A Death of Distinction

by Marjorie Eccles

  ‘Not particularly,’ she answered, reading the signs of his restlessness, knowing that his mind would be elsewhere and that he’d be too keyed up to concentrate on the music ... which would frustrate him all the more, since he regarded anything less than total application as an insult to the orchestra. That the supper they’d planned at the Italian restaurant might as well be bread and cheese for all the interest he’d take in it. ‘You have a hot shower, and I’ll pour us a drink.’

  ‘Make it a big one.’

  An hour later, Cleo Laine on the turntable, the lamps low, a drink in his hand, she asked, ‘Like me to slip out for a takeaway?’

  He stretched out a hand and pulled her to him. ‘I’ve a much better idea than that.’

  The lamplight laid a radiance on her body, lay like a salve on the scars that she’d been shy of letting him see, at first. God! he’d thought, when he realized how near the heart the main scar was. The bastard had almost killed her. He lay on his back now, one arm behind his head; he let his other hand lie, heavy and lax on her thigh, unwilling to move and waken her, not wanting to remember what it had been like when he thought he might have lost her ... knowing what he wanted for her now, and that he mustn’t influence her in any way, any decisions must be hers alone.

  Alex wasn’t asleep, merely in a state of total contentment. ‘Are you awake, Gil?’

  ‘I am now.’ He leaned over her, propped on his elbow, ran his finger along the edge of her jaw, looking down at her face in the golden light of the lamp, seeing her hair spread like dark silk against the pillow.

  ‘I’ve something to tell you.’

  She began hesitantly, taking her time about it, and it was what he’d expected to hear for a long time, but – ‘Are you sure? Sure about your reasons? You have a future, you know, if you want it.’

  ‘No, I’m not all that sure, it’s a step in the dark, but I have to take it. And I am sure I don’t want a future in the police – and not just because of what happened.’ It was coming out in a rush, now. ‘I’d always thought of myself as career-minded, but I don’t like the way things are any longer – God, that’s an understatement, sometimes I hate the police! I could carry on, taking things superficially, but at a deeper level I know it would be wrong for me ... I don’t believe in what I’m doing any more, I don’t feel comfortable with it...’ Her voice ran down. ‘I’m not making much sense, am I?’

  He’d had some inkling that this was how she felt – two people as close as they were couldn’t hide feelings like this completely – but he’d thought it was a temporary disillusionment, he’d had no idea it was as bad as this. Been too wrapped up in himself, he thought guiltily. ‘Go on – you’re not doing so bad. I’m trying to understand.’

  ‘It’s what we have to deal with now that I can’t cope with. It’s a rotten, filthy world we live in, and I know somebody has to deal with the consequences, but I don’t want it to be me. Carry on, and you end up brutalized – or go under.’

  ‘That doesn’t always follow, you know.’

  ‘Oh God, don’t take it personally! It’s the way people like you cope that makes me feel so inadequate – ‘

  ‘Inadequate? You? Never!’ She was tough, a police sergeant, for God’s sake. She hadn’t got that commendation for nothing.

  ‘Yes,’ she insisted. ‘When I see the way the children are growing up – old and experienced and cynical before they’re out of primary school, into drugs and crime ... knowing there’s nothing we can do about it, it’s out of control, we’re losing the battle ... I’m not opting out, I simply need time to sort myself out... I can’t expect you to understand, you don’t feel like that.’

  ‘No.’ He wasn’t one of life’s optimists, but if he’d felt that sort of despair he wouldn’t be in the police, either. Soldiering on was what worked for him, taking things as they came, doing what was best at the time. It was people like Alex, with this need to see the world and everything in it as perfect as she wanted it to be, the need to be able to make it so, who suffered when things didn’t come up to expectations.

  He thought she was saying, in a different way, something of the same sort of thing Jack Lilburne had been reported as saying in his speech, the night before he was killed. But there was Jack’s ‘however’. Alex hadn’t got as far as that. She was still floundering in the dark.

  He cupped her troubled face in his hand and kissed her gently. ‘You need time to get things in perspective. Don’t rush it, it’ll happen.’

