Come Clean (1989)

by James, Bill

  ‘Yours know something, too.’ He groaned happily in his quiet, apologetic way.

  ‘You made me gentle and loving, Ian.’

  ‘Only ten minutes ago you were being so tough, shoving chunks of building about.’

  ‘That’s what I mean, you change me, make me somebody different. Nobody else can do that.’

  ‘Why you want me?’

  ‘It’s part of it.’

  ‘I hope you realize, you’ll never make me somebody different or change me, Sarah.’

  ‘I don’t know so much. This is changing. It’s growing.’

  ‘Christ, but you’re so crude.’ In a little while he said: ‘You’re responsive absolutely everywhere on your body, you know that? I bet you get a thrill cleaning your teeth, even.’

  ‘Only up and down. Listen, Ian, do we have to wait?’

  ‘No, of course not, love.’ He moved towards her.

  ‘Sometimes I like to wait, sometimes, no.’

  ‘Seems reasonable.’

  ‘Tonight, no.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘Yes, you don’t want to wait either, do you?’

  ‘How can you tell?’

  When she reached home there was a light on in the front room downstairs and at the kerb an old Viva, the worse for wear. That would probably mean her husband was with Colin Harpur, Detective Chief Superintendent Colin Harpur, head of criminal investigation. Harpur often drove battered-looking cars, hoping they would give some cover, though his big body and head, and thick fair hair jammed up against the top, were almost comically conspicuous in a small vehicle. He was Francis Garland’s boss, and worked a good deal with Desmond, too, so presumably had heard most of what there was to hear about her life and ways though he never gave any sign. None, except, possibly, that he seemed to treat her with special gentleness. Police knew how to sit on secrets, and especially Harpur. The story went that his own marriage and love life had their complications. At any rate, there had been days when she was very grateful for his tender, understanding style with her.

  ‘Sarah’s been at bridge, Col,’ Desmond Iles said. Both men had stood when she came in and folded down back into the leather chairs now. What could be the sound of a crushed crisp packet came from deep under the cushion of Harpur’s. One day she was going to have a big clean-up in this room, and probably the whole house. Yes, definitely, one day: the same sort of target date as for cutting back on her loving warmth in bed with Ian.

  ‘How was it?’ her husband asked.

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘Never got to grips with bridge,’ Harpur said. ‘Bridge, crosswords, chess and the veleta I can’t manage.’

  ‘Bridge needs a certain kind of mind,’ Desmond told him. ‘Subtle, bruising, painstaking. Col, you’d be lovely, unbeatable, on the last. But you’re far too charitable. Sarah’s goodish all round. Yes.’ He turned to her. ‘We’re chatting policy, love. You know, whether we should advise kiosks to put the Mars bars at the back of the displays, to beat shoplifters, with the Maltesers at the front, or might it be the other way about? Criminologists are silent on this and Nietzsche only tentative.’

  The two men were in shirt-sleeves, drinking tea from the best, real china cups. Desmond had a thing about decent crockery and glass when guests came, even subordinates. His upbringing had been what he called ‘wholesome and chintzy’. In front of Harpur was a pad, with a few very brief pencil notes on it.

  ‘Pow-wow? Is there some big police activity ahead, then?’ she asked.

  ‘Always,’ Desmond said.

  ‘Yes, well, I think I’ll have a bath and go to bed now, if you don’t mind,’ she replied.

  ‘It would be so nice to talk to you for a while,’ Desmond said, ‘it really would, wouldn’t it, Col?’ The tone was as close to a plea as she had ever heard from him.

  ‘Grand.’ Harpur smiled at her and she was conscious again of his wish to see her happy, or at least unhurt. They said he looked like Rocky Marciano, the boxer, but fair. She doubted that. As she understood things, Marciano was ruthless in the ring. Harpur looked tough, but kindly with it, patient. And, despite what he and Desmond said, he must be bright, too, or he would not have that job in his thirties.

  ‘I’m so tired. Another night?’ she said.

