Boiling Point

by Frank Lean

  ‘OK, don’t get your knickers in a twist, lover boy. I’ll see if she wants to chat.’

  I could hear the flesh peddler bawling Marti’s name. I cringed. I should never have let her go. It was a large house because he went on shouting for some time before the phone was picked up.

  ‘Dave, is that you? When are you coming down?’

  ‘I’m not. I’ve got dear old Charlie here. He wants to talk to you.’

  ‘You bastard!’ she shouted. ‘You’ve told him where I am.’

  ‘No, I haven’t. He wants you to give him an alibi over the Lou Olley killing. The police seem to think that it might have been a crime of passion.’

  There was silence for a moment and then the familiar mad laugh rang out. Even on a phone it sounded like Concorde crashing the sound barrier. At last she calmed down enough to speak: ‘Put him on, Dave. This could well be the most expensive telephone call in the history of the Carlyle family.’

  Next morning I was up bright and early and on the road before seven. I jogged along Edge Lane towards the little park where the pigeon lover awaited. I spotted her at some distance. She was clutching a large white plastic carrier bag. We were on converging courses for the park gate and she was through it before I was. Unseen by Mrs Griffiths, another figure emerged from behind a tree. A stockily built woman, struggling to carry a yellow plastic bucket, she headed for the same corner of the field that my customer was making for. Hoping to reach the collision point before she did, I accelerated.

  ‘You mad bitch!’ the woman suddenly shrieked. ‘You won’t be told, will you? Those birds come and roost on my roof. Go and feed the shitty things in front of your own bloody hovel!’ The aggressor looked about fifty, with greying hair and a very determined expression on her face. She swung the bucket back, preparatory to giving Mrs Griffiths an early bath.

  ‘No, don’t do that,’ I said in my most reasonable voice.

  ‘And what bloody business is it of yours?’ the avenging fury demanded.

  ‘He’s here to see you don’t get up to any mischief,’ Mrs Griffiths crowed in triumph.

  The ice-cold water hit me full in the face. I gasped and involuntarily took a step forward.

  ‘Don’t you dare to raise your hand to me,’ my assailant screamed. ‘I only did that to teach you a lesson.’

  Mrs Griffiths gave me a beatific smile and then turned back to her pigeons.

  19

  THE EARLY MORNING action invigorated me. I got into the office before Celeste. Her resolution to show mustard keenness hadn’t lasted. I left the mail for her to sort and retreated to my inner sanctum. I was in an excited mood: apprehensive but not frightened. How long would it take Cullen to match up the description from the Renaissance Hotel with the real Charlie Carlyle? Surely he couldn’t be deceived for much longer. I looked up old cases in the files. I tidied my desk. I repositioned the furniture slightly. I found it hard to stop looking at my watch. It crossed my mind to write out instructions for Celeste in the event of my incarceration. The part-timers would all have to be paid.

  The time crept slowly up to nine o’clock and then on. No DCI Cullen, no Sergeant Munro. At twenty past nine the front door rattled and I almost jumped out of my skin, but it was only Celeste.

  ‘Sorry I’m late. Alarm clock didn’t go off,’ she explained. ‘I’ll make it up tonight.’

  I nodded.

  ‘Are you all right, Mr Cunane?’ she enquired. ‘You look as if you’re expecting something.’

  ‘Really?’ I said, genuinely surprised that I was so transparent.

  I told her about my dawn encounter with the pro- and anti-pigeon forces.

  ‘Are you expecting the Press or something? It’s just that your office looks much tidier than usual.’

  It crossed my mind that Celeste was much more perceptive than I’d given her credit for.

  ‘You know this legal executive course you’re on?’ I asked.

  She tried to hide a guilty frown.

  ‘They haven’t been on to you, have they?’ she said. ‘I didn’t go last night. It was my cousin’s eighteenth birthday, I couldn’t not be there.’

  ‘So that’s why the alarm didn’t go off?’ I muttered.

  She shrugged apologetically.

  ‘No, it’s not your college, Celeste. I was wondering if as well as being a legal executive you’d like to take more part in the actual work of the firm. You know, go out on jobs. Most of it’s terribly boring – sitting in the car for hours waiting for someone to come out on the street so you can put legal papers in his hand. Routine things like that.’

