26
Barney joins us at the pub that evening, after we’ve filled him in on everything else that’s going on.
We hope at the pub we might be able to surreptitiously question our fellow shopkeepers while they are having a drink and discover who might be the infamous timekeeper.
But instead our questions are expertly evaded at every turn.
So we leave the pub even more confused than before, and decide to go back to Adam’s flat to try to make sense of everything.
To my surprise, Barney declines the offer.
‘Oh, God, it’s the stairs, isn’t it?’ I say, suddenly realising, and I’m annoyed with myself for not considering Barney before deciding to go to Adam’s.
‘It might be a factor,’ Barney says in his usual matter-of-fact way.
‘Then we’ll go somewhere else,’ I say. But my house also has the main living area upstairs, so that won’t be any better. We’ve just come from the pub and that’s far too busy tonight to discuss the kinds of things we need to.
‘Really, it’s fine.’ Barney shrugs. ‘I’m used to it.’
‘No, it’s not fine!’ I say crossly. ‘You’re as much a part of this as we are now. I want to hear your take on everything. It’s not fair if you miss out.’
‘I don’t know if this is the right thing to suggest,’ Adam says quietly. ‘But I can carry you up the stairs, Barney, if that would help. Or would that be totally condescending and wrong?’
I close my eyes, fearing what Barney might say. But I’m surprised to hear him respond favourably. ‘On this occasion, Adam, that would be great, thanks.’
So I watch as Adam carries Barney – who isn’t a particularly large young man, but still must weigh plenty – effortlessly up the stairs to his flat, where he places him carefully on the sofa.
‘Cheers, Adam,’ Barney says, arranging himself more comfortably. ‘That was good of you.’
‘No problem, mate. You’re no heavier than some of the equipment I used to lug around in my touring days.’ Adam winks at Barney and then nips downstairs again to lift Barney’s wheelchair up the stairs too.
‘You can at least be independent up here,’ Adam says, putting the chair next to Barney. ‘Cos there ain’t no way I’m carrying you to the toilet, fella!’
Barney laughs and I breathe a sigh of relief as the atmosphere in the room relaxes.
‘Did you notice how they all evaded our questions tonight?’ I say to them both, when Adam has got us all a bottle of beer and we’re sitting in the lounge waiting for yet another takeaway to be delivered.
I feel like I’m living on takeaways right now, but there always seems to be something going on that prevents me from eating my usual healthy-ish meals.
Maybe one day Adam and I might be able to go out to dinner in a restaurant, just the two of us, and talk about the sort of things that normal couples did – but then, when was it any fun to be normal?
‘I did notice that,’ Adam says. ‘Do you think that was deliberate? Or were we reading things into it that weren’t really there?’
‘Difficult to say?’ Barney says. ‘But we did the right thing by pressing them. How else are we going to find this timekeeper?’
‘I actually thought at one point they might be questioning us?’ Adam says. ‘Or was that just me.’
‘No, I thought that too,’ I say. ‘But why would they do that?’
‘How about we go through everyone one by one,’ Adam says. ‘See if we can rule anybody out of the equation.’
‘Worth a go, I suppose.’
‘So we definitely think the timekeeper is someone who lives here in Clockmaker Court?’ Adam asks.
Barney nods.
‘Yes,’ I say. ‘It must be. Well, at least someone who has a shop.’
‘Why not the others who use the buildings as offices and flats?’ Adam asks.
‘They come and go,’ I say. ‘But the shops have all been here for … well, as long as I can remember.’
‘What, all of them?’
I think about this. ‘When I started helping my grandparents out, Harriet and Rocky were here, and Luca too. Orla had been here for a while, I think, and Ben has been here for ever, as we all know.’
‘So the shops haven’t changed much, then?’
‘No, not really. Actually, not at all. Gerald owned the bookshop next door before you did, and Ben said before that, Ozzie, Gerald’s father, had owned it. So that’s been here ages too.’
‘Right then, so what do we know about all these people?’ Adam asks, sounding like a detective in charge, summing up the case so far with his team. ‘Do any of them have families?’
‘Not that I know of …’ I say, suddenly realising that I don’t know that much about any of my fellow shopkeepers. ‘But they must do, I guess. Do you know, Barney?’
‘No, come to think of it, I don’t remember any of them ever talking about families. But then I’m not here as much as you, Eve.’
‘Harriet and Rocky are married … but don’t have any children,’ I say, trying to add something useful.
‘I think Orla’s family must live in Ireland …
not that I remember her actually saying that, though.
