by Ruth Rendell
‘Police,’ said a voice. ‘If we might have a word.’
Inez unlocked the door. There were two of them, both men. The elder, who introduced himself as Detective Inspector Crippen, said he was sorry to trouble her but they were making routine enquiries. Inez thought his an unfortunate name for a police officer but supposed that to younger people it would mean nothing. Both of them were very different from handsome, suave, elegant Chief Inspector Forsyth.
‘What can I do for you? Is this something to do with the girl who was killed in Boston Place?’
‘That’s right, madam.’ She would almost have preferred him to call her ‘love’. ‘I expect you’ve seen about it on your TV.’
‘It happened nowhere near here. Boston Place must be a mile away.’
The younger one smiled indulgently. ‘Not quite as far as that. A person, gender unknown, was seen running from the scene of the crime, and a similar figure, according to a reliable witness, observed entering Star Street from the Edgware Road ten minutes later.’
‘What do you mean, “entering”? Still running or what?’
Crippen was about to speak when the door to the back hall opened about a foot, Jeremy Quick put his head round it, said, ‘I’m awfully sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt,’ and withdrew.
‘Who was that?’ said Crippen.
‘The tenant of the top-floor flat.’
‘We’ll want to talk to him. Where will he have gone, madam?’
‘Towards Edgware Road tube, I expect,’ said Inez.
‘You run after him, Osnabrook,’ said Crippen. ‘Come on now, be quick. Have you any more tenants, Mrs—er?’
‘Mrs Ferry. Yes, two. You were telling me whether this person, gender unknown, was running.’
‘Still running. Was there any possibility of you seeing this person? It would have been around nine fifteen on Thursday night.’
‘I was upstairs in my flat. The curtains were drawn.’ Inez gave a sigh of exasperation as the door was again opened.
But this time the intruder came in and closed the door behind him. Freddy Perfect was never, as Jeremy had once said, backward in coming forward. ‘Good morning, all,’ he said. ‘Not often we have callers this early, is it, Inez?’ He winked at her. ‘Must be pressing business.’
‘Is this gentleman another tenant, Mrs Ferry?’
Freddy answered for her. ‘I am not the tenant, sir. The tenant, Madame Ludmila Gogol, is my paramour.’
If this was the first time anyone had called Freddy a gentleman, so it was also probably the first time Crippen had been called ‘sir’ by any but subordinates. His reaction to Freddy’s word for his girlfriend or partner was a rapid blinking of the eyes. The street door opened and Osnabrook came back, preceded by Jeremy Quick.
‘It mustn’t take more than five minutes,’ said Jeremy. ‘I shall be late at the office.’
Osnabrook asked him about the running man but before Jeremy could answer, Freddy Perfect chimed in. ‘Now why would he have been running, is what I ask myself,’ he said conversationally. ‘I ask you. What or who was he running from? Was someone in pursuit?’
‘That we don’t know.’
Crippen said it impatiently and repeated his question to Jeremy. In the corner, by the large urn with the Parthenon frieze round its circumference, Freddy stood, sagely nodding his head and palpating in his hands a pair of Victorian opera glasses as if they were worry beads.
‘I did see him as a matter of fact,’ said Jeremy. ‘It was about ten past nine, a quarter past nine. I heard feet pounding along outside, you see, and brakes squealing. It was as if the person running had crossed a street, maybe the Edgware Road, and a car had had to brake to avoid him. I looked out of my window. Two of my windows look down on Star Street. He was running down the street towards Norfolk Square.’
‘You told no one about this?’
‘I didn’t make the connection.’
‘Of course he didn’t,’ said Freddy, putting the opera glasses down and picking up a silver napkin ring. ‘Why would he? Every time you see a person running you don’t think he’s escaping from the scene of the crime, now do you?’
‘Mr Quick?’
‘Exactly. He’s right. This chap might have been doing his evening work-out for all I know.’
Osnabrook cast up his eyes. ‘It was definitely a man? You’re sure of that.’
Jeremy suddenly looked nonplussed. ‘Now you say that, I’m not sure. I suppose it might have been a woman. Look, I do have to get to work.’
‘Just let us have a description before you go, Mr Quick.’
‘Now we shall see how observant he is, Inez,’ said Freddy.
