Читать книгу Coffin and the Paper Man - Gwendoline Butler - Страница 5

Tuesday morning through to evening, May 30, to Wednesday, May 31

Five, nearly six days after the finding of the body in Rope Alley felt like three months in Leathergate and the neighbouring area of Spinnergate, for unease spread over here too. Murderers came from anywhere, this one could be far away by now, but he could be local. Was most likely local, everyone said, because of knowing about Rope Alley, dark even in sunlight and with several hiding places in it as well as a quick exit at each end.

‘I think it’s as bad about the boy as anything I’ve ever heard. I mean … him finding her. After his mother.’ The elder Mrs Zeman spoke to her niece. They were sitting over the tea-table, Mrs Zeman favoured a strong blend of Darjeeling, procured at her own special shop in Brook Street. She sipped her tea which was piping hot, just how she liked it. ‘His mother,’ she repeated, between sips. ‘It must have reminded him.’

‘She killed herself, Aunt Kay.’

Her niece had her own small pot of Earl Grey; as with so much of their life together there were carefully defined boundaries. Tea was one of them. Coffee, decaffeinated or not, was another.

Aunt Kay Zeman sniffed. ‘She always was unreliable.’

‘She managed that all right.’

Mrs Zeman did not relent. ‘I’ve always thought it was an accident.’

‘And he didn’t find her. No one did.’

Not for several months anyway, until the river finally delivered her on a muddy bank down the estuary. But of course they knew where she’d gone and where she’d gone in: she left plenty of evidence around. It had never been Clare Marsh’s idea not to punish someone. The only thing was, reflected the niece, she had punished plenty of people who didn’t deserve it.

‘Not entirely the husband’s fault,’ said Mrs Zeman judicially.

‘I should think not indeed.’

‘All the same, he’s trouble. Not really suitable to be your lover.’

‘He is not my lover.’

It was Mrs Zeman’s idea that her niece did have a lover somewhere, but she had not so far been able to get positive proof of the victim’s identity although she had her ideas. She thought of him as a victim. In her experience, lovers were victims, as well as victors, torments, and objects of delight.

She said no more, contenting herself with this probe. Her niece, child of her younger sister, long dead, was called Valerie, which Mrs Zeman regarded as an awkward, unlucky name. Valerie had certainly been some witness to the truth of this belief since she had been a failure as an artist (she had a wooden studio in Aunt Kay’s garden, rent: looking after her aunt), and as a woman with a string of abandoned relationships behind her.

‘You must try and attract someone, Val, hold on, instead of being always a failure.’

‘A lucky failure,’ she retorted at once to this probing sally of Aunt Kay’s, ‘because I’ve ended up happier than you by a long shot.’

Katherine Zeman did not believe this: in her eyes no woman was happy without a settled marriage and at least one son.

‘Happiness is not what an adult expects,’ she replied. ‘A woman should hold on to her man. I held on to mine. You did not. You are a bad chooser.’

‘Someone will kill you one day, Aunt Kay,’ said Val, ‘and it just might be me.’

Mrs Zeman poured another cup of tea. Milk first, she always said, otherwise it stains the cups. Her son had told her that her tea, dark and strong, had long since stained her gullet and stomach deep brown. She did not believe him. Her body would naturally not allow such liberties. She and Val, both strong characters, enjoyed, in fact, a happy relationship in which their sharp differences of opinion were not only allowed but pleasurable. Each knew the frontiers over which not to step and if Mrs Zeman sometimes, as now, strayed too far over them, then she felt it allowed to her as an old woman. It was one of the taxes she levied on Val’s good humour, part of her rent.

‘The girl wasn’t one of Leonard’s patients, was she?’

Valerie occasionally acted as Dr Leonard Zeman’s receptionist and secretary, keeping his records in her fine clear handwriting, so she knew who was on his list.

‘No, I believe she’s with the Elmgate practice.’ The Elmgate Health Centre was a large group of some six doctors near to the Spinnergate Tube station, and was popular with all the company at the St Luke’s Workshop theatre. Dr Greer was the company physician. ‘But Tim knew her, of course.’

‘Sweet on her, was he?’

‘I don’t know, Auntie. She was very pretty.’

‘Wouldn’t be surprised, then.’ In fact, surprised if not. Tim Zeman had an eye for the girls, thought his grandmother complacently. She knew less about Tim than Val did. ‘Well, he wasn’t with us that day.’

