Sanctuary

by Lisa Appignanesi

  When Isabel had bought the apartment, it had been one large, high ceilinged, unroomed loft, with a score of windows on three sides. She had had walls put in to create three smallish rooms, a bathroom and an open-plan kitchen, which still left a good-sized living and dining area, backed on one side by floor to ceiling book shelves. At one end stood two bright sofas and easy chairs forming a rectangle; at the other a long ultra-modern refectory table, topped by a lavish pewter bowl. Gone was Isabel’s old assortment of Victorian bric a brac, her paper weights and flea-market wooden figurines and walls chock-a-block with animal prints. On the wall here, there was only a single large abstract in vibrant yellows and reds and pinks. It was as if Isabel had determined to leave London for L.A. without crossing any geographic frontiers.

  Feeling like an intrusive stranger, Leo placed her bags out-of-the way in a far corner of the room, then carried the post into Isabel’s study, a functional cubby-hole to the back of the book shelves. The desk was uncannily bare. No papers or books or magazines or forgotten coffee cups littered all available surfaces. Only an aluminium tray stuffed with what looked like an assortment of bills stood at the far edge of the desk’s L-shape, next to it the telephone, devoid of a flashing red-light to signal messages. All of it was utterly unlike the casual messiness that attended the Isabel she thought she knew.

  This sense of unfamiliarity followed her into the living room and kitchen, both so pristine that she might have been entering a model home unit. Just to reassure herself that Isabel had not suddenly decided to move out, leaving only minimal items behind to entice potential buyers, Leo flung open one turquoise kitchen cabinet after another. The crockery was there, even an assortment of teas and spices and tins and condiments. And a jar of instant coffee. She needed that to settle her nerves. She flicked on the kettle. The refrigerator opened on a carton of longlife, a tub of marge and some marmalade. Nothing else. It was all, Leo reflected as she poured water into a mug, acutely unsettling.

  Coffee in hand, she continued her inspection. The blinds on the living room windows were mostly up. It came back to her that over Christmas her friend had made something of a ritual of pulling every single one of these down as soon as it was dark and pausing to switch on the room’s various lamps. ‘I hate the night coming in… and there’s so much more of it here,’ Isabel had murmured. Quickly, Leo repeated her friend’s gesture, noting that even if nothing else was certain, she now knew that Isabel must have left home in daytime.

  The bedroom looked as if it had never been slept in. The striped duvet and matching pillows were carefully plumped. No renegade dress or T shirt, no stray shoe disrupted the order, not even a book to mar the symmetry of a plinth-based night table. The television stood opposite the bed on a discreet stand. Leo slid the wardrobe door open. Isabel’s clothes hung there, tightly packed, emitting a slight whiff of cedar. Leo stared, urging the array to offer up some clue. Surely if Isabel had packed for a longish journey, the ranked dresses and suits and trousers and shoes would show some gaps. Nothing made any sense.

  She slid the door shut with a bang and stepped quickly backwards. Something crunched and crackled underfoot. She looked down. A piece of glass. She bent to it and only then noticed the shattered vase. It lay in fragments along one side of the room, as if someone had thrown it in a fit of rage from its customary position on the small table which stood beneath the window. That was where Isabel had placed it when Leo had given it to her as a house-warming present, loving the flowing Lalique lines of it, the embossed strands of ivy on its side.

  The broken vase was the single discordant note in the virginal harmony of the apartment. Why this? Her eyes fluttered across the room and paused at its sole window. The blind here was down, but it quivered slightly. She pulled it open with a jerk and watched it judder upwards. The window it exposed was slightly ajar at its base. She pressed her nose to it and looked out into the yellowy night of the city. The cross-street lay below, a narrow quiet road with only a smattering of parked cars and darkened buildings. As she wondered once more at Isabel’s choice of neighbourhood, she suddenly noticed the weave of an old blackened fire escape clambering up towards the window and beyond.

  The scene hit her with the force of a hallucination: Isabel, ready to leave for New York, her bag packed, the apartment completely, if unusually, tidied in preparation for her return. The intruder making his way up the fire escape, slipping in through the window, shattering the vase in the process. Isabel, startled by the sound, running in to find him holding a knife or gun to her.