  ‘All right, love. We’ll probably bog on a bit longer, won’t we Col?’

  As she crossed the door and moved towards the stairs, she thought she heard Desmond say to Harpur: ‘Yes, bridge, very tiring.’

  Sitting in the bath, thinking over the evening, she tasted salt on her lips and became aware, suddenly, that she was weeping. It shocked her. She rarely cried, and when she did she generally knew about it. Now, she hung her head forward something like the injured man’s in the club earlier, and let the tears drop into the soapy water, a tiny squall on a grey and white pool.

  God, what was this all about? She straightened her neck and swirled the water about with one hand, as if drowning the tears in suds would drown the pain, too. But a mix of sadnesses competed in her head. For a moment downstairs, when Des asked her to stay and she refused, all the pain and aridity of the marriage had closed on her like an illness. Something in her had wanted to please him and almost made her agree. Ten minutes would not have killed her. Simply, though, she had found she could not do it. The chore of speaking to him had seemed too much, much too much tonight, even though Harpur would have been there to help out the talk and prevent any slide into coldness or abuse.

  So, was it the hopelessness of things between her and Des that had made her bawl? She could not really believe it. Hadn’t she known for long enough about that? Wasn’t it now almost fully sublimated into a scar, no more a hurtful wound? The absence of children no longer troubled her, surely? She consulted a marriage counsellor off and on, but this was to help her make up her mind about Ian and the rest of it, not Des.

  Perhaps she was crying about Ian, then. It had been all right, it had been lovely, back at his place. That part of it almost always was. Yet tonight those doubts about him, the anxieties, had surfaced again. They were always there, not far out of sight, and at the Monty this evening they had become suddenly more alarming than she could remember them ever before. Did she know him? Could she know him? He held her off, cut off the lights, doused awkward conversations.

  She climbed out of the bath, still impatient with herself for growing so gloomy and philosophical, and eager to be in bed and asleep or apparently asleep before Des came up. Briefly she examined herself in the full-length mirror. It wasn’t bad, was it? Another few good years left? Perhaps that was one plus for having no pregnancies. She had stopped crying.

  Chapter Two

  Just as Sarah reached her car in the drive next morning she saw Ralph climb quickly from a Montego parked near the house and walk towards her. Panic hit her immediately, and her first terrified, unhinged thought was that he had no right to come up from the Monty to a decent, leafy, pebble-dash road. Christ, it broke the rules: she ran two lives and he ought to stay stuck in that other, down-town version of herself. Boundaries should be respected, at least by him. It was like a rat in the bread bin.

  ‘Mrs Iles,’ he said, ‘well, I’ve been waiting for you, obviously. I wasn’t sure if you’d be going out, but I waited. I didn’t want to call at the house, even after your husband, the senior officer, had left. I had an idea you wouldn’t like that.’

  ‘Probably not.’

  ‘This needed delicate handling. Luckily, in business, you get used to summing up a situation.’

  ‘It’s a knack, isn’t it?’

  They were standing near her car and she decided that the sooner they were not the better. She did not want him in the house, so she got behind the wheel of the Panda and opened the passenger door. He joined her and she drove out of the road at once, feeling hopelessly stressed and confused.

  Her day had begun badly at breakfast, when she found Desmond civil but very distant, more than usually distant, as if some powerful anxiety gripped him. He was not easil
y upset, not prone to worry, so whatever it was must be serious. Conceivably, he felt special grief or hopelessness about their marriage this morning, though she doubted it: they had both become toughened to that failure for months now. More likely, Harpur’s visit last night signified a delicate and probably messy police problem that he and Des did not feel comfortable discussing in headquarters, maybe a coming operation, maybe aftermath. Private meetings between the two did happen now and then and the best china came out fairly often these days.

  ‘Is there something you want to talk about, Des?’ she had asked, knowing the answer.

  ‘Nothing pressing, love. Is there something you want to talk about? The bridge evening?’

  ‘You’re not interested in bridge.’

