A Few Little Lies

by Sue Welfare

  She pulled the lacy jacket off the hanger. She hadn’t sewn up the split sleeve seams. She pulled it on anyway; it wouldn’t show.

  Downstairs the night was already dark. She tip-tapped on her high heels to her car. She’d parked it outside the street door when she’d come back from the hairdresser, thinking it would be easier to leave it there, rather than negotiate the uneven pavements down to the lock-ups in her new high heels.

  She undid the boot. Lillian’s box was still there, all wrapped around in its shiny black plastic bag. She pulled down the top and looked inside. The photos of Tom Fielding were back in their envelope and pushed down the side. She took the envelope out and turned it over in her fingers before tucking it away safely.

  ‘Well, here we go,’ she murmured under her breath, closed the box flaps, pulled the plastic bag up around the sides and snapped the boot shut.

  Driving in high heels was a mistake. She popped, hopped, jumped and spluttered her way across town towards the college.

  The trees along the college drive were strung with chains of fairy lights. It looked quite magical. She joined the phalanx of cars creeping up towards the car park.

  Away from the main building, where a crowd of party-goers was already scurrying towards the doors, was the clock tower. It stood on a slight hill, surrounded by a skeleton of scaffolding. It was built and rebuilt annually by final-year construction students. At the moment it was three-quarters complete, which told everyone that the summer term was finally on its way. Dora glanced across at it.

  ‘See you at midnight,’ she murmured under her breath and indicated left. She bumped over the sleeping policeman into the staff car park, away from the red stream of tail lights which was heading towards the main car park, alongside the function hall.

  The staff car park was in darkness. She drove slowly towards the far side, well away from the buildings, so that when she turned off the headlights the Fiat was completely engulfed in a shroud of grey. Dora sat for a minute or two wondering whether it would be a better idea to hide in plain sight amongst everyone else. Her stomach was quietly tying itself up into a sheep shank with a double half-hitch.

  She ought to have said something to Jon.

  Dora stared out into the gloom. Here and there patches of potholed tarmac were picked out by a string of overhead lights. Rather than relieve the darkness they seemed to accentuate it.

  They would be going home in Jon’s car. So, tucked out on the edges of shadow, the Fiat wouldn’t be in anyone’s way. At least, that’s what she told herself. They could pick the car up in the morning.

  Easing herself out into the chilly night air she straightened her dress and jacket. Through the twilight she could hear a thread of dance music. Grabbing hold of it, she let it guide her back towards the ball.

  From outside, as Dora approached, it appeared that the guests stepped from monochrome anonymity into a bright spotlight when they climbed the steps up towards the main door. There was a receiving line down in the foyer. The mayor was shaking hands with everyone, as was the principal of the college, the vice principal and the president of the students’ union, who was all done out in top hat and tails. Alongside the main party were a dozen other minor somebodies and a plethora of wives.

  Dora took her courage and her full-length skirt in both hands and climbed the steps. Another hour and Jon would be there too. She’d tell him all about Lillian Bliss and Tom Fielding then – it wasn’t too late to put things in order. As she moved along the line, shaking hands, she saw Josephine Hammond at the top of the stairs. The reporter was dressed in a black sleeveless sheath dress and looked stunning.

  Across the foyer, Alicia Markham was standing by the coat check talking to Lawrence Rawlings. Behind them, Guy Phelps was talking to his wife and Calvin Roberts and his wife, Sarah. Bob Preston, Fairbeach’s former mayor, cradled a champagne glass and chatted to the chairman of the chamber of trade. Everywhere she was surrounded by familiar, respectable, comfortable faces.

  Nothing can happen tonight, Dora thought, as she glanced around. The place was awash with pillars of the community. Everything was going to be all right after all. Dora let out a long low breath to ease the knot in her gut and headed towards Josephine.

  ‘You look amazing,’ she said as they met on the stairs.

  Josephine grinned and struck a pose. ‘Same pedigree as yours. Not bad, eh? Seen Tom Fielding yet?’

  Dora winced. ‘Did you have to say that? I was just thinking it was going to be all right.’

  Josephine poked her playfully in the ribs. ‘It is, it is. Come on, let’s go and get a glass of champagne. Is Lillian here yet?’

