Baby Drop

by Jennie Melville

  In case it was Kate who was the focus for this unexpressed sympathy, she made herself telephone Rewley at home. It had been a rule with her lately that she would not bother with questions to him or Anny (Kate’s mother and her closest friend), except when Anny, aggressive as ever, attacked her – which was quite often).

  She hesitated about telephoning: she had her share of emotional stupidity and didn’t always get it right where her affections were involved. But who did?

  She rang Rewley’s home number. Kate and her husband had made a very happy home in a modern flat, which Kate was rich enough to decorate in her own style (not to everyone’s taste, but now it was her own home she had become more orthodox and peaceful, her kitchen being plain white, unlike the deep red one she had insisted on creating for Charmian); expensive French cottons in apricot and pink hung in the sitting-room with a carpet made to Kate’s own design. Charmian could imagine the telephone ringing. Presently, Rewley would lean over the arm of the pale leather sofa and pick up the receiver.

  The telephone was ringing out in that empty way it has when no one is going to answer it. She let it ring once more, then put it down and walked away. This was where a cigarette would have been useful but she had long since given up that indulgence.

  She made herself some more coffee although she felt twitchy enough already, and would certainly be much worse after another cup or two, so she ate a biscuit which was meant to be calming.

  Muff jumped up on the table to suggest that she too was under strain and needed food.

  ‘You always do,’ said Charmian, as she opened her refrigerator which, in spite of her trip to the supermarket, was almost empty. She closed the door sadly and gave Muff some biscuits, cats’ specials.

  There was no doubt about it: empty cupboards did make you feel less a woman, whereas a full refrigerator made a woman feel good. It must go right back to primitive man when a hunk of mastodon hanging in the cave made a woman feel safe.

  However, she had many years of feeling unsexed, since in her early days in the force at Deerham Hills, her fellow officers had had many ways of diminishing a woman, ranging from the simply idle to the openly prurient. She had known how to kick all those critics back, and now, of course, as head of SRADIC, she was treated with respect. Maybe not liking but always with respect. She was someone now who knew too much.

  She decided to give Rewley another ring. Perhaps he was at the hospital? She knew he went in as often as he could, always if he was worried about Kate, which was most of the time.

  A polite voice informed her that she could not talk to Mrs Rewley, who was asleep.

  Was her husband there? He was not. How was Mrs Rewley? Very comfortable, and the doctors were pleased with her, perhaps she would call again in the morning?

  A bland, polite response, but soothing in its way: Kate was asleep, and Rewley was not there, so he was not sitting by her bedside in a state of anxiety. He might even be out enjoying himself with friends. Or silently drinking alone somewhere. No, that was not Rewley’s style.

  She put the worry over Kate aside, she could pick it up again tomorrow.

  The packet that Feather had given her was on the side table where he had put it down: she picked it up and let it rest on the palm of her hand while she considered his motives in giving it to her. He was never an easy man to read; his large, well-covered face had learnt long ago to disguise his feelings. She wondered how his family managed this opacity, but one meeting with the tiny Mrs Feather, who had shaken her hand in a vice-like grip and told her she was called Fluff, had convinced her that Feather was nicely managed at home, fed on good puddings and thick steak. A snapshot she had once seen of him as a youngster, newly in the force and a champion runner, had shown him to be long and thin. Times passed. He now had a new partner and she thought he might be losing weight: so the new lady was creating a new man.

  He seemed willing to humour her interest in the long dead child, bringing little details about the skeleton as he learned them.

  She opened the packet which had been stuck together with zeal, but eventually she had the paper apart. The locket had been cleaned, when she held the gold oval, it was heavier and more solid than she had expected. A good piece of eighteen-carat gold, and no piece of Victorian pinchbeck.

  This added to the feeling she already had that the child was not the child of poverty. Unwisely conceived, unhappily delivered into the world, but not poor.

  The locket seemed to get heavier. The past gripped you sometimes, stretched a hand and took hold.

  She wasn’t the first to handle this object since its rescue from the earth, it had been photographed, been cleaned, and then parcelled up, but she felt in touch.

