by Adam Nevill
It was becoming difficult to maintain the smile. But what she intended to do was invasive. She had shown up in the rain to interrogate the staff, and potentially a long-term resident, for information about apartment sixteen. She knew from Stephen that these exclusive apartment buildings in west London were often havens where the wealthy and famous expected the strictest privacy and security. Porters were forbidden to give out any pertinent information about the residents or the building. Stephen told her kidnap was now an ever-present danger for the children of the wealthy.
‘So what can I do to help you, Miss Apryl? Today I am the happy man because of the pay day see? So anything at all I am happy to do for you.’
‘Well, I have a strange request.’
Piotr slapped one hand over his heart. ‘At last the day is a here. When the beautiful lady comes into the Barrington House and say she have a request for me, no?’
Don’t push it, fat boy. ‘I don’t know whether you know, but this building has some history. You see, a painter lived here. A man called Felix Hessen.’ Without revealing the fact that he lived in number sixteen, Apryl watched Piotr’s face for traces of recognition, but it remained blank and slightly distracted as if he was merely thinking of the next thing to say to her. Before he could interrupt, she told him of her research into her great-aunt’s life and of her desire to speak with a long-term resident, someone who had lived in the building since just after the Second World War.
‘Ahh.’ He raised one finger in the air. ‘I think there are two peoples that live here after the war, no? Mrs Roth and the Shafers. Very, very old now, yes? But their nurses tell Piotr that they live here oh so long ago.’
‘That’s amazing. My great-aunt said she was friends with Mrs Roth, and Mr and Mrs Shafer. How do you spell those names?’
He moved back behind the desk and opened a leather-bound ledger on the desktop.
One of his plump fingers moved down a list of names and telephone numbers stored beneath the laminated pages of the desk ledger.
Quickly, she leant over the desk. Her eyes became frantic, flicking up and down the names and searching for apartment and telephone numbers. She looked at the place in the ledger where Piotr’s index finger had paused: Mrs Roth, followed by three phone numbers. One was next to what had been misspelled as Dawter, another was next to Nerse, and the third read Landline. This was an 0207 number and she quickly committed it to memory while fishing for her cell phone.
While Piotr talked quickly about them meeting for ‘the coffee, no? To speak about the history and the aunt Lillian, yes?’ she smiled and nodded, half-listening but trying to screen out the sound of his voice while she quickly added Mrs Roth’s number to the address book of her phone. When she caught Piotr studying her, she raised the phone to her ear, as if to listen to a message. ‘Sorry, I have to listen to this. A voicemail.’ She rolled her eyes as if irritated. After a suitable pause she snapped the lid of the phone shut, shaking her head. ‘Not what I thought.’ Then looked into Piotr’s eyes and smiled.
He went into a diatribe about ‘the mobile’, while her eyes scoured the page of the open ledger again to find the Shafers. There it was: number twelve, with one phone number given, which she also rehearsed and then surreptitiously inputted into her cell phone by holding it below the top of the desk.
‘It is not so good at this time to speak to Mrs Roth and the Shafers.’ Piotr beamed and held out his arms. Then closed his eyes. ‘Ahh, but I will surely tell them that you asked about the aunt Lillian, no? In the mornings they don’t like to be disturbed. Maybe if we meet and you tell me the interesting story about the aunt Lillian, then I can say to them: hey, I know this really nice lady who comes to our lovely building and is the relative of Lillian. Then I think they might say the yes, no?’
‘No.’ She couldn’t keep the edge out of her voice. But then softened it to say, ‘I don’t have time. I’m very busy with sorting out the apartment and seeing . . . friends in the evening. I can catch up with these people another time.’
Maybe the Shafers and Mrs Roth would be annoyed when she called. They’d already refused to see her once. It was all such a long shot. But it was a shot she had to take if she was to validate anything in Lillian’s journals. Miles had said as much in the bar in Notting Hill the night before. After reading a few of Lillian’s journals he was suddenly very keen for her to find out whether anyone had seen Hessen’s paintings in Barrington House before he disappeared. For an art historian, this kind of information would be a coup.
