The Elephant Girl (Choc Lit)

by Gyland, Henriette

  ‘You’re saying my aunt is a fence?’

  ‘Not really. She just facilitates the sale. And charges a commission which she doesn’t declare to the tax man.’

  ‘But some of those figures had to do with objects already sold through the auction house.’

  ‘So the auction is rigged, then,’ said Charlie.

  ‘The bidding is open to the floor,’ Helen pointed out. ‘You can’t rig an auction unless the auctioneer is in on it.’

  ‘Probably gets a bit on the side.’

  ‘There are rules and regulations, Charlie. Guidance from the Department of Trade and Industry, the Office of Fair Trading—’

  ‘You can easily get by those.’

  Helen laughed. ‘You watch too much TV.’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Charlie, ‘But I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a hefty trade going on, and a lot of money involved. And if some of that money changes hands under the table, it’s usually because it’s dirty.’

  Helen went still. This could be bigger than she’d imagined. If Charlie was right, and if this scam had been running a long time, some of Ransome’s clients were very ruthless, ruthless enough to kill if there was someone interfering.

  Or perhaps Mimi had been a dodgy dealer too, and ended up on the wrong side of one of these individuals?

  It was her mother who’d agreed to meet her killer at some godforsaken hour, irresponsibly bringing her five-year-old daughter. Her mother that had brought a bag of paperwork to the meeting.

  Her mother who’d choked on her own blood, while her child lay helpless on the back seat, potentially the killer’s next victim.

  The thought that her whole world may have been turned upside down over something as base as dirty money twisted inside her like a knife slicing through butter, but she couldn’t back down now. She had to get to the bottom of it, whatever ‘it’ was.

  Even if it meant finding out things about her mother she’d rather had remained buried.

  ‘Please don’t say anything about my connections,’ said Helen when they got back. ‘I’m not exactly proud of them.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Just … don’t, okay?’

  Charlie shrugged. ‘Sure, have your little secrets. It’s nothing to me.’

  ‘Promise?’

  ‘Cross my heart and hope to die.’

  Don’t say that, thought Helen. Don’t say that.

  She handed the parcel to Letitia, who was on the phone and only acknowledged her with a nod. She would have liked a chance to speak to Ruth, to see if she’d imagined the look that passed between them earlier, but Ruth was no longer there, and she was left alone with her thoughts. Cup of tea in hand, she sat on the steps to the loading bay, a favourite spot for the smokers, but no one chose that moment to sneak out for an unscheduled cigarette break.

  It was funny how lies always begot more lies and landed you in a right old mess.

  Now both Jason and Charlie knew who she really was. She could probably trust Charlie not to say anything for the moment, but soon she’d have to come out with it, and what would happened then? When she left India, she’d never expected to make friends with her colleagues and her house mates, and suddenly a lot more was at stake than finding out what happened with her mother.

  She thought of her new friends in turn. Jason and Charlie. Bill and Jim. Lee, after a fashion.

  Fay.

  The name echoed in her head. Her mother’s killer.

  Or not.

  Fay was guilty of harassment and stalking, but she may be innocent of murder. If Helen’s mother had been a whistle-blower or involved in something bad, and got herself killed in the process, then instead of committing murder, Fay could have, by following Mimi around, actually saved Helen’s life simply by being there. By going down for it despite not being able to remember anything, she had ensured no one came looking for a five-year-old witness.

  Helen had harboured feelings of hatred and resentment for twenty years, feelings which had played a far greater part in making her into the person she was than the actual loss of her mother. Was it possible she should have been feeling gratitude all of these years instead?

  Chapter Eighteen

  Jason turned the key, revved the engine and felt the motorbike thrum to life under him. The bike was Trevor’s, an old Triumph Bonneville he’d spent years restoring, and it had taken a great deal of persuasion on Jason’s part to get him to hand over the keys in exchange for Trevor needing to borrow his van for the day.

  ‘Just make sure you bring her back in one piece, or you’re dead meat,’ grumbled Trevor. ‘Oh, and one other thing, that company name you mentioned, the one your bird works for—’

  ‘She’s not my bird.’

