The Corpse on the Court (16 page)

B
righton is a big city and Carole Seddon only really knew the centre of it. The sea front, the Pier, the Royal Pavilion, the intricate trendy thoroughfares of The Lanes, the Marina, all of those were familiar to her. But she'd never been to Moulsecoomb before.

She was characteristically early for her meeting with Donna Grodsky, drawing the Renault neatly into the pub car park just before eleven forty-five. The George's Head did not look at all Carole Seddon's sort of pub. It was painted white, but every outside feature – window frames and surrounds, doorways, mock-Tudor beams and guttering were picked out in a garish red. An array of colourfully chalked blackboard signs stood outside, offering happy hours, meal deals, senior specials, karaoke nights and the inevitable Sky Sports.

Carole, whose attitudes had changed since she became a regular at Fethering's Crown and Anchor, went instantly back to her default position of not being ‘a pub person'. Still, she was at the George's Head in Moulsecoomb in the cause of investigation, so she swallowed her prejudices and entered.

She was surprised by how noisy it was at that time of day. Part of the sound came from the massive screens at each end of the bar, one of them apparently tuned to sport and the other to a pop-music channel. But there were also a lot of customers in there, all talking loudly and none paying any attention to either of the televisions.

Elderly couples sat at tables, consulting menus with great concentration as they tried to decide which senior special to opt for when orders started to be taken at twelve. Standing at the bar were quite a few of what Carole thought of as ‘workmen' (in other words men with faded tattoos in sleeveless T-shirts), but also around the tables a good few of what she thought of as ‘single mothers' (with buggies and rather newer tattoos). It was this demographic that Carole expected shortly to be joined by Donna Grodsky.

She advanced awkwardly to the bar, feeling every eye in the place was on her (though actually nobody showed any interest). Agonizing over whether a pub like the George's Head in Moulsecoomb would stock Chilean Chardonnay, and indeed whether she should have an alcoholic drink when she was not only driving but also investigating, her thoughts were interrupted by a shout of ‘Hi! Are you Carole?'

She turned to face what had to be Donna Grodsky. The girl, as she had said she would be on the phone, was dressed in a gold hoodie and jeans with a lot of diamanté on them. Her hair with blonde highlights was scraped back into a scrunchy so tight that it was flat against her head. The face was heavily made up with eyelashes too long to be real, and a silver stud pierced her lower lip.

In the buggy beside her, in immaculately clean blankets and Babygro, with a tiny blue baseball cap on his head, lay her baby, angelically sleeping. Carole wouldn't in the past have been much good at estimating infant's ages, but up to speed thanks to Lily's appearance in her life, she would have estimated he was about four months old.

‘Hello, you must be Donna.'

‘Dead right.'

‘How did you know it was me?'

Donna Grodsky looked around the pub and grinned. No one else was wearing a Burberry raincoat. Or such sensible shoes. ‘I just knew.'

‘Now, can I get you a drink?'

‘I've got one.' The girl indicated what looked like a Coke in front of her.

‘Oh, you shouldn't have—'

‘Don't worry. I've started a tab for you with Vin at the bar.'

‘Oh?'

The girl took a long swig from her drink. ‘And actually I'm ready for another.'

‘Coke, is it?'

‘With a large voddy in, yes.'

Vin, the girl at the bar, knew about ‘Donna's tab' and knew she'd want a ‘large voddy and Coke'. Carole wondered idly what ‘Vin' might stand for. The girl didn't look like her idea of a ‘Lavinia', but she couldn't think of anything else.

Carole had by now decided that she was definitely going to need a drink. To her surprise the George's Head turned out to have an extensive wine list and she got her Chilean Chardonnay.

Back at the table she found Donna Grodsky studying the huge A3-size menu. ‘Better order quick. Hell trying to eat once the little bugger wakes up.'

‘What's his name?' asked Carole.

‘Kyle.' The girl looked at her defiantly. ‘And I love him to bits.' She put down the menu. ‘I'll get the sirloin steak, medium rare, with everything and extra onion rings.'

