Angel Hunt (9 page)

One of the apprentice glaziers had lit up a wide-mouth blowtorch.

‘When was this?' I asked quickly.

‘Six, seven months ago.'

‘And she bought this place in Highbury?'

‘Bought? Rent? How should I know? Said she wanted somewhere better to bring up her baby.'

‘She had a baby?'

‘One baby and maybe 27 cats. The place smelled awful as soon as she moved in. What is he doing?' He pointed to the lad with the blowtorch.

‘I think he's going to weld the new window into place. Have a nice day.'

I jogged down the stairs while he began to argue with the builders. I didn't fancy being around when Sunil got back to check his library.

 

So that's how I was heading north-west towards Highbury and Lucy instead of north and east to Zaria. I'd get to her later; hopefully before Sunil got to me. But I still wasn't sure why.

Perhaps it was Nassim's mention of the baby that sparked me off, however subconsciously. Perhaps I thought that if it was Billy's kid, then somebody had to tell Lucy the bad news, and if she was skipping probation, it had better not be the cops. But then, if it was Billy's kid, why didn't he know she didn't live on Dwyer Street any more?

One fact I did recognise and hang on to was that late afternoon was the best time to find a young mother at home. Even if you didn't know anything about baby-feeding times, a quick look at the TV schedules would tell you that. The programme planners assumed that most women's brains came out with the baby. If I was a young mother, I'd write in and demand re-runs of Joseph Losey movies or continuous showings of
Jewel in the Crown
,
but then I'd never get to learn about biological cleaners working at low temperatures.

Geneva Street was a row of identical terraced houses without even different front-door paint-jobs to distinguish them. No 28 was noticeable only because it did not have net curtains, just long, dark purple ones that were almost drawn across the front room window. I could see the flicker of a television set reflected in the glass, though. I'd been right about the biological cleaners.

I parked Armstrong round the corner and walked back to press the doorbell of 28.

Before the two note ding-dong had faded, a baby had started to howl inside. And howl, and howl.

Eventually, the door opened an inch on a chain thick enough to restrain a Rottweiler. A lock of blonde hair and the edge of some round, gold-rimmed glasses appeared at my chest height, and I'm not that tall.

I almost asked if her sister was in; then the tone of voice that said, ‘Yes, what is it?' told me that wouldn't be too clever.

‘Er … Lucy Scarrott?'

‘Who wants to know?'

I couldn't blame her. I do the same if someone I've never seen comes up and uses one of my names. Sometimes I do it if I know them quite well.

‘My name's Roy,' I said round the corner of the door. ‘I wanted a word about Billy Tuckett.'

‘Billy's not here. I haven't seen him in over a year.'

From behind her, the baby's howl turned to a high-pitched whine, like Concorde warming up.

‘I've got to go. Tell him he'll have to stand on his own two feet.'

The door began to close and I put out a hand to stop it.

‘I can't. There's been an accident.'

The door eased back against the chain.

‘How bad an accident?'

‘The worse kind,' I said, hoping it didn't sound flip.

‘He's dead?' said the blonde voice, after ten seconds silence.

‘I'm afraid so.'

More silence, then she said: ‘I'm sorry. Thank you for letting me know.' And then she closed the door, leaving me on the step in the rain.

For a minute or so, I just stood there. I hadn't really known what to expect, but it wasn't this.

To my left, I saw the long purple curtains twitch in the window, and for a moment I thought it was her just making sure I'd gone. But then they twitched again, and I looked down to see, just above the sill, the curls and bright blue eyes of a snub-nosed child.

I crouched down so that we were eyeballing each other and began to pull funny faces; the sort of expressions you do in traffic jams when you don't think anyone's watching. The kid began to laugh and steam up the window-pane, then started slapping the glass with a tiny hand, leaving greasy fingerprints.

After about two minutes of this, I heard the door open.

‘Was there anything else you wanted?' she said.

I had to take my thumbs out of my nostrils and uncross my eyes before I answered.

‘I wouldn't mind a chat about Billy, if that's all right?'

I drew a pattern in the raindrops on the window for the kid while she thought about it. The kid laughed loud enough for me to hear, and then the chain snicked off.

‘You'd better come in,' she said. ‘Before the Neighbourhood Watch get you.'

