The Geranium Kiss

by John Harvey

  I closed my eyes and tried to bring it back. The projector clicked into action. I was back in an old house. There were a governess and two young children, a boy and a girl. Fear filled each room. The woman’s fear. Fear of the two children. Fear that showed in her face when she looked into their eyes.

  Eyes that stared at her, through her, as though seeing something, someone that she could not. Knowing things that she did not know; things that they should not have known.

  My legs were suddenly cold, cold as ice. My skin felt oddly sensitive. The hair at the back of my neck tightened; my scalp began to itch with a prickly feeling.

  The children were staring past the governess, staring straight at me. I blinked and rubbed my eyes: they were still there. Staring still.

  The governess lifted the boy up from the floor.

  ‘Time for bed,’ she said, as though afraid no longer. She carried him out of the room.

  The little girl remained. She was wearing a long garment, white. A nightdress. She walked slowly towards me.

  ‘Aren’t you going to take me to bed?’ she asked and all the while she looked deep inside me.

  She put up her arms to be lifted and I bent down. The little arms flung themselves around my neck and clung on tight, almost choking me. When I loosened them, the face was almost touching mine; the eyes, dark and large, were burning into my face. She smiled a strange smile.

  ‘A good night kiss?’ she asked.

  I lowered my head over hers and felt her breath on mine. It should have been warm, but it was cold, cold and musty like the damp air at the centre of an old wood.

  I put my lips to hers gently, but immediately her mouth opened wide and she drew me inside. I felt her small pointed tongue pushing itself between my lips …

  That was when I had heard the scream. That was when I had woken up.

  I thought about trying to get off to sleep again, but decided against it. I was going to have to leave for Blake’s place early as it was.

  My legs pushed out over the edge of the bed and my feet found the floor there beneath them as usual. This morning, at this time, nothing would have surprised me. Even a bottomless pit.

  Don’t tempt providence, Mitchell. They’re probably saving that for later. They. He. Whoever runs this thing. I mean someone must. Nothing could get as fucked up as life just by accident.

  I thought I could try standing up. That’s better! Easy does it now! Take the stairs one at a time. Good. Now don’t splash the water into that kettle too loudly.

  I took my coffee into the living room and pulled the photo album over from the table. Turned to the blank page. I looked at it for a long time and waited until things settled down in front of my eyes, until they stopped revolving round in my head like a roundabout that was chasing itself hard into oblivion.

  Finally it slowed down enough for the people to get off. There were only two passengers. One was Cathy Skelton, the other was her uncle. I turned through the pages until I came to the most recent picture and slipped it from its mounts. I’d stand a better chance of finding out where the missing lady was if I knew what she looked like.

  Perhaps.

  An hour or so later I dialled Tom Gilmour’s home number. It rang ten times with no answer so I put the receiver down and waited half a minute then tried again. The third ring did the trick.

  The voice at the other end sounded as though it was owned by a grizzly bear that had got its head caught tight in a noose. I was glad to be out of reach of its claws.

  ‘What stupid mother is calling me at this godforsaken hour?’

  ‘Steady, Tom,’ I said, ‘I could be the Commissioner.’

  ‘Like a monkey’s tit, you could!’

  ‘Take it easy, Tom. You’ll never make your pension at this rate.’

  He told me a few things I could do with his pension, which seemed unusually charitable for a man who had only just been rudely awoken from hard-earned sleep.

  ‘Anyway,’ he finally growled, ‘why aren’t you over at the Blake place?’

  ‘I’m on my way,’ I said. ‘There were a couple more things I wanted to ask before I went.’

  ‘Get on with it then.’

  ‘When this thing broke the other day, did you check Blake out?’

  There was a short silence at the other end and I tried to work out what the expression on Gilmour’s face might be.

  Then he said, ‘We asked a few questions. At the time there didn’t seem to be any point in going further. Are you suggesting there is?’

  ‘No. I’m not suggesting anything. I only wondered if there was something you knew about him which might help.’ I let out my breath, then added, ‘It might be interesting to know how he made all his money in the first place, though.’

  Gilmour didn’t say a thing for a while. Perhaps he was one of those people who don’t like to talk early in the morning.

  ‘One other point,’ I added after a while, ‘do you have somebody watching the house?’

  ‘Shit! Of course we have someone watching the house. What the mothering hell do you think we’re playing at?’

  I didn’t tell him. I said, ‘But not from the house directly opposite?’

  ‘No, smart guy, not from the house directly opposite.’

  ‘And you’re not using two heavy looking musclemen, one of whom could be deaf and dumb and the other wearing a few dozen yards of blue overcoat?’

  ‘What the hell are you talking about?’

  ‘Okay, okay, forget it. But, Tom, if your man there doesn’t log the fact that those two characters were sitting in the street in a green Zodiac last night and that they followed me away, then you’d better find out if he’s asleep on the job or just on the take like nearly everybody else.’

  People were always hanging up on me in the noisiest possible ways. I’d have to take a Dale Carnegie course in telephone tactics if my ear drums were going to survive.

