by Ruth Rendell
I wonder if I could sell the dress, she thought. She played the tape once more before going to bed.
Ismay got out of the tube at Clapham South and began the walk home. She thought about the women of her own age who lived in Hammersmith and Acton and Shepherds Bush and who, since Preston’s arrest, had felt safer now he was locked up. Even here was west enough to be risky. While he was free she had been conscious all the time while out of the need to be streetwise, to keep to well-lighted places, preferably frequented places, never to take short cuts along alleys or narrow dark lanes. Their street was never thronged with people, only packed with cars, cars lining pavement edges on both sides. Someone (a man) had once told Ismay that if what he called ‘one of those lowlifes’ approached her she should jump on the bonnet of a car and scream. She didn’t think she could jump on to a car and if she tried such a safety measure she was sure her pursuer would be better at making the leap. But things really were safer now Preston was under lock and key. She came to the house with the pineapples on the gateposts and climbed the steps under the glass canopy to the front door.
As soon as she let herself in she smelt it, something she hadn’t smelt in here for months. Cigarette smoke. No one who smoked came here – except one person. Her heart seemed to swim up inside her ribcage and knock against the bones. Because her mouth had dried the little cry she gave was halfway to a gasp. Her hand shook as she unlocked her own front door.
Andrew was sitting on the sofa, smoking a cigarette and reading the Evening Standard.
CHAPTER 23
‘I would have come back before but it seemed – well – unfeeling, with Eva dead in that terrible way. I waited a decent interval.’ He held her in his arms. From the moment she came home and found him there he had held her. Eva was nothing, Eva was dead. ‘It was those two being here that made me leave in the first place,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t stand sharing our home with them.’ That old excuse again but all she heard was ‘our home’. He thought of it as his home as well as hers. ‘They’re not likely to turn up, are they?’
‘No, Andrew,’ she said. ‘They won’t turn up.’
They won’t turn up because they’re upstairs. Don’t think of that. She wanted no alloy to her happiness that night. Don’t think of them, she told herself. Don’t think how they offered to stay on, maybe for weeks. And I was grateful, I was pleased. He pulled her down on the sofa and began to kiss her with little soft kisses, whispering how much he loved her, how he had always loved her, and she thought of nothing much any more (except how happy she was) until it was deep night, the mad after-midnight hours and he was fast asleep in her bed.
She got up and did something she couldn’t remember ever doing before in the night-time. She made herself tea. Then, for the first time, she saw and smelt the flowers he must have brought with him. Without eyes or sense of smell for anything but him, she had failed to see the chrysanthemums, big, luscious, expensive ones – like everything he indulged in – stuck in an inch of water in the kitchen sink. She fetched a vase, put them into it because, though she hated them and they reminded her at once of Guy, Andrew had given them to her. Carrying the vase into the living room, she sat down on the very spot he had sat on the evening before when she had found him there. I think too much, she whispered to herself. It would be better for me if I didn’t think, if I could just enjoy, live and be happy. But it’s beyond my control. Never mind Heather and Edmund upstairs. They’re not in here. They’re not living with me, it’s not the same as it used to be. Andrew may never find out or by the time he does they’ll be gone. Is he going to move in with me here? I don’t know. I only know he said ‘our home’. It’s mad to worry about something when you don’t really know what you’re worrying about.
What I’ve got to worry about is something real, something that’s happened. Andrew’s come back to me because Eva’s dead. Because someone – Preston, I thought – killed Eva. But Heather knew Eva, she’d talked to her on the phone and maybe met her too. Heather killed Guy to save me and now she’s killed Eva to save me in another way. To bring Andrew back to me. Was it possible?
Of course it was. It was exactly what she had feared, only she had thought that when murder was committed again it would be to protect Edmund or even their children. She hadn’t considered herself once more as the beneficiary of an act of Heather’s, but so it was. And it had worked. It had brought him back to her. Killing Guy had saved her from his attentions and killing Eva had brought Andrew back and made her happy. She asked herself, what shall I do?
