The Glass Room (Vera Stanhope 5) (33 page)

They sat by the window. Outside the street lights came on suddenly. Already the shops in the main street at the end of the alley had Christmas displays in the windows. Nina smelled the camomile tea as it was set before her, watched Ashworth drink his coffee as if he needed it to stay alive, then he spread butter on a warm cheese scone and took a bite. She wondered when he had last eaten.

‘How can I help you?’ Because Nina thought the man did want her help. He sat across the table from her looking tentative and anxious, the scone poised near his mouth.

‘This do at the Writers’ House . . .’

‘Yes?’

‘How’s it going to work, like?’

‘It’ll be a party,’ she said. ‘Like a launch party, only for a group of authors instead of an individual. And the idea is to start a fund to keep Miranda’s vision of the Writers’ House alive.’ Across the street she saw a mother holding the hand of a little girl. The girl was skipping, almost dancing along the pavement. Nina imagined what it would feel like to be holding the hand and thought that probably she’d never really know.

‘Have you talked to Alex about the idea?’ Ashworth had swallowed the scone and had almost finished his coffee. He stared at her.

‘I haven’t. I’m sure Chrissie has; she talked about going to see him the other day. It’s her project.’ Still Nina couldn’t work out what the detective wanted from her. Had the fat woman sent him to get information? Was Alex having second thoughts about hosting the party? Nina wouldn’t blame him if he was. Chrissie might dress it up as a memorial celebration, but it would be a party nevertheless. Had Alex complained to the police that he was being bounced into something he didn’t care for?

Ashworth said nothing. He gazed out of the window and she saw that he was watching the mother and daughter too.

‘Is there any news on the investigation?’ she asked. The silence between them was becoming awkward. ‘I suppose I should think about moving back to my flat. I can’t hide out at North Farm for ever.’

He turned towards her sharply. ‘Stay there for a little while longer. At least until after the event at the Writers’ House.’

‘Why until then?’ she demanded. ‘What difference would a book launch make?’

‘Probably nothing.’ He gave a strange little laugh. Nervousness? Or to cover the fact that he was lying to her? ‘We just hope that we’ll have a result by then.’

‘You’re close then?’ He looked at her as if he didn’t quite understand and she added, mimicking his words, ‘To getting a result?’

He didn’t answer and instead came back with a question of his own. ‘Who will be there from the “Short Cuts” course?’

‘Everyone who’s contributed to the anthology: Giles Rickard donated a special story; Mark Winterton has written a true crime piece; Lenny Thomas, Joanna Tobin, me. And Chrissie will be there of course, even though she hasn’t written anything for the book. Is it important?’

‘Probably not.’

But it seemed to Nina that it was the most important thing in the world to him at the moment.

‘Why did you come to the university to find me?’ The words seemed to be propelled by a blast of energy inside her mouth. They emerged sharp and staccato, like gunshots.

He seemed shocked by her bluntness. ‘I wanted to check you were all right.’

‘Did the inspector send you?’

‘No!’ he said. ‘I suggested it.’

‘But she knows you’re here?’ Nina thought he was here to gain information after all. Why couldn’t Vera Stanhope do her own dirty business? She was in touch with Chrissie. She stood up. It seemed to her that the exchange was going nowhere. ‘I should be getting back to North Farm. I promised Chrissie I’d go shopping with her. Stuff for the memorial party.’

He got up and they stood for a moment side by side. The elderly cafe owner continued to read his book – oblivious, it seemed, to any tension, though Nina could feel it. Physically, like static electricity.

Ashworth put a hand on her arm. ‘Take care,’ he said. ‘Yeah?’ And he hurried off and was swallowed up by the Christmas shoppers. She stood for a moment, still unsure of the purpose of his visit. Had it all been about those last few words? Had he come into town just to warn her?

Joe Ashworth hurried through the busy streets and thought he should never have come into town. What had he hoped to achieve? He stopped for a moment outside Fenwick’s department store, drawn by the crowds staring at the window. It was a Newcastle institution, Fenwick’s Christmas window. He and Sal always brought the bairns in to see it and the trip marked the start of the festive season. This year it had a space theme: mechanical astronauts bouncing on the moon, whirling stars and a rocket that took off in one window and landed in another. Real sparks from the engine. Santa Claus and his reindeers all wearing space helmets. The kids would love it.

