Music Macabre

by Sarah Rayne

  Phin said, ‘I used to hear Toby’s stories about you and think you were a frivolous scatterbrain, and that you’d be absolutely maddening to actually meet.’

  ‘Am I? Maddening and scatterbrained?’

  ‘Beautifully so.’

  ‘It’s all very good, isn’t it?’ said Arabella, then propped herself up on one elbow and looked down at him. ‘Isn’t it?’ she said, with a sudden note of doubt.

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Phin, reaching for her again. ‘It’s all very good indeed.’

  It was almost two a.m. when Phin finally got home. He managed to pick up a taxi outside Arabella’s flat. He liked being driven through London at this hour. The streets were never really deserted, and London was never entirely quiet, because London, like all cities, never really slept.

  He let himself into the big old house and went softly across the dim hall, moving as quietly as he could because of Miss Pringle who lived in the garden flat, and who was a lady of a rather timid disposition. The smallest scrape of noise after ten p.m. usually sent her anxiously peering through a chink in the door to see who was abroad at such a dissolute hour. Toby always invited her to his parties – he invited the entire house, in fact, which he said saved complaints about noise. The parties terrified Miss Pringle, but she generally presented herself for a polite half-hour, before retiring to the security of her flat to watch DVDs of Midsomer Murders, Inspector Morse and, more recently, Endeavour, all of which had her unswerving devotion. Arabella sometimes took her out to lunch at the trattoria on the corner, and the other residents of the house occasionally invited her to supper, but that seemed to be about the extent of Miss Pringle’s socializing.

  Phin tiptoed past her door, wincing when a floorboard squeaked, but reaching his own flat without mishap. He was physically tired, but mentally wide awake – which was partly due to Arabella, of course. He smiled, then remembered she would be away for three weeks. Still, there was the intriguing ‘Liszten for the Killer’ sketch to be investigated. And the curious song tonight.

  And it would be interesting to see Harlequin Court by daylight tomorrow and look through the old papers that Loretta Farrant had promised to look out. He considered Loretta. She had said she and her husband owned the restaurant jointly, although she had seemed somewhat dismissive of him. He wondered vaguely what kind of man such a forceful lady would have married. It would either have to be somebody very strong-minded who could stand up to the lady’s assertive manner, or it would have to be a complete wimp who would happily fill a role of subservience and think everything she did was marvellous.

  FIVE

  Roland Farrant had not met up with Loretta until they ate breakfast together. Sometimes he waited up for her after her evening session in the restaurant, but she had not got in until almost half-past one last night, so he had gone to bed by himself.

  It was not unusual for her to get home so late. People sometimes stayed on after their meal in the restaurant, lingering over a final cup of coffee or a liqueur. You could not point crossly to the time, Loretta said, although you had to be careful about not serving drinks and food after hours. You never knew when the licensing authorities might be setting sneaky traps to catch you out. She knew all about these things, because she had worked in hotels and restaurants for years. When they first met, Roland had loved listening to her tales about the hotel guests and their quirks and foibles.

  But Mother had not cared for Loretta. ‘False,’ she had said, the first time Roland took her back to Dulwich. ‘All that gushing and bringing me flowers and saying how marvellous the food was at lunch. I saw through all that right away. I can always tell if someone’s not genuine. She’s not good enough for you, Roland.’

  Mother had not thought any of the girls Roland had tentatively taken out good enough, and it had usually been easier not to argue. If they were not dubbed as forward little madams, then they were colourless brown mice with no personalities. There had not, in fact, been many of them, and Roland had not been especially keen on any of them anyway.

  He was very keen indeed on Loretta, though, and certainly nobody could have described her as colourless. Spanish, he had thought when they met. Like something out of a painting – olive skin and dark brown eyes and high, slanting cheekbones. She liked to wear rich dark reds and vivid sapphire blues, and she had unusual jewellery – not precious stones, but modern designer jewellery. Necklaces of chunky gold or jade. Earrings of jet or amber.

  Quite soon after meeting her, he began to hope that she might feel the same about him. She came to the house several times, and she was very good with Mother, very patient and interested, wanting to help with little household tasks like putting up some new curtains, and offering to help with pasting some old photographs into albums. She liked old photos, she said; she had several of her grandparents – even her great-grandparents. Links to the past mattered, and she would be really interested to see any photos of Roland’s family.

  ‘Pushy,’ said Mother, later. ‘Prying into things. It’s my opinion it’s not family photos she’s interested in – it’s money. She wants to find out how much money we’ve got.’

  ‘She hasn’t got any family left of her own,’ said Roland, who was delighted that Loretta was taking so much trouble, and gratified to think he must be the reason.

