Little Face (36 page)

`Simon? The creche?'

`Lowe was right. The baby changing unit's next to the bog. There's
a closed door in between it and the main part of the creche. Hiding
anything in the unit would've been a piece of piss.'

Charlie nodded. She felt as if she had embarked upon a long, slow
convalescence from a serious illness. She had been torn to pieces and
she had only two choices: disintegrate further or fight to rebuild her
equilibrium. She chose the latter. Simon didn't love her and he never
would. She didn't know why he'd rejected her at Sellers' party, or if
he'd told some or all of their colleagues about the incident, and she
never would. There was something comforting about accepting, finally,
that certain things were beyond her control.

Others weren't. Charlie knew, when she was able to be rational about
it, that her value as a person was unrelated to Simon's opinion of her. She
had been a confident woman before he came along, and she could be one
again. And until she was, however desolate she felt, she would behave
well. She would be friendly to Simon, instead of dismissing his suggestions simply because they were his. Charlie hoped she wasn't so much of
a pillock that she would let a man who didn't appreciate her fuck up her
work, the one thing she'd always known she was good at.

`That's how Beer and Lowe got in.' Simon pointed at the door that
led out on to Alder Street. `It's where I came in when I met Alice Fancourt. Both times.'

`Right. So Beer used the health club without paying, and he hid the
knife he used to kill Cryer in the creche. Is that what we're saying? Is
that all we're saying?'

Simon hadn't decided yet whether he wanted to tell Charlie some, all or none of what he'd found out. Certainly not all. But if he gave her
only a partial account, she might make a phone call herself and find
out the rest. Shit. He hated feeling so cornered.

`Beer and Lowe called Vivienne Fancourt Lady Muck,' he said.
`She used to listen to them bragging about their many run-ins with the
law. She'd have known Beer's DNA would be on our database, she's
not stupid. She wanted Cryer dead because Cryer was restricting her
access to her grandson, but she wasn't prepared to take the risk of
killing her unless she could be sure she wouldn't get caught. What better way of making sure than framing someone, planting physical evidence of that person at the scene? Especially when that someone's a
scrote the police already know.'

`So, what, one day she leaned over in the Jacuzzi and pulled out a
clump of Beer's hair?'

`What's the one thing everyone has with them all the time in a place
like Waterfront? Come on, swimming, Jacuzzi, sauna-what would
you take with you?'

`Fags.'

`A towel,' said Simon. `All Vivienne would have had to do is swap
her towel for Beer's. Or wait until he discarded his and pick it up. It
would have had his hair and skin all over it.'

`He could easily have seen her,' said Charlie. `What if he left his
towel in a locker in the changing rooms and didn't take it to the pool
area with him?'

`What if he did take it with him?' Simon persisted. `What if Vivienne
watched him for weeks, months, while she thought up her plan? She'd
have known his habits, wouldn't she? She could have worked out the best
time to take his towel.' Please let her go for this, he prayed. He couldn't
bring himself to reveal the rest, though he knew he'd have to eventually.
Unless Vivienne Fancourt were to confess-and why the hell would she?

`This is all speculative.' Charlie sighed.

`I know.' Simon's mouth was a hard, determined line. `But while
we're here, we might as well see what the set-up is with the towels.'

Charlie shrugged, then nodded. It was worth a look, she supposed.

`David and Vivienne Fancourt must have been bloody thrilled when
Beer pleaded guilty,' Simon muttered.

`You're assuming they were in it together, then?' He was assuming
an awful lot, and Charlie knew she was indulging him. Shit. Would she
have gone along with Sellers or Gibbs so readily if they'd wanted to
explore a similarly unprovable hunch? Was this the good behaviour she
was aiming for with regard to Simon, or special treatment? `Even if
you're right, it's just a guess,' she said. `There's no evidence.'

Simon's eyes blazed with purpose. He wasn't listening. `I'm going to
find Alice today,' he said.

Charlie thought about the clothes, shoes, car and cash cards Alice
had not taken with her. And all Florence's things, left behind at The
Elms. She feared the worst. `You're in love with her, aren't you?' she
said. It was all right to say this, she thought. As a friend. `You might not
have been before, but you are now. You fell in love with her after she
disappeared. That was what made her your perfect woman.' She felt a
few missing pieces slot into the jigsaw puzzle in her mind as she spoke.

`We've got work to do,' said Simon curtly. `It's down in the lift to get
to the swimming pool.'

Charlie followed him into a carpeted internal corridor that contained a buzzing sound and the smell of lilies. A brass sign opposite
them said `Main Reception' above a black arrow. They walked side by
side in the direction indicated, saying nothing. Charlie's mind was racing, filling in the details of her new theory. Simon, bright red in the
face, carefully avoided her eye. She had to be right. He didn't want a
woman in his life, not really. He wanted a fantasy, someone imagined
and inaccessible. What could be better than a missing woman?

She followed him into the lift, which was mirrored from waist to
head height on three of its four sides, and pressed the button marked
`LG'. It was even harder, in here, for Charlie and Simon not to look at
one another. The journey from the ground floor to the lower ground
floor seemed to take impossibly long. Charlie became aware, at one point, that she was holding her breath. Now she knew what it felt like
to be trapped in a lift, and the damn thing wasn't even stuck.

It was a relief to emerge, finally. Another carpeted corridor. This
time the sign opposite them said `Swimming pool', above another helpful black arrow. Charlie heard echoey splashes, a low bubbling, a hum
that vibrated under her feet. `Here we are,' she said.

