Sunday Morning Coming Down: A Frieda Klein Novel (7)

by Nicci French

  ‘Is there something new?’

  ‘This is the only story that matters at the moment.’

  ‘What have you got that all the other papers haven’t?’

  ‘That’s why I need time. I’ve covered this from the start.’

  ‘I was thinking of getting Suzie to do a feature on it. Woman’s angle.’

  Blackstock could feel the rage in his chest, thick as sludge. His eyes burned. The yard looked white in the glare of the day; the sky shimmered an electric blue. ‘I know everything there is to know about Frieda Klein,’ he said. ‘I’ve been there from the start. I’m the one who should write about it. And if I get something fresh, then the paper can syndicate it all over the world.’

  There was a silence. Money always did the trick.

  ‘I’ll give you till after the weekend.’

  ‘Where are you off to?’

  ‘Work. Or had you forgotten I worked? Paid the bills, put food on the table.’

  ‘I work too,’ Lee said timidly.

  Blackstock looked at his wife. She worked in a residential care home. She came back, especially after a night shift, smelling different, something sweet and sharp. When he thought of what she did – the physical stuff, the bodily stuff – it made him shudder. The pay was pitiful. He didn’t tell people at work what she did: he said she was a teacher.

  ‘Right. See you.’

  ‘Do you know when …’

  But he’d left, stepping out into the warmth of the morning and feeling his spirits lift. He glanced at his mobile: he just had time to pay a quick visit to his secret room, the one where he felt most fully himself, and then he would have a look at Frieda.

  There were still a few photographers in Saffron Mews, but they told him that Frieda Klein had left earlier in the morning, striding past them without so much as lifting her head for a photograph. Blackstock thought for a moment, then turned away. He went instead to where he knew her consulting rooms were, in the mansion block less than ten minutes’ walk from her house. It stood overlooking a cratered building site.

  He bought himself a large cup of coffee from the store on the corner and shook in three sugars. His whole body was pulsing with anticipation and excitement and he felt he needed energy. He had been here just a few days ago, watching like this; that was when he had seen Rossiter go into the building and then he had seen him come out again, his face blazing with rage, and he had known, just known, that he was one of Frieda’s and ripe for the picking. He kept seeing Morgan Rossiter’s face as he toppled, as he died, and seeing his own figure as well, standing over him. It was like replaying a film, over and over.

  He sat on a bench across the road from the building, where he could keep an eye on the exit. He knew that each morning she came here, but had assumed that after Rossiter’s death she would be taking time off. He chuckled softly to himself: typical Frieda Klein, if she’d gone back to work straight away. Not like his wife. When Lee had a cold, she’d take to her bed with a pile of tissues and lots of magazines.

  He drank his coffee. A few feet away a man in shabby clothes was playing his violin, its case open for coins. Daniel Blackstock’s phone rang and he looked at the screen. It was work, so he didn’t answer. They’d given him till after the weekend. Fifteen minutes later, it rang once more. This time it was Lee. He pushed it back into his pocket. At just before midday he saw a familiar figure: short, scrawny, ginger-haired, flat-chested, wearing sneakers, as if she was a teenager not an adult. The detective. Petra Burge. He was about to shrink out of sight when he remembered: he had a right to be here. He was a reporter, a Frieda Klein reporter. However much he followed her, it wouldn’t be suspicious. He sat up straighter, waiting for her to notice him but she didn’t look round, just pushed her way through the doors and out of sight.

  ‘The public are eager to help,’ said Petra.

  ‘That’s good, isn’t it?’

  Frieda was sitting in her red armchair, and Petra was opposite her, where patients usually sat. Between them was a low table and a box of tissues; on the wall was a drawing, on the windowsill a flowering plant. It was cool and quiet in this room, a haven from the hot roar of Oxford Street just minutes away and the heaving building site just outside the window.

  ‘Hundreds and thousands of them. We can’t keep up. So far, it’s simply taking up a lot of time. By the way, Professor Hal Bradshaw contacted me. He thought I could use his expertise.’