After a while, the smell of the chrysanthemums, bitter and medicinal, drove her back into the bedroom and there she gazed down on his sleeping face. It was dark still but enough light from street lamps came through the curtains for her to see him. She thought of a story she had once read of the girl called Psyche holding up a lamp to look down at her lover Eros while he slept. A drop of hot oil fell on him and he leapt up and ran away from her for ever.
‘I think I’ll move in here,’ he said next morning.
‘Oh, Andrew, please do.’
They were having breakfast. ‘I told Seb I very likely would in a week or two. Give him a chance to find someone else to share with him.’
‘Suppose I’d said no.’ She smiled to make it seem a joke.
He took another piece of toast. ‘There wasn’t much chance of that.’
No, there had never been any chance of that. She felt cold, though it wasn’t cold. Wasn’t that what she wanted, that he should take her entirely for granted? That he should rely on her always being there, his lover, his home, the place he could always come back to. Why not? Why not? I said I’d wait for ever, she thought, and now he’s come back and the waiting’s over. I should be as happy as the day is long. I am happy.
‘Where are those two now? Still with his mother?’
If it had been anyone but Andrew she would have thought him obsessed with Heather and Edmund. ‘They’ve got a flat,’ she said. It was true in substance if not in intent. She changed the subject swiftly. ‘Something I’ve just thought of. I had my handbag stolen but I’d kept my keys in my pocket. If they’d gone I’d have had to change the locks and then you wouldn’t have been able to get in.’
‘Are you glad the keys weren’t in your bag, my darling?’
‘You know I am, you know it.’
Upstairs Edmund was giving Beatrix her capsule embedded in a Black Magic strawberry cream chocolate, her favourite. When she had chewed it up and swallowed it he let her have a stick of chewing gum. She switched her radio on too low for anyone except herself to hear and squashed her right ear against it. Heather was at the front window, looking down on the steps, the bushy front garden, the pineapples on the gateposts and the roadway.
‘Andrew has just gone out of the gate and down the street,’ she said.
‘What?’
‘I told you he’d turn up.’
‘I didn’t believe you. D’you think he’s come back for good?’
‘Depends what you mean by “for good”. Until another little blonde fairy turns up.’
‘I hope we don’t have to meet him,’ said Edmund. ‘What time are you on today?’
‘Not till one. I’ll stay here with Mum.’
Ismay came upstairs after he had left. Heather put her arms round her and held her close. ‘I know,’ she said. ‘I’ve seen him.’
She couldn’t stop herself. ‘Has he seen you?’
Heather released her. ‘Not so far as I know. I saw him from the front window about half an hour ago.’
Although Beatrix, as usual, had taken no notice of her arrival, Ismay went up to her and kissed her cheek. ‘I stood upon the sand of the sea,’ said Beatrix, ‘and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns and upon his horns ten crowns and upon his heads the name of blasphemy.’
‘I suppose he doesn’t like it that we’re up here,’ said Heather.
In a low voice as if Andrew could hear Ismay said, ‘He doesn’t know.
’
‘Would you like some coffee?’
‘No, thanks.’
‘What did you mean by “he doesn’t know”?’
‘Just that.’
‘No, you didn’t.’ Ismay couldn’t recall her sister ever before speaking to her in that cold, resolute tone. ‘You meant you don’t want him to know. You want us to hide ourselves, pretend we’re not here and Mum’s alone. Because if he thinks we’re living here he won’t want to come here. That’s it, isn’t it?’
‘Please don’t be cross, Het.’
‘I’m not cross, though I may be in a minute. Andrew will just have to put up with us. We won’t pretend. I know I can speak for Ed. We’re not going or pretending we’ve gone. We’re not sneaking in after dark. It’s only for a fortnight anyway. You’ll have to see him at his place.’
‘He’s coming to live with me.’
‘When? Now?’
‘In a couple of weeks. When Seb Miller’s found someone to share the flat.’
