A Room Swept White (33 page)

The footsteps are getting closer. I spring up, lunge across the room at the dehumidifier and knock it over. I pick it up, turn it so that the broadest side is facing the office door, and sit with my back pressed against it, pulling my knees up to my chin and putting my arms round my legs, refusing to listen to the voice in my head that’s saying,
What’s the point? So they won’t see you when they look through the glass in the door –
so
what? In a minute Maya’s going to let them in, and they’re going to find you, very obviously hiding from them
.

Is there any way I can pretend I’m sitting like this because I’m feeling particularly humid today? I’m sweating buckets; maybe that’ll help make the lie convincing.

I hear the quieter of the two male voices say, ‘What’s that? An electric heater?’

’Never seen one as big as that,’ says Sellers.

I tuck my chin into my chest. I had no idea I could do this: make a ball of my body while still sitting up. Maybe I ought to take up yoga.
What are you going to say when they unlock the door, walk in and see you
?

‘Sorry, guys, do you want to start with Fliss’s old office? It might take me a while to track down one of the spare keys for Laurie’s. He was always forgetting his, using the spares, then putting them back in odd places.’

Thank God
. My relief lasts about half a second, until it occurs to me that the only good thing about my old room was the view of Laurie’s office, across the courtyard. I could lie on the floor beneath the window and not be seen by the police, but then if Maya walks past, she’ll see me through the glass in the door. With much panicky swearing through gritted teeth, I shunt the dehumidifier round, so that its widest side now faces the window, and pull it a metre or so across the room. Will the detectives notice it’s been moved, or will they assume all four sides are the same?

This is the only place I can sit and not be visible from either vantage point. I assume the tucked-in-ball position again, and wait for what seems like years, listening out for the sound of the police coming back in this direction.
And when I hear them, my plan is to do what, exactly
? Questions flit round my brain: too many moths around a lightbulb, clustering blackly around the source of light, making it dark. Why am I bothering to pretend I might get away with this, and what’s the point anyway? Why did Tamsin tell me to read a newspaper? Why do I love Laurie so much when I shouldn’t even like him? Why can’t I bear the thought of being told by DC Sellers that I can’t speak to Ray again until he says I can?
Why are the police looking for her? Do they think she killed Helen Yardley?

Is that the story she wants to tell me
?

Footsteps. And DC Sellers’ boom-box voice again, faint but getting closer. I scramble across the floor to the window and try to prise it open. It feels as if it’s been painted shut. Have I ever seen Laurie with his window open? Did I ever notice anything apart from every detail of the man himself – the hairs on his arms, his ankles in black socks – in all the hours I spent gazing across the courtyard at him?
Silly question
.

I push and shove, leaning my whole weight into the window, muttering, ‘Yes, thank you, thank you,’ as if it’s already given way – a little trick that’s sometimes worked for me in other situations. There’s a creak, then – glory and hallelujah – it opens. I climb out, and am about to lie down next to the wall when I remember my bag.
Shit
.

I push myself through the window again. Why is it such a tight squeeze? I can’t have got fatter since three seconds ago. I’m surprised I haven’t lost half my body weight, the amount I’m sweating. Back in the room, I freeze, panic rollercoastering through my veins. The police and Maya are right outside; seconds away. I hear a metallic jangling: a bunch of keys. I grab my bag, and half fall, half wriggle through the window. There’s a loud tearing sound as I hit the courtyard’s paving stones. Christ, that hurt. I kneel up and detach a swatch of material that used to be part of my shirt from a jagged shard of wood protruding from the window frame.

I hear the key turn in the lock.
No more time
. I push the wood that’s come free back into the frame and give the
window a shove. It almost shuts. There’s no way I can close the catch, not from outside and not with Maya and the two detectives walking into the room, so I do the only thing I can do: lie flat on my side, pressing my sore body against the wall under the window. I scan the rooms on the opposite side of the courtyard. I’m safe – they’re all empty.

‘It’s a dehumidifier, Sarge,’ DC Sellers says. So the quieter man’s in charge.

‘What do you reckon to Maya Jacques?’ he asks.

Maya’s not with them any more? What the hell’s she doing, letting two cops loose in my office unsupervised?

