by Nhys Glover
When she went on, it was far more politely. “How many floors are there?”
“Four, if you include the ground floor. Two flats on each. So, you’d have people above and below you. All soundproofed, of course. It always amazes me how much difference soundproofing makes to these old buildings. They were probably very noisy back in the past, but definitely not now.”
Adie remembered that Minerva’s flat had been 4B. So she would have been on the top floor. Young legs wouldn’t have been concerned about three flights of steep stairs.
“Are all the apartments the same size in the building? The same floor plan?” Adie pressed, starting up the staircase that was, in fact, beautifully carpeted, for all its steepness.
The black, wrought-iron handrail matched the front door, looking both old-worlde and trendy. The perfect, unadorned walls, painted a pale, neutral color Adie was sure wasn’t any kind of stock beige or cream, didn’t distract the eye from their ornate beauty.
“Pretty much. The As and Bs are mirror images of each other though. Eight apartments in all. Flats we call them. But the building’s owner had each decorated for uniqueness. Even their front doors are slightly different.
“As soon as they went on the market they were snapped up, even though the London residential prices were astronomically high at the time. This is the first one that has come back onto the market since then, as far as I know. People are very happy living here. The sellers of 3B are retiring to the Azores, otherwise they would have stayed on, I’m sure.”
Adie had no idea where the Azores were, but she assumed somewhere tropical. People tended to retire to the tropics, didn’t they? If they could afford to do so.
They made the rest of the journey up the stairs, with Elizabeth filling them in on the kind of information any prospective purchaser would need to know. Adie would have felt guilty for wasting her time had she not been ogling Cage every chance she got. If Adie hadn’t kept asking questions, she was sure the woman would have forgotten she was even there.
Was Cage flirting and encouraging her? Adie didn’t think so. Cage tended to have a mask he put on when he was meeting new people, and it was that mask he was presenting to the realtor. If the blonde read it as interest then that was probably just wishful thinking on her part.
By the time they got to the second floor, or third by her reckoning, Adie was breathing a little harder than she would have liked. Cage, of course, was not. But Elizabeth was panting a little, too. And Adie didn’t think it was from excitement.
So, not as fit as she’d liked handsome men to think, huh?
Adie brought her thoughts back to the issue at hand. This was not some female pissing contest. She couldn’t believe how quickly the realtor had raised her previously non-existent hackles. Maybe it was the fact that Cage should have been off-limits, given Adie’s ‘partner’ status. Yet the woman couldn’t seem to keep her interest purely professional.
Focus! They were checking out Minerva’s old stomping grounds for a reason. How else could Adie get into the head of a teenager in the 60s? Or maybe the mind of a go-go dancer trying to make it on her own after a nasty divorce that had lost her her son.
As the apartment they were here to see was a B, it was probably directly below Minerva’s, with the same outlook and layout. That would have to give her something.
But the ultra modern renovations she saw, as soon as the door was opened, gave Adie no sense of the home Minerva would have made with her fellow would-be actresses. Disappointment had her shoulders slumping.
Trying to block out the perfect, white walls and trendy furnishings in the living/dining room, Adie imagined what Minerva and her dad would have seen that first day. The room was small, especially for a place with three bedrooms, the windows not providing a lot of light, even though the spring day outside was sunny.
Cramped was the word that came to mind. Too cramped for three women forced to share the same space. And the furnishings would have been shoddy and second-hand, she was sure. No wall-sized TV or sound system. Could they have had one of those turntables for records and a radio?
The ultra-modern kitchenette led off the living room, a wall having been demolished to bench height to create the illusion of more space in the galley-style kitchen than there actually was. She imagined the wall in place and three young women stepping around each other as they prepared their meals.
Had there been a small kitchen table at one end? Possibly. Because the modern appliances probably took up a lot more space than the few items Minerva would have had. No dishwasher, for sure. No washer/drier, either. The icebox would have been ancient and the stove equally so. The massive fridge/freezer currently in residence, with an ice-maker in the door, was as far from what had been there in the 60s as you could get. And the sleek, four burner gas stove, with its modern extractor fan above, looked like it would have fitted nicely on a Sci-Fi movie set.
Adie went to the living room windows, which were double-glazed but not large, and looked out at the teeming street below. That scene wouldn’t have been so different for Minerva. The vehicles would have been different with chunky, red, double-decker buses, colorful VWs, and blocky minis with union jacks painted on their roofs. There would have been other kinds of cars, as well. She’d seen those in photos of the time as well, but she couldn’t have named them.
But the street itself would have been the same. Just as crowded. Far too crowded for Adie, but maybe not for a teenager looking for buzz and excitement in her new life.
Adie hastily backtracked to follow Elizabeth and Cage down the short hall lit by wrought-iron sconces. Four modern doors led off it, two on either side.
Elizabeth opened the first door, which turned out to be one of the bedrooms. It was a tiny home gym with mirrored doors on a built-in closet, giving the illusion of more space than there actually was. One narrow window looked out over the street.