  Frieda could feel that Petra was observing her reaction. ‘Why are you telling me?’

  ‘I know you two have a history.’

  ‘How did you respond to his offer?’

  ‘I thanked him politely. He’s going to be presenting a big television series about twenty-first-century killers, including Dean Reeve and all the latest developments. I thought I should warn you.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘They’ll want to interview you.’

  ‘I think I’m done with all of that.’

  ‘He’s contacting people who know you.’

  Frieda’s heart sank. She stood up and crossed to the window. ‘When I first came here, there were houses. I saw the wrecking ball demolish them all. It happened so quickly – one day they were there and the next gone, just rubble on the ground. Then the work was stopped for a while and kids moved in and made it into a kind of playground for themselves. They had games of football out there. Teenagers went there to smoke or take drugs or just lose themselves for a while. Lovers came. Lonely people. There were lots of foxes at night. And now it’s all started up again, the digging and the building. That’s London. It changes all the time.’

  ‘After I’ve gone through everything with you once more, I’m going to talk to Chloë, at length.’

  ‘She says she’s being badgered by the press. Her name got out, after all.’

  ‘It usually does.’

  ‘So why are you wanting to interview her again?’

  ‘I have to start somewhere.’

  ‘Why with her?’

  ‘There’s a theory that the first crime someone commits is the impulsive one. After that, they get more planned. So the first crime can reveal more.’

  ‘A theory,’ said Frieda. She wrinkled her brow.

  Petra nodded. ‘It’s certainly true that with serial murders, for instance, the first body tends to be nearest to the perpetrator’s home.’

  ‘It sounds a bit dubious to me.’

  ‘Nevertheless, when I leave here I’m going to Walthamstow to talk to your niece.’

  ‘But she doesn’t remember anything more than last time you talked to her.’

  ‘She met this person. She might know him, or know people who know him. It’s not going to help her or any of you to be protective. We have to investigate everybody, everything.’

  Frieda looked at her broodingly. ‘You’re right, of course.’

  ‘But?’

  ‘I can’t help feeling there’s something I’m missing. Something I’m not seeing.’

  ‘That’s something I can relate to.’ Petra looked around her. ‘So this is where you see your patients.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And transform their neurotic misery into common unhappiness.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I said –’

  ‘I know what you said. You’ve been reading Freud.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Petra, defensively.

  ‘Because of me?’

  Petra shrugged. ‘I thought it might help me in my enquiries.’

  ‘Has it?’

  ‘Not exactly. But it’s interesting.’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘How strange everyone is, even to themselves, how mysterious.’

  On her way out, Petra saw one of the journalists who had interviewed Frieda hanging around on the other side of the road, presumably waiting for her to come out. What was his name? Daniel something. He was always at the press conferences. He’d done a pretty good job, accurate at least. Shortish, with a pigeon chest, beaky nose. He always wore hi
s trousers pulled too high up his waist. She ignored him.

  40

  At eleven o’clock that evening, when Frieda was reading a book in her living room, there was a banging at her door. She lifted the cat off her lap and went to answer.

  ‘Are you all right?’ Chloë didn’t look all right. Her cheeks were blotchy and her expression desolate as she tumbled over the threshold. ‘How did you get here?’

  ‘Don’t worry. I got a cab, and there are two police officers at the entrance of the mews, in case you didn’t know.’

  ‘I did. Come and sit down. Here.’ Frieda gestured to a chair on one side of the hearth, where every winter evening a fire burned. ‘Is there anything in particular? I know Petra Burge was coming to interview you.’

  ‘It’s not that.’ Chloë made an impatient gesture, running her hand through her hair. ‘It’s not as if I don’t go over it in my head all the time.’

  Frieda nodded. ‘So if not that, what?’

  ‘It’s William. You remember I told you about him. William McCollough. He’s the new guy at the workshop.’

  ‘I remember,’ said Frieda. She also remembered what Rudkin had found out about him: that he had been in care, had been abused as a child, had a criminal record for theft and drugs.

