The Elephant Girl (Choc Lit)

by Gyland, Henriette

  To her surprise Whitehouse caught up with her in Back Hall reception.

  ‘Here, take my card,’ she said, and held out a pristine-looking business card as perfect as her manicured fingernails. ‘If you do find anything, no matter how insignificant you think it is, give me a call, and we’ll chat about it. I can’t promise anything, but it’ll help me get a clearer picture of what happened. In the meantime, I’ll read up on the case.’

  ‘Why are you being so nice to me?’

  ‘You sound like that doesn’t happen very often.’

  ‘It doesn’t.’ Except Jason, who’d been unfailingly nice, even when she’d lied to him.

  Cool blue eyes sought Helen’s for a moment. ‘Maybe I understand how you feel.’

  ‘How can you?’

  ‘I lost my own mother when I was young. A hit-and-run. They never got the guy. Believe me, I know how it eats away at you.’

  ‘Do you think I’m making it all up? That “my mind is conjuring up images because it’s desperate”?’

  Whitehouse pressed the card in her hand. ‘Here’s what I think. I think you’re confused, you’ve never really dealt with your mother’s death, and you were an unreliable witness. But, no, I don’t think you’re making it up.’

  Helen left with a feeling that it hadn’t been a complete waste. DI Whitehouse was going to read up on the case. She may well come to the same conclusion, that she hadn’t enough to go on for the case to be reopened, but it gave her an element of hope.

  Also, without meaning to, Wilcox had given her an idea. If he wasn’t prepared to try and find the old witnesses, she would find them herself.

  Jason was having a quiet day at the market when his mobile rang.

  It was Trevor. ‘Any chance you could come by the house this afternoon? There’s something I need to talk to you about.’

  ‘I can come now. I’ll close up for the day. Unless you want to tell me over the phone.’

  ‘Face to face is best,’ said his uncle, and hung up.

  Trevor opened the door before Jason had a chance to knock. ‘I’m off to the park with Jessie. Walk with me.’

  The Rottweiler was sitting by his feet, lead in mouth, wagging her tail. Trevor clipped it on and locked the door behind him.

  ‘Someone’s excited,’ said Jason as Jessie pulled them along the pavement, muscles rippling.

  ‘Best thing she knows. Some dogs love food, others just want to laze on the sofa all day. For Jessie it’s walkies. Here, girl, look what I’ve got.’

  Trevor pulled a rubber ball out of his pocket, and Jessie whined and bounced up to grab it off him with what Jason could only describe as a big grin on her face. One day he’d like to have a dog like Jessie. That, and a houseful of kids. Then he remembered why he was here.

  ‘What did you want to—’

  ‘Not here,’ said Trevor.

  At the park Trevor unclipped the lead and gave Jason the rubber ball to toss. Jessie ran after it, brought it down like it was prey, then trotted back, but ran off again as soon as Jason reached for it.

  ‘So that’s how you wanna play.’

  Jessie growled in reply and moved out of his reach when he tried to take the ball again.

  ‘Oh, she’ll have hours of fun doing that. Never tires of it. Let’s indulge her.’ Trevor took a step towards the dog who kept running off and coming back, always keeping the ball just out of reach as they moved along the path. Finally she placed it at Jason’s feet and allowed him to toss it again.

  ‘I wanted to talk to you about my time with your dad,’ said Trevor. ‘Something I’ve never told a living soul, not even Lucy. You know I started out as his chauffeur. A few years after, I moved on to personal security, although I still did a bit of driving. There wasn’t a job description as such.’

  ‘Like Jones?’

  ‘Yeah, a bit like Jones.’ Trevor’s lip curled, either from humour or distaste. ‘You’d be surprised how much of a commitment it is to keep a man like your father safe. You’ve gotta have an eye on every finger 24/7 and be ready to act if you see any threats. No good hesitating. Like being on presidential detail, I suppose.’

  ‘Did you ever have to, er, get rid of any threats?’

  ‘Might’ve hospitalised one or two. Never had an official complaint, though.’ He grinned. ‘Of course, Lucy put a stop to that when we met. Wanted me on the straight and narrow, or I’d be out on me ear, thank you very much. Her exact words.’