‘Good body, good hair, bad face,’ says Sellers. Bad personality, I’m tempted to call out, from what I’m trying, euphemistically, to think of as my courtyard retreat. There are weeds sprouting up between the flagstones. One is almost touching my nose. Its leaves are sprinkled with soil and white powder: paint dust from the window. I’m already cold; soon I’ll be freezing.

‘I think she knows the Twickenham address. She protested a bit too much.’

‘Why wouldn’t she tell us?’

‘Laurie Nattrass has nothing but contempt for the police – he says as much in a broadsheet at least twice a week. Do you think he’d tell us where Ray Hines is staying?’

‘Probably not,’ says Sellers.

‘He wouldn’t. He’d protect her – that’s how he’d see it, anyway. I think we’d better assume everyone at Binary Star feels the same way. Here, look at this.’

What? What are they looking at?

‘New message from Angus Hines.’

No, no, no
. I nearly wail out loud. I left my email inbox
up on the screen. This is the part where the police find out I locked a man in my flat. This is the beginning of me going to jail.

‘Interesting.’

‘Have you opened it, Sarge? Living dangerously, aren’t you? Interception of Communications Act, and all that.’

‘I must have leaned on the mouse by mistake. “Dear Fliss, here are two lists you might find interesting. One is of all the women, and a few men, against whom Judith Duffy has given evidence at criminal trials. The other is of all the people she’s testified against in the family courts. All, on both lists, were accused of physically injuring and in many cases killing a child or children. You might also be interested to know that in another twenty-three cases, Dr Duffy testified in support of a parent or parents and said that, in her opinion, no abuse had taken place.” ‘

‘And?’

‘That’s it. “Best wishes, Angus Hines”.’

That’s it? No mention of illegal imprisonment in my basement flat? I swallow a sigh. It would be a basement flat, wouldn’t it? I hadn’t thought of that before. Locking up other human beings is never ideal, but when there’s any sort of cellar involved, you know you’re dealing with a monster.
Wonderful. Just wonderful
.

‘Thirty-two on the criminal list, fifty-seven in the family courts,’ says Sellers. I hear a whistle that I think means, ‘That’s a lot of people’.

‘Family court proceedings are confidential. Where’s he got these names from?’

A good question, but not the main one in my mind. Why has he emailed me the two lists, with no explanation? Is it
his way of saying he wants me to make the documentary? Perhaps by locking him in my flat, I proved to him that I have flair and initiative.
Yeah, right
.

He could have got the names from Judith Duffy. She might well keep a record of everyone she’s given evidence against in court. She and Ray are now friends, Ray and Angus are more than friends . . . I press my eyes shut, frustrated. I’m accumulating information, but making no progress. Each new thing I find out is like a thread that leads nowhere.

‘Holy crap,’ says Sellers.

What?
What
?

‘New mail icon just flashed up again. I clicked on it . . .’

‘You mean you leaned on the mouse by mistake. And?’

‘Look at this photo.’

‘Is that . . .?’

‘It’s Helen Yardley’s hand. Those are her wedding and engagement rings.’

‘Holding a card with the sixteen numbers on, and . . . what’s behind the card? A book?’

I can feel my heartbeat throbbing in my ears and throat. I’m glad they found it, not me. I hope they delete it, so that I don’t have to see it.

‘Nothing But Love,’
says Sellers. ‘Her own book. Seen the sender’s address?
[email protected]
. He’s spelled “hilarious” wrong.’

‘Forward it to your own email and close it.’

‘Think it’s him, Sarge?’

‘I do,’ the quieter one says. ‘That picture was taken in Helen Yardley’s living room – see the wallpaper in the background? I think he took it on Monday, before he shot her. Whoever he
is, he wants Fliss Benson to know what he did. It’s as if he’s . . . I don’t know, boasting or something.’

I can’t decide if I’m relieved or disgusted. The idea that a killer has me on his mind and has contacted me four times makes me want to climb into a boiling hot shower and stay there for a long time. But if he’s boasting to me, if I’m his audience, perhaps he’s less likely to harm me. I desperately want to believe this.

I hear papers being shuffled. My files.

