by Lynda Renham
‘We have a problem,’ she says.
‘You’ve only just realised?’ sighs Felix.
‘The flat on the seventh floor has green curtains.’
‘Maybe they changed them,’ says Felix.
‘In six hours?’ argues Sylvie. ‘Anyway, the last thing on the murderer’s mind will be the curtains.’
‘Right,’ he says, looking at her suspiciously. ‘It doesn’t comfort me that you seem to know how a murderer would think.’
‘The flat below it has red curtains though,’ she continues, ignoring Felix.
‘That’s it then,’ I say. I look for the police cordon. It can’t be possible that nobody heard the gunshot.
‘I think we must have the wrong block. Someone must have heard the shot and called the police. Why isn’t the place cordoned off?’ I ask.
Sylvie chews her pen thoughtfully while Felix and I wait for her reply.
‘I’m not sure. It does seem odd, but this is the right block. I’m certain of it.’ she says, before turning to the back seat and looking at Felix.
‘What?’ he asks. ‘Don’t tell me Sherlock, you’ve just deduced that I’m the murderer.’
‘I need you to go in and knock on one of the ground floor flats. Tell them you’re a reporter for the local rag. Let’s face it, you look like one. Say you’re looking for human interest stories about what took place here in the early hours.’
‘I’m not going in there on my own. Have you seen the riff-raff hanging around here not to mention those kids? I’ll be mugged the minute I step out of the car.’
‘It’s not that bad,’ I say.
‘Darling, just be grateful you’ve got bald tyres and a hole in your exhaust. They only gave your car a cursory glance and followed it up with one of pity.’
‘They’re just kids Felix.’
‘Ah, you say that love. They thought they were just kids in Children of the Corn didn’t they? If they’re just kids then I’ll eat my arse. What’s the betting they’re tooled up?’
‘It’s I’ll eat my hat,’ says Sylvie.
‘Not when I say it love.’
‘And Children of the Corn was a Stephen King novel. This is real life.’
‘There ain’t much difference darling.’
‘Felix, I can assure you that you’ll come to no harm.’
He sighs and straightens his scarf.
‘If I’m not back in ten minutes send in the SAS.’
‘That’ll be School Age Services would it?’ giggles Sylvie.
‘Or Silly-R-Soles,’ I add.
‘Bitches,’ he snarls climbing from the back of the car.
‘You could at least have four doors, this is so bloody undignified. What if someone sees me?’ he grumbles, yanking his foot from under Sylvie’s seat. She shoves her notepad at him. We watch him adjust his coat and walk towards the flats. Sylvie winds down her window so we can hear what’s said.
‘Alright granddad,’ one of the boys says while winking at Felix.
‘Oh dear,’ mumbles Sylvie.
‘I’m a reporter for the local rag,’ says Felix, sounding like a robot. ‘I’m looking for a human …’
Sylvie groans.
‘We’re all humans ‘ere mate.’
‘Story,’ continues Felix ignoring him, ‘on what happened here in the early hours.’
‘Ooh I say,’ laughs one.
‘A lot goes on ‘ere in the early hours mate but I’m not so sure they’ll want to tell you.’
Felix glances at us with despair on his face.
‘Go in,’ Sylvie mouths.
He disappears through the entrance and Sylvie and I wait nervously. I wince as I bite my lip and my thoughts are drawn to Ark Morgan. Was it really him last night? He’s more gorgeous in the flesh than he ever was in my fantasies. If only he were my true love. My stomach drops as I remember Angie flashing her tits. What I am going to do? I can’t forgive Darren, not a second time, and who knows if this is the second time. It could be the third or fourth time for all I know. I hope his prick drops off. I’ve a good mind to chop it off myself.
I’m pulled from my reverie by Sylvie’s elbow in my ribs.
‘He’s coming back and he looks unscathed.’
‘Well?’ asks Sylvie as Felix clambers back into the car.
