Cold in the Earth (5 page)

By lunchtime the following day the tentative plan had become an imperative. She’d had visits from four of her mother’s friends, three offering affectionate support and the fourth, the long-nosed Mrs Martin, offering ‘help’ in disposing of her mother’s wardrobe (‘I know how distressing these things can be for the family, dear’) and proving unable to conceal her disappointment at being told that it had been dealt with already.

The phone went all day with offers of hospitality as well as business calls from lawyers and accountants. Laura had collapsed again into bed, even more exhausted than she had felt the day before, with a priority list on her bedside table headed ‘Find Flat’.

This morning had started in just the same way (‘Now Laura, my dear, I want you to come to lunch on Sunday. My grandson’s popping down from London –
such
a nice boy, doing so well with KPMG. I’m sure you’d have a lot in common and I simply won’t take no for an answer . . .’) and by the end of the fourth call Laura was feeling persecuted.

She eyed the phone with loathing as it rang for the fifth time, had a brief wrestle with her conscience, then picked it up. She found it hard to keep the terseness out of her voice. ‘Yes?’

There was a slight, surprised pause, then a pleasant male voice said mildly, ‘I was hoping to speak to Laura Harvey, if it’s convenient. This is Nick Dalton – I’m Features Editor of the
Sunday Tribune
.’

‘Oh!’ Taken aback, Laura sat down heavily on the little tapestry chair by the phone table. With her other problems, she’d put the article completely out of her mind; now she rapidly tried to gather her scattered wits. ‘Sorry, yes, Laura Harvey speaking.’

It was a very flattering phone call. He was impressed with the article, thought it might well strike a chord with readers and wanted to run it in a couple of weeks or so. He even hinted that, dependent on reaction, there might be the possibility of an occasional series on what he called domestic psychology and mentioned a fee which would have made Laura sit down abruptly if she hadn’t been sitting already.

‘Now, you’re down in the country somewhere, aren’t you? I wonder if we have a photographer anywhere near you?’

It was a sign. ‘I’m going to be in London within the next few days,’ Laura said and promised to contact him, but her first thought on setting down the phone was not that here was a possible new career opening up. It was that at least she had a genuine excuse to escape Sunday lunch. She’d always been a rotten liar.

The dress agency was a small, single-fronted shop, flanked on one side by the lavish plate-glass expanse of an estate agent’s and on the other by the primly frosted windows of a solicitor’s office, in a side street off Gloucester’s main shopping centre. The name above it, The Band Box, was painted in elegant gold script on black and in the simply dressed window a dusty-pink suede suit was artfully displayed to emphasise the lines of its expensive cut.

Inside, it was no more than a large room, with one end partitioned to provide a small back office and two changing rooms behind grey velvet curtains. The carpet too was soft grey and long mirrors reflected the rails of clothes arranged in blocks of colour and the shelf above where hatstands flaunted extravagant creations.

Its owner, currently reassuring a customer of the fit of a DKNY trouser-suit, was a slim woman, fine-boned and a little above medium height. Her hair, done in a French pleat, was natural blonde; she was discreetly made-up and unobtrusively well dressed in a pale caramel jersey suit with a cream shirt in heavy silk. Her manner, too, was quiet, as if not drawing attention to herself was a considered policy.

Over the years she had built up a loyal and extensive client base, on the one hand of ladies who came in twice a year to sell last season’s designer wardrobe, on the other those who had the aspirations but not the clothing allowance. She had at one time or another passed most of them in the street unrecognised, yet if she had chosen she could have been very striking with her blue-grey eyes and refined bone structure. But there were lines of sadness about her mouth, and around the eyes where laughter lines usually show, her fine pale skin was curiously unmarked.

She packed up the trouser-suit, layering it carefully with tissue paper and carrying out the credit card transaction with quiet efficiency, responding with a smile to the customer’s confidences about the job interview for which it was being purchased. She saw her to the door and wished her luck, then returned to her desk in the back office with the label to credit the sale to the appropriate account. She enjoyed her work, was proud of the business she had managed to build with a minimal bank loan. It gave interest and definition to a life which held very little else.