Apryl was shepherded by Piotr up to the door that connected the lobby to the east wing. Close to her, his breath was unpleasantly warm on her face and neck, and the broken-English banter was relentless, insistent, until she practically fell into the sombre elevator to escape the bulbous shape beaming through the glass of the doors as they slid shut. He mimed the holding up of a phone, while showing her all of his little square teeth.
She half-turned and pretended not to see his hand signals. But then saw something else from the corner of her eye. She glimpsed it in the mirror at the back of the carriage. Something moving quickly behind her shoulder. Tall and thin and whitish, it rapidly vanished from her line of sight.
Sucking in her breath, she lurched around to see the gleaming but empty carriage. Nothing there but her. ‘Jesus,’ she said, breathing out. Then looked at the panel, as the elevator made what felt like a deliberately slow ascent. Six, seven . . . come on . . . eight . . . nine. And why wasn’t the door opening now? It hadn’t ever taken this long before, had it?
With a swish the doors finally opened and she rushed out of the carriage, looking back over her shoulder, at herself in the elevator’s mirror, at her frightened pale face. A face with an expression she’d only ever seen before in the mirrors of Barrington House.
‘Who is this? What do you want?’ The tone of voice was as unsettling as the smashing of crockery on a tiled floor.
Apryl cleared her throat, but the thin voice that slipped out was not one she cared to recognize as her own. ‘I’m . . . Er, my name is—’
‘Will you speak up! I can’t hear you.’ Mrs Roth’s voice rose beyond annoyance. Elderly, sharpened by age, too brittle for warmth, it instantly made her want to hang up.
‘Mrs Roth.’ She raised her voice, but couldn’t banish the tremor from her words. ‘I hope you don’t mind me disturbing you, but—’
‘Of course I do. Who are you?’ In the background she could hear the music from a television show.
‘My name is Apryl Beckford, and I’m—’
‘What are you saying?’ the old woman shouted, adding, ‘I don’t know who it is’ to someone who must have been in the room with her. ‘No! Don’t touch it. Leave it! Leave it!’ she shouted at the other occupant.
‘The television. Perhaps you should turn the television down,’ Apryl prompted.
‘Don’t be ridiculous. I’m watching it now. There’s nothing wrong with it. Stephen fixed it for me. I’m not interested in anything you have to sell.’ The phone hit the cradle with a sound like a stone hitting a windshield.
Apryl winced and listened to the dialling tone for a few seconds, too stunned to move.
Three hours later, sitting on the bed in Lillian’s bedroom, she called again. This time there was no sound of a television booming in the background. Instead, the woman sounded as if she’d just been roused from sleep.
‘Yes?’
‘Oh, I hope I didn’t wake you.’
‘You did.’ The words uncurled like something dark and mean, and in her mind Apryl saw small cruel eyes narrowing. ‘I don’t sleep at night. I’m not well. How can I sleep?’
‘I’m very sorry to hear about that, Mrs Roth. I hope you get well soon.’
‘What do you want?’ The question was more of a bark than a sentence.
‘I’m . . .’ Her mind went blank. ‘Well, I’m calling because—’
‘What are you saying? You’re making no sense.’
Then shut your mouth, you e
vil bitch, and I’ll make some sense. ‘I’m very interested in Barrington House, Mrs Roth. The history. You see—’
‘What’s it got to do with me? I don’t want to buy anything from you.’
Apryl imagined the phone crashing down again and braced herself. ‘I’m not selling anything. I’m the niece of Lillian Archer, Mrs Roth. I’m just trying to find out about her. I never knew her. And I believe you’ve lived here for a long time. I would really like to talk with you because I’m sure you have some very interesting stories. Especially about the artist—’
‘Artist. What do you mean, artist?’
‘Erm. A man called Felix Hessen. He lived—’
‘I know where he lived. What are you trying to do? Frighten me? I’m not well. I’m old. And it’s a cruel thing to call me and remind me of him. How dare you?’
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you, ma’am. Only, I’m visiting here from America to sort out my great-aunt’s—’
‘I’m not interested in America!’
