‘I still might,’ I muttered.
It was his refusal to take me seriously that had enraged me. Once we’d changed my tyre, Paul and I had driven our respective vans back to Nick’s place and I had told him everything. First of all, he pretended he didn’t believe me, as if I’d imagined the whole thing.
‘What they do on Dartmoor?’ he asked. ‘They go back to London.’
‘Perhaps they were stopping off to visit some of their nice friends in prison,’ I suggested sarcastically. ‘I don’t know! All I know is, they stopped when they saw my van.’
‘They would not hurt you, Juno,’ he kept saying.
‘Vlad had a knife!’ I told him furiously. ‘He’d slashed my tyre so I couldn’t get away.’
‘They just want to frighten you … You make them look small … They want teach you lesson …’
‘Oh, that’s all right, then! They might have stopped short of stabbing me. They might have been content with beating me up and raping me, or perhaps just carving their initials on my face.’
‘No, no … Juno,’ he said soothingly. ‘They not do that.’ He tried to take my hand and pat it, patronising old bastard, but I snatched it away.
‘You told me …’ I spoke softly but my voice trembled with rage, ‘… when I wanted to ring the police, that day when those two were here threatening you … you said that if I rang the police, things could get very bad.’
He didn’t have an answer to that and I just nodded. ‘I’m out of here! Bye, Nick.’
‘But Juno, wait!’ he called out as I thumped angrily down the stairs.
Paul caught up with me as I stood out in the alley, taking deep breaths. ‘Look, he really is shocked and frightened about what happened to you today. He just doesn’t want to admit it, that’s all.’
‘He’s talking as if I’m making it all up!’ I said furiously.
Paul risked a smile. ‘Why don’t we go and get a drink?’
‘That’s the best idea I’ve heard today,’ I told him, and we walked down to The Silent Whistle.
‘So, what happened this morning?’ I demanded crossly. ‘Why didn’t you tell me you were setting this meeting up?’
Paul looked a little sheepish. ‘We didn’t think it was a good idea to involve you,’ he confessed.
‘Oh, really?’ I tossed back a drink. I don’t usually drink double brandies but I reckoned I deserved one. ‘Quite ironic in the circumstances, don’t you think?’ I croaked, my throat scorched with burning alcohol. I plonked the glass back on the bar and signalled the barmaid to pour me another.
‘It was a strange experience,’ Paul admitted. ‘I’m standing there in stony silence, trying to look like a hard man, whilst Nick and … Vlad … is that what you call him …?’
I nodded. I’d broken into a bag of crisps and my mouth was too full for me to speak.
‘Well, they argued for quite a while,’ he went on. ‘Of course, I couldn’t understand a word, and behind them, the other guy …’
‘Igor,’ I muttered, trying not to spray him with shrapnel.
‘Igor stood in silence, like me, doing his hard-man act. And I have to admit,’ he added ruefully, ‘his was a lot better than mine.’
‘But they settled their differences, in the end?’
‘I suppose. Nick handed over a thick envelope of cash. I watched Vlad count it and I reckon there was at least three thousand in there. They seemed happy, even shook hands. Which makes me wonder …’ he tailed off thoughtfully.
‘What?’
‘Why did they come after you?’
I’d been wondering about that myself. ‘I can’t believe they followed me all the way to Tavistock and back. I think I was just unlucky. I don’t know what they were doing on that road, but they must have spotted the van. It’s difficult to miss it. Vlad didn’t like having his photograph taken. I suppose he seized an opportunity to get rid of it.’
‘And to scare you enough to stop you going to the police,’ Paul added.
‘Or get rid of a witness altogether.’ I was still convinced he and Igor would have killed me if Duke hadn’t come to my rescue.
‘They don’t like having witnesses to what they’re up to, that’s for sure. I don’t think they’ll come back,’ he added, putting his empty beer glass down on the bar and helping himself to a crisp, ‘I doubt if they’ll want to deal with Nick again.’ He grinned suddenly, his dark eyes lighting up. ‘They didn’t reckon on Boudica and the Hound of the Baskervilles.’
