Ruth Rendell - Thirteen Steps Down

Her car was parked outside. Good. He had been afraid he had started out too late and she'd have gone out. For about halfan hour he hung about in the square, walking down and backagain. The milk arrived and sat on the doorstep in the full sun. She must be counting on the breeze keeping the temperaturedown. He was wondering if she had already taken the newspaper in when it came and was deposited on the doormat beside the milk.

Someone would steal it and the milk as well. She'd thankhim for ringing the doorbell and handing in the cartons andthe enormous Sunday paper. It might even be possible for himnot to hand but to carry them in for her. Ifhe did that she'd bebound to ask him to stay for coffee. She'd probably be only half-dressed, in deshabille as they said. He imagined her in ababy doll nightdress, barely covered by a diaphanous robe, and he marched up to the door and rang the bell.

No reply. He put his ear to the grille of the entryphone. Silence.He rang again. She wasn't in. She must have gone out onfoot, running perhaps, or caught a train somewhere. He was bitterly disappointed. So near and yet so far, he said to himself, going back down the steps but still lingering in case she cameback from her run.

No one went jogging for as long as two hours. He'd try again tomorrow. Then, walking back, he remembered that he'd better go in to work tomorrow and he remembered too that he'd never phoned head office to say he was ill on Friday,he hadn't phoned them at all. And he hadn't looked for messageson his mobile or checked his answerphone. Of course it wasn't important. If he couldn't take an afternoon off without crawling to management like a trainee after all the years of service, who could? He expected messages from at least one of the three clients he'd let down on Friday but, as it turned out, all three had phoned him, one disappointed and pleading, another furious, and the third threatening to take her business elsewhere. Nothing from head office. Nothing from Jack Fleisch.He'd have been amazed if Mr. Pearson bothered with him, andt here was nothing from him either. No doubt he had thought better of further reproaching such an asset to the firm as Mix was with his experience and his efficiency.

The day had as usual become very fine and warm. The Indianman's geese were grooming each other under a palm treein the sunshine. It was the only tree in the garden Mix was able to identify and he recognized it from an illustration in his grandmother's Bible. What had become of that Bible he had no idea. But he remembered the picture. The Indian man's palm looked as if it had been there for years and years, long before he and his wife came. Mix was surprised that it survivedthe winters, Notting Hill being a lot colder than Jerusalem. He had never noticed it till this morning. But he had never spent so much time watching the garden as he did now.

The two patches of freshly dug earth looked very obvious to him, the one where he had dug at first and where the heavinessof the soil defeated him, and the other that he had chosen for Danila's resting place. There was nothing to be done about it. He must wait for the weeds to grow back and he had no ideahow long this would take. If only he'd had more time he would have dug deeper. It troubled him a little that her body lay only three feet down, less than three feet really, because although she was thin, a section through her at the rib cage would be severalinches. Still, who was going to look?

Old Chawcer never went out there, or never had to his knowledge, and was even less likely to do so now. He had nevers een Ma Winthrop or Ma Fordyce venture into the garden. The old man on the side with the conservatory never looked over the wall, as far as he could tell. The house on the otherside was all flats, but the basement, or "garden flat," had been empty all the time Mix had been there and he imagined that the damp made it impossible to live in. No one would be interested in two rectangular dug-over plots. Bodies buried in the earth, according to Dr. Camps in Medical and Scientific Investigationsin the Christie Case , became skeletons after a few months. Not that long. By next spring she would be just bones.

He had left her just as she was, naked and wrapped in the red sheet. The plastic bag he had slid off her, brought it back upstairs and carefully cut it up, depositing the small pieces in his rubbish sack for collection. Twice he had checked the copperto be sure nothing was left behind. It was dark in the washhouseand impossible to see to the bottom of the copper but hecould tell there was no room for anything to be left behind…

A cold tremor passed through him. The thong. What had become of the thong? Now he remembered clearly feeling the bulge of it in his pocket and dropping it into the copper after he had heaved the body in. He had never retrieved it, of that he was sure. It must still be there. What does it matter, he thought, no one will look in there, she hadn't lifted that lid for years, probably never will again. Besides, he could go downand get it, almost whenever he liked. Now if he wanted. He was nearly certain she had still been in bed when he came back from his walk to Campden Hill and even when she got up,s he'd take herself straight to that sofa in the drawing room.

He pocketed his keys and came out onto the landing. Bright sunshine streamed through the window above the stairs, so ofcourse Reggie's ghost was hiding itself away in some dark corner.As he started down the tiled staircase he heard the frontdoor open and close and a voice, unmistakably belonging to Ma Fordyce, called out, "Hiya, Gwen! You still in the land of the living?"

Old fool. Now he'd have to wait for her to leave again andthat might not be for hours.

Hoping she wouldn't have to climb all those stairs, Olive went straight into the drawing room, still carrying the two bags of food she had bought on the way. She was wearing her newblack trousers and a lemon-colored linen jacket that matchedher new hair tint. To her relief Gwendolen was up, though still in her nightclothes and lying on the sofa.

"I've brought you some goodies, dear."

" Timeo Danaos et donaferentes , " said Gwendolen.

"I don't know any Tim, Gwen," said Olive with a heartylaugh, "and I can't understand a word of that lingo. How are you?"

"As well as can be expected. I've no appetite so you needn't have bothered with goodies, as you call them."

"Don't be such an old curmudgeon. I'm trying to help. I'm going to make us a coffee each, won't be long."

While she was gone Gwendolen investigated the carrierbags. Chocolate-well, she could eat that-biscuits, marzipanfruits, a nasty sponge cake with mock cream. Still, Olive hadn't done badly. At least there wasn't a lot of salad stuff and green apples with no taste to them.

Olive reappeared with milky coffee and ginger nuts on a plate. "You're so thin you can eat as much as you like. Aren'tyou lucky?"

"You don't mean you're dieting. At your age?"

"I always say you're never too old to take pride in yourappearance. "

"On the subject of appearance, is this yours?"

The object that was put into Olive's hands made her giggle.

"Are you joking, Gwen? Is this some sort of game?"

"I found it in the bottom of my copper, in my washhouse. Is it yours and what is it?"

" Well, Gwen, you've never been married and I knew you were innocent about a lot of things, but I didn't know it went that far." So Olive took her revenge for years of rudeness andingratitude. "Even a child would know what that is."

"Thank you. You've said quite enough. Now perhaps you'll tell me what it is."

This caused Olive some embarrassment, which she triednot to show. "Well, it's a-it's a kind of pair of-well, knickers. Girls wear them. Once I'd have said 'only that sort of girl,' but things have changed, haven't they? Now even nice girls, I mean, not actresses or-well, stripteasers, if you know what I mean."