by Joan Smith
“She hasn’t got a husband.”
“Guy called John Tracey? He called just as I was leaving, that’s why I was late.”
Loretta stared at him. “He called you?” she asked, unconsciously imitating Sam’s speech pattern. “What for?”
“He’s a reporter, right? Elaine talked to him and when she said he was your husband I guess I was intrigued. He seems like a nice guy. I told him I was meeting you for lunch and he said could you call him.” He glanced at his watch. “Is there a phone in this place? He didn’t know what time he’d be leaving the office.”
“Leaving?”
“Yeah, he’s coming to Oxford.”
“To—” Loretta bit her lip, aware that Bridget was watching her intently.
“Niçoise salad?” The arrival of their food was a welcome distraction and she jumped to her feet, calling over her shoulder to the surprised waiter: “I won’t be a minute.”
She hurried through the swing doors at the far end of the room, pausing in the corridor on the other side where a public telephone faced the door to the gents’. There were half a dozen coins in her purse and she fed them all into the slot, punching in a sequence of figures before she remembered that the Sunday Herald had recently moved to Docklands. It took her a moment to summon up the new number but the female voice which answered her call in a slurred monotone was reassuringly familiar.
“John Tracey, please.”
“Trying to connect you.” There was silence for a few seconds, followed by an internal ringing tone.
“Tracey.”
She had forgotten the curt way he answered the phone when he was working. She grimaced and said: “John? It’s me—Loretta.”
“Hi. How are you?” His voice was warm, unsurprised; it was as if they were picking up a conversation begun two days ago.
“Fine. Sam, Sam Becker that is, he says you’re coming to Oxford.”
“That’s right. The cops have called a press conference at four.”
“I wouldn’t have thought—it doesn’t seem like your sort of story. I thought you only did foreign stuff these days.”
“Oh, any excuse to come to Oxford.” Loretta moved her weight from one foot to the other, uncertain how to react to this apparent attempt at gallantry, but then he added: “My old stamping ground, you know. There are one or two people I’d like to look up.” Tracey had been a mature student at Ruskin, a piece of his history which had temporarily slipped Loretta’s mind. “Did you get my letter?”
“What?”
“My letter. Did it arrive?”
“Yes.” The doors from the restaurant swung open and a woman appeared, a striking blonde in a very short skirt who was on her way to the ladies’ toilet. Loretta turned her face to the wall and bent her head over the mouthpiece. “I—it arrived this morning.”
“This morning? Christ, it would have been quicker to bring it back and post it in Brixton. Listen, how are you fixed for dinner?”
“Dinner? When?”
“Tonight. I’m booked into the Randolph, I always fancied staying there when I was a student.”
“The Randolph?” She felt a little surge of relief at the discovery that he did not, as she had feared, expect to stay in Southmoor Road. “I read about your award in the Guardian,” she said suddenly. “Congratulations.”
“I’ve only been nominated,” he said, dismissing it. “About tonight, I know it’s short notice. We could make it tomorrow if you’re busy.”
“No, I . . .” Uncertain of her feelings, she changed the subject again. “Sam said you talked to him about the murder.”
“Not so much the murder as the press coverage. You’ve seen today’s papers?”
“Yes, we’ve just been reading them.”
“Yeah, well, the tabloids are supposed to have cleaned up their act because of Calcutt but—”
Loretta had been watching her money dwindle and now the illuminated display was flashing zero. “John, I’m sorry, my money’s run out. Ring me when you get to Oxford?”
“OK. Ciao, Loretta.”
She walked slowly back along the corridor and through the swing doors, realizing they hadn’t come to any arrangement about dinner that evening. She was aware before she looked up that Bridget was watching her progress, agog to hear about her conversation with Tracey, and she was as much relieved as surprised when the barman appeared at her elbow clutching a plate.
