Chapter 1

Dulcie Hanson was conducting a wedding; Paul Meadows was marrying Eileen Glover, and the union was particularly pleasing to all concerned in view of the heartache and upset that had preceded it. (See, ‘Dulcie and Paul’ for the full story.) She was unaware, of course, of a tragic event taking place about fifty miles to the north. She would see a report, sketchy in detail, on the local evening news, but apart from sorrow and sympathy for those involved, she had no reason to know that she would have a personal part to play in the lives of the survivors.

A young man was pedalling a mountain bike along the narrow secondary road by the Orwell River. It would be fair to say he was ‘labouring’. Rather overweight and pasty-faced, his face was moist with sweat and his t-shirt was also wet. Emmanuel Xavier Wagner was American, though living in England. He was a puzzle to his parents who were both confident, out-going professionals. Joseph Wagner was a mid-level diplomat assigned to the U.S. Embassy in London. For whatever reason, he and Simone, his wife, had chosen to live in Colchester rather than in London, and Simone was employed as a teacher in a local private school. The commute to London was, in fact, quite easy. Both parents took care of their health and could not understand their son, shy, reserved in the extreme, overweight and addicted to reading, mainly fiction ... adventure, fantasy, sci-fi ... and romance.

It would not be too strong to suggest Emmanuel disliked his names. Hatred might better describe his feelings about them, but he was stuck with them. The teasing he’d experienced from his peers at school and the bullying that resulted from his inability to shrug off his embarrassment went a long way toward explaining his social discomfort. But he had bravely decided to do something about his weight and general health. When he declared to his mother that he meant to buy a bicycle from his earnings as a very junior library assistant and get some exercise, she was delighted and insisted on going with him and paying for a much better machine than he’d intended.

On the day in question he was hopefully looking forward to a cold drink in the next village.

Some way behind him, Roger Marshall was close to losing his temper. Already driving too fast for the road, his wife Gillian was shrewishly telling him they were going to be late. Their three-year old, cute, blonde daughter, secure in her child seat in the back, was picking up on the tension and sniffling, preparatory to crying in earnest. They shot past the young man just before the blind bend ahead.

The young man winced at the closeness – the car skimmed past him bare inches away – and shook his head as it hurtled into the corner.

There was a screech of brakes and the horrid crunch of crushed metal and shattered safety-glass.

Reaching the corner himself, he saw the mangled car against a wall, a truck, bearing a largish yacht, with signs of the impact on its front off-side, the trucker climbing shakily down from the cab.

The young man stopped, dropped the bike unceremoniously and ran to the car; there was a strong smell of petrol and he heard the child screaming in the back; he wrenched open the door, released her harness and pulled her free, then ran to put some space between the car and his burden and himself.

Can anyone predict a child’s reaction? One might expect the screaming to increase, but young Karen calmed and quieted and took a firm hold of her rescuer’s neck with both arms and buried her face in the space under his chin. Reaching a grassy bank, he looked back and saw the trucker pulling the woman from the front passenger seat. The reaction hit him and he sank to the ground, the child still clinging to his neck.

Behind the truck, out of sight, another motorist had his mobile out, calling emergency services.

The trucker moved towards the young man and the child, half carrying the woman, who suddenly twisted free of him. “My child! Karen... !”

“She’s there, ma’am,” the trucker said, pointing. “She’s alright.”

She looked that way, seeing the child held in the pudgy, pasty-faced, young man’s arms and screamed, pulling away from the trucker and rushing to her child.

“You pervert! What do you think you’re doing? Let her go!” She was way beyond reason and couldn’t – or wouldn’t – hear what the trucker was saying. She grabbed Karen and dragged her away from Emmanuel, not noticing that the resistance was from the child’s grip on his neck; his arms had fallen away and were wide open. The child, aware only of the hands on her, the sudden, rough attack on her comfort, burst into tears as her arms lost their grip. She wasn’t at all happy to be squeezed, not realising initially that it was by her mother’s arms.

Emmanuel’s eyes widened, and what little colour his face possessed drained away.

The woman backed away, then, turning, looked back at the car.

“Roger!”

The trucker moved in front of her. “Don’t go there, ma’am ... there’s nothing you can do.”

The motorist with the mobile, blocked behind the truck, had gone to look in the mangled car. His eyes met those of the trucker and he shook his head.

The woman held her crying child and stared at the wreckage.

“Roger?...”

A siren sounded in the distance.

The police were first on the scene ... closely followed by paramedics and a fire appliance. The firemen foamed the petrol spill and cut Roger Marshall’s body free of the wreck.

A female police constable listened to and recorded a rather hysterical rant from Gillian Marshall; her male colleague a much more coherent and rather different account from the shaking trucker.

It was clear no account of any sort would be obtained that day from Emmanuel Wagner, who was curled up in a tight ball on his side on the grassy verge. Photographs were taken, skid marks measured and, surprisingly, several witness accounts were recorded.

No one really knows how the human mind works ... yet, and there are many theories about why things go wrong. While the accident was traumatic all round, there was no apparent reason for Emmanuel Wagner to retreat into, well, catatonia. It is, by definition, not a rational situation. Gillian Marshall’s reaction was similarly unreasonable but explainable in terms of mental defence mechanisms. Her behaviour before and after the accident, a major factor if not the only one, she denied, projecting all the blame on the trucker and Emmanuel.

Karen Marshall just became very quiet and withdrawn.

Dulcie Hanson’s first involvement began a few days later.

“Darling,” Peter Hanson began, “we’ve a funeral to handle. I’m sorry to land you with it, but even if I wasn’t due at that conference tomorrow, I’d still want you to handle it. Youngish woman with a three-year-old daughter – the father died in an RTA on Saturday last. They are parishioners, but as far as I know, never attended. Tough one, but...”

“I know, lover. Don’t worry.”

Bereavement visits are never easy, but Dulcie was very good at getting the survivor to open up about their grief and, often, anger. While not exactly looking forward to the visit, she at least felt competent to deal with whatever she met. What she met, though, was, somehow, wrong. She couldn’t put a finger on it, but though there was anger and distress enough, she felt uncomfortable.

She didn’t say anything beyond explaining who she was and inviting Mrs. Marshall to tell her what had happened. A small, very pretty child sat in the room with them, arms tight round a large soft toy – a panda – almost as big as herself. As the woman talked, Dulcie listened, of course, but part of her mind was praying. When Gillian Marshall eventually wound down, Dulcie sat silent for quite some time.