Gloria was in high spirits when she arrived for supper. She was
acting triumphant, which annoyed Cleo, but was understandable, seeing as she
had played the same secrecy game as they had, and won!
“Well, not white, dear. Even I know better than that. What
about you?”
“It’s a secret.”
“Show me!”
“No. Anyway, it’s at Dorothy’s for minor adjustments.”
“And Robert? Are you going to get out of that striped apron
for a bit?”
“For a whole day, Gloria. We’ll put a notice up and stay
closed all day Thursday.”
“What a good idea. Delilah will be pleased.”
So Gloria even knew about the wedding party. Of course, she
would have been asked, but last minute so that she could not interfere.
“Just one question folks: How were you planning to keep your
ceremony secret after you had posted a notice keeping the shop closed?”
“I hadn’t thought of that, Gloria,” said Robert. “Cleo has
been doing the planning.”
“That is a clear case of passing the buck, Robert,” said
Cleo. “The whole thing was his idea, but we could say there is a bereavement in
the family.”
“Is that what it feels like to you, Cleo?” said Robert.
“I won’t answer that.”
“What about Gary?”
“He’s going to be my witness, Gloria,” said Robert.
“I don’t know whether to laugh or cry,” said Gloria, and
Cleo looked at her questioningly.
“Try laying the
table, almost mother-in-law,” said Robert.
Cleo had done the cooking for a change. Today it would be veal
with onion gravy and healthy green vegetables - and no pudding, though that
took a lot of self-control on Cleo’s part.
“Are you trying to starve us, Cleo?” said Robert.
“No, but I don’t want to put weight before next wearing my
wedding outfit. Fewer puddings would be good for us all!”
“You should wear a sarong, Cleo. They fit everyone,” said
Gloria.
Fortunately for Gloria and Robert, Dorothy popped in bearing
a fresh fruit loaf, still warm after her latest baking session. Bara brith is soul-food,
Robert said. Butter, plates and knives were brought in hastily and two of the gourmets
set about wrapping themselves round the carbohydrates.
“I’ll make some coffee,” said Cleo, disgusted that Robert
and her mother could be so gluttonous despite her setting such a good example.
The loaf was nearly gone.
“I’ll help you,” offered Dorothy, intending to have a few
words with Cleo in the kitchen. She was anxious to know a bit more about her
next mission.
“What will I be
looking for tomorrow?”
“Not tomorrow, Dorothy. Next week.”
“OK. I need time for my greenhouse. The tomatoes are growing
wild and there are strawberries to pick and make into jam.”
“We will need to know anything suspicious about the person who
looked after Sybil Garnet’s child regularly or now and again.”
“Garnet? How do you know that name?”
“The first name was on a scrap of paper hidden inside Anna’s
teddy-bear and Gary traced the report on Anna going missing.”
“What about the address?”
“Beethoven Road.”
“Goodness. That’s where so many profligate women live.”
“We assume that Sybil Garnet was living at that infamous
address when the child disappeared.”
“I see.”
“And Dorothy, I don’t want Gloria in on this so don’t fall
for her questioning.”
“I never do, Cleo. Does Gary know I’m going there?”
“You can tell him.”
“I will if he doesn’t
come back too late. He has stopped sleeping at Julia’s place.”
“Why doesn’t he sleep at his own flat?”
“I didn’t know he had one of his own.”
“He does,” said Cleo. “And he must start living alone.”
“Don’t be so hard on him,” said Dorothy.
“I have to be for my own sake, Dorothy. He might still be in
his office now, Dorothy.”
“Really? So late?”
“I sent him a reel of film from Mrs Bone’s camera. He’s
going to edit the relevant images and send them to me as well as some he took
himself. One will show the dead woman from the Bell Tower.”
“So with any luck someone in Beethoven Road is going to
identify it.”
The name Banu crops up in Sybil’s diary. Maybe someone
remembers her.”
Together, Cleo and Dorothy carried a tray of mugs, hot milk,
sugar and a can of espresso into the living-room.
“Finished exchanging secrets, you two?” Robert asked.
“Business,” said Dorothy.
“I suppose you mean it’s none of my business,” said Gloria.
“Work, Mother.”
“Okay, Okay. I wasn’t being nosy.”
“You were.”
Robert came to the rescue.
“Well, I don’t know about you ladies,” he said, “but I’m
tired. I’m going to bed when I’ve drunk my coffee.”
“Time for me to cut along, too,” said Dorothy. “We can leave
together, can’t we, Gloria? These people need their beauty sleep.”
Even Gloria could not ignore that broad a hint, but if she
thought she could coax information out of Dorothy before they went off in
different directions, she was definitely up a gum tree!
