Bryant & May - London's Glory: (Short Stories) (Bryant & May Collection) (11 page)

May behaved differently around such women. He felt somehow vulnerable and awkward, as if he was a teenager again. The change was obvious enough to wring sarcastic responses from those who knew him well, but there was absolutely nothing he could do about it.

Opening her handbag, she took out a monochrome photograph and pushed it across the desk. ‘I thought I should let you know what I’m going to do,’ she said. ‘I want there to be no mistakes or misunderstandings.’

‘I’m sorry, I’m not quite with you,’ said May uneasily, sensing something bad approaching.

‘In one week’s time I’m going to kill this man. There’s nothing you can say or do that will make me change my mind.’

For a moment May wondered if he had indeed wandered into a 1940s noir movie. ‘We’re not a private detection agency,’ he said, ‘we’re a unit seconded to the City of London Police. You can’t just come in here and tell me you’re going to kill someone.’

The woman raised an eyebrow. ‘Then who
should
I tell?’

‘No one. Well, I mean, you’re not actually allowed to kill anyone. Who is he? Your husband, your boyfriend? What has he done that makes you think he deserves to die?’ The photograph showed a handsome, tanned businessman in early middle age, sleek and well groomed.

‘If I told you, you wouldn’t …’ She searched carefully for the right words. ‘… appreciate the problem.’

‘If anything happens to this man, you’ll be arrested. Am I allowed to know who he is?’

‘His name is Madden. He’s rich and successful.’ Slipping crimson nails under the photograph, she dropped it back in her bag.

‘And he’s hurt you?’

‘No.’

‘Then why come here and tell me this?’

‘Because in a week’s time he’ll be dead, and you’ll come looking for me.’

‘I don’t know who you are,’ said May, exasperated.

‘No, but you will,’ she said, rising and leaving.

Against his better judgement May had a look for Madden, but with only a surname and his memory to guide him he drew a blank. One week later, the PCU received a call about a man who had drowned in the rooftop swimming pool of an exclusive City club near the Guildhall. He had indeed been identified as Joel Madden. A young woman had been picked up on the building’s CCTV, and was now being sent to them for questioning. And so it was that John May found himself in the unit’s interview room sitting opposite the very same woman, once again clad in dark couture.

‘You refused to give your name to the officers, is that correct?’ he asked, determined not to let her undermine him a second time, which was fine until she said:

‘I told them I would only talk to you.’

‘Why me?’

‘Because we’ve already met.’ Her relaxed attitude astounded him.

‘You were seen leaving the swimming pool,’ said May, emptying out the evidence bag that had been placed before him. Inside were several photographs of the deceased that Giles Kershaw had sent over. Madden did not look like a drowning victim, more like someone who had just drifted off to sleep. He read Giles’s report. Chlorinated water in the lungs; no external markings beyond a faint red line on the left wrist. He turned his attention back to the suspect.

‘Do you want to tell me in your own words exactly what happened?’

The woman sat motionless, her bag on her knees, but she allowed herself the smallest of smiles …

Joel Madden swam with the same languor, the same sense of luxury he possessed out of the water, his tanned arms lifting and falling through the cool blue shadows.

He was happiest at night on his own in swimming pools, during business trips to faraway hotels, or even here at the club near his office. He liked to watch the pool glazing on his exit, the last one to leave. Rolling on to his back, he studied the rivulets of rain sliding down the glass canopy as he lazily drifted beneath it. He had already swum his thirty lengths; now he could relax in these final few minutes of freedom before heading home for the weekend. The Beijing contract had been renegotiated this week, and he had led the team to a hard-won victory. It was a pity he couldn’t stay on in town and have fun, but duty called.

The tight-fitting plastic goggles locked him into a cool green world. Chlorine affected his vision adversely. More than ever he found himself wearing shaded lenses of some kind; his eyes were becoming sensitive to the bright strip-lighting at work. He had considered buying photochromic glasses, but wondered how they would affect his appearance.

