There were no car headlights. Something stirred in the adjacent hedge, and a small dirty white shape scurried across his path, almost under his feet. As for John’s car, he heard it approach only seconds before it struck him. It fired Richard along the lane in a corkscrew tumbling motion. He passed through a gossamer caul of flaming white stars. There was no air in his lungs. The impact had knocked it out of him, but he was not compelled to breathe. He should try to sustain this spin, the engineer thought, if the world was not to end. In the event, his movement was terminated by the narrow trunk of a mature larch.
It was the end of this thing that had begun with a bar of soap.
The police made no connection between the two fatal incidents. Their enquiries continued, but no significant information came to light. Gloria was unaware of a cyclist being knocked down and killed on a narrow service road near the city dump, let alone that there might be some connection with her late husband.
When Richard returned to a deserted apartment after that first night with Virginia, he was not to know that his wife was a few yards away with Fidelma on the fourth floor. She knew nothing about his trip to the dump, and nothing of what came out of it. Nothing about any romantic trip to Rome.
The autopsy did not support the theory that Richard had suffered a heart attack and had staggered into the path of an oncoming vehicle; nonetheless, this was what Gloria believed. She could not, however, explain how Richard had come to be on foot and wandering in the industrial wasteland where his body was found.
Fidelma proved herself as a true friend and unflinching supporter. Gloria’s old flame, Tom, rang to offer his sympathy as soon as he heard the news. That was a comfort.
Part 2
John Miller
11
There was a property in Putney that had to be cleared of squatters. John parked his car two streets away. It was the wise thing to do. In the early days there had been an incident with a brick through his windscreen. People jumping up and down on the bonnet. He had done with much of that front-line stuff, but today there was nobody else available to do it. He went to Putney on that dark, wintry day to speak firmly but courteously, in a slack sort of way. These were hoary old hippies with suction pads on their feet. Patience and a timely bribe was the way forward, John was thinking, but he had a date and was in a hurry. In the event, he offered the bribe on arrival. To begin with, they weren’t having it, though they were set to go and there were packing boxes in the hall. They wanted the offer sweetened.
John’s date was with an Italian. She was a student at the LSE. Just started. She was a nice, sophisticated girl, self-possessed and magnificently standoffish. What was he thinking? He should stand her up. The visit to the hippies, with their righteousness and their tea and the bit of hash-cake they’d given him, had thrown him.
The Italian didn’t know London well. He had arranged to meet her outside the Odeon, Leicester Square. He upped the offer to the Putney brigade, got a result, sped into the West End, managed to get to the appointed spot on time. The whole of John’s life ran on high octane in those days, but gratification, he had found to his dismay, was illusive.
The leaden sky opened and it began to pour. John slipped into the National Gallery via the Orange Street entrance and let his car-coat down from over his head. He wandered a while, the wet coat draped over his tightly folded arms, not thinking about the Italian girl, the hippies, or himself, for that matter. He couldn’t settle on a route through the building. He must have looked lost. He was thinking he, might sit down, when a woman spoke to him. She was on her own. She walked over to him directly and struck a smile.
‘I know your face,’ she said. She didn’t. Not really. She liked his face. Was drawn to it. She had seen him somewhere, it was true.
John went blank for an instant, but perhaps it didn’t show, what with the hippie-shit. ‘Hello.’
‘Where have we met?’
‘You have me there.’
‘Not here. You’re from Dublin?’
‘Me. Yes. And you?’
‘I know you from there. Or somewhere.’ She moved closer.
He put out his hand to shake. ‘John Miller.’
‘Virginia Coates.’
‘Virginia,’ he echoed, as if her identity might fall into place.
‘You’re meeting somebody?’
‘Well, yes. Not in here. Outside.’
‘A date?’
He liked her impertinence. It seemed to be guileless. ‘Yes. And you?’ He liked this freshness, but couldn’t think why he was so nervous. Perhaps he wasn’t nervous at all. Shouldn’t have taken the Putney cake if he wanted to know fully what he was at.