  ‘Are you joking me?’ she asked earnestly. Her eyes were the size of saucers. She let out a long slow breath.

  ‘No,’ I said.

  ‘You know, to be honest, I’ve been waiting for a chance like this for months. I think I could really do well at detective work. That’s why I signed on for the college course. I was beginning to give up hope.’

  ‘You must keep on going to college,’ I said solicitously. ‘That will give you lots of options for the future.’

  ‘I got five GCSEs, you know. I’ve always wanted to be a detective but I knew I could never join the police.’

  ‘The first thing you’ll have to learn, Celeste, is to keep on the right side of them.’

  ‘Like you do, boss,’ she commented with a hearty laugh. ‘I saw you send that young copper out with a flea in his ear. He didn’t know where to put himself when he came into my room, the little Muppet.’

  ‘Celeste, that was a thirty-two-year-old detective sergeant.’

  ‘They’d hand him his balls on a plate, round where I live.’

  ‘Ugh!’ I muttered.

  ‘You knew that Olley, didn’t you? The one that got himself killed? He threw my desk over and mashed you up that day, didn’t he?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, wondering what was coming next.

  ‘I won’t mention anything to the police about that . . . I mean, he was asking for trouble.’

  ‘Celeste, I haven’t offered you promotion to shut you up.’

  ‘No?’ she asked, her eyes gleaming.

  ‘No, the police know all about that incident. For the record I had nothing to do with the death of Lou Olley.’

  ‘I wouldn’t care if you had,’ she said defiantly.

  ‘Well, I didn’t, and the only reason I’m offering you a new start is because it’ll be good for the business.’

  ‘OK,’ she said. I could see she was unconvinced. She gave me a beaming smile. ‘You went to Armley Jail with that Marti King, didn’t you?’

  ‘How the hell . . .’

  ‘My older sister’s boyfriend’s in there. She saw you. He gets on well with Vince King. Lennie, that is, the boyfriend.’

  ‘Small world,’ I muttered angrily. I wondered what other secrets were about to be laid bare.

  ‘It is. Lennie says that she hasn’t visited Vince since she got married and now she’s suddenly started all this about getting him out. I mean, he’s not any more innocent now than he was five years ago, is he?’

  ‘No,’ I agreed.

  ‘If he is innocent, that is.’

  ‘So what does Lennie say?’

  ‘Vince thinks it’s because she wants him to take care of Charlie Carlyle and his dad. He reckons it’s all because she wants a divorce, but the only way Brandon Carlyle will ever let her leave the Carlyle family is in a pine box.’

  ‘What?’ I gasped. Suddenly Celeste had my complete attention.

  ‘Yes, if her old man’s running loose it’ll give the Carlyles something to think about. He really hates the Carlyles does Vince.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I don’t know. He won’t tell Lennie anything about that. He says it’s better if he doesn’t know.’

  ‘Any more revelations?’

  ‘No, that’s your lot, boss.’

  I hadn’t anything to say to that, so Celeste smiled warmly and said, ‘I’ll just go and sort through the morning mail.’
/>   The chat with Celeste really churned me up. I sat at my desk struggling for calm. After a few minutes I managed to convince myself that Charlie hadn’t wanted Marti’s address so he could kill her. He’d only spoken to her on the phone anyway. Then I experienced another sudden stab of anxiety. Suppose Cullen was playing a waiting game? Suppose he was having me watched? I got up suddenly and walked through to the front office.

  ‘Just going down the street,’ I told my new assistant investigator.

  I walked up to Albert Square. There was no sign of any interest in my movements. Perhaps I was becoming paranoid. I made my way back to the office.

  ‘Fax, just come in from Manila,’ Celeste announced.

  It was from the agency I’d contacted. Angelina Maria Theresa Levy, formerly Angelina Maria Theresa Corazon, had left Manila via Singapore on a flight arriving Manchester on 28 August. So when Mr Levy was hiring me to go to the Philippines his wife had already been back in England for over two weeks. I decided that a personal visit was in order. Meanwhile, Celeste was watching me with an unhealthy eagerness. I was already beginning to understand how Victor Frankenstein felt that night in Ingolstadt when his creation smiled right back at him for the first time.