‘And do we know what they’re up to?’ I asked, pointedly ignoring this unflattering reference. ‘Do we know what Nick was trying to sell for them?’
Paul shook his head. ‘He’s very tight-lipped about that.’ For a few moments, he gazed thoughtfully at our reflections in the mirror behind the bar. I gazed too, and in the reflection, our eyes met. For a moment, we just stared. Then Paul spoke and broke the spell.
‘Just as they were leaving, Vlad spoke to me. I’m stupid, I suppose, but I didn’t realise he could speak English.’
‘It came as a bit of a shock to me,’ I admitted. ‘What did he say?’
‘He came right up close to me, looked me in the eye and asked, “Are you bodyguard?” He smiled in a way that made me want to kill him − derisively, I suppose, and said, “You tough guy, eh?” Then he laughed, the other guy joined in, and they both left.’
‘Did you say anything?’
‘I opted for dignified silence.’
‘But Nick was all right?’ I asked. ‘When they left, he was happy?’
‘He seemed very relieved.’ Paul smiled suddenly. ‘He was right about you, though.’
‘What do you mean?’ I asked, wishing his smile was not so warm.
‘When you’re angry, you’re a sight to see – a real flame-haired goddess.’
Our lovemaking that night was more of a celebration for my being alive and unharmed, rather than outright lust, that and being more than slightly drunk. Not that the night was without passion. We made the little caravan rock on its springs. But in the morning, we both knew that it hadn’t been a good idea.
When I awoke, Paul was sitting on the edge of the bed, staring at a picture on his phone. He wasn’t aware that I had woken and I was able to study the muscular contours of his back and shoulders, smooth skin made golden by the early sun, and the sad, lost look on his face. I sat up and rested my chin on his shoulder so that I could see the picture too. A pretty, brown-haired woman pointed towards the camera, crouching next to a dark-haired toddler who looked just like his daddy. ‘How long is it since you’ve seen them?’
‘A few weeks.’ His voice was laden with longing.
‘Then go and see them now. Today. Take some time off.’
He turned to me, dark eyes full of guilt. ‘Juno, I don’t want you to feel used.’
I silenced him, placing a finger against his lips. ‘Look, we had a great time last night, but I’m not stupid.’ I smiled, taking his chin between my hands. ‘Go and see your wife and child.’
He frowned. ‘Will you be all right? I don’t think you need to worry about those two Russians. I don’t think they’ll be back.’
‘I’ll be fine.’
He smiled and stroked my cheek. ‘You’re great, Juno.’
‘Yeah, yeah, I’m a real goddess!’ I shivered and pulled the duvet around my bare shoulders. ‘Now make me a cup of tea, you swine. I’ve got to go and walk dogs in a minute.’
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
To be truthful, it took a while for me to stop looking over my shoulder for Russian thugs. I stayed away from Nick. He kept phoning, trying to persuade me to go and see him but I didn’t answer his messages. I tried to forget all about him.
But I had twelve boxes of his stock piled up in the hallway to remind me of his existence every time I went in the front door and I needed to do something about them. In the end, I sorted out some pretty things and took them around to Pat for her Honeysuckle Farm stall. She was doing quite well with her earrings. I told
her I wanted fifty per cent on any of Nick’s stock that she sold. This fifty per cent I would eventually give back to him. It meant that I didn’t get anything out of the arrangement, but I was past caring by then.
I had a second reason for keeping Nick at a distance. When I’d got back from Paul’s caravan that morning, I found a message from Verbena Clarke, telling me that she no longer required my services. I needn’t call again.
I was livid. I’d resisted the temptation to contact her about the visit from the police, looking forward to a free and frank discussion when I saw her next, which should have been the following morning when I went to work for her. Her abrupt termination of my employment was as good as an accusation.
I tried to ring her back but she didn’t pick up and she’d turned off her answering machine. I considered storming around to her house, but after five minutes of fuming consideration, I decided that I was well shot of her. And if I was, as Ricky and Morris suggested, guilty by association, then I was well shot of Nick too.
