Four o’clock. I’d pop into Rissington for a courtesy farewell to the Major, and then back to London.
London was hot. The temperature was building up, the nights weren’t cooling, the air still hung like soup. I parked the car in Cambridge Gardens where there was unrestricted parking and locked it for the insurance company’s benefit. Chances were it would be vandalized, but that wasn’t my problem.
The three-hundred-yard walk down Ladbroke Grove was hard going. I’d brought my notes, Kelly’s notebooks, and the huge wodges of material in brown manila envelopes, including the Rissington Abbey promotional video, which the Major had thrust upon me. He certainly seemed to do his paperwork three deep.
When I got to Ladbroke Crescent I went upstairs to my flat to dump my packages before looking in on Polly. Her flat was silent as I passed. At least she wasn’t watching the Cassie video again: perhaps she was asleep. Best thing.
Her flat was silent, but mine wasn’t. As I groped for the flat key I heard unfamiliar music: something French. It sounded like a sound library atmosphere track, the kind of predictable accordion onion-seller music a plodding director like Alan would lay over shots of Paris.
It rattled me. Polly had the key, of course, but why should she be upstairs in my place instead of in her own mourning bed? I dropped the packages on the floor to leave my hands free, pushed open the door, and said: ‘What the hell?’
The accordion wheezed Gallically on, and the girl lying on the sofa with bare feet looked up and said: ‘Hi, Alex.’
It was Alan’s Claudia.
‘What the hell are you doing here?’
‘I hope you don’t mind.’
She wasn’t pretty, but she was almost beautiful. She had a long, narrow face, with a high-bridged nose, a wide mouth, and an astonishing head of curly, shimmering black hair, caught behind her ears with silver-trimmed combs and tumbling down her back. Her eyes, too, were almost black, and very bright under strongly-marked eyebrows.
She sat up and began to put on a pair of top-of-the-range Nike trainers. Even bending over, her face was pale against her hair. She looked cool. Her white shirt was full and crisp, tucked into a wide leather belt and Naf-Naf jeans. It looked a designer shirt. She looked a designer girl. Not a fashion victim, just as if each one of the garments she wore would have an origin, probably Italy by way of Bond Street.
‘I do mind.’
‘Polly let me in.’
I took a deep breath. Polly, walking-wounded, was still safe from recriminations, however justified.‘Could we kill the French atmos?’
‘Atmos?’
‘Atmosphere. The bloody music. It’s yours, I suppose.’
She turned it off. ‘It’s not mine, it’s the radio. I tuned it to a French station. I’m sorry to barge in like this, I really am, but I must talk to you. You didn’t ring me back.’
‘No.’ I picked up the paperwork, stacked it on my file shelf, and went through to the kitchen. ‘I’m making coffee. Do you want?’
‘Real coffee?’
‘Yes.’
‘Do you grind the beans?’
‘Yes.’
‘Thank you, I’d love some.’
She annoyed me, badly. ‘In your position I’d accept a cup of coffee if it was made with instant acorn powder.’
‘I can only drink real fresh coffee. Otherwise, I’d rather not.’
‘And I’d rather you weren’t here.’
‘I’ve already apologized.’ She spoke mildly but firmly, in her alien, stateless voice. She had the blithe self-absorbed self-confidence of an American girl, the kind who answers ‘May I open the window?’ with ‘I’d much prefer you didn’t’, thus shaking the English right down to their socks.
It was a mode I didn’t object to, usually. I prefer it to Uriah Heep. I took another deep breath. ‘Come into the kitchen, watch me make the coffee, and tell me what you want. Quickly. Then I want you out of here.’
‘It’s very simple. I want to make a deal with you.’
‘Tell me.’
‘I want to be a researcher. I don’t know anything about it. I want you to teach me.’
‘No way.’
‘Hear me out. I’ll pay. You’re a freelance, aren’t you? OK, I’ll pay. I’ll hire you as a teacher. My money for your expertise.’
‘Why me?’
‘Alan says you’re the best.’
‘And you trust Alan’s judgement?’
‘Not Alan’s. But what Alan says is always what everyone else says, that’s why he says it.’
