False Picture

by Veronica Heley

  How? He must have broken bones in his fall, surely? There was a herbaceous border immediately below her and she could now see that for half its width the plants had been crushed and broken. He’d broken the plants, but not himself in his fall.

  He was nowhere to be seen. And Velma was unconscious.

  Bea pulled down both sash windows and locked them. She drew the curtains against the dark night outside. She reached for the bedside phone and summoned an ambulance.

  Midnight Tuesday, to early Wednesday morning

  ‘Looks as if she’s had a slight stroke,’ said the paramedics, brightly. ‘We’ll take her in straightaway. And what have you been doing to yourself, then?’

  ‘I’m all right,’ said Bea, fighting off waves of dizziness.

  ‘What’s been happening here, then?’ asked the paramedic. ‘Was it a domestic?’

  ‘Burglar,’ said Bea. ‘Had a knife. Gone, now.’

  ‘Did you call the police?’

  ‘Can’t remember. Tried to, I think.’

  ‘We have to report it, you know.’

  ‘Fine,’ said Bea. She insisted on finding her handbag and Velma’s, setting the alarm, locking up the house, and walking to the ambulance behind Velma on her gurney. She sat in the ambulance, holding the pillowcase to her breast while watching Velma for the slightest sign of recovery. Her mind zigzagged between the memory of the knife biting into her, and the terrible rigidity, the waxen look on Velma’s face … or was that the light in the ambulance? What time was it? She tried to turn her wrist to read her watch and released more blood from her wound.

  She must ring Maggie. But not yet. All in good time.

  Velma stirred, nestling into the blanket around her. Opened her eyes. The relief!

  As they arrived at the hospital, Velma tried to sit up. The paramedic told her to lie still, they were nearly there.

  ‘What happened?’ said Velma.

  Bea let herself relax, and saw the world go black around the edges. As she fainted, she heard the paramedic yell for help.

  Accident and Emergency Department. A fire bell was ringing somewhere inside the hospital, notching people’s nerves up even further than they were already. A multiple car crash had brought nine people in, bloodied, groaning, unconscious, dying. Nurses and doctors moved around, no panic, but get a move on, will you …

  Bea was stitched up, told that her friend was doing fine and she could see her in a minute, but they were both being kept in overnight, just in case.

  ‘I must ring home. They’ll be so worried.’

  ‘I’ll do that,’ said the nurse. ‘The number to contact is in your handbag, is it? Right? Now the best thing you can do is stop worrying. You’ve lost some blood but the scar won’t show where it is just under the breast. I don’t suppose you’ll be wanting to wear a bra for a few days, but your friend’s coming on nicely.’

  ‘Did she have a stroke?’

  The nurse didn’t reply and despite the noise and the bustle around her, Bea drifted off to sleep. She half woke when they moved her bed, but went off again.

  Early the following morning she sat up, wincing at the pull of the stitches under her breast. She was in a small ward. Across the room from her was Velma, out of bed and struggling into the clothes she’d worn the previous day. They smiled at one another.

  ‘Bathroom’s thataway,’ said Velma, pointing to the right. Her speech wasn’t slurred, her face looked normal, and she was using both hands.

  ‘You’re a fraud,’ said Bea, heaving herself off the bed with an effort. ‘You had me so worried, I passed out.’

  ‘Ditto, ditto,’ said Velma, grinning. ‘The nurse said they’ll want to keep us in for tests. How’s about we stage a mass walkout?’

  ‘Chicken Run. Definitely.’ Bea pulled her bloodied clothing out of the bedside locker. ‘Only, do I dare let my public see me dressed like this?’

  ‘And me!’ Velma ran her fingers through her hair, which had been so expertly cut that it fell back into shape straight away. ‘You might have thought to bring my make-up bag when you called for an ambulance.’

  A nurse bustled in. She was alarmingly large and spoke to them both as if they were children. ‘What’s all this, eh? Back to bed, both of you. The doctors will be round after breakfast, and they’ll be the ones to decide if you’re going home today or not.’

