Looking for Trouble (23 page)

SMILEY – I QUIT. LOVE SAL.’

‘You could drape a white sheet out the window.’

‘Yeah,’ I sighed. ‘Bit rude though, issuing an ultimatum like that and not waiting for an answer.’

I was pulling on clean, if crinkled, clothes, getting ready to go round to Diane’s, when the phone rang again. My stomach corkscrewed. I didn’t want to answer it. Ray was downstairs and he called up, ‘For you, Sal.’

He held out the receiver and whispered, ‘A woman – American, I think.’

‘Hello, Nina?’

‘Sal.’ Her voice was gravel-thick.

‘Are you okay? You sound awful.’

‘I’m sorry, oh...’ The words were slurred.

‘Nina, what’s wrong? What’s the matter?’

She moaned, then there was a clatter as the phone was dropped. I couldn’t get an answer from her. Shit.

I raced back into my room and pulled a sweatshirt on over my jeans and T-shirt. Ray was in the shower. I called out to him that I had to go out, work, I’d leave the address downstairs. I scrawled the Zaleski’s address on the back of an envelope with a wax crayon.

‘It’s not anything to do with that nutter, is it?’ he called from the top of the stairs.

‘No way, Ray.’

There were no lights on at Nina’s. The drive had taken me fifteen minutes, during which time I’d imagined every horror under the sun to account for the aborted phone call. I parked in front of the veranda. I looked about before getting out of the car but the twilight played games with the shapes and shadows.

As I stepped up onto the veranda steps, an intruder light snapped on, flooding the porch and beyond with glaring sodium light. I fought the impulse to flee and knocked loudly with the lion’s paw. Somewhere in the back of the house, the dog Fang set up a rhythmic barking. I knocked again and again. In between the steady woofs, I listened, ears cocked for any other sounds. I heard a car on the road slowing down, slow enough to turn into the drive. I skipped down from the door and listened in the dark. The car was nearby but not coming up Nina’s drive. I heard the rattle of gravel, next door’s perhaps.

I jumped back into the limelight and made my way round the side of the house. I’d hoped to peer in through windows but elaborate shutters covered them all, except for a small frosted glass rectangle towards the back of the house, on the right-hand side.

I hesitated for a few seconds. Would it be better to go and find a phone box, try rousing Nina that way? But I was too worried to delay any longer. Nina had been distressed; she could be lying in there, bleeding to death. There were a couple of hideous wrought-iron sculptures at either side of the veranda steps. I picked one up and carried it round to the glass window. Fang was quiet.

I raised the twisted iron and brought it down hard against the window. The glass buckled rather than shattered, reinforced in some way. No bells or sirens. Fang went apeshit. He was nearby, but not in the room itself. Mixed with his deep-throated barking was the clatter of claws scrabbling against a door.

I had to hit the glass several times to break it up, like smashing toffee. I pushed lumps of it into the room with the edge of the sculpture. When I’d made a clear hole, I heaved myself up and lunged over the sill head first. It was dark and, when I was half-way in, I realised I’d no idea how far I was going to drop. I could only go forward but I didn’t relish breaking my neck. I put out my hands and flailed around, felt canvas and metal, a tent, leaning against the wall beneath me. I carried on wriggling forward, wincing at the pain as my hip-bones caught on the edge of the window frame. I was aiming to slither down the tent, to buffer my fall. My weight shifted suddenly, I pulled my hands round my head for protection and tumbled onto the carpeted floor only inches below. I felt my way across the carpet till I found the skirting board. Followed that round to the door-jamb. Felt up both edges till I got the light switch. Bingo.

A storeroom. The tent that had eased my entrance was actually a bag of golf clubs. Other leisure accessories were neatly arranged round the room; skis, a beautiful wooden toboggan, rucksacks, a massive lime green and pink snow-suit hanging up like a day-glo Michelin Man. I felt like climbing into it for protection. Instead, I selected a golf club and put my ear to the door. Fang’s barking was close but not too close. I inched the door open. No movement in the hail.