***
On Sunday morning Cleo worked in her office for a
few hours. She had not meant to go there, but Gary had sent the photo of the
dead woman through and Cleo had replied that she was going to the office to
print it on her business notepaper and catch up on other cases. She had not
invited Gary, but he turned up, ostensibly on his way to the Common to get some
fresh air on a sticky July day. The inevitable happened.
“I don’t really know how you had the nerve to come,
Gary.”
“Dorothy sent me.”
“She did what?”
“She sent me. Dorothy is an astute old bird, Cleo.
She told me that if I could not stop you marrying Robert, I could at least
convince you that I am the best lover in town.”
“I can’t believe she said that.”
“She did. Scouts’ honour! I thought she disapproved
of our affair, but she’s a romantic at heart.”
“It means a lot to me that she understands, Gary.”
“So I will have to live up to her expectations,
won’t I?”
“You sure will!”
Two hours later, Gary braced himself for a very
short sprint to the Common and back. Cleo wrote reports and tried to figure out
who was trying to ruin the local hairdresser’s trade by spreading rumours of
poisoned shampoo and monoxide gas hair spray before going home. She was elated,
but Robert did not notice. He made a late lunch and finally took time to look at
her. Cleo wondered if her joy at seeing Gary again so soon was somehow visible.
She tried some small talk about some ones efforts to find a boarding-school for
their little boy that offered him the Eton breeding and old boys network but
cost only a fraction.
“If I had a kid, I’d park him in a boarding-school,”
said Robert. “But we agreed not to have any, so that’s problem solved already.”
“Who agreed?” said Cleo.
“If you weren’t quite dark skinned, I’d say you
were flushed, Cleo,” he said. “Or have you got a temperature?”
“I’m sure I have, Robert, but it’s normal, and my
skin is not so dark that you would not see me blush.”
“I didn’t know that coloured people could blush,”
said Robert, who made a big effort not to echo the racism grumblings of some of
his customers. They had even advised him to keep well away from ‘coloured
foreigners’, but he did not tell Cleo that.
“Blushing happens when someone looks at you
suspiciously, like you did just now, Robert.”
“So did your lover come to the office?”
“Why would you think that?”
“Walls have eyes, Cleo.”
“Then they would have seen me writing reports,
wouldn’t they?”
"I don't really believe you, Cleo."
"OK. I admit it. My favourite lover came and
we had great sex. Satisfied now?"
Robert bit his lips, but not pursue the issue.
Cleo again marvelled that Robert did not believe
what he did not want to believe.
"I love Gary," Cleo said, wanting to
pursue the subject and hoping Robert would simply walk out of her life.
But he didn't.
Cleo was even more puzzled. Was respectability so
high on Robert’s priorities?
The rest of the day was tedious. Despite being
about to get married, conversation between Cleo and Robert was stunted, and no
wonder, since Cleo had confessed her love for Gary and hoped Robert would
finally call off the wedding farce.
Eventually, Robert went to the shop to do his
reports and decide what he would order at the wholesaler’s next day. Cleo
phoned Gary on her mobile and told him she thought Robert knew about their
meeting at the office. She had even told him she loved Gary. She had also
confessed to Gary’s visit, but in the end, Robert was not prepared to believe anything
she said.
“The engagement is a mockery, Gary, but I’m committed
to the guy. He needs me for his status.”
“Don’t marry him, Cleo. You’re just torturing
yourself and me.”
“I have to, Gary."
"If he were to believe your claim to love me,
he'd be out on a limb," said Gary. “I’d come to be with you now if Robert
was not likely to reappear. Can you come here?”
“What about Dorothy?”
“She’s going to church,” said Gary.
“OK. I’ll bring the edit of that photo, Gary. It’s
a good excuse to come, and Dorothy will be saved a journey.”
“I’ll take her to Beethoven Road tomorrow.”
“Great. Give me ten minutes.”
“One day you won’t need an excuse to be with me,”
said Gary.
“I don’t really need an excuse now, except that I’m
trying not to hurt Robert’s feelings.”
“He's as thick as a brush and we have to assume
that he has no feelings that are not connected with the accumulation of
possessions, including you. As I have so often said, you should not go through
with your crazy plan.”
An hour or so later, it was again time for the lovers to
part.
“Two trysts in one day. I can hardly believe my luck,” said
Gary.
“Don’t be cynical. This is not the end. It’s the beginning,”
said Cleo.
“The beginning of the end, Cleo. What if you like being
married to that butcher? Where does that leave me?”
“In my bed, Gary. On the other hand, it’s cramped for three
and I can’t very well throw Robert out of it, can I? After all, my Mother works
for him and lives in his old apartment.”
“I can see the problem. Would you like me to knock him down
at the registry office and run away with you? I could hire a white horse.”
”You would end up hospitalized, Gary.”
“But you won’t give me up, will you?”
“Never, but for now it’s adieu, Sweetheart.”
“Correction :
Au revoir, Cleo. Au revoir.”
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