‘Yes, yes. Meeting a chap who should know better.’
‘Ah … I see.’ He didn’t.
She told him she was attending St Martin’s. One of her fellow students was coming to get a lecture from her. They’d been having a dispute. She wanted to get him thinking right about the human body. There were paintings she wanted to rub his nose on, then they were going next door to the portraits. ‘Then, we’re going to bed.’
She wasn’t trying to shock him. Curiously, he could tell. Still, it was too much information, and he told her so.
‘There’s a lot to share,’ she said. ‘we’ll have a full day – once he gets here.’
‘Sounds lovely,’ said John.
‘You think?’ She was glad John Miller approved, even if he showed signs of faltering. ‘You want to walk with me?’
‘Yes,’ he heard himself say, ‘but you’ll want to meet you friend?’ It was obvious yer man wasn’t coming.
‘He’ll find me.’
‘Look, it’s all right if you don’t want my company.’
‘No, no. It’s just I should check ….’
‘For your friend outside?’
‘Yes.’ Now why was he doing this? Those gobshite hippies. But he couldn’t blame them. Whatever hash-haze there had been had now lifted. There was no denying he was thinking straight.
‘If she doesn’t show, you can find me,’ she said.
‘Yes. I will indeed.’ What a beautiful, warm smile she had. He looked about for his way back to Orange Street.
‘Main entrance is that way.’ Virginia pointed with her hip.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Right.’ And went as he had been directed. He took his time. Found it a pleasure to rack his brains about Virginia Coates. Where might he have seen her? London, most likely. Or somewhere: the way she had tossed that away. His progress to the main entrance was slow. He turned a corner and found Virginia sitting on a bench, staring intently into one corner of an Italian Renaissance landscape.
She was waiting for him. No doubt. The staring didn’t fool John.
‘Aha ….’
She was holding back on the figurative work, she told him, ‘but to hell with fucking Charlie.’
Charlie was never going to pitch up. She must have known that.
‘Come on,’ she said, linking her arm through his. She was glad to fight the wet wool coat for space. ‘You show me something.’
They wandered through the rooms like a well-established couple. Anyone taking a passing glance at them would think they were a settled couple who might well make love on the couch before they had their tea that evening.
Life was rich.
Look. Ah yes. This way. Can we just go in here? There was no lecturing from Virginia on the human form. The rain pounding on the galley roof made the pictures vibrate on the walls for the besotted John Miller. He looked at his watch just once.
‘What time is it?’ Virginia asked, quick as you like.
He angled his watch.
‘You’ve dumped her. It’s official.’ She kissed him lightly on the cheek. ‘Come with me.’
They stood a moment peering through the rainsmoke, at the square.
‘She’s not here, your date?’
‘No.’ Richard made a little performance of looking left and right at the huddles of people sheltering under the colo
nnade. ‘Charlie?’
‘No sign.’
They walked out into the rain. She pulled on a red woollen hat.
‘You want to come under my coat?’
‘No thanks, John.’
They were soaked to the pink by the time they got to the car park. Droplets fattening in their eyelashes. Rivulets streaming from the tips of their noses. They drove to her flat, a terrible little dive in Southwark. Something that was once a corner shop, then a storehouse, now part store, part partitioned flat.
‘Good God.’
‘What’s wrong with you? It’s only temporary.’
They peeled off their sodden clothes. She put on ‘The Girl from Ipanema’ on her record player. They lay down under a reproduction of Caravaggio’s Doubting Thomas, with his finger in Christ’s spearwound. The coupling was luscious for them both. Real passion between strangers. Strangers’ passion. Wasn’t it wonderful what life could randomly put your way?
There was a heavy knock on the door.
Charlie.
