Summertime

by Charlotte Bingham

  ‘Shall we go straight in to dinner?’ Meeting her eyes, Micklethwaite saw with some guilt that she looked suddenly vulnerable, as if she knew that he did not want to waste too much time on her.

  ‘Yes, of course.’ Her voice, which had been cheerful and optimistic when she greeted him, was now dulled and subdued.

  ‘We can order champagne in the dining room. You like champagne, don’t you?’

  ‘As long as it’s vintage,’ she said, not smiling. ‘I don’t want shop girl’s champagne, if that is what you mean.’ She laughed suddenly.

  How dreary hotel dining rooms were, it seemed to Micklethwaite, when you were, as he was, constantly in them out of obligation. When you were in them out of dire necessity, out of penal duty, they were worse than dreary, they seemed to be full of the damned, eating, eating, eating. Fat people eating to make themselves fatter, thin people eating and staying thin and greedy. No-one really needing or enjoying what they were swallowing, no-one staying cheered by what they were drinking.

  ‘You’re not in love with me, are you, David?’ Agnes looked across the table at him.

  They had eaten and they had drunk, and pretty soon they would have to – at least he would have to – make love.

  ‘No, I am not in love with you. Did you imagine that I was?’

  She was not stupid, so it would have been incredibly foolish to even attempt to lie to her. She was a woman of the world. She would not tolerate a romantic lie. Any woman who looked as she did, and gave that short, sharp, cold little laugh, would not have believed him had he attempted to deceive her.

  ‘No, I did not imagine that you were.’ Again the cold little laugh, followed by a sip of her coffee, and another of her brandy. ‘No, I just wanted to make sure that we both felt the same.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘Real.’

  ‘Oh, I think we both feel real, all right?’ For the first time Micklethwaite gave a genuine laugh.

  ‘Good. Because I enjoy sex with you, but I would hate you to think that I was in love with you, or worse, that I thought you were in love with me.’

  ‘This is tough talking.’

  He smiled, and for some reason he did not understand he started, for the first time, to find this hard woman terribly attractive. It had never occurred to him before that a woman would go to bed with him for the same reasons that he would go to bed with a woman, for the plain enjoyment of sex, and nothing to do with love. He always thought that women were romantic enough to at least persuade themselves that they were in love with a man. That here was a woman who seemed to have no such requirement was, to say the least, intriguing. He was, of a sudden, very glad that he had booked the best suite, and his earlier fears now seemed groundless. It might be possible that he could have a good time, and, what was more, accomplish his mission of blackmailing her. It was going to be nothing but a pleasure to take her to bed, and remembering Lewis’s dismissive attitude he even found himself feeling sympathetic towards her. He just wished that he did not have to blackmail her too.

  But here again he was to be surprised.

  There was no need to blackmail Agnes Smythson. He had no need to threaten her with telling her husband of their dalliance, or anything else, for that matter. She was far too practical.

  ‘Now.’ She sat with her back against the satin bedhead and smiled across at him. Her hair was slightly tousled, as it would be after lovemaking, and she was now wrapped in a black satin dressing gown, and smoking a cigarette, which made her look pleasantly decadent. There was a slight look to her of a courtesan painted by some minor French artist, and, with her dark hair hanging over her shallow forehead, at the same time an attractively raffish air.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Yes. Now, down to business, because that is why you are here, is it not, Mr Micklethwaite?’ she said, coyly teasing. ‘Here to do business for some reason that I am dying to know!’

  She smiled, but Micklethwaite did not return her smile. The matter was too delicate, too important. ‘Very well, to begin at the beginning. How fond are you of your stepdaughter?’

  There was a long silence before Agnes Smythson started to laugh. ‘Fond of her? She has been a thorn in my side, and her wedding day the happiest day of my life, although I have to say that I certainly did not realise it at the time. I can’t tell you, getting that creature off my hands and out of our house was the best thing that has happened to me in years. Her and her father, peas in a pod, two of them in one house, it was enough to drive you dotty.’

  ‘Then you can help me?’

