She clicked the point in then out again.
‘There’s probably some DNA on it. And my finger-prints. So you’ve got me. Attempted murder. Case solved. You could have me locked up for a very long time.’
She rolled the pen towards Mayland.
‘And you’d be doing just what he wants.’
The room was very quiet. Ade was hardly breathing. Should I hold out my wrists for the cuffs? No, overdoing it.
‘So it was you. And he tried to rape you? And there are no witnesses, no real evidence? Of course not, the staff in that place know what side their bread’s buttered on.’ Mayland ran a hand through her hair. ‘First guess is generally right.’
She reached out and picked up the pen and held it, clicking the point in and out. After a while, she took out a tissue, licked it and carefully wiped it over the pen. Then she wrapped it in the tissue, wrapped a clean tissue round it and placed the package back on the desk.
‘Oh bugger,’ she said. ‘I’ve spoiled the evidence. And I’ve got a cold coming on too. You might as well throw that in the river.’
Ade let out her breath in one long gasp.
Mayland went on: ‘You’re doing this for Gemma?’
Ade nodded: ‘And for Amy.’
‘You took a big risk, coming here with that. An injunction. Why not?’ Mayland pulled the keyboard towards her and tapped at it for a few minutes.
Ade leaned over to Gemma. ‘It’s going to be OK,’ she said softly. She winked at Amy. Amy stared at her over Gemma’s arm, her eyes large.
Mayland finished typing and looked up. ‘That’s settled. The order will be executed first thing tomorrow. If that bastard – that’s a technical term used by women police officers – comes near you, dial 999 and he’ll have more grief than he can imagine. Much more.’
She unlocked the desk drawer, opened it and took something out. ‘Here. A couple of Mars bars. One now, one for later.’ She held them out to Amy who slipped out a hand for them under her mother’s arm. Gemma nudged her.
‘Thank you,’ said Amy. Ade reached out and picked up the package on the desk, the tissues crumpling in her hand.
Mayland grunted and turned to Ade. ‘See? Maybe I’m not as bad as you think, I just like to make the thing work. Never had kids myself, no time for it. Don’t expect to see you again. And you’re old enough to buy your own Mars bars.’
33
Ade loved Christmas dinner. She loved the smell of roast turkey. She loved the way the fat trickled out when you plunged the knife in. She loved the bread sauce, the stuffing, the parsnips, the roast potatoes, the gravy, the pudding, blue flames dancing round it and the sprig of holly on top, the brandy butter, the cream, the mince pies and the crackers. She loved the sherry, the white wine, the red wine and what was left of the brandy in small glasses, and the milk stout in bottles. In some ways, she thought, I’m a traditionalist.
‘Not bad,’ she said, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, then stopped and used the napkin, a square of kitchen roll. ‘Not bad at all.’
Gemma nodded and fanned at her face. Amy sat between them, grinning from one to the other.
‘Another mince pie?’ asked Ade. Amy reached out her hand then remembered and said ‘Please,’ and lifted her plate. Ade put the pie on it and poured thick cream over it.
‘Don’t know where she puts it,’ said Gemma sleepily.
It was Christmas Eve, an early Christmas dinner because she’d have one with Paul and everyone at the squat, but he was a veggie, and Gemma had insisted and done most of the work. Anyway, it was best he didn’t come to the flat, not just yet, not until Amy had got used to things. They’d been hard at work since breakfast, stuffing the turkey with the stuffing they’d made yesterday, getting it in the oven, then all the vegetables, potatoes first, followed by the parsnips, Brussels sprouts and carrots, then the pigs in blankets and bread sauce and everything else. They had to remember to baste every half hour, when the rich breath of the oven poured out over them and Amy had to be held back. Good thing I know that oven, thought Ade.
