Rooted in Dishonour

by Christina James

  “Mrs Pocklington, this is serious. If we can’t find your daughter, we have to assume that something bad may have happened to her. Could you try to think back to when you last saw her?”

  “Yesterday evening, I think. Or it might have been the evening before. The days run into each other a bit at this time of year, don’t they? But, yes, I’m pretty sure it was yesterday. She came in late. Seemed a bit upset about something, now I think of it.”

  “Did she tell you what she was upset about?”

  Liz Pocklington giggled.

  “Oh, I didn’t ask her. Would you have done? They need their own space at that age, don’t they? I thought she’d tell me when she was ready. And if not . . .” she shrugged, abandoning the sentence almost before she’d started it.

  Juliet’s patience was wearing thin.

  “Mrs Pocklington, should I make you some coffee? You need to be taking this a lot more seriously. Do you have any idea where your daughter is? Could she be with her father, for example? And if you think she might be, can you tell me where to find him?”

  Again the giggle and silly shrug.

  “Bastard’s tucked up with his scheming little bitch. Didn’t give me his address. Margie may have it. I did hear tell he was living in Bourne.”

  “Thank you. That’s helpful. What’s his full name? And can you remember his date of birth?”

  “His name’s Gerald.”

  “Gerald Pocklington?”

  “No, Gerald Arsehole! What do you think? Oh, my God . . .”

  “Mrs Pocklington?”

  Liz Pocklington suddenly rose to her feet and scurried, crabwise, across the floor. She disappeared into her kitchen. Juliet could hear her throwing up in the sink.

  Chapter 41

  It is hard for me not to warm to Nancy. She and Tim and I managed to enjoy our supper together and afterwards she helps me to clear away while Tim goes off to pack his suitcase. I tell her that Juliet has asked me to talk to some women who’ve been abused by their partners. Immediately she fixes her eyes on mine, her attention rapt.

  “I fink that’s a good idea. If you need any more ’elp, let me know.”

  “I will. How long are you going to be here?”

  “A few days, probably. I’ll be ’elping DC Armstrong.” She pulls a wry face.

  My loyalty to Juliet won’t let this pass.

  “She’s a fine policewoman and a good friend of mine,” I say. I realise straight away I sound a bit pompous.

  “I’m sure you’re right, but she doesn’t like me.”

  “How do you know that?”

  She chuckles.

  “Oh, believe me, it wasn’t ’ard to find out. She didn’t exactly beat about the bush.”

  “That doesn’t sound like Juliet.” But I realise as soon as I say it that there’s a new Juliet, different from the one I’ve known for several years, a more strident, less tolerant woman than I’ve ever thought Juliet could be.

  “Oh, I don’t blame her. I’d probably ’ave felt the same if I’d been treated like she ’as: ’ad a strange woman dumped on my case when I wanted to solve it myself.”

  “Strictly speaking, it’s Tim’s case. Juliet reports to Tim and I’m helping her.”

  Nancy shrugs.

  “You know what I mean. She’ll be the one doing the donkey-work. And you. And me, if she’ll let me. Does she want you to talk to some abused women to make a stronger case for an ‘honour killing’, or to prove the opposite?”

  “I think probably to prove the opposite. She’s not convinced that it was an honour killing, or even that Ayesha Verma’s actually dead. What do you think?”

  “I’d say the same. It’s a pity you couldn’t have got a bit further with it before this trip to India.”

  “I think part of the plan was to use the information to decide whether the trip to India was really necessary. But Tim’s had his hand forced by the fiancé now. If he doesn’t see him this week, he might lose the opportunity.”

  “Yes, I know. Still, quite glad to ’ave ’ad ’is ’and forced, isn’t ’e?” She grins again. Her combination of perceptiveness and outspokenness is disarming. I close down the conversation.

  “The bed in the spare room’s made up,” I say. “You must be tired. I’ll find you some towels.”

