Piece Of My Heart

by Peter Robinson

  “So how did she make money?”

  “She worked in a shop. Biba. It’s pretty well known. They just moved to Kensington High Street. Do a lot of ’30s nostalgia stuff. You know the sort of thing: all floppy hats, ostrich feathers and long satin dresses in plum and pink.”

  “Do you happen to know her address in London?”

  Nokes gave him an address in Notting Hill.

  “Did she live alone or share?”

  “Alone. But she had a good friend living in the same house, across the hall. Came up here with Linda once or twice. American girl. Her name’s Tania Hutchison.”

  “What does she look like?”

  “Like a dream. I mean, she’s like a negative image of Linda, man, but just as beautiful in her own way. She’s got long dark hair, really long, you know. And she has a dark complexion, like she’s half Mexican or something. And white teeth. But all Americans have white teeth, don’t they?”

  It sounded like the girl Robin Merchant had described. So what, if anything, did this Tania Hutchison have to do with Linda Lofthouse’s murder?

  There was nothing more to be got from Dennis Nokes, so Chadwick gave Enderby the signal to wrap up the interview. He would send someone to talk to the others later. He didn’t really think that Nokes and his pals had had anything to do with Linda Lofthouse’s murder, but now he at least knew where she had been living, and this Tania woman might be able to tell him something about Linda’s recent life. And death.

  Before heading to interview Vic Greaves the following day, Banks first called at Swainsview Lodge out of curiosity, to soak up the atmosphere. He got the keys from the estate agent, who told him they had kept the place locked up tight since there had been reports from local farmers of someone breaking in. She thought it was probably just kids, but the last thing they needed, she said, was squatters or travelers taking occupation of the place.

  Entering the cold and drafty hallway, Banks felt as if he were entering one of those creepy mansions from the old Roger Corman films of Poe stories, The Fall of the House of Usher, or something. The long wainscoted hallway had paneled doors opening off each side, and there were obvious spaces on the walls where paintings had once hung. Banks tried some of the doors and found they opened to empty rooms in varied states of disrepair. Bits of ceiling had crumbled, and a veneer of plaster dust lay over everything. Banks kicked clouds of it up as he walked, and it made him cough, made his mouth dry.

  At the end of the hall a moth-eaten, dusty old curtain covered French windows. Banks fiddled for the key and opened them. They led out to a broad empty balcony. Banks walked out and leaned against the cool stone of the balustrade to admire the view. Below him lay the empty granite-and-marble swimming pool, its dark bottom clogged with weeds, lichen and rubbish. Lower down the hillside the trees on the banks of the river Swain were red and brown and yellow. Some of the leaves blew off and swirled in the wind as Banks watched. Sheep grazed in the fields of the opposite daleside, dots of white on green among the irregular patterns of drystone walls. The clouds were so low, they grazed the limestone outcrops along the top and shrouded the upper moorland in mist.

  Wrapping his arms around himself against the autumn chill, Banks went back inside the building and headed downstairs to the lower level, where he found himself in a cavernous room that he guessed must have been used as the recording studio. So this was where the Mad Hatters had recorded their breakthrough second album during the winter of 1969-1970, and several others over the years. There was no equipment left, of course, but there were still a few strips of wire lying around, along with a broken drumstick, and what looked like a guitar string. Banks strained but could hear no echoes of events or music long past.

  He unlocked the doors and walked out to the edge of the swimming pool. There was broken glass on the courtyard and bottles and cans at the bottom of the pool, where it sloped down to the deep end. Banks saw what the estate agent meant, and guessed that local kids must have climbed the wall and had a party. He wondered if they knew the house’s history. Maybe they were celebrating Robin Merchant the way the kids flocked to Jim Morrison’s tomb in the Père-Lachaise cemetery in Paris. Banks doubted it. He thought he heard a sound behind him, in the abandoned recording studio, and turned in time to see a mouse skitter through the dust.

