The two ladies passed again in the middle, heads high, no greeting this time. Other staff had arrived, filling up the space. One of the women was crying.
Helen turned her back to the glass, regretfully. The sun rose a little higher. The day was all but accounted for: two hours form-filling, the relentlessly stupid, bureaucratic curse of working for cut-price, ill-managed justice, then a funeral, then the last of home improvements. Not bad for a day off which Redwood would resent because it was summer and she did not have children.
It had taken some time to get Shirley Rix arranged for her passage from corpse to ashes. The husband had made a fuss, said he wanted horses with plumes, until he realised fuss meant money and he only got a small grant for a fiery consignment to mother earth. Mr Rix might have been as sad as Mary Secura, but his primary symptom was resentment. He sat on one side of the Chapel of Rest, still bearing signs of prison pallor among persons looking slightly tanned, his son sandwiched between himself and his own mother with a smattering of hunched family behind, while on the other side was Shirley’s crowd, planning kidnap of the child and so full of hate they could scarcely say their prayers. The arrangement into combat zones was more appropriate to a wedding. Mary Secura, braced, but not motivated to keep the peace, bristled when Helen West slid into the seat beside her.
There was the disembodied sound of pre-recorded organ music and the sensation of being crushed by the queue waiting for the next one outside.
‘What are you doing here?’ Mary sniffed. ‘What did you have to come here for?’
‘Same as you. Showing respect.’
The place stank of flowers, the lingering perfume of exotic blooms, tributes in wreaths and hothouse bouquets. More sweetly from home-grown bunches of roses, sweet peas from allotments, backyard scented stocks predominating over sterile lilies.
‘How did you know this was going on?’ Mary hissed, her voice drowning in a languid hymn. Helen was wishing religious culture could catch up with the times: in a building with supermarket windows, it seemed odd to be playing music which belonged in a dark church.
‘You told me. You phoned me and told me, last week. You barked, remember?’
‘I still don’t understand why you came.’
‘I didn’t want you to think I’d forgotten, that’s all.’
They stood, filed out. There was a short, sharp squabble at the exit door, swiftly shushed into ominous silence. Shirley Rix’s son ran to his maternal grandad, he was yanked back none too gently and began to cry. He was a beautiful boy, Helen noticed, eyes like brown saucers and hair like a smooth thatch. They all breathed better, dispersed more quickly out in the heat, while the next queue moved in. Helen and Mary Secura sat on a bench, smoking; they watched the rest climb into cars while an older man rearranged the flowers, as if looking for his own.
‘That one over there,’ Mary said, ‘is under the impression he is Shirley’s dad. He could be right. Shirley didn’t think so. He wouldn’t listen when she wanted help. You’ve seen the photos: what do you think?’
‘Don’t know, doesn’t matter,’ Helen said. ‘But it did occur to me to wonder whether Shirley’s gorgeous little boy is really the same blood as the man who reckons he fathered him. I mean, look at them. Not remotely alike. Shirley had quite a past, didn’t she? I’m not examining her virtue, you understand, but if it ever came to needing to remove that boy from his dad’s care, well it might help to question Papa’s territorial rights. Can’t hurt Shirl, can it? Suggest it to the family. DNA testing would prove it. Filthy thought.’
‘Christ,’ said Mary. ‘I never considered that.’ She shivered, not quite knowing why it was so uncomfortable to either like or admire Helen West, setting herself against it.
‘You know DC Ryan, don’t you? He told me you were beaten up once. By a bloke. Is that true? That how you got a scar on your forehead?’
‘I bumped into something.’
Smoke wreathed upward through perfumed air.
‘You came to this funeral for me, didn’t you? You’re watching me.’
‘What’s so important about you? I came for Shirley. In case no-one else did.’
‘Oh fuck off. You’re just like every other lawyer I ever met. A bloody liar, only you do it nicely. Got to be an angle, I mean, you’ve got to want something, haven’t you? All right. I admit it. I’ve been to see your cleaning lady.’
‘I never asked you to do that.’
It was in her throat to say that she did not actually know how to utilise police power to her own personal purpose, that the ambit of her authority was smaller than any of them dreamed and that she had spent two hours filling in forms to stress her role as cog in wheel; but sitting on a warm wooden bench, with a view of a garden full of mourners drifting round like blossom, she could also sense the futility of trying to turn prejudice into realism.
‘Course you didn’t ask me to see her,’ Mary mimicked her voice. ‘Not in so many words. Can’t accuse you of anything so straightforward, can I now? Only it just happens to be Ryan, Bailey’s sexy little errand boy, who comes down to me and asks the questions, doesn’t it? Now is that coincidence or is it not? Don’t answer, I don’t want to know. How’s the decorating, by the way? Does he like it?’
‘Not in any way you would notice. He’s scarcely seen it.’
‘I gather from her, Cath Boyce I mean, that the place looks great and she’s been helping a lot.’
‘Yes, she has. Still does. I thought the best thing I could do was keep her busy and give her money. I don’t think anyone goes to heaven on my counselling skills.’
Mary stubbed out her cigarette, grinding it onto stone with a neat heel.
