The Bursar's Wife (14 page)

“But I think the real solution is for me to get my own place,” Jason said, when the revs had settled down. “It kind of cramps your style, being at home, never mind listening to your mum doing telephone porn.”

“Can you afford it though?” I asked. “We might as well be living in London as far as rent’s concerned.” In my wing mirror I saw a car pull out, overtaking the car that was behind the coach. I thought it was going to pull in behind the coach but it kept on coming. I glanced ahead: the driver would have to get a move on; a lorry was heading towards us. Back in the mirror I could see the car was a Subaru that had one of those vents in the bonnet and a rear spoiler indicating extra horsepower. The driver made it with a car’s length to spare. We heard the extended blare of the lorry’s horn as it thundered past us, rocking the Golf with turbulence. I checked the rear-view mirror: I couldn’t make out the driver because the windscreen of the Subaru was tinted, something I thought was now illegal. I realised that Jason was talking; he’d missed the whole overtaking drama behind us.

“…depending on whether I could get some work to pay the rent. There’re plenty of people who work their way through college,” he said.

“You’re right,” I said. “I met one of them the other day doing nights at McDonald’s. She looked like shit.” I checked the mirror: the Subaru had dropped back and was now letting someone overtake it – odd since it had taken such a risk overtaking the coach in the first place.

“Besides,” Jason was saying, “if I could find somewhere reasonable…” We came up to a roundabout and I drove straight on into the outskirts of Royston. The Subaru was still there (now two cars back) but that meant nothing since we were on the main road that went through Royston towards London. “Surely you could do with some extra cash?” Jason was saying.

“What?” Had I missed something?

“You’ve got three bedrooms, boss. Surely you could spare one.” I was looking at street names and it took me a moment to realise what he was saying.

“You want to rent a room from me?”

“I just wondered—”

“Forget it, Jason. I’m no fucking landlord.” I passed him the sheet with the directions to Chauffeured Comfort Cars on it. “Get us to this bloody place, will you?” He took the sheet and looked at it.

“Next left. Then third right,” he said. The kid was disappointed, I could tell by his deflated tone. But I was not going to have a nineteen-year-old living in the house with everything that entailed – I’d been a teenager myself, and a pain in the neck to my parents. He was a good kid, but I didn’t want him as a lodger. Besides, I was getting used to bumbling around the place on my own. Perhaps I’d been a little harsh in the way I’d dealt with it though. I turned left into an industrial area.

“Listen, if you need somewhere to crash for the odd night then that’s fine, I’m always happy to lend an ear and a bed. I even know how to order pizza.” Jason snorted or chuckled, I couldn’t tell. I checked my mirror as I turned right into a cul-de-sac of five or six industrial units and just caught the Subaru turning off the A10.

“It’s just here on the right,” Jason pointed to a fenced-off area with about a dozen fancy cars parked behind it, one of which was the silver S-Class Mercedes. A sign confirmed that we had found Chauffeured Comfort Cars. I drove past and pulled into a space on the left, in front of a white van. “Why are we parking here?”

“Don’t get out, I just want to check something.”

In my wing mirror I watched the Subaru slow down at the junction we had just come off. Although the side windows were also tinted I imagined the driver looking down towards us. Then the car sped up and disappeared.

“What is it?” Jason asked.

“Nothing. Let’s get this bloody tracker.” But after I locked the Golf and we checked to cross the road I saw the Subaru turn onto the road and stop in the customer parking bay of a trade plumbing outlet. No one got out of the car.

A PORTAKABIN SAT JUST INSIDE THE GATE IN THE HIGH-FENCED
area that was Chauffeured Comfort Cars. Jason was surprised that they hadn’t called it Cambridge Comfort Cars, or Cambridge Chauffeured Cars. I know what he meant; it seemed that every company within a fifty-mile radius of the city prefixed their company name with ‘Cambridge’ as if it automatically imparted some aura of respectability and learning. The top of the fence was spiked and high enough to put off climbers and there were CCTV cameras mounted everywhere. I peered through the window of the Portakabin where a thin-haired man was hunched over a desk studying a magazine. I managed to make out that it had more photos than words before he noticed me. He quickly got up and came to the door. When he opened it we got a blast of cheap aftershave, which he must have showered in.

