the old man she was talking to.

oo0oo

“That lover of yours is dead,” growled William Hampton to Annie, “I heard it on the grape vine and all I can say is good riddance!”

“He’s not … I mean is wasn’t … a lover, not really,” Annie mumbled, “but he’s not dead! He can’t be!”

“He is,” gloated William, “I’ve been told by the police. They say he was murdered. Struck down in his prime, probably by a jealous husband of one of his many paramours!”

“That’s not fair!”

“It’s what you were!”

“A woman has needs and you don’t seem to be able to get your head round that!” she replied, almost spitting the words at him. “I’ve seen the way you ogle that bloke though!”

“Me… ogle a bloke? You must be joking!” stammered William, “You’re my hearts delight, the love of my life, the only creature on God’s Earth for me!”

“I’ve seen you, William.”

“You can’t have. I must have been looking at something else. I would never...”

“Yes you would and I don’t mind all that much as long as you turn a blind eye to the odd little adventure I might find myself forced to have,” she said tartly.

“But you’re wrong!” he stammered, though in his heart a voice muttered that the game might well be up and he really ought to face the truth. But how could he? He was married to her, they’d had a courtship during which they’d spent the greater part of their time together naked because they both really and honestly preferred to live that way and had met in camps designed for nudists.

But all the time and simmering in his heart was a fascination with men. Not all men and oddly not naked men, but men who teased him by being forbidden. Clothed. Married, sometimes, with tribes of kids. The dog walker was one of them. He was never naked, probably would never want to cavort around in a state of undress, he ogled girls as if ogling girls might be outlawed some day soon, and showed absolutely no interest in males. That made him forbidden and yet William worshipped him from afar.

Yet he’d never exchanged a word with him.

“I don’t mind being married to you if we understand each other,” she said, eyeing him almost fiercely. He noticed that expression and it almost aroused a physical reaction in him. Almost, but not quite.

“What do you mean?” he asked, almost timidly.

“I used to wonder, when we were courting, why you never tried it on with me,” she said, “after all, it wasn’t as if I was a silly young teenager having to behave properly in front of her parents. I was already beyond that! And we went about, to naturist sites, the two of us, and sometimes I wanted to eat you up! You looked adorable to me! And not once did you cart me off behind the woodshed and try to ravish me like I really wanted you to!”

“I respected you. Your virginity. That was it. I respected your virginity.”

“Which I lost quite willingly years before we met,” she sighed, “then we got married and I was c**k-a-hoop with expectations on our wedding night.”

“I did try… I was nervous.”

“You were terrified! I remember it so well, the look in your eyes the absolute terror you must have felt...”

“I … I’m sorry,” he stammered.

“Belatedly,” she murmured. “Anyway, I know you now and believe it or not I rather like you still. Not love you. That would be a step too far, when we don’t express our feelings physically. And as long as I’m not upsetting you with my little escapades then as far as I’m concerned we can carry on as we are unless, and this is a big unless, I meet someone who really loves me and who I really love in return. Then it would be a different situation and maybe we’d both have to rethink things.”

“I see.” And he did see; and a thought went round in his mind, that things were nowhere near as bad as they might have been. She didn;t, it seem, want a divorce: or at least, not for the present.

“Which brings me to the big question,” she said with an impish smile, “I was having a little bit of a flurry with David Stokesey and someone murdered him. It wasn’t you, was it?”

© Peter Rogerson 30.03.19