It wouldn't be the first time, but I didn't say it.

She led me into the front room where, defensively, she picked up the baby. She was only about five feet tall, if that, and the kid, a big, healthy specimen, seemed to be only a few inches off the floor. Lucy and the kid were wearing matching outfits: jeans and blue sweatshirts with World Wildlife Fund patches. The kid had bright yellow socks on; Lucy was barefoot and her hair was longer and she wore glasses. Otherwise, there wasn't that much difference.

The baby pointed at me and said: ‘Der … da-dat …'

‘You have a lovely daughter,' I said, shaking my head slightly to stop raindrops running into my eyes.

She looked impressed.

‘Most men think Cleo is a boy, just because I don't dress her in pink frocks.'

It had been a 50-50 chance, but it's better to be lucky than good. (Rule of Life No 1.)

‘The pink for a girl, blue for a boy thing was probably thought up by men just to help them identify their kids without having to resort to close inspection. How old to she?'

‘Sixteen months.'

‘So she was born when you lived in Leytonstone?'

‘What is this? What the hell has that got to do with anything?'

‘I'm sorry.' I must have moved towards her, as she took half a step back. I indicated a chair, and she nodded that it was okay for me to sit down.

She relaxed visibly as soon as I did so. Now she looking down at me.

‘I'd better come clean,' I said. ‘I was in the house you used to own in Dwyer Street on Sunday. Billy Tuckett fell off the roof and killed himself.'

‘What?'

She let Cleo slide over her thigh and down onto the floor. The kid toddled off like a drunk trying to balance two pints of beer.

‘I don't know any other way of saying it.' I did, but not so she wouldn't scream. ‘He fell off the roof and killed himself

‘Suicide?' She sat down herself, but her face remained blank. In a good light she could pass for 16.

‘No, no way. It was an accident. We think he might have been trying to find you.'

‘We?' Suddenly suspicious. ‘Just who is we?'

‘Look, lady –' Little Cleo staggered back into the room clutching a bright red balloon ‘– I just happened to be there, looking after the place while the owner was away. That was my first bit of bad luck. The second bit was that I had to identify Billy. I knew him, back in student days, but I hadn't seen him for ten years.'

Cleo ran to Lucy and hit her around the knees with the balloon, shouting ‘Doon … doon.'

Lucy reached out and ruffled Cleo's curls. ‘I haven't seen him myself for about a year,' she said quietly. ‘He called round one day and saw Cleo there and after that ... I think Cleo was a shock to him.'

‘Is ... was ... ?'

‘Don't be embarrassed; I'm not. No, Billy wasn't the father. That's why it was a shock to him.'

Cleo tore off towards a fold-up dining-room table on which a hairy brown cat I hadn't noticed until now had begun to stir and stretch.

‘Dat … dat … dat …' yelled Cleo, pointing at the animal, which wisely stayed just out of her reach.

‘Cleo's a constant source of worry,' said Lucy vaguely.

‘Seems fighting fit to me,' I said.

‘It's her words,' Lucy went on, almost as if I wasn't there. ‘Everything she says starts with a “D.” She can't seem to get her mouth round anything else.'

‘Don't worry, it'll come,' I said paternally, but not too much. ‘Was ... er ... Billy …'

‘Expecting to be the father? No. I think even Billy knew you had to sleep with somebody before that happened. Billy and I were just good friends, really good mates. That's all. Can you believe that?'

‘Sure. Why shouldn't I?'

‘Most men can't, or won't.'

Cleo did another circuit of the room and emerged from behind a chair with a well-sucked teddy bear. ‘Ded … Ded …' she cooed as she hugged it.

‘Billy moved away to work –' she hesitated for a fraction of a second ‘– out of London about three years ago, and I started seeing someone and Cleo was the result. Billy came back just before I sold the house in Dwyer Street and saw her when she was a baby. Yes, I can see what you're thinking. He was disappointed in me, I think. Anyway, I didn't see him again. And now I don't suppose I ever will.'

She leaned over and hugged Cleo, who put a delicate finger on her mother's nose as she whispered: ‘Dose …'

‘Did you tell Billy you were moving out?'

‘I didn't tell
anybody
I was …' She looked at me accusingly. ‘How the hell did you find me?'

