Bleeding Heart Square

‘Mrs Langstone?’ Serridge said, ignoring Fimberry. ‘Can I have a word?’

Fimberry slipped into his own room, closing the door.

Serridge towered over her. ‘He’s not been pestering you, has he?’

‘Not really.’

‘That means he has.’ Serridge scowled. ‘I’ll have a word.’

‘Please don’t. He’s just trying to be friendly.’

‘It’s up to you, Mrs Langstone. How are you getting on?’

‘Very well, thank you.’

‘I heard you were looking for a job.’

Lydia nodded, wondering who had told him.

‘Any luck so far?’

‘Not yet. But it’s early days, I suppose.’

Serridge scratched his untidy beard. He was such a big man, Lydia thought, and not just in terms of physique. He took up too much space. She found him far more oppressive than she did Mr Fimberry, though she was not sure why. There was the sound of hammering upstairs, perhaps from the attic flat. Mr Wentwood must be making himself at home. At least Mr Wentwood seemed relatively normal.

‘If you want a job,’ Serridge said, ‘I might be able to help you.’

A narrow flight of stairs rose up to the tiny attic landing. Doors to left and right led to the sitting room and to the bedroom respectively. Both rooms had dormer windows, steeply sloping ceilings and gently sloping floors of ill- fitting, creaking boards. The rooms made you feel as though you were living life at an angle and were slightly drunk as well. The furniture was plain and old-fashioned. Most of the pieces were dull with lack of polish but they had a solidity lacking in Mrs Rutter’s furniture in Kentish Town.

It took Rory nearly an hour to unpack. He set up his typewriter, a Royal Portable his parents had given him as a leaving present before he sailed to India, on the table in the sitting room. It squatted there, looking efficient and important. It was his badge of office, he thought, a visible sign that he was, or soon would be, a working journalist or copywriter.

Most of his clothes went into a big chest of drawers with tarnished brass handles. One of the two top drawers had jammed, and he returned to it last of all. He was obliged to take out the drawer below it before he was able to ease it out of the chest. The drawer itself was empty but removing it dislodged a folded sheet of paper that had wedged itself at some point in the past between the drawer and the side of the chest. Yellowed with age and spotted with damp, it was covered with sloping handwriting in faded ink.

… rather lax about making notes, as I had intended. Still, as I was rereading the Parable of the Prodigal Son this evening (Luke 15), I could not help be struck both by the beauty of the language and the spirituality of its message. We must rejoice when a sinner repents, Our Lord tells us, because Our Father which is in Heaven will …

Someone’s Bible study notes, Rory thought idly, and began to screw up the sheet. As he did so, he noticed something written in pencil on the other side.

Dear Mr Orburn

Thank you for your letter of the 7th inst. I have considered what you say your proposals about re the house very carefully and decided to proceed as you suggest, so long as it doesn’t cost more than the cost does not exceed your estimate of?110. Please let me know when you will require the money, and I will so that I may instruct my bank manager to withdraw it from the deposit account.

Yours faithfully truly,

P. M. Penhow

Rory frowned. P. M. Penhow. Fenella’s Aunt Philippa and Narton’s Miss Penhow came together in the signature. For the first time, she was more than a couple of words in someone else’s mouth. This piece of paper was independent proof of a living, breathing woman. It was a draft of a business letter, presumably — to a builder? No, more likely to her agent or her lawyer. Clearly she had not been used to writing this sort of letter. He touched the signature with the tip of his finger. Had she once owned this chest of drawers?

Footsteps were coming up the stairs from the landing below. Rory dropped the paper into the drawer, closed it and turned towards the open door. Mrs Renton appeared, carrying a tray.

‘I brought you some tea,’ she announced.

‘That’s awfully kind.’

‘Not that I’m going to make a habit of it, Mr Wentwood. And there’s a letter come in the post. Mind you bring the cup down when you’ve finished, and don’t forget the tray.’

The Lamb in Lamb’s Conduit Street was far enough away from Bleeding Heart Square for Narton to be able to relax. He ordered half a pint of mild-and-bitter and nursed it by the fire. He wondered whether Wentwood would turn up. That was the trouble with having to deal with amateurs. You couldn’t rely on them. Five minutes later, however, the young man came bounding through the door. Christ, thought Narton sourly, the chap’s like an overgrown puppy. But at least he was here.

‘I had your letter,’ Wentwood said. ‘Everything all right?’

Narton nodded. ‘You needn’t shout about it though.’

To his relief, Wentwood didn’t expect to have a drink bought for him. Indeed, he asked Narton if he wanted the other half of what he had in front of him. When the young man rejoined him at the table, Narton smiled at him with something approaching benevolence.

‘Cheerio,’ Wentwood said, raising his glass. ‘We have to toast my new home.’

Narton drank obediently, then sat back and wiped his mouth. ‘So you’ve moved in all right?’

‘There wasn’t a great deal to move. Still, it’s a place of my own. I know I’ll have to find my own meals but I can’t tell you what a relief it is to get away from Mrs Rutter and Kentish Town. Listen — I found something.’ He took a sheet of paper from his pocket and passed it across the table. ‘It was in a chest of drawers in my room.’

Narton took his time examining it.

‘Is it important?’ Wentwood demanded. ‘It proves she was there, doesn’t it? And who’s this chap Orburn?’

‘It proves nothing. It was her house, remember — she probably furnished it with her cast-offs. As for Orburn, he was her solicitor. He used to manage Bleeding Heart Square for her before Serridge took over.’ Narton put the letter on the table. ‘Have you seen Serridge?’

‘He turned up to give me the keys and read me a lecture about keeping up with the rent.’ Wentwood searched his jacket pockets for cigarettes and matches. ‘He’s a formidable character, isn’t he? Do you know what Miss Kensley told me the other night? That Miss Penhow thought he was God. I’d the feeling that she might not have been speaking metaphorically.’

Narton grunted. ‘You’ve talked to her about Serridge then?’

‘I had to tell her where I was moving to.’

‘I asked you to keep all that under your hat.’

‘I know. But it wasn’t that easy. Besides, I said nothing to her about looking into what happened to her aunt. I just said that I happened to be passing, and saw there was a flat vacant that would suit me. Is it a problem?’

Narton took the cigarette that Wentwood offered him and leant across the table towards the match. ‘As it happens, no. I’ve changed my mind on that front, see? I’ve got a request for you, Mr Wentwood. A suggestion, if you like. But we’ll need her cooperation.’

‘I’m not sure how she’d feel about that.’

‘The thing is,’ Narton said quietly, ‘you could do me a favour, a big favour. There is an important piece of evidence in this case, and I think we need a second opinion on it. Either Miss Penhow was murdered or she wasn’t. The official line is that she can’t have been murdered because she went to the States instead with person or persons unknown. We know that because she wrote a letter from New York, which is why our investigation was officially closed. The thing is, some of us aren’t convinced that letter was genuine.’