Coffin on Murder Street

by Gwendoline Butler

  ‘What did you say to her?’ She didn’t want to talk to him, but curiosity was stronger than pride. He didn’t answer. Didn’t hear me again, she thought, fury bubbling up.

  What he had said to Nell was: ‘What’s this about the shoe?’ He too was aware of Ellice Eden hovering.

  Nell had turned her head slightly so that Ellice could not see her face. ‘I remembered … I had a pair like that. Bought them in Macy’s. I forgot.’ She peered hopefully into Coffin’s face. Short-sighted, he diagnosed. Doesn’t wear contact lenses or can’t. ‘I never wore them. Made my feet look too big.’ She looked down at her feet, she did have long thin feet. ‘So I forgot about them.’

  ‘But you remembered. What made that happen?’

  ‘Suddenly came to me. That’s how memory works, isn’t it?’

  Could do, Coffin had thought, or it could indicate a lie surfacing.

  ‘And then Sylvie said hadn’t I had a pair like that,’ Nell went on, as if this had been of no importance, ‘and reminded me.’

  ‘Do you still have the other shoe?’

  Nell shook her head silently.

  ‘Sure?’ He studied her face. There had to be another one somewhere, and that somewhere might be of interest.

  ‘Looking,’ submitted Nell.

  ‘And you don’t know how the one shoe came to be in the car?’

  Nell looked him straight in the eye. She shook her head. ‘No idea. Can’t think. It worries me.’

  You certainly have every right to be worried, decided Coffin. It certainly worries me.

  ‘Who’s been in your flat recently?’

  Only friends.’

  ‘You’ll have to name names.’

  ‘You, Stella, Gus Hamilton came once, Ellice, others from the play.’ She looked around helplessly. ‘People drift in and out, after rehearsal or before. It’s the way things are.’

  Easy to pick up a shoe, thought Coffin, if your mind ran that way. Damn it.

  ‘I feel sick,’ whispered Nell. ‘Right inside me. That’s because of Tom.’

  He tried to read her face, and couldn’t. He could see grief, tension, anxiety, plenty of that, but he didn’t know what to make of it: she was an actress.

  Across the room, Stella was registering fury and he could read that all right. We must talk, Stella and I, he said silently, I must listen to her more.

  But when he had got back to Stella, all he said was: ‘Tomorrow Nell Casey will be going in to talk to Paul Lane. I want you to take Sylvie out during that time. Doesn’t matter where. Just away. Out of that flat in The Albion. I will come to take you to the flat and then I will stay.’

  Stella was silent. ‘Are you looking for the boy there?’ she asked at last.

  ‘Can you think of a better place?’

  He was conscious of carrying around with him a double deceit like a hump on his back. It was a double deceit, because he was using Stella to get Sylvie away, because he was not going to tell anyone, not Paul Lane or Archie Young, and his intention was to request Mary Barclay to meet him there.

  His would be the responsibility.

  It was a nice day, with the sun shining and a blue sky, but a sudden shower of heavy rain set in as John Coffin and Stella Pinero arrived at The Albion.

  ‘I was going to ask the girl to come for a walk. But I can hardly do so now.’ Stella was cross and not worrying about showing it. She had groomed herself with a mathematical precision that made her look hard. She knew it, and didn’t care about that, either.

  ‘Take her shopping,’ said Coffin. ‘Just take her.’

  ‘I believe I would be justified in being angry with you,’ said Stella in a quiet civil voice that let him know she was furious. ‘But I’ll do it. Not for you, though. For Nell and Tom.’ She felt as though she ought to cross herself when she said the boy’s name, he was so vulnerable, so likely to be dead. And if not dead, then suffering what?

  But she was sweet to Sylvie when the girl opened the door, said she thought it would be a good idea for her to get out of the house, so come and have a cup of coffee with her in Max’s and then they could decide what to do. Harrods, maybe?

  Sylvie’s eyes curved with pleasure. ‘Oh, Workers for Freedom, please,’ she said, her voice reverent and hushed, the voice of the really dedicated shopper. ‘And Hyper—Hyper … where Princess Diana shops.’