‘No, Auntie.’ In fact, they hadn’t seen him for some time. Old Mrs Zeman minded, although she hated to admit it. ‘I believe he was with some friends in Kent.’ The young Edens, Angus Eden had been at school with Tim. He had an even younger and prettier wife.

‘Have you seen him since?’

‘No, he’s been keeping himself to himself.’

‘Upset, I expect.’

‘I think he’s just working for his exams, Aunt Kay.’

‘Certainly what he ought to be doing. Pour some more tea, dear.’

Another cup of dark liquid went down to join the buttered tea-bun and the toasted tea-cake. Yet she was not fat, as Valerie, who put on weight quickly, noticed and thought unfair.

‘Anyway, it’s not Tim, I’m worried about.’

‘I didn’t know you were worried.’

‘I am always worried.’

‘All right. Who especially this time?’

‘I’m worried about Leonard.’

Val drank some tea. ‘Why Leonard?’

‘I don’t think he is happy. And I am sure that Felicity is not.’

‘Well, it’s probably her job. Always dealing with sick babies. It’s a wounding profession.’

‘She cures them.’

‘Sometimes, but not always. Not often, probably. She gets all the serious cases.’

‘It’s her marriage. Something wrong there. I feel it.’

Valerie shrugged. If Aunt Kay Zeman felt it, then she would go on feeling it, and nothing would shake her.

‘Do you think she’s got a lover?’

‘Really, Aunt Kay, I don’t know.’

‘And wouldn’t say if you did know,’ said Mrs Zeman in a not unamiable way. ‘I like loyalty in a woman.’

Val shrugged. So did she, but it was a hard commodity to come by. ‘Sex isn’t always the trouble.’

‘It mostly is. Think of that poor girl. Sex killed her.’

‘All right. I suppose it did. Being the wrong sex.’ Boys got killed too, of course, but not so often. Not nearly so often. And hardly ever by girls, usually by a member of their own sex.

‘So what do you think is the trouble with Leonard?’

She wasn’t going to give up, this was developing into what the family called ‘searching sessions’. Search being the operative word.

‘Do you think he’s got a lover?’

‘Why don’t you ask him?’

‘I did, and he just laughed. His father wouldn’t have laughed. I didn’t know what to make of it.’

‘I expect the answer is No, then,’ said Val, ‘and he just didn’t want to disappoint you.’

‘He’s very in with that theatre crowd,’ said Mrs Zeman broodingly. ‘And so are you. Get me tickets for their next production, will you? I don’t trust that Pinero woman. Got a roving eye.’

‘Oh, Aunt Kay,’ said Val. ‘People don’t talk that way any more.’

‘They act that way, though,’ retorted Katherine Zeman with grim pleasure.

Val took the two tea-trays through into the kitchen. Her tray with the china pot of Earl Grey tea from Fortnum’s and the thin coconut biscuits from the same shop, and Mrs Zeman’s large silver teapot of the best Darjeeling with the covered dish of hot tea-buns. They occasionally raided each other’s supply of eatables (there was a rich chocolate biscuit cake which they both liked) but never the teapots.

Through the open kitchen door Val could see down their garden to the garden across the way. The Annecks, that would be. Their lilac tree was in full bloom, a pleasure to behold, but in return the Zeman roses would presently be scenting the air for the Annecks.

On the skyline she could see the tower of St Luke’s old church, now called St Luke’s Mansions, where dwelt, among others, her friend Stella Pinero whose reputation she had just defended. There was a small Theatre Club in Feather Street of which she was secretary; all of them were Friends of the St Luke’s Theatre and got special rates for a season’s subscription.

She poured a bowl of tea and milk for Bob, the black and white dog; he liked Darjeeling, liked it weak and lukewarm. Now he tongued it up with great slurping noises, he was not a neat dog.

The telephone rang on the wall in the kitchen. All callers were well aware that Kay Zeman, wherever she was in the house, might grab an extension.

Val lifted the receiver. No, she couldn’t hear Aunt Kay’s breathing, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t there.

‘Hello?’

‘Leonard here. I want to talk. Is it all right?’

He meant who’s with you.

‘I’m in the kitchen on my own,’ said Val with caution.

‘The police have been questioning Tim about the Kinver girl. Her murder, that is. Asking how well he knew her, where he was that day and so on.’

Where had he been. Val wondered. ‘I expect they are going round all the girl’s friends,’ she said.

‘So I suppose.’

‘Who told you?’

‘Not Tim,’ said his father with feeling. ‘Mrs Anneck rang up. They had Peter in.’

‘Well, there you are then. The police are just doing the rounds.’