  ‘Oh yes, Celeste. Now if Mr Levy’s wife’s back in England she’s probably working somewhere local. I’d like you to phone agencies that employ Filipino staff as domestics, waitresses, etcetera and see if they’ve got an Angelina Maria Theresa Corazon on their books. Some of these people can be sticky about giving out names, so be creative, say you know her and would like to employ her again . . . Use your imagination.’

  Celeste looked up at me as if I’d just handed her an Oscar. The phone was already in her hand. I made a rapid departure.

  Mr Levy lived out at Bowdon. I took the long route through Sale and Altrincham rather than the motorway. I needed time to think. There were still aspects of this assignment that puzzled me.

  His house was larger than I expected. An Edwardian building with a double bay front, it was built in the style of Norman Shaw. The original bold bare walls were now partly covered in ivy and the leaded windows were small and horizontal. Steep pitched roofs with tall chimneys gave the building an imposing character. Somehow it looked too grand to be a private residence – it could have served as the headquarters of some secret government department. A jungle of dark vegetation, rhododendrons and pines, provided a suitable backdrop and gave the building an air of isolation and complete privacy. I wondered what had gone through Angelina Corazon’s mind when she was ushered into this building to become the wife of a man she barely knew.

  At the doorstep I searched in vain for a bell. There was an impressive bronze lion’s head with a massive knocker looped through its maw. I struck a couple of heavy blows against the door. The sound hardly had time to reverberate through the house before someone was shifting bolts and turning locks on the other side.

  ‘Oh, it’s you,’ Mr Levy said disappointedly. ‘It could have been my lucky day, yes? Angelina might have come back.’ He reluctantly opened the door and allowed me into the entrance hall. The first thing I noticed was a faint aroma of fresh paint but otherwise it was like stepping into a museum. Facing me, a splendid panelled staircase in light oak was hung with expensive looking pictures. Above the stair landing and looming down over the entrance hall there was a life-size portrait of a woman clad in a long, bilious green gown. Even in full daylight the picture was illuminated by a pair of spotlights. The female portrayed wasn’t Angelina Corazon but a sharp-featured, dark-haired European woman. The artist may have been under instruction to highlight the pearl necklace the woman wore. It certainly blazed out against the dull green background. I took the subject to be Levy’s mother, because there was a strong family resemblance, especially in the eyes and hair.

  Art Nouveau chairs lined the hallway like guardsmen on parade.

  ‘School of Glasgow, aren’t they?’ Mr Levy commented impassively. ‘If you’re going to do something you might as well do it properly. The chairs are genuine C. R. Mackintosh originals.’

  He looked at me expectantly.

  ‘Charles Rennie Mackintosh,’ I responded, like a contestant in a knowledge quiz.

  His eyes lit up. ‘Not for sitting on, are they?’

  ‘I won’t sit on them,’ I assured him.

  ‘Coming in, or just talking?’ he asked pointedly.

  ‘I’d like to do both,’ I muttered.

  Levy led me past the staircase along a corridor that penetrated into the depths of the house. As I walked behind him I studied his jet-black hair minutely. There was no sign that it was dyed, but then Levy could afford the services of an expert hairdresser, Very likely someone called every couple of days to give him a rinse. He led me into a modern kitchen dominated by an immense Aga range. It was unpleasantly warm. Here again the furnishings were elaborate although modern: heavy oak, with innumerable variations on the theme of cupboards. On one wall there was a large framed colour photograph of the same woman who dominated the hall. It looked old and the woman looked younger, in her late twenties. She was wearing pearls again, just a single strand this time. Her dark eyes were an almost luminous shade of brown.

  ‘German fittings,’ Levy said sadly, with the air of someone making polite conversation. ‘They do the best kitchens. I’ve put the best of everything in this house – I’ve had people up from the Whitworth Gallery.’

  ‘I’m not surprised,’ I said.

  ‘We consulted them about the Edwardian décor. I wanted everything right.’

  ‘It’s very impressive.’

  ‘Yes, I’ve had people round from television wanting to use the house as a period location but I couldn’t allow that. Too many might get the wrong idea, yes? Crooks, riffraff and such, eh?’