  Stella looked surprised, but agreed. The girl knew her fashion onions. It had not been Stella’s intention to do any serious shopping, but they were obviously about to do just that. ‘Come on, then.’ It was to be hoped the girl had the right shiny plastic cards in her purse, but somehow she had that look that said she did.

  Sylvie left with Stella without appearing to notice that Coffin remained behind. Clothes had her in their thrall.

  Within minutes, Mary Barclay rang the bell. ‘I saw them leave.’ She stood on the threshold. ‘I was told to report to you, sir, and stay as long as wanted.’ She waited for him to say something. He didn’t, he wasn’t even looking at her, but standing there as if he was waiting for the place to speak to him.

  She came in and shut the door behind her. Quietly, but there was no one to hear. The boss didn’t seem to be getting any answers, either.

  After a minute, a clock with a silver chime began to sound the hour in the room down the hall, and Coffin came back to the world where she was. Not a nice world, maybe, but for the moment one they shared.

  The flat was very still and quiet once the clock stopped chiming. Someone had had a bath or a shower, you could smell scented essence, piney and bubbly.

  ‘Sir?’ she said.

  ‘I want you to look round here. To look for any signs of abnormality, any signs of child abuse.’

  Mary Barclay moved her head sharply. Not what she’d expected. ‘Alison Jenkins is the expert on that sort of thing.’

  ‘You are the expert on this family.’

  ‘You think I shall find that?’ She didn’t name it, that horror she was meant to detect. It struck her that her position was ambiguous. What am I being asked to do here?

  ‘I don’t know. But I am uneasy.’

  ‘See what I can do, sir.’ For some reason that she chose not to determine, she was anxious to keep the formality there. Not that there had been any suggestion she should abandon it. On the contrary, she had never known John Coffin so withdrawn. But you don’t know him, she reminded herself, he is the head of a body of which you are a very unimportant member.

  ‘Three rooms. You go round clockwise, I’ll go widder-shins.’ He started to move away. ‘Ignore me. Pretend I’m not here.’

  Oh yes, sure. Only the boss figure, the top man of her particular tree, he from whom all promotion and favours might flow. Ignore all that? Step carefully, girl, she told herself.

  ‘Right, sir.’ She turned her back on him and walked off.

  A narrow hallway with the rooms on either side. On the right was the sitting-room, and next to it the kitchen. On the other side were the two bedrooms, Nell’s own and the larger one that Sylvie shared with Tom. The bathroom was at the end of the corridor, it had no window.

  Coffin took the sitting-room, while Mary Barclay took the bedrooms first. They would both cover all rooms but Coffin had always intended to be the first in the sitting-room. Just in case.

  Just in case of what? You don’t really expect to find Tom in a cupboard, do you?

  It was a big, well-lighted room on a corner with a view down the street as well as sight of the apex of the garden. The furnishings had been done by a professional to make a good letting property, so the face of the room was bland, neutral and uninformative. There were no cupboards.

  Nell had kept the room tidy and dusted (or Sylvie had) but otherwise it looked neglected. The real living had been done elsewhere, perhaps in the bedrooms or the kitchen. In Nell’s case, probably in the theatre. She might be one of those theatre people who didn’t need a home, just a trunk. He could see a few bowls of flowers, but they had a professionally arranged look which me
ant they had been presents from fans and admirers. Nell must have plenty of those, he speculated, an attractive woman succeeding in her career, her foot firmly on the ladder. There were cards on the flowers still. One said: From the Friends of the Theatre Workshop. To make you welcome. The other said: From Ellice, with love. Both pots were equally dried out and neglected. Nell was showing no favourites.

  Some rooms palely reflect their occupiers, still others send out signals you couldn’t miss. This room said nothing about Nell. Negative.

  A pale cream and tan sofa with matching chairs which were lined up around a marble-topped table. He touched the table: imitation.

  A desk in one corner of the room with another set of neglected plants on it. He opened the top of the desk, but it was empty except for a railway timetable. Perth to Penzance: 1988. Out of date and for another country.