  ‘Well, whatever. Anyway, I think I’ve seen that name before. Lucy sometimes brings work home, and I’m sure I saw it in some of her papers. Why don’t you ask her?’

  ‘Okay, will do.’ Jason revved the engine again and grinned when Trevor waved him off with an impatient gesture.

  He’d made Trevor feel guilty about not being able to operate his stall without his van to cart everything back and forth, but truthfully he didn’t mind. He needed to work on the house anyway. But as he rode home, something Lee had told him this morning in the kitchen, about Helen standing outside the door to Fay’s room at night, was playing like a loop in his mind. Jason had believed her when she said she wasn’t planning to harm Fay, but what if he’d made a mistake? Why was she creeping around?

  Okay, so Lee crept about too, but he didn’t live under the same roof as someone convicted of murdering his mother.

  Jason changed course and headed towards Helen’s work. He’d see if she could take a break, maybe invite her out for coffee, then give her a chance to explain herself.

  Just as he pulled up to Ransome & Daughters, he saw Helen get in a taxi. On the hope that she’d have a few minutes to spare for him when they got to wherever she was headed, he gunned the engine, pulled out into the traffic and followed. When she got out on Piccadilly and hopped on the back of a scooter, his first thought was that she’d seen him and was trying to give him the slip.

  Then another thought hit him. She had a boyfriend she hadn’t said anything about.

  She didn’t have to, of course. Tell him about her private life. But that didn’t stop the feeling of jealousy creeping up on him. Flexing his fingers, he tightened his grip on the handle bars. He could hardly accuse her of playing with him, but when they were together, he’d got the sense that there wasn’t anyone else.

  When Helen and Scooter Man pulled up outside Stephanov’s town house, and Scooter Man took off his helmet, Jason nearly laughed. What an idiot he’d been – he’d completely forgotten that Charlie was working as a courier now.

  That didn’t explain why Helen was introducing Charlie to her uncle though, when she’d asked Jason not to mention the connection. At least he knew it couldn’t have anything to do with harming Fay, because Charlie would never be party to that. But why were Helen and Charlie covertly meeting up in the middle of traffic, sneaking off to meet with her Russian uncle?

  Spying on Helen was ridiculous. He should come forward, let her know he was there. Or better yet, drive away. But if his instincts were wrong about her, and Fay or Charlie suffered for it … He drove around the corner and into a small side road, where he had a view of the house without being too obvious.

  They emerged fifteen minutes later. Helen, carrying a smallish flat parcel and an envelope, stopped on the pavement and they seemed to debate something. Then Helen glanced around her, resting her eyes on him for a second, but he was safely disguised by Trevor’s helmet so she didn’t recognise him. The girls got back on the scooter.

  Jason followed them as discreetly as he could, but Charlie’s driving was erratic and in total disregard of the Highway Code, and he nearly lost them. They stopped outside a traditional pub with seating outside and hanging baskets planted with ivy and trailing petunias. He drove past and parked the bike behind
a large van, then walked back and peered through the window of the pub. They were sitting in the far corner with the parcel on a table between them, and Charlie had a ‘don’t-argue-with-me’ expression on her face.

  Uh-oh, he thought, I know that look.

  Helen opened the parcel, but he was too far away to see what it was, and he couldn’t go inside because they’d recognise him. He leaned against the wall and wondered what to do.

  A gate opened to the pub’s back yard, and a youth came out dragging a garden hose with a long spout. Watching him watering the hanging baskets, Jason had an idea.

  ‘Would you like to earn a quick fifty quid? Don’t worry, it’s nothing dirty,’ he added when the kid sent him a horrified look.

  ‘What do I ’ave to do?’

  ‘See those girls there at the back? I want you to find out what they’re looking at.’

  ‘Thass all?’

  ‘That’s all, yes.’

  ‘Gimme a minute.’ The youth dragged the hose back into the yard, and Jason followed him just inside the fence in case Helen and Charlie came out while he was waiting. A few minutes later the youth returned holding a cloth and a Tupperware of water. ‘I pretended I was, like, wiping the tables,’ he said, clearly pleased with his own cleverness. ‘They didn’t even no’ice.’

