After Martin Cashman had told Stella that no one had reported Stanley missing, shocked by David’s lie, she’d erased his contact from her phone. She had found his number on her mum’s customer database and rung to ask if he wanted his possessions back.
‘Yes! I’ve lost all sense of myself. It’s like a death.’
When Stella had arrived at Aldensley Road, David reiterated his request that she deep clean. This time Stella had no hesitation in refusing. He’d called out as she was getting into her van, ‘Stella, there’s something I must tell you.’
She had been about to say she didn’t want to hear, but David was speaking: ‘I never told the police we found Stanley. I wanted to keep him. He would be our dog. Yours and mine. I lied to you.’
‘I know you did.’ Stella drove away.
*
Stella gave Stanley another liver treat although the blackbird had gone.
Jack licked along the Rizla; sealing it, he laid the cigarette in his case. ‘Let’s go!’ He snapped the case shut.
Stanley gave a gleeful bark and leapt off the bench. Stella caught him before he landed on the grass and swung him on to her shoulder. ‘Go where?’ She latched the park gate after them.
‘This way.’
A typical Jack answer, but with Jack, as with Lucie May, it was better not to probe.
A three-metre-high hoarding on the corner of Thames Cottages hid the crater that had been Natasha Latimer’s cottage. Stella knew the dog cemetery was a mass of churned-up soil, the headstones stacked against the wall. Repeated along each panel of the hoarding was an image of the proposed house. A legend read, A quaint three-bedroom Victorian-style cottage in keeping with adjacent properties. An inset diagram showed three downstairs rooms, two bedrooms on the second floor and an attic bedroom. There was no basement.
‘If Natasha Latimer had been content to live in the house as it was, she might have been happy,’ Jack remarked. ‘Greed drove her to want more and she’s ended up with nothing.’
Stella snorted. ‘No one in this street is happy, with or without a basement.’ She faced reality head on. Apart from the Lawsons, for their own private reasons, everyone in Thames Cottages had played a part in Helen Honeysett’s death.
The basement company had gone bust so couldn’t pay Latimer compensation for what Graham dubbed as ‘grossly incompetent’ building work. She owed over a million pounds in demolition and legal costs. Claudia said it was only money. She’d inveigled her sister to join her at a drumming festival in Wales. ‘I promised Nats she can have her own yurt.’
*
At the lamp-post by the top of the towpath steps, Stella decided she’d invite Jack for his tea. She was a dab hand at omelettes now. Stanley tugged on his lead and broke free. He shot along the towpath. She groaned, ‘I don’t believe it! I should have known he’d do that.’
‘He’ll be fine.’ Jack seemed unperturbed. ‘We know where he’s going.’
‘There are people living there!’ She hadn’t been to the towpath since January. The house was no longer dilapidated. The stucco had been replaced and painted a warm cream that glowed in the warm evening sun. She could see figures in the downstairs rooms. The cobwebs and dirt had gone. A tea towel hanging beside the porch rather spoilt the effect. Stanley was sitting on the doormat, lead trailing, waiting to go inside.
‘Come on, Stanley. This isn’t where you live now.’ Stella felt a pang. Stanley must miss Brian Judd and his home by the river. She waved a liver treat. He didn’t notice. The front door was flung open.
‘Oh! It’s you,’ Stella exclaimed. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘Waiting for you!’ Jackie clapped her hands. A crowd spilled out of the brightly lit hall on to the path – the dried leaves on the floor had gone. Stella saw her mum; Lucie May was perched on a shooting stick beside Bette Lawson. Garry and Megan were behind them. Graham Makepeace picked up Stanley. Beverly swooped forward with a cake ablaze with candles. She lifted it and a sudden breeze blew out all the flames.
‘Dale gave me his secret fruit-cake recipe!’ Suzie crowed.
‘You’re all trespassing.’ Stella was appalled. ‘Who owns this house?
‘I do!’ With a flourish Jack whipped the tea towel from off the wall. ‘I took your advice, Stell, I sold my parents’ house in St Peter’s Square. I’ve left my ghosts behind!’
Stella read out the words on a grey slate plaque: ‘“Stanley’s House”.’
‘Now Stanley can come here whenever he likes.’ Jack took Stella’s hand and led her inside. ‘You both can.’
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Acknowledgements
About Lesley Thomson
About The Detective’s Daughter Series
From the Editor of this Book
An Invitation from the Publisher
Acknowledgements
The inspiration for this novel came from Alfred, our poodle. A fluffy, sometimes irascible writing companion, he’s part model for Stanley. My working day is structured around dog walks and many Mondays end with his agility class.
