Risking It All (27 page)

‘I told you and your aunt the truth and as much as you needed to know,’ I said. ‘My mother’s in the hospice. She did know the Wildes years ago. Yes, Jerry did try to visit her after you phoned, but she wasn’t up to seeing anyone that day.’

‘But there’s more to it than that,’ Ben said quietly.

‘More, but I can’t tell you.’ I frowned. ‘How well do you yourself know Jerry and Flora? I mean, when I visited your aunt, you didn’t say you knew them at all.’

‘You didn’t ask me. I knew them quite well when I was a kid, when they lived near Aunt Dot. They didn’t have Nicola then, and Flora made a bit of a fuss of me. I was about seven or eight. My parents—’

Again he hesitated at the mention of his parents. ‘They were away a lot. I spent a lot of time with Aunt Dot and her husband, Uncle William. He’s been dead a while. But I still keep an eye on Aunt Dot. She kept an eye on me all those years, after all. You should have seen her house then. It was full of those little dogs she used to breed. Every time the doorbell rang, they went berserk. Uncle William had his koi carp and other fancy fish for a hobby. He was a nice chap, an old-fashioned, home-loving nine-to-fiver.’ Ben smiled. ‘He thought a day trip to Boulogne was foreign travel enough for any man. He worked in an architect’s office.’

That rang a bell. ‘Is Jerry Wilde an architect, by any chance?’ I asked. I was thinking how knowledgeable he’d been about Royal Holloway College. Moreover, if he was, it would have been a link between him and the Mackenzies, suggesting why Mrs Mackenzie had kept in touch all these years.

‘That’s right. They were a really nice couple and we were all sorry when, after Nicola was born, they moved away. Aunt Dot sent them a Christmas card every year, and I wrote “and Ben” after her name. Later I got too old for that sort of thing and started sending my own cards. Flora always sent an individual one to me, right from the start. When I was still at school, she sent funny ones. Now she sends the usual scenes of festive cheer. That’s as far as it went until recently, when I started doing some research at the Botanical Gardens here at Kew, in the hothouses.’

‘Best place,’ I mumbled, thinking of my chilled wait.

He grinned. ‘Best place for my research, certainly. Have you ever been there?’ When I shook my head, he went on, ‘You ought to pay a visit while I’m there so I can show you what I’m doing. Well, I thought, as I was in the area, that I’d look the Wildes up. I’ve called round there a few times since. It’s been nice meeting up with them again, seeing how they are, how big Nicola’s grown. I remember her as just a baby. She’s a fantastic violinist, you know.’

I did know, because Wilde had been at pains to tell me, but I was spared having to discuss Nicola .by the appearance of the hamburger, which arrived with plentiful chips and salad, carried by Josh. The burger looked great. Josh looked miffed. He set it down in front of me rather as he might have put down a bowl of Winalot in front of the family dog.

‘Enjoy your meal,’ he said starchily.

‘Where’s the mayo?’ I asked. ‘I like mayo on my chips.’

He didn’t quite snarl at me. He fetched the mayonnaise in a dinky little bowl (no plastic sachets here), and dropped it down in front of me without another word. In addition to everything else, I had betrayed myself as a food philistine. However, I was embarrassed when I realised Josh wasn’t returning with a second plate.

‘You’re not eating?’ I asked Ben.

‘Later.’

‘With the Wildes?’

He nodded.

I was tempted to advise him to eat here first, remembering all that fat-free shopping. But I restrained my impulse in favour of good manners. ‘Then I’m making you late. They’ll be wondering where you are.’

‘Don’t worry about it. I was a tad early. Jerry’s not due back for a bit.’

Just as well I had called off my wait. ‘Ben,’ I said, ‘I need to talk to Jerry. The thing is, I don’t want Flora to know about it, or their daughter. Flora would flip at the mention of my name. That’s why I couldn’t go to the house and was hanging about outside waiting for Jerry. He won’t be too happy either. I know how dodgy it all sounds, but I can’t explain it to you because it involves others and I’m just not free to do it. Can you just give a message to Jerry for me? That Fran wants a word, that’s all. It’s important. I can meet him in any public place.’ I stressed the word ‘public’. I wasn’t going anywhere secluded with Jerry Wilde.

