by Peter James
He smiled. ‘No, that’s right. Not yet.’
‘Not yet? You think you’ll be able to one day?’
‘There are patterns to everything. By understanding patterns you can make order out of chaos.’ He raised his glass. ‘I’m getting far too serious.’
‘No, I’m interested.’
He drank and then set the glass down with exaggerated care. ‘Tell me about your parents. What do they do?’
The time slipped by easily, almost unnoticed, as they chatted. Their table had become a private island where they sat alone, absorbed in each other and undisturbed except for the arrival of food and more drinks and the removal of plates, and at some point, even when Frannie already thought she was feeling far too drunk, a bottle of Sancerre was presented and poured. She became increasingly surprised at the things they had in common. Attitudes and interests. She told him how she had first become interested in archaeology as a child, from a book on the Romans at school, and had persuaded her parents to take her to stately homes and museums at weekends.
Oliver elaborated on his love of mathematics and how he believed that it was both an art and a science, one which could ultimately solve all the mysteries of the universe. She talked about her love of archaeology and how she believed that it was through uncovering the secrets of the past that the mysteries of the universe would be solved.
Finally, Frannie noticed there was no one left in the courtyard except themselves. She looked at her watch, and saw with shock that it was four o’clock.
Oliver took her back to the Museum in a taxi, and asked her if she would have a meal with him on Friday. She told him she would like that very much.
She hurried back up the steps into the shadow of the colonnaded portals, stepping on air, her guilt at being so late back cushioned by the haze of alcohol.
An hour later, as she began to sober up, she had a slight sense of unease about Oliver and she was not sure why. He seemed almost too good to be true. It was as if there was something about him that did not totally fit together; a piece missing from the equation. Something about himself that he wasn’t telling her, perhaps; that he was either hiding or holding back. And she was still bothered, also, by the feeling that she had seen him before.
Normally Frannie was confident and looked on the bright side and she found it unsettling to feel this way. All the more so as she realized quite how deeply she fancied him.
CHAPTER FIVE
Debbie Johnson rang her late on Wednesday evening, curious to know how her date had turned out. Just back from her aerobics, Frannie tried not to say too much, afraid it might be bad luck to talk about it too soon. She promised to call her friend back on Saturday and report on Friday’s date.
As she hung up, the phone rang again. It was Oliver. He apologized for having made her so late in getting back to work on Tuesday afternoon and she told him it had not mattered, although actually she’d been carpeted by the unpredictable Declan O’Hare. They chatted easily. He asked her what she had been doing at work and she told him she had spent the day cataloguing Indian daggers and had then been to her aerobics class; and he said he had just got back from playing tennis. There had been a pause in which she had been tempted to say, ‘Why don’t you come over?’ but she did not want to seem pushy or too keen. It was enough that he had called. And she was secretly pleased that at nine o’clock he was at home and not out on a date.
On Thursday evening she washed her hair but could not settle down and relax. She was unable to concentrate on reading, or on the television and instead spring-cleaned the flat. She knew she was behaving like a besotted teenager and was angry with herself. But she could not help it.
On Friday she left work punctually at half past five and hurried home, having a sudden, uncustomary panic about what to wear. She unhooked the black dress, a high-street version of Chanel, which she had decided on. She liked it because it was short and neat, but she was worried in case it didn’t make her look attractive enough for Oliver Halkin. She tugged several more outfits out, but nothing else looked right, so it was going to have to do.
A narrow rectangle of sunlight lay across the bedroom floor, touching the edge of the white rug she had bought in Petticoat Lane a few months ago to try to brighten up the room. Sometimes it could feel dark and oppressive even though the walls were white and the ceiling was high, and at times it had an atmosphere that made her feel distinctly uncomfortable. A window opened on to a basement well which only accentuated the subterranean feel of the room.
Frannie had hung a couple of Egyptian prints on the walls, and on the mantelpiece were her family photographs, as well as two small fragments of tessera that she had pocketed from one of the first digs she had ever been on, and which still gave her a thrill. In spite of all the objects she handled daily at the Museum, nothing quite measured the feelings she got from the few treasures of her own.
