Ruth Rendell - Adam And Eve And Pinch Me

“You can’t be sure, darling. They may only have assumed we disliked him because it seems that most people did except these poor women he strung along.”

“No. Fiona told them. How would they know no one liked him? They don’t know anyone he knew. His past life is a blank, Fiona said. She’s betrayed me and I hate to say this, but I can never feel the same about her again, never.”

“Don’t cry, darling. I can’t bear to see you cry.”

Miss Demeanor and her twin-it was two women this time-wanted something Michelle had always believed wasn’t a real requirement but only a feature of detective stories and television sitcoms. They asked her and Matthew to provide an alibi. At first this shocked her. Living in a sheltered world where honesty was taken for granted, she believed the senior of the two women would take her word.

“My husband and I were out shopping together. First we went to Waitrose at Swiss Cottage and then, because it was such a lovely day, I drove us up to the Heath.”

“Hampstead Heath?” Miss Demeanor asked this as if there were dozens of open spaces in London known familiarly as the Heath. Michelle nodded. “You parked and sat in the car? Where exactly was that?”

Everyone must surely know how difficult it was to park anywhere in the vicinity. You could no longer go where you chose, as was the case when she and Matthew first came to Holmdale Road, but had to settle for wherever you could find a space.

“It was by the Vale of Health pond.”

“What time would that have been, Mrs. Jarvey?”

She couldn’t remember. All she could say was that they’d left and gone home soon after half past four because Miss Harrington was coming in to have a drink with them at five-thirty.

Matthew said, “We went out shopping at half past two and were at the Vale of Health by a quarter to four. We stayed there for three-quarters of an hour.”

Surely they must have been impressed by his beautiful voice. Was that the voice of a thug who went about murdering people with knives? Michelle hadn’t expected the next question.

“Did anyone see you? Would anyone remember you at Waitrose?”

“I shouldn’t think so.” Matthew looked faintly amused, his lips twitching. “Hundreds of people were in there.” And we don’t look as funny as we used to , Michelle thought. I’m still fat and he’s still thin, but the contrast isn’t so great. Lots of couples look like us . “I can’t remember seeing anyone at the Vale of Health. People don’t go out for walks anymore, do they?”

No one answered him. It was then that Michelle had asked how they knew she and Matthew had disliked Jeff and the two officers said they were unable to divulge that information. Matthew said he couldn’t understand this insistence on an alibi. They alibied each other, they’d been together all the time. Miss Demeanor’s colleague smiled pityingly. Ah, yes, but they were married. The inference was that each would readily lie to save the other. That was absurd when you remembered how many husbands and wives were at loggerheads.

Michelle reverted to the subject next morning. Sleep had been slow in coming to her last night and when at last it did she dreamed of her unborn children, those children that would now never be born. There were three of them, all girls, all clones of Fiona, each one turning their back on her and walking away, saying they’d never loved her because her heart was full of hatred.

Wanting to raise the subject again with Matthew, she lighted upon it obliquely. “I can’t believe they’d seriously think of us as people capable of murder.”

“Well, if you think that, darling, you’ve nothing to worry about. So cheer up. Come and give me a kiss.” Michelle kissed him. “You know, you look lovely today, you look years younger.”

Even that was no comfort to her. She could hear Fiona saying the words. The people next door, she’d have said, we’d got quite friendly with them, but they made it plain they disliked Jeff. It got uncomfortable being with them. Sometimes Mrs. Jarvey had the most awful vindictive expression on her face. All Jeff did was imply that she’s fat. Well, for God’s sake, she is fat and she knows it perfectly well.

“You can’t tell if she said those things, Michelle. It does no good conjuring up these scenarios. It’s a very dangerous kind of fantasizing. After a while you stop distinguishing between the fantasy and what really happened; you don’t know the reality anymore.”

Michelle knew that there could be only one kind of reality, that Fiona had led the police to believe she and Matthew, the gentlest and most civilized of men, hated their neighbor’s partner so much that they were capable of killing him. In a neutral voice she said, “I’d better think about getting our lunch.”

Not that she would eat anything. Since Jeff’s death she had lost her appetite and often felt that food would choke her. In death as in life, he had given her invaluable help. What would the police think if she told them that? That she was mad or that she’d killed Jeff to make sure she’d lost her appetite? Matthew, on the other hand, had discovered the pleasures of a food new to him, ciabatta, the best thing he’d tried for years. Fiona had tried it on him last week. Before Jeff died, before she betrayed me, Michelle thought, as she cut two slices of the Italian bread and put them on a plate with cottage cheese and twelve salted almonds.

For Zillah it had been a terrible day, an awful night, and a worse morning. First, of course, the media crowding her, the flashbulbs going off in her face, the bombardment of shouted questions.

“How does it feel to be married to two men at once, Zillah?” No one called her Mrs. Melcombe-Smith anymore. “Why didn’t you get a divorce, Zillah? Did you get married in church both times? Will you and Jims marry again? Properly this time, Zillah? Is this your little boy, Zillah? What’s your name, darling?”

It was then that Mark Fryer, the rat, had deserted her and run off. Several young women with notepads pursued him. Zillah had put her hands up in front of her face, leaving a gap in the mouth area, through which she shouted, “Go away, go away, leave me alone!”

She’d scooped up Jordan, who was crying as usual, and not just crying but sobbing, bellowing, shrieking in fear. One of the porters had come down the steps, not looking sympathetic but with a dreadful expression of disapproval as if he were silently saying, This isn’t the kind of thing we expect in Abbey Gardens Mansions, here under the shadow of the Houses of Parliament . But he provided her with a coat to cover herself and escorted her into the building, the other porter doing his best to keep the crowd back. Zillah was very nearly pushed into the lift. The doors closed.

The moment she entered the flat the phone started ringing. Ten minutes later she knew better than to answer it but this first time she lifted the receiver.

“Hi, Zillah,” a man’s voice said. “The Sun here. Come out into the sun, right? Can we have a few words? Now, when did you first…”

She slammed down the receiver. It rang again. She lifted it tentatively. It might be her mother, it might be-God forbid-Jims. But she’d have to speak to him. Jordan sat in the middle of the floor, rocking from side to side and screaming. This time the caller was the Daily Star . He must be on a mobile, she could hear the traffic in Parliament Square, Big Ben chiming.

“Hi there, Zillah. How d’you like being the center of attention? Fame at last, right?”

Having unplugged the phone and the one in Jims’s bedroom and the one in her bedroom, she went to bed with Jordan in her arms, hugging him close and pulling the covers over her. Later on, she reconnected her bedside phone and called Mrs. Peacock. Would she fetch Eugenie from school?