  ‘Sounds like her,’ said Jason. It shook him a little, hearing Trevor refer to the job of guarding his father as nothing more than an ordinary day at the office. Despite his efforts he’d never quite succeeded in making himself immune to what his father did for a living. ‘Did it involve guns? Knives?’

  ‘Sonny, this is your father we’re talking about. He’s as legit as they come in his line of business. Just don’t make the mistake of taking legit for softness. There are many ways a person can be persuaded, know wha’ I mean.’

  ‘I can guess,’ said Jason drily.

  ‘So twenty years ago, give or take, I was driving your old man around. This was a job with very anti-social hours. Late into the night, early morning sometimes. Including one morning, at Ealing Common.’

  Jason swung around, and blood rushed to his head with a whoosh. ‘What?’

  ‘Sorry, I didn’t click, not until you asked me to look into the Mimi Stephanov thing. Then I remembered more than I wanted to. Never told a living soul, and I wasn’t planning on telling you either. Not until Lucy … well it was something she said last night. Something to do with the length of Derek’s involvement in that company. I knew he met with someone that day.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘I didn’t see.’ Trevor shook his head. ‘I was told to stay in the car. I didn’t like it and said so. He told me he didn’t pay me to have an opinion. So I stayed put. Later I heard a woman was stabbed, but your dad assured me he had nothing to do with that.’

  ‘You believe him?’

  Trevor shrugged. Just because he didn’t work for Derek Moody any more that didn’t release him from the obligation to keep his mouth shut. Jason knew that.

  ‘Do you think he met with Mimi Stephanov?’ he asked.

  ‘I couldn’t say.’

  ‘What can you say?’

  His uncle sent him a dark look. ‘Lucy will have my guts for garters,’ he muttered.

  ‘Lucy is the least of your problems right now.’

  ‘You’re not married to her. Okay, what I can say is he wasn’t gone long. Came back looking …’ Trevor whistled for Jessie who was straying too close to a group of mums with toddlers. A little girl was crying, and her mother lifted her up and held her on her hip.

  ‘Could you keep your dog on a leash, please?’ she said.

  She was pint-sized, and Trevor, a six-foot-four ex-bodyguard with the advantage of probably a hundred and fifty pounds, towered over her. He slipped his finger under Jessie’s collar.

  ‘She’d never harm a kid no matter how excited she gets,’ he said.

  ‘Maybe not, but my daughter doesn’t know that.’

  ‘You’re absolutely right, madam. I suppose when you’re that age, big dogs can be scary.’ Trevor smiled at the little girl who’d stopped crying and was now staring at this mountain of a man with huge eyes. She’d stuck her thumb in her mouth, and her dark lashes were still dewy with tears.

  Jason experienced a curious kick inside. She reminded him of Helen, of what she must have looked like as a child. He could almost hear her crying, like a twenty-year-old echo.

  ‘Thank you,’ the woman said when Trevor had clipped the lead back on.

  ‘He came back looking like … what?’ Jason asked when they turned down a less crowded path in the park.

  ‘Sort of sick, worried maybe, not sure. He got back in the car and told me his contact didn’t turn up. He’d taken his suit jacket off and draped it over his hands inside out. When we found out later what had happened, he reassured me he had nothing to do
with it, like I told you, and I never pressed him, not even after we became related. No point with your old man.’

  ‘And that’s all?’ Jason couldn’t help the mixture of disappointment and relief warring inside him.

  ‘Pretty much, except he told me to stop at an all-night petrol station. Wanted to use the gents. When he came out, he’d scrunched his jacket into a bundle. I didn’t think it the proper way to treat a bespoke tailored jacket, but I thought it best not to say anything.’

  ‘Could he have wrapped something in his jacket?’

  Away from the toddlers and their concerned parents, Trevor released Jessie and tossed the ball again.

  ‘Possibly. You tell me.’