She had finished getting ready by twenty past seven and had forty minutes to kill. She looked around the sitting-room. Her efforts of last night had improved it a little. It was the first flat she had ever had of her own and she did not mind the cheap furniture and the drabness because it had given her freedom and independence. She always enjoyed playing hostess when her friends came round. But most of them were as used to the flat’s less-than-impressive air as she was. It was only now, with Oliver coming, that Frannie suddenly found herself gazing uncomfortably at the ugly vinyl sofa and armchairs, the dining-table with its peeling mahogany laminate, and the shabby net curtains.
The only stamp of her own personality on the room lay in the framed posters of past exhibitions at the Museum, her books and her pride and joy – a small, plain earthenware Roman vase that sat on the coffee table. It was pear-shaped and rather dumpy, with the handle and part of the rim missing, and had been carefully glued back together by the amateur archaeologist who had dug up the pieces in 1925.
Often Frannie wondered about the life of the Roman artisan who had made it, imagined what he or she had looked like. The clay indicated it had been made in Italy and brought over maybe by an immigrant like her own parents. She had paid five hundred pounds for the vase three years ago in the Portobello Road, on the day she had received the letter from the Museum telling her she had got the job. It had been a spur-of-the-moment bit of madness that had blown her savings, but she had never regretted it.
She switched off the overhead light, leaving just a table light and the wonky lamp standard and that made a further improvement, made the room seem almost cosy. Another year and she would buy somewhere of her own. It would be tiny but it would be tasteful, she resolved.
She picked the Jilly Cooper novel she had just started off the sofa, made a mental note of the page number and closed it, tucking it into her bookshelves, and pulled out instead a paperback of Guy de Maupassant short stories, which she opened and placed casually, face down, in the same position on the sofa.
As eight o’clock approached, Frannie began to feel nervous. She went into the bedroom, and felt a bit reassured by the girl who stared back at her from the mirror. The short dress showed off her legs and her figure well. She had frown lines from anxiety so she deliberately relaxed and smiled. A sultry girl with dark, shiny hair that framed her face and touched her shoulders smiled back. The girl looked OK.
She looked great.
She went back into the sitting-room, sat down and picked up the Maupassant, glancing through, unable to concentrate. She could hear muffled gunshots ringing out from the television in the flat above. Her watch said eight-fifteen. Then eight-thirty. He wasn’t coming. Chickened out. Stood her up. Going to end up spending the evening watching the box.
Then she heard footsteps. A shadow crossed the curtains. The doorbell rang.
She jumped up, went into the hall and opened the front door. Oliver Halkin peered over the huge bunch of flowers in his hands, looking relieved that he had found the right place. ‘Sorry I’m so late,’ he said. He pushed the flowers forward as if he was slightly embarrassed by them.
‘I hope you – sort of like these –’
‘Wow!’ she said. Their scents blotted out for a brief moment the rank, humid smells of London at night, of unemptied dustbins, exhaust fumes and dust, reminding her that there was another world of parkland and countryside. ‘They’re gorgeous!’ She took the flowers, brought the heads close to her nose and inhaled deeply. ‘Thank you.’ She kissed him spontaneously on his cheek, but he made no response and the gesture left a moment of awkward silence between them.
He was wearing a navy double-breasted suit that looked good on him, a soft-collared blue shirt and a yellow tie. His hair seemed more carefully groomed than before and he was wearing black Oxfords that looked fairly new. The neatness of his appearance belied her original image of him. When she offered him a drink, he looked at his watch, then back at her, expressionlessly.
‘I think perhaps we ought to make tracks – I booked for eight-thirty.’
‘I’ll just put these in some water.’ The flat suddenly seemed dingier than ever. She ushered him through into the living-room, then walked with a heavy heart into the kitchen, and ran the cold tap into the sink; a feeling of unease was establishing itself inside her. He seemed a bit distant.