  ‘I told her about him. Not just him. Everyone I worked with, of course. But he’s the one they’re interested in. A couple of detectives came back a few hours later and then he went off in their car with them.’

  ‘That doesn’t necessarily mean anything.’

  ‘He was staring at me as he went, as if I’d betrayed him.’

  ‘You just answered the questions you were asked, which is what you have to do.’

  ‘You don’t think it could have been him?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘He’s sweet. A bit odd. He’s got long grey hair in a ponytail and he won’t meet your eye and he mumbles when he talks. I feel sorry for him.’

  ‘The police have to investigate everyone.’

  ‘I know. But they’re not investigating my other workmates. Anyway, that’s not all.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘I stayed late. We were all a bit upset and Robbie – he’s one of the guys, we dated for a bit but now we’re just friends – he went and got some beers and we sat around talking. I told them everything that had happened.’ She looked at Frieda, her face smudged and anxious. ‘It was good. They were great about it. I don’t know why I hadn’t been able to say anything before.’

  ‘And that’s why you’re upset now?’

  ‘Sorry. I keep getting sidetracked. Suddenly a journalist turned up. Why had William McCollough been taken in for questioning? Did we have suspicions?’

  Frieda didn’t reply.

  ‘How the hell did she even know?’

  ‘Police officers leak information like that.’

  ‘She was all smiley and friendly and unbelievably persistent.’

  ‘Let me guess. Liz Barron.’

  ‘Do you know her?’

  ‘We’ve met.’ She thought of Liz Barron’s fresh and shining face, her implacable girlishness.

  ‘She was saying all these things about Will. How he’d been abused as a child. How he’d been a drug addict and been in prison for theft. It was horrible. She was pretending to be sympathetic, but all the time she was insinuating that if you’ve been abused as a child, then you’re going to be an abuser as an adult. That’s not true, is it?’

  ‘It probably isn’t,’ said Frieda. ‘But it can be.’

  ‘It’ll be in all the papers now, won’t it?’

  ‘I think it will.’

  ‘This is because of me. I don’t believe it was Will. I just don’t. I think I’d know.’

  ‘I thought you said you were the Frieda Klein expert.’

  ‘What?’

  Daniel Blackstock was bleary with sleep: he’d been woken by his phone ringing and he saw that, although it was getting light outside, it was not yet six. He sat up in bed. Lee was working nights for the rest of the week so he was alone in the house: that was good.

  ‘I’ve just spoken to the night editor. You said you knew everything there was to know about Frieda Klein,’ his editor said.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So how come Liz Barron’s got a scoop and you’ve got nothing?’

  ‘What’s the scoop?’

  ‘Does the name William McCollough ring any bells?’

  ‘William McCollough?’

  ‘A joiner who works with the niece. Creepy-looking guy. He was taken in for questioning yesterday afternoon. It looks like they might have found their man. Why does Liz Barron know about this and not you?’

  Daniel Blackstock’s brain was working slowly. He got out of bed and opened the curtains, blinking in the onrush of light. He had never even heard of McCollough. ‘I’ll go and read what she says and get back to you,’ he said.

  ‘I want something online by nine. Then we’ll talk.’

  He sat in his small bare study and turned on his computer. Liz Barron’s article occupied the entire front page of the Daily News, under a photo of McCollough, who looked seedy and furtive, his long hair in a ponytail and his eyes half closed. There was a double-page spread as well, with more pictures of McCollough, and also a photo he’d seen many times before of Frieda Klein and a smaller one of her niece, Chloë Klein. He paused, looking at both women. He felt an intimacy with them, a connection. He remembered the day he had handed Frieda the envelope, their fingers touching, her eyes looking into his.

  What to do? There would be a great media clamour now. McCollough suited the part all right: he was just the kind of person the public wanted to be a killer, a damaged loner. Then it would die down. He had to find a way of using this. He was thinking more clearly now. He’d had an idea, a good idea. He could feel that he was getting better at this.

