‘Come inside, missus,’ he said. ‘You come inside with me. Uncle will look after you.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
Francis Thurloe suffered a number of reactions both during and after, long after, he was spoken to by the police (not an interview, sir, we’d like to make that quite clear), each sensation quite different from the other. First bewilderment, which was humiliating since he was too long in the tooth, he had thought, ever to be bewildered by anything half as prosaic or part of his daily bread as policemen. Strange how one never looked at them when they were simply part of a courtroom scenario, joked about them, never quite took them seriously or saw them as men, always a race apart. In one fell moment, without too much analysis, Francis understood why his clients felt so differently about the police. It was having to look into their eyes and stay still. That made life swim before Francis, as with a drowning man. In the shallows, he thought with a shock of recognition, drowning in the shallows, not the deep water where the divers go for pearls.
‘No real cause for concern, sir.’ The ‘sir’ could be an insult or genuine respect. How could even a junior officer such as this tolerate the endless calling of a professional man sir, when he was never called sir in return? Francis supposed it was from training school and hoped they did not mind as he would himself, although he had come through an education where teachers, however inept and second rate, were always designated sir. It was not a comparison he enjoyed.
‘There was a note from you, with your address, sir, in the glove compartment of her car. I take it you were … friends?’
‘Lovers,’ Francis stated. He had decided to bite the bullet.
‘Quite. She seems to have disappeared. Taken a holiday, perhaps? Only we found her car, Miss Young’s car, wrecked and vandalized, not a wheel left, checked out the owner, owner away from home. Lady on the ground floor says she’s been gone a week, doesn’t go away too often, place locked up, but the lady had a key. Went without a by your leave, but then, why not? She’s a free agent. We only wanted to tell her about her car. I expect it was stolen.’
‘Perfectly possible. She used it only when absolutely necessary, left it parked in the next street, I seem to remember.’ Francis stressed the past tense. ‘Could have been stolen any time. She didn’t use it every day, only for moving things. We had, by the way, parted company shortly before, in case you need to know. I’ve no idea where she is.’
‘Parents? Dead, I believe? We had to check. Had to go in her flat, see if we could find something. There was a birth certificate, put it all back, of course. So she hadn’t gone to see her people, there aren’t no people traceable where she comes from. Far as we know. Young ladies often take off, if they can. Not a criminal inquiry, but if she contacts you, let her know about the car. Any hard feelings, have we?’
‘About her? No. It worked for a while, then it didn’t.’ Francis was shocked, angered by these artless revelations. Who then did Elisabeth visit if she did not visit a family, and were her family another, elegant smokescreen blown for his own benefit? The policeman enjoyed the ability of discomfiting someone he was obliged to call sir. He sighed extravagantly, offensively man to man.
‘Just as well you gave her up, judging from this neighbour. If you don’t mind my saying, you weren’t the only one. Only gentleman friend, I mean. She had a stream of men, I’m told. In and out all the time, if you’ll excuse my turn of phrase. Pardon me. As well to know, I always say, sir.’
Later when the first reaction of utter humiliation had died, to make way first for curiosity and, finally, anger, Francis phoned the policeman, to ask the name of the place from which Elisabeth had come. According to her birth certificate. The anger had begun to percolate.
‘By the way, sir,’ said the policeman in that tone of endless confiding, ‘we found a blood transfusion card in her flat. Gave blood twice a year for fifteen years. Good, isn’t it? Put it back, of course, for when she comes home.’
‘What on earth is the relevance of that?’ Francis asked, frostily, pen poised while his neat hand wrote down CLAY-FIELDS, the name of the village from which his lover had originated, a place of which he had never heard since he dismissed the whole of the north of England as a wilderness. He was surprised by this evidence of public-spirited philanthropy. Giving blood was not Elisabeth’s style. Giving almost everything else obviously was. He wanted, very badly, to hit the policeman, stuff the phone down his throat to end those sedulous and mocking tones.
‘Relevance?’ The policeman was jocular, as two men sharing a joke, crudely. ‘Well, you might like to know she didn’t have Aids last time she gave blood. And all that blood in the well of her car can’t have been hers, either.’
