Out Late with Friends and Regrets (28 page)

It was pleasant to get out into the late sunshine.
 
Most of the shops were closed or just closing, but Fin walked around the streets of the surrounding area, getting familiar with her temporary patch.
 
It seemed to be a mixed jumble of small businesses, bars and restaurants, with a modern low-rise office block, a bank, a Costa and a Methodist chapel.
 
Either the fresh air or the simple fact of moving about had cleared her head considerably, and she looked around for an eaterie where she wouldn’t feel too scruffy, but which wasn’t a fast food outlet.
 
A narrow-fronted restaurant called Beanbaggage appeared to fit the bill, its house style being as cheerfully casual and esoteric as the patrons she glimpsed through the window.

Climbing the stairs to 2B, with the extra weight of wild mushroom risotto and apple pie on board, Fin looked forward to a very early night and a new sense of motivation in the morning. The Herculean task of mucking out the flat would have to give way to commercial pressures tomorrow, but she should be able to spend Friday on making it habitable.
 
She was still a little anxious as to whether the shop could support her as well as her new deputy, especially if the predicted job losses in Cantlesham affected trade, as well it might.
 
Well, even if that was to be the case, she would rather get a part-time job than go back.
 
No. There would be no going back.

There was a flyer on the mat, and Fin picked it up.
 
There was a crude depiction of the head of Christ wearing what must have struck even the artist as a sinister and threatening expression.
 
Or perhaps that was the intention, the first line of text reading: “Friends, your
sin
is a
cancer
that will
kill
your
soul!
And I am talking
everlasting death
, with all the
torments
of
hell
, for ever and ever! Repent
now
, or feel
God’s wrath
! Let me tell you a story of a man who chose a life of selfishness, sin and unnatural practices!”

“That’s all I need!” Fin told the beetle-browed Christ, automatically turning the sheet over to see how long the rant went on.
 
There were just five words on the reverse, written in red biro.

“I will be watching you”

No real reason for her to tremble, or be afraid, but she did, and was.
 
She threw the sheet into the bin in the kitchen and clutched her hand, as if it had been burned by contact with the paper.
 
The shower was lukewarm, and the grudgingly-falling water had specks in it, but she washed her hair and body mechanically, mind almost numb.

Put the incident in the box on the shelf.
 
Set the angel on guard duty.
 
Childish foolishness, but it might help.

It didn’t.
 
It was very late by the time she got to sleep.

The part of her mind which had always thrown a mantle of rationality over life, even in the most nightmarish of times, registered with pragmatic disappointment that the client had placed an order for less than half that of the previous year.
 
She tried never to count too much on club clients; new treasurers took over, members fell away, stuff happened.
 
Big orders were a bonus when they came, not part of a forward projection.
 
But she had allowed herself to hope that this order would settle Roxoff’s invoice, and give her a little elbow room for making calm decisions about the direction the business seemed to be taking.
    

But she smiled in pro fashion, she joked with Dek, she chatted to browsers and served customers with the usual attention.
 
She left the shop early at four, but still found the journey back into Harford congested and tedious.
 
By the time she parked in Mornington Road and took a bus back to Clutton Street, it was six o’clock.
 
The stairwell was full of dark shadows, and despite the last of the sun piercing the grubby skylight at the top of the building, Fin felt her heart beat faster than usual as she climbed the two flights.
 
She took a deep breath as she turned the key in the lock, keeping her eyes level until she was inside.
 
Then she looked down on the mat.
 
Nothing.
 
Thank God.
 
It had struck her during the day that it might be prudent to keep the flyer, so she retrieved it from the bin, a stain from a teabag discolouring one corner, but it was still fairly flat and perfectly legible.
 
Who would do this? Perhaps the cyclist downstairs?
 
She had not seen many other inhabitants of the eight flats, only a man carrying a toolbox who had nodded to her on the stairs, and the retreating backs of a couple plodding up to the third floor.
 
Someone from outside? Ahmed? The policeman? The lorry driver? Hardly.

She had eaten half a sandwich at lunch, appetite having deserted her.
 
Now the mother inside her told her to go and get a good meal, to stoke up her energy for tomorrow’s big clean-up.
 
Beanbaggage had been a good choice last night, so she tried their fish pie with a generous helping of spinach, smiling at the thought of Popeye making short work of the cleaning in 2B.
 
She resisted a third glass of wine, but sat for a while over the second, watching this funny little place earning its living.
 
The glasses were cheap and chunky, and both furniture and cutlery were blithely mismatched.
 
The dark green walls were covered in posters, photos, drawings and objects, and the customers included Rastafarians, latter-day hippies and tourists.

Then home – no, not really home, it would never feel like home.
 
She stared at the door of the flat where the cyclist lived, wondering what would make someone do that, what would make her threaten a neighbour that way.
 
If
she were the culprit.
 
Again Fin went through her own front door, holding her breath, until again, she saw there was nothing on the mat.
 
