The man was still outside the Mexican restaurant, peering inside now, no doubt wondering how he had missed me. He went inside. Perhaps he had got hungry. Then he came out in a great hurry and began peering into parked cars.
Fear dried my body. I climbed under the counter and made myself as invisible as possible. My hand closed over something small and furry and dead. I nearly screamed, then I realized it was a ball of wool, petrified with age. It was a wool shop, one of those old-fashioned shops that sold knitting patterns and knitting needles and had skeins of wool stacked on shelves on the wall. Not many people knitted these days when a sweater was cheaper to buy ready-made.
I was inhaling dust, drawing shallow breathes, trying not to cough. This had not been a good day for my asthma. There was no way I could stay under the counter. I hunted around for some kind of weapon and found what I wanted - a steel knitting pin, the kind you need four of to knit socks. It was buried in the lower groove of a sliding cabinet door.
I was only half breathing. This did not seem real. Time was something I had forgotten. The beer was having an argument with the corn chowder in my stomach. It was not a happy situation.
There was no one outside now. Suddenly I didn’t care if he was in wait for me. I wanted to be somewhere familiar and safe. My shop. I went out the same way I came in and shadow-shimmied into the tiny parking space behind my shop which I never used. I held the knitting pin point forward. The feel of my key going into the lock of the back door was beautiful. I slipped into my own place like a glove. There was no need to put a light on. I knew every inch of the way. I checked that both front and back doors were locked and bolted.
My spare Ventolin was in the filing cabinet. A few pungent puffs settled my breathing. I switched on the percolator to heat coffee and sat in the Victorian button-back in the dark, stretching and rubbing my aching legs. It looked as if I would have to spend the night here. I put on an extra jersey, composed a new shopping list: spare blanket, sleeping bag, toothbrush.
I felt transparent. I forgot who I was. I was a shade of blind.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The wind went wild in the night. Barking mad. Loose windows rattled, doors shook, cans rolled about in the gutters. I slept fitfully, thinking every sudden noise was someone trying the door. Twice I got up to check on the street outside, seeing alien shadows hovering by every tree, imagining a figure catching sight of me and moving in for the kill.
But no one in their senses would hang about on a night like this. It wasn’t fit for a lugworm to put its head above the sand. The rain slashed at the last lingering autumn leaves, tossing them to the wind; trees groaning in despair, hammering at window panes; each heavy drop a measure of chilled cloud.
I was getting cold so I wrapped myself in some old overcoat which smelled of fusty wardrobes. Charity clothes for surveillance were one thing, to wear them by choice was another. My distaste for the garment was overcome by the fear of frostbite and a greater fear of what waited for me outside.
Could I also sense evil outside?
Suddenly, I realized the whole game was evil. This was no genteel Latching charade. I’d been locked in Trenchers and attacked on the street. Ursula had been half gassed in her home and Ellen Sawtry had been murdered. Not exactly Monopoly.
Any sympathy for Ursula’s persecutor had gone. It had been an emotion chosen to justify my own dislike of Ursula. Cleo was a delightful young woman but she might easily have a new man friend, unmentioned as of yet, unnamed for good reason, someone unscrupulous. Nice women often fall for thugs, philanderers, rakes, blackguards. She was still the number one suspect. But how could she have done all these things? And to her own mother? Hardly dutiful daughter syndrome.
In the dim light of a creeping dawn, I checked the street out front for my stalker. It seemed clear. I started relaxing some.
I boiled some water and woke myself up with a hot wash, soaking my hands up to the elbows in the bowl to bring them back to life. Then I switched on the light in the back room and got out all the junk mail Ursula had given me and spread it out on the floor. I emptied the bag from Ellen’s bedside cabinet and lined up the items alongside the junk mail. I had no idea why. The only reason seemed to be that the two women had lived next door to each other. Perhaps there was a link, a common fingerprint of some kind.
I sat cross-legged on the Persian rug, a mug of black coffee at my side, staring at the evidence. Somewhere amongst all that lot was a scrap of information I had missed. My head began aching from the lack of food and sleep and too much coffee.