  Dora looked back over her shoulder. ‘I haven’t seen her.’ As she spoke there was an explosion of flashbulbs.

  Josephine pointed a long beautifully manicured nail. ‘Talk of the devil – Gary just bagged her mugging with the mayor for the front page of the Gazette. Just look at her.’

  Below them, Lillian Bliss was making a grand entrance. She was dressed in a fantasy scarlet ball gown. It was cut off the shoulders with a skirt like a tiered wedding cake. As she moved along the line, the president of the students’ union executed a sweeping bow, plucked off his top hat and offered her his arm. Lillian fluttered an ostrich feather fan in front of her perfectly made-up face and slipped her arm through his.

  Dora couldn’t help but smile as a ripple of applause broke out amongst the spectators for Lillian’s breathtaking entrance.

  Josephine grinned. ‘Well, she has most definitely arrived now. Come on, let’s mingle. I’m supposed to be working.’

  At the coat-check desk. Spar watched Dora Hall’s progress up the main staircase. Damn, no coat. He looked round to see if he could spot Milo. His companion was over by the potted ferns talking to one of the waitresses. Spar pushed his way through the people towards him.

  ‘Milo?’ His friend smiled at the waitress and gave her his business card.

  He turned to Spar. ‘Just drumming up a little bit of trade. We might have ourselves a nice tidy divorce case after this. So, what did you get?’

  Spar pulled a face. ‘Nothing. No coat.’

  Milo snorted. ‘Better get out into the car park then. Where is Dora Hall?’

  Spar nodded toward the staircase. ‘Gone off with that reporter from the Gazette.’

  Milo grinned. ‘Off we go then, sunshine. Time to rock and roll.’

  They slipped through the crowd, outside into the cold night air. Spar fought the temptation to head back in to get his parka. It was bloody nippy.

  ‘We’ll take a row of cars each,’ decided Milo, pulling a fag out of a silver cigarette case. ‘If you find the Fiat come and get me. Don’t try anything on your own.’

  Spar set off, eyes working over the line of cars in front of him. Funny how the light made them look a different colour. He went up and back and up and back growing colder and colder as he got further away from the lights of the hall.

  Milo, picked out by the single red glowing eye of his cigarette and a white rectangle of dress shirt, met him at the far end of the final line.

  ‘She can’t have brought her car,’ said Spar desperately, slapping his arms up around his thin hired dress suit.

  Milo sniffed. ‘Well, she didn’t bleeding walk, did she?’

  Spar was so cold he was close to tears. ‘Maybe she came in a taxi.’

  Milo’s eyes glittered angrily in the gloom. ‘Was she carrying anything?’

  Spar thought about it. ‘Just a little tiny bag, no bigger than a fag packet.’

  Milo threw the cigarette butt down and ground it into the tarmac. ‘Then she hasn’t got it on her. She must have brought her bleeding car.’ He sniffed, looking left and right. ‘She’s stuck it out of the way somewhere.’ He grinned. ‘Which is a good sign. Come on, we’ll have a look over the back here.’

  It took them two minutes to find the Fiat tucked away in the staff car park.

  ‘Bingo,’ Milo hissed and pulled a pair of surgical gloves ou
t of his jacket pocket. ‘Get the torch out and tell me if you see anyone coming. You are about to witness a master craftsman at work.’

  Out of the corner of his eye. Spar could see the torch light dancing, while he kept his attention firmly on the rolling sea of darkness around them. After a few seconds there was a reassuring click as Milo popped the lock and then the sound of him opening the door, sliding into the front seat … Minutes passed.

  It was amazing what you could see just by listening. Spar thought, and he was about to tell Milo how he knew exactly what he was doing, when Milo swore.

  ‘Nothing,’ he snorted. ‘She’s cleaned the bleeding car out. It’s as clean as a whistle in here, nothing.’

  ‘What about the glove box?’ Spar asked, even though he had heard it snap open a few seconds earlier.

  ‘Just the handbook and a torch from the AA.’ Milo clambered out. ‘Can’t see her taking out the back seat or anything like that.’

  ‘What about the boot?’ Spar suggested.

  ‘I know, I know,’ snapped Milo, ‘I was going to do that next. I’ve done this before, I’m not half-sharp, you know.’