‘I’m never going to forgive you for this, you know that don’t you?’ he says, taking off his hat and shaking his hair into place. ‘I was lucky to get out of there alive. The woman on the ground floor is a nymphomaniac. She said a lot goes on in the early hours and can also go on later in the day if I was interested. Do I look like I’m interested in the female form?’
‘What else?’ I ask.
‘What do you mean what else? That’s it.’
‘Did she hear a gunshot?’ probes Sylvie.
‘No, but she did hear someone arguing, but according to her people argue here every night, especially on a Saturday night. I think we’ve got the wrong block of flats or you dreamt the whole thing up.’
‘Buddha,’ I say, as the memory floods into my brain.
‘Oh wonderful, she’s now gone all religious on us,’ says Felix.
‘There’s a Buddha painting in the flat,’ I say, barely able to control my excitement.
Sylvie shuffles in her seat as if she has ants in her pants.
‘There’s only one way to find out,’ she says. ‘Let’s go to the flat with the red curtains.’
With a groan from Felix, we file out of the Fiesta and head to the entrance.
Chapter Ten
‘There’s no one at home,’ whispers Sylvie.
‘If there’s no one home why are you whispering?’ says Felix.
‘Because there could be someone in flat 102 or flat 103,’ she snaps.
We watch in stunned silence as Sylvie pulls a credit card from her bag and begins using it to pick the lock.
‘What are you doing?’ I whisper. ‘What if there is someone inside?’
‘And not forgetting the fact that this is known as breaking and entering,’ says Felix.
‘We’ve knocked several times,’ Sylvie says, as though that justifies breaking in.
‘Remind me to always let you in,’ says Felix.
‘I live with you,’ she snaps.
‘For one wonderful moment I forgot about that. It must be the stress of breaking into someone’s home.’
‘I’ll knock again,’ she says.
‘Dead bodies don’t answer doors do they? But the bloody murderers can. What if he is still in there?’ whispers Felix with a tremble in his voice. ‘He’ll slaughter us all before we reach the stairs. I’ve seen enough slasher movies to know how these killers work.’
‘He’s right. Let’s call the police,’ I agree.
‘He’s not likely to still be there,’ says Sylvie.
‘You don’t know,’ argues Felix.
My phone rings and Felix screams. I rummage in my shoulder bag with shaking hands and silence it. It’s bloody Darren. Trust him to nearly get me killed.
‘Oh God, I think my bowels have locked,’ mumbles Felix.
Sylvie shakes her head and continues fiddling with the credit card while Felix and I struggle to breathe. There’s a click and Sylvie gasps.
‘I never expected it to work,’ she says.
We stare at the door of flat 104 expectantly. I’m not sure what we imagine is going to happen but after what feels like an eternity and nothing does, Sylvie gingerly pushes it open and peeks inside. Felix grips my arm.
‘Can you see a body?’ he asks in a shaky voice. ‘Is there a lot of blood?’
‘I can’t see anything. I’m still shocked I got the door open,’ Sylvie says, awe-stricken at her own skills.
‘Hello, anyone home?’ she calls.
‘I wish I’d brought my Imodium,’ moans Felix, gripping my arm tighter. ‘Do you think it would be okay to use their loo?’
I roll my eyes.
‘You can’t use the loo, you’ll leave traces of
your DNA if you do’, Sylvie admonishes.
‘I’ll leave more than my DNA,’ Felix mumbles.
‘Right,’ says Sylvie determinedly, pushing the door wide open. I peek over her shoulder and gasp when I see the Buddha painting.
‘It’s the right flat,’ whispers Sylvie, prizing my hand away from Felix’s.
‘Keep watch Felix and whistle if anyone comes.’
‘I can’t whistle,’ he says in a panicky voice.
She sighs.
‘Well cough or something.’
He nods meekly.
‘We’ll leave the door open,’ she assures him. ‘We need to take off our boots. We don’t want to leave a mess. Careful where you walk though, we don’t want blood on our socks.’
Felix shudders.
‘Jesus peanuts, I so need the loo,’ he grumbles.
