The awareness of the irony in her vociferous defence of the man she was sure was cheating on her did nothing to quell her rage. She did want to know if there was another woman in Howard's life, but she would never have gone to such lengths. The thought of some seedy private eye in far off places probing into her husband's activities filled her with revulsion.
“I'm sorry, I thought I was doing the right thing.” For David it had all gone wrong. He sat bemused and deflated. This was not the reaction he had expected from Pauline. There was meant to be anger, plenty of it, but not directed at him; directed instead at Howard after she had read the report. He had been ready to fan the flames of this anger into a fiery crescendo that would finally burn itself out in his bed. Now it looked as if she wasn't even going to read the report. “And, don't forget, it was you who brought me into your problems in the first place.”
“I just wanted someone to talk to about them, that's all.”
“What can I say?” he said weakly, spreading his arms in a gesture of helplessness.
“Nothing.” Pauline violently pushed back the chair as she stood up. “I don't think there is anything more for us to say to each other at all. Don't try to get in touch, David. Stay out of my life – for good!”
“Pauline,” he called after her a she made for the door, but the fire in her eyes told him further protest was useless. Instead he picked up the envelope and held it towards her. “You might as well take this anyway.”
Staring at the envelope, she began to tremble. Her every instinct told her she shouldn't take it. Wasn't she so enraged that it existed at all? She should have the courage of her convictions, tell him to throw it in the garbage where it belonged. The envelope hung tantalisingly in front of her, daring her to turn away without learning the secrets of its contents. Did it really have the answer?
She snatched it from his hand. “This doesn't make it right, David.”
As she disappeared through the door, David kicked the side of his desk in frustration. He had played his trump card and still lost – for ever, it seemed.
Pauline sat in her car in the car park outside the offices for five minutes looking at the envelope lying on top of the dashboard, trying to find the courage to open it. It was too real. Here were not worries, suspicions or suppositions; this was fact. She still had a tiny lifeline of hope to cling to, a possibility, however remote, that she was wrong about Howard. The contents of that envelope could break that lifeline in two.
The hand she finally forced to reach out shook visibly. Neatly typewritten, under the heading of an unpronounceable name, though it was possible to decipher the address was somewhere in Madrid, the report, despite its brevity, made harrowing reading:
“Mr. Howard Greenfield, hereinafter referred to as the subject, stopped at the Hotel Husa Presidente, Barcelona, on the nights of September 20th/21st this year. On the first night, at approximately 8.40 p.m. local time, he was met in the foyer of the hotel by a woman. The woman was said to be in her twenties, height around 160 cm (5 feet 3 inches), blonde, very attractive with particularly striking eyes. Their meeting appeared to be a social one and they left immediately in a taxi. The couple went to a restaurant where they dined, leaving together shortly before 11.00 p.m. local time. The subject was observed to return to the hotel shortly after 4 a.m. local time the following morning. A few hours later, at 9.30 a.m. local time, the subject was met again by this woman and they left the hotel together once more.”
There followed an uninteresting list of business appointments. Pauline would have liked to see more detail; what happened after they left the restaurant, where did they go? She considered the report not a particularly efficient piece of work, but had no way of knowing the level of competence had been regulated by the automatic pointed at the investigator's forehead. Yet what it did say was damning enough.
A letter accompanying the report stated. “As we have been unable to establish the identity of this woman and think now we have little chance of doing so, we feel there is no justification in continuing this investigation at your expense with so little hope of it being productive.”
Pauline could no longer hold back the tears. Letting her head fall onto the rim of the steering wheel, she sobbed uncontrollably. Overhead the winter sun had given way to dark swirling clouds. The first signs of an icy drizzle sprinkled across the windscreen.
Chapter Seventeen
Howard Greenfield parked his car in the car park of the Mole with Two Heads with drinking the last thing on his mind. According to the information on the back of the photograph, this was where Tommy Morgan would be that night. The A-Z road map showed only one logical route back to his apartment in Milverton Road, leaving Greenfield only to pick the right spot to carry out his task.
Pulling his overcoat collar up around his ears, protection against the biting wind and freezing drizzle, he set off along Hopdale Avenue. The terraced houses, fronted by tiny gardens, running the whole length of both sides, were not what he was hoping for. When School Road seemed to be offering only more of the same, he was unable to contain a growing sense of foreboding. Houses meant people. The first few minutes after he had carried out the kill were vital to him. Every second that elapsed before anybody realised what had happened or reached the scene was a second longer to run, another step between him and the body he would have left sprawled on the pavement.
He was getting towards the crossroads over which stood Milverton Road itself, when the scenery suddenly changed. The houses suddenly ended, giving way to a playground and the school that obviously gave the road its name. Across the street, behind high green railings, were the school's playing fields, with, so far as he could see, one muddy soccer pitch and an equally soggy hockey pitch. Along the final hundred yards or so of School Road there were no houses.
The street lighting looked to be poor, old-fashioned, with lampposts too far apart to give adequate illumination. The crossroads provided an escape route. It looked right. This was where it would happen. This was where he would kill Tommy Morgan.