Luca … I mean, I know he has partners, I’ve met some of them before, and we both met some friends of his from the States, didn’t we, the other night at the pub? ’
Adam nods. ‘Yes, they were friends, weren’t they, not family?’
‘I guess. And I don’t think Ben has family either … when he was ill a while back, Orla went to look after him because he had no one else.’
‘So not one of us has ever heard any of the others talking about a family?’ Adam says, his eyebrows raised.
‘But that doesn’t necessarily mean anything,’ I say quickly. ‘I mean, you and I don’t have any direct family still alive, do we?’
As what I’m saying begins to register in my brain, I stare at Adam, and he, looking equally as surprised, gazes back at me. I turn to Barney.
‘Barney, please tell me you have family somewhere?’ I ask desperately.
Barney slowly shakes his head. ‘Not blood relatives, I was adopted when I was a baby. So I’ve only ever known my adoptive parents.’
As we sit silently trying to take in exactly what this means, the doorbell rings, making us all jump.
‘That must be the takeaway downstairs,’ Adam says. ‘I’ll be right back.’
‘What’s happening, Eve?’ Barney asks. ‘I’m getting a really weird vibe about this.’
‘I don’t know, Barney. I wish I did, but I don’t.’
Adam comes back up with the Indian takeaway we’ve chosen tonight and after we’ve plated everything up, we sit back down to eat.
‘Do you want to continue our discussions?’ Adam asks. ‘Or shall we wait until after we’ve eaten?’
‘I don’t know about you two,’ I reply. ‘But it’s all I can think about right now.’
‘Me too.’ Barney picks up a poppadom. ‘I don’t know how we can’t continue to talk about it.’
‘Right, then.’ Adam takes the lead once more. ‘So apart from the family thing, which we don’t know is relevant yet, what else do we know?’
‘What about these doors you have in the shop?’ Barney asks. ‘Should we discuss them a bit more?’
‘The Venus and Mars doors,’ I say. ‘With the tree in the middle of both of them. We’ve had a lot of tree symbolism and this is just the latest one.’
‘Do you have the letter from your grandmother?’ Barney asks. ‘The one with the clues on it?’
‘Not on me. I thought it best if we keep it safely locked away in the shop safe. But I took a photo of it. Here.’ I pass him my phone.
Barney quickly reads through the letter. ‘Do you think There is someone close who will have many of the answers could be the same person as the timekeeper?’
‘I think it’s more than likely.’
‘So the only clues you have nothing on is The Romans knew their numbers and Hide-and-seek, Eve ?’
‘We think the first one is Roman numerals of some sort.’
‘But you’ve no ideas on hide-and-seek?’
I shake my head.
‘Did you used to play hide-and-seek as a child?’ Barney asks.
‘I guess I must have.’
‘Don’t you remember?’
How could I tell Barney I blocked many of my childhood memories a long time ago. Remembering what I once had is too painful.
‘Not really.’
Barney glances at Adam.
‘Could you try, Eve?’ Adam asks softly. ‘I know it’s difficult for you, but it might help?’
‘All right, I’ll try.’ But after a few moments, I shake my head. ‘Nope. I’m sorry. Nothing.’
Adam glances at Barney this time, and I snap at them.
‘You two can stop with all the looks. I am trying. Really, I am.’
‘We didn’t say you weren’t,’ Adam says calmly. ‘You’re the one who seems a bit jittery when we talk about hide-and-seek.’
‘I just don’t remember, that’s all. And even if I did, what connection could those two small doors have with my childhood? It’s not as if I used to play hide-and-seek in a cupboard with those two doors on it. I think I’d remem — I stop suddenly. Something is jolting in the back of my mind.
‘What is it, Eve?’ Barney asks. ‘Have you remembered something?’
‘Give me a minute,’ I say, thinking hard.
I close my eyes. My mind doesn’t want to go back …
but I force it to. ‘I did used to play hide-and-seek …’ I say as a distant memory begins to swirl in my head.
‘With my grandmother when she was younger and more agile …’ I can feel my face screwing up as I push my mind to go deeper.
‘I used to hide in a sort of half-dresser thing … no, it wasn’t a dresser …
it was a cupboard with two doors and it was built into the wall …
a bit like a cupboard under the stairs. Actually, that’s exactly what it was – a cupboard under the stairs.
’ My eyes fly open. ‘I used to play hide-and-seek with my grandmother in a cupboard under the stairs. That’s it, I’m afraid. ’
‘Were the doors wooden with engravings on them, by any chance?’ Barney asks excitedly.
‘Not that I remember.’
