Desolate places, p.9
Desolate Places, page 9
Absorbed, she wasn’t at all sure how much time had passed when her doorbell rang.
Bella rushed to the door, her tail wagging, and Callie followed, trying to imagine who it might be. She didn’t think she had any appointments, and wasn’t expecting a delivery. Marco, maybe? Or her brother?
On the other side of the door was Zuzanna, and behind her a young man, perhaps in his mid-twenties. In contrast with Zuzanna’s blond fairness, the man was black-haired and brown-eyed. He was burdened with a large rucksack and carried something bundled in his arms.
‘Miss Callie, I am sorry,’ Zuzanna began, looking like she might be ready to cry.
Callie opened the door wider. ‘Come in,’ she said. ‘No need to be sorry.’
‘This is Tariq,’ Zuzanna said as they came into her flat. ‘He is my … my boyfriend.’ She gave Callie a self-conscious smile.
‘It’s good to meet you.’ Callie extended her hand to the young man, who awkwardly shifted his bundle before he was able to shake it.
He spoke for the first time. ‘Zuzanna has told me about you. You’ve been very kind to her. Thank you for that.’
His English, Callie realised with some relief, was much better than Zuzanna’s, and only slightly accented. ‘I haven’t done anything special,’ she demurred.
‘You were there when she needed someone to talk to.’
That was her job, Callie wanted to say. But instead she smiled at the young couple and ushered them into her sitting room. ‘Can I get you something to drink?’ she offered. ‘Tea? Coffee?’
Tariq spoke for both of them. ‘No, thank you.’ He put his burden down in the corner and shrugged off his rucksack. ‘If you don’t mind.’
‘Of course not. Make yourselves at home.’
The two of them sat on the sofa, close together, while Callie perched on a chair. Zuzanna stroked Bella, who settled at her feet, then leaned back and snuggled into Tariq’s encircling arm. Seeming to take courage as well as comfort from him, she addressed Callie with a boldness she hadn’t previously displayed. ‘Tariq, he need place to stay,’ she said. ‘Just tonight, maybe. Or maybe longer. He stay here, Miss Callie? On your floor, maybe?’
Callie looked over at Tariq’s belongings and realised that the bundle he’d carried was a sleeping bag.
She didn’t even think about it – about the consequences, about what Brian would say. About what Marco would say. She responded from her heart, and from her instincts. ‘Yes, she said. ‘Yes, of course.’
Mark Lombardi was waiting at the mortuary when Ben Chapman arrived. He was in no doubt that the young man who strode through the door was the one he was there to meet: he was tall, well-dressed in a City suit and an expensive-looking silk tie, and he had the confident air – reinforced somehow by the heavy tortoiseshell-framed spectacles he wore – of one who was not intimidated by even such a setting.
‘Mr Chapman?’
‘That’s right.’
‘I’m Sergeant Mark Lombardi, and I’ve been assigned to act as your Family Liaison Officer in the matter of your mother’s death.’
Ben Chapman shook his head. ‘I’m certain there’s some mistake here, Sergeant. A big mistake. I don’t believe for one minute that my mother is dead.’
‘That is what we’re here to establish,’ Mark reminded him. ‘In the absence of your father, who is I believe in Wiltshire, you are here as next-of-kin to identify the body.’
‘Or not.’
‘I suppose it’s possible that a mistake has been made,’ Mark conceded. ‘Anyway, thank you for coming.’
‘I’m a busy man, Sergeant. Let’s get this over with, shall we?’
No tension-easing chit-chat, then. No preliminary cup of tea. ‘All right, Mr Chapman. It’s this way.’ He led the way into the viewing room which had been prepared in advance, the covered body on a gurney.
The attendant met them with a sad smile. ‘Thanks, Ray,’ said Mark.
‘No problem.’ He pulled back the sheet from the face.
Mark’s eyes were on Ben Chapman rather than the body. The man gasped, paled visibly, and reached out an instinctive hand for some sort of support which wasn’t there.
While Ray re-covered the face, Mark took Chapman’s arm and led him to a folding chair at the side of the room. ‘Sit here,’ he said. ‘Would you like some tea? Water? Something else?’
