A Splash of Red

by Antonia Fraser

  The inference, to those used to such things, was obvious. Jemima fancied she detected the hovering hand of the police in these mentions of Kevin John. A word in time, of a discreet nature, from the police, helped the Press to direct their eager noses in the right direction; and the Press in their turn helped on the police by their own enquiries. It was after all only an amplified version of Jemima's own relationship with Pompey.

  Unlike the television channels, the Press gave no significant mention to Chloe's literary works. The measured warmth of Jamie Grand in the Guardian was the honourable exception (J.S. Grand, editor of Literature, writes: 'A talent to observe .. .'). Otherwise the person was considered so much more newsworthy than the oeuvre. Jemima thought that Chloe would have found in that personal concentration matter for regret, despite the vast publicity given to her death - but could she be sure of anything to do with Chloe any longer? Perhaps her friend would have relished the street fame, the passionate popular interest ... No, surely not, a writer must always hope for the elevation of the work over the personality. And Chloe, whatever her other qualities, had been at heart a writer. In that at least Jemima had not been deceived.

  There was not even the merest hint in the Press of Sir Richard Lionnel's connection with Chloe. Even the fact that she had lived - and died - in that controversial modern building, creation of the Lion of Bloomsbury, 73 Adelaide Square, received little emphasis. Only the Telegraph seemed remotely interested in the subject, and this interest was limited to the phrase: 'recently in the news due to student protest at the demolition of Adam's work'.

  Did she also detect the hovering hand of the police here? More likely the hovering hands of Fleet Street's eagle-eyed libel lawyers. No point in going for the (almost certainly) innocent Sir Richard Lionnel, armed with his own equally watchful lawyers, when the (almost certainly) guilty Kevin John Athlone, a picturesque enough killer for any editor, was there for their delectation.

  Jemima's favourite editor, Jake Fredericks - brother of her own boss the ebullient Cy - did ring her up from the London Evening Post and suggest a piece about Chloe.

  'I gather that handsome brute of a painter finally went over the top and did it,' he observed cheerfully. 'I never could stand him myself. Irresistible to women, I am assured, blows and all. Maybe I should deliver a blow or two myself. I must check with Eveline sometime. Anything to please. I used to meet Athlone at Cy's parties when he was with Sophie and he used to beat her up something terrible then. She went to hospital, needed stitches, all that kind of thing. And I think Oonagh Leggatt had something of the same experience. Ugh.' Jemima repressed a smile at the thought of the charming rather motherly Eveline Fredericks entering into some kind of sado-masochistic relationship with Jake. Unlike Cy, Jake had been happily married as long as Jemima could remember. 'Good painter, though,' he added. 'Still it's not quite enough, is it? We can't have our lady novelists dying like flies, can we?'

  Jake Fredericks' notion was, as he expressed it, that Jemima should set the record straight about Chloe. 'After all she was a very good writer, as well as a grand horizontal, wasn't she? My colleagues have concentrated so far on the latter angle. Here at the London Evening Post we have always believed in a woman's right to be both.'

  Jemima was not to be drawn. Thanking Jake politely, she declined and headed for the British Library. She felt depressed. Things were getting blacker for Kevin John. A known record of violence towards the women in his life was not going to help his case forward with Pompey -or, if it came to that, with a jury. It remained to be seen whether Valentine Brighton, in heaving something off his own chest, would also relieve Kevin John Athlone in some way of the burden of guilt.

  But Valentine Brighton, pale but composed, speaking in a low voice in view of the regulations of the Reading Room, did no such thing.

  'I saw him.' It was as bald as that. 'I was shattered. No, no, not doing the murder—' His voice rose slightly. 'Just afterwards. It must have been just afterwards.'

  'Sssh' came very angrily from the middle-aged woman of foreign appearance at the desk next to Jemima's. 'Here iss not a place for talking.' Jemima, in her own state of shock at what Valentine had just said, vaguely resented the interruption but made no effort to curtail Valentine's stream of words.

