The Marx Sisters bak-1

by Barry Maitland

  ‘Oh.’ Kathy stared balefully ahead at the traffic. ‘It didn’t. Something came up.’

  ‘Sorry. Nothing serious?’

  She shot him a look which made him grunt and change the subject.

  ‘Fill me in on Adam Kowalski, then. A collaborator, you said?’

  Kathy nodded and began to fill out the brief account she’d given Brock over the phone.

  The plate-glass door to the developers’ offices had no handle and was locked. As they pushed it tentatively, a female voice issuing from the chrome grille in the marble wall panel instructed them to enter.

  The door slid open, revealing a small marble-lined lobby. Ahead of them was a narrow, open lift. They got inside and eyed themselves in its smoky glass walls as it rose to an upper floor. Reception was lined with the same dark marble. Its impressively sombre effect was spoilt by the display on the walls of some rather garish watercolour impressions of modern office blocks. A young woman sat at a large toughened glass table, her long legs crossed beneath a surface on which nothing much appeared to be happening. She looked as if she wasn’t long out of some expensive private school.

  She eyed them coolly, like a face from the cover of Vogue.

  ‘Mr Slade’s secretary will be along in a moment. Would you like to take a seat?’

  Brock and Kathy subsided into soft black leather cushions. Recessed downlighters in the smoky silvered ceiling picked them out in pools of light, so that they felt like scruffy artefacts on exhibition in an upmarket gallery. Copies of The Estates Gazette bound in clear perspex covers were to hand on glass side tables.

  Mr Slade’s secretary was considerably more mature and more functional than the receptionist. She led them down a timber-panelled corridor and knocked at an unmarked door.

  ‘Come.’

  Derek Slade was in his shirtsleeves, his tie loosened at his neck. He was a powerful-looking man in his midthirties, who looked each of them directly in the eye, shook hands firmly, sat them down courteously and ordered coffee.

  ‘Have we met before, Chief Inspector? Your face looks familiar. No? Well, this is an unusual visit.’ His voice managed to sound both circumspect and quietly forceful. ‘I don’t believe I’ve ever been interviewed by detectives from Scotland Yard before.’

  Both Kathy and Brock were trying to process his accent in the automatic English way, without success. It seemed both classless and placeless.

  ‘Yes. Thank you for seeing us so promptly, sir,’ Brock led off. ‘We’re conducting inquiries into a possible murder, and you may be able to give us some background information on the circumstances of the victim.’

  ‘Really? Is it someone I know?’

  ‘Meredith Winterbottom.’

  Slade looked puzzled. ‘I don’t think the name rings a bell.’

  ‘Of 22 Jerusalem Lane, WC2.’

  Slade’s expression didn’t change. He just stared for a moment at Brock.

  At that moment the phone at his elbow burbled discreetly. He lifted it.

  ‘No calls, Valerie… Oh? All right, I’ll speak to him.’ He smiled apologetically at Brock. After a brief exchange he hung up.

  ‘My solicitor. A colleague of his wanted to warn me that you might be calling on me. Intriguing. So, how can I help?’

  ‘We understand,’ Kathy said, ‘that your company has been buying property in the area of Jerusalem Lane. Can you tell us how much of the block you’ve actually acquired to date?’

  Slade frowned. ‘We have agents who act for us in property acquisitions. If you want to talk about that, I would prefer to have them present.’

  ‘Oh, is that necessary? Surely you would know which properties you actually own?’

  ‘They act under our instructions, but we may not have a complete record of transactions to date here in this office. If you want an accurate picture I’d really prefer to get them in. They’re only round the corner-Jonathan Hockings.’

  ‘You think Mr Hockings might be available?’ Kathy asked.

  Slade smiled at her. ‘Jonathan Hockings are the company. You’ve probably seen the name on letting boards. They’re an international firm. Their Quentin Gilroy works for us. I’ll try him.’

  He picked up the phone and placed the call through his secretary. Gilroy was available, and promised to come round immediately.

  As they sipped their coffee, a look of recognition suddenly came over Slade’s face.