  It’s now almost midnight. Tim and I are alone in our bedroom. Nancy Chappell has been installed in the spare room – I can still hear her moving around – and Sophia is asleep. Tim’s put his case on the floor on his side of the bed, the lid open, awaiting a few last-minute additions in the morning. He’s getting undressed. He looks tired and haggard. I know it’s not a good time, but I’m desperate to talk to him.

  “How’s Freya?” I say conversationally.

  “Oh, Freya’s Freya. You know what she’s like. She doesn’t change. You were probably right: I should have stayed in a hotel.”

  “She was very worried about you when you were taken ill. And then when you didn’t go back to hers.”

  “She made far too much fuss about it. Trying to prove her point, I suppose.”

  “What do you mean? What was her point?”

  “That I’m hopelessly feckless and inept. That’s always been Freya’s point about me, ever since we were kids.”

  “I think you’re being a bit unfair. Freya’s too grown-up to pursue childhood squabbles.”

  “So she’d have you believe. Why are you sticking up for her, anyway? You and she are hardly best mates, are you?”

  “I don’t think sisters-in-law often get on all that well. But she was worried.”

  “So you keep saying. Let’s change the subject, shall we? We’re both tired. The last thing we want to talk about is fucking Freya.”

  “She does know you’re all right, doesn’t she?”

  “Yes, of course she does. I saw her this morning.”

  “This morning? She said you spent last night somewhere else.”

  “Yes, I did, but I needed to go back to Freya’s for a show . . . for a shirt.”

  “Couldn’t you have borrowed one from Derry?”

  “I suppose I could have. But he got up before I did and left early. I didn’t like to go poking around.”

  I can tell when Tim’s lying. His irises seem to shrink and his face takes on a pinched, shut-in look.

  “Why didn’t you just go out and buy another shirt? It’s a long trek back to Surbiton from Derry’s. It must have taken you most of the morning.”

  “Look, Katrin, can’t you just drop it? I’ve got to get up in a few hours and I’m dog-tired. I’m pretty sure I felt ill because of the malaria tablets I was taking. I’ve finished the course now, but I’m still knackered. And having you nagging at me doesn’t help. If you must keep on pestering me about what I did in London, I’d appreciate it if you could save it until I come back. Ok?”

  He swings his legs into bed and hurriedly turns off his bedside light. I stand in the semi-darkness for a while, drained of all energy. I’m certain that something happened in London that Tim doesn’t want me to know about. I’m not sure what it is: I’d suspect him of having an affair, but it’s hard to believe that he could have started one in the few days that he’s been away, especially as he’s been ill. Perhaps he and Derry are up to something? I wouldn’t put anything past Derry: he’ll sail too close to the law himself one of these days, if he hasn’t done so already.

  As I undress, I hear something fall to the floor in the spare room, followed by a muffled expletive. I get into bed and lie there quietly, my back to Tim’s, as far away as possible from him. I wonder if Nancy Chappell knows more about what Tim’s been doing in London for the past three days. I’m immediately annoyed with myself for such an underhand thought until I put up my hand to my face and discover that it’s wet with tears. If Tim has betrayed me, he doesn’t deserve my loyalty.


  Chapter 42

  When they got off the bus, ‘Pedro’ decided neither to wait for another bus nor to hail a cab. Instead he gripped her arm above the elbow and they began to walk.

  “It’s quite a way,” he said. “Made a rod for your back, now, haven’t you, my dear? Not to be trusted on public transport, so we’ll have to rely on Shanks’s pony.”

  She allowed him to frog-march her, if that was the correct term for the shuffling half-lope that was all his injured leg would permit him. Every step he took was causing him pain. She wondered what had prompted the determination that drove him on so ruthlessly. He was undoubtedly stronger than he looked: his thumb was digging viciously into her arm. She envisaged the large purple bruise that would be forming there.

