“I don’t mind that. I remember Lily—Lily Marsden she were then. But she were older than me and Colin. Why would we be keeping an eye on her?”
“Sorry, I’m not making myself clear. I don’t mean minding her. I was trying to find a polite way of saying watching her, spying on her.”
Harry Sugden grinned.
“Well, that Lily Marsden were always up to summat, an’ you know what lads are like at that age—smutty as hell.”
That tied in with the hints from the other children about what Lily was getting up to.
“It was something like that, was it? Or you two thought it was. My memory is that she was calling on someone, going to see some man and getting paid for whatever she did.”
“By ’eck, you’ve got a memory. Tell you the truth, I do mind it now, but not a lot more than you’ve said.” He took up his tea again and drank thirstily. “She were goin’ somewhere and gettin’ money for doin’ summat. O’ course it could have been anything: running errands for someone who was disabled, or old, or—”
“But you and Colin didn’t think so.”
“None o’ them did, none o’ the kids around here. It were—I dunno—it were her way, the way she talked about it, the sly, secretive way she referred to it. Ee, she were a funny lass. There was no pinning her down. She—well, she knew things us kids could only guess at.”
“Sex?”
Harry scratched his chest. Matt clearly hadn’t hit the nail squarely on the head, but Harry was at a loss to explain the essence of Lily’s strangeness.
“That, I suppose. But—I don’t know as I can put my finger on it. I were never that clever wi’ words—it were more psychological than physical, if you catch my meaning. No doubt there were that as well, in some shape or form, but what pleased her specially were that she were being told about things—things most children in them days would know nowt about, whatever they might pick up today. She were on equal footing with an adult.”
Matt thought for a moment.
“Who was this person she was going to?”
“Search me.”
“You and Colin knew she was visiting someone, but not who?”
“I think that’s right. You’re callin’ on memories I hardly knew I ’ad, so I may be messin’ you about entirely. But I think we found out the house she was visiting, an’ we kept watch on it, but I don’t think we ever knew who it were.”
“Where was the house?”
“It were down in our part o’ Bramley—where your auntie lived and where I lived. Down in every sense o’ the word from these houses. It were one o’ the streets off from the Raynville Road—you know them. We lived in Lansdowne Avenue.”
“My auntie lived in Grenville Street, and Lily Fitch as she is now lives in Lansdowne Rise.”
“Does she now? Then there’s Grenville Grove, Leighton Terrace, an’ several more little streets as go off from Raynville Road. Could be any o’ those. It weren’t LansdowneAvenue—that were our own street, an’ I’d’a known who she were visiting if it were close to our ’ouse. Anyway, we lost interest because squatters moved into a ’ouse in one o’ those streets and we got more interested in them, otherwise I bet we could ’ave found out. ’Ave you spoken to Lily?”
“I have. She’s saying nothing.”
“She wouldn’t if she had anything to do wi’ this baby business.” He shot a quick look at Matt. “It is that we’re talkin’ about, isn’t it?”
“It is.”
“Aye. Tony told me.”
Matt felt a bit shamefaced about his secrecy.
“I didn’t tell him till yesterday that I’d known these houses when I was a boy. Made me sound like the poor little kid who looks up at a big house and dreams of owning it. This was a big house to me in those days.”
“To me an’ all.”
“You don’t remember anything more about those days that could be useful?”
“Not a thing.” He thought before saying carefully, “It doesn’t seem likely, does it, that them children were involved? I mean, apart from Lily they were pretty nice kids.”
“May be you’re right. But Lily Fitch is hiding something, I’m sure of that.”
“That were always her way. . . . Mind you, I’d ’ave to say I probably wouldn’t ’ave known if there were anything up. Soon as me mate came back from Brid I’d’ve been off wi’ him, and not playing up here. I knew me place.”
“You can’t remember when that was?”
“Give us a break! After all these years? But I think you were still around.”
“And you never played up here with them in later years?”
