by Roy Lewis
She left Joe and Myra in a stunned and uncomprehending silence. They were incapable of uttering even a platitude.
* * *
He opened the car door for her and Joan ran across the dark pavement from the shop doorway, with a scarf draped over her hair. She told herself it was protection from the spattered rain but she knew that other motives dictated her action: she had no desire to be recognized. The car door slammed behind her; the warm distinctive smell of damp leather came to her and she shrugged off the scarf to look at him. The windscreen wipers beat a slow steady rhythm, outpaced by the quickness of her pulse.
There was no smile on his face. He was taking out a cigarette; the paper pack was battered and twisted. He lit the match and the glow in the car gave his saturnine features a devilish cast, lean and cruel. But she remembered the warm urgency of his mouth and the fierceness of his body and she took the cigarette from his lips and put her arm around his neck and kissed him. His hair was wet, and droplets touched her cheek. Her body stirred.
‘Where to?’ he asked as he broke away from her embrace, and recovered his cigarette.
‘Anywhere.’
‘Your place?’
She opened her eyes as a tremor of shock and fear shot through her. He couldn’t be serious!
‘My . . . my place?’ she repeated in stupefaction.
‘Why not?’ His tone was careless as though the answer, or any of this, were of little importance to him. She was hurt. She shook her head.
‘But that’s rather foolish . . . and dangerous, isn’t it, to go to my home?’
‘Why?’
‘Well . . . Bill, what if Bill should come home when . . .’
Her voice died away. He shrugged carelessly and drew on his cigarette, staring forward through the streaming windscreen. ‘You said he’d be out this evening. But no matter.’
She waited. He said nothing more and she continued to wait until she knew that there’d be no words from him until she spoke again. There had been that one glorious evening with him, when he had made her behave in a way that still brought colour to her cheeks when she thought of it. She thought of it often, almost hourly during the day since it had happened. She thought of how it had been, the things he had made her do, the things he had done to her, and she remembered how he had hardly spoken, made no display of affection, how he had made no suggestion for another meeting but had simply fallen in with her wishes, her approaches. There had been no affection in him, just a wild, yet calculated violence when he took her, but she couldn’t help that; she had wanted him then and she wanted him again. Tonight.
‘Can’t we . . .’ She faltered, and then plucked up courage. ‘Can’t we just drive somewhere?’
He just looked at her for a moment, turning his head and staring at her, and then he drew on his cigarette again, once, before flicking it out with a thumbnail and pushing the stub into the top pocket of his leather jacket. Without a word he engaged first gear, released the handbrake and they jerked forward spasmodically. The engine roared and they lurched down the street as the rain came at them in needle points, white under the soft headlights. Sadruddin drove through the town and she half expected him to take the side road up towards the moor where they had gone the evening after the student meeting, but he drove on. This time he was taking the road to her home.
He stopped the car in the roadway outside the house. She glanced up to the second floor where their flat, hers and Bill’s, was situated, and there was no light. She had been expecting none.
‘I’ll see you.’
His tone was flat and harsh. Worse, it was indifferent. The engine was still running. She stared at him and caught the line of his profile and she put out a hand, but he turned his face aside like a child, avoiding her hand. Yet it was not a childish gesture; it was a cold one, a vicious one. He wasn’t looking at her.
‘I’ll see you around.’
Wordlessly he switched off the engine. The silence crept around them and the windscreen wipers were frozen into streaming immobility. She leaned over and kissed him slowly but his lips were cold. She broke away, got out of the car and slammed the door. She ran around to the pavement and the rain dashed against her body and her face and soaked her hair as she fumbled for the keys to the front door. When she finally opened the door she paused and stood there in the doorway, holding the door wide, and looking back to him.
With a jerk the car door was opened; the car lights were switched off, and the road was dark under the drumming rain.
