There was a movement behind the door, but still it didn’t open. Vera pulled Margaret’s keys from her bag and tried the one they hadn’t yet identified. The door opened. One mystery solved, then. Dee Robson stood just inside, legs apart, braced for a fight. When she saw Vera she spoke with loud and righteous indignation.
‘Hey, lady, you can’t just let yourself into my home!’
Vera took no notice and looked around her. If she hadn’t known better she’d have thought the flat was derelict. There was the same smell as in the stairwell. Mould grew where the walls and the window frames met. There was no carpet on the floor, which was sticky underfoot. Through an open door she saw the bedroom. Here there was a stained rug and a double mattress covered with a shiny pink quilt. In there Dee must entertain the men, so desperate or so drunk that they’d been persuaded home with her.
They stood for a moment in the hall, staring at each other. ‘Well?’ the woman demanded. ‘Who the fuck are you?’ She was wearing tracksuit bottoms and a hoodie and it smelled as if she’d been sleeping in them for days. She hadn’t cleaned off the make-up of the night before and the mascara had run down her cheeks. She’d been crying.
‘You’ve heard about Margaret,’ Vera said.
Dee nodded. ‘They were talking about it in the Coble last night. Then it was on the news this morning. You’re the police.’ Not a question.
She wandered into the living room and they followed her. Again the floor was bare. A Formica kitchen table stood against one wall, with two plastic stools at each side. There was an easy chair, the shape of springs visible through the orange fabric, and in the corner on the floor stood a small flat-screen television.
‘Margaret gave you the telly.’ Vera nodded towards it.
‘Aye. She said she didn’t watch it much anyway, and I’d have gone crazy on my own in this place without one.’ Still the woman was wary. ‘I didn’t nick it, if that’s what you’re thinking.’
‘We’re here to ask about Margaret. She was your friend, and you might be able to help us find out who killed her.’ Vera kept her voice gentle.
Joe Ashworth was hovering just inside the door as if he was worried he might catch something. He must have been in hundreds of scuzzy houses since joining the police service, but the way some people lived still horrified him.
Just wait until your Jessie becomes a student. Vera gave a quick secret smile.
‘Have you got tea, Dee?’ Vera asked brightly. ‘Milk? I’m gasping for a cuppa and we’ve brought cakes. I never go visiting empty-handed.’
The woman looked at her as if she hadn’t understood a word.
‘Off you go, Joe. Kettle on. And if you can’t find what you want, nip out to the shop. Dee and me are going to have a chat.’
‘There’s milk!’ Dee seemed suddenly to come to life. ‘Margaret brought it with her when she came to visit. She always brings milk. She knows I forget.’
‘When did she last call round?’ Vera asked. She landed on a stool. Dee took the easy chair. In the kitchen there was the sound of a tap being switched on. Joe would be scrubbing the mugs.
‘Yesterday lunchtime. She said she was on her way into town.’
‘Did she say where she was going?’ Vera tried to imagine the elegant, well-dressed woman Joe had described from the train, sitting in this room, drinking tea from the stained mugs and talking to Dee.
‘No, just that she had business to sort out.’
Vera supposed that could mean anything. A visit to a solicitor? An accountant?
‘How did she seem?’ Vera asked. ‘Quiet? Upset? Angry?’
But Dee just shook her head, as if another person’s feelings were beyond her.
Joe came in then, carrying the tea. Vera put the bag of cakes on the table and tore open the paper so that Dee could see inside. Joe looked at the stool, but chose to lean against the door instead.
‘And before that,’ Vera prompted, ‘had you seen Margaret recently?’
‘Last week.’ Dee’s mouth was full of cream sponge. Joe looked away. Fastidious, Vera thought. That was the word to describe him. ‘We went shopping in town.’ She seemed suddenly excited, and Vera thought sadly that the trip into Newcastle could have been the highlight of Dee’s month.
‘Margaret took you shopping?’
‘Aye, she said I needed a proper jacket or I’d catch my death. The church has a fund. Mostly for the lasses at the Haven – extras they might not be able to afford – but Margaret said there was no reason why I shouldn’t get some of it.’
‘Why did you leave the Haven?’ This was Joe, not able to help himself, accusing. He’d bring back the workhouse, given half a chance.
Dee muttered something that Vera could only just make out, about being stuck in the middle of nowhere, and a cow called Jane who picked on her.
‘Tell me about going shopping,’ Vera said.
Dee’s face brightened again. ‘We went in on the Metro. Had our dinner in a caff. I had fish and chips. Margaret only wanted a sandwich. We bought the jacket in New Look. Dead smart.’ She launched into a description of the coat. Given any encouragement, she’d have brought it out to show them.
Vera allowed her a couple of minutes, then interrupted. ‘Was it just shopping? You didn’t go anywhere else? An office? Or perhaps Margaret met someone she knew?’
A pause. Great concentration. ‘She didn’t meet anyone, but she saw someone.’
‘Tell us what happened, Dee.’ Vera reached out for a vanilla slice. ‘No stories, mind, just the truth.’
‘We were walking down Northumberland Street and there was this man on the other side of the road. Margaret told me to wait where I was and she ran after him. But he was faster than her and she couldn’t catch him up.’
‘What did he look like, this man?’ Vera wasn’t sure how much faith to put in Dee’s account. She certainly couldn’t imagine the woman in a witness box. And a vanilla slice was tricky to eat without a plate and a knife. She turned to Joe. ‘Is there a knife in the kitchen? I’ll have cream all over me if I don’t cut this.’
Dee shrugged. ‘Don’t know. I didn’t really see him. I wasn’t looking. He just ran off when Margaret saw him.’
‘He was young, was he? If he ran fast?’
Dee thought again. ‘He was faster than Margaret, but she was an old lady. Most people would be faster than her.’
‘And you can’t tell me anything at all about him?’
‘Like I said, Margaret just ran across Northumberland Street, shouting for me to stay where I was. She wasn’t gone very long. I asked her who the guy was, but she wouldn’t tell me. I thought we might stay out for our tea, but she said it was time to go home.’ Dee looked at her. Panda eyes over the rim of her mug. ‘Margaret was out of breath after running. I thought for a minute she was going to die.’
Ashworth came back with a kitchen knife and Vera cut the cake into bite-sized pieces. Nobody spoke. Footsteps clattered down the stairs outside the flat. Below a door banged shut.
‘Where were you yesterday afternoon, Dee?’ Vera kept her voice quiet, almost uninterested. No pressure. ‘After Margaret left you.’
‘Out.’ Her mouth shut tight like a trap.
‘We just need to know, Dee.’ Vera leaned forward towards her. ‘No one’s going to be cross if you were in the Coble all afternoon. None of our business. But we need to know.’
‘I was in the Coble,’ Dee said. ‘Then I met someone.’
‘A man?’
She nodded.
‘Where did you go with him? Did you bring him back here?’