Greenfield couldn't explain the compulsion that took him in to Milverton Road. Having accomplished what he had set out to do, there was no need to go on, yet he continued walking, into the road where Tommy Morgan lived.
The houses were different here, much larger and mostly detached, probably once the homes of the reasonably well off he suspected. Now they were rotting away with neglect, divided up into apartments.
Greenfield stopped in front of number fifteen, looking up at the paint flaking off the crumbling woodwork surrounding the large window on the first floor. He wondered if Morgan was in there now, this close to him. What was he doing this very moment? There was no sign that Morgan was up there, this man who looked so young and full of life on the photograph. Perhaps he went to work, not much of a way to spend the last day of one's life. It was difficult to imagine what he could have done to bring such a fate down on himself. Why would someone want him dead?
“Can I help you?”
Greenfield was startled by the voice breaking into his thoughts. Wheeling round, the words he began to utter in reply stuck in his throat. He was looking straight into the face on the photograph. This was something he had not wanted to happen. Not this closely. He cursed himself for not turning back at the school, sparing himself the torture of looking into those bright, brown eyes he was soon to close for ever.
Morgan spoke again. “Are you all right, my friend?”
Greenfield struggled to regain his composure. This was a bad mistake, but all he could do now was extricate himself from it as best as he could.
“Er, yes, of course,” he stammered. “You, er, gave me a bit of a start, that's all. I was miles away.”
“I'm sorry.” Did Morgan have to smile that way? Why couldn't he be hostile and abusive? “Are you sure I can't be of any help?”
“I'm looking for a flat. I wondered if there were any vacancies around here.” Greenfield had to say something. That was all he could think off.
&
nbsp; Morgan looked him up and down, taking in the smart, obviously expensive clothes. “If you don't mind me saying so, I would have thought you could do better for yourself than Milverton Road.”
Greenfield searched for a plausible reply. “It's only for a couple of days a week when I am up in town, so I wouldn't want anything very expensive.”
“Well, these are probably as cheap as you will find in London,” agreed Morgan, “but you have got to live with the fungus decorating the walls and get friendly with the lice trotting in and out of the woodwork. I am not sure that would be your style.”
Greenfield forced a smile. “Perhaps not.”
Moving past him, Morgan said, “Still, if you are really interested and can wait a few days, my flat should be vacant next week. I'm going home.”
Home? Where was home? Greenfield had not thought any further than this run-down apartment. Was there a wife waiting somewhere for this man, children perhaps? Greenfield wondered how much grief he would cause that night when he snuffed out this young life prematurely.
“Can I help you, can I help you?” These first few words Morgan had spoken reverberated round his brain as he made his way back to the car, hammer blows making an indelible imprint on his mind. Oblivious to his surroundings, he could not get the face out of his mind. He doubted he ever would.
Chapter Eighteen
The vodka bottle was empty. Lifting her glass, Pauline swallowed the last dregs with a gulp, wincing as the burning liquid sprayed the back of her throat. The empty bottle slipped from her hand onto the carpet with a dull thud as she lay back on the settee, all track of time lost, aware only that day had turned to night as the vodka bottle had gone from full to empty. On the floor lay a crumpled piece of paper, a few words typed by a complete stranger in a foreign land that had left her life in ruins.
Far from drowning her sorrows, the alcohol had served only to multiply the tears and cultivate the bitter sense of rejection. Suddenly she was second best, cast on the scrapheap to make way for another woman. What did this blonde with the striking eyes have to offer Howard that she couldn't? Was she really so much more desirable? Pauline had tried to keep herself trim as the years advanced, careful about what she ate, doing a bit of exercise whenever she had the chance. She knew she looked younger than her age, but Howard, it seemed, was expecting too much. She couldn't stop the clock completely.
Lying back in the darkness, she looked in vain for sleep to rescue her from her torment. Fired by the drink, her brain refused to rest. It was she her husband should be making to feel beautiful and wanted, she her husband should be making to feel needed and desirable, not this young blonde-haired pretender to the crown she had held and served loyally for fifteen years.
She sat upright with a jolt.
“Damn you, Howard Greenfield, damn you!” she screamed, hurling her glass across the room, so that it smashed noisily into pieces as it crashed against a wall.
Resting her head on her knees, her whole body shaking as she sobbed loudly, the image burst once more into her mind, a recurring vision that grew vividly stronger with the increasing grip the alcohol was taking on her brain. She seemed powerless to stop it exploding in her head and unable to make it go away when it did.
A man and a woman naked on a bed, their long and searching kisses leaving them gasping for breath, locked in each other's arms so tightly they could have been imagining they would fall off the world if they let go. The face of the woman was an indistinguishable blur except for two features. Pauline could see clearly the blonde hair and a pair of large, seductive eyes. The man's face was not visible to start with, but when he turned over, eagerly pulling the blonde, female image underneath him, there was no mistaking Howard, the husband who had shared her bed for so many years. Pauline put her hands over her eyes, trying to shut out the vision, but she could only watch helplessly as her husband and the woman devoured each other's bodies with their unrelenting passion.
Pauline let out a loud, demented scream. How long must this torture go on?