  The real gratification came a month later. They had had dinner in a small restaurant that Loretta had suggested, and afterwards she invited him back to her flat for a drink. It was not so very late, she said; he would not be expected home quite yet, would he? Roland, who had casually told Mother that he would be having a few drinks with his office colleagues, said at once that it was entirely up to him when he got home. They took a taxi to the flat and they held hands in the back, and it was probably, but not necessarily, an accident that Loretta’s hand brushed between Roland’s thighs, and then lay there for a few moments, the fingers curling around him …

  Her flat was quite small, but it was very comfortable. The softly cushioned sofa was very comfortable indeed, and presently, Roland ventured on more explicit embraces than he had attempted with Loretta before. They were actually more explicit than he had attempted with anyone, because on the few occasions he had been in this situation in the past, Mother’s disapproving visage always came into his mind, and Mother’s steely remarks about girls who went to bed with men before marriage sounded in his brain. He knew it was impossibly old-fashioned and very nearly Victorian prudishness, but it was what always happened. It always had an embarrassingly shrivelling effect, and it meant he had never really managed to get as far as anyone’s bedroom.

  But that night with Loretta was different. She was exciting and assertive and they did not even bother to reach her bedroom; it all started happening there on the sofa almost before Roland realized it, with buttons torn off in passionate haste and zips frantically undone and no thought about condoms, which Roland did not have anyway.

  There was a frenzied bouncing of the sofa springs, and the sensation of being out of control of his own body and of being rushed towards a conclusion. And then the conclusion took him over, and it was marvellous and shattering. Roland did not think Loretta would know it was his first time ever, and he privately vowed never to admit it to her.

  Afterwards, Loretta padded into the kitchen to make cups of tea for them; she put on Roland’s discarded shirt which was so intimate – so very nearly loving an action – that Roland thought she could surely not refuse a proposal of marriage.

  He made the proposal nervously while they drank the tea. If it was not exactly inept, it was certainly nowhere near the glossy romantic proposals you saw on films and TV, and heard about in the press. He more than half expected her to refuse, though.

  But Loretta did not refuse. She accepted it with an enthusiasm that astonished and delighted him so much, that he discovered he was capable of making love to her all over again.

  After this second excursion, she said, a bit hazily, that she supposed his mother would not object.

&n
bsp; ‘Because I had the impression she didn’t care for me very much.’

  Roland tightened his hold on her. ‘She’ll get to know you,’ he said. ‘And in any case, I won’t let her stop me from marrying you.’

  ‘No? You promise?’

  ‘Nothing will stop me from marrying you, Loretta.’

  In the end, he had not needed to fall out with Mother about marrying Loretta, because Mother died several days after that memorable night on Loretta’s sofa.

  Roland told himself it was very sad, and that it would leave a massive hole in his life. He had to repeat this several times, and even then he did not really believe it. He told people what a happy evening they had had on that last night, and that this memory was a great consolation.

  Loretta had been to supper for the evening – in fact she had provided supper, arriving in a taxi with a casserole which she had made, and which only needed to be heated up and served with a salad. The casserole had been very good indeed, because Loretta was a very good cook. Roland had opened a bottle of wine, and had suggested that for once Mother had a glass.

  ‘It’s very soft and light. Very relaxing.’

  ‘Well, perhaps I’ll have half a glass just this once. It might help me to sleep. I’m a martyr to insomnia,’ Mother told Loretta.

  ‘How miserable for you.’

  Mother was not a martyr to insomnia at all, but she liked to promote the image of herself lying wakeful throughout the night. She had the wine and went up to bed. She liked her bedroom – she was private up there, she said; she had her books, her TV, even her own shower room next door, put in by a previous owner who had a big family and a live-in au pair.

  Once, when Roland had asked if the extra flight of stairs might be getting a bit of a haul, she had said sharply that she might have a touch of arthritis and a twinge or two of angina, but she was not so decrepit that she could not manage a few stairs once a day.

  ‘Two flights of stairs,’ Roland said.

  ‘I can manage perfectly well.’

  But on the morning after Loretta came to dinner, Mother had not managed well at all. Coming downstairs for the day, she had fallen all the way down both flights of stairs, stumbling over a rucked piece of stair carpet outside her door. She had broken several bones, of course, but, most crucially of all, the fall had broken her neck.

  Everyone had been kind, and at the inquest the coroner said Roland must not feel guilty. Wynne Farrant’s death had been tragic and unfortunate, but carpets did come away from their moorings and people did trip over them and tumble to their deaths. He directed that the jury bring in a verdict of Accidental Death, and said that no blame whatsoever could be attached to Mr Farrant, who clearly had been a devoted and attentive son.

  Loretta had been marvellous. Roland had been grateful to her in the days that followed. She had helped with all the bewildering practicalities – the post mortem and the inquest and all the paperwork. She said it was a wife’s job to do things like this, and she was practically his wife. And Roland should remember that she had had to do it all herself a few years earlier for her own mother, and a few years before that for her grandmother, as well. It meant she was familiar with all the procedures, she said, and she was not letting Roland go through it on his own.

  There was a good deal to sort out. Mother had been highly insured – there were two policies that Roland had not known existed. There were bonds and investments, as well, from Roland’s father who had died many years ago. Overall, there was far more money than he had realized. Everything came to him.

