Читать книгу A Few Little Lies - Sue Welfare - Страница 9

4

Lawrence Rawlings, cradling the remains of a large brandy, settled himself back in an armchair by the fire to watch his fellow guests. The function room at Fairbeach’s Conservative Club was packed. Alicia Markham had buttonholed Edwin Halliday. The look on the cabinet minister’s face was a delight. Lawrence smiled – damned woman, rattling on about the effects of agricultural policy on Fairbeach farmers, while Halliday, the worse for several glasses of wine and a rather good port, was blinking, affecting rapt interest.

Little brackets of animated conversation had formed around the function room.

Jack Rees’ memorial supper for the Fairbeach Conservative inner circle had proved surprisingly successful, though Lawrence suspected Alicia had planned it to ensure Edwin Halliday MP felt obligated to stay overnight. Lawrence had seen the look in her eyes – agricultural policy was not the only thing on her mind.

His concentration moved on. To his surprise Guy Phelps was no more than a yard away, on his blind side, staring at him. Lawrence, a little nonplussed at being trumped at his own game, lifted his glass.

‘Went off rather well, wouldn’t you say?’ remarked Guy. ‘Alicia says we have to call a council of war now Jack’s safely buried.’

Lawrence Rawlings said nothing.

Guy glanced back into the room. ‘Marvellous to see everyone together like this. I’m sure good old Jack would really have approved.’

Lawrence snorted and indicated the chair on the other side of the hearth. ‘Take my advice, Guy, save the sentimentality for the hustings. Jack Rees would have stuck his nose round the door, found a damned good excuse why he had to leave early, and then gone off to shag one of the waitresses.’

Guy coloured slightly.

Lawrence rolled the dregs of brandy round in his glass. He couldn’t help wondering why Guy wasn’t snuggled up alongside Alicia and Edwin. He wasn’t sure he had the patience for the long trawl through the social niceties to find out. Guy was about to speak when Lawrence got to his feet.

‘If you’ll excuse me, my daughter and son-in-law are having a drink downstairs in the club bar. I promised them I’d go down and meet them after the dinner.’

Guy swallowed down his prepared sentence. ‘You’re leaving, Lawrence?’ he said in astonishment. ‘But, I thought –’

‘Not leaving, think of it as a short sabbatical.’

‘I’ve been thinking –’ Guy began again.

Lawrence beaded him with ice-blue eyes. ‘I wouldn’t make a habit of it, Guy. Leave it to those of us who have the knack. Alicia, I’m sure, will handle all your serious thinking for you.’ He stood the brandy balloon down on a side table. ‘I’m surprised they haven’t ordered up a circle of simpering acolytes for you yet.’

Phelps looked uneasy. ‘My wife is over there with Mrs Hewitt and the other ladies. Jack Rees was a loner, I prefer to model myself –’

Lawrence leant forward and patted Phelps gently on the shoulder.

‘Jack Rees was a man in a million, Guy. If he hadn’t been, he’d have been Prime Minister years ago. Take my advice, take all the sycophants and hangers-on Alicia can dig up for you. And make sure they find you a good political agent. Politics is a lonely business, you can do with all the support you can buy. Now, if you’ll excuse me I really have to go downstairs and talk to Sarah and Calvin. Why don’t you have another brandy?’

Lawrence was pleased to be outside on the landing; the air was cool and surprisingly clear. Our Lady Margaret, rendered in oils by a member of the local art club, stared down at him from the oak-panelled wall. In certain lights she appeared to have very long canine teeth peeking provocatively from under her top lip. Tonight she wore a Mona Lisa smile.

Lawrence slipped a hand casually into the pocket of his dinner jacket. He had no great desire to see either his daughter, Sarah, or Calvin Roberts, but he had even less inclination to spend any time with Guy Phelps. He walked slowly down the stairs. He had seen the selection lists from party headquarters. There were at least four stronger candidates than Mr Phelps.

He could still hear Alicia Markham’s insistent voice at the selection meeting. She’d railroaded the rest of the committee.

‘What we need is another local man, someone who understands the Fens,’ she’d snapped waspishly as the other names were offered up.

Lawrence shook his head; what they needed was Jack Rees. Alicia had thrown Phelps’ CV onto the table.