Inside the house he shook himself like a dog and made no attempt at silence as he mounted the stairs behind her. She stood aside at the door to let him enter the flat first and then she followed and closed the door behind them. He was standing in the dimness with his back to her and she came up behind him, put her arms around him, strained the softness of her body against him and he turned and switched on the light. He grinned. ‘Nice.’
She drew the curtains and lit the gas-fire.
Sadruddin stood with his legs braced apart, staring around him at the flat. The sitting-room was small, with two easy chairs, a settee, a radiogram and two bookcases, both crammed with paperbacks on sociological topics with a creaming of light fiction. Joan caught her reflection in the mirror as she straightened up from the fire: her hair was damp and sticking to her forehead but her eyes were warm and excited and there was a flush to her cheek. She turned and looked at Sadruddin and he was grinning again, his teeth white under the black moustache, lines appearing along his lean jaw. The humour in his eyes held a hint of malice, nevertheless.
‘Come here,’ he ordered and held out his arms. She went to him quickly and his arms were tight around her, locking against her spine, so tight that her head fell back until she was looking up at him involuntarily. He kissed her; she didn’t like the contempt in the kiss and struggled against him.
‘You’re hurting me!’
‘Isn’t it what you want?’
‘I don’t want you to—’
‘You had no objection the other evening, when I hurt you. And you haven’t forgotten it, Joan, have you?’
She hadn’t forgotten it. He had hurt her, a tearing hurt, but she hadn’t fought against it for it had been at the height of her excitement. This was different, more cold, more deliberate, but even so the thought of the other evening softened her now and she pushed her head against his chest, feeling her limbs tremble. He released her and she stared at him for a moment before taking his hand to lead him across to the settee.
She lay back and looked up at him and he smiled, shaking his head.
‘No. Not here.’
She was puzzled. She sat up and he pulled at her arm.
‘I want you in there.’
In her bed. Bill’s bed. Their bed.
Her resistance to the suggestion was simply overcome, by the slightest pressure on her arm. She wanted this man, wanted to experience the wild urgency of the previous occasion. She stood quite still in the bedroom while he removed her clothes, expertly, slowly, and she shut her mind to Bill and the flat and their bed and the two years of their married life, and she waited only for the slow rise of excitement in her stomach to change to a flowing heat that would thrust her into that shuddering darkness again.
She felt the coldness of the sheets against her skin and the warmth of Sadruddin’s thighs. Then there was the pain, and the harshness of his breathing and the exciting, culminating surge once more.
Later, much later, in the darkness she whispered to him.
‘We must go, now.’
He stirred, threw an arm across her breasts.
She smiled at the dark head beside her and pushed at his arm.
‘No, we must get up. It’s late. You’ll have to go, and I’ll straighten things up.’
He grunted, turning slowly towards her and his hand grasped her shoulder, his body moved against hers. She laughed, pleasurably.
‘You’re never satisfied! Don’t tell me you want—’
He was crushing her.
Suddenly she struggled because it was late and she didn’t want him again, and he was coming at her angrily, like an animal, but he was strong and she couldn’t control him and then, in a few moments, she could no longer control herself either as the heat and the movement and the desire mingled into a threshing that was timeless and endless and surging on a sea of pain.
Until light was bright and white in her eyes and she could see the blackness of Sadruddin’s sweat-soaked hair and feel the crazy laughter bubbling up in his chest, against her breast. He rolled back from her and he was laughing and she sat up. Her breasts were damp and the air struck cold against them outside the sheets and Bill was standing in the doorway with one hand still on the light switch and his mouth wide open, gaping in his broad, soft face.
Sadruddin stopped laughing and sat there, supporting himself on his hands, staring amusedly at her as she stared at Bill and Bill stared at both of them, naked in the marital bed.
Then Bill said one word and charged. Sadruddin moved with speed, cackling hysterically. He snatched up the pillow and threw it with accuracy, straight at Bill and it hit him in the midriff. Joan saw her husband stagger sideways and then come on forward again as Sadruddin rolled out of bed. Bill sprawled across her thighs, his suffused face below hers, his hands grabbing for the man who had just left her. Sadruddin skipped up across the room, still laughing, and Joan was reminded of all those crazy 1920s comedies but this was different, for this was Bill, enraged, and this was Sadruddin. She stared wildly at him as he laughed. His body was lean, and young, and brown, and his movements were uninhibited, graceful as a young jungle cat. She had never seen anything more beautiful in her life.
