Darkness & Light: A Frank Elder Mystery (Frank Elder Mysteries)

by John Harvey

  “No.”

  “You didn’t go away together? Some small hotel?”

  “No.”

  “I’m grateful you’ve agreed to see things my way, that’s what you said.”

  “What?” Singer flinched.

  “I’m grateful you’ve agreed to see things my way—in your e-mail to Claire.”

  Singer’s head dropped; sweat slid into the corners of his eyes; his back pressed hard against the bench.

  “Agreed to what?” Prior said.

  “Nothing.”

  “Sorry?”

  “Nothing. It was just...”

  “Was it to see you that weekend? Is that what she agreed to? To see you that weekend?”

  “Yes.” Head bent low again, scalp beginning to show through his gray hair; Singer’s voice was swallowed up by all that space.

  “I’m sorry, you’ll have to speak up. I didn’t hear what you said.”

  “I said, yes. Yes, that was what I wanted. What she agreed. A hotel, in the Cotswolds. I’d been there before, on my own. I knew Claire would like it. I was certain. That was why I wanted her to come so much.”

  A woman jogged past in running shorts, pushing a fancy buggy, the child strapped inside cackling and waving. Lower down on the grass, another woman, older, was walking no fewer than half a dozen dogs, some on leads, the others trotting behind, stopping occasionally to sniff.

  “Tell us what happened,” Elder said quietly.

  “She didn’t come.” The words broke out of Singer from deep in his chest. “We’d arranged to meet at the station. Paddington. Friday afternoon. She’d said she could get time off work. Get away early, beat the rush. I waited... I waited near the information board, where we’d said. At first I thought there’d been a delay, on her train down to London. Or maybe the Tube. I didn’t know. I just sat there, waiting. Even after I knew she wasn’t coming. After I realized she’d changed her mind.” He glanced quickly at Elder. “Perhaps she’d never intended to come, I don’t know.”

  There were tears in his eyes and, taking a handkerchief from his pocket, he wiped them away.

  “It’s stupid, isn’t it? Pathetic. You must think I’m pathetic. A man of my age, carrying on like this. But I thought... my friendship with Claire... we’d only seen each other a few times, I know, but I thought it was special. And it didn’t mean anything to her, not really, not at all.”

  “So what did you do?” Prior asked, trying, not quite successfully, to disguise the impatience in her voice.

  “I telephoned the hotel, made some sort of excuse, and cancelled the reservation. They said, in the circumstances, if they got another booking they would return my deposit, but they never did.” He looked at her unswerving stare. “That was it. What else could I do?”

  “Got angry,” Prior suggested. “Lost your temper.”

  “What for? What would have been the use? Besides, with whom?”

  “With her. With Claire.”

  “She wasn’t there. That was the whole point, she wasn’t there.”

  “You knew where she lived.”

  A firm shake of the head. “I wouldn’t do that.”

  “Do what?”

  “Go chasing after her. Just to give her a piece of my mind.”

  “Why not? You were angry. She’d ruined your weekend.”

  “No. I couldn’t.”

  “But you knew where she lived.”

  “Even so. I wouldn’t just turn up, unannounced.”

  “Why not?” Elder said. “You’d done it before.”

  “When?”

  “When you persuaded her to change her mind.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “I’m so sorry for not respecting your wishes and arriving in the way I did—that sounds like turning up unannounced to me.”

  Singer sighed and slumped forward, head in his hands, elbows on his knees. A crocodile of small children filed past them wearing brown blazers with gold braid, matching brown and gold caps on their heads, a visitation from an earlier time.

  “The more you lie,” Prior said, “the worse it gets.”

  FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER THEY WERE BACK AT SINGER’S flat at South End Green, Elder not remembering the low ceilings quite in time and catching his head a good crack on entering. What had Jennie said it made her feel like? Alice in Wonderland? Trapped and unable to escape.