At this third uncalled-for intervention, Crippen exploded. ‘If you don’t mind, Mr—er, whatever-your-name-is?’
‘Perfect,’ said Freddy. ‘Perfect by name and perfect by nature, as I always say,’ and with dignity, ‘I intended to be helpful.’
‘Yes, well, thank you. Did you get a good look at him—er, her, Mr Quick?’
‘Man or woman, he, she was quite young, twenties anyway, wearing jeans of some sort, ordinary jeans and a top, long-sleeved, no jacket. The lot a darkish colour, dark-grey or blue, I couldn’t tell, it was dark and colours look different by artificial light. I really do have to go now.’
‘Pity I didn’t see this—this hermaphrodite,’ said Freddy. Pleased with the word, he repeated it. ‘Hermaphrodite, yes. I could have furnished you with a detailed description.’ He held up a Venetian glass champagne flute to the light and peered through it. ‘As luck would have it, though, me and Ms Gogol were out having a refresher in the Marquise Restaurant.’
‘Please put that glass down, Freddy,’ said Inez sharply. ‘I’m sure I don’t know who said you could walk about in here examining everything as if you owned the place.’
Freddy looked injured. ‘It’s what customers do in junk shops.’
‘This is not a junk shop and as a customer you have yet to buy anything at all. Haven’t you anything better to do?’
Osnabrook said, ‘We’ll be going, then, so long as there’s no one else we ought to talk to. Haven’t I seen a young Asian girl about in here?’
Inez sighed. What man could forget the sight once seen? ‘She doesn’t live here. She works for me.’ Or would, she thought, looking at the grandfather clock, one of these fine hours.
‘We may want to talk to you again,’ warned Crippen, departing as Osnabrook held the door open for him.
‘Are you surprised we’re on the crest of a crime wave?’ asked Freddy. One thing you could say for him, he never took offence. This, too, had its disadvantages. ‘You know, if you’re ever looking for a second assistant I wouldn’t mind obliging, provided, of course, the money was right.’
He sat down in a grey velvet armchair that had been aunt Violet’s and settled himself for a cosy chat. Before Inez could reply to his offer with a categorical ‘no’ Zeinab came in.
‘We’ve had the Old Bill in here,’ said Freddy, ‘asking questions about the Rottweiler. Our mutual friend Mr Quick was able to give them some perfunctory details. Funny, they never said a word about the bite, wasn’t it?’
‘He doesn’t bite them,’ said Zeinab. ‘That was a mistake. It’s too distasteful for me to explain.’
Today’s miniskirt was of black leather with discreet gold studs, the angora sweater snow-white and shimmering. She had a golden bird on each of her fingernails to match the studs. Inez wondered that her strict father didn’t object to the way she dressed herself but perhaps he didn’t know, perhaps she sneaked out of the house in secret or even covered herself up in a chador.
‘Time you went, Freddy,’ Inez said briskly. ‘Ludmila will be wondering where you are.’
That would, in fact, be the last thing Ludmila was wondering. She would know very well and had an ongoing vendetta with Zeinab whom she suspected of setting out to fascinate Freddy. He got to his feet reluctantly, spotted for the first time the jaguar and began walking clockwise roun
d it, nodding his head as if in approval.
‘Freddy!’
‘I’m going.’ He waved to the jaguar, said he was in need of something ‘to wet his whistle’ and would return upstairs.
‘Now he’s gone,’ said Inez, ‘I’ll belatedly make the tea. How was your dinner with Mr Phibling?’
‘Much the same as usual. Nag, nag, nag and bits of poetry, lot of stuff about wanting to be with me under a tree with a loaf of bread and a bottle of wine. God knows why. Men do go on and on, don’t they?’
‘Some of them do.’
‘Rowley Woodhouse wants me to get engaged. He’s a real nutcase, he’s already bought the ring. I wish I could have the ring without the bloke.’
Inez went away to make the tea. When she came back with two mugs on a tray a woman in a fake-fur coat much the same colour as the jaguar had come in. She was standing in front of a long gilt-framed wall mirror Zeinab was doing her best to sell her, but after twenty minutes of giving it close examination she walked out without buying it.
‘I’m not sorry’ said Zeinab, as if she owned shop and mirror. ‘I don’t know where I’d be without that. I do my make-up in it.’