  'And further I must tell you, you are sitting in the place of Professor Leinsdorf,' hissed the woman, after a moment, plucking at Jemima's sleeve. It was true. Jemima had been waved to Bio by Valentine, but Professor ‘ books, as they presumably were, were neatly stacked in the corner. The theory of economics, mainly in German. As Jake Fredericks would say, ugh.

  Valentine Brighton was at this moment saying: 'Jemima, I've got to use you as my mother confessor. Do I go back to the police and tell them? How on earth do I explain what I was doing there? My God, do I have to explain about - well - I mean will it all come out, be in the papers? It will kill Mummy, I tell you it will kill her—'

  His voice, never particularly deep, rose to an accompanying angry 'Sssssh' from the friend of Professor Leinsdorf.

  'It did kill Chloe Fontaine,' Jemima hissed back furiously. 'Or rather someone did. And of course you must tell the police what you saw. Besides, they already know a good deal of it - look, Valentine, I may as well tell you now. They found the peep-hole.' Pompey had confirmed the prints as being Valentine's that morning.

  For a moment Jemima thought Valentine was actually going to faint. His slightly sweaty pallor increased dramatically and his eyelids closed and flickered. He swayed in his seat.

  'Oh God, poor poor Mummy,' he groaned. Professor Leinsdorf’s friend stood up and regarded the pair of them with extreme disfavour; she arranged her own books and belongings all over her desk as though to prevent the possibility of any further territorial infringement by Jemima. Jemima noted the label on her briefcase, a surprisingly smart object of black leather, considering its owner's own careless appearance: Dr Irina Harman, it read, and the address was somewhere in Cambridge.

  'I go to have a coffee,' Dr Irina Harman announced. Then: 'Those are the books of Professor Leinsdorf. It iss not in the rules to sit at that desk.' As Jemima did not react, she said in a louder voice: 'It is occupied.' Then Dr Harman stumped away.

  'If it gets into the Press, I can't bear it. I simply cannot bear it,' Valentine was saying. 'I'll go and live abroad.'

  'Oh for Christ's sake, Valentine. This is not the nineteenth century and you are not the wicked Lord Byron. Do stop thinking about yourself. What's a little harmless voyeurism among friends?' She forbore to remind him that she herself had received two of his calls.

  Valentine groaned again. Jemima's furious flippancy only seemed to make him feel worse. For her part, she wanted to shake him.

  'I take it you saw Kevin John Athlone - in Chloe's bedroom.'

  'I don't know why I do such things. It started when I was a child. Perhaps because I was lonely. Anyway, where Chloe was concerned it all began one day by accident. I found the way up the fire escape when her buzzer didn't answer. There was a loose brick - I was looking for a key.

  She was somehow so provocative, Chloe, wasn't she? I mean I almost felt she wanted me to watch her. But how can I tell the police that? As for Mummy—'

  'Valentine,' Jemima whispered as calmly as she could. 'What did you actually see? The police aren't interested in your private tastes, they're only interested in you as a witness to murder.'

  'I went up the fire escape and I looked through the peep-hole,' he said. 'Chloe hadn't turned up here. I had some vague idea of warning her about Francesca Lionnel. I'm not quite sure what I expected, I never am when I do these things. I suppose I also thought I might see you. I called you, you know, the night before and in the morning.' He spoke quite flatly. He seemed to have no shame where Jemima herself was concerned. Perhaps he imagined that life in television had inured her to such things.

  'Leinsdorf? Your books.' An Asian carrying two large grey volumes was standing over Jemima. He deposited them without waiting for a confirmation. He
was handsome and quite young; and was wearing a red ‘I-shirt with the face of Marilyn Monroe on it. Jemima recognized him. He had tried to deliver some books to her desk - commissioned by someone called Hamilton - on Saturday. This time she accepted the Leinsdorf books without comment.

  'Go on.'