‘Don’t tell Mother. I don’t want her worried, her heart’s bad.’

Val sighed. ‘She’ll pick it up. She’s sending out signals like a TV station as it is. She might very well be listening now.’

‘About the murder?’

‘Not only that. She wonders if you have a lover.’ She held the receiver to her ear, listening carefully.

Leonard Zeman managed a laugh; he too had heard the sound of breathing. Mother had arrived. Where had she been until now? Probably cleaning her teeth after all that strong tea.

‘Or if Felicity has one, or even me. But she thinks I’m a failure there.’ Val did not mind repeating this; after all, it was no news to Mrs Zeman, whose breathing could be clearly heard now, and Leonard ought to know.

‘Tell her I’m sending her medicine round, will you? It’s a new tablet prescribed for her to try.’ Not by him, of course, but by one of his partners, he did not treat his own family. ‘See she takes the proper dose, will you?’

The conversation moved on to things medical which it was perfectly allowable for Mrs Zeman to overhear, and which, indeed, he was talking about so that she could.

He and Val had learnt plenty of tricks.

As she leant against the kitchen wall talking, Val could see Mary Anneck come out of her back door and walk down the garden path with her dog.

Mrs Anneck strolled down the paved way between the geraniums with her Jack Russell nipping at her heels. She was used to this, wore stout shoes and boots sometimes on purpose.

She knew she was right to have telephoned Leonard Zeman. She had the feeling that at a time like this they must stick together. The police had been in her house interviewing her elder son, Peter, her daughter, her daughter’s current boyfriend (although he hadn’t been that last week and might not be next, they changed so fast), and her young son Adrian. She supposed that they had to question all Anna’s friends, although it was hardly likely Adrian could be of much use to them since he was only twelve, but you never knew these days.

It was what you never knew that made her heart sink.

‘Be quiet, Edie,’ she said to the terrier bitch who had caught sight, or thought she had, of a whisker of her brother and best enemy through the garden hedge and was screaming in fury.

Mary Anneck concluded that the dogs would get no regular exercise until the dog-walker, Jim Marsh, had recovered his balance. He must be having quite a time with the police too, poor boy.

Like Kay Zeman she was worried about him. Life could be so unfair. She thought he’d had enough. He always looked so frail physically too, with those narrow bones and that thin face, but of course, he couldn’t be, because he walked all the dogs and handled them beautifully. She must try and feed him up, she was a great believer in red meat and none of this vegetarian business that his mother Clare had gone in for. Anorexic she’d been in Mary’s opinion and her death no disaster to anyone once they’d got over the shock.

It was a mystery why Clare had killed herself, but by all account she’d made one or two earlier attempts. Perhaps she just didn’t like being a milkman’s wife. And that was no joke, thought Mary Anneck, because Clare had almost certainly started out life with different ideas. Philosophy at Oxford, hadn’t it been?

Then to her surprise, she heard the bell ringing from the Darbyshires’ back door, which must mean that Jumbo (their little disaster of a dog was called Jumbo, although he was the smallest, shortest Jack Russell imaginable) was going out on his walk. And since Philippa Darbyshire had broken her ankle, and her Harold hated the dog even more than Jumbo hated him, it must mean that Jim Marsh was on the job. With any luck he would come for Edie next.

Philippa Darbyshire limped back to her chair from her bell-ringing exercise, thankful to see the back of Jumbo for a bit. With plenty of exercise you could just be in the same room with him; without a lot he was unbearable. He was always unbearable, Harold said, but that was unkind. Jumbo had defended Philippa from a mugger once, and although it had been a task after his own heart, and the mugger had felt desexed by his wounds for some months and had considered claiming damages, it had ensured Jumbo a longer life than might otherwise have been expected, taking his ferocious habits into account.

Philippa herself was still shaken from the death of Anna Mary. Since no payment was asked she had tutored the girl in extra mathematics for her computer studies out of love of the subject and sympathy with the girl, so ambitious, so pretty, so badly taught elsewhere. Harold had helped here too.

She had been questioned by the police and so too had Harold. She hadn’t liked the idea of that interrogation, because that was what it had been judging by Harold’s face afterwards, cross and white. What had Harold got to do with the death of this girl he hardly knew? He only saw her when she came to the house for tutorials.

The boys would be back from Scotland tomorrow, when no doubt the police would want to interview them too. They had been friendly enough with Anna, close even, she knew it and no doubt that smooth policeman Inspector Younger knew it too. They had not been in London the night she was killed. Presumably you called t-hat an alibi.