It was the most expensive item on the menu. Carole wondered briefly if she was being taken for a ride. On the other hand, all of the prices at the George's Head were extraordinarily cheap. And if Donna Grodsky did have any useful information . . . She gave in the order at the bar, adding a tuna and cucumber baguette for herself.

Carole was disarmed when she returned to the table by Donna saying, ‘Thanks for picking up the tab and that. I used to be quite a girl for the clubs and the pubs, but since I've had Kyle . . .' She raised her unfinished first glass, said ‘Cheers' and gulped down what was left. ‘Real treat for me these days, this is,' she went on. ‘Getting out of the flat, seeing people who aren't Kyle or my mum.'

‘His father . . .?' asked Carole tentatively.

The girl let out a bitter chuckle. ‘What do you think? He scarpered soon as he knew I was up the duff. Not that I mind. I wasn't in love or anything like that. He was quite fit but, anyway, he served his purpose.'

‘You mean you wanted to get pregnant?'

‘Too right I did. Always wanted to have something I could really call my own. Now I've got Kyle. Anyway, council wouldn't have given me the flat if I hadn't got the baby.'

Carole bit back various
Daily Mail
responses that were rising up towards her lips. ‘If we could talk about Marina . . .'

‘Sure. I liked her. That's why I hope nothing bad's happened to her.'

‘Her mother thinks she was murdered.'

‘I know. But there's lots of things that can happen to girls of her age that aren't murder.'

‘That would cause her to disappear?'

‘Yeah. I know plenty of girls down here in Brighton who just moved out of their homes. Mostly from a long way away, Scotland, the North. They just couldn't stand the way their parents kept going on at them. Nobody knows where they are, but they haven't been murdered. They've just started leading different lives.'

‘And you think that's what happened with Marina?'

‘I think it's more likely than her being murdered.'

‘You're probably right. Susan – Marina's mother – talked about her having a lot of sleepovers with her school friends . . .'

‘Nothing odd in that. We all did.'

‘Did she stay at your place?'

‘Coupla times. Look, I know what you're going to ask next.'

‘Oh?'

‘Did she stay with me the night before she went missing?'

The girl was brighter than her appearance might suggest. ‘How did you know I was going to ask that?'

‘Because the police did too. It's the obvious question to ask.'

‘You said on the phone you weren't very impressed with the police's enquiries into Marina's disappearance.'

‘No, well, they just went through the motions. Don't blame them really. Marina was sixteen, over the age of consent. If she wanted to move in with a boyfriend, well, that was her business, wasn't it?'

Carole was very quick to pick up on that. ‘And is that what she did? Move in with a boyfriend?'

Donna Grodsky blushed. She'd said more than she intended. ‘I don't know,' she stuttered. ‘I mean, that's what she said she wanted to do, but I don't know if it was kind of just an idea or if she'd actually got someone in mind.'

‘Did you tell the police what she'd said?'

‘No, of course I bloody didn't!'

‘Why not?'

‘Because she was my mate. Look, if she's moved in with some bloke to get away from her mum, I'm not being much of a mate if I set the police off investigating that possibility, am I?'

‘And for the same reason you didn't tell her mother?'

‘Of course I didn't.'

They were interrupted at that moment by the arrival of Vin with their food. The portions were massive. Donna's steak and accompaniments hardly fitted on her plate. And Carole's baguette was served with chips, which she hadn't expected. But they did look rather good chips.

Carole noticed that both their glasses were empty. ‘I don't know if you . . .?'

‘Yeah. Vin, get me another large voddy and Coke. And same again for Carole.'

‘Oh, I'm not sure that I—'

‘Go on, get 'em, Vin.' As the barmaid went off, Donna Grodsky demanded, ‘Why're you looking at me like that, Carole?'

‘I'm not looking at you like anything.'

‘Yes, you are, and I know exactly what you're thinking. Third double vodka and she's meant to be in charge of a baby.'

‘No, I wasn't—'

‘You don't think I'm breastfeeding the little bugger, do you?'