Heather lifted her shoulders in a little light shrug. Turning her eyes away from her, Ismay thought, I must be mad, I’m feeling a bitch because I ought to be grateful to her. She’s given Andrew back to me and here I am asking her and her husband to disappear. ‘Forget what I said, Het.’
‘Of course.’ But Heather spoke in the same cold tone. ‘I’ll try. Ed says we ought to forgive but forgetting takes longer, maybe a lifetime.’ She smiled but it was a rueful smile. ‘Changing the subject, do you know a woman called Marion Melville?’
‘I don’t think so.’
‘She’s a friend of my mother-in-law. She phoned and said she wanted to get in touch with you. Ed took the call and gave her your address. Was that OK?’
‘I suppose so.’
‘Do you know what she wants?’
‘Does she work for a charity? Only I gave a donation to a children’s charity and ever since all the other children’s charities have been appealing to me.’
‘Then you’re used to saying no,’ said Heather.
‘Where did you get it?’
‘In a bin in Soho,’ said Fowler.
Marion wrinkled up her nose. ‘You are so disgusting.’ For once she hadn’t waited for him to turn up but had sought him out, finally running him to earth in Conduit Street outside the Kenzo shop. Now they were sitting on the bronze seat at the bottom of Bond Street, Fowler between the statues of Churchill and Roosevelt, and Marion on Churchill’s knee, sharing a packet of salt and vinegar crisps. Fowler had bought them with half his morning’s takings.
‘Has your old chap come up to scratch yet?’
‘Has what?’
‘It’s what they used to say in olden times when a girl wanted to get a guy to propose. Has he?’
‘It’s not your business,’ said Marion. ‘I’ve lost my job but I’ve got my eye on another one.’
‘You won’t need another one if you marry the old boy. You’ll have to seize time by the forelock. Did you come all the way down here just to find out where I found those Indian songs?’
‘Don’t flatter yourself. I’m on my way to Clapham. I’ve got friends there.’
Marion trotted off without saying goodbye. The street named by Edmund Litton was a turning off Clapham Common Road and great walker though she was, she decided she couldn’t get from Bond Street to Clapham on foot. It would have to be the Northern Line tube. On the way she would think the whole thing through and make up her mind what to say when she rang the doorbell and Heather’s sister answered.
She had chosen a Saturday because the sister wouldn’t be at work. Edmund had told her that. He had also asked her in that abrupt, not to say rude, way of his what she wanted. Marion had answered, ‘Oh, this and that,’ in an airy tone. She walked through St James’s Park to Westminster. By then her feet were hurting. The pointed shoes with kitten heels weren’t ideal footwear for a trek on hard pavements. She didn’t want to arrive limping but there was no help for it. She couldn’t afford a taxi – they were even more expensive on a Saturday – still less a pair of flat shoes, even supposing she could bear to put her dainty feet into such things. At last Embankment station was reached and she could sit down in the train to ease her feet. She got out at the wrong Clapham station and after another quarter of a mile she was in a discount store buying a pair of blue jelly flip-flops. She could just about afford that and the relief was overwhelming.
She saw the house and guessed it was the right one before she read the number. Edmund had mentioned the pineapples on the gateposts. Steps ran up to the porch and the front door under a funny glass arrangement, creeper climbed over the brickwork, and the bells told her there were two flats. Before passing between the gateposts, she had studied the house, noting the stained glass in the heavy black-painted front door, the open window on the upper floor, the newspaper still trapped in the letter box and the untended front garden. That newspaper had suddenly been withdrawn, the door opened and a tall, dark-haired young man came out, slamming the door behind him and running down the steps. Of Marion, standing beside one of the gateposts, he took no notice. She stayed where she was until he was out of sight, climbed the steps and rang the bell under the card which said ‘Ismay Sealand’.