The man was trembling; he buried his face in his hands as he sank onto the chair. ‘No. Nothing.’
Mark spoke gently. ‘It’s your mother, then?’
Ben Chapman nodded.
‘Tell me what’s happened,’ said Callie.
Zuzanna spoke quickly. ‘Mr Wicker, he tell Tariq to go away.’
Wicker – the hotel manager. ’Away from the hotel?’
She nodded.
Callie was confused. Maybe, she reasoned, Tariq was hanging round the place and distracting Zuzanna from her work. But Zuzanna wasn’t at the hotel: she’d been sent away earlier.
The young man tightened his arm round Zuzanna’s shoulders and explained the situation to Callie. He worked at the hotel, in the kitchen. That was how he and Zuzanna had met, and where they’d fallen in love. But that morning, after he’d cleaned up at the end of the breakfast shift, Wicker had told him to clear off and not come back until he contacted him.
He pulled a phone out of his pocket. ‘Mr Wicker said he would ring me in a few days, when things had calmed down. When it was safe to come back.’
‘I don’t understand. Why can’t you go home?’
The young man gave her a grave smile, infused with sorrow. ‘I have no home,’ he said simply. ‘Mr Wicker allows me to sleep in a store room at the back of the kitchen. That’ – he pointed to his sleeping bag and rucksack – ‘is my home. It is all I have. Mr Wicker told me to pack it all up and take it away.’
‘You can’t stay with Zuzanna?’
The girl shook her head vehemently. ‘My sister. Krysia. She would not allow. She not even know about Tariq.’
‘But why haven’t you told her?’ Callie spoke impulsively, without thinking. A second later she realised the answer to her question, even before Zuzanna opened her mouth to reply.
‘Tariq is not Polish. Tariq is not Catholic. Tariq is not … Christian. Krysia, she would not like him. She would not allow.’
Tariq took Zuzanna’s small pale hand in his olive one and squeezed it. ‘I’m Syrian,’ he said. ‘I’m Muslim. But I love Zuzanna very much. I want to marry her.’
Zuzanna’s smile, in spite of everything, was radiant. ‘You see, Miss Callie? You see how it is?’
Callie saw all too well. Romeo and Juliet had nothing on this pair. After all, unlike this star-crossed pair – and herself and Marco, for that matter – Romeo and Juliet were both Italian, and both Roman Catholic. The friar had no problem marrying them.
‘Miss Callie, I tell Tariq you will do wedding for us.’
Never had Callie been gladder that her status as a deacon did not allow her to perform marriages. ‘I can’t,’ she said quickly. ‘Not that I don’t want to. But I can’t marry people until I’m a priest.’
‘You said you would be priest soon,’ Zuzanna reminded her. ‘Soon. Then you will do wedding?’
Sid Cowley lit up a fag as soon as they were out of the Regent Hotel. ‘What a piece of work,’ he pronounced. ‘He’s hiding something – there’s absolutely no doubt in my mind.’
Neville couldn’t disagree with that pronouncement. ‘He isn’t very keen on us talking to his employees, for a start.’
‘Ring her,’ Cowley urged. ‘Ring that Polish cleaner.’
‘I’ll do it when we get back to the station. I need to check a few things first.’ He unlocked the car and climbed into the driver’s seat. ‘Speaking of phones, Sid, something just occurred to me. The dead woman – did she have a mobile? I don’t think there was one on the bedside table, was there?’
Cowley scratched his head. ‘No. But there was one in her handbag, I’m pretty sure.’
Neville put that on his mental list of things to check up on at the station. ‘You were so busy drooling over the bag – Coach, wasn’t it? – to worry about little things like a phone.’
‘I found her driving license, didn’t I?’
‘You did,’ he admitted.
Running through his priorities on the short drive back to the station, Neville made some decisions, and they involved delegation. ‘Okay, Sid,’ he said as he pulled into the car park. ‘Here’s what I want you to do. First, put out that fag.’
Cowley gave him a reproachful look, opened the car door, tossed the cigarette on the tarmac and ostentatiously ground it out with his heel.
