Smiley left the room and Langton glanced at Anna. He nodded to the mantelpiece showing a few photographs of the couple’s wedding and two rather stilted school photographs of their children.
Mrs. Smiley bore no resemblance to the pretty dark-haired girl in the wedding photograph, or the small picture Smiley carried of her in his wallet. She was about seventeen stone, with solid thick arms and legs like tree trunks. Her hair was cut short and worn in an unflattering style with a barrette on either side of a part. Her face was devoid of any makeup.
“This is Sonja,” Smiley said as he hovered behind her. She was almost as tall as he was, and he sort of skirted around her to stand by the sofa.
Langton introduced himself and then Anna. Sonja gave them a curt nod. “What is this about?” She had little trace of an accent and cold blue eyes.
“We are just making inquiries, investigating a case that we believe your husband may have information about.”
“What case?”
“A murder inquiry.”
She turned to her husband and then back to Langton. “Why do you want to talk to John?”
Langton explained that his Transit van had been parked in a service station close to where the murders had been discovered.
“Not one, then, more than one?” she asked.
“Yes, that is correct,” Langton said.
“Why do you think John can help you?”
“Because we are asking anyone we have on CCTV at the location to try and recall if they saw anything suspicious.”
“I don’t know anything about it, but my husband is a good man, and if he can, he will help you. Can you help them, John?”
“No, love. I only stopped off for a bathroom break, then, as usual, drove on. You know I like to get my deliveries over and done with as soon as possible so I can get home to say good night to the kids.”
“You also fit blinds, don’t you?” Anna asked him.
“Yes, it’s all part of the delivery. I take the measurements sometimes before the orders, and then when I deliver, I put them up. We’ve found it’s better if I get the exact size, as the blinds are made to measure. If they’re out by so much as half an inch, we have to take them back to the workshop.”
Langton showed him the photographs of Anika and Estelle once again. “Did you ever go to either of these girls’ homes to measure for blinds?”
Mrs. Smiley looked at the photographs left on the coffee table and then back to her husband.
“No. I’ve never seen them,” he replied.
“They were both Polish,” Langton said quietly.
Mrs. Smiley picked up one photograph after another and then shrugged. “I never seen them; they look very young.”
Langton then laid out Margaret Potts’s photograph on top of the others. “This woman was also a victim.”
“Why are you showing these pictures to my husband?”
“Well, we hope he might have seen them at the service station.”
She pursed her lips and then looked at her husband. “Did you see these women?”
“No, love. I’ve already told them that.”
Langton replaced the photographs in the envelope.
“Wait a minute.” Mrs. Smiley pointed to Margaret Potts’s picture. “This woman is older, different. Is she Polish?”
“No, she was from London.”
“She was a prostitute who worked the service stations, picking up men, often truck drivers.” Anna watched Mrs. Smiley as her mouth tightened into a hard line.
“I’ve seen her type in Aldershot, hanging round the soldiers on leave when they went to the pubs. Disgusting, they were. I worked in a bar for a while, and these women would drink themselves stupid.”
“But you have never seen this woman?” Langton persisted.
Smiley shook his head, and then Sonja folded her arms. “Have you got what you come for, then? Only being it’s John’s day off, I need him to do some shopping for me before the children get home for their lunch.”
“Do you have some of the blinds from the company?” Anna asked pleasantly.
“Yes, in the kitchen and bedrooms. We get them at cost price.”
“Could I see them?”
Sonja hesitated and then shrugged her wide shoulders, gesturing for Anna to follow her out of the room. The kitchen was orderly, with a pine table in the center and two place mats ready for the children’s lunch. They had all the modern conveniences, dishwasher and washing machine, deep freeze and fridge, and in the windows was a set of pale wooden blinds.
“I’d have preferred white, but they only do them in different shades of wood,” Sonja said.
The two women went up the stairs. There was a plastic runner all the way up and even on parts of the landing. Sonja was out of breath; she puffed and rattled as she gestured for Anna to go into the master bedroom.
“We got them in all the bedrooms. That’s ours, and then our son, Stefan, has the box room and... this is my daughter Marta’s bedroom.”
The room had pink walls, pink bedcovers, a pink carpet, and dolls and a dollhouse were stacked neatly against a wall with a big pink chest. The blinds were a darker brown in this room.
“Very nice,” Anna said. “She’s very tidy.”
“They both are. It’s no good having nice toys if they break them, so they’re taught to appreciate their things. My parents came to England with nothing. I never had such lovely things.”
“Your mother died a few years ago, didn’t she?”
Sonja glared at Anna. “How do you know?”
“Your husband told us when he came to the station.”
“I don’t understand. You’ve talked to him before, then, have you?”
“Yes, when he was in London.”
“I see.” She headed back to the stairs, grasping the banister rail, as she was so short of breath.
As they reached the hall, Langton was waiting. He smiled. “We’ll be on our way now. Thank you for your time, Mrs. Smiley.”
“Goodbye.” Sonja went straight to the kitchen, and John Smiley hovered to show them out.
“I’m sorry not to be of any help,” he said, and promised that if he remembered anything at all, he would call them straightaway.
Anna looked back at the house as she put her key into the ignition. “I bet she’s having a go at him. She didn’t know he’d been to see us in London. God, she’s an unpleasant woman, and that house is like a show home. Even the children’s rooms are in military order.”
“She’d scare the pants off me,” Langton agreed.
“She’s not very fit, either. Just moving up the stairs had her heaving for breath.”
Anna adjusted the rearview mirror as they saw John Smiley exit from his house carrying an array of empty shopping bags. “I bet she’s got him on a short rein. I didn’t get anything new from talking to him, did you?”
Langton made no reply. They drove in silence for a while.
“Back to the station, sir?”
“What?”
“I said, do I drive straight back to the station?”
“Yes.”
Anna wondered if he felt, as she did, that the whole trip had been a big waste of time, apart from enjoying Ken’s family. She began to replay in her mind the previous evening, wondering if she would get to meet up with Ken again. It had been a while since she had felt physically attracted to someone, and the fact that he wasn’t connected to the Met was a major bonus. None of the male officers she worked alongside interested her, apart from Langton. She began to calculate how many years she had been emotionally tied to him, to the detriment of ever finding herself a partner.
“He ticks all the right boxes,” Langton said quietly.
“Smiley?”
“Who the hell do you think I’m talking about?” he snapped.
“Unless we’re wrong and the boxes you are referring to are from Cameron Welsh, as I wouldn’t trust a word he says.”