I turned on the grinder and pointed to a kitchen stool. She sat down, necessarily silent. When the grinder stopped, she started again. ‘I wouldn’t get in your way, I really wouldn’t . . .’ She kept talking and I thought. Of course she would get in my way. Bound to. My working life was postulated on the fact that you can almost always get more done by yourself working on your own. I’d have to explain what I was doing, I’d have to slow down to her pace.
Besides, I like being on my own. It suits me very well.
And the practical side of it. If she wanted to be trained as a television researcher, she’d have to come with me while I did some television research, and I wasn’t booked to do any until the end of June, nearly three weeks away.
But I’d already promised myself this year not to turn down any work because I couldn’t afford it. Times were very very hard.
So I’d probably have to take her on. Oh, God.
I passed her a mug of coffee, some milk. I guessed she wouldn’t take sugar.
She looked accusingly at the milk carton. ‘This is full cream. Got any semi-skimmed?’
‘No.’
‘I’ll drink it black.’
‘Oh, good,’ I said waspishly.
‘I’m eighteen,’ she said. ‘I’ve got my International Baccalauréat. I went to school in Switzerland. I speak French and German and I get by in Italian. I live mostly in Paris, sometimes Rome, because my second stepfather lives there and I stay with my stepsisters . . .’ That explained the voice, I thought. She’s a gilded Eurochild. ‘My stepfather expects me to go to college here or in America, but I’ve had it with books, and I want to work in television.’
‘Do you realize how much it’ll cost, to pay me?’
‘That doesn’t matter. My trust fund’ll pay. The trustees were expecting to shell out for my college expenses. The fees at Harvard or Oxford aren’t exactly cheap.’
‘And I’m not exactly Harvard or Oxford.’
‘In your own line, you are. It isn’t just what Alan said. The other people at your party, too, they all said you were the best.’
I’m as human as anyone. My first reaction to flattery is to enjoy it, to believe it. Then I look for the small print, which in this case was that I couldn’t take her on if it would annoy Alan. I still needed him.
‘No problem,’ she said airily. ‘I’ve sorted it with Alan. I made him think it was his idea. He’s still a little pissed off with me about your party, anyhow. I said I’d go back to him when I’d learnt something.’
The money was tempting. I could just take her on and have her trotting behind me, but she was going about it the wrong way. I started to explain that she needed to be in a big organization, preferably the BBC, with decent current affairs resources.
She interrupted. ‘I don’t care about that. Basic techniques are what I need, and I couldn’t get taken on by the BBC at my age anyhow.’
So then I told her that I wasn’t doing any of the right kind of work for some weeks, that at the moment I was working as a private detective.
‘Yeah. Alan told me. Look, this is how I see it. I’m learning nothing at Alan’s except how to answer the telephone, and I knew that already. Give it a week’s trial. I pay you your daily rate and my own expenses and I come along as your “gofer” – is that the right word? Alan said it. What does it mean?’
‘A “gofer” is the person who fetches things. “Go for the coffee, go for the camera.” That’ll be five b
ucks, please.’
‘I don’t understand. Would you prefer to be paid in dollars?’
‘Forget it.’
She shrugged. ‘Fine. You answer my questions when you’re not actually working. OK?’
‘And you do what I tell you?’
‘Of course,’ she said blithely. I believed she meant it but not that she understood it.
‘Everything I tell you to do, you do it, right then?’
‘Sure,’ she said.
‘I have another problem,’ I said. ‘The private investigation I’m on is confidential. If you work with me, you’ll know things you mustn’t repeat, to anyone. Do you understand?’
‘I’m very good at keeping secrets. I never tell anyone about my mother’s lovers.’
‘You’ve just told me,’ I pointed out.
‘In general. Not in particular And I hardly think you’ll tell Dieter.’
‘Who’s Dieter?’
‘My current stepfather. He’s . . .’
‘OK,’ I interrupted. ‘Do you remember Alan’s guide-notes about research for Headache?’
‘Sure. I word-processed them. I’ve a copy at home.’
