Friday on My Mind (14 page)

‘It’s kind of you,’ she said to Veronica. ‘I think that I’d like to come.’

Back at Sasha’s house, Frieda made Ethan a lentil salad, which he didn’t eat, and then played a game of hide-and-seek with him. It was true what she had said to Veronica: children really do view things differently. Ethan thought that if he couldn’t see her, then she couldn’t see him. He stood in the corner of the room with his hands over his eyes and she loudly tried to discover his whereabouts. Then he slithered under the table with his wooden animals and she could hear him talking to them, a bit bossy but confiding. When his voice stopped she peered under the tablecloth and saw he had fallen asleep, his hands clutching his miniature toys and his mouth half open. She gently pulled him out of his den and laid him on the sofa, pushing a cushion under his hot head and closing the curtains so his face wasn’t in the sunlight. She sat and watched
him for a while, the breath puffing his lips and the flickering of his eyes in dreams. What was he dreaming of, she wondered, this mysterious little creature? What did he see when his eyes were closed?

When Sasha returned, Frieda was reading a book to Ethan. It was about lots of animals sitting on a broomstick and he knew it almost by heart and joined in with the words.

‘This is the sixth time I’ve read it,’ said Frieda, standing up. ‘If I try to read anything else, he holds his breath so that his face goes bright red. I was afraid he would pop. It’s amazing how much power a small child can have.’

‘But has he been all right?’ She bent to kiss Ethan but he wriggled free of her and disappeared under the table where they could hear him banging things.

‘He’s been good.’

‘You saved me.’

‘Hardly.’

‘I’ve taken tomorrow off – they think I’m going to a conference in Birmingham – so I can sort out childcare. I can hardly bear the thought of it. Beginning all over again with some stranger. I’d almost rather give up my job, but I don’t know if I’d cope with that – just being a mother, losing that structure and identity in the outside world. That’s what I’m really scared of: collapsing, going mad like I did before. I never want to go back to those days. I never want Ethan to see me like that. He must not.’

‘Perhaps you don’t have to bear it,’ Frieda said, after a pause.

‘What do you mean?’

‘I can cover for a while. A week or two. Especially if you take some of the holiday you’re owed.’

‘Are you serious?’

‘Of course.’

‘Why?’

‘Because you need someone to look after Ethan, someone you can trust.’ Frieda forced herself to smile reassuringly. ‘People don’t really look at a woman with a child and that’s what I want.’

‘Tell me about it.’ Sasha’s tone was rueful.

‘So we would be helping each other out, until you find a replacement.’

‘I can’t tell you how wonderful that would be.’

‘Wait,’ said Frieda, with a sterner expression. ‘You need to think about this. By not reporting me, you’re committing a crime.’

‘That doesn’t matter.’

‘It might.’

Sasha shook her head decisively. ‘Nobody will know.’

‘Except Ethan.’

‘Ethan won’t tell anyone. He’s not old enough – he doesn’t make connections. If something’s not there it doesn’t exist any longer.’

Frieda thought of Ethan standing with his hands covering his eyes, thinking he had made himself invisible. ‘Right,’ she said. ‘Let’s see how it goes.’

‘I don’t know what I would have done without you, Frieda. Seeing you this morning was like a kind of dream – well, it still is. I half expected Christine to be standing at the door with her jacket on, looking disapproving. She was an awful woman, wasn’t she?’

‘She was.’

‘I don’t know why I put up with her.’

‘She’s a bully.’

‘Perhaps I attract bullies.’

‘Perhaps you do,’ Frieda said. ‘You should think about that.’

‘What about you?’

‘What about me?’

‘What’s going to happen to you?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Where are you living?’ Frieda didn’t answer. ‘You can’t be in hiding for ever.’

‘I don’t intend to be. I just need to ask some questions. And answer them as well.’

‘It’s like a nightmare.’

‘It seems real enough to me.’

‘Do they really think you did it?’

‘Yes. With some reason,’ she added. ‘The evidence does point to me. I thought I knew who killed him, I was certain, but I don’t.’

‘You have no idea?’

‘No.’

‘And if you don’t find out, then what will happen to you?’

‘I’m thinking about you, just now,’ said Frieda. ‘What if the police come in a few days and ask about things?’

‘I’ll deny everything.’

‘What if they ask about your childcare arrangements?’

‘Why would they?’

‘But what if they do?’

