Lynda Plante - Blind Fury

“But you liked her?”

“Yeah, I liked her — but I used to find it depressing, like I was lookin’ at what could happen to me all the time, know what I mean? And then I had a spot of trouble — the bloke I was with at the time was doin’ drugs and they took me kids off me, but I never done crack or brown. Maybe smoked the odd spliff — who doesn’t? — but I left the hard stuff alone.”

“What about Margaret?”

“Yeah, she’d take whatever she could lay her hands on — coke, mostly — and she’d drink. Can’t blame her, really, having to drag her arse out to the friggin’ M1 most nights, and sometimes it was freezing cold. She got knocked ’round a couple of times as well.” Emerald sighed and dug into her laundry basket.

“Did she ever report it?”

“Nah. She was on the game — you get used to it, but you know, some of them wouldn’t want to pay. Some bastard chucked her out of his cab once.”

“Did she tell you about it, like who had done it?”

“No, just waited until her black eyes healed up.” Emerald sighed more loudly. “I said all this before, you know. I’m just repeatin’ myself.”

“Did she have a pimp? Someone looking out for her, maybe?”

“No, she was a loner. Like I said, she wasn’t young and knew all the tricks, so why shell out her hard-earned cash?”

“But you do.”

Emerald’s face tightened. “I’m in a different league ’cause of me responsibilities. I work out of a massage parlor, I’m not touting for business on the effing motorway, and my man takes good care of me.”

“So she worked solo... What about other friends?”

“I never knew them. Listen, Maggie was a tough old boiler. She knew the risks, and she’d got the number of the blokes that had knocked her around, and like I said, she didn’t always go with the truckers. Sometimes she was flush from a few punters she’d had in posh cars. She looked out for herself, and she even took down the license numbers.” Emerald gave a strange laugh. “Said she couldn’t remember their faces, but she’d remember their reg numbers — had ’em all written down.”

“What, in a diary or notebook?”

“Yeah. Reckoned if they got nasty, she could tip off friends to beat them up.”

“You mean other working girls?”

“Nah, strong-armed blokes. We all know a few. A couple are ex-coppers workin’ for bailiffs who can run a trace on license plates so they can get their addresses.”

Anna could hardly contain herself. “You wouldn’t know where this notebook was kept, would you?”

“No idea, but it could have been in her stuff, I suppose. Did they find her handbag? It’d be in that, I expect.”

“No. There was nothing to identify her — we ID’d her from her fingerprints.”

“Oh, right. She’d done a few stretches.”

“Would it be among the things you said she’d left with you?”

“No, I never saw it. There was just clothes and bits and pieces.”

“Did you mention that you had some of her belongings when you were previously questioned?”

“Yes. The police looked through it all back then. To be honest, at the time I’d forgotten I had the suitcase. Well, I moved around a lot before I got this place. I even had gear stashed all over London, but when the Social Services found this flat for me, I collected it all. A few times she turned up, but like I said, I didn’t like her bein’ here when it had all been done up nice.”

“Could I see the case?”

Emerald lit another cigarette. “I don’t have it no more,” she said, and shrugged. “It wasn’t worth keeping.”

“But you said it had good clothes in it, like that track-suit?”

Emerald unplugged the iron, mumbling, “I gotta go and do some shoppin’.”

“You just threw it out?”

The young woman turned on Anna angrily. “Yeah. Like I said, it wasn’t worth keeping, and your lot didn’t want it, so I chucked it out onto a skip. There were just some blouses and skirts and shoes and this tracksuit, all right? There was nuffink of value.”

Anna could feel Emerald’s growing animosity from the way she banged the ironing board closed. It showed she was getting her temper up.

“I’m sorry if you think I am accusing you of anything, because I’m not. It’s just that if we could find Margaret’s notebook, it would be of great value, as we would be able to question the men she picked up. I’m not interested in anything else that was in her suitcase.”

“Well, there was nuffink else. Now I gotta go out.”

Anna stood up and placed the stool under the breakfast shelf. “I really appreciate you giving me your time, Emerald. By the way, is that your real name?”

“I wasn’t christened with it, but me great-grandmother worked as a cleanin’ lady for a high-society woman called Emerald. She’d given her some nice things, and it’s me favorite color. Turk is the name of my father, but it was never on me birth certificate because he pissed off before I was born.” Emerald stood with her hands on her hips. “Anything else you want to know?”

“No. Thank you for seeing me.”

Heading back along the rubbish-filled corridor, Anna suspected that Emerald was lying about the contents of the suitcase, but there was little she could do about it now, as the original investigating team had already looked through it and found nothing of importance. She had a feeling, if she was correct and Emerald did still have the suitcase, that it would be thrown out as soon as she left. There was nothing for it but to return to the car and set off back to the station.

The moment she’d checked that the policewoman’s car had gone, Emerald was on her hands and knees beside her wardrobe, dragging out boots and shoes as she reached for the suitcase. It was a cheap make, and the zipper had already been broken when she had used a pair of pliers to unlock the small padlock holding it shut. Margaret’s name was printed on a travel label attached to the handle.

Opening it up on her bed, Emerald started to remove the few items she’d left inside. Tossing them out of the way, she felt along the lining, digging inside the side pocket, and took out a small red notebook. She didn’t even look at it, but put it into her tracksuit pocket. Next, she stuffed the suitcase into a black plastic binliner, tying it at the top. To begin with, Margaret’s suitcase had also contained two thousand pounds in ten- and twenty-pound notes, and a red velvet jewel case. Inside this there had been two small diamond rings, a gold moonstone pendant, looped gold earrings, and a thick gold bangle. Emerald had kept the gold bangle but got five hundred and ten pounds for the jewelry from a guy she knew in Berwick Street Market. She’d put the money to good use, buying the fridge-freezer, the kitchen stools, and the steam iron. She had intended getting the zipper on the suitcase fixed, but now she just wanted rid of it.

An hour or so later, Emerald carried the bag out of the flat. She had not far to walk before she saw a half-filled skip near a building site and threw the bag into it with some relief. She then hurried off to the local Tesco to pick up some groceries for the kids’ tea. By the time she’d fed and bathed her two children, it was time for her to get changed and ready for work. Her babysitter arrived, and Emerald went off to the massage parlor, where she could forget all about the events of the afternoon.

The notebook was left in the pocket of the tracksuit. Emerald didn’t want any repercussions. Even though Anna had explained the importance of the contents to their investigation, she could think only of the trouble she might get into for having sold the jewelry. She certainly didn’t want anyone showing up claiming the money. It had all been spent anyway.