‘Does he?’
‘Well, I’d call it flirting; he’d probably say it’s just being agreeable. Whatever, he likes to make women feel good, and like him.’
‘And go to bed with him?’
Something occurred to Jennifer, some memory that caused her expression to soften, but whatever it was she apparently decided not to share it with Kathy. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘That happens. But nothing serious or dangerous. Nothing that need disturb his perfect family.’
‘It’s perfect, is it?’
‘Oh God, yes. Wife’s family are old county, a mansion in the Cotswolds. He has a married daughter and two sons, both at Oxford, and they live in this fabulous house on the edge of Greenwich Park. He was a navy flier for a couple of years when he was young, helicopters, and he’s still got some of that dash. Well, you’ve met him.’
‘And he still pulls the girls.’
‘Just as a diversion. He can be very amusing and charming, quite different to Charles.’
‘Charles being the fiery and dangerous one?’
‘Fiery, sometimes, and intense. Dangerous? Well, if Miki was having an affair he’d have been angry and jealous, certainly, but he wouldn’t have done that.’
‘So why did he?’
‘Opinion is divided. Among my staff, the secretaries and bookkeepers, the reason is that he just flipped, because all designers are basically a bit obsessive and demented, aren’t they? Among the architects the feeling is a) he didn’t do it and it’s all a terrible mistake, or b) she drove him to it.’
‘How did she do that, if it wasn’t with a lover?’
‘It’s to do with their work. Their lives are so bound up in their work that it would have to be that. Deep down they all care more about how to detail the next staircase than whether their wives are being screwed.’ She laughed and drained her glass. ‘Mmm, that’s quite nice, isn’t it?’
‘Have another,’ Kathy said.
‘Thanks. Does this make me a paid informant? A snout? A grass?’ She laughed again, enjoying herself.
Kathy signalled to a waiter. ‘Go on, then, how did the work drive him to it?’
Jennifer frowned as if trying to work out how to explain. ‘This is not spelled out exactly. It’s more like an undercurrent of belief or superstition that you pick up from time to time in the drawing office. And in a way it is sexual, but not as straightforward as a lover.
‘Did you notice the gender distribution at VP? Basically, there’s a divide. The admin staff are mostly female, while the architects are almost entirely male. I don’t know why it is. I’ve watched them recruiting and interviewing, and I never detected any bias, but not many women designers apply to work there, and those that come usually don’t last. Maybe all architects’ offices are like that, I don’t know; but you’d think it would be a good profession for a woman, wouldn’t you? I’ve wondered if maybe there’s some kind of suppressed aggression or competitiveness at VP that puts women off. Anyway, whatever the reason, that’s the general rule. But there are exceptions, like Miki, and before her Charles’s first wife, Gail.
‘I knew Gail Verge. I joined the firm the year before she left. I used to watch the way she and Charles worked together. Each evening, after the bulk of the staff had gone home, the two of them would tour the drawing office, going from board to board, or computer to computer. They would examine what each person was working on, and Charles would make notes and sketches on a pad of white paper he carried around with him, then he’d tear the page off and leave it for the designer to look at next day.
‘But the thing I noticed as I watched them was that it was almost always Gail who took the lead. She’d stare at the work for a while in silence, then point at something and they’d have a discussion. Then Charles would nod his agreement and do one of his famous little spiky black sketches to show the guy what he had to do.’
The second glass of wine arrived and Jennifer paused while Kathy paid.
‘I assume you’ll get expenses to cover this, will you? The prices are scandalous here.’
‘Don’t worry,’ Kathy said, trying to sound nonchalant. ‘So you think Gail was the better architect?’
‘I’m not sure. Maybe she was a more perceptive critic. Maybe her judgement was better. I think that must be very important for them, don’t you? I mean it’s one thing to be very creative and come up with lots of bright ideas, but it’s also important to be able to decide between them and pick the winner. She was a deeper thinker than Charles, and had a lighter touch. I think that they complemented each other’s strengths. Maybe you should talk to her, she might give you a different angle on Charles. I’ve got her number here.’ She gave it to Kathy.
‘Anyway, she must have decided she’d had enough of living in the shadow of Superman and she walked out, and suddenly Charles was on his own. And it showed; maybe not to the clients on the outside, but to Charles’s hot shot designers. There were whispers in the office that he’d lost his touch. At first we put it down to depression over Gail leaving him, but then it began to seem more than that, as if some kind of magic had left with her. The projects kept rolling in, bigger and bigger, and the discipline of the practice and its talent kept the show going, but something was missing. The rave reviews in the international magazines became more cautious and people began to say that VP was becoming mainstream.
‘Then Miki came along, and Charles came to life again, and everybody was hoping that she would be another Gail, a fresh young queen to rejuvenate the tired old king. I mean, she could draw like an angel and she looked the part, as if she’d sprung fully formed from one of his sharpest buildings, and although she was so young she had confidence and authority.’
‘I thought people didn’t like her.’
‘On a personal level, that’s true. She was arrogant and ambitious and cold. But that didn’t matter. The point was that she might restore Charles’s magic touch, turn the good back into the brilliant.’
‘Did it work?’
‘No. After they were married Charles began to give her more and more freedom in their design work together. It seemed okay, people were encouraged. Then came disaster.
There’s this building that nobody in the firm ever mentions now, the Labuan Assembly. Fortunately it’s a long way away and almost nobody goes there, but those that have all agree that it’s an absolute pig-out of scale, clunky and derivative. And it was Miki’s.’
‘But what about Sandy Clarke? Where does he fit into this?’
‘Sandy is the one who manages the teams who develop the production drawings for the buildings after Charles and his people have worked out the concept designs. You could say that Sandy’s talent is to bring Charles’s designs to life as faithfully as possible. When he realised what people were saying about the Labuan Assembly building, he persuaded Charles to keep the architectural press away. Effectively he buried it.’
‘How did Miki feel about that?’
‘She was furious, but Charles knew in his heart that Sandy was right. After that he insisted on making all the major design decisions alone.’
‘How did that affect their relationship?’
Jennifer shrugged. ‘That was the end of the honeymoon. Things got tense.’
‘What about the Home Office project, Marchdale Prison? Who designed that?’
‘Charles, one hundred per cent. I would say that Marchdale is Charles’s attempt to wipe out the shame of Labuan, his demonstration that he can still do it like in the old days. He was obsessive about it and took control of every decision, doing little sketches at night for the draughtsmen like he used to do with Gail. Mind you, to hear Miki talk about it sometimes, you’d have thought it was all hers.’
‘Are you suggesting that as a motive for murder? Professional jealousy?’
‘No. Everyone at VP knew whose work it really was. But if you were to look at their personal relationship as a reflection of their working relationship, you’d have to say that when he killed her she was already dead for him.’