Sasha thought for a moment. ‘I don’t know what I could say.’

‘No,’ said Frieda. ‘But I do.’

The gathering for Sandy was at seven, near Tower Bridge. Frieda went back to her rooms first. She needed to wash – though washing wasn’t very satisfactory when the shower was feeble and the water cold – and to change into something less brightly loud.

When she approached her door, she stopped in her tracks. She had seen something, a shape. Then the shape moved, and Frieda saw it was a figure sitting hunched up, matted dark hair, a baggy shirt, bare feet.

‘Hana,’ she said, going forward and bending down to the woman.

Hana lifted her head. Her face was barely recognizable: the left cheek was mashed and swollen and the left eye closed. The nose looked broken.

‘Come with me,’ said Frieda, taking the woman and heaving her to her feet. She smelt of tobacco and fried onions and old sweat; there were damp patches under her arms and a dark V down her back. There was blood on her collar and down the front of her skirt and splashes of it on her bare, grubby feet.

‘Carla.’ Her voice was thick. ‘I was going to –’

‘Don’t talk yet. Here.’

She led her inside and sat her on the stained sofa, then ran water into a bowl and carefully washed Hana’s face; the water turned red and cloudy. The woman made small moaning noises.

‘I think you need stitches. You should go to the hospital.’

Hana shook her head wildly. ‘He’d kill me.’

‘He’s already nearly killed you.’

‘You don’t understand.’

‘Who is he?’

Again Hana shook her head, although the movement obviously hurt her.

‘Is he your husband? Your partner?’

‘Do you still have whisky?’

‘Yes.’ Frieda rose and poured some into the tumbler. Hana drank it as if she were thirsty, though much of it dribbled down her chin. Frieda could see blood in her mouth. ‘Have you thought of going to the police?’

‘No!’

‘Or a women’s refuge.’

‘I have no money. Not a penny. He has everything. My papers, all of it.’

‘You can still leave him. You have a choice.’

‘You don’t understand,’ the woman said again. ‘It’s different for people like you. I have nothing. Nothing,’ she repeated. ‘He has even taken my shoes away. I said I was leaving, I was going to stay at my cousin’s, and he cut my shoes up and did this.’ She touched her mangled face very gently with the tips of her fingers. ‘This is my life,’ she said. ‘I was stupid to think it could be different.’

Frieda looked at the woman’s softly hunched shoulders, her battered face, her dirty feet and her bloodstained, tatty shirt. ‘I can help you,’ she said.

‘How? You’re here as well, aren’t you? What can you do?’

‘Wait.’

Frieda stood up and went to the bedroom. She pulled her holdall from under the bed. Tucked inside her walking boots was the cash she had withdrawn from her bank, on the day she had left her life behind. She counted it out: she had six thousand, two hundred pounds left. She counted
out three thousand, one hundred pounds and pushed the other half back into her boot.

‘Here,’ she said, holding the money out to Hana as she returned to the living room. ‘Take this.’

Hana’s eyes widened and she shrank back as if she were scared. ‘Why?’

‘So that you can leave.’

‘No.
Why?
’

Frieda looked at the money in her outstretched hand. ‘That’s not important,’ she said. ‘It’s for you.’

Hana took it and stared at it dazedly. She licked her dry lips and gave a huge sigh that turned into a kind of snort. ‘Is this a trick?’

‘No.’

‘You’re a strange woman.’

‘Maybe. Who isn’t? Take my flip-flops as well,’ said Frieda.

‘What?’

‘You have no shoes. I don’t need these. I have others. They’ll fit well enough.’

She slid off the flip-flops and passed them over. Hana stared at them as if they might blow up.

‘I’ve got to go out in a minute,’ said Frieda. ‘I just need to wash and change.’

‘Can I have some more whisky?’

Frieda slid the bottle along the table and left Hana on the sofa. She went back into her bedroom and looked through the clothes she had bought, none of which she liked or felt comfortable in. She selected the dark grey trousers she had got for the funeral, and then a blue T-shirt to go over the top. It had a large green star on the chest. Her top half looked like a cheerleader’s; her
bottom half like a frump’s. Carla Morris would probably wear some make-up but Frieda Klein was tired of Carla Morris and left her face bare, though she put on her fake glasses.

‘I need to go now,’ she said to Hana.