‘Cheap labour, isn’t it? Still, I suppose it’s better than no job at all. In answer to the question you meant to ask, your Cath seems fine. She got the long straw, after all. Such as, a man who hasn’t yet got round to hitting her in the face, somewhere to go when she left and no kids for blackmail fodder. More than most of my ladies get in a month of Sundays. Not frightened either, our Cath.’
‘Yes, she is. How can anyone not be frightened in her situation? She’s left him anyway. I wish I knew when people should stay or when they should go, but I hope she stays away.’
Helen said this with regret. It seemed such an indulgence to let Bailey traipse across her memory: Bailey’s distance, Bailey’s removal from anything, his taciturnity, followed by openness, making her feel like an occasional convenience in his life, not an influence.
‘I didn’t say anything about Cath,’ she began. ‘I didn’t come here to talk about her. Cath has her own willpower. I don’t want to talk about Cath; I don’t need to talk about Cath, I’m not even good on double motives—’
‘Nor am I, but we all have to pretend we aren’t, don’t we?’ Mary interrupted with a laugh so loud it fluttered the lilies. ‘Anyway, I’ll tell you what you want to know, in case you didn’t already. Your cleaning lady is getting reunited with her old man this evening. Whatever he’s done, she still loves him. So she’s going out tonight, meeting him from work, all dressed up in her glad rags. From what I can see, you’ve even provided her with the frock; she showed me. Good gear you gave her, you gotta be made of money. Or guilty as sin to be giving away stuff like that. She says you haven’t paid her.’ Another drag of fresh cigarette. ‘Haven’t paid her for all the work she’s done. Painting, all that.’
Helen was calm, growing calmer. Seeing Cath take home all those clothes.
‘You’re making this up as you go along, Mary. She’s certainly cheaper than a decorator, but that wasn’t why … What do you mean? Sure, I gave her clothes, that’s my business, and I always pay her far more than she asks.’
Mary took no notice.
‘Well anyway, she’s going out with the little fucker tonight. The man might have killed her brother and she’s going out with him like a virgin girlfriend, full of hope, outfit provided by the Crown Prosecution Service to save money all round, I ask you. Don’t offer me a hanky whi
le I cry, I’ve got my own.’
She was back into that big bag, diving deep down in there among the radio, paper handkerchiefs, the scarf, the notebook and all the detritus of a woman who carries her life around. The thing looked like a punch-bag, Mary could have flung it round her head and thrown it like a hammer, she was strong enough and sufficiently angry. Helen ventured one more question.
‘Where is she meeting him? Cath, meeting her old man?’
‘I thought you would know,’ Mary spat. ‘You probably made them a dinner reservation.’
Helen stood up, shook out her skirt: there were petals in the folds of the cloth. She thought of Cath, morose and uncommunicative the whole weekend, giving nothing away.
‘Enough, Mary. Enough. If you can tell me how I can help Cath, I’ll listen, but otherwise, not.’
Mary had fallen into silence, wanting to spit or apologise, the way she always wanted things too late, and then went on, making them worse.
‘Advice? About Cath? Strikes me you already gave it. There’s nothing you can do. She’ll help herself to freedom, or she won’t. Besides, you wouldn’t want to stop her painting your windows, would you? Just don’t interfere. You won’t make it better. No-one can.’
Do not interfere. Bailey remarked this very English precept, which was honoured the length of the number 59 bus route, more so in the environs of Knightsbridge than in the neighbourood of Mickey Gat’s pub, but still honoured. The failure to interfere, or even to offer information so that other people could interfere, was indigenous to the brickwork wherever he looked. In Mickey Gat’s place, it was more a question of the punters not being good at framing facts or concerns into words. Greetings and jeers were often confused. Monday lunchtime was less than crowded; boredom made Mickey herself more than usually articulate.
‘Where’s your little friend, Mr Bailey? The one who has to go home to his wife, so she can wash his ears?’
‘Day off,’ Bailey smiled. ‘Probably taking his kids to a park, so they can learn how to mug the others.’
‘That’s not nice talk, Mr Bailey. Sit down, will you? Nothing happening here.’
They sat, huge woman and slender man. With no-one watching, Mickey did not insist on the male ritual of making her guests drink. Both of them nursed orange juice.
‘We haven’t got this right, you know. We haven’t got this right at all.’ There was no need for Bailey to specify what he meant.
‘Well, that makes a change, doesn’t it? You don’t often get things right, you lot. What’s different now?’ Bailey was quiet. Mickey’s sigh was the last breath of a hurricane. She smelled wonderful. No fake perfume for Mickey.
‘I loved that man Damien like a brother, Mr Bailey. Weren’t a lot I could do for him though, except help him look after his own. So I got the flat for his sister and a job for the brother-in-law and I still take an interest, Mr Bailey. You can’t stop taking an interest just because people get killed, can you? I dunno what you want to know. You just seem to ferret around. You even look like a ferret. My dad used to run them.’
‘Just talk to me about Damien. Anything which comes to mind.’
