A Lesser Evil Part 22

Chapter thirteen.

When Dan hadn't come home by six, Fifi thought there must have been some delay on the tube, or his boss had kept him back to discuss something, but by the time it got to seven o'clock she was annoyed. Emergency Ward 10 Emergency Ward 10, her favourite television programme, was on at eight, and she'd expected that by then dinner would be cleared away so she could relax.

At eight, because the dinner was getting dried up, she dished it up and put Dan's over a saucepan of boiling water, then ate her own.

The fish pie was absolutely awful, and that made her even angrier because she'd tried so hard to make something special. And still Dan hadn't come home.

The combination of worrying about where he was, the disappointment about the fish pie and thinking about the man in the red Jaguar, had stopped her enjoying watching Emergency Ward 10 Emergency Ward 10. When Dan finally turned up at nine, she didn't wait to hear his explanation, and shouted at him that his dinner was ruined.

'That's probably just as well,' he grinned, making a comic display of sniffing the air. 'It stinks. I could smell it as soon as I opened the front door. What was it?'

'Fish pie, which I spent hours making,' she retorted, getting more annoyed by the second because he was so unconcerned about her feelings. 'I wouldn't have made anything if you'd told me you were going to the pub. It's a waste of my time and money.'

His grin vanished. 'I haven't been down the pub. I went to see a flat. I wouldn't have bothered, if I'd known you were going to be so crabby.'

'What flat, where?'

He shrugged. 'There's no point in telling you, I didn't get it. The landlady must've been to the same charm school as your mother, took one look at me and told me she'd already let it.'

The sarcastic reference to her mother on top of the ruined dinner was too much for Fifi. She looked scathingly at Dan. His hands and face had been washed, but his work clothes were covered in bits of cement, there was a jagged tear in his trousers with his knee showing through, and his boots were filthy.

'It wouldn't occur to you that maybe it would be a good idea to get cleaned up before going to see a flat? n.o.body in their right mind would want to let a place to someone as dirty as you!' she shrieked at him.

'G.o.d, you sound worse than your mother,' Dan said, and wheeling round went out on to the landing. He took the plate of dinner off the saucepan and tipped it into the bin, plate and all. 'And you can stick your b.l.o.o.d.y fish pie,' he called back. 'I'll go and get something decent to eat where people don't judge me by my clothes.'

The moment the front door slammed behind him, Fifi wished she hadn't been so nasty. She was also embarra.s.sed by the fish pie, because it really was stinking the whole house out. She retrieved the plate from the bin and washed it up, then took the rubbish down to the dustbin, hoping the smell would disperse.

When she came back up the stairs, she saw he'd left the small canvas satchel he took his sandwiches to work in out on the landing, so she opened it to take his sandwich box and flask out to wash them. With them was a page torn from a newspaper, one advertis.e.m.e.nt circled.

'Two-bedroom self-contained garden flat in Barnes. Low rent for married couple in exchange for routine maintenance jobs in apartment block. Pleasant tree-lined avenue near river. Good references required.'

Fifi gulped hard. She understood Dan's reasoning now. As the landlady wanted maintenance work done, he had thought it would be fine to appear in his work clothes. He'd probably rushed over there full of hope, with the intention of giving her a lovely surprise if he got it. And she'd belittled him for it!

All at once she felt very ashamed of herself. He'd been at work since seven o'clock, but getting them somewhere better to live was more important to him than his dinner. No wonder he'd stormed off! She would have too if their roles had been reversed.

Dan came home after the pubs had shut. Fifi tried to apologize and ask him if he'd got something to eat, but he ignored her, stripped off his clothes and went to bed.

He was asleep within seconds, but because he'd got into bed without was.h.i.+ng, smelling strongly of drink and cigarettes, and never even asked how her arm was without its plaster, she got angry all over again.

In the morning Dan got up at his usual time and left without a word, or even a cup of tea. As it was Sat.u.r.day, she had wanted to know if he was working all day or coming back at noon, but he left so quickly she didn't get a chance to ask.

