Dangerous (24 page)

Jan was shaking her head. ‘Nah, Sal wouldn’t do that. She liked it here, with all her mates.’

‘You been round to her place?’

‘Yeah, I been round. Didn’t get no answer, though. I thought maybe she’s moved out of the area, who knows?’ Jan looked worried. ‘But I don’t think she’d do that. Not without telling me. We been friends for years.’

‘Where’s she live?’

‘Houndsditch.’

God! That place. ‘Don’t worry, she’ll turn up,’ she said.

‘She won’t. I know she won’t! Look, would you come round her gaff with me? See she’s all right?’

‘God, Jan, I’m up to my arse in—’

‘Please! For God’s sake, anythin’ could have happened to her.’

‘Isn’t she a bit of a drinker? Don’t she like the gin?’

‘Yeah, she does,’ admitted Jan. Sal had been known to go off on a bender and roll in a week later – Clara had chewed her arse about it on more than one occasion. But it was getting on for a month now . . .

‘That could be it. She might be off on one.’

‘No! It’s too long,’ said Jan fretfully, echoing Clara’s own thoughts.

Shit
, thought Clara. Jan was looking to her to do something, take some action. But Houndsditch . . .

She remembered it. She’d never forget it. The stink of the slums. The damp and the despair. She shuddered to even think of it. She didn’t want to go back there.

‘
Please
, Clara. Come round there with me will you? I’m getting scared now.’

Clara took a breath.
Fuck it
. ‘Look, we’ll go tomorrow morning, all right? You and me. Come in here at eleven, I’ll meet you and we’ll go.’

‘Thanks, Clara,’ said Jan, looking relieved.

Shit, shit, shit,
thought Clara.
Houndsditch.

57

Next day they set off in a taxi into Clara’s deepest, darkest nightmares. The driver, a big bluff Londoner, stopped at a certain point and wouldn’t go any further.

‘This is as far as I go,’ he told them.

‘Oh, come on . . . ’ said Clara. It was pouring down outside.

‘No, lady. Now get out, OK?’

Sheltering under an umbrella, Clara and Jan hustled on foot along the streets and Clara thought that it was like being fifteen again: the dank air, the rubbish mouldering on the pavements, the unwashed bodies hurrying past, trailing their feral scent of poverty.

‘Is it much further?’ asked Clara, teeth chattering, desperate to be gone.

‘Not far.’

‘Do you live round here too?’ asked Clara.

‘Here we are, up in these flats. I live over in the next street. Sal and me, we see each other a lot. It’s not like her to just not turn up.’

Now Jan was hurrying up stairs to the top floor, going along a rubbish-strewn landing. Lines had been set up and strands of washing flapped tiredly in the faint breeze. They could hear televisions blaring inside the flats; all the paint on the doors was peeling and there was the strong scent of cats in the air up here.

Shivering with disgust at actually
being
here again, streets away from where her poor mother had died and where they had lived such desperate and miserable lives, Clara followed, cursing Sal and Jan equally. The sooner they roused Sal from what was probably nothing but a drunken stupor, the sooner they could get out of this filthy hole and back to civilization.

‘Here we are . . . ’ Jan stopped outside a door and knocked on it.

Clara felt sick. She couldn’t believe she’d been dragged here, it felt like a ghastly dream.

‘Oh . . . ’ said Jan.

‘What?’ asked Clara, through chattering teeth. She looked round, focused on the door. It was ajar. When Jan knocked, it had swung inward.

Jan was staring too. ‘When I tried last time, it was shut,’ she said.

‘Well, let’s get in, at least it’ll be drier inside . . . ’ Clara moved past Jan and the door swung open further. She stepped into a small, semi-dark room. Something jingled under her feet. She looked down. Small change on the floor, and a red purse, open, as if it had been dropped there. Then . . .

The smell hit her like a blow, straight between the eyes.

‘Oh – Jesus!’ shouted Jan.

Clara reeled back a pace, barrelling into Jan and nearly knocking her flying. ‘What the fu—’ said Clara, her hand clamped over her nose. Oh Jesus, that
smell
.