‘Read through them tonight. And read this.’ I tossed her my copy of the Rissington Abbey prospectus. ‘Think of questions to ask when we go there tomorrow. Now finish your coffee and bugger off. Be here tomorrow morning at seven o’clock. Wear something you can move about in. Bring an overnight bag in case we stay over in Banbury.’
Give her credit, she went, without much blether As soon as she’d gone, I rang Barty.
‘Hi. This is Alex.’
‘Six-thirty Saturday morning OK for you?’
‘Fine.’
‘I’ll pick you up.’
‘Fine.’
‘Take care.’
‘And you,’ I said, and put down the receiver, grinning idiotically.
I sorted out my flat a bit and then nipped down to Polly’s, taking the Rissington Abbey promotional video with me. If Polly showed any sign of trying to make me watch Cassie again, I’d fight back. But she didn’t. I agony-aunted for a few hours. While he was still sober enough to listen I made her promise to watch the Major’s video for me and report. She looked blankly at me from her duvetnest on the sofa as I put the video on the floor beside the television. ‘A school’s promotional video? Are you serious? What am I looking for?’
‘Evil,’ I said flippantly. I’d told her the details of the Olivier case – anything to keep her off the subject of Cassie – but I didn’t think she’d taken most of it in. ‘The ex-priest I spoke to said the school was evil.’
‘Well, they’ll hardly put that in the video, will they?’
‘Watch it anyway. See what you can see.’
‘You’re just trying to distract me. I think you should give up the mother hen bit. You’re lousy at it.’
I didn’t think about Claudia again until Polly’d sunk into a gin-soaked sleep and I was back upstairs. I undressed and lay in the bath, savouring my freedom. Tonight, I’d work for an hour or two; glance through the Major’s material so I could pretend to be interested in Rissington Abbey’s response to the challenge of the National Curriculum; check through my notes and organize questions for my interview with Tim Robertson; and, if I could be bothered, keep trawling through Martin Kelly’s stuff.
Tomorrow I’d be joined at the hip with Claudia. On Saturday, I’d be away (where?) with Barty. But I wouldn’t think about that now.
Thursday, June 4th
Chapter Sixteen
Next morning, Claudia’s first test was in punctuality. I’d told her seven o’clock. I waited ten minutes, then left without her and enjoyed my own company and Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony on the drive down.
Her second test, a very easy one since she had the telephone number of the hotel in Banbury, was to find me. That one, she passed. I was in the Wanderotel dining-room, only just starting on bacon and eggs, when she came in carrying a very big designer leather overnight bag. She was wearing different jeans, a different white shirt, a wide belt, a bum-bag, and a sulky expression.
‘You left without me,’ she said accusingly, ‘I—’
‘Lesson one,’ I said. ‘Be on time. Lesson two, if you’re not, apologize.’
‘But I—’
‘Lesson three. Don’t argue. D’you want some breakfast?’
‘I don’t eat bacon and eggs. Have you any idea of the cholesterol in that stuff? It’s bad for you. And you drink full-cream milk—’
‘We’re standing in the dining-room another ten minutes. Here’s the menu, there’s the cereal and juice table. And don’t tell me what to eat. If I wanted a dietary adviser. I’d hire one.’ I wasn’t sharp, just firm, and I didn’t smile.
She looked at me, taken aback. ‘Don’t you think it was clever of me to get here so fast?’
‘No. Barely competent. Get your food organized and I’ll tell you what we’re doing.’
She settled for muesli and skimmed milk, and munched while I talked. The Olivier business sounded even sillier when I explained it to someone else. She was very excited when she heard who his parents were. ‘Michel Mouche and Freedom Pertwee? Great! Have you met them? Is he as sexy in real life as he is on television?’
‘I’ve no idea,’ I said repressively, ‘and that’s not the point.’ After that she had enough grip to listen in silence. When I stopped, she said: ‘So really we’ll have enough when we see Tim Robertson again?’
‘Possibly. We can’t go on one person’s word, so we’ll have to cross-check it with one of the other boys, or the housemaster. But effectively, maybe.’
‘And we’re going back to Rissington Abbey this morning?’
