Dying to Read

by John Elliott

  Chapter 18

  Confessions of Norma

  The classroom bell kept ringing and ringing, yet, try as she might, Geraldine could not find her recently ironed blouse nor the rest of her usual school uniform. Even when she did lay her hands on it and manage to put it on, it not only came off again, by some force beyond her control, but disappeared once more into some unknown part of the house where she had never ventured. Meanwhile time was of the essence. Hamish was waiting impatiently in the car across the street. Time, however, was disobedient. It was out of kilter and the slope of the stairs turned the wrong way round. The other children were already waiting in the room under the invigilator’s piercing eye. All of them seemed to know what the exam was about apart from her. ‘I don’t go there anymore,’ she wanted to say, but her protests were useless. Nobody listened, and in the car Hamish was no longer her Hamish, and something locked in the boot was impelling her to get out of the passenger seat. ‘Go and open it for me,’ said Augustin Cox very softly in her ear.

  It seemed the bell still rang when she opened her eyes. The illuminated clock face on the bedside table showed 7:16 am. Her mobile beside it betrayed no activity. The sound identified itself in the faint but persistent ringing of the landline downstairs. She got up, her movements now unimpeded, and descended with one half jaw-cracking yawn to the library where the nature of the incipient day remained hidden behind the still drawn curtains. Threading her way confidently between the now familiar furniture she switched on a large Chinese vase table lamp. Lacenaire, ignoring both her and the pool of light surrounding her, kept his head tucked protectively under his wing. She picked up the receiver. Whoever it was they were either determined to get a reply or unusually patient.

  ‘I knew you’d answer given time in the Irish sense,’ said Norma’s voice after Geraldine had muttered the Bones Agency identification in less than good grace. ‘The sun is aloft and wearing its best trilby,’ she continued. ‘Portents declare detectives should be astir and not a-bed.’

  ‘Personally, anything up until 8 o’clock belongs to the night before as far as I’m concerned,’ Geraldine countered. ‘But you sound unreasonably chipper for someone who not long ago was in decline.’

  ‘Chipper, eh! I don’t know where you young people get your slang. No doubt you’ve been grubbing in the miserabilist of Hull’s dorm fantasies again. No, chipper or not, I’ve been neglecting you, Geraldine, and the bird, come to that, while pursuing my own selfish course. I plan to come round. Dollis Hill isn’t the right abode for me at the moment. I’ll stay a few days. No, don’t worry. I won’t displace you. The spare room will be fine, as indeed would be the couch in the library.’

  There was an expectant pause which Geraldine hurriedly plugged with an, ‘Of course, that’s okay. I look forward to it. There’s something you should know, however. Joan Oliphant is no longer our client. She ended the contract last night.’ A longer silence ensued. ‘Norma, are you still there?’

  ‘Yes.’ The previous flippancy had gone out of her voice.

  Geraldine continued, ‘What should I do? I mean we.’

  ‘What all the books tell us. The client, especially one as implicated as ours, invariably pulls out. The investigation then proceeds as a matter of altruism if not honour. Even if she no longer wants justice for Augustin, once we start we finish. Agreed?’

  ‘Agreed.’ Geraldine felt relief as, with or without official Bones Agency recognition, she had already decided not to give up. ‘What time will you be here?’

  ‘Shortly. I thought breakfast together would be pleasant.’

  ‘Remember I’m not Alison. Frugality or total abstinence are my MO.’

  ‘Chipper and now MO. I spot the continuing influence of your Feltham laddie. Provisions will be brought and, oh by the way, I’ve a confession to make.’

  Before Geraldine could hop in with a supplementary enquiry as to the particular nature of the confession, Norma had departed. Less abruptly than Joan Oliphant, it was true, but still without the niceties of a ‘now what do you think of that’ or even a rudimentary ‘ta-ta for now’. In the confession line, Confessions of an English Opium Eater by Thomas de Quincy was a book Geraldine had heard of but never read. She was also vaguely aware there was something about giving up smoking with ‘Confession’ in the title and the name of an ancient Greek. It could well be lurking in the library along with the de Quincy. Really there ought to be a catalogue. Compiling one would save time in the end, but she relinquished that train of thought. She was a detective, after all, not a library assistant concerned with installing a Dewey classification system. She sighed. Here she was with only a silent parrot for company, clientless, not really detecting anything and no Hamish. It was probably too early to call him, but a text wouldn’t disturb much.