The woman on the doorstep Ismay had never seen before. She was a little thin woman of forty-something with stick-like legs and bony feet thrust into blue jelly flip-flops. The flip-flops, which would have been passable with a sundress, looked very strange with a check tweed skirt and a red jumper that matched her curly crimson hair. Ismay said, ‘Hello.’
‘Hello. I’m Marion.’
‘Oh, yes. My sister said you’d phoned.’
‘Can I come in?’
It was said aggressively, rather as if people one didn’t know had a right to come into one’s house any time they liked. Ismay, who had been feeling the purest intense happiness, a happiness all the greater because Andrew had gone out, leaving her to savour her joy and bliss in his absence and in the knowledge he would return, thought, what would he do? He’s much better at these things than I am. She knew what he would say and she said it, but politely, ‘I’d like to know what this is about.’
‘You are Ismay Sealand?’
‘Yes, of course. Sorry. Didn’t I say?’
‘No, you didn’t. Can I come in then?’
Ismay stepped back and closed the door after her. ‘Are you collecting for something?’
‘You could put it like that.’ The tone wasn’t aggressive this time but strangely menacing. ‘D’you live on your own?’
Ismay knew she ought not to have answered that. She ought to have asked the woman what she wanted but she was so happy that Andrew was here and with her, that he would be back soon and with her all day and night and every day and night, she was so proud of him, that she said, ‘No, with my boyfriend. I expect you saw him go out just now.’
‘Maybe.’ Marion sat down. She had begun to feel aggrieved. There was something wrong with the way things were ordered that this girl had a man like the one she’d seen coming out of the gate and she was stuck with old Barry. Still, old Barry had the money and by the look of the place there wasn’t much to spare round here. ‘I’ll come to the point,’ she said. ‘Have you lost a handbag?’
‘I had a handbag stolen,’ said Ismay. ‘Why, have you found it? Have you got it?’
‘I’ve got what was in it.’
Just six words but as they were spoken, as she realised what they implied, all her happiness vanished. It was as if the sun had been shining, warm and bright, but a cloud had come and covered it and the world was plunged in darkness. ‘I don’t understand,’ she said, though she did.
She might have been less distraught if she had known how uneasy her visitor was feeling, how doubtful of how to proceed. There was something innocent and gentle about Ismay, something sweet and trusting, which Marion had seldom encountered. She was undeterred but she was a little daunted. However, she went on, accompanying her words with a defiant stare, ‘You know what I’ve
got so I don’t need to spell it out. You never gave it to Edmund, did you? I wonder why not. I could play it to him. I could take it to the police. Or what about the boyfriend? What does he do?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Do for a living. Not a policeman, is he?’
‘He’s a lawyer.’
‘I could play it to him. Ah, you don’t like that, do you? I can see it in your face.’
‘What do you want?’ Ismay’s voice had grown higher-pitched and more childlike.
‘A hundred pounds now and a hundred next week and then we’ll see.’
It didn’t occur to Ismay not to meet this demand. Only the victims of blackmailers who are strong-willed and experienced in dealing with those on the criminal fringe resist them and go straight to the police. With most people, going to the police comes later, as a last resort. The possibility of telling someone else and asking for advice did flash across her mind – flashed and vanished. Telling Andrew, to whom she should naturally go for support, was out of the question. You don’t tell the object of the blackmailer’s threat that you are being blackmailed. Edmund or Heather or both of them would have to be told about the tape – unthinkable. Pamela? The only possibility – but Pamela was incapacitated and far away …
Marion had understood her silence and waited with apparent patience. In fact, she felt more than usually jumpy, half expecting someone else to come into the room. Hadn’t Irene said those sisters’ mad mother lived here? What she most feared was that Edmund would arrive and be unpleasant, even throw her out. The boyfriend coming back would, on the other hand, have its advantages. She had sat down opposite this silent girl – how old was she? She looked about sixteen – for much longer than she usually remained still. Unable to put up with it any longer, she jumped to her feet and began walking up and down. Upstairs someone was moving about. She could hear footfalls overhead.