  ‘David. You know I will help you. Any time, anywhere!’ She laughed, but this time it was a rich laugh and one that seemed to ricochet off the walls and around Micklethwaite’s head, a laugh that belonged to a woman who enjoyed sex, but did not understand love.

  ‘She has left Lewis. He is distraught. We need you to help us to find her, if you will.’

  There was a long silence while Agnes took this in, and then she scrambled off the bed, stubbing out her cigarette in the ashtray on the way, and pulling her black satin robe around her.

  ‘My God, but this could mean that I’ll have her back with me, at Glebe Street. I certainly hope it doesn’t mean that. Where is she? She must be found and sent back to her husband at once. We must find her.’

  Micklethwaite nodded in agreement, feeling only gratitude that they were as one in their ideas. They must find the little bitch and send her back to her husband, his boss, and pronto, chop, chop.

  ‘Exactly, we must. The only trouble is . . .’ Micklethwaite looked at Agnes and shrugged his shoulders. ‘The only trouble is that we do not know where to look for her. Don’t even know where to begin. And Lewis, being Lewis, and being in the position he is in, and having so many enemies, a man in his position, and so on, and not being able to afford bad publicity, is, as I say, distraught. In fact he has told no-one except, so far, myself. He has to throw himself on your mercy. You have to help him find her.’

  Agnes stared at Micklethwaite. He did not know, as why should he, that he was not the only man with whom she had enjoyed sex over the past months, so the last thing she needed was for some nosy stepdaughter to come back home to live with her. The very last thing that she needed, was someone else around the house spying on her, wanting to know where she was going.

  Looking at it dispassionately, Agnes had known for some years now that her marriage was a sham. Michael was too distant, too inhibited for her more exuberant personality. He never wanted to socialise, as she did, never wanted to take her anywhere, except to the occasional restaurant on an equally occasional day of celebration. Yet, conventional as she was, the idea of infidelity only crept up on Agnes very gradually, after she had returned from Bognor of all places, following the brief fling she had enjoyed with David. The whole deceit of it was thrilling. Lying to Michael, watching his seeming indifference, was all part of a thrilling adventure, and one to which she had become extraordinarily addicted.

  ‘Do you know the expression “Follow the man home”?’

  Micklethwaite watched Agnes Smythson with some fascination as she paced the floor, his admiration for her increasing. She was something that he admired, a hard woman. He had met many hard women in the course of working for Lewis James, but they were really not hard enough underneath to be intriguing. They all had turned out to have some sort of soft centre. Some well-hidden weakness for their dogs, or their children, or an old boyfriend, something. But this woman was different. She was truly hard, and she did not bother to conceal it. More than that, she enjoyed being hard. She had, obviously, every reason not to want her stepdaughter to leave Lewis James, but, surprisingly, it was not to do with money.

  ‘I do know the expression. Follow the man home and you will know everything about him, all his reasons for acting as he does in business.’

  ‘We must find out why. Why would Trilby want to leave him? She had everything, didn’t she?’ The expression on Agnes’s face became dreamy as she thought of her stepdaughte
r’s clothes, her jewellery, her large house in a fashionable area, the holidays that she could take when and if she wanted them; of Lewis James’s yacht, the paintings in the dining room, the priceless furniture. ‘How could she walk out on so much?’

  ‘No reason that we know of, yet. There was nothing, no reason that we can find, as yet,’ Micklethwaite continued. ‘Lewis had given her everything that she wanted, after her – you know – after her illness. Bought her a studio, and everything in it. And what is more, he handed it over to her to do what she wanted in it, when she wanted. He has been more than generous, more than reasonable, in fact he has been, to my mind, quite, quite saintlike.’

  ‘Of course.’ Agnes had stopped her pacing and was standing in front of David. ‘Lewis has been perfect. He has been a perfect husband. We all know that. She knows that. She is just spoilt, just a spoilt brat. Her father always indulged her, she could always twist her father around her finger. The moment I was out of the door, he took her side, indulged her, and this is the result. But now, not even her father could find her, I don’t suppose.’