‘Guy comes from a well-known local family, he’s happily married, his children all go to local schools. His interview went very well.’

They’d fallen like skittles – Harry Dobbs, Celia Heath, Elizabeth Hewitt …

The noise of the club bar rose up the stairwell like smoke, breaking Lawrence’s train of thought.

Calvin Roberts was in the foyer hanging the phone back into its cradle. He smiled up at Lawrence as he descended. ‘Evening, Lawrence, just a quick business call. No peace anywhere these days, you know what it’s like.’ Calvin spoke far too defensively for there to be any truth in what he said. ‘How are you this evening?’

Lawrence nodded. ‘Fine. Sarah in the bar?’ He didn’t wait for an answer. Calvin fell into step beside him and they walked in through the double doors, shoulder to shoulder like a pair of gunslingers.

Sarah Roberts smiled when she saw them both and got to her feet.

‘Daddy, I’m so glad you came down. How did the dinner go? Did Calvin tell you his office was broken into?’

The two men stood either side of Sarah, eyeing each other up like dogs contesting territory. It was an old battlefield, the lines well drawn. Sarah slipped her arm through Lawrence’s.

‘I wanted to thank you again for a lovely day on Sunday. Lunch was wonderful, as always. The girls had a super time. I was saying to Calvin it was a shame he had to miss it.’

Lawrence wasn’t looking at his daughter, but at Calvin, who in turn held Lawrence’s gaze. Sarah talked on and on, her voice a delicate silken thread that bound both men together.

‘Would you like a drink?’ said Calvin, cutting across her.

Lawrence nodded. ‘Brandy.’

Calvin was the first to turn away. Sarah guided her father to a table. Instantly, the atmosphere lightened and he smiled down at his precious child.

‘So,’ he said, ‘what are those girls of yours doing tonight?’

Sarah leant closer and rested her head affectionately on her father’s shoulder.

‘I’m hoping that they’re sound asleep by now. We’ve got a new au pair, she …’ Lawrence listened with half an ear, comforted by trivia.

Across the room, Calvin was sharing a joke with the barman.

In her flat in Gunners Terrace, Dora took one final deep breath and opened the door for Jon Melrose. He stood on the dimly lit landing, hands stuffed in the pockets of his casual jacket. His hair was longer, it suited him. She smiled, feeling a peculiar little flutter of excitement in her stomach.

‘Hello, why don’t you come in, I’ve just put the kettle on.’

He stepped into the little hallway and grinned, running his fingers through his hair. ‘I hope you didn’t mind me dropping in. I recognised your name on one of the report sheets –’

‘No, not at all. It’s really nice to see you after –’ Dora stopped, not daring to count up how many years. ‘I heard you’d been transferred.’

Jon nodded. ‘That’s right. Sold down the river. But only as far as Keelside. Rationalisation, they call it. What it really means is that all our officers and most of the crime reports end up sitting on a desk half way across the county.’

Silence closed over the two of them like a heavy fog. Dora rubbed her hands uneasily on her sweater. ‘Why don’t you go into the sitting room, I’ll bring the tea in.’

Jon nodded. ‘No sugar for me.’ He paused. ‘You’ve been painting.’

Dora grinned, tugging at a magnolia streak in her hair. ‘I didn’t like the design job my uninvited interior decorator did. Bit radical for my tastes. I’ve just given it another coat, mind you, if you squint you can still read most of it. Who said the youth of today are illiterate?’

The silence dropped again; neither moved. Dora laughed, thinking how ridiculous it was. She lifted her hand in invitation. ‘If you’d like to go through –’

Jon looked at her. ‘Things have changed a bit since I last saw you.’

Dora nodded, as Jon, like everyone else who ever visited her, stepped straight into her office. She sighed and went into the kitchen.

His disembodied voice followed her. ‘So how’s the writing coming along?’

‘Not so bad –’

‘Ever write that book we planned?’

Dora peered round the office door. ‘Some of it. I just couldn’t sell the idea to anyone else. Seems like a long time ago now.’

He had pulled out a copy of a Catiana novel and was squatting on his haunches in front of the book cases, letting the pages of print flicker open. Sensing her standing in the doorway he held it out towards her.

‘Do you read much of this stuff?’