  'I saw him, Kevin John Athlone. In her bedroom. He was alone. At least I think he was. He was holding a razor in his hand. You can't see the top of the bed you know. The hole is too high. Only the bottom of the bed, the rest of the bedroom and the door. He was just standing there. Looking right at the picture. At me. I was terrified he'd see right through it and see me. And she'd promised me it was all over. I felt quite sick. I went away. Then I saw you walking towards the British Museum and I followed you. I followed you right into the Reading Room. I watched you looking for a place. I moved someone else's books just ahead of you and sat down. I made a place for you. You see - I wanted you to find me. I pretended to be asleep so you wouldn't suspect. I was still feeling sick.'

  'Ah. The wrong books which were delivered—' Jemima began.

  'Oh, Jemima, couldn't you tell the police? Explain I'm not feeling at all well, and I'm not, absolutely not up to it. Poor Mummy, how will she bear it—'

  'You must make your own statement; it's vital, don't you see that? I can't give your evidence.'

  'Pardon me, but I believe those are my books,' said a polite soft female voice above Jemima; this time the accent was not mid-European but American. 'Since I had not purposed to vacate this seat, you should provide yourself with another one. And adjust your seat number accordingly on any request slips you may have already filed.' Professor Leinsdorf spoke in the terminology of a firm but courteous public notice.

  But contrary to Jemima's mental image, the Professor besides being female was comparatively young. She wore a neat white blouse and pale grey skirt, with a soft grey chiffon scarf at her neck. She might have been a member of some modern nun's order, which wore contemporary dress. She was also rather pinkly pretty with full lips and a high natural colour: although she wore no visible makeup, she hardly needed it to enhance her wholesome and attractive appearance.

  'I'm so sorry,' said Jemima hastily, leaping up. 'Valentine, we have to talk. Let's go outside. Right?'

  Valentine made a movement she interpreted as a nod. Professor Leinsdorf also nodded with the confident air of one who was used to restoring things to their rightful order wherever she went, and sat down.

  She heard Valentine's voice calling rather faintly after her and returned. This time his message was only whispered: 'Give me five minutes to recover, old girl.' The sobriquet was somehow pathetically sportive. 'I won't rat on you,' he added, in the same Kiplingesque idiom.

  'Sure. Meet you by the head of Rameses in, say, ten minutes' time? I'll fill in a book slip or two for when I return.' Valentine gave a rather more vigorous nod in which she discerned relief.

  Jemima took herself off to find a new seat, succeeding finally among the L’s; a rather noisy position due to the presence of a row of machines behind her being cranked by readers to show microfilm. Still L for Love had good connotations; she speculated whether Valentine's dogging her footsteps on the fatal Saturday had not been responsible for the strange aberration of her mental alphabet on that occasion.

  On her way Jemima passed Dr Harman who shot her a look of malevolent triumph. The doctor's heavy figure, ill suited by her brightly flowered skirt and green blouse, stockingless white legs in flat sandals, together with her mouse-coloured hair scraped back into a tight bun, made her the prototypical figure of the earnest female scholar of the old style, just as the fresh and soignee Professor Leinsdorf (who could have been photographed for Taffeta in one of its serious moods, just as she stood) epitomized the new. Yet it was possible that the two women were in fact about the same age.

  'It is not good to take the seat of another person,' said Dr Harman in a loud voice. 'You will learn.' Jemima ignored her.

  Finding the press mark in the catalogue - a list of numbers - and filling in a white slip to order a book was a famously aggravating task. In another area of her mind Jemima, as she coped with the heavy catalogues, was also turning over what Valentine had told her. She too was shattered. A few minutes' respite for them both was perhaps not a bad thing.

  Moreover the catalogue appeared to have taken on a life of its own; it was a creature of mood, and in this case a peculiarly perverse mood. It sent her scurrying from one quarter of the alphabet to the other - a shift of numerous volumes - as a book written by one Marion Miller frustratingly turned out to be listed under her maiden name of Evans. As Miller had also proved to be Millar - a shift of another volume -and the literary Evanses were innumerable - more than one heavy volume of entries - the whole operation took a great deal of time.