  ‘No, not her father, but you could. You see, the day that she left she had been in the middle of painting some old lady. But we don’t know who, and as it is we can’t ask. The matter has to be kept so secret. As you can appreciate, the moment we lift the telephone and start asking questions, well, the cat will be out of the bag.’

  ‘I see that.’

  ‘Which is where you come in.’

  Agnes had turned away to the mirror and was applying a thick, red lipstick to her full lips. As soon as she was satisfied that they were glowing and carmine, she eyed Micklethwaite through the mirror, her own eyes narrowed, before brushing her hair, then powdering her nose.

  She was such a good-looking woman that Micklethwaite began to feel proud that he had pleased a woman of her undoubted attraction and beauty. A little hint of the more mature film star, a soupçon of the gracious beauty, and more than a dash of the risqué made Agnes Smythson immensely desirable. If he was not otherwise engaged with another equally attractive woman, he would have liked to repeat his experience with her, but as it was, he had done his duty to Lewis James, and it was over, although not to be forgotten.

  Nor could he now remember why he had been so reluctant to take her to bed before. Perhaps it had been because of Trilby? Down by the seaside with Trilby dashing about the beach, braving the waves in all weathers, standing on her head in the sand, Agnes Smythson had seemed all too tarnished compared to her slender, innocent step-daughter.

  ‘Very well. Carry on, quickly. There is obviously no time to lose. Tell me what I can do to help you and Lewis?’

  ‘Well, I thought if you came with me now, we could go to her studio, and you could identify the woman in the painting, the one that she was painting, and you could tell us, perhaps, who she was? And since she was the last person to see Trilby, as far as we know, at any rate, it would hurry things up so much. We could go straight round to her.’

  Agnes was now dressing herself with all the speed of an actress in a fashionable revue with only half a minute to spare before she had to go back on stage to perform in another sketch.

  ‘I’ll come with you straight away,’ she told Micklethwaite. ‘What about the hotel? What did you tell them?’

  ‘The hotel?’ Micklethwaite looked surprised. ‘What did I tell them? Why – nothing.’ He smiled. ‘I didn’t have to. We own it.’

  Agnes laughed, impressed. She liked the kind of style that went with vast unseen wealth. In fact she liked everything about the Lewis James organisation, and she could no longer remember why she had been against Trilby marrying him. She dimly remembered it was because she had found that Trilby acted as a distraction for her husband, Michael. Her stepdaughter’s comings and goings had been a really rather good cover-up for Agnes. As long as Trilby was dashing in and out of the neighbours’ houses, Agnes could come and go as she pleased, seeing friends, shopping, going to events that she considered important, such as fashion shows and jewellery exhibitions, staring at so much that she wanted and so little that she could have.

  Hastening round to the studio, on foot so as not to attract any attention, Micklethwaite and Agnes laughed and talked all the way, both of them sure that the painting of the old lady must, without doubt, lead them to the person who had last seen and talked to Trilby. It was bound to, they persuaded themselves; it could not fail to, they told each other. They were both buoyant with the idea of catching up with the little bitch and returning her to her rightful owner.

  ‘She did not leave a suicide note, nothing like that,’ Micklethwaite reassured Agnes, but Agnes, who was nothing if not a flinty-heart, merely shrugged her shoulders as if to say ‘So what if she had?’ ‘In fact the note that she left was really quite realistic, almost matter of fact, apparently, in tone. So we do think, we almost know, that we could swear to the fact that she is alive. The question is – where?’

  Lewis had given Micklethwaite Trilby’s spare key to the studio, which he had found in the tiny kitchen when he broke in with Lyons, and this Micklethwaite now inserted quietly into the lock of the outer door. The side street in which the studio stood was as quiet as any country lane at night, and the slightest sound would, he feared, serve to attract the attention of someone who knew Trilby and would wonder what they were doing there. Perhaps some neighbour walking a dog, or some other painter – for there were a number of other studios in the street – returning from the small local pub where mildly bohemian folk liked to meet and exchange mildly left wing views.