‘Yeah.’ Hana’s eyes had a glazed look. She knocked against her chest as if she were a door she could open. ‘Me too. My new life’s waiting.’

‘You can do this.’

‘You think so?’

Frieda thought at first she must be in the wrong area. She was on a busy road just south of Tower Bridge. Buses and lorries were thundering past warehouses and housing estates, but she turned onto a side street and found herself in a Georgian terrace. Each house was painted a different colour – light blue, yellow, pink – and there were blue tubs of flowers in the front gardens.

She reached number seven and knocked at the door. It was opened by a woman in her late sixties, tiny and wiry, with a shock of grey hair and small eyes gleaming behind her glasses. She looked surprised.

‘I’m Carla Morris,’ said Frieda. ‘Veronica Ellison invited me. I hope that’s all right.’

The woman took Frieda’s hand in a firm grip. ‘I’m Ruth Lender,’ she said. ‘Come in.’

Frieda stepped inside and felt a sudden burn of memory. It came from the smell: books, beeswax furniture polish, herbs; it was the dry, clean smell of her own home. For a moment she was standing in the hall of her narrow mews house and a cat was at her ankles.

‘You were a friend of Sandy’s?’

Frieda nodded. She at once liked this woman, as she had liked Veronica. She was glad that Sandy had found friends and at the same time had an acute sense of what she had rejected. She had had several clients over the years who had fallen desperately in love with partners or spouses after they
had died: death is a great seducer. She was in no danger of that with Sandy, but there was the feeling that the wretched and angry man of the last eighteen months had receded and the other Sandy, the one of quick intelligence and kindness, was clear to her again. She was glad of that.

‘Carla, you say? I don’t think he mentioned you to me.’

‘It was a long time ago.’

‘It’s sad, isn’t it, how we want to get back in touch with people once they have died?’

The house was spacious, and shabby in a way that Frieda liked: the kitchen had a rickety wooden dresser in it, and unmatching chairs around the wooden table, on which were dozens of glasses, tumblers, side-plates and a wooden board on which were several oozing cheeses. The large living room was lined with books; piles of papers and periodicals were stacked up by the wall, evidently pushed there to clear a space for the gathering. There were about twenty-five people already in the room, perhaps more. She scanned the faces quickly, waiting for the shock of recognition, but none came. All these people were strangers to her. Some of them obviously knew each other and stood in small groups, holding wine glasses and talking; others stood at the edges of the room, unsure. She saw Veronica with two men, one spindly and fair, the other squat, barrel-chested, with a rumbling voice that carried across to her. A young man pressed a glass into her hand and moved away. The woman next to her caught her eye and smiled shyly, hopefully.

‘My name is Elsie,’ she offered. She had an accent that Frieda couldn’t place.

‘I’m Carla. It’s good to meet you. How did you know Sandy?’

‘I was his cleaner. He was a very nice man.’

‘He was.’

‘Very polite.’

‘Yes.’

‘And tidy too. My work was easy. Although sometimes’ – she lowered her voice – ‘sometimes he broke things.’

‘Broke things?’

‘Yes. Plates. Glasses.’

‘Oh.’ Frieda was nonplussed. ‘You mean, deliberately?’

‘He put them in the bin, but I always knew.’

‘Really?’

‘One woman I worked for used to put all her chocolate wrappers into a tied-up plastic bag in the bin. She was very thin.’ The woman held her hands close together to indicate her employer’s extreme narrowness. ‘But she ate many chocolate bars each day.’

Frieda spoke neutrally, looking away from the woman: ‘So what did Sandy want hidden?’

‘No wrappers. But he was worrying.’

‘How could you tell?’

‘More drink. More cigarettes. More lines in his face. More broken plates. Worry.’

‘I see. Do you know why?’

‘No. We all have worries, after all.’

‘That’s true.’

‘I know there was a woman who left him and he missed her. He told me once, when he had drunk some wine.’

‘Really.’

‘I saw her photo on his desk, before he put it away.’

Frieda tried to maintain her expression of mild interest.

‘Dark and not smiling. Not so beautiful, in my opinion.’

There was a ping of sound as Ruth Lender rang a spoon
against the rim of her glass; the room fell unevenly into silence. She was standing at the end of the room, by an upright piano that Frieda now saw had a large framed photo of Sandy on it: a head-and-shoulders portrait of him, in a suit with a white shirt. He was half smiling. His eyes were looking straight at her.

