The Villain’s Daughter (5 page)

Gently she placed the plastic lens-like caps under the lids, their textured surface, along with a dab of Vaseline, ensuring that the eyes remained closed. Some embalmers used glue, but she didn’t care for it herself. She cleaned the body again, then washed and dried the few remaining strands of thin grey hair. Next, she shaved his face and neck, removed a few stray hairs from the nostrils and tidied up his fingernails.

All that was needed now was a little light make-up. She turned and took the cosmetics bag off the counter. This was where she had to be especially careful: the trick was to add subtle shades to the bloodless face whilst keeping the appearance as natural as possible. She applied a layer of fine translucent foundation, blending it with her fingertips, and then added a tiny amount of colour to the cheeks. A final dab of lipstick, massaged into the lips, completed the task.

Alice stood back and viewed her work. She was pleased by it, satisfied that she had done a good job. No, better than that - an excellent job! If there was one thing she excelled at, it was breathing life into the bodies of the dead.

By midday, the reception area had been cleared of its debris and the furniture returned to its rightful position. Iris had swept the heap of polystyrene cups and plastic spoons into a black bin liner, run a damp cloth over all the surfaces and even given the carpet a quick vacuum. Although this fell outside the realm of her more usual secretarial duties, she wasn’t going to complain; her main priority these days was just keeping busy. And making sure she kept her job.

Like so many other small firms, this one was finding it tough in the present economic climate. There was no shortage of prospective clients - as Toby delighted in pointing out, people were always going to die - but getting them or their relatives to choose Tobias Grand & Sons above the competition remained a major problem. The funeral parlour may have stood in the High Street for over a hundred years, but tradition had ceased to count for much.

However, a large and very public funeral like Lizzie Street’s was always good for business. It would get Tobias Grand & Sons’s name mentioned in the local papers and even on the regional news - the kind of publicity money couldn’t buy. This was probably why, after his return from Kellston Cemetery, Gerald Grand was looking so pleased with himself. Or maybe it was simply relief that everything had gone so well. Obviously no unexpected punch-ups or other graveside disputes had marred the smooth running of the ceremony.

He gave Iris an unusually wide smile, thanked her for all the cleaning she’d done, and then disappeared into his brother’s office. Whether he had gone to pass on the good news or, more likely, to start the joyous process of compiling the bill, was anyone’s guess. William Grand dealt mainly with the financial side of the business.

‘The Brothers Grimm’ was how Toby always referred to them, having little respect for either his father or his uncle. It made Iris laugh although she always felt guilty about it afterwards. Well, guilty about William at least, who was always scrupulously polite to her. Ten years younger than Gerald, he was the very opposite to him in personality: a reserved, grey man who never said more than he had to. He floated around the premises as quietly as a ghost. If it wasn’t for the invoices he periodically placed on her desk, Iris could easily forget he even existed.

Toby was convinced that William had the ‘hots’ for Alice Avery and teased the poor woman mercilessly about it. Her cheeks would blush bright red whenever Toby was on the attack, her shy shoulders hunching in defence, her eyes becoming liquid. Iris always did her best to deflect the worst of his onslaughts, either by glaring at him or trying to provide some diversionary snippets of gossip, but rarely to much effect. Once Toby got his teeth into someone he never let go.

‘You shouldn’t do that,’ Iris had remonstrated more than once, usually after Alice had scuttled back down to the basement.

‘Why not?’ he always retorted. ‘Those two are perfect for each other. They just need a shove in the right direction.’

But Iris wasn’t so sure. If, as the saying went, opposites attract, then William Grand was the last person Alice would be interested in.

 

The afternoon was quiet and at four o’clock, with no one else in reception, she took the opportunity to give Michael a ring. When he answered the call, she could hear the sound of voices and loud music in the background. He was, she guessed, in a pub somewhere. ‘Hi, it’s me. Where are you?’

‘What?’

‘It’s Iris.’

‘Hello, love. Sorry . . . sorry, it’s noisy in here. I can’t hear you too good. I’ll go outside, shall I?’