There was nothing, nothing at all in the junk mail that I had not scrutinized a dozen times before. Black marker pen on the back of unsolicited mail. Hairnets, grips, old receipts, mostly faded and unreadable. The lid of the booklet of matches flipped open.
Something was written inside. Oh, God, how could I have missed it? There was a phone number scribbled inside. A local number - 596836 - with the Latching code. I swallowed hard. This was the key. This must be the link. It was too early to dial the number but my fingers were twitching.
I picked up the photograph of the garden of The Beeches. I thought it was a photograph of the air-raid shelter. Look at it in a different way, I told myself. This is simply a photo of a garden and forget the shelter. Anyway, why would anyone take a photo of a moldering dump of concrete?
Fence, shrubs, untended flower beds, a rustic seat, a few pots of wilting geraniums. I peered closely at the rustic seat. Something had been carved onto the back of the seat, two words … a name? I got my magnifying glass out of the filing cabinet and squinted at the letters… an L, an V, and was that squiggle at the end an R? Definitely an S, a T, and a Y. The vowels I took a guess at.
It flew together. OLIVER SWANTRY. It was so macabre, putting a seat with your husband’s name in your own garden. How could Ellen have ever sat on it? Yet, according to the Family Records Office, Oliver wasn’t officially dead. But Ellen thought he was dead enough to have bought a memorial seat and an inscription. There were no dates.
Time blurred. I fancied a rustic bench in my memory, somewhere along the coastal path, high on the chalky Seven Sisters, where I could watch the rush and suck of the sea forever.
I sat back, staring at the photograph in my hand, trying to ground these torments. It was telling me something but the message wasn’t getting through. Was taking that photograph Ellen’s way of leaving a message to the world but what the hell was it?
I had to know more about how she died. I had to have the autopsy report. DI James, you have got to come clean. Forget it, forget it, I flailed at myself. This isn’t your case. Ursula Carling is your meal-ticket. Let the efficient West Sussex Police Force work out the nun. You’ve already given them enough help.
But I wanted justice for Ellen Swantry. She deserved it. I wanted to know who killed her and why.
Six-twenty a.m. I could hardly start making phone calls at dawn. Detective Inspector James came strongly into my mind, tall bodied and cool of eye and I lost all concentration. Damn the man. Get out of my life, get out of my mind.
I needed warming up and cleansing. The health club would be open soon. I could do with a sauna and steam bath and half an hour in the hot Jacuzzi.
The health club was in an old converted school house, pebble-dashed, gabled, cobbled yard. There was a faded sepia photograph in the reception area of the school taken in 1860 with rows of obedient children in pinafores sitting on benches in the dusty sunshine.
I took off my clothes in the changing room and stuffed them in an empty locker. I didn’t have 20 pence for the lock. A warm shower ran off my body in a gentle caress. I had the place to myself so I didn’t even bother with a towel as a sarong.
Billows of searing steam blew into my face as I opened the patterned glass door to the steam room. Thick eddies rose from the vents, white and pure vapour. God, it was hot. Gingerly I sat on the wet plastic bench, drawing my knees up to my chest in case someone else was there. By the time my eyes became used to the h
ot fog, I realized I was alone.
My twitchy airways drank in the steam, became soothed and lubricated by the damp heat. They relaxed and almost immediately my breathing was infinitely easier. Next to the sea, this was the best place in the world for me. I imagined James with me, stretched out on the other bench, his skin glistening with sweat, tendrils of hair on his body dripping with moisture. I knew there would be dark hair on his arms from glimpses of his wrists. Once I’d seen him in his shirt sleeves with the cuffs pushed up. I shuddered with desire. It was time to close my eyes and surrender to dreams.
There came a point when I could stand the heat no longer. I made myself stand under the shock of a cold shower, then went into the decadently warm and bubbling Jacuzzi, sinking down to my neck, feeling the jets of pummeling water massage the ache out of my body.
