The Marx Sisters bak-1

by Barry Maitland

‘Here.’ He indicated to Kathy to sit on the bed, and pulled a picture from the pile. ‘This is Dora. When she was sixteen. You see how she hated to wear shoes? It was the next spring that the soldiers took her.’

  He handed it to Kathy, his eyes full of tears, and reached for another.

  Depressed and no wiser, Kathy returned to Jerusalem Lane. It was past noon, and a steady stream of building workers and police were filing into Mrs Rosenfeldt’s shop with lunch orders. At least the old lady’s mind was entirely in the present, Kathy thought, even if she didn’t welcome the interruption.

  ‘This is coming up to my busy time,’ she grumbled. ‘Can’t you come back later?’

  ‘No, I can’t,’ Kathy said, making little attempt to keep the exasperation out of her voice. ‘Let the girls cope with it for ten minutes. I need to speak to you now, in private.’

  Mrs Rosenfeldt shrugged and led her through to a small storeroom at the back of the shop, in which there was a scrubbed wooden table and two chairs. They sat down facing each other across a pile of invoices and receipts.

  ‘I’ve told you all I know about the vandals. There’s nothing else I can say about Eleanor’s death.’

  ‘Not Eleanor. I want to talk to you about Meredith.’

  Mrs Rosenfeldt raised her eyebrows. ‘Six months, and suddenly it’s so urgent?’

  Kathy hardly knew how to begin. After Dr Botev’s ramblings, and surrounded now by the bustle of a changing present, the ghosts of the past seemed increasingly irrelevant.

  ‘Do you know anyone called Becky?’

  ‘Becky?’ Mrs Rosenfeldt’s eyes glittered suspiciously through her steel-rimmed glasses.

  ‘Yes. A friend of Meredith.’

  ‘Of course. I am Becky.’

  ‘You? Ah.’ Kathy smiled. She would never have associated the name with this severe little woman.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘We heard she had a friend called Becky, but didn’t know who it was. It doesn’t matter.’

  It does, Kathy thought, but how? What thing from Mrs Rosenfeldt’s past could have touched Meredith?

  ‘When you first spoke to us, you said we should look out for Nazis. Did you really mean that? Surely all that was far in the past?’

  ‘Really?’ Mrs Rosenfeldt snapped. ‘You think Nazis disappeared because the war came to an end? They never disappear. Don’t you read the papers?’ She rubbed a stick-like thumb angrily on her bony wrist.

  ‘But not in Jerusalem Lane, surely. I mean, I know Meredith discovered that business about the Kowalskis’ past during the war, but that was, well, a tragedy. They were victims too, weren’t they?’

  ‘Oh, you think so?’ Kathy could see that Mrs Rosenfeldt was holding herself tight as a spring.

  ‘Don’t you?’ She smiled innocently at the rigid face. She thought for a moment that the old lady wouldn’t respond, then she saw the thin lips open.

  ‘Don’t tell me about victims, young woman!’ She spoke with an intensity that made her frail body shake. ‘I have seen victims! Adam Kowalski was never one. His students were victims. He was one of them . I know. I can smell them, the way you can smell dog shit.’

  Her vehemence unnerved Kathy. ‘He’s a frail old man,’ she protested.

  ‘So? Even Nazi murderers get old.’

  ‘And you told Meredith this? That Adam Kowalski was a murderer?’

  Mrs Rosenfeldt bowed her head in a gesture which Kathy thought rather evasive.

  ‘What has this got to do with Meredith’s death, really, Mrs Rosenfeldt? What did Adam Kowalski do to Meredith?’

  Kathy saw from the woman’s dismissive shrug that this was not the right question.

  ‘Marie Kowalski, then?’

  Warmer. Mrs Rosenfeldt’s fingers had developed a sudden interest in the paperwork on the table.

  ‘What do you know about Marie Kowalski?’

  The gaunt figure didn’t respond, and Kathy felt herself become angry. She got abruptly to her feet and leaned forward across the table. ‘What about Marie Kowalski, Mrs Rosenfeldt?’ She was aware that her voice was loud, almost shouting. ‘Did you see something?’

  When the old woman looked up to meet her eyes, Kathy saw, somewhat to her shame, that they were filled with fear.

  ‘She came…’ Mrs Rosenfeldt began, and then hesitated.