I established that Fang was behind the kitchen door to my left. He was becoming hoarse with fury. I switched on the hall light and walked along to the white lounge at the front of the house. It was disarrayed but only with the debris of ordinary life; magazines, a newspaper, empty mugs and discarded shoes. I called Nina’s name out a couple of times as I prowled. Checked behind the huge white Chesterfield. Went upstairs. Half-way up, I heard another car and froze as I listened. Again, I heard the vehicle slow and the telltale rasp of gravel. I went on up and looked out of the landing window, the one that overlooked Fraser Mackinlay’s. His porch, columns and all, was illuminated by the same sort of ghastly light. It spilled out and swept an arc over the gravel. I could see a couple of cars there. A figure was silhouetted at the door. Anonymous. The door opened, he entered. Darkness fell. Plenty of callers for a Monday night.

Nina was in the main bedroom, which ran above the lounge at the front of the house. The room was big enough to split into a boudoir and a lounging area, all done out in red and black. I saw her from the doorway, on the floor next to a chaise-longue, the phone beside her. I moved closer, my pulse speeding up in dread. I gulped in a powerful, sweet stench. Alcohol, lots of it, mingled with the acrid notes of vomit and shit.

She’d been sick where she lay, her cheek rested in it. There were patches on the crimson housecoat she wore. Her face was the colour of putty, with the same oily sheen. Eyes closed. I felt for a pulse, ignoring the frantic pace of my own. There was one. Weak but discernible. I touched her cheek and she drew a shallow breath. I

followed first-aid procedure with the narrow-minded clarity that accompanies shock; checked her mouth for obstructions; put her in the recovery position; shuffled her away from the pool of sick. As I settled her head, a thin trickle of dark bile leaked from the corner of her mouth.

I punched 999 into the handset and gritted my teeth while I answered the pro-forma questions that had to be answered before the ambulance would be dispatched. I turned back to Nina. Was she breathing, still? Oh, God. I placed my hand on her sternum and felt the slight rise and fall. That reassured me. I kept it there.

Surveying the room, I wondered who had chosen the decor, the wrought-iron headboard, the wall lights with their crown of thorns brackets, the fluffy orange carpet with its black fleur-de-lys motif. Jack or Nina? Maybe an interior designer had come up with the concept; sort of barbed wire and shag pile. Whoever it was would be better off designing the inside of aerosol cans.

I heard the ambulance approach at the same time as its headlights swept across the ceiling. I ran down to open the door.

The man at the door was young and bearded. He followed me upstairs, knelt by Nina, took her pulse, raised an eyelid and went back down to relay instructions to his mate. I hovered, waiting for them to come back upstairs. They brought a stretcher and blanket. While the older man sorted out the equipment, the bearded one talked to me.

‘We’ll take her into Detox. She done it before?’

‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘Will she be alright?’

He nodded. ‘She’ll be alright – more than I can say for her liver. She not taken pills or ‘owt?’

‘I don’t think so.’ I glanced round. I hadn’t seen any small tablet bottles. ‘Which hospital?’

‘The Infirmary. You her next of kin?’

‘No.’

‘Neighbour?’

‘No, I just met her.’

‘Tonight?’ He was puzzled.

‘Recently. She rang me tonight.’

The other man grunted gently as he eased Nina onto the stretcher.

‘You coming to the hospital? We could do with a few details and that.’

‘No, I can’t.’ I found a pen and tore a blank page from my diary. Wrote down Nina’s name, my own and my phone number.

‘You won’t know her N.H.S. number then?’ said the man, adjusting the buckles on the stretcher.

‘No.’ Stupid question.

‘She’s probably BUPA, furious when she wakes up on the ward.’ He cackled.

When they’d gone, I stood in the hallway. I wanted to go home. I wanted a stiff drink, a long sleep, to give in to the fatigue. But there was a broken window to sort out. I rummaged round the storeroom itself but there weren’t any tools there. I’d noticed another door tucked under the stairs, so I tried that. It was unlocked. Stairs led down to a basement room. It was kitted out like a DIY. catalogue. Shiny tools hung neatly in rows. Nails and screws were stacked in boxes, graded by size. Sheets and lengths of wood stood to attention in one corner. No off-cuts, no sawdust. I doubt whether any of it had been touched since they’d bought it. Well, dusted maybe.