It wasn't until about eleven that morning that she thought gain about Stan and the man in the red Jaguar. Last night, long before Dan came home, she'd decided it wasn't a good idea to tell him any of it. Setting aside that he'd be cross she'd gone to Stan's depot, he wasn't likely to believe that the man she saw driving past was the same man she'd seen with John Bolton going into the Muckles'. He'd think she was becoming obsessive again and it might lead to a row.

But she knew she was neither obsessive nor imagining what she'd seen. That man in the Jaguar was definitely the same man she'd seen before. Maybe he wasn't Stan's boss, but he had some connection with the council yard or he wouldn't have been going in there. She felt it was her duty to go to the police with this, and she would go now and do the shopping for the weekend on the way back.

'Thank you for coming to us with this, Mrs Reynolds,' PC Tomkins said as he showed her out of an interview room at the police station. 'We'll look into it.'

Fifi was disappointed that Detective Inspector Roper hadn't been available for her to talk to. Tomkins had been nice, far nicer than Roper who could be curt, and he was young, no more than thirty, and quite attractive too. But to her disappointment he seemed to know very little about the case. She'd spilled out that she went to the council yard because she wanted to help Stan, and carefully repeated the conversation she'd had with the men there. She explained about seeing the man in the red Jaguar turning in there, and how her memory was jogged about where she'd seen him before when she saw John Bolton. But the young policeman had looked at her in the same faintly bemused way her father used to when she was making an excuse for why she was late home.

Maybe she'd talked too much? She did go on a bit about what a kind, good man Stan was, and how furtive the men at the depot had been. And even as she was explaining it all, she felt it all sounded weaker than it did in her head. Without any hard facts like the registration number of the red Jaguar, she supposed Tomkins couldn't really be blamed for thinking she was a bit hysterical, with an overactive imagination.

She had also been forced to admit that she'd only known Stan a few months, and Tomkins raised one eyebrow in a way that suggested he didn't think a few months was long enough to make a judgment about anyone's character. As she left she could imagine him laughing with his colleagues about nosy people who justified themselves by trying to be amateur sleuths.

On the way home she got some shopping, including a half-shoulder of lamb for Sunday dinner. Roast lamb was Dan's favourite meal, and even she couldn't mess that up. She was still very embarra.s.sed about the stink of the fish pie, it was the first thing she'd noticed when she woke up. It was a wonder Miss Diamond hadn't complained.

As she got to the corner of Dale Street, Yvette came out of the shop with some shopping in her arms and smiled at Fifi.

'Ah! Ze plaster, they take it off,' she remarked. ''Ow does it feel to use your right hand again?'

'Strange. I keep forgetting to use it,' Fifi said, grinning and wiggling her fingers. 'I'm going back to work on Monday. It will be nice to get back to normal.'

As they walked down the street together Fifi asked her if she knew about Stan.

Yvette nodded. 'I saw 'im come home yesterday evening. I theenk no charges 'ave been made. Those silly policemen! Stan could never hurt a child!'

'He's home? I've just been down to the police station,' Fifi exclaimed, shocked that Tomkins had let her pour out all that about Stan without telling her they'd let him go. 'Why on earth didn't they tell me? There I was pleading for him!'

'You went to plead for Stan?' Yvette asked, looking puzzled.

Fifi explained why she was there, telling her all about her trip to the depot and the man in the car. To her shock, Yvette rounded on her.

'You silly, silly girl,' she said. 'You must not get involved in this.'

'But I had to tell them that I'd seen the man before going into Alfie's,' Fifi said indignantly.

'No, you should not 'ave. It ees better to leave such things alone. These are bad men, Fifi. If they knew you were watching them they would .. .' She paused to make a gesture of slitting her throat.

Fifi laughed nervously. 'You know them then?' she asked.

Yvette caught hold of Fifi's arm. Her dark eyes blazed. 'I 'ave lived 'ere for long enough to understand when it is better to look the other way. You are like a child, Fifi. You weesh to meddle with everything. You tell people things best kept to yourself.'