Bill gasped obscenities at them both and lurched up to face Sadruddin. The naked Arab faced the raincoated, irate husband and they took up similar stances, leaning forward watchfully, but while Bill’s face was puffed with anger Sadruddin’s was still twitching with the laughter that bubbled uncontrollably from his lips. It had the effect of further angering, yet confusing Bill and he glanced back towards Joan, and again at Sadruddin. The student spat contemptuously and said something in Arabic and a spasm shook Bill Lambert’s body.
Next moment he turned and his hand swept back and lashed Joan across the cheek. She screamed, more in surprise than pain, and threw herself back on the bed. Bill was staring at Sadruddin again and Sadruddin was grinning. Neither moved.
Joan knew her husband was afraid of the Arab.
‘Get out!’
The words came in a snarl but Joan and Sadruddin and Bill Lambert knew it was a gesture only. It was only because Sadruddin felt that there was nothing to keep him there that he was prepared to accept the order.
‘Like this?’ he said, pointing to his body and grinning infuriatingly, but Bill made no reply. Sadruddin waved a hand at Joan and moved across to the pile of clothing on the floor beside the bed. He began to dress, whipping his long legs into his narrow trousers with insolent, provocative jerks. He grinned continually, his eyes flickering from the naked woman to the angry husband. He buttoned his shirt.
‘Don’t take it hard, Mr Lambert. I’ve just been indulging in what we might call a sociological survey. Some of the findings . . .’
A growl started in Lambert’s throat but it died again as Sadruddin’s eyes changed from mockery to malice. Again, Lambert recognized his ineffectuality and lashed out at his wife, verbally this time.
‘You whore!’ She stared at him, clutching the bedclothes to her as though reluctant to allow her husband to see her breasts, mottled from contact with her lover’s body. ‘You whore — sleeping with an Arab!’
Sadruddin straightened slowly. He slipped on his shoes. The smile remained on his face but his glance was cold.
‘Racial prejudice is a funny thing. Curious classifications, each with shades of meaning, eh?’ The smile expanded and it was the smile of a tiger. ‘I’ll allow you that one epithet, Mr Lambert, because I’m still the gainer, eh, Mrs Lambert?’
He slung his leather jacket over his shoulder and began to walk towards the door with an insolent swagger. He had just reached it when Lambert lost control and started for him. The Arab whirled around to face his assailant and his hand swung up from his waist. There was a light in his face, the glow of blood lust. A knife flickered in his hand.
‘Come on then, let me cut your horns!’
Lambert stopped dead in his tracks and his enraged face paled visibly. He stared at the knife in silence and the two men remained immobile, half-crouching, stiff-legged. The knife began to move slightly from side to side and Lambert’s eyes followed the flicker, fascinated, until with a casual relaxation, Sadruddin straightened from his crouching stance and sniggered.
‘I thought not.’ He winked mockingly at Joan. ‘Till next time, then?’ With a studied contempt he turned his back and walked through the bedroom doorway. Lambert expelled his breath in an anguished sigh and then turned to face his wife. His mouth twisted. He swore at her, an obscene flood of words. Sadruddin’s voice floated back from the sitting-room.
‘Don’t be too hard on her, Lambert! After all, who are you to talk?’
Joan saw the way Bill stiffened and clenched his fists but then the door slammed and Sadruddin was gone and Bill was glaring at her. He seemed to be struggling with himself as he stood there and she was suddenly aware that she was naked from the waist up. She’d released the bedclothes involuntarily — now she made a convulsive grab at them but the movement angered her husband and brought a furious desire leaping to his eyes.
‘I’ll show you, damn you!’
