Staging Death (14 page)

Hunching from me, he muttered into the intercom. That wasn’t a very good idea. If I’d been young and rash I might have risked sprinting past him when his back was so literally turned.

‘His dresser says he’s on his way out now. Do you want to hang on?’

No. I really didn’t. This was a very foolish enterprise. Just as I was about to shake my head and flee, a familiar silhouette materialised. I was standing with my back to the light, so it took Toby a moment to realise who I was. As soon as he did, he rushed forward to give me the sort of extravagant social kiss that means nothing. But he held me just a fraction too long.

‘Vee, my darling, what an unexpected treat.’ He tucked my arm in his, and we set off towards the river. Dropping my arm unceremoniously, he stopped at the foot of Sheep Street. ‘I’ve been clocked by a paparazzo. Drat. Just what poor Allyn needs is a shot of me with Another Woman. Even if it is only you,’ he added, with less care than I’d have liked for my ego.

‘Keep walking. In fact, speed up. Look at your watch as if you’re late for a business meeting. There’s a new fabric shop in Bell Court. If it’s not closed – and it just might be – we’re going to look at material for your bathroom curtains.’

‘I thought you’d ordered—’

‘Of course I have. But he doesn’t know that. Anyway if he gets close enough, I shall give him my business card.’

‘Will it work?’ he muttered out of the side of his mouth.

‘Hitching up your toga and running sure as
hell won’t. Is it true you don’t wear anything underneath it?’

‘Baggage! Who told you that?’

‘No one told me. But someone asked me,’ I said. ‘Anyway, the moment you get home you tell Allyn I’d come to ask you a favour. Which has the virtue of being true. I may need freebies at short notice. This is the problem.’ I explained.

By the time I’d finished, we were almost at the shopping mall and the pavements were more crowded. If we’d really made the effort we could have shed the snapper, but that would have looked more suspicious, in my book at least. In fact we were spared the pantomime of choosing new fabric: the
Open
sign was being turned to
Closed
even as we reached the door.

‘I’m going to lose my rag with you,’ I told him. ‘I’m expostulating with you for being late for your appointment here. Do you understand how professionally damaging that is for me? Really, Mr Frensham, you have behaved most irresponsibly. And now I am about to turn on my heel and go back to Greg’s to pick up my bike and you are going to seek out Allyn, wherever she might be, and explain the whole charade. Especially the part about asking you for comps for a pair of old-age pensioners. Do you get that?’

He held up his hands, showing the very back
of the gods how apologetic he was. He said, ‘Are you sure you’re supposed to call them that? Isn’t it ageist?’

‘What would you know about that?’ Damn me if I didn’t feel a giggle coming on, which would have ruined the whole performance. I’d never corpsed during a performance and I wasn’t about to now.

‘I think they’re called senior citizens, the silver generation, the bus pass army – anything.’ His words responded to mine; his posture expressed apology to the point of contrition. ‘Anyway, give me a call as and when you need them.’ He bowed formally, and turned back into the street.

With another huge shrug, I turned round and set off back to Greg’s, as I’d planned. Clearly, with my face still expressing tight-lipped anger, I couldn’t turn round to watch his ongoing expression of hangdoggery, but I bet it would have won an Oscar.

The evening was pleasant enough for me to spend a few minutes tidying up the front garden. This didn’t mean digging up weeds – it meant picking up other people’s litter. One polythene carrier wasn’t empty. Some obliging soul had gathered up its doggy’s deposits and in the absence of a red bin within five yards had slung it over my fence. I was just striding back from the bin when I was
hailed by one of my neighbours, a real
keenie-beany
who ran our Neighbourhood Watch. I thought he’d long since given me up as a dead loss, but here he was, bustling towards me.

‘Ms Burford, I wanted to ask you about some strange vehicles we’ve had hanging round here. I don’t suppose you’ve had any visitors in Chelsea tractors?’

Half of me wanted to ask with a snarl if I looked as if I had such rich friends. But of course I did. So I managed a puzzled shake of the head. ‘Not to my knowledge,’ I said carefully. ‘The only big car I see regularly round here belongs to that man I’m sure’s dealing drugs. You know, thumping hi-fi and tinted windows.’

