Dying for Millions

by Judith Cutler

  ‘Nobody’s streetwise when it comes to men,’ said Becky.

  ‘So what about blokes? Was she going out with anyone? Did she fancy anyone?’

  Predictable giggles.

  ‘I reckon she fancied this bloke she met at the Music Centre.’ I shot at random, but by the surreptitious exchange of glances I reckoned I’d hit something. ‘Did she tell you about him?’

  Farhana shook her head. ‘Muslims don’t talk about such things in Ramadan.’

  Not officially, maybe, but I was sure she was in on Karen’s plans.

  ‘I do! All the time!’ Becky was starting to giggle. ‘He fancied her, at least. She said he fell in love with her soon as he saw her.’

  ‘You wouldn’t have a name for this guy, would you?’

  Damn! I’d gone too far.

  ‘Don’t want to get her into no trouble.’ That was Soos, shaking her hair-extensions till the beads in them rattled. ‘She goes, if her folks find out they’ll go spare.’

  ‘Set the mice on her,’ Farhana said, and stopped, covering her mouth.

  Some time I’d have to tell her it was all right to laugh. Even in Ramadan.

  I was just locking the room when Soos came back. ‘That coriander, Sophie.’ She glanced around quickly – no, there was no one to overhear. ‘It’s to make him fancy her. It’s an afro – afro-something—’

  ‘Aphrodisiac?’ I prompted, keeping my voice neutral, as if this were just an English vocabulary test.

  She nodded. The beads rattled like bones.

  If I listened very carefully I’d be able to hear someone saying it. Think about the voice. Not Brummie … Australian, that was it! Sam the chef, talking about the kid with the beautiful bum. He and Karen had something in common since they both … since they both came from Acocks Green. Where had my brain been?

  The staff room was seething with students, and all the phones were in use, even the one on my desk. I dumped my bag on the heap of paper in what I hoped was an authoritative manner and looked ostentatiously from the phone to my watch and back again. Eventually the message penetrated my colleague’s skull, and with ill grace she passed it across to me. Since she’d been talking to her mother in Scotland, possibly at William Murdock’s expense, I didn’t apologise for harrying her.

  It took ten years to get through to Ian’s extension – and then he wasn’t there. Inspector Stephenson? Needs must, I supposed.

  She greeted my theory without enthusiasm.

  ‘Look, you have that list of roadies and other hangers-on. Wouldn’t it be worth at least checking on that lad from Acocks Green? His address would be there, surely.’

  ‘When I’ve got someone free.’ Her voice dripped uninterest. Perhaps it was time to wake her up a bit.

  ‘There is one other thing. Karen’s friends think she might have put something in Andy’s drink.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  Damn it! Couldn’t she show decent excitement, like a normal person?

  ‘Apparently she spoke of coriander. I suppose the contents of the flask didn’t include coriander?’

  ‘Ms Rivers, you must realise I can’t possibly give you that kind of information.’

  ‘OK.’ And I put the phone down. She wouldn’t expect a courteous valediction and I was incapable of giving one.

  The papers I needed for the lunch-time meeting were in my filing tray. By now I was five minutes late, a churlish response to Richard’s generosity. I grabbed everything in the tray, realised I’d had no time to buy a sandwich, and scarpered.

  We were deep into quality control systems, and I was shuffling through the papers which summarised a student survey about which Mags was supposed to be pontificating. She always liked intelligent questions, so I’d better invent one. Fast.

  I know I said it aloud. ‘My God! How stupid can I get?’

  I expect everyone looked at me. They certainly did when I got to my feet, and rushed to the door. Richard’s voice was frigid with anger: ‘Sophie?’

  ‘I’m sorry. I really am. But these are Karen’s letters!’

  The police would have to have them. But not until I’d read them.

  I locked myself into a staff loo – at least no one would interrupt me there – and slipped the first from the envelope. It was a letter to someone else, of course, and I found unfolding the pages hard. Did I have the right to break Karen’s confidence?

  OK. Time to read it.