Charlie was not what John expected – not that he was ever expecting to see Charlie. Tall, skinny, sloping shoulders, lank hair which was plastered to his head because of the wet, large brown eyes, outsized mouth. ‘Have you anything to say to me,’ Virginia?’ There was something inappropriate about his delivery. It signalled hurt and offence in a lazy south London accent.
‘If you’re here on your high horse, I’m not interested,’ Virginia replied, with remarkable patience.
‘Where were you?’ he asked slackly.
‘With a friend in the gallery,’ she answered, as if John were invisible.
‘I was in the gallery. I waited half the blood day for you.’ He couldn’t seem to slip up a gear, increase the temperature, tighten the skin around those eyes even a little.
‘You didn’t go looking, did you?’
‘We said at the foot of the stairs.’
‘You didn’t look.’
‘Of course I looked. You need a holiday, my love. Get your head right.’
‘There’d be too much pressure to enjoy myself.’
‘I’d go with you, only it wouldn’t do me any good.’ He put his nose to her breast. ‘What’s that smell? I haven’t smelt that on you before. I prefer the old Virginia.’
Well this was bizarre. John was in a guerrilla play, standing stage left, waiting to make his presence felt. ‘Excuse me ….’
‘Are you fucking our friend here?’ Charlie asked with the same flatness, except now he was pointing limply at John.
‘Excuse me, pal ….’
‘It’s all right, John,’ Virginia said.
‘Yes, it’s all right, John,’ Charlie echoed, ‘I’m well used to it. Is that your car outside, blocking the way?’
John Miller gave Charlie a drubbing, but not before Charlie gave him two black eyes. That, too, was unexpected. John didn’t see the narrow, bony fists coming down from a great height.
Virginia intervened. She wrestled them both while they fought, then got Charlie out the door.
It was hard work, but Charlie held his bloody nose and put in the nearside headlight on Miller’s car with the heel of his boot.
It was Charlie, you could say, who provided Virginia with the connection to Stephen Graham, and John who made the introduction. When Stephen saw John’s black eyes, he wanted to meet the woman who had been the cause of the affray.
A week later, John moved Virginia out of the flat in Southwark and into a flat in a house in Clapham that Graham & Co. had just bought. Four months later Stephen and Virginia were engaged.
John, too, had fallen in love.
With Virginia.
Without her knowing. Knowing, and responding, would come later.
At St Martin’s, Charlie went entirely abstract.
12
That was a long time ago, and now, Stephen and John were in London together to conclude some business. They were choking off an operation that was about to lose a lot of money. Smart remedial action: that was a feature of Stephen Graham’s business practice. He had a reputation for being astute and clever with his solutions where others would panic. John was the quiet one at meetings. The capable persuader, one-to-one. The enforcer. It was Stephen who had tutored John in the business of imminent failure.
They were due to fly home, but Stephen suggested they stay in town and catch a later flight. He wanted them to go to the American Bar at the Savoy Hotel. ‘I like it there,’ he said, out of badness. John did, too – though he was more fastidious, and secretly feared that one day soon he might run out of privilege, just as a man might run out of sperm.
‘I’m up for it.’
‘You and me, John. You and me.’
‘You want to get drunk?’ John’s eyes were burning with compassion for his pale, beleaguered friend.
‘I haven’t done anything foolish for a long time. I feel a bout coming on.’
‘You want to make fools of us both.’ John was seeking confirmation.
‘In my case, it will pass.’
Was this the beginning of some final game-plan starting to play out? ‘We can get drunk and talk sense. Talking sense will save us. That’s always the hope.’
‘Always hoping, John. Never go into business with your friend, right?’
‘Right.’
‘We’ve done well.’
‘We have.’
‘You’ve done well.’
‘I’m not finished.’
‘John, I’m afraid.’
‘I know.’
‘No harm being afraid, you’d say.’
‘None.’
Before going to the Savoy, Stephen took them to a jewellers’ in Knightsbridge. He wanted to get Virginia a present. Something special. He bought her a gold ring with a high-set emerald. He seemed to have it already picked out.