  Singer told them he had arrived at Claire Meecham’s bungalow late in the afternoon and waited until she returned from work; angry and surprised to find him there, at first she had refused to let him in. Then, when it had become clear he was not going to go away, and not wanting to have a long and possibly intense conversation in front of her neighbours, she had relented. She had insisted he sit in the living room and, without as much as taking off her coat, given him five minutes to say what he had to say and then leave. Singer had pleaded his case well; well enough for Claire to relent a little and remove her coat, sit down with a pot of tea, and talk. She had told him something about her family for the first time, how much she missed her son in particular, off there in Australia. She had spoken of her late husband’s illness, his lingering decline. He had wanted to hold her, offer consolation, but she had shrugged him away. In the end, possibly because she was at a low ebb, or perhaps so as to convince him to leave, she had agreed to change her plans and go to the Cotswolds with him that weekend.

  What plans, Elder asked, were those?

  Singer didn’t know. When he’d asked, she had refused to say.

  “You realize,” Prior said, “if you’ve been lying about seeing Claire Meecham that weekend, we’ll find out.”

  Singer nodded, head down.

  “If you’ve lied about going back to the bungalow, or anything else, sooner or later, we’ll know.”

  “Yes.”

  “So is there anything else you want to tell us before we go?”

  For an answer, Singer got up and left the room; a minute later he returned with a postcard in his hand. On the front there was a black-and-white picture of the moon partly shielded by clouds, high above a distant, tree-lined hill. On the reverse was written the word “Sorry,” and, below that, the name “Claire.”

  The postmark on the front of the card read Nottingham, and it was dated Saturday the ninth of April.

  The card itself had come originally from the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. A reproduction of a photograph by Alfred Stieglitz, and Elder had seen it, or one very much like it, on the wall of Vincent Blaine’s house in the Vale of Belvoir.

  “We’ll need to take this with us,” Prior said, and when Singer began to protest, “we’ll take good care of it and let you have it back as soon as we can.”

  That it had been stamped on the ninth didn’t necessarily mean it had been posted that day; it could have been slipped into a box on the evening of the day before.

  ON THE JOURNEY BACK THEY DISCUSSED THE ramifications of what they had learned. Claire Meecham had made plans for that weekend, plans she had told Singer she would cancel, then, presumably, had changed her mind. It was more than possible she never intended to do anything of the kind, had simply said so to placate Singer and see him on his way.

  And wherever she had been, whoever she had been with, the identity of her companion was quite possibly among those other names from her computer that were still being sifted through.

  “You think he’s still lying?” Elder asked.

  “About seeing her that weekend? It’s possible.”

  “The card, though—if it’s genuine...”

  Prior nodded and turned her head toward the window.

  Elder leaned back in his seat. Instead of the passing scenery, he kept seeing the Stieglitz photograph on Vincent Blaine’s wall, knowing that in all probability it was a coincidence and nothing more, that there was nothing to link Blaine and Claire Meecham, nothing at all—yet wondering, all the same, where exactly Blaine had been that weekend.

  Chapter 23

  THIS TIME THERE WAS NO ONE O
N THE THRESHOLD TO greet him. Elder locked the car automatically and as he walked toward the house, raised voices, a man’s and a woman’s, filtered out through the partly open door.

  Elder knocked and waited.

  The voices stopped.

  The air was still and close, and clouds were beginning to mass toward the horizon.

  Blaine was wearing similar clothes as before, a checkered shirt and corduroy trousers, but with a new brightness in his eyes.

  “Mr. Elder—a surprise.”

  “I’m sorry to disturb you...”

  “You could have telephoned.”

  “There’s something I wanted you to look at. It won’t take more than a moment of your time.”

  “Very well,” Blaine said grudgingly. “Come in if you must.”

  Entering the room was like stepping into the aftermath of a storm, the tension tangible in the air. The woman Elder recognized as Blaine’s companion from the gallery was standing by one of the wood and chrome chairs. Her red hair blazed around her head; her cheeks were full and flushed.

  “Allow me to present my friend, Anna Ingram,” Blaine said. “Anna, this is Mr. Elder. Mr. Elder is presently working with the police.”