  ‘To see you?’

  She nodded, lowered her eyes.

  ‘Marie Kowalski came to see you. Yes?’ Come on.

  With a small effort at bluster, Mrs Rosenfeldt tossed her head. ‘And I told her. Of course I told her. They couldn’t escape just by running away to the seaside!’

  Kathy sat down slowly and stared at her. Is that it? ‘You told her that Meredith would go on telling people about them?’

  Mrs Rosenfeldt’s head dropped low so that Kathy found herself staring at the silver bun of her hair. It was a nod of acknowledgement.

  ‘When was this?’

  ‘That afternoon.’ The voice was a whisper. ‘The afternoon she died.’

  ‘Marie Kowalski called on Mrs Rosenfeldt shortly after 2 that afternoon.’

  Brock put down the draft report he had been reading to listen to Kathy, who was slightly out of breath from the speed with which she’d taken the stairs.

  ‘She came to say goodbye,’ Kathy continued. ‘She had never realized that it was Mrs Rosenfeldt who had been stirring the pot over Meredith’s discovery. For months Mrs Rosenfeldt had been telling Meredith she should do something about it, to unmask the Kowalskis. I think that’s what had been getting Meredith down. She didn’t know what to do for the best. Mrs Rosenfeldt was pretty formidable once she got an idea in her head.

  ‘That afternoon she just couldn’t let Marie get away without putting the knife in. She told her that she could expect big trouble. Their names would be in the papers. Meredith would see to it. Marie left at around 2.15 in a state. Three hours later Mrs Rosenfeldt heard that Meredith was dead, and drew her own conclusions. But she couldn’t tell us directly without revealing that she had inflamed the problem. I think she feels as guilty now as if she’d killed Meredith with her own hands.’

  ‘The past is a jealous mother.’ Brock repeated the phrase and shook his head. ‘It doesn’t sound like Dr Botev.’

  ‘I think he was quoting. An old Bulgarian proverb probably.’

  ‘Well, we’d better find out PDQ exactly what the Kowalskis’ movements were that afternoon.’

  ‘I think we know, sir.’ Kathy frowned. ‘I’m sorry. It’s in the file and I never realized. DC Mollineaux was still checking when the investigation was closed. His report was added to the file later, and I didn’t know it was there. I phoned him just a moment ago, and he told me.’

  She opened the file she was carrying. ‘The book dealer in Notting Hill where Adam Kowalski and his son Felix went to dispose of the final load of books confirmed to Mollineaux that they arrived around 1.45 p.m., and were there for about thirty minutes. Then the van rental place in Camden Town turned up their records which showed the van was returned at 3.05 p.m. Marie must have been on her own in the Lane from about 1.30 p.m. to 2.30 p.m. or a bit later.’

  ‘That was what Adam Kowalski told us, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Yes. It was Felix who said they were back around 2.00 p.m.’

  Brock looked at his watch. ‘Looks like another trip to the seaside, Kathy. Let’s grab one of Mrs Rosenfeldt’s meat pies before we go. Bren says they’re excellent.’

  26

  It seemed that each time they drove down to the coast the weather became more threatening. Now the sky was filled with oppressive dark snow clouds, and the sun, when it did manage to break through, was a baleful red disk, the eye of Lucifer observing their progress across the frozen grey countryside.

  They had phoned ahead to make sure the Kowalskis were at home, and when they arrived at the doorstep they could see the two of them through the window, sitting in the front lounge, dressed in their Sunday best like a pair of refugees waiting stoically for their d
eportation orders. Marie opened the front door and led them without a word into the room, where they all sat formally facing each other. There was an indistinct, unpleasantly sweet odour in the air, and Kathy loosened her coat, feeling suddenly nauseous. She looked at Adam, who sat to attention beside his wife on the settee, his watery eyes fixed on a framed photograph hanging on the opposite wall, of the two of them on their wedding day. His suit, and the starched collar and cuffs of his shirt, hung absurdly loose about his gaunt frame. Brock began by trying to separate the two old people, and take statements in different rooms, but Marie refused to say a word if they were split up, and Brock relented.

  There was no satisfaction in listening to Marie’s confession. On the contrary, it made Kathy feel deeply depressed. She had immediately sensed a great tension in the little woman, and as soon as Brock made it plain that they knew about her visit to Mrs Rosenfeldt on the afternoon of Meredith’s murder, the words began to tumble out of her in a low, breathless torrent, as if the effort of holding them back had become unbearable.