‘Sarge, these are full of stuff about Yardley, Jaggard and Hines. We need to take all this away, and Benson’s computer. And Nattrass’s, even if we have to break into his house to get it.’

‘You read my mind. I’ll speak to Proust.’

I assume they’re not talking about the dead French novelist.

‘We need warrants, soon as possible. I don’t see how any judge could knock us back. Helen Yardley’s dead, Sarah Jaggard’s been attacked, and Ray Hines is missing – presumed at risk until we track her down. The main thing linking the three women is the documentary.’

‘Do we know where Benson was on Monday?’

Monday? A chill sweeps through me that has nothing to do with the weather as I realise what they must mean. Helen Yardley was murdered on Monday. It’s all I can do to stop myself from leaping up and yelling, ‘I was here, in the office. I was here all day.’

‘Leave those files as you found them,’ says the quiet sergeant. ‘I’ll tell Maya Jacques to keep the office locked and make sure no one touches anything in here.’

Finally, they go. A few minutes later, I hear the thock-thock of Maya’s heels and the sound of the key turning in the door.
That’s it. Everyone has finished with my office for the time being – everyone but me. I stay where I am and force myself to count to a hundred before moving. Then I climb back inside and close the window behind me. That’s as close as I ever hope to get to a camping holiday, I think to myself as I brush the crumbs of dirt and dust off my clothes.

My hand shaking, I delete the email from ‘hilairious’ without opening it; the police have taken ownership of it, which is fine by me. I print out Angus Hines’ email and put it in my bag, along with Laurie’s revised article. Stupidly, forgetting the key sound I heard, I try to open the office door and find I can’t. How ironic: I’ve been locked in. Isn’t there something called locked-in syndrome? That’s what I’m suffering from, me and Angus Hines. I guess all those irritating people who say ‘What goes around comes around’ must be right.

I unlock the door, then close and lock it behind me. I take the scenic route out of the office, the one that doesn’t involve going anywhere near Maya, and hail another taxi. I give the driver my home address. If I see a strange car camped outside that might belong to the police, I’ll tell the cab to drive past, but if I don’t, I’d quite like to check my flat’s still in one piece – no broken windows or piles of glass on the carpet, no scratch marks on the walls.
No irate Tamsin sitting on the sofa, waiting to deliver a stern lecture.

Tomorrow I’ll have to go back to the office and make copies of everything in those box files before the police take them away. Maya won’t be in – Sunday’s her manicure and pedicure day. Raffi might be around on the Lord’s Day of Rest, as he called it, but the chances of him taking an interest in my activities are slim. If I’m efficient, I should be able to
photocopy the lot in five or six hours. The thought makes me feel weak with exhaustion.

And once you’ve copied it all, where are you going to take it? Where are you going to hide
? Tamsin and Joe’s flat? Mine? Both are places the police are bound to come back to, if they’re as keen to find me as they seem to be.

I think I probably made the decision a while ago, but it’s only now that I allow myself to acknowledge it. Marchington House. That’s where I’ll go. Ray won’t mind. I’ve known her less than a week, but I know she won’t mind. There must be spare rooms there, plenty of space for me and the contents of several large box files. Plenty of time for me to plough through all the paperwork Laurie and Tamsin generated, looking for . . . what? Something Laurie missed because he couldn’t see the trees for the wood?

I feel utterly drained, but I’m too wired to sleep, or even to stare out of the window. I need to do something productive. I pull Laurie’s article out of my bag and start to read it. I stop when I get to a sentence that doesn’t sound right:

Despite never having murdered anybody, Dr Duffy was responsible for ruining the lives of dozens of innocent women whose only crime was to be in the wrong place at the wrong time when a child or children died: Helen Yardley, Sarah Jaggard, Dorne Llewellyn . . . the list goes on and on.

Three names isn’t a long list. Why didn’t Laurie include more, to prove his point? There
were
more in the original draft, I’m sure of it. I turn to the last page. Laurie has also, wisely – or perhaps because the journal editors gave him no choice – deleted his insinuation that Rhiannon Evans must have
murdered her son Benjamin because she’s a working-class prostitute and that’s the sort of thing they do. It makes sense to cut that out, but why strike names off the list of Judith Duffy’s victims – a list that’s supposed to go on and on?