‘You didn’t tell me about blood in the car.’
‘You didn’t want to know, sir. You didn’t ask.’
You didn’t ask, she had said. Ask, and I may tell you, but you did not ask. He was fired by paintings, the luxury of owning things and the luxury of her embraces. A little weeping in the night he had not questioned. He liked his ladies fun, but had become less sure about liking them slender: in the last ten days, walking, driving, his eyes had been drawn to different shapes, more like Elisabeth’s curves, but why should he care? A daughter of a village unknown to him. He had spoken of his childhood: she had listened, avidly asked for more, never volunteered particulars of her own. He had not taken her anywhere near his numerous relatives: she had not been (how could he put it now and how did he put it then?) quite suitable. He had kept her back, although he had somehow assumed she came from roughly the same stable as himself, comfortable in some uninvestigated equivalent, the kind of family from which people acquired university degrees, the odd bit of furniture, the luxury of cultural interests, financially and spiritually OK.
Francis noticed another crooked picture on his wall, but that was part and parcel of all his annoyance about Elisabeth Young hastening away without as much as a note, and him not being the only one, for the little time he had lasted. And not liking skinny women the way he did; and somehow, being completely fooled by everything about her.
‘Let us know if she doesn’t come back, won’t you? I mean, give her a month.’
‘Oh dear, such a worry.’
‘Don’t fret about it, honest. Happens all the time. Obviously planned. She locked up, put out her rubbish, took some clothes, paid up her rent for a whole quarter. Can’t treat that as suspicious. Lovely tea, smashing, thanks. Doesn’t sound as if she’s much of a loss.’
‘You’re welcome. Any time,’ Enid preened. The iron curls bounced always from her forehead in obedient leaps: she had come up this morning smelling of roses.
‘What do I do if anyone wants to get in?’
‘Like who?’
‘The landlord. Relatives.’ She sniggered. ‘Boyfriends who might have left something behind. She’d let them in if she was here. She always did.’
‘Oh, you let them in, too, I should. If they’re genuine, of course. Not much to steal. Use your discretion.’ He winked and smiled. ‘Thanks again for the tea. Call us if you need us.’
‘Oh, I shall, I shall,’ said Enid, sorry to see them go. There was nothing nicer than a man in uniform. A sergeant, too. The lies had tripped off her tongue with pretty ease: there was money in her purse, copied keys in her pocket; she was mistress of all she surveyed, had keys now to everyone’s flats, all those lives. Plus a belly full of satisfaction for the privilege of her exclusive knowledge that Elisabeth was not coming back. Uncle said so. He was not quite so sinister in his absence. Remembering Uncle in a pang of horror, Enid went in search of the cat. Only the cat had mourned Elisabeth and even then, briefly.
Annie had found friends among her customers more often than she counted, but Francis Thurloe was not one of them. Two phone calls in a week were not expected: she guessed, pragmatically, that this was not because he liked her for herself, but because of someone else. She agreed to meet him for several, half-formulated reasons. One was because, all of a sudden, ther
e was no one else to meet, and the second was because there was always the chance Francis might want to buy a painting. He had bought before, first in his own right, and then on Lizzie’s recommendation, and, having put one in touch with the other, Annie felt faintly proprietorial about them both. Besides, she needed the distraction. The accounts were still a jumble: there were still a few paintings she could not trace through her hectic system, and all of this would be better done with a hangover. She was surprised to be asked out by Francis; he was still merely an acquaintance, rather too up-market and scrupulous for her taste, although he looked divine, and he was, after all, another person’s property. Discovering in round one of the conversation that this was no longer the case, that Elisabeth and he were no longer coupled, was faintly cheering. Annie had always been a man’s woman as opposed to a woman’s woman, not a feature she particularly liked in herself but she did not know how to change. Annie could never rid herself of a predatory instinct and did not wish to try.