But he was only distracted for a moment and pushed on, past the grandmothers with wide-eyed toddlers strapped into buggies, the street pedlars, the working people who’d sloped off early to avoid the rush. Usually he liked being in town, but now he felt hemmed in. He’d spent too long with Vera and her need for the hills.

He’d paid the visit to Nina Backworth because Vera had asked him to: ‘Just call in on your fancy friend in the university.’ Her voice amused. ‘Find out what she’s up to. Or what her publisher’s up to. It’s one way of making things happen, this party on the coast. Like a chemical reaction. Shake the bottle and wait for the fizz.’ Then she’d paused. ‘I need to know that all the elements will be there. All the suspects. I don’t want to contact the Kerr woman again. She already thinks I’m taking too much of an interest. But your Nina will know.’

She’s not my Nina
, he’d wanted to say, but he knew that would only provoke another caustic comment.

Instead he’d fought back the only way he knew, by turning Vera’s own words against her. ‘I thought we were going to sort this one with traditional detective work. Knocking on doors, talking to witnesses.’

‘Aye, well.’ She’d looked at him, frowning. ‘That’s getting us nowhere quickly, and you know me. Patience was never one of my virtues.’

So he’d phoned the university and found out that Ms Backworth had tutorials all day. And had driven in immediately, knowing he might bottle it if he gave himself time to think. He’d replayed his last encounter with Nina in his head since the group from the Writers’ House had broken up. Lust that felt like adultery. How his colleagues would mock him if they knew! They took one-night stands and affairs in their stride, and he hadn’t even touched the woman.

He reached the multi-storey car park and tried to decide how he felt about Nina Backworth now. There’d been the sudden thrill of attraction when she’d come out of her office in the university. So upright. Her body held straight by the tailored jacket, the narrow skirt, the black leather boots. And then what? Only an anxiety that he was making a fool of himself. She’d sat in the cafe, cool as ice, and he’d burbled questions that seemed to come from nowhere.

His phone rang as he reached his car. Vera, of course. Still impatient. Still not trusting him to carry out the simplest of instructions.

‘Yes?’ He stood, leaning against a concrete pillar, looking down at the city.

‘Well,’ she said, ‘how did it go?’

‘They’ll all be there. Rickard, Winterton, Thomas, Joanna Tobin, Chrissie Kerr.’

‘And your friend Nina?’

‘Of course,’ he said, though it was impossible to consider Nina a suspect. She’d been a victim. That’s why she was camping out in a strange house, why she couldn’t return to her own home.

‘I’m going to the Writers’ House tomorrow morning,’ she said. ‘I want to talk to Alex. And get a feel for the place again. If you fancy coming.’

‘Sure.’

‘What are your plans for the rest of the afternoon?’

‘Why?’ Joe could tell from her voice that she had plans for him. He didn’t say that it felt like evening to him, not afternoon, and that his shift was nearly over.

‘I want you to call in on Lenny Thomas,’ she said. ‘He’s got no alibi for the dead cat or the break-in at Nina Backworth’s place, and Holly said he seemed shifty when she talked to him. But you know Holly: she hasn’t got the gentlest of interviewing techniques. She makes
me
feel shifty. I’d like a second opinion.’

Ashworth felt himself smiling. Above him a plane was approaching Newcastle airport to the west, dual landing lights flashing as regular as a lighthouse beam. He knew Vera was as fickle as any lover, but he liked it when he was in favour. Couldn’t help himself.

‘Sure,’ he said again.

The flats in Red Row were quiet and most of the curtains were drawn. Climbing the stairs, he heard the occasional murmur of the television behind closed doors. A new headline on the national news to replace the Writers’ House murders. There was still heavy press interest, though it was mostly local now. On one of the doors someone had hung a Christmas wreath. Joe thought it’d be dead and brown by the beginning of December, but coming closer he saw that the holly leaves were plastic. A sudden squawk of a baby reminded him of his wife and the kids at home. Then silence again.

Lenny answered as soon as Joe knocked. He was in the narrow corridor in the flat, wearing a coat.

‘On your way out?’ Joe said.

‘Nah, I’ve just got in.’ He stood for a moment, then his eyes slid away from Joe’s face. Even Joe thought he looked shifty. ‘What is it?’

‘A couple of questions. You know how it is.’

‘Not really.’

Lenny frowned, and Joe wondered what was bothering him. What was giving him the guilty conscience? Maybe he’d found another woman and, despite the divorce from Helen, he considered that a betrayal. Helen had said he was romantic, a dreamer.
Like me?
Joe thought, and then:
For God’s sake, man, you’ve got sex on the brain.

