Ghost Girl (21 page)

Optimistic of success, Stella drew a grid in her Filofax with columns headed ‘Date’, ‘Street’, ‘Accident’ and ‘Victim’. She put in seven rows, because, not counting the numbers with letters, there were seven streets. She squeezed in an extra column for the picture number.

She had forgotten how unsettling a local newspaper could be. The murders, muggings and accidents that befell people in the ordinary course of their lives – house fires, more than one murder in an abandoned church or a bedsit, robberies and accidents at work and in the street – were so frequent that, if they read the paper, residents of Hammersmith could be paralysed with fear.

After two hours she had only reached May 2002 and found two fatal traffic accidents. An elderly man – Harry Pickering – hit by a motorbike and a young man who, the article reported, had yet to be identified, crushed by the 272 bus on Shepherd’s Bush Road, not far from Stella’s office. He had died later of head injuries. This story intrigued her because a man arrested at the scene was not the bus driver, which inspired further questions. Who else could be responsible? Was he pushed in front of the bus? She trawled through the following weeks but found no answers. She was getting distracted. Terry would keep strictly within the limits of the case. There was no mention of a horse trough.

Her back ached from sitting on the hard chair and a headache from staring at the poor resolution screen was nagging at her temples. She went to the lavatory.

She was drying her hands – on a towel whose hygienic properties she mistrusted on principle – when she saw what had been under her nose. She hurried back and pulled out the blue folder from her rucksack; she flipped to the street with the witness board (number 5b) and there they were. Two horse chestnut trees – she had learnt about trees at primary school and could still identify most species in the British Isles – their bare branches black lines against a white-grey sky placed the season of the photograph as late autumn or winter. Stella was safe omitting the months between May and August from her search.

She opened the cabinets housing film dating back to the 1960s, eased out ‘September 2002’ and loaded it into the machine. By now she was operating the clunky apparatus with the breezy skill of an expert and arrived quickly at Thursday, 5 September, the day the paper came out. No accidents reported for that week. A woman was found dead in her bed of a paracetamol overdose. A nurse in the renal department of Charing Cross, she had stopped work to care for her father and after his death was diagnosed with depression. Stella believed that keeping busy was the best cure, not that she had looked after Terry. She whizzed the film on and accidentally skipped a week. Reversing it, she found no fatal accidents.

Another hour passed and she was at the end of October. Her headache was worse; she could do with a handful of paracetamols herself.

She was about to give up when she found it. Date: Thursday, 14 November 2002, above an advert for Woolworths in King Street.

Hit and Run Man in Fatal Collision

By Lucille May

A man who was given a suspended sentence of two years for causing death by dangerous driving and leaving the scene was killed when his Peugeot RCZ hit a tree on Britton Drive W6. James Markham was taken to Charing Cross Hospital on Sunday night where he was pronounced dead.

The smash is known to have occurred after 11.30 p.m. when DS Terence Darnell, an off-duty police officer, drove down the street and noticed nothing unusual.

James Markham, 36, of l Glenthorne Road, was married with a two-month-old son. On 2 January 2002 Markham caused the death of seven-year-old Christopher Mason, who ran out in front of his car on Shepherd’s Bush Road. Mr Markham failed to stop, but reported the accident at Hammersmith Police Station that evening. His widow Sasha Markham told us: ‘Jamie was thrilled to be a father and was rebuilding his life.’

Anyone who witnessed the incident or who has information should contact Hammersmith Police Station quoting reference P103/1900/12.

Incredibly Terry had given the accident a time frame. Trembling, Stella pressed ‘copy’ and the photocopier by the librarian’s desk sprang to life. She called up Street View on her iPhone and dabbed Britton Drive into the search box. She had expected a fiddly, careering perambulation along the streets as the controls on the phone were clumsier than on her laptop – but there, set back from the kerb and framed by two sweet chestnut trees in full leaf, was a horse trough. Street View takes pictures in the summer when it is meant to be sunny; these were taken in June two years ago. Like the trees in Terry’s photograph these were sweet chestnuts. Stella knew not to confuse them with horse chestnuts. More evidence, if she had needed it, that she had found one of Terry’s streets. Stella sat back in her seat, her arms folded to contain her excitement. If she needed proof that the pictures in the blue folder were clues to a case, this was it. Sometime later, years later even, her dad had returned to Britton Drive and taken his own record of the accident spot. Why?