The next room was clearly a home office, but was equally as small as the first. Adie had trouble picturing how a young woman would have found space for all her belongings in a bedroom that small. She surely couldn’t have had a bed larger than a twin. And closets back then would have been large and chunky, like the ones she was only too familiar with at the farm. One of those would have taken up almost all the space on its own. Forget a dresser. Maybe a largish nightstand beside the bed? That might have fitted.
A mirror? On the inside of the closet.
If this had been her place she would have torn out another wall to make one much larger room. But then, she would never want to live here in the first place.
On the other side of the hall was the master bedroom, which was marginally larger than the other two and held a queen-sized bed that was probably too large for the space.
The final door led into the small shared bathroom. Although it was beautifully fitted out, and managed to contain a deep bath with a rainforest shower over it, the size felt claustrophobic.
How had three women managed to negotiate one tiny bathroom, especially on nights they were getting ready to go out? A nightmare! But then, it probably added to the novelty of the situation for Minerva. Roughing it. Starting at the bottom so she could work her way up her career ladder and achieve her goals.
And she had done that, hadn’t she? Maybe she hadn’t become a famous actress, but she had become wealthy, mixing with all the rich and famous people of the time, not only here in London but all over the world. A jetsetter. That was the term, wasn’t it? She’d married well and moved up the social hierarchy using her good looks and personality.
This small flat would have been a bit of a lark to her. A fun vacation, like camping. The inconveniences would have only added to its appeal.
“Any questions?” Elizabeth was saying, looking at Adie for once.
Adie shook her head mutely. She’d seen all she needed to see. For all the modern accoutrements, she thought she now had a feel for the place Minerva had called home. When she read her aunt’s journal, she’d have a clearer picture of what her a
unt described.
Chapter 6
Using Cage’s phone, Adie and Cage negotiated the streets of Soho, having left the slightly disappointed realtor at the door to Minerva’s building.
“What did you think?” Cage asked, using his bulk to clear the way for them both along the overcrowded sidewalk.
“Do you mean the flat or the over-attentive realtor?” she snarked.
Cage laughed. “You reacted just like a jealous partner protecting her territory. Well done!”
Adie grimaced. “Hardly difficult. The woman was eating you up with her eyes from the first moment she laid eyes on you. Expect to get a follow-up call later. And not to find out if you’re interested in the flat.”
Cage glanced down at her, his brows furrowing. “Maybe. But I’m not going to be in London for long, am I? Hardly going to take her up on any offer she might make.”
Adie shrugged, trying to act as if she didn’t care one way or the other. She hated that he’d even thought enough about the blonde to consider how much spare time he had while he was in London. That had to mean he was interested, didn’t it?
“But I was asking about the flat. It had definitely been renovated recently. Hard to imagine what it looked like back in the 60s,” he went on, guiding her around people standing in the middle of the pavement, chatting.
“Small. Tiny. I kept trying to imagine three women living together in such a confined space. Unless you were good friends, it would have to have been uncomfortable,” Adie answered, letting thoughts of the realtor go. “Our house back home was small but not as small as that!”
“I can imagine her dad wouldn’t have liked her living there,” Cage said. “I know I’d think twice about letting my teenage daughter live there, even in its current gentrified state. Still feels seedy to me.”
Adie nodded her agreement as they took a turn into a very narrow lane that was barely wide enough to accommodate a small car. The dark, ominous buildings on either side seemed to loom over them, blocking the spring sunshine.
Did prostitutes in the past make use of these walls to give a man in a hurry a quick hand-job, or more? The idea made Adie blush. Maybe it was the Adult Entertainment store they’d just passed that had given her the idea.
“I’m glad we came, though. It definitely sets the scene. And if this was the way Georgie walked to and from her job at the Den then it’s a wonder she ever made it home at all,” Adie said, shivering a little at the idea of walking down the lane alone at night.
“Yeah. But she didn’t go missing at night, did she? It was during the day. She left late Saturday morning. That’s what the police report said.”
Adie nodded. “How desperate would you have to be to walk home from a nightclub alone, though? Or maybe she was a bit of a hard nut. Capable of taking care of herself.”
“The police report didn’t make it sound that way. Not even the suggestion she was doing more than dancing. I thought the detective sounded respectful when he said she lost her job when she knocked back her boss’ proposition.”
Adie looked at her large companion in surprise. “You got respect from that formal recitation of information?”
Cage shrugged. “You learn to read between the lines of a police report. Cops can say things without actually saying them.”
“Hmm,” she answered noncommittally, as they turned back onto a wider, more populated thoroughfare.
But Cage was taking in their surroundings and comparing it to the map on his phone. He turned down another lane, this one a little wider than the last. After a few steps he stopped and looked up at a modern high-rise that took up one side of the street and didn’t fit with its surroundings at all.
“This was where it was. Barry was right that it was torn down and replaced,” he muttered, turning in a circle to get his bearings. Adie did the same.
A row of small shops lined the other side of the street from the new complex, all looking old, weathered and cramped. Yet from the steady flow of foot traffic, it seemed they were doing a good trade.