‘The number of times I’ve reported him to our community support officer. And what’s happened? Nothing’s happened, that’s what. Disgraceful.’

‘Absolutely. And what do you want me to do if I spot any of these big cars?’

‘Just keep an eye open for suspicious behaviour, that’s all at this stage. And report anything to the next meeting – which is on Tuesday. I don’t suppose you’d like to come along? No, no one ever does.’

‘I’ll do my best,’ I assured him earnestly. ‘Unless anything crops up, of course.’ To my shame, I hoped something would.

I had agreed to have lunch one day with Greg’s rival estate agent, Heather – the one he’d passed over for promotion; a couple of emails established that we should meet on Tuesday.

Much as ladies who lunch like a leisurely meal in the elegant surroundings of a hotel such as the Alveston Manor, Heather didn’t have the time and I didn’t have the money to match our aspirations. Or, of course, the suit. At least Heather knew Greg’s meanness first hand, and had come up with the idea of a set-menu lunch at her favourite Thai restaurant, the Thai Kingdom. She even had the foresight to book an outdoor table, the spring weather continuing so kind. She offered to pick me up from outside our office in her latest toy, a hybrid car, totally disconcerting in its silence. Since we immediately got stuck in a jam, I’d have thought we’d have done better to
walk. I said nothing, but her hips tacitly agreed with me. She must have put on a stone since she’d left, a fact even her beautifully cut suit couldn’t conceal.

What if I put on that amount of weight? Actually, it wasn’t the weight itself that worried me: I’d always thought a little comfortable flesh was quite attractive. As for poor Allyn and her diet from hell…

No, I was concerned simply with my girth. If I couldn’t get into my summer outfits, I’d be scuppered. Claire had assured me that the Wimpoles’ move was progressing nicely, but in house buying, even when everything goes on
well-oiled
wheels, the whole process is horribly slow – and not just for the parties directly involved, of course. I’d have to remind Greg to give the Sedgwicks a little nudge in the direction of their new home. Always assuming they’d found one.

With clothes in mind, I ordered what seemed the most figure-friendly options, a hot sour prawn soup followed by chicken with chilli and basil. Much as I would have loved a green curry, I could see the calories leaping off the plate and on to my waist if I risked anything involving coconut milk.

Apart from the fact that we liked each other, Heather and I had little in common except our jobs. So we tended to talk shop. I had to be
careful to do no more than mock Greg gently – I might want to tear strips off him from time to time, but that was because I was his sister, and I might moan about him to Claire, but only because he was the boss, and it was a serf’s privilege to moan about the moneyed classes. Heather, on the other hand, felt free to sound off about him personally, but not, it seemed, enquire about the state of his business. If we talked about clients – and I’d never even mention the Thorpes and their goodies – we gave no names. We could talk about properties coming on to the market, but not give away details that might encourage each other to poach them.

All the rules were tacit, but rules nonetheless.

And I was about to break one the moment we’d given our orders to our charming Thai waitress, exquisite in a silk outfit that I could have got away with only ten years ago.

‘Do the names Brosnic, Gunter, Turovsky and Cope mean anything to you?’ I asked. As questions went, it was a bit bald, but so be it.

‘You’ve mentioned the Turovskys before, haven’t you? And the Brosnics? So I’ve kept my eyes open, but there’s no sign of them. We haven’t had many really big, old houses on our books recently. I suppose we’ve been too busy trying to corner the modern sector of the market.’

‘Each to his or her own,’ I said, equably.

‘But we have just been asked to handle an Edwardian farmhouse. I wonder if that would be their sort of thing. Why, are they still troubling you?’

‘Only by their absence.’ I explained, omitting my theory, however, about their involvement in a crime. ‘They seemed so nice, so genuine. You know how you loathe some would-be purchasers on sight, and warm to others.’

She nodded. ‘I had a real brute the other day. He seemed to take it as a matter of personal affront that we didn’t have any large sprawling properties on our books. I pointed out that estate agents specialise in a particular area of the market. I may even have recommended Burford’s.’

‘No, no – you wouldn’t go that far, surely!’ I joked.