“Morning,” he said. He was of beefy peasant stock and looked ill at ease in a suit that was cut for someone slimmer and shorter – the trousers didn’t cover his ankles, nor the sleeves his wrists. I couldn’t tell whether he was the owner or manager of the place. He kept a rictus smile while he appraised our potential worth as customers. “Can I help?”

“Hello,” I said, sticking out a hand. “I’m here with my nephew and we’re looking for something to take him to his twenty-first birthday party in style.” He reluctantly put a clammy hand in mine, rested it there for a second then withdrew it to his pocket where he proceeded to adjust himself.

“Do you have anything in mind?” I looked at Jason who was scouring the cars.

“Nothing too tacky. Just be me and a few girls,” he said. I rolled my eyes at him, which he ignored. He pointed. “What about that S-Class Merc, can I look at that?” He walked off without waiting for an answer.

“The boy has no taste,” I said. “That looks like a corporate rental to me, am I right?”

“Yeah, that one is booked every week by the same guy,” the man said, as we traipsed behind Jason, me feigning a limp to slow us up.

“You OK?”

“Five-a-side. Sliding tackle,” I said. “So the same guy rents the same car. You’d think buying one would be cheaper.” Up ahead Jason was running his hands over the bonnet of the Merc, like he was smearing suntan lotion onto a woman’s shoulders.

“He likes being driven about, that’s his thing. He always wants the same driver.” Jason moved to the back of the Merc and I stopped next to a stretch limo with tinted glass.

“I think he’d be better off with something like this, no?”

The man nodded, turning to the car and patting the polished roof with his free hand, his other still being used to play pocket billiards. Over his shoulder I caught Jason ducking behind the Merc.

“This is your traditional party rental, the girls love riding in them.”

“I agree it would be more suited to the occasion,” I said, beginning to sound like a salesman myself. He was giving me some stats about the car when Jason wandered over, grinning, waving the tracker at me behind the guy’s back. Then his phone started making that weird noise that passed for a ring. The guy turned and Jason stuffed the tracker in a pocket, pulling his phone from the other. He checked the screen and put it to his ear, turning his back to us. I engaged the guy in talk about rental costs.

“Uncle George,” Jason said, a moment later, and then said it again more insistently. It was on the third go that I cottoned on: I was Uncle George. “It’s Mum, for you.” I excused myself and put the thing to my ear.

“Hello?”

“George, you should get back here pronto.”

“What’s up?”

“I have Lucy Booker with me in the office and she wants to talk to you. Also, someone from the nursing home called. A Megan?”

“Everything OK?”

“Yes, it’s fine. She said she had some information about the person who visited your dad? I’ve left her number on my screen.”

“Thanks,” I said, hanging up before she could ask me more questions.

I lied to the ill-suited man about how we would get back to him about the car hire and we made our way out. As we crossed the road I saw that the Subaru was still there. We’d reached the Golf when I remembered that I’d forgotten to limp. I looked back towards the compound but the guy had disappeared into his Portakabin. In the car I found my notebook and gave it to Jason. I told him to write down the licence plate number of the Subaru as we passed it, just in case.

“Is it following us?” Jason asked. He was looking down at his phone, his thumbs moving quickly over the little keypad.

“I don’t think so, but try and concentrate.”

“I’m on it, boss. Don’t worry.” I watched the Subaru, trying to peer through the impenetrable glass, but I saw just the shadows of two men.

* * *

I sat opposite Lucy in an otherwise empty Antonio’s and we sipped hot cappuccinos from big wide cups. Antonio brought over a small plate of biscotti, delicious morsels made by his wife. I’d brought her over here because Sandra and Jason were in the office, Jason downloading the information from the tracker onto the computer.

Lucy looked even paler than usual with dark rings under her eyes. Eyes which in no way could be confused for her mother’s. I couldn’t remember which parent eye colour was inherited from or whether it was random, nor could I remember the colour of her father’s eyes. She was dressed for Sunday school, a far cry from how she had looked when visiting Quintin Boyd. I’d done the condolences thing, which she barely acknowledged. She could hardly look at me over her wide cup.

“I wanted to thank you for helping me out last Friday,” she said, and the memory of it brought some needed colour to her cheeks.

“It was nothing,” I said, because it was nothing.

