Written in Blood (34 page)

‘You’ve had an idea, I think?’

‘No, sir.’

At that point the night shift arrived. Barnaby checked his desk over and made for the door, his mind already closing on the anticipatory pleasures of the kitchen. Herbs and mushrooms to be chopped, liver to be thinly sliced. A glass of the ’90 Crozes-Hermitage while he worked. What could be nicer?

As he passed the windows of the incident room on his way to the car park he noticed that Inspector Meredith was still there. Utterly engrossed, his fingers were tapping busily at a computer keyboard as his snaky head, quite still and urgently attentive, studied the screen.

Brian pushed his muesli and grated apple sullenly around its homely dish. He had had a rotten night and was now looking at a rotten, filthy day. Rain beat in a rattling crescendo on the white-framed kitchen windows and, in the garden, trees and shrubs bent this way and that in the force of a driving wind.

Sluggardised by wakefulness and bad dreams Brian sat on the fake pine breakfast bench attached to the table. Actually he did not so much sit as lurch, semi-upright. A posture that, should anyone else in the family have adopted it, would have brought about an immediate lecture on slovenly behaviour.

Brian was going over, as he had done more or less constantly since hobbling away from Quarry Cottages, the complete turn of events that had taken place there. His imagination had already largely rewritten several crucial moments, but enough were left inviolate to make his memories of the occasion somewhat disagreeable.

But he tried not to dwell on those. And it wasn’t as if matters could not be put right. It had, after all, been the first time. A certain amount of awkwardness was only to be expected. But now that he knew what Edie wanted, what turned her on, things would be very different. Looking at the already brown fruit mincings in front of him Brian reassembled the apple in his mind’s eye. Immediately it transformed itself into a creamily perfect, pink-tipped breast.

Keenly fraught with lust, he shifted uneasily back and forth, staring sourly across the room at his earnest shambles of a wife. He wished her moon face far away. And her saggy, russet-aureoled boobs and big feet. Christ, how was it possible for a woman with legs like Olive Oyl to take size eights? He’d thrown himself away there all right, by God he had. Casting the pearls of his intellect and talent before such an unpractised simpleton.

There was little doubt in Brian’s mind where the main responsibility for last night’s shortcomings lay. Why, when finally holding the girl who had fired his red-hot imaginings for so long in his arms, he had reacted like a puritanical schoolboy.

A more sensitive partner, a more perceptive, caring partner, would have found ways to develop her husband’s sensuality. Made him wise in the paths of carnal knowledge, for were not the skills of the harem in every woman’s blood?

Oh! Why had he ever let his parents persuade him into ‘doing the right thing’? Why hadn’t he had the courage to just clear off and leave Sue and her infant to fend for themselves? Other men did. Tom Carter probably would have. Collar and Denzil, no question.

It wasn’t even as if his family appreciated the sacrifice. Sue took him totally for granted and spent money as if he had a printing press in the garden shed. Mand, quite sweet when she was little, now hardly spoke unless it was to moaningly compare him to someone called Trixie’s dad who apparently let his daughter stay out all hours, drove an open-topped Jaguar and looked like Jason Priestley.

Brian tucked a cushion beneath the vacuum in the seat of his trousers and tried to wriggle into a comfier position. He was fraught with anxiety at the thought of meeting Edie again. There was no rehearsal, and no English class either today so unless he sought her out, or unless, miracle of miracles, she sought him out, they would not see each other till after the weekend. He didn’t think he could bear that.

Brian wondered how it would be when they did meet. Perhaps she would be shy and unable to bring herself to talk about the matter. Or eager, like she was last night, already angling for another date? He’d take her somewhere really plush next time. Maybe a hotel on the river for a drink and a meal afterwards . . .

Already the negative aspects of their encounter (squalid environs, uncontrollable spillage of the Clapton seed, genitals that felt as if they were gift-wrapped in barbed wire) were fading fast. And Edie’s post-coital coldness, wounding at the time, was, on reflection, totally understandable. How she must have been looking forward to that first conjugation. Naturally, after his inadequate performance she had withdrawn, no doubt needing to protect herself from further hurt and humiliation.

If only she hadn’t touched his beard.

