A Vision of Loveliness (35 page)

‘Is that you?’ said the voice. It was Henry but it didn’t say it was Henry.

‘Yes.’

‘What are your plans?’

The police had said not to change address. Safest to be vague.

‘I thought I might go and see Lorna.’

‘Very good idea. Excellent.’

And he hung up.

Suzy hadn’t been driving either of course. She said so and Henry believed her. She had been whisked away from the police station and taken to a borrowed flat in St John’s Wood where Big Terry was waiting with a new short hairdo and a rather racy auburn rinse –
A fresh hairstyle can make a woman feel reborn
. Henry had found her a job as a receptionist in a big firm on Western Avenue somewhere where she could sit behind a bird’s-eye maple desk in tight cashmere sweaters – a whole new wardrobe of greens and blues to go with the auburn rinse – purring into telephones and flicking through her
Architectural Review
. When the divorce came through two years later and Sir Henry Swan married Susan, only child of the late Captain St John ‘Brandy’ Johnson, nobody made the Double Dates Death Drive connection. Henry made friends with some new maître d’s and Captain Swan got some new usual tables.

Jane picked up the phone again and rang Lorna. There was still that funny open-air sound. Lorna no longer messed about with silly voices:

‘Hello.’

‘It’s me.’

‘Hello.’

Lorna never felt the same about Suzy after the
Evening News
affair, as if the whole sordid business – her getting pregnant; the professor not wanting to marry her; her mother being a poisonous, loveless old bitch – were all somehow Suzy’s fault. She arranged for the murder of Lorna’s baby, she was capable of anything as far as Lorna was concerned.

‘Suzy killed him, you know. She put her foot down and drove straight into him.’

That ought to keep them busy. It had gone very quiet Lorna’s end. Jane leaned back and suddenly spotted the missing black shoe peeping out from under the sofa.

‘Is Glenda there?’

‘No. I thought she was away. Spain.’

‘I’ve got a feeling she’ll be around later on.’

The sound of pennies dropping.

‘All right.’

The line went dead.

Jane lugged the laundry box out of the airing cupboard and crammed in what she could: the navy grosgrain (unfortunate associations but still very useful); the red velvet; the blue faille; the two Hardy Amies numbers – poor old Tony; her cashmere twinsets and her tweed skirts. She remembered seeing a Junior Saleslady Required sign at a madam shop in Kensington High Street. You never knew.

She squeezed a dozen pairs of Glenda’s shoes round the sides then laid the mink jacket and alligator bag on top. She should be able to get a few quid for them or she could use them as bait for a new Sergio. Always supposing she wanted a new Sergio.

She checked the contents of her old manila envelope. There was over £100 in the post office savings book and another, smaller brown envelope tightly filled with crisp five pound notes which hadn’t been there before. And there, right at the bottom, still in their wallet were the birth certificate and National Insurance gubbins of the late Mary Jane Deeks (eighteen next birthday). That and her make-up all fitted nicely into Uncle George’s overnight bag.

She didn’t have to be a saleslady. She might be able to just do that part time, go on day release and train as something else entirely: typist; stylist; telephonist; receptionist; chiropodist; machinist; manicurist; illusionist; contortionist; abortionist. Anything she fucking liked.

She sat at her blue dressing table and checked her make-up. The emergency paint-job might have looked all right by the light of a Fleet Street flashbulb, but in the soft, expensive glow of a Mayfair bedroom she looked suddenly very old and very cheap. She brushed her hair out of its makeshift chignon and tucked it into the old fake tortoiseshell slide. Could she still pass for a seventeen-year-old junior sales? She could if she took all that stuff off her face. She went into the blue and gold bathroom, ran the blue flannel under the hot gold tap and washed herself away.

She dragged the laundry box through the kitchen and out on to the fire escape. She had to stand on tiptoe to keep her stilettos from slipping into the square holes of the iron gridwork. Still nobody down below.

It had turned very cold all of a sudden and the March wind was cutting right through her thin mac. Suzy’s reversible swing coat was still hanging on a hook in the hall cupboard. Warmer than the silk: smarter. She nipped back inside to shrug into it (beige side out), ignoring the tinkling phone and letting the fire-escape door slam behind her as she left the empty flat for the last time. The cashmere of the turned-up collar slapped softly against her face. The sweet, sickly scent of Suzy was still trapped in the fabric: smelled a bit like Joy.

Acknowledgements

A Vision of Loveliness
was locked in a drawer for a number of years. It emerged thanks to a sharp prod from the
Sunday Telegraph’
s literary editor Michael Prodger and to the faith and encouragement of Paul Golding, Kyran Joughin and David Benedict (who introduced me to United Agents). Anna Webber (of UA) and Helen Garnons-Williams, Alexandra Pringle, Erica Jarnes and the team at Bloomsbury have all been a joy to work with. Sarah-Jane Forder was a sharp but painless copy-editor.

June Torrance gave me the inside track on London’s post-war couture showrooms and Chief Superintendent Anthony Stanley (retired) supplied priceless insights into the workings of Savile Row police station in the early Sixties. Clement Crisp and the late Pat Creed were kind enough to check the original typescript for errors and anachronisms (remaining blunders are mine).

Most of all I must thank Pete Mulvey for his love and patience.

A Note on the Author

Louise Levene is a journalist, academic and one-time saleslady. She is currently the ballet critic of the
Sunday Telegraph
, and used to write and present Radio 4’s 
Newstand
among other programmes. She lives in London.
A Vision of Loveliness
is her first novel.

First published in Great Britain 2010

Copyright © 2010 by Louise Levene

This electronic edition published 2011 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

The right of Louise Levene to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by

her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

All rights reserved. You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make

available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (including without

limitation electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, printing, recording or

otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does

any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution

and civil claims for damages.

Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 36 Soho Square, London W1D 3QY

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 978 1 4088 1820 6

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