  ‘Brock! Of course. You were in charge of that recent shooting case, weren’t you? That’s where I’ve seen your face. On TV.’ He smiled and sat back in his chair staring at Brock appraisingly.

  ‘Look, could I have your autograph for my son? He was following it all.’

  Brock dutifully took the offered pen and notepaper and wrote, ‘Best wishes from Detective Chief Inspector David Brock, Scotland Yard.’

  ‘Splendid. Could you maybe put his name at the top-to William Slade?’

  As he added this, Brock said, ‘I understand you’re planning a bit of development around Jerusalem Lane, Mr Slade?’

  Slade gave a little smile. ‘You might say that. Come, I’ll show you.’

  They went through the secretary’s connecting office to a long, windowless room with a boardroom table. At one end stood a large architectural model. Three granite-clad towers with pyramid roofs, ranging from fifteen to twenty-five storeys in height, stood in a landscaped plaza.

  Slade gestured with open hand: Jerusalem Lane, mark two.’

  ‘Good God!’ Kathy exclaimed. ‘Where’s the Lane?’

  ‘We’ve kept the name in a bistro planned in the podium here.’ Slade pointed. ‘Sunlight, space and greenery. Like the squares of Georgian London. Well, the Prince won’t think so. All the same, a big improvement on what’s there at the moment, yes?’

  At that moment the door opened and a tall young man stepped soundlessly into the room. ‘Derek,’ he murmured, and then shook the others’ hands as Slade introduced them.

  ‘This is the famous Inspector Brock, Quentin. You remember? That shooting of those policemen.’

  ‘Oh, right, yes.’ The young man smiled languidly at Brock. He had the casual assurance of a public school education and three years at Oxford, and the sharp eyes of a dozen years in real estate.

  ‘Have you come across a Mrs Longbottom, Quentin?’

  ‘Winterbottom,’ Kathy corrected.

  ‘Believe I may, Derek. Jerusalem Lane?’ He nodded at the model.

  ‘Right. Seems the lady is deceased, and the Inspector is interested. Any clues?’

  ‘Last spoke to her about four months ago, I’d say. Not interested in selling, I’m afraid. It’s in the monthly printouts.’

  ‘How much of the block does First City actually own now?’ Brock asked the agent.

  Gilroy raised an eyebrow at Slade, who nodded.

  ‘Pretty much all of it, number 22 excepted. And 83-87 Carlisle Street is still with the lawyers. Braithwaite’s still playing silly buggers, Derek. I’ve told him to get his bloody finger out, but he’s the same as always. I think you should give him a blast. The synagogue’s still in limbo, but it seems pretty certain now that the Minister will declassify it.’

  ‘But surely,’ Kathy broke in, ‘if 22 doesn’t sell, the whole thing will be stopped.’

  Slade smiled indulgently at her. He reached across to the model and lifted out a small section of the podium near the base of the tallest tower. ‘Phase five,’ he said. Beneath the removed section was the outline of the plan of 22 Jerusalem Lane. ‘They can stay if they want. Of course it’ll be a worthless piece of real estate if they do. Unsaleable.

  ‘You have to understand,’ he continued, fixing Brock with his unblinking eyes, ‘that this has been the outcome of a long and painstaking process. The key to the redevelopment of this run-down area of London has been land ownership. For hundreds of years no one has been able to assemble the land to redevelop it. Now we have. It’s taken a long time. We bought our first property in this block thirty years ago, and we’ve h
ung on to it through boom and bust, and gradually added to it and waited until within the last year the whole block matured like a ripe fruit, ready to go. I didn’t know Mrs Winterbottom, and I’m sorry to hear about her death, but her decision wasn’t going to make any difference to this development, one way or the other.’

  ‘Couldn’t she have objected to your planning application?’ Kathy asked.

  Slade shrugged. ‘As I said, it would have made no difference.’

  ‘Mr Gilroy,’ Brock said, ‘who else have you negotiated with over number 22, apart from Mrs Winterbottom?’

  Again the agent looked to Slade, who gave an imperceptible nod.

  ‘I did speak to the family solicitor. I thought he might have been able to help Mrs Winterbottom to get a balanced view of the advantages of our offer.’