  The letter itself was reasonably short: all the extra pages turned out to be poems she’d written to him. On the other hand, it was reasonably embarrassing, and I could quite understand why she hadn’t wanted Andy to see it. Apart from a complete run-down on how he made her feel – vaginal lubrications included – she quoted at length and not always accurately from his songs. Oh dear. Letter two was shorter, more conventional, and included a couple of lines which alarmed me:

  Truly I would rather die than hurt you, or even think about hurting you, you do understand don’t you that I’d rather die. I realise now I made a mistake, and only hope you will forgive me.

  If only they had phones in lavatories. And then I discovered I didn’t want Stephenson to know about this. Not yet. Maybe, just maybe, there was some other explanation for Karen’s verbal excesses, and Stephenson appeared to have the most literal of minds.

  It dawned on me at long last that there might be more than one way of skinning a cat. OK, Stephenson wouldn’t tell me Acocks Green Man’s address – but Ollie would know the address of the caterers for whom he’d been working. From there to running the young man to earth might take for ever – but at least it was a start.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I suppose I should have expected it. Ollie had switched off his mobile phone. Even though I knew it was useless I tried him on his home number. Unobtainable: he’d no doubt forgotten to pay the bill again.

  I stared around the emptying staff room hoping for inspiration. I was late for class again, but I had other priorities. Phone Missing Persons and give an anonymous tip-off? But Karen had probably gone quite voluntarily, and might well be staying quite voluntarily. Might not be. Theory’s one thing, practice another.

  Cursing my good citizenship, I dialled Ian’s Rose Road number: please let it be Ian, not Stephenson to answer it. Please.

  ‘I’m sorry – there’s no reply from that extension. Can anyone else help you?’

  Exasperated, yet at bottom relieved, I left a message asking Ian to call me asap. And promising myself I’d make more time at break, I went off to teach.

  Break found the Rose Road number constantly engaged. Ollie’s phone was still switched off. And someone had left the Yellow Pages on my desk, open at ‘Estate Agents’. It didn’t take very long to turn it to ‘Caterers’. OK, so I couldn’t remember what they were called: seeing the name in print might just jog my memory. Might.

  Vineyard Caterers? Something to do with booze?

  Mags popped in, distributing the Union newsletter.

  ‘What’s the latest?’ I asked, wondering if it was worth my time to read it.

  ‘Jungle drums are reporting redundancies at George Muntz,’ she said. ‘That’s where you were, wasn’t it?’

  I nodded. And slapped my head. Grapevine! That’s what it was. And my finger was tapping the digits before I could work out why I’d thought of it. And before I’d thought of a plausible cover-story.

  My mother would have described as cultured the voice which answered. I said the first thing that occurred to me – that I was wondering about work experience placements.

  ‘Oh, I shouldn’t think so. We’re a very small organisation.’

  Infusing a benign glow of innocence into my voice, I jumped in before she could cut me off. ‘But you do some very prestigious events, don’t you?’

  ‘Well—’

  ‘Didn’t you do that wonderful spread at the Music Centre the other night? Saturday?’

  ‘That’s it, you see – we have to maintain our standards.’

  ‘Are all
your staff specially trained, then? Or do you use temps?’

  ‘Even the temporary staff are trained silver service waiters.’

  Great. I was getting precisely nowhere, and irritating her to boot.

  ‘Ah,’ I said, playing for time, ‘that explains their professionalism. In fact,’ I added, growing ever more inventive, ‘I was speaking to one of your young men on Saturday, at the Music Centre Reception, about the possibility of his doing further training. I promised him some information about part-time courses. But I can’t remember his name, only that he lived in Acocks Green.’

  ‘Acocks Green? In that case, Miss Er – I don’t think I’m able to help you. We only take on staff from – er—’

  The better suburbs, no doubt. God, what snobs! And wasn’t that outright discrimination?

  She realised what she’d said. ‘The travel, you know. Acocks Green is rather – remote. Good after—’

  ‘Oh, but he was very well-spoken. Public school, I think he mentioned.’ God forgive me! ‘Very tall, very well turned-out. A credit to you. And I feel so bad about letting him down—’

  ‘Let me think – it could be – I’m afraid I simply can’t divulge names over the telephone, Miss Er – it would be entirely irresponsible. If you care to leave the materials you spoke of at my office I would be happy to pass them on. The Olton office.’