  Spar turned his attention back to listening, as Milo circled the car on the uneven gravel.

  ‘Shit, I reckon she must have put everything out of the bleeding front in here. It’s full of rubbish; boots, ropes, crisp packets …’ There was a pregnant pause. ‘And what have we got here?’ hissed Milo, with a triumphant note in his voice. ‘Bingo.’

  Spar spun round. ‘What is it?’

  Milo passed him the torch, pulled a large carrier bag out of his pocket and started to shovel photographs into it. He looked up at Spar.

  ‘The mother lode, my old son, the mother lode.’

  Back inside, Dora glanced around the hall, trying to pick out Jon’s face from amongst the crowd. The clock above the door said it was nearly nine. A group of dignitaries had assembled on the stage and the music had faded to a respectful level.

  The college principal tapped the microphone and murmured, ‘One-two, one-two.’ Satisfied it was working, he gave a broad smile of welcome.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen, it gives me great pleasure to be hosting our eleventh annual Spring Ball. As is our tradition, tonight we will be presenting awards which have been made by both the faculty and the student body to members of staff, the student body and members of the community alike …’

  Dora let her attention drift back towards the main doors. Guy Phelps was standing under the balcony with a group of men in dinner jackets. Dora’s eyes moved across them casually and then swung back. She recognised the man beside Phelps. They were sharing a joke, their heads angled together. It was the man she had seen with Phelps at the bring and buy – the same man she had seen breaking into Lillian’s flat in Keelside.

  She poked Josephine. ‘Who is that guy with Phelps?’ she whispered.

  Josephine looked round in surprise. ‘What?’

  ‘The man there, on his right?’

  A flurry of applause broke out as the principal announced the awards would be followed by a buffet supper in the refectory.

  Josephine peered round. ‘That’s Colin Scarisbrooke. He’s Phelps’ political agent. Why?’

  Dora let the information sink in and then shook her head. ‘I’m not sure, but I think I may just have found out who is looking for Tom Fielding’s photos.’

  Josephine stared at her. ‘What? Are you certain?’

  Dora turned to check, but the crowd had shifted, obscuring her view. ‘I think he’s the man I caught breaking into Lillian’s flat.’

  Josephine’s incredulous reply was interrupted by another burst of applause.

  ‘This year,’ the principal continued, as the clapping died down, ‘to present the awards, we are privileged to have local businessman and longstanding supporter of our college charity projects, Mr Lawrence Rawlings …’ There was more applause.

  Dora felt obligated to watch Lawrence Rawlings making his way to the front of the stage, but not before she saw Alicia Markham, with her tail up about something, blustering through the doors at the back of the hall.

  ‘Good evening,’ Lawrence Rawlings began. ‘My association with both Fairbeach and the college has been lifelong …”

  Alicia Markham pushed her way into the VIP ladies’ washroom followed somewhat uneasily by Spar and Milo. She waved them inside.

  ‘For God’s sake get in here, and stop drawing attention to yourselves. Everyone else will be downstairs watching the awards ceremony. Here, give me that bag.’ Snatching it away from Milo she upended it onto the long marble counter and pawed through the landslide of photos and papers like a terrier after a rat.

  The first thing that caught her eye was a buff envelope. Inside was a folded sheet of paper. It wasn’t the photographs, but perhaps it might be what Lawrence was looking for. Inside was a birth certificate. She scanned it in seconds, her eyes resting on ‘father’s name’. What was written beneath was a revelation. She stared at Milo and Spar without focusing.

  ‘My God,’ she hissed. This had to be what Lawrence had been looking for. He was trying to protect Jack Rees. She hesitated and then reread the certificate. At the funeral hadn’t Caroline, Jack’s widow, said something about Jack being found out once he was dead? Alicia read it again: Jack Rees was Lillian Bliss’s father.

  She smiled thinly, carefully refolded the certificate into the envelope, slipped it into her handbag and then began to search again. She sifted through swimming certificates, endless photos of the young Lillian Bliss with a mongrel on a pebbly beach …

  It was dross. All of it. She looked up at Milo.

  ‘Is this it?’ she said murderously. ‘Are you certain you looked everywhere?’ There was an unpleasant acidic taste in her mouth. These men were complete morons. She could have done a better job herself.