  ‘Right. Not in bridge.’ He smiled a bit wearily, a bit sadly. ‘Oh, look, forgive the show of self-pity, will you? Put it down to colic.’

  She left it at that. Generally they did leave the potentially hurtful topics like that – hinted at, skirted. Still feeling low after he left for work, she rang Margot, the counsellor who helped her occasionally, and was able to make an appointment for later in the morning. God, her marriage problems were getting to be like bad teeth, needing rush treatment at agonizing moments.

  Always she dressed for full impact when seeing Margot, to make it clear that although she might sound down and desperate there was still plenty of fight in her. Today, she did a thorough job on her hair, improved all key zones with Rive Gauche, and wore pieces of her zappiest jewellery. She reckoned she looked pretty positive in a strained way, but did not feel any better. And when she saw Ralph, she felt much worse.

  ‘I want to make it clear there’s nothing to worry about,’ he said now, as they drove. ‘This is a precautionary visit, very much so. May I say I love your perfume?’

  ‘Have you had breakfast?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘How long have you been there? Dawn? What’s so urgent, Ralph?’

  ‘Please, I don’t want you to worry. Your breathing, it’s very fast.’

  ‘I had school colours for it.’

  He sat back and had a nice, long avuncular chuckle about that, tapering it sweetly from very, very amused indeed to just very, very amused. ‘Good,’ he said. ‘I like someone who keeps a sense of humour, regardless.’

  ‘That’s the thing about senses of humour, they must be regardless.’

  ‘Laughter is certainly an antidote. That’s well known.’

  ‘Yes it is.’ None of the fear had ebbed and her body was stiffly arched as she drove. Sweat began to run from her head and neck down between her shoulders, and would soon be making a nonsense of the Rive Gauche. For one moment, to her astonishment, she found herself wishing that Des were with her to cope with this man. Absurd as well as feeble: if Des had been around, Ralph would never have shown himself.

  He sat half-turned towards her, his knees together, almost touching the gear lever, hands interlaced demurely in his lap. From the corner of her eye as she drove she could just about make out that he was smiling gently, and when he spoke his voice sounded light and friendly. He was making an effort to seem innocuous, and she found it creepy. ‘I’ve known your Ian Aston for years and years,’ he said. ‘You can’t go wrong there.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Ian’s a man I’d always stand by.’

  ‘Grand. I’ll just drive around the park and the lake and then take you back to near your car, Ralph. I can’t be long. I’m on my way somewhere.’

  ‘Of course.’ For a while he grew silent and watched from the side window, apparently content. Then he turned and said: ‘You’re bound to wonder what all this is about. I understand, perfectly.’ He swung away slightly in the passenger seat, so that he was looking from the side window again. When she glanced towards him, she could see only the line of his nose and jaw, with its smooth, white scar. Despite that mark, there was something fine, even noble, about his profile, like a cut-price and darker Charlton Heston. She had noticed that before, in the Monty. Ralph’s were the sort of bony good looks her mother had always fancied and found trustworthy, because they were so different from her husband’s, Sarah’s father. Some of that taste must have been inculcated in Sarah. As if to confirm that life had brought him down a rung or two he said: ‘I’m not free to act as I would like, you know, Mrs Iles.’

  ‘Who is?’

  ‘Well, quite,’ he said peaceably, ‘indeed, who is?’ And then his voice suddenly lost its gentleness and became edged with stress and venom. ‘Mrs Iles, this is not some fart-arsing dreamy philosophical discussion, you know.’ He turned violently in the seat to face her again. ‘I’m trying to tell you something, something real, that counts. Do you understand that, you – well, you wife?’

  She drew in at the kerb. ‘Would you like to push off now?’

  ‘Oh, don’t come that, the big, other-age dignity. It went out with the Stanley Steamer.’

  ‘Goodbye,’ she screamed at him. The windows were closed but her voice must have reached the pavement, and a couple of old ladies in plastic macs, one pulling a shopping bag on wheels, stared through the glass, in the searching way people looked into ambulances. He was probably right: she had started to act stupidly, putting on the class, like Mrs Desmond Iles of Idylls, Rougemont Place, instead of finding out why he had come, and what he had to say about the situation of Sarah Iles, mistress, and sometimes troublesome guest at his cruddy club. Nerves had done it, nothing else.