January was always a slow month for clothes sales and it had been a quiet day. It was dark outside and in another quarter of an hour she could shut up shop and return to her comfortable rented flat; she had planned a pleasant supper and tonight there was a good drama series on television. She was contented enough with that and her books for company and barely noticed the solitude any more.

Mechanically she tidied her desk and took the keys to lock up. A newspaper lay beside them, neatly folded in the buff wrapper in which it had been posted. She picked it up with a sigh, looked at it as if the act of tearing off its covering would be an ordeal. With a paper-knife from the desk she slit it slowly, then unfolded it.

It was a local newspaper with only half-a-dozen double sheets and it didn’t take long to scan. Nothing in particular caught her attention but when she put it down her mood had changed. The quiet evening at home didn’t seem so attractive now; perhaps she’d check if there was something she’d like to see at the cinema where she could sit in the warm dark surrounded by people instead of the ghosts of her past, and with the most highly paid entertainers in the world up there on the silver screen doing their best to take her mind off all the things she didn’t want to think about.

Marjory Fleming wasn’t exactly dragging her feet over setting up an interview with Conrad Mason – not exactly. But when he turned out to have a couple of days off, and then she did, and then there was a conference she had to attend and the statistical return had to be completed before the deadline, she wasn’t particularly sorry to have an excuse for putting it off. It was only when she passed PC Langlands in the corridor a week later that her conscience pricked her into action.

When Conrad Mason came into a room, you knew he was there. He had the sort of presence which is a professional asset for a policeman: he was tall and broad with it, possessed of an uncompromising cast of features which suggested hitting first and answering to the complaints panel afterwards. He’d been known to break up a brawl just by coming into the bar and looming.

He was looming now. ‘Sit down, Conrad,’ Fleming ordered. ‘I always feel like a stick of forced rhubarb under a flowerpot when you’re standing over me.’ He obeyed, smiling.

With her mother’s remarks about his uncle in mind she looked at him with fresh interest and was forced to acknowledge that he too was actually a bit of a hunk. His hair was short, very dark and curly, and he had the sort of craggy face which might no longer be fashionable in the age of the New Man and the sarong but which would certainly appeal to any woman whose favourite fantasy involved caves and clubs and a bit of chest-pounding.

She only became aware that she was staring when he shifted uneasily and put a hand up to his face. ‘Have I a smut on my cheek, or something?’

‘No, no,’ she said hastily. ‘I was just in a dwam. OK, do you know what this is about?’

He shook his head, puzzled but not troubled.

‘If I say the name “WPC Johnston” would it ring a bell?’

‘Jackie Johnston. Yes, she’s new, started a few weeks ago.’ He still looked perfectly relaxed.

‘Do you remember shouting at her ten days ago?’

That was a shock. His face darkened. ‘Did she tell you that?’

‘No, she didn’t. It was reported by someone else, and let’s get this straight right now this minute,’ her tone was steely, ‘if I hear even a wee suggestion that you’re taking it out on her you’ll be in the sort of trouble that will make you wish you’d taken a job cleaning public toilets instead. You and I both know it’s not the first time we’ve had to have this sort of conversation and I’m trying to make up my mind where we go from here.’

She expected him to apologise, make excuses as he always had before. Instead he said, tight-lipped, ‘Is the verdict in already before the trial? Or am I to be allowed to put my side of it?’

A muscle at the corner of his mouth was twitching and his brows had drawn together; he was staring directly at her in a way which made Fleming wonder if he was daft enough to think he could intimidate her. She leaned back in her chair and met his challenging gaze squarely. ‘Yes, of course.’

‘We were about to detain a suspect. I told her to give the caution and she had three attempts at it and then I had to prompt her. Maybe we should use her all the time – they’d all be so helpless with laughter we could throw away the handcuffs.’

‘Do I take it you felt she’d made you look in some sense ridiculous?’

‘Too bloody right I did.’

‘Watch your tone, Sergeant.’ Fleming spoke sharply, concerned at his belligerent attitude. ‘You felt, did you, that the constructive thing to do about a professional failing on the part of a new recruit was to frighten her into hysterics? That this would make it more likely that she would be able to cope next time?’