‘Mr Nassim,' I said quickly. ‘The guy who looked after your furniture. The guy who helped buy your house. He's my landlord. I was doing him a favour looking after the house over Christmas.'

‘Have you told anyone else?'

‘No. Any reason why I shouldn't?'

‘I don't want Cleo's father to find us.' She stood up. ‘I'm sorry about Billy, but I don't see what it has to do with me or how I can help you. Just what are you trying to do anyway?'

‘I'm not sure,' I said, more or less honestly. ‘Maybe just laying a ghost. There'll have to be a funeral.'

‘There usually is. Thanks, but no thanks. I have my own problems.'

Just for a moment, I thought I saw a flicker of emotion in her eyes, but it was probably a trick of the light.

‘You and Billy were into animal rights campaigning, weren't you?'

That stumped her for a few seconds, then she opened the door to the hallway for me.

‘That was a long time ago. You'd better go now, I have to get Cleo's tea.'

There didn't seem to be any point in pushing it, so I made to leave.

‘Bye, Cleo.' I waved to the toddling girl, who was over by the window again, banging a fist on the pane and watching the rain drizzle down.

‘Dith … dith … dith …' she said to herself.

I don't know why Lucy was worried about the kid. I could understand every word she said.

It was dithing it down outside.

 

 

 

 

 

It was dark and well stormy by the time I got to the Aurora Corona Rest Home, and the residents were probably battened down for the night. I parked Armstrong on the road and walked down the short drive to the impressive Gothic porch around the front door. That at least had a light showing. At first I thought the rest of the building was in total darkness, but as I crunched gravel and got closer, I could see they used extra-thick curtains, maybe leftovers from the blackout. They'd help deaden the screams.

I got wet again, as the rain had set in in stair-rods. The interior of Armstrong was beginning to smell of wet dogs, and that just added to my bad mood. Since lunchtime, I'd done nothing except be in the company of women, hanging around in pubs or crawling through traffic. I was getting hungry and frustrated because I hadn't been able to enjoy any of it.

There was a printed card fixed above the doorbell, which told me I had about ten minutes before visiting times were up. I pressed it, and there was a buzz and a click and the door opened an inch by itself. I shook the rain out of my hair and wiped my feet on the doormat, then stepped into the porch and tried the inner door. That opened into a hallway with a huge open staircase, almost certainly pinched from an older house, and a reception desk.

If it hadn't been so quiet, it could have been Paddington station during a commuter cull. The hallway and various passages off it were full of visitors helping pyjama-ed relatives in and out of chairs, plumping cushions for them or fetching magazines from a well-stocked rack, or encouraging them to that last little drop of cocoa from what seemed to be a standard-issue purple mug. None of the wrinklies – sorry, shouldn't be ageist – looked remotely grateful or pleased to see their visitors, and the feeling was probably mutual. They needed something to stimulate them, even I could see that, to dispel the overwhelming atmosphere of gloom.

I thought about leaving a few of Simon's visiting cards around, or suggesting they all get together and build a glider in the loft, but then I saw the frosty-eyed Matron in a blue uniform and matching hair rinse clocking me from behind the desk.

I was on borrowed time. Better turn on the blag.

‘Good evening, Matron,' I beamed, walking straight towards her. ‘I hope you don't mind me arriving without an appointment like this, but I understood you had an open door policy.'

She looked as if she didn't know what I was talking about, which was okay. That made two of us.

‘I am right, aren't I?' I pressed on. ‘You do encourage potential residents to call in and inspect at any time, don't you?'

‘Well, actually–' she began.

‘Of course, it's not for myself.' Big joke, smile, show the good teeth to full effect. ‘It's my grandmother.'

‘Your grandmother?'

‘A marvellous lady. Eighty-seven going on 55, as we say in the family.'

‘She's …?'

‘Yes, you've guessed. She's just getting too much for my sister to handle, and what with me being abroad so much … Even with Concorde, I'm away for long periods nowadays.' Steady on, don't overdo it. ‘So I thought I'd strike while the iron was hot, so to speak, and we were just passing, and so here we are.'

‘Your grandmother's here?'

‘Well, outside in a taxi, actually. She has her things with her –'

‘I'm sorry, but this is highly –'

‘And we've been recommended to you by one of your staff, I believe. A Miss Zania, is it? She gets on very well with my grandmother; in fact, she's one of the few young people she'll actually listen to when –'

‘Sorry, we don't have … Oh, you must mean Zaria.'

