Something to hide a lynl.., p.53
Something to Hide: A Lynley Novel, page 53
part #21 of Inspector Lynley Series
Monifa wondered it had not been tagged. But she saw that the artist had signed his work—Annan Kwame—so perhaps he was a resident nearby and due respect was given to his art.
Alice unlocked the metal door and raised it. Then she unlocked the café itself and motioned for Monifa to go inside. There was an open/closed sign posted on the door’s glass, and Alice did not change it from the closed position. She said to Monifa, “Tabby will be along straightaway and I’ll want her watching when we get to the cooking. Let’s have coffee meantime.”
It didn’t take long to make their coffees, which Alice carried to one of the café’s tables along with a tin jug of cold milk and a basket of various sweeteners. Both of them sat and Monifa said to her, “You have had this café for many years?”
Alice nodded. “When Stoney—our Harold—went inside, I needed a distraction to take my mind off where I went wrong raising him. Benj said I had to do something other than fret as there was nothing more we could do for Stoney, him and me. So I thought about it and since my only talent—other than tatting, and I do like tatting, don’t I—was cooking Caribbean, that’s what I decided. I did it for Brixton Market at first, just three hours this was, from ten till one. I still have a stall there—Tabby’s mum works it—but Benj thought a regular caff would be better as I get older. To keep me out of the weather in winter and the like. So here I am.”
Monifa considered what she’d said and asked, “Cooking?”
“What’s that?”
“Cooking is your only talent?”
Alice smiled. “Like I said, I do my tatting and I s’pose there’s other talents inside me but this is the only one I practise regular. When you’ve hungry men to cook for, what else is there to do, eh? Plus we always could use the money if I actually made any. Which I did not, not in the beginning when I was starting out. I overordered, I cooked too much, I served up too much. It took awhile.”
Monifa said, “For me, it’s the same. Cook, wash, clean, iron, and do the shop.”
Alice nodded and took a sip of her coffee, grimaced, then said, “Good Lord, that’s strong. You drink that, Monifa, you’ll be awake for a week. Let me make another.”
“Oh no. Please. This is, I am sure, very fine.” Although Alice looked doubtful, Monifa added some milk and sugar, and she brought the cup to her lips. It was too strong, but she would never say. “So you have made your talent . . . the work of your life?”
“Life’s work?” Alice ran her hand over the table, seemed to find it not up to her standards, and went behind the café’s counter. She brought back a spray bottle and a rag and vigorously used them both. “I think it’s only my life’s work if I’m still learning, you know? That’s why I brought you here. I expect you can teach me a lot. You ever thought about teaching Nigerian cookery?”
Monifa cocked her head and studied Alice to see if she was joking. She said, “Me? Teaching?”
“Why not, eh? You’re going to teach me today, aren’t you?”
“That is different.”
“It isn’t. You could teach in the evenings easy. Right here in the caff if you want. I expect you could get quite a group together. ’Specially as more and more people with the funds to pay move to this area. You’re going to need something.”
“I? Why?”
Alice said nothing for a bit. She gave her attention to the Formica topping the table where they were sitting. Finally she seemed to make up her mind, for she straightened her shoulders and looked at Monifa squarely. “I’ll say this direct,” she said. “You don’t appear to be a fool, Monifa.”
“I hope not to be,” Monifa replied.
“Yeah, I bet you do hope that. But let me tell you something you likely need to hear just now. You’d be a real fool to go back to a man who’s beat you. Now, from what I can tell, Jewel’s given you a decision today. Am I right?” And when Monifa nodded, “Way I see it, then, you’re at a crossroads. It’s down to you what happens next.”
PECKHAM
SOUTH LONDON
Cynthia Swann and Clete Jensen (Clete? she had thought. Really?) were arguing as Barbara made her way to Peckham. Her choice had been to drive from Chalk Farm or to use public transport, but since public transport was going to involve tube, rail, bus, and her feet—not to mention most of her morning—she opted for driving and she’d brought along the audio version of Cynthia and Clete’s star-crossed love story to keep her blood pressure steady as she navigated the morning traffic. This had proved to be just the ticket. In the tale of found love/lost love/regained love, things were heating up. Clete had just flung himself from the ranch house that Cynthia had inherited from an uncle long estranged from the family and Clete was the cowboy who’d maintained it, skilfully keeping the ranch above water, both figuratively and literally. Cynthia had come to the ranch to acquaint herself with her inheritance in . . . Barbara could never remember the state although the description of it made her think the author had spent too much time in Australia’s outback. At any rate, here had arrived Cynthia and here had locked eyes Cynthia and Clete and here had Cynthia and Clete been thrown together by fate and by the fact that there was no other person within fifty miles save a very old former convict who preferred a solitary life. Here had both that fate and that fact decided they were meant to be as one. Within twenty-five pages they had done the deed twice with “unmatchable fulfillment,” but the third time had been their undoing—temporary though it was considering the nature of the novel—and now Clete was riding off on his stallion (there was no way he would be riding a gelding, for obvious reasons) while Cynthia sobbed at the window and watched him go. He turned back once as if having second thoughts, allowing their eyes to meet, to hold, to yearn, to soften, to cling to a promise that could not, could never go unrealised . . .