  ‘Did you see what it was?’

  ‘Money first.’

  Jason handed him two crumpled twenty pound notes and a tenner, which were crammed into a jeans pocket faster than lightning.

  ‘It’s some kind of wooden book, but it’s like a painting as well, know what I mean?’

  ‘Not quite. Did you see the motif?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘What was on the painting?’

  ‘Something you might see in church. Like a saint.’

  Like a saint, Jason thought. Grinning, for the first time he actually found himself thanking his father for his expensive education. It sounded like they could be looking at an icon. It was the right size for the parcel he’d glimpsed in Helen’s hand, and it fitted with the Russian connection. But was it significant? He had no idea, but wondered what had made them open it. Couriers didn’t normally open the parcels they were carrying, and he’d even heard of some who’d carried drugs or cash without knowing it.

  He could hardly ask them. With a sigh he got back on the bike and drove in the direction of Tower Bridge. There was one other person he could ask.

  Ms Barclay pursed her lips when he entered the inner sanctum. ‘We’re in a foul mood today. Be warned.’

  Jason grinned. ‘I’ll call you if there’s any trouble. He respects you.’

  ‘I bet you say that to all the girls.’

  ‘Wouldn’t you like to know? In the meantime, could you look after this for me, please?’ He passed her the motorcycle helmet. ‘I can do without a cross-examination.’

  ‘Very wise.’

  Derek was on the phone. He held up a hand to stop him from interrupting, and Jason dropped into one of the squishy armchairs, content to wait. The office hadn’t changed since the last time he was here apart from a vase of strongly scented roses in pride of place on the desk. Ms Barclay, he thought, probably from her garden, although he doubted if his father could tell the difference between home-grown and shop-bought. That woman could tame lions.

  ‘What do you want?’ Derek snapped when he’d finished on the phone.

  ‘Nice to see you too, Dad.’

  Derek smiled, of sorts. ‘How are you, son?’

  ‘Very well, but I didn’t come here to discuss my health. You’re a collector of rare and expensive items.’ He flung out his arms to indicate his father’s office in general: the paintings, the statue, the desk with its gilded ink stand and period-piece paraphernalia. ‘Tell me what you know about icons.’

  ‘Turkish? Greek? Russian?’

  ‘Yes, Russian,’ Jason replied.

  ‘What do you want to know?’

  ‘Market. How they get into this country. Authenticity. Anything else which might be relevant.’

  Derek’s eyebrows rose, and he looked amused. ‘Market is good, not saturated, but they’re expensive. Collectors’ items only. They come from Russia, obviously, or other countries belonging to the Russian Orthodox Church. Value depends on age and condition. The older they are, the more they’ll fetch. The Byzantine ones are incredibly valuable. But that’s all stuff you can look up on Wikipedia. Why come to me?’

  ‘I want to know about the darker side of the trade.’

  His father laughed. ‘And you think I know?’

  ‘Well, don’t you?’ He held his father’s eyes.

  Derek rose and went to mix himself a drink from a silver tray on a wall-mounted cabinet. Like the rest of the furniture in his father’s office, the cabinet was sleek and modern. One of the doors concealed a mini fridge, and his father pulled out an aircraft-sized can of tonic water.

  ‘Drink?’

  ‘A tonic without the gin would be very nice, thanks.’ It was a delaying tactic, and Jason decided to lull his father into a false sense of security by giving him time to consider his answer. He’d get it soon enough.

  His father handed him a tumbler of tonic water with ice, poured himself a drink, then sat back in his office chair with his hands behind his head. The posture signalled superiority, but Jason saw through that too. It struck him that he’d managed to rattle his father’s cage, and that he was trying hard not to show it. He sipped his tonic to hide his own smirk.

  Interesting.

  ‘What if it was really old?’

  ‘Well, there are rules and regulations about that. Russia tends to hold onto her treasures these days. Anything over a hundred years old is hard to come by.’