Gemma had worked out a time-table. They’d got the pudding out and ready, they’d put the mince pies on silver paper so they could warm them, they’d boiled the water and started the roast potatoes in the microwave, they’d mixed up the brandy butter and left it to coagulate, they’d studded the onion with cloves for the bread sauce (Amy had crumbled the bread, the day before) and they’d opened the red wine to let it breathe and they’d had half a glass each to try it before starting on the sherry. Amy had had coke and a half glass of wine and water with the meal. They’d do the washing up later. Much later. Maybe it would be a good chance to bring Paul over, tomorrow. He could do it while they were in the other room. She’d slip out and help him for a while.
They moved to the sitting room, Amy on the sofa and Ade in the chair opposite the TV. Gemma came in with the tea and set down the tray. Ade stared.
‘More mince pies? That’s stamina. I’ll just have the one.’
Amy ate the mince pie as if she’d been starved. ‘Is it presents now?’ she asked, glancing between them.
‘I suppose so,’ said her mother, ‘and I’m going first.’
She took Amy’s hand in hers and they both looked at Ade. Ade saw how large and tender her eyes were.
‘You’ve done so much for Amy and me, sorting out the police and the papers for the court and making us safe and everything. There’s no way we could ever say thank you. It’s something my Mum gave to me, God rest her soul, and I want you to have it, ‘cos you’re the best person I ever met. There, I’ve got tears in me eyes.’
She sniffed and wiped her nose and presented Ade with a large brown-paper parcel that gave against her fingers when she held it. Amy started weeping but smiling at the same time and bouncing on the sofa.
‘Open it! Open it!’
Ade felt the tears coming to her own eyes. ‘Thank you very much. It’s been my pleasure to help, it really has.’
‘Open it!’
She pulled at the paper but the sellotape bound right round it made it difficult, so she tore the wrapping all down one side and slid it off. There was a layer of tissue, then, inside it, delicate silky white material, carefully folded, with a lacy edging and little seed pearls sown on.
‘You can hold it up, look,’ said Gemma.
Ade found the shoulder straps. ‘Oh my!’
It was a full-length white silk dress with a train and pearls. The pearls were translucent, almost glowing.
‘It was my Gran’s wedding dress. And my Mum’s. There’s a lace cap and a veil and satin slippers.’
‘Oh Gemma, it’s gorgeous but you can’t give it to me. What about Amy when she gets married?’
Amy shivered. ‘Ain’t never going to get married.’
‘But you might want to one day.’
Gemma rose to her feet. ‘I made up my mind. Amy agrees. We want you to have it. You might need it. We want you to need it, don’t we Amy?’
Ade flung her arms round both of them. They smelt of sherry and Christmas pudding and turkey and brandy butter and mince pies, sugary and aromatic and rich and spicy and everything jumbled together at once. She felt her head swimming.
‘Thank you so much. I’ll take very good care of it.’ She folded the dress up and wrapped the tissue paper over it to protect it. ‘Now I’ve got something for you.’
She handed Amy a neat, flat parcel in Christmas tree paper from Wilkinson’s with a red ribbon. ‘Thank you,’ said Amy, taking it in both hands and holding it as if she were frightened of dropping it, ‘thank you so much.’ She carefully tore off the end and folded back the paper to display a flat grey plastic surface.
‘Put it on the table and open the lid.’
Amy’s eyes shone. She lifted the lid gently using both hands.
&
nbsp; ‘It’s from Paul and me.’
Amy snatched back her hand and put her fingers to her mouth, staring up at Ade.
‘It’s all right. Paul’s not here. He’s a friend, a good man. He wanted you to have this.’
Ade smiled at her.
‘Just touch the screen. Not too hard.
After a moment Amy stretched out a hand and dabbed at the surface. The computer came to life with a synthetic fanfare and showed a screen saver of Father Christmas. She giggled.
‘It’s a man,’ she said. ‘With a beard.’
‘It’s Father Christmas,’ said Gemma and Ade together. ‘He can’t touch you. There are some nice men in the world. Like Paul.’
‘Suppose.’
Ade ran her finger across the screen.