  The catch opened easily and there it was once again, the faded sepia photograph of a very young woman. On the back of the locket was engraved some initials, so curved and entwined that they were hard to make out.

  An E or B with a C or a D? And curling in and out a W or an M. She couldn’t be sure, the engraving was so worn.

  Going back to a childhood trick, she went to her desk to find a piece of thin paper and soft pencil. A crayon would be better, nursery memories of red and green and deep blue crayons stirred, but she had none, the pencil would do. Then she pressed the paper over the back of the locket, and passed the lead over it, back and forth, not too hard, but hard enough to make an image.

  It began to look more like an M and a C entwined.

  She was staring at it when she heard a car draw up outside. Maid of Honour Row was a quiet street where most of her neighbours went to bed early.

  When she looked out of the window, she knew the car, dark blue, newish, powerful. Humphrey’s car. She waited for a moment, then ran down the stairs and opened the door. A cold damp breath of wind blew in, making her shiver.

  ‘You’re cold,’ he said, putting his arms round her, and pushing her through the door.

  ‘I’m glad to see you.’ She was hugging him back. ‘Didn’t think I would be somehow.’

  ‘I always meant to come.’ He sounded surprised. But grateful too, he had not always got such a warm welcome from Charmian.

  ‘I’ve been worrying about you.’ Also about bones, a dead child, a lost child, but underneath always about you.

  ‘This isn’t the place to kiss you, which I mean to do, let’s go upstairs.’

  Charmian drew back. ‘No, wait a minute. This is where you say: “But there’s nothing to worry about.” ’

  ‘Let’s go up.’

  ‘Is there anything?’ she persisted.

  ‘Shall we talk about it later?’

  ‘That means yes … I’ve been sitting in the kitchen, drinking coffee. Let’s go there.’

  ‘Working?’

  ‘You could call it that. Thinking, anyway.’

  The kitchen was warm and quiet. The coffee pot still hot and fragrant, Muff asleep on the chair. She opened one eye, gave a purr, and went back to sleep. Her tail lashed once or twice.

  ‘I don’t know about coffee. I could do with a drink.’

  ‘Whisky or brandy?’

  ‘Brandy, I think. You’ve been smoking?’

  Dan Feather had not smoked but the smell of cigarettes hung about him permanently, and he left a faint legacy of it behind.

  ‘Not me, no. But Dan Feather called. He didn’t smoke here but he had been, it’s those terrible little cigar things he goes in for.’

  Humphrey sat down at the table. ‘That was the work, I suppose. Anything new?’

  ‘Not about Sarah, nor the boy. He brought me something … I called on Biddy again, and I’ve met Lady Grahamden and Peter.’

  ‘What did you think of them?’

  Charmian tried to assemble her thoughts. ‘What did I think? Still sorting it out. Odd, is the first word.’

  ‘They are odd. She’s a throwback, this isn’t her century. When he was younger I used to think Peter was as near mad as made no difference. Do anything. But he’s toned down a lot lately.’

  �
�I think he’s very unhappy at the moment, all three. I don’t know if they were lying or acting. I’ll get the brandy.’ She was shocked at his appearance. A kind of whiteness under the normal healthy tan, he looked exhausted sitting there, arms on the table. He made as if to rise. ‘You stay there, I’ll get it.’

  When she came back with the brandy, he was studying the pencilling she had made.

  ‘What’s this?’

  ‘I was trying to make out the initials on the back of this locket.’ She was pouring out the brandy. ‘ It was found near the baby’s bones. Belonged to her, I guess. Was a girl, by the way. I just had the idea that I might somehow find out a bit about her. A long shot.’

  Humphrey gave her an enquiring look but he said nothing.

  With the first draught of brandy, the colour was coming back into his cheeks. He looked better. ‘You’ve done a good job. These engraved initials are always hard to make out. The flourish was what they wanted.’ He took the locket in his hand. ‘It’s heavy, good stuff.’

  ‘I know, that struck. I could see it must have cost something.’

