Until It's Over (26 page)

‘Mr Gifford?’

I looked round. I was so taken by surprise that it took me a few seconds to realize it was Detective Chief Inspector Kamsky.

‘Who? Me?’ I said stupidly. Ahead, Astrid disappeared round a bend in the road.

‘Could we have a word?’

Chapter Forty-two

It had all gone wrong. Of course. I had dropped something somewhere, forgotten a detail. There was always a loose end, however much care you took. Even so, I hung on. I thought about how to be innocent. Ask questions, be puzzled. I could feel my face burning and there was a twitch at the side of my mouth that I couldn’t control, but somehow I managed not to collapse. I told myself it was all right to be a bit rattled. The police made ordinary people nervous. Only real criminals are casual and amused about being arrested. Kamsky barely spoke on the drive to the police station.

‘Is there a problem?’ I asked, hearing how my voice came out a bit cracked and hoarse. I gave a sharp cough to clear my throat. ‘Is there something more you need to ask me?’

‘There’s someone who wants a word with you.’

‘Who?’ I asked.

‘You’ll see.’

‘Is it someone I know?’

Kamsky paused for a moment, as if trying to make up his mind. ‘You’ll see,’ he repeated finally.

I was thinking so desperately that I hardly noticed as the driver pulled into a car park behind the police station and I was led across the cracked tarmac, through a back door, along a narrow corridor into a room and left alone to walk up and down. I’d only left it a couple of hours earlier but it wasn’t like before. Nobody offered me tea. I didn’t know if it was the same room. It felt darker. I tried to compose myself. But not too much. I mustn’t seem defensive. The news wasn’t entirely bad. No. If they were simply arresting me, they would have done it immediately. I would have been warned. Wasn’t that the way it happened?

Kamsky came into the room, carrying a cassette tape-recorder. Behind him was another man in a suit. He was heavily built with grey hair that looked as if it had just been combed, too hard, against his skull. Kamsky motioned to me to sit at the table. The two pulled chairs to the other side and sat down. Kamsky placed the tape-recorder on the table and looked at it for a moment but didn’t switch it on. ‘I’d like to introduce you to my colleague, Bill Pope,’ he said.

‘What’s this about?’ I said. I could feel the spanner in my pocket.

‘DI Pope came down this morning from Sheffield.’

I clenched my fists, then relaxed them, hearing my knuckles crack. I tried to make myself appear alarmed but not too alarmed. I felt my features twist into an expression but I had no idea how I must look to an outsider.

‘Has something happened?’ I asked. Bees inside my skull. Buzz, buzz.

Pope took a notebook from a pocket and opened it. He put on a pair of rimless glasses and peered down at it. ‘David Michael Gifford,’ he said.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘What is it?’

‘You used to live at fourteen Donegal Close.’

‘That’s right. Has something happened?’

‘When were you last there?’

‘I don’t know,’ I said. Was that my voice? Yes. ‘Five or six months ago.’

‘Who lives there now?’

‘My mum, I suppose.’

Pope frowned. ‘You suppose?’

‘I haven’t been in touch for a while.’

‘Why?’

I gave a shrug. ‘When I came down to London, I wanted to make a new start.’

‘What for?’

There was a pause as I tried to think how a person who didn’t know what was going on would respond. ‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘What’s this about? Has something happened?’

Pope clicked and unclicked the pen he was holding. ‘Why?’ he said. ‘Should it have?’

‘Please,’ I said, in a tone that was meant to sound distressed and confused. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘Why did you leave Sheffield?’ Pope asked.

‘Look, what’s all this…’ I stopped. Get it right, Davy. Hang on. ‘I always knew I wanted to go to London. I got the offer of a job in London. It seemed the right time. Please could you tell me what this is about? You’re alarming me.’ I tried to smile at him. I couldn’t. The skin on my face was stiff like cardboard.

Pope closed his notebook and leaned back in his chair.

‘Concerns were expressed by residents of Donegal Close. Two days ago police officers forced entry to the premises and a body was found.’

This was it. This was the big moment on which everything would depend. I’d thought about it for a long time. ‘Is it my mum?’ I asked.

‘The body had been there for some time. Months. But we managed to find out by… Well, we’ve confirmed it’s the body of Mary Gifford.’

I could feel them staring at me. Their gaze on my face was hot like the sun.

‘Dead?’ I said. ‘What happened? How could she…? I mean, why did nobody find her?’