  Velma sank into the chair beside her bed, while Bea did exactly as she was told. After the nurse had done her obs – or observations – Bea said, ‘Velma, what do we say to the police? I told the paramedics it was a burglar. But what we saw in the flatlet …’

  No reply. Velma lay back in her chair and closed her eyes.

  Bea lay back, too. It would sort itself out in the end. She supposed she ought to be giving thanks to God for saving her … but in a few hours’ time, Mr Van was going to discover that he’d been tricked and if she’d read him aright, he’d be straight on the phone to that nasty young man with the knife. And then … what had happened to their assailant …? God knew, of course. She had to trust he’d keep on looking after her. Trust and … there was something that went with the word ‘trust’ but for the moment she couldn’t remember what it was.

  She drifted off into a doze.

  Later that morning Maggie organized some clean clothes for Bea, delivered via a passing nurse. Although Maggie hadn’t been allowed up on to the ward, she phoned Bea with various titbits of news. Charlotte had stayed out all night with her new boyfriend. The police had rung to make an appointment to see Bea, had been told she was in hospital and said they’d connect with her there. Piers had rung to ask how Velma was doing, and Oliver had gone off to see a friend about something, Maggie wasn’t sure what.

  Both Velma and Bea had been told they could go home if they reported to their GPs, took some medication, and didn’t get into any more hassles with burglars … and oh yes, the police would be contacting them at home.

  Velma looked limp, but declared she’d be fine when she could get at her full array of make-up again. Only, ‘Bea, I really don’t understand what’s going on, and I’m not sure that I want to know but one thing’s for sure, I can’t face going back to that big house by myself. Would you … could you …?’

  ‘I’ll tell you everything, once we’re out of here. I was thinking, myself, that you wouldn’t want to be alone for a bit. You can have my guest room. Charlotte was in it, but she was out all night and anyway, she drives me nuts, so if she does turn up, she can either go back to her flat or bunk down on a mattress on the floor in Maggie’s room. I don’t owe her anything.’

  ‘I owe you a new outfit of clothes. Harvey Nichols for lunch?’

  ‘I’ll hold you to that, but not today, I think.’ She ordered a taxi. ‘Let’s pick up some clean clothes for you and get you settled at my place.’

  Velma said, ‘I must look a hag. Do you think I should have some Botox treatment?’

  Bea scrutinized her friend’s pretty face. Yes, there were a few lines around her eyes and mouth, but even now Velma looked young for her age. Anyway, she got by on charm and pizzaz. ‘Botox tends to give one a stiff face, doesn’t it?’

  As they turned into the Boltons, Velma broached a matter which had been on both their minds. ‘You noticed someone had been in the flat, didn’t you?’

  Bea nodded. ‘Men never think to turn equipment off at the mains, or take out the garbage.’

  ‘He’d used the telly, the microwave, the shower in the bathroom – and left the seat up on the toilet.’

  ‘Not recently, though. The telly was cold. He wasn’t in the flat yesterday, I think. He knew how to get in?’

  ‘He had his own key to the main house, knew the password for the alarm. But I’m thinking Sandy let him in as soon as my back was turned, and that’s why he kept saying he was sorry. If he were here now, I’d give him a piece of my mind, but …’ She sighed. There was no more fight in her.

  As Bea paid off the taxi, Velma stared up at the cream cake façade of her house. ‘
What a carry on. Poor little me, and that big house. Shall I give it to charity and become a nurse?’

  Bea couldn’t help laughing, which made her hold on to her ribs. ‘Ouch, that hurt. Why not go on a cruise and find some ancient but exceedingly rich man who wants a pretty woman to care for him in his declining years?’

  ‘Never again,’ said Velma and let them into the house. Alarm off. Milk, papers and letters taken in. The pile of bedlinen was still on the chair at the bottom of the stairs, where Bea had left it. ‘I owe you a pillowcase. Remind me.’

  ‘I owe you more than that. I wasn’t exactly in my right mind yesterday, was I? And that nice lad of yours – what was his name? No, don’t tell me. I can’t pack any more information into my head at the moment. Shall we look into the affair of the flatlet first?’