“I put it under the lights to keep warm,” he explained, sliding her ham and eggs onto the table, and Loretta was able to resume her seat without responding to Bridget’s unspoken question. She busied herself with spreading a paper napkin on her skirt and sprinkling salt on her chips, until Bridget could contain herself no longer.
“Well?” she demanded. “How was the great journalist?”
Loretta waited until her mouth was empty. “We couldn’t really talk, my money ran out.”
“Have you arranged to see him?”
“Hon,” Sam said warningly.
“He’s going to ring later.” Loretta speared a chip and was about to lift it to her mouth when she remembered something. “This press conference,” she said to Sam, “are you going?”
“Press conference?” Sam seemed surprised. “This afternoon?”
“So Tracey says. I assumed you knew.”
He shook his head, thought for a moment, then shrugged and continued eating. “I guess I’m not invited to this one.”
Loretta put down her fork. “But how will we know if anything—if there are any developments?”
Sam gave her a slightly pitying look. “It’s a press conference, Loretta. All you have to do is turn on the TV news.”
She felt her cheeks grow red. “They don’t report everything,” she said defensively. “John used to say—”
He stopped her with an impatient gesture. “If your ex is going to be there, what’s the problem? You’ve got your own deep throat.”
Loretta frowned, thinking of the pornographic film, then realized he was talking about the mole who leaked inside information about the Watergate scandal to the Washington Post. She smiled ruefully at her mistake, recognizing it as a symptom of sexual anxiety, and told herself she was getting far too worked up about a simple dinner invitation. Sam was looking at her, apparently waiting for a reply to a question she had not heard, and she said: “What did you say?”
“I said, how long were you guys married?”
“Oh, I’d have to work it out.”
Bridget said crisply: “Too long. He’s bad news as far as Loretta’s concerned, John Tracey.”
Sam frowned. “What is this, hon? He seemed a nice enough guy on the phone.”
Bridget looked at Loretta and mouthed a single word: “Men.” Loretta responded with a minute shake of her head, dipped a chip into the yolk of one of her eggs and got on with her meal in thoughtful silence.
The banging on the front door was loud and insistent, so loud that whoever it was appeared not to hear Loretta’s irritable assurance: “I’m coming.” She flung open the door and found a sinister figure on the step, a tall man dressed from neck to toe in black leather and carrying what looked like a space helmet under one arm.
“Do you have to make all that noise?” she demanded, her momentary fright receding as she realized he was merely a motorcycle messenger.
“Package for Mr. Tracey,” he said impassively and held out a Jiffy bag.
“Mr. Tracey?”
“This is the right address?” He showed her the label on the package.
“Yes, but John Tracey doesn’t live here.”
“Are you going to sign for it or not?”
“Oh, all right.” She scribbled her name on his clipboard and he strode off, climbed onto a large motorbike parked a few yards up Southmoor Road and revved the engine with savage force.
“It wasn’t my car then?” Bridget, who had been taking a nap in the front bedroom, came downstairs rubbing her eyes.
“No, it was someone dropping off a parcel
for John Tracey.” Loretta closed the front door and examined the package more carefully, observing that the address label was adorned with a trendy logo and an address in Dean Street.
“God, he’s got a cheek. Why couldn’t he have it delivered to his hotel?”
“I don’t know. It feels”—Loretta turned it over, squeezing the object inside—“it feels like a book. Or a video.”
“Open it.”
“I can’t do that.”
“Course you can. It’s your house.”
Loretta laid the package flat on the hall table as though temptation might get the better of her if she held on to it any longer. “I’ll ring the Randolph,” she said. “He should have arrived by now.”
“What time is it?” Bridget yawned and started down the stairs to the kitchen.
Loretta looked at her watch. “Just gone six.”
“Just gone six? Where the hell’s my car? They promised they’d bring it back this afternoon.”
Loretta shrugged. “Why not give them a ring after I’ve phoned the Randolph?”
“All right. Fancy a cup of tea?”