‘Zaria?' I played dumb, having been cut off in mid-flow.

‘Zaria Inhadi. She's one of our staff nurses. Or rather …'

Behind me, I heard one of the elderly male residents say to his visitor: ‘Oh God, it's her.' Then another toothless male voice said loudly: ‘Quick, son, stand in front of me, she's coming.'

I sneaked a glance to my left, but all I could see was a rather attractive young nurse wheeling a chair-ridden, white-haired old dear down the corridor towards us.

‘I'm sorry?' I concentrated on the Matron. It was important not to give her thinking time. ‘You were saying … about Nurse Zaria?'

‘I'm afraid she's not here any more. She gave her notice in and left yesterday. She had family problems. It was very sudden.'

‘Good lord. My grandmother will be most disappointed. Zaria was one of the few people who could control her when she had the moods.'

‘Well, there's nothing I can do about that,' she said stiffly. ‘And it is certainly most unusual just to turn up on the doorstep like this, Mr …?'

‘Prentice,' I said off the top of my head.

Behind me, one of the men seated in the hall whispered urgently: ‘For God's sake stand in front of me, son.'
I still couldn't see what the problem was, but the whole hallway area had gone suspiciously quiet. The pretty nurse with her wheelchaired lady was nearer, and I could read ‘Sally' on her white uniform badge.

‘I really don't see how we can accommodate your dear grandmother at such short notice …' Matron plugged on. Then I realised most of the visitors and all the residents were watching me, and I turned my head from side to side to see why I was getting that uncomfortable my-flies-must-be-open feeling.

As ‘Sally' came level, we made eye contact and I smiled politely at her. The rubber wheels of the chair she was pushing squeaked on the tiled floor as she passed behind me, and then I felt a hand on my inner left thigh.

I think my eyes bulged and my buttocks clenched in reflex, but there was a fair amount of surprise there, as I could see both of Sally's hands on the handles of the wheelchair. I knew what she was doing but I couldn't work out how.

Then the hand got higher and the grip tighter and suddenly Sally was not looking at me but at the old lady in the chair and saying sharply: ‘Mrs Cody! Stop that!'

I got a quick squeeze and then the hand withdrew.

As she went by, the old dear cackled loudly and yelled: ‘Did you see the arse on that, young Sally? Eh?'

The Matron flushed.

‘Mr Prentice, I'm
so
sorry …'

‘Don't worry about it,' I said generously. ‘I think my grandmother would fit in very well here.'

I meant it as well, even though I knew she'd miss the hang-gliding.

 

The next morning, I was a day older, no wiser and put in a bad mood right from the off because I was dragged from the Land of Nod kicking and screaming (well, grunting and stumbling actually) by the Celtic Twilight hammering on my door.

I'd christened the new residents of the flat above that just in case they ever decided to form a folk-singing duet and needed a stage name. From the first moment I'd seen Inverness Doogie and his Welsh wife, Miranda, I'd had them down as a sort of suicidal Sonny and Cher.

Doogie was Scottish – well, he would be; nobody would admit to coming from Inverness if they weren't – and had absolutely no sense of humour. It was almost as if it had been surgically removed along with his appendix when he was a kid. On our first meeting, he had thought I was a removal man working for Frank and Salome who had gone on to higher things (mainly higher rates, mortgage repayments, so fourth, so fifth). Things had got worse after that, when I'd met Miranda: as dark and austere as a Welsh mining valley and as much fun as chapel on Sunday. It was she who'd told me that Doogie was a commis chef at one of the better Park Lane hotels (and I'd said I hadn't realised his politics were important and she'd just looked at me) and that she was a journalist with one of the North London suburban weeklies. I'm sure she wrote everything from the ‘What's On in Stoke Newington' column to the reports of the Council's planning committee meetings with equal sincerity, convinced she was helping to change the world. If she didn't change it, I suppose Doogie could always poison it.