  She knew she must try to keep calm. She looked around her. She hardly knew London at all, but guessed that the street along which they were hastening was very far from the centre. It was lined at intervals with late Victorian parades of shops built in dark red brick, punctuated with scruffier establishments: greasy spoons, launderettes, repair shops. They passed several pavement stalls selling fruit and flowers. Most of the people they encountered were dressed in Western clothes, but some of the women wore burkas or saris and some of the men also were wearing flowing robes. She couldn’t guess at their nationalities, but they were many. As she had on the bus, she thought about calling out to one of these people, imploring them to help her, but she was terrified that they’d ignore her. Perhaps they didn’t even speak English. If she failed to escape from Pedro, he’d probably punish her for trying. Many of the people looked strange: aliens preoccupied with their own poverty or misfortune. She tried to catch the eye of a smartly-dressed woman who was walking purposefully towards her, but the woman’s eyes swept through her, intent perhaps on reaching a meeting on time or simply desirous of getting out of this mean street as soon as possible.

  They arrived at a crossroads. The street they had been walking along was now bisected by another, wider, one. They turned into it. Immediately the buildings were cleaner and more prosperous, some of the people better-clothed. She was aware that she and Pedro appeared more incongruous here. They attracted some curious stares: an elderly down-and-out man who looked as if he’d been in a fight, manhandling a girl young enough to be his granddaughter: he dressed formally but shabbily; she wearing jeans and a thin, short-sleeved T-shirt. But no-one was suspicious enough to challenge him.

  Pedro stopped suddenly, as if recollecting himself, and steered her down an alleyway. It led into a courtyard, from which rose up an imposing white building several storeys high.

  As they approached the glass doors of the building, she could see its name and function discreetly displayed in embossed white letters: Caspiania. Private Hotel. There was a black doorman wearing dark red livery and a top hat standing guard on the cobbles in front of the entrance. She didn’t know what a ‘private hotel’ was: to her it seemed a contradiction in terms.

  The doorman looked askance at Pedro: it was obvious he both recognised and disapproved of him. Pedro released Margie’s arm and prodded her, as if playfully, in the back.

  “Get along dear. Go inside. What are you waiting for?”

  “Do you need a porter, Miss?” said the doorman.

  “A porter? Good Heavens, no, why should she need a porter?” said Pedro. “She travels light, as you can see.”

  He fussed around her in a pretence of care and hustled her through the glass door.

  She found herself in a kind of atrium, a high-ceilinged empty space separated from the deeper interior of the building by an opaque glass partition before which gigantic pots containing young trees had been placed. She tried not to be impressed by its splendour. The cool elegance of the exterior was misleading: inside, ostentatious opulence had been restrained neither by economy nor good taste. Margie suspected that the décor was vulgar, but she didn’t care: she was impressed by the cream and gold shimmering beauty of the walls and, above all, their spotlessness. It seemed a magical place, incapable of co-existing in the drab, run-down, forlorn world she customarily inhabited.

  “Not bad, is it?” She was jolted back to reality by the sound of Pedro’s voice, his usual plummy drawl now restored, obliterating the sibilant viciousness that had frightened her so much. “A little obvious for my liking, but you can’t expect them to go in for English Arts and Crafts.”

  She stared at him, at a loss to understand what he was talking about. He let out one of his high-pitched whinnies.

  “But I daresay I’m expecting too much of you. Follow me, now. You need to meet your new boss.”

  He led her to the glass partition. Another man in uniform sprang smartly out from behind it. He studied Pedro’s ruined face with some curiosity and waved them through.

  Margie found herself in a vast area partly filled with long streamlined desks arranged in a fan pattern, each one an island separated from its neighbour by yards of gleaming floor tiles. Two young women stood or perched on stools behind each. They were exotically and identically dressed in sophisticated pale brown and scarlet suits. Each desk had been fitted with a small black screen at the end nearest the centre of the room and some of the young women were sitting behind these screens, talking into telephones. She had no clue what they were engaged in. She wondered if the job Pedro had mentioned meant she would be joining the young women, although most looked older than she was. Her spirits rose.

  “What are they doing?”

  “They’re receptionists, my dear.”

  “Receptionists? Why does the hotel need so many?”