“Yes, please. I’ll be down in five minutes.” Loretta went into her study, lifted down the Oxford telephone directory and looked up the number of the Randolph Hotel. She dialed, asked for John Tracey and was told he was out.
“Can I leave a message? Would you ask him to ring Loretta? No, Loretta—that’s it. Thanks.”
She was halfway down the stairs when the doorbell sounded very faintly and she went back, half expecting to find Tracey on the doorstep. Instead, she opened the door to a young woman who held up a bunch of keys and said breezily: “Mrs. Bennett?”
“No. Are those her car keys?”
“That’s right. I’ve left it back there, in the residents’ parking.”
Loretta turned as she heard Bridget come up behind her. “Your car’s here, I’ll have to give you a visitor’s parking permit.”
“About bloody time,” Bridget said ungraciously.
The policewoman was unruffled. “Could one of you sign here, please?”
Loretta stepped back to allow Bridget to pass, and heard the phone chirrup in her study. “Excuse me,” she said, and went to answer it.
“Loretta.” It was Tracey’s voice, low and urgent.
“A package came for you,” she said. “By messenger.”
“Oh, right.” He didn’t explain, didn’t even seem to be interested. “We need to talk.”
“What about dinner?”
“Fine, but something’s come up.”
“Because I had an idea,” she said, aware that her voice suddenly sounded high and unnatural. “You’ve never seen this house and I thought it might be nice if we ate here. I walked over to the covered market this afternoon, after I spoke to you, and there’s this terribly good place where they make their own pasta—”
He said abruptly: “Bridget’s staying with you, isn’t she?”
“Yes.”
“Then I don’t think that’s a very good idea.”
“Come on, John, I know you’ve never liked her . . .” Loretta lowered her voice as the front door closed and Bridget went past the open door on her way to the kitchen. “Can’t you make an effort for one evening? Sam’U be here and I’m sure he won’t mind talking to you about the tabloids. It’s not like you to pass up the chance of a story.”
“You don’t understand.”
“Yes, I do. We can have dinner on our own any old night, there’s no need to rush things. I mean, we’ve hardly seen each other in the last couple of years—”
“I’m not talking about us, Loretta. Loretta?”
“Sorry,” said Bridget’s voice, “I didn’t realize you were still on the phone.” There was a click as she put down the kitchen extension.
Tracey groaned: “This is impossible.”
“Please, John. I told her I was going to invite you, and I’ve bought all this food. What am I supposed to say to her?”
He sighed. “All right. I assume her feelings won’t be terminally hurt if you and I have a quiet talk before we eat?”
Loretta rolled her eyes upwards. “Course not.”
“This package,” he said abruptly. “Does it look like a video?”
“That sort of size, yes.”
“Do you still have a VCR?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, well, that’s something. Listen, I have to call the office and I’ve got a couple of other calls to make. Shall we say about seven?”
“Fine. See you then.”
The line went dead and she put the phone down, belatedly wondering if he knew how to get to Southmoor Road. She decided against ringing back, guessing he would be on the phone to the Sunday Herald, and went downstairs to the kitchen.
“Sorry,” Bridget said again, pouring tea into two mugs. “I was hoping to catch Sam before he left.”
Loretta pointed to the phone. “Go ahead.”
“Doesn’t matter. Is he coming to supper?”
“Mmm.”
Bridget narrowed her eyes. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”
Loretta reached for the mug without milk, picked it up and sipped her tea.
“Aren’t you going to say anything?”
“What can I say? You two have never got on.”
“You two have never got on is more to the point. You were miserable with him, Loretta. Don’t you remember?”
“He’s coming to supper, not planning our second wedding. Can we skip the lecture? I don’t criticize Sam.”
“Sam?” She looked startled. “There’s no comparison.”
Loretta said nothing.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Like what?” Loretta went to the fridge, remarking over her shoulder: “As you say, there’s no comparison.”
Bridget thought for a moment. “Sarcasm doesn’t suit you,” she said finally. “You used to be so—direct.”