  She went back upstairs and got her mobile. Perhaps smoking was the sin Norma felt the need to confess to. Maybe in the past she had been a forty a day lady and had now reverted while in decline. Yet no smell of fags had pervaded the bedroom on her visit. However, one never knew the precautions addicts took to hide their lapse from virtue. As for the possibility of classified drugs, well Norma was no Sherlock, nor was she likely to be found in a Sax Rohmer Millwall opium den. No, it had to be something else. Something that affected Geraldine herself. Casting aside these errant thoughts, her fingers construed a bonne-bouche, as Norma might say, for the probably sleeping Hamish. Client confidentiality was over, and if she and Hamish were to go on sleuthing together meaningfully, what she held, and what he had so clearly wanted, could now be shared. With a press of send, Joan Oliphant passed into common property.

  Over an hour later, while she still awaited a call or texted reply from the slumbering or awake policeman, Norma arrived slightly out of breath and toting a Sainsbury’s bag-for-life which she carefully deposited on the kitchen table. ‘Quails eggs,’ she explained. ‘Delicate little buggers. I thought I’d rustle up a post-raj kedgeree.’

  The tiny and thankfully unbroken eggs successfully transferred, she issued forth the other manifold ingredients with appropriate running commentary: ‘Smoked haddock — Icelandic I’m afraid, not a finnan in stock — how one yearns for the days of the gunboats — basmati rice, curry powder, flat parsley in the continental mode, milk of the unadulterated kind, butter — saltless for solidity — two shallots and one unwaxed lemon. All present and correct. But how’s my bird?’

  ‘Morose.’ Food itemisation and now Lacenaire, Geraldine thought, but nothing about how I am. ‘I hope you’re not expecting me to deal with this concoction,’ she said, surveying the assorted pile, which she, herself, would scarce accumulate in a week.

  ‘No, my dear. You’ve made your anti-breakfast stance very clear. I shall concoct, as you charmingly put it. I wasn’t in the Rawalpindi girl guides for nothing.’

  In spite of herself, Geraldine laughed. Visions of a stripling Norma seated round a campfire singing wogga, wogga, wogga, or whatever it was they used to chant, tickled her funny bone.

  ‘That’s better. You’ll see, a little of my unctuous mixture will soothe your black heart. Let the bird wait. All I need now is to find a pinny. There should be one on the hook on the back of the cupboard door.’ She crossed the room and successfully tied round her waist a splash-resistant garment picturing a large tilted bottle of Heinz tomato ketchup. Her blouse and navy blue skirt now protected, she began to range an assortment of pans onto the stove. ‘We’re still hot on the trail, you know. Never say die, as the horse whispered to Lester Piggott. But first to cooking. The art of preparation and the alchemy of combination. Detecting is as much about providing the recipe from the available ingredients as finding the right book.’

  Geraldine hovered uncertainly, watching the haddock being poached in milk and butter before being withdrawn and left to cool. Confession, it seemed, was temporarily at least, on the back burner. The shallots, now finely chopped by Norma’s surprisingly deft wrist, were softened in more butter, and the rice coated in the resulting mixtu
re. Alchemy, whatever its result, was well underway. The strains of Bjork’s Human Behaviour on her mobile jerked her from her silent contemplation. With uplifted heart she left the kitchen and the sorceress’s apprentice to it for, after all, compared to Alison’s proved culinary expertise, Norma, with or without the girl guides, might prove to be a duffer.

  When she returned, having given a cursory glance at the antithesis of a talking parrot. there was a continued lightness in her step. The kitchen, to her appreciative nostrils, eased forth wholesome and soothing smells. It appeared that Norma’s transforming powers were working. ‘Hamish sends his regards,’ she said. ‘He looks forward to meeting you.‘

  For a moment Norma’s face was almost stern as she turned from the saucepan into which the flaked haddock had been amalgamated with the cooked rice, then it visibly relaxed. ‘Half a mo for the eggs,’ she said, tapping the face of her wristwatch. ‘They’ve been off the heat for two minutes. The yolks need to be squishy. They’re done.’ She scooped them out of the water with a slotted spoon and held them briefly under the cold tap. ‘Now help me shell them. The plates are warming in the oven.’