  He moved on to the kitchen. The sink was full of almost clean dishes, washed, from the look of them by having the tap run over them, and then left to drain. There was a dishwashing machine in the corner. He pulled it open: full up with the equipment of eating and not emptied. Not washed, either.

  Some women liked clean kitchens, others seem not to mind dirt. He had met both kinds.

  He opened cupboards and drawers rapidly. ‘If I knew what I was looking for it would be easier.’

  But he was looking for an idea. An idea that would tell him what Nell Casey was.

  ‘She is not what she seems,’ he said under his breath. ‘But how do I know that?’ The answer was he didn’t, that he was guessing, but it wasn’t a game.

  The bathroom was hung about with pairs of pale drying tights and brief silk undergarments, which looked smaller than they were because they were so crumpled and dry. Several of a more recent crop dripped into the bath.

  Clean personally but disorganized was the verdict. But his judgement here was kindly. If I was in the emotional state these two women are, he asked himself, would I wash my socks? The answer was no. Men were probably biologically dirtier animals.

  He crossed with Mary Barclay in Nell Casey’s bedroom, she was working more slowly than he was. He sat on the window-seat and let her get on with it.

  She gave him a brief, grave look and continued her search, which she was conducting with care so that no signs of her progress was left behind her, exactly as he had expected she would do.

  Not that much sign would be apparent since Nell was not tidy, depositing her clothes about the room, some on hangers, others dropped on the carpet.

  The bed itself looked humped and untidy. But in the middle of the bed, on the turned back duvet, near to the crumpled pillow, she had defiantly deposited one high-heeled shoe.

  The shoe. The other shoe, Cinderella’s other shoe.

  Coffin saw it and Mary Barclay had seen it, but neither of them said anything. What does it say? thought Coffin. It looked like defiance.

  Mary moved towards the door. ‘Back soon,’ she said. ‘Meet you back here.’

  ‘Right.’ He heaved himself up and went into the room shared by Sylvie and Tom. Sylvie had kept it tidy, carefully separating her territory from Tom’s. There was a clear frontier between her possessions and those of Tom. He had plenty: a cupboard full of clothes, all brightly coloured and looking expensive, a cupboard full of toys, a row of picture books. He had a large easel on which he could chalk. He had covered it with scribbles in all colours. Tom had worked hard on that board and no one had touched it since he had.

  He turned back into Nell’s room where Mary Barclay was waiting.

  ‘Well.’

  ‘She loved the child.’

  He nodded.

  ‘Something odd in the bathroom. Did you see?’

  He shook his head. ‘No.’ He had known that if there was anything there of importance, then Mary Barclay would find it.

  ‘You’d better come and look.’ She led the way to the bathroom. ‘Cupboard on the wall. That lower shelf. It’s filled, absolutely filled with—’ She threw open the door. Packets and bottles lined the shelves, stacked deep. All new, all unopened. Tights in shiny packets, a silk scarf crammed into a corner, even a man’s tie. Armani, nothing cheap. ‘What a magpie collection.’ She gave Coffin a shrewd, professional look. ‘I’ve seen hoards like this before. Spells shoplifting to me.’

  It did to him too. The stuff was new, recently possessed. They would have to take professional psychiatric advice, but what it suggested to him was that Nell, under stress, had gone back to her old vice. ‘Go on, tell me what you think.’

  ‘She loves the child. In the drawer by her bed are any number of photographs of him, with her, on his own, playing, asleep. None as a tiny baby. I don’t think she had any of those.’

  ‘So no hint of abuse or ill-treatment.’

  Mary Barclay shook her head. ‘Nothing like that at all. She loved him and I think he loves her. But not quite normal all the same.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘She had to get him into the country. You can’t just bring a child in, can you? You need documents.’

  ‘I suppose he would be on her passport,’ said Coffin slowly, saying what he knew she wanted him to say. He watched her face.

  ‘He didn’t travel on her passport. Got one of his own. He had a little passport all to himself.’

  She produced a big envelope: ‘Her passport, his passport. One blue and stamped with the Lion and the Unicorn. The other dark green.’

  An American passport. He inspected them gravely.