  He tried to imagine the scene on that summer night thirty-five years ago. There would have been music, and probably lights strung up outside, around the pool. Incense. Drugs, of course, and alcohol, too. By the early seventies, booze was coming back in fashion among the younger generation. There would also have been girls, half undressed or more, perhaps, laughing, dancing, making love. And when everyone was sated, Robin Merchant had… well, what had happened? Banks didn’t know yet. Kev Templeton was still in the basement of Western Area Headquarters going through the archives.

  A gust of wind rattled the open door and Banks went back inside. There was nothing for him here except ghosts. Lord Jessop was dead of AIDS, poor sod, and Robin Merchant had drowned in the swimming pool. The rest of the Mad Hatters were still very much alive, though, and Vic Greaves was around somewhere. If he would talk. If he could talk. Banks didn’t know exactly what the official diagnosis was, only that everyone claimed he’d taken too much acid and gone over the top. Well, in a short while, with a little skill and a little luck, he would find out.

  Wednesday, 17th September, 1969

  It was a long time since Chadwick had walked along the Portobello Road. Wartime, in fact, one of the times he had been back on leave between assignments. He was sure the street had been narrower then. And there had been sandbags, blackout curtains, empty shop windows, rubble from bomb damage, the smell of ash, fractured gas lines and sewage pipes. Now the biggest mess was caused by construction on the Westway, an overhead motorway that was almost completed, and most of the smells were exotic spices that took him back to his days in India and Burma.

  Chadwick had taken the afternoon train down to King’s Cross, a journey of about five hours. Now it was early evening. The market had closed for the day; the stallholders had packed up their wares and gone to one of the many local pubs. Outside the Duke of Wellington a fire-eater entertained a small crowd. The atmosphere was lively, the people young and colorful in brightly printed fabrics, flared jeans with flowers embroidered on them, or gold lamé caftans. Some of the girls were wearing old-fashioned wide-brimmed hats and long dresses trailing around their ankles. There were quite a few West Indians wandering the street, too, some also in bright clothes, with beards and fuzzy hairdos. Chadwick was sure he could smell marijuana in the air. He was also sure he looked quite out of place in his navy blue suit, although there were one or two business types mingling with the crowds.

  According to his map, there were quicker ways of getting to Powis Terrace than from the Notting Hill Underground station, but out of interest he had wanted to wander up and down Portobello Road. He had heard so much about it, from the Notting Hill race riots of over ten years ago to the notorious slum landlord Peter Rachman, connected to both the Kray twins and the Profumo affair of 1963. The area had history.

  Now the street was full of chic boutiques, hairdressers and antique shops with bright-painted facades. There was even a local fleapit called the Electric Cinema, showing a double bill of Easy Rider and Girl on a Motorcycle. One shop, Alice’s Antiques, sold Edwardian policemen’s capes, and for a moment Chadwick was tempted to buy one. But he knew he wouldn’t wear it; it would just hang at the back of his wardrobe until the moths got at it.

  Chadwick turned down Colville Terrace and finally found the street he was looking for. At the end of the block someone had drawn graffiti depicting Che Guevara, and underneath the bearded face and beret were the words LONG LIVE THE REVOLUTION in red paint, imitating dripping blood. The terraced houses, once majestic four-story Georgian-style stucco, were now dirty white, with stained and graffiti-covered facades – THE ROAD OF EXCESS LEADS TO THE PALACE OF WISDOM and CRIME IS THE HIGHEST FORM OF SENSUALITY. Rubbi
sh littered the street. Each house had a low black metal railing and gate, which led down murky stone steps to the basement flat. The broad stairs leading up to the front door were flanked by two columns supporting a portico. Most of the doors looked badly in need of a paint job. Chadwick had heard that the houses were all divided into a warren of bedsits.

  There were several names listed beside the intercom at the house he wanted. Chadwick had timed his visit for early evening, thinking that might be the best time to find Tania Hutchison at home. The problem was that he didn’t want her to be warned of his visit. If she had had anything to do with Linda’s murder, then there was a chance she would scarper the minute she heard his voice. He needed another way in.