Her phone rang. She fled back to the toilet because a notice at the reception instructed users of the library to turn off their phones and, reluctant to obey instructions other than her own, Stella had ignored it.

Suzie. She would be complaining about Jack’s cleaning. Stella did not answer.

25

Thursday, 26 April 2012

Jack did a check on his dormitory. Nothing had been touched; it hadn’t even been cleaned. They were cutting costs. Outside the flat, he waited a moment. No sound. He retrieved the key from above the door with the shamrock holes. If it took a while to finish the repairs, he would make a copy.

Jack had forgotten he was there to get back his street atlas and get out.

The old man was a hazy figure in the poor light; he hovered godlike over his streets, his breathing stertorous. He gave no sign of knowing Jack was there. Jack manoeuvred along the tight gangway between the model and the wall that had served so well as a hiding place the other night. The man was wiring one of the signals outside Hammersmith Underground station. He gestured at the work table.

‘You’re late.’

‘Yes, sorry. I…’ Jack’s father had hated excuses. He measured out the powder into a bowl, trickled in water from a pint bottle and stirred until the mixture was a thick malleable consistency. He cut squares of gauze with a scalpel, soaked them in the plaster and then laid them out on an artist’s palette. Holding the palette and a flat-bladed knife he worked his way along the stuffy crawl space to emerge in the middle of the Thames.

‘Did you mention I was here the other night? To your daughter?’ He regretted the question instantly. The old man would not have mentioned him, he trusted Jack. His question fractured that trust.

The man was mumbling something.

‘Pardon?’ Jack leaned out over Hammersmith Flyover.

‘She’s not my daughter.’

‘I’m sorry, it’s not my business.’ Jack’s hands trembled as he draped the plastered gauze over the wire frame he had exposed on his last visit, careful not to drop any on to the rails. He did not apply too much or the roof would sag and lower the height of the tunnel. Practised at constructing tunnels, Jack knew how to spread the load and keep the height for the rolling stock.

The old man behaved as if he had not heard Jack speak.

Preoccupied with his mistake, for the second time Jack did not hear his Host return until she opened the door to the flat.

She paused at the second flight to get her breath; once upon a time she had run up and down these stairs, carrying bags, trays of hot drinks, laundered blankets. She sniffed the air; there was an infinitesimal change. She put down her bag and padded along the corridor to the first dormitory.

Everything was as she had left it. Or was it? Colin’s bed was made, yet she didn’t recall smoothing the blanket and he wouldn’t have made it himself. Before term started she would collect up the glasses and give them a wash. Jimmy had dropped his book on the floor – he was a one for reading after lights out; she bustled over. She had to guess his place from the way the book fell open. No bookmark, silly boy.

How often she had stood in the doorway listening to the boys’ breathing, ready to catch the culprit who had been up to mischief and was feigning sleep. She had always hated the holidays when beds were empty.

She heard his voice as soon as she entered the flat, conspiratorial and secretive. It twisted her stomach. She went to the kitchen and decided to find a tasty snack for him. He’d like that.

He was flicking at a rooftop with her pastry brush. She stumbled in and leant on the Chiswick boundary. He eyed her over his glasses. He didn’t like being disturbed at work, but he was always at work, she had no choice.

A District line train left Hammersmith station and rattled along the viaduct down to Barons Court where it stopped to let passengers alight and get on board. She watched it disappear into the tunnel. The plaster was a brilliant white; he had repaired it. Perhaps he would let her paint it.

26

Thursday, 26 April 2012

Stella had not read David Barlow’s directions. She had forgotten all about the date. She found the folded note in her anorak when, having done all she could do at Terry’s, apart from eat the shepherd’s pie, she was looking for her van keys. Even allowing for her watch’s extra minutes, she was due at the pub in ten minutes. The sloping capitals were like Jack’s handwriting. She should have stuck to her initial instinct and refused the invitation. Except her initial instinct had been to agree. She read the directions and caught her breath. The Ram, by the Bell Steps leading to the River Thames, had been Terry’s local. Maybe a drink was just what she needed.