I wasn’t able to cry but I rubbed my eyes hard and murmured unintelligible things. For a moment I put my face in my hands, shutting out their gaze and giving myself time to think. Then I looked up again. The two detectives stared at me impassively.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I should have been in touch. I didn’t call. I didn’t see her all the time I was away. But I never thought… I never imagined…’ I rubbed my eyes hard again, and let a few whimpers escape.

‘The officers talked to neighbours,’ said Pope. ‘They mentioned her son. They hadn’t seen you for some time. Or her.’

‘She wasn’t well,’ I said. ‘She wasn’t very mobile.’

‘Her body was in the bed.’

‘Bed,’ I said numbly. ‘She lay there a lot in the day.’

‘Nobody knew where you’d gone,’ said Pope. ‘But then your name popped up on the computer. Imagine our surprise. I thought I’d better come and see you.’

‘I’d have come up,’ I said. ‘Are you sure? My mother? Mum? She’s really dead?’

‘We need to ask some further questions,’ said Pope. ‘I now need to warn you that, in the case of charges being brought, what you say could be used as evidence in court. I should say also that you have the right to a lawyer present. If necessary, we can obtain one for you. Do you understand?’

‘No,’ I said slowly, as if in deep shock. ‘I don’t understand. Was there a crime?’

‘That’s what I’m here to consider.’

‘Was she burgled? She wasn’t… Was she attacked?’

‘Did you understand my warning? Do you want a lawyer?’

I’d thought about this carefully in advance and I knew what I was going to say. ‘A lawyer? What for?’

‘It’s up to you,’ said Kamsky.

‘My mother’s dead,’ I said. ‘I loved her. I should never have left her alone. I’ll answer anything you want. I’ll do anything I can to help.’

Kamsky switched the tape on and announced the date, the time and the place, the names of the officers present, my full name and that I had been told my rights and had agreed to be interviewed without a lawyer present. They began to ask me questions, but really over the next hour or so I learned far more than they did. I was deliberately vague and fumbling in my answers. After all, I was a son who had just been told his mother was dead and, despite his distress, was trying to do his best to help. If I had been precise in every detail about my movements and motives and what I had been doing in the weeks before I came to London and why I hadn’t returned or even been in touch, that’s what would have been suspicious.

It became clear that, after the heat of the last few weeks, the body had been so decayed that it had been difficult enough to make an identification and impossible to find out anything else significant. I could imagine the sequence. First the flies, then the maggots, a boiling carpet of maggots, scouring everything away. It was obvious that they didn’t have anything but they’d brought me in to look at me, to jolt a reaction out of me. I didn’t need to be clever. The more confused and helpless the better.

‘I feel so terrible,’ I said at one point. ‘I thought her friends would look after her. I don’t know what could have happened.’

‘Did she have many friends?’ asked Pope.

‘A few,’ I said. ‘Less since she’d got ill.’

‘How ill was she?’

‘I don’t know what was wrong with her but I think she was sometimes in pain,’ I said, glassy-eyed. ‘I know she tried to keep it from me. But she was so brave about it. Maybe she tried to do too much.’

I wanted to keep on playing stupid. I knew it was the right thing to do. But I couldn’t resist it. I had to know. I waited until the questions seemed to come to a halt.

‘I don’t understand,’ I said. ‘Why are you both here?’

‘I need to consider all possibilities,’ said Kamsky.

‘My mother was found dead in her bed. In Sheffield. What do you mean, possibilities?’

‘I hate this case,’ Kamsky said.

It was my own fault. I’d gone through that door. I decided it was time to get angry. ‘What do you mean, this fucking case?’ I said. ‘What case? You’ve just told me my mum’s dead. What are you talking about? You’ve arrested fucking Miles. What are you after? Ask me anything you want. I don’t care. But don’t fuck me around.’

Too many fucks. That wasn’t how Davy talked. It sounded like play-acting. I gave a hoarse sob to make up for it.

‘Calm down,’ said Pope, in a more soothing tone. ‘Tell me about your mother. Were you close to her?’

They tried to probe my psychology but it was going nowhere. I was able to bore them into submission. I sniffled a bit, and stammered. I went round in aimless circles. I did some more dry sobbing. I did some more hiding my head in my hands. Finally there was a pause and Kamsky looked at Pope, nodded, then leaned over and switched off the tape-recorder. They both seemed quietly irritated at the waste of time.

‘Please accept my condolences,’ said Pope.

I didn’t reply. I was remembering the months of irritation with my mother that had built up like a noise inside my head. All it had taken was a pillow over her face and the noise had gone away. It had been so easy, as if I had just left her sleeping. Pope took the notebook and replaced it in his jacket pocket.