Blah, blah, blah, Barbara thought. She switched the sound off. Clete would be back. One night of unrivalled passion—or two or three nights—would never be enough for either of them. Love regained was just round the corner.
So was Padma Gallery, she discovered, although by that time she was on foot. She was lucky to find it, as it was tucked in an alley that broke off Rye Lane, and it was nearly overpowered by ZA Afro Foods and Ali Baba’s Barber. Indeed, she’d walked by it three times before she finally asked at an Asian furniture shop for a clue as to its location.
She should have seen it, she reckoned, but she’d been distracted by the brick wall into which the gallery’s door was built. The wall was heavily tagged although the imperative Feel It had been rendered with some attention to form and colour. Not that Barbara knew the first thing about art or form or colour, but she could tell Feel It was something special, whereas JOBZ RES! was clearly the work of a rank beginner.
When Barbara entered Padma Gallery, she was struck by its contrast to everything else in the alley. Inside were all creamy walls that held paintings, white pivoting stands that held sculptures, pristine glass cases that displayed jewellery, and shelves that offered various types of folk art.
A woman wearing African garb and a complicated head wrap looked up from a desk in a corner of the room. She stood and approached Barbara, her hand extended. She was Neda, she said, an associate of the gallery’s owner.
Would that be Padma? Barbara enquired.
No. Padma was the mother of the owner, Neda explained.
Barbara took the photocopy of Standing Warrior from her bag and handed it over, asking if it had come from Padma Gallery.
“Oh yes,” Neda said. “It’s called Standing Warrior,” and she confirmed that Padma Gallery had sold the piece. In London, they were the sole representative of the artist. She was from Zimbabwe. “Would you like to see it?” she asked.
“It’s here?” Barbara said, with jackpot and bingo doing the cha-cha in her skull. “Is it a consignment piece? Did someone bring it in for you to sell?”
“That happens on occasion. But in the case of Standing Warrior, I’m afraid not.”
Barbara frowned. “I’m not following. You said I could see it?”
“Of course. It’s just over here, among several other sculptures. All different artists, but grouped together they look very striking, I think.” She led Barbara farther back into the gallery, where a dimly lit alcove had cones of light striking five different pivoting stands. She stopped in front of one of the stands—the largest—and there it was, exact to the photo Ross Carver had pulled from the internet.
The piece stood some eighteen inches tall, a stylised depiction of an African warrior with spear and shield. He was thin and muscular, long-faced but without expression. He wore a necklace of beads and a ring in one ear.
“Artists working in bronze generally do limited editions of their work. This particular artist—Blessing Neube—did fifteen of Standing Warrior. She sends them to us two at a time. We don’t have the storage for more. When we sell two, she sends the next. This one is number thirteen. You can see the number on the bottom of the piece along with Blessing’s initials. May I ask what your interest is?”
Barbara identified herself and explained her interest in Standing Warrior: as a murder weapon. While Neda looked concerned at that, she nodded when Barbara asked to pick up the sculpture. It was, Barbara reckoned, perfect for use as a cosh. It was simple to grip round the warrior’s ankles, heavy enough to do serious damage, but not too heavy for a woman to wield. She observed the number 13 on the bottom, which prompted her to ask if Neda knew where the other twelve copies of Standing Warrior had gone.
Yes indeed, Neda assured her. The gallery kept records of all purchases, not only for purposes of provenance but also to alert buyers should something come to the gallery by the same artist. Barbara gave her Ross Carver’s name, and she made very short work on her computer to confirm that, yes, Mr. Ross Carver had bought a Standing Warrior. “It was numbered ten,” she said.
“I’ll need a list of the other buyers,” Barbara said. “We’ll want to contact them to make certain they’re still in possession of the piece they bought.”
Neda looked hesitant. She said, “It’s terribly irregular . . .”
“So’s a search warrant,” Barbara told her pleasantly. And she waited a moment before adding, “It’s just to make sure we know where the other Standing Warriors are.”
Neda gave a small sigh but she printed the list of buyers and handed it over. Barbara gave it a glance. Not a familiar name on it, but it was a box that wanted ticking. She dug one of her cards out of her bag and handed it over, saying, “If someone should bring the sculpture in for you to sell . . .”
“I will let you know at once, of course,” Neda assured her.
CHELSEA
SOUTH-WEST LONDON
Tani had not managed to work out why only three people lived in this house, along with a dog and a cat. It was the largest family home he’d ever seen, at least twice the size of the house where Sophie and her family lived. It had rooms for everything: bedrooms, bathrooms, library, kitchen, and those were just the beginning of the place. The previous night had introduced him to the dining room, where all of them had sat at an oblong mahogany table so polished he could see his reflection in it. Eight upholstered chairs followed its curve, and on an ancient cupboard thing against a wall, a big-arse covered soup bowl stood on a tray. To either side of it were framed pictures, all of white people, of course, but then what would you expect? There was among them a wedding picture of the couple who were housing him and Simisola at present, the bride wearing a posh white gown done up to her throat, the groom in a princely grey cutaway, her hand through his arm, his hand covering hers. We’re in love, we’re in love, the picture called out. But at the end of the day, it was just a picture.