  ‘And her son, Mr Terry Winter?’

  ‘Yes, the solicitor mentioned him. I had a word with him on the phone one day. Didn’t do much good, though.’

  ‘But he was receptive to your proposals?’

  ‘He listened to what I had to say.’

  ‘May I ask what you were prepared to pay for number 22?’

  ‘Do you recall, Quentin, or do you need to look it up?’

  ‘No, Derek, I do remember. We offered Mrs Winterbottom two hundred K. I believe I indicated to Mr Winter that we might go to a quarter million.’

  As they stepped out through the sliding glass door on to the street, Kathy took a deep breath. ‘Poor Meredith,’ she said, ‘and poor Peg and Eleanor.’

  8

  Terry Winter was waiting for them in an interview room when they got to divisional headquarters. He looked sulky.

  Kathy began, her face expressionless, voice neutral. ‘Well, Mr Winter, what can we do for you?’

  ‘I wondered if there were any developments.’

  ‘Oh we’ve made some progress. We believe that your mother did die of asphyxia. And we’ve discovered that you didn’t have a cup of coffee in the place next to your Deptford salon, as you informed us yesterday.’

  Winter rocked a little in his seat and blinked. ‘Yeah,’ he said hoarsely. ‘Well, that’s what I came here to talk to you about, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Could you speak up, sir? Just so we don’t miss anything.’

  ‘Look, I didn’t tell you the exact truth yesterday.’ He spoke aggressively. ‘I was in sort of a difficult position.’ He shrugged, as if that explained it.

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘I spent most of Sunday afternoon with a friend… a woman friend. My wife doesn’t know.’ He tried to address himself to Brock, but the Chief Inspector had opened a newspaper and appeared to be ignoring the proceedings.

  ‘Yes,’ Kathy said without any hint of surprise. She thumbed through a file of papers on the table in front of her, as if the whole sorry mess had already been written up. ‘Name?’

  ‘Is… is it going to be necessary for this to come out?’

  ‘Is she married?’

  ‘No, divorced. I was thinking of my wife.’ His voice tailed away. He swallowed. ‘Could I have some water?’

  Kathy poured him a glass. He took a gulp. ‘Can I smoke?’

  ‘No. I’d rather you didn’t. It’s these new smoke-free zones, you know.’

  ‘Jesus.’ He shook his head and shoved the packet back into his jacket pocket. ‘Her name’s Geraldine McArthur. She’s the manager of my New Cross salon.’

  ‘You were with her between what times?’

  ‘From about 2.15 till around 6.’

  ‘Can anyone else vouch for that?’

  ‘No. No, I don’t think so. We were alone in her flat near the salon at first. Then we went out for a drive in the Merc, up to Greenwich. We took a walk in the park, but I don’t remember seeing anyone in particular there. We returned to her place for a cup of tea, then I left.’

  ‘No one phoned her while you were in her flat?’

  He shook his head. He was fingering the gold chain round his wrist impatiently.

  ‘And you’ve discussed this with her, and told her you were coming to see us?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘All right. We’d better get her over here straight away. Where will she be?’

  Winter gave Kathy a phone number and she left the room. They waited in silence, Brock slowly scanning the pages of his newspaper, until Kathy returned with a young woman constable.

  ‘We’re going to videotape you. Is that OK?’

  ‘I suppose…’

  ‘Fairly normal now. Just to make sure we get it right. Now, you realize that, having lied to us once, you have now given us an explanation of your movements during the afternoon your mother died which depends on one other witness, with whom you have since had the opportunity to collude, and with no likelihood of corroborating evidence. So’-Kathy sighed and put her papers to one side-‘the only way we can test your statement is to take a detailed account from you and another from Ms McArthur, and see if they match.’

  ‘I’ve told you what we did…’

  ‘I said a detailed account, Mr Winter, minute by minute, of what you did. Who did what, to whom, in what order, and for how long.’

  Winter stared at her, startled. He glanced at the policewoman in the corner, head down, writing furiously, and at Brock who turned the page of his newspaper absently.

  ‘You’re not serious!’ Winter was agitated, his fingers working overtime.

