52
Thursday, 3 May 2012
Stella slotted the van into the last bay on Margravine Road behind Barons Court Underground station and let herself into the redbrick mansion block. She pressed against the grille and peered up the dust-furred shaft. The lift was out of sight. Most residents – young couples and single professionals – were at work. Again she bit back frustration that Suzanne Darnell would not move to a place where she might meet people, be taken out of herself. Stella took the stairs. The flat door was ajar, she pushed it open.
She was in a brightly lit hall. So preoccupied had she been with the morning’s events that she had exited the stairwell at the wrong floor and wandered into the wrong flat.
The layout was identical to her mum’s, but instead of the fusty passage that no amount of cleaning could cheer, sunlight splashed through open doors on to a crimson runner. No flecks of paint or blackened varnish. The hallway, with no newspapers, was spacious and made more so by white-painted walls that, though yellowed with age, appeared fresh. Stella traced this impression to beeswax polish and a new non-toxic multi-surface lavender cleaner she was trialling. Whoever cleaned here knew what they were doing. A wild notion of recruiting them was interrupted when she came face to face with the drawing of the dog.
The black Labrador retriever sat beside a bowl half its size and a huge pot with a red flower, petals sticking out in an uneven circle. The background was a strict division of green for grass and blue for sky. The moulded picture frame was too grand for the child’s crayon drawing. Stella read the words, written in rounded lower case, ‘trixy and tulip. stella aged 6’.
That day the fat waxy crayons had done her bidding and recreated the dog exactly. She had a good feeling in her tummy when her teacher pinned it on the classroom wall. The good feeling went when Stella explained to the children at her table that Trixy was best at sniffing for bodies underwater. She was sent to the headmistress. Her mum had been cross with Terry. Soon after – and so in the seven-year-old’s mind linked – her mum and dad divorced. Why was ‘trixy and tulip’ here?
Stella was in her mother’s flat. It was clean last time she visited; this was a transformation. She paused by the open door to her bedroom. The tiger fleece bedspread from her adolescence was draped over the bed; the rabbit knitted by her nana was propped on the pillow. Bunny had gone to charity, how come he was back?
Stella drifted into the room. No dust on the venetian blind. On the shelves above the bed were the boxes of stationery with the original Clean Slate branding and files bulging with Clean Slate’s first invoices and receipts. Her mother’s electric typewriter was next to them. Gone were the mounds of fabric and the heaps of suppliers’ catalogues that Suzie had collected.
‘Stella, is that you?’ her mum trilled from the living room.
‘Yes.’ The door swung wide when Stella pushed it and banged against the wall. This was because the carton of clothes Suzie refused to let her chuck had gone.
‘You’ll dent the plaster!’
House-proud now.
Suzie was perched in her armchair; she too seemed spruce and to have grown in stature. The plaster ceiling rose of carved blooms and cherubs was free of London grime.
Stella did not need to inspect for vacuum marks on the carpet pile, she could see them from where she stood. The scent of carpet shampoo stung her nostrils. The curtains in the two windows were tied back with coloured lengths of material, presumably from the fabric collection. The panes were so spotless they were invisible. Free of its protective plastic cloth, sunlight brought up the finish on her mother’s pine dinner table. It was no longer laden with objects. Gone was the box of cleaning samples, along with the ‘Bag for Life’ bulging with bargains brokered in junk shops, regardless of need. There was no chipped crockery or postcards from forsaken seaside resorts. Surfaces gleamed.
The room was restored to the room of Stella’s childhood. The rag mat on which she had played with her dad’s Meccano was spread in front of the gas fire.
‘I got your message, Mum.’
‘We’ve made you tea.’ Jack gestured to the familiar diamond of coconut matting on the coffee table. Stella might be seven; time could be turned back. She took the mug and went into the kitchen. Strategically positioned appliances on the deeply cleaned counter made it a showcase for what is possible in a tiny space.
‘What are you doing, love?’ Suzie called.
‘Sticking it in the microwave. I like it hot.’
‘It’s hot,’ Jack joined in.
‘It won’t be enough.’ She took a sip to prove it and fanned at her mouth. It was hot. She came back and sat on the edge of the sofa, now by the window.
On the Saturdays her mum had her – which was most Saturdays – she let her have a bar of chocolate. Sitting here, Stella ate it too quickly, flicking through the Beano and later Jackie. She had sat here, washed and dressed, waiting for Terry to collect her. Sometimes he could not come.
‘See what a good job your Jack has done?’ Suzie tapped on the obligatory cushion; something had not changed. ‘Take your jacket off, you’re always in a rush.’