I so need to go home, back to bed, and to wake up from this awful nightmare. I cautiously follow Sylvie into the flat and stare at the Buddha painting. I turn my head towards the window expecting to see a body on the floor but of course there isn’t one. The flat is more modern than I thought it would be. It’s open plan. One of those with it flats where you can chat to your guests as you prepare dinner for them. Personally I’d hate the smell of cooking in my living room but each to their own. Leather couches sit either side of a mahogany coffee table that is piled neatly with arty type magazines. A white rug covers the middle of the floor and I stare nervously at it, looking for bloodstains.
‘Is this the room you saw?’ Sylvie asks, pulling my attention away from the rug.
‘I recognise the painting but not much else,’ I say truthfully. ‘I was looking at the men.’
She sniffs noisily.
‘I can smell a slight odour,’ she says.
I hope Felix hasn’t shit himself.
‘A gun has been fired in this flat.’
Oh God.
‘You’re sounding more like Columbo by the second,’ Felix hisses through the door.
Sylvie bends down and opens her rucksack, pulling out yellow washing-up gloves.
‘I thought you were going to have those special surgical gloves,’ I say. Kitchen rubber gloves are as good as useless aren’t they, unless she’s planning on us spring-cleaning the place.
‘Ark Morgan doesn’t supply us with surgical gloves does he? These will have to do. It’s not like you’re going to give someone an enema,’ she snaps.
I gasp.
‘These are Ark Morgan’s property?’
‘Not his personally, I can’t imagine Ark Morgan wearing rubber gloves can you?’
Ooh I don’t know about rubber gloves but I can certainly imagine him doing rubber. Careful, whispers my inner goddess, don’t start fantasising now. It really isn’t the place is it?
‘Just put them on,’ she says throwing a pair at me. ‘Do you want a mask in case we find the body. Hopefully it won’t smell too much yet.’
‘Don’t you think we should just call the police?’ whispers Felix.
‘And tell them what exactly?’ snaps Sylvie. ‘That Roxie saw a murder last night and then failed to report it. That she was half pissed at the time. Then in the morning she thought about reporting it but was then worried that she’d be in trouble for not reporting it the night before. And now we’ve come here to see if there really was a murder and …’
‘Broke in with a credit card,’ he finishes. ‘Okay, I get the picture. I’ll just keep watch and keep schtum, unless, of course I have to cough.’
‘Ready?’ asks Sylvie. ‘You check the cupboards and I’ll check the freezer.’
‘The freezer?’ I repeat. ‘You mean that little fridge freezer?’ I say, pointing. ‘Have you seen the size of it? You couldn’t even get a midget in there. Oh my God, you don’t think he …?’
We stare at each other.
‘Well, it happens but I doubt he had time for that and there would be blood everywhere,’ says Sylvie thoughtfully. ‘Best to check though.’
‘You said there wouldn’t be blood if they were dead,’ whispers Felix through the doorway.
‘No, I meant if he, the murderer, cut the body up,’ Sylvie says. ‘Of course there would be blood.’
‘Saints alive,’ groans Felix. ‘I wish you’d hurry. My bowels really aren’t enjoying this.’
I cautiously open a door and scream as something falls towards me. I flap my arms around trying to ward it off and knock a painting off the wall. It crashes to the floor, knocking a vase of flowers over in its descent.
‘Fuck, have you found the body?’ calls Felix.
‘Jesus wept. Can you two make a bit more noise? I don’t think the neighbours quite heard you. For Christ’s sake Rox, it’s just a broom,’ snaps Sylvie.
We look down at the painting with held breath.
‘Is the glass smashed?’ I ask, not daring to look.
‘It’s okay,’ she says as she sponges the carpet.
My heart pounds so loudly that I barely hear her. I push the broom back, close the cupboard door and turn to hang the painting.
‘Oh God,’ I mutter.
The picture hook’s gone and what’s worse there is a ruddy big hole where it once was. I look frantically around.
‘The picture hook’s gone.’
‘Saints alive, it sounds like you’re doing more damage than the murderer,’ says Felix, peeking around the door.
Sylvie finally finds the hook but now the hole is too big for it.