  Hell – miles away. Quick! ‘Do you do most of your work that side of the city?’

  ‘Indeed no. This evening, in fact, we shall be catering at the Cem – I really don’t know why you’re asking all these questions. Good afternoon.’

  Win some, lose some. The Cem – It couldn’t be the Cemetery, could it. Come on, Sophie. The Cem – No. Nothing. No further forward – and late for class.

  All the snow had disappeared in the course of the day: there was even a hint of premature spring in the air. Time to go home. Sure enough, my Renault sat patiently in the car park. Remembering why the police had been looking after it for me, I approached it quite gingerly. It seemed all right. I’d seen people on TV looking under their cars: I’d look too, even if I wasn’t sure what for.

  Returning to the vertical I found Richard peering at me.

  ‘Exhaust,’ I said.

  ‘Well, it is Friday,’ he said. And got into his Volvo and reversed out.

  Friday. Freya’s day. Come to that, Thor’s day and Woden’s day. And there’s that Black Country town, Wednesbury, to which radio announcers allocate four distinct syllables while we all pronounce it Wensbry. I was well into the Monument Road traffic jam for the Ivy Bush intersection with Hagley Road, cheering myself with musings about mispronunciations, when it struck. What if, by all that was wonderful, Catering Woman hadn’t said ‘Cem—’ but ‘Cen—’ and she was talking about the Centennial Centre? Half a mile from here. Less. And I was a few cars short of the one-way system. Signalling, belatedly, I wrenched the car round into one of the side roads and wriggled it round to face the opposite direction. I was on my way.

  Parking was easy. Slotting into a place marked ‘Reserved’, I locked up and prepared to march in. Except it wouldn’t be as simple as that. Security was sensible everywhere these days, and I didn’t want to have to try Catering Woman’s patience with any more specious explanations.

  They say the devil looks after his own. At this point a little Rascal drew up: a delivery of flowers. They were cutting it a bit late if the function was this evening. And only one young woman to wrestle all those pretty table posies into the hall! Perhaps it would be polite to offer …

  As I debated the risk, the woman disappeared inside, reappearing almost immediately with a tall young man wearing a white chef’s jacket. I looked more closely. The young woman was an ex-William Murdock student. That was it – her parents had wanted her to take a degree, but she’d managed to get a temporary job in a florist’s. At first she’d planned simply to take a year out, but she ended up enjoying her work so much she’d thrown up Uni altogether to manage a new branch of the florist’s: ‘Fleur’s’, tritely enough. And she – she was – Roberta? Some bad female adaptation of a male name – always reminded me of a lip-salve, or a disease. That was it! Nigella.

  I approached slowly. It was dark, after all, and I had to be sure. But the gods were definitely on my side.

  ‘Hey! Sophie, what are you doing here? Haven’t seen you for ages! How are you doing? Oh, hell—’

  One of the posies slipped out of the shallow cardboard box: I fielded it.

  ‘Well held!’ A male voice. And the voice came with enormously long legs and chef’s trousers.

  It didn’t take the three of us long to carry in the remaining boxes; it was natural that I should help Nigella distribute the posies on the tables. But it was equally natural for Long-legs to back out and return to the kitchen – as he was now doing.

  ‘Excuse me,’ I said, sounding horribly like Joyce Grenfell, ‘but haven’t I seen you …’ No, it was too crass. I sounded as if I were trying to pick him up.

  He stopped, and looked back at me. ‘Yeah, weren’t you at the Music Centre? The main act’s sister, or something?’

  ‘Cousin. And – I’m sorry, I don’t know your name—’

  ‘Ford.’

  ‘Ford – any chance of a quick word?’

  He shrugged but, deciding it was best to humour the senile, motioned with his head to the door nearest to the kitchens.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Look, Ford – I’m looking for someone. A student of mine.’

  For a moment he stared, and then, hearing a movement behind him, turned. ‘Not Karen, by any chance?’ he asked.

  And there she was, decked out in the neat Grapevine waitress’s uniform.