  Loretta accompanied him to the meetings with solicitors and bank staff and financial advisers. She was surprisingly knowledgeable, and Roland was immensely proud of her. And when life had settled down into some kind of normality again, it was marvellous to tell people at the office the exciting news that he was engaged. There were surprised celebrations; Loretta was invited to a drinks party with the office staff so they could meet her and congratulate her. There was wine and modest snacks, which two of the girls had brought in. The following week Roland went to the hotel which Loretta managed and which was part of a chain, to be introduced to her friends and colleagues there. There was another celebration, this time with champagne and snacks that were slightly more upmarket. He felt he was moving into a whole new life.

  Loretta did not mention the house, not directly, but Roland did not think she liked it very much. It was a rambling old place, of course, not to everyone’s taste. When Loretta said, quite casually, that she supposed there were a great many memories in it, Roland agreed, but he did not say that a good many of the memories were unhappy. When Loretta next remarked that properties in Dulwich were fetching some very good prices, he contacted an estate agent, and was staggered to find that Loretta had been right, because the agent thought a very high figure could be achieved. Why not try offering it, he said. Roland agreed, and was even more staggered when two people wanted to buy it at what was practically the full asking price.

  After this, there was no reason to delay their wedding, and they were married shortly after probate was granted. There was a brief honeymoon in Scotland.

  Linklighters was mentioned three weeks later.

  ‘It’s something I’ve always dreamed of,’ Loretta said. Her eyes were shining. Roland had never seen her look like that, not even in bed when she told him he was the most marvellous lover in the world.

  ‘My own restaurant,’ she said. ‘Our own restaurant.’

  ‘Yes, but …’ The enormity of what she was suggesting rose up like a gibbering monster. Roland took a deep breath and said, ‘Where is this place, exactly? And how did you hear about it?’

  ‘Oh, it was one of those chance remarks,’ said Loretta, vaguely. ‘I forget exactly – or it might have been someone staying at the hotel. Yes, I believe that was it. And the thing is, Roland, that I’ve already been to see it – I didn’t tell you, because I wanted to see what it was like first. It might have been a complete ruin.’

  ‘Isn’t it?’

  ‘No,’ she said, softly. ‘Oh, no, it isn’t a complete ruin at all. It doesn’t look anything very much at the moment, but it could be made really terrific.’

  ‘You still haven’t said where—’

  ‘It’s quite near Charing Cross Road. You have to walk along a little alleyway – only a few steps – and then you’re in a kind of small courtyard. It’s close to St Martin’s Lane, so we could do early meals for theatre-goers, and late suppers for when they come out. All it needs is the right kind of advertising. It was a Victorian music hall in the late 1800s – you can still see traces of that, even under all the dirt and rubble. It was called The Linklighters Supper Rooms. Beautifully Victorian, isn’t it?’

  ‘What were linklighters?’

  ‘Usually young boys who would light people through those thick old London fogs with lanterns.’

  ‘You’re very knowledgeable.’

  ‘I read it up,’ said Loretta, offhandedly. ‘Anyway, my idea is that we’d recreate the original music hall ambience as far as possible. The food could be things like steak and oyster pies and even jellied eels. Game pie and champagne jelly. I know one or two chefs who have a real feel for that kind of food – I think I could tempt them to come in.’ She glanced at him. ‘I know this is all a bit out of the blue, and I never thought it could be possible,’ she said, and for the first time since Roland had met her, she sounded shy and even a bit nervous. His heart melted, because she had never allowed him to see a vulnerable side before. He thought – she’s had no one and nothing for most of her life.

  ‘I could get estimates and talk to builders and architects,’ Loretta was saying. ‘And find out about planning regulations and things. None of it will commit us to anything, of course.’

  ‘But I don’t know the first thing about running a business,’ said Roland, worriedly. ‘I wouldn’t know where to start.’

  ‘Rubbish. You’re an accountant. You’re dealing with people’s business affairs all day. Of course
you’d know.’

  It was nice that Loretta thought him so capable and knowledgeable, so Roland did not remind her that he did not really deal with people’s business affairs – that he had somehow gravitated to the audit and tax section of the company, which the partners seemed to think was more suited to his abilities.

  But when Loretta showed him the estimated cost for transferring the lease, what he said was that they could not possibly afford to lease and run a restaurant in central London.

  ‘We could, you know,’ said Loretta. ‘It’s the tail-end of a lease that’s being offered. There’re only four years of it to run – which means we could get it fairly reasonably. We can do a lot in four years, and by the end of that time, if we’ve made a go of things, we might be able to afford to renew.’

  ‘But there are other costs,’ said Roland, trying not to be swept along by her enthusiasm. ‘Ground rent and a service charge. And business rates – they’ll be colossal.’ He felt on safer ground with this; he knew all about business rates.

  ‘Well, let’s look at the statement for those bonds – I remember noticing how well they’d done. It should be in this file here.’

  She had organized the paperwork into folders, each one neatly marked. She was a marvel when it came to this kind of thing. And she was right in saying that the bonds had been extremely profitable.

  ‘We could cash them in,’ said Loretta, studying the statement. ‘And with the money from the house I think we’d have enough for a proper renovation and refurbishment job.’