The Indecent Death of a Madam Read online

  Fran said nothing, looking at them all, like a lingering camera shot, taking in their surprise and fascination, before slowly retiring upstairs.

  ‘I was only asking,’ he said, disappearing from view.

  ‘Houseboy causing you problems?’ said Martin. ‘You just can’t get the slaves these days.’

  She ignored him and Tamsin continued.

  ‘So what do you do here? That’s my question. I mean, as a group. You send out unpleasant stickers, of course. We’ve had complaints about those, which we may or may not follow up. But apart from those, why is it that you meet exactly?’

  ‘Haven’t we gone over all this, Detective Inspector?’ It was Martin. ‘You somehow manage to make the promotion of good manners and civil behaviour sound like a crime!’

  ‘In 1530, Erasmus of Rotterdam published a book on good manners,’ said Peter.

  ‘Definitely one for my Christmas list.’

  ‘It was called On Good Manners for Boys and it contained advice about yawning, bickering and fidgeting.’

  Geoff was yawning as Peter spoke, which caused a little mirth.

  ‘Clearly one for Geoff’s Christmas list as well,’ said Martin.

  ‘But the core tenet of his book was this,’ said Peter. ‘Erasmus defined good manners as the ability to “readily ignore the faults of others; but avoid falling short yourself”.’

  There was a short pause.

  ‘Well, I’m sure we’re all with the second half of that proposition, Abbot,’ said Blessings, as though summing up. ‘But readily ignoring the faults of others? I’m not sure where that would leave the world.’

  ‘Well, it would leave you without a job,’ said Martin.

  ‘And you without a paper.’

  The exchange was quick and ruthless.

  ‘Rosemary would never ignore a shop with poor disability access!’ said Geoff, feeling virtuous by association. ‘So I don’t think she’d be too happy about ignoring the faults of others – whatever this Erasmus fellow’s views on the matter!’

  ‘So who delivered the sticker to number nine, Church Street?’ asked Peter.

  ‘What sticker?’ asked Martin.

  ‘There was a sticker delivered to number nine, Church Street.’

  ‘You mean the brothel?’

  He did mean the brothel, but he preferred using the address.

  ‘It was stuck on an inside door by someone – someone here, presumably. It seems unlikely to have come from Rosemary.’

  ‘Perhaps she’d had a Damascus road experience and seen the light. A repentant sinner!’ said Martin. ‘You like those, don’t you, Abbot?’

  ‘It must have been discussed here,’ said Peter, looking around. Respond, don’t react, he told himself. ‘When did you discuss delivering a sticker to number nine, Church Street?’

  Silence. And then Peter took out the sticker in question, in its evidence bag, and held it up.

  ‘Anyone’s?’

  ‘It does look like one of ours.’

  ‘It does, doesn’t it?’

  ‘But we have never discussed it, as far as I’m aware,’ said Geoff. ‘Or not at any meeting I was present at.’ He was a little shaken.

  ‘Quite true,’ said Martin, reassuringly. ‘That sticker did not come from us. I mean, it looks like one of ours, but it didn’t come from here.’

  ‘Blessings?’

  ‘They’re right. We never discussed the place.’

  Peter put the sticker away. What to believe?

  ‘So either one of you, or all of you, are lying,’ said Tamsin. ‘Or, there’s a rogue member out there, with access to your tools – but taking decisions for themselves.’

  And now Fran was coming down the stairs again, and walking round the group towards the front door.

  ‘I’m going out,’ he said. ‘I hope that’s allowed. Or will I too be getting one of your stupid stickers?’

  ‘He does have a temper, that boy,’ said Blessings. ‘He seems to spend his whole time angry.’

  ‘We need to talk,’

  said Fran, explaining his presence. He’d turned up at Model Service unannounced, which had freaked out Cherise. She’d told him to stop coming and now here he was again.

  ‘What are you doin’ here?’ she asked angrily. ‘I told you I didn’t want to see you ’ere.’ But she let him in; he’d have to come in off the street. ‘I could have been working!’

