That Estate Agent. Stella had been twenty when Helen Honeysett vanished in January 1987. Stella had remarked to her mum that it was a mistake for the woman to jog on a footpath at night and Suzie Darnell had told her off for ‘blaming the victim’, yet had forbidden her to jog anywhere. Not that Stella needed to jog; cleaning kept her fit. Terry Darnell wasn’t involved in the investigation, but had told her that detectives believed Honeysett was murdered within hours of going missing.
Latimer was still talking. ‘...obviously it’s tosh. Ghosts don’t exist. But all you need is a rumour of haunting and the property value drops like a fucking stone.’
‘You bought it without knowing so when you come to sell it…’ Stella didn’t want to discourage dishonesty, but surely phantoms wouldn’t show up on a survey and you couldn’t be blamed for not declaring the existence of something that didn’t exist.
‘The old man who lived there – the sitting tenant – told Claudia. It was to put me off buying. I got rid of him.’
‘No one is “got rid of”,’ Claudia observed placidly. She was swaying as if in time to an inaudible tune.
Stella unzipped her jacket and shrugged it off. ‘Would you like tea? There’s chocolate bis—’
‘…I hear her. Squeaking and shuffling. She’s never been laid to rest, that’s what it is, and Nats has dug down into deep time with that extraordinary basement – I keep telling her. It isn’t only those left behind who agonize. Now the dead have no home.’
‘Claudia, enough!’ Latimer barked. ‘The sooner I sell the better.’
Stella knew that old houses made odd noises; her own did. ‘Have you actually seen her…?’ She had forgotten the ghost’s name. She was teetering on a tightrope of seeming to treat both Latimer and her sister seriously. She wouldn’t make the mistake of assuming, for all her fancy gear, that Latimer held the purse strings.
‘I hear her breathing!’
Natasha Latimer gave an exaggerated shudder. ‘The way Claw talks, you’d think it was Mrs Goddam Grace Poole!’
The bobble hat dipped. ‘Actually Mrs Rochester.’
‘Do ghosts breathe?’ Stella mused.
‘Of course not.’ Latimer examined her nails with a furious expression. ‘It’ll be one of that lot trying to get me out. They’re all barking!’
‘The basement was more change than the community could bear.’ Claudia soothed her sister.
Belatedly Stella understood that Latimer had bought her house to make a profit, not to join a community. Stella had done jobs for several clients who made money from improving properties and selling them on. In a secluded neighbourhood, that wouldn’t go down well, especially, Stella supposed, with the old man who’d rented the house before Latimer evicted him.
‘If Clean Slate is going to take on the job, they must have the subtext.’ Claudia glided around the desk and began massaging her sister’s shoulders. Stella was surprised when Latimer slumped down in the chair and shut her eyes. ‘What happened to that poor girl was terrible. I was three.’ Claudia shook her head; the hat shook with her.
Surely Claudia had no recall of something that had happened when she was so young. Jack could remember the day his mother died – he’d been about four – but that was different.
‘How can I help?’ Stella meant to imply Clean Slate could not help.
‘Get rid of her!’ Latimer jumped up. Claudia stayed where she was, her hands in mid-air. ‘I’m not idiotic enough to think there actually is a ghost. But people are incredibly thick. I need to quash the haunting rumours and get it on the market.’ She was ferocious. ‘Wipe out this Honeysett girl!’
‘That’s not a good way to frame it, Natty.’ Claudia appeared to float back to her place by the coat stand.
That someone had very likely ‘wiped out’ Helen Honeysett appeared to be lost on Latimer. Stella resorted to her spiel. ‘We do cleaning. Along with basic tasks of vacuuming and polishing, we clean carpets and upholstery, polish internal glazing and if necessary we can perform a scheduled deep clean which involves sanitiz—’
‘I want all of that.’ Latimer waved the ballpoint pen like a conductor’s baton.
‘It might be an intruder. Perhaps the police...’ Stella was mildly cheered by the vision of Martin Cashman, Chief Super at Richmond Police Station and her dad’s old colleague, negotiating Claudia in her blanket and bobble hat telling him about the ghost of an estate agent.
‘No one can get in. The property is alarmed; there are cameras and most of it’s underground, for Chrissakes.’
Stella tended to think that radiators, putting in draught excluders and filling cracks in floorboards did the trick. ‘The Church does exorcisms,’ she offered brightly as the thought occurred.