‘Then go and find that bag. If there’s a phone in it, bring it to me in my office. Or … no, wait. If it’s unlocked and useable, bring it to me. If you can’t easily get into it, take it to the techies and see what they can do. Then you can make the arrangements to get everyone at the bloody Regent Hotel fingerprinted – and get DNA samples, while they’re at it. Check with the SOCOS to see what sorts of prints they’ve come up with at the crime scene. Or anything else we ought to know, for that matter,’ he added. ‘I need to make some phone calls.’
Callie decided it was time to change the subject – away from weddings. ‘Mr Wicker,’ she said. ‘Why would he send you away? Why doesn’t he want you to talk to the police?’
The two young people looked quickly at each other, then down. Neither one of them spoke, and neither would meet Callie’s eyes.
‘What aren’t you telling me?’
The silence stretched, uncomfortably, into a great many seconds. Finally, reluctantly, Tariq raised his head. ‘I must trust you,’ he said. ‘I will tell you. It is because I am … not legal.’
‘Not legal?’
‘I did not enter this country legally,’ he amplified. ‘It is better if you don’t know all of the details, but I came from Syria. I had to leave. It took many weeks, many months. And reaching England – it is not easy. They don’t want us here,’ he added with a flash of bitterness. ‘But I came. I got here to London. No passport, no papers – no way to get work. I need work to live.’
‘What sort of work did you do in Syria?’ Callie asked.
He gave her a bittersweet, twisted smile. ‘I was an English teacher. Can you believe that, Miss Callie?’
‘I wondered why your English was so good.’
Tariq looked gratified. ‘I learned English at school, studied it at university. Everyone wants to learn English, so it was a good job. But no one in London needs a Syrian English teacher. Even if I had papers, even if I were legal.’
‘But Mr Wicker gave you a job?’
‘I asked around. Someone told me to try the Regent Hotel. They said that Mr Wicker wouldn’t be too picky, wouldn’t ask too many questions.’
‘Mr Wicker pay Tariq very bad,’ Zuzanna interjected, frowning.
Tariq squeezed her hand. ‘Nothing on the books, so he can get away with it. He gives me a roof over my head – of sorts – and feeds me three meals a day.’
‘Food very bad, too,’ stated Zuzanna. ‘Cheap food.’
‘Every week he slips me a few quid in cash. And that’s it. That’s my life.’
Callie was appalled. It must have showed on her face.
‘It’s not ideal,’ Tariq said with a philosophic shrug. ‘But it’s better than living on the streets. And it’s better than living in Syria – trust me on that.’
‘But that man Wicker – he’s exploiting you! And he was only thinking of himself when he sent you away. He just doesn’t want to get caught doing something illegal.’ Callie’s sense of justice kicked into action, followed rapidly by indignation. ‘You shouldn’t let him get away with it!’
He shrugged again, and spread his hands in an eloquent gesture. ‘What can I do?’
Callie thought about Marco, and about his other friends in the police. Decent people, all of them, working to see the right thing done. ‘My fiancé is a policeman,’ she said slowly. ‘You could talk to him. I’m sure that something—‘
‘No!’ Zuzanna jumped up from the sofa and interrupted her. ‘No! No police!’
‘But he could give you advice. He could—’
’No police!’ She was crying now, already on the verge of hysteria. ‘Police not understand. Police, they would send Tariq back to Syria!’
Callie reached for a box of tissues and held it out wordlessly. Zuzanna grabbed one, pressing it to her face as her shoulders shook with emotion. ‘Please! Please, Miss Callie! No police! You must promise.’
‘But …’
‘Promise!’ Zuzanna took a step closer to her and stretched out an imploring hand. ‘We trust you, Miss Callie. You must promise, no police.’ She waited.
‘All right,’ said Callie reluctantly. ‘I promise.’
There were important phone calls to be made, but first things first.
Neville grabbed his office phone and rang Triona’s mobile; she picked up after three rings. ‘Thanks for nothing, Stewart,’ she snapped. ‘You just woke me up.’
‘Sorry. I just wanted to see how you’re doing.’
Triona sighed. ‘I’m feeling a bit better, I suppose. But washed out. All I want to do is sleep.’