‘You’ll be contacted about the inquest,’ he said. ‘You’ll be wanting to arrange the funeral. And there’s the house to be dealt with.’

The house. It had been there all this time, waiting for me.

‘Did you hear me, Mr Gifford?’

‘It’s a bit sudden,’ I said. ‘I’m trying to take it in. Being an orphan. And all that.’

I looked at them in turn. It seemed to go down all right.

Chapter Forty-three

I had a house. They had no evidence against me and now I owned a house. Not a large one, not a lovely one, not one in a desirable area, not one I would ever want to live in. But mine. How much would it fetch? It had three bedrooms and a garden and I didn’t believe in ghosts. The nasty smell could be scrubbed away. A hundred grand? I hardly needed the money in Astrid’s jacket any more, but it wasn’t to be sniffed at – it would still come in useful. Say, a hundred and twenty thousand pounds. Not bad, not bad at all. I could never have got that much from Ingrid de Soto’s house. Funny how things turn out.

Or how things
could
turn out, I reminded myself. There were still things to do. Things in my way. There was the paperweight. Astrid just needed to hear about it, and to remember.

I had been scared and tired even before Kamsky had tapped me on the shoulder, but now all of that had gone. I was on top form again. I could feel my thoughts clearing in my head. I could feel my heart beating steadily again and my muzzy fatigue lifting, like the fog lifts in the morning.

I looked at my watch. It was well past midnight. It was too late to find Astrid now. She’d be asleep somewhere, tucked up in bed, those big eyes closed and those golden limbs relaxed under the sheets, not knowing what tomorrow would bring. It was too late, as well, for me to find somewhere to stay now. I briefly considered going round to Melanie’s. She’d welcome me in, no matter how late it was. Indeed, she was probably lying awake, waiting for me to call or to come. But I couldn’t go to Melanie’s, not tonight, not ever again. She was history. I could hardly bring myself to remember her face, her dewy eyes, her frightened smile, her clutching hand.

I found a nasty little café with grimy windows, which was still open. There were only two people in it – an old man with long grey hair tied back in a greasy ponytail who was sitting at a table, stirring sugar into a cup of very milky coffee, and a young woman at the counter. She had spiky blonde hair and a sulky mouth.

‘Are you still serving food?’ I asked her.

‘The chef’s gone home. I could give you a sandwich, if you want.’

‘OK.’

‘Bacon?’

‘OK.’

‘But we close in a few minutes.’

‘Right.’

The bread was stale. The bacon was tough, fatty and cold and bits stuck in my teeth. The woman turned chairs upside-down on tables and swept crumbs up round my feet. The man with greasy hair shuffled out. When I had my money, I would go to smart restaurants with clean windows and polished tables where waiters in dark suits would fill my wine glass and bend respectfully over me, calling me ‘sir’. I chewed a few small mouthfuls very slowly, not hungry in the slightest but marking time, then ordered a coffee, though I didn’t need it to keep me awake. I was already wide awake, fully charged. The next twenty-four hours lay in front of me like a road, clear and straight. I felt the spanner in my pocket. I checked my mobile to make sure it had enough battery. There were several missed calls from Melanie, but I ignored them.

At a little after one, the waitress slouched over to the door, turned the ‘open’ sign to ‘closed’ and asked me to leave.

I walked. Past queues outside nightclubs, past a group of drunken men in suits, past down-and-outs in doorways strewn with cigarette butts. Down to the river. I sat on a bench and looked at my watch. It was three o’clock. In two hours or so it would be light. I closed my eyes and went through everything in my mind. When I opened them, it was half past five and there was light on the horizon. I had no notion that any time had gone by and no memories of dreaming, but I supposed I must have slept. I stood up and stretched. I made sure all the buttons on my shirt were done up, took a comb out of my breast pocket and neatened my hair. Then I walked back the way I’d come. At twenty past seven, I stopped in a café and ordered a cup of tea, but I could only manage a few sips. My insides were burning. I bought freshmint chewing-gum from a newsagent: that would have to do this morning in the place of cleaning my teeth. I bought a bottle of water as well, and rinsed my mouth. I felt like a runner waiting to take his place on the starting blocks.

At half past eight, I went to a public pay phone, used my mobile to remind me of Astrid’s number and punched it in.

‘Hello?’

‘Astrid! Did I wake you up?’

‘Is that you, Davy?’

‘Yes. My mobile’s packed up and I’m in a phone booth.’