He tore off his coat, threw it on the floor and knelt on the bed, grabbing for her, swearing and tearing at her. She fought him with far more determination than she had thought she possessed. She’d never known him like this and she kept him at bay, hitting him about the head and shoulders as he scrabbled at her, kicked his way on to her, and she rolled and scratched and bit like a wildcat. In spite of his strength she succeeded. She kept him off, in spite of the numbness of her face where he’d hit her, in spite of the scrambling urgency of his attack. And once she knew he was beaten she cooled; once she knew he couldn’t take her against her will, she felt the cold power in her veins.
But it wasn’t until there were red clawmarks on his face, his angry vicious desire was spent in the violent attack upon her body, and he was sobbing in self-pity, and remorse, and emotional collapse, that she asked him.
In a cold contempt she asked him and he told her. And she discovered what Sadruddin had meant.
* * *
Next morning the sky had that pale, washedout look that was typical of a morning after heavy rain. In Sedleigh a blocked drain had overflowed into a bakery and short-circuited the electricity. Half of the town had been blacked out and there were three incidents involving burglary which could be put down to the blackout. Two youths had been taken into custody for the first of the burglaries: it had been an on-the-spot decision for them, and their lack of planning had contributed to their downfall. The other two jobs had not been bungled and though all the local villains who were known to indulge in such activities had been checked or were being checked there was some doubt at Headquarters that the CID would get much joy out of the exercise.
But Crow could leave all that to the local force. He was tied to the Harland murder and he was devoting his whole attention to it. His concentration was producing few results, nevertheless.
The Woods girl, for instance. She’d not been in a good humour when he’d followed her into the dining-room because those stupid parents had nettled her. The father had been a pompous fool, one used to the sound of his own voice in his own home, and Crow had little patience with such men. Mrs Woods was an affected, simpering nonentity whose main concern seemed to be that the middle-class gentility she fostered was to be maintained under any stress whatsoever. It hadn’t been an auspicious start for an interview.
Only with difficulty had Crow managed to get a few facts from her, facts that were of some assistance
in filling in the background on Rosemary Harland. She’d known Rosemary for five years — Rosemary had been ahead of her at school but they had met socially at the youth club and Sally had admired Rosemary. Rosemary Harland had been rather quiet, it would seem, and had been quite happy to spend her time with the younger girl at the club. She’d had little truck with the lads who hung around there and she’d remained friendly with Sally after she started her secretarial course at the Branch College of Further Education.
There had been more facts than this, but still there was something missing. Crow hadn’t been able to put his finger on it but there was something. He knew what the trouble was, of course; he was a good police officer as far as results were concerned but he knew his limitations — and one of them was interviewing young women. Perhaps it was that he was too conscious of his unprepossessing appearance, and gaucheness. Sally Woods had answered his questions, given him a number of facts he needed, but he felt he’d not got all he wanted from her.
He’d had to press her considerably over the question of the times when Rosemary had stayed with her. Sally had agreed that Rosemary had stayed at the Woods’s home from time to time but was vague on dates. Only when Crow insisted did she finally come out with what he wanted.
‘All right, all right. Have it your own way!I suppose there were occasions when she said she was staying with us but she wasn’t with us at all. Yes, and I suppose the night she was killed I did phone her mother to say she wouldn’t be coming home and would be staying with me. No, I wasn’t worried when she didn’t come to my house, but that’s because I didn’t expect her anyway. The fact is, she rang me up about four-thirty at work and said that she had a date that evening and didn’t want to go home. She asked me to ring her mother and say she would be staying overnight with me. So that’s what I did. I waited till early evening and then I phoned her home, told her mother that Rosemary would be staying the night and was already with me and that was that. And it’s no good asking me who she had a date with, or how many times she’d seen him, or anything else. We were friends and I talked to her sometimes about my men but she never told me a word about hers. Or even if there was more than one. She was tightlipped. And now she’s dead and I wish you’d stop asking me all these bloody questions!’