To their left, there were two doors. One said `Ladies Changing' and
the other `Gentlemen Changing'. `Presumably those lead straight
through to the pool area,' said Simon. `Bloody hell, any idiot could get
in. You'd think they'd tighten up their security.'

Charlie shrugged. `I doubt it'd occur to many people to try and
sneak in to a health club without paying the membership fees. I mean,
you'd just assume you wouldn't be able to. My sister's health club's like
Fort Knox. You need a little card thingy or the barrier won't open.'

`Look.' Simon pointed to a large wooden sideboard directly in
front of them. On top of it, white towels were piled high on one side.
On the other there was a big, square hole. `Is that what I think it is?'

`A towel bin.' As Charlie spoke, the door that was labelled `Ladies
Changing' opened, and a woman emerged with wet hair, carrying a
crumpled towel in one hand and a pink Nike sports bag in the other.
Her head was crooked, trapping a pink mobile phone between her
shoulder and her ear. ` ... bloody pool and showers were freezing!' she
said, irate. `One of the boilers is broken. I'm going to ask for a discount
on next month's membership if they haven't got it sorted by tomorrow.' She dropped her towel into the square hole. It didn't fall very far;
the used towels were piled too high already. The woman tutted and
walked towards the stairs, now holding her phone in her hand, still
complaining loudly.

`All I'd need to do is reach in and pick up the towel she's just
dropped,' said Simon, `and I could frame her for murder.'

Charlie knew he was right. Right that it was possible; not necessarily
that it was what had happened.

`Simon, are you a virgin?' she asked.

Thursday, October 2, 2003

I AM IN the kitchen, clutching the tape in my right hand. I cannot
believe that my idea, born out of desperation, worked. It did not for
a minute occur to David that I was bluffing. My handbag is on the
kitchen work surface beneath the back window, next to my keys,
mobile phone and watch-all my confiscated possessions. I pick up my
watch and put it on, half expecting an alarm to start wailing. I am
wondering whether I should put the tape in my bag, hide it somewhere
else or destroy it, when I hear breathing behind me.

I curl my hand around the tape and turn. Vivienne is standing
about a foot in front of me. I wonder if she was about to touch me. She
is wearing her long, navy dressing gown over white silk pyjamas. Her
skin is shiny from the night cream she uses, the best that Waterfront's
beauty salon has to offer. Her face is greasy, white and spectral. `What
are you doing?' she asks. I don't normally come downstairs after
Vivienne has gone to bed. Nobody does. She can't sleep if she thinks
anybody else is still up. It is one of the many unwritten rules of life at
The Elms. This change in my normal pattern has alerted her to a possible danger.

I decide to use a Vivienne tactic, to answer a question with a question. `Are you nervous about tomorrow?' She is disconcerted by my
prying into her psyche. She is the one who asks, always. `I mean, it's
easier for me,' I continue, my heart leaping up into my mouth with every beat. `I know what the test result will be. You don't. It must be
hard for you. Waiting. Not knowing.' Were it not for my triumph over
David, I would not dare to say any of this. It is as if the pilot light of
my confidence has suddenly been lit again, though the flame is still a
faint, low one.

Her eyes glint. Vivienne is a proud woman. She hates to have it
pointed out to her that she is at a disadvantage. `I'll know soon
enough,' she says. Then, as if suddenly aware she has admitted to
uncertainty, she adds, `David is my son. I believe him. You've not been
yourself, Alice. You know that.'

`Why do you call her "the baby" if you believe David? You haven't
called her Florence once, have you, since you got back from Florida?
You don't cuddle her. You supervise her, but you don't touch her.'

Vivienne's tongue flicks out to moisten her lips. She tries to smile
again but it is even harder for her this time. `I was trying to be tactful,'
she says. `I didn't want to upset you.'

`That's not true. Deep down, you can't quite bring yourself to dismiss what I'm saying, can you? I'm Florence's mother. You know
what it means to be a mother. And you've always liked and trusted me.
You call Little Face "the baby" because, like me, you don't know who
she is. And you're terrified of tomorrow morning. Because pretty
soon, you'll have to face the truth that I faced last Friday-Florence is
missing. The denial you're in at the moment, that's going to end.'

`That's nothing but psychobabble,' she spits, the tendons in her
clenched fists sticking out like ropes.

`I'm going to miss Little Face,' I whisper. `When we have to give her
back.'

`Give her back?' Vivienne looks flustered.

`To the police. Well, we won't be allowed to keep her, will we? Not
once the police know she's not ours. They'll take her away. We'll
have no baby at all.' My voice wobbles.

Vivienne lunges at me and pushes me hard in the chest with both her
hands. I cry out in surprise before losing my balance. My shoulder bangs against the top of the oven as I fall to the floor. For a few minutes I cannot move for the pain. I curl up on my side.

Vivienne hovers above me, bending down. I can smell her face
cream, its sharp lily of the valley scent. `This is all your fault!' she
screams. The sound of her unrestrained rage is more of a shock than
her physical attack on me. I have never heard her shriek like this
before. `What sort of mother goes out on her own and leaves her newborn baby at home to be kidnapped? What sort of mother does that?'
Her face looms over mine, her mouth a dark cave, wide open. I smell
mint-flavoured toothpaste and my own sweat, my fear of her.

And then I am alone in the room, the Dictaphone tape still wrapped
in my shaking hand.