From the tone of his voice she could tell he didn’t really relish the prospect of stepping out into the cold winter air. Or was perhaps just unwilling to give up the comfortable seat he was occupying. ‘No, it’s okay. I need to talk to you but it can wait.’ It didn’t seem right shouting down the line that she wouldn’t be able to make it on Friday evening. Better to buy him a drink and do it face to face. ‘Where are you?’ she said again. ‘I’ll be finished in an hour or so. Can we meet up?’

 

Iris paused as she stepped through the door, her ears protesting at the noise. She couldn’t believe how crowded it was. The Hope & Anchor, situated close to Kellston Station, was not so much an old-fashioned East End pub as one that no one had bothered to redecorate for a decade or three. It had been neglected to the point where it now seemed almost deliberately retro. The brown lino flooring was scuffed and stained and pocked with cigarette burns. An old, scarred counter arced around the right-hand side. To her left were a couple of slot machines and a juke box that was pounding out ‘Mack the Knife’ by Frank Sinatra.
Oh the shark has pretty teeth dear
. . .

It was only as she was forcing her way through a sea of black designer clothes and recognising a few faces from the morning that she realised what was going on. This dingy backstreet pub was, amazingly, the venue for Lizzie Street’s wake. Of course, it wasn’t strictly a wake - these were supposed to take place before a person was buried - but she couldn’t think of what else to call it.

‘What are you doing here?’ she said when she eventually found Michael. He was at a table near the back, the last third of a pint of Guinness sitting in front of him. She bent to kiss his cheek, catching a pungent whiff of his alcohol-laden breath. ‘Isn’t this a private do?’

‘Nah, not that private,’ he said, shifting along the bench to make room for her. ‘Everyone’s welcome.’ He patted the seat. ‘Come on, love, sit down.’

Unconvinced, Iris remained standing. She was uncomfortable at the thought of gatecrashing such an occasion.

His smiling blue eyes gazed up at her. ‘I’m just paying my final respects, sweetheart.’

More like taking advantage of the free drinks that would have been on offer earlier, she thought. Michael O’Donnell could sniff out a freebie from a mile away. ‘You didn’t even know her.’

‘Sure I did. Me and the lovely Lizzie went to school together.’

Iris stared down at him, amazed. ‘You never said.’

‘Did you ever ask?’ he replied with a grin. He rummaged in his pocket and produced a grubby tenner. ‘What are you having?’

‘It’s okay,’ she said, waving the note aside. ‘I’ll get these.’

At the bar, she had plenty of time to look around. The three curvy barmaids were run off their feet; there was nothing like a good funeral to get the tills ringing. Especially if the old faces were present. Everyone wanted to ingratiate themselves, to ply the ‘boys’ with drinks and compliments. Terry Street might have been returned to his lonely prison cell, but his attention-seeking cronies were more than happy to fill the gap.

Iris noticed Toby across the far side of the pub. So this was where he’d been all afternoon. He and the volatile Danny Street were standing together, knocking back shorts and laughing loudly. Since when had those two become so pally? Not that she was overly surprised. Toby was one of those typical, middle-class guys, resentful of their comfortable background and fascinated by the world of crime. Rubbing shoulders with the local sharp-suited villains was probably his idea of living dangerously. After a minute she spotted Chris Street too, deep in conversation with a pair of hard-looking bruisers. Neither of the brothers seemed particularly upset - nor, come to that, did anybody else. Of course, wakes were not supposed to be dreary affairs, but the degree of mourning in this room was so negligible as to be virtually absent.

One of the girls eventually took her order. Iris bought a pint of Guinness and a large red wine, elbowed her way back through the crowd and sat down beside Michael. ‘Why did they choose this place?’ As soon as she said it she was reminded of Guy Wilder’s very same question about Tobias Grand & Sons.

‘It’s one of her joints - or rather, one of Terry’s. The first place he bought after he made a few quid.’ He finished his pint and immediately started on the next. He nodded towards the bar. ‘No point letting all those readies drop into some other landlord’s pocket. They’ll make a decent wad today.’

Hardly the point, Iris thought, although not a startling revelation either. Villains like the Streets were not renowned for their sentiment, especially when it came to the cold hard business of profit and loss. ‘So what was Lizzie like?’

Michael lifted his broad shoulders and shrugged. She waited, but he still didn’t speak.

‘You said that you knew her.’