  Her hand was warm and her eyes, Elder noticed, were big and green. Late forties, he guessed, early fifties. Built, as his father would have said, to last.

  “You’ll have coffee, Mr. Elder?” Blaine asked.

  “As I said, it’s just one question...”

  “But coffee, nonetheless.”

  “All right, thank you.”

  Blaine walked off in the direction of the kitchen, leaving Elder and Anna Ingram alone.

  “I can’t help but think I’ve walked in on something,” Elder said.

  Anna Ingram smiled. “You heard us arguing.”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “Nothing more exciting than the state of contemporary art. A show we saw yesterday. From Africa. These huge and colourful hangings, like tapestries, but made out of discarded bottle tops and cans. It was really vibrant. Exciting. For me, at least. Vincent’s appreciation, I’m afraid, doesn’t extend much beyond works on canvas or paper. Sculpture’s permissible, but nothing more modern than Barbara Hepworth or Henry Moore. Certainly not when it’s made from old tin cans.”

  “Is that what you are then?” Elder asked. “An artist?”

  She smiled. “No, I’m afraid not. I’m a curator.”

  “I’m not sure I know exactly what that is. You look after things? Collect them? Works of art?”

  “Not exactly. I organize shows, exhibitions. Supervise their installation. Write those impenetrable little notes that appear alongside.”

  She sat down and indicated that Elder should do the same.

  “I would have offered to make the coffee myself and allow the two of you to talk, but coffee-making’s one of those things Vincent believes can only be done in a certain way, and therein, I’m afraid, I am forever doomed to fail.” She smiled another self-deprecating smile. “In that, as in so many things.”

  There were sounds of movement from the kitchen, china against china.

  “Whatever it is you want to talk to Vincent about, it’s a police matter, I suppose, rather than something artistic?”

  “Actually, it’s both.”

  The photograph of the moon and clouds was where he’d remembered it on the wall, next to the close-up of Georgia O’Keeffe with the hands reaching up across her neck.

  “I’m sorry,” Blaine said, carrying the coffee in on a tray, “sometimes it seems to take longer than usual to filter through. But I’m sure it gave Anna the chance to enlighten you as to some of my foibles.” He passed the cups around. “If she were my mother, she’d doubtless delight in causing great embarrassment by showing pictures of me naked in the bath, age nine months.”

  Anna stuck out her tongue.

  “So, Mr. Elder,” Blaine said, settling back into his Charles Eames chair, “how may I be of help?”

  Elder slipped the postcard, now protected by a plastic envelope, from his inside pocket. “I’m assuming you recognize this?”

  Blaine took it carefully between finger and thumb. “Of course. It’s one of a set of ten Stieglitz took in the twenties. All very similar. There’s a copy of another over there on the wall. As I’m sure you know. It was something he liked to do, shoot pictures from the same setting but in different conditions. A strategy, I suppose you’d call it. There are several well-known sequences he took from the window of his first gallery in New York, for instance.”

  “One thing you can be sure of with Vincent,” Anna Ingram observed, “ask a simple question and you’ll be sure to get a lecture in return.”

  “Actually,” Elder said, “I’m not sure my question is so simple. Or if there’s a question at all. More like something nagging away at the back of my brain.” He paused, looking at Anna before continuing. “At present I’m helping with an investigation into the deaths of two women, Claire Meecham and Irene Fowler, both murdered. Mr. Blaine was one of the last people to see the earlier victim, Irene Fowler, alive. That card was posted by Claire Meecham around the time she disappeared.”

  “And the connection is what?” Anna Ingram asked, a little incredulously.

  “Clearly,” Blaine said, tapping the front of the postcard, “the connection is this. Stieglitz. One of my particular interests, as you know.”

  “But those cards are ten a penny. You can buy them anywhere, any self-respecting art gallery or shop. That this woman chose an image that Vincent happens to have on his wall is neither here nor there, surely? I mean, it isn’t even as if she sent the card to him. There’s no link to him at all.”