“Not as I recall. I’d played on and off in earlier years, but not later. . . . Some o’ them were gettin’ a bit old for playing—‘leiking,’ as we used to call it down the ’ill. They were coming up to an age when they’d be more interested in the other sex. I must ’ave met some o’ them around, living pretty close like I did, but I don’t think I ’ad anything more to do wi’ them as a group.”
“So you wouldn’t know where any of them went to in later life, where they landed up?”
Harry Sugden shook his head slowly.
“Not most of them, but just the one I do. Though I don’t know about ‘landed up,’ because this were—oh, must be eight or ten year ago now. I were on me own then, trying to run me own business. It didn’t work out—I ’ad to keep the costs so low to compete that I never made a living wage. This one I’m talkin’ about drove as ’ard a bargain as anyone. If he had the money to buy a house on the Otley Road—close to Lawnswood Cemetery, do you know the ones I mean?—you’d ha’ thought he could’ve paid a decent screw to ’ave it decorated. But no—”
“Who is this you’re talking about?”
“Pemberton were the surname. I can’t call to mind the Christian name but it were something unusual.”
“Rory.” Matt reached for the telephone directory, but shook his head. “No Pemberton, R., here.”
“Probably ex-directory. Most people wi’ money are. They’re allus being hounded by telephone salesmen.”
“You don’t recall the house number?”
“No, but it were one of those posh jobs they built justbefore the war, wi’ flat roofs and curved bays out front. I only have to drive by to find the number.”
“Would you do that?” Matt paused, wondering whether to offer petrol money.
“Don’t think of it,” said Harry, and Matt registered his sharpness. “I’m only too glad to ’elp.”
“Did you and Rory say anything about the old times?”
“He wasn’t interested. Like as not he thought I were using the fact that I used to play five-a-side wi’ ’im as a way of screwing a bit more out o’ him, but it would ha’ needed more than that, I can tell you. Only time he reacted wa’ when I mentioned Lily Marsden.”
“Oh?”
“I see her now an’ then, shoppin’ in Armley, or at the Owlcotes Centre. She’s the only one I ever do see, an’ she doesn’t recognize me. Any road, it seemed natural to mention that I knew she was still in the area. But it didn’t seem to be welcome to ’im.”
“Not welcome?”
“He got broody like. Then he said: ‘Damned woman. It all started wi’ ’er.’ I said, ‘What did?’ but he just turned and went out of the house and banged the door.”
Harry Sugden was as good as his word. He rang Matt in the early evening to tell him that the house he had redecorated was number 48. Matt decided there was no time like the present.“I thought we might take Beckham to Golden Acre Park for his evening walk,” he said to the children.
“Why should we go there?” asked Lewis.
“What’s there?” said Stephen.
“Birds. And moles. But mostly lots of unusual birds.”There was a flicker of interest. “Anyway, I’ve got something to do out there. You can all take Beckham around the lake. But don’t let him tangle with a goose.”
“Could he kill one?” asked Isabella.
“No, h
e’d come off worse. Everyone comes off worse who tangles with a goose. So keep him on a long lead.”
The children had been disappointed in their hopes of a nightly sighting of the urban fox. He or she had been seen just the once since they moved in, and since that was by Stephen alone the other two were skeptical of his claim. Matt thought it a good idea to take them to a place where there was a more reliable source of wildlife observation, though the birds of Golden Acre were almost unnatural—so stuffed with bread by visitors that they were a terrible warning against welfare dependency.
The birds were an immediate hit. The children didn’t worry about, or even notice, their weight problems but were so stunned and enchanted by the number and variety to observe that for a time they were speechless. Beckham, after an initial flurry of excitement, decided he was horribly outnumbered and outsmarted. He had already developed a cynicism about the squirrels around the Houghton Avenue houses, due to their numbers and their thoroughly unfair advantage of being able to climb trees. He put on a blasé air and trotted behind the children, sniffing the ground and ignoring the beasts of the air.