  She had called on Mrs Rosenfeldt to pass the time until Adam and Felix returned. Their relationship had never been warm, rather distant in fact, but Marie thought it only polite to say goodbye to her neighbour. She was shocked to discover the depth of Mrs Rosenfeldt’s hatred of her husband and herself. It was like a physical blow, which left her for a moment stunned.

  Then Mrs Rosenfeldt said that Meredith Winterbottom felt the same way. That Meredith was determined to expose her husband’s war crimes. Those were the words she used. No matter where they went, the evil of their past would, one day, be exposed for all the world to know.

  Marie left Mrs Rosenfeldt’s apartment in a state of shock, and walked slowly back to Jerusalem Lane. Gradually, the terrible injustice of Mrs Rosenfeldt’s accusations filled her mind. At first she couldn’t believe that Meredith-an intolerable busybody certainly, but not malicious or vindictive-could really intend to persecute them in this way. Then the prospect of their retirement haunted by such ghosts rushed through her imagination. She was overwhelmed by despair, then indignation, and finally anger. She determined to have it out with Meredith. She marched down to number 22, rang the bell, and when no one answered, opened the door and stormed straight up to Meredith’s flat.

  At this point Marie paused in her account. She looked rapidly at each of the other people in the room, at Kathy writing in her pad, and her husband staring fixedly at the wall, and finally came to Brock who held her gaze, looking, so it seemed to her, straight into her soul. The hands clasped upon her lap shook. When she began to speak again, it seemed the words no longer wanted to come, but had to be forced, struggling and shameful, out into the room, where they were frequently interrupted by choking sobs.

  She described how she found Meredith asleep on her bed. As she looked down at the still figure it occurred to her that there was only one way to ensure that her husband’s last years would not be haunted by the past. She thought of using a pillow, but then recalled the television advertisements that warned of the dangers of children playing with plastic bags. She went into the kitchen, and put on a pair of pink rubber washing-up gloves beside the sink so that she wouldn’t leave fingerprints. Then she found a plastic bag in a drawer. She returned to the bedroom and slipped it over Meredith’s head without difficulty. Meredith passed away peacefully within a few minutes.

  On her way out Marie noticed a plastic carrier bag tucked under the bed, containing books. She looked inside and thought she recognized the old and valuable books which Adam had told her about. On an impulse she took them with her. She didn’t mention the books to Adam or Felix when they returned, but later contacted a dealer through the Yellow Pages and sold them. She couldn’t recall his name.

  Throughout all this, Adam had sat without moving. It was as if he had heard nothing, although Kathy thought she could detect tears in his eyes.

  Brock made Marie repeat the final part of her story, from when she had left Meredith’s bedroom. She used almost exactly the same words as in her first account.

  Brock charged her formally with the murder of Meredith Winterbottom, and told her that they would take her back to London with them, where she would be held. He advised her to contact a solicitor. Inevitably this turned out to be Mr Hepple. She had to be helped out to the telephone in the hall to leave a message with his answering service.

  When she returned she said, ‘Felix must look after his father now. You must tell him to come.’

  Kathy made the call to Enfield. A tentative female voice answered.

  ‘Mrs Kowalski? Can I speak to Mr Kowalski, please?’

  Felix’s wife was hesitant. ‘Who is this?’

  ‘I’m Detective Sergeant Kolla from the Metropolitan Police. I need to speak to Mr Kowalski urgently.’

  ‘Oh.’ More hesitation. ‘He’s away at present. At a conference.’ She spoke uncertainly, as if she found talking on the phone a problem.

  ‘Well, could you tell me where? Maybe we can contact him.’

  ‘I’m not sure. It’s at the University of Nottingham… What is this about? Has he been involved in an accident or something?’

  Kathy took a deep breath. ‘No. It’s his parents, Mrs Kowalski.’

  ‘Oh no. What’s happened?’ The woman’s voice sounded flat, defeated.

  ‘His mother is being detained by the police in connection with a serious offence. She wants your husband to look after his father while she is in custody.’

  ‘Custody?’