‘Yes, and that’ll be useful for you, because it’s cover. I’ll be handling it as if I was doing research for Alan, so you can pick up something from that. Maybe.’
Too many maybes. I took her upstairs to my room so she could dump her overnight bag and we could get started as I meant to go on. I wasn’t going to let her disturb my routine.
‘This is a really grotty room,’ she said looking round. ‘It’s a grotty hotel. And my muesli wasn’t even home-made. It was full of gritty bits. It might even have contained additives.’
‘My heart bleeds,’ I said. ‘Get used to it.’
She fished a chequebook out of her bum-bag. She was rattled: her instinct was to pay. Perhaps she thought it would give her leverage. ‘How shall we do this?’ she said. ‘Do you want a week in advance, or what?’
‘Let’s get this straight. You’re not going to pay my daily rate, because you’re not buying all my attention. You pay half, and I’ll keep going just as if you weren’t there. I’ll tell you what I think you need to know and I’ll answer sensible questions. You get this weekend off because I’m going away.’
‘With your man?’
‘My man?’
‘The tall attractive one who threw me out of your flat after the party. Alan says you’re an item.’
‘None of your business,’ I said, covering up pleased with brisk. ‘You’re with me today, tomorrow, and next week, Monday to Thursday. That’s six days. Pay me for that, and next Friday we’ll think again. And start an expenses sheet. Log your breakfast bill.’ I passed her my organizer, opened at my Plummer expenses page. ‘That’s how you do it. Date, place, etc. In an organizer if you have one.’ She showed me, proudly, a leather organizer with gold trimmings. Expensive, stylish, much too small. ‘Get a bigger one,’ I said, but that’ll do for the moment. Now I’m going to have a bath. While I’m in there, go through this.’ I tossed her Martin Kelly’s notebooks. ‘This is the stuff I told you about, from the ex-priest.’
‘Defrocked,’ she said. ‘You should say “defrocked”, not “ex-priest”.’
‘Are you a Catholic?’
‘Cradle Catholic, educated by the Jesuits till I was twelve.’
‘Good. That might be helpful if we have to get back to him. You can break the ice by chatting to him in Lat
in.’
‘I can’t speak Latin,’ she began to explain. ‘It’s a dead language . . .’
Young, rich, nearly beautiful, and literal-minded. What had I done to deserve this? I took a deep breath. ‘I know, I know. I was being facetious. I’m quite often facetious. It’s an English trait, you may not be used to it.’
‘My mother is English. I’m English—’
‘Not exactly,’ I said. ‘You come from the crossroads where the Champs Élysées meets the Via Veneto.’ She opened her mouth, probably to correct my geography, then shut it again when she saw my expression. I waited, then went on. ‘These are the ex-defrocked priest’s notebooks. Go through them. Word by word, number by number.’
‘What am I looking for?’
‘Anything to do with Rissington Abbey, and anything that you’re not sure about. Most of it’s self-explanatory and nothing to do with us – flower shows, car crashes, court reporting of minor crimes. If it’s obviously useless, tick the page. If you think it’s useful, copy it out on another sheet of paper, date the entry, and star the page. I won’t be long. Make yourself some coffee, if you want.’
She looked at the Wanderotel’s instant coffee packets: she looked at me: she took a deep breath. ‘Do you want some?’
‘Yeah. Milk, one sugar. Not too much milk.’
She brought it in to me. In the bath.
I was lying there, naked (of course), and when she came in I scrambled to cover myself.
‘Don’t you knock?’ I said sharply.
She was completely taken aback, shoved the coffee cup on the floor, and retreated, to burble at me from the other side of the door: ‘Sorry . . . Gosh, sorry . . . I didn’t think you’d mind. I mean, why would you? You’ve got a terrific body. I’d kill for your breasts.’
I looked at my breasts. They seemed to me, as they always did, too big. ‘Just get on with the notebooks,’ I called, ‘and remember. I’m your boss and I didn’t go to boarding school so I’m not used to girlish intimacy.’
‘I’m really sorry,’ she called back. ‘Really.’
In At The Deep End Page 10