David Mitchell - Slade House

“Whichever suits.” She stood and walked me the last few steps to the small black iron door. I drummed my fingers on it, wondering whether to go for her phone number, but Chloe Chetwynd then said this: “ Mrs. Edmonds made a wise choice of husband, Detective.”

Oho? “That area of my life’s a bloody train wreck, Mrs. Chetwynd. I’m dumped, single, with the bruises to prove it.”

“All the best TV detectives have complex domestic lives. And really, address me as Chloe, if that’s allowed.”

“Off duty, it’s allowed. Off duty, I’m Gordon.”

Chloe toyed with a button on the cuff of her granddad shirt. “That’s settled, then, Gordon. Au revoir .”

I stooped and sort of posted myself through the ridiculously small doorway to get into Slade Alley. We shook hands over the threshold. Over Chloe’s shoulder I thought I saw movement and a blink of light in an upper window of Slade House, but I probably didn’t. I thought of my flat, of the washing-up in the sink, of the leaking radiator, of the copy of Playboy stashed behind my toilet brush, and wished I was inside Slade House now, looking over the twilit garden, knowing Chloe’d soon be coming back, cream-skinned under her clothes. “Get yourself a cat,” I heard myself say.

She smiled and frowned at the same time: “A cat?”

Back on Westwood Road, the cars all had their headlights and wipers on, and raindrops splashed my neck and my not-quite-yet-bald spot. My visit to Chloe Chetwynd hadn’t been exactly as per standard police protocol, I had to admit. I’d lowered my guard, we’d sort of flirted at the end, and Trevor Doolan would be most unchuffed if he’d heard me discuss Fred Pink the way I did; but now and then you meet a woman who makes you do that. But it’s okay, Chloe Chetwynd can keep a secret, I can tell. Julie was a blabbermouth — brash on the outside, emotional jelly on the inside — but Chloe’s the reverse. Chloe’s got this chipped outer shell but an indestructible core. That bit at the end when she smiled, or half smiled … Like when the lights come on at the end of a power cut and you think, Hallelujah! The way we sat down and smoked like it was the most natural thing in the world. Sure, Chloe Chetwynd has a few bob tucked away and her house is worth a fortune, and I don’t have a pot to piss in, but all she’s got in her life now are spiders, mice and memories of a sick husband. I may be an idiot in some respects but when it comes to women, I’m more experienced than most guys. I’ve slept with twenty-two women, from Angie Pike the Sheerness Bike to a Surrey stockbroker’s bored housewife with a thing about handcuffs, and I could tell Chloe Chetwynd was thinking about me like I was thinking of her. As I walked back to my car, I felt fit and slim and strong and good and sure that something had just begun.

“Good evening, here are today’s headlines at six o’clock on Saturday, October the twenty-ninth. Earlier today, U.S. Secretary of State George Schultz announced at a press conference in the White House that the American Embassy in Moscow is to be entirely rebuilt, following the discovery of listening devices in the walls of the building. President Reagan expressed his—” Who gives a shit, honestly? I turn off the radio, get out and lock my car. Same space as seven days ago, smack bang outside The Fox and Hounds. What a godawful day. This morning a piss-head on speed attacked the desk sergeant just as I was passing and it took four of us to drag him to the cell — where the stupid bastard died an hour later. The toxicology report’ll clear us, eventually, but we’re already under the Spotlight of Shame courtesy of the Malik Enquiry — whose initial findings, we found out at lunchtime, have been leaked to the bloody Guardian . Force Ten Fucking Shit Storm Ahoy. Doolan said he’d “do his best” to shield me from the flak. “Do his best”? How half-assed does that sound? To add yet more grit to the Vaseline, a final demand for payment from Dad’s care home arrived before I left for work, along with a final final demand from Access, my flexible friend. I’ll have to extend my overdraft, come Monday. Or try to. The one ray of sunshine to brighten up this nightmare of a day was Chloe Chetwynd calling this afternoon. She sounded nervous at first, but I told her I’d been thinking about her since last Saturday. She said she’d been thinking about me, too — and at least two of my organs went Yes! So after leaving the office I got myself a twenty-quid haircut at a poofter parlor, and drove here via Texaco where they sell carnations and condoms. Be prepared and all that, right? I hurry along the pavement, whistling “When You Wish Upon a Star,” swerving to avoid first a jogger in black and day-glo orange running togs, then a guy my age who’s trundling a pushchair. The brat’s screaming blue bloody murder and the guy’s face is saying, Why oh why oh why did I shoot my wad into an ovulating female? Too late now, pal.

There’s no sign of the traffic warden at the mouth of Slade Alley tonight. Into the cold alley I go, down to the corner, turn left, onward twenty paces, and here we are again: one small black iron door. I give it a hefty shove but tonight it stays shut. No rattle, no give, no nothing. A new frame, concreted in, with freshly laid brickwork along the bottom edge. Top job. You couldn’t even jemmy in a crowbar. I set off down towards the Cranbury Avenue end of the alley to find the main entrance to Slade House, when I hear a click and a thunk from the door. Here she is, stepping out through the munchkin-sized doorway: “Good evening, Detective Inspector.” She’s wearing an Aztecky poncho thing over thigh-hugging black jeans, and holding something against her breasts. I come back, peer closer and see a small ginger cat. “’Ello ’ello ’ello,” I say. “What’s all this, then?”

“Gordon, Bergerac. Bergerac, Gordon.”

“ ‘Bergerac’? As in Jim Bergerac, the TV detective?”

“Don’t say it so incredulously. Getting a cat was your idea, so it seemed appropriate. He’s too cute to be a Columbo, too hairy for a Kojak, too male for Cagney or Lacey, so I settled on Bergerac. Isn’t he a dor able?”

I look at the furry bundle. I look at Chloe’s eyes. “Totally.”

“And how about my new improved door, Gordon: will it deter unwelcome visitors, do you think?”

“Unless they’re packing knee-high antitank missiles, yes. You can sleep safe in your bed from now on.”

A little silver shell dangles on a black cord around Chloe Chetwynd’s neck. “Look, it’s so kind of you to drop by. After I put the phone down I got in a tizzy about wasting police time.”

“This isn’t police time. It’s mine. I’ll spend it how I like.”

Chloe Chetwynd holds Bergerac against her soft throat. I smell lavender and smoke and I get that off-road feeling you get when anything’s possible. She’s had her hair done, too. “In that case, Gordon, if I’m not pushing my luck, would you mind inspecting the door from the garden side, too? Just to ensure that my state-of-the-art triple mortice lock meets industry standards …”

Chloe lowers the sizzling side of beef onto her kitchen table. I sniff it in, filling my head with it. The table’s old and massive, like the kitchen. Julie used to drool over pictures of kitchens like this in that magazine she got, Country Living . Oak beams, terra-cotta tiles, recessed spotlights, a view of the sloping garden, fancy blinds, a Welsh dresser with a collection of teapots, a cooker big enough to roast a small child, a Swedish stainless-steel fridge-freezer as big as they have in American films and a built-in dishwasher. There’s a fireplace with a big copper hood over it. ‘You carve the meat,” says Chloe. “That’s the man’s job.”