Fifi was staggered by the woman's response. 'I only tell you things. I thought we were friends,' she said indignantly.

Yvette's face softened and she put one hand caressingly on Fifi's cheek. 'It is because you are my friend I weesh to prevent any harm to you,' she said softly. 'I 'ave told you many times you should leave this street. But you are still 'ere.'

'We are going, as soon as we can find somewhere to live.' Fifi felt as if she was being told off by her mother.

'That is good,' Yvette said. 'And when you go, tell no one where. Not even people you think are your friends.'

Fifi was so unnerved by Yvette's reaction that when she got home, she lay down on her bed for a while. Anyone else would have either told her she had an overactive imagination, or been hanging on her every word. But Yvette had sounded really scared, as if she knew absolutely everything about this business and was alarmed Fifi had stumbled on part of it!

Did she know the man in the red Jaguar? Was it him she thought was dangerous? Could she have still been in her flat when the murder took place and heard or seen something?

The police believed Yvette had gone out early that morning to do a fitting, and presumably they checked with Yvette's client as they'd checked on everyone else's alibi, Dan's included. But supposing they hadn't? Could she have been there?

Fifi told herself that this was impossible, yet her mind kept recalling things Yvette had said in the past, before Angela was killed. 'I have seen and heard many terrible things.' What exactly had she seen and heard? Fifi had a.s.sumed at the time it was just fighting, maybe Alfie hitting Molly, even the kids getting a beating, the same sort of things almost everyone in the street had heard. But maybe it wasn't just that?

Everyone had remarked that it was odd Alfie wouldn't name the men at that last card game. Now Fifi had seen for herself the hideous squalor inside that house, she couldn't imagine anyone in their right mind wanting to spend an evening playing cards there.

What if the cards weren't the real attraction?

'No,' she whispered aloud as a hideous thought came into her mind. 'It couldn't be that!'

Yet Angela had been raped and murdered, that was fact. Why, if those other men had really been only drinking and playing cards, hadn't they come forward? Maybe Alfie was speaking the truth when he said he hadn't killed Angela, but he couldn't admit who did do it because he was too scared?

Just like Yvette.

Dan arrived home at half past one. Fifi had calmed down by then, even told herself that she was letting her imagination run away with her. She had decided that she was going to make it up with Dan as soon as he got home, whatever time that was.

When she heard him greet Frank jovially down in the hall, she took it that he'd decided not to work all day to meet her halfway and that pleased her. When he came bounding up the stairs in his normal manner she put the kettle on.

Yet as soon as his head popped up above the banisters as he reached the last landing and she saw a sort of furtive expression on his face, she knew something wasn't right.

He had a letter in his hand. 'For you,' he said, holding it out to her as he came up the last five steps, and Fifi immediately recognized the writing on the envelope as her mother's.

'That's funny,' she said, taking it from him. 'I didn't see any mail for me this morning when I went out.'

Frank always picked the letters up and put them on the shelf in the hall.

'Second post maybe,' Dan said, turning his head away. 'Or the postman put it through the wrong letter-box and they've just returned it.'

That explanation was too pat; he'd never been a good liar.

'Or you saw the Bristol postmark and picked it up on your way out this morning?' she suggested, looking sharply at him.

He gave the game away by blus.h.i.+ng.

'Why, Dan?' she asked. 'Were you going to steam it open to see if she'd said anything about you?'

'No, of course not,' he said, but had the grace to look slightly ashamed. 'I just wanted to be with you when you read it to see if I was right.'

Fifi knew he was referring to his bet that her mother would invite Fifi home alone. 'Couldn't you just trust me to admit it, if that's what she did do?' she asked quietly.

'No,' he said. 'I couldn't, because I know you've got divided loyalties.'

Fifi turned her back on him and went into the living room, ripping the envelope open as she went.

