Bad Little Girl(58)

Lorna was steadily and impassively scanning through the channels now, Claire could hear little snatches of music, gardening shows, old sitcoms and Westerns.

‘Can’t you settle, Lorna?’

‘It’s all boring.’

‘I thought I’d make a roast dinner today, what do you think? With roast potatoes?’

‘Are they the ones like big chips?’

‘Yes.’

‘Don’t like them.’

‘But you’ll try them, though?’

‘Mmmm.’ Click click click through the channels and now the news. Halfway through the headlines: ‘A twenty-nine-year-old woman has been arrested in connection with the fire. Local people have named the woman as Paulette Coulson, mother of Peter Marshall’s two children, though we have had no statement as yet from the local police.’ Lorna turned up the volume. Her expression didn’t change. ‘Further doubt has been cast on the source of the blaze. A fire brigade source told Sky News that it was looking increasingly unlikely that the upright storage heaters were to blame, and that petrol has been found in the drains and hallways of this small terraced house—’

‘Lorna.’ Claire hovered by the door.

‘Watching.’

‘Lorna, is this good for you, though?’

‘Watching.’

‘All right.’ But she stayed in the doorway, watching the light from the TV on the girl’s face. The same close-ups of flowers, that same charred door. And now a photo of a young woman hugging two children, their faces pixelated out.

‘That’s her. That’s his ex, the one who said she’d stop him seeing his kids,’ Lorna said tonelessly, staring at the screen. ‘They’ll find out she did it, I bet you.’

Claire sat down beside her on the sofa and took her slack hand. ‘Did you know her?’

‘No. But Pete talked about her all the time. Said she was a psycho. She once smacked Mum in the town.’ She wiggled her feet. ‘Cold.’

‘I’ll get you some socks in a minute.’

‘I’m cold though! Please?’

Up in the girl’s room, Claire took socks and a duvet. On the floor was a Famous Five book, one of the ones that Claire had given her. The cover was folded in half, and Anne’s head had been ripped off. Lorna really ought to be more careful about things, but then, one had to learn to be careful, and nobody had taught her. But now, look at that . . . George’s eyes all gouged out and the face coloured over with black . . . that was just, well, not destructive exactly, but . . . Claire had had that book since she herself was a child, and it had survived forty odd years with no damage, not even the spine had been cracked. And now, in the space of a few weeks, Anne was headless and George had fangs. She needs, what does she need? Boundaries? Yes. But she mustn’t be made to feel as if she is being told off. Gentle guidance, that was the way forward. But harming books, wilful destruction, it made Claire’s heart hurt. She folded the cover back on itself to make the crease even out and hunted around for Anne’s head, but it was nowhere. She sighed, walked down the stairs, and paused just at the bottom, looking at Lorna’s back.

She was jiggling one foot up and down on her knee and picking her nose. Sky News had a helicopter's view of the house; a white forensic tent covered where the kitchen and living room had been – ‘. . . possibly asleep when the fire took hold, and fire services say . . .’ – Lorna began to hum tunelessly – ‘. . . feared three dead, as we said earlier, but not all of the bodies have yet been accounted for.’ Lorna, sighing, dug a thumb up one nostril. ‘Police have another forty-eight hours to question the twenty-nine-year-old woman arrested in the early hours of this morning.’ Lorna sang, ‘Gimme gimme gimme what I a-a-sk for,’ as a police chief made a statement: ‘. . . early stages of our inquiry, which is complex, and will be going on for some time to come. But please don’t see the arrest we have made as being the end of our inquiry, and I ask anyone out there in the community who may have any further information to contact us, bearing in mind that three people, a mother and two children, lost their lives in this fire. Peter Marshall remains in a critical condition, but police are hopeful that he will be able to help us with our inquiries when he recovers enough to do so.’ Lorna stiffened. A reporter asked, ‘Is Peter Marshall a suspect of this crime, or a victim?’ The police chief hesitated. ‘That is something that we are trying to ascertain.’ Lorna turned the TV off and Claire handed her the duvet and socks.

‘What’s “ascertain” mean?’ The girl was still staring at the blank TV screen.

‘It means to make sure.’

‘They’re not sure he’ll die?’ Lorna was snuffling into a piece of kitchen roll, she turned around and tears were starting.

‘It means they’re not sure if he started the fire or if someone else did,’ Claire answered gently.

When Lorna saw that Claire was still holding the Famous Five book, she began to sob. ‘I haven’t had much nice stuff, but I promise I’ll take more care of things, I promise. I won’t do anything like that again.’

‘Well, it did make me a bit sad, because books are very precious.’ The girl stared at her silently for a few seconds, and then began to wail, hunching into a quivering ball on the sofa. ‘But, Lorna, look, it’s only a book. Come on now, try to calm down, it’s not the end of the world!’ It took a long time to uncurl her, to pat and soothe her into a semblance of quiet.