As she went into the sitting-room she was pleased to see him staring with interest at the Roman vase.
‘Is this one of your finds?’ he said.
‘Yes – well – sort of – I found it in a shop.’ Her confidence had gone and she realized she was sounding stiff and nervous.
‘How old is it?’
‘About 50 BC.’
‘Good Lord.’ He squatted and stared at it more closely. ‘I’ve got one very similar at home. I’d no idea it was as old as that. What would it have been used for?’
‘Probably for water or wine. I could have a look at it for you if you like.’
‘Yes, I would.’
‘I sometimes feel guilty about owning it.’
‘Why?’ He stood up again.
She shrugged. ‘I suppose it’s the same as I feel about the treasures locked away in the vaults in the Museum. That things from the past like this ought to be accessible to everyone – that maybe it shouldn’t be tucked away down here – a secret little treasure hoard.’
‘You could always open your flat to the public’ He grinned, fleetingly.
‘Great idea. England’s first stately basement!’
He laughed, and although it was a little forced, the atmosphere seemed to improve between them.
It was now dark outside. She followed him to a small Renault that was either grey or blue beneath a London patina of grime and dust; it was badly dented down the passenger side, and there was a row of holes where a chromium or plastic strip had been torn away.
He held the door for her, scooped a clutch of papers off the passenger seat, and she climbed in. The interior of the car was full of clutter. She carefully placed her feet between several library books that lay on the floor. A residents’ parking sticker, Borough of Chelsea, was stuck on the windscreen beside the licence roundel, plus another permit that she could not read. Several parking-tickets in cellophane bags lay in the indent above the glove compartment, along with a packet of Fisherman’s Friends, a couple of ball-point pens, several loose pieces of paper and a tennis ball.
She pulled the seat-belt over her chest and found the buckle. He climbed in and sat slightly hunched, his head touching the roof lining, as if the car were a suit that was a size too small. He twisted the ignition key and the engine clattered into life, then he turned towards her. ‘I apologize if I’m not quite with it at the moment. I had a bit of grim news just before I came to pick you up.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said.
‘No – it’s –’ he shrugged. ‘My son’s on holiday in the South of France, staying with some friends who’ve a boy his age – they have a villa down there.’ His voice tailed and he pulled the car out, accelerating harshly. ‘I just had a phone call this evening – they had a ghastly accident on a speedboat yesterday.’ He braked at the junction and peered sternly out into the main road, as if he expected the traffic to stop under his withering gaze. ‘Apparently they all went out in the boat to find a bay for a picnic and water-skiing. On the way back they ran over a swimmer – a girl.’
‘God!’ Frannie said. ‘Awful. Is she –’ she hesitated. ‘Badly hurt?’
‘She was killed.’
‘That’s terrible.’
He accelerated decisively out into a gap, alarmingly close to an oncoming car.
‘Is your son all right?’
He drove on without replying for some moments. ‘Fine. Edward’s fine.’ He said it rather oddly, she thought; quite defensively.
‘Shock sometimes hits people later,’ she said, remembering the time she had been a passenger in a motorway pile-up four years ago, and one of the cars behind had caught fire. Just a few flames under the bonnet at first. Everyone had tried to get the trapped driver out, but the flames had soon engulfed the car and beaten them back. She’d watched him banging the windscreen and yelling until she could bear it no longer and had had to turn away. It had been a week later that she’d had the first nightmare about it. She still dreamed of it now, occasionally.
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘Who was driving the boat?’
‘I’m not sure. It wasn’t Edward.’ He was about to say something else, then was silent.
‘What a horrible thing for a child to see,’ Frannie said.
‘I had a word with him over the phone. He seemed fine – far more concerned about whether I’d got his Scalextric working again – there was a problem with the transformer.’
She smiled. But there was no humour in Oliver’s expression and he lapsed into silence. She watched him, the glare of each passing street light flaring on his face then fading. Something about his taut profile reminded her of a rabbit when it is caught in the glare of the headlights and doesn’t know which way to turn. Just for a moment. Then the impression was gone.