  I went out and started scraping the frost from the windscreen. Maybe I should use the garage more often. I’d probably wait until the weather changed.

  It was still dark and the street light shone brightly above my head. I was beginning to feel hungry. I wondered if she was a good cook, too.

  4

  In the event she didn’t cook the breakfast, Mrs Skelton did that. I should have guessed. However, it left Stephanie free to wander around the place looking cool and beautiful. She was wearing black pants, which hugged her hips and her bottom as though they really cared. Above the waist, she wore a white blouse with loose sleeves and a high, open collar. Over this there was a black waistcoat. Her hair and make-up were perfect and she looked like she’d been up for hours.

  It was six thirty precisely.

  Crosby Blake sat at the other end of the table, head down behind last night’s paper. He was obviously content to ignore me for the time being, which suited me fine. It meant I could concentrate on the food.

  Stephanie may not have cooked it, but she had passed on my order with the expected efficiency. Normally I was an orange juice and coffee man, but I guessed I could get used to this kind of living without too much difficulty. All I needed was somebody around permanently to provide the necessary service.

  I was in the middle of biting into the last mouthful of kidney when Blake banged his paper down on the table and stomped out of the room. Twenty minutes to phone call time and he was beginning to feel every passing second.

  In his shoes I might be feeling the same but I wasn’t wearing his shoes and so there were things I had to do. Like settling him down or sorting him out or doing something that would ensure he didn’t crack up on the phone and ruin the whole play.

  I wiped the juices from the plate with a piece of bread and stuffed it into my mouth. Then I went looking for Crosby Blake.

  I found him in the living room. He was sitting alone in the dark room and the s
tereo was on. Someone was playing the piano, slowly and with feeling. Blake’s hands were to his face when I walked through the door and they didn’t move until I had sat down opposite him.

  When he spoke, his voice was quieter than last night, as though all of the confidence had been knocked out of him.

  He said, ‘You must think I’m reacting in a very stupid way?’

  I shook my head and said that I didn’t think that at all. It was no time to hammer him even harder. Not that I was beginning to like him; I just needed his co-operation a while longer.

  ‘Look,’ I said in my best reassuring manner, ‘you’re going to be okay when this call comes through, aren’t you?’

  He nodded and added nothing.

  ‘Right. Good. But let’s go through what happens. As soon as the phone starts to ring, you count up to six, then pick up the receiver. I’ll take up the extension phone at exactly the same time. That’s important. We don’t want him to hear two phones being lifted. Then you just have to listen to the instructions very carefully and if anything isn’t clear, stop him and get him to repeat it. If you can, at the end, ask him if he’ll go through things one more time. Say you don’t want to make any mistakes in delivering the money. Have you got all that?’

  He looked at me with eyes that were tired from too much worry and too little sleep.

  ‘Why the last part?’

  ‘The longer you can keep him talking, the more chance there is of the police tracing the call. At least, they should be able to cut it down to an area, even if they don’t have time to pin-point the exact phone.’

  He heard me but I wasn’t too sure how much he understood—or cared at that moment.

  ‘There’s one more thing,’ I went on.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Proof.’

  He looked at me without a sign of understanding.

  ‘You must ask for proof.’

  ‘Proof of what?’

  ‘Proof of Cathy still being alive.’

  The tired eyes closed; the hands returned to the face; behind us unseen fingers struck notes in quick succession.

  I reached forward and pulled his arms down. Stared at him hard. At first he looked as though he was going to hit out at me, then as if he was going to cry. In the event, he did neither. Just looked back at me, strain showing in every line and in the set of his oddly thin mouth.

  ‘Look,’ I said again, ‘there are two reasons why you must do that. Firstly, if whoever this is is any kind of professional he’ll expect it and if it doesn’t come then he might be suspicious. Secondly, for Cathy’s own sake. Let’s presume she’s still alive—and remember we have no way of knowing if that is so—then there’s nothing to stop the kidnapper changing that situation before he collects the money. That way it would be easier for him to disappear afterwards. For one thing, she wouldn’t be able to identify him.’

  The hands pressed down on the face, the knuckles turned white.

  ‘So you want some kind of proof—positive proof—that’s she’s alive and you want it before you part with the cash. And as close to that time as possible.’

  He peered at me through his hands, trying to take in what I was saying.

  ‘But won’t he release her at the same time as he takes the money?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s doubtful,’ I told him, ‘that’s too dangerous as far as he’s concerned. The thing to do will be to leave her somewhere and what we’ll get in exchange for the ransom is the place spelled out for us. That’s all.’

  Blake said nothing more, but looked at his watch. I checked mine. It was five to seven. He stood up carefully, as though afraid he might keel over at any moment.

  Without another word or a look he walked out of the room and shut the door behind him. At first I thought that when he left he took the emotion with him.

  But he hadn’t. There was still the piano playing its disembodied way round the still dark morning of the room.

  The music rang louder, fragmented, like small birds diving and fluttering, unsettled, over a field of corn. The keys hammered out odd little journeys of the heart.