He was forty-one and in good shape, vain about his ability to maintain a flat stomach. He felt he still had his pick of the females, and his current girlfriend, an astonishingly athletic nineteen-year-old from Poland, watched him with a possessiveness that made every one of his male colleagues feel bitter about themselves. His wife pretended everything was fine, and spent her days with the children or at her laptop, taking courses in Spanish and figure-drawing or wandering around malls looking at hideous hand-woven rugs, for which she had developed a penchant. She seemed to be happier when not having to think about him, which suited both of them. She looked after their house near the coast and he lived in an overpriced City apartment from Monday to Friday, reasonably arguing that it lessened his commute and increased his productivity. The last time he failed to turn up for her birthday party he bought her a horse by way of compensation, so everyone was happy.

At this time of night there was usually no one else left in the swimming pool. The rest of the lane-ploughing high-flyers had showered and dressed, to disperse in every direction from the City, having burned off the aggression they would otherwise have taken out on their families. One other swimmer remained, a slender young woman with cropped blonde hair, seated motionless at the left-hand corner of the deep end. She was wearing a white bikini that was cut outrageously low. To be honest, he was surprised the club had allowed her in dressed like that. The bikini bottom slimmed to a single silver string at the sides and left very little to the imagination.

The young woman rested her palms on the edge of the pool and leaned back, staring up into the fluttering mesh of reflected light that danced arabesques on the glass canopy.

‘I went for a swim,’ she told John May. ‘The club was getting ready to close. Mr Madden was the only other person in the pool. I swam for a short while and left.’

‘You didn’t speak to him, have anything to do with him?’

‘No.’

‘You didn’t touch him?’

‘No.’

‘What was Mr Madden doing when you left?’

She held his gaze just long enough to make him feel foolish. ‘Swimming.’

May checked the evidence bag again. There was no CCTV coverage in or around the pool for the sake of propriety. A private club, old school. They operated under their own rules. Madden had been found at the bottom of the deep end. There was nothing else out of the ordinary anywhere. The changing rooms had already been searched, and nothing had been found out of place except a small pair of nail scissors left in the ladies’ dressing area.

‘The City Sports Guild,’ he said. ‘You’re a member of this place?’

‘No.’

‘Then how did you get in?’

‘I walked in.’

‘And nobody stopped you?’

‘No.’

He didn’t doubt her word. She had a look that could open doors, and some of the City clubs were so discreet that they always appeared to be deserted. But there was supposed to be somebody on the reception desk.

‘Can you give me exact timings for when you arrived and when you left?’

‘Of course.’

May was starting to understand the situation he was in. If he failed to establish any link between her and the dead man, he would have to let her go. In a heavily chlorinated pool there was unlikely to be salvageable DNA evidence. There was even a possibility that she had picked the Peculiar Crimes Unit because it was not a police station; visitors weren’t filmed. There were supposed to be cameras in the ground-floor corridor, but the two Daves, the Turkish workmen who never seemed to leave the building, had yet to put them in place. Someone had done their homework very carefully.

‘Is there anything else you can tell me about what happened?’ May asked, puzzled.

Madden lowered his feet, reaching down to touch the sloping floor of the pool. He stood still and allowed the water to settle. Through his green lenses the woman looked confident and attractive. It could do no harm to swim up beside her. He took his time, windmilling slowly, kicking once in a while, then gliding to the tiled edge.

He decided not to remove his goggles because his hair dripped chlorine into his eyes, and besides, they left oval rings on his face. Resting the soles of his feet against the wall of the deep end, he gripped the edge and flexed his muscular arms, looking up at her.

When she turned her face down, it was to look past him. Fascinated by the slivers of light that pierced the pool and descended into pale helices, she seemed determined not to look his way.

‘Come on in,’ he said. ‘The water’s perfect.’

The young woman allowed a moment to pass before she turned to him. ‘I’m not a good swimmer. It’s a little too deep for me.’

‘It’s the best time to swim,’ he said, ‘when it’s quiet like this.’

She glanced around. ‘Isn’t there supposed to be a lifeguard on duty?’

‘It’s a private club, not a municipal pool. Tucker likes a drink. He usually goes off once the bar’s open upstairs.’

‘Ah. I’ve never been here before. I’m using a friend’s membership.’

‘I’m not sure that’s in the rules,’ he said. ‘Perhaps you should come in and get wet, just for appearances.’

‘I’m fine here. The water relaxes me. I just have to look at it. I like the reflections.’ She pointed over to the diving board, where buttresses of light danced around the ladder and dropped into the refracting depths.

