A Coffin for Charley (5 page)

Then someone, a boy, told her she was pretty and she shed all the ‘disturbed' symptoms overnight and grew up.

You cannot be a disturbed adult, not if you are looking for sympathy, you are meant to pull yourself together, or they give you pills or electric shocks or put you away, or a combination of all three, and Annie wasn't having any of that. So she put that portmanteau of disturbance behind her, recognizing that it had been self-induced and not wholly satisfying.

Marriage she had enjoyed while it lasted. She was sad when it ended, not blaming Jack Briggs or herself, thus proving to her own satisfaction that she was grown up at last.

The house in Napier Street where Annie and her small daughter and her young sister, Didi, now lived was one of three tall, narrow houses. The top two floors had been formed into a separate flat, while Annie inhabited the
bottom two. The top flat had its own front door reached by means of an iron fire escape of solid Victorian construction.

Miss Royal had rented the flat from Annie about eighteen months ago and had been an object of interest to Annie ever since. To the neighbours as well when they got a chance to view her.

Miss Royal was blonde, leggy, wore trousers almost all the time, which caused the unkind old neighbours next door, Nancy and Bob Tyrrett, to say she must be a lesbian, and they didn't mean it as a compliment. The Tyrretts had watched her move in and kept their eyes open since but had not managed more than the odd fleeting glimpse. Miss Royal was a buyer in fashion for a large chain of department stores and not home a lot.

‘She has to travel a lot on business,' Annie had explained to her sister. ‘But she finds it fascinating and loves it.'

‘She never says a word to me, just shoots past.' Not that she had done that lately either. Must have wings, thought sister.

‘Well, she does to me. On occasion. When she feels like it.'

‘And she's asked you to call her Caroline?'

‘Oh, everyone does that now.'

‘Does she call you Annie?'

‘Sometimes,' said Annie, unwilling to admit that Miss Royal never did.

‘Does she have a man up there?'

Annie blinked. ‘Well, I'm her landlady, not her keeper. So what if she does? She's adult.'

Didi frowned. ‘Thought I'd ask.' She drank some coffee. ‘What sort is he?'

‘The usual sort, I suppose. Why?'

‘He looks,' she hesitated … ‘different. I saw him once.'

‘Keep out of things,' advised Annie. ‘She lives her life, let us live ours. Laissez-faire.' A new phrase on Annie's lips; she had left school too young and was now getting an education as a mature student. She knew who Metternich was, and Lord Palmerston, and had heard of Adam Smith.

Annie was doing a course at the local university, the new
one, upgraded from a polytechnic. She had a small grant which just allowed her to eat while she studied Law and History but the great plus was that Maida, her child, went to the university children's group daily.

She had read all about Marianna Manners's murder even if she did not admit it. How could they think I was not interested in murder, I who know more about it than most.

‘I wonder if she'd talk to me if I went up,' Didi speculated, more to see what Annie said than because she intended to try. ‘I need to talk to someone about fashion if I'm going in for drama. I haven't got my image right.'

‘She told me she specialized in fashion for the older lady,' said Annie. ‘But you could try.'

That means don't bother, assessed Didi. As if I was going to, anyway.

The front doorbell rang.

‘Late,' said Annie.' I shan't answer.' She began to tremble.

‘Not that late. Depends what sort of life you have.'

The bell rang again.

‘I'm going to answer it.'

‘Look out of the window first.'

Didi said: ‘Oh, it's that man.' She moved fast. ‘I'll open the door.'

‘Who?'

‘Tash.'

Tom Ashworth.

‘What does he want so late?'

‘Like I said: it's not so late if your life is like that.'

Didi let him in, she had been looking forward to meeting him ever since Annie had told her that she had employed a private detective. She thought it was a waste of money but it certainly gave them status. No one else in her set had their own detective. Makes me up there with the Princess of Wales. Not that she'd boasted about it, of course, but she had certainly let the news creep out.

Tom Ashworth was a tall, easy-mannered young man who must have used the gentleness to advantage in his
work. Not quite as young as he looked, he was genuinely polite and did genuinely like people.