Many a time I had wished that Frank and Salome were not so upwardly mobile and were back slumming it in Stuart Street. But short of a stock market crash, a hundred percent divorce rate and the legal profession starting to work for free, I couldn't see it. Frank had designs on being the first black High Court judge, and Salome actually enjoyed her job in the City, as well as prospered from it. The other factor against a return was that I reckoned it only a matter of time before they stopped being Dinks (double income, no kids) and became Whannies (‘We have a nanny').

An early morning call from Doogie and Miranda left a lot to be desired, especially as it was not yet nine o'clock. I fought off the duvet and padded to the door, grabbing a towel from the bathroom to wrap around my waist and avoiding a cunning ankle-tap trip-and-throw move from Springsteen. He'd been practising it while I'd been away.

Doogie's idea of knocking on a door was to impersonate a heavy machine-gun, and I'd never heard him run out of ammunition. The only way to stop him was to open it.

‘Good morning, sir,' I said cheerfully. ‘Do you mind if I ask you something? Do you actually read your Bible? Do you know that the answer to all your questions, all your
problems, is actually contained within its glorious covers? There you can find hope. There –'

Doogie held up a finger.

‘Ahm knocking on
your
door,' he said slowly.

I hit my forehead with the heel of my hand.

‘So you are. I'm sorry. Force of habit.'

Behind him, the dark and diminutive Miranda rolled her dark eyes to the ceiling and shook her head.

‘Just give him the message,' she said wearily.

‘A friend of yours called Bunny rang last night and told you not to forget that you're playing at Christopher's place this morning,' said Doogie, then nodded to himself, pleased
that he'd remembered his lines.

‘Thanks. I hadn't forgotten.'

I had, but I had no intention of giving Miranda the impression I was disorganised. I grabbed at my towel just before it slipped.

‘C'mon, Doogie, let's get to work,' she said, starting down the stairs. ‘Before he starts rehearsal.'

Doogie raised his eyebrows, then his shoulders and then the corners of his mouth, and set off after her.

‘Rehearsal?' I shouted after them. ‘Don't know the meaning of the word.'

But as soon as I had the door shut, I began to ransack the flat for the sheet music I keep for special occasions such as Christmas,
bar mitzvahs,
weddings and so on.

In the bottom of the hi-fi cabinet I found, sandwiched between an old Ramones LP and the new Tommy Smith, the few printed sheets I possess. In there were ‘Santa Claus Is Coming to Town', ‘So This Is Christmas' and, of course, ‘Do They Know It's Christmas?'

I love the traditional carols, don't you?

 

I had a feeling that this jam session on the back of a truck with Bunny was going to end in tears, even before I left the house. If Bunny had organised it, it usually did. But even I couldn't blame him for the phone ringing just as I was at the front door.

It was a police person telling me that the inquest on Billy Tuckett would be at ten o'clock the next day at Queen's Road mortuary, where there was a Coroner's Court. Detective-Sergeant Prentice had specifically requested my presence and left instructions that I was to go to Queen's Road and not Whipps Cross Hospital mortuary. It appeared that the roof Billy had fallen off was in one coroner's jurisdiction, but where he'd landed was in another's. Billy never could do anything right.

I said I'd be there, and no, I didn't need fetching. Me being carted off with the sirens going would just about put my street cred in overdraft.

This close to Christmas, the wild West End was a militarised zone for private transport, even taxis. So I bus-hopped into the City and took the Central Line as far as Bond Street. I had my trumpet case on my knee and half a carriage to myself, so I pulled out a paperback of Gore Vidal's latest essays and read the one where he thinks he gets confused with Anthony Burgess. Funny, that; one's so much taller than the other.

I emerged on to Oxford Street, where the decorations festooned the streetlamps and even the Wimpy bars had spray-snowed their windows. The crowds weaved around the barrow boys selling Christmas wrapping paper and ribbon and those party-popper things that go bang and send streamers of shredded Hong Kong daily newspapers across the room. (Not the other sort that contain amyl nitrate, are marketed – legally, so far – as ‘liquid incense' and can be bought in the sex shops on Tottenham Court Road for £5.95. Or so they tell me.)

I had a back pocket full of readies, as I planned on doing some Christmas shopping while up West and I had no intention of joining the Christmas Eve rush to the lingerie departments of the big stores, so the first thing was to get away from the temptation of the HMV shop. I did that by averting my eyes and crossing the road quickly, almost tripping over a chestnut-seller at the entrance to St Christopher's Place.