Alex didn’t call that afternoon. Kate guessed that he hadn’t got her fax, and debated sending another or phoning him again before deciding not to do either. She would see him that evening. Now she had waited this long, she could wait a little longer to give him the news.
On the way home, she stopped off and bought a bottle of champagne. Alex rarely arrived before seven, and Kate put salmon steaks in the oven and set the table in the lounge with candles and a white tablecloth. She poured herself a glass of milk and put on a CD, humming along to it while she changed into a navy blue mini-dress. She smiled as she studied the flat-stomached reflection in the bedroom mirror. “Enjoy it while it lasts,” she said out loud, and laughed.
It was almost seven o’clock. Kate went into the kitchen and turned on the heat under the vegetables. The CD had finished, so she went into the lounge and put on a Nina Simone collection, knowing it was one of Alex’s favourites. She made a minute adjustment to the napkins she had folded neatly into the glasses on the table and lit the candles. Switching off the lamp, she sat in the candlelight and waited for Alex.
At eight o’clock she remembered the food. The kitchen was full of steam as she turned off the oven and gas rings.
The bubbling pans subsided. The new potatoes broke apart like puffballs when she touched them with a fork, while the broccoli had disintegrated into pale, swollen florets. They bobbed on the surface, slowly sinking to the bottom as the water settled down.
Kate stared down at the ruined vegetables, then abruptly turned and went into the hall to the telephone. She called the Ealing Centre first. An electronic crackle hissed in her ear. She tried again, with the same result. She broke the connection and dialled Alex’s home number.
The phone rang on and on, hollowly. Each pause between rings seemed to take longer, then the next one would trill out, a fresh announcement of loneliness and vacant rooms. Kate hung up.
She went back into the lounge and turned on the lamp. The table waited, the glasses and cutlery reflecting back the light from the candles. One had dripped red wax onto the tablecloth. Kate looked down at the dark circles on the white surface, and then leaned over and blew out the flames. The wicks sent thick ribbons of smoke towards the ceiling. Its pungent, cloying odour filled the room.
The phone rang. Kate gave a start, then ran into the hallway and snatched it up. “Hello?”
“Hi, Kate, it’s Lucy.”
The leaden ball settled back in her stomach. “Oh, hi, Lucy.”
“Well, don’t sound so pleased. What’s the matter?”
“Nothing, sorry. Well, Alex is a bit late, that’s all.”
Lucy laughed. “Got to that stage already, has it? Rolling pin behind the door?”
Kate concealed her irritation. “No. I’m just worried. He should have been here over an hour ago.”
“I wouldn’t worry. He’s probably stuck on a tube somewhere. So how’s it going?”
“Okay.” She felt no desire to tell Lucy she was pregnant. Not until Alex knew.
Lucy sighed. “I can tell you’re not in a chatting mood. Look, I’m sure he’s fine. He’ll turn up with some excuse. They always do.”
But he didn’t.
By next morning Kate felt dulled with worry and fatigue. She had slept fitfully, sometimes jerking awake convinced that the doorbell or the phone had rung. Then she would lie with her heart thudding in the aftermath of the adrenaline rush, conscious of the cold space beside her in the bed as she listened to the meaningless night-noises of the flat.
At one point she thought of the table, still set in the lounge, and the prospect of seeing it unchanged in the grey light of morning was unbearable. She got out of bed and cleared it without turning on the light, stripping it in the near-dark so she wouldn’t see what she was doing.
Daylight and the normality of the rush-hour crowds was reassuring. Kate walked quickly out of King’s Cross, the rain drumming against her umbrella and spattering her legs. She had promised herself that the first thing she was going to do was contact the centre again where Alex worked. The phone was bound to be working by now, and someone there would surely know what had happened to him, would at least be able to tell her if he was all right. She hurried along the rain-drenched streets, driven by a fearful eagerness.
The door to the agency was unlocked. She opened it and backed in, shaking off the water from her umbrella outside.
Closing the door, she turned and saw Clive looking at her. Two men were in the office with him. “There’s somebody to see you,” Clive said in a voice that was oddly flat. One of the men stepped forward. “Miss Powell?”
He was a big, heavily built man in his fifties, with bristly grey hair, thinning on top, and startlingly thick black eyebrows. His tweed overcoat smelt like a wet dog. The other man was younger and wore a blue nylon anorak. He remained in the background.
Kate glanced at Clive, but his face was expressionless.
“Yes?” she said.
“I’m Detective Inspector Collins. This is Sergeant Daikin. I wonder if you could spare us a few minutes?”
A hollowness had settled in her stomach. “Come up to my office.”
She led them upstairs, remembering herself enough to ask if they wanted tea or coffee. Both declined. They sat opposite her across her desk, the older of the two opening his overcoat to reveal a creased brown suit. His shirt was stretched drum-tight across his heavy stomach. The younger man took a sheet of paper from the folder he was carrying and handed it to him. The Inspector glanced at it and held it out for Kate.
“Can you tell me if you sent this?”
It was a photocopy of the fax she had sent to Alex the day before. She fought down a rising panic. “Yes, I sent it yesterday.”
“So you know Dr Turner?”
The hollowness in her gut had contracted, squeezing so she couldn’t breathe. “Yes. Look, what’s happened?”
“What’s your relationship with him?”
“I’m a — a friend. Please, tell me, is he all right?”
The Inspector spoke matter-offactly. “I’m sorry. He’s dead.”
It was as though the air pressure in the room had suddenly altered. There was a roaring in her ears. She saw the older man watching her, a concerned expression on his face, and realised she was swaying in her seat. She put both hands on the desk to steady herself. “How?”
She wasn’t sure if she had spoken out loud, but she must have because the Inspector answered.
“He was found in his office last night. There was a fire, and when the fire brigade went in, they found him.”
He hesitated. “We’ve not got the post-mortem results yet, but it looks like he’d been beaten to death. Then whoever did it tipped out all the paper from the filing cabinets and tried to set fire to the room. Luckily, it was a rush job and the building’s got a sprinkler system. They don’t always work in old buildings, but this one did. It doused the fire before it got a hold.”
Kate felt a great detachment. There was no pain, no sensation at all. She wasn’t really sitting here, hearing this. This wasn’t Alex they were talking about. When she spoke the words seemed unreal, as though she was taking part in someone else’s play. “Who did it?”
The Inspector shifted slightly in his seat. It creaked under his weight. “We’re not sure yet. But we know Dr Turner was staying behind to see one of his patients. Unfortunately, with the computers shorted out by the sprinkler system and the office in turmoil, everything’s still a bit confused. We’re hoping to have a better idea about that later this morning.”
He nodded at the photocopy Kate still held in her hand. “That was underneath him. Or rather, the original was. You didn’t sign your surname, but the agency’s address is printed on it. So we thought we’d come and see if you knew anything that might help us.”