Thirteen Steps Down (37 page)

herface in the dark. Earlier than usual, the lights in Mr. Singh's house

had gone out and the fairy light tree was also indarkness.

To his dismay Mix found himself trembling as he came into the

bedroom, not from the temperature but from fear. Ye twhat was there to

be afraid of? This time the ghost hadn't even made him shiver. All the

doors downstairs were locked and, where this was possible, bolted. He

and she were alone. The ghost was upstairs of course but Mix had felt

and still felt that Reggie approved of what he was about to do. And,

mystifyingly, the pain in his back had gone. He had taken no more

ibuprofen, yet it was gone. He'd be all right now.

As he approached the bed a black shape uncurled itself andreared up,

arching its back. The green eyes seemed larger andbrighter than usual.

"I'll kill you too," said Mix.

He made a lunge for Otto who eluded his grasp with ease, hissed like a

snake, and leapt for the open door and the stairs. The woman on the bed

was perfectly still. Do it quickly, hesaid to himself, do it now. Don't look

at her. Just do it. Her head was on one pillow and there was another

beside her, athird up-ended against the bedhead. He took hold of the

upendedpillow in both trembling hands and turning his headaway,

pressed it down on her face as hard as he could.

She didn't move. There was to be no struggle. She remained utterly still.

He held his hands there and they steadied while hecounted to a

hundred, two hundred ... At five hundred he let his hands relax and as

they did so his fingers touched the skin of her neck. It was icy cold. He

had never before touched such an old person--his grandmother had died

at seventy--and he wondered if all of them were as cold as that, the heat

in theblood, the warm life, cooling gradually with age.

He put the pillow back where he had found it and pulled thebedclothes

off her body. It surprised him to see that she wasfully dressed. Maybe

she always went to bed like that, nevertook her clothes off. He stripped

the top sheet out from under the coverlet and blanket and began to roll

the body up in it. By now he had some experience of this soh of thing, he

was lessfearful and less clumsy. The trembling that he couldn't

accountfor had entirely ceased. He felt very calm and resigned. He

hadhad to do it. Before he wound the end of the sheet around herhead

and face he made himself look. Her wide-open eyes remindedhim of

Danila's. But Danila's had been young and clear, her body warm to

touch.These eyes, rheumy, clouded,lay in a nest of wrinkles. And this old

woman was ice-cold.

She was much heavier than Danila and it took him a longtime to drag

her up the stairs to the top, the body bumping on every step. He

expected renewed back pain but there was none.Once the body was

inside his flat and he had had a drink, afairly stiff gin, he went back to

her bedroom and tidied the bed, making it look as he thought she might

have made it, in a rather slovenly way. Her shoes, which she must have

kicked off before lying down, he put into the cupboard to join the

jumblea lready there. He was going to tell those who inquired that she

had decided to go away and convalesce, leaving everything the way she

would if she had really gone.

All the time he was dragging her upstairs he was thinking hemight

injure his back again, but he was quite free of pain. And somehow he

knew he would continue to be unless it came on later, as it had done last

time. At the trial of Timothy Evans, Reggie had made the court believe he

couldn't have killed Evans's wife because his back was too bad for him to

lift her. I won't be going near any court, Mix told himself resolutely. I got

rid of her to keep myself out of court.

He went downstairs and drew back the bolts on the front door in case

Ma Winthrop or Ma Fordyce decided to come every early in the morning

and thought it was funny the door being bolted. He didn't want anyone

thinking anything was funny. This house was a dreadful place at night,

such a place as shouldn't be allowed to exist, he thought. Living here for

long would drive you mad. You'd feel it was moldering away and slowly

rotting around you, the wood and the hangings and the ancient carpets

disintegrating hour by hour, minute by minute. If you stood still and

listened you could almost hear it, tiny drippings and droppings, moths

chewing, flakes falling, splinters, rust, and mildew turning to dust. Why

had he ever thoughthe wanted to live here? Why had he spent all that

money on making a small part of the house fit to live in?

Returning to the stairs, he saw Otto above him sitting on the first

landing. Had she fed the cat? She would always do that before she went

to bed and would have done so before she left in the morning on this

journey she was supposed to be going on. He went back to look in case

one of those two old women checked and found it funny the cat's plate

being empty. Either Otto had eaten it or none had been put down. Mix

opened a can and filled the plate.

"I'd put poison in it if I'd got any," he said aloud.

Otto came down the stairs, Mix aimed a kick at him, but the cat sprang,

raking claws down his bare ankle. Mix cried out, reached for his leg, and

brought his hand away covered in blood. He cursed, peering through the

moonlit dark for that shape and those eyes, but Otto had disappeared,

leaving the food uneaten.

Mix followed, dripping blood. The moonlight came in everywhere it

could find an uncurtained window or a crack between door and jamb,

scattering spots and lines of white light. The landing windows let it in

and it seeped through her bedroom door, which he had left ajar. Above

him he saw Otto padding up the tiled flight. At the top, without

hesitation, moving through a big square of moonlight, the cat turned left

along the passage. When Mix got up there he was nowhere to be seen.

Like some witch's familiar, he had disappeared into the ghost's abode.

There Mix was too frightened to follow him.

He thought of searching once more for Gwendolen's sleeping pills but

he was afraid. Such fear was irrational, he knew, as was the horrible

fantasy he had of sleeping for too long and deeply until he awoke blearily

to find police in the flat, thef ront door kicked in and Ma Fordyce

unwrapping the bundle in which was Gwendolen's body. He must stay

alert, lie down,and rest but not sleep. He had things to do in the morning

that couldn't wait.