  ‘He’s not her child,’ said Coffin, getting up to pace the room. ‘I knew there was something wrong. Could smell it. But why would a hardworking actress with a tough career lumber herself with a child?’

  Mary Barclay made her kind, serious face look as cynical as she could, she had not enjoyed her tour round Nell’s flat, her attempted journey through Nell’s mind. Somehow it stank, what she was doing and what they were finding. There was something wrong. ‘Maybe she brought him in as a prop.’

  And yet she loves him, she told herself.

  ‘Where were these?’ Coffin asked, handing the passports back.

  ‘In the drawer of the bedside table. No attempt to hide them.’

  ‘Put them back as they were. What a lot of questions we shall have to be asking that young woman.’

  But he thought she had guessed there would be a search of the flat. The way the shoe was arranged was deliberate.

  ‘Let’s go down and start asking them.’

  Paul Lane and Archie Young, in order of precedence, would not be pleased: he was moving into the case in strength.

  CHAPTER 14

  Still on March 21

  Faced with the shoe on the bed and the passport in the drawer, Nell was defensive, weepy, and in the end, uncommunicative.

  ‘Yes, my shoe. If it matches the one you have got, the one found in the car, then yes, my pair of shoes. Just one more of the creepy things that happened. But I was not driving that car.’

  There were none of her fingerprints in the car. Plenty of fingerprints but all probably from the last owner and the owner before that. The steering-wheel and the door had been wiped clean.

  ‘The driver wore gloves,’ said Archie Young; he was now assisting fully on the case, the Lollard business having taken a back seat. To him, that was now past history. ‘Likely thin rubber. So the science boys say. Surgical gloves. But I’m not looking for a surgeon. You’ve heard about the sighting of someone in a nurse’s dress? Yes, don’t know what to make of that.’ He gave a bleak smile. ‘Casey’s fingerprints on the shoe, but she admits it was hers. Is hers.’

  He stood in front of John Coffin’s desk as if he was a schoolboy awaiting a bad report.

  ‘Yes, I am surprised about the boy not being hers. I’ve been with Casey a lot lately, and she really loves that child. A lot of emotion there.’ He was sensitive enough in his way and he had picked that up. He had a child himself and knew what love was like.

  ‘I’ve got her waiting for you in the intervi
ew room. Barclay is having a cup of tea with her.’ He added, with mild surprise, ‘They seem to trust each other.’

  Nell had repaired her lipstick and with it her morale.

  ‘I hated being questioned that way,’ she said to Mary Barclay. ‘It made me feel like a criminal, as if it was my fault that Tom has been taken. God knows, I do blame myself but not in that kind of way. What do they think I am?’

  You’ve got to remember she’s an actress, Mary Barclay told herself, and can play any part she likes. Loving mother, distraught mother, witch of the woods. ‘More tea?’

  ‘Please.’

  Mary Barclay put her head round the door and asked the constable outside for two more cups and no sugar. They drank their tea and waited until Coffin, who was taking his time, possibly deliberately, Mary Barclay decided, came down to them.

  Nell absorbed the fact that they knew she was not Tom’s biological mother without comment.

  ‘I knew you’d get on to it, but I didn’t think it was any of your business. I call him my son, he calls me mother. We have that relationship.’

  ‘But not in fact,’ said John Coffin. He was studying her unobtrusively. As was natural, she was extremely tense, but he was picking up other undertones as well. Wouldn’t mind a look at her medical records, he thought.

  ‘Yes, in fact. Just not genetically.’

  ‘How does it work?’ asked Coffin.

  ‘It’s just an arrangement between friends. His mother, that mother, I mean, entrusted Tom to me because she couldn’t be what she wanted to him.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I’m not going to tell you that. That’s her business.’

  ‘We aren’t getting very far, are we?’

  ‘It has nothing to do with Tom being abducted.’

  ‘We can’t know that.’

  Nell was silent. A wetness appeared about her eyes, but she ignored it. ‘I always cry when I’m angry. Nothing else.’ Eventually she produced from her pocket a crumpled packet of letters.

  Coffin took them. Written on cheap, thin paper, in a big scrawling handwriting.