  They climbed the stairs, rather more slowly than they’d done the day before, took the keys from behind the picture, and let themselves into the flat. The stand-by lights were still on. The blinds were still in the same position over the windows. Bea took the bathroom first. ‘The soap bar is hard. No one’s used it for some time, but someone has used the shower since the cleaner was last in, and left scum round the washbasin. Men never bother to clean up after they’ve shaved and showered.’

  Velma called back from the kitchen. ‘There are two pizza boxes in the garbage, some banana skins, an empty bottle of booze, an empty carton of milk and half a loaf of bread. The bread’s stale, showing mould.’

  ‘Which means,’ said Bea, switching off stand-by lights, ‘that he was here for a couple of days some time ago. Maybe four days, maybe five. Perhaps he came here as soon as he left Charlotte’s flat.’

  Velma hugged herself, shivering, cracking up. ‘Sandy must have let him in when I went off to see the dentist, but warned him to keep out of sight. No wonder Sandy ran out of cash; he was subsidizing that rat! It’s creepy, to think he was so close and all the time Sandy knew!’

  Bea sank on to the double bed, and looked around. ‘What about your cleaner?’

  ‘She’s Polish, hardly any English. She’s got keys, comes in twice a week for a couple of hours at a time, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Ditto the gardener. If Philip stayed in the flat while they were around, he was safe. He could have stayed here for days and nobody would have noticed. What I don’t understand is why he left.’

  Bea remembered the day she’d first come to the house to collect things for Velma. There’d been a puff of air, an almost soundless closing of a door upstairs. ‘I think he must have overheard me talking to the police when they wanted to search the place. I sent them away, but after they’d gone I thought I heard a door close upstairs. I didn’t think anything of it then, but if Philip was there and realized the danger, it would have been enough to send him on the run again.’

  Bea got to her feet, moving with care. ‘Velma, could you help me tip up the mattress? It’s on the soft side and I think I can feel something hard underneath. Philip kept some correspondence under his bed in the flat. I hardly dare hope, but …’

  Velma helped her tip up the mattress and they stared at a sheeted package underneath. Velma whipped off the covering and met the bold eyes of a teenaged girl in a dark dress against a blue sky.

  ‘Bingo!’ said Bea.

  ‘Millais. Genuine. Those eyes go right through you.’

  ‘Do we leave it here?’

  ‘It’s as good a place to hide it as anywhere, I suppose.’ She let the mattress drop. ‘One more thing before we go.’ Bea had noticed a telephone with an answerphone on it in the living room. A red light winked.

  She depressed the play button, and heard a young girl’s voice. ‘Philip, are you there still? I gave you the wrong number. It’s two-oh-eight, not two-eighteen. I told her you’d be there before closing time and it’s late on Thursdays and Fridays. Divine, right?’

  It was the only message.

  ‘Doesn’t make sense.’ Velma sagged against the wall.

  Bea said, ‘Come on, put a few things into a bag and I’ll take you home.’

  Velma locked the door of the flat. ‘Your car or mine?’

  Bea held on to her ribs. ‘A taxi. If either of us tried to take a car on the roads at the moment, we’d be arrested for dangerous driving.’

  ‘In that case,’ said Velma, ‘I’ll bring a bottle of champagne.’

  ‘You’re on medication!’

  ‘Champagne’s better for me than medication.’ She turned pathetic. ‘I’ve lost my bubble, Bea.’

  ‘But not your squeak,’ said Bea, at which they both laughed inanely.

  ‘Better than crying,’ said Velma, who was doing just that.

  Bea wondered how soon the knife man would strike again … and how long it would be before Mr Van arrived on her doorstep.

  Rafael had gone back to the flat in Kensington because he couldn’t think, for the moment, what else to do. Two gardens he’d had to cross, two walls he’d had to climb before he almost fell into the lap of an elderly man who’d been having a surreptitious cigarette before turning in for the night. Rafael had explained that he’d had a fight with someone at the party nearby, that a woman had scratched him, that he needed to get away. Could the gentleman kindly let him out into the street through his house?

  Kind gentleman had done more than that, offering to clean him up, and brush him down. He’d even offered to call the police. Naturally Rafael had refused to have the police involved; it had been a quarrel over a woman, he said. So he’d limped out of the front door of the man’s house and with a couple of rests on the way, had managed to get home.

