by Ann Granger
I set off back home through the lamplit streets. I passed the Rose pub which was agleam with lights and noisy with laughter. It had a new landlord but he had kept up the previous landlord’s habit of engaging live acts to entertain customers. They must have had a comedian on stage tonight and one who was being reasonably successful to judge by the guffaws. He was probably one who had realised that sophisticated humour didn’t go down well with the patrons of the Rose. They just liked the blue jokes.
As I passed through the gap where there had once been a gate into the forecourt of the house where I lived, I heard a rustle in the dead privet hedge to my left. It was alive when I moved in. I did that hedge to death, though not intentionally. Inspired by one of those TV gardening programmes, I pruned it, whereupon it died. I didn’t pay much attention to the faint sound because small creatures still took up temporary residence in the tangle of dead twigs. But as I fumbled for my door key I heard it again. It was followed by a faint whimper.
I froze and turned. In the shadows under the hedge something moved and crawled out, limping towards me into the yellow glow of the street lamp. It was a small bedraggled white dog with black patches.
The vet who checked Bonnie over said that although very hungry and grubby and suffering sore pads on all four paws, she was unhurt. I explained how she came to be lost and she came up with a theory.
‘People find dogs which are lost or simply wandering about on their own. Although the animals are in good condition and well cared for, they still assume they are abandoned,’ she said. ‘Instead of taking them to the nearest animal shelter, they take a fancy to the animal and decide to adopt it. They take it home and home may be miles away. They keep the animal indoors or restrained for a while until it gets used to its new home and so it’s some time before the dog escapes. Sometimes, of course, they don’t escape. They just settle down happily with the new owner. Others slip away and try to find their way home. We don’t know how animals do find their way home over long distances but they do, and I think this is what Bonnie has done. The condition of her paws suggests she’s walked a long way.’ She scratched Bonnie’s ears. ‘Unfortunately, she can’t tell us. But I think whoever had her looked after her all right. You may find she clings to you for a while, follows you round the house and doesn’t like to be parted, wants to sleep on your bed, that sort of thing.’
‘She did that before,’ I said. ‘She used to belong to a homeless person.’
I carried Bonnie home but I told her she ought not to get too used to travelling like that. Once her paws were better she would have to start walking again. ‘Just remember that!’ I said. She stretched up and licked my chin with a look in her brown eyes which clearly said, ‘But I like being carried.’ ‘Tough!’ I told her.
I felt as though Bonnie’s return was the last in a series of events which had gone wrong from the start but now had finally come right with her reappearance. But in fact it still wasn’t quite all over.
A week after that I was wandering up the Strand early in the evening when a taxi drew up ahead of me, just by the entrance to the Savoy. And who got out? Mickey Allerton and Lisa. They didn’t see me. I stepped into a convenient doorway and watched as he paid off the cab and they both went into Simpson’s-in-the-Strand restaurant. Nothing but the best for Lisa, I thought sourly. But I got a good look at both of them. Mickey looked well pleased with himself. Lisa was beautifully dressed in clothing cut to disguise the bump. All the clothes vandalised by Julie must have been replaced. But it was her face which struck me most. She looked completely blank, features frozen into complete nothingness. As I watched, Mickey took her elbow and propelled her forward into the building. She went with zombie-like obedience and indifference. Mickey had indeed got what he wanted; and he didn’t mean to let her slip from his grip again - ever.
I went to see Susie Duke. She’s in the detection business and she’s known Allerton a lot longer than I have. I couldn’t tell her what Jennifer had done and could no longer accuse Lisa of murder, but a chat with Susie might help me sort out what I felt about the whole unsatisfactory affair.
I found Susie taping up her toes and heels with strips of adhesive tape cut from a long roll of the stuff.
‘What have you been doing?’ I asked.
‘Running!’ she grumbled. ‘They ought to put me in for the Olympic Games. I was doing a check on this feller. He’s been claiming compensation for an accident at work which has left him unable to do any sport, or so he says. His employer doesn’t believe it. He heard the injured feller had been seen out jogging, right? So the employer hired me to snoop round and see if I could catch him at it. I staked out his house with my little camera and waited.’
‘And he spotted you and chased you,’ I said.
‘Yes and no. He spotted me and set his perishing dog on me. Ruddy great thing with flapping ears and a long red tongue, legs like a pony.’
‘Did you outrun it?’ I asked, impressed.
‘It nearly caught me. I jumped in a taxi and then it chased the taxi. Look at ’em!’ she ordered, sticking out what now looked like a Chinese concubine’s bound feet for my inspection.
I sympathised and told her about my adventures in Oxford.
‘Always steer clear of cases like that,’ said Susie immediately. ‘Too many personal angles.’
‘Like I had a choice!’ I snorted.
Susie pulled a pair of cotton socks carefully over the bandages, then leaned back and tapped the roll of adhesive tape against her top teeth. Traces of fuchsia lip gloss began to appear on it. ‘There are things about this you can’t tell me, right?’
‘I really can’t, Susie. The coroner’s verdict was “accidental death”. Let’s leave it like that. But whatever really happened, Lisa was responsible for Ivo being in that river. Every time Allerton looks at her now, he’s got to think about that and, maybe, just wonder a little.’