‘Gone? What? Elisabeth? Gone off with another chap, you mean, straight after finishing with you? Blimey.’ She put on the cockney voice which was not her real inheritance. Francis’s almost shocking attraction made her do that. Annie’s dad had been an accountant – to the market trade, but still a white-collar man, well off, born far from the sound of Bow Bells. She was feeling indignation on Francis’s behalf, an indignation he did not seem to share.
‘Well, no. Or I don’t know. Someone stole her car, smashed it up. Because of that the police went into her flat. There’s no evidence she went off with somebody, only that she went. They had to go through her things to find out where she might be, only to tell her about the car, which she definitely wasn’t driving, by the way. I suppose she might have been with the person who was.’ Francis did not mention the blood, which haunted him. Jealousy flared for the second time, a vicious little flame licking the inside of his throat and making speech difficult. He drank instead, crisp white wine from the Loire, not an autumn drink, but painless.
Annie shrugged. ‘She always was secretive. I don’t know who else knew her. Lots of people round and about. She did tell me she came from the North, foreign territory to me, funny place, the North, and her parents had died. That was all, really. We talked about paintings, mainly.’ This was the point when Annie remembered about the two thousand pounds, payment deferred. A sudden vacation by Elisabeth did not equate with Elisabeth needing that hard-earned cash. Annie’s conscience was clearer: she could afford curiosity.
‘What about all these men, then? Who told you about that?’
‘The police. Gleaned from the neighbours and the inside of her place, I suppose. I never saw the whole of her place, you know: she never let you in where she worked.’
‘She was a close one …’ said Annie suggestively, slightly roguish, as if she were party to more knowledge than she was prepared to reveal.
‘Perhaps they found wall-to-wall condoms and evidence of bondage. Whips and rubber. Racks.’ Both of them snorted into their wine, giggling with guilty disrespect, swaying with laughter at this weird juxtaposition of ideas. Elisabeth was mysterious, but her large serenity defied any notion of aberrant sex. Then Annie sat bolt upright.
‘My paintings!’ she yelled. ‘She’s got some of my fucking paintings … Supposing she doesn’t come back? My stock, Christ… those three naives she was going to do in a rush. I’ve got to get them. Mrs Ballantyre’ll kill me. And, yes now I know where it is, another one she’s had for ages. Listen, can we get in Liz’s place? I mean, now? My effing stock, the cow. How could she leave me in the lurch?’ Two bottles of wine had been consumed and the night was young. They were looking at each other rather wildly, both bemused into conspiracy, joined by their separate senses of outrage, his the flame of resentful jealousy unquenched by wine, hers a suspicion of theft. Perhaps Elisabeth had got her own back for that missing money after all.
‘No,’ said Francis. ‘No. She would hate anyone to go in her place. Privacy is all with Elisabeth, remember?’
‘So you say. You’re nicer than I am. What about all those other men? Private, was it, or only one at a time? Anyway, she’s probably back already. Come on, let’s go.’ It was the frenetic energy which made Annie good at business, made her a pack leader, party giver, profit maker, a hyperactivity which disallowed stillness, made resolutions turn to deeds within a split second, to be regretted later but believed entirely for the moment. The second lieutenant in Francis, his capacity to follow a definite lead, made him rise and follow. Annie insisted on paying the bill.
‘All right,’ he said. ‘If she’s not there, we’ll go and eat. But if she isn’t there, how do we get in?’ He was being towed in her wake, reluctant, but only a little. He let her enthusiasm break over his back.
‘Oh, we’ll find a way. I’m good at getting into places.’
