The Paying Guests(133)
‘Of course they never did!’ said Mrs Viney.
‘How did they do it, then?’
‘Oh, well… The doctor’s got a special light, I expect, and he shone it in Uncle Lenny’s ear.’
Hearing that, Violet got hold of a crayon lipstick from her mother’s bag and, calling it the doctor’s light, she started to go from person to person saying she had to put it in their ears so that she could look at their brains. Frances obliged, tilting her head, tucking back her hair. But she did it distractedly, her eye on Vera. For, having offered her cigarettes, Vera had risen from the sofa to carry the saucer of stubs to the hearth and throw its contents on to the coals; but instead of returning to her place she had set the saucer on the mantelpiece and was looking around, in search of something. Frances, her heart beginning to thud, watched her go to the easy chair and glance over the back of it; she watched her wander across the room, to look in the shadows beneath the table. After that, there was only one more place for her to try. She went to the sofa, peered behind it, and – oh, Christ, here it came. She reached a muscular braceleted arm into the gap between the sofa and the wall, brought out the stand-ashtray and, with a grunt of satisfaction, set it squarely down on the rug.
Frances stared at the thing with eyes that, for a moment, seemed unable to close. There was a scorch-mark on the base of it, from where she had held it to the coals. And just an inch from where it stood on the carpet she could see, now, one of the stains. Again she felt the grip of Leonard’s fingers, the burn of his cheek. The violence, the horror – it was all still here, in this cosy room. Couldn’t anyone else feel it?
But Netta, Min and Mrs Viney were fussing with the baby, Vera was thumbing a flame from a ladies’ lighter, and no one gave the ashtray a glance – no one save the little girl, who capered around it, the lipstick held between her fingers in a flapperish way. She hadn’t got a doctor’s light now, she announced, she’d got a cigarette; no she hadn’t, she’d got a cigar. And for the next few minutes she made elaborate play of puffing on the end of the crayon, then tapping it into the bronze-effect bowl.
When Lilian and the men emerged from the bedroom, Lilian stood in the doorway, saw the ashtray, and the last remaining bit of blood in her face seemed to drain out of it. She looked so dreadful that her mother gave a cry at the sight of her, and Inspector Kemp said, Yes, he was sorry to have kept Mrs Barber so long. ‘But,’ with a lift of his eyebrows at Sergeant Heath, ‘we’ve everything we need for now, I think?’
Frances saw the sergeant nod. He was tucking a bundle of things into his pocket: letters and papers, perhaps a railway ticket… She was too far off to be sure. The inspector stepped forward to retrieve his hat. Passing Violet at the ashtray, he gave her a genial tap on the head. ‘Having a smoke like the ladies, are you? What have you got there, a Player’s?’
‘It’s a De Reszke,’ she answered, in her withering way.
‘Oh! It is, is it?’
Chuckling, he and the sergeant made their way out to the landing. When Frances rose to escort them, they waved her back. They could see themselves out, they assured her. They had put her to too much trouble already…
As their steps faded on the staircase, she looked at Lilian. ‘Are you all right?’
Lilian nodded, her head lowered. ‘Yes. Yes, I’m all right. They just asked the same things, all over again. I – I need the WC, though. I’ve been needing it all this time. Where are my shoes?’
Her mother found them, and held them out. ‘But don’t go down there on your own! Not with murderers all over the place! Have someone go with you. Ver —’
‘I’m all right,’ said Lilian. She sounded fretful. ‘Just let me be.’
‘Let you be?’
Frances moved forward. ‘I’ll go down with Lilian, Mrs Viney.’
‘Oh, Miss Wray, are you sure? You’ve been so good.’
And, ‘Yes,’ said Lilian, ‘let Frances take me down. She’s the only one who doesn’t fuss me. I can’t stand it! Let Frances take me.’
The sharpness of her tone set Siddy off crying. She put a hand to her forehead, then caught hold of Frances’s arm; they left the sisters seeing to the baby, and went in silence down the stairs.
Once they were in the kitchen with the door shut she sank into a chair, making a pillow of her arms on the table and letting her head fall forward.
Frances, alarmed, sat beside her. ‘What’s happened? What is it?’
She shook her head without raising it, and answered in a murmur. ‘Nothing.’
‘What did the inspector ask you, really?’
‘He asked all sorts of things. All about me and Len. Where we go, what we do, who our friends are – things like that. But something’s not right, Frances. He kept asking me about Charlie. You heard what he said Charlie told him, about Friday night?’
Frances nodded. ‘Why would Charlie say that?’
She hid her face again. ‘I don’t know.’
‘To lie like that. It doesn’t make sense, unless – well, unless he has something to hide. Something he’s keeping from Betty? Do you think he’s been seeing another girl? It must be that, mustn’t it?’ And then, when Lilian didn’t answer: ‘God! It’s more of a muddle than ever. And what did the sergeant take away?’