‘That’s the art programme. Go on, make a picture, just use your fingers.’
Ade and Gemma exchanged glances over her head. Amy was drawing a horse on the screen, not too badly.
‘But those things cost a fortune,’ said Gemma. She had her fingers crossed.
‘It’s OK. Paul got it for me. He knows people, he can get things like that dead cheap. He thought Amy’d like it. He’d show her how to use it if you’ll let him.’
‘Now it’s my present’ said Amy. She went to the bedroom and came back with a roll of paper with a piece of pink ribbon tied round it. She held it out, balanced on both arms, smiling, with her lips sucked in in excitement.
‘Now I wonder what this can be…’ Ade made her eyes large and round. She slowly undid the ribbon then flicked open the paper so it unrolled across the coffee table and onto the floor, two metres long. ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Oh my. Oh Amy.’
Every square inch of the paper was covered in writing, some large, some small, some so small she couldn’t read it, in black, green, yellow, brown, blue, crimson, purple, turquoise and brick red. It was written in all sorts of scripts, gothic, Arabic, modern, angular, copybook, italic, some of it horizontal, some of it vertical, at all sorts of angles, in spirals and circles and zigzags. She stared at it and read the same words over and over: ‘Thank you, Ade. Thank you, Ade. Thank you, Ade.’
She wrapped an arm round Amy. ‘That’s wonderful, how long did it take you, it must have taken hours?’
Her other arm was round Gemma.
‘She worked at it pretty well all the time, whenever you was out, I couldn’t stop her.’
Amy whispered in her ear: ‘I love you, Ade. Nearly as much as I love my Mummy.’
‘Best Christmas I’ve ever had.’ I’m not just saying it, it’s true.
34
She caught sight of Paul from the far end of the street, waiting for her outside the café. He waved and started to run towards her, with the glittering Christmas decorations above him in the early evening darkness and the lights of the shops on each side. He ran clumsily, one hand behind his back. She wasn’t going to run, not with that Christmas dinner inside her.
She wrapped her arms round him, her face buried in his warm hair, smelling the scent of him, then leaned back and kissed him for a long time. ‘Best Christmas ever and it’s getting better and better and it’s not Christmas Day yet!’
She held him tight against her as they walked along the street. He squeezed her, one-armed, then brought his other arm round from behind his back. ‘Here’s something for you.’
He held up a bouquet of flowers, dahlias, crimson, white, orange, turquoise, their great heads glowing in the darkness. She plunged her head into them and breathed in the bouquet, rich and sumptuous.
‘Dahlias – at Christmas! However did you get them?’
‘I still got friends. They’re for you.’
He stood there smiling at her. She had her arms round him. ‘I love them.’
‘There’s something I’ve got to say to you.’.’
‘Just a minute,’ Ade gripped his hand. ‘I know what I want to do. I want to be part of your homeless centre when you get it. I want to do welfare rights. I’ve known it ever since I was in the homeless place at the council. It’s what I’ve always been good at, money, numbers, spreadsheets, bureaucracy, making sense of the law. I’ll learn all the rules, how to deal with the system, how to fill in the forms. What works and what doesn’t. I’ll tell people, maybe one day I’ll train others. I’ll do test cases. It’ll grow.’
‘That’s brilliant, but it ain’t easy. I don’t know when there’ll ever be a homeless centre.’
‘No reason not to keep on.’
‘I think you’re wonderful. And that’s what I want to talk to you about.’ He paused and glanced down, and took both her hands in his. ‘Ade, what do you say to a Christmas wedding?’
She realised he was suddenly on his knees, on the pavement, looking up at her. ‘I love you. Will you marry me?’
She looked at him for a second. She knew she needed time, there were so many things she hadn’t finished, some she hadn’t started. There’s never a right time. She heard a voice inside her, drowning out all her other thoughts and she didn’t know if it was Nadia, or CI Mayland, or Denny or Morwen or all of them. Listen to your heart, it said, what else is there?
