Looking Good Dead

Kellie was quiet, the orange street lights strobing on her face as Tom drove the Audi down the London road back towards Brighton. The radio was turned down low; he could just hear the Louis Armstrong song ‘We Have All the Time in the World’, which always stirred him. He turned it up a little, tired out, struggling to stay awake and completely sober. The car clock read 1.15 a.m.

The evening at Philip Angelides’ house had gone OK, but the atmosphere had been stilted. Some years ago he and Kellie had joined the National Trust and used to like driving out to visit different stately homes on Sunday afternoons. Some of the houses they had visited were smaller than the Elizabethan pile they had been in tonight.

There were sixteen of them seated around the antique dining table, served by a retinue of starchy retainers. Angelides forced each guest in turn to guess the provenance first of the white wine, then the red, starting with the country of origin, then going on to grapes, style, maker and year.

Caro Angelides, the tycoon’s wife, was probably the most stuck-up woman Tom had ever had the misfortune to sit next to, and the woman on his right, whose name he had forgotten, was not much better. Their sole conversation was horses – it veered from eventing to hunting and back again. He could not remember either of them asking him one single question about himself throughout the entire evening.

Meanwhile, Kellie had had the man on her right brag to her about how clever he was, and the man on her left, an oily-looking banker who had got increasingly drunk, repeatedly put his hand on her leg and tried to move it up inside her skirt.

All the other guests were clearly seriously rich, and from an entirely different social stratosphere to Tom and Kellie, neither of whom had ever had any exposure to really fine wines, and it had particularly angered Tom to see Kellie’s choices belittled by her host. And he’d had no chance to engage him in any kind of business conversation. In fact, as he drove he wondered why Philip Angelides had bothered to invite them at all. Except perhaps just to show off to them?

But it was bonding of a sort. He hadn’t misbehaved; he’d managed to keep the conversation going with the two women on either side of him despite zero knowledge of the horse world – apart from an annual flutter on the Grand National. And he had at least guessed that the red wine was French – although that was a total fluke.

‘What a horrible bunch of people,’ Kellie said suddenly. ‘Give me our friends any day! At least they are real people!’

‘I think I’ll get some good business out of him.’

She was quiet for a moment then she said, grudgingly, ‘Great house, though. To die for.’

‘Would you like to live in a place that big?’

‘Yeah, why not, if I had all those servants.’ Then as an afterthought she added, ‘We will one day, I’m sure. I believe in you.’

Tom put his hand out and found Kellie’s. He squeezed, and she squeezed back. He continued to hold it, driving with one hand as they lapsed back into silence. Into his thoughts. Heading home, heading back to reality.

His decision to go to the police hung like a dark shadow at the back of his mind. Of course he had done the right thing; what choice did he have? Could he have lived with his conscience? They had made the decision together; that’s what you did as husband and wife. You were a team.

They were approaching the turn-off now. He moved into the left-hand lane on the almost empty road, freed his hand, needing both now, followed the sharp bend all the way round, then headed up the hill, coming off at the roundabout at the top.

Less than a minute later, dropping down into the valley, he made a left turn into Goldstone Crescent, then a sharp left into their road. He drove up the steep hill, pulled into the carport, switched off the engine and climbed out. Kellie remained strapped in her seat. Tom, holding the key fob, his finger on the electronic locking button, waited for her to get out. But she didn’t move. He glanced around at the cars parked down either side of the road, all well illuminated by the street lighting. His eyes studied all the shadows. Looking. For what? A sudden movement? A solitary figure in a parked car?

Paranoid, he told himself. Then he opened Kellie’s door. ‘Home, sweet home!’ he said.

Still she did not move.

He looked at her face, wondering for a moment if she was asleep, but her eyes were open; she was just staring ahead.

‘Darling, hello?’

She gave him an odd look. ‘We’re home, I know,’ she said.

He frowned. She seemed to be having a Kellie moment. And they were getting more frequent. He could not put his finger on exactly what these moments were, but every now and then for a few seconds, sometimes longer, she seemed to disappear into a world of her own. The last time he’d raised it with her she had snapped back at him that sometimes she needed space, thinking time. But she sure as hell sometimes chose odd places and times to do it.

Eventually she unclipped her belt and climbed out of the car. He locked the Audi, then walked to the front door, put his key in, pushed it open and politely stepped aside for Kellie to go in first.

The television was blaring. Christ, he thought, the children were asleep; didn’t Mandy have any common sense? Then he looked around, surprised that Lady hadn’t barked or come bounding out to greet them.

Kellie put her head through the lounge doorway. ‘Hi, Mandy, we’re back! Did you have a good evening? Turn the sound down, will you, love?’

The babysitter’s reply was drowned out by the din of the television.

Tom walked into the lounge. Because he had been driving, he’d drunk very little and was now feeling in need of a stiff nightcap. Except it would be wise to wait until he had dropped Mandy home. It was a good couple of miles to where she lived; stupid to risk it.

On the screen a teenage girl was standing in a rain-drenched alleyway, screaming, as a shadow bore down on her. Mandy was sprawled out on the sofa, a teenage magazine open on the carpet, along with several sweet wrappers, an empty pizza carton and a Coke can. Engrossed in the movie, without taking her eyes from the screen she hovered her left hand over the carpet, searching for the remote, but she was several inches off target.

Just as the girl on the television screamed even louder, Tom knelt, grabbed the remote off the floor and muted the sound. ‘Everything OK, Mandy?’

The teenager looked a little surprised by the sudden silence, yawned, then smiled. ‘Yeah, fine, Mr Bryce. The children wasn’t no trouble – good as gold both of ’em. I’m a bit worried about Lady, though.’

‘Why’s that?’ Kellie asked.

Sitting up and putting on her boots, Mandy replied, ‘She doesn’t seem herself. She normally comes and sits with me, but she didn’t want to leave her basket tonight.’

Tom and Kellie both walked anxiously into the kitchen. Lady, curled in her basket, did not even raise an eyelid. Kellie knelt down and stroked her head. ‘Lady, darling, are you OK?’

Mandy followed them in. ‘She drank quite a lot of water a while ago.’

‘She’s probably got a bug,’ Tom said, glancing at half a congealed pizza lying on the work surface, along with a knife and fork, and a tub of melted Tesco caramel crunch ice cream with the lid off. He knelt and stroked the Alsatian as well. Cocking his head at the dog he asked, feeling very sleepy suddenly, ‘Have you got a bug, Lady? Feeling grots?’

Kellie stood up. ‘Let’s see if she’s any better in the morning. If not we’ll have to call the vet.’

Tom gloomily saw a big bill coming, but it couldn’t be helped. He loved the dog; she was a part of his family, part of his life. ‘Good plan,’ he said.

Kellie squared up with the babysitter, then told Tom she would drive Mandy home.

‘It’s OK, I’ll do it,’ Tom said. ‘I deprived myself of all those fine wines – I might as well drive her.’

‘I didn’t drink much either,’ Kellie said. ‘I’m fine. You’ve done enough driving tonight. Have a drink and relax.’

He didn’t take much persuading.

Tom poured himself two fingers of Armagnac, flopped down on the sofa and flicked the remote, changing from the horror film Mandy had been watching to a golden oldie comedy show, Porridge, and watched Ronnie Barker in prison for a little while, before changing again, this time to an American football