  With his arms around her, he let her talk on and felt her gradually relax, relieved for her sake that things were out in the open at last. And for other reasons, too, that maybe didn’t bear examining too closely. Standards had been relaxed, a blind eye was turned these days to cohabiting officers, but a kindlier one was turned on those who conformed: the Chief Constable was a chapel-going non-conformist, a Baptist lay preacher, with old-fashioned standards.

  Mayo couldn’t help being aware that Alex’s decision wouldn’t exactly do any harm to his own standing.

  14

  Marc looked at his watch as he came off night duty: a digital watch, which also gave the date, and realized with astonishment that it was barely ten days since he’d met Flora. She was already so much a part of his life that he found it incredible to believe he’d known her such a short time – only since the day of the bomb which had finished off her father, Mr Jack Lilburne, OBE, the Governor of the Young Offenders’ Institution, in fact. That same day Marie-Laure had moved into her new flat and that he’d hoped would mark a new beginning for her, only it hadn’t.

  He wondered what she’d say if he told her about Flora, but he couldn’t imagine himself doing so. She’d shrunk more and more into herself, the loving relationship he’d envisaged hadn’t materialized. Anyway, she’d think he was crazy, to imagine anything could ever come of his longing for Flora. He sometimes thought so himself. He’d often seen people do stupid things when they thought themselves in love; he was less contemptuous of them now. If they’d been as helpless as he was, in the grip of this infatuation ... no, love, it was love he felt for Flora, nothing else could describe his feelings – if they’d felt like this, he could understand.

  He’d tried to phone her several times but it was always her mother, or someone he guessed was the cleaning woman, who answered. Once it had been a man. They couldn’t have told her he’d rung, or she’d have been in touch. A familiar, violent compulsion to do something about it came to him. He made a right turn at the next lights, and within minutes, found himself driving towards the older part of the town where she had her shop, in one of the busy, narrow streets that sloped down to the river. It was risky, but if you never took risks you might as well be dead, anyway.

  It was Flora’s second day back at the shop. Anthony was driving her there and she was asking his opinion on the matter of buying herself a new car.

  ‘It’s not a write-off, your Polo, you know.’

  Flora shuddered. ‘It is as far as I’m concerned. I don’t want to see it ever again, never mind drive it. But I can’t let you go on chauffeuring me around. It’s sweet of you, but you don’t have the time. And I do need to get into a driving seat again soon, and pretty soon, or I never will.’

  ‘That’s my girl. Though you know I don’t mind what I do for you.’ Anthony took his hand from the steering wheel and laid it on Flora’s knee. She didn’t remove it, but she didn’t show any outward signs of enthusiasm. Ah well, early days yet! He had to be patient. She was already surprising him with the speed of her comeback, showing that she was Dorothea’s daughter as well as Jack’s, that there was a steely backbone stiffening those soft, yielding contours. She was bravely determined to pick up the threads, even to showing an interest again in what she wore.

  She said suddenly, apropos of nothing, ‘I’m worried about my mother.’

  Anthony didn’t show at his best, driving a car. He gave the impression of being in charge of a wild mustang, his arms stretched tensely to the steering wheel as if
reining it in, snatching at the gears as if they might bite him, peering myopically through the screen. Sometimes, Flora wondered if he should be driving at all. The car bucked now, as he turned his head to gaze at her. ‘Your mother?’ he repeated.

  Thankfully, they were nearly there. They’d turned down into Butter Lane, past the fashionable Interiors on the corner and Saville’s antiquarian bookshop, and were now in Fetter Hill, in front of the little, half-timbered shop that was squeezed in between the art shop and an old-fashioned chemist that still had the big glass jars of coloured liquids displayed in the window. Anthony pulled into the kerb. ‘What about your mother?’

  ‘Something’s worrying her. I mean, apart from the obvious. She isn’t eating properly, and I don’t think she’s sleeping, either. She doesn’t seem to be able to concentrate. It’s so unlike her.’

