The Glass Room (Vera Stanhope 5) (3 page)

Vera stood for a moment and wondered how Joanna might fit into this group. Joanna, with her big hands and feet, her loud laugh and her dirty fingernails. Her brightly coloured home-made clothes. If she was here, had she escaped already to the privacy of her own room, daunted by the confidence of her companions?

Vera had decided that it was time to go back to the front door, ring the bell and ask to speak to Joanna. She had a cover story prepared. There would be a domestic crisis: a relative’s illness, which Joanna should know about. That was when Vera heard a sound that shocked the people on the other side of the glass from their self-indulgent conversation. A scream. It seemed hardly human and was without age or gender: loud and piercing and terrifying.

Vera couldn’t tell where the noise was coming from. Inside the house? If so, why did it seem so loud, even out here? The sound seemed to surround her, almost to swallow her up. Perhaps it was the pitch, but it was as if she was feeling it through her bones, rather than hearing it with her ears. There was no escape from it. She took a few steps back and looked up. At the top of the house, double glass doors, mirroring the ones here out onto the terrace, led onto a stone balcony. The woman from the kitchen was there, lit from behind, leaning over, emptying the noise from her lungs into the cold air. Vera was reminded of a drunk spewing. Suddenly the noise stopped.

It seemed to take Vera hours to get into the house. The struggle to be heard, to get inside, reminded her of one of her recurring nightmares: she was a child, locked out of a house where her mother was dying, and she could never find a way in to save her. Now the adult Vera banged on the patio doors, where moments before the guests had been drinking tea. Nobody responded. They must all have rushed away to find the source of the screaming. She retraced her path round the house to the front door. Now the light had gone and she stumbled from the path, losing her way in the thick vegetation of the shrubbery. She pushed through the bushes, struggling to fight off the panic, and decided she must be walking in the wrong direction because there was still no path. The branches scratched her face and pulled at her clothes. She forced herself to stand still. She was no longer a child and she wasn’t lost.

In the distance she heard the faint sound of waves on shingle. As she turned away from the sound, the solid shape of the building became clear against the sky above the shrubs. Vera climbed back to the path and walked round the house to the front door. There was no sound from inside. Checking her watch, she saw that she’d been wandering round in the garden for nearly twenty minutes. She ran her fingers through her hair and pulled a dead leaf from her jacket, then rang the brass bell by swinging the rope, which was attached to a heavy clapper. There was no response. There was a light in the cottage on the other side of the yard and she considered going over. Then the door of the main house opened and she saw the young chef, who had been working in the kitchen. He was still wearing his whites.

‘This way,’ he said. Then he added distractedly, ‘How did you get here so quickly?’

Vera thought for a moment that she felt like a very fat Alice in a strange Wonderland. The chef darted away from her down a narrow corridor, leaving her to follow. He was thin and very dark. As he’d opened the door she’d seen black hairs on the backs of his hands and his lower arms.
A wolf in chef’s clothing.
She glimpsed the guests through a half-open door, but he was walking so quickly that she couldn’t make out individuals as she hurried to keep up. If Joanna was in there, Vera didn’t see her. The house was much bigger inside than she’d have guessed, a warren of passages and small rooms. He led her up a short flight of stairs. By now Vera was completely disorientated; she must have seen just the outside of the newer extension, and now there were no windows to help her make out which way they were going.

‘I was in the area anyway.’ Finally she got close enough to him to answer the question. The speed of their progress had left her a little breathless.

‘I phoned for an ambulance too. I don’t know where that is.’

‘Ah,’ she said. ‘They might take a while to get here. They’ll be coming from Alnwick, most likely.’

‘Actually . . .’ The young man paused. ‘I don’t think there’s much rush. They won’t be able to do anything, after all.’ He stopped at the end of a corridor and opened the door.

It was not at all what she had been expecting. She’d thought she’d be stepping into a bedroom, a grand bedroom because of the balcony. But this was another Alice moment. Another contradiction. It was as if an outside space had been brought indoors. Everything was green and alive. She stood at the threshold and looked in.

