Wishing and Hoping (12 page)

‘Try me.'

Dwelling as she was on her own problems, Marcie couldn't bring herself to make comment or to intervene. The only thing she did notice was that Allegra no longer wore make-up or jewellery and yet she owned the very best. Victor had been generous to his mistress. Perhaps, thought Marcie, she'd wanted more than that. But Victor was married. Just as Michael was married to her. She still couldn't believe that he'd been involved with a girl like Linda Bell, but hadn't had it out with him. Fear got you like that, she decided. Fear of the truth. Fear that her happy life was nothing but a sham.

Allegra seemed to come to a considered decision. She took a deep breath. ‘I just feel that we sometimes pursue the same things other people pursue without really wanting them. Once they're gone we see them for what they were – just passing fancies . . .'

‘Like Victor?' asked Sally.

Allegra glanced at her as though her intervention was predictable and not worth commenting on. ‘If you like. It was an experience, and one I will not be repeating.'

‘We've all said that,' laughed Sally. ‘You'll fall in love more than once in your life. We all do. Isn't that right, Marcie?'

Marcie's fingers tightened over the piece of material. Johnnie would always have a place in her heart
because of her daughter, but the feeling she'd had for him was slowly evaporating. Michael had replaced him and when they'd married she'd told herself that she would never want anyone else. He'd told her that he would love her forever. She'd believed him. And now there was Linda Bell . . .

MICHAEL STARED ACROSS
the table, unable to believe that he was being accused of murdering Linda Bell.

‘No,' he said shaking his head. ‘No way!'

‘Witnesses say you threatened to kill her. Come on, Michael. You might call yourself Jones, but we all know who your old man is, don't we? Victor Camilleri. Catholic he might be, me old mate, but saintly he is not. Like father, like son, in my opinion.'

They were in an interview room at the local nick. The smell of industrial-strength cleaner failed to mask the lingering scent of stale sweat. The copper on the other side of the table was chewing a matchstick at the side of his mouth. He looked confident, cocky even.

His sidekick – introduced as Detective Sergeant Bill Floyd – was sitting next to him. A uniformed constable was doing doorman duty. He stood like a stone pillar against a white-tiled wall. Michael guessed that the same white tiles were used in the cells below, a foretaste to the accused of things to come.

Although he tried desperately to hold on to it,
Michael felt his confidence sinking fast, not that he'd let them know that.

‘You have to be fucking joking!' he exclaimed.

The bloke chewing the matchstick shook his head slowly. ‘Murder is no joke. You had a set-to with Linda Bell. You were heard threatening to kill her. Are you denying knowing her?'

‘No. I knew her.'

‘Witnesses said she claimed to be pregnant. Was it yours?'

Michael glowered. ‘Fuck off!'

‘Less of the bad language,' said the copper doing the interviewing, who had introduced himself as Detective Inspector David Daniels. He had a sandy-coloured moustache that shielded his upper lip from view. His eyes were a murky shade of hazel and his hair was like a sandy thatch sitting at a lopsided angle on his head.

Despite the circumstances, Michael couldn't help a wry grin. The bloke was definitely sporting a wig.

‘What's so funny, Camilleri?'

Michael felt his facial muscles tighten and his smile disintegrate. ‘My name's Jones, Michael Jones.'

He'd learned how to handle the police from his father. He knew that Victor had a few high-up members of the constabulary in his pocket, bundles of loot handed over in exchange for them looking the other way. But he knew that things had floundered a
bit of late. The coppers he was now dealing with weren't the same ones who had got hold of details of Victor's very illicit business deals. They had Michael to thank for that. It was Michael who had passed over the accounts books and the lists of clients paying protection money. Michael had presumed that nobody would come asking
him
for protection money simply because he was Victor Camilleri's son. But they had. Now all he had to decide was which one of the bastards had set him up for this: his own father or Paddy Rafferty. The former had been really pissed off at being put inside on fraud charges on account of his own son. The other he had insulted and made clear to him that he was not going to get the partner ship he'd pushed for.