‘And how is Jerry going to take it when I give him this message?’ Ben raised a quizzical eyebrow.

‘Not well,’ I confessed. ‘But he’ll want to see me. Ben, believe me, I’m not making trouble for the Wildes. I’m trying to help them. Will you do it?’

He drew a deep breath and held it for a moment before slowly expelling it. ‘All right. I’ll pass the message on to him tonight. Have you got a phone number?’

I hadn’t got any paper. Ben hunted in his pocket and brought out a miscellany of string, plant ties, pencil stubs, those little plastic markers you stick in seedbeds and, finally, some sort of bill with muddy fingerprints on it.

‘Gardener’s pockets!’ he said ruefully. ‘You name it, gardeners carry it round with them. You can write on the back of this.’ He pushed the bill towards me, together with a pencil stub.

I wrote out the shop’s phone number and explained that it was a newsagent’s but that any message would certainly reach me, as they were friends.

‘You ought to get yourself a mobile,’ said Ben.

‘Can’t afford one.’ I remembered something. ‘Ben, when you get to the Wildes’ place tonight, Nicola may say something about a beggar asking her for change near the house. It was me. I’m not a beggar but she wanted to know why I was hanging about there and I had to say something.’

He didn’t comment on this and I didn’t know whether he believed it. He’d begun stuffing all the bits and bobs back into his pockets. ‘I’ll have to leave you here to finish your meal alone, OK? I should get over to the Wildes’ now. Oh, give me your boot. The one with the broken lace.’

I slipped my foot out and handed him my boot. Muddy, wet, old, it looked like one of those bits of abandoned footwear you see on canal banks, always the one, never the pair. I was wearing navy socks with white spots on them, but rain and pavement water leaking in had turned the spots grey. I hoped Josh couldn’t see.

Ben pulled out the broken lace and threaded the length of twine from his pocket collection through the eyelets. ‘Not beautiful, but it will get you home. At least you’ll be able to walk straight.’

I thanked him. He said he wouldn’t forget about the message for Jerry and would make sure Flora didn’t overhear. Then he was gone. I relaced the boot on my ankle and finished my chips. As I left, the barman gave me a sneer which clearly said he thought I’d spun good-natured Ben some sob story to get a free meal. I called out a cheery goodbye and waved at him as if I were a regular, just to annoy him a little bit more.

I’d known that sitting about in the rain and cold wouldn’t do me any good, robust as I generally am in adverse weather conditions. After all, I don’t have central heating in Hari’s garage, and in most of the squats I’ve lived in, you’ve had to sleep in your clothes in winter. But this time it got to me.

I slept very badly, tossing and turning on my narrow bed so that once I almost fell out. Bonnie got so fed up with the disturbance that she jumped off the bed and curled up nearby. I had a peculiar dream. I was walking up the drive to the hospice, but before I got to the door I saw Flora Wilde waiting to intercept me. She wasn’t angry, but nice and smiling. She held out her hand to me and I almost took it, but then a woman I didn’t know arrived on the scene. Her outline was indistinct and I couldn’t see her face. Whoever it was, Flora stopped smiling and looked upset. When she turned back to me, her welcome had turned to accusation. ‘You’re responsible for this!’ she said. I was denying it when I woke for the umpteenth time, cold and sweating together. For a moment I didn’t know where I was, until Bonnie pushed her nose into my hand. I switched on the lights and made coffee on my little Calor Gas picnic stove, telling myself that I was
not
going to be ill. I’m a believer in mind over matter. I just wished I didn’t feel so rotten.

A little after six I tramped up to the shop and asked Ganesh if he had any paracetamol.

‘You look like death,’ he said kindly.

In hoarse tones I informed him I was fine, just a bit headachy.

