Bleeding Heart Square

sheet of foolscap with the list of names — the same name: P. M. Penhow, written over and over again — as if someone had been practising it. On the smaller sheet of paper were the words I expect you are surprised to hear. She turned over this second sheet and discovered that there was something else on the back, written faintly in pencil at the top of the page. It was not in the same handwriting but in the clumsy, rather childish version of copperplate that they used to teach in board schools.

and so tell the padre you’re sorry for all the upset, that you met an old pal, a sailor who you were going to marry, and you went off and married him, and now you’re making a new life in America. We want him to break the news to all and sundry because you’re ashamed. A lot depends on this, old man. You won’t let me down.

There was no signature. The last page of a letter to America? She had wanted a distraction and now she had found one, she wished she hadn’t. She fetched her handbag from her bedroom and emptied its contents onto the table.

An astonishing amount of rubbish had accumulated since she had left Frogmore Place. There were more paper clips, an old matchbox with no matches in it, three bus tickets, a silver threepenny piece, a partly used lipstick that she had forgotten she had owned and at least half a cigarette’s worth of tobacco flakes. Finally she found, crumpled into a ball, the note that Serridge had given her with Shires’ address and the time of her first appointment with him. She smoothed it out and laid it side by side with the pencilled notes from the writing box.

The first was in ink and very short; the second was in pencil and not much longer. The handwriting wasn’t very distinctive, in any case — hundreds of thousands of people, perhaps millions, must have been taught to write like that. All she could say with any certainty was that they might have been written by the same person. And that the person might have been Joseph Serridge.

A sense of urgency gripped her. She folded the two sheets of paper and tucked them into her handbag. She piled her own belongings on top of them, and felt happier when they were out of sight and the handbag was closed. She shovelled the rest of the items back in the box and returned it to its shelf.

But closing the handbag and putting the box away didn’t obliterate what she had seen: Miss Penhow’s name, written over and over again, and that fragment of — what? A letter? An instruction? A lot depends on this, old man. You won’t let me down.

Like falling dominoes, the thoughts led from one to the next, as if they had been queuing ever since she came here, waiting for this moment. Scraps of Mrs Alforde’s conversation rose up from her memory like unwanted ghosts: ‘making pen-and-ink sketches of the chimney pieces that Gerry’s uncle put in the drawing room and the library’; ‘forged several cheques, falsified the accounts and embezzled the mess funds’.

And then there was her father returning from America where Miss Penhow’s letter had come from. Now he was living without visible means of support in Miss Penhow’s house. Except it was no longer Miss Penhow’s house; it was now apparently owned by Joseph Serridge.

‘Damn the man,’ she said aloud. How could her father have been so stupid? If he had forged a letter from Miss Penhow on Serridge’s behalf, that must mean one of two things: either Serridge knew that Miss Penhow was dead and he was trying to cover up the fact, or he had no idea where she was and was trying to avoid being accused of her disappearance. Either way, her father was an accessory to whatever Serridge had done and something was very wrong.

The front door banged. Lydia’s pulse began to race. There were heavy and uneven footsteps on the stairs, followed by a tap on the door. When she opened it, she was almost relieved to find Malcolm Fimberry on the landing. At least he wasn’t Serridge.

‘Mrs Langstone, good evening. I’m glad to catch you in.’ It was a cold night but the sweat was running down his face. ‘I wanted to apologize.’

‘There’s nothing to apologize for.’

‘Oh but there is.’ He came up to her and laid his hand on her arm. ‘I cannot forgive myself for not warning you about the skull.’

‘It really doesn’t matter at all.’ Lydia brushed his hand away from her arm, casually as though it were a fly. ‘After all, I’d seen it before.’

‘Yes, but it must have been such a shock.’ He snuffled and swallowed noisily. ‘However, it was such a pleasure to see you there this afternoon. I wonder — would you allow me to show you the chapel itself?’

‘Thank you. But I’m-’

‘What about tomorrow afternoon? I shall still have the keys after the meeting’s over, you see. That would make everything much more convenient.’

‘I don’t think I can manage that.’

‘Oh, but Mrs Langstone, it really-’

He stopped as they both heard the rattle of the front door again, followed by a confused fumbling in the hall and the sound of Serridge saying wearily, ‘God damn it.’ As soon as he heard his landlord’s voice, Fimberry backed rapidly away from Lydia as though he had suddenly realized that she was the bearer of an infectious disease.

There were dragging footsteps in the hall below. Lydia came out of the room and went to the head of the stairs. Serridge was at the bottom, supporting her father.

‘Evening, Mrs Langstone,’ he said in a flat voice. ‘I’m afraid the Captain’s had one over the eight.’ He caught sight of Fimberry behind her. ‘Fimberry, come down and lend a hand, will you? It’ll be easier with two of us.’

Lydia went into her father’s bedroom and straightened the bedclothes. The two men manhandled him upstairs. He was conscious, quite cheerful and rather sleepy.

‘On the bed?’ Serridge said.

‘Yes, please.’ Lydia edged away from him. ‘Is he all right?’

‘He’ll live.’ Serridge nudged the bedroom door fully open. ‘Best thing for him now is sleep. If we hold him up, would you pull his coat off?’

Ten minutes later, Lydia was alone with her father. He lay on his back, snoring loudly. She hung up his overcoat and jacket, removed his shoes and covered him with two blankets.

When she had finished, she stared down at him on the single bed beneath the unshaded bulb dangling from the ceiling. He looked very peaceful. If he had been awake and reasonably sober, she would have had to sit down with him and demand an explanation for what she had found in the box. She would have had to argue with him, cajole him, upbraid him and condemn him. Instead she inserted the wooden trees into his shoes — he was particular about maintaining their shape — and slipped them under the bed. Her father’s snoring stopped. She looked down at him and saw that his eyes were open. He smiled sweetly at her, and she knew she was smiling back.

‘Thank you, my dear,’ he said.

The eyelids slipped over the eyes like blinds over a window. He began to snore again.

His watch had stopped. But Rory knew it must be later than he had thought. The windows of the house were in darkness. There were still lights downstairs at the Crozier, although the outer door that led to the bars was closed for the night. He paused on the corner by the pump, turning his head to and fro, looking for movement in the shadows and listening for sounds. He was always cautious now when coming back to the square after dark.

Dawlish had taken him to the American Bar at the Savoy, where they had shared a bottle of champagne with a third man who had turned out to be a regular columnist on Berkeley’s. A decent chap, Dawlish — the better he knew him, the more obvious that was. It made everything more complicated.

Rory walked slowly across the cobbles and let himself into the house. From somewhere above his head came the rhythmic drone of Captain Ingleby-Lewis’s snores. He followed the stairs to his own flat. He ought to be feeling tired but he was still wide awake, buoyed up by the excitement of the day and the fact that he now had at least the possibility of a future. Before he went to bed, he would have another go at the shorthand. He pushed the Yale into his door and let himself into the flat. Just as his hand touched the sitting-room switch, he registered the fact that there was an unexpected smell in the air.

The tang of spirits.

He brushed his hand down the switch and the room filled with the harsh glare of electric light. The first thing he saw was Joseph Serridge sitting in his armchair.

‘Look here,’ he said, stumbling over the words, ‘what are you doing in my flat?’