A big thank you to top canine behaviourist and trainer Michelle Garvey of Essentially Paws for her work with Alfred. His family – and Stanley – are all the better for it…
My thanks go to the best of dog walkers; as we pace through the shadows in various groups, before dawn and over fields in all weathers, our discussions range far, from the state of the world to The Archers and Bake Off, and we swap nuggets of dog wisdom. So, here’s to: Ian Anderson, Teresa Andow, Clare Biggs, John Gower, Nikki Gower, Gillian Hamer, Alayne Hayward-Tapp, Simon Hayward-Tapp, Margaret Healy, Tom Healy, John Hughes, Lucy Hughes, Miranda Kemp, Jillian Oborne, Martha Oborne, Isabel Oborne, Tina Ross, Danny Minnikin, Dee Minnikin, Catriona Murphy, Lucy Smart and Joann Weedon. None of whom bears resemblance to any characters in this novel, living or… murdered.
Thanks to Sandra Baker for telling me about being an editor at the Stock Exchange. Any mistakes are mine.
To Domenica de Rosa who, apart from being a good mate, gave me a mini-excavator – thank you!
Much gratitude to Dr Kath O’Hara for taking the trouble to provide me with detail of particular medical symptoms. Any medical errors are my own.
My thanks go to Philip Morrish and Angela Kaye, Master and Mistress of the Worshipful Company of Environmental Cleaners for introducing me to a new echelon in the cleaning world. Philip’s was the winning bid in an auction in aid of St Peter and St James Hospice for his company and Angela to be named in the novel. They’re responsible for Clean Slate losing a major contract…
I am lucky enough to work with Madeleine O’Shea and Laura Palmer, the finest of editors, thank you to them and to all at Head of Zeus, including Richenda Todd for her penetrating copy-editing eye.
As ever, I’ve had wise, considered guidance and feedback from Philippa Brewster at Georgina Capel Associates Ltd. My warm thanks go to all at the agency for their support, in particular Georgina Capel and Rachel Conway.
I continue to be grateful to Stephen Cassidy, retired Detective Chief Superintendent with the Metropolitan Police, and to Frank Pacifico, Test Train Operator for the London Underground, for their helpful suggestions and generosity.
Any inaccuracies around police detection or driving on the London Underground are mine.
I’m been lucky to be buoyed up by friends and family: Tasmin Barnett, Simon Barnett, Juliet Eve, Hilary Fairclough, Marcus Goodwin, Kay Heather, Nigel Heather, Lisa Holloway, Katherine Nelson, William Nelson, Alysoun Tomkins and Hannah Tomkins.
Lastly, but firstly, love and thanks go to my partner, Melanie Lockett, for everything.
About Lesley Thomson
LESLEY THOMSON was born in 1958 and grew up in London. She went to Holland Park Comprehensive and the Universities of Brighton and Sussex. Her first novel, A Kind of Vanishing, won the People’s Book Prize in 2010. Her second novel, The Detective’s Daughter, was published in
2013 and sold over 300,000 copies.
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About The Detective’s Daughter Series
Stella Darnell must clean. She wipes surfaces, pokes her cloth into the intricate carving of an oak table, whisks a duster over a ceiling rose. She keeps the world in order. Her watch is set three minutes fast for punctuality – a tip she learned from her father – and the couch in her sterile apartment is wrapped in protective plastic, though she never has guests. In her mid-forties, six foot tall, Stella is pleasant but firm, helpful but brutally pragmatic. The detective’s daughter has time for neither frivolities nor fools.
Jack Harmon is everything Stella deplores. Fanciful and unpredictable, his decisions rely on random signs. He will follow a paper bag blown along a pavement by the wind; a number on a train will dictate his day. Jack is the best cleaner Stella has ever known. Jack sees that Stella makes sense of his intuitive ponderings. Together, as unofficial detectives, these two misfits solve mysteries that have left the police confounded.
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A Detective's Daughter short story
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From the Editor of this Book
If you enjoyed this book, you may also enjoy reading these novels recommended by the editor.
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First published in the UK in 2017 by Head of Zeus Ltd.
Copyright © Lesley Thomson, 2017
The moral right of Lesley Thomson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN (HB): 9781784972257
ISBN (XTPB): 9781784972264
ISBN (E): 9781784972240
Jacket Design: kid-ethic
Author Photograph © Emily Andersen
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