‘Saw your light on so I thought I'd pop in. I have something to report.'

‘Oh, good. I mean it is good, is it?'

‘I think it's good news. Or most of it. You always get a mixture, don't you? It's how life is.' He smiled at Didi who smiled back. Annie watched nervously, wondering if she ought to offer him a drink. Detectives drank, didn't they? There was some gin and a bottle of aged sherry if it hadn't dried up. Caroline liked gin, so she always kept gin and tonic in case Caroline came down here.

‘Would you like some coffee? Or something stronger?'

‘Coffee would be lovely.'

‘I'll get it,' said Didi. She went out to the kitchen, using her special stage walk.

‘So what's the news?' asked Annie. After the news would come the bill and she wondered if she would be able to pay it.

‘What do you want first… The good news or the bad?'

Didi was listening at the kitchen door as she heated the coffee. She liked him.

‘Well, I've checked out the Creeleys, the young ones, and they seem clear. Eddie anyway. No debts, credit is good, no record. And there is no reason to believe the boy is hanging around you to no good purpose.'

‘He knows me,' said Annie grimly.

‘Yes, he knows you, but I think you can stop worrying about him.'

‘Here is the coffee,' said Didi, swivelling in, hand on hip, mug of coffee in the other.

‘I don't know why they've come back,' said Annie, continuing with her grievance.

‘Eddie couldn't settle in New Zealand, that's the story. And he had the house, owned it, so he came back. You can't blame him for that.'

‘It was let to perfectly decent people.'

‘You didn't know them,' said Didi in surprise.

‘That was what was decent about them,' said Annie with
feeling. ‘I didn't have to know them. I have to know the Creeleys, they live inside me.'

Ashworth and Didi exchanged looks and Didi gave a little shrug.

Tom Ashworth took his coffee from Didi before she spilt it. ‘Houses are important.'

Annie had seen the glance and resented it. She decided to give Didi a slap. ‘You ought not to bite your fingernails if you want to succeed on the stage.'

Tom looked at Didi appreciatively. You're the sort of girl I'm looking for, his glance said. Both the sisters were pretty, with thick dark hair and blue eyes, but Didi did not have Annie's perpetually apprehensive expression. She would not have frown lines on her forehead so soon.

‘Actress, are you?'

‘No, not yet. No Equity card or anything.'

‘She's only just left school.' Annie's voice was sharper than she meant it to be: Didi's chosen career was a source of friction between them. ‘She could be at a university, she got very good A-level results.'

‘I will be at the university, in the drama department, and that will be working with the St Luke's Theatre School when it's set up.'

‘Which it isn't yet.' This was the real rub.

‘Miss Pinero says it will be. Soon.'

‘Pinero, Pinero, that's all we here now.' Annie turned to Tom. ‘And meanwhile she's working in a Delicatessen shop selling brioches.'

‘And coffee,' said Didi, who knew how to needle her sister.

‘Not acting at all?' Tom looked at Didi.

‘I'm auditioning for a part in an amateur production. It's a kind of pre-run for getting a place at the drama school. Annie doesn't realize how competitive it is. I've got to fight for a place.' Didi shook her head. ‘Do anything.'

Tom looked at her admiringly. ‘Good for you.' It was the sort of thing he might have said himself. ‘I seem to know the name Pinero … Isn't she married to the chief of police here?' The vagueness was professional discretion,
he knew Stella Pinero, had acted for her but one did not mention one client to another.

‘Yes. Do you know him?'

‘Not to say know. But in my business you run across the police so you have to know names at least.'

‘Is that how you started out yourself … in the police?'

Tom did not like answering personal questions; it was the wrong way round. He asked, others answered. So he skipped answering automatically.

‘And the bad news—' he turned to Annie—‘since you didn't ask, is that Will Creeley has had a stroke and is being given parole, so Lizzie gets the same. She'll be out. Probably out now.'

Annie had heard a rumour of this but had chosen not to believe it.