‘It’s good to see you all here,’ Ruth said, as the faces turned to her, solemnly anticipatory. ‘And although none of us wants this to be formal or constrained, it is nevertheless a time for us to talk about Sandy and remember him, each in our own way. Because he died so young, and so shockingly, because there’s a horrible mystery about his death, because there won’t be a funeral yet, it seems important to find ways of talking about our feelings and of saying goodbye to him.’

‘Hear, hear.’ This from the barrel-chested man beside Veronica.

‘In about an hour we will have snacks – most of them inspired by food that Sandy loved – and we know how he loved good food, good wine. Not-so-good wine.’ A ripple of laughter ran through the room. ‘But, first, let’s see if we can express some of the things we feel.’ She paused, took a sip of her wine. Frieda recognized a woman who was used to speaking in public, giving lectures.

‘Some of you have come prepared, I know, but everyone should feel free to have their say – or to remain silent, of course. It’s always hard to break the ice, so I thought I’d begin.’ She reached across to the top of the piano and pulled a small pile of cards from it. ‘But I don’t want to give you my purely personal memories of Sandy – who, by the way, I was responsible for bringing to the university, because I considered him smart and imaginative and
forward-thinking, and I never for an instant regretted it. I’ve spoken to colleagues and some of his students, people who can’t be here today, and they’ve given me sentences or phrases or single words that they thought summed him up.’

She took another sip of her wine, then put it on the piano, and pushed her glasses more firmly into place.

‘So, here goes. Terrifyingly clever … Didn’t suffer fools gladly … Intellectual in the best sense of the word … Better than me at poker. Handsome … Cool … A dab hand at the cutting remark … Someone you wanted on your side … He had a nice laugh … A man whose good opinion I valued … He was the best teacher I ever had and I wish I’d told him that … I will miss him … I was a bit scared of him, to be honest … Very competitive … He had a fearsome backhand spin … He loved blue cheese and red wine … Complicated … Mysterious …’

Frieda listened as the words continued. She was remembering Sandy as she had seen him outside the Warehouse, his face contorted in anger, and then suddenly she saw him the first time they had gone back to his flat, his face smoothed out with happiness so that he looked younger and more innocent. She would hold onto that.

Someone else was standing up now, a tall, gangly man with angular features and quick gestures, who introduced himself as Sandy’s close colleague; he was talking about a conference he and Sandy had been to, an argument about the artificial notion of self that continued through the night with Sandy fresh and vigorous, drinking whisky. At times, the man’s voice became husky and he had to stop, clear his throat. When he was done, Veronica came forward.

‘I just want to say a couple of things.’ Her cheeks were flushed and Frieda could tell that she was nervous. ‘As some of you in the room know, Sandy and I had our ups and downs. I saw him when he was vulnerable and I saw him when he was harsh, even cruel at times, though I think he was really a very kind man. One of the words used about him earlier was “complicated”, and he certainly was. But he was the real deal. He’d lived, he’d loved, he’d suffered. None of us here knows why he died, but the person who killed him killed someone who is irreplaceable and will be missed by all of us.’

Her voice trembled and her eyes filled with tears. The gangly man who had spoken before her put his arm around her shoulders and led her back to her place in the corner. Frieda saw a tall woman with black hair and extraordinary blue eyes put out a hand in comfort.

There were more stories. A man who had played squash with Sandy described his ferocity on court to laughter from the room. An old woman read a poem by John Donne in a voice so quiet people had to strain to hear it. Someone else read out a favourite recipe of Sandy’s in a thick Scottish accent and said he would email it to anyone who wanted it. A woman with tattoos running down both her bare arms said how good he was with kids and a voice called out: ‘Ask Bridget about that. She’ll have stories to tell.’

The black-haired, blue-eyed woman Frieda had noticed before glared. ‘None that I want to share, thank you,’ she said, in a clear voice. ‘Sandy was a private man.’

The atmosphere chilled for a moment. People exchanged awkward glances, but Frieda looked at the woman with interest. She had turned her back and was looking out of the large french windows onto the garden, which
was lush and overgrown, with roses in blowsy flower.

A woman came forward holding a violin and introduced herself as Gina. Frieda knew about her, although they had never met. Gina said she and Sandy had been involved a long time ago, and although they hadn’t met for many years, she had wanted to be here to play something for him. She said she had chosen a Bach piece that he had loved. She played it with sinuous skill, apparently in a world of her own. Frieda saw a couple of people pressing their fingers into the corners of their eyes or pulling tissues from their pockets.