  ‘Right, good. Now for the second door.’

  Agnes had not even known that Lewis had given Trilby a studio in which to paint. And even if she had she would have been less than interested, for the truth was that Agnes was never even vaguely curious about anyone else, unless they were interfering, or, as in this case, threatening to interfere, with her pleasures.

  David Micklethwaite switched on the lights and looked round the suddenly big, light room with blinking eyes. It was after midnight, and he knew that just the lights going on could attract unwanted attention.

  ‘So this is where she was painting?’

  He nodded as Agnes stared around her.

  ‘And what else was she doing here?’

  ‘Else?’

  Agnes started to laugh at Micklethwaite’s expression. ‘Don’t be naïve, David. A girl like Trilby married to an older man, coming here every day, you don’t suppose she was just painting, do you?’

  ‘Oh yes, I think she was, I don’t think that Trilby is promiscuous in any way. In fact I happen to know that she was not, absolutely not promiscuous, she was, is, just not that sort of girl. I would stake my life on it. Besides, Lewis being Lewis, she would not have had any opportunity. He always had her watched, or so he said.’

  Micklethwaite surprised himself by the shock in his voice. He had never been aware of feeling loyal to Trilby in any way, but now he realised that he did feel loyal to her. At least, he felt loyal enough to defend her, or to defend the person he imagined she was. Indeed there were times, knowing what he knew about Lewis, when he had, albeit fleetingly, even felt a little sorry for her.

  ‘Oh, well, if you choose to take that line, I can’t stop you. But believe you me, if a girl ups and runs off, it is hardly ever with no-one. In fact, if you care to take a bet, I will lay you ten pounds that we will find that my stepdaughter has a lover.’

  Micklethwaite, again for no reason that he could name, felt shocked by the very notion of an innocent, fresh young girl like Trilby being an adulteress. He surprised himself by his deep-seated desire that she should always remain as she had been when he had first met her. He knew it was impossible that she could, yet he hoped, illogically, that she had.

  ‘We had better find this painting before someone finds us.’ He nodded up at the skylights above them. ‘People in these narrow London streets are always so nosy. If some neighbour sees these on, they might call the police.’

  �
�We’ll be all right.’

  ‘Not for long we won’t, she never ever works here at night. Lewis likes Trilby home at six, on the dot, when he gets back, and there would be all hell to pay if she stayed any later, I know that.’

  Micklethwaite walked down the room and started to sort through the various canvases stacked against the wall, picking them up and staring at them uncritically, searching for a painting of an old woman. Until he remembered that Lewis had told him that the relevant painting was the one that was still on the easel at the very back of the studio.

  He went at once to the easel, and stared up at it. It was indeed a portrait of an old lady – the hands, the frock, the shoes told him that – but the face, the hair, the neck had all been blacked out. He stared at it, mesmerised. Like everything disfigured by desecration, by graffiti, the once innocent canvas now looked shockingly obscene.

  And yet a blacked-out canvas can become mesmerising, asking, as it does, why? What lay behind it? Suppression lends importance, and at that moment nothing was more fascinating to Micklethwaite, and even to Agnes, than that blacked-out canvas.

  Chapter Ten

  The Sunday following the start of Trilby’s summer sojourn, having watched Piers cook more food than, she imagined, could possibly be eaten even by a bunch of hungry youngsters, she set off with Piers to collect ‘Mum’s brood’ from Wake Park.

  The winding narrow lanes of Dorset were lined with bright fresh green grass full of early summer flowers. As they drove with the windows down, the dawn chorus, always so noisy in early morning, had turned from choral work to duets and solos, so that every now and then, when they stopped to allow another car through, or sat while a farmer moved his cows from one pasture to another, Piers would put his head on one side and say ‘Listen – a nightingale’. Or ‘Ah, my friends the blackbirds’, and Trilby, who really did not know one bird’s song from another, would also put her head to one side and strain to hear what Piers could hear – the innocent differences of nature carolling into the pure, clear Dorset air.