‘Claudia had them round. A priest chucked water about and made a flood. My lovely hippy-dippy sister got one of her faith healer friends to sneak about burning weeds. He set off the sprinkler. I’m still getting rid of the stink.’
‘It was sage. It’s healing.’ The ‘hippy-dippy’ sister puffed with contentment. ‘We brought comfort to her.’
‘How long did Helen Honeysett live there – I mean when she was alive?’ Stella would balk at living where a person who was murdered had lived, however comforted they were. It was strange enough being in – she still had trouble calling it ‘living in’ rather than ‘visiting’ – her dad’s place since his death five years ago.
‘She was never there! She lived at number four. The husband’s still there, swanning about with some new girl every week.’ Latimer clicked the pen on and off.
‘Wouldn’t she be more likely to haunt her husband?’ Stella tried to sound neutral.
‘She’s not haunting anyone.’ Latimer flung her a look of exasperation. ‘The point is that the neighbours think she is and neighbours talk! Claudia’s not helping with incantations and nonsense.’
‘I see.’ Stella moved towards the door. ‘Maybe you need a PR agency?’ Stella’s commercial success was based on promising only what she could fulfil.
‘I advised Nats to get a stringent clean – twenty-four/seven occupancy, no dust must settle, ghosts love dust. A clean home is like garlic to a vampire.’ Claudia was opening and shutting the jaws of the staple remover in time to her speech. She appeared to have forgotten that Helen Honeysett was a ‘gentle soul’. Although, as to method, Stella was with her every step of the way.
‘Claudia’s away with the fairies, but that did make sense,’ Natasha conceded.
Stella felt ill equipped to comment on vampires or fairies, but did see the endless advantages in a clean house. ‘We can do that. I can’t guarantee it will get rid of—’
‘I want a live-in housekeeper who can scotch any suggestion of some estate agent clanking her chains in my basement.’ Natasha Latimer tossed the Clean Slate biro down; it lay between them like a gauntlet.
Stella picked up the pen. ‘We have just the person.’
2
Christmas Eve, 1986
‘Champagne, darling?’
Megan mechanically put out a hand for the glass that the lady in the zebra dress with feathers sticking out of her hair was holding out to her.
‘She’s too young to drink, Mrs Honeysett.’ Garry tugged at the sleeve of Megan’s red cotton tunic dress. ‘She has to have juice.’
‘Oh, call me Helen, please! “Mrs H.” is my august mother-in-law, the Horse on the Hill. Whoops, mustn’t call her that!’ The lady covered her mouth and winked at Megan. ‘Gotta say, Megan, you look jolly grown up to me. And you, Garry Lawson! Haven’t you got a gor-geous bro, Megan!’
‘Garry keeps budgies.’ Megan had waited for her chance to tell the new people at number 4 this information. They would see how lucky they were to have come to the street.
‘Incredible!’ Helen Honeysett marvelled. A response that satisfied the seven-year-old but annoyed her soon-to-be-teenaged brother.
He finished his orange juice in a long draught and admitted stiffly, ‘I breed budgerigars.’
‘Coo-elll! Can I have one?’ Helen Honeysett drank from the glass she had offered Megan and exclaimed, ‘Hot damn! Now I’ve got three on the go!’
‘Garry sells them for a pound each and two pounds if they’re albinos. That’s white all over and it’s a good thing so it costs double the blue and yellow ones. He hasn’t made one yet, have you, Gal?’ Megan looked up at her brother.
‘Shut up, Megs.’ Reddening, Garry pushed up the sleeves of his black nylon bomber jacket and shuffled his feet, clad in black Converse high-tops new on that morning.
‘I want a blue and a yellow one. Two, so they don’t get sad and lonely,’ Helen Honeysett crooned absently, her eyes roving the crowded room.
Helen and Adam Honeysett had moved to Thames Cottages, one of a row of five terrace houses off the towpath near Kew Bridge, the week before. The next day they dropped cards through the neighbours’ doors inviting them to a ‘Real Honeysett Yuletide House-Warming’. The card was a Christmas tree. Balls hanging from the branches were inset with the faces of the occupants of the other four cottages. The words ‘Adam Honeysett Design’ were by the greeting. Megan pointed out happily that her dad was at the top of the tree by the star. Her mum, Bette, was less pleased to be on a lower branch. Next to Bette was Sybil Lofthouse from number 5. ‘They must have hidden in the hedge to take me. Sneaky, I call it.’