Then Clara became aware of the noise. At first she thought it was the rain hammering on the roof – it was heavier now, and there was dripping, somewhere in this hellhole there was a leak. She heaved sideways, wondering if she was going to be sick, and her foot knocked against tin. A bucket. The roof was leaking water, and Sal had placed a bucket there, to catch it. She reeled over against a small table, and there was Sal’s little black evening bag. Numbly Clara picked it up. And . . . oh Jesus,
what was that
?

Things were pitching on her clothes, buzzing against her face. Big black things were crawling over the expensive cream wool of her coat, landing on her neck. With a shuddery cry of disgust she brushed them away.

Meat flies.

There was something rotten in here, something festering and dead. Her eyes flickered around the place, the dirt in here, the stench, the . . . oh God, there was a bed in the corner, there was something on the bed, and she didn’t want to look but her eyes were drawn to it, to the image that would haunt her for weeks, months,
years
to come.

There was Sal.

Her face was blue, her bulging brown eyes opaque and staring, her mouth open in a silent scream, and there were – oh God! – maggots writhing and scrambling over the exposed mass of her spilled innards.

‘Jesus!’ said Jan.

Clara elbowed her aside and went out, away from this nightmare, out onto the walkway. Suddenly bile rose in her throat and she was sick, retching violently. Brushing a trembling hand at her mouth, she stumbled back to the steps and halfway down them Jan bustled past her, almost knocking her over in her haste to get away from the horror up the stairs. They were running as if there was a mad man coming behind them.

Gasping, they reached the bottom of the steps. Clara couldn’t hold herself up any more. She collapsed onto the bottom stair, seeing Sal in her mind’s eye, eviscerated, dead. Big mouthy Sal. Gone.

‘I’ll get . . . I’ll get help . . . ’ Jan was saying.

Shaking, shivering, Clara nodded. Somewhere, she’d dropped her umbrella. The rain was pouring now, drenching her. Jan stumbled away into the gloom, leaving Clara on the step. People were hurrying past, no one taking the slightest notice of the crouching woman there. She had to move, had to get up, had to leave. If only she could gather her strength. But she felt drained, weak as water. Someone bumped against her knee, stumbled; a man.

‘Sorry,’ he muttered, and then instead of moving on, without any warning, he grabbed her hand, pulled off her sapphire ring, and the diamond, and the emerald, wrenching at her fingers, hurting her.

Clara let out a scream. The man shoved her so that she fell back against the steps, and then he ran away. She looked at her hands. The only ring he hadn’t taken was – thank God! – the only one she really cared about. Her mother’s gold band, that was still there. Now there was someone else, coming closer. Clara shrank back, one hand in front of her face, waiting for another attack.

‘Clara?’ he said.

Clara dropped her hand slowly and stared up at the man’s face. There was a lean, hungry look to him. A camera hung on a strap around his neck. It was David, Bernie’s soon-to-be fiancé.

‘Oh . . . it’s you,’ she said faintly.

‘What on earth are you doing here?’ he asked, staring at her like she’d landed from another world.

Well, she had. She’d left this place far behind her – and good riddance to it. And now she’d come back to find poor Sal, done to death. Clara opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out.

‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Let’s get you somewhere warm and dry.’

He put a hand under her elbow and helped her to her feet.

58

It struck Clara then that David was probably a very nice man. Poor, yes; but caring, pleasant, even handsome in his gangly long-limbed way. He took her to his grubby little studio and she felt a bit faint and had to sit down at his desk while he fetched some water.

When she’d recovered, he put the CLOSED sign on the door and led the way upstairs to his surprisingly clean but untidy flat. He made her tea, sat her down, gave her a towel to dry her sodden hair. Clara became aware that she still had Sal’s black evening bag on her lap, that she’d carried it with her out of the flat. She saw a portrait of Bernie, smiling shyly at the camera, up on the mantelpiece.

‘What the hell were you doing there, of all places?’ he asked, when they were sitting down and he’d switched on a two-bar electric fire. It felt chilly in here; Clara thought that he could probably not afford to run the damned thing, and probably never did, but was doing it because she looked so cold and shaky.

A nice man.

Clara sipped her tea, clasping the mug between her hands, feeling the warmth seep into her frozen body. She glanced at her left hand, bereft of rings.

‘Someone stole my jewellery, just before you came by,’ she told him.

‘Well what were you doing, wearing stuff like that around that area? It’s asking for trouble.’

‘One of the
poor
you have such sympathy with,’ said Clara.

