Beneath The Skin

of people. He lived in a small alley that was difficult to find. I walked past it the first time, then asked and found it and walked along and round the corner. The tiny cobbled backstreet was deserted on this Saturday evening. At the end I found a door with a little card by the bell: BURNSIDE. I rang the bell. There was silence for a time.

Could he have gone out? Then I heard a series of knobs being turned, levers pulled, and he opened the door. He looked amazing, a live wire. He was wearing bulky trousers with large pockets all over and a short-sleeved shirt. He was barefoot. But there was something about his eyes, bright and alive, that was captivating. He had an energy about him that was like a force field. He was an attractive man, and what was more-here my heart sank a little-he was a man who fancied himself in love. I hoped he hadn’t made a mountain out of a molehill, just in the hope of wooing me.

“Nadia,” he said with a welcoming smile.

He stood in the doorway and looked over my shoulder. I turned and looked as well. There was nobody there at all, the whole length of the street.

“How did you get away?” he said.

“I’m a magician,” I said.

“Come in,” he said. “I haven’t tidied up.”

It looked very tidy to me. We had stepped straight into a small and cozy living room with a doorway at the far end leading into a short corridor.

“Was this a warehouse?”

“Some kind of workshop, I think. I’m just flat-sitting for a friend who’s out of the country.”

The only thing out of place was an ironing board and iron to one side by the table.

“You’ve been doing your ironing,” I said. “I’m extremely impressed.”

“Just this shirt,” he said.

“I thought it was new.”

“That’s the trick,” he said. “If you iron your clothes, they look like new.”

I smiled.

“The real trick is to wear new clothes,” I said.

I walked around the room. I was addicted to looking at other people’s houses. I gravitated with the instinct of a master snooper to a large cork board on the wall on which, here and there, were pinned takeaway menus, business cards of plumbers and electricians, and, most interesting of all, little snapshots. Morris at a party, Morris on a bike somewhere, Morris on a beach, Morris and a girl.

“She looks nice,” I said.

“Cath,” he said.

“Is she someone you’re seeing?”

“Well, we had a sort of thing.”

I smiled inwardly. She was someone he was seeing. When men said of a girl that they had had a sort of thing with her, it was the equivalent of a man taping over his wedding ring. They wanted to be ambiguous about their state of availability.

“Where are the rest of them?”

“What?”

“The pictures,” I said. “Many drawing pins, few pictures.” I pointed. There were gaps all over the board.

“Oh,” he said. “There were just some I got bored with.” He laughed. “You should have been a detective.”

“Speaking of which, this had better be good, because Detective Inspector Stadler is going to be very angry. I’ll probably be lucky if I get away with a charge of wasting police time.”

Morris gestured me to a chair at the table and he sat opposite me. “I’ve been going over the interview I had with Stadler and-what was the other one?”

“Links?”

“That’s right, and I’m convinced that there’s something strange about Stadler. The way he talked about those other two women was really strange, and I wanted to go through it with you. And I just felt I had to get you away from him.”

“Have you got any evidence?”

“What?”

“I thought you might have found something we could use against him.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I wish I could have.”

I tried to think. The mist in my mind that had been clearing suddenly became thicker again. Then suddenly I felt a wave of coldness pass through me.

“It doesn’t work anyway,” I said dully.

Morris looked puzzled. “What doesn’t?”

“The police theory. I got so excited about Zoe and that watermelon and her connection with the police before the notes arrived. But that doesn’t explain Jennifer.”

“Why?”

“Her locket was planted in Zoe’s flat before Zoe died, before Jennifer started getting the notes, before she called the police.”

“The police might have faked the planting of the locket.”

I thought for a moment.

“Well, maybe,” I said doubtfully. “Still, that doesn’t explain the connection with Jenny. Why pick on her?”

“Stadler may have seen her somewhere.”

“You could say that about anybody. The police theory depended on the fact that they had dealings with all the women.”

I felt depressed and sick. “It was all wrong,” I said. “I’d better go.”

Morris leaned across and touched my arm. “Just stay a bit,” he said. “Just a bit, Nadia.”

“It would have been so good,” I said flatly. “It was such a nice theory, it’s a pity to let it go.”

“Back to the haystack,” Morris said. He was smiling at me as if that was funny. His teeth, his eyes, his whole face, shone.

“You know what?” I said dreamily.

“What?”

“I used to feel strange that I’d never met Zoe and Jenny. It’s different now. Sometimes I think of us as sisters, but more and more I think of us as the same person. We’ve gone through the same experiences. We’ve lain awake at night with the same fears. And we’re going to die in the same way.”

Morris shook his head. “Nadia…”

“Shhh,” I said, as if to a small child. I was almost talking to myself now and I didn’t want my reverie interrupted. “When I went to the flat with Louise-that’s Zoe’s friend-it was amazing. It was almost as if she had already been my best friend, as if we recognized each other. It was so funny when she talked of going shopping with Zoe on that last afternoon; it was almost as if she had been talking of a shopping expedition that we had made together. She felt it too. I could tell.”

And at that moment, quite suddenly, the fog lifted and the landscape was there-there it was-cold and hard in the sunshine and I could see it. There was no doubt. I had been going over the forensic file in my mind ever since I had seen it.

“What is it?”

I started. I had almost forgotten Morris was there. “What?” I said.

“You don’t seem quite here,” he said. “What were you thinking?”

“I was thinking,” I said, “that when Zoe was killed she was wearing a shirt she had just bought with Louise. Funny, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know,” said Morris. “Tell me why it’s funny, Nadia. Tell me.”

“Pity to mess it up,” I said.

Morris gazed at me as if he was trying to see inside my mind. Did he think I was going a bit mad? Good. I leaned over the table and took his hand. It felt clammy. Mine felt cool and dry. I held his right hand between my two hands and squeezed it.

“Morris,” I said. “I’d love some tea.”

“Yes,” he said. “Yes, of course, Nadia.” He was smiling and smiling. He couldn’t stop.