But it came again, the two naked figures, as though the film had been wound back and restarted. She didn't notice the change at first. It was a gradual realisation that this time the blonde hair and the large eyes had disappeared. Complete and in focus, the woman's face was frighteningly recognisable. Pauline shook her head vigorously. Perhaps she could shake the manifestation from her mind. But it persisted. And there could be no mistake. She was looking at herself.
What was happening now? What was this madness? Even without a view of his face, Pauline could see the man she was pulling hungrily down on top of her was not Howard. The body of this man was bigger, broader. He appeared younger. This vision filled her mind so vividly it seemed real, actually taking place in front of her. She felt she could reach out and touch her own image. Then she saw the man's face. It was David. Desperately she fumbled with the switch of the table lamp beside the settee until light flooded the room, banishing the darkness and wiping the picture from her mind in the same instant.
Pauline lay back exhausted and very drunk. She and David; she could make it happen. An immense sense of satisfaction welled up inside her at the thought that she had no lesser power than the blonde, big-eyed bitch who had lured her husband from her bed. She smiled. David adored her, worshipped her. It was impossible for him to hide it. She could have David any time she chose.
Suddenly her alcohol-ravaged senses were swept by an overwhelming need to see the longing in his eyes that had given her so much secret pleasure. She yearned to feel wanted, to know once more the thrill of exciting a man. She didn't seem to excite her husband any longer. Somebody else excited him now. She needed reassurance that she still had the power.
Struggling to her feet, she had to hold on to the arm of the settee as her unsteady legs threatened to dump her back among the cushions. After a few deep breaths, she managed to make her way slowly to the shower. The warm water dampened some of the drunken fever ravaging her brain, but not enough to weaken her resolve. This was something she had to do. There was no turning back.
She chose a plain, white dress that Howard had always liked because it fitted her tightly, but smoothly, tapering down to just below knee-length with the slightest of slits at the side. Her hair washed and blow-dried, she applied her make-up with meticulous care. She meant to look her best.
Aware that she was in no condition to drive herself, she ordered a taxi on the telephone. Never having been to David's flat before anyway, she wasn't exactly sure how to get there, so would be happy to rely on the taxi driver's superior knowledge of the area.
It would be there in ten minutes the voice on the telephone had said. She took a final look in the tall mirror, first front-ways and the sideways on. Her stomach was not quite as flat these days as she would have liked, but otherwise she was more than happy with what she saw. For a reject, she thought she looked pretty damn good.
Chapter Nineteen
Tommy Morgan was angry. The Beard had returned to the table in the lounge bar of the Mole with Two Heads after taking a telephone call with news that pushed the Irishman close to the limits of his self-control.
Across the room Howard Greenfield tried, through the smoke and dimmed lighting, to make out what was going on. Unfortunately, because of his earlier encounter, he had to sit as far away as possible. The last thing he needed was a wave and a smile from the man he was about to murder. He could see that Morgan had become very agitated, but there was no chance over the noisy buzz of conversation in the crowded room, the over-loud piped music and the incessant chiming of the gaming machines of picking up any trace of what was being said.
In fact, the Beard was trying desperately to calm Morgan down, without much success. “For God's sake, don't make a scene of it,” he pleaded, with a restraining gesture of his hands.
“What do you bloody well expect?” Morgan was too fired with rage to be influenced by the pleas for calm. “You said he would definitely be here tonight. I've had my fill of being messed about
by you people.”
He saw Horace and Lenny tense and wondered how many guns were trained on him under the table.
“I don't know why he has changed his mind,” insisted the Beard.
“Didn't he give any indication?”
“Men like him don't give reasons for what they do.”
“Well, he'll give reasons to me,” Morgan exploded, prompting more gestures for calm from the Beard. “I demand to know what's going on here. I want to know if our deal is still on and, if not, you had better bloody well say so and be done with it. I want to know by tomorrow.”
“Who the hell do you think you are with your demands?” spat out the Beard. “Have you any idea who you are dealing with here?”
“Remember for once who you are dealing with,” seethed Morgan. “You may not care much for our organisation, but you ignore us at your peril. By tomorrow, I said.”
“I'll see your message is reported back, but I cannot give you any guarantees. We are not in the habit of responding to threats.”
“Then you see four million pounds' worth of heroin go out of the window, because I'm on tomorrow night's boat train. Christmas is only a week or so away and I am a very weary man. I'm going home, deal or no deal.”
“For Christ's sake keep your voice down.” The Beard's concern was unfounded, for it was impossible to be overheard in the general noise of the crowded room. “Your superiors won't be happy if you go back without a deal.”
“When I tell them what's gone down over here, they will probably want to know why I didn't come home earlier. I have been as patient as I can be, taken as much punishment as I am prepared to take. God knows, I've been beaten and abused to the point of death itself, but no more. I'm not going to allow myself or my organisation to be humiliated any further.” Morgan finished off the beer in his pint glass. “We'll find another market. Try another country – the States possibly. Probably there's more opportunity out there anyway. Perhaps it's too big for your lot. No belly for it; I believe that was a phrase you once used.”
The Hit-and-Run Man Page 12