The best-regulated builders start work early and finish early. Keith was a good builder in that when he told a householder he would be with her early in the week he meant Tuesday and not Thursday afternoon and when he said he’d be back tomorrow he really did go back, if only for ten minutes. He turned up more or less when he said he would in the morning, that is, around eight, and kept his radio turned low or even switched it off if the client was a stickler for silence, as some peculiar people were. The work he did was quite good too. At first he had thought having a childish guy like Will Cobbett to work for him too much of a responsibility. Could he leave him alone in someone else’s place? Would he be ready on time when Keith called for him? Could he rely on him to do a simple job? No one had ever mentioned ‘learning difficulties’ or ‘chromosomal problems’ to Keith and he probably wouldn’t have taken Will on if they had. All he knew was that Will had been in care and was rather ‘slow’. But Will turned out to be a good worker, did what he was told, didn’t smoke or even want to smoke—Keith himself was odd in that he didn’t either—and seemed entirely reliable. All had been well until today, nothing to complain of, and if conversation with him was like talking to his ten-year-old nephew, better that than some of the crap previous employees had come out with. But now something disquieting had happened. His sister had taken a fancy to Will.
She still lived at home with their parents in Harlesden. He’d been over there on Sunday and while his mum was having her after-lunch nap and his dad was doing the dishes, Kim got him alone in the sitting room and confided in him. ‘Has he got a girlfriend, Keithy?’
‘I doubt it,’ he’d said. ‘He’s never said.’
‘I really fancy him. He’s ever so good-looking. He’s more like a Hollywood star than those actors that get on TV.’
‘Look, Kimmie, you know he’s not very bright.’
‘Well, what? Don’t say anything about brains, please. Dominic had brains, he was going to university, and look how he treated me. He’d have raped me if I hadn’t stuck a safety pin in his leg.’
‘I’ll tell you something,’ said Keith, ‘Will’ll never ask you out. You’ll have to ask him if that’s what you want.’
‘Where are you working tomorrow? Place in Abbey Road, isn’t it?’
‘Right, but you can’t come there.’
‘Why not? You said she’s out all day. I’ll pop in in my lunch-hour.’ Kim, who spoke with more courage than she felt, worked in a hairdresser’s in St John’s Wood High Street. ‘I’ll ask him. I don’t mind. I’ll tell him there’s this film I want to see.’
‘You’ve got a cheek,’ said Keith admiringly, ‘asking a bloke you don’t know to take you out.’
‘Well, that way I’ll get to know him, won’t I?’
He had laughed but still he was troubled. Will was young and big, he could be a more efficient rapist than that wimp Dominic. Still, his sister was a free agent and no innocent. No doubt she could handle it with the pin in the leg technique. Maybe they’d go out just the once and that would be an end to it. Having brains enough to go to a university was one thing, but a huge gap existed between that and Will’s level. Weren’t there plenty of men in that gap, on the scale from genius to vegetable, who would do for Kim? But Will was so very good-looking …
Morton Phibling had just left, having arrived in his orange Mercedes and spouted (Zeinab’s word) for a long time about his love being a garden enclosed, scented with many spices. Not for the first time Inez wondered where she had seen him before. Long ago it had been and somehow she connected him with Brian, her first husband, but further than that she couldn’t reach. A small mystery.
Zeinab opened a drawer in a Victorian medicine cabinet, took something out of it and flashed the diamond she had slipped on to the third finger of her left hand at Inez. ‘What d’you think? I popped it into the drawer while Morton was here. Rowley told me to wear it for a trial run. I haven’t made any promises.’
‘Very pretty,’ said Inez. ‘It’s reminded me about my earring. I’ll just go next door and see Mr Khoury, I won’t be long.’
She had a feeling they wouldn’t sell any more that day. As it was they had done rather well, offloading the big urn with the Parthenon frieze, which had been hanging about for months if not years, and selling all the Venetian glass to a woman who collected it. The white van with the notice about undergoing scientific dirt analysis was back. About time they clamped it, Inez thought. She was still looking suspiciously at the van when Keith Beatty’s drew up in front of it and Will got out. Ten past four. They always finished at four sharp.