“I wonder if anyone remembers The Den,” Cage mused, studying each shop in turn. “Let’s go ask some questions.”
They hit pay-dirt almost immediately. The manager of the first shop, an off-license liquor store, had heard of The Den. He was a middle-aged middle-eastern man who kept bobbing his head in understanding, and seemed comfortable talking to Cage.
“My father ran this shop before me. He’s retired now. But he was well known in the area back in the 60s and 70s when that club was operating,” the shopkeeper said, his cockney accent at odds with his swarthy appearance.
“Is your father still alive?” Cage asked deferentially.
The man bobbed his head again. “Oh, yes. Very much alive. My mother, Allah protect her, passed ten years ago. But my father still rules the family as he has always done. He’s upstairs now,” he finished, pointing upward.
“Could we bother him for a few minutes?” Cage asked.
“Of course, of course. He’ll be glad of the company. And if anyone knew anything about what was going on in this community back then it was him. I won’t call him a busybody, but he did believe that having your finger on the pulse of a place was the best way to stay safe and succeed.
“He came from Pakistan when he was a young man, you know, determined to make a success of himself. He was sure hard work and a good head would be enough. And, for all the challenges, he did succeed. We own this shop, and our home above it, now. That is no small feat in London, I can assure you. It’s a very expensive city to live.”
In short order, the shopkeeper had arranged for his assistant to man the cash register so he could direct Adie and Cage up the narrow, dark staircase at the back of the store. At the top of the stairs they entered a small sitting room that looked out over the street they had just left. Across the road would have been The Den.
Adie had to wonder how much noise the club had made well into the early hours of the morning. It had to have bothered the residents in the neighborhood. Back then there would have been no double-glazed windows to keep out the noise.
In the very dated room, surrounded by Islamic iconography and photos of family members, sat an old man. He was hunched over and his knees were covered by a knitted rug. A gas fire burned in the original fireplace, even though the day outside was quite mild.
“Father, you have visitors. People who are interested in the old night club that used to operate across the road,” the man introduced them, speaking louder than normal.
The old man turned from the window and glared at them suspiciously. “Why would anybody still be interested in that den of iniquity? Allah struck down those who operated that place many years ago.”
This man had an accent that matched his appearance, but his English was perfect. Probably more perfect than his son’s.
“We’re actually interested in the owner back in 1965. At the time one of the dancers went missing,” Cage said, moving in closer and taking the son’s lead by speaking as loudly and clearly as possible.
“Ah, that girl. Yes, I remember that girl,” he said, his mood mellowing slightly. “Sit down. Would you like refreshments?”
Adie and Cage took the sofa across from the man, but refused the offer of refreshments. If there could have been a more opposite scene from the last one with Embers she couldn’t have thought of one.
“I’ll leave you to your chat. When you’re finished, I hope you’ll be able to find your way downstairs on your own.”
Cage nodded to the man. “Thank you. We will. We appreciate you taking the time to assist us.”
“It was my pleasure.” He bowed and backed out of the room, closing the sitting room door as he did so.
“Can you tell us what you know about the disappearance?” Adie asked, getting straight to the point.
Rheumy eyes flicked to her for a moment, surprised that she’d spoken. Maybe she shouldn’t have. Once again she realized that this was Cage’s show not hers.
Dismissing her, the
old man turned back to address Cage, while answering her question. “I did not know the girl personally, of course. I read about her in the papers, though. The police were around here every second day, looking for clues to what happened to her. I was forced to provide an alibi for that demon spawn. Allah preserve me, I could not lie, although I wanted to,” he said, sounding defeated.
“You mean Owen Jeffers?” Cage clarified.
“Yes, yes. I could not lie. I did see him outside his club that afternoon. I wish I hadn’t. If anyone could have killed that girl it would have been him. He was connected, as you Americans call it. Organized crime was everywhere at that time. My shop was a grocery store, not an off-license back then. That meant we had less dealings with the criminal element. I paid my protection money, kept my head down, and tried not to attract the attention of bad men to my family and business.”
“Did you ever hear stories about Jeffers? From his staff, I mean,” Cage asked.
“His people would buy their cigarettes and snacks here. I heard them complain about the man. Especially the girls. He tried to make the dancers do more than just dance. You know what I mean. And he took liberties with them. He came to no good, in the end. And his connections didn’t save him.” Satisfaction rolled off the old man in waves.
“What happened?” Cage pressed.
“He was arrested in the 70s for drug trafficking and murder. He was serving life. Maybe he is still there. After he went to prison the place fell into disrepair and was eventually torn down. Good riddance. Allah is slow to vengeance, but He always exacts righteous punishment on the unholy.”
Cage stood, and Adie followed his lead, yet again. “Well, thank you for your help. We’ll see ourselves out.”
“I can’t say I was much use to you,” the old man said, seemingly a little disgruntled that he’d lost his visitors so soon.
“You have. More than you know. Thank you again.”
Back on the street, Adie lifted her brows at Cage. “Why did we leave so quickly? Surely we could have gotten more information from him. He obviously knew what was happening in the area at the time.”