‘No, I—'

‘Look, I'll have you know this is the first drink I've had for three weeks. I can't afford booze on the pittance of a handout the government gives me. So when someone offers me a drink, I'm not going to say no, am I? And it's not like you're not getting what you asked for. I'm answering your questions, aren't I?'

‘Yes. I'm very grateful for—'

‘Then why're you looking so bloody disapproving?'

‘I'm not deliberately doing it. I just think,' Carole confessed, ‘that I've got the kind of face that does rather . . . tend to look disapproving.'

Donna Grodsky looked at her and then suddenly burst out laughing. ‘I think you're right, you know. You've hit the nail bang on the head there. You were born looking disapproving, weren't you?' She looked down sharply to the buggy where Kyle was starting to move his little arms. ‘Better get a move on with the eating. He'll be waking up in a few minutes. Then he'll want to be picked up and have his bottle.'

‘Do you mind if we get on with the questions too?' asked Carole.

‘Not if you don't mind.'

‘Why should I mind?'

‘Well, my mum always told me – and I'm sure your mummy told you, and all – that it was bad manners for me to talk with my mouth full.'

Carole realized that she was being sent up. She grinned. Donna grinned back. Maybe there had started to be something of a bond between them.

‘The obvious next question,' said Carole, ‘is whether you have any idea whether Marina really did have a boyfriend and if so, who he was.'

‘I agree,' Donna replied through a mouthful of steak and onion rings. ‘That is the obvious question. And the answer is, I don't know. Marina never gave me any name or anything like that. But I think I know the kind of boyfriend she would have liked to have.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘Listen, Carole, I don't know if you know about where Marina come from . . .'

‘Her mother told me about her being found in a rubber dinghy.'

‘Yeah, so you know the basics. Anyway, Marina was convinced that her real parents were Russian. That's why she was drawn to me. As you might have deduced from my surname, I am not one hundred per cent through-and-through British. My dad was a Russian sailor, came home to see my mum between trips off round the world. Well, he did for a while. Then he buggered off, rather in the manner of Kyle's Dad. Do you detect a pattern here, Carole?'

‘I'm not quite sure what you—'

‘It's a pattern called men, that's what it is.'

The baby in the buggy was beginning to twitch and make little grunting noises. Carole didn't have the young mother's undivided attention for a lot longer.

‘So are you saying that Marina had a Russian boyfriend?'

‘No, but I'm saying if she was looking for a boyfriend, she'd have tried to link up with Brighton's Russian community.'

‘Is there much of a Russian community in Brighton?'

‘A bit, yeah. There is in most big cities. You know, they've got their social clubs, that kind of thing. Restaurants, pubs they go to.'

‘Did Marina know about these places?'

‘I'd told her a bit, yes. My mum knew about them, from when she and my dad . . . well, we're talking some time back obviously. Probably the places she knew had closed, but other ones had come along. Anyway, Marina was fascinated by all this stuff. She was convinced that she really was Russian and, well, if any Russian boy had come on to her, she'd have let him do anything to her.'

‘And did any Russian boy come on to her?'

Donna Grodsky shrugged. ‘I've no idea.'

‘Did she mention any Russian boy's name?'

‘She mentioned a few, but, look, I'm not going to remember them, am I? We're talking over eight years ago.'

‘Are you sure you can't remember a name?'

The girl screwed up her eyes with the effort of recollection. The lashes looked as if two large black moths had settled on her face. ‘Oh, there was one boy Marina talked about. Vladimir, I think . . . Vladimir . . . oh, God, what was the surname? Mind you, I don't know if he even existed. Marina was a great one for her fantasies. Lived in a kind of dream world, you know, where somehow her Russian heritage was going to claim her back at some point. I took everything she said with a large sack-load of salt.'

‘Vladimir . . .? Vladimir . . .?' prompted Carole patiently, hoping to stir Donna's memory for a second name.

But she was only rewarded by a shake of the head and the eyes reopening. ‘No, it's gone.'

‘Are you sure you don't know the name of—'

‘I've told you, I don't
know
anything. It's just, as I said, if I was trying to find out what'd happened to Marina, I'd check out the Russian connection.'