  Tania’s flat, he noted, was number eight. He wondered how security-conscious the other tenants were. If drugs were involved, probably very, though if someone was under the influence… He decided to start with the ground floor and after getting no answer went on up the list. Finally he was rewarded by a bad connection with an incomprehensible young man in flat five, who actually buzzed the door open.

  The smell of cats’ piss and onions was almost overwhelming; the floor was covered with drab cracked lino and the stair carpet was threadbare. If it had had a pattern once, it was indiscernible from the dull gray background now. The walls were also bare, apart from a few telephone numbers scribbled around the shared pay phone. Out of habit, Chadwick made a note of them.

  Now he just had to find number eight. It wasn’t on the ground floor, nor the first, but on the second floor, facing the front. That landing had another shared pay phone, and again Chadwick copied down the numbers. It smelled a little better up here, mostly due to the burning incense coming from one of the rooms, but the bulb was bare and cast a thankfully weak light on the shabby decor. Chadwick could hear soft music coming from inside number eight, guitars and flutes and some sort of oriental percussion. A good sign.

  He tapped on the door. A few moments later, it opened on the chain. He wasn’t in yet, but he was close. “Are you Tania Hutchison?” he asked.

  “I’m Tania,” she said. “Who wants to know?”

  Chadwick thought he detected an American accent. Only a thin strip of her face showed, but he could see what Dennis Nokes had meant about her good looks. “I’m Detective Inspector Chadwick,” he said, holding up his warrant card. “It’s about Linda Lofthouse.”

  “Linda? Of course.”

  “Do you mind if I come in?”

  She looked at him for a moment – he could see only one eye – and he sensed she was calculating what was her best option. In the end the door shut, and when it opened again it opened all the way. “All right,” she said.

  Chadwick followed her into an L-shaped room, the smaller part of which was taken up with a tiny kitchen. The rest was sparsely furnished, perhaps because there was so little space. There was no carpet on the floor, only old wood. A mattress covered in red cheesecloth and scattered with cushions sat against one wall, and in front of that stood a low glass table holding a vase of flowers, a copy of the Evening Standard, an ashtray and a book called The Glass Bead Game by Hermann Hesse. Chadwick had never heard of Hermann Hesse, but he had the feeling he would be safer sticking to Dick Francis, Alistair MacLean and Desmond Bagley. An acoustic guitar leaned against one wall.

  Tania stretched out on the mattress, leaning against the wall, and Chadwick grabbed one of the hard-backed kitchen chairs. The room seemed clean and bright, with a colorful abstract painting on the wall and a little light coming in through the sash window, but there was no disguising the essential decrepitude of the house and neighborhood.

  The woman was as Dennis Nokes and Robin Merchant had described her, petite, attractive, with white teeth and glossy dark hair down to her waist. She was wearing flared jeans and a thin cotton blouse that left little to the imagination. She reached for a packet of Pall Mall filter-tipped and lit one. “I just found out yesterday,” she said, blowing out smoke. “About Linda.”

  “How?”

  “The newspaper. I’ve been away.”

  “How long?”

  “Nine days.”

  It made sense. Chadwick had only discovered Linda Lofthouse’s identity from Carol Wilkinson on Saturday, so it hadn’t really hit the papers and other news media until Monday, and now it was Wednesday, ten days since the Brimleigh Festival had ended and the body was discovered. Looking at Tania, he could see that she had been crying; the tears had dried and crusted on her flawless olive skin, and her big green eyes were glassy.

  “Where were you?” Chadwick asked.

  “In France, with my boyfriend. He’s studying in Paris. The Sorbonne. I just got back yesterday.”

  “I assume we could check that?”

  “Go ahead.” She gave him a name and a telephone number in Paris. It wasn’t much use to Chadwick. The guy was her boyfriend, after all, and he would probably swear black was white for her. But he had to go through the motions.

  “You were at Brimleigh, though?”

  “Sure.”

  “That’s what I want to talk about.”

  Tania blew out some smoke and reached for the ashtray on the table, cradling it on her lap between her crossed legs.

  “What happened there?” Chadwick went on.

