A Ghost in the Machine (17 page)

“That's OK. I've already—”

“Have you, really?”

“I mean, it's too late…”

“Got it in one,” said Kate. And walked out.

 

The next morning Mallory, who had spent the night on the library sofa, made some tea as soon as the hour seemed civilised. He took the tray to Kate's room. She was deeply asleep. Soft light, gradually spreading into the room through semi-transparent curtains showed clearly where tears had dried, imprinted on her cheeks. Tenderness for her mingled with shame over his own behaviour consumed Mallory. He put the tea down on the bedside table very gently, but Kate opened her eyes and was immediately awake. She struggled to sit, pushing herself up against the headboard.

“Darling Kate – I'm so sorry about last night.” Mallory sat on the side of the bed. “I really, truly am.”

“No, no.” She was talking over him. “I shouldn't have said what I did. I'd been drinking…worrying if you were—”

“Listen. I want to tell you—”

“It doesn't matter.”

“Yes, it does.” He took her hand in both of his own. “I was with someone who is in real trouble. They asked for help and I couldn't refuse. It took longer than I expected.”

“Was it someone at school?” Already Kate's warm heart was drawn to this unhappy soul. “Is there anything I can do?”

“I promised not to discuss it with anyone.”

Then Kate understood. And Mallory knew that she did. He reached out and took her other hand. Gripped them both. And hung on.

Here we go again, thought Kate. Two against one. In spades, this time. In bloody spades. At least up until now everything that happened between the three of them – discussions, rows, jokes, arguments had been just that – between the three of them. Or had it? That was the whole point of secrets. Those outside never knew there was something they didn't know. How could they?

Kate had always considered herself a pragmatist. Someone in the family had to be. Clear-eyed, she understood how things really were, though accepting things as they really were had never been easy. She remembered Polly as a tiny child climbing on her daddy's knee. Playing with his tie, putting her arms around his neck, whispering in his ear. Winding her silky hair around his fingers.

And now she was in “real trouble,” her mother was not allowed to help. Was not even allowed to know what the trouble was. To Kate's surprise – for had she not found herself only the other day wondering if she still loved her daughter? – this hurt a lot. She went with the pain, bowing over slightly, one hand against her breast. Mallory put his arms around her and they rocked gently for a while back and forth.

Eventually he said, “I thought I'd get breakfast today.”

“Brilliant,” said Kate. She took a deep calming breath. And then another. “I'll have a shower and come right down.”

“And afterwards we'll have our first business meeting.”

Benny had been invited to dine at Kinders. She was looking forward to it immensely, and not just for the pleasure of Dennis's company, for he was also a wonderful cook.

She arrived about seven, carrying a bottle of Carey's apple wine and a stephanotis she had been bringing on in the greenhouse. She balanced the pot awkwardly in the crook of her arm to open the gate. Dennis's strip of garden, running around the base of the house and full of agapanthus and marguerites, looked bone dry and Benny itched to get her hands on a watering can. She knocked quietly on the blue front door and waited. No one came so she did it again, as loudly as her shyness would allow, but with the same result.

Then she made her way through the garage, squeezing past the car and up the double steps to the kitchen door. It was unlocked. Stepping inside she was filled with apprehension. If Dennis was in and had not heard her knocking there was only one place he could be. The kitchen was full of warm, delicious smells. Benny put her plant and wine on the spotless draining board, then stepped into the carpeted passage that led to the rest of the flat.

“Cooee?”

Pointlessly she peeped into the sitting room. Evening sunshine illumined the lovely Chinese rugs and gilded the ornate picture frames. There were some yellow roses and lots of books and newspapers. A quiet, sad wailing came from the hi-fi speakers and she recognised Dennis's Saracen songs from the crusades.

Benny hurried past the bathroom and paused briefly outside the single, monkish room where Dennis slept. The door was ajar. She coughed hoarsely into the aperture and called again. Silence. Now all that was left was the war room.

The flat had lightweight walls, which were about ten feet high, and artificial ceilings. Once inside, as with any other building, the surrounding landscape was invisible and consequently unthreatening. But observed through one of the arrow-slit windows under Kinders' high roof it must have looked extremely fragile. Vulnerable too, like a climber's hut crouching between steep and silent cliffs of white plaster and menaced by the great dinosaurs of iron and steel and wood that stalked the shining floors.

Benny, standing by the door that led to this great space, already had her strategy planned. She would sweep the room with a single glance, swift but thorough. This would show her whether Dennis was there and, if he was, where he was. Then she would go directly across to him, walking carefully and looking only at the ground. Having done this once it would inevitably be less frightening the next time. Even less the next. And so on…

“And after all,” murmured Benny, her hand already trembling the latch upwards, “it's not as if they're alive.”

She saw him straight away. He was standing in front of the giant slingy one looking up at the high rack of heavy wooden balls and the fearsome ropes and ratchets. He stood motionless like a statue, his hands clasped loosely behind his back. Though full of trepidation Benny walked quickly to his side.