‘No more contractions, then?’
‘Not since last night.’
Neville let out a breath he hadn’t realised he was holding. ‘I’ll let you get back to sleep, then. And I’ll see you tonight.’ He added, almost self-consciously, ‘I love you,’ then pushed the button to end the call before she had a chance to reply. Or not.
His next call was to Mark Lombardi’s mobile. Mark answered immediately. ‘Did you get my voice message?’
‘No,’ Neville admitted. ‘I didn’t even check.’ He wasn’t very keen on mobile phones. The one he had was rather antiquated and not easy to use; Neville tended to keep it switched off and didn’t check his messages as often as he knew that he should. ‘What did it say?’
‘Only that I’ve been at the mortuary with Ben Chapman and he ID-ed his mother’s body. Didn’t want to believe it, and he didn’t take it very well. Now I’m awaiting further instructions from you.’
‘Where is Chapman now? Are you with him?’
‘He’s gone back to work. I tried to tell him he should go home, but he wasn’t having it. Apparently the financial stability of the planet depends on him being at his desk,’ Mark added ironically.
Neville rubbed his cheek, discovering a small patch he’d missed during his hasty morning shave. ‘Well, mate,’ he said, ‘it sounds like you’ve done all you could at this point. You’ve given him information on how to contact you?’
‘He said he didn’t need a Family Liaison Officer. But he did take my card. Reluctantly.’
‘And you know how to reach him, as well?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then I’d say you can leave it till tomorrow, unless he rings you later. Give him a follow-up call tomorrow. Or show up on his doorstep, if you think that would be more effective. I’ll try to keep you posted about what’s going on at this end. Not much, so far,’ Neville added ruefully. It’s early days. We know who she was, we know how she died. And that’s about it. So if I were you, I’d just go ahead and enjoy the rest of your day off.’
‘Ha,’ said Mark. ‘Cheers, mate.’
Neville put down the phone, then fished in his pocket till he found the scrap of paper he’d been given by Ronald Wicker. He smoothed it out on his desk. ‘Zuzanna Dabrowska,’ he said aloud, practicing, then reached again for the phone.
He was disappointed but not surprised when, after a few rings, he was told by a mechanical voice, ‘I’m sorry, but the person you called is not available. Please leave a message after the tone.’
7
PC Grace Long couldn’t stop thinking about Felicity Chapman, dead in a London hotel room. Admittedly, the case was a huge – and rather exciting – departure from the usual routine activities which filled the days of a junior police officer in rural Wiltshire. But something about it had reached her on a deeper level.
After the visit to Alan Chapman, mindful of the sensitive and confidential nature of the case, she hadn’t said anything about it to her father or her brother. She’d been quiet through tea, and had retired rather earlier than usual to her room, the better to be alone with her own thoughts.
Propped up in bed, she’d tried for a while to read the crime novel she had from the library – it was an old one by Ann Cleeves, and up till tonight she’d been utterly absorbed in it. But she’d found her mind wandering again and again away from Vera in Northumberland to Felicity Chapman, dead in a London hotel room. Eventually she’d given up on Vera and retrieved her notebook, reading and re-reading the notes she’d made during the interview with Alan Chapman.
On Friday morning she’d hoped to discuss the case with Tom Burton. Tom, though, wasn’t at his desk in the morning, and she wasn’t able to catch up with him until lunch-time, when she spotted him in the canteen. He was hunched over the usual Friday fare – fish and chips – and looked up reluctantly as she arrived beside him.
‘Is there any news?’ Grace asked eagerly.
‘News? What sort of news?’
‘About Felicity Chapman.’
Burton frowned and shoved a chip in his mouth. ‘Why would I have any news? It’s not our case, sweetheart.’
‘But we were … involved.’
He shook his head. ‘We did what we were asked to do. End of. It’s nothing to do with us.’
Grace felt like stamping her foot. Instead she pulled out the chair across from him and sat down, fixing him with a stare which her father would have recognised as dangerous.
He ate another chip, hacked off a piece of fish, and conveyed it to his mouth.
Grace continued to stare at him silently.
