“All right, stay here while I interview this bloody poet. I’ll get rid of him as soon as I can and take you to the station. Half an hour. You can rest on the couch.”
“Thanks, Leon, but I want to get going. The sooner I’m home the better I’ll feel.”
“Martin won’t find you here, I promise.”
“I know.” Nevertheless that was what she was determined to avoid. “I’ll be all right. I got here on my own, didn’t I?” Nothing he could say would persuade her. As soon as his assistant had finished, Molly got dressed with her help and kissed Leon’s cheek before she limped away.
She felt easier once she was out of the building, but not for long. Not only were there no taxis to be had, she now realized she had no clothes to take with her. She would have to go back to the flat. It was after eleven, there would be plenty of people about. There was no reason to suppose Martin would be there; now she thought about it, the key had been in the niche under the steps. She wished she had taken it with her, but surely he wouldn’t come back. In any case, if he did no doubt he would be desperately contrite. He’d better leave at once, that was all.
She limped home, the air smarting her bruised face. Once she reached the shops, there were crowds. She passed W. H. Smith’s and made for the path between the traffic lights, then she grabbed the pole of the nearest to stop herself. Martin was standing on the corner of her hill.
He didn’t look at all contrite. His face was dark with fury—he must have gone back to her flat and found she wasn’t there. His father’s death must have driven him crazy. She limped into the nearest side street for fear that he would see her and come running.
It led to Nell’s. The thought of explaining her state depressed her, but where else except Nell’s could she hide until Martin gave up? She went as fast as she could, she was ringing the doorbell before her pain gave her the chance to realize that Nell would be at work.
She was turning to hobble away when the door opened. It was Susan. “Oh, poor Molly,” the child said. Perhaps she was home from school because it was lunchtime, or perhaps she was ill; Molly was too relieved to care. Susan let Molly in and matched her pace on the stairs. Either she didn’t want to know what had happened or felt she was too young to ask. Her disinterest was so welcome that Molly felt like weeping.
The green room was cool and calming. Susan stood by the couch to show her where to lie down. “Better not have anything to drink just yet,” she said, and Molly marveled at how old the child seemed. She lay down and closed her eyes, and felt safe. She thought that Susan had begun to whisper to her, or perhaps even to sing her a lullaby, as she fell into a peaceful sleep.
46
MARTIN disembarked at Heathrow in the early afternoon. The Customs officers clearly knew who he was, and one kept him waiting while another took his passport away. Eventually they gave it back and let him go, having made sure he understood that he was in the country only by their leave. Their eyes were blank as cameras. So long as he saw Molly first, he didn’t care if they sent him back.
The Underground took most of an hour to get him to Gloucester Road. Daylight made him blink and grin. On his way to Kensington High Street he decided he would call Molly as soon as he’d dumped his luggage.
He wished he could have called her from Chapel Hill. But he hadn’t wanted his mother to hear him telling Molly that he didn’t blame her for keeping him away until it was too late. Of course she hadn’t; he’d done it to himself, out of aimlessness as much as anything. He’d begun fiercely to resent her when he had learned that his father was dead, but he’d dealt with that feeling. If he was seeking anything to blame, he would have to start years earlier, pick through the whole unsatisfactory jumble of his life.
He let himself into the mansions and pressed the button to call the lift. The faint squeak of the descending cage caught his throat; the empty sound reminded him how empty his mother’s house was now. He’d held her last night as she wept and he’d wept himself, for her and his father and Larry and lost opportunities. “Come back soon” was the last thing she had said to him. “You have to bring Molly to see me, you hear?”
He hadn’t liked to leave her, though her friends visited constantly, though she had insisted. “You go back to that girl of yours before someone steals her,” she’d said. He hoped to take Molly home soon—perhaps they could find work in America. He no longer felt so inhibited about making films there. He’d realized why his English work was so unsatisfactory: he had been too concerned what his father might think, no longer able to trust his own instincts.
He clashed the gates together, unlocked his door, and went into the bedroom to dump his luggage. Someone, two people, was in the four-poster bed.