‘I’ve been awake for ages.’

‘Me too. Listen, I know we’re meeting later with everyone, but I was really hoping I could come and see you beforehand. There’s something I think you should know.’

I thought at least she’d ask me to explain, and I had my answer ready, but she didn’t. Her voice was warm, natural. ‘That’d be fine. Why don’t you come here at – what? Ten, ten thirty? Then we can go on to Maitland Road together.’

‘Great. You’d better tell me where “here” is, though.’ If she was with a friend, I’d have to change plans.

‘Oh, sorry.’ She gave an odd little snort. ‘I’m staying at my friend Saul’s – you met him a couple of times. I’m feeding his cat and watering his plants for the next few weeks while he’s away. Sorry. Too much information. It’s Capulet Road, just off Stoke Newington Church Street. Number sixty-six A.’

It was so typical that it made me smile. I had spent a night wandering the streets while Astrid had already found somewhere to stay, with plants and a cat. I’d never become part of the world where people did things like that and knew other people who did it too.

I walked to Stoke Newington. It was just a couple of miles and it cleared my head. When I got to the main street, I went into a rather cool shop selling men’s clothes and bought myself a new shirt. It was an olive-green colour and smelled cottony and clean. I looked at myself in the mirror and liked what I saw. I was pleased with the slim young man with honest grey eyes in a fresh face, and – I leaned forward and smiled at my reflection – oh, yes, a modest and endearing smile that said, ‘You can trust me, you can lean on me, you can tell me what’s troubling you. I won’t let you down’. I wouldn’t let myself down. I’d come this far and I was on the last leg of my journey.

At ten minutes to ten I turned off Stoke Newington Church Street and down Capulet Road. I passed sixty-six A but it was too early; I didn’t look up but kept on walking. At three minutes to ten, I halted and put the last two sticks of chewing-gum into my mouth, chewed them vigorously, then spat them out on to the pavement. Then I went back up Capulet Road. I got to number sixty-six, a little cobbler’s that looked like something out of medieval times. The dark blue door to the left said ‘66a’, in gold. I stood in front of it for a few seconds. I straightened my jacket over my shirt. I took some deep breaths. I ran my fingers through my hair. I licked my lips, arranged my expression. And then I rang the bell.

It was only a few seconds before I heard the unmistakable sound of Astrid’s footsteps running down the stairs: light and quick. She pulled open the door. Her feet were bare and she was wearing faded jeans and a high-necked green cardigan that was short enough to show a strip of her tanned stomach. We were co-ordinated, I thought, on this day of all days. But there was something different about her and it took me a few moments to understand what it was. She was smiling at me and seemed properly pleased that I was there. Of course, she had always been perfectly friendly and approachable before, but in Maitland Road we had rarely been alone and I had always felt I was on the sidelines of her life. Today it was simply me and her. Nobody had just left and nobody was about to arrive. Her eyes were fixed on mine; her expression was attentive. She put her hands on my shoulders and kissed me, first on one cheek, then the other. ‘Hello, Davy,’ she said. ‘I’m really glad you’re here. I’ve been feeling so cast down about everything.’

She didn’t look cast down. Her face glowed with health and life. Her dark hair shone and her lips were glossy. She smelled of lemon and roses.

‘Of course you have,’ I said, stepping over the threshold and shutting the door behind me. I followed her up the stairs. The tendrils of hair at the nape of her neck were still damp; she must be fresh from a shower, I thought. Her back was slender. She led me into a room that served as kitchen and living room. It was all a bit higgledy-piggledy and cluttered. There were geraniums in the window box, and a ginger cat lay curled up and purring on the baggy corduroy sofa. It opened one yellow eye, examined me, then shut it again.

Astrid looked at me with concern. ‘Where did you spend the night?’

I mumbled something about staying at a friend’s.

‘You look terrible.’

‘Thanks,’ I said.

‘I was wondering if you’d like a shower or something.’

‘I already had one.’

She laughed. ‘It wasn’t an accusation. Sit down. Try to ignore Saul’s mess.’ She hurled a coat and a bag off the sofa. ‘Coffee? Tea? Juice? I think there’s juice, anyway, I haven’t really examined the fridge yet.’

‘Coffee.’ I wanted to prolong the moment; watch her as she served me, watch the way her cardigan tightened over her breasts as she reached up for cups.

‘A small amount of milk and no sugar, right?’

‘You remember.’

‘Of course.’ She smiled at me and I felt my throat thicken with desire.

‘How long are you staying here for?’