  “What do you mean, ‘What happened there?’ Lots of things happened there. It was a festival, a celebration.”

  “Of what?”

  “Youth. Music. Life. Love. Peace. Things you wouldn’t understand.”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” said Chadwick. “I was young once.” He was getting used to being criticized by these people for being old and square, and as it didn’t bother him in the least, it seemed easier just to brush it aside with a glib comment, like water off a duck’s back. What he still didn’t understand, though, despite Enderby’s explanation, was why intelligent young people from good homes wanted to come to places like this and live in squalor, probably hardly eating a healthy meal from one day to the next. Were all the sex and drugs you wanted worth such a miserable existence?

  Tania managed a little smile. “It was different then.”

  “You can say that again. Swing. Jitterbug. Glenn Miller. Tommy Dorsey. Henry Hall. Harry Roy. Nat Gonella. Al Bowlly. Real music. And the war, of course.”

  “We choose not to fight in wars.”

  “It must be nice to believe that you have a choice,” said Chadwick, feeling the anger rise the way it did when he heard such pat comments. He was keen to steer back to the topic at hand. They’d sidetrack you, these people, put you on the defensive, and before you knew it you’d be arguing about war and revolution. “Look, I’d just like to know the story of you and Linda: how you came to be at Brimleigh, why you didn’t leave together, what happened. Is that so difficult?”

  “Not at all. We drove up on Sunday morning. I’ve got an old Mini.”

  “Just the two of you?”

  “That’s about all you can fit in a Mini if you want to be comfortable.”

  “And you were only there for the one day?”

  “Yes. The Mad Hatters said they could get backstage passes for us, but only for the day they were there. That was Sunday. To be honest, we didn’t really feel like sitting around in a muddy field in Yorkshire for three days.”

  That was about the first sensible thing Chadwick had heard a young person say in a long time. “When did you arrive?”

  “Early afternoon.”

  “Were the Mad Hatters there already?”

  “They were around.”

  “What did you do?”

  “Well, it was great, really. We got to park where the bands parked, and we could just come and go as we pleased.”

  “What was going on back there?”

  “Music, mostly, believe it or not. When the bands were playing you could get around the front, in the press enclosure, if there was room. That was where you got the best view in the entire place.”

  “The rest of the time?”

  “It’
s sort of like a garden party round the back. You know, a beer tent, food, tables and chairs, someone plucking on a guitar, conversation, jamming, dancing. Like a big club and a restaurant rolled into one. It got a bit chaotic at times, especially between bands when the roadies were running back and forth, but mostly it was great fun.”

  “I understand there were caravans for some of the stars.”

  “People need privacy. And, you know, if you wanted somewhere to go and… Well, I don’t have to spell it out, do I?”

  “Did you go to a caravan with anyone?”

  Her eyes widened and her skin flushed. “That’s hardly a question a gentleman would ask of a lady. And I can’t see as it has any bearing on what happened to Linda.”

  “So nobody needed to go into the woods for privacy?”

  “No. It was like we had our own little community, and there was no one there to lay down the law, to tell us what to do. A perfect anarchist state.”

  Chadwick thought that was something of a contradiction in terms, but he didn’t bother pointing it out. He didn’t want to get sidetracked again. “Who did you spend your time with?” he asked.

  “Lots of people. I suppose I was with Chris Adams a fair bit. He’s the Hatters’ manager. A nice guy. Smart and sensitive.” She smiled. “And not too stoned to have a decent conversation with.”

  Interesting, Chadwick thought, that Adams hadn’t mentioned this. But why would he? It would only connect him with events from which he wanted to distance himself and his group. “Were you with him during Led Zeppelin’s performance?”

  Tania frowned. “No. I was out front, in the press enclosure. I suppose he might have been there, but it was really crowded and dark. I don’t remember seeing him.”

  “You’re American, I understand,” Chadwick said.

  “Canadian, actually. But a lot of people make that mistake. And don’t worry, I’m here legally, work permit and all. My parents were born here. Scotland. Strathclyde. My father was a professor at the university there.”