Dora blushed crimson. ‘Er, no, actually I was going to ring the police about that.’

Jon lifted an eyebrow.

‘I couldn’t tell the officer who came round after the burglary because my sister was here.’ Dora bit her lip, marshalling her thoughts into neat crisp lines. ‘I don’t read them, I write them. I’m Catiana Moran.’

Jon pulled a face. ‘I’ve lost this somewhere.’

‘My agent, Calvin Roberts, hired someone to represent me – to pretend to be me, to promote my books. That was the girl who was on TV.’

‘He mentioned you were a client of his.’ Jon looked up and closed the book. ‘You’ve picked an interesting way to make a living.’

Dora blushed even more. ‘It pays the bills,’ she said defensively.

His face had settled into a flat landscape that told her nothing about what he was thinking. ‘I wouldn’t have thought it was your sort of thing.’

‘I’m not sure it is really, but it sells well.’

Jon looked at her levelly. ‘And, apparently, gets you burgled.’

Dora felt an unexpected crystal shard of pain in her throat, with tears pressing up fast behind it.

‘I wondered if it might be a coincidence,’ she said slowly, trying to steady each word before it came out.

Casually, Jon slipped the book back amongst the others. ‘Maybe. This sort of break-in is very common, but it seems odd after what you’ve just told me that they did over Calvin Roberts’ place on. the same night.’

Dora leant against the door frame, trying hard to fight back the compulsion to ask Jon the next question. ‘Do you think,’ she began unsteadily, ‘that I was burgled because of the TV programme?’

Jon pursed his lips, and stood up slowly. ‘No idea, but I don’t think we can rule out the possibility.’ He spoke on a long outward breath, holding her gaze. His eyes were very dark, like Whitby jet.

Dora looked away first. ‘I think I just heard the kettle. What about Calvin Roberts? Why did they go there?’

Jon shook his head. ‘The local police think it’s probably just kids. There was no money on the premises. A few quid in petty cash. It seems pretty senseless, unless of course they were looking for something and it wasn’t here –’

Dora hovered between the hall and the office. ‘Is that what you think?’

Jon shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Weekday nights are usually quiet – that’s why I noticed the reports. If it had been Friday night you’d have been lost in the rush.’

A little flurry of something dark and cold had bubbled up from just below Dora’s navel. She leant back against the cool panels of her office door.

Jon pursed his lips and exhaled slowly. ‘Have you got any idea why someone would want to break in here?’

‘I’ve got nothing of any value.’ Dora paused. For a moment she imagined a figure creeping through the flat, his face in shadow. She shivered, a trickle of fear running down her spine like iced water. ‘Maybe we should ask Lillian.’

Jon looked confused. ‘Lillian?’

Dora nodded, working hard to keep her voice even. ‘She’s the girl we hired, the one who was on TV the other night. Her real name is Lillian Bliss. If someone thought she lived here …’ Dora’s voice faded. She didn’t want to talk about Lillian Bliss. She wanted things to be normal. ‘I think I ought to make the tea.’

Dora closed the kitchen door quietly behind her. If only Jon could have called, for another reason – any other reason. He’d looked so impassive when she’d told him about the books; a policeman’s face. She took two mugs off the draining board, trying to shepherd her thoughts back onto simple things. As she picked up the teapot, fear, red raw and completely unexpected, boiled up through her like a rising tide. Hands shaking, she grabbed hold of the kitchen sink and fought to regain her composure. It felt as if her mind could easily slip and race away from her if she didn’t keep a tight grip on it.

When she came back, a few minutes later, Jon had found his way into the sitting room and was folded comfortably on the settee. On his lap, Oscar curled and simpered, purring with delight. Dora stood the tray on the coffee table.

‘You really shouldn’t encourage that cat, he’s a complete tart.’

Jon grinned, stroking the cat’s ears. ‘I don’t mind.’

She thought he looked very at home on her battered sofa. The soft lamp light picked out the laughter lines round his eyes. Dora swallowed hard. She wished she’d had the courage to ring him years before.

‘Can you tell me what happened?’ he asked, glancing round the room. ‘Do you mind if I smoke? I don’t remember …’

Dora nodded. ‘Not at all, in fact if you’ve got a spare I’ll cadge one.’