Stella shook her head. She was in a rush.
‘We have a proposal.’ Jack lifted his glass of milk to take in Suzanne Darnell.
Stella sniffed an ambush. Jack was inclined to be sentimental about families. ‘Suz, you tell.’ He looked at her mother.
‘I want a job.’ In her effort to get the words out, Suzie Darnell’s intonation was aggressive. Her fingers thwacked the cushion. This provided her daughter with the justification she needed to wrest control of the situation.
‘You’re retired, Mum, you don’t need a job. Your finances are healthy and will be even better if you move. The landlords are desperate, they’ll give you a lump sum and I’ll top it up. We could get a cottage in the country. With a garden. Or sheltered accommodation, maybe by the sea.’
‘I’m only sixty-six and I feel thirty-six. I don’t want to moulder in a henhouse.’
‘Anyone over fifty can live in those places if their partner or husband is older.’
‘My husband is dead.’
Stella’s tea was exactly the right temperature. Although Jack only drank milk, he made perfect tea and coffee.
‘I want a job.’ Her mother was appealing to Jack.
Stella jumped up.
‘Hang on.’ Jack put up a hand. ‘What your mum means is she has skills to offer.’ Without his coat, in his grey knitted sleeveless jumper frayed at the shoulders, crumpled shirt sleeves rolled halfway up his wrists and glasses perched on his nose, Jack had an old-fashioned authority. He was always looking for a home; it seemed he had found one.
Ghost girl. Stella saw herself cross-legged under the table, beneath a tent of fabrics and blankets, dressed in the Red Indian Chief costume her dad had given her but never saw her wear. After she had constructed the wigwam and donned the costume, she hadn’t known what to do next. Nor did she now.
‘Stella, did you hear me?’ It was Jack.
The wigwam vanished. The girl too.
‘What do you think?’
‘I told you she wouldn’t listen.’ Suzie drummed her cushion.
‘Yes, yes, she will!’
Stella had never seen Jack angry before. She sat down.
‘Your mum wants a job with Clean Slate. I thought this was possible. You are looking for another assistant for Jackie.’
‘Doing what?’ At the mention of her business Stella bristled.
‘You tell me. For a start, typing.’ Jack took a long draught of his milk. ‘Suzie’s speed is ninety-five words per minute with a nil error rate.’ He bit his lower lip. ‘That is fast.’
‘We don’t do “typing”, as you call it and Mum hasn’t had that speed for years.’
‘It’s like riding a bicycle.’ Suzie Darnell addressed the electric fire, her fingers skittering over the fabric. ‘The quick brown fox…’
‘Your mum types every day.’ Jack indicated Suzie’s cushion.
Her mother had developed the tic of tapping a cushion when she spoke after Stella had left home. Now she saw what Jack meant. It was a keyboard. Each finger tap was a letter, each beat of her thumb put a space between words. Phantom stenography. Her mum was stressed. If she worked, this would increase.
Stella’s mobile was ringing.
‘Jackie, hello there!’ Timing never better. ‘I’m so sorry about our meeting. An emergency with my mother, as you guessed.’
She went through to the kitchen, the phone tucked between her cheek and her shoulder. She dropped a spot of washing-up liquid in her mug, sluiced it under the hot tap and dried her hands on a crisply ironed towel.
‘No problem. We need to meet to review the short list though.’
‘Yes.’ Stella opened the cupboards until she found where the mugs now went. What shortlist did Jackie mean?
Jackie must have guessed her bewilderment. ‘Six candidates coming in. Three today and three tomorrow, for the post of my assistant.’
‘I’m on my way.’ Too late Stella discovered the phone was on hands free. Her mum and Jack had heard the conversation.
‘I have to go.’ She breezed back. ‘I’ll give you a lift.’ She tipped her head at Jack.
‘I’ve finished here.’ Jack reached for her mum’s mug.
‘Leave that, love.’ Suzie Darnell touched his arm and, looking at her daughter, said: ‘You don’t want to be late for Jackie.’ Her fingers remained still. Stella muttered a goodbye.
Jack was quiet in the lift. He took out a tobacco pouch strapped with an elastic band and, opening it, pinched out a twist, shut the packet and returned it to his coat pocket. Stella hesitated over the lift buttons as if there were any way but down.
Downstairs she wrenched open the gate with a clang and followed Jack. He walked head-down, tweaking tobacco into a thin line, the cigarette paper butterfly-like in his palm.
‘Your mum said, before she had you she worked for the police, typing reports, cases lists, indexing.’ He rolled the paper into a cylinder.
‘We’re not talking yesterday.’ Stella hurried along Margravine Road.