I found a bit of plywood that I thought was about the right size, selected nails and hammer. It didn’t take long to hammer it over the frame outside. I hurried, in my anxiety to get away. It was a bodged job but at least the hole was covered up. Back inside, I wrote a note in case there were any callers ( cleaner, close friends or even Jack back sooner than expected). I left it by the hall phone. There were a bunch of keys there and they fit the front door. I went out and locked up. Stood for a moment, just breathing in the warm night air, a faint trace of night scented stock in it. Heard a tawny owl ‘kerwic’.

Fang was still barking intermittently. He might need food and water but I wasn’t going to go anywhere near the animal. Bloody dogs.

I got in the Mini and drove to the bottom of Nina’s drive. There I stopped. I hadn’t planned it but it seemed the right thing to do. I slipped a felt pen in my pocket and slid out of the car. Walked quickly round to Fraser’s gates and through them into the shrubberies at the side of the drive. I wove through the rhododendrons and camellias till I reached the lawn that surrounded the forecourt. There were four cars and a minibus parked there. I wrote down the registration numbers on my forearm with the pen. Then I retraced my steps. Who was calling on Fraser tonight? Unfortunately, I don’t have a direct line to the police computer but there was one name I could fill in anyway. One of the four cars was a white Mercedes. So, was Eddie Kenton there for business or pleasure?

I had a rush of elation once I was homeward-bound. I fished out an Otis Redding tape and stuck it on. Joined in with a vengeance. All the fears I’d been sitting on since Nina had rung could be faced now. Nina was alive. She hadn’t been attacked. There was no big conspiracy; I hadn’t had to find another corpse, just a dead drunk, and I was so grateful to her. I sang along to ‘Try A Little Tenderness’.

Half-way home, I remembered Diane. My stomach plummeted. I should have been there hours ago.

‘Diane, it’s Sal, I’m so sorry. I got a phone call from this woman. She’d drunk herself unconscious – not when she rang me, but nearly – and...’

‘Sal, spare me the sordid details. You could have bloody well rung me.’

‘But...yes, I’m sorry, I didn’t think.’

‘I know.’

I squirmed at the chill in her voice.

‘I don’t need this, Sal, not on top of everything else. It’s not fair. If you can’t make the time, I’d rather you came out and said so. I need someone I can rely on.’

‘I could come now.’

‘And regale me with stories about your adventures tonight? No thanks.’

‘I’m sorry, I don’t know what else I can say.’ Silence. ‘Diane?’

‘Goodnight.’ She rang off.

I smarted with the injustice of it. Did she really think I was so shallow? Was it just her depression talking? My fists were clenched. I couldn’t keep still. No way was I going to sleep, in this state. I wanted to run, to hit something, to dance myself senseless. I was full of energy again, dizzy with adrenalin.

I pulled my cycle from the shed and set off down the backstreets. Turned into the park and pedalled fast round the outer paths. I passed a couple of dog-walkers, spotted a huddle of teenagers under the climbing frame in the playground. Caught a whiff of sweet smoke.

At the far side of the park, I joined Platt Lane, a long straight road, not too busy. I pedalled hard, pushing myself as fast as I could. When I reached the end, I took a right. It didn’t much matter where I went. It was the speed I wanted. I kept up the pace. My calves and buttocks clenched with the effort. My chest burned.

I was red, gasping and bathed in sweat when I walked unsteadily into the kitchen.

‘Well,’ said Clive, straightening up from the fridge, ‘just look...’

I was beside him in a trice. ‘Don’t say it, Clive,’ I jabbed my finger at him in warning, ‘just don’t say a fucking word.’

‘What makes wind, Mummy?’

Six-thirty. A host of worries swarmed in on me like parasites. Diane, Nina, Fang. That voice on the phone. Getting out of bed, I felt as though I’d been fed through a mangle. When I tried to bend to put my socks on, the muscles across my lower back screeched in pain. It was a day of picking up pieces. I dropped the kids off and walked round to the Dobson’s. It was ages since I’d been to the office – its new cheap and cheerful look still felt unfamiliar.