He shook out a packet and offered his lighter. Dora stood an ashtray between the mugs.

‘So, what else can you tell me?’

‘Nothing very much. Calvin Roberts hired Lillian Bliss to promote the Catiana Moran novels. I scripted her interviews and she learnt them.’

Jon leant forward. ‘And you very thoughtfully included your address?’

Dora shook her head. ‘Not exactly, she got caught on the hop and started ad-libbing. Anyway, I went out shopping the day after the broadcast and when I came back the place was wrecked. Nothing taken, just one hell of a mess.’

Jon took a long thoughtful pull on his cigarette. ‘Anyone know you were going to be out?’

‘No, nobody.’

Jon pulled out a small notebook. ‘Several people rang your agent to And out about Lillian. The TV station gave out his number to anyone who was interested, so that might explain how they found him. Perhaps they were looking for something. They couldn’t find it here so they went to Calvin Roberts’ place.’ He leant forward as if waiting for her to say something.

Dora remembered sitting in a café with Jon, drinking coffee. She had contacted the local police to get some background for a book she wanted to write and Jon had been volunteered to talk to her. They’d met in Lacey’s coffee shop creating scenarios, spinning workable plots. This one sounded no different, except, of course, it was real.

‘But what about all the damage?’

Jon shrugged. ‘Covering their tracks? I should warn you, I don’t think there will be much of an investigation into this. Nothing’s been taken – the CID have got bigger fish to fry.’ He paused. ‘Divorced now?’

Dora smiled. I’m afraid so, Ray didn’t take too kindly to me picking up off-duty policemen.’

Jon laughed, holding her gaze. ‘My wife felt the same about stray writers,’ he said softly.

Dora wondered exactly what he was telling her.

‘What do you think they were looking for?’ she asked evenly.

She’d always sensed Jon’s interest was more than professional. She’d seen it in his eyes, heard in his teasing when they’d sat together in Lacey’s. Hunched over her notebook, listening to his deep, lyrical voice, she had used her husband to fend him off then, bringing her marriage into the conversation like a tank trap. Now it was the burglary.

‘I was hoping you could tell me. Is that tea brewed yet?’

Dora leant forward to pour it. ‘By the way, what were you doing at Jack’s funeral this morning?’

‘Show of respect. They sent Edwin Halliday, the cabinet minister, down to represent the government. Had to keep an eye on him. He could easily have got lost once he was off the M25, you know what MPs are like.’

Dora handed him a mug. ‘You’re a bodyguard these days?’

Jon snorted. ‘Not really, they wanted a couple of senior officers there to represent the force. I volunteered. I’d met Jack a few times, he was a nice guy.’

Looking away, Dora stroked the ash off her cigarette around the edge of the ashtray. ‘What’s going to happen about the burglary?’

‘You want me to be honest? Not a lot. By the way, who else knows you’re really Catiana Moran?’

Dora bit her lip. ‘No-one, just Calvin and now Lillian. The publishers know because of the contracts but no-one else locally.’

Jon nodded. ‘Family?’

Dora shook her head. ‘Good God, no, they have got no idea.’

‘That’s fine, try and keep it that way.’ He downed the rest of his tea. ‘You should be fine now, but don’t quote me on it.’

‘If my mystery caller decides to come back for a second look, you mean?’ she said.

‘Exactly. Look, I’ve really got to be going. At the moment there’s no way of knowing what’s going on. It might be nothing at all, but be careful. Check your locks and think about getting a security grille for the kitchen window.’

Dora looked around her familiar shabby sitting room. Oscar stretched and mewled. She shook her head. ‘Maybe it was just kids.’

Jon lifted his hands in resignation. ‘Maybe. I’ve asked the local plod to keep an eye on the flat while they’re out on their rounds.’

Dora snorted. ‘That’s very reassuring.’

Jon slowly got to his feet. ‘It’s the best I can do at the moment.’ He’d reached the hallway, hands back in his jacket. ‘Thanks for the tea.’

She didn’t want him to go. The realisation surprised her. It had nothing to do with the burglary, but a sudden awareness of how many years it had taken them to get back to this point.

‘You know, I’ve really missed you,’ she muttered thickly, feeling herself blush as she said it.

