Nicci French: Waiting for Wednesday

‘What?’

‘You know what he’s like, Frieda. Insinuating.’

‘Just tell me.’

‘He said that he had some dangerous enemies, even if they didn’t do their own dirty work.’

‘Meaning me?’

‘Yes. But also that he has some powerful friends.’

‘Good for him,’ said Frieda.

‘Don’t you care?’

‘Not so much,’ said Frieda. ‘But what I want to know is why you do.’

‘You mean why should I care?’

She looked steadily at Yvette. ‘You haven’t always looked after my best interests.’

Yvette didn’t look away. ‘I have dreams about you,’ she said, in a low voice. ‘Not the kind of dreams you’d expect, not dreams where you’re nearly killed or stuff like that. These are odder. Once I dreamed we were at school together – though we were our real age – and sitting next to each other in class, and I was trying to write neatly to impress you but I just kept smearing the ink and couldn’t form the letters correctly. They were crooked and childish and kept sliding off the page, and yours were perfect and neat. Don’t worry, I’m not asking you to interpret my dreams. I’m not so stupid I can’t do that myself. In another dream, we were on holiday and were by a lake surrounded by mountains that looked like chimneys, and I was really nervous because we were about to dive in the water but I didn’t know how to swim. Actually, I can’t really swim – I don’t like getting my head under water. But I couldn’t tell you because I thought you’d laugh at me. I was going to drown so I didn’t look like a fool in front of you.’

Frieda was about to speak, but Yvette held up a hand. Her cheeks were crimson. ‘You make me feel completely inadequate,’ she said, ‘and as if you can look into me and see through me and know all the things I don’t want people to see. You know I’m lonely and you know I’m jealous of you and you know I’m crap at relationships. And you know …’ Her cheeks burned. ‘You know I’ve got a schoolgirl crush on the boss. The other night I got a bit drunk, and I kept imagining what you’d think of me if you could see me lurching around.’

‘But, Yvette –’

‘The fact is that I nearly let you get killed, and when I’m not having dreams I’ve been lying awake and wondering if I did it out of some pathetic anger. And how do you think that makes me feel about myself?’

‘So you’re making amends?’ Frieda asked softly.

‘I guess you could call it that.’

‘Thank you.’

Frieda held out her hand and Yvette took it, and for a moment the two women sat across the table from each other, holding hands and gazing into the other’s face.

Frieda was dreaming about Sandy. He was smiling at her and holding out his hand to her, and then Frieda, in her dream, realized it wasn’t Sandy at all – that it was actually Dean’s face, Dean’s soft smile. She woke with a lurch and lay for several minutes, taking deep breaths and waiting for the dread to subside.

At last, she rose, showered, and went into the kitchen. Chloë was already sitting at the table. There was a mug of untouched tea and what looked like a large album in front of her. She was bedraggled, her hair unbrushed and her face grimy with yesterday’s mascara. She looked as though she had hardly slept for nights. She was like an abandoned waif – her mother was going through a messy crisis and barely thought about her, her friends had been taken away from her, and her aunt had absented herself at her time of need. She lifted her smudged, tear-stained face and stared blindly at her.

Frieda took a seat opposite her. ‘Are you OK?’

‘I guess.’

‘Can I get you some breakfast?’

‘No. I’m not hungry. Oh, God, Frieda, I can’t stop thinking about it all.’

‘Of course not.’

‘I didn’t want to wake you.’

‘How are you feeling?’

‘I was lying in bed and I kept imagining what they were feeling at that very moment. They’ve lost everything. Their mother, their father, their belief in their past happiness. How do they ever get back to an ordinary kind of life after this?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘What about you?’

‘I didn’t sleep so well either. I was thinking about things.’ Frieda walked across the kitchen and filled the kettle. She looked at her niece, who had her head propped on her hand and was dreamily staring at the pages of the album in front of her.

‘What is that?’ she asked.

‘Ted left his portfolio. I’ll give it back to him but first I’ve been looking through it. He’s an amazing artist. I wish I was just a tenth, a hundredth as good as he is. I wish –’ She stopped and bit her lip.

‘Chloë. This has been hard for you.’

‘Don’t worry,’ she said harshly. ‘I know he just thinks of me as a friend. A shoulder to cry on. Not that he does cry on it.’

‘And probably,’ said Frieda, ‘your own feelings are rather complicated because of everything he’s been through.’

‘What d’you mean?’

‘I mean there’s something extremely attractive about a young man who’s so surrounded by tragedy.’

‘Like I’m a grief tourist?’

‘Not exactly.’

‘It’s all over now,’ said Chloë. Her eyes filled with tears and she went on staring at the book in front of her.

Frieda leaned over her shoulder as she turned the large pages. She saw a beautifully exact drawing of an apple, a bulbous self-portrait as reflected in a convex mirror, a painstakingly precise tree. ‘He’s good,’ she said.

‘Wait,’ said Chloë. ‘There’s one I want to show you.’ She leafed over page after page until she was almost at the end. ‘Look.’

‘What is it?’

‘Look at the date. Wednesday, the sixth of April, nine thirty a.m. That’s the still-life drawing he had to do for his mock A level. It’s also the drawing he did on the day his mother was killed. It almost makes me cry just to look at it, to think of what was about to happen.’

‘It’s beautiful,’ said Frieda, and then she frowned, turning her head slightly. She heard the kettle click behind her. The water had boiled. But she couldn’t attend to it. Not now.

‘It bloody is,’ said Chloë, ‘it –’

‘Wait a moment,’ said Frieda. ‘Describe it to me. Tell me what’s in it.’

‘Why?’

‘Just do it.’

‘All right. There’s a watch and a bunch of keys and a book and an electric plug thing and then …’

‘Yes?’

‘There’s something leaning on the book.’

‘What is it?’

‘I can’t tell.’

‘Describe it.’

‘It’s sort of straight, and notched, like a sort of metal ruler.’

Frieda concentrated for a moment in silence, so hard that her head hurt.

‘Is that what it is?’ she said finally. ‘Or what it looks like?’

‘What do you mean?’ said Chloe. ‘What’s the difference? It’s just a drawing.’ She slammed the portfolio shut. ‘I need to take it into school,’ she said. ‘To give to Ted.’

‘He won’t be at school,’ said Frieda. ‘And, anyway. I need that book today.’

Karlsson stood in front of her but he didn’t look at her. ‘I wasn’t expecting you,’ he said at last.

‘I know. This won’t take long.’

‘You don’t understand, Frieda. You shouldn’t be here. The commissioner doesn’t want you here. And you’ll not make your case any better with Hal Bradshaw if you start hanging round the station. He already thinks you’re an arsonist and a stalker.’

‘I know. I won’t come again,’ said Frieda, steadily. ‘I want to see the murder weapon.’

‘As a favour? But you’ve called in the favour, Frieda. And I’m in huge trouble now. I won’t bother you with the details.’