Michael had been unaware that the building he'd bought was up for redevelopment. Not that it mattered much. Both his father and Rafferty possessed a similar brand of revenge mentality. He was in the firing line no matter who had loaded the gun.

David Daniels was not amused. He raised his voice. ‘Wipe that smirk off your face! I think we've already made it plain that murder is no laughing matter!'

‘I totally agree with you. Sorry. I was just thinking.'

‘Thinking what?'

One corner of Michael's mouth lifted into a half-smile. ‘How some men lose their hair quicker than others.'

Perhaps Daniels might not have lost his rag if Michael hadn't ran his fingers through his thick head of dark brown – almost black – hair. The policeman's face went bright red before he flung himself across the table, his hands groping for Michael's throat.

Michael kicked the chair back and stood up before he could reach him. The officer by the door came to life, catching the chair and stepping forwards ready to restrain the prisoner.

‘Dave!'

Detective Sergeant Bill Floyd was a bull of a man. Although getting on in years, he was strong and had no trouble in getting his superior to sit back down.

‘Got to keep to the rule book, Dave,' he said.

It was obvious from his tone and his words that Bill Floyd was a stickler for doing things by the book. That was probably why he was still only a Detective Sergeant, promotion having passed him by in favour of younger and more flexible operators. Michael recognised the steadiness in him and was thankful he was there. He adjusted his tie by way of fingering his throat. He looked at Daniels with a face full of swagger, even if inside he was reeling.

‘Charge me or let me go,' he said to them grimly and with confidence.

Daniels pointed a warning finger. ‘You did it, you
bastard! You arranged to meet her with the aim of killing her. She turned up hoping that you'd do the right thing by her and instead you shot her.'

Michael sat back down as directed by Detective Sergeant Floyd. ‘This is ridiculous. I can't – couldn't – do the right thing by her. I'm married. I'm sorry she's dead but, like I said, I never had the pleasure.'

Actually saying that he was married filled him with fear. What was Marcie going to say? Surely she wouldn't believe that he'd been having a relationship with Linda Bell? He had to make her believe that it wasn't true. His life might depend on it.

He decided to say nothing until he had to. He didn't want to upset Marcie unnecessarily and he was so sure that the police would let him go that he hadn't even asked for a brief.

Then Daniels dropped the bombshell.

‘We've got the gun. Your prints are all over it.'

Michael felt the blood draining from his face. The gun he'd found in the club the other night! Further enquiries of his employees had shed no light on where the gun had come from.

Michael had placed it in the safe until he decided what to do with it. Unfortunately it meant his prints were all over it. It was reasonable to assume that someone had been paid to plant it in the drawer. Up until now the thought had never entered his head. Now here he was, jumping to conclusions that this
was some kind of a set-up. All the same, he had to bluff it out.

‘I don't have a gun.'

‘Not a legal one,' snarled Daniels with a hint of glee in his eyes. ‘We checked our records. You hold no gun licence – but that doesn't mean you don't own one. Blokes like you operating outside the law don't go in for gun licences. Only blokes that shoot pheasants and rats do that. But then you are a rat, Michael Camilleri . . .'

‘My name's Jones,' Michael repeated with an edge to his voice. ‘Michael Jones!'

Daniels grinned. His eyes glittered. ‘Whatever! Michael Jones, I am arresting you for the murder of Linda Georgina Bell. You don't have to say anything but whatever you do say may be taken down and given in evidence against you.'

Jacob Solomon had arrived in England as a refugee from Nazi Germany just before the Second World War and had immediately set up home and his legal practice in the East End of London amongst other members of the tribe of Israel. Having fled brutal oppression he'd been very relieved and happy to find such a safe and friendly haven, so much so in fact, that he rarely left the East End of London for anyone. But Michael Jones was one of his best clients and he liked him, recognising something of the son
he'd once had who he had left behind with his wife in Germany. He'd hoped to make arrangements for them to follow him to London but he'd never seen either of them again.