  Jemima concentrated on filling in the order slip accurately; a mistake in the catalogue number would send her back to the start of the whole ponderous process. Slip finally filled and deposited in the box provided, Jemima made for the exit. On her way she glanced towards Row B. Valentine had gone on ahead. The typescript he had been perusing in his capacity as a working publisher was however still there, sheets spread about the desk. Clearly he intended to return and collect it.

  Jemima hoped that Valentine's pause for recovery would only have crystallized his intention to make a clean breast of his story to Pompey as soon as possible. Valentine's own first-hand evidence - rather than her second-hand report of it - was both crucial and devastating where Kevin John was concerned. So far as Jemima knew, this was the first positive proof that Kevin John had been at the scene of the murder during the lunch hour. Under the circumstances her own irrational belief in Kevin John's innocence was fast fading. To say the least of it, Kevin John had lied about his movements to the police in his sworn statement (and to Jemima herself on the afternoon of the murder, for that matter).

  Jemima was amused to see that Professor Leinsdorf and Dr Harman had also abandoned Row B. Perhaps some economic conference of their fine minds was being held elsewhere in the building? Their respective papers and books however were spread about ostentatiously; no chances were being taken of another alien invasion.

  She wended her way to the end of the Reading Room and proceeded to the checkpoint where a couple of uniformed officials, one woman and one man, maintained a search of bags and belongings to ensure that the valuable rare books of the British Library did not stray.

  Jemima's prettily patterned notebook was always subjected to a peculiarly rigorous search as though some exciting rarity was being smuggled out, although half the pages were blank and the other half filled with her own hand-written notes. Jemima was just giving her automatic speech - 'That's my own hand-writing; no, it's not the property of the British Library; look, no press marks; yes, it's my own notebook' when she was interrupted by a familiar guttural voice -speaking even louder than before.

  'Ja, ja, it iss her! It iss she who took the seat of Professor Leinsdorf.' Panting heavily as though she had been running, Dr Irina Harman was standing at the exit and pointing in the direction of Jemima. 'Stop her!' A middle-aged man in a jacket and tie stood at her side.

  It was really too much. Jemima, already tense about her rendezvous with Valentine - she suddenly feared she might have allowed him enough time to change his mind - felt her patience beginning to snap. The whole incident was so absurd.

  'For God's sake,' she began angrily as the official stepped forward. He looked acutely embarrassed, particularly when he recognized Jemima; Jemima for her part rather thought she recognized him; he was the superintendent, or held some other fairly responsible position, and they had met in a discussion group about the future of the Reading Room.

  'Excuse me, could I have a private word with you?' he asked in a low but firm voice. 'It's Jemima Shore, isn't it? We've met.' His embarrassment deepened still further. 'And you were sitting in Row B just now, and holding a conversation—'

  'For God's sake,' Jemima repeated in a furious voice
which she did not bother to moderate. 'It was only a tiny episode and I've already apologized. This lady seems to be quite obsessed—'

  'No, no, you don't understand, Miss Shore. I'm afraid the gentleman you were talking to just now collapsed very suddenly at his desk. We're trying to track anyone who knows him—'

  'Collapsed! But I only just left him—'

  'I know. It was very sudden, according to this lady here. Some form of heart attack, I fear. We've summoned an ambulance. But I ought to prepare you—'

  'He iss dead,' interrupted Jemima's quondam accuser in a heavily lugubrious voice. 'He spoke to uss, said some words which are odd, then he iss dead. There iss nothing even Professor Leinsdorf could do for him. She had tried respiration immediately. Your friend iss quite dead.'

  13

  Strong women

  'Fatal heart attack. Could have happened any time. Heart in a terrible dickey state. Mother - strong woman that, by the way, remarkable fortitude - confirmed it.' Chief Inspector Portsmouth gave a shake of the head which under the circumstances was positively blithe. 'Mind if I do?' He poured himself another pale whisky and water, courtesy of Sir Richard Lionnel. 'What about you?' Jemima in turn shook her head.