The girl’s face peered shocked around the man’s hairy shoulder. She looked remarkably young, especially next to the man’s long white hair. As he turned toward Martin his face went pink, red, purple. “Who the devil are you?” he shouted. “What do you mean by walking in here?”
Martin felt a wild urge to act out the situation as comedy: do a double take, retreat to the outer door to see if the number was right, go to the mirror to see if he was someone else… . But the long-haired man had recognized him. “Oh, I see,” he said contemptuously. “You must be the American.”
“One of them,” Martin admitted as the girl hid her face behind the man’s shoulder.
“I’m assuming you were not told this is no longer your flat. Presumably the message went astray.” He glared at Martin with a coldness that almost managed to seem righteous. “Will you please leave? You can see you are causing embarrassment. If it’s your belongings that concern you, they have been moved. I have no idea where.”
Martin gazed at the couple in the bed he’d shared with Molly, and somehow couldn’t look away until he knew what they meant to him.
“What do you want?” the man spluttered.
“Maybe just to know who you are, since you know me.”
“Never mind who I am. Have the goodness to leave before I call the police.” Then his pride got the better of his caution. “That is who I am,” he said ominously, pointing to a National Theatre poster he had stuck to the wall. “I wrote that and other plays you may .have seen on Broadway. I mean to write a play for television, but by heaven, I won’t be doing so if this is an example of the treatment I can expect from your people.”
“They aren’t my people.” Martin had tired of him. “May I use your phone, the phone?”
“If you must.”
Martin went into the hall and dialed Molly’s number, but it was unobtainable. He knocked on the bedroom door and called, “Enjoy the accommodation,” before heading for Bayswater Road.
When he rang Molly’s bell, there was no reply. The key had gone from its niche under the steps. He rang the bell again, for it made him a little uneasy that the curtains were drawn. Eventually he made for MTV, reminding himself to find out where he’d been rehoused.
Leon wasn’t in his office. Martin looked into his own in case Molly might be there, but there was nothing to be noticed in the room except a faint musty smell. He ought to go up and find out where he was living now, except that he was growing anxious about Molly, he didn’t know why. He went down to the studios and found Leon in the middle of an interview.
Leon caught sight of him through the glass. “You fucker,” Leon mouthed.
He couldn’t be serious. Martin had enough to deal with already without this. “How do you mean?” he mouthed back.
“How do I mean?” Leon was shouting now. He turned to his interviewee, a man with a shock of gray hair: “Look, this isn’t working. Too many interruptions. Let’s do it in the open, all right? Film you in your countryside. I’ll be in touch.” He stalked out while the man gaped after him, and advanced on Martin so violently that Martin had to make himself stand his ground. “What do you want here? Looking for Molly?”
“Sure, if she’s here.” Why should that make Leon shake with rage? Martin was suddenly afraid for her. “Wha
t’s the matter. Leon?”
“What’s the matter? You shit, you fucking shit.” He beckoned his assistant with a gesture that came close to scratching Martin’s face. “You saw Molly Wolfe. Know what this bastard just asked me? He asked me if anything’s wrong.”
His assistant, a motherly Cockney who could outswear anyone in the building, gave Martin a single contemptuous glance and grasped Leon’s arm in her large hand. “Ignore him, Leon. He isn’t worth it. Let the police have him.”
“She’d have been better off with Ben Eccles. To think I persuaded her to work with this …” Leon looked as if he could weep with rage. “I need my fucking head examined.”
Martin was losing his temper. “Look here, Leon, I don’t know what you’re talking about. What’s wrong with Molly?”
“What’s wrong with her!” It was somewhere between a scream and a humorless laugh. “Jesus Christ, what’s wrong with her as far as you’re concerned is that she’s still alive, I should think.”
“Leon,” Martin said as calmly as he could, “I give you my word that I don’t know why you’re talking to me like this. Has Molly tried to harm herself?”
Leon actually screamed. “Has she what? Right, of course, why didn’t I think of that? No wonder she looked such a mess if she had to punch herself in the face until she knocked herself out. All the same, it must have been hard for her to kick herself in the ribs.”