  Those two bitches were going to call the police, weren’t they? Fortunately they didn’t know who he was, or where he lived. There was nothing to connect him with the Weston house except for Philip – who was still missing – and Charlotte, who was out of their reach. All the Maggie bird knew was that Charlotte was going out with someone from the library, and Rafael had never worked in a library. But if Charlotte had talked to Maggie about Ralph, alias Rafael, if Zander recovered full consciousness and named him … he couldn’t risk it. He’d better pack up and move on.

  Could he, dare he keep his job at the gallery? It had provided him with information about collectors, it had been useful to him in so many ways, he was reluctant to let it go, but if they once connected harmless-seeming Ralph with the burglaries then he was looking at a long stay in prison. He’d best move on. He could get another job, not in the West End perhaps, but in any city which boasted an antiques shop or two.

  His cheeks burned where that woman had struck him with her talons. Before he left London, he’d get even with her. As soon as he’d replaced his knife, his precious knife.

  What would he tell Van? By midday Van would realize he’d been tricked.

  Rafael shrugged. What could Van do about it? Rafael took a padded envelope out of his breast pocket, and unwrapped a gold box. Its gleam drew the eye. Total simplicity, costing not less than everything. It was the only thing he’d ever kept from his little jaunts. Its beauty had seduced him as no woman had ever done.

  He phoned the gallery to say he’d gone down with flu and wouldn’t be in for a while. Now to find another place to stay for a couple of nights, and to buy another knife …

  Nineteen

  Wednesday morning

  Bea paid off the taxi at her door, and helped Velma up the steps with her overnight bag and make-up box. Velma sagged against the doorframe as Bea sought for her front-door key.

  Maggie heard the key in the lock, and rushed out to meet them. ‘Are you all right? Oliver’s still missing but he did phone to say he was with an old friend, doing some kind of experiment, if you please. The phone’s been ringing off the hook with your son trying to reach you, and Mr Piers and, oh, lots of people. But I don’t suppose you want to be bothered with all that. You poor dears, you do look awful. You ought to have let me fetch you from the hospital, and now the police have arrived, but I’m not sure you’re up to answering questions, either of you. Are you
?’

  Velma said, ‘I don’t think I am, but I suppose I’d better try.’

  Bea held back a sigh. Her ribs hurt and she ached all over. ‘Neither of us is up to it, but ditto. Maggie, could you make up the spare room bed for Mrs Weston? She needs looking after for a while. Perhaps we can persuade Charlotte to—’

  ‘Oh, she never came back. I waited up till two and rang her mobile, but she didn’t answer so I suppose she’s with her new boyfriend. I’m really rather cross with her, and if she does come back I’ll tell her to go to a B and B or something, right? Would you like some coffee, or some soothing camomile tea?’

  ‘Camomile tea,’ said Bea.

  ‘Strong black coffee,’ said Velma.

  ‘Camomile tea,’ said Bea, firmly. ‘Mrs Weston needs to be careful for a while.’

  Velma handed Maggie her bottle of champagne. ‘Too careful means having no fun at all.’

  ‘Have it just before lunch,’ said Maggie, being diplomatic for once. The telephone rang in the agency rooms below and she disappeared, saying she’d deal with it.

  Bea and Velma went into the living room. A tall grey man in a grey suit rose from where he’d been contemplating Bea’s game of patience by the window. He pulled his ID from his pocket.

  ‘Detective Inspector Greene, three “e”s.’

  A WPC with a sniffly nose materialized behind him, producing her own ID. She mumbled her name so much that Bea failed to catch it.

  Bea waved everyone to seats, and sank into one herself. ‘What kind of policeman are you, Detective Inspector? Stolen arts department, common assault, or murder?’

  ‘Or all three?’ Velma subsided on to the settee, graceful even in her fatigue. She closed her eyes. ‘Pretend I’m not here. Wake me when the champagne comes up.’

  The DI had a thin smile and heavy lines under his eyes. ‘You rang the station last night. Something about smuggling art treasures. Suppose you tell me all about it.’