‘He’s hoping we’ll hire him to design stuff,’ Steve Lawson had told Megan. ‘Not a bad idea. Shall I stick a U-bend pipe through some letterboxes? Could bring in loads of work!’
‘Everyone already knows you’re a plumber,’ Megan had said. ‘You fixed Mrs Merry’s leak.’
Megan had been astonished that the inside of the Honeysetts’ cottage was bigger than the Lawsons’ because from the pavement the houses looked the same size. The living room went right through to the back. It was topsy-turvy, with rugs on walls and bare floorboards. None of the chairs matched and there were bulges and dips in the velvet-covered sofa. There were toys everywhere. Megan particularly liked the mouse reading in a tiny rocking chair, glasses on the end of its whiskery nose. She had tried to get Garry interested in a carved tableau of a kitchen. The table and chairs were modelled to create perspective. It reminded her of her family’s kitchen although they didn’t have the dresser with plates propped on the shelves. Everywhere was something new and magical. Model cars and building bricks that were nicer than Garry’s. The Honeysetts didn’t have children so the toys must belong to them. Megan was envious that they didn’t have to tidy them away, especially for a party. She had reached up to stroke a dog on the mantelpiece and Mr Honeysett had come up behind her and said that it was a nutcracker. He showed her how its mouth opened when she lifted up his tail. Her dad had whispered, ‘Careful, Megsy, his jaws could crush your fingers!’
Before the party, Bette Lawson had instructed her children to be friendly. ‘Don’t stand in the corner like wet weekends.’ Keen to keep Mrs… Helen talking to them, Megan asked, ‘When did you take our faces for your card?’
Garry paled. ‘Megan!’
‘That was huge fun! I set up camp in our bedroom and waited for my moment! I take pictures at work. My job is to show people around houses and get them to buy them. I photograph boring empty rooms or houses that are horribly tidy. I saw you come from the towpath with your daddy and your dog and snap!’ She mimed holding a camera, not noticing she had sloshed champagne out of the glass. ‘Seems everyone takes their dogs down there.’
‘Mum said it was sneak—’
Garry Lawson elbowed his sister and she staggered back into the Lawsons’ Christmas tree, wincing as a branch scratched her arm. She breathed in the scent of pine.
‘Now, kids, give me a rundown on everyone.’ Helen Honeysett leant into the children conspiratorially. ‘Dish the dirt!’
Brows furrowed, Megan cast about the cluttered room. ‘That’s Mr Rowlands by the door. With spectacles and strange eyes. He’s at number one Thames Cottages. He’s been there all his life and he’s old. He lives with his mum. We call him the Lizard because he slides about. You don’t know he’s there and then he is.’
‘I always know he’s there,’ Garry contradicted her fiercely. ‘And so what? We live with our mum.’
‘He does look pretty old and wrinkled. Is he scary?’ Helen Honeysett widened her eyes.
‘Yes.’ Megan realized that he was.
‘Is it a matter for the police? Have you told your parents?’ Helen Honeysett looked serious and Megan felt a stirring of discomfort. She hadn’t told her mum or dad. What would she tell them?
‘She’s making stuff up,’ Garry said. ‘She gets like this.’
‘He looks a sweetie standing there, like a little boy lost.’ Helen Honeysett squeezed Megan’s arm. ‘I’m afraid his mother wasn’t on the card. I’ve never seen her out. Does she actually exist?’ She did a face as if she’d been rude.
‘Yes she does!’ Megan exclaimed with delight that she knew something for sure. ‘My mum says she’s “failing” and will die. Mum’s a nurse.’ She sought to assuage any doubt about this extraordinary detail. ‘Dad changed their boiler. He said she stays in her bed in the day. It’s not Mr Rowlands’ boiler because he’s like us, he rents.’
‘He’s not like us.’ Garry was gruff as he bounced on the balls of his high-tops, hands in the pockets of his brand-new Oxford bags.
‘Is your jacket Levi, Garry?’ Helen fingered the fur collar on the boy’s denim jacket with manicured fingers. Her nails glinted dark red in the Christmas-tree lights.