Loretta straightened up and shut the fridge door, a plastic bag in her hand. “Does Sam like black pasta? It’s very fresh, they were making it when I went into the shop.”
Bridget looked blank. “I doubt if he’s had it. What makes it black?”
“Squid ink. I thought I’d made a tuna and lemon sauce. Why don’t you get dressed and I’ll get on with it?”
“OK. When’s the—when’s Tracey arriving?”
“Sevenish. I think he wants to watch that video first.”
“Video? The one that was biked over? What’s it all about?”
“He didn’t say.”
“Didn’t you ask him?”
Loretta emptied the pasta, long black strings of spaghetti coiled together into thick hanks, onto a plate. “No, as a matter of fact. There—doesn’t it look great?”
Bridget did not seem very sure. “What’s it taste like?”
“Fishy. I thought you were going to get dressed.”
Bridget drifted towards the door, then remembered something and turned. “Have you heard any news since we got back?”
“I heard the headlines at five but they didn’t mention the press conference, if that’s what you mean.”
“Oh.” Bridget pursed her lips, appeared to be on the verge of saying something but changed her mind and went upstairs. Loretta watched her go and then began assembling her ingredients: a red onion, a head of papery pink garlic, small tins of tuna and chopped tomatoes, a jar of capers and a ripe lemon. Her spirits lifted now she was alone and she began to hum a tune, a Puccini aria, as she coaxed the fat garlic cloves out of their skins, placed them on a wooden board with a handful of capers and started to chop.
8
“You Are Serious? This Isn’t Some Kind Of, I don’t know . . .”
“A joke? Does it sound like one?”
“No.” Loretta paced up and down the drawing room, arms folded across her chest. For Tracey’s visit she had changed into a low-necked black Lycra top which now seemed entirely inappropriate to the occasion and a long na
rrow skirt which, far from feeling sexy, strained against her calves and hobbled her anxious stride. It was hardly the moment to disappear upstairs and slip into something more comfortable, so she halted at the window with her back to Tracey and said: “It sounds . . . ridiculously far-fetched. I mean, there’s no connection, there can’t be.”
She heard a clink as Tracey finished his drink and disposed of his glass on the coffee table. He was silent for a moment and she could picture his face, irritation fading as his sense of fairness asserted itself and he tried to think of a way to explain.
“What you’ve got to understand,” he said finally, “is how the police work these days—the pressure they’re under. The tabloids, they don’t make any distinction between a murder and a new soap opera. Each day’s another episode and if there isn’t a sensational development they make it up, it’s a sort of feeding frenzy. Christ, would you like to run a murder inquiry with the Sun breathing down your neck? Not to mention having to go on Crimewatch and MPs banging on in Parliament about the clear-up rate. Did I ever tell you there was a rumor Mrs. Thatcher was going to go up to Leeds and take over the Yorkshire Ripper inquiry herself if they didn’t stop making a mess of it?”
Loretta turned, her eyes wide with interest. “Did she?” Then she remembered the subject of their conversation and filed this juicy tidbit away for another occasion. “Did he explain, this cop you talked to, why on earth Bridget would want to bump off a complete stranger and hide the body in her own garden? Assuming, as I suppose we must, that a pregnant woman suffering from high blood pressure is capable of transporting a corpse—”
Tracey gritted his teeth. “Calm down, Loretta, it wasn’t like that. All he was doing was marking my cards.”
“Sorry?”
“Giving me a steer. Off the record, just to let me know the way they’re thinking.”
“Blacken someone’s name, you mean, without giving them a chance to answer back? I think that’s terrible.”
“Loretta, you may not like it but there’s a relationship between the cops and the press—a symbiosis, to use one of your long words. They tell us things off the record, it gives us an idea where the story’s going—what angles we need to have covered. All he said was they’re not one hundred percent satisfied that your mate and her husband are in the clear. What is all this about her losing her diary, anyway?”