Martin felt as if a band were tightening on his skull. “You’re saying I did that to her?”
“I’m saying it? No, you cunt, you turd, you shit. It’s what Molly said.”
For a moment Martin almost felt he might have done everything he was accused of. If Molly believed he had, wasn’t that as bad or even worse? He couldn’t speak, couldn’t think. Leon seemed to have lost impetus too. “Why did you do it, Martin?” he said almost sadly. “Because she got you back your job? Because she tracked down the cop who killed Lenny Bennett all by herself so that our bosses would have to admit you were right after all? Didn’t you want her to help?”
It was too much all at once. Martin was beginning to wonder if Leon had flipped. “I didn’t know about any of this.”
“She wanted to wait and tell you when you came back. And you never even gave her the chance, did you, you fucker.”
“Leon, I haven’t seen her for more than a week. I only got back here a couple of hours ago. If she really thinks I hurt her, I mean if she thinks she actually saw me, things must have got too much for her, these dreams and all that stuff. She seemed pretty close to the edge when I went away. I wouldn’t have gone, except I had to.”
Leon looked as if he could spit in his face. “Christ, you’d say anything, wouldn’t you?”
Martin almost tore his pocket as he dragged out his passport. “Leon, will you look. There’s the date I came back, on the visa. Today’s date.”
“Right, today’s date. The day you beat her up. It doesn’t prove a fucking thing, mate. Pity they let you back in.”
“Leon, I came in less than three hours ago. For God’s sake, if you don’t believe me, call Heathrow.”
For the first time Leon seemed doubtful. “Maybe I will. Just go away now, Martin, all right? Maybe I’ll be in touch.” He shook his head as he realized what Martin was thinking. “Don’t go looking for Molly. You won’t find her.”
“Take me to her, Leon. You must. I give you my word she’ll be safe.” Martin hardly knew what he was saying. “She needs help.”
Leon stared blankly at him. “I’ve no idea where she is, Martin, and if I had I wouldn’t tell you.”
Martin turned away, because he felt ready to grab Leon and choke him. He headed for the lifts and out of the building. Though he was hardly aware of his surroundings, he knew where he was going. It wasn’t only the thought of the drawn curtains that was driving him back to Molly’s, it was the belated impression that he’d heard someone moving stealthily beyond them.
The key still wasn’t under the steps. She must have taken it from its niche to prevent him from going in to her. He tapped gently on the window. “Molly,” he said, trying to keep his voice low, “it’s Martin. Please let me see you. If you won’t open the door then come to the window.” He was still knocking on the glass when the van screeched to halt by the railings and two burly policemen came clattering down the steps. “Don’t try anything, mister,” one said. “Just get in the van.”
Martin controlled himself as he never had before. “I can explain. Just let me explain,” he said as they took hold of him. “My girl friend’s in there. She needs help.”
“We know all about her. It isn’t help she needs.”
“My God, you’ve been watching the place because of what she did.” Martin forced himself not to struggle. “Look, I’m sure she’s in there. If she isn’t, you know where she is, right? I need to see her, she’s in trouble. You’ve nothing to arrest me for.”
“She’s in trouble and so are you.” Their grasp was bruising his arms. “As for the rest of it, neither of you are that important, if you want to know. The neighbors called us because someone was breaking in down here, and that’s why we are formally arresting you.”
It might be true, for Martin heard a window slam on the second floor. The realization came too late. Everything that had been happening to him exploded all at once. “Goddamn it, you know where she is,” he yelled. “I have to go to her.”
They mustn’t have expected him to struggle, for suddenly he was free and lurching toward the steps, so fast that one of the policemen tripped on them and fell. Martin didn’t get far. A blow on the back of his head with a truncheon knocked him down; the weapon was heavier than it looked. Though the women on the second floor were watching, the policemen clubbed him twice as they dragged him up the steps to the van.