She said, ‘Hello, Will, how are you?’ and he said, ‘Fine, thanks, Mrs Ferry.’ He stood there trying to puzzle out the notice and either failing or else understanding it but not finding it funny. Inez went into the jeweller’s.
Mr Khoury seized upon her as the person he had been awaiting all day on whom to unload his grievances. ‘Policemen came,’ he said in a shocked tone. ‘What am I to think? I tell you what I think. They come to arrest me as Al Qa-eda terrorist.’
‘Surely not, Mr Khoury.’
‘As you say, it is surely not true. It was the latest dead young lady. Am I seeing a running person on Thursday evening? You think I live on these premises? I say. Here? I say. Me, in this neck of woods?’ This was not very flattering to Inez but she let it pass. ‘I have fine detached home in Hampstead Garden Suburb, I tell them. Has anyone tried to sell me fob watch or keyring, they ask. They think I can’t read media? I am no fence, I tell them. Besides, will I touch this trash? Not with a beanpole. When they hear that they go away. Now, how may I help, madam?’
‘My earring,’ said Inez.
It was still being repaired, having been sent off to some mysterious workshop in Hungerford. No, he had no idea when it would be back. Re-entering the shop, Inez passed a satisfied-looking customer holding one of Star Antiques’ dark-blue carrier bags.
‘What did she buy?’ Inez asked, her guess having proved wrong. ‘It looked quite big. Not the Chelsea china clock with the man in a turban and the harem lady on top? I’d given up hope.’
‘No, and it wasn’t that animal either. It was a couple of brass candlesticks and them dried flowers.’
‘Shall I make another cup of tea?’
‘Not for me,’ said Zeinab. ‘Can I go home now, Inez? My dad gets funny if I’m not in by six.’
Why, then, didn’t he get funny when she went out with Morton Phibling or Rowley Woodhouse? Or did he think she was always in the company of women friends? Inez was tired of asking how she was going to get home—up to the West Heath from here was an awkward journey by public transport—and even more tired of having her offers of a lift refused. A pity, because she wouldn’t have minded going out, even if it meant being on her own after she had dropped Zeinab. There was a kind of melancholy
pleasure in anticipating sitting in her car by the Vale of Health pond or down at South End Green, looking at all the young people going into the lighted cafés, late shoppers buying greengrocery and men bouquets of flowers. It was warm for April. The sunset had coloured the sky with long bands of coral and apricot and primrose, clouds like tails of grey fur between them. Ah, well, she wouldn’t go on her own without a reason …
Zeinab touched up her lips, flicked back her hair and said cheers and she’d be seeing her. A possible choice of transport for her would be the 139 bus up to Swiss Cottage and then a change on to one that went up Fitzjohn’s Avenue. But Zeinab turned her back on the bus stop, crossed the Edgware Road at the Sussex Gardens lights and walked up towards Broadley Terrace and Lisson Grove. Passing men turned their heads to look at her and one, whom Zeinab categorised as a lowlife, called out, ‘What you doing later, darling?’
She ignored him. Entering Rossmore Road, she began to hurry for it was down there, in Boston Place, that Caroline Dansk had died. When Zeinab thought of the wire garrotte round the girl’s neck and then, when it had done its work, the ugly mask of a face closing over the swollen veins and the trap of a mouth biting, her whole body began to shake until she remembered he didn’t bite them after all.
But she was nearly there. She crossed the road and at the sign which said City of Westminster, Local Authority Housing, turned into the lane that ran between the blocks. At Dame Shirley Porter House the lift had broken down. Surprise, surprise. Zeinab walked up the three flights, inserted her doorkey into the lock on number 36 and called out, ‘Hi, kiddos, I’m home!’
CHAPTER 4
Refusing an invitation was so unlike Will that Becky could hardly believe she had heard him correctly. But made peculiarly sensitive by her guilt, she felt unable to ask him why not. She wouldn’t have asked any other potential guest so why ask him? After he had said he couldn’t come on Saturday, there was silence at the other end of the phone, pleasant and companionable but silence all the same.
‘Why not come over on Friday evening, then?’ She was always exhausted on Friday evenings. If it were anyone else, she could take him or her to a restaurant but Will wouldn’t like that. It was home he liked, familiar things about and familiar food. ‘If you can find your own way over I’ll take you home.’