‘I don’t know. A fortnight at least. I can’t see beyond that. I’ve no idea what I’ll do next. Maybe I should grow up and try to sort out my life. What do you think?’

‘Think?’

‘About what I should do next.’

I stared at her, memorizing every detail of her face. ‘I don’t think you should plan beyond the next few minutes at the moment, Astrid.’

She turned away and shovelled several spoonfuls of ground coffee into a cafetière and poured in boiling water, stirring vigorously. ‘This might be a bit strong.’

She sat down on the sofa next to me, pushing the cat to the end without waking it. Her leg brushed my leg; her shoulder was a few millimetres from mine. When she bent her head to take a sip of her coffee, I gazed at the curve of her cheek, at her long dark lashes. Steam rose into her face, moistening her skin. ‘You’re trembling,’ I said to her softly.

‘Am I?’ She held up her free hand. ‘So I am. I’m tired, Davy. Tired, scared, lonely, at a loss.’ She put the hand on my knee. ‘Do you understand that feeling?’

I put my hand over hers. ‘Do I understand it? Astrid, I’ve spent my whole life feeling like that.’ Tears welled in my eyes but I didn’t try to check them. I was done with pretending. This was my moment, my perfect day. I put down my coffee cup and picked up her hand between both my own.

‘I should have paid more attention,’ she said. She let me lift her hand to my lips and hold it there for a moment. ‘You’re the only person in the whole house to have come well out of all of this. Everyone else went to pieces or turned on other people, except you. You were always calm and kind. Especially to me. Do you think I didn’t notice?’

‘Do you know why, Astrid?’

‘I think so.’ She placed her hand against my cheek. She gazed at me, then leaned forward and, very lightly, kissed my lips. I pulled her to me. Her lips opened under mine, I felt her breasts against my chest. I pushed my hand into her hair and kissed her again, more roughly, tasting blood but that didn’t matter. My Astrid. My destiny. My ending and my beginning.

I pushed her back on the sofa. I kissed her gently, then started to do things I’d wanted to do since the first moment I’d met her. I put a hand on her breast. She smiled blurrily at me and I moved my hand under her cardigan and felt her warm, smooth stomach, then the rough fabric of her bra. I wanted her. I wanted to do everything to her at once. I moved my hand down to her jeans and started to fumble with the button. ‘Wait,’ she said dreamily. ‘We’re got time, Davy. We’ve got all the time in the world.’

‘I’ve waited so long,’ I said.

‘I know,’ she said. ‘I know.’

She sat up, stroked my hair and kissed me. ‘I think I owe you,’ she said.

‘Owe me?’ I was finding it difficult to speak.

She pulled my jacket off and very delicately undid the first button on my shirt. ‘You got Miles out of the way for me, didn’t you?’

‘Maybe,’ I said. ‘What does it matter?’

She smiled at me and kissed me again. I could taste her, wet and sweet. She undid the second button. ‘It matters to me,’ she said, kissing my lips, my face. She kissed my ear and whispered, ‘Tell me. I need to know. I want to know everything about you.’

‘It was easy,’ I said.

She undid the third button and pulled open my shirt. She put her lips against my neck. I moaned. I couldn’t stop myself.

‘So what did you do?’

She lay back on the sofa again. I bent over and kissed her lips. I kissed her hair, breathed it in. The clean soft smell was like a drug that made me feel dizzy and drunk with her. She gave a murmur.

‘It was the paperweight,’ I said.

‘Mm?’

I put my fingers on the fastening of her jeans, and this time she didn’t try to stop me. I undid the fastening, then drew down the zip. I saw her blue knickers, lacy at the top. I put my hand on them. I felt the hair through them, warm under my hand.

‘Tell me,’ she said.

‘The paperweight.’ I said the words to her between kisses. ‘You saw it in my room. I just put it in Miles’s room.’ I pushed my hand deeper under her knickers.

‘No,’ she said. ‘My top. Take it off first.’

I undid the first button. She lay back with her hands raised behind her head, open to me.

‘Peggy was just a mistake,’ I said, undoing the second button and the third. ‘But it was in his room, so the traces were there already.’

‘You?’ she said.

‘Yes,’ I said.

‘Perfect, Davy,’ she said. ‘Perfect.’

And I didn’t know whether she meant me, stroking and kissing her beautiful body, or whether it was because now she finally understood it was me who knew everything and had done everything. I unfastened the last button and pulled the cardigan open and apart.

‘No, it was a mistake. Leah and Ingrid.’