The Ullswater Undertaking

here? How would he know the number? He can’t possibly be living near here. He was in London, I think. Although I remember that his family did live in Cumbria.’
‘I’m just repeating what he said. He wants to talk to you about a promise you made – calling in a favour of some sort.’
‘Oh God!’ Christopher suddenly leant back in the chair by the radiator and stared blindly at the wall in front of him. ‘I did, didn’t I? Lord help me. He probably wants to kill me, then. We’d better bar the doors and windows.’
Simmy’s first concern was for her baby. A threatening man with a grievance against her partner was no joke. ‘You’re not serious?’ she said. ‘What about Robin?’
‘I don’t know. Let me think. Did he leave a number? What did he say exactly?’
‘I can’t remember the exact words. He didn’t sound friendly. You made him a promise and he’s coming to remind you of it. And he now lives in Ullswater. You don’t really think we should worry about him, do you?’
‘I thought he was dead. He was in pretty poor shape even before the fly bit him. Drugs, smoking like a chimney, eating nothing but junk. The medics that came for him obviously thought he’d barely survive the trip to hospital. He and I had ten minutes together in the tent, and he was raving. Something about an aunt who lived in England and needed to hear an important message from him. Honestly, it was like something from a cheap thriller. I don’t remember any details – I didn’t take it at all seriously. I mean – you promise anything to a dying person, don’t you?’
‘Some people do, evidently,’ said Simmy, recalling an instance in Grasmere where Christopher had also made a rash promise to a dying friend. ‘You especially,’ she added.
‘Oh? Maybe I do. It’s wrong, do you think?’
‘It might backfire sometimes,’ she said carefully. ‘Like it seems to have done with this Crick person.’
‘I do remember thinking the aunt sounded interesting and it might be fun to visit her next time I was up here seeing my folks.’ Again, his gaze was on the wall. ‘He called her “the ultimate entrepreneur” I remember. That caught my attention.’
‘Oh?’
‘Yeah. The thing is, I’d been doing a bit of dealing before that trip – buying indigenous artwork cheap on the streets and selling it for big profits. I’d been boasting about how easy it was to make money if you just found the right niche. And Crickers picked up the fact that I had people in Cumbria, the same as he did. He connected it all up – that’s how his brain worked – and told me I should visit the aunt and see if she had some words of advice for me, and to tell her he was thinking of her in his final days. All rather melodramatic, I admit, but not the sort of urgent message you’re making it sound. I thought I might as well do it, if I was in the area – but by the time I got back here, I’d completely forgotten her name, address – the whole thing. And whatever you say, the fact that I was sure he was dead made it seem a bit pointless.’
Simmy thought of wartime soldiers taking considerable trouble to visit the widows of their dead comrades to describe their final moments and wondered whether Christopher was typical of subsequent generations who disregarded such obligations. ‘You could have told her all about what happened to him. People like to have the full story when someone dies, you know.’
‘I suppose they do,’ he said doubtfully. ‘But I can’t say I saw it like that at the time. She was only an aunt, after all.’
‘The fact remains that you ignored your promise to this man, the way he sees it. And now he wants some sort of recompense.’
‘I didn’t ignore it. My plans changed. It was another three years before I came back here. Anybody would have forgotten after that time. I was young and irresponsible, I admit. I’ll be able to explain it to him. I mean – he’s damned lucky to be alive. And the aunt must have died yonks ago. He probably just wants to rub my nose in it.’
She gave him a suspicious scrutiny. ‘Are you trying to make light of it? He sounded as if it’s been building up to quite a head of resentment.’
Christopher groaned. ‘The honest truth is that I barely even knew the man. It was just my luck that I ended up being the one to watch over him while the medics struggled to get to us. Who knows what might have been happening to him in the past ten years? He might have gone completely round the bend – or the exact opposite. For all I know, he’s married with three kids and working in a bank. He might want to come round for a drink and a laugh about those crazy days in Africa. How am I supposed to know?’
She sighed. ‘Well, I think we can assume he hasn’t been living around here for very long. If he had, don’t you think he’d have found you before this? You were in the paper last year – name, job, everything. Before that, the Henderson name was out there when your father died. He obviously hasn’t been looking for you until recently.’
‘Which phone did he use?’ Christopher asked suddenly.
‘Um – the landline.’
‘So how did he get that number?’
‘They still have directory enquiries, don’t they?’
‘Do they? Did it not occur to us to go ex-directory, then?’
‘Not to me it didn’t. I quite like being available at the end of a phone.’
‘Did he leave a number for me to call back?’
‘No, but you can get it with 1471. Nobody’s called since then.’
‘Good thinking. I’ll do that – I’m not sitting around waiting for him to condescend to phone back.’ But when he tried to get the number, there was