They’d passed round plates of food, and they’d engaged in what probably went for typical rich-white-person conversation. Simisola joined in when she was asked a question directly, but when the others were talking, her round-eyed gaze merely travelled among them, as if she couldn’t quite believe her bloody good luck in ending up in such a fairy-tale happy ending household.
In the morning, after breakfast, he’d gone into the garden. He began throwing a chewed-up tennis ball for the dog. He wondered why anyone would call a dog Peach, why anyone would call a cat Alaska. Neither name made the least bit of sense to him.
Peach didn’t seem to care one way or another what she was called. At the moment, she was intent upon the ball. She barked till he threw it, she barked as she went to retrieve it, she barked when she dropped it at his feet. From the central tree, Alaska watched them, the slightest flick of the end of his tail showing he was paying attention.
“We need your opinion, Tani.”
He turned to the house. Deborah was at the top of the steps that led down to the basement kitchen. “Simi and I are looking at some pictures. How on earth did you get Peach to fetch that ball for you?”
He looked at the dog. Peach was trotting his way. “I threw it,” he said. “All dogs fetch when you throw something.”
“I see you’ve never known a dachshund,” was Deborah’s reply. “Or perhaps better said: You’ve never known this dachshund. Generally, she’ll run after the ball once, drop down to the lawn, and begin to ravage it. I mean the ball, not the lawn. I suppose we could have taught her, using the reward method. You know: bring the ball and get a treat. But none of us have the patience for that, and she’s far too wily to act as if she’s learned something, because that might prevent her earning more treats. So she’s mostly window dressing in our lives, I’m afraid. Will you join us?”
She took him to the dining room, Peach on their heels, obviously in expectation of something edible, which she did not get. A laptop was set up on the mahogany table, Simi kneeling on a chair in front of it. She greeted him with, “Deborah’s taken ever so many pictures, Tani. You must see. They’re from yesterday and we’re to choose which one we like the best. They’re ginormously nice. Come here, come here.”
He placed himself behind her chair and Simi began going through the photos. They were good, he thought. In his case, Deborah had used the light streaming into the flat from outside to create shadows hiding how beat up his face was. She’d also managed to isolate a moment when his hard shell had produced the first of its cracks, softening his expression to reveal something vulnerable. That picture made him distinctly uncomfortable.
Deborah handed him a small piece of paper. He saw that two other similar pieces had been folded into quarters and lay on the table. She told him that it was now his turn to choose three photos: one of himself, one of Simi, and one of himself and Simi together. “Simi and I have made our own choices,” she said with a gesture at the folded papers. “Now it’s your turn. We’ll compare each other’s choices at the end.”
“This’s a game?” he said.
“No, no. It’s a way to narrow down choices without influencing each other.”
“What’re you doing with them, then?”
“The photos we end up with? I’m going to give them to your mother when I meet her. Whoops. I probably shouldn’t have said that. It might influence your choice. Sorry. Try to forget I said it. Although that’s stupid, isn’t it? How are you supposed to forget what I said thirty seconds ago? Never mind. Do your best.”
She was nervous. He could tell. He made her nervous. Typical. White lady, Black teenage boy. She probably had the family silver locked up somewhere just in case.
He drew a chair over to sit next to his sister, but he didn’t begin going through the pictures at once. Instead, he thought he could actually use her nervousness, so he gave her a look and said, “Did you mean it, about Sophie?”
She looked confused for a moment. But then she said, “About her coming here to see you?” And when he nodded, “Of course. She’s very welcome.”
“I think Sophie’s ever so nice,” Simisola said. “She’s got two brothers and a sister, Deborah. She’s a secret, though, i’n’t she, Tani? I mean, Tani was meant to go to Nigeria and marry a girl there which is what he got told by Papa only Papa di’n’t know he has a girlfriend already. Only now, we think he does know because someone in the market told him.”
Deborah turned her attention to Tani, saying, “I didn’t know you were meant to go to Nigeria. Do you want to?”
“Not bloody likely,” Tani said.
“What do you want? I mean, what do you prefer?”
“You mean what do I want compared to marrying some virgin in Nigeria that I never seen?”
“That’s exactly what I mean.”
“Sixth form college for a catering certificate and then uni to read business.”
“That makes more sense to me than getting married just now. How old are you?”
“Eighteen.”
“He can’t force you to marry anyone, your dad, can he?”
“He can,” Tani told her. “Through Simi. He set it up that way.” He took up the piece of paper and jotted the numbers of the three pictures he most liked. When he folded it and put it in the centre of the table, he said, “I want to give Sophie a bell if tha’s okay.”
“Of course,” Deborah said. “Shall I write the directions down for you? So she’ll know how to get here, I mean?”