‘Yes! Mum told him it was ridiculously hot for indoors, but he won’t take it off,’ Megan piped. In case Helen had forgotten that she wanted to know about everyone: ‘Miss Lofthouse is the one next to Mr Rowlands not talking. She never talks. She goes out early before anyone’s up. I did once see her on the towpath. Her dog’s called Timothy Trot. Daddy says it’s cos he gets the trots!’ She gave a squawking giggle.
‘We named Baxter after the soup. I was drunk. It suits him though, don’t you think?’
‘Yes,’ Megan said promptly and, not to be diverted, went on, ‘Mum says Sybil Lofthouse doesn’t like “idle chat” and prefers her own company. When she sees us she acts like we’re invisible. Dad had to get our ball out of her garden once. She said no. He says she doesn’t like children. Isn’t that funny because she was once a little girl like us.’ Megan was enjoying herself.
‘I’m not a little girl,’ Garry growled.
‘Maybe she’s always been a grown-up. Some people are.’ Helen Honeysett sipped champagne. ‘Or like Mr Rowlands, they never grow up. Look at him nibbling his finger. He’s nervous, poor chap. I must rescue him from himself. And rescue Miss Lofthouse from the horror of company that isn’t hers. I’m honoured she’s deigned to come.’ She put the champagne glass down on a shelf and adjusted the giant red clip holding up her hair. ‘Miss Lofthouse gave Adam such a ticking off for taking her picture without permission. Hey, maybe she’s a James Bond spy!’
‘She’s not,’ Garry said reliably. ‘She works at the Stock Exchange.’
‘Bor-ing!’ Helen flashed him a smile and, flustered, he downed his orange juice in one. ‘Adam told her it was me who took the photo. Wasn’t that mean! He grassed me up!’ Her cockney accent was like the man in the Mary Poppins film; Megan would do it when she got home. Grassed me up.
‘Yes it was.’ Megan eyed her brother with puzzlement. He was gaping at Helen Honeysett as if she was from outer space. The last time he’d done that was when her mum accidentally shut his finger in the bathroom door. ‘Mrs Merry is by your piano. She is very good at playing it.’ Megan hugged herself. She was getting carried away. Mrs Merry did own a piano, but Megan had never heard her play.
‘I recognize Daphne Merry.’ Helen Honeysett nodded at a tall thin woman in a flowery dress talking with Adam Honeysett. ‘She’s holding her drink as if it’s a Molotov cocktail!’ Adam Honeysett laughed loudly at something he’d said, prompting a thin smile. ‘She brought us
a cake the day we got here. I went and chucked out her old cake tin. That put the kibosh on good relations!’
Megan didn’t know what this meant, so said, ‘Mrs Merry cooks very nice cakes.’ She decided to hold back the best bit about Mrs Merry.
‘It was so battered and scratched, it never occurred to me she’d want it back. She asked for it and got quite shirty when I told her the dustmen had carted it off that morning. She wouldn’t let us buy her another one.’
‘Her little girl was killed.’ Garry’s voice was breaking; the last word came out as a squeak.
‘What? Crap! When did that happen?’ Helen Honeysett was aghast. Megan was dismayed that Garry had got in with the best bit of news first.
‘Dunno. The kid was seven. Same as Megan, that’s why she likes her. Megan is a substitute.’ The boy flicked back his hair.
‘Gosh, how awful. Did she drown in the river?’
‘Substitutes are in football and it’s not why she likes me. We’re not meant to know about her child. It’s secret.’ Megan drew herself up. Mrs Merry had never told her, but still she saw herself as the Keeper of the Secret. Garry had completely spoilt it all.
‘Everyone knows,’ Garry scoffed. ‘Her husband was driving back from France with her and her daughter. He’d got to England and fell asleep. The car smashed into a tree. He was killed. It was a silver Austin Allegro with a spoiler and power steering. Mrs Merry “got out of the car without a scratch on her”.’ Garry co-opted the phrase his father had used when he came back with the old newspaper he’d found lining a box in the shed.
‘How absolutely bloody tragic! And now Adam’s towing the poor woman through one of his interminable jokes. Megan, should I rescue her?’
Megan was astounded that Helen Honeysett was asking her opinion. Personally she didn’t think that Mrs Merry ever needed rescuing and if she did, Megan would do it. She spotted a cue. ‘Daphne’s my best friend. I call her Daphne and I’m her De-Cluttering Assistant.’ It wasn’t as good as the dead daughter, but it was still amazing.
The Dog Walker Page 2