‘Oh.’ Barney sounds disappointed. ‘That’s a shame.’
‘Not necessarily,’ Adam says slowly. ‘If your grandmother was trying to tell you something by mentioning hide-and-seek, do you think she was hinting at something similar – a cupboard recessed into a wall or a cupboard under some stairs?’
‘Perhaps. But where would that be? We used to play hide-and-seek in her old house – not the same house I have now, but their previous home.’
‘What about if it was here?’ Adam says, thinking again. ‘In Clockmaker Court. What about down in our hidden office? You have to go down some stairs to get to that, don’t you?’
‘But we didn’t see any cupboards when we went down there,’ I say. ‘Only filing cabinets and desks.’
‘What if the cupboard was hidden by one or two of the filing cabinets? They were big enough.’
It takes a moment for what Adam is saying to sink in, then I cry out excitedly, ‘Let’s go take a look! This could be it!’
‘Now?’ Adam asks, sounding remarkably calm.
‘Yes, now. Why not?’
Adam glances at Barney.
‘Don’t worry about me,’ Barney says. ‘I’ll stay here if there are stairs involved. You two go.’
‘No way, José,’ I tell him. ‘You’re coming too.’ I look at Adam and he nods.
‘Too right you are. That’s if you don’t mind me lifting you again?’
Barney grins. ‘Of course not. Come on, then! What are we waiting for?’
‘It’s like I’ve stepped into the forties,’ Barney says in awe, looking around the office. ‘Either that or a really good museum.’
We got downstairs to the little office in stages.
First Adam lifted Barney down into the bookshop, and then he went back for his chair.
Then we opened up the metal door and I went first into the darkened room, and then down the stairs to switch the lights on.
Adam then followed carrying Barney, and again went back for his chair, in which Barney is now sitting, looking around the room in amazement.
‘Now to see if we were right,’ Adam says, looking at the filing cabinets in the office. ‘Come on, Eve, I might need a hand moving these.’
Adam and I begin to push one of the large metal filing cabinets away from the stair wall. ‘Blimey, this is heavy,’ I say, struggling to push. ‘It’s just as well we’ve brought the muscle with us. Eh, Barney?’ I wink at him.
‘Indeed,’ Barney says. ‘Although, I’ll sit this one out if I may. You two look like you’ve got it covered.’
Although I am helping to heave the huge filing cabinet away from the wall, I’m sure it’s really Adam who’s doing most of the work.
‘There is a door!’ I shout out excitedly as one side of a pair of doors is revealed. ‘Look!’
Adam puffs. ‘Let’s get this other cabinet moved first, then I’ll look.’
We both push the second filing cabinet in the opposite direction and again we find another small door concealed behind it.
‘Right,’ Adam says, still puffing a little. ‘Shall we see what’s inside?’
‘Do it!’ Barney says encouragingly.
Adam pulls on one of the doors, but it doesn’t open. He then pulls on the other. ‘I don’t believe this. Now these doors are locked too. Why is everything locked all the time!’
I look around to see if there’s keys hanging anywhere. Then we all start opening drawers in the desks and the filing cabinets to see if we can find one.
‘Here!’ Barney triumphantly holds up a large key and wheels himself towards the doors. ‘It only bloody works!’ he says as the key turns easily in the lock. Barney gives a tug on the first door, then reverses back a little to fully open it.
‘What can you see?’ I ask.
‘Nothing. It’s just dark.’ He pulls open the second door.
But the same greets us – only darkness. ‘It’s just an empty cupboard,’ he says disappointedly shining his phone’s torch around.
He wheels himself forward a little, until he’s able to get all the way inside.
At Barney’s height in his wheelchair, he doesn’t need to bend his head.
‘Yep,’ he says. ‘It’s a hell of a cupboard, but there’s just a wall here at the end.
’ He reverses himself back out again. ‘Now what?’
‘Why would someone hide this cupboard behind these filing cabinets if it wasn’t important?’ Adam says. ‘There are other walls these cabinets could have stood against that didn’t block it.’
‘Do you think your doors would fit this opening?’ Barney asks, his head tilted to one side. ‘I only saw them briefly today, but I reckon they look a similar size to these ones.’
‘They might,’ I say, trying to size them up in my mind. ‘Should we try them, do you think?’
‘What would be the point?’ Adam asks. ‘Nothing is going to change if we attach two new doors to this empty cupboard.’
‘That is where you are wrong, I’m afraid.’ A familiar voice comes from the top of the stairs. ‘Things will change, and dramatically so. For us all.’