‘Actually,’ she said seriously, ‘I wouldn’t have wanted you to have to show him round. Mr Nasty, that’s what we called him.’

Even in the bright sun, I felt a sudden chill. ‘He wasn’t actually called Cope, was he? A big man, looked as if he had to use the gym to keep his weight down. With a wife much younger than he?’

‘There was a wife. Lots of glitz, as I recall. And he – I’m no churchgoer, but I felt he was… evil. But he wasn’t called Cope. He was called – hell, these senior moments.’

She wasn’t a day over forty, but I didn’t want to interrupt her chain of thought by saying so.

‘What was it now? Mr and Mrs…? We made a joke about the surname. That’s it. Mr and Mrs Carver. Carver by name and Carver by nature. The sort of man who’d have you off the road on a roundabout just because he felt like it.’

‘I think that your Mr Carver and my Mr Cope might be one and the same,’ I said.

‘So how did they manage to get valid ID?’ She sounded puzzled rather than apprehensive.

I certainly felt apprehensive rather than puzzled. ‘Put it another way, how did they get hold of valid-
looking
ID? I suppose you haven’t got CCTV in your office yet?’

‘Not yet. It’s under discussion, of course. We have a little panic button under the reception desk if anyone gets really stroppy. What I do if there’s anyone who’s just suspicious-looking is wander out and casually take their photo on my mobile, without them knowing. It probably breaks all sorts of data protection laws, but what the hell? I don’t suppose old Moneybags has forked out for cameras at your place?’

Sheltering my eyes, I peered upwards. ‘Can’t see any flying porkers, can you?’ As for a classy photo-taking mobile, I could feel my credit card wince. ‘I’ve been wondering,’ I continued slowly, and desperately wanting such a stable person’s
encouragement, ‘if I ought to tell the police what’s been going on.’

She gave a blink so huge she might have been the actress, not me. ‘And tell them what? That you don’t like the prospective purchasers you’ve had to show round? That would really help your agency’s reputation, I don’t think.’

I bit my lip. I’d forgotten that when she’d left Burford’s she’d crossed the line into management, and would now think like a manager.

‘And I think you’ll find that the police want evidence these days,’ she continued, sounding more managerial by the second. ‘And the Crown Prosecution Service will. Hard evidence.’

‘You don’t think dodgy contact details would be evidence? And the same man visiting our agencies using different names? And someone tailing me?’

‘Tailing you? Did you get the number? Oh, for goodness’ sake!’ Had she once trained as a teacher?

I shook my head. It was either that or hang it in shame.

Mercifully our waitress arrived bearing our soup. We could change the topic of conversation with no loss of face on either side. Perhaps Heather thought she’d gone too far. She embarked on a wickedly funny story of how a rival agent, pompous enough to make Greg appear positively
humble, had fallen through a patch of dry rot as he stamped his foot on what he swore was a perfect floor. I made myself laugh.

As we waited for the bill, she turned serious again. ‘Let’s just for a moment assume that these clients of yours aren’t what they seem. What precautions are you taking?’

‘You mean me personally or Burford’s in general?’

‘Both. I assume everything you know about the client is logged and that you check that he’s who he says he is?’

‘That’s Greg’s job,’ I said, knowing full well how seriously he took it. ‘I make sure that Claire knows when and where I’m going. As a matter of fact I asked her to phone me the other day to make sure I was all right.’ I smiled as if expecting a gold star.

‘Have you preprogrammed your mobile with emergency numbers? I make our representatives put in 999 at the top of their list.’

‘But you just said I needed evidence to involve the police.’

My gold star was whipped away. ‘There’s a difference between suspecting something vague and being damned sure someone’s about to attack you.’

The statement came out unbidden: ‘I thought Cope could have had me killed – maybe killed
me himself – and not turned a hair.’

Her eyes narrowed. ‘Key in 999, then. Now. Let me see you doing it. That’s a good girl. Now, one thing the Suzie Lamplugh Trust recommends is having a coded system of calls back to the office. Firstly – and I make this standard for my team – I insist that they always call from the property they’re showing to say they’ve arrived. The rule is that they can then say they’re checking for an important message. If they feel uneasy, they phone back asking for information from the blue file. This means the office must call back in less than five minutes. If it’s the red file they want, it means call the police pronto. Simple.’