  ‘Only way, sir. So let’s get on with it. You arrived in your car at what time?’

  Winter began haltingly with the innocuous details of his arrival. He described parking the car round the corner because it was so conspicuous among the wrecks in her street, the walk to her front door, how many times he rang the bell, the sound of her footsteps running to the door. His attempt to maintain a neutral flow of words was disturbed by vivid pictures of what he was describing-Geraldine’s face glowing with pleasure at his arrival, her arms around his neck.

  ‘Was that before or after you closed the front door?’

  ‘After.’

  ‘Then?’

  Pause.

  ‘I said, “Let’s go to bed.” ’ There was an edge of defiance in his voice.

  ‘You said, or she said?’

  ‘She said.’

  ‘You first said that you said it.’

  ‘No.’ Confusion. ‘No, she said it.’

  ‘Then?’

  ‘We went into the bedroom. Geraldine drew the curtains. We got undressed.’

  ‘Did you undress each other, or what?’

  ‘No. Each on our own side of the bed. Quickly.’

  ‘Did you put your clothes on a chair? What were you each wearing?’

  Winter was becoming flustered, but he stuck gamely to his account, the mental images of private passion so at odds with this drab room and his indifferent questioners that he kept losing the thread. He saw his lover’s naked belly, smelled her perfume. He lifted the glass of water again and saw that his hand was trembling.

  ‘And then we made love.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘How did you do it? What position?’

  ‘I don’t know, several.’

  ‘You made love several times?’

  ‘No, once. But we had several… positions.’

  ‘Describe them.’

  ‘Well… to begin with face to face… then later, her on top.’

  ‘Did you have oral sex?’

  ‘Yes… no, I don’t know.’

  ‘You don’t remember?’

  ‘No… I can’t remember.’

  Kathy raised her eyebrows incredulously. ‘What about anal sex then? Do you remember that?’

  Winter’s face had turned bright red and there were drops of sweat on his forehead. He turned to appeal to Brock, but he was now engrossed in the crossword.

  ‘No, certainly not that, because…’

  ‘Because?’

  His jaw was clenched tight and for a moment it looked as if he might explode. Then he
burst out, ‘Because we used to do that, but we had to stop after Geraldine saw the doctor.’

  His chest was heaving, his eyes fixed on the floor. But what he saw was not the grey sheet-plastic flooring, but the look on Geraldine’s face when she had told him that time that it was hurting.

  ‘All right, Mr Winter.’ Kathy’s voice was mild, reassuring. ‘Don’t worry. You’re doing fine. Just have a little break. Have another drink of water. Perhaps you’d like tea, no?’

  They started again, patiently opening up Winter’s Sunday afternoon, moment by moment. They discovered the form of contraception used, whether Ms McArthur was having her period, and what colour the pillows were. Then they moved from the bedroom to the bathroom, to the kitchen and the lounge.

  An hour after he had arrived at his girlfriend’s flat, the two had gone out to his car and driven to Greenwich. They walked through the park, where there might or might not have been small boys playing football on the grass, families picnicking beneath the trees and tourists queuing to see the Queen’s House. They established that the affair had been going on for six months, and that the Sunday afternoon assignation had been a regular event for over four. The only questions which Winter evaded concerned the future-whether he was intending to divorce his wife and marry his lover.

  ‘I don’t see the relevance of that,’ he said.

  ‘It would be expensive, wouldn’t it? That nice house in Chislehurst, the cars, the overseas trips, maybe some of the business. You’d lose quite a bit.’

  Winter shook his head and shrugged. ‘I don’t know. It could all be worked out.’

  ‘You think your wife would be reasonable, do you?’

  Winter looked queasy.

  ‘When did you suggest to your mother that she mortgage her house and lend you the money?’

  For a moment Kathy thought Winter was going to pass out. His expression was stunned, his eyes unfocused. Then he recovered himself and gasped, shaking his head.

  ‘That… that was nothing to do with this. After I opened the fifth salon last year, I needed extra cash. It was just a suggestion to Mum, in passing. It wasn’t serious.’

  ‘Well, she seemed to have taken it very seriously. She was very worried about it.’