  “They have very important clients. It wouldn’t do to keep them waiting,” Pedro replied smoothly.

  Margie’s experience of hotels was limited to being taken for a drink at the White Hart in Spalding, where the reception consisted of a small boxed in area in one corner of the bar that was accessed via a mahogany counter with a flap that could be raised to let the receptionist in and out. She nodded as if she understood, but still wondered how the hotel could possibly need so many people doing the same job, especially as some of the women were just sitting there, with nothing visible to occupy them.

  “Will I be working here?”

  “I’m not sure,” he said, suddenly evasive. “Ah, here’s Mrs Ali. She’ll tell you what your duties will be. Hello, Moura.”

  The woman inclined her head very slightly. She was plump but well-proportioned. She was dressed in a fitted costume made of the same light brown material interfaced with red as the receptionists’ outfits, but she alone was wearing a floor-length skirt. She either did not hear or chose to ignore Pedro’s comment.

  “Is this the girl?”

  The woman turned to Pedro unsmilingly. She didn’t acknowledge Margie.

  “Yes. Promising, don’t you think?”

  “We’ll have to see. Name?”

  “Marisa Price,” said Margie, almost as an aide-mémoire to herself.

  “We’ll have to see what we can do with that.” This time the woman addressed Margie directly. “How old are you?”

  “Seventeen.”

  The woman took her by both shoulders and turned her round slowly in a complete circle.

  “She’s slim enough,” she said to herself. “Can you dance?”

  “Not much. I’ve never really been interested.”

  “You’ll have to make it your business to be interested.”

  Margie looked across at the gazelle-like brown and scarlet receptionists. None of them was taking the slightest interest in her.

  “Can they dance?”

  The woman ignored the question. She sighed.

  “I suppose she’ll have to do. Come with me,” she added over her shoulder.

  She headed for a door set into the wall beyond the furthermost desk. Margie did as she was told. She was aware that Pedro was close on her heels.

  When they re
ached the door, the woman pressed numbers into a keypad and pushed it slightly ajar before looking back at them. Pedro was standing beside Margie now. The woman gave him a vigorous push in the chest. He flinched, grabbing at his ribcage.

  “Not you,” she said. “You’re not to come any further.”

  “But I have to see Jas . . .”

  “You’re perpetually whining about Jas. I should have thought you’d have had enough of him for one week.”

  “I’ve done the goods. I deserve to be paid.”

  “You’ll have to take that up with him. He’s away at the moment. Amsterdam,” she added, as if that explained all Pedro needed to know.

  “But he’s left me without money again. I haven’t got . . .”

  “Oh, for God’s sake shut up. Here!”

  She took a fistful of notes from her pocket and handed them to him.

  “There’s a hundred. It comes off your fee.”

  “Thank you. When . . . ?”

  “That’s enough. I’m going now. Arrange to see Jas when he comes back.”

  Margie had been observing this scene playing out, dreamy with fatigue, as if she’d been watching a television soap. She suddenly understood that Pedro wasn’t coming with her. She was convulsed with panic.

  “Don’t leave me!” She said to him. “Please don’t leave me!”

  Still wrapped up in his own concerns, he barely registered her plea.

  “That’s enough,” said the woman sternly, grabbing her arm in the exact place where he had bruised it earlier. “I’m warning you, if you make a scene, you won’t last long. We don’t allow hysterics here.”

  She shoved Margie through the door, quickly following and banging it shut behind her. Margie caught a last glimpse of Pedro staring down at the notes in his hand, lost to the world of opulence surrounding him.

  Chapter 43

  Juliet had persuaded Liz Pocklington to be taken to hospital. She didn’t think the woman was dangerously drunk, but Juliet needed her to sober up quickly. She’d forgotten that she’d called for back-up and was about to request an ambulance when PCs Giash Chakrabati and Verity Tandy appeared. Juliet knew they wouldn’t like it if Liz threw up in their car, but they’d take it more philosophically than some of their colleagues. It would be a better option than tying up an ambulance crew for a couple of hours.