Jane opened the drawer and took out two sets of knives and forks, then Dexter handed her the glasses and she walked down the stripped pinewood floor in the hallway. The main room again took her by surprise. It was huge, with high ceilings, two white sofas, and what looked like a very expensive woven rug lying between them, with a clear glass coffee table on top of it. The large windows had stripped pine shutters that matched the bare wooden floorboards. There was a modern, long, white dresser with silver handles for the nine drawers. Two decorative bowls sat on top of it, one containing bunches of keys and the other containing packs of Marlborough cigarettes and Henri Wintermans Café Crème Cigars, along with several boxes of matches.
There was a rack of records and an expensive-looking stereo system, with two speakers positioned on the wall above it. The dining table was glass-topped pine, with six matching chairs and was positioned in front of a floor to ceiling window. Jane laid the two sets of cutlery out, along with the wine glasses, and took her jacket off to place around the back of one of the chairs. There were no paintings but on the far wall there were some black-and white-framed photographs. Oddly there were three white oblong canvasses with large black dates painted on two and the third was empty. Jane moved closer to look at the photographs. One was of a mangled car and printed beneath it ‘Silver Porsche 550 Spyder sports car 1955 James Dean.’ Another photograph was of Dexter wearing a ski suit, carrying a set of skis with another older man, laughing.
‘Dinner’s served!’ Dexter said, carrying in a tray made up of the fish and chips on white plates, a large tomato ketchup container, and the bottle of wine. He had two mats and napkins and deftly flicked them down onto the table.
‘Sit down, and mind out… the plates are hot.’ He quickly put one plate on each of the mats.
Jane sat down as Dexter poured the wine, then sat at the end of the table.
‘Cheers!’ he said, lifting his glass.
She was trying hard to think what to say. She felt so out of her depth and uncomfortable, but he was completely relaxed. He proffered the ketchup and she shook her head, so he poured a large dollop on the side of his plate and started to eat.
‘You have an amazing flat,’ she said.
‘Thanks. How’s your new flatmate getting along?’
‘Pearl? She’s fine. She was at home when I left, watching Coronation Street. To be honest, I don’t know if it’ll work out. We seem quite different now she’s moved in.’
‘You were wise to have her checked out first… you have to take precautions and you did the right thing. I hope you also make a note of any odd phone calls, and look out for anyone loitering near your flat…’
‘I do… and I appreciate DCI Church is also looking out for me. I even checked with Pearl’s previous landlady and Madame Tussauds, where she works. There was no connection to any Irish background and her family come from Southport…’
‘So, she works at Madame Tussauds?’
‘Yes, she does the guided tours.’
‘You know there was an IRA bomb there in 1974, but a coded warning was sent and they managed to evacuate the premises just before it exploded.
Jane looked shocked, ‘Oh, my God, I had forgotten about that! She never mentioned it.’
‘It’s easy to get a bit blasé, we have so many bomb scares in London nowadays.’
Jane ate sparingly. She was nervous and was still trying to make polite conversation.
‘In comparison to your place, my flat would probably fit into one room! How many bedrooms have you got?’
‘Just one. I had two, but knocked them together. It’s not what I would call guest-friendly… well, not for my mates anyway.’ He smiled. ‘By the way, I had Daphne’s friend, Raymond Brocklesby, checked out. He’s quite a character… been married twice and inherited a fortune when he was in his thirties. He’s also a highly-decorated war hero, but he’s now living in sheltered accommodation as he has Parkinson’s. He’s wealthy enough to have bought his own mobility car and have it adapted to his specifications. He’s got quite a lengthy paragraph in Who’s Who.
Jane was beginning to relax now they were on a subject that she could interact with him on.
‘When I told Daphne we had met him, she wasn’t at all happy we’d been in her flat. She said we should have asked her permission to collect her reading glasses.’
‘We were just being cautious… but I think we’ve kept her well under wraps so far.’
‘She mentioned both you and Crowley spent time with her last night? I thought it was just Crowley.’
Dexter nodded, and poured more tomato ketchup onto his plate. ‘Sorry, I thought I said it was both of us. It was after I had the row with him about you and the artist’s sketch. Crowley wanted to pop in and explain what was happening. She was rather high on morphine, but she’s exceptionally intelligent and, considering what she’s been through, she’s amazing.’
‘Did she give you a description of the man she saw?’
‘Yes. Like she told you, it was different from the artist’s impression. Daphne took great delight in pointing that out to Crowley.’
‘What did he say?’
‘He told her it was possible there were two IRA men working together at the tube station… she saw one and you the other. Anyway, she agreed to an artist’s impression being made of the man she saw. Crowley’s organising it.’
‘So Crowley’s still saying that the man in the artist’s impression is the Covent Garden bomber? Even though Daphne and I have both said it isn’t?’
‘Well, either way, it doesn’t matter now. Crowley can’t issue a press release saying the artist’s impression was wrong and that the Covent Garden team could have been two men and a woman. Whoever the bastards are, they could still be around in London, feeling confident that we haven’t identified them. IRA members don’t fit a single defined stereotype; they come to London under the guise of looking for work, rent flats to live in and store nitro-glycerine and other equipment in a bedroom. What we also need to try and trace is the contact he made in the telephone box… all we know is that she was a woman with a fancy headscarf, but we can’t even be sure she had anything to do with it as we only have one witness who came forward.’
‘So the witness definitely didn’t see the face of the woman in the phone box? And she didn’t see our suspect approach her?’
‘No. The phone-box witness only saw the headscarf with Red Setters on it and the leather gloves she was wearing. Typical woman, she can describe the Hermès scarf and remember the gloves, but she can’t give any useful information after that… no description of her face or height.’ He stopped to take a sip of wine, then continued, ‘Can you take me through what you saw again… maybe something has jogged your mind since we were at Covent Garden?’
‘Being a typical woman, I haven’t recalled anything that I haven’t said already.’
‘I’m not having a go, Jane, it’s just that traumatic things we see or experience are put to the back of our mind. They’re in there somewhere and all I want to do is help you remember. So far, Daphne was the only one who saw him leave the bag by the ticket booth and the only one who can identify him when he’s arrested.’
‘If I’d seen his face I would have immediately told DCI Crowley or you. It all happened very quickly… a minute maybe, before that big man moved in front of me and the bomb exploded… He saved my life, whether he knew it or not. There is nothing more I can add to what I have already said repeatedly. If there was, believe me, you would be the first person I’d tell.’
Jane had only eaten half of her fish and chips but Dexter had wolfed down everything on his plate. He said nothing as he wiped his mouth with his napkin. She tried to think up something else to say, and turned to the three oblong canvases.