  Irresponsible was the most restrained of the words I could find to describe her, but there was no point in using it. She was seventeen, above the age of consent, and he was eighteen, so no legal blame could be attached to either of them. There was something touching – or nauseating – in the way they kept their hands on each other as they talked: his thumb slotted into her waistband, her hand cupping his right buttock. The sad thing was, of course, that the romantic idyll would have to be interrupted. The police and her parents needed to know the truth and they’d have to face, at the very least, recriminations. For though I hadn’t spelt it out to Ian, I’d bet my next summer holiday that he’d deduced Karen had some plans in mind for Andy’s drink, and I was equally sure that Diane Stephenson wouldn’t forget my questions about coriander.

  Which reminded me.

  ‘Karen,’ I said, interrupting the flow of their protestations of mutual love, ‘I have to talk to you. OK, Ford?’

  ‘OK. I should be back in there anyway.’ He kissed Karen lingeringly on the lips and pushed back into the kitchen.

  ‘What’s up?’

  ‘It’s about Andy—’

  ‘You’ve never been and shown him my letters!’

  I shook my head. ‘More serious than that. Karen – did you put anything in that flask of his?’ I was appalled with myself. What had happened to tact? Or even common-sense?

  But she was flushing. Not with righteous anger, but with guilt. She hung her head like a five-year-old.

  ‘Well?’ I tried to make my voice gentle.

  ‘I wanted him to – you know. Fancy me. And there was a piece in this magazine talked about it. And Mum’s always on about making things happen if you really want them to – I mean, she was in the same shop as Robin Gibb one day, so it only goes to show. So I looked in the library and I found this book and it said coriander was an aphrodisiac. But then there was a jar of it in the kitchen: Mum’s got a lot of herbs she never uses. And I thought, if I could get it into one of his flasks – you know he has a supply made up and keeps one on stage – then maybe I could get off with him at the party. But then, when I’d done it – put the coriander in – this Australian guy reckons he doesn’t have any special order for his flasks, so he could just as easily drink mine first as last, and fall in love with someone else
.’

  ‘I don’t think aphrodisiacs work quite like that,’ I said. ‘How much coriander did you use? Was it seeds, or dried leaves?’

  ‘Just said “powdered”. About this much, I suppose.’ She held her thumb and forefinger about an eighth of an inch apart. ‘Between two flasks? Oh, Sophie! You’re not saying – it hasn’t done him any harm, has it? Made him ill? He wasn’t allergic – oh, my God!’

  ‘No, no! Calm down. No, Andy’s perfectly all right. Perfectly.’ I bit back all the things I wanted to say about her stupidity; they’d come soon enough from the police. I didn’t see Diane Stephenson accepting the story as phlegmatically as I had. ‘Look, you have to go and phone home. And tell them you’re going home tonight.’

  Her eyes flared. ‘Not to stay! We’re – we’re – I want to stay with Ford?’

  ‘Take him as well,’ I said, suddenly tired.

  Chapter Seventeen

  There was no point in going home: choir practice started at seven-thirty. There was just time to fight my way through the Five Ways traffic jam and into Tesco’s; who knows there might even be a sandwich left, or a healthyish snack. Right now I’d murder for a Kit-Kat, or some of those wonderful Belgian chocolates ready to leap into my trolley … Come on, Sophie – it’s serious-shop time. Loo rolls; kitchen towels; tights; muesli; tea: I’d prise myself out of bed good and early tomorrow and cycle down to the butcher’s and the deli in Lonsdale Road to get the more interesting things. Select the shortest checkout queue. Pray the bags don’t tear. Back to the car park, shopping in the back seat, and off to the redundant church hall where choir practice would start in five minutes.

  I’d failed to buy both the forbidden chocolate and a more sober sandwich, but managed to cadge some biscuits set aside for out mid-evening break. And then into Brahms’s German Requiem.

  I knew it like the back of my hand. I could go on automatic pilot.

  One could always rely on Luigi to find food. Indeed, he prided himself on being able to provide spectacular snacks, so it made sense to go back with the others to The Duke of Clarence. I wouldn’t drink, of course, not even after one of his wonderful baguettes: Maria’s, more accurately, full of genuine Italian sausage and vegetables she always appeared to have picked from a non-existent garden just before trapping them in new bread. Yes, one of Maria’s rolls: the thought of it kept me going, despite the rather pedestrian pace our choral director had for some reason chosen.