‘Ah, that was a long time ago.’

Iris sensed his reluctance, but it only fuelled her curiosity. ‘So what was she like back then? Come on, I’m interested. I’d like to know.’

Her uncle gave a soft sigh, glanced around as if to check that no one else was listening and then leaned closer to her. ‘Hot,’ he murmured in her ear, ‘the hottest girl I’ve ever met.’

She smiled. ‘And?’

‘And smart with it. That girl had looks
and
brains. She always knew exactly what she wanted.’

‘Did you two . . .?’

Michael sat back and laughed. ‘Are you kidding? We were mates, we used to bunk off school together, but that was all. Even at that tender age, the lovely Lizzie had ambition, and grubby little oiks like me didn’t fit into her plans for the future.’

‘Is that just a tiny hint of resentment I can hear?’

He took another swig of his pint and gave her a sideways look. ‘I’m way too old for regrets, love.’

Which provided Iris with a timely reminder of why she was here. She still had to tell him that she couldn’t make the meal on Friday. ‘You’re not old,’ she insisted. At forty-eight he was only two years younger than her father. Which, in turn, reminded her that it would be
his
fiftieth birthday soon. December 30. It was one of those landmark dates that would normally be marked by a family celebration.

‘I feel it,’ Michael said. ‘My bones are starting to creak.’

As Iris looked at him, she wondered how much of her father, how much of Sean O’Donnell, she might be seeing too. From the small but precious collection of photographs she possessed, they had clearly been physically similar when they were young: the same height, the same solid build, square jaw, blue eyes and black curly hair. Streaks of silver were running through Michael’s hair now, but it was still as thick as when he’d been twenty. Although the booze hadn’t done much for his appearance, reddening his cheeks and thickening his waist, he was still a handsome man. There was every chance that her father -
if
he was still alive - might not look too different.

She was taking a sip of her wine, preparing herself to make the necessary excuses for Friday, when Michael put his pint down on the table and began to talk again. ‘Lizzie had big plans, starting with getting out of this Godforsaken hole, but it all went wrong for her. Got up the duff, didn’t she, when she was fourteen, got landed with a kid she didn’t want and . . .’ Then, remembering Iris’s miscarriage, he stopped suddenly and scowled. ‘Shit. Sorry, I didn’t . . .’

Iris laid her hand on her arm. ‘It’s all right. I’m not made of porcelain. I won’t shatter if you mention babies.’

‘I didn’t mean to . . .’

‘I know,’ she said, leaning affectionately against him. She sometimes thought Michael grieved more for the loss than Luke ever had. ‘It’s okay. As it happens, I met him yesterday. Lizzie’s kid, I mean. Except he’s all grown up now.’

‘Guy?’

She nodded. ‘Yeah. He came in to see her at Tobias Grand & Sons. Unfortunately, his timing wasn’t great. The Streets arrived ten minutes later and . . . let’s just say that the reunion wasn’t a happy one.’

‘Tore the place up, did they?’ He laughed. ‘I bet that arse-licking guvnor of yours was none too pleased.’

‘Not overjoyed, no.’

Michael laughed again, but then suddenly grew serious. He gazed almost mournfully down into his drink. ‘She really loved that kid, you know. Worshipped the ground he walked on.’

‘Did she? Only I heard that . . .’ Iris hesitated, in two minds as to whether she should repeat what Guy Wilder had said. She couldn’t claim that he had told her anything in confidence but then again he had just been in a nose-bleeding scrap with a couple of thugs while he was supposed to be viewing the body of his mother. People came out with all kinds of regrettable comments when they were grieving or in shock.

‘That she was a heartless bitch who dumped him with his gran?’ Michael suggested, saving her the bother of wrestling too hard with her conscience.

Iris stared down at the table.

He saw the look on her face and nodded. ‘Well, Lizzie had her reasons. She knew what Terry Street was like, the kind of life he lived. There were things she wanted - money, power, the good life - but she wasn’t stupid. Nah, never that. She knew there’d be a price to pay. Terry’s world was hard and vicious. You know what I mean? Big risks, but with big rewards too. She was determined to give that kid all the chances she never had, but to distance him from all the bad stuff too. She was just trying to keep him safe.’