One day, when I was very rich, when I had both time and money, I would have a Jacuzzi in my own home to soak in every day. I would offer calling friends a casual twenty minutes in the Jacuzzi and we would stand our mugs of tea on the floral tiled edge and poke each other with inquisitive toes. The room would be white marble walled with Grecian columns in each corner and loops of green garlands strung round the plinths. There would be a concealed hi-fi system with button controls at hand and I would play Grover Washington Jnr. and Spiro Giro, George Michael and Simply Red, till my more classical friends screamed for mercy.
I thought I heard someone go into the sauna but I did not open my eyes. After another cold shower, I went back into the steam room. I would finish off with ten minutes in the sauna, then be ready for the day. My breathing was near normal by now. The steam was growing thick and undisturbed. I stretched out, accustomed to the heat now.
I don’t think I fell asleep but I certainly dozed off for a few moments. There hadn’t been much sleep during the cold night. Some sound woke me up. I half expected to find a pink and naked woman peering around the glass door and coming in to join me. The sauna suite had designated male and female times. No mixed bathing in Latching.
Clouds of fresh steam billowed out of the vents. It worked on a thermostat system. Suddenly it was far too hot for me. I might faint if I stayed in any longer.
I peered towards the door, looking for the push bar and leaned on it. It didn’t move. I pushed harder. It was a heavy glass door, self closing. What was happening? It was impossible to move. A new wave of hot steam seared my back. The system was going berserk.
“Take it easy,” I murmured grimly. I didn’t panic. Not yet. It was only a technical hiccup. The door was stuck, suction or something. One extra push would break the air lock. I gave it a sharp, hard shove.
But nothing happened. I sank down onto the floor where it was a few degrees cooler. I was starting to wilt, struggling for breath. This was ridiculous. A tremor of fear began to grip me. The steam was as thick as broth now.
I was becoming afraid, very afraid. Cold fear and panic to my bones released adrenaline. Without it, I would die. There must be a panic button somewhere. Wasn’t it a Health and Safety regulation?
My eyes were smarting but I made myself crawl up onto the benches, to feel around. I searched the streaming walls for some indentation. They were running with water, slippery and silky. I was never going to come here again. I was finished with steam rooms. This was a nightmare.
I was beginning to shake and gasp. My skin was on fire. I couldn’t touch it. I ached with terror. Scalding was a terrible injury. I’d seen children scalded by kettles of boiling water, or saucepans of soup stock tipped sideways, their skin peeling off like tissue paper.
It was becoming more difficult to breath. I took in rapid, shallow mouthfuls. I dropped to my knees again, as the heat was a few degrees less intense nearer the floor. My lungs were grateful for the more acceptable air but the relief did not last long. The vents were blasting out hot steam as if in a frenzy that an Ice Age had descended on Sussex, freezing Latching in its grip.
I felt around the streaming walls again for the panic button. Where the hell was it? Surely there was one though I had never noticed it during my many visits to the health club. I was groping about in lowlying cloud, like a primeval monster in a disaster movie.
“Help! Help!” I started to shout although I knew the room was sealed. I banged on the door frantically. I was beginning to feel like a shrimp cooking. Any minute now I would shed my skin.
“Please … someone, help me.”
There was nothing, absolutely nothing, with which to break the door. The steam room was empty of anything but plastic benches. If I’d been locked in the sauna, I could have swung the bucket, the ladle, ripped up the wooden racks to use as missiles. But the steam room was completely bare. My nails sought cracks in the tiled floor in case one of them was loose. How about the ceiling? I couldn’t even see it.
The heat higher up was unbearable. I held my breath for a count of ten as I stood up. My lungs couldn’t manage much longer. Sweat was pouring off me. But my fingers had found a round shape at the top of the wall. I had to drop down for a moment, gasping and coughing, then with a last effort stood upright again. It was a button, recessed into the wall. I thumped it hard, again and again. A tiny, red winking light came on, barely discernible through the blanket of steam.