He shrugged. ‘They’re desperate. You must have looked like easy pickings.’

Clara didn’t answer that. It had been a terrible day. Finding Sal like that, and then being robbed. She was still shuddering, still seeing that awful scene in her head. She wondered if she would ever forget it. Someone had
murdered
Sal. Her brain could hardly absorb it; it was too horrible. She had been lying there dead, undiscovered for weeks. Jan had called by, but no one else had knocked at her door. No one else had cared. Suddenly all Clara wanted was to get home, to see Toby, tell him all about this. She was lucky; she had a husband, a home, a sister, people who cared about her. She could have ended up like poor Sal.

But . . . hadn’t the rent man called in all that time? And hadn’t Jan said the door was closed last time she’d called, and this time it was open?

‘I know you don’t like me,’ said David.

Clara snapped her wandering attention back to what he was saying.

‘And I can understand why,’ he went on. ‘But I love Bernie, and I want to make her happy.’

‘But you can’t, can you?’ said Clara. ‘How are you going to earn a living, with a family to support?’

‘We’ll manage,’ he said.

Clara put her empty mug aside. She eyed him cynically. What a pair of dreamers they were, him and Bern. Fortunately she had a clearer view of the situation. She nodded to the photo on the mantle. ‘That’s a lovely photo of her,’ she said.

‘She’s very photogenic. Good bones.’

‘Does she come up here often to visit you?’

‘She does. I suppose you don’t like the idea, but it’s serious, Clara. We’re not just messing around. She sits in that same chair you’re sitting in, every time she comes.’

‘Could I have another cup of tea?’

He smiled and went to fetch it. When she’d finished it, she said: ‘I think I’d like to go home now,’ and stood up.

‘You’re sure? You can stay here for a bit, if you’re still shaky. What were you doing over there, anyway? You never said.’

‘Visiting a friend,’ said Clara. ‘That’s all.’

He eyed her with disbelief. ‘can’t imagine you having any friends down there. Still. Not my business.’

‘No. It’s not.’

‘I’ll get my coat,’ said David, and left the room.

When he came back, they went down the stairs and out into the street. The rain had nearly stopped and everything looked brighter, raindrops catching on trees and shrubbery and glittering with rainbow shades. People were coming out into the streets again. Life was going on.

But not for Sal.

A feeling of deep unease gnawed at Clara. She had seen death close-up today, and it was shattering. And on top of that, she had just done a very wicked thing. Necessary – but wicked.

59

At four in the afternoon the cops called in at the Heart of Oak, wanting to speak to all the staff. Jan wasn’t in. Neither was Toby. Clara had got home yesterday to find he wasn’t there. He was obviously off around town with Jasper.

Now, for the first time, Clara wished for a
proper
husband, someone who would always be there for her, instead of gallivanting around the gambling dens and nightclubs with his handsome young lover.

All last night Sal’s tortured face had haunted her dreams, pulled her sweating and half screaming from sleep time after time. To find herself alone. No Toby. No Bernie, either, sleeping in the next room. When Clara checked, she found her bed hadn’t been slept in. She must have stayed over at David’s.

There was nobody to confide in.

Well, she was used to that. Carrying all the responsibility. Making all the decisions. But it seemed to be getting harder all the time, and this fresh disaster had made her feel fragile, cast adrift.

Where the hell was Toby when you needed him?

And where was Jan?

She found
that
out quickly, when a police inspector came up to her office to take her statement and told her: ‘Miss Cutler is taking the day off, trying to get over the shock.’

Thinking about that hideous scene again, Clara suppressed a shudder. Poor bloody Jan; if she felt anything like
she
did, she needed a day off. The difference was, she was getting it. Clara couldn’t enjoy such luxury. She had to soldier on.

‘It was a particularly vicious crime,’ said the inspector. He was tall, cadaverous, and his pale eyes looked like they had seen far too much. ‘Miss Cutler was very shaken at finding her friend like that, and she was upset you left the scene.’

‘I’m sorry. I think I just panicked. Do you have any idea who . . . ?’ asked Clara, dry-mouthed.

‘Not yet. We’re making inquiries. So Miss Dryden worked here. Would you say she seemed happy?’

‘Sal was never happy. She loved to have a moan, it kept her going.’