He seemed so vulnerable, so incomplete, so full of life, and they’d be together and it would work, she knew it would, and she wanted it so much. She pulled him to his feet and clasped him against her.
‘Yes, yes and yes! But … everything that’s happened. It doesn’t go away just like that. It’ll take time. You know that, don’t you?’
I’ll always hate him, it’ll be there, but you put layers round it and after a while it doesn’t hurt so much. Like building a pearl.
‘I’ll cope. I’ve got issues too. But don’t squeeze too tight.’
They were kissing then, again and again on the street corner. She became aware of something brushing ever so gently on her cheek, against the back of her hand.
‘It’s snowing!’
Fat white flakes were whirling down out of the night, gleaming in the streetlights, already beginning to settle along the pavement. She watched him put out his hand, a snowflake melting slowly against his pink palm. The snow was thicker now, muffling the noise of the city, forming a screen round them, softening the Christmas lights into a luminous haze. She shivered.
‘Come on! I need sausages!’
‘You’ve just had Christmas dinner.’
‘Yeah. This is supper.’
He kissed her again.
35
Ade stared at the menu over the counter. Black pudding today, she thought. She’d decided to look after herself, she was going to limit it to twice a week.
It was three weeks into the New Year. She stared at the folder in front of her, the papers spilling out if it across the table. Maybe. They’d got the injunction. Maybe they could get Gemma a flat of her own. Then she and Paul…
Getting a flat out of the homeless people. It wouldn’t be easy, like Paul said. He always said things like that. He was usually right. Then he went at it, anyway. He was with some of his friends from when he worked for Centre Point, in the pub. They had plans to set up a homeless centre with the money she’d got from Webster. Advice and maybe some short-term accommodation. Maybe. Get them started anyway. But there was something else she had to sort out just now.
She took a long cream envelope out of her pocket and laid it on the table in front of her. The address was typed in a faux antique copperplate script. It had come to the flat by special courier that morning, delivered by a polite young man who had been most careful to get a signature for it. She could see how Gemma had relaxed when she opened it and said it was OK, just for her, nothing to do with Maxie or the flat. They’d talked about how Amy was settling at the new school. She’d already asked if she could bring some friends back, she’d never wanted to do that before.
Ade gave a wry sm
ile. Want to beat the City of London and you end up doing one small good thing. Which is OK.
Paul waved to her from the door. He was kissing her before she’d had time to rise from her seat. He sat down and immediately started talking. ‘It’s great. We’ve got the plan worked out. I’ll be one of the wardens. We’ll have another go at getting the money. Alex thinks he can get a meeting with this philanthropist person. We can make it work, I know we can. We’re going to ask for enough to pay a worker for a year.’
‘That’s you.’
‘Oh no. I don’t take the money.’
‘So how will we live?’
He shrugged.
‘Find a way. Always have. Can’t really look homeless people in the face if you’ve got a good salary can you? Look, there’s these porridge pots. You just add hot water. Do you think they’d…?’
‘Ask ‘em. But what you said about homeless people and having a salary. Is that true?’
‘It’s how I feel. I’ll ask about the porridge.’
‘Wait, there’s something else first. Listen.’ She opened the envelope and slid out the sheet of thick lawyer’s paper.
‘“Dear Ms Corey,”’ she read,
‘“My client wishes you to attend in room 1.17 at the Consultancy Clinic, Harley Place, tomorrow at 3.00pm, where you will hear something to your advantage.
You are under no obligation, but we respectfully request that you accede to this invitation,
Yours faithfully,
Josiah Threadgold,
Attorney at Law.”
It came yesterday.’
‘You going to go?’
‘Why not? Only if you’ll come too. Get your porridge and eat up.’
Ade would have taken the Consultancy Clinic for a substantial private residence, with its black painted railings and white stone steps up to the front door, if she hadn’t noticed the discreet brass plate screwed to the wall.
‘Why’s this street so quiet?’ asked Paul. ‘You can hear your footsteps.’
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