Later, he thought how right he had been to believe in this optimism of hers. Not about the task in hand, but about the ease of breaching those castle walls which Elisabeth had made so impregnable to anyone unwanted, she who could remain untouched by guilt or duty to answer either her telephone or the imperious summons of the bell. He had envisaged her there, more than once, a shadow behind the blind, too careless even to hide, letting him walk away if his visit were neither timely nor expected. Before the quarrel, which had been no more than the picking of a scab from a wound, a belated yelp of pain, he had believed in this version of her behaviour, had felt the indifference as he walked away after a chance call. At the time he had respected it: never remained on her doorstep like the schoolboy fan he had felt at first; never imagined she might have been afraid to answer her door. Now the thought that he might have been refused because the territory was already occupied by others felt like a cut from a knife. Walking up that almost gentrified road with Annie swinging her bag as if on holiday, he envied her guiltless sense of purpose. His sense of trespass was drowned in wine from the Loire: all he wanted was more of it. Hoping Elisabeth would be in, yet at the same time wanting to avoid the emotional gulp he knew he would feel on sight of her, he paced behind Annie, like a servant, trying to fuel his resentment and managing to do so, even when their entry was, as Annie promised, unbelievably easy.
‘You see?’ said Annie. ‘I told you so. People always let you in if you either smile or threaten, even if they’ve got no right to let you. I thought Liz said she had an old bat living upstairs, but that woman was all right, trust Liz to exaggerate. Funny hair, though, and I didn’t fancy stopping for tea. Not after wine. Told us to be careful. No need, really, is there?’ The look she turned in his direction was almost a leer. It was merely a twisted smile: he knew as much, still felt revolted in a mild way. This was still Elisabeth’s flat and they had no business there, all their justifications faded away with the light. Francis and Annie were not a couple: she should not assume they were in agreement about anything. So far he had liked her well enough: now he was less certain.
Going illicitly into another person’s flat when the occupant could, in theory, return at any time was unnerving. Francis had dreamt of burglary as a boy: he had never failed to understand the temptation in others. Not a crime, he told himself, this is not a crime. Why not? It has the implied permission of the owner. No, it does not. All right, it is not a crime because we have no intention to rape or steal. How Elisabeth, on her return, would cope with this, was not something he wanted to consider. Elisabeth would never confront: she would roll with the punch, move house and set up somewhere more remote, indelibly hurt by the invasion. Francis wanted to shrug away his reservations, but could not do that, either. It occurred to him that he and this acquaintance were treating Elisabeth as if she were either a criminal or dead.
There had been a faint smell of paint about the door leading into the corridor between her rooms, a plant standing there less dead than he remembered from the last visit before. A week or two seemed a long time.
‘Shit a brick. Blimey, what a slut, eh? Sorry, Francis, didn’t mean that. Just di
dn’t know she was so messy.’
The kitchen was slightly dirty, the mere dirt of disuse. Annie never minded anyone describing her as a cheerful slut, as long as they were not referring to her kitchen. She took the word to imply a kind of flattery if said by another woman, implying a good sport with a sense of priorities. Francis, who did not give the same implication to the word, flinched.
‘It’s not bad,’ he ventured, wanting to say nothing at all.
They had passed the bare kitchen and the living room where guests would sit, gone beyond the bedroom where he had also been to his delight, into the open door of the room where he had never ventured. He had not guessed, felt now he should have guessed, that this was the largest, potentially lightest room in the place, and, opposed to the open spaces of the rest, gloriously cluttered.
The studio was hung with tattered pictures like flags. There was a roll-top desk, a table, an easel, four chairs, two built-in sets of shelves as high as his head and another shelf the height of his calf and constructed out of pieces of wood supported on bricks, but fine polished wood, the same as the desk. This shelf was full of jugs, broken bits, colours and more frenetic colours. The head-height shelves contained further pottery plus the implements she required, all in jugs: paintbrushes in jugs, turps bottles in jugs, bottled poisons and powdered pigments in jugs, gauze bandages in jugs, corks, palette knives, rubber thimbles, buttons, string, all jugged. Each jug was of a different shape and shade: they did not stand in sequence and many were chipped. There was no gradation of size or quality or shape: they were simply jugs, so dazzling to the eye, so crazy and cheerful, he laughed out loud.
‘What’s so funny?’ Annie did not share his joy. She had tripped on a rosewood pig, standing aimlessly, the snout catching her shin. She kicked it and winced. Francis remembered why they were there, to look for property, a proper barristerial pursuit, stood upright and saluted. There was no mockery in his respect: Annie was so much more logical: and she was angry.
Half Light Page 11