  ‘And if I wanted to buy a really old one anyway? Like a Byzantine one.’

  Derek heaved a sigh. ‘You could buy one which has been “authenticated” to be newer than that. There’s always a way.’ He sent Jason a hard look. ‘Thinking of starting a collection?’

  ‘Yeah, with what?’

  ‘Or is it another Russian you’re interested in?’

  ‘As far as I’m aware she’s not for sale.’

  ‘Everyone has their price, even Little Orphan Annie,’ said Derek. ‘Yes, I’ve done my homework,’ he added in response to Jason’s surprise. ‘Now, if that’s all …?’

  The realisation that her mother may have died because of dirty money was strangely other-worldly, and Helen made one mistake after another in her work. Bill didn’t hide his frustration. ‘Come on, come on, this is no time to hang about. We need to mark up this lot ’ere before the end of the day.’ They were working on a consignment of Chinese vases which were being auctioned off the following morning.

  Shutting out Bill’s grumbling, Helen lifted one of the vases out of a packaging crate and turned it over in her hands. According to the accompanying notes, it originated from China, in the style of Ming Dynasty antiques, but if Charlie was right, it could be an original. Not being an antiques expert, she had no way of telling.

  She was still studying it when Letitia walked past the door to the packing room in a swish of Shantung silk and clattering stilettos.

  On a whim she let the vase drop, and it smashed on the concrete floor.

  ‘Oops,’ she said. ‘God, I’m so sorry.’

  The room fell silent, and Bill stared at her, mouth opening and closing like a goldfish. Letitia stopped, turned, and reappeared in the packing room, the clattering heels echoing in the silence.

  Helen stuck out her chin. ‘Just as well it was only a copy.’

  ‘A copy?’ A small muscle worked in Letitia’s jaw.

  ‘It says so in the paperwork. But you can take the money out of my pay anyway.’

  Letitia cleared her throat. ‘No, there’s no need for that. We’re insured against human error, among other things. Have to be in this business.’ She looked at the shattered vase on the floor, drew herself up, then smiled coolly. ‘I’d better call the owner. The overall responsibility i
s mine.’

  She left the room, and the scent of her perfume lingered in the air with a sense of doom.

  Bill grabbed Helen roughly and dragged her to the staff room, then slammed the door. ‘What’s your game, girl?’ he hissed. ‘What are you playing at?’

  ‘It’s no game.’

  He shook her hard, then let go of her. ‘If you know what’s good for you, you stay well away. You hear?’

  Rubbing her arm, Helen winced. The old geezer had fingers of steel.

  But it wasn’t steel which tinged his voice, but regret, when he added, ‘Said the same to your mother a long time ago, but would she listen?’

  ‘What do you know, Bill?’

  ‘Nothing. Nothing at all.’

  ‘Bullshit.’

  He glared at her and stabbed her in the chest with his finger. ‘And neither do you.’

  ‘This is important to me,’ she said, crossing her arms. ‘I’ve waited all my life to find out what happened to my mother and why. I’m not going to stop now. If you don’t tell me what I need to know, I’ll just keep digging until I find out for myself.’

  ‘I bleedin’ well hope not. ’Cos you might just be digging your own grave.’

  ‘Is my aunt a fence?’

  Bill sent her a startled look. ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘Well, is she?’ she repeated, cross with Charlie for planting the idea in her head in the first place.

  ‘First and foremost, your aunt’s a successful business woman,’ he replied with a pained expression.

  ‘And apart from that?’

  ‘Many things, I suppose. She has a good standing in the industry. A lot of contacts, as you’d expect, some of them from the, shall we say, shadier side of life. Sometimes she bends the rules. But a fence … that’s a bit strong. You’d better be careful throwing words like that around. Someone might take it amiss.’

  ‘I’ve got nothing to lose.’

  Bill didn’t comment. Instead he said, ‘I’d like you to stay in here for the rest of the day until I figure out what to do with you. Can’t have you in the packing room if you’re going to be Miss Butterfingers. It’d be my head on the block if you break something else.’