Michael was a gentile and only a substitute for his dead son, but it gave him comfort. Jacob took pride in Michael's achievements as though he were his real son. He liked the fact that the boy had rebelled against the Camilleris. He'd heard what brutes they were, violent landlords of Victorian tenements that had survived the Blitz. He abhorred all violence. It was in his blood to do so.

Marcie was totally taken aback to see him standing on her doorstep. Her day at the sewing room had not been without its problems. Number one, Renee hadn't turned up. A note had finally arrived saying she'd tripped over a neighbour's cat and twisted her ankle. Normally she would have phoned but the shop phone was out of action. Following numerous calls from the public phone box, the Post Office people had eventually turned up and informed her that the fault was with the telephone receiver in the shop below with whom she happened to share a party line. Oddly enough the broken telephone connection made her feel better. Michael was obviously trying to ring her, but couldn't get through. It gave her some solace and even the hope that he could drop by the sewing room if he couldn't get through.

The problems of the day had been unexpected. Jacob turning up at their home was even more so.

‘Jacob! What a surprise.'

At first she smiled, but on seeing that his solemn expression remained dark, her smile faded.

‘May I come in?'

Joanna was gazing at
Muffin the Mule
on the television in the front room and Aran was asleep in his cot. Marcie took Jacob into the dining room and asked him if he would like a cup of tea.

He shook his head and sucked in his lips. His eyes flickered nervously behind his horn-rimmed spectacles.

His manner said it all. Marcie felt her face drain of colour because she knew, she knew beyond doubt, that something was terribly wrong.

‘Are the police coming here?'

It sounded mad. Nobody had given her a reason that the police were coming.

Jacob nodded. ‘They may very well do so. Michael has been arrested.'

She collapsed into a chair, the breath knocked out of her, her jaw slack, her mouth open. No words came.

Jacob sat down opposite her, set his briefcase down and rubbed his bony white hands together.

‘I want you to be calm before I tell you this. Michael is convinced that he's been set up. I'm sure
he has, but my belief in him is nothing compared to yours. You have to believe that Michael is telling the truth. A girl came to the club and accused him of getting her pregnant . . .'

‘Linda Bell!'

Jacob's eyes opened wide. ‘You knew?'

‘She came to me and told me. I threw her out. I didn't believe her. I'll say it to her face too.'

The eyes behind the spectacles looked away from her. ‘I'm afraid that will not be possible.'

It wasn't easy to subdue the shiver that ran down her spine like ice-cold water.

Seeing that she said nothing, Jacob came right out with the problem.

‘Linda Bell's dead. Michael has been charged with her murder.'

‘
LET ME TAKE
your arm, Garth.'

‘All right, Auntie Rosa.'

With a feeling of great relief, Rosa Brooks slipped her hand through Garth's arm. ‘The butcher's next,' she said to him. ‘But not too fast. My legs are older than yours.'

‘Right you are, Auntie Rosa.'

The truth of the matter was that her legs were not really the problem. The fact was that she could no longer clearly see where she was going.

A passer-by said good morning, addressing her by name as they went by.

‘Good morning. How are you?' she replied while quickening her pace. She dare not stop in case the other person took her question literally and began telling her exactly how they were. She couldn't stand that. Not any more, the plain fact being that she hadn't a clue of the person's identity because she couldn't see them.

Rosa Brooks was becoming more and more aware that the darkness of the night was infiltrating her daylight hours. The doctor had told her this would
happen. He called it glaucoma and said that it was as a direct result of her diabetes. He'd prescribed insulin tablets but told her she might have to have injections when the tablets no longer did their job. He could do nothing about her eyes.

‘Four lamb chops, Mrs Brooks?'

‘That's right. English lamb, please. And can I have an extra piece of white paper around it. I wouldn't want the blood to run into my bag.'

‘And then I can draw on it!' Garth exclaimed.

Rosa dug her elbow into his ribs. ‘Never mind that.'