“Dennis?” She waited, hesitating. “My dear, are you all right?”

There was a short silence, then Dennis shook his head and sighed.

“What is it?” urged Benny. “What's wrong?”

“I'm not sure. Nothing, probably.” He smiled but his expression remained uneasy. Then turning away he added in an absent-minded manner, almost as if talking to himself, “Or perhaps…a ghost in the machine.”

“Oh!” Benny gasped as if cold water had been thrown in her face. “How awful! Ghosts, oh!”

Dennis linked arms. Something he had never done before. He must be
really
worried, thought Benny. Gladly she turned with him away from the death-dealing mechanism and they walked away, soon to be out of the fearful place.

“It's good to see you, Benny. I'm sorry I wasn't present when you came.” Dennis poured a glass of Madeira to which Benny had become extremely partial. She sat at the kitchen table while he took a small blue iron casserole out of the oven. “It's turbot in a white wine sauce.”

“Lovely. D'you think it's true that fish is good for the brain?”

“Not so good,” said Dennis, adding tiny carrots and new potatoes to warm plates, “as reading and music and paintings.”

They ate in the dining room, sitting in soft, springy armchairs with trays on their laps. The sort that were really comfortable, with big bags underneath, full of granules, so the tray didn't slip and slither and upset your food. Benny confidently accepted another drink, this time white wine. She knew she could handle it. It wouldn't be like it was the other night with Kate. She didn't get all giggly or silly or stupid with Dennis. He brought out the best in her. His grave attention to everything she said made what she said more considered. She was never compelled to rush into speech to cover gaps in conversation as she did with strangers. Instead the pauses felt more like little comfort stops along a delightful walk.

“This turbot is just beautiful.”

“That's a relief. I bought it on Thursday, then got home too late to cook it.”

“Was that pressure of work, Dennis?”

“In a way.”

Benny was the last person he could unburden himself to. An incident merely out of the ordinary would worry her. A genuine mystery and she'd be consumed with anxiety on his behalf. But Dennis did want to discuss his concern. He hoped that another point of view might put the business of the lights in some sort of perspective. Show it up for the trivial bit of nonsense it might well prove to be. He had been thinking about this all morning and had almost decided to talk to Mallory.

“We had our first meeting today.”

“Really?” Dennis felt rather disappointed. As the new company's financial advisor he had hoped to be present at this. “How did it go?”

“It was so exciting! We didn't talk about money, of course, because you weren't there, but Kate's worked out a brief advertisement that should be in
The Times
on Monday. And we decided on the company's name. Excuse me.”

Benny took a break to finish her turbot and drink the rest of her wine. Dennis, entertained by all the “we's” waited, smiling.

“Obviously we had quite a list and, I must admit, some were a bit out of the way. But eventually we got them down to three. The Pierrot Press, which was Kate's suggestion, Fireproof Books from Mallory—”

“I like that,” interrupted Dennis. He recalled newsreels showing towers of flaming books in countries under the rape of tyranny. “That's good. Fireproof Books.”

“It is,” agreed Benny, “but Kate thought not everyone would understand the sym— Um…symbols…”

“You mean they might take the title literally?”

“Exactly. So anyway, what happened was…” Benny squirmed with embarrassment and delight. She could hardly speak and her next words seemed to be squeezed out against their will. “They chose mine.”

“
Benny!
”

“Yes, they did.” Her face shone, radiant with success. She nodded her head. “Mine.”

They sat beaming at each other, equally thrilled. Dennis said, “Well?”

“I thought of it because they're all over the orchard in the spring and Carey was very fond of them. Also there's a lovely watercolour in the library that Kate thinks we could use as our trademark. So we're going to be called…the Celandine Press!”

“This should be champagne.” Dennis poured them both some more wine. “How clever you are, Benny.”

Benny felt her face go all hot and prickly. As far as she could remember no one in all her life had ever told her she was clever. “Tomorrow we're going to start looking at equipment. Computers, printers and suchlike.”

“On Sunday?” Dennis was disappointed. Tomorrow would have been the ideal time to have a talk with Mallory.

“Places are open every day now,” said Benny. “They'll bring me back, then they're going home for a couple of days to start packing up.”

“I see.” A couple of days wasn't long. He would try to ring Mallory before they left. Set a definite time. “Would you like some chocolate tart?”

“Yes, please.”

After Dennis had served the tart and Jersey clotted cream in glass bowls shaped like waterlilies he put his own dish down on a little side table.

“The thing is…erm…I have this friend.”

“Oh, yes?” Benny, tucking carelessly in, now had a little brown and cream moustache on her top lip. “This is truly scrumptious.”

“Written a novel.”

“What sort of a novel?”

“Historical, I believe. Does that sound like the sort of thing the Celandine Press would be looking for?”