Refreshments followed. Young people, whom Frieda guessed to be Sandy’s students, carried trays around with snacks on them. She took a blini with smoked salmon on it and made her way across the room towards the woman who had refused to speak about Sandy. She was talking to Veronica; the gangly man stood beside them. He had a thin, clever face and almost colourless eyes. As she approached, Veronica saw her and beckoned.

‘Hi, Carla,’ she said. ‘These are my good friends Bridget and Al. Al worked closely with Sandy,’ she added.

‘Hello,’ said Frieda. She shook their hands. Bridget was almost as tall as Al, and her strong, vivid appearance contrasted with his pale thinness. She was all colour and form, while he was made up of planes and angles.

‘Carla knew Sandy a long time ago,’ explained Veronica.

Bridget looked at her, taking in her stupid T-shirt and dowdy slacks, her roughly cut hair.

‘You were right, he
was
a private man,’ Frieda said to her. ‘I always felt he was hard to properly know.’

Bridget frowned and looked away; she wasn’t going to be drawn into reminiscences.

‘In fact,’ said Veronica, after a pause, ‘Carla might be just the person you were looking for.’

‘I’m sorry?’ said Frieda.

‘Carla’s a nanny,’ continued Veronica. ‘Aren’t you, Carla?’

‘Oh, yes.’

‘Bridget and Al have been let down by theirs and are looking for someone to step into the breach.’

‘That’s right,’ said Al. ‘We have a girl of three and a boy of just one. Are you available?’

‘No.’ She remembered she was Carla here, not Frieda, and added in a more conciliatory tone: ‘Not really.’

‘Not really?’ Bridget raised her thick eyebrows and smirked. She seemed in a jangled and impatient mood. ‘What does that mean?’

‘It means I’m not really available.’

‘Well, if you change your mind, give us a call.’ Al pulled a wallet out of his jacket pocket and extracted a card.

Frieda turned away but Veronica followed her to say: ‘Don’t mind Bridget. She’s upset.’

‘Because of Sandy?’

‘They were close. She and Al were the nearest thing Sandy had to a family.’

‘I thought he had a sister.’

‘Well, yes. But Sandy spent a lot of time at Al’s house and the kids were very attached to him too.’

‘I see.’

‘She doesn’t do sad. So she does angry instead. Poor Al,’ she added fondly.

‘Complicated?’ said Frieda. ‘What did you mean by that?’

‘Complicated?’

‘You said Sandy was complicated.’

Veronica seemed discomposed. ‘Nothing in particular. But don’t you feel that events like this don’t really show people the way they were? It’s always “they liked this” or “they were good at that”. We’re all messier than that.’

‘In what way was Sandy messy?’ said Frieda.

‘He could be difficult,’ Veronica said awkwardly, and Frieda felt she couldn’t push any further.

A large man was seated on the spindly piano stool, his dimpled hands rippling delicately over the keys. In the corner Frieda thought she glimpsed Lucy Hall, who had been Sandy’s PA several years ago, but Lucy showed no sign of noticing or recognizing her. Sandy’s cleaner was talking to Ruth Lender; she towered over the tiny professor, and tears were running down her cheeks. Gina was putting her violin back in its case. Frieda considered talking to her but decided against it: what was the point of hearing an old flame’s fond memories?

Then, out of the corner of her eye, she glimpsed a figure with red hair and turned away sharply, staring fixedly out at the garden with her back to the room, not daring to move. She heard Ruth greet him, and Veronica’s voice joined them.

‘Lawn needs cutting,’ said a voice beside her. It was Al.

‘I suppose so. I like it a bit wild.’

Very cautiously she adjusted her position and glanced to her left. The man with red hair was standing near the piano. He was holding a glass of wine and talking to Veronica and Ruth; he seemed hot and a bit agitated. He dabbed a handkerchief against his freckled forehead. She had been right: it was Tom Rasson, married to Sandy’s sister, and someone she had met many dozens of times. The room was emptying and she felt exposed, standing
there in her shallow disguise. He had only to look her way to see Dr Frieda Klein, the woman who had thrown over his brother-in-law, who had identified his body, who had run from the police, suspected of his murder, who had turned up with a shorn head to snoop on the people who had become his friends.