  Milo lifted his hand in apology and then sniffed. ‘What you want not there, then?’

  Alicia beaded him with a furious glance. ‘No, it’s not there.’ She sucked her teeth. ‘Where the hell are the photographs?’

  Spar considered for a few seconds. ‘Dora Hall said she was going to deliver them at midnight.’

  Alicia couldn’t bring herself to speak to him and instead stared into his reflected gaze.

  Spar flinched.

  ‘Well, she’s got to have them, then, hasn’t she?’ Milo reasoned. ‘We just go there at midnight and pick them up.’ He squared his shoulders. ‘Two of them, two of us and one of them’s a woman. And anyway, we’ll have the element of surprise.’

  Alicia sighed. ‘Right. I want you to go to the clock tower and wait.’

  ‘Why?’ said Spar. ‘It’s really cold out there.’

  ‘In case she decides to get there early,’ Alicia snapped. She looked at Milo. ‘Then it will be one against two. One of whom will be a woman.’ She snapped her handbag shut with an air of finality and then swept out of the powder room, leaving Milo and Spar staring at the pile of photos.

  Spar looked uncomfortably around the pale pink interior of the ladies’ toilet. ‘What are we going to do, then?’ he said.

  Milo picked up the carrier bag and began to funnel the photos back into it.

  ‘Do what the lady says. Maybe there’s something in this lot your man Rawlings might want.’

  ‘No,’ said Spar unhappily. ‘I didn’t mean that. What about waiting up at the clock tower for Dora Hall? It’s bloody freezing out there.’

  Milo grinned. ‘We’ll light a little fire. Do you know any good ghost stories?’

  ‘And finally, last, but by no means least, we have the awards given by our student body,’ announced the principal. He smiled indulgently. ‘As always, their choices have been a little eclectic’

  Dora was beginning to get twitchy. She wanted Jon there with her. Across the room, Lillian was preparing to climb the steps up to the stage.

  ‘Hello, you look stunning,’ purred a familiar voice, as a hand slipped around Dora’s waist.

  Smiling, D
ora turned round, and looked up into Jon’s dark eyes. ‘You’ll really have to get rid of those crepe-soled shoes, or is it a police thing, sneaking up on people? I’ve been watching out for you.’ She nodded towards the main entrance.

  Jon grinned. ‘Perks of the job. They let me in through the side door. How’s it going?’

  He smelt beautiful and looked better. A flutter of desire was stamped on by the realisation that Dora now had to tell him about Tom Fielding’s photos, and how she was planning to meet him at midnight. It seemed melodramatic and ridiculous.

  Dora took a deep breath. No time like the present.

  ‘I’ve got something I have to tell you –’ She was cut short by a thunderous explosion of applause as Lillian Bliss mounted the stage. The strawberry blonde seemed to float across towards the dignitaries, blushing demurely, and acknowledging her audience with a discreet wave of the hand.

  Lawrence Rawlings appeared totally overawed by her and held onto Lillian’s hands far too long as he awarded her her certificate and crystal vase. Lillian rewarded him with her carnivorous smile, and a delicate peck on each cheek, before she turned towards the microphone.

  ‘I’d just like to say thank you very much for this award. It really does mean a lot to me,’ she said, in her low breathy voice. Her eyes moved across the audience until she met Dora’s eyes and then she winked slowly. ‘I’d really like to thank my dear friend Dora Hall, without whom none of this would have been possible. Thank you, Dora.’ As she spoke she hoisted the vase up in the air to a round of tumultuous applause.

  Dora groaned and tightened her grip on Jon’s arm.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he said, out of the corner of his mouth. ‘It’ll all be over soon.’

  Dora looked up at him and pulled a miserable face.

  ‘That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. I think we ought to go and find somewhere quiet. Let’s go out into the corridor.’

  It took two minutes to explain, which was almost exactly the same amount of time Jon stared at Dora after she had finished speaking.

  Finally he opened his mouth and said, incredulously, ‘Are you stark raving mad? This isn’t fiction, you know. What are you playing at? Why didn’t you ring me?’ He glanced over his shoulder, back into the hall. ‘I ought to go and find Tom Fielding.’