  ‘Dangerous times we live in,’ I murmured. Levy seemed to be in a world of his own.

  ‘Most people would say that, wouldn’t they? Look after your possessions, that’s what you must do, yes?’

  ‘Everyone should be prudent.’

  ‘You joke me, Mr Cunane?’

  ‘No, no. Not at all,’ I said. ‘Why should you make things easy for them?’ I realised that I was slipping into Mr Levy’s own mode of speech.

  ‘For all the place is worth to me now I’d make them a present of it. I’d help them to load my stuff on their van.’

  ‘You mustn’t think like that.’

  ‘Sit down, Mr Cunane, make yourself at home. Would you like a coffee or something stronger?’ He gestured towards a cupboard which was crammed with bottles of whisky. They were arranged in alphabetical order like books in a library. ‘I collect them,’ he explained. ‘I’ve got over a hundred different kinds of single malt in the house at the moment. Have a glass, I can see you’re tempted. I so rarely have anyone here to drink with, it’ll be a treat for me.’

  ‘It’s a bit early.’

  ‘A conventional type, are you? No, I think not. Go on, have a glass with me.’ He reached down a bottle from an Islay distillery that I’d never heard of.

  ‘Have you seen one like this?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘This is a rare one,’ he said, beaming with pleasure. ‘I have to send off for it. They say the Queen Mother likes it.’

  He stroked the bottle proudly and held it up to the light.

  I laughed. ‘I may not be conventional but with all due respect to royalty I find that lifting my arm at half ten in the morning isn’t a good start for the rest of the day.’

  ‘Go on, Mr Cunane. Those who drink beer will think beer, and those who drink rare whisky will think fine thoughts, yes?’

  ‘Put like that, how can I refuse?’

  ‘You are the wise man of Manchester, aren’t you, Mr Cunane?’ he said as he poured out two healthy shots of the pale, peaty coloured liquid. ‘Charge me for the whole day if you like. I know you’ve something unpleasant to tell me. I’d rather buffer myself before I get the bad news.’

  ‘It’s not necessarily bad news,�
�� I said.

  I estimated that the heavy cut-glass tumbler he pushed towards me cost the equivalent of my disposable income for a week.

  ‘You can put tap water in that if you want, or even Canada Dry,’ he invited. ‘I’m not a purist.’

  I sipped the neat whisky. He smiled at me in apparent pleasure and then took a gulp out of his own glass. Leaning back, he balanced the drink in two hands above his watch chain like an alderman at a civic reception. A solid seeming figure, wearing a dark three-piece suit today, there was nevertheless something desperate about Mr Levy. His formal clothing – suit, crisp white shirt, tie with Windsor knot, diamond cufflinks, polished black shoes – it was all too much. The man looked like a theatrical knight whose dresser has just turned him out for a Royal Command performance.

  ‘Are you on your way somewhere?’ I asked.

  ‘No, I stay in. Angelina might call.’

  ‘I see.’

  The explanation struck me as false. He’d waited two months before doing anything about Angelina’s disappearance and now he was scared to go out in case she turned up?

  When he seemed about as settled as he was going to get I told him that Angelina was back in England and probably in the Manchester area. He didn’t take the news well. First, he blew his nose on a large coloured silk handkerchief, then he wiped his eyes, and finally, to my embarrassment, he began to sob openly. Weeping elderly men are not part of the culture that I’ve been raised in.

  Awkwardly, I went round the table and put my arm on his heaving shoulders. He shook silently for a moment or two and then drew away. Not knowing quite where to put myself, I sat down again. Like a small seismic disturbance the shoulder-heaving grief subsided quickly and Levy poured more whisky into our glasses.

  ‘You think I’m a fool, don’t you? An old man chasing a young woman who only wanted a marriage certificate and a passport.’

  ‘We don’t know what her motives were. Perhaps there was some difficulty and she found it hard to explain it to you.’

  Removing his glasses he wiped the tears away and focused his eyes on me. No longer magnified by his heavy spectacles, his eyes looked small and artificial, like the dark glass buttons on a teddy bear’s face. He gazed at me steadily. The room was quiet apart from the whine of distant engines.