The staff kept me immersed in a bath of cooling lukewarm water till my fingers were wrinkled like prunes and I was definitely beginning to sprout a tiny fish tail. I obediently drank pints of water, swallowed salt tablets. The management were hopelessly apologetic. They’d discovered the thermostat was on the blink. They couldn’t explain the faulty door but maintenance were looking at it. An ambulance arrived. They wanted to cart me away still naked because of the reddened and tender skin. Riding naked in an ambulance was not my idea of a scenic tour of Latching.
“Look, the skin isn’t actually swollen or broken,” I protested, still shaking. “Wrap me in a bag or something.”
They settled for cling film and then a supportive light cotton sheet. They put me in a side room off Ward 3 at Latching Hospital. Coming to this hospital was getting monotonous. They’d be naming a bed after me soon. A young doctor thought I was light relief at the end of his night shift and began laughing.
“Locked in a steam room?” he grinned.
“Not funny,” I said as he fixed a saline drip in my arm.
“Sorry. It seems funny. It’s been a long night of hernias, gall stones, perforated ulcers. No pretty girls with nothing on.”
“OK, I understand. Ouch.”
“Does that hurt?”
I nodded. “First degree burns usually do.”
“I’ll get the nurse to put on a paraffin gauze dressing. At least it’s all very clean. Anywhere else that needs wrapping up?”
“The soles of my feet. Palm of my hands. My nose …”
When DI James arrived in the doorway, I looked like someone practicing to be an Egyptian mummy. Some bits of me were still visible. I was only wearing a thin blue hospital robe. He spotted the bruise on my throat.
“Who did that?” he asked, reaching the bed in three strides.
“Some joker with a problem and a pad of chloroform. That was last night.” I didn’t know what else to say. I was surprised to see him. I never thought to see him again, not after our last meeting.
“You didn’t report it. What’s going on? This is an official visit. The hospital called us. They were not happy with the circumstances of your injuries.”
“That makes several of us,” I said. “I am certainly not happy with the circumstances. The thermostat was tampered with and somehow the door mechanism fouled up.”
DI James was being official. I was glad about that but I couldn’t help wishing for some glimmer of anxiety.
“I’ll get it checked out. Do you think someone was trying to kill you?”
“Do I, heck? All I know is, it gave me one big fright. Perhaps they were trying to scare me off. Look, James, I’m getting really close to knowing more about Ellen Swantry’s murder. And I want to ask you abo
ut the autopsy. I need the details, to know exactly how she died. Were there any traces of chloroform?”
He touched the bruises on my throat very gently, looking at them this way and that. I almost stopped breathing. The feel of his hands on my skin was like a salve. He was so close. I could see sprinklings of grey hairs touching his temples.
His face was very near. The air was perfumed with his male smell. I tried to breathe the air that he exhaled.
“Jordan? Who did this to you?”
“I don’t know. Some man followed me from the station, caught hold of me round the neck …” I wouldn’t let myself get upset, but I was close, inching towards female collapse. I stared at the window blinds, hoping they’d calm me.
“Look, Jordan. This is no joke. They are trying to frighten you off, that’s for sure. Maybe something about Ursula Carling is getting tricky. You haven’t solved that one yet.”
“Don’t rub it in … it’s like trying to find an invisible man or woman. I don’t know what to do next or where to look. It’s all dead ends. Everything I follow up leads to nowhere. James, I need your help.”
“No, nothing doing, Jordan. You know I can’t. And keep out of my case before you get really hurt. Doesn’t all this tell you something, you idiot? Someone out there thinks you know something and they are determined to shut you up, anyway that works. Next time you might not be able to find a panic button.”
It was like diving into a dream. I had such a feeling of attachment to this man but it was obvious he did not feel the same. I was a nuisance. I wanted to ask him out, to suggest a concert or a walk on the wetly bleached beach, knowing that I would regret it for the rest of my life if I didn’t even try. A moment only happens once and I let the moment pass.
“I suppose you’re right,” I said meekly.
Jordan Lacey Mystery 01 Pray and Die Page 17