Queenie had been invited to a Fordyce-Akwaa family brunch.She thought

it extraordinarily nice of them to ask her becauset he company would

consist of Olive, her sister, her niece Hazel, and Hazel's two sons with

their wives and two babies;she would be the only outsider. Gwendolen

also had been invitedbut she had refused, as Olive--this was perhaps the

reasonshe had been so anxious to ask her--had known she would.

Gwendolen was difficult. Everyone who came into contact with her

knew that, but you had to make allowances for her age, ten years older

than Queenie herself, and her single status. It was a well-known fact that

being single all those years made you selfish. Queenie and Olive often

discussed Gwendolen's rudeness and "contrariness" but agreed that they

must put up with it and not consider withdrawing their friendship. They

were also in agreement that it was unthinkable for her, in her present

state, to be left alone for more than a few hours. Queenie should be the

one to call at St. Blaise House in the morning while Olive would try to

look in later, as she would bebusy before that with the brunch.

Nine o'clock was early, but she couldn't help that. She had things to do

before she went round to Olive's. Still outstanding was the vexed

question of what she was going to wear. The pink dress or the new white

trouser suit she had been lucky toget in a size 18?

Gwendolen was probably still in bed. Queenie let her selfinto the house,

calling, "Yoo-hoo" as she always did becauseshe didn't want to startle her

friend. She looked first of all intot he drawing room. The bottle of port

was still on the table andso were their two glasses with crimson dregs in

the bottom of each one. In the kitchen was the customary mess. Nothing

unusual in that. Queenie knew the tidiness and cleanliness achieved by

herself and Olive was bound not to last. Otto's food bowl was half full.

"Without quite knowing why, Queenie felt relieved Gwendolen had been

strong enough to feed him before she went to bed.

There was no help for it, she was going to have to climb those stairs.

Twice, probably, because Gwendolen would bebound to want a cup of

tea. Solve that problem by makingit now. The old kettle, burn-encrusted

on its outside and nodoubt coated in limescale within, took ages to boil.

Finally Queenie was able to make the tea, a cup for Gwendolen andone

for herself, liberally sugared with granulated for energy. She put both on

a tray and began the climb.

Gwendolen's bed was empty and so was the room. The bed was made,

not approaching Queenie's own standard with "hospital corners" but

exactly the way Gwendolen would think adequate. The curtains were

drawn halfway across the windowsand the place was as stuffy as usual.

Queenie came out and avoice from above said, "Hi, there."

Very unlike him, she thought. Why was he being so pleasant?"Is that

you, Mr. Cellini? Good morning. Do you happen to know where Miss

Chawcer is?" .

He came down. She thought he looked terrible, his roundface gaunt and

hollow-eyed, the skin with a clammy sheen to it. His belly bulged over his

jeans and the laces on his trainers were undone. "She's gone away," he

said. "For convalescence, she said. Somewhere near Cambridge. She's got

friends there."

As far as Queenie knew she had no friends but her and Olive. Then she

remembered Gwendolen had said she was expectinga letter from

Cambridge--or had it been Oxford?--the one she had practically accused

Mr. Cellini of purloining. Had Gwendolen had a letter from these friends

and said nothingabout it to her or Olive? It was more than possible. It

would be like her. Or thses Cambridge people might have phoned last

eening. Still, it was very short notice. And Gwendolen had hardly

seemed fit enough…

“When did she go?”

Must have been about eight. I went downstairs to get my mail and there

she was in the hall with her bag packed waiting for a cab to come."

Queenie couldn't imagine Gwendolen calling a cab, still less having an

account with some taxi company, but what did she know? How would

she know?

"I supposed she asked you to feed the cat?"

"Sure and I said I'd see to it."

"Do you know when she'll be back

"She never said."

"Well, there's no point in me staying, Mr. Cellini. I've abrunch party to

go to." Queenie was proud of having been invited, as a widow of no

particular importance, to what amounted to someone else's family

gathering. "It's a joint venture of Olive and her niece Mrs. Akwas."

He stared. “Will Miss Nash be there?"

Ridiculous man! She remembered the things he had said to Nerissa the

day Gwendolen came out of hospital. He obviously had it bad, was quite

smitten, as her late husband used to say."Sadly for us, she won't."

Queenie disliked a man showing a preference for any woman but herself.

She took a certain malicious pleasure, quite unlike her, in denying Mr.

Cellini the chance of sending some lovey-dovey message. "She always has

a day out with her father about this time of year and they've fixed on

today. It's become quite a tradition."

She went downstairs and to her surprise he followed her."Did you drive

here?" he asked when they were in the hallway."

I haven't got a car. Why do you ask?"

"It doesn't matter. I just thought if you had you might take me up to the

DIY place on the North Circular."

Queenie, who generally lacked Olive's acerbity, for once forgetting to

exercise her charm on a men said sharply for her,"I'm sure I'm sorry to

disappoint you. You’ll have to go on the bus." At the front door she

turned round. "Olive and I will both be back. We'll want to get to the

bottom of this mysterious trip of Gwendolen's."

Chapter 25

Buying a sufficiently large and sufficiently thick plastic bag was less easy

than he had thought. There was nothing available astough as the one he

had taken from the firm's warehouse—why had he been such a fool as to

cut it up and throw it out?—and he had to be satisfied with a cot

mattress cover, designed to be urine-proof. All the way back on the bus

he was thinking of the smell of Danila's body as it began to decay. The

weather wa swarmer again. On some days it had been up in the twenties

Celsius. Just the same, he knew that burying Gwendolen's body in the

garden would be impossible. As he was walking round the DIY

supermarket he had felt shooting pains begin, little stabs like tiny knives

pricking his spine. He could disable himself for life, he thought, if he

attempted putting a spade to that concretelike clay.