‘How did you manage that?’ asks Sylvie.
‘I don’t know,’ I answer truthfully, struggling to twist the hook back into the hole. I hang the painting on it. It wobbles slightly and then hangs precariously.
‘It’s lopsided,’ I say. ‘And the water’s marked the carpet’.
‘They won’t notice,’ says Sylvie. ‘Men never do.’
She opens the tiny freezer.
‘Christ.’
‘Oh my God, what’s in there?’ I say, wanting to hear while at the same time not wanting to hear.
‘Frozen peas and enough vodka to sink a ship, this guy sure likes his booze, or should I say liked?’
‘You couldn’t pass a bottle out here could you,’ says Felix.
‘We’re going to need to re-enact the crime,’ says Sylvie. ‘That way we’ll know where to search for evidence.’
‘It was near the window,’ I say, ‘shouldn’t we start there.’
‘I’ll be the murderer,’ she says, ‘unless you want to.’
‘No, I’ll be the victim,’ I say, thinking it matches how I am feeling at the moment.
‘So, where were they standing?’
‘A few feet from the window,’ I say. ‘My man was waving his hands around and pointing at something over there, and then he threw himself at the other guy and went for his throat.’
I imitate the actions and lurch towards Sylvie putting my rubber gloved hands around her throat.
‘Then what happened?’ she asks.
‘You push me away and pull out the gun.’
She rummages in her rucksack and then tells me to attack her again.
‘Masochist,’ quips Felix.
I grab her by the throat and she pushes me away, reaches behind her and points a tin of pledge furniture polish at me.
‘This is so unrealistic,’ I say.
She gives me a sour look.
‘Sorry,’ I mumble.
I fall to my knees dramatically as I’d seen the man do and wave my arms around.
‘Now you shoot me, or in your case, spray me to death. That’s when I swung the telescope away and when I looked back all I could see was the gunman. He wandered about a bit and that’s when I saw the painting.’
‘Right, so we need to work out what the victim was pointing at.’
I point in the direction that I had seen the man do and realise I am pointing at the fridge freezer.
‘Not helpful,’ says Sylvie.
I sigh. He must have been pointing at something. It’s then I see
it. It’s about the size of a pea so I’m not surprised we missed it.
‘Oh my God,’ I say breathlessly.
‘What is it?’ asks Sylvie, taking a sharp breath.
‘There’s a bloodstain under the coffee table,’ I whisper.
‘Right,’ says Sylvie in that authoritative tone of hers. I watch with a sinking heart as she dives into her rucksack again. I’m really not happy that we’ve taken stuff from the hotel’s stock cupboard. She pulls out freezer bags, baby powder and a blusher brush that’s covered in coral pink blusher.
‘We need to get some fingerprints.’
At that moment Felix starts coughing.
‘Someone’s coming,’ he whispers.
Chapter Eleven
It takes seconds for us to spring into action. Sylvie scoops up her bag and I hurry behind, almost knocking over Felix in my panic. Sylvie throws a duster at me and another at Felix and we all make a show of polishing the stairwell. An elderly gentleman comes puffing up the stairs.
‘Bleeding lift is out,’ he grumbles.
‘Disgraceful,’ says Sylvie.
He stops and studies Felix.
‘You look like Boy George,’ he says finally.
‘Oh really, thank you very much,’ says Felix.
‘Nice and quiet here isn’t it?’ prods Sylvie.
‘If it’s not I take me ‘earing aids out.’
He grunts and fumbles in his pockets. Felix looks at me and mouths shit.
‘Bleeding keys,’ grumbles the old man.
‘We’re the cleaners,’ says Sylvie, while Felix and I stand there like two frozen kippers. ‘Can we help?’
‘Cleaners,’ he says, giving us the once over. ‘What you sodding cleaning?’
Before she can answer he whips out his keys and Felix and I hold our breath. Oh God, he isn’t going to open the door of 104 is he? He pushes them into the lock of 102 and I think Felix is going to faint from relief.
‘We heard it was noisy here last night,’ probes Sylvie.