As he spoke, Bailey was wondering idly how Helen would manage in a place like this. He was faintly surprised to conclude that she would manage very well. She would shake Mickey Gat by the manicured paw, cope with the extraordinary apparition without unfortunate comment, probably accept the perfume with a beatific smile and then offer to draft her will.
‘I think they were all right, you know, Joe Boyce and Catherine. Damien worried about them, though. I mean Joe didn’t want his wife to get a job, would you believe, but she went on about it until Damien told him, let her do what she wants, for God’s sake, she ain’t going to run away. So Joe agreed, but it had to be him found the job, somewhere near where he worked, so he could keep an eye on her, come home on the bus with her, that kind of thing, although I don’t think it quite worked out that way. You know what I mean? He’s so jealous, that Joe Boyce, he even went and looked in the windows of the place she works, one night, just to check. Silly bugger. He told Damien that, when he was pissed; Damien thought it was funny, so he told me. Last year that was, soon after she started. I suppose we all get jealous, don’t we, Mr Bailey?’
Mickey leaned forward for her drink, tapped her nose. ‘So I upped his hours at the Spoon and made it six days a week, of course. Gave him less time for mischief. He’s all right, Joe, really.’
‘Are you going to keep him on there?’ Bailey made his curiosity sound mild and inconsequential showing no real signs of impatience, as if this information was incidental to what he might have wanted.
‘Course I am, why not? He’s reliable. Anyway, I thought of what Damien would have wanted. Best thing for his sister is for Joe to stay in work and her to stay where she is, with her old man. It’s not good, a woman being on her own.’
‘Oh, has she left him then?’ He knew that perfectly well, but it was always wise to feign ignorance with Mickey.
Mickey nodded sadly. ‘Yeah. She went to stay in Damien’s gaff, but I’ve had a word with her. And him. So they’re going out on the town tonight; I even gave her a bit of spending and him a night off. Women, you know, they sometimes make me ashamed. You know …’
‘Yes, I know.’ Bailey guessed what was coming next. ‘Like cats, if you don’t feed them.’ Both of them stared at their unwanted orange juice, weighed down by their own wisdom. Bailey rose and stretched.
‘So you don’t know a single person who might have had it in for Damien?’
Michaela Gat shook her head, looked up at Bailey’s height.
‘Unless it was someone envied him. Damien was good at a lot of things, he was even ace at selling perfume down the market. He could do five hundred quid a day, could Damien. Dunno why Joe Boyce never wanted part of the action. He’s a sensitive.’
‘That must be why he hits his wife.’
Mickey shrugged herself to her feet.
‘That’s up to him, Mr Bailey. Shows he loves her.’
They were standing shoulder to shoulder. Mickey looked Bailey up and down as if examining a horse before a race.
‘No, you’re still in good shape, Mr Bailey, I’ll say that for you. When you getting out of the police? You’re wasted in there. We come from the same place, you and me, and look what I’ve done with my life.’ She gestured the room, expansively. ‘And then look what you’ve done with yours. I got a nice house in Wanstead, with a family and a swimming-pool, and you got fuck all. Shame, really. Let us know when you need a proper job. I could do with a useful ferret and I pay proper.’
With that accolade, they parted, Bailey smarting, despite laughing. It was a strange sensation to be pitied. Humiliating to be seen as the servant of another, and thus, a failure.
By mid-aftemoon, the heat at the top of Bevan House was stifling. Mary Catherine Boyce had washed herself in cold water, although she had already taken a bath, courtesy of Helen West, before leaving that home for this. She had been tempted to stay there, change her clothes and go out for the evening, but it seemed a liberty which could only lead to well-intentioned questions, so she came home. Helen had given her too much cash, as it happened, but if she did not deserve it for pacifying the carpet men, getting up at dawn, Hoovering after they had gone and flogging back here on the bus in an afternoon of stifling heat, well, Helen would not grudge it.
Cath had dusted the mirror in order to feel better about her view of herself as she confronted it. She was so pale. Make-up, then: she had a little of that and Helen’s bathroom cabinet had revealed a few supplies so clearly abandoned it was high time they were recycled. Cath did not have much skill with the art of maquillage, but a fingerful of eyeshadow and some carefully applied mascara made such a significant difference, she blushed at the sight of herself, emboldened to tackle the clothes. In the days when she loved clothes, she had preferred heavy coats, good woollens and colourful legs, not flimsy cotton. Summer was a time for girls; winter favoured women. Not
bad all the same: black blouse, the cascading dark floral skirt, shoes with slight heel, all of her streamlined, taking the view of herself up from the tiny ankles, skimming full hips. Pity she had to take that little PVC bag with her in the absence of anything else convenient, but just as well. Joe might not be able to recognise her without it, and besides, it was fate which had given her something to carry in the bag.
She wished it was perfume, found herself searching Damien’s one-time home in case he had some of it still hidden away, then shook her head in front of the mirror, chiding herself for the regret. What a terrible gift was perfume, always given by a man to make you wear it and please him, while you stank of blackmail; but in memory of long-past gifts, memory of Damien, she wished she could add a spray to her wrists as a kind of charm.
A Clear Conscience Page 20