  “I’m delighted,” Blaine said, “that reading all that detective fiction hasn’t been a complete waste of your time.”

  “Just one thought,” Elder said, addressing Blaine. “It’s not possible Claire Meecham might have been a student of yours at some time? An adult education class, something of that sort?”

  “It’s possible. But as Anna rightly suggests, cards like those are available everywhere. You don’t exactly need to have taken a course in twentieth-century photography to pick one out of the rack, pay over your fifty pence or whatever it costs, and affix a stamp to the back. Nowadays gallery cards are common currency. Seaside postcards for the educated middle class.”

  “A coincidence, then,” Elder said. “Nothing more.”

  Blaine briefly smiled. “So it would appear.”

  “I’m sorry,” Elder said, getting to his feet, “for taking up so much of your time.”

  “Not at all. The pleasure was mine. And Anna’s too, I’m sure. I’m only sorry I wasn’t able to help more.”

  “Vincent,” Anna Ingram said, “why don’t you let me show Mr. Elder to the door? I can probably do that without too great a mishap.”

  With one final glance, Blaine handed Elder back the card.

  Outside, the clouds seemed to have dispersed; the horizon was clear. There was a freshness in the air that reminded Elder of Cornwall and, not for the first time since returning, he wished he were there.

  “How long have you known one another?” he asked.

  “Vincent and I? Seven, nearly eight years.”

  “You’re very protective of him.”

  “Am I?” She laughed. “If Vincent thought that were true, he’d never forgive me.”

  “You don’t think he notices, then?”

  Anna smiled. “For an intelligent man, and that’s surely what he is, the things Vincent fails to notice are legion.”

  “What kind of things?”

  “Oh, anything he thinks is beneath him. Anything to do with the heart.”

  Elder looked at her, but said nothing.

  “What? What are you thinking?”

  “That perhaps that’s a strange thing to say about somebody you’ve been in a relationship with for almost eight years.”

  She looked at him with widening eyes. “Are you married, Mr. Elder?”


  “Frank, please. And, no, not anymore.”

  “But you were.”

  “Yes.”

  “For how long?”

  “Eighteen years.”

  “Then you’ll know all about compromise. The kind of accommodations we make so that things might last.” For a moment, her hand rested on his arm. “Vincent and I, we argue about the theatre, about music, about film...”

  “About art.”

  “Exactly. I let him lecture me on wine and, once in a while, he allows me to put on my chef’s apron and pretend to be Nigella Lawson. Although, Vincent being Vincent, he’d far rather I were Elizabeth David.”

  It was a reference Elder failed to grasp, but he let it pass.

  “Well,” Blaine said, appearing behind them, “still here? Enjoying the view?”

  “No,” Anna Ingram said. “Talking about you.”

  “Only good things, I trust.”

  Anna laughed. “Every scurrilous bit of gossip I could dredge up.”

  “I doubt then you’d have been here for so long.”

  “I must go,” Elder said, starting to move away. “I’ve already taken enough of your time.”

  “There’s a show of mine at the castle,” Anna Ingram said. “The Staithes Group. Paintings. Even Vincent approves.”

  Elder raised a hand and carried on toward his car. Disturbed, a magpie rose up with a dry, crackling cry and flew back to where its mate was waiting in the branches of a stunted elm. When he glanced back over his shoulder toward the door, both Vincent Blaine and Anna Ingram had gone back inside.

  THERE WAS NO ANSWER AT MARJORIE PARKER’S DOOR. “She went off on her bike about an hour ago,” Gladys Knowles said brightly. “Off shopping I shouldn’t wonder. I can put the kettle on if you want to wait in mine. No trouble at all.”

  Elder was saved by the sight of Marjorie Parker’s sturdy stand-up-and-beg bicycle coming slowly into view, burlap bags swaying from each end of the handlebars.

  “Organic this and organic that,” Gladys Knowles said dismissively. “What’s wrong with Asda, that’s what I want to know?”

  She scurried back across the street in her unlaced sneakers, past the sign that announced Claire Meecham’s bungalow was for sale.