  I knew that Crosby Blake wasn’t the only person who had lost someone. My mind went back to another time, another place. I was looking anxiously along a road, empty in the dusk. Always empty now.

  The phone had sounded twice before it had fully registered. By the fourth ring I was by the extension. After the sixth I lifted the receiver.

  Blake said the number: then nothing.

  An awareness of someone at the other end, the faintest sound of a breath being drawn: then the line cut off: dead.

  It had been less than a minute.

  I expected him to be more shaken than ever, but the abrupt click of the receiver being replaced at the other end of the connection seemed to have jolted the life back into him.

  Some snap had returned to his walk and the eyes were brighter now.

  ‘What does that mean?’

  I looked back at him. I didn’t know. I said so.

  ‘I thought that was why you were being paid—to know things.’

  He was right. It was just that I didn’t know all of the answers: at the moment I didn’t even know most of the questions. And his sudden change of manner surprised me. In a way, it was as though he was relieved.

  In which case maybe he should be telling me what the phone call had meant.

  Instead of that, he asked me again.

  ‘Well,’ I hesitated, chewing a few ideas gingerly around the edges, in case one of them should snap back at me, ‘the first thing is that we can only presume that it was our man.’

  ‘Come on, Mitchell,’ he interrupted. ‘It’s pretty unlikely that anyone else would call at the exact time. Especially with a strange call like that.’

  ‘Right,’ I agreed, ‘though remember that our kidnapper was supposed to be talking about ransom demands—not doing his deep breathing exercises. You sure you haven’t got a hidden admirer who goes in for dirty phone calls?’

  The look in his eyes told me that he hadn’t. It also told me I’d better come up with something else if I wanted to stay on the payroll.

  I tried.

  ‘The possibility is,’ I said, ‘that he wants us to know that he’s still around and to assume that he still has Cathy and is interested in doing a deal. Only for some reason we don’t know, he doesn’t want to talk about it at the moment.’

  ‘That’s great!’ said Blake, pushing his fists down hard into his jacket pockets.

  ‘It could be worse,’ I offered.

  ‘How?’

  ‘He needn’t have called at all.’

  Just at that point the phone rang again, jolting in upon our conversation when neither of us expected it. Stephanie appeared from nowhere and picked up the receiver first.

  I went for the extension but she stopped me with a wave of the hand.

  I saw her face wince a couple of times as though someone was whistling loud down the line. Then she put the instrument down and turned to face us.

  ‘Was it him?’ demanded Crosby, the colour fading fast from his face once again.

  ‘No,’ Stephanie shook her head of fair hair from side to side.

  ‘Who was it then?’ I asked.

  ‘That policeman.’

  ‘Gilmour?’

  ‘That’s the one. He doesn’t exactly have an orthodox way of talking to the public, does he?’

  ‘Tom doesn’t have an orthodox way of doing anything. What did he say?’

  ‘Well, in between mistaking me for his mother every few words, he asked if we had heard from the kidnapper. When he learnt what had happened he said he wasn’t surprised.’

  ‘But did he say why not?’ asked Blake anxiously.

  ‘Not exactly,’ Stephanie replied, ‘but he did suggest that we changed our reading habits this
morning and got hold of a copy of the Comet.’

  Blake and I exchanged glances. We thought we knew what had happened: the imposed silence had been broken.

  ‘I’ll get one,’ said both Blake and Stephanie at the same time. I stopped them both with a gesture that would have made a traffic cop proud.

  ‘Let me. I’m the one who’s getting paid to run around.’

  They didn’t argue with that so I left.

  The Comet wasn’t a paper that normally wasted its readers’ time by insulting their intelligence with too many long words. Life happened in thick headlines and exclamation marks and anything that couldn’t be dealt with in that way didn’t exist.

  They didn’t have much in the way of either facts or rumour this time, but that didn’t worry them. They just sank the headline an extra half-inch down the page.

  Enough to make sure that our friendly neighbourhood kidnapper couldn’t miss it.

  SCHOOLGIRL KIDNAPPED!

  A Comet World Exclusive

  Three nights ago vivacious young sixth-former Cathy Skelton was snatched from her luxury North London home. Her mystery kidnapper broke into the house in fashionable ‘Millionaires’ Row’ in the middle of the night and whisked her away into the darkness. Since then nothing has been seen or heard of her.

  It is understood that the kidnapper has contacted Cathy’s uncle, Crosby Blake, to make his ransom demands. Mr Blake is a retired businessman of considerable wealth. He amassed his fortune from a wide range of transport interests and is believed to still exercise considerable control over his former empire.

  Police in charge of the case are playing their cards extremely close to their chests. Last night they were not prepared to make any statement about the kidnapping, not even to confirm that such a crime had, in fact, taken place. However, it is confidently believed that they have several definite theories as to the possible identity of the kidnapper, who may be a man they already wish to interview in connection with other serious crimes.

  There is no suspicion of there being any political motive behind the kidnapping of the schoolgirl victim.