I got back into my pre-Nick groove, concentrating on my clients. Chloe Berkeley-Smythe had come back from her cruise and I returned to cleaning for her in her old weekly slot. To be truthful, I never got much work done for Chloe. She would have been quite happy to pay me to chat, pore over cruise brochures, and help her plan her next romp around the Caribbean. I had to be disciplined, doggedly working on while her foghorn voice bellowed over the noise of the vacuum-cleaner, telling me that it must be time to stop for a little drinkie by now.
I put in more time for Ricky and Morris, who were kind enough never to say ‘I told you so’ about Nick. Only once in the following weeks did I find myself driving down Shadow Lane. I had to stop and pull over on to the pavement, to let a car travelling in the opposite direction go by, our wing mirrors almost touching as the driver squeezed his vehicle past in the narrow roadway. For a few moments I was forced to halt opposite Nick’s shop and my attention was snagged by a tall, skinny man emerging from the end of the alleyway that led to Nick’s front door. He looked furtive, his watery gaze shifting from right to left before he stepped out from the alley, as if checking the coast was clear. For a moment, our eyes met and he smiled. Not a friendly smile, but more a nervous rictus at realising he was being observed. I recognised him then. I remembered his loud laugh, his big yellow teeth like old piano keys, his gelatinous handshake. I’d spotted him again at the antiques fair. Albert, I think Paul had called him. Now it seemed he was one of Nick’s back-door customers. He was carrying something awkwardly, trying to conceal a package under his coat. More dodgy dealings, I thought contemptuously, and drove on.
A few days later I was in Ashburton on foot, shopping for Chloe Berkeley-Smythe. She’d forgotten she had a friend coming to lunch and asked me to fetch emergency rations from the delicatessen on North Street. I came out with a variety of local cheeses, thinly sliced beef, olives, home-made pâté, pastries, handmade chocolates and other mouth-watering spoils that I could never afford to buy for myself.
It was starting to rain, sudden large drops that made everyone hurry into doorways and the shelter of awnings. The van was parked several streets away, so I thought I’d take a shortcut down the alley that joined Sun Street and Shadow Lane, past Nick’s front door.
I threaded my way along the narrow space between the wheelie bins, taking care not to knock the bags of shopping, not really looking where I was going, shoulders hunched against the increasingly heavy rainfall. It was the tap-tap of high heels that made me look up. Someone else was using the alley as a shortcut, coming straight towards me from the other end.
Verbena Clarke stopped dead in her tracks; her face turned white, then scarlet. She stared, hesitating a moment, pushing back her cloud of fluffy blonde hair with a gloved hand.
‘Hello,’ I said. ‘I want to talk to you.’
She didn’t give me the chance, turned on her heel and fled, back the way she had come. I hurried on after her, past Nick’s door.
At the end of the alley I was forced to halt abruptly, teetering, as a mother pushing a baby in a buggy along the pavement, almost wheeled over my toes. This gave Verbena the time she needed to yank open the door of her parked Porsche and slide into the front seat, muttering as she slammed the door after her. By the time I had crossed the street and reached the car she had already locked herself safely inside. I knocked on the side window, but she ignored me, revving in a way that warned me to keep my distance, and pulled away. Thwarted, I fumed at the pavement’s edge. I watched her drive off down the street, far too fast. As the car disappeared round the corner, I heard a sudden screech of brakes. No satisfying crump of metal on metal, though, just a near miss.
It was just as well she’d evaded me. A kerbside brawl was probably not wise. But she needn’t think she’d escaped me completely. One day, when I could no longer think of the incident without smouldering, I would pay Mrs Clarke a visit. Revenge, they say, is a dish best eaten cold. And I intended to enjoy every mouthful of mine.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Pat was not impressed with my attempt to make a Victorian panorama from two wooden clothes pegs and the case of the stuffed weasel, although I dressed the peg dolls carefully and painted little faces on them.
‘That one’s cross-eyed,’ she told me, peering at it through the glass, ‘and the other one looks simple.’
I accepted this withering criticism of my creative efforts without affront. ‘I’m sure you could do a better job.’
