Starburst (34 page)

W
hy this evening of all evenings, Tess Goodwin thought to herself as she leaned over in her seat to get an unrestricted view through the windscreen of the bus, hoping to see what had caused it to remain stationary for the past ten minutes. There was no traffic coming down Hanover Street, so she knew there had to be some sort of blockage up ahead. She glanced at her wristwatch. It was half past seven. She was going to be so late and the last thing she wanted to do was to arrive at the restaurant in a flustered state. Tonight she had to be in the mood to play it ultra-cool, bordering on iceberg-cold.

Getting to her feet, she slung the strap of her laptop case onto her shoulder and walked down the aisle to stand by the driver. “Are we going to be moving soon?” she asked, peering up the street.

“Nae idea,” the driver replied, masticating heavily on a piece of gum. “Looks like an accident. Ah’ve just seen a police car head down past the roundabout on George Street.” He turned to her. “How far are ye goin’?”

“Dundas Street.”

“D’yae want tae walk, then? Ye’d be better tae.”

“Yes, I think you’re right.”

The doors opened with a swish and Tess jumped down onto the pavement and began half-walking, half-running up the incline.

This had to be the most imperfect climax for what had already proved to be a gruelling week. The dinner date with Peter Hansen had been permanently at the forefront of her mind. She was distracted at work, forgetting to attend at least three meetings and to organize press calls that would normally have been second nature to her, and then, because Peter had gone against his word and had kept calling her constantly, she had become near paranoid about her mobile phone ringing. She considered turning it off altogether, only she knew it was her constant lifeline during the festival.

But the worst had always been when her day’s work was over and she had gone home to Allan. She tried to act as naturally as she could with him, but everything that she said or did seemed so false, so deceiving, that eventually she resolved to plead utter exhaustion and keep all conversation between them to a minimum, hoping that he would not question the sudden change in her mood and character. So every night she would lie beside him in bed, her eyes fixed on the television but taking nothing in, while he would give up on his nightly attempts to make love to her and fall asleep, resigned to his sudden celibacy, with his head leaning heavily against her shoulder. She dreaded the coming of the day when she would have to meet Peter Hansen at the restaurant, yet she also longed for it so that she could put an end to this appalling charade and get her life with Allan back to normal.

Just before arriving at the flat, she took her mobile from her bag, thumbed the keys and put it to her ear. Her call was answered immediately. “Yes, it’s Tess,” she said in a voice that was distinctly cryogenic. “I’m going to be late…I don’t know, maybe half an hour, depends on the traffic…can’t do that, I’m on my way home now. I want to have a shower first…no, Peter, you read nothing into that. You really could not be more wrong.”

Angrily, she put the mobile back into her handbag as she shouldered open the entrance door. She ascended the stairs quickly, praying she still had time to get changed and away from the place before Allan came back from the office. Tonight, she thought to herself, when this whole thing is over and done with, I’ll make it up to him.

Her heart sank as soon as she walked into the flat, dropping her case on the chair in the hall. She could hear the blare of the television coming from the bedroom. She took off her coat as she walked along the passage and entered the room. Allan was lying propped up on the bed drinking a mug of tea, still in his suit trousers but with stockinged feet and his tie loosened. An open newspaper lay beside him. His eyes momentarily left the television screen and she saw immediately the deep sadness in his eyes.

“Allan?” she asked quietly, feeling her heart give a jolt of apprehension. “What’s happened?”

He smiled at her. “Nothing.” He zapped the television with the remote. “Just been watching the end of some stupid romantic film. Got to me a bit.” He dropped the remote on the bed beside him. “I came home early ’cos I thought we could go out to dinner.”

Tess bit at her bottom lip. “I can’t, Allan. I’ve got to attend another reception tonight. I’ve just come home to change.” Feeling her face colour, she turned away from him and walked back over to the door. “I’m just going to have a quick shower.”