‘Shall we sit down?’ Joe moved further into the flat and shut the door behind him. Still Lenny showed no sign of moving or taking off his coat.

‘Aye, all right.’ Lenny seemed to have lost his puppy-like energy and enthusiasm. ‘It’s cold in there, though. I’ve only just turned the heating on.’

‘I could murder a cup of tea. That’ll soon warm us through.’

The living room
was
cold. Lenny switched on the light and pulled the curtains shut. The place was tidy enough, but there was dust on the mantelpiece and biscuit crumbs on the carpet. Lenny saw Joe looking at the muck on the floor. ‘Sorry.’ For a moment he was himself again, apologetic and eager to please. ‘I haven’t done the hoovering this week.’ Still wearing his coat, he went through to the kitchen and filled the kettle.

Joe remained standing. He considered what it must be like to live alone; he’d gone straight from his mam and dad’s place to setting up home with Sal. Under the window there was a table, spread with a few sheets of printed paper and a glossy image of a house surrounded by bare trees. The angle was unfamiliar and it took the arty writing of the title –
Short Cuts from the Writers’ House –
to make him recognize it. He turned and saw Lenny watching him from the kitchen door.

‘That’s the page proofs,’ he said. ‘You get them from the publisher and check for mistakes. The picture will be on the cover.’

‘You’ll be at the launch party then?’

‘I will.’ Lenny hesitated. The kettle boiled and clicked off, but he took no notice. ‘I wondered if I’d ask Helen. My ex. She never thought I’d make it, and here I am with my name on a book. But would she think I was showing off – putting her down, like.
I told you so. You were wrong all along.
I wouldn’t want it to be like that.’

‘I think she’d like you to ask her,’ Joe said. ‘She’d be proud. Really.’

‘Maybe I’ll risk it then,’ Lenny said. ‘Maybe I will.’ And he disappeared to make the tea.

Later, a mug on his knee, Joe asked, ‘What have you been up to lately?’ Hearing his voice, he almost winced. It was patronizing and with that forced jollity that bachelor uncles and priests put on when they are talking to children.

Lenny was immediately suspicious. ‘What am I supposed to have done?’

‘Nothing!’ But surely the man deserved an explanation. ‘Someone killed Miranda’s cat and laid it out in the Writers’ House chapel. A sick joke maybe, and nothing to do with the murder, but we’re asking everyone what they were doing that afternoon. And at the time someone broke into Nina Backworth’s flat. You do understand. It might help us track down the killer.’

There was that frown again. ‘I wouldn’t do something like that. And I couldn’t even get to the Writers’ House. I don’t have a car.’

‘An officer came to see you before, to ask you where you were that day. You told her you couldn’t remember.’

‘That young lass,’ Lenny said. ‘Snotty cow. She wouldn’t even sit down. Worried maybe that she’d catch something.’

‘Where were you, Lenny?’ Joe tried to keep his voice light. He liked the big man. ‘You don’t have such a hectic social life that you really don’t remember.’

Lenny paused and for a moment Joe thought he was preparing an answer. But at the last minute the man shook his head. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘When you’re home all the time like me, one day seems just like another.’ He stood up. ‘But I wouldn’t do that. I wouldn’t upset Nina or Alex. They’re good people.’

Joe realized that Lenny hadn’t answered the question. Perhaps he couldn’t bring himself to lie. But he knew fine well where he was, those days of the bizarre happenings. He just wasn’t saying.

Joe found a card in his pocket. ‘This is my mobile number. Give me a ring if anything comes back to you.’ He could tell that forcing the issue now would just make Lenny more stubborn. Lenny left the card on the table where Joe had put it, but he nodded.

Outside, Joe thought the day was turning into a disaster. One failure after another. He’d wanted to bring Vera good news to justify her faith in him. At the car something made him turn back to look at the flats. He saw Lenny, holding the curtains a little apart, looking down at him.

He wants to tell me,
Joe thought,
but he’s scared. What could a big man like him be frightened of?

When Joe got home the kids were ready for bed, but still up and waiting for him. Sal had put on a DVD for the big ones and she was sitting beside them, feeding the baby. They all looked up when he came in, but none of the children seemed excited to see him. They were drowsy after their baths and their attention was on the screen. A cartoon about giant insects. He was pleased to find the house calm, but oddly disappointed all the same.