‘For crying out loud, go upstairs and have a hot bath. Get Hari to give you some breakfast.’ He pressed a pack of paracetamol into my hand. ‘Don’t take more than two in any four-hour period.’

‘Thank you, Dr Quincy,’ I croaked.

I didn’t fancy any food, but the hot bath sounded like a good idea. I went upstairs, where Hari also informed me I looked very ill and suggested I see a doctor.

‘Just a bit of a cold,’ I assured him.

He told me colds were notoriously treacherous. They could turn to something worse before you knew it. He listed a variety of diseases which started with flu-like symptoms. He asked if I had any spots.

I told him I hadn’t seen any but would check when in the bath. If I found any, he advised, I was to try rolling a glass over them, and if they didn’t disappear under pressure, that meant I had meningitis. I promised him that in that case, I’d go immediately to Casualty.

Hari told me one last cheery tale, about a cousin who’d dropped dead only twenty-four hours after developing a sore throat, and then, thank goodness, went downstairs.

I soaked in the bath and afterwards felt much better. I went back downstairs and told them so.

‘It’s started to rain again,’ Ganesh said. ‘I really don’t think it’s a good idea for you to go out to Egham, if that’s what you’re planning. Not that you tell
me
what you’re planning these days! Besides making yourself worse, you’d infect all those sick people out there and they’ve got enough symptoms to be going on with.’

I conceded the point. He let me ring the hospice to check on my mother and explain why I wouldn’t be coming that day. Sister Helen said that Mum was tired and it was just as well I wasn’t planning a visit. She wasn’t up to visitors really. If I came, I could only sit by the bed, not talk to her. She hoped I felt better soon.

Just to make sure I didn’t slip out, Ganesh offered me a morning’s work behind the counter on the grounds that Hari had to go to the bank plus a couple of other calls. We were fairly busy despite the weather. The shop doorbell jangled regularly and we dispensed papers, magazines, ciggies, sweets and oddities like stamps and lottery tickets in a steady stream.

You’d think Gan would be pleased at all this trade, but all he did was stare morosely at the cold drinks cabinet and say that Hari ought to install a tea and coffee machine. ‘Who’s going to buy a cold drink on a day like this?’

Hari returned from his errands, announcing gloomily, ‘Brass monkeys, isn’t it?’ as he came in. He studied me for signs of cholera, Black Death or Ebola, or failing that, simple old flu, and seemed disappointed that I was not only still on my feet but improved. Hari, though, isn’t one to give up easily.

‘All this wouldn’t have happened if you were eating properly. And frankly, my dear, I have a bad conscience about you. Sleeping in that garage, it has made you ill.’

I tried to convince him that sleeping in the garage wasn’t the problem. I’d stayed out in the rain too long the previous evening, that was all. At this, Gan gave me a reproachful look.

Hari went upstairs.

‘I am trying to find somewhere to live,’ I said. ‘I can always move into Norman’s place if nothing else.’

‘Why were you out so long in the rain?’ Ganesh demanded.

‘I missed the bus. Oh, all right, I was watching for someone. I can’t tell you, Gan, honestly. But I will just as soon as it’s all settled.’

‘You’re looking for Duke’s killer,’ he snapped. ‘And you’ve got a suspect, haven’t you? At least tell me who it is, then if you go missing, I’ll have a name to give Inspector Morgan, somewhere she can start looking for you.’

Oddly, this made sense. I was nervous at the idea of meeting Jerry Wilde again. On the other hand, I didn’t want Gan haring off to the police if I was just gone a few hours, nor to give him a name which could lead to Nicola. He might inadvertently let it slip. I compromised by writing the Wildes’ name and address on a scrap of paper and sealing it in an envelope.

‘You’re not to open this unless I’ve been gone twenty-four hours without any contact, right?’

He grumbled a bit about this being the sort of thing characters in corny old films did, but agreed. I watched him tuck the envelope inside his blouson jacket and felt quite reassured. Not having Ganesh at my side in all this had been an extra difficulty. Having to continually put him off was placing a strain on our friendship.