  And then? Leo didn’t want to think any further. For whatever reason, Isabel had been abducted. Kidnapped. As she rushed into the study to dial 999, her mind flew back to the diatribe against Monsanto she had read on the plane.

  Half an hour later, the police arrived, a tall, pink-cheeked young officer with a snub-nose, his cap in hand to reveal a thatch of bleached hair, and a stout, no nonsense woman, in identical trousers but wearing a rough-ribbed navy sweater in place of a jacket. The woman did most of the questioning at first and took the notes. The man, Leo sensed, was suspicious as soon as she said she had just flown in from New York - or maybe it was simply the fashionable affluence of the loft which set him on edge.

  Nonetheless, Leo explained with what she thought was extraordinary patience how Isabel Morgan had not turned up in New York on the expected day, how unable to contact her and worried about her welfare, Leo had come to find out what was wrong. And yes, she had the keys: they were good friends.

  ‘So you want to report a missing person?’ the man asked sceptically.

  ‘Yes, that too. But I told them on the phone. There’s been a break in.’

  Leo waved them into the bedroom. She only realized that her voice must have risen to an hysterical pitch when the woman patted her on the shoulder and murmured a ‘There, there, dear. It’ll be all right.’

  ‘Anything stolen?’ the man asked, as he peered round the room.

  ‘I…I don’t really know. I’ve just arrived. I don’t live here. And that’s not the point. Someone came in through that window and must have attacked my friend. Ms Morgan. She’s strong, so he must have had a weapon of some sort. There’s glass everywhere.’

  The officer trod carefully amidst the fragments, looked out, examined the window. After a moment, he gestured to his partner, pointed at something. Leo couldn’t make out his mumble.

  The woman officer came back towards Leo who didn’t altogether like the solicitous look on her face. She cleared her throat. ‘You see Mrs. Holland, that’s not altogether likely. Come and have a look.’

  She urged Leo towards the window. ‘Because of these, see.’ She pointed towards two brass bolts at the sides of the window.

  His gloves on, the man eased the window upward. It stopped some four inches up. ‘No one could get through that. Well, a cat maybe.’

  ‘The intruder could have put the bolts back, afterwards.’

  ‘Not half likely if he was holding a weapon. Even more chance of leaving prints.’

  The man looked so pleased with himself that Leo wanted to argue. She controlled herself. ‘You’ll take prints,’ she said in her coldest voice.

  He shrugged.

  ‘But…’

  ‘Does your friend have a cat, Mrs. Holland?’ the woman officer asked from behind her. She was holding a piece of the vase up to the light.

  Leo had forgotten about Isabel’s cat, a huge tabby with prominent whiskers. She nodded once, curtly. ‘But there’s no sign of him. And there’s no food out. Isabel would have left bowls, water…’

  ‘It’s just that this looks remarkably like a muddy paw print.’

  Leo’s nails dug into her palm. ‘It does,’ she conceded.

  ‘Perhaps your friend left in a hurry for some reason and had neither the time to clear up this mess, nor contact you. She just pushed the window down and…

  ‘That doesn’t alter the fact that she’s missing.’

  ‘No, no, it doesn’t. Of course, not.
Let’s take some more details.’ She urged Leo back towards the table. ‘How old is your friend, Mrs. Holland.’

  ‘Thirty-five.’

  The two officers exchanged glances.

  ‘And she holds a British passport?’ the man asked.

  ‘I…I don’t really know. She’s from Australia, but she’s lived here a long time.”

  He scratched his thatch of hair as if something unpleasant had got into it.

  ‘We can make out a missing person’s report, Mrs. Holland, but… you know, come a certain age, people are allowed to change their minds - even vanish if they choose, as long as there’s no foul play. Disappearance isn’t a crime.’

  ‘Isabel didn’t just change her mind. I know that.’ Leo’s voice rose again. She lowered it, reprimanding herself for behaving like a madwoman. ‘She isn’t like that,’ she said more evenly.