She shook her head and worried at a small cross hanging from her neck.

“No it wasn’t nothing. I’m particularly grateful for the fact that you said nothing to Mother about how you… found me.” This was all very interesting but not as interesting as the fact that she had come to my office only three days after her father’s suicide to tell me this.

“That boy who came back with you to the office. Jason, isn’t it?” I nodded. “I’ve met him before, at the Flying Duck, after rowing.” Shit. I’d forgotten about that. “He was there with Rowena and her group of Roughers,” she said.

“Roughers?”

“Yes, as in ‘roughing it’. They compete to go out with people they deem to be, uh, lower than them in social status.” She blushed violently. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to suggest that Jason was in any way of a lower…”

“Don’t sweat it. I’m sure Jason will be quite flattered to be considered a bit of rough.”

“Does he work for you?”

“Occasionally,” I said.

“Well, he could do better than her.”

“I’ll tell him.” She looked alarmed so I explained that I was joking.

“So tell me, how did you know where to find me?” I asked.

“You told me your name when you drove me home, remember.” She smiled. It was a thin, lipless smile. “No, I wasn’t that far gone. Besides, it’s unusual, so I remembered it when I found your card in Mother’s handbag.” I didn’t ask what she was doing in her mother’s handbag, nor did she deem it necessary to explain. I drank my coffee and nibbled a cantuccini, wondering when she was going to mention her dead father.

“What did my mother hire you to do?” She held my gaze but it was an effort for her.

“Who said I was working for her?” She shrugged and examined her nails. If she was looking for one to chew she was out of luck; they were all painfully bitten to the flesh.

“When you rescued me you said you worked for one of her charities.” I didn’t say anything; it suited me if that’s what she thought. Thankfully she was too polite to pursue it. She’d hardly touched her cappuccino. She looked up at me again, her dark eyes brimming. Here it comes, I thought.

“I was hoping you could help me.”

“Help you how?”

“Find out why my father killed himself.” I looked at her pale face and red nose and teary eyes.

“Have you spoken to your mother about it?”

“Of course. She just says that there were some financial irregularities with the college. I just don’t think that’s enough, is it, for—” Then she started to cry properly.

I figured it was best to leave her to it and signalled Antonio who nodded and came over with a box of tissues, which he silently put on the table in a practised manner, all the while giving me a disapproving look as if it were my fault. He walked away shaking his head and muttering to himself. While Lucy was busy blowing her nose I wondered whether I should ask her about Quintin Boyd, but that would give away the fact that I knew about him and then she’d know what it was I was doing for her mother.

“I’m sorry,” she said, sniffling.

“Nothing to be sorry about. Most natural thing in the world.”

“So will you help me?”

“I’m not sure what I can do, to be honest. The police are handling it and no doubt the college will be looking into the financial side of things.” I studied her. “Do you have any reason to believe that he had something else on his mind?” She shook her head and absentmindedly moved the cross up and down the chain round her neck.

“No. I just know that a few bad investments is not reason enough for him to… to do what he did.”

“Listen, Lucy. You can never really know what is going on inside someone’s head. Even someone very close to you,” I said. She just stared at her near-full cup of coffee.

“Look, if I find out anything then I’ll let you know, but there’s no reason to go digging. OK?”

She nodded. Over her shoulder I saw Jason come into the café and wave at me from the door. Lucy looked round and blushed. I signalled to Jason to hang on. Lucy was furiously wiping her cheeks. I couldn’t help smiling to myself; even when smothered in grief, life endures.

“You look fine,” I said.

* * *

I left Lucy and Jason sitting at stools in the window of the sandwich shop across the way from Antonio’s and took my lunch up to the office to see what Jason had downloaded from the tracker. When Jason had come into Antonio’s Lucy had gone to the toilet to freshen up, which had given me an opportunity to brief him on the investigator’s creed of not divulging client-sensitive information – especially to the client’s daughter.

“I know nothing, boss,” he reassured me. I wasn’t very comfortable with Lucy knowing about me but there wasn’t a lot I could do about it and since our attention had now shifted from her to Quintin Boyd I told myself it was not such an issue, even though she was the reason we were interested in him. Still, I didn’t want Jason spilling any beans; especially since I’d learnt he was a sucker for plummy-voiced girls.