  It wasn’t the best thing to say, Cherise was aware of that, but she was angry. She didn’t like the unexpected – unless it was a lottery win – and anyway, if he didn’t like what she did, he knew what he could do. They’d been through all this. And it wasn’t as if they were an item or anything! They’d only been together a few weeks after he’d done some gardening work for her.

  Cherise couldn’t be doing with gardens, even her small one – and he was the cheapest quote. ‘Gardener Man’, he called himself in the popular Stormhaven Scene, delivered to every house in the area. So their relationship had started with laughter, her taking the mick.

  ‘I saw a “Plumber Man” – did you steal the idea from him?’

  ‘No, that’s me as well,’ said Fran, with some seriousness.

  ‘You’re “Gardener Man” and “Plumber Man”?’

  ‘I was brought up on a farm, remember. And on page thirty-seven, I’m “Decoration Man” as well.’

  And they’d laughed again. Though they hadn’t laughed since, because Fran was making it increasingly clear that he didn’t like what she did for a living and that he could look after her. Cherise didn’t care, she really didn’t . . . and told him it was none of his business.

  ‘Look who’s earnin’ the money here!’ she said.

  ‘I’m doing my best. It’s not easy with a record.’

  ‘And good luck to you. I like a man who works and all that, but if you think I’m throwin’ all this away . . .’

  ‘There are other jobs.’

  ‘But which one of them is going to pay like this one? I won’t get a grand a week as a hairdresser, I’m tellin’ you.’

  ‘No one needs that amount of money.’

  ‘Really? And how the ’ell would you know?’

  But today Fran needed to talk because he was worried.

  ‘I think Blessings might know.’

  They were now sitting in Cherise’s bedroom on the first floor. Fran looked around at the mirrors and the toys, and felt ill.

  ‘Might know what? What is there to know?’

  ‘That I’ve been seeing you. Or coming here, anyway, to this place. I don’t know which is worse.’

  ‘I don’t see the problem. I mean there’s nothing between us.’

  He paused. ‘She thinks I’m gay.’

  ‘She thinks you’re gay?’ She started laughing. ‘Why the ’ell does she think you’re gay?’

  ‘It’s not funny.’

  ‘It’s quite funny. Are you gay?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘So why does she think you are?’

  ‘Because that’s what I told her, all right?’

  ‘You told her you were gay?’

  ‘When she visited me in prison and it seemed like there might be some accommodation. And I mean, it could be true, so it’s not really a lie.’

  ‘Well, it is a lie, because it ain’t true.’

  ‘Everyone wants a home, Cherise. We’d been talking about how difficult it was for gay men in prison, she’d been sympathetic . . . so why not make myself gay? It seemed a good path to go down, at the time.’

  ‘Oh yeah, a really good path. Lie to a bloody judge, why don’t you, about how gay you are?’

  ‘I don’t think she’d have me in her house if she thought I was straight. Then I wouldn’t have met you.’

  Cherise was still trying to get her head round it all. ‘But why say you were gay?’

  ‘I’ve just explained.’ And he had just explained, but Cherise wasn’t really listening because she didn’t ever listen and she was also expecting a call from a regu
lar, someone she hadn’t heard from for a while. She needed to be ready. ‘So I was wondering if I could come and live at yours.’

  ‘Live at mine?’

  ‘Well, why not?’

  ‘You can’t live at mine, Fran. I mean, I haven’t got room at the moment.’

  ‘Well, you have got room.’

  ‘No, but I mean it’s not like we’re together.’

  ‘We are together.’

  ‘Only in your head, Fran.’

  ‘But I thought—’

  And then the Skype call came through, the screen buzzing, and she said she’d have to take it, unbuttoning her shirt as she moved towards the computer.

  ‘Hello, honey – I was wonderin’ where you’d been!’ Her voice was as soft as a peach. ‘Just hold on a sec, big man . . .’ she turned the camera away, and indicated that Francisco must leave, NOW! She was waving him out, and he left quietly enough; though as he closed the door, Cherise was speaking to ‘big man’ again. ‘Now I hope you haven’t been a naughty boy while you’ve been away, honey, because you know me, I’m always a good girl! . . . What do you mean, not always?! . . .’