  William McCollough’s doorbell was ringing. His phone was ringing. He pulled back the curtain and looked out of the window. A small crowd was on the pavement, staring up. Lights flashed at him, and he jolted back. He sat on his bed and put his face into his hands. He tried to block out the sound of the world, but the phone went on ringing, ringing, ringing and they wouldn’t go away and he was filled with shame and fear. He would never be free of the past. However far he went, however much time passed, even when he was old, even when he was dying, it would follow him.

  Frieda sat in Petra Burge’s office. Her face was white with fury. ‘You say he’s not a suspect.’

  Petra leaned her face on her hand and fiddled with a pen on her desk. She looked drab with tiredness. ‘I’m saying that William McCollough has not been charged.’

  ‘So how did they get hold of him? Have you seen all the papers, everything that’s being written about him?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘He’s being hounded. Who told Liz Barron?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’m trying to find out. We’ve released a statement to the media saying he isn’t under suspicion.’

  ‘But they’re not going away.’

  ‘No.’ Petra sat back in her chair and pushed her fingers through her ginger hair. ‘You know how it is. He’s got a history. He looks a bit strange.’

  ‘He was in care. He was abused. Because of that, his life is being wrecked all over again.’

  ‘I’m sorry. You can be sure I’ll find out who leaked the story.’

  ‘And then what? Give McCollough his life back?’

  Frieda left the station, walking rapidly in her angry distress, barely aware of which direction she was going. She had paused at a road, waiting for a gap in the traffic, when there was a voice behind her.

  ‘Dr Klein?’

  She turned to see the journalist who had interviewed her and, more to the point, had handed her that photograph of Chloë. ‘It’s Daniel Blackstock, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes.’ He took a step towards her. ‘You’ve got a good memory.’

  ‘I don’t want to talk to any of you,’ she said.

>   His face puckered. ‘Because of what’s happening with William McCollough?’

  ‘How can you all do this?’

  ‘Look at me,’ he said. ‘I’m here, not there, which is where my paper wants me to be. Believe me, I’m disgusted by it. That’s not what I’m like. I’ve always treated you fairly, haven’t I?’

  Frieda looked at him. ‘You have,’ she said grudgingly. ‘I know you’re not all the same. But I’m angry.’

  ‘So am I. No wonder people don’t trust us.’

  She half turned away.

  ‘I could do something to make amends,’ he said. ‘You said, that time outside your house, that if you were going to talk to anyone it would be me.’

  He was reminding her that she owed him a favour. She studied him. His face was earnest; his brown eyes gazed back at her.

  ‘What are you suggesting?’

  ‘You could give me a quote about how appalled you are. And I was wondering …’ He stopped, licked his lips.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘You might not like this idea but I think it could be very powerful.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘I could perhaps interview your niece.’

  ‘Chloë?’

  ‘She knows William McCollough. An interview with her, one of the victims, would do more good than a thousand statements from the police.’

  ‘I’m not sure it’s a good idea. I don’t want Chloë dragged into the spotlight. She’s been through quite enough already.’

  ‘So has McCollough.’ The unspoken, because of you, hung in the air between them.

  Frieda frowned. He watched her intently. ‘I’ll talk to Chloë,’ she said eventually.

  ‘You have my word that I’d be very unintrusive. And she and you could see the copy before it was published. I know it’s only a London paper but I promise it would be picked up by everyone, like that.’ He snapped his fingers in front of her face. ‘And it might make a huge difference.’

  ‘We’ll see.’

  ‘Here’s my card.’ He pulled his wallet out of his trouser pocket, took out a card and handed it to her. ‘Call me any time. But, for McCollough’s sake, don’t wait too long.’

  41

  Frieda sat at her kitchen table; opposite her was Chloë, who looked as if she had turned up for work somewhere smart and discreet. Gone were the heavy boots and the oversized man’s shirt, the exaggerated eyeliner, the stud in her nose and in her eyebrow. When she arrived, she had taken off her jacket to reveal a blue blouse that Frieda recognized as her own, one she hadn’t been able to find for months. She wore a cotton skirt, unobtrusive leather sandals. Her face, bare of make-up and piercings, seemed defenceless and young.