‘She typed for Terry – he couldn’t read his own handwriting. I didn’t know she used to run Clean Slate with you.’ Jack cradled his silver cigarette case.
‘We’re going to see someone.’ The words were out before Stella had formed the idea.
‘Don’t you have interviews?’ Jack slotted his seat belt into the socket.
‘Jackie can do them.’
‘Jackie has a jolly good sense of people,’ Jack agreed, the roll-up bobbing between his lips.
In anyone else the pallid complexion and dark stubble would have been a concern, but Stella guessed this was one of Jack’s good days. ‘Take this.’ She lifted down a street atlas from a compartment above the sun visor. ‘Look up British Grove.’ She executed a six-point turn, crushing a recycling bin against the wall.
‘What happened to the satnav? You don’t believe in maps.’
‘It’s broken.’
‘British Grove is off King Street, opposite the junction for Goldhawk Road.’ He raised the book. ‘Is this A to Z yours?’
‘Clean Slate’s, yes.’
‘I’ve lost mine.’
‘Yours is defaced by those letters on each page. Time you got another.’ Stella had to be firm with Jack. ‘That is not yours.’
‘I dropped it and now a stranger has it.’ Jack sounded mournful. He believed his possessions were lost without him. Stella scoffed inwardly, but then saw Bunny sitting on her pillow at her mother’s. She’d been worried sick about him when he went. However, a street atlas was hardly the same.
Travelling towards the lights on Hammersmith Road, passing the site of the register office – long gone – where her parents had married in 1966, Stella remembered: ‘What was that about cracking the code?’
‘Ah yes.’ Jack tapped his cigarette case. ‘The digits for the dates when the men died all equal seven.’
‘Not all. Some have eight numbers.’
‘Not the number of numbers, the total of the numbers. Take Paul Vickery, our first death on Marquis Way. He died on the sixteenth of March. That’s a one, a six and a three. It equals ten. One and nought is one. Add the year, which was 1977. One plus nine is ten, make that a one again, two sevens are fourteen which is five. Add in our two ones and we have seven. The trick is to think of it like reducing gravy, keep boiling it down.’
Concentrating on keeping to the speed limit, Stella had lost track. ‘I’ve nearly filled in the grid. Get my Filofax.’ She indicated her rucksack.
Jack scrutinized the neatly drawn matrix. ‘Hey, well done on Denis Atkins. How did you find him?’
‘There was a plaque on Mafeking Avenue. I found an article about when it was unveiled, which gave me the year. It mentioned a man called Atkins…’ Stella was rather impressed with herself.
‘See! The seventh of September 1970. All of that comes to thirty-three. Add that and it comes to six.’ Jack’s cigarette fell on to his lap. ‘And Charlie Hampson’s date – the15th March comes to twenty which boils down to two. What a nuisance.’ He found the cigarette and snapped it into his case. ‘Something about threes maybe, thirty-three was Jesus’s age when —’
‘Two of them were killed on a Sunday and mostly in March, including Hampson.’ Stella felt excitement building, the answer was just out of reach. They were by Marks and Spencer’s. The witness appeal board about Joel Evans’s death was still there.
‘Very true.’ Jack shut the Filofax and popped it back in the rucksack.
‘There’s a seven in half of the dates, we keep finding seven bits of glass and the boys who died were aged seven. This man has a thing about seven.’ Stella was on it now.
‘What’s in British Grove?’
‘Lucille May.’
‘Who’s she?’
‘A reporter on the Hammersmith and Fulham Chronicle. She covered most of the accidents. She did that piece about Terry. Don’t mention it. I won’t say who I am.’
‘Sounds like a Hollywood actress. Great name.’ Jack whistled. ‘Nice one, Stell. Are we telling her about Terry’s photos?’
‘Absolutely not. She’s a journalist.’
‘Have to be clever. They have the snouts of porcupines.’
‘You’ll think of something.’ Stella dipped down a road behind the garage where Terry got his car serviced. It had closed down. Hoardings blocked it from view; a sign warned of demolition. Stella saw why older people could resent change. It played havoc with memory. If you didn’t recognize a place, how could you remember where, or even who you had been? The garage going put Terry at another remove. The nice man who had given her polo mints while they waited for his tyres to be changed must be dead now. More bloody ghosts.
‘They’re putting up luxury flats.’ Jack dropped her rucksack on the floor. ‘Ooops.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Some man told me.’ He pushed everything back into the bag.
The garage gave way to a terrace of redbrick villas. Stella drew up by the first house.
‘What’s this?’ Jack held up the printout from the police database.