‘Going home? Back to Wellington Street?'

‘Reckon she'll have to. She isn't going to live long, Annie, she's no danger to you.'

‘Yes, she is, you'll see.' Annie's voice was a wail. ‘And what about him? Will?'

Now for the bad bad news. ‘He's tucked away in hospital, can't walk or talk, he's in a worse state than she is. So they are both out. Natural justice, I suppose that's the reasoning.'

‘He'll kill me,' said Annie, white-faced.

‘He's an old man now, Annie. I don't think he's a threat.'

Annie stood up, she could be as dramatic as Didi when she liked, and swept to the window. ‘There's a murderer out there. A killer. Marianna Manners lived not far from here. It could be young Creeley. Family business. You say he's not been hanging around. I think he has.'

Tom took a deep breath. ‘Well, maybe I haven't been quite straight with you there. I think he's looked around, seen the house. Even rung the doorbell.'

Annie stared at him.

Tom turned to Didi. ‘Come on, Didi, you know the boy, don't you? It's you he's after. And not to kill.'

Annie turned on her sister. ‘Is this true?'

‘I told you I liked Eddie, he's decent. He wants to act too. We rehearse together.'

‘Good for you,' said Tom.

‘I trust him,' said Didi.

‘You can't trust a Creeley. You're a fool, Didi.'

Annie made a dramatic gesture with her hands. ‘You know what you're doing, you two? You are talking to a woman who is dying. I am going to be killed.'

Tom made an opportunity to speak to Didi at the door. ‘Keep an eye on her.'

‘Oh, she'll be all right. She's got her social worker looking after her.'

He considered. ‘Still?'

‘I think he's off the job, it's personal now. He's in love with her.'

‘That's not ethical.'

‘What's ethical? Life's not ethical.'

Tom laughed. ‘You're right there. What's his name? I'll look into it.'

‘Alex Edwards. I don't know his address.'

‘I'll find it.' He saw she was more anxious about her sister than she wanted to admit.

‘Don't worry too much, kid. I think your sister will have a long life.' He was not in a position to be sure of this, who could be? But he wanted Didi to be happy.

‘She does get so upset.'

‘Don't we all?'

‘Not you.'

‘Me too. When I'm keen on something. Or I like a person.'

He smiled, and after a pause, Didi smiled.

‘I'm serious.'

As he drove away, he wondered if he ought to have told her to be careful with the Creeley boy. But that night be over-egging the pudding. He would seek a chance to have a word with the Chief Commander, John Coffin, and say something quiet. Go into one of the pubs he used and take
his chance. Like a careful man, he had taken the trouble to run a check on the life and habits of John Coffin. Meaning him no harm, he told himself, but it is as well to know what you can.

After all, he could say, I am looking for your sister's missing daughter (although in my opinion the mother knows more about the child than she is letting on, and they just don't want to meet for reasons all their own but which I intend to know) and I helped with your wife's divorce and that was a fudged-up affair as I expect you know. Or didn't you know?

And as he drove, he said quietly to the traffic lights as they turned red: I have put my foot in that pool and I am not taking it out.

Tuesday through to Wednesday. In Spinnergate

Stella Pinero, as she went about her business for the next day or two kept a watch for her obsessive admirer. If that was what he was. Stalking a star, that was the phrase, wasn't it?

She seemed to be free at the moment. In her life she had been the object of passionate love, of jealousy, and of dislike. Even sometimes, almost harder to bear, of indifference. But there was something uncomfortable about being the object of an obsession.

She considered what she knew of the figure in the shadows, Charley, she called him. There was never any attempt at contact. She had never been touched, had had no letters, never been sent a photograph, had no telephone calls.

She had seen the man in the courtyard outside the St Luke's Theatre after a performance. In the road outside St Luke's Mansions, looking up, just the flash of dark glasses turned her way. Once she had seen him on the
station at the Spinnergate Tube, but he didn't get on the train with her. There may have been many occasions when she had simply not seen him. Certainly in the beginning, before she became alerted, there must have been such times.