  ‘Flora, that’s par for the course, in the circumstances. It’ll take time –’

  ‘I’m not talking about that. It’s something else. I tried to get her to talk last night, but she wouldn’t.’ Flora stared absently through the windscreen for a while, then bent to pick up her bag from the floor. ‘Oh, well, it’ll work itself out, I suppose. Have a cup of coffee before you go back?’

  ‘I’d better not.’ Anthony had missed his breakfast in order to drive her to the shop before the morning rush, and without doubt the coffee here would be better than any he might get back at Conyhall, but he didn’t want to cope with Charlie. Charlie, who was horsey and county, and made Anthony feel like a wally. And he suddenly remembered the meeting scheduled to start in half an hour – it was today, surely? Or was it tomorrow? He was usually conscientious about this sort of thing, but suddenly, it didn’t matter. Something unexpected jolted inside him, some impulse making him push his luck. Everything he knew or had learned professionally told him he was playing it wrong – it was too soon, she wouldn’t be ready. Despite these warnings, he found himself putting his hand on her knee again and saying just a minute. Flora, didn’t she think it was time they – she and Anthony ... began to think about... wouldn’t it be an idea ... well, what he wanted, more than anything else in the world, actually, was for them to get married.

  Oh God. He’d blown it. Damn it to hell. Blurting it out like a callow schoolboy. Any way to do something wrong, he’d surely find it.

  Flora said calmly, ‘I know. It’s what Da wanted, too. He told me so, just before he died.’ A glow was spreading under her skin, her eyes were luminous. ‘It’s rather what I want, as well, Anthony, darling.’

  He was momentarily stunned, then he felt the blood rush to his head, he wanted to shout and sing. It just showed, you never knew. All these months. Old Jack! Flora! He twisted round to grab hold of her but the steering wheel was in the way. And then a distinctly sobering thought occurred to him. ‘What will your mother say?’

  ‘Oh, she’ll be all right. She’ll be very pleased, in fact. She told me yesterday she thinks you’re a very reliable young man.’

  ‘I’ll have that coffee, after all,’ Anthony said, winded.

  Marc drove slowly, looking for the shop. For an instant, thinking what it would be like to see Flora again, it came to him with horrifying and explicit clarity what might easily have happened to her, precisely how it must have affected her since, but the thought distressed him so much that he put it out of his mind and concentrated on finding Mark Two. Amongst the old, timbered buildings, its frontage was so narrow, barely wide enough for the name, he nearly passed it by. He was disappointed; he’d expected something much more classy.

  He wasted fifteen minutes looking for somewhere to park his car. Although it was so early, the narrow street was already congested and he had an argument with a baker’s delivery van driver who pulled a fast one and beat him to the only space left. His already jumpy mood hadn’t improved by the time he’d parked several streets away and walked back, pushed the shop door open and entered.

  She didn’t look as he’d remembered her at all. He was staggered by the difference. She was dressed in a very short tubular dress that showed a lot of her legs, she wore make-up and her lips were a shiny red. Her hair had been done up in some sort of fashionable frizz. She’d looked so much more beautiful in the hospital, without all that goo on her face and with her hair falling naturally to her shoulders. He supposed she had to dress the part, but he was aware of a flicker of doubt. His sweet, virginal Flora looked – well, almost indecent, though she was more desirable than ever, in fact. He put it down to not having seen her for so long, except in his imagination.

  There was some man with her in the shop, she was talking animatedly to him and smiling, but when she saw Marc, her face changed. At first he thought her expression was one of annoyance, then he realized it could be surprise at seeing him there, and perhaps embarrassment. Perhaps she wasn’t supposed to have personal visitors while she was working in the shop. But that couldn’t be so, he remembered she was her own boss, she’d told him she owned a half share in the business.

  ‘Hello, Marc.’ She smiled gently and said to the man, ‘Anthony, this is the man I told you about, who was so kind to me in hospital.’

  Beaming all over his face, the other man shook Marc by the hand and said Flora had told him how he’d kept his eye on her, and thanked him, as if he’d done him a favour as well. Then he said he must be going and took both Flora’s hands in his and looked right into her eyes. Marc didn’t like the proprietary way he did this, as if he owned a share in her, much less the way Flora didn’t seem to mind. The lingering way she smiled at him, in fact.