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  On Saturday while Jason was out, Helen had found the contact numbers for three local papers and placed an advertisement under ‘Classified’, appealing for the owner of an Airedale Terrier who’d been walking his dog on that particular morning to come forward if he had he seen something relevant to a murder which took place.

  She hadn’t said anything to Jason about the way his father’s name cropped up in connection with R & D. She sensed that he really liked her, and didn’t want to spoil it by blackening his father’s name before she knew if she had any real reason to. She also had mixed feelings about placing the ad. If the dog owner had anything to do with her mother’s death, she was potentially exposing herself. Even though contact would only be through the editor, it wouldn’t protect her against someone determined enough to find her, but it seemed like she had no other options left.

  It was like trying to find the proverbial needle in a haystack.

  There’d been no calls on Sunday and so far Monday was proving to be uneventful, other than the fact that Ruth had come to the office, which had only happened once in the three weeks Helen had worked there. She thought back to last Monday, when Ruth had seemed almost approving of Helen standing up to Letitia. Where did Ruth’s loyalties really lie? It was time to find out.

  The front office was empty, the secretary out to lunch maybe. Steeling herself for a possible confrontation, Helen put her hand on the door to Ruth’s office, but stopped at the sound of a high-pitched voice, bordering on the hysterical.

  Ruth.

  ‘You just can’t wait to get rid of her, can you? So you can get your hands on her shares.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ retorted Letitia, in her characteristic low voice. ‘Those shares would be divided between you, me and Helen. It won’t make any difference to Mother other than giving her the rest she needs, and the three of us will have more power on the board.’

  ‘Yes. Helen,’ Ruth spat. ‘What made you take her under your wing?’

  ‘That’s what Mother wanted. You see, I do listen to her. Besides, she works hard.’

  Helen half-snorted at that. The aunts could say what they liked about her; she had Aggie’s affection, and that was enough. She thought of barging right in, if only for the satisfaction of seeing their red-faced shame, but something held her back.

  Listen and learn.

  ‘That’s all you ever think about,’ Ruth complained. ‘Money, shares, the company. It’s like a stuck record.’

  ‘If you’d shouldered your part of the burden when we needed an extra pair of hands, things might’ve turned out differently. But oh no, you had to go off and try and have babies, spending a fortune only for them to tell you that your ovaries are shrivelled up like dried prunes.’

  There was a shocked gasp from Ruth, and she was silent for a moment. Despite her resentment, Helen couldn’t help feeling sympathetic.

  ‘You can be so cruel sometimes. You always know exactly where to stick the knife, don’t you?’

  ‘I’m just being realistic, Ruthie. And to think, there was a ready-made child you could’ve had,’ Letitia added. ‘Too bad that didn’t work out.’

  Didn’t work out? Helen stiffened. What did that mean? Had Ruth wanted her and not been allowed? But who hadn’t allowed it, the law or Aggie? It tallied with what her grandmother had said about wanting to keep her away from Arseni. As a blood relation he would have had a claim, but Ruth wouldn’t.

  Letitia sighed exasperatedly. ‘But why don’t we put it behind us for now? I do think it’s best for Mother to go into a nursing home. I worry about her mental capabilities, and the daily care is really too much for Mrs Sanders. She’s told me so on a couple of occasions.’

  Hah, thought Helen, still just outside the door. From what she’d witnessed of the nurse’s engagement, it had seemed like a pretty cushy job to her.

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with her mind,’ Ruth snapped. ‘Her disability is physical. Mrs Sanders stays, and we engage a male nurse to do the heavy lifting.’

  ‘You’re not thinking straight. If she stays for now, six months later we’ll be faced with the same problem. By then she may have donated her shares to a cat society or something equally eccentric.’

  ‘Maybe thinking straight isn’t my strongest point, but I know for a fact that Mother would prefer to stay in her own home for as long as possible. And even if she’s in a nursing home, she’ll still have her solicitor to look after her financial affairs, so you may whistle for those shares all you like!’

  ‘Despite your low opinion of me I just want to make sure she isn’t being exploited. This Sweetman character …’ Letitia paused, ‘well, he’s hardly our kind, is he? Who knows what sort of hold he has over her? Their association never made sense to me.’