‘No, but it certainly showed the bastard we were arresting who was boss.’

Fleming said nothing. Loudly. The pause lengthened uncomfortably until at last he burst out, ‘Oh, I suppose you’re going to say it was inappropriate and unprofessional behaviour. I suppose I should have said it didn’t matter and patted the little dear on the head – oh no, of course not, I’d have been reported for sexual harassment instead, wouldn’t I?’

‘Yes, you certainly would. And you don’t seem to realise how lucky you are that no formal complaint of bullying and harassment has been lodged.’

‘Then what the hell is all this about?’ He was on his feet, his face suffused with dark colour, his eyes wild and his huge fists tightly clenched. ‘If I’m just here to jump through hoops—’

‘Stop right there, Sergeant. That’s an order. And stand to attention.’ Fleming jumped up and came round the desk to within a foot of him. She was not that much shorter than he was; she held his gaze relentlessly, hoping that he couldn’t hear the pounding of her heart. The silent struggle continued for a few seconds, then like an animal subdued he dropped his head. A moment later he straightened up, hands by his side, feet together, as the tide of angry colour ebbed from his face.

‘Sorry, ma’am,’ he mumbled.

‘Oh yes, I should think you are. And it’s just a question of how much sorrier I’m going to make you.’ She went back round the desk, glad to sit down before her shaking knees betrayed her.

He stood in front of her, rigidly at attention, his eyes fixed somewhere above her head. She sighed. ‘Oh, for God’s sake, Conrad, sit down and stop being such a fool. You’re a good detective but you’ve just demonstrated a lack of control which would make you a total liability.’

He almost collapsed into the chair, as if someone had hit him behind the knees. He was sweating; he was taking out a handkerchief to mop his brow as she went on, ‘That, plus the business with Johnston – I have to ask how long it’s going to be before you lose it completely and take someone out. What on earth is going on?’

‘Sorry,’ he said again, still speaking thickly. ‘Personal problems. I shouldn’t have let them get on top of me like that. It won’t happen again.’

This wasn’t the moment to point out that this was what he’d said last time. ‘Do you feel like telling me about them?’ Fleming said gently.

Mason bit at his lip, his head again bowed. He looked up at her fleetingly, then down again, as if trying to make up his mind. Then he started: his mother – she was so demanding, claiming he neglected her but it was only because he was going on training courses and anyway he’d a right to live his own life after all, hadn’t he, and most men wouldn’t put up with it . . .

Eventually he trailed into silence. Fleming hesitated, weighing her words, then said, ‘Tell me to mind my own business if you like, but why don’t you get a place of your own?’

‘It’s – well, it would be difficult.’ But he was recovering visibly, as if what he had said had released some almost unbearable tension. He shrugged and smiled. ‘I certainly couldn’t afford the Jag on what they pay me at the moment.’

Conrad Mason’s XJ6 was celebrated throughout the Galloway Constabulary and was held to explain his success with a string of very flashy young women, though none of them lasted long. Not the type, anyway, that you would take home to a possessive mummy, his superior officer reflected.

‘I suppose I thought if I got promotion it would make it possible to get my own place,’ he went on. ‘But after this – there’s no point, is there? Well, the only good thing about it is I’ll have more time to spend with Ma. She’ll like that.’

After what he’d said about his mother, this response was so false that alarm bells jangled in Fleming’s brain. He was no fool; she’d given him a clue that she thought it would be good for him to have his own place and he was implying that a stop on his promotion would prevent this desirable outcome. He was trying to manipulate her.

‘I’m going to have to think this one through,’ she said coolly. ‘I’m sorry to leave it unresolved but you must see that you have brought it on yourself.’ She trailed the remark provocatively – hoping, perhaps, that another outburst would bring things to a head.

If so, she was to be disappointed. ‘I know I have. I’m sorry to have placed you in this position, ma’am. Thank you for not condemning me unheard.’

He went out. It was an entirely appropriate, indeed commendable reaction. Why, then, did it make her more, rather than less, uneasy?