  ‘Have you got a picture of her?’ the woman asked.

  ‘Yes, yes. I’m sure there must be one. Give me a minute.’

  Leo went into the study. She heard them talking in low voices, as she pulled open one after another of the drawers in Isabel’s study. She should be feeling relieved, she told herself. There had been no horrible intruder, no ghastly struggle. She tried to calm herself and think clearly. She remembered a portfolio from which Isabel had once shown her professional pictures of herself. At last, she located it at the base of one of the shelves built into the desk and hurriedly brought the whole thing back with her. A slew of photographs fell onto the table, one more glamorous than the next. Isabel smiling seductively at some unknown photographer. Isabel, hair flying, astride a bicycle. Isabel, showing ample bosom, at a party. Isabel, looking queenly, in candlelight.

  This time, she felt, rather than caught the glances of the two police officers. ‘Yes, she’s beautiful,’ she said flatly. ‘That doesn’t mean she’s either irresponsible or empty-headed.’

  ‘Of course not,’ the man said with a studied air.

  ‘She’s a journalist. A writer.’ As if to prove it, she passed him a photo of Isabel, pen in hand, gazing meditatively at a notepad. ‘Here, have this one.’

  They took down details of height and weight, asked for a credit card number which she couldn’t provide, and assured her that they would put it all into the system.

  ‘What does that mean?’ Leo asked querulously.

  ‘We’ll feed her details into the computer, do a cross check on accident records, hospitals, that kind of thing.’ The man was suddenly polite now. He put his cap back on his head. ‘You’ll be all right, will you?’

  She nodded with more assurance than she felt. ‘And you’ll keep me in touch?’

  ‘Of course, dear.’ The woman officer was soothing. With a flash of graphic humour, Leo saw her on a platform as one of the new breed of Labour politicians speaking from a set script. ‘She’ll turn up soon enough. Don’t you worry. Everything will be fine.’

  ‘And don’t forget to ring us when you hear from her. You’ve got our names, the case number,’ the man added.

  ‘Yes, your names,’ Leo echoed. ‘PC Collins and Sergeant Drew.’

  As she shut the door behind them, Leo had the dismal sense that apart from their better manners, they would prove as useless as the police she had rung in New York. Neither recognised her sense of urgency. Unless there was evidence of crime, a missing person it seemed was a legal anomaly. How much you missed them was evidence of nothing at all.

  3

  The unexpected ringing shattered the silence of the apartment with all the menace of an ambulance siren. Boiling water splashed over the edge of Leo’s mug. A mud-coloured stain spread on the gleaming counter. She shook herself into awareness and raced for the videophone. The small screen showed no face. ‘Who is it?’ she shouted into the machine.

  A muffled voice responded. It wasn’t coming from the machine. ‘It’s me, Mike. From upstairs.’

  After a second’s hesitation, Leo unlocked the door. A small intense man with slit dark eyes in a narrow face examined her in consternation. ‘I saw the police pulling away.’ His tone accused her. ‘Thought I’d better check things out. You’re…?’

  ‘Leo Holland.’ Leo stood her ground. ‘And you?’

  ‘Mike. Mike Newson. I live upstairs. Isabel left me in charge.’

  ‘Did she?’ She returned his inquisitorial gaze and then relaxed as she remembered Isabel giving her a comical portrait of her new neighbour: ‘Slick as his slicked back hair. Requisite unstructured suit, mind equally unstructured though the self-certainty is enviable - a man who by his own assessment is bound for high places in the media world. Watch out for the bright lights.’

  ‘Come on in.’

  ‘Isabel didn’t tell me she was expecting anyone called Leo Holland. You must be the woman I saw coming out of the taxi earlier.’ He tapped his jacket pocket from which the rim of spectacles peaked. ‘I’m a bit short-sighted. Thought you were my girlfriend. Her train’s late back from Manchester.’

  ‘So you know where Isabel is?’

  ‘Yes.’ He folded himself into the sofa as if he were quite at home. ‘Off in the States somewhere. She asked me to look after her plants in her absence. Then…Wait a minute.’ He lurched forward with sudden aggression. ‘What were the police doing here? What are you doing here?’

