Maxim Jakubowski - The Mammoth Book of Best British Mysteries 6

“Room two-two-three,” he said, leaning with his back against the wall and folding his arms over his chest. “Rented one night to Stanley Hall, aged twenty-six, commercial rep in motor oil.”

I didn’t know Stanley Hall, had never heard of Stanley Hall, could swear on a stack of Bibles that I was not involved with anything connected to Stanley Hall, and with great enthusiasm, I imparted this knowledge. “I know sod all about motor oil, too,” I added with gusto.

“Hm.” Sullivan scratched his cheek and stared at the sparrows pecking at the crumbs along the windowsill. “What about a Mr and Mrs Cuthbertson?” he asked, still not bothering to look at me. “Know anything about them?”

At times like this there’s nothing else a girl can do but drop her file on the floor. “Name doesn’t ring a bell,” I said, although my voice was a tad muffled, seeing as how my head was stuck under the desk.

“No?” His suddenly appeared on the other side, and for large hands, they were surprisingly deft at picking up foolscap. “Only Mrs Cuthbertson made a reservation yesterday morning, specifically asking for that particular room.”

I like that room, I wanted to say. It faces the sea front, and from the bandstand you can, if you stand on the furthestmost bench to the right, get a half-decent snap of anyone in the bay window. The courts liked that sort of thing, especially when they were presented with photos of the clients closing the curtains. Furtive always goes down well with a judge.

“Really?” I scrabbled for an imaginary paper clip.

“It probably doesn’t mean anything,” he said, actually finding one. “Maybe they’d stayed there on their honeymoon, maybe she just liked the view.”

“Maybe,” I said and, still on my knees, pretended to arrange the scattered papers, even though I knew I’d never find anything in this damned file again.

“Who knows?” If he wasn’t craggy when he smiled, how come the wolf in Little Red Riding Hood suddenly sprang to mind? “But it seems they were so disappointed that the guest in two-twenty-three hadn’t booked out as expected that when the Cuthbertsons were given three-one-seven, they hardly stayed more than a couple of hours.”

“Oh?” I murmured, rubbing the bump where I’d brought up my head sharply.

“I expect it’s a class thing,” he said, straightening up and brushing the dust off his trousers. “All the same, though.” He paused. “Don’t you think it’s strange they didn’t check in until two-thirty-five, yet were gone by the time I went to question them at half-past four?”

Was that squeak as noncommittal a squeak as I’d hoped? Because here’s the thing. I’d agreed to supply the Cuthbertsons with evidence for a quick divorce. Their deposit was already earning interest in Susan’s trust fund. So the minute Sullivan had finished questioning me the day before, I’d flown upstairs to three-one-seven, stuffed a new film in the camera, and grabbed the nearest chambermaid.

At this point, I want to tell you about Mavis. She’s nowhere near as common as her name suggests, and very pretty with it, in a busty sort of way. But her husband left her for a bus conductress last September and… well, to cut a long story short, Mavis gets what I suppose you’d call lonely. I guess Mr Cuthbertson got bored waiting for my knock.

I think it’s safe to say that this was one set of evidence the divorce courts would not be querying.

“Can I go to the park with Lynn and Josie, Mum?”

“Yes, of course.” I know the park warden. The girls will be fine. He beat that last flasher to a pulp.

“There’s a bag of bread for the ducks,” I said, nodding towards the table. “But take a scarf, love, it’s cold.”

“Mum!” She dragged it into two syllables. “It’s summer.”

“It’s the second of October. Take a scarf.”

I couldn’t help but smile, hearing her belt out “Hound Dog” at the top of her little off-key voice while she skipped upstairs to fetch it. You keep that crush on Elvis, I thought happily. You dream about Rock Hudson, girl.

“You look over your shoulder,

Before you stick your right arm out.

When it’s clear, then you manoeuvre…”

“That’s not Elvis.”

“It’s what the road-safety officer taught us. He says that if you sing it to your favourite song, then you ain’t gonna get mown down…”

As I stuffed sage and onion into a chicken, I consoled myself with the fact that the RSO was “old”, and that if she did have a crush on him, she’d soon grow out of it. Lightning surely can’t strike twice?

“And you wrap it round your neck,” I insisted.

My daughter knows when she is beaten. She might have stuck her tongue out, but that scarf went round twice.

“Mummy, what’s a bastard?”

Four pounds of poultry slid straight through my fingers. Nine years I’d been waiting for this moment. Every single day for nine years I’d braced myself. And I still wasn’t ready.

“It’s… someone whose parents aren’t married, darling.” I have a feeling my voice was rather quaky as I explained the intricacies of illegitimacy, the fact that there was still a stigma attached to such children, though there shouldn’t be because it certainly wasn’t their fault, and that anyone who called children by that name ought to be shot.

“So when Peter Bailey called Jimmy Tate a little bastard, he was being horrid?” she asked, tipping her head on one side.

“P-Peter Bailey?”

“In the playground yesterday. Jimmy took his penknife and dropped it down the drain, so Peter called him a dirty little-”

“Hey! That’s enough bad language out of you, my girl!”

Relief rushed through me like water down a flood drain, and my knees were still imitating aspens as the door banged behind her, so much so, I didn’t even yell at her for slamming. But as she wheeled her bike adroitly through the gate then pedalled down the road, it wasn’t really Susan I was seeing. It was maths teachers. It was schoolgirl crushes, sleepless nights, schoolgirls growing into typists, then bumping into her old teacher one summer’s day.

Why, Mr Rolands! Those same old palpitations.

Please. It’s Stephen, now.

I should have stuck with “Mr”, because images of stolen kisses, secret meetings, declarations of true love flashed through at breakneck speed, and no doubt it was the pain of that damned chicken landing on my toe, but my eyes were watering like crazy. All I could think of were promises and reassurances that were as empty as his heart.

And over the kitchen chair draped casually, as if by chance, hung Susan’s scarf.

“Are you busy, Lois?”

Lois. He calls me Lois now. “I’m always busy, Sullivan. It’s how I pay the rent.”

I shoved the incriminating photographs of Mr Cuthbertson back in the envelope, and thought, Really, Mavis! That’s no way to treat a hired fox fur! And that’s when you realize that, civilized or not in the way rich people handle things, the cracks in that marriage were very wide indeed.

“I know how you pay the rent,” Sullivan rumbled, and there seemed twice as much gravel in his mouth this time. “That’s why I want to talk about the camera you were waving round room two-two-three.” He made himself comfortable perching on the edge of the desk and I thanked God it was solid oak. “You’re sure there was no film in it?”

“I showed you. It was empty.” I can do innocent. You just bulge your big brown eyes. “I even let you go through my handbag and pockets at the time.”

“Women have a surprising number of storage facilities,” he said in a way that suggested the species was foreign to him. “Tell me you’re not holding back on me, Lois.”