  ‘Maybe I’ll ask Helen what she thinks,’ said Ruth.

  ‘Helen? She has nothing to do with this.’

  ‘She should do. Mother is very fond of her, you know. I could probably persuade her to be on my side in this.’

  Letitia scoffed. ‘I doubt it. Not after the way you let her down. You could’ve been her new mummy but you didn’t want a child that wasn’t perfect. You didn’t even try to make her love you.’

  ‘I never said—’

  ‘Not only that, but she was the child of the woman who slept with your husband. Admit it, you couldn’t even bear to look at her. You’d have made a terrible parent!’

  Helen stifled her horror with her hand. She’d heard enough. Trembling and battling with a sudden headache, she tiptoed backwards and left as quietly as she had come.

  On the stairs she met the secretary clutching a greasy sandwich bag. ‘Can I help you?’

  ‘No.’

  Screw them both, she thought.

  Screw them all.

  She collected her rucksack and jacket from the staff room, then stormed out the front, baffling the security guard. She had to get away. Away from the aunts and their poisonous, complex relationship. Aggie who manipulated them all like a giant toad in her nest, Arseni and his cloying attention.

  Away from Fay and the feelings of wanting revenge, which hung over her like a dark cloud. From the doubts which sucked all the energy out of her.

  Everything which stopped her having a normal, proper life.

  In her bag she had what she needed: money, phone, medication, the picture of her parents. The rest could come. She would jump on a train out of London, to Scotland maybe, and leave it all behind. Start again.

  She was halfway to Kings Cross station when she realised this meant leaving Jason too.

  This is no good, she thought, as she stood outside the imposing entrance to R & D again. She’d overheard enough to cause her immense pain, but she owed it to Ruth, and to herself, to get the whole story. The danger of eavesdropping was that it gave you only half the picture.

  Thoughts of Jason had cooled her anger, like a glass of milk on an ulcerated stomach. He wouldn’t just walk off. He would stay and get to the bottom of things, do what was right, not for himself but for others. He could have thrown her out of the house when he discovered the truth about her, but he didn’t. She admired him for that.

  More than anything, it was the idea of never seeing him again which had stopped her from beginning a new life in the Outer Hebri
des. She’d run away once before, and it hadn’t solved anything. This time she wouldn’t.

  ‘Thought you’d got the sack the way you took off earlier,’ said the security guard.

  ‘No, not the sack,’ she replied, and clomped up the stairs to the offices again.

  Neither of the aunts were there, the secretary informed her. ‘But Mrs Partridge will be back soon. You can wait in her office.’

  Helen sent her a questioning look.

  ‘I know about the family connection,’ she added. Was it Helen’s imagination, or was she just a bit less sniffy?

  ‘Thanks.’

  Ruth’s office was as richly furnished as Letitia’s. Gleaming desk, Persian rug, grandfather clock, a hideous but expensive onyx globe in the corner. It was also completely devoid of anything personal, not even a magazine to read, probably because Ruth was rarely here. Helen dropped down into a shiny leather sofa to wait for her. After half an hour Ruth still hadn’t returned, and when she stuck her head out of the door, the secretary’s station was empty and her computer switched off.

  Helen debated with herself whether to continue waiting or maybe catch Ruth another day, except she had no idea when Ruth would be in the office again. Then she spotted her aunt’s handbag on the floor beside the desk, and decided to snoop. She had no reason to, other than feeling bloody-minded. And, she had to admit, a hope that Ruth would come back and say … well, something. Anything to take away the feeling that nobody could be bothered with her. That she was nothing but a nuisance.

  But there was nothing interesting in Ruth’s handbag, so she tried the desk drawers instead. There had to be something personal somewhere. Even though it was an office, it wasn’t right that there was so little life in it.

  But the desk drawers contained only stationary. She was thinking about turning on her aunt’s computer when her eyes fell on the grandfather clock. It was one of those longcase clocks with a pendulum and weights, the kind that would tick so loudly the sound would fill the office. Except this one was either broken or hadn’t been wound in a while, because it wasn’t ticking.