She might have a talk with Valerie Humbertson about it, Val was about her closest friend, but she thought that Val had troubles of her own.

Stella Pinero could be more helpful, she knew how to give advice. Had been through the mill herself. Many a time and oft, as she had once said with feeling. Stella was not a close friend, but an admired one, and the girl’s mother had worked for her. Still did, probably, if she was up to working for anyone now. Mrs Kinver had worked for Philippa herself once, but when the offer of a job at the theatre had come up, she had been unable to resist it. Philippa had understood, she was stage-struck herself.

It was a horrible business, but the police would soon sort it out.

On this hopeful note, she awaited the arrival of Jim Marsh to exercise old Jumbo.

Two days, three days, a week. Unease was still oiling itself all over Leathergate with Spinnergate feeling it too. The discomfort, quite physical for some people like the Kinvers, husband and wife, reached even St Luke’s Theatre Workshop where the company directed by Stella Pinero had embarked on advance preparation for its most ambitious production so far.

They needed something popular so they were going to do Cavalcade, using local actors for part of the huge cast. Not that their cast was going to be Drury Lane big. Stella had pruned sternly.

Using local talent was a wise political gesture (low cunning, some said) since the theatre received a grant on condition it hired graduates from the Drama Department of the new Dockside University. Using amateurs fulfilled the spirit of the thing, Stella maintained, with the advantage they did not have to be paid. She was always short of ready cash. Lætitia Bingham, her ultimate controller, kept them on a rolling budget.

Hopefuls were flooding in for audition, their arrivals organized by several amateur acting societies and the Theatre Club in which Mary Anneck and Philippa Darbyshire were prominent. But with this flood came also a spate of rumours and anxieties about the murder of Anna Mary.

She was surprised how guilty many felt. Guilt and alarm seemed spread about the community. Somehow it was their fault, they were a bad lot in Leathergate and getting no better.

John Coffin came in for a drink that evening, one full week after the discovery of Anna Mary’s body in Rope Walk, bringing Tiddles with him. Tiddles liked a sweet sherry in a saucer.

‘Any news?’ She stirred a cocktail, she was learning to make them now, they were the smart thing, and anyway she wanted to get into the Coward mood.

‘Don’t make that thing too sweet, will you?’ Coffin stared at what she was doing disapprovingly. ‘I can’t bear sweet drinks. About the murder? No, nothing much.’

‘This brew will be as bitter as hell.’ Stella handed over the drink.

He had seen all the usual reports, of course, forensic, technical, photographic, made a point of it, so his comment was not strictly true, but there was no news that counted. Not what she meant. No strong suspect in sight.

‘I miss Mrs Kinver. She came in to work today, but she wasn’t really with us, I sent her back home.’

‘She might have been better working.’

‘I thought of that, of course, but her husband turned up, was walking up and down outside, frightened to let her out of his sight. That worried her. Worried me, too. He’s in a bad way, John, taking it worse than the mother, really, although you can never be sure what’s going on inside.’

Coffin frowned and sipped his drink. Repulsive, he thought, and looked for somewhere to pour it away. ‘He needs help. I can probably get him some. We have a psychiatrist on the Force who specializes in helping victims of violence.’

‘Is he good?’

‘I think so. He helped me.’

Stella gave Coffin a surprised look, but he did not explain his words.

‘I think Kinver’d like to kill someone,’ she said. ‘Anyone, but preferably the murderer of his girl.’

‘Is that what his wife thinks?’

‘I bet it is.’

‘Then she needs help too.’

The telephone rang.

He managed to slip his drink into Tiddles’s saucer while Stella’s attention was diverted. Tiddles took a sip, then looked at him with a baleful green stare. Poisoning me, are you? the stare said. Well, I know what to do about that. Tiddles stepped in the saucer, overturning it.

She turned round from her desk. ‘It’s for you. How did they know where to find you?’

He shrugged. ‘They always know where I am.’

He took the telephone. His old friend Superintendent Paul Lane passing on a report from Archie Young. He listened. ‘Yes, that is interesting. Good. Keep me up to date.’

He returned to Stella. ‘Swinehouse have picked up a man with dried blood on his clothes. And a knife.’

Stella stared. ‘Wouldn’t he change his clothes? If he was the killer?’

‘Yes. If he could. This man could not. He couldn’t, didn’t have any.’

A vagrant. Living rough.

Next day was the day on which they had the first letter from the Paper Man.

It was sent straight to John Coffin himself, as if the writer wanted to be sure he got it.