“Stick to the main path,” shouted Matt. “Otherwise we’ll never find each other.” And he went back to the car and retraced his route to the part of Otley Road closest to Ring Road. He parked round the corner from number 48 and walked back to it. It had a gate and a small, neat front garden. It was indeed a thirties house—spacious,clean-lined, and attractive. He rang the doorbell and waited.
“Yes?” The door had opened without a sound from inside. The hall was thickly carpeted and the blonde who opened the door was so heavily made-up as to be a health hazard to asthmatics. She was in her late thirties, smartly dressed, and looking as if she regarded staying in as just as much a challenge to her desirability as going out.
“I’m looking for Mr. Pemberton—”
“Rory?” The woman was genuinely surprised. “Good heavens, he hasn’t lived here for ages.”
“I’m sorry—I’m obviously very out-of-date,” said Matt, casually friendly. “Did he leave a forwarding address when he moved?”
“Oh, I know where he lives. I didn’t buy this from him or anything, it was part of the share-out. I’m his wife—ex, anyway.”
“I see. I need to talk to him—I knew him as a child. Does he still live in Leeds?”
“Near Bingley. Very nice place for him and his current, if they’re still together. One thing I’ll say about Rory, he always does well for himself. He really understands money.” There had been a footstep behind her, and a saturnine young man’s head appeared behind her shoulder. “Wouldn’t you agree, darling?”
“A prat who money clings to,” said the young man. “Why are we talking about Rory?”
“It’s this man who wants to talk to him.”
“Best of luck. You’ll find five minutes will exhaust your interest. Why don’t you give him the address, Nita? Rory’s never asked us to make a secret of it.”
“I suppose not,” said Nita Pemberton, if that was what she called herself now. “Well, it’s twenty-seven Chalcott Rise, just off the Saltaire to Bingley Road—the A650. A very nice neighborhood.”
“Well, if Rory’s got nice neighbors, they’ve struck unlucky,” said the young man, disappearing into the bowels of the house.
Nita raised her eyebrows in a look of complicity at Matt that said she had not chosen her current companion for his charm and tact.
“I didn’t say he had nice neighbors,” she said with a sigh, “only that it’s a nice neighborhood. Quite a different matter.” Matt nodded, thinking of the Cazalets. “Knowing Rory, he’ll hardly know they’re there, and they’ll hardly know he’s there. All they’ll know of him will be the clink of bottles being put in the bin, and the sound of whatever gas-guzzling car he’s currently driving.”
“Well, thank you for the address,” said Matt. “I’ll pay him a call when I can.”
“Make it when he’s sober,” said the woman. “Otherwise he’ll meander on about babies and God knows what. You won’t get any sense out of him.”
But when Matt had piled the children into the car, and was listening to their excited chatter—their determination to bring their mother there, their speculation as to whether she would let them keep a bird, species undecided—he wondered whether the best thing to do was to visit Rory Pemberton when he was likely to be half-seas over.
CHAPTER NINE
The Social Round
The more Matt thought about it, the better he liked the idea of catching Rory Pemberton when he was drunk. Drunkenness, as he knew from his footballing days, could take many forms, from quarrelsomeness to unreasoning happiness, from surliness to unquenchable (and usually very tedious) garrulousness. It sounded from Rory’s ex-wife as if his took the form of a maudlin raking-over of his past. In any case, if it didn’t work out Matt could try Rory again when he was sober. He might not even remember that they’d had a previous conversation. Did he get drunk in pubs and wine bars? Matt wondered. Or was he a solid, determined home-by-himself drinker? Either way, Matt fixed on the following Friday to make the experiment.The next morning an aerogram from Aileen made it clear she would not be getting back in the immediate future.
“Pity,” said Matt to the children at breakfast. “I was hoping to hold a little drinks party here so she could meet the locals.”
“You haven’t met several of them yourself,” Isabella pointed out. “We’ve met more of them than you have. Why don’t you hold a party anyway, and I’ll do the catering.”
“Do you mean you’ll buy in some nibbles?” asked Matt.
