Читать книгу Mystery Lady - Paul Magrs - Страница 8

I am getting very nasty vibes from that ream of typescript. All the way back to Timmy’s flat I try to warn Dodie about what she’s letting herself in for.

‘Nonsense,’ she hisses at me, out of the corner of her mouth.

To his credit, Timmy is saying many of the same things I am. ‘Look, if there are peculiar, dangerous people after this book, why put yourself in the firing line? Why help out an old dame you’ve never even met before?’

Dodie frowns heavily at him. ‘Timothy Bold! I’d have thought better of you! You saw how frightened she was, underneath all that bluster and bravado. What’s wrong with wanting to help a stranger?’

As we walk along those fancy, immaculate streets he falls back a little, muttering to himself. Ever since we left the bistro he’s been in a funny mood. I think it’s all to do with having his romantic triste crashed by that old lady. But I was sitting there, wasn’t I? It was hardly a romantic meal for two in the first place.

I try to reason with Dodie: ‘You never saw the horrible chap in the train compartment. The one attacking Miss Spedding. If you’ve got types like him on your trail you won’t be very pleased.’

‘Oh, I can deal with funny types,’ scoffs Dodie.

But all the way through the quaint alleys and mews I’m keeping a watchful eye on dark doorways and corners. What if someone was to jump out on us? We should have taken a taxi. I’m sure Timmy would be next to no use in a brawl…

Now he’s saying to her, ‘You just wanted to see the whole manuscript, didn’t you? You wanted an early look at this book with your story in it.’

Dodie blushes. ‘Can you blame me? The novelty hasn’t worn off yet. The idea of being in The Horrible Book of Terror!’ she chuckles at her own vanity.

Then the two of them go off reminiscing again about how they’d slip out of Dodie’s house when they were kids in Manchester. They’d steal away with a stash of her stepfather’s lurid paperbacks and they’d go and lie in the long grass and the sun on the secret lake and read together. It was really a pond of industrial waste, overgrown and hidden behind a demolished factory, but it was their private paradise. They’d take turns to read out scary stories to each other until the shadows grew long and it was time to creep home…

This is a past they share that’s well before my time. I lag behind, left out of all this, wishing I had something to contribute, but really, I’m just an employee, aren’t I? I’m part of the gang, but only as long as I’m useful…

Oh, these are gloomy thoughts, Cassandra. I tell myself to buck up and think myself lucky to be involved in such glamorous lives! I could be back in the typing pool, couldn’t I? I could be sticking stamps on envelopes and going nowhere.

Now, here I am, staying in the fancy pad of a swinging TV star.

Once back indoors, Dodie flings herself down on a strawberry-pink chaise longue and Timmy goes off to fetch a nightcap for them both.

I perch next to Dodie and sigh. ‘He hasn’t said where I should sleep.’

‘Ah,’ she smiles. ‘You can bunk in with me, dearest. Of course you can.’

‘Thanks,’ I smile, and she notices my despondent mood at last. ‘It’s nothing,’ I assure her. ‘Just sometimes… I wonder where my life is headed. I tag around after you and – don’t get me wrong – it’s lovely… but I don’t have much independence, do I? I don’t have much life of my own. And really, I’m not much cop as an assistant, am I?’

Dodie looks shocked. ‘Cassandra, don’t ever let me hear you say such a thing again! How dare you be so hard on yourself?!’

I smile at her, spirits lifting a tiny amount. ‘Really?’

‘Who was it saw Miss Spedding having a dust-up with the skinny malinky man? Who was it knew all about that before we even met the old woman?’

‘Me, I guess…’

‘You’re always in the right place at the right time to pick up just the right clue, Cassie. It’s a kind of marvelous genius you have.’

I can’t help beaming at this. ‘Really? Do you think so?’

‘I know so.’

Timmy comes swanning back in with two little glasses of honey-coloured liqueur. He’s in a blue satin dressing gown and looks very dashing.

He hands Dodie a glass and I make my excuses and head for the bathroom.

In the living room he starts doing exactly what Dodie’s been slightly dreading all day.

Wooing her. With knobs on.

When I drift back from the bathroom I hover in the doorway, earwigging.

He’s got the ring out, evidently, because he’s saying: ‘I’m really going places. I really am. I don’t want to sound boastful or anything…’

‘Oh, you don’t,’ Dodie says. ‘If anything, you’re too modest, Timmy. Anyone else in your position would be shouting it from the rooftops. They’d be whooping it up. And look at you – taking me for a quiet little dinner. It’s very lovely and modest.’

‘I just want to be with you, alone,’ he says, dropping his voice.

‘That’s not as easy as it seems,’ she tells him.

‘Of course it is! We’re young! We’ve known each other all our lives. And… I’m afraid I’ve always taken you for granted, Dodie. I thought you’d always be there by my side. And it’s only recently that I’ve started… started looking at you… through the eyes of love…’

She sets down her glass and there’s a pause then. I can hear her gasping. At first I think she’s having a funny turn, or the hiccups.

‘Don’t laugh!’ says Timothy Bold. ‘Why are you laughing? Stop it!’

‘I’m sorry, Tim. I’m really sorry. You were being so lovely and romantic. But you were being so serious, too! Your face looked so funny! I’ve never seen you look like that before!’

She starts laughing again. Timmy gets up off his knee and he sounds sulky. ‘Now I feel a bit silly.’

I would, too, if I was in his position. She’s still laughing at him.

‘Timmy, I’m so sorry. But I just can’t take any of this seriously. It’s just not us, is it?’

He sounds like a little kid suddenly. ‘Isn’t it?’

‘Of course it isn’t. You’re not romantically interested in me at all, you big fool. You would just like to be, that’s all. Because we’d look fabulous together in your new life as a rising star. You’d like to be seen about town with me. And it suits your mood to fancy yourself in love…’

‘That’s not it at all…!’ He sounds really upset when he shouts this.

‘And it’s fine,’ Dodie says. ‘I don’t mind being your date at these kinds of red carpet do’s. I don’t mind hanging out at one or two groovy night-spots with you, when required, but neither of us have to tie ourselves down, do we? We don’t have to go round pretending to be in love, and all that dreary stuff, do we?’

I hear him sigh very deeply. ‘Of course not. I… I was only play-acting, Dodie. Of course I was. I thought it would amuse you, dearest…’

She laughs again. A gay little tinkle from the chaise longue.

Oh, Dodie, I think. That heart of yours. It seems so cold sometimes.

Then I go off to the room that I’m to share with her. Suddenly I’m ever so tired.