‘I see how steady you are,’ John said in the taxi to the hotel. ‘How calm. I know what that is.’
‘You do?’ said Stephen.
‘It’s despair. You’re an ill-content.’
Stephen could see that his friend was trying to humour him, trying to show a bit of robust humanity. ‘I am.’
‘I’ve been that: an ill-content.’
‘In despair …?’
‘No. Never so steady. Thankfully, never quite so calm. That’s a beautiful ring.’
‘It is, isn’t it?’
‘Virginia will love it.’
‘She will.’
When they had sat down in the American Bar and ordered their drinks, Stephen placed the smart little bag on the table and said: ‘Here, John, I want you to give it to her.’
‘What?’
‘I already have something for her. You give Virginia this.’
John felt sick in his stomach. ‘Stephen, I don’t follow ….’
‘I know what you’re doing. I know about you and Virginia.’
John performed a series of deep optical shifts, which ended with direct eye contact. Their drinks arrived promptly. Stephen thanked the waiter with a bidding smile that made for an express withdrawal. ‘We’re here – just you and me – to drink and talk about Virginia.’
‘I want to talk.’
‘Don’t worry. I forgive you. I’m finished. I need somebody to look out for her and Clarissa. You’re the man for me.’ He took a mouthful from his whiskey glass.
‘Stephen, I can’t tell you how – ’
‘Have your drink.’
John took a generous gulp of his whiskey and soda.
‘You’re not like the others,’ Stephen said. John nearly choked. ‘There’s nothing for you to worry about. They’re in the past. You’ve been up in her studio space, of course: the studio she can’t work in?’
John nodded. Evidently, Stephen needed him to speak. ‘Yes,’ he admitted. ‘I have.’
‘She has me up there too, on occasion. I like it, don’t you? I’ve told her we could rework it: the space, I mean. Create a different kind of studio. But she says no, it’s fine the way it is
. Counts herself lucky, she says.’
‘Stephen ….’
‘You get a fire going up in that room and it’s really very comfortable. No one to bother you. Nice view to the east over the treetops.’
John was struggling. He had another mouthful of his drink.
‘Nice little nest, don’t you think, John?’
‘Yes. Nice.’
Stephen drank from his glass and let out an appreciative sigh. ‘Strange to say, she loves me. I know that much, and she doesn’t doubt that I love her. There’s something never to be taken for granted.’
There was a silence. The two men were sitting beside each other and, together now, they belatedly took in the familiar surroundings. There were only a few patrons. Lucky people, they seemed to both men.
‘I captured Virginia,’ Stephen said, leaning a little in John’s direction, ‘not the other way around. Time for me to let her go.’ He laughed at his own bittersweet words. ‘Fuck – I can say that now.’ Let her build her world again around her painting. Let her get close again to Clarissa. Have you look out for them both. Are you listening?’
‘Yes. Of course.’
‘She needs to go forwards. Not stay stuck. She can be free.’
John nodded giddily. ‘Of course,’ he repeated. He turned his chair around so that he was facing his friend. So that he might squarely take all that was due.
‘God, I love this place,’ Stephen said. He downed the last of his whiskey smoothly, as though normality was about to burst through. ‘Finish that. We’ll have another.’
There was more drinking, but it was tempered. In the waiting lounge at Heathrow Airport, both men sat at a plate-glass window. John had his arms wrapped about the satchel he cradled on his lap. Stephen had thrown his briefcase under his chair. They looked out into the night sky.
‘Sorry we missed the flight,’ said John. ‘My fault.’ He saw that his friend was very tired.
Stephen’s response was, nonetheless, steely and charged. ‘Lateness … late arrival … showing up late … it’s not the same as coming to it late. That kind of lateness is the product of slow thinking. The overcoming of confusion at a late hour.’
Quiet City Page 6