Outside the subway tunnel Stella checked her appearance in the distorted reflection of the convex safety mirror. She fluffed up her hair. The style was meant to be messy, but not this messy; it kept falling over her eyes. She would have to do.

On time, she pushed open the door of the nineteenth-century pub on the corner of Hammersmith Terrace and Black Lion Lane as Terry must so often have done. She wondered briefly if he had ever spoken to David Barlow.

Stella saw him at once because he was in the seat near the fireplace. She had chosen that seat the only time she been here before; and, it being out of the way, she had been heading for it again now. That night she had been avoiding a man whom she had dumped. This memory made Stella feel bad.

‘What do you fancy drinking?’ He was by her side.

‘Let me,’ she countered.

He shook his head, so she gave in and requested a ginger beer.

When David Barlow returned, he sat opposite her and they clinked glasses.

‘Cheers!’ They said it together and laughed. Stella relaxed.

‘The grave looks good with the headstone. Tidying took me a while, but done and dusted now.’

Stella could not think what to say. Jackie had offered to take her to Mortlake Crematorium on the anniversary of Terry’s death to see the Memorial book open on the page with her message. ‘To Dad, love Stella.’ Stella had been on a twelve-hour shift and besides, she said, the crematorium had a website, she could see it online anytime.

‘Do you miss your father?’ He was looking searchingly at her.

‘Yes.’ Stella gulped her drink and the bubbles made her cough. She hadn’t properly considered this before. She was suffused with heat although the fire was not lit and, unlike the previous time she was here when it had been snowing, the door was propped open, letting in a cool evening breeze.

‘You were close. That’s nice. When I was a boy me and my dad were like that.’ He clasped his hands together. ‘But we grew apart. Jennifer wanted me to make something of myself. My dad didn’t fit her bill. He was a mechanic – he could have built a car from scratch – but Jennifer didn’t have time for cars that needed mending. I miss him for the wrong reason. Too many regrets. The newspaper article said your dad was proud of your success.’

‘Don’t know how they knew that.’ Stella gripped her glass. ‘Amazing you kept the newspaper.’ While pleased at the PR success, Jackie had thought this peculiar.

‘To be honest, the newspaper was lining the bottom of the wardrobe. I found it when I was disposing of Jennifer’s shoes and what not.’ He rolled up his shirt sleeves, smoothing the material at each fold. He ran a hand over his arm, up and down. Stella found herself picturing doing the same. His skin would be smooth, yet muscular. ‘I thought that if you could give your dad that send-off you’d be principled. Our parents launch us into the world; we owe it to them to see them out. I reckoned Clean Slate would be like you.’ He took a draught of his beer.

Jackie had predicted that readers of the article would think that. When Stella had been horrified that Terry’s funeral had made the front page, she had said it was great publicity. Her comment had surprised Stella since Jackie discouraged her from always taking a business perspective. ‘Sometimes it’s good to think with the heart,’ Jackie said.

Stella tried to think with the heart. ‘You must miss your wife.’

‘Would it shock you to say I miss my dad more?’

Stella had cleaned for too many households to be easily shocked, but shook her head, deciding it unwise to voice this. Clean as if you can’t be seen. What you see, never say, she had penned for the Clean Slate staff manual. Thinking of this reassured her.

‘Jennifer and I weren’t right for each other. We met too young. Since we didn’t have children, these days we might have gone our separate ways. But I hold store by loyalty and she was not a woman to give up.’

‘Like school friends who remember the person you want to forget you were.’ Stella was not in touch with anyone from school and supposed this was why.

‘That’s exactly right!’ He drained his pint glass and wiped his lips with the back of his hand. ‘Why do we go to school reunions? Jennifer’s death is hard because, if I’m honest, it’s a relief.’

Stella thought of her manual: Listen and nod; keep cleaning. The client is not interested in you, only that you agree. Suzie talked about Terry as if they had stayed together for the last forty years. ‘If you had divorced it might not have helped,’ she pondered.