Apryl closed her eyes and shook her head. What was wrong with these people? Apart from Miles, every tenuous connection to Hessen led her to the unstable, the dysfunctional and the senile. It was wearing her out. It was impossible to communicate with them. They didn’t listen. She was just there to function as an audience for their craziness. She took a deep breath. ‘You don’t have to be interested in America. Please, just listen to me. It’s quite simple really. I’m not trying to sell anything. Nor am I trying to frighten you.’ Irritation gave a force to her words.
‘You don’t have to shout, dear. It’s not very nice.’
Apryl bit her bottom lip. ‘I just want to talk to someone who knew my great-aunt, and the artist Felix Hessen. She wrote about him a lot. Nothing more. Just a conversation.’
And then an extraordinary thing happened that filled Apryl with remorse at having raised her voice to this confused and elderly lady she’d woken from a nap. Mrs Roth’s voice quivered with emotion and then thickened with a sob. ‘He was an awful man. And I can’t sleep because of him. He’s doing it again.’
‘Mrs Roth, please don’t cry. I’m sorry I upset you. I just want to speak to someone who was here when Lillian was alive.’
The crotchety voice disintegrated into a few frail words interspersed with sniffs. ‘I can still hear him. I’ve told them downstairs.’
Apryl struggled to comprehend what she was being told. ‘Mrs Roth, I’m sorry you’re upset. You sound so sad. My aunt was too. Because of him.’
‘Well I am, dear. And you would be too. You believe me, don’t you?’
‘Yes, I do. Of course I do. And talking to someone might help. I think you need a new friend, Mrs Roth.’
Somewhere in the apartment, the metronome of a clock’s hand struck a steely echo that travelled like sad tidings throughout the empty rooms. But she couldn’t see the clock or seem to be able to get any closer to the far-off sound. And it was still hard to believe homes like this existed in Barrington House: peeling and faded with neglect from floor to ceiling, room after room.
As the small Filipino nurse, Imee, scurried ahead of her, Apryl found herself in a daze, dawdling down the long hallway of Mrs Roth’s apartment, the soles of her boots landing hard against the worn carpet. It might have been blue once, but was now threadbare and grey.
To the side of the hatstand and telephone table, a small and aged kitchen presented itself, cramped with an old enamel cooker and refrigerator. It looked like it hadn’t been used in years.
Apryl glanced into the living room. With her quick eyes she caught glimpses of elegant disorder. A silver drinks trolley sat idle, loaded with crystal decanters, an ice bucket, tongs, and half-empty bottles of spirits. Ageing heavy furniture retreated sorrowfully into the corners. The air was shadowed by leaden drapes, drawn by heavy gold braid. And all this beneath a magnificent chandelier, hanging like a gigantic ice crystal over a mahogany table.
The thin light caught these once glamorous but now dust-filmed objects. They seemed frozen in a forlorn disappointment at the absence of whoever it was who once peopled the space. It made her melancholy. In the noisy maelstrom that existed outside, of angry traffic and marching strangers, of ugly, tragic council estates, of wind-blown garbage, beggars, and the intense energy that both drained and invigorated you at the same time, how could such stillness exist? Shabby with neglect but undisturbed and ominous in its silence, it was another quiet relic from an era of elegant ladies in long dresses and gentlemen in dinner jackets.
And there was nothing on any of the walls. No pictures, no mirrors – not so much as a single watercolour. Nothing.
An open door beside the bathroom revealed a smaller bedroom with an unmade bed. The nurse’s room, beside the Queen’s chamber. Outside which they came to stand. The nurse paused before the closed door and lowered her solemn eyes, too tired to even attempt an encouraging smile. Behind the antique door the sound of a television boomed. Imee knocked so loudly it made Apryl jump.
When a voice, fierce with age, cried out from the other side of the door, she entered the master bedroom.
Apryl suspected the wizened figure had been deliberately positioned and prepared for her arrival. Small as a child, with mottled arms as thin as sticks resting upon the covers, the big hands incongruous below the lumpy wrists, Mrs Roth sat propped up in bed. She was clad in a nightgown of blue silk edged with white lace, an outfit that did nothing but add to the horror of the aged body inside it. The carefully arranged but grotesquely old-fashioned hairstyle had the unmistakable sheen of hair that had been recently attended to. It was as high and perfectly conical as a bishop’s hat, but transparent. And the lipless beak of a mouth above the heavily grooved chin, protruding like the muzzle of a small dog, had been painted bright pink. Small eyes full of mistrust watched Apryl enter.
