Chapter 95
Matthew Mackie had been surprised to get the call from Elizabeth asking if he was available for a confession.
He had been gardening and thinking. The police interview had upset him, thrown him off balance.
Life had been so simple a few months ago.
His life wasn’t happy, exactly—he hadn’t been happy for many years—but was he at peace, perhaps?
Had he found some contentment? As much as he was ever going to, he supposed.
He had his house, his garden, his pension.
He had nice neighbors who would look in on him.
A young family had recently moved in opposite, and the kids would play on their bikes on the pavement.
He could hear bells and laughter if he kept the windows open.
He could walk down to the sea in five minutes.
He could sit and watch the gulls, and read the paper when it wasn’t too windy.
People knew him and would smile and ask how he was keeping and, if he wasn’t too busy, could they tell him about their nose bleeds, or their hip, or their sleepless nights?
It was a life; it had a rhythm and a routine and it kept the ghosts at bay. What more could you ask, really?
But now? Brawls, police interviews, nonstop worry.
Would this blow over? He knew it wouldn’t.
Whatever they say about time healing, some things in life just break and can never be fixed.
For now, Matthew Mackie was keeping his windows shut.
There were no bells and there was no laughter, and he is old enough to know there might never be again.
It seemed that every bit of news he had received in the past month had been bad news. So what to make of the phone call? What was this to be?
Did he know the confessional stall at Saint Michael’s chapel, she had asked. Did he know it? He still dreams of it now—the darkness, the dull echo, the walls closing in on him. The place where his life broke in two, never to be fixed.
Should he go back there? It wasn’t a fair question. He had never left.
He had known his life would lead him back there one day. God’s sense of humor. You had to hand it to him.
He has seen Elizabeth, he’s sure. At the consultation meeting, and again on the awful day of the murder. She stood out.
So what was on Elizabeth’s mind? What sin could she no longer hide?
And why ask for him? And why there? She must have seen him on the day of the murder, he supposed.
Must have seen the dog collar; that usually stuck in people’s minds.
It often made people want to tell their secrets.
What had he unlocked in her that made her pick up the phone?
And, for that matter, how had she got his number?
He wasn’t listed. Perhaps it was on the internet? She must have got it somewhere.
And so that was that. Back to Saint Michael’s. Into the confessional, with Elizabeth. Back to where it all began, and where it all ended. A macabre coincidence. If only she knew.
Matthew Mackie was already on the platform at Bexhill station when he realized Elizabeth hadn’t actually mentioned which of them would be doing the confessing.
He had thought about turning straight around. But by that point he had already bought a ticket.
She couldn’t possibly know. Could she?