  Geraldine obeyed. They were tiny and fiddly. Why people bothered was a mystery. Couldn’t quails, which were inconsequential birds basically harming no-one, be left to their own devices? Now a parrot’s egg: that would be something substantial if they were ever eaten by people. ‘Little did I think when I got up this morning I’d be messing about with quail eggs,’ she remonstrated. ‘It just goes to show.’

  ‘Indeed it does.’ Norma took two plates from the oven, filled one for herself with a substantial portion of the finished kedgeree and measured out a dainty selection of rice and fish, topped with a single egg on the other.

  Bisecting the white with the edge of her fork, Geraldine watched the yolk ooze out according to plan over the rice grains and smoked fish chunks. She gave an appreciative sniff. It smelled so good she took a determined mouthful. A slight hit of curry came and went through the overall creaminess. ‘Aren’t you supposed to grind your own spices according to Rawalpindi housewifery?’ she asked, polishing off the remainder.

  Norma, who had already done serious damage to her collation, leant across and smacked her wrist lightly. ‘The cook expects nothing less than fulsome praise. You can do the washing up for that remark. Now have some more and tell me properly how good it is.’

  ‘By the way, I told Hamish about Joan.’ Geraldine returned to the table with a second more generous helping. ‘I admit it is good.’ She waited expectantly for an acknowledgement of both her remarks, but again Norma appeared suddenly preoccupied and simply transferred heaped forkfuls to her mouth. ‘Did I do wrong?’

  At last, putting down her knife and fork and dabbing her lips with her napkin, Norma shook her head. ‘No. You’ve done nothing wrong, Geraldine. I, on the other hand. Drat! I’ve still got the pinny on. I meant to take off before I sat down. We’ve got our own etiquette to follow. I shouldn’t be forgetting mine.’ She leant behind her back and untied the now superfluous garment. ‘Mrs Oliphant must expect a visit from the police, and I don’t mean Hamish. In fact, she may already have had one.’

  ‘Norma, are you alright?’ Geraldine was concerned at the careworn expression her companion displayed.

  ‘Not entirely. As I said when I phoned, I’ve confessions to make. The truth is I’ve gone behind your back. With the best intentions, of course.’ She sighed. ‘They’re always the worst, and in doing so I may have precipitated something awful.’

  Geraldine stared at her with growing apprehension. All the normal banter and flippancy, which was so much de rigeur between them, had vanished. Another, in a strange way, more male persona now sat glumly opposite. ‘Go on,’ she managed to get out in encouragement.

  ‘Well,’ Norma cleared her throat, ‘to begin with I curtailed my decline and made Alison fib to you on my account. You see, I wanted to know more about our client, and I knew some people who I thought might help. No reflection on your ability, Geraldine, it was just that old habits can’t be easily cast aside. Anyway, I did find out where the fragrant Joan plies her etiquette instruction. The nature of which we both know,’ she paused, delved into the provisions bag and fished out a handful of polaroids. ‘I snapped these punters going in and out during my surveillance.’

  Geraldine shuffled through them, then stopped at one with an alert expression. ‘Who’d have thought it? Our ancient philosophy interpreter unmasked.’

  ‘You know him?’

  ‘Yes indeed. I’ve attended several of his lectures. In fact, I first met Hamish at one of them. Professor Euan Donald. There’s no mistaking him.’ She handed the photo back. ‘The rest I haven’t seen before.’

  ‘The last one. The young woman,’ Norma waited while Geraldine studied it again, ‘is now dead. Murdered like Augustin Cox. Oh, I don’t mean in exactly the same way. Strangulation in her case. Death seems contagious to the inner circle of our erstwhile client’s specialities.’

  ‘Inner circle? You mean more than simply a customer. What was her name?’

  ‘Blythe Fuller. She witnessed the beatings. Some customers wanted an attractive young woman to watch their humiliation and paid accordingly.’

  Despite herself, Geraldine shuddered. ‘And how do you know she was murdered?’