  ‘Why don’t you take it into John Madge, he might help.’

  ‘Yes, he would try. I have already spoken to him about it, showed him a photograph.’

  ‘You surprise me sometimes, do you know that? This is an historical investigation, not a bit of detection.’

  ‘Same thing, I suppose, in a way.’

  ‘Why do I get the feeling that means something more to you?’

  ‘I’m interested,’ she said, unwilling to admit that she couldn’t let go. The bones rattled in her mind all the time, setting up a dance that called her in.

  Muff purred, the room was warm, the coffee smelt good. She poured them both a cup.

  ‘So, now tell me, what’s it all about? What is it you are going to tell me?’

  Dan Feather had been sympathetic and Lady Grahamden had hinted about whatever it was.

  ‘I wondered if it was my fault … perhaps you were having second thoughts about our marriage … I know I’m not easy.’

  ‘No, not you, never you.’ He reached out to hold her hand.

  ‘I know you’ve been having a lot of headaches.’

  He held on to her hand as if it was a comfort. ‘I began to think it was a bit more than a headache or so … My eyes were playing up. Not all the time, but sometimes.’

  She waited, longing for him to go on but dreading what seemed to be coming.

  ‘I saw my own GP, he sent me to a brain man … I had a scan. That was today. He thinks there may be something there that will need an operation … I shan’t know for a couple of days.’

  ‘I knew there was something. I wish you’d told me.’ Several people seemed to have made guesses, right or wrong, she had not.

  ‘It wasn’t so much telling, but I couldn’t talk about it.’

  ‘We don’t talk enough, you and I,’ she said sadly. ‘ We bury a lot.’ And now there might not be much time for talking.

  ‘I don’t want to die and leave you.’

  Charmian held on to his hand. ‘Don’t worry about me. You stay alive for your own sake.’

  ‘Thanks.’ He could manage to laugh. ‘ I’ll be doing that too.’

  She wanted to say: ‘I’m not going to believe in it. It’s not going to happen, I won’t let it,’ but she knew she couldn’t. Some facts are so big, stone hard and monumental, that you have to see them, you can’t walk round them or over them or under them. Better to stare at them, spit at them, kick at them if you have to.

  ‘When will you know?’

  ‘Next few days. My GP will ring me.’

  —So that’s how they did it? Read out the death sentence by proxy. ‘ Let’s have some more brandy.’ Alcohol was not lifting her mood, the stone misery was heavy in her stomach like a kind of emotional indigestion, but she poured with a generous hand.

  ‘Have you eaten?’ she asked suddenly.

  ‘Not for some time.’

  She was brisk at once, this was what she could do. ‘I’ll make an omelette. It’s what I had myself. Cheese do? Won’t take a minute.’

  He knew her omelettes, they could be thick and heavy or thin and runny. Not good to laugh, though, she was prickly about her cooking. Too many lovers, she had said, expect you to be a good cook as well as everything else. In any case, he liked her style.

  ‘I don’t think I’ve told you why I love you.’

  ‘The usual reasons.’ Her voice was light. ‘That’s what I thought, but I suppose I could ask.’

  ‘Because you can be so hideously practical,’ he said.

  She whisked away, saying nothing, being hideously practical. Not knowing how to be anything else at that moment. Possibly she never had known and this was her weakness.

  She was beating the eggs with vicious concentration as if she was whipping all those people she disliked most at that moment: the killer of Joe, whoever had abducted Sarah, the long ago woman who had buried her baby, dead or alive. Not to mention all those people from Biddy Holt to Dan Feather who might have lied to her.

  ‘A lot of the things we haven’t said, ought to be said. But I don’t know if I’m ready for them yet.’

  ‘Let’s leave them then.’ Whisk on, Charmian, this might get painful.

  ‘Leave the eggs.’ He came up and took both her hands. ‘Come and sit down. I want you to know that I love you. But you haven’t always made it easy for me to show it. You run away. And that has made me angry.’

  ‘I’ve felt that,’ said Charmian. ‘You are good at showing anger. I haven’t liked that. Nor the hint of violence.’

