I was instantly wary. “Through mutual friends, really.”
“He’s not a close friend of yours, or anything, then?”
“Well, I don’t suppose I’ve known him very long, but he seems likeable enough,” I said, torn between endorsing him and not wanting to be too closely affiliated in case she knew something incriminating.
“Ah.” Miriam sipped her coffee. It was clear she had information to divulge. I was by no means sure I wanted to hear it. Certainly not then, in front of Anna. But it would have seemed unnatural not to ask.
“Why?” I hoped I sounded casual. Miriam put her cup down. I could see that nothing could have prevented her telling us anyway.
“Oh, I just wondered. I was talking to someone yesterday who knew him. Or knew of him, at any rate.”
“Who was that?”
“An old friend of mine. He went out with her niece for a while.”
I was relieved. Whatever she knew, it was not the same information I had. That would have been disastrous. “I gather she told you something about him?”
“She did indeed. According to her, he’s a real monster. Gave her niece a terrible time. Walked all over her, let her know he was seeing other girls. All sorts of things. Finally, the silly girl threatened to cut her wrists. I suppose she was hoping to frighten him. The next day she had a parcel delivered. A packet of razor blades in a red velvet box.”
I instinctively glanced at Anna. She looked shocked. “She didn’t use them, did she?”
“No, thank God. When he did that she came to her senses. Realised what a shit he was and pulled herself together.”
“Perhaps he’s just a shrewd judge of human nature,” I said, furious with her. “That could have been what he intended.”
Miriam was unconvinced. “It might have been, but my friend seemed to doubt it. And even if it was, he was still taking a hell of a risk.”
I smiled. “It’s a pity he didn’t have a box handy on Saturday night. We could have presented them to Jessica.”
Deflected back to her dismal party, Miriam laughed embarrassedly. “God, yes. I think I’d have even held her down while someone used them.”
She chatted some more, but she had finished what she came to do. An apology on the one hand, a character assassination on the other. When she had gone I turned to Anna.
“That was rather surprising about Zeppo. I didn’t think he was the type to do something like that.”
“No, neither did I. Just goes to show you never can tell.”
I busied myself with a catalogue. “If that is what happened. Miriam’s stories do tend to be a bit apocryphal at the best of times, and a third-hand version from someone’s aunt hardly seems to be the most reliable source. I’m sure Zeppo wouldn’t do a thing like that.” I stopped before I became too defensive. It was best to dismiss it. I closed the catalogue. “Anyway, if her taste in art was anything like Miriam’s, I couldn’t blame him if he had.”
We laughed.
The second piece of slander came from Zeppo, and was much more encouraging. I had not heard anything from him since Saturday, and suspected that his silence was a display of petulance after his loss of face. But by mid-week he had presumably licked his wounds enough to feel like talking to me again.
“It’s Donald,” I said when he answered the phone. “I’ve been trying to get in touch with you.” I kept my voice neutral.
“I’ve been away. I can go away, can’t I?”
“Of course. I simply wondered where you were. I’ve been trying to get hold of you for days.”
“Well, now you have, so what’s your problem?”
His moodiness was beginning to annoy me. “The problem is that in future I would appreciate it if you would at least let me know when you’re planning to take a holiday.” I had not intended to argue, but I was not going to be spoken to like that.
“Oh, I’m so sorry. What would you like a written apology on your desk by tomorrow morning? With detention for spelling mistakes?”
“There’s no need to be facetious.”
“Stop acting as though you fucking own me then! If I want to go away for a day, or two days, or a fucking month I will, and I don’t expect you to get on my back about it! Okay?”
I was astonished by his outburst. “May I remind you that I’m paying you for this?”
“You’re paying me to do a job, and I’m doing it. I don’t have to take shit from you as well. If you’re going to start acting the big boss, you can find someone else to get into your girlfriend’s pants. If you can. Understand?”
I took a deep breath. I realised this was only Zeppo’s way of reasserting himself after Saturday. It was better to let it pass. I still had a trump card he was unaware of, but I was not going to throw it away in the heat of the moment. It would be all the sweeter when he finally realised that, whether he wanted to or not, he would do as I told him.
“I think you’ve made yourself perfectly clear,” I said.
“Good.”
Neither of us spoke for a moment. I cleared my throat. “If you’ve got that out of your system, I called because I thought you ought to know Miriam came into the gallery yesterday.”
“So?”
“Apparently you used to be... acquainted... with a niece of one of her friends.” I repeated what she had told us about the razor blades. It immediately put him in a better mood.
“Christ, I’d forgotten all about that.” He laughed. “Shit, what was her name? Carol? Susan? I can’t remember. Did she use them?”
“Don’t you know?”
“Why should I? I was hardly going to phone her to see if she’d committed suicide, was I?”
“Well, she didn’t. Apparently the razor blades shocked her out of it.”
“Pity. I liked the idea of someone killing themself over me.”
“Yes, well, as sorry as I am to disappoint you, that’s not the main issue, is it? The point is that Anna knows about it.”
“So what?”
“So it hardly shows you in the best of lights, does it? We’ve spent all this time trying to create a good impression, and now this happens!”
“Donald, you worry too much. And you might have been trying to convince her that I’m nice and wholesome, but I haven’t. That doesn’t get you into bed with someone. The idea is to fire her with passion, not get her to vote me neighbour of the year.”
“Yes, but even so—”
“Trust me. It’ll only make me seem more exciting. Girls love bastards. All it’s going to do is make her more intrigued.” He paused, dramatically. “And from what I’ve been told about Marty, she’s probably desperate for somebody to give her a good time.”
I was clearly supposed to ask what that meant. I did.
“Can you remember the guy with dreadlocks on Saturday night?” he went on, appeased. “Well, he’s gay, and guess who he said he’s seen hanging around gay clubs?”
I was incredulous. “Marty?”
“Bingo.”
“Are you sure?”
“Stevie was. After you’d all gone he said he recognised him from a club called the Pink Flamingo.”
“Is he certain it was Marty?”
“He said so. He remembered him because he was always alone and never spoke to anyone. Just sat there by himself
“That doesn’t necessarily mean he’s homosexual, does it?”
Zeppo laughed. “If you can think of any other reason for going to a place where the waiters are topless and wear leather chaps, I’d like to hear it.”
I was prepared to believe almost anything of Marty. But this seemed too incredible. “Perhaps he didn’t realise it was a gay club.”
“Be serious.”
I still could not accept it. “But what about Anna?”
“What about her? He might be bi, or trying to go straight.” He chuckled. “Face it, Donald. Our Marty’s a closet queen.”