Brian emerged from this reverie to find himself gazing at a residue of black sludge in the bottom of his cup.

‘What the hell’s all this?’

‘All what?’

‘This mud.’

‘It’s filter coffee.’

‘But we don’t have a filter.’ He spoke slowly and loudly. ‘We use a coffee pot.’ A. Coffee. Pot. For extra emphasis he held it up.

‘You won’t drink anything but Costa Rican. And Sainsbury’s only had it in filter grind.’

Patience, Brian, patience. She can’t help it. Count to ten.

‘It’s all right if you don’t stir it.’

‘How on earth you ever got through teacher-training college beats me.’ He poured the thick, dark stuff over his muesli and pushed the lot aside.

There was a rattling from the front door and Sue said, ‘I think that’s the post.’

Brian did not move. Sue hesitated. As head of the house he always picked up the post. It might be something important. But to her surprise he said, ‘Well, go on then. No doubt it’ll be more bills. You eat me out of house and home the pair of you.’

Forbearing to mention that invoices for provisions rarely arrived via the Royal Mail, Sue went into the hall. There was one letter - a long, white envelope, immaculately typed. She took it into the kitchen and Brian held out his hand, murmuring wearily. ‘Let’s have it, then. Might as well hear the worst.’

‘It’s for me.’

‘What?’

‘From London.’

Sue, sick with anticipation, stood holding the envelope. It was not big enough, not nearly big enough, to contain her drawings and manuscript. She eased up the flap with trembling fingers, drew out a sheet of stiff, headed paper and read, frowning. And read again. Then, with one swift collapsing movement, she fell into the armchair.

‘
Now
what?’

‘It’s from Methuen.’

‘Who?’

‘Methuen - children’s books.’ Brian looked cross and bewildered. ‘I sent them a story and drawings - “Hector’s New Pony”.’

‘You didn’t tell me that.’

‘They want to publish it. Ohh Brian . . .’

‘Let’s have a look.’

Reluctantly, as if letting the piece of paper out of her possession even momentarily might instantly devalue its contents or, worse, render them null and void, Sue passed it over.

After a quick, efficient scan Brian handed it back, saying, ‘As I thought. Trust you to get the wrong end of the stick. It doesn’t mention publishing at all.’

‘What?’ His wife studied a letter suddenly, mysteriously, bereft of promise. ‘But the editor says—’

‘She merely suggests a meeting.’

‘Lunch.’ Sue sounded surprisingly firm.

‘OK, lunch,’ said Brian snappily. ‘They obviously see some vague merit in the sketches and are offering some encouragement. I think you’d be very foolish to read more into it than that.’

Sue went over the letter for the fourth time. It was true that it did not actually contain the word ‘publication’. Even so . . .

‘I’m only saying that,’ continued Brian, ‘because I hate to see you getting all worked up only to be disappointed.’

Sue did not reply.

‘They must do this sort of thing all the time. Keep tabs on people they think might have a bit of talent.’

‘I see.’

Sue saw exactly. She lowered eyes brimming with excitement, so as not to annoy him further but could do nothing about her joyful countenance.

‘No wonder this place looks like a squat,’ Brian squeezed himself out from behind the narrow table, ‘if all you’re doing all day is messing around painting.’

Sue watched him in the sitting room struggling into his tartan lumberjacket and checking his Puma bag before making for the front door.

‘Brian?’

Grunt.

‘Why are you walking like that?’

‘Like what?’

‘As if your knees are tied together.’

‘Don’t be so bloody rude.’ Brian turned and glared at his wife; the tips of his ears burned fiercely.

‘Well. You are.’

‘I hit my knee on the car door, if you must know.’

When he had slammed off Sue sat motionless until she had heard the VW drive away, then she stood up, flung her arms open wide and let out a great cry. Jumping out of her heavy clogs she began to dance. Around the kitchen, into and out of each corner of the sitting room, up and down the stairs, to and fro between the bedrooms.

And as she danced, she sang. Nonsense words, old songs, new songs, bits from Hector’s story, jingles from commercials, half-remembered poems and nursery rhymes, snatches of operatic arias. She sang her Methuen letter and the
Guardian
headlines and all the ingredients for a Leek and Potato Soubise.