  ‘I would never hurt you.’

  ‘That’s always said, isn’t it?’

  They were tearing away the bandages and underneath there was raw flesh.

  ‘I don’t want to go on with this,’ said Charmian quickly. ‘Not now, it’s not the right time.’

  ‘There you go again.’

  She stood up, dislodging Muff from the chair next to her by the force of her action. ‘ You cook the eggs.’

  At this point, the telephone rang. She seized it with relief. ‘Rewley? You must have telepathy. I was trying to get you.’ Her voice was uneven.

  ‘Are you all right? You’re talking in gasps.’

  ‘No, I’m fine, nothing at all.’ She could see Humphrey looking at her with a frown on his face. ‘ Is it Kate?’

  ‘No, nothing to do with Kate, as far as I know she’s asleep. No, they have a pederast in the Interview Room, he came in and confessed to having held and kidnapped the boy and also Sarah. He’s talking like a canary.’

  ‘Who is it? A new man? Or one of the old lot?’

  ‘Totty Bow, that’s the man. I got the name, not sure I know him, but I swear it meant something to the other two.’

  Totty Bow. So it was Bow, not Bridge or Barnes.

  ‘Did they tell you all this?’ She knew how closely they hung on to information, each team for itself and sometimes each man.

  ‘No, I just happened to be down there. I went to see Kate earlier, and she really is fine, by the way, less uncomfortable, and Dolly Barstow came so I knew she’d have company. I’d been working late to catch up … I was sitting in the car, and I saw Jephson and Farmer, I knew they were part of the team and I could see something had happened … So I was sitting there, watching. I read their lips … I thought you’d want to know.’

  ‘I do, I do. Thank you.’

  Charmian turned back to Humphrey who was watching her gravely. He couldn’t lip read and he didn’t practise telepathy but he knew his Charmian.

  ‘It’s bad, isn’t it? Don’t worry about me, do what you have to do.’

  She pushed her hair back from the forehead. She had been cold and now she felt too hot.

  ‘I can’t take all this in … I’m going down there.’

  He didn’t ask where, he had probably worked out most of the dialogue with Rewley.

  ‘Will you be here when I get back?’

 
‘Do you want me to be?

  She hesitated. ‘Yes.’

  Chapter Nine

  ‘The dog whose name’s called, eats. The dogs whose names an’t, keep quiet.’

  The Old Curiosity Shop

  Dan Feather was there ahead of her, he was just walking into the building as she arrived. So he hadn’t gone home.

  Had she really thought he intended to? Feather had sounded honest, but that was his skill.

  He hadn’t noticed her car, so she sat back in the dark, letting him get ahead. Time to confront him later. Not too much later, she decided, as she didn’t want to miss anything important. She watched Feather’s back disappear; he was walking slowly as if tiredness came even to his indestructible form. He was known, in a fairly friendly way, as the Iron Man. The name went back to his youth when he had lifted the wheels of a motor car off a child, and also to several later episodes when his treatment of sex attackers had been adamantine, and only what was called ironically ‘the Feather Fan Club’had kept him out of trouble. Charmian was not a member of that fan club, women were not admitted, but a number of high-ranking officers were. Charmian herself liked investigation carried out with a subtler touch but no one had ever faulted Feather. He had the reputation of knowing where all the bodies were buried, but by now Charmian knew where a few were stowed herself and had helped put some away.

  She was beginning to wonder if the Sarah Holt case with the Loomis-Grahamden connection was going to be such a burial, and if Feather had started the process by calling on her.

  But that would be politics calling the cards in and although Lady Grahamden looked capable of anything that suited her, she couldn’t see the case for it here.

  She leaned back in the car. Count to twenty, then go in.

  She had got to fifteen when Rewley tapped on the window. ‘ I was watching you, wondering what you were going to do.’

  ‘Go in. Join the party.’

  ‘Did you see Dan Feather?’

  ‘I was watching him. He’s a wily beggar, told me he was going home. If he went there at all, then he didn’t stay long.’