She returned five minutes later wrapped in a towel, her skin tingling from the scalding she had given herself in the hope it would purge away her guilt. Allan was still sitting on the bed, still looking at her. She smiled at him as she walked over to the open wardrobe and took out a dark red silk cocktail dress on a hanger.

“We need to talk,” Allan said.

Tess glanced round at him. “What about?”

Allan shrugged. “Anything you want. We haven’t communicated for about a week, or maybe you haven’t noticed.”

Tess placed the dress on a chair and walked across to the bed and sat down next to him. “I know and I’m sorry. It’s just—”

“Work,” Allan interjected morosely.

She put a hand on his arm. “After tonight, things will be different, Allan, I promise. We could go out for dinner tomorrow night?”

Allan shrugged and picked up the newspaper. “Have you any idea what happened to Angélique Pascal?” he asked, the change of subject seeming to Tess a ruse to avoid giving her an answer, yet she was glad of it. She shot a glance at the radio alarm on the bedside table. It was almost eight o’clock. Peter Hansen would no doubt be sitting in the bar at the restaurant waiting for her.

“No,” she said, getting to her feet and walking over to a chest of drawers and taking out a pair of panties and a bra, “other than she’s returned to France.”

Allan let out a hollow laugh. “You’re really a strange one, Tess. A week ago you were beside yourself with worry about her, and now you’re acting as if you couldn’t give a damn.”

Dropping the towel to the ground, Tess slipped on her panties and her bra, and then stood for a moment staring at her reflection in the mirror that sat on top of the chest. He was right, of course. She hadn’t given Angélique another thought ever since she’d left. She was too preoccupied with her own damned problems. “I
am
concerned about her,” she said, picking up the dress from the chair and slipping it off the hanger. “It’s just that—”

“
How
concerned are you?” he cut in.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it’s been almost a week since she left Edinburgh,” Allan replied, giving the newspaper a thump with the back of his hand, “and we’ve heard nothing more about her. Wouldn’t
you
think, as someone who deals with the press all the time, that a story about a world-class violinist who has had to cancel a whole load of concerts because she’d cut her hand badly would be pretty big news? I mean, there’s been no follow-up story, no progress report, not even a photograph. Don’t you think that’s a bit weird?”

Tess rubbed her fingers against her brow. Again, he was absolutely right. Even though she’d had her nose buried in the newspapers for the past week looking out for reviews and articles on artistes, it had never occurred to her there had never been a mention of Angélique.

“Maybe she’s asked for some privacy during her convalescence,” she offered hopefully. “She is quite a private person, after all.”

“Come on, you know as well as I do the paparazzi don’t give a damn about the privacy of
any
celebrity. It’s all just money to them. And don’t you think it’s quite odd she hasn’t been in touch with you? You became pretty chummy with her and she did have your mobile number.” He closed the newspaper, spun it onto the floor and then folded his arms. “I think you should try to find out more about her, because to tell you the truth,
I’m
concerned even if no one else appears to be.”

Tess gazed at him for a moment. “You’re right. She should have been in touch.”

“I know.”

She glanced once more at the time on the radio alarm. This was an issue she was not going to be able to avoid. Peter Hansen was just going to have to wait for a bit longer. Pulling on her dress, she walked over to the door and left the room. She returned a few moments later with her mobile phone and address book. She sat down on the bed next to Allan, flicked through the pages and then began dialing a number.

“Who are you calling?” Allan asked.

“A reporter called Harry Wills,” Tess replied, putting the phone to her ear. “I tell you, this is really breaking a cardinal rule. I never ask information from the press.”

Allan swung his legs over the side of the bed and got to his feet. “I’m getting another cup of tea. D’you want one?”

“Hullo, is that Harry Wills?” Tess asked, shaking her head at Allan’s offer.

Five minutes later, Allan returned to the bedroom, a brimming mug of tea in his hand, to find Tess staring thoughtfully out of the window, her mobile held limply in her hand. “How did you get on?” he asked, putting the mug down on the bedside table.

“He’s coming round here now.”

“Why? What did he say?”