  ‘I’m afraid so. Look, would it be easier if we took Mr Kowalski senior back up to London with us? I’ll give you an address and a phone number, and you can make arrangements with your husband to pick him up later this afternoon, say around 4.’

  They drove back in silence, the old couple like statues together in the back. In the event it was their daughter-in-law who was waiting for them when they arrived, and who took charge of the old man. She hadn’t been able to get a message to Felix yet, she explained, as the conference sessions had finished for the day, although they hoped to contact him when he came in for his evening meal with the other delegates. She had a little boy, about four or five, clutching her hand and she looked drained, as if there were already so many things to cope with that she could hardly bear to find out what this was all about. Brock and Kathy left her talking with Mr Hepple, whose cup was obviously brimming over. Brock had some difficulty being civil in response to the solicitor’s ebullient greeting.

  On their return to 20 Jerusalem Lane they found Bren Gurney in almost as good a mood as Mr Hepple. His earlier hunch had been dramatically vindicated, and he felt entitled to some measure of triumph. He himself had had no luck with his own lines of inquiry. The plumber who had worked on Caroline Winter’s kitchen had died of a heart attack just two months before, and no trace of the missing books had been found either, although, as he pointed out to Brock, half the places they visited had been closed for the weekend.

  ‘Yes,’ Brock nodded resignedly, ‘we’re not going to get anywhere further with that until Monday.’

  ‘All the same,’ Gurney grinned, ‘this clears the way to charging Winter with Eleanor’s murder.’

  Brock shook his head wearily. ‘No Bren, sorry, not yet. You yourself said that his girlfriend will likely as not change her mind about being with him that night. It’s all too circumstantial. Let’s get that damn book dealer first. Find out who he contacted and how much he told them.’

  Gurney made as if to argue, then changed his mind and shrugged. ‘All right, chief.’

  Brock gave a little nod. ‘See you Monday, Bren.’

  Kathy gathered her things together to follow her colleague downstairs.

  ‘Eleanor’s funeral is tomorrow afternoon,’ she said to Brock. ‘I think I may go.’

  Brock seemed not to hear at first. He appeared preoccupied and unsettled. Then he roused himself. ‘I should take a break, Kathy,’ he grunted. ‘You’ve had a solid week of it. Tomorrow’s Sunday. Go out and ha
ve some fun for a change.’

  Kathy smiled. ‘Easier said than done.’

  ‘Get that architect to take you out to a show or something.’

  ‘Bob Jones?’

  ‘Yes. Much more your type.’

  ‘Than Martin Connell?’ She looked at him carefully. ‘Don’t worry about that, sir. It doesn’t bother me. Not any more.’

  He nodded. ‘I just wouldn’t like to think that we were confusing our targets, between Winter and his solicitor.’

  ‘I understand. You’re still not sure we’ve got it right, are you?’

  ‘I’d feel happier if Marie had told us something she couldn’t have got from the newspapers. Like that the plastic bag was found in the bin in the kitchen, not on Meredith’s head.’

  ‘Yes, but why would she lie? And she did know about the pink washing-up gloves, and the books.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t doubt she called on Meredith that afternoon. If only she could have told us the name of the book dealer!’

  Kathy nodded. ‘What will you do tomorrow?’

  ‘Oh,’ Brock shrugged, ‘I’m going down to a gliding club on the Downs. A winter picnic, they call it. Must be mad.’

  ‘Do you fly, then?’

  ‘Used to glide. Mainly a spectator now, though. They invited me down for tomorrow.’

  ‘What about Bren? How does he spend his time off?’

  ‘He’s a family man, Kathy. Young kiddies.’

  When she got downstairs, she bumped into Gurney again who was heading for the door.

  ‘We’re making a mistake,’ he muttered. ‘We should be nailing Winter now while he’s still in a panic. I reckon that bastard Connell’s beginning to make Brock jumpy.’

  ‘I don’t think so, Bren. Is Connell a bastard, or is he just good at his job?’ Even as the words came out, she wondered why she was saying this. Did she really want to know why Gurney was so riled by him?

  ‘You’ll find out for yourself, I dare say.’

  Now she was getting herself in a mess, letting Gurney think she didn’t know Connell. Yet she couldn’t face the thought of having to explain. She cursed Martin inwardly for involving himself in this of all cases, and said, ‘How about your unlawful entry? Has he made any more of that?’