  He did not leave the car and when he spoke again his voice was back to considerateness and a sort of amiability. ‘Believe me, this is not how I see myself, not at all, Mrs Iles, coming out here to frighten someone like your good self. I’m on your side, very much so, I hope that goes without saying. Oh, you have your views of the Monty and of me, I don’t doubt it, but there’s nothing untoward about the club or myself, nothing dubious or malfeasant, I hope you’ll accept that. I’m a family man through and through, doing what I can to give those dear to me a decent life. When I say “on your side” you’re going to reply that you have no side, I understand that, but what I mean is I’d do everything I could to save you distress, and Ian.’

  She drove on.

  ‘Did you and he discuss that matter of last night, I mean, afterwards?’ Ralph asked.

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘Understandable. You have better things to talk about, for heaven’s sake. Just an episode, wasn’t it, what’s called an aberration?’

  She felt stifled by the seeping verbiage, desperately looked for a sentence or phrase that meant something to her, like seeking footholds in a swamp. ‘Who were those people?’

  ‘At the club?’

  ‘Of course at the club.’

  ‘What I have to tell you is that they’ve made an identification.’ He sighed and turned towards her. ‘Yes, I’m sorry.’ The tone was as if he had informed her of a death.

  ‘What? What does that mean, an identification? Who of? Look, we’re nearly back to your car. I don’t want to go into Rougemont Place again.’

  ‘Understandable, entirely. Park here, briefly. Then I’ll walk.’

  She drew in again.

  ‘Yes, I had another visit,’ he said.

  ‘From one of them?’

  ‘One or two.’

  ‘Which one or two? The one with the false teeth? The grey-haired, balding one?’

  ‘You’re observant,’ he said, sadly. ‘I don’t know whether one really wants to stare at people as closely as that.’

  ‘I couldn’t help staring, for heaven’s sake. Think what was going on.’

  ‘Well, perhaps. Put it another way: best not to be shouting these descriptions around. I mean, wildly. Such glimpses can be very subjective, misleading. We were all under stress. Distortions do take place.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘When what?’

  ‘This second visit.’

  ‘Very early this morning. They were asking about the people who went into the yard last night.’

&nb
sp; ‘They were there when Ian and I –?’

  ‘These are people who set quite exceptional store upon their privacy, Mrs Iles. The flashlight, and probing into the skip – they watched that, apparently, from wherever they had taken cover and were very discomposed.’

  ‘What identification?’

  ‘They were quite all right with me, I want you to understand that, no untowardness at all.’

  ‘What about malfeasance?’

  ‘What? These are people who like to act in a moderate, professional way, a reasonable way. These are business people, obviously. They don’t seek, well, emotive incidents.’

  ‘Emotive?’

  ‘Vigorous, unnecessarily vigorous. Civility up to a point is what they pride themselves on.’

  ‘Which point?’

  ‘Well, that’s the question, I agree. And they’re gifted. That’s what I mean, achieving an identification so quickly.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Yourself, Mrs Iles. They were able to put a name to you, which means an address as well, clearly. This is what is so regrettable.’

  He sounded genuinely hurt and grave, and his eyes were sad, his mouth mournful. There were times when she could almost believe he worried about her, as well as about his skin. She wished now she had taken the trouble to know him better on those visits to the Monty. He was about forty, strong-featured, a bit too charming, when he was doing that turn, but with nothing that she could see in his face to declare he might have a record, had been inside. About that, though, she could only guess. To Des or Colin Harpur his looks might proclaim something very different. She had read in the Sunday Telegraph that detectives travelling on a train played a game called CRO – guessing from passengers’ looks which had a place in the Criminal Records Office. True, Ian knew Ralph well and liked him, so there ought to be something decent and straight present, ought to be if Ian himself was all right.