  Fran loved Cherise. He’d never loved anyone like he loved Cherise . . . so why couldn’t she give this up for him? He was doing his best to earn money. ‘Plumber Man’ was busy – well, he would be, given time – and things would pick up, and when they did, he could provide for her. No one needed that amount of money, not what she earned. And how could they ever be together if she carried on doing what she was doing?

  He’d done what he could, but that clearly wasn’t enough. She was a bad girl and he’d need to teach Cherise a lesson.

  ‘It must be a regret, Abbot.’

  Blessings spoke with the confidence of one who knows for certain and who cuts through the flannel of polite discourse.

  ‘What must be a regret?’ he asked.

  She’d told him to stay for a moment, when everyone had left after the evening meeting convened by Tamsin. He was looking forward to climbing the stairs of his house by the sea. The end of the day was calling him, as always it did; his bedroom, at the end of the day. But Blessings might have something useful to tell him and so he loitered in the kitchen as the others departed. They were back in the front room now. It seemed too big for the two of them.

  ‘Never having had children,’ said Blessings, by way of explanation. ‘You must regret that.’ Peter was surprised. ‘I presume you haven’t had children – from your choice of clothes.’

  ‘I haven’t, no.’

  ‘So would you like to have had children? Of course you would! Of course you would, Abbot!’

  ‘If you speak on my behalf, Blessings – and inaccurately – I may decide there’s no value in me being here.’

  The judge smiled. ‘Well, would you?’ she asked. ‘Would you like to have had children?’

  ‘It has crossed my mind on occasion.’

  ‘You see. I was right.’

  ‘Right about the wish but wrong about the decade. I haven’t thought it for a while.’

  ‘The world misses a little Peter, I think!’

  ‘Or a little Petra?’

  ‘Quite. Though a boy would be particularly special, don’t you think?’

  ‘You clearly think so.’

  ‘Oh yes.’

  ‘Well, as I say, it’s all a little late for me, so it’s not something I dwell on. Seasons change – and things once carried by the thrusting tide of desire sink down into the silt of the past; forgotten things.’

  Though, in truth, he had dwelt on it recently, with things from the past so stirred. Could he and Rosemary have had children?

  ‘Well, perhaps it isn’t too late, Abbot. Have you ever considered that?’

  Peter laughed. ‘You have a time machine in the garage?’

  ‘No, I have something better – a younger body in the house, of child-bearing age.’ Peter froze. ‘You are still fertile and able, I presume?’

  Peter was struck by how normal this all felt, sitting with a judge in Stormhaven discussing his fertility . . . when it wasn’t normal. And what was Blessings suggesting?

  ‘I’m sorry, I don’t quite . . .’

  ‘I only want a donor, Abbot! Your face!’

  ‘A donor?’

  ‘It would be nothing more than that. A sperm donor. The world is crying out for them.’

  ‘I hadn’t heard.’

  ‘There’s been a shortage of them since the anonymity laws were changed. The offspring can now come and find you, by law, which has made men think twice about a brief spillage at the clinic. The donors have dried up, so to speak. But I’m a little choosy anyway.’

  Peter relaxed into his chair and pondered the unfolding scene.

  ‘I’m not sure what to do with this conversation, Blessings.’ She smiled mischievously. ‘I mean, we seem to have moved at a deceptively fast pace and – well, as I said, I don’t know what to do with it all.’

  And he didn’t.

  ‘That doesn’t sound like a no, Abbot. And really, you don’t need to do anything – well, only a little. I mean, I’m not looking for a husband. I’m not even looking for a father for the child; that would be quite up to you. I’m just looking for a boy who will grow to be a man . . . a proper man.’

  Peter remembered the story of her father’s unfortunate demise, as told by Martin. Death in the toilet. But he held back from comment. The longing for a child – a male child – was clearly some search for redemption. He wanted to help; but not in that way.

  ‘I’m sure you’ll find someone.’