His smile broadened to reveal perfect bleached teeth. He thought it made him look boyish, but against the wavering blue it gave him the appearance of a marine predator.

‘What’s your name?’ he asked.

‘You already know it.’ Her voice was as cool as the water. ‘We’ve met before.’

‘No, I don’t think so.’

‘We most definitely have.’

‘Trust me, I never forget a …’ The sentence hung unfinished. He studied her through the green lenses until she began to look uncomfortable. He raised his goggles in order to see her a little more closely. Now he could see that she had remarkably blue irises.

‘You could be right,’ he told her. ‘Did we go for dinner somewhere?’

‘You
do
remember.’

‘It’s distracting, seeing people without their clothes on. One doesn’t tend to look at the eyes. Yes, we did, didn’t we? We went for something to eat. It was one night in the week. Did we have a date?’

‘Not really. But I felt like I got to know you.’

‘How was I?’

‘You were very funny.’

‘Was I? I wonder what put me in such high spirits.’ It was like fishing. He liked the pull on the line, the turn of the reel, the way the fish tacked back and forth behind the boat, gradually growing tired, being brought ever closer. ‘When was this?’ he asked.

‘Mmm.’ She thought for a moment. ‘About four years ago.’

‘That long?’ She didn’t look more than twenty-five. ‘Where did we go?’

‘A restaurant in Soho with a French name. L’Escargot, I think. The food was very nice. Expensive. You ordered a dozen green-lipped oysters.’

‘Really?’ That wasn’t much of a clue. He always ordered a dozen oysters when he’d just met an attractive girl. Oysters had the taste of victory. He maintained the smile, intrigued.

‘Yes,’ said the young woman, remembering. ‘You insisted on paying for absolutely everything.’

‘Now that doesn’t sound like me at all.’ He laughed. ‘What did we do after?’

‘We went to a club just across the road from the restaurant and drank cava at champagne prices.’

‘And I paid again?’

She nodded slowly. ‘You must have done. I think I was out of work at the time. I remember your name. It’s Joel. And you can’t remember mine.’

‘I’m not good with names. Faces and bodies, though, I’m usually good with those.’ The amusement faded slowly to a warmth between them, but the water started to feel cold on his back and thighs. He moved a little closer to her.

‘So tell me,’ he coaxed, ‘where exactly did we meet?’

‘I’m sure you’ll remember if you put your mind to it,’ she teased. ‘You paid for all the drinks in the club as well. Do you always pay for everything?’

‘I consider it the gentlemanly thing to do. I like your bikini.’

‘Do you?’ She fingered the side-string. ‘You paid for this too. In a roundabout way.’

‘Now that’s impossible. I only buy presents for—’

‘For your wife.’

He was growing a little uncomfortable. He liked to be in control. There was something about her that bothered him.

‘I told you I was married?’

‘You even showed me her photograph. It was in your wallet.’

‘You know what? I think you’re bluffing.’ He wagged his finger at her.
Naughty girl.
She pretended not to feel patronized. ‘You’re making all this up. Lots of men like oysters; lots of men keep photos of their wives in their wallets.’

‘To be fair, you were a little bit drunk when we met. You’d been celebrating a deal. Some kind of merger.’

He shrugged, shook his head. He was growing tired of this game. But then she shifted her position at the pool edge, opening her thighs slightly. Her bikini bottom was no bigger than a cocktail napkin folded in half. He felt himself heating up.

‘You still don’t know who I am.’

‘I give up,’ he said impatiently, ‘just tell me.’

‘OK. Come here and I’ll let you in on a little secret.’

She said this very slowly. If he hadn’t known better, he would have sworn she was trying to beat him at his own game. Without moving another inch she somehow managed to beckon him closer, and knew he would follow because she was young and attractive and he was intrigued.

A sixth sense told him that something was not right. It was the kind of sense that made one halt at a kerb, take a foot off an accelerator or step back from an excited animal, but he was not a man to be intimidated by common-sense rules. Pulling his broad arms up on the pool edge, he drew himself closer still. As much as he wanted to fathom her motives, his eyes could not resist following the outline of her body. His arm was almost touching her thigh.