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She’s gorgeous.
chapter twenty-three
YESTERDAY I FINISHED WRITING UP STEVIE RAY AT ELEVEN-THIRTY and went downstairs to watch telly. Feeling pretty smug, I remembered the video in Box 2. Yeni and Margie were in bed. I decided to watch it.
I sat on the settee, watching the TV with one eye, remote ready to hand in case I needed to turn it off quickly. The index showed that there were three items on it: a bit of home video followed by a one-hour documentary shown on Cha
Box 2 Document 9 Videotape
PROGRAM 1: HOME MOVIE 1 3/1/98 3:18 P.M.
As it started, the image of a gray little office was tugged down the screen in jagged horizontal lines. Finally it resolved itself and, offscreen, Harvey Tucker says, “Brilliant.”
I made extensive notes as I watched.
The room looks small and ugly. There is a shelf of books on the far wall above a metal desk. I can’t actually read the titles, but I recognize the spines of some of the books and can see Susie’s sports bag under the desk. This is her office, but I’ve never seen inside because she works in a secure institution. It is small and gray and low. Susie taped interviews with some of her patients, I remember. She brought the prison’s camcorder home to film Margie’s first Christmas. On one of the bookshelves, up high near the top of the wall, a tiny bright glint catches my eye. It is her wedding ring. The design we got was quite chunky, and she takes it off to work, just like I do when I’m typing things up here. That’s how she lost it. She told security she went to put it back on again after typing a report and found it gone.
In the center of the static shot is a black plastic armchair with a low seat and wooden arms. Do
In front of Do
It’s painful to look at Do
“Hi, Do
Do
“Now,” says Susie, “if at any point you feel uncomfortable with this, we want you to say so, okay?”
Do
Tucker emphasizes the point. “Yes. Any time you want us to stop filming, we will.”
“’Kay.”
She smiles at him, and I can hear in his voice that he is smiling back as he adds, “All you have to do is say so.”
Tucker is not delineated in the shadow on the floor, and it makes his voice seem disembodied and God-like, coming from nowhere. Do
“Are you going to ask me personal things?” She has a lisp, and her accent is all over England. One minute she’s from London, the next she’s from Newcastle. I thought she was from Leicester.
“No,” says Susie in a soothing voice, “nothing terribly private.”
“Good. Good. I don’t want to talk about my Andrew, either.” She shivers with excitement. “I can’t wait to meet him.”
“I want to ask you about your attraction to Andrew and what made you write to him in the first place. Then I want to ask you about your feelings. Will that be all right?”
Do
“Okey-dokey,” says Susie jovially, and Do
“I saw him in the papers.”
“You saw his photograph?”
“Yeah, the one where he’s got the green jacket on. The one with the beard.” (I realize suddenly that this is how Susie knew which photo Do
“And you liked that picture, did you?”
Do
Susie pauses. “You see, not everyone would take that out of that photograph. To a lot of people he might look a bit scary.”
Do
“Do you think he wanted to look kind in the photograph?”
Do
“How do you think he wanted to look?”
She thinks about it, but I can tell she’s a bit bored and doesn’t really care. “Handsome?”
Susie makes a noncommittal noise and moves on. “What was happening in your own life at the time when you saw the photograph?”
“Oh.” Do
“And how did that make you feel?”
“Du
Tucker interjects. “But you looked after your father? You and your husband lived with him?”
Do
“You must have felt some affection for your father, then?”
“Yeah, du
Susie is thrown. “Oh,” she says. “Um… Shoe Nation, I think.”
Do
“No, they’re patent leather. They’re always that shiny.”
Do
Susie has spotted the fact that Do
It would be a loaded question for a woman who was in love with Gow, but Susie’s voice is steady and my heart leaps. I rewind and watch that bit over and over again until the nuances of her voice are completely lost to me. Truthful, not fucking him, and possibly not even loving him. This has been a great couple of days.