The restaurant was a cheap and cheery trattoria, with red-and-white tablecloths, strips of fish netting and wickered Chianti bottles strung from the walls. The air was heavy with cigarette smoke, and stronger, sumptuous smells of hot olive oil and garlic, of searing meats and grilling fish. All the tables were occupied and the place had a crammed, lively atmosphere which made Frannie immediately feel comfortable.
A waiter with an accent Frannie recognized as Neapolitan led them down a staircase into an equally packed basement. There was a burst of raucous laughter from a large party of people in their twenties at the far end. Only two tables were unoccupied and he led them to one tucked in a corner alcove near the party. ‘You like an aperitif, perhaps?’ he said as he pushed Frannie’s chair in.
‘Yes, I – er –’ Oliver raised his eyes quizzically at Frannie.
‘Love one.’ She felt in need of a drink.
‘A couple of your cocktails.’
‘Due Vito Fizzo,’ he proclaimed, presented each of them with a large, handwritten menu and wheeled away. A packet of pannini lay beside each of their places. Oliver picked his up and tore open the top.
There was a deafening eruption of laughter from the party behind them, and Frannie instinctively turned her head. As she did so, a chuckling face looked familiar. The luxuriant hair was shorter than when she had last seen it, but there was no mistaking the thick lips, the burly frame, the booming voice. She watched as Seb Holland banged the table and called out: ‘Hey, Luigi, bring me an alligator sandwich and make it snappy!’ He turned, roaring with laughter at his joke, to his companions.
She hadn’t seen Seb since university, over three years ago. He was going into his family business, she remembered. They were in insurance, something large in the City, and he looked like a prosperous City businessman now, in his chalk-striped suit and loud tie. Their eyes met and he beamed in recognition, stood up, stumbled slightly drunkenly out of his chair, came over, and leaned across the table. ‘Frannie! Hi! How are you? You look gorgeo
us.’ He gave Oliver Halkin a cursory glance. ‘Sorry, ’scuse me,’ he said. ‘I’ve always been in love with this girl – might try and pinch her from you later on if I get pissed enough.’ Seb Holland’s voice was slurred with booze and he spoke too loudly.
Frannie blushed and introduced the two men.
‘Hello,’ Oliver said. There was a brief silence as Oliver and Seb frowned at each other in vague recognition.
‘Met you before,’ Seb said. He was having difficulty in standing upright without swaying, and held on to Frannie’s chair-back.
‘Yes,’ Oliver said good-humouredly, ‘I – seem to think we – have –’ He frowned which made him look rather fierce, Frannie thought.
‘Halkin? Halkin-Northrop bank?’
‘Yes,’ Oliver said. ‘Seb Holland? Any connection with Holland Delarue?’
‘Yah.’
‘Ah!’ Oliver’s face relaxed into a beam as recognition dawned. ‘I know Victor Holland.’
‘’S’ my brother.’
‘Good Lord! Your brother! I play tennis with him occasionally at Queen’s.’
‘Didn’t you come to our Christmas party last year? That’s where we met.’
‘At your rather super building?’ Oliver’s eyes narrowed as if he was trying to remember its name. ‘That’s right. We talked about cricket! How is Vic? Haven’t seen him for a while.’
‘He’s fine.’
‘Good – well –’ Oliver looked awkward suddenly, as if unsure how to end the conversation. ‘Give him my regards.’
‘Yes, I will.’ Seb turned to Frannie. ‘So, how are you? What are you up to?’
‘Fine. Working at the British Museum. How about you?’
‘Great.’ He sniffed. ‘Getting married next month. That’s my fiancée.’ He pointed at the table, but Frannie could not work out which of the girls he meant. ‘Lucy – d’yever meet her?’ He screwed up his eyes as if finding it hard to focus. ‘No – that was after university. Getting married next month,’ he repeated. ‘Hey, you must come! Send you an invite. I’ve still got your family address. We must have a drink sometime before that, anyway.’