“Well, to begin with, he seemed quite adamant that Angélique had gone back to Paris, but then when I told him she was a good friend of mine and that I couldn’t understand why I hadn’t heard from her, his whole attitude changed.”

“In what way?”

“He just started asking me a whole load of questions about how I’d met her and when was the last time I’d seen her, and then when I told him I worked in the International office, he just immediately said he thought it would be best if he came round to see me.” She laid the mobile and the address book down on the bedside table. “Funny thing is, I think I now recognize his voice. I’m pretty sure it was him who called the International office to break the news about Angélique’s accident.”

“Sounds as if I was right, then,” Allan said, sitting down on the edge of the bed and rubbing his face with his hands. “My word, there seems to be a hell of a lot of cloak-and-dagger stuff going on at the festival this year.”

He said the remark in such a strained voice that Tess shot him a worried glance out of the corner of her eye. She decided silence to be the only fitting reply.

Forty minutes later, Tess closed the door of the flat behind Harry Wills and walked back along the corridor and into the bedroom. Allan was pulling on his suit jacket, studying the piece of paper the reporter had ripped out of his notebook.

“Where are you going?” she asked.

“Out to East Lothian. Someone’s got to go see Angélique.”

Tess bit at her lip. This was decision time, but already, in her heart, she knew where she had to go. “I’m coming too.”

“Don’t bother,” he said, studying her face intently. “You’d better go to your reception.”

She glanced at her wristwatch. A quarter to nine. It was all too late now, anyway. She didn’t know what Peter Hansen’s next step would be, but she was prepared to face the consequences. She picked up her handbag from the chest of drawers. “No, I want to come.” She walked towards the door. “I’ll just make a quick phone call to Sarah Atkinson to say I won’t make the reception.”

It was not a good time to be attempting to cross over to the other side of Edinburgh. The streets were clogged both with traffic and with pedestrians, and for the greater part of the journey through the city Allan drove in silence, only breaking it to mutter some oath under his breath as the traffic lights incessantly changed to red as he approached them. Tess didn’t care. Her mind was completely set on the confrontation that was now inevitable between herself and Sir Alasdair Dreyfuss. She kept imagining the scene of her being called to his office, trying to work out what she would say when he questioned her about her affair with his friend Peter Hansen, knowing that whatever she said in reply would make little difference. Her future as an employee of the International Festival would be considered untenable.

When she had spoken to Peter Hansen on the telephone before leaving the flat, he had been surprisingly understanding of her reasons for not being able to turn up at the restaurant. “How disappointing,” he had said. “In that case, we should make it another night.” And she had replied, “Maybe.” Now she thought to herself how much easier, how much more self-preserving it would have been to have answered, “Yes, of course we can,” but then she glanced across at Allan, shaking his head in frustration as he edged the car forward another few feet, and she knew she had made the right decision not to continue with this stupid, foolish, damaging game any longer. Her job was expendable, but not her husband. This was the man she loved, and this was the man she did not want to lose.

She didn’t want to think about it any longer. She switched her mind to Angélique and wondered if she should ring her at the house in East Lothian to warn her they were on their way out to see her. She took her mobile from her handbag and picked up the slip of paper next to the gear stick on which Harry Wills had written the address and the mobile number of Angélique’s friend Jamie Stratton. She read his name again, trying to work out why it seemed so familiar, and then her mind registered on the meeting she had had in the Hub Café with the elderly cameraman who had been desperate to find somewhere to stay in the city. Distractedly she put her mobile and the piece of paper back beside the gear stick and leaned her head against the window, thinking to herself how extraordinary it was that she’d already spoken to this man.

The next thing she knew she was jolting herself awake, blinking her eyes to accustom them to the glare of the oncoming headlights. The car was now travelling at speed along a dual carriageway. To her left she could see the illuminated block of the power station at Tranent. She reached across and squeezed Allan’s hand. “Sorry about that. I dropped off.”

“You must be exhausted,” he said.