twenty-three

The police came and took Mr Atkinson in for questioning that afternoon.

I imagine he was sitting in his study, unaware of who it was knocking on the front door. He might have been having an early drink (he liked a drink, Joe had once told me), and talking on the phone to a business acquaintance. Or maybe he was watching television – he had his own set in his study, built into the wall so that he could lie back on his leather couch and enjoy the programs of his choice without any interference from the rest of the family.

It was a still afternoon, a perfect end to the weekend. The storm had passed leaving behind it a cooler, cleaner day. Great puddles of water sparkled by the sides of the road, the trees glittered as leaves shook in the slight breeze. Everyone was out again, tentative, unsure as to whether they were entirely safe from another downpour but then, on seeing the clarity of the sky, more certain that the worst of the weather had indeed passed.

I imagine he heard the knock in that stillness but didn’t get up to answer. Not straight away. He would have called out for Cherry to go to the door, assuming it was one of her friends who had come around because, after all, it was really only kids who turned up uninvited on a Sunday afternoon.

Cherry wouldn’t have answered.

I know that much for sure: she wasn’t at home.

A few hours earlier, she had sat on the floor in Kate’s bedroom and told us what she knew, barely capable of uttering the words. We had listened, unable to fathom what it was we were hearing. In fact, it wasn’t until some weeks later that the full ramifications of her confession began to filter through, the impact of all that had happened having left a marked impact on our neighbourhood.

Her tale was not a complicated one. Cherry told us that Amanda had stayed at her house a few times in the weeks before she died. She had liked coming over, Cherry had said, somehow still wanting to insist that there had been a friendship there.

We had all waited for her to continue, no one able to speak.

After dinner, they would go up to Cherry’s room and hang, reading magazines, talking, listening to music. One night, Amanda went back downstairs to get her schoolbag. She took a while to return. Cherry had eventually gone to see if she was okay. She had found her listening in at her father’s study door.

‘She must have overheard something she shouldn’t have.’

Cherry had looked down at the ground then, not wanting to say what this could have been.

I could only imagine; Dee’s stories of Mr Atkinson’s dealings were still fresh in my mind.

‘I thought it was strange and then I forgot it,’ Cherry had told us.

I had stood there, cold in my wet clothes, and watched her frozen in despair. In that moment I wished I hadn’t opened this up.

‘A week later, she called.’ Cherry’s voice had trembled. ‘Not me. I just happened to pick the phone up in the hall and I heard her. Talking to him. I was just about to interrupt, to say that I was here, it was okay, I’d got the phone, when I realised what she was doing. She wanted money in exchange for keeping quiet about what she’d heard. They were making a time to meet.’

Joe, Stevie and Kate had looked at her, eyes wide, uncertain as to what it was they were hearing. But I was remembering Daniel telling me how his parents had lost everything and how much Amanda had hated it. I had seen inside their lives.

‘I thought he’d just put a stop to it,’ Cherry had said.

And he had, but not in the way she’d imagined.

Amanda had arranged to meet Mr Atkinson at the waterfront at a time when she knew all her friends were busy. She couldn’t have known what she was getting herself in for. It was probably just a moment of reckless action that had tumbled too fast down an incline that was always going to be dangerous.

She may have changed her mind about going countless times, wishing she’d never started it all. But perhaps on that day it was particularly bad at home. The recklessness in her reared up again. What did she have to lose? Everything was stuffed.

He wouldn’t have taken any money with him. He would have had no intention of giving her a cent. She was just a schoolgirl and his plan would have been to frighten her off, to make sure she presented no future threat to him. Because he couldn’t just dismiss her as a joke. She knew his daughter. He would have to see her on a regular basis, and he didn’t want hints dropped or another attempt at blackmail to occur.

He might have twisted her arm and leant in close, turning it that little bit too hard as he told her to back off. He might have shoved her against the rocks. He might have lost his temper and gone a little further than he intended.

The police said she had died from drowning.

The river was below them, deep and dark, slapping against rocks pocked with oyster shells, clammed shut, crusted edges sharp enough to draw blood.

Was she pushed or did she fall?

The police seemed to think she fell, or at least that was Tom’s understanding.

For Cherry’s sake, I hoped it was true.

We had stayed in Kate’s room, silent in the face of her tale. None of us had known what to do. She had kept her eyes fixed on the ground, scratching at the flaking polish on her toenail, while outside the rain had ceased.

Eventually, she had stood up.

‘I’d better go to the police,’ she had told us.

It was Kate who had taken her downstairs, holding her by the arm. We heard them, in the kitchen, talking with Kate’s mother, their voices a low murmur as we let ourselves out the front door, all of us standing in silence in that sparkling clean afternoon.