The room was a first-floor conservatory. It was tall and narrow and glass doors led onto the balcony, but there was glass too in the sloping ceiling. From the terrace below she hadn’t seen that. And glass walls on each side. There was a tiled floor and painted wicker chairs. Pots of enormous plants with shiny dark leaves formed a mini tropical jungle. All the plants were fat and fleshy and one had a tall spike of pink flowers. The smell was of compost and damp vegetation. In the daylight there would be a magnificent view over the sea. A large mirror in a green frame hung on the one solid wall. The glass must be old with flaws in it, because the reflection was slightly distorted and, glancing into it, Vera felt the queasiness of seasickness. The room was very warm.

‘So what am I here to look at?’ She shook her head in an attempt to clear her mind.

‘Didn’t they tell you? They made me repeat the details.’ The young man walked past the plants and the garden furniture and opened the glass door to the balcony. There was a rush of cold air, and in the distance the sound of the tide sucking on shingle. The balcony was wider than the glass doors and each end was in semi-darkness. He turned to Vera impatiently. ‘Out here!’

She followed him outside and in the faint light from the room saw a man crouched in the corner of the stone parapet, his knees almost up to his chin. The pose seemed strange because his cropped hair was grey; he was in late middle age. Older men didn’t sit on floors because they found it hard to get up again. Their joints creaked. And nobody would sit on a stone floor in late October. The angle of the lights from inside the room threw odd shadows onto his face. He looked angry. Outraged.

He was wearing a pale-coloured shirt under a black jacket. In this light it was hard to make out the exact colour of the shirt. Most of it was covered in blood. And there was blood on the stone floor and on the wall. Looking closer, Vera saw that there was spatter on the glass door. It seemed that he’d been stabbed, but there was no immediate sign of the knife.

‘Who is he?’

‘I told them when I phoned 999.’ The young man was beginning to get suspicious. ‘Who are you anyway?’

‘Aye, well, not everything gets through.’ Vera showed him her warrant card, pleased that she could find it on the first trawl of her bag; tilted it so that the light caught the photo. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Stanhope. What’s your name?’

‘Alex Barton.’

‘Your mother runs this place?’ She’d had him down as the hired help and couldn’t keep the surprise from her voice.

‘We run it together. I’m a partner. Though sometimes you wouldn’t think so.’ The tone was resentful and it was obvious that Alex regretted the comment as soon as it was made. He realized this wasn’t the right time to air family grievances. ‘Don’t you want to know what’s happened here? Shouldn’t you be speaking to—’

‘Of course, pet. First of all, tell me about the victim.’ Vera had never liked being told how to do her job. She took his arm and led him back through the strangely shaped glass room and into the corridor. ‘But out here, eh? We don’t want to muck up the crime scene more than we already have.’

On her way to the room she’d noticed a small sitting area where two corridors formed a crossroads. There was a chaise longue and a low coffee table, covered with upmarket newspapers and literary magazines. There was still no window and the only light came from a dim wall lamp covered by a red shade. Vera thought you’d struggle to read anything much here, and that the whole house was more like a stage-set than a place for practical activity. She lowered herself carefully onto the seat and Alex followed.

‘Where’s everyone else?’ she asked. An event like this, there were always spectators.

‘I told them to wait in the drawing room.’

‘And they always do what you say, do they, pet?’ He didn’t answer and she continued. ‘What do you know about the chap on the balcony?’

‘Didn’t you recognize him?’ There was something supercilious about the question. Vera had got the same reaction when she asked for chips in a posh restaurant.

‘Famous, is he?’

‘He’s called Tony Ferdinand. Professor Tony Ferdinand. Academic, reviewer and arts guru. You must have seen him on
The Culture Show
. And he did that series on BBC4 about the contemporary novel.’ The man didn’t wait for a response. Perhaps he’d already worked out that Vera wasn’t a natural BBC4 viewer. ‘Oh, God, this’ll be a nightmare. We’ll never get any of the professionals from London up after this. Imagine the publicity! Lunatic students cutting the lecturers’ throats! It’s hard enough to prise the sods away from London as it is.’

‘So he was working for you?’ But not much liked, Vera thought, if Alex’s first thought was for the business rather than the man.