  Other men’s names came to mind, possible volunteers, suitable sperm donors ready and waiting in Stormhaven, and he nearly offered some names. (‘Have you ever thought of Martin Channing? An intelligent man, no question of that.’ He’d leave out his morality. ‘Or Terence, even? Such a brave soldier, and a much loved leader of men.’) But he didn’t. It wasn’t as if Blessings was an impetuous soul. She’d have thought through these matters carefully, sifted Martin and Terence like a medieval flour merchant. Blessings did not suggest things casually. And, more importantly, he was not responsible for her solution. A son was her issue, not his . . . he needed to leave.

  ‘This conversation will remain confidential, I trust,’ she said.

  ‘As confidential as it can be, given that no promises were made.’

  ‘She never would have been good enough for you, you know.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Rosemary.’

  ‘Rosemary?’

  ‘I saw you having lunch in the deli. All very cosy.’ They’d been seen. ‘Should you really be on the case – given such intimate connection?’

  Blessings was not making a casual enquiry.

  ‘Everything has been cleared,’ he said, and it was almost true. ‘I am neither a suspect nor a beneficiary.’

  ‘But close to the deceased.’

  ‘I have spoken more words with you in a few days than I have with Rosemary in the last forty years. I’m not sure how close that is.’

  Was she going to be difficult?

  ‘We must not speak ill of the dead, Abbot,’ she said, preparing to speak ill of the dead. ‘And her death is a tragedy, of course. But she would not have been a good pond for you to return to. Really she wouldn’t, quite unsuitable.’

  And that appeared to be that. As Peter walked home, he found some peace in the sea that evening, the waves unusually calm.

  Though sometimes a storm followed such water.

  ‘He likes to be whipped,’

  said Tamsin.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Major-General Terence Blain.’

  Abbot Peter sighed. They were back in his small front room, catching up. Tamsin had brought her own coffee.

  ‘Try this,’ she’d said, ‘and you’ll never go back to the Lidl brew.’

  And while it did taste very good – really very good indeed – the abbot was finding the case less pleasing. The whole thing was beginning to feel like a conspirac
y against men: a critique of his own inadequate love life and the inadequate lives of others of his gender, and all the more uncomfortable for being true.

  ‘And we have this on good authority?’

  ‘The best . . . the one who whips him.’

  ‘Cherise?’

  ‘How did you know it was her?’ asked Tamsin.

  ‘An educated guess.’

  ‘That’s who you’d choose?’

  It wasn’t who he’d choose.

  ‘We’re here to catch a murderer, I believe,’ he said.

  ‘And I was thinking of your Venn diagram, Abbot, the shared circles.’

  ‘Oh.’

  He was surprised she’d taken to his idea. The ideas of others were not usually acknowledged by Tamsin. She preferred credit focused firmly on herself.

  ‘It wasn’t such a ridiculous idea, you know,’ she said.

  ‘Remarkable.’

  ‘With a little tweaking by me. I showed Cherise photos of the men in the Etiquette Society, you see. Terence, Martin and Geoff.’

  As suggested by Peter. Had she forgotten that? ‘OK.’

  ‘And what do you know? There’s the man she knows as “Curly” but who is in fact Terence Blain. One out of three isn’t bad!’

  ‘It isn’t a crime, I suppose, being whipped; and the major-general has been through a lot.’

  ‘But it’s all so depraved,’ she said, shaking her head, as if this was about much more than mere crime. As if a little terror on the battlefield went anywhere near justifying this. ‘Don’t you find men depraved?’

  He was an unlikely advocate for the male gender but he couldn’t help but attempt some sort of defence. Tamsin brought out such reactions in him.

  ‘Is it really any more depraved than someone who goes shopping to cheer herself up?’

  ‘That’s what you tell yourself, is it? Being whipped is the same as retail therapy? I hardly think so!’

  ‘We all live with the unresolved inside, buried in the layers of our ego. We all feel the need for escape, for release.’

  ‘Cherise could fit you in tomorrow afternoon apparently.’

  Ignore her. ‘He won’t find this easy,’ said Peter.

  ‘Who won’t?’

  ‘Terence. He won’t find the spotlight of investigation easy.’