‘Sit there,’ the voice commanded while the hard eyes glanced at the two chairs at the end of the bed, arranged on either side of the television.
Smiling weakly, Apryl unlooped her bag from her shoulder and made a move for the nearest chair. ‘Hello, Mrs Roth. It’s so good of you to see me. I—’
‘Not there!’ the figure barked. ‘The other one.’
‘I’m sorry. I was just saying—’
‘Never mind all that. Take your coat off, dear. What kind of woman wears her coat indoors?’
On either side of the enormous bed in which the tiny figure was huddled at the very centre, surrounded by large white pillows, two small dressers were cluttered with photographs. The black-and-white faces all looked towards the foot of the bed, where Apryl now sat, uncomfortable on a hard chair with wings that obscured the room on either side of her head, tunnelling her vision forward to the little creature among the pillows.
An audience had truly been granted. But what kind of audience? Mrs Roth’s manner was hardly conducive to any kind of reasonable conversation – but that was the point. The clever old bird maintained complete control of both the discourse and the visitor by immediately unsettling and belittling them with her unpleasantness. And who was anyone to object, either as a guest or as a disempowered member of staff on her payroll, like the porters downstairs? Even the garrulous and feckless Piotr shuddered at the mention of Mrs Roth. And poor little Imee’s face reflected the same fear and aversion. The nurse didn’t enter the room – some rule probably forbade her doing so. Instead, she waited at the door.
But as Miles had reminded Apryl, Mrs Roth was one of a small and shrinking group of people still alive who could attest to the existence of Hessen’s mythical paintings. She was now here on Miles’s behalf too. More importantly, Mrs Roth had known Lillian. And the last tangible traces of her great-aunt’s life were evaporating.
At least Mrs Roth was more lucid than Alice from the Friends of Felix Hessen, and beneath her inhospitable carapace there was a vulnerability about the old woman.
‘I don’t want to talk about him,’ Mrs Roth said, as if reading her mind.
‘Mmm?’ Ap
ryl asked.
‘You know who I am talking about. Don’t play games with me. I’m not stupid. But you are a bloody fool if you think I am.’
Then why did you agree to see me? She couldn’t risk an argument. Mrs Roth was not someone to trifle with, but to weather until the woman’s mood changed. And she knew from experience that the rude and unpleasant were not insensitive to flattery; the very insecurity that created a menacing facade could be turned into an Achilles’ heel.
Apryl smiled her sweetest and most guileless smile. ‘Not for a minute would I suggest such a thing, Mrs Roth. Would a fool live in such a grand apartment? I’ve never had the pleasure to see such a place.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous. It’s terrible.’ But no sooner had her attempt to win Mrs Roth been rebuffed than the old woman’s mood changed swiftly to something more agreeable. Her cheeks flushed and her eyes flared with self-importance. ‘You should have seen it when my husband was alive. We had such wonderful parties, dear. You’ve never seen anything like them. Full of lovely people. The kind of people you would never meet. You have no idea how charming the men were. You’ve never met such gentlemen. And the beauty of the ladies. You girls are nothing compared to how we used to be. I mean, look at you, dear. You should do something with your hair. It’s awful.’
Apryl tried to maintain her smile. ‘Yes, I should. Maybe you could recommend somebody. As soon as I came in, I noticed the lovely colour of your hair. It’s so shiny.’ Apryl looked at the carefully domed wisps and smiled as sincerely as she could.
Mrs Roth blushed. ‘Would you like some tea?’
‘That would be nice.’
The old lady picked up a small brass bell from her bedclothes and began to ring it furiously. ‘Oh where is she?’ she cried out at exactly the same moment she began to ring the bell.
In seconds the door opened and Imee shuffled in, her eyes lowered to her white gym shoes. ‘We want tea, Imee. Tea! My visitor has been in the rain and you have forgotten to make tea again.’