‘Not enough to let it worry him,’ said Susie, gesturing at me with the mauve-stained roll of tape. ‘If your friend Beryl is right, then Mickey’s in love with the girl. You never want to believe anything nasty about someone you love, do you? You sort of suppress it even when the evidence is jumping up in your face. Look at my late husband, Rennie. He wasn’t perfect.’
‘No,’ I said tactlessly. Rennie Duke had been a shifty little double-crosser, in my view.
‘But he had his good points,’ Susie retorted. ‘And I loved the little squirt, see? So I overlooked the bad ones.’
‘Susie,’ I said. ‘However you interpret it, what kind of life is Lisa going to have with Allerton?’
‘I don’t know why you should think she’ll be so miserable,’ said Susie briskly. ‘I wish I could find a bloke who’d buy me designer wear and carry me off to live in the sun in a luxury villa. Blimey, Fran, what do you want from life?’
‘Freedom!’ I said promptly.
‘To do what, starve? Or earn a crust being chased by a hound with teeth like a croc?’ Susie laced her trainers and stood up, experimentally taking the weight on the damaged digits. ‘You thought again about coming to work with me in the Agency?’
‘You’ve got to be joking!’ I told her. ‘Anyway, I’ve given up taking an interest in other people’s business. It’s too complicated.’
‘You haven’t given up. You’ve got bitten by the detection bug, like me. There must be a dozen different safer ways I could earn a living. I know this time you didn’t choose to take on the case, it was forced on you. But just wait, next time something will come along and you won’t be able to keep away from it.’
‘It’s what worries Ganesh,’ I said.
I didn’t tell Ganesh what Susie had said but I did tell him about seeing Allerton and Lisa in the Strand.
‘It’s not that I feel sorry for her,’ I said. ‘She got herself into that situation, like I told poor Ned. She’ll have to put up with it. But she’ll be a bird in a gilded cage.’
We were taking one of our favourite walks along the Regent’s Park canal ben
eath the shade of the overhanging trees. Bonnie, her paws no longer sore, pattered along ahead of us. A tourist barge with sightseers on it chugged past cutting a V-shaped ripple on the green surface of the water. I could hear an animal at the zoo bellowing in the distance. We had a can of Dr Pepper apiece which Ganesh had brought from the shop together with a couple of Mars bars. Hari was still so pleased that Bonnie had come back that he’d agreed to us having these items without the usual lament that he was never going to make any money if we ate all the stock for free. Ganesh made no reply to my observation. He’d been silent during the whole walk.
‘But funnily enough,’ I went on, undeterred by the lack of response, ‘I do feel a bit sorry for Mickey. I never thought I would, not for that man. But she’ll find a way to wriggle out of his control eventually. She’s pretty resourceful, I reckon. He’ll take her out to Spain and she’ll run off with a flamenco dancer. Anyway, I still think that’s not his baby and when it’s born . . .’
‘I do wish,’ said Ganesh breaking his silence at last, ‘you’d shut up about Lisa’s baby. It’s nothing to do with you, and I’m fed up with hearing about babies.’
‘Ah,’ I said. ‘I’m looking forward to seeing Usha’s. Are they glad it’s a boy?’
‘The whole family has gone baby-crazy,’ grumbled Ganesh. ‘My mum, my dad, my aunts . . . all they talk about is Usha’s baby and babies in general. You’d think no one ever gave birth before. Jay is going around being the proud father. All right, it’s a nice baby and I don’t mind being an uncle.’ He paused. ‘But I’m not going to be an uncle like Hari is to me. I’m going to be a modern one.’
‘Good,’ I said.
‘The worst of it,’ added Ganesh in deepening gloom, ‘is that they keep looking at me and saying it’s about time I settled down.’
‘Oh,’ I said. ‘I see.’
‘No, you don’t,’ he retorted. ‘Anyway, I’ve told them I’m considering going to evening classes and making a new career. I can’t be thinking about settling down until I’ve done so.’
‘What will you study at evening classes?’ I asked.
‘I don’t know! I haven’t decided. Nor have I persuaded Hari that he’ll have to give me time off to study. He’s being a bit difficult at the moment so it’s not a good time to ask him. He’s got rid of that horrible rocket at last. It kept breaking down. But he’s annoyed about it and grumpy. However, when I find the right study course, I will sign up and Hari will have to agree.’ Ganesh’s gaze became distant and dreamy. ‘With any luck,’ he said, ‘I can spin it out indefinitely.’
‘Right,’ I said. ‘Why did the rocket keep breaking down?’
‘How should I know?’ he said.
‘You’d never make an actor, Ganesh,’ I told him. ‘Your voice changes when you’re being economical with the truth.’
‘That,’ said Ganesh loftily, ‘is because I am an honest man.’
‘An honest man with a guilty conscience.’
He stopped and turned to me. ‘You talk to me about conscience? You’ve got a nerve.’
‘Why? What have I done?’ I demanded.
‘What haven’t you done? One of these days,’ said Ganesh, ‘I’ll write it all down and make a book out of all the things you’ve dragged me into, and it’ll turn out to be in three volumes like those Victorian novels.’
‘OK, Watson,’ I said.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen