No Cooperation from the Cat (16 page)

I tapped on her door and swung it open, carefully balancing the tray. The curtains were drawn back, so she must be awake and stirring.

“This isn’t to get you up and back to work,” I said defensively. “It’s more of a little thank you for the good care—”

I was talking to an empty room. Her bed hadn’t been slept in.

“Don’t be melodramatic,” I told myself in Martha’s most critical voice. “She’s probably…”

I tapped on the bathroom door and, getting no answer, opened it. Another empty room.

Perhaps she’d arisen early, made her bed, and gone out for a breath of fresh air before starting breakfast for us.

Except that she hadn’t been outside for days. And, however much cabin fever might have set in, she was still too frightened—or too wary—to venture out now.

Wasn’t she?

I was still trying to convince myself that there was a reasonable explanation for her absence when a modified hubbub at the door of the flat announced the arrival of the cleaning crew.

I retreated to my room with the tray I had prepared for Jocasta and left them to it, trying not to worry.

There was nothing I was interested in on television, but my book was absorbing and Cho-Cho, curled up at my side, was comforting. I allowed myself to be soothed. Although Jocasta was becoming increasingly distraught, she wasn’t silly. There was bound to be a reasonable explanation for her absence—and we would all have a good laugh about it when she returned.

Cho-Cho’s purr was hypnotic and my eyelids were fighting a losing battle to keep open and let me read a few more pages when there was a knock on my door.

“Jocasta?” I called hopefully.

“It’s Mrs. Mopp,” a voice fluted. “Can I do yer now?”

In my half-dozing, half-waking state, unreality seemed not only possible, but actually real. This was London, it was a foggy day, I was hearing a voice from its wartime past. Or was I? It seemed quite possible that time had slipped a cog and flipped me back into that past. At least, I’d be more comfortable there than if it had tossed me into some unknown technological future.

The door opened and a head popped round it. “I’m Mrs. Mopp,” it announced. “And I’m ’ere to do you. Can I do yer now?”

Except that he wasn’t Mrs. Mopp, nor even the actress who had played her. He was a pleasant-looking young man mouthing the tagline of a character from a famous wartime radio show he was too young to have heard at the original time.

I smiled vaguely at him, wondering if I should applaud. I woke up a little more and inspected him closely. There was something familiar about him. But the cleaning crew was always changing—the company employed young actors and they came and went, depending on who had landed a part in something and who was resting. I frowned, trying to recall what show I might have seen him in.

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Sensitive to atmosphere, he caught my frown. “Is this a bad time? I didn’t mean to wake you up.”

“No, no, it’s all right. I was awake. It’s just—I know I’ve seen you before, but not here. I was trying to remember what show—?”

“Oh, bless you!” he cried. “I haven’t been in a show for ages—and that was up north. Before I came down to London to try my luck. You don’t recognise me because I’m out of context. I’m your waiter at the Harpo. This is my day job.”

“Oh, of course.” I knew him now. He was shorter than I had thought, but most of us are when you see us offstage or -screen. The Harpo was obviously his stage for the time being and, when you’re sitting at a table with the waiter hovering over you, he appears taller.

“Even if you had seen that show,” he sighed, “you wouldn’t have noticed me. I was in the background … in the chorus.”

“Nothing wrong with that.” I tried to cheer him. “I started out in the chorus myself.”

“I know. That’s why I was so thrilled to find you at home today.” He advanced into the room and, looking back over his shoulder, closed the door behind him.

“I was hoping—if you don’t think I’m too presumptuous. I was hoping you might give me a few tips—”

“Tip? Tip?” Evangeline’s outraged squawk came from the doorway connecting our rooms. “Don’t give him a penny, Trixie! He gets quite enough. His lot charge like the Light Brigade, as it is!”

“Not that kind of tip, Evangeline,” I said wearily.

“Great Heavens, no!” He was horrified and embarrassed. “I wouldn’t dream—I’m not that sort of—” He broke off, doubly embarrassed, remembering that, as a waiter, it was the kind of tip he would accept gladly.

Evangeline identified the flaw in his righteous protest, too. Her eyes lit with triumph and she opened her mouth—but the look I shot her made her close it again.

“The chorus—” I tried to wrench the conversation back to a more comfortable subject. “Are you a hoofer or a singer?”

“A bit of both, actually.” He gave me a conspiratorial look. “As we have to be. I used to see myself moving up to a juvenile lead but…” He sighed. “I’m afraid I’m getting a bit beyond that now.”

“Oh, you mustn’t give up!” I said quickly, hoping he hadn’t noticed Evangeline’s nod of agreement.

“I’ve been giving it some thought,” he assured me. “There’s too much competition for the romantic leads. Juveniles come and go. But a good character actor can go on forever. And villains do even better.” He narrowed his eyes, his face chilled ominously, and he gave me a stare I wouldn’t like to see coming towards me on a dark night. I shuddered involuntarily. Then he relaxed his features back into his usual amiability.

“I’d aim for that, if I were you,” Evangeline said. “For a moment there, you looked positively evil.”

“Oh, thank you.” He beamed.

“Yes, I think that’s definitely the line you ought to work on—” I groped for the name he announced every time he told us he was our waiter for the night. Ah, that was it—“Robin.”

“Er, no. I’m sorry—that’s my waiter name. Actually, I’m Toby—Toby Trent. It will fit on a marquee better. And Robin sounds a bit soppy for a villain.”

“True.” Evangeline nodded judiciously. “But why do you keep on at the Harpo? You must get more money doing this.” Rancour returned to her voice as she remembered what the cleaning company charged us. “And it must be exhausting waiting on tables all night.”

“Oh, it is,” Toby said. “But the networking is great. Do you know, I’ve had Frella Boynton at one of my tables about three times a week lately—and with a different producer or prospective backer every night!”

No wonder poor Teddy was wandering around like a rudderless ship trying to limp into a port, any port. More and more, it sounded as though he was on the way out—and he knew it.

“From all over the world!” Toby continued enthusiastically. “The play looks a dead cert to transfer to Broadway when the London run ends. Berlin is talking about getting Frella over there—if not with this show, then another. Paris, Budapest, Rome, Warsaw—they’re all after her. I tell you, that woman is
hot
! Er, professionally, that is.” He became aware of the way we were looking at him. “Well, I couldn’t help hearing what they were saying.” He was defensive. “You learn an awful lot from people talking at your tables. But I’m very discreet—”

“I’m sure you are.” Thankfully, Evangeline kept a straight face as she agreed. “I’m just surprised now that you keep on with your cleaning job when there’s so much going on at the Harpo. Or are there just as many networking opportunities doing this?”

“No, but the money is better,” he admitted. “And I find it very interesting having a window into so many different lifestyles. Amazing, in fact. You wouldn’t believe the way some people live. They look so poised and fashionable when you see them at the theatre or in photographs—but their homes are a tip. An absolute tip!”

That word again. This time, Evangeline ignored it. She had scandal on her mind.

“Who?” she demanded. “Who?”

“You become more aware of these things.” Toby shook his head. “Not just in houses, but outside. Everywhere. Even here—”

Evangeline bristled.

“No, no, I don’t mean
here
here,” he said quickly. “I mean outside the building. In that little dock behind it. Someone has dumped a big bundle of old clothes into the river there.”

He shook his head disapprovingly. “Pollution at its worst. Some people have no respect at all for the environment.”

I met Evangeline’s eyes and we started for the door as though joined at the hip. We didn’t need to speak. The last time we had gone past the little dock, the water had been as clear and clean as a public reservoir.

“What was it? What did I say?” Toby followed and caught up with us as we waited for the elevator. “I didn’t mean to offend—”

“No, no,” I assured him. “It’s just—”

“JAKE!” a voice bellowed from behind us. “Jake! What do you think you’re doing? Get back here!”

“Ja-a-ake?” Evangeline made it sound suspiciously close to “haa-aa-and-ba-a-ag.” “Who’s Jake?” She looked around.

“Oh, that’s me,” our waiter/actor/cleaner said. “That’s my cleaning name. I think it’s so important to keep one’s personas separate, don’t you?”

“JAKE!” The bellow came again, just as the lift arrived.

“I’d better go,” he sighed. “I really need to keep this job, you know.” He turned and headed back into the penthouse.

“Robin … Toby … Jake,” I said. “I wonder which name he really wants to be called.”

“‘Hey, you!’ would seem the safest option at the moment.” Evangeline stabbed savagely at the G for ground button. “That boy has a serious identity problem.”

“We have a problem of our own,” I told her. “Jocasta has disappeared. Her bed hasn’t been slept in.”

“And you think—?” Evangeline glanced at me sharply.

“I’m trying not to think. But she’s been under a terrible strain lately. Veering close to breakdown, perhaps.”

“Enough to send her over the edge?” Evangeline raised an eyebrow. “I wouldn’t be so sure.”

“We’ve never had any rubbish dumped in our dock before. And we’re a bit off the beaten track for casual litter louts.” The lift stopped and the doors slid open.

“Come on,” Evangeline said. “We’d better go and find out the worst.”

The air was cold. The water must be colder still. Too cold for anyone to survive in it long. If Jocasta had slipped out last night …

“There it is!” Evangeline took my arm as she urged me to the far end of the dock. Now I saw it, too.

The semi-submerged bundle of clothes bobbed quietly in the water, so sodden it was impossible to tell what colour they had been originally. The piece of garment most in view appeared to be a coat. Would someone really put on a coat to throw themselves into the Thames?

On the other hand, why not? Instinct clung to the thought of comfort somehow. There were plenty of cases of suicides carefully placing a pillow for their head into the oven before turning on the gas.

“We’ve got to get her out!” I started forward.

“Not as easy as you might think.” Evangeline held me back. “We might fall in ourselves. This is a job for experts. Let’s go back upstairs and call Ron—he’ll know what to do.”

“But we can’t leave her there.”

A river barge chugged past on its way to the Thames Estuary with some sort of heavy cargo. The deep waves swelled out from its wake, rippling in our direction, into our dock, setting the bobbing bundle into motion.

As it rode the eddying ripples, rolling from side to side, it lifted out of the water just enough to allow us a partial glimpse of the face. Just enough to identify it.

It wasn’t Jocasta.

It was Teddy.

Chapter Seventeen

The welcome fragrance of freshly brewed coffee, frying bacon chops with sautéed potatoes and onions and fried eggs greeted us as we entered the flat.

“Martha?” I called tentatively. We had had to wait in the downstairs lobby until the river police arrived on the scene. I’ll admit we were watching the river waiting for them, but I’m sure I would have noticed if Martha had driven up.

“Warmth!” Evangeline cried, elbowing me aside. “Food! I’m chilled to the bone!”

“We both are.” I sent a bit more chill in her direction.

“Jocasta!” Evangeline stopped short in the kitchen doorway. I bumped into her. “We couldn’t find you anywhere. Where have you been?”

“Ah—” There was the scrape of a chair being pushed back from the table. I moved around Evangeline to see Nigel rising to his feet, wiping his mouth. “Actually—”

“I’ve been downstairs in Nigel’s flat,” Jocasta said. “Everything here has been so awful, I couldn’t stand it another minute. And he offered—”

“Ah. I slept on the couch in the sitting room,” Nigel said quickly, ever the gentleman.

“How sweet.” Evangeline lost interest and abandoned the subject in favour of a far more important one: food. “Are those chops ready to eat?”

“Coming right up.” Jocasta moved swiftly to serve them.

Nigel hovered uncertainly, still marshalling arguments of virtue, whether his or Jocasta’s, I wasn’t quite sure.

“Ah. Well,” he said finally. “I’d better be getting along. Lots of work to do, but it’s looking promising. Very promising.” He gave us a look which was obviously meant to be significant.

“Good,” I said automatically, since he seemed to expect it. He nodded a couple of times and went off, satisfied—and well fed.

Food … warmth … Evangeline and I slumped into our own chairs while Jocasta brought our breakfast.

“Prr-eow…”
Cho-Cho leaped into my lap, a long strand of bacon dangling from one side of her mouth like half of a Fu Manchu moustache. Her little pink tongue worked busily as she reeled it in.

“Cho-Cho! Darling!” I clutched her to me and the traitorous thoughts I had been trying to conceal from myself surfaced and engulfed me.

All right, I felt like a swine and a monster, but I couldn’t help it. The joy and relief swamped all other feelings.

Poor Teddy was dead—and that was awful. I wouldn’t for a moment have wanted anything like that to happen. But it had. And we would do everything we could to get to the bottom of what had happened. But the fact remained:

Teddy was dead—and Cho-Cho and I were safe. No one could take her away from me now.

*   *   *

It was perhaps the happiest breakfast of my life. Not only was the food delicious, but the atmosphere was ecstatic. Or was it just me? It didn’t matter. Safe! We were safe!