Dearest Fifi, she read. It was lovely to see you and your home the other day, your father was so pleased to hear the visit went well, and that we'd made a start on sorting out our differences. The boys and Patty were thrilled too, they are looking forward to seeing you again before long, they all have so much to say to you. It was lovely to see you and your home the other day, your father was so pleased to hear the visit went well, and that we'd made a start on sorting out our differences. The boys and Patty were thrilled too, they are looking forward to seeing you again before long, they all have so much to say to you.I meant what I said about you and Dan coming for a weekend soon, but on reflection it would probably be for the best if you came alone the first time. There is still so much to be talked over, and we need to get that out of the way before we can really welcome Dan.I'm sure you'll understand what I mean.Write soon,All our love, Mum and Dad.

'Well?' Dan said behind her. 'Was I right or wrong?'Fifi felt sickened that her mother had let her down, but as she turned and saw Dan's smug 'I told you so' expression, she felt angry with him too.

'Wrong,' she lied. 'She only says how nice it was to see me and our home the other day.'

'So can I see it?'

'I've just told you what she said.'

'You've only told me part of it,' he said, and he lunged forward and s.n.a.t.c.hed the letter out of her hand before she even saw him move.

'Give it back,' she shrieked. 'You've got no right to read my letters.'

He held it above his head, out of her reach, and read it.

'I rest my case,' he said as he handed it back to her. 'Just as I said, she wants you there all on your own. Once you've told her all my faults, it won't take her long to convince you that you'd be better off without me.'

Earlier this morning, before she went to the police station, Fifi had felt Dan was justified in walking out the night before, and she had been determined to tell him so when he got home today. She really wanted things to get back to the way they used to be, making each other laugh, being relaxed and happy together. When they first got married they had agreed that it didn't matter what anyone else thought or said about either of them. He said that he could live with her parents' att.i.tude towards him, because he knew they had something together that was very rare and precious. She had promised him that she would never let her family come between them, and she believed she had kept her promise.

So she felt betrayed now, because after all they'd been through, he had decided to believe she was so stupid that she couldn't see how manipulative her mother was, and so weak that if she did go home alone, she would just bow under the pressure.

He had made sarcastic comments about her mother in the past, but Fifi had always laughed them off, understanding it was because he felt a little insecure, and she'd given him rea.s.surance that he was the only important person in her life.

But now she felt angry that he couldn't see she had merely been protecting his feelings with this letter. She was the one who had been virtually cast out because of him. Dan had lost nothing at all. So how dare he get on his high horse about a situation which she had been trying desperately to improve?

'Perhaps I would be better off without you,' she snarled angrily at him in the heat of the moment, not stopping to think what she was saying. 'My life took a downturn the moment I married you.'

The goading, smug look he'd had seconds before vanished. She saw deep hurt replace it, and if she could have clawed back those words, she would have done.

'I didn't mean that,' she said quickly. 'I'm sorry.'

He raised one eyebrow and just stared at her, not saying a word. Then he turned on his heel and went into the bedroom.

She heard the sound of the wardrobe door opening, but thought he was just getting some clean clothes out to get changed. She decided it was better to leave it for now, and she began to lay the table.

She looked round as he came out of the bedroom, and to her consternation he was just standing on the landing looking at her, his duffel bag in his hand.

He looked exactly as he had when they first met. A bit grubby, hair in need of a wash, stubble on his chin, even the duffel bag was the same one. But he'd smiled all the time that evening, and now his expression was cold and unreadable.

'I'll be off now. I've left money on the chest of drawers for you. When you go back to Bristol drop a line to the site, and I'll come and get the rest of my stuff.'

'You're leaving me?' she asked incredulously.

'It's better for me to go now than pull you down even further.'

The hurt in his voice matched that in his eyes.

'Don't be ridiculous, Dan,' she pleaded with him. 'You know perfectly well I didn't mean it.'

'You did, and I can't really blame you either. It's true, I have pulled you down.' He was off down the stairs too fast for Fifi even to attempt to stop him.

'Come back, Dan,' she yelled, but the front door slammed and he was gone.

The shock was so great that she just stood on the landing like a statue. She couldn't believe it. She half expected him to come back in after a few moments and say it was a joke.

He surely couldn't leave her over something as petty as a letter. Could he?