‘He deigned to grace us with his presence.’ He must have seen that Vera still needed an explanation. ‘He came to the Writers’ House once every couple of years to act as tutor. Making it clear that he was doing my mother an enormous favour. They go back a long way. But his support made a big difference when we set up the writing courses.’ He paused, seeming to realize that he sounded callous. ‘I’m sorry. It’s hard to believe that he’s dead.’

‘How long have you known him?’ Vera found herself amused. This young man was hardly more than a child to her and surely couldn’t have been involved in this business for more than a few years.

‘Pretty well as long as I can remember. Since I was a child. Tony worked with my mother at St Ursula’s, and when she was first published his positive reviews made a big difference to her career.’

Vera wasn’t sure how any of this worked. St Ursula’s? This was a world about which she knew nothing.

‘She’s a writer too, is she?’

‘Of course. Miranda Barton!’ He paused. ‘I suppose she’s not that well known now. But don’t let on you’ve never heard of her. She’d be mortified.’

‘Sorry, pet. I don’t get much time for reading in my line of business. Not stories, at any rate.’ Through the thick walls she heard the muffled sound of a police siren in the distance. The local cavalry arriving, showing off for all they were worth. What did they need a siren for? To scare one tractor and a bunch of sheep from the lane?

‘What was Mr Ferdinand doing here?’ Vera went on. ‘Was he lecturing on this course, “Short Cuts”?’

‘In theory.’ Again she thought she sensed bitterness in the young man’s voice. It seemed there were lots of complications in this case. At least she hoped there were. She liked something she could get her teeth into, something to prove what a brilliant detective she was.

‘And in practice?’

‘He was here to massage his ego, to convince himself that he was still as influential as he’d always been. In 1990
The Observer
called him a star-maker. I think he’s always on the lookout for more stars, to prove his importance in the literary firmament.’

Again Vera wasn’t sure what this meant, and now wasn’t the time for another show of her ignorance.

‘Who found the body?’ she asked.

Alex leaned back against the end of the chaise longue as if he was suddenly exhausted. ‘My mother. Tony was scheduled to run an informal session before supper. Questions and answers. All about how to find an agent or a publisher, how to submit work. It was often the most popular workshop of the week, the practical side of getting work into print. It was what a lot of the students came for. Of course they all hoped Tony would recognize their genius and recommend them to an agent or publisher. He was charismatic, you know. One word of praise from him and they’d believe in themselves as writers. Tony hadn’t appeared for tea, so Mother went to find him. The glass room was one of his favourite places.’

‘That’s what you call it? The glass room?’

‘Yes.’ Again he regarded Vera with suspicion.

‘Was that unusual? Mr Ferdinand not arriving to work on time?’

‘It was, rather. Tony wasn’t the easiest person to work with, but he was professional.’

‘Your mother came up here and saw him on the balcony?’ Vera wasn’t sure that made sense. If you were looking for someone, wouldn’t you just poke your head round the door to see if they were inside? How could she know that Ferdinand would be crouched in a heap in the corner?

‘Yes,’ Alex said. ‘Then all hell broke loose.’ Despite his expression of shock at the professor’s murder, it seemed to Vera that the young man was devoid of emotion. He was going through the motions. Which couldn’t be said of his mother. Vera could still hear the sound of Miranda Barton’s screaming in her ears, feel it reverberating through her body. The sight of the man on the balcony – the fixed and angry glare on his face, the blood – would be shocking of course. But she thought that there had been more than shock in that noise. It was more personal. Like a mother keening for a child. Or a woman grieving for her lover.

‘This room is just above the drawing room,’ Alex went on, ‘so everyone who was having tea could hear her. They all ran out to see what was going on. The last thing I wanted was some sort of circus, so I told them to wait downstairs. It didn’t take much to wind my mother up. If anything, I was embarrassed. I thought she was just causing a scene. When I saw Tony, I brought Mother downstairs and asked another tutor, Giles Rickard, to take her into our cottage. I went back to the office to phone the police.’

‘And the ambulance,’ Vera said.

For the first time he gave a wry little smile. ‘I know, that was ridiculous. But I’d never seen anybody dead before. I suppose I needed confirmation, someone medical to tell me I wasn’t making it all up. I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do.’