I nodded humbly. ‘Just two problems,’ I said. ‘Greg’s not such an enlightened boss as you are.’

‘Don’t involve Greg, for goodness’ sake. Claire’s bright enough, for all her sense of humour’s been amputated. Just involve her. And the other problem?’

‘I can’t imagine Mr Cope letting me use my mobile. He obviously wanted my full attention.’

‘Tell him that’s just tough – you have to do your job.’ Then she registered the expression on my face. ‘Ah. I see. You’re right. I wouldn’t have liked arguing with our Mr Carver.’

It was suddenly clouding over and might even threaten rain, so I gladly accepted Heather’s
offer of a lift back. The whole experience was as disorientating as before, especially when she had to reverse from her space and the thing started to emit strange beeps.

‘At least it doesn’t have a disembodied voice saying,
Vehicle reversing
,’ she said, with an embarrassed grin.

The car slid along, silent as a milk float and a great deal more comfortable, easing its way past her agency so she could park in the patch at the rear of her office. Neither of us would have wanted her to contribute to Stratford’s congestion by parking on a double yellow line to decant me. I nearly caused an accident, however, when I grasped her wrist and squeaked. ‘Look! Over there! It’s the Turovskys!’

The Turovskys it was, going into Heather’s agency. She swung into the car park, missing a wall by a millimetre. ‘Are you coming in?’

‘You bet. Am I about to become your new employee?’

‘You might be. You can think on your feet, can’t you?’

‘I rarely think on anything else.’

Access was via a short passage full of boxes of A4 paper and other standard paraphernalia. One door led into her office, the other directly into the main office. She chose the former. I followed.

‘This is the deal,’ I said. ‘You call your
receptionist – Jan, is it? – and tell her you’re showing round a potential part-time employee, but not to worry – you’re only going through the motions. We go through. I clock the Turovskys; we both watch their reactions.’

‘Fine. I’ll just brief Jan.’ A few pithy words and she cut the call. Fishing her mobile out of her bag, Heather led the way.

Jan was busy at her computer screen, clicking the mouse with the irritation born of knowing that what she was doing was pointless.

‘I’m sorry, Mr Nikolaiev,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘That really is the only thing suitable.’ She settled some particulars in the sober but chic folder Heather favoured and closed it firmly.

‘I can guess what they want!’ I declared, horribly skittish. ‘How nice to see you again, Mr Turovsky. And Mrs Turovsky.’ I put out a hand to shake his, which remained, however, firmly in his pocket. Hell, what if he was holding a gun and his patience ran out? I pressed on nonetheless. ‘Something big and old, that’s right, isn’t it, Mr Turovsky? I’m so sorry none of the properties I showed you matched your expectations – perhaps you’ll do better here.’

Mrs T’s phone rang. At least something was playing a tinny chunk of
Swan Lake.

She answered immediately, looked anguished, and said something terse to her husband. She was
almost rocking with shock. He took her arm to steady her.

He frowned. ‘Another day, ladies. My wife’s mother has been taken ill.’ With that, he ushered her through the door and away down the street.

Jan, a woman who didn’t care how many summers had baked her skin, leant forward, stringy arms folded challengingly across her crêpey chest. ‘And what was all that about?’

Heather looked hard at me, with something like a smile creeping round her lips. ‘I think Vena may just have stopped us getting our fingers burnt. Those two are involved in a scam of some sort. Nikolaiev? Turovsky? I wonder how many other aliases they use. And, more to the point, what they’re using them for.’ She patted her phone. ‘I still don’t know about bothering the police,’ she said, ‘but what I will do is alert our colleagues. By sending out their photo, of course,’ she explained, her look of sad despair reducing me to a five year old again.

I picked up the folder Jan had prepared. ‘Moat Farm. This is the place you were telling me about earlier?’

‘That’s right. The owner died a while back and his remaining family live in Australia. They’ve already stripped everything saleable out. It’s just the shell.’

‘Which was the Turovskys’ preferred state, of course. What the hell are they up to?’