‘This case is a bit tatty.’
‘It was all I had. Look, it’s just the idea I’m showing you, Pat,’ I explained. ‘I thought you might be able to do something with it.’
‘Our Ken could make a better case than that.’
‘Great!’ I was beginning to feel impatient with Pat’s lack of enthusiasm. I’d started off the day feeling reasonably mellow, but my mood had been soured by a driver in a flashy car who’d nearly wiped me out, and the van full of dogs, by careering around a sharp bend on the back road into town. Technically, he might have been below the national limit but he was still driving at a speed only a reckless fool would attempt on such a blind corner. We missed crashing head-on because I swerved the van into the hedgerow, my halt accompanied by a lot of yelping from the back and the sound of dogs being flung about.
I jumped out to check. They were shaken and whimpering. There didn’t seem to be any bones broken, but without the wire safety grille I was convinced Schnitzel the dachshund would have joined me on the front seat. What really infuriated me was that the other driver didn’t even bother to get out of his car, just rolled down his window and laughed.
‘No damage done?’ he’d called out cheerfully.
Other than vandalising a bit of ancient hedgerow and upsetting me and the canines, no there wasn’t. ‘No thanks to you,’ I’d replied through gritted teeth. ‘You might like to consider slowing down.’ I jerked my head back in the direction I’d come from. ‘There are horse riders back there. Crash into one of them and they might make a nasty mess of your motor.’
‘Thanks for the advice,’ he responded smoothly and drove off, leaving me seething by the roadside, clearing broken brambles and squashed blackberries from my windscreen.
‘I’ll leave it with you then, Pat,’ I said, gathering up my things.
She was gazing at the panorama, deep in thought. ‘Yes thanks, Juno,’ she said, without looking up.
‘You’re welcome,’ I told her, standing up to leave. ‘How are the earrings going?’
Pat looked up at last. ‘Oh, they’ve sold really well! I’ve ordered some more beads and Ken’s making me a bigger display stand.’
‘Excellent!’ I muttered and stalked away, leaving Pat still staring pensively into the panorama’s painted interior.
My next call was on Maisie in Brook Lane. As I creaked open the garden gate I could see her standing in the porch of her cottage, busy fussing with a feather duster amongst the shelves, flicking it around the prickly army of potted cacti that defe
nded her front door, whilst Jacko dozed in his favourite spot on her windowsill. She scowled when she saw me and tottered inside. She was sulking because the day before I’d insisted on putting her stinky old dressing gown in the washing machine.
‘Your friend’s in hospital,’ she told me as soon as I went inside. There was a waspish sting to her voice. ‘Did you know?’
‘What friend?’ I asked.
‘You know.’ She sat down. ‘Thingy.’
I viewed Maisie’s pink cheeks and bright eyes with suspicion and crossed the room to lay a hand on her cheek and then her forehead. ‘You’re not feeling feverish, are you? You are drinking plenty? We don’t want you getting dehydrated again. Remember what happened last time.’ I went to the fridge for a bottle of squash and poured her out a full glass. ‘Drink this.’ I held it out to her. ‘All of it.’
Anyone who thinks little old ladies are feeble wants to try wrestling with one suffering from a urinary tract infection. This is brought on by dehydration and produces symptoms that can easily be mistaken for dementia. I called the paramedics the first time it happened. Maisie was already in fighting mood when they whisked her off to hospital. I followed in the van after packing her an overnight bag. By the time I got to the ward she’d turned violent and was going three rounds with one of the orderlies.
‘Who are you bossing about?’ she demanded belligerently, not taking the proffered squash. ‘Bossy cow,’ she muttered under her breath.
‘Fine.’ I set the glass down on a table. ‘I’ll ring Janet then, shall I?’ Janet is Maisie’s daughter who lives up north in some town that sounds like heck-as-like, and is always the ultimate sanction when Maisie misbehaves.
She picked up the squash hastily. ‘No, no. I’m only having you on.’ She sipped as if she suspected it was poison.
‘So, what friend were you talking about?’ I asked her. ‘Who’s in hospital?’
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