47
GEOFFREY was cutting himself a piece of bread when he heard the knock at the front door. It threw him. He stared around the kitchen and couldn’t recall where he’d put the butter, couldn’t even remember which meal he was trying to make himself. Outside the window the light of the flat sky was neutral, which seemed to suggest noon. Presumably he was making lunch, though he couldn’t recall when he had last eaten: sometime yesterday, he must assume, after he’d come home from visiting Joyce’s new day center. Hadn’t that been the dinner at which the meat in the stew had tasted like plastic? He must have been tired, that was all; he still was. It took a repetition of the knocking to remind him that someone was at the front door.
He dusted crumbs from his dressing gown as he made his way along the hall, and had to switch the knife from hand to hand. He mustn’t rush, he wasn’t getting any younger, and it annoyed him when his visitor knocked a third time. “Yes, yes,” Geoffrey muttered angrily. Perhaps it was his peevishness, or the sight of the knife in his hand, that made Mr. Rowley step back.
“Oh, Mr. Rowley.” Geoffrey just managed not to admit he’d forgotten that Mr. Rowley had made an appointment; it was enough of a shock to himself, “Do come in.”
The stamp dealer looked troubled as he ventured into the hall. “I was just preparing lunch if you’d like some,” Geoffrey said, hoping there would be enough bread and cheese for them both. Mr. Rowley shook his head, and still seemed troubled. Perhaps the old lady’s breathing was bothering him.
Geoffrey let him go first up the stairs. “You know the way, Mr. Rowley. I have to take my time.” He expected Mr. Rowley to go into the office, but the dealer waited for him at the top of the stairs. “Forgive my prying,” he murmured, “but what’s wrong with Mrs. Churchill?”
“Nothing at all. Why do you ask?” Of course, he meant the breathing. “That isn’t Joyce, it’s an invalid lady we’re taking care of.”
He found the key of the safe in the pocket of his dressing gown and stooped to the lock. He carried Mr. Rowley’s stamps to the desk. He turned back to close the safe, and then he clung to the edge of the open door. There was something in the safe it was crucial to remember.
He was s
till peering into the safe when Mr. Rowley finished examining the stamps. “These are highly satisfactory, Mr. Churchill,” he said, and cleared his throat. “I hope you won’t think me presumptuous, but we’ve known each other for a number of years. May I ask if you’ve been to see a doctor? You don’t look at all well.”
Geoffrey was touched, knowing what an effort Mr. Rowley must have made to break through his reserve. “Just tiredness, Mr. Rowley. Nothing to worry about.” He hoped he didn’t sound abrupt, but he’d realized what was in the safe: Stuart Hay’s letter. He needed to remember what that meant, what it should remind him of. “May we talk business now?” he said.
Mr. Rowley named a price. “Fine,” Geoffrey said, but Mr. Rowley looked more dismayed than he had at the front door. “Perhaps you could hold on to the stamps for me, Mr. Churchill. I have to come to London for a sale next week.”
“I assure you, Mr. Rowley, your price is quite acceptable. It always is.” Geoffrey didn’t want to be distracted from the letter in the safe, not even by haggling. “By all means write me a check.”
Mr. Rowley did so reluctantly. He locked the album in his briefcase and gazed at Geoffrey while Geoffrey willed him to leave, twisting the cord of the dressing gown in his fists. At the front door he said, “I do hope you will consider my advice, Mr. Churchill. Surely it will do no harm to consult a doctor.”
“You have my word I’ll think about it. I do appreciate your concern.” Geoffrey closed the front door and trudged upstairs, wondering what possible use a doctor could be.
In his office he found he’d left the safe open. That showed how tired he was. Nobody could have got into it while he was downstairs but all the same, his carelessness dismayed him. He stepped forward to close the safe.
He was too eager and too exhausted. As he pushed the heavy door he lost his balance. Without thinking, he grabbed the upper edge of the safe, and the door closed on his thumbnail. He snatched out his thumb before it could take the full weight of the door, but even so the pain made him dizzy, so that he fell into his chair by the desk. The pain jarred him out of his stupor: he had meant to leave the safe open to remind him what it contained.
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