Sue’s old brown skirt whirled around, her hair flew and when, physically exhausted, she fell into the old kitchen armchair, her mind danced on.

What am I going to
do
. I can’t just sit here, quietly, inside my skin. Not on a day like this. Within minutes, once more full of energy, she jumped up and went to stare out of the window.

She had never in her life seen such an utterly beautiful day. Rain, like rods of silver light, hammered on the glass. The sun had started to shine. There were even a couple of Watteau-ish clouds, snowy and scallop-edged, all puffed up like inflated bloomers. Moving away, Sue caught sight of herself in the mirror and stopped still.

Her cheeks glowed like peaches and her eyes shone. Her long, milk-chocolate hair, usually so stringily forlorn, was a polished curtain of shot silk.

‘What nonsense,’ she said, laughing. ‘It’s nonsense.’

She moved away from the lying glass and sat quietly down again, trying to be sensible. She was strangely certain of a momentous difference in herself. What it was she could not fathom for she had completely lost touch with any ability to analyse. But that it had occurred she had not the slightest doubt.

 

The nine a.m. briefing, though short, was packed with interest. The outside second shift, swigging coffee and looking blearily pleased with itself, had come up with a real result.

Several highly priced companions of the night, working only from their apartments (‘Very concerned I got that straight they were,’ said Detective Sergeant Johnson), would, if requested by telephone, visit lonely businessmen in their criminally expensive suites at the Golden Fleece Hotel to offer all the comforts of home.

Most of these canny professionals knew each other, at least by sight, and kept a wary eye out for anything new in the way of competition. A couple of them had seen the woman described by their interrogators on several occasions.

‘How can you be sure it’s the same person?’ asked Barnaby.

‘She fits the description very closely, sir,’ said Johnson, producing a slim roll of statement forms from his jacket pocket. ‘Even down to the little hat with the veil. Always wears black, apparently. A Mrs . . .’ - he unrolled a form - ‘Fionnula Dobbs admits to seeing her at least half a dozen times covering a period of some months. Each instance in the hotel lobby. I don’t know if you’ve ever been in the Fleece, sir?’

‘Only if someone else is paying.’

‘Quite. Well, the lobby’s very plush. Lots of deep sofas and armchairs, tables with newspapers and magazines and a posh bar opening off. The lady was usually sitting quietly, reading something or other and drinking coffee. Minding her own business as you might say.’

‘Smoking?’

‘Um.’ He blushed. ‘Didn’t think to ask that, sir.’

‘Go on.’

‘The girls seem to have thought her, though quite attractive, a bit long in the tooth to be any sort of serious competition. In any case the Fleece keeps a very sharp eye out for prostitutes trying to work the premises. The barman’s convinced she wasn’t on the game. Says she approached no one, and if a man spoke to her he was politely rebuffed. The staff change over at ten this morning, though I shouldn’t think,’ concluded the sergeant, ‘the new lot’ll have anything more interesting to add.’

‘None of the women you interviewed actually spoke to her?’

‘No. There’s an acknowledged drill to their visits which the hotel’s very strict about. Once on the premises the girls go straight to the clients’ rooms then, having done the business, it’s straight out again. Any attempt to fraternise and they know they’ll be banned.’

Having completed his input Sergeant Johnson placed the statement forms in a neat stack beside the nearest computer.

‘Is that it?’ asked Barnaby. Seemingly it was. ‘Nobody knows anything about her? Where she comes from? Goes to?’

‘I’m afraid not, sir.’

‘Well, we can’t leave it there. You’ll have to keep after the bar staff. Ask around. People always know more than they think they do. Right,’ he looked around the room, ‘anything else?’

If he was disappointed in the resulting silence it didn’t show. However all was not lost, for barely had he drawn breath ready to discuss the occupations of the day when Inspector Meredith spoke.

‘Actually, sir . . .’

Barnaby looked sharply across the room. He was not fooled by the modest curve into which Inspector Meredith’s slender form had settled. Or by the falsely hesitant verbals and unassuming downward tilt of the reptilian head. He studied the immaculate line of Meredith’s parting with distaste. The man’s hair was plastered to his skull like some thirties’ gigolo.