  Norma retrieved the photos, laid the one of Blythe face up and softly rubbed its edge. ‘It was on local TV News. The trouble was, you see, I followed her. I talked to her. I told her who I was and that I was a detective. We spoke about Augustin and her relationship to him and Joan. I left her and, well tragedy happened.’ Norma put the image back amongst the others.

  ‘But why on earth do you feel responsible?’ Geraldine could see Norma’s distress, although why it was so deep was a mystery.

  ‘Someone was tagging us. Someone I couldn’t fully see. You get a sixth sense when you’ve been in the tailing trade as long as I have. Someone I didn’t know. Someone who I might have pushed over the edge by talking to Blythe. Or else, and I think this is the more likely scenario, someone used me in order to identify and have their victim followed.’

  ‘You think they also killed Augustin?’

  ‘I don’t know. The connection is there. It’s a high possibility.’ Norma got up and took the empty plates to the sink. ‘Be a love and make some coffee. You can wash up later. I’m going to talk to the bird. I’ve been neglecting him for too long.’

  Geraldine filled the kettle with fresh water. There was so much to get her head round. She picked up her mobile. Hamish wasn’t answering his for some reason. Impulsively, she texted the address Norma had scrawled on the back of the photos for Joan and wondered about Professor Donald. Had Hamish gone to the lecture because he already knew about the possible Cox connection but hadn’t told her afterwards? Their partnership was not on fully solid ground. There was still no reply from him as she heated the cafetière then spooned in three generous heaps of ground mocha. Whatever the effects of Norma’s ministrations in the library, no parrot tones reached her ears. She filled the jug, got out two cups and saucers, placed them on a tray and carried them through. When she entered, sure enough, Norma was by the cage repeating slowly to the bird first in French then in English, ‘you talk, you talk, it’s all you do.’ Totally unmoved by her prompting, Lacenaire perched dejectedly, eyes staring fixedly at the bottom of his enforced abode.

  ‘He was Henrietta’s really, you know.’ Norma came and sat down at the table where not so long ago Hamish had studied the card he’d picked up then put down triumphantly on Geraldine’s lower one. ‘He came in part payment for a case we had,’ Norma went on. ‘Henrietta was like that. You’d have thought she was a Victorian GP accepting barter instead of dosh. Owner claimed he could talk, but like now we didn’t hear a single word for ages. It’s reversion.’

  ‘Since you’re in confessing mode, there’s something I’ve wanted to ask you.’ Geraldine poured the coffee. ‘I could have asked Alison but I didn’t. I’d sooner
ask you. Was Henrietta…? I mean was she similar in that,’ she managed to get it out at last, ‘she was Henry?’

  ‘No.’ Taking a long slurp from her cup, Norma’s tone turned grave. ‘Christabel, her only child, was the fruit of her womb and no-one else’s. She spent her last days down here, when she could no longer manage the stairs, tended by me and Alison and watched by Lacenaire. We made a bed over there. We had many less books then. I installed the others later.’

  ‘Alison?’

  ‘Yes. She was great friends with Christabel, and she had always liked Henrietta. Christabel was on one of her anthropological surveys in Papua New Guinea when it happened. Communications weren’t good and made worse by the terms of the field rules, or some other scientific blather.’ She stopped and put down her cup. ‘Sufficient caffeine, I think it isn’t good for me. I miss her, that’s the nub of it. She had a flair. A flair I don’t have.’

  ‘Finding the right book?’

  ‘Exactly put.’ Norma smiled wanly. ‘I tried more or less at random, whereas she had an instinctive feeling, and she’d read four times as much as I had. Something I’ve tried to make up for since. You see my confession is only partly over. There’s more you have a right to know.’

  Geraldine reached over and squeezed her hand. The skin was mottled and felt cold to her touch. ‘Alison said she died of Parkinson’s.’

  ‘She was dying of it. Towards the end Christabel didn’t come. Henrietta hung on and hung on.’ Norma withdrew her hand from Geraldine’s. They sat in silence for a bit until she continued. ‘We’d talked about it. If the level of pain became too much. If words like dignity and quality of life were left with any meaning. I hadn’t agreed. I’d never said yes I will. I promise. Yet I’d never said never under no circumstances. I read aloud to her most evenings. She chose. Then one morning, out of the blue, he spoke.’