  ‘Have you known him long?’ he asked jealously when the Anthony person had left.

  ‘Oh, ages,’ Flora said casually, and Marc recalled that the man had been years older than Flora. Probably an old family friend. He was almost certain he was the one who’d answered the phone when he’d rung.

  ‘Did you get my flowers?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh, so it was you? How sweet of you.’

  She explained why she hadn’t thanked him, and it was just as he’d thought – she hadn’t wanted to ring him at the hospital, she didn’t know his last name – ‘Daventry,’ he said, ‘Marc Daventry, Marc with a “c”.’ Repeating it twice so that she’d remember. ‘You’re looking better,’ he added – meaning that she looked less ill than she had.

  ‘Oh well, you have to make the effort. As you said to me, life must go on.’

  She smiled, but it was a smile that wobbled at the edges, and while registering pleasure that she’d remembered what he’d said, he saw she was, underneath, still the lost little girl he remembered in the hospital, and that had an immediate, cheering effect on him.

  The shop didn’t appear to be busy. There were no customers, although there were a lot of fancy clothes on the rails and displayed on models. Marc found the atmosphere very claustrophobic. The shop was extremely small and had a low-beamed ceiling, thick grey carpets and big mirrors that showed disconcerting reflections of himself, and the air was heavy with the residue of expensive perfumes. Flora began folding a raspberry-coloured silk suit that was laid out on the large glass-topped table that served as a counter and said, ‘Well?’ Looking at him expectantly.

  ‘Will you have dinner with me one night?’ he blurted out, coming to the point much more quickly than he’d meant to, suddenly feeling his nerve giving out, afraid that he might leave the shop without ever having asked her, if he didn’t do it immediately.

  She gave him a quick upward glance from under her lashes, then lowered them and went on smoothing down the suit skirt.

  ‘I don’t think that would be a good idea, Marc,’ she said quietly, at last.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I – I don’t have much spare time, for one thing, and for another –’

  ‘I’m not your social class – is that it?’ he interrupted, quick on the defensive, unable to keep the bitterness out of his voice.

  ‘No, of course not, not at all! It’s just that –’

  A woman came in from th
e back of the shop. ‘Flora? Anything wrong?’ she asked in a cut-glass accent.

  ‘No, Charlie, Marc’s just going, aren’t you, Marc?’

  Charlie – what sort of stupid name was that for a woman to call herself? Marc judged her to be a few years older than Flora, heavily made up, with shiny, streaky hair tied back with a black velvet bow, wearing a very short-skirted navy blue suit that showed legs with knobbly knees, and enough gold chains clanking round her neck to anchor the QE2. She gave Marc a look that froze.

  After Flora’s unwillingness and that look, he wasn’t going to hang around to be humiliated further. ‘I’ll ring you,’ he said to Flora. ‘You must have some free time – this week, next week –’

  ‘Don’t, Marc, it won’t be any good.’

  He wasn’t all that experienced in asking girls out, but this was supposed to be how some of them reacted, wasn’t it? Played hard to get? He didn’t believe that was Flora’s style, yet she couldn’t really mean what she said.

  ‘Why not? Why won’t it be any good?’

  The Charlie woman began, ‘Look here –’ But Flora interrupted her.

  ‘Because for one thing, I’m engaged to be married.’

  ‘I – I don’t believe you.’

  ‘Yes, I am. To Anthony. Anthony Spurrier, the man you just met.’

  He was stunned. ‘You can’t be. You’re lying!’

  ‘You’d better go,’ the other woman said coldly, though he could have sworn all this was news to her, too.

  ‘Yes, Marc, I think you had,’ said Flora. Her eyes were huge, and her face had gone very pale.

  They stood there, looking at him, and he had absolutely no idea what to say. He couldn’t have spoken anyway at first for the tumult boiling up inside him, churning his stomach. At last, he managed it. ‘All right, but I’m not going to leave it there. You let me think ... You kissed me when you left the hospital!’