  ‘Isabel and I were meant to be travelling together. She never turned up in New York, never answered her phone. I got worried and flew over. I called the police.’

  ‘Seems a bit hasty.’

  ‘Did she leave you any phone numbers?’

  He shook his head. ‘She went off sooner than I expected. When I got back from Amsterdam, she was gone. Left me a note under my door reminding me about the plants. There was a lot of stuff about the cat, too, but she crossed that out and said to forget about it. She’d see to the Beast herself. Good thing, too. I’m not a cat lover and Isabel’s is aptly named. No way was I going to take him off to the kennels.’

  ‘Do you still have the note?’

  ‘Shouldn’t think so. I tend to chuck things. And there was no reason to… What did the police say?’

  Leo told him, then asked, ‘Do you have any idea who might know where she went?’

  ‘Not really.’ He uncoiled himself from the sofa, suddenly in a hurry. ‘I’d better get back upstairs.’

  ‘No one at all?’ Leo insisted. She felt defeat and a long stretch of sleepless night waiting for her in the wings.

  ‘Unless you call that builder of hers. Mine too, once, but he prefers to be down here. Always seems to be here.’ He paused, his face sharp with a leer.

  Leo wasn’t sure she liked what it implied. ‘What’s his name?’

  ‘Hamish. Hamish Macgregor. I’ll dig out his card for you. I still have it somewhere. Then you can always try that shrink she’s forever rushing off to see. I meet her sometimes going out at the crack of dawn, when I’m off to a shoot. She probably tells her everything. Don’t know her name, though.’

  ‘Her?’

  He stopped at the threshold. ‘Guess it could be a him, now that you mention it. But don’t go to too much trouble. I’m sure Isabel is fine. She’s always running off and coming back. You’ll look after the plants then?’ He was already half way up the stairs as she nodded.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ she stopped him. ‘Do you know anything about Isabel being involved in a TV show?’

  ‘Oh that.’ His face took on a shifty air. ‘It’s nothing. It fell through. She’ll be fine. Nothing to worry about.’

  An oppressive silence enfolded her as she went back into the loft. Why did everyone insist that everything was just fine and dandy when she knew differently. It was as if people wanted wilfully to keep blinkers on, to deny anything that ruptured the ordinary flow of their daily lives. Until it was too late.

  Not that she herself was any different. She too had her selective blinkers, preferring not to see what she felt was there in the hope that it might go away and the world would still be rosy. She had been like that
with Jeff, sensing full well that he no longer loved her, let alone fancied her - if that was the right word for it - yet preferring not to confront it in the hope that it would all pass. How many years had she spent in her strategic limbo? Too many. Isabel who was tough-minded would never have stood for it.

  With a swift shake of the head, Leo put the first disc that came to hand into the CD player. Bessie Smith’s plaintive ironies filled the loft. Glancing at her watch, she lowered the volume. It was almost midnight. Only just seven New York time. She wished she could go out for a stroll and sort out her thoughts, but the empty streets around the apartment felt too threatening. She sifted through the portfolio of Isabel’s photographs instead.

  Did Isabel have a ‘kitchen man’ she had failed to tell Leo about? This Hamish Macgregor, her upstairs neighbour had taken such a dislike to? Had she gone off with him unexpectedly and failed to come back in time to catch her New York flight? Was that the reason for her disappearance?

  Questions. That was all she had.

  It was odd how one disruption of the expected threw open the windows on a gale of rank unknown matter that must have been festering just out of sight. Like the evening Jeff hadn’t turned up, after a conference in California. She had rung everyone then too, his hotel, airlines, friends, had even at two o’clock in the morning rung the police. She had imagined accidents, rational explanations, and somewhere in the midst of that she had known, had forced herself to know that he was betraying her, had been doing so for a long time. And that was the real reason why he wasn’t where he was meant to be. In that moment, the hoarded unhappiness of the past years suddenly rose up to choke her. She had sobbed a storm of salty tears into her pillow. And then she had grown calm. She didn’t know where the calm had come from, but it carried an icy certainty with it.