“Anything that has literary merit, Kate said.”

“As to that…” Dennis seemed uncertain.

“Don't worry,” said Benny. “You know what they say, nothing ventured, nothing gained. What's your friend's name?”

Dennis stared at her.

“So I shall know who to look out for.”

“Walker.”

“Get him to send it in,” said Benny, “and I shall give it my personal attention.”

 

In the end Polly did not change the money she owed Billy Slaughter into cash to ram down his trousers and up his nose. She recognised this impulse now for what it was – a childish “sucks boo” born of rage at her previous impotence. Also, if she tried it he might hit her.

There was, too, the question of prudence. Polly remembered sitting at a shared table in the LSE Brunch Bowl a while ago when an anthropology student read out a news item from his paper. Apparently someone was being mugged every three minutes night and day in London. They all laughed when he added: “You'd think the stupid sod would move to Brum.” But it wouldn't be funny, Polly thought now, if it happened to you. Especially if you had several thousand in cash about your person. So she decided to pay her debt with a banker's draft.

Of course she had not been able to wait, as her father had suggested. She had rung the only number she had the very next day, only to be told that Mr. Slaughter was in the country and would return after lunch on Monday. The person speaking sounded just like some crusty old retainer in a crusty English play.

Polly had been surprised at Billy's address. She had imagined him hanging out somewhere really flash. At the top of a high tower in Canary Wharf with a Porsche in the garage or over the water in a converted Docklands warehouse. Maybe even at Montevetro, the gorgeous Richard Rogers building, shaped like a gigantic slice of glass cake, sparkling and glittering on the river at Battersea. But he lived at Whitehall Court, Whitehall Place. A few minutes from the Cenotaph. Central, sure, but how dull.

Polly asked around to see if anyone had heard of the place. She drew a blank with one exception. An old Etonian reading Philosophy and Economics. Apparently his uncle, a retired admiral, had a flat there. Handy for his club in the Mall, and the House of Lords. Always grumbling about the service charge, which he swore was higher than his daughter's mortgage.

Polly walked there from Embankment Tube station. The vestibule to the apartments was richly carpeted in pale rose and full of flowers. Polly, about to go straight through, was stopped by a porter who enquired about her business. A telephone call was made to confirm that she was expected and she was directed to the lift.

Making her way down the long, thickly carpeted corridors past cream and grey marble pillars and panels of beautiful stained glass Polly, in spite of herself, began to feel impressed. And it was so quiet. Minutes from Trafalgar Square and you couldn't hear a mouse squeak.

Then, way above her head, Polly heard the lift door clash to and the mechanism start whirring. Waiting, she recalled the novels of John le Carré. Surely this was exactly the sort of discreet, anonymous place that civil servants and their masters, their moles and droppers of notes into hollow trees would gather to trade and betray. Somewhere a stone's throw from the nation's seat of power. A place where no one knows your name. And suddenly it didn't seem so strange that Billy Slaughter should be living here.

She came out of the lift into another long, dimly lit corridor running into deep shade at the very end. Then a heavy door was opened, flooding the space with light. Into this illuminated area stepped a man in evening dress. He raised a hand and called something that Polly didn't quite hear.

She stepped out, walking the walk. He watched her coming on. She wore a soft dress, tiny navy dots on cream with a flirty skirt that swished and swirled above her dimpled knees. She stepped out swinging her hips, her long tanned legs making confident strides. Her pretty, pink-toed feet nonchalantly balanced on four-inch heels tied around her ankles by narrow strips of glittery stuff.

How do women do it? mused Slaughter, admiring Polly's swagger. How do they stay up there? As she got nearer he went back into the flat. Polly, who had been afraid there might be some form of physical
rapprochement
, was relieved. She wouldn't put it past him to try to kiss her. Or sneak a crafty arm around her waist. He'd got enough cheek.

The interior of the flat was a further surprise. The room into which she followed Billy was furnished like the sitting room of a country house. The dark green Knole sofa was well worn, as were several armchairs. Diamond-paned bookcases were crammed with what appeared to be much-handled books. There were several small oil paintings, mainly landscapes, but two showed fine, elegant horses standing in formal gardens in front of playing fountains. Some framed pencil sketches of dancers hung on the opposite wall. A clarinet lay on a low table beside a stack of scientific journals and next to a glazed blue dish holding ripe apricots.

“Well, Polly?”

Slaughter was standing behind a desk, honeyed mahogany and green leather, which also looked pretty old. There was nothing on it but a computer and a copy of the
Evening Standard.

Polly, impressed and surprised by her surroundings, did not immediately reply. She was also slightly surprised by Slaughter's appearance. It had been some weeks since they met but, in her constant and angry remembrances, he had been fat. Gross even. Now, though plainly a big man, he was not a fat one. Polly wondered if he had lost weight. Or if she had blown him up (so to speak) in her imagination.