“No, I don’t. I mean I shall provide some delicious and unusual canapés and scrumptious biscuity snacks, all free except for the cost of the ingredients.”
Isabella had emerged from her wanting to be a vet phase and gone into a great cook (or possibly smart caterer) phase. These were phases not of the moon but of the television schedules, and she could next be expected to go through an interior decorator phase, or possibly a costume designer for glossy televisualizations of the classic novels phase. Catch her while she can be useful, Matt thought.
“You’re on,” he said. “What about Thursday evening, six till eight?”
“If you’re going to have people in, I’m going along to Jack Quinton’s,” announced Stephen.
“Who’s Jack Quinton?” Matt asked.
“He’s my friend round here,” Stephen said, pleased to have one, while the others had failed to find anyone of their own age. Matt was not worried about this. Isabella and Lewis would find friends, or else just keep up with the ones they had at school in Pudsey. They were naturally gregarious children—unlike, he suspected, Rory Pemberton, and perhaps Eddie Armitage. But perhaps he shouldn’t compare children of today with children of that earlier age. Perhaps childhood had changed in those thirty years.
Before driving to work Matt popped along to Delphine Maylie in Ashdene, who looked rather put out to be caught in her early-morning deshabille (and she did indeed look rather like a peeling wall). However, shecooperated enthusiastically in putting together a list of everyone who lived in the eight houses of the two terraces. Delphine predicted who would jump at the invitation and who would fail to turn up, and in the event she proved one hundred percent accurate. Matt printed out some fairly informal invitations at work, and Lewis went along delivering them after school.
The price Matt had to pay to Isabella was a visit to Leeds Market, where he cringed in the background as she demanded to taste all sorts of meats and cheeses at the specialty stalls, and a trip to Sainsbury’s at Greengates that included a quick dart into Homebase to buy the most exotic houseplant they had, which was clearly of the dead-within-a-fortnight variety but pretty and brilliant while it lasted. Matt had to admit on Thursday, when at last Isabella allowed him to sample them, that the nibbles were indeed tasty and adventurous, and beautifully set out. He had thought of economizing on the drinks, but eventually bought rather good wines, and plenty of gin, sh
erry, and vodka. I am trying to butter them up, after all, he said to himself. Certainly when people started arriving they were appreciative, and they mingled well since they nearly all knew one another. He had added to the guest list Charlie and Felicity, and Carl Farson, who had sold him the house, on the pretext of letting him have a look at what had been done to it. Farson was friendly on the phone, but said he would only be able to pop in briefly. Matt was interested to note that when the Peaces arrived everyone seemed to know who Charlie was.
He was on less certain ground in relation to many of his guests. Several of them realized this, and made haste to identify themselves.
“Jason Morley-Coombs,” said a young man with gleaming slicked-over hair and a smooth, unguent-massaged face, making Matt think he must be a sucker for all those television advertisements that confused masculinity with delicious smells. “Hello!” the man said, holding out a soft hand as he breezed in from the hallway. “We haven’t met. I live in Dell View. And this is the lady-friend.”
“Hello,” said the lady-friend, giving the impression that anything beyond that would be regarded as an intellectual challenge.
“I’m Matthew Harper,” Matt said, shaking her hand and waiting for her to give herself a name. She shook the hand and smiled. Giving herself a name was presumably unduly assertive.
“You used to be in football, they say,” said Jason, accepting a glass of wine from Isabella. “Wise career move. Lots of money there, eh, old chap?”
Matt screwed up his face.
“At the very top,” he said. “A big difference between the top and the not-quite-top. And a big difference between then and now. Ten, twelve years ago, when I was—well, not in my prime, but—”
“Point taken, old chap,” interrupted Jason. “But you must have hung up your boots pretty young. I’ve been hearing your voice on the old car radio for a fair while now. Why cut off the flow of golden guineas?”
“I was out of the game through injury too often,” said Matt. “The story of present-day British sport. More like a bumper episode of ‘Casualty’ than Chariots of Fire. ”
The Bones in the Attic Page 9