As she turned on the radio and made a cup of tea, it occurred to her that she might not be the only one to receive such a message.
 
Suppose the girl downstairs had got one, too?
 
And all the other tenants? Since Fin herself had only just moved in, she couldn’t surely be a sole target? It must be someone with a very sick sense of humour – or just very sick – leafleting the whole building.
 
The thought gave her an enormous sense of relief.
 
Perhaps it would be a good idea to ask the original suspect whether anything of the sort had happened to her.
 
That, of course, would take a special sort of bottle, to knock on the door of the foe, the woman who had shouted at her, and had ignored her apology.
 
Ridiculous, she told herself.
 
What can she do, or say, to hurt you?
 
It was just that she had always shrunk from confrontation, and she squirmed at the thought of what she needed to do for some peace of mind.
 

Fin gave the downstairs door two sharp raps, so that there was no possibility of retreat, should the girl be in.
 
She heard steps behind the door, and the rattle of a security chain.
 
That was something she would definitely organise, at her next place.
 
2B had evidently had a chain at some stage, but the wood of the door had splintered away where it had been wrenched from
 
its moorings.
 
With the inattentive part of her brain she had noticed where the scar had been painted over, but its significance hadn’t hit her until now.

The door opened.
 
The woman was shorter than Fin, which made her feel a little better, but the eyes below the wispy fringe were steady with suspicion.

“Yes?”

“Hello, my name’s Fiona,” she began.
 
There was no reaction.

“It’s two things really; I wanted to apologise for putting your bike in my van, it was only for safety while I moved my boxes up to my flat, because I wouldn’t have been able to get them past the bikes you see, I’m sorry if you thought I’d stolen them...”

She realised she was speaking increasingly fast, and found she was also panting embarrassingly, and blushing.
 
The woman would be sure to think she was lying.

“Yeah, OK,” said the woman, with a noncommittal smile.
 
“It’s just that I’ve had bikes nicked before, and I was running late for a job interview.
 
What was the other thing? Oh, I’m Denise, by the way.”

Fin put her hand out to shake, and for a moment it seemed that Denise wasn’t going to take it, but eventually she did.

“I’ve had a rather unpleasant thing through the door – a kind of fire and brimstone religious leaflet -”

Denise’s eyebrows and the angle of her head suggested, “So?”

“- but it was what was written on the back that was really unpleasant, it said, ‘I will be watching you’.
 
I just wondered if anyone else in the flats had got one.”

“Oh, right, that does sound creepy.
 
When did it come? I certainly didn’t get one through my door.
 
I’d tell the police, if I were you.”

“Yesterday.
 
Thanks, Denise, I think I will.
 
Good night.”

The rattle of the chain being refastened was followed by the metallic slide and bang of a bolt being rammed home.

When Fin returned to 2B, she had introduced herself to five of the tenants in the block, two having been out.
 
None of the five had received the flyer through their door.

It was just her.

At least the WPC hadn’t dismissed it out of hand, although she did ask whether any of Fin’s misguided friends or colleagues might have thought it would be a bit of a joke to give her a scare.
 

Now who, amongst my enormous circle of friends and colleagues, would do a thing like that, she wondered.

The policewoman had taken details and appeared to take the incident seriously, once Fin told her that such friends and acquaintances as she had so far made in Harford had been eliminated from her own enquiries.
 
As she had suspected, there really wasn’t a great deal the police could do unless there was a repeat occurrence.

Please God, no, she thought.

She cleaned the flat to decontamination standard, making her a welcome customer of Mr. and Mrs. Khan.
 
But apart from purchasing the largest mirror in the shop to reflect more light into the living room, she made no further attempts to personalise the place.
 
The stack of boxes which filled the space between the bed and the walls in the bedroom remained untouched, except for those containing the barest necessities.

A new habit developed.
 
Each time she left the flat, she checked the windows and front door twice, and was particularly careful about the outer door of the building.
 
Other tenants sometimes left it unlatched, even after the postman had been, but there was nothing she could do about that. Out in the street she looked back from the corner, to see if anyone was showing interest in the entrance to number 6.
 
On her return she would study the 2B on the door to the flat, mutter “You don’t have the power to touch me,” and once inside count to three before looking down at the mat.
 
There was only ever junk mail.

“You’re getting slightly paranoid, Fin,” said Ellie a week later, as they slurped the Fairtrade froth on a Beanbaggage cappuccino, “you really need to get out of that place as soon as possible, even if it’s somewhere else temporary.”

“Nothing wrong with a little prudent paranoia!” replied Fin with a smile.
 
“But I shall be very glad to get out of that dump, anyway.
 
I’ve been searching hard, believe me.”

As soon as she was able to move out again, she would take the evidence out of its acetate file pocket, and burn it.
 
But not until she was actually in the new place.
 
Maybe after she was really settled.
 
A week or so, maybe.
 
Perhaps she would give it a month.
 
Just in case.