He didn’t seem to notice. ‘Funny, I was just thinking the same thing. Can I ring you, I mean, maybe we could go out somewhere, or something?’

Dora nodded. ‘Yes, I’d like that.’

He was moving reluctantly towards the door. ‘I know it’s a bit pushy but are you doing anything tomorrow night?’

She smiled. ‘Pushy I can cope with. What had you got in mind?’

‘I’ve got the night off, maybe we could go out for a meal?’

Dora nodded. ‘I’d like that. What time?’

‘Eight-ish?’

‘Fine.’

‘I’ll pick you up here.’

After she closed the door behind him, Dora pressed her forehead against the cool woodwork and wondered exactly what had happened to all the years since she had last seen him, and why they had never kissed. Behind her, Oscar mewled malevolently and scrambled into the kitchen. She went back into the office and plugged the phone in. Her daughter, Kate, answered on the third ring.

Dora barely had a chance to get past hello.

‘Mum, is that you? Aunty Sheila rang me to say you’d been burgled. I’ve been ringing and ringing –’

‘I unplugged the phone,’ Dora said.

Kate sniffed, sounding uncannily like Sheila. Concern was rapidly being displaced by indignation. ‘Why on earth did you do that? I’ve been so worried. Are you all right? Did they take much?’

Dora took a breath to reassure her she was fine, but Kate continued. ‘Have you rung Dad yet? I said to Mike that maybe we ought to ring Dad and let him know.’

Dora stared at the receiver. Some part of Kate had never been reconciled to the fact that she and Ray were divorced. Marriage, even if legally dead, somehow meant you were permanently, irreversibly joined at the hip.

‘No,’ she said slowly. ‘No, I haven’t rung your father.’

Kate sniffed again. ‘Do you want me to ring him? Do you want me and Mike to drive up? I mean, it’s only a couple of hours. Or you could come and stay down here for a while with us. We’ve got the spare room done now, we’re out at work all day but –’

Dora sighed, and dropped her voice into the tone she had once used to reassure Kate that she was more than a match for any monsters that lurked, fangs dripping, under her bed.

‘Really, love, I’m absolutely fine, how’s everything with you? How’s Mike?’

Kate sucked in a long breath, determined not to be side-tracked into conversations about her marriage. ‘I’ve been really worried.’

When Dora finally hung up she felt drained dry.

As she switched off the office light, in the darkness something caught her eye in the street below. Parked just outside the arc of a street lamp was a small dark car; inside was a man looking up at her window. A featureless moon-white face stared up at the flat. Dora smiled; the local plod. Jon had been as good as his word.

In her house in a select avenue overlooking Fairbeach park gardens, Alicia Markham waited for the fluorescent light to stop flickering. She let her eyes adjust to the glare and then slipped on her spectacles. The rest of the kitchen was in darkness, everywhere still and quiet.

Carefully, she lifted a box down from the shelf in the pantry. Inside, a diary and a filofax were neatly wrapped up in a curl of tissue paper. Her man had delivered two, or so her resident house boy had informed her. She glanced up at the other box, not that there was really time to look in that either now.

They had been delivered while she was out at Jack’s memorial supper. She stood the box on the butcher’s block and thumbed through the contents. No photographs, nothing that she could use. Alicia knew exactly what she hoped to turn up, and of course there might be other things too that could be of value, one could never be certain what would be trawled up. All she needed was one positive piece of evidence and Guy Phelps would be on his way to Westminster.

‘Alicia, darling, are you down there?’ Edwin Halliday MP’s silky-smooth orator’s voice followed her down the back stairs. Alicia glanced over her shoulder as she slipped the lid back on the cake box.

‘I won’t be a moment, Edwin, go back to bed, darling.’

They went back a long way, Alicia and Edwin, even if their links and the liaisons had always been very tenuous. Neither had any long-term plans for the other. They met at party Conferences, weekend think tanks, networking retreats and funerals. She undid the top two buttons of her negligee and folded her spectacles back into their case.

‘Just getting another bottle of Krug,’ she called, snapping off the pantry light. ‘I won’t be a minute.’

If Edwin hadn’t been so bloody honest she might have recruited him to help her win Fairbeach for Guy. She hurried back upstairs to bed. Perhaps the man she had hired would be able to turn up something else. They had a little more time.