On Saturday morning, Zoe lay in bed daydreaming. She glanced at the clock and saw it was half past ten. It was unheard of for her to be up later than half past eight – she usually left the badge of sloth to Jamie, who often required a forklift to get him out of bed during the holidays – but today was different.
It dawned on her that she was entering a whole new phase in her life. Up until now, she had been first a child, with natural restrictions placed on her freedom. Then she’d become a mother, a state that necessitated complete selflessness. And lately she had been a carer, helping and comforting James through his final weeks. But this morning, she realised, apart from her never-ending role as mother, she was freer than she had ever been in all her twenty-nine years. Free to live as she wished, make her own decisions and live with the consequences . . .
Although Art had left before eleven last night, and their lips had only met in a chaste kiss goodnight, she’d woken feeling wrapped up by love in the calm, contented way that one associated with a night of satisfying sex. They had barely touched, yet even the brush of his jacket against her side had sent desire tingling through her body.
When he’d arrived, they’d sat down in the sitting room and talked – at first both shy and uncertain, but soon relaxing into the easy intimacy of two people who had once known each other well. It had always been that way with Art, from the very beginning. While others around him treated him with deferential uncertainty, Zoe had seen his vulnerability, his humanity.
She remembered when they had first met, at a trendy smoke-filled club in Kensington, Marcus insisting they celebrate her eighteenth birthday with her first legal drink. Marcus had promised their grandfather that he would look out for Zoe, make sure she got home safe, but that had extended as far as Marcus buying her a gin and tonic, and pressing some cash into her hand – ‘For the cab home. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!’ And he’d melted into the crowd with a wink and a grin.
At a loss, she’d sat down on a bar stool and looked around her at the gaggle of people on the dance floor, laughing loudly and wrapping their bodies drunkenly around each other. James had always taken care to shield her while she was growing up, so, unlike most of her boarding school friends, she didn’t have wild stories of nights out or experimenting with drugs in dimly lit toilets. Clutching the sweaty twenty-pound note Marcus had given her and feeling so uncomfortable that she decided she wanted to go home, she was just standing up from her stool when a voice had stopped her.
‘Oh, are you leaving? I was just about to ask if you wanted a drink.’
She’d turned around to look up into a pair of dark green eyes, framed by a fringe of straight blond hair that seemed incongruous alongside the fashionable longer hair sported by the other young men in the club. He looked vaguely familiar to her, but she couldn’t place him.
‘No thanks,’ she’d said. ‘I’m not much of a drinker, really.’
‘Me neither.’ He’d broken into a relieved grin. ‘I’ve just shaken off my . . . er, friends. They were more keen on this place than I was. I’m Art, by the way.’
‘Zoe,’ she’d said and had awkwardly stuck out her hand. He’d taken it in his and squeezed it briefly, sending a frisson of heat through her.
Looking back now, Zoe wondered whether, if she had recognised him then for who he really was, she would have left well alone? Would she have refused him when he’d asked her to dance with him again and again – the feel of his body pressed against hers sending all sorts of strange and wonderful sensations through her own . . . ? Then, finally, as the club was closing, allowing him to kiss her, swapping numbers and agreeing to meet again the following evening?
No, Zoe thought firmly. She’d have made exactly the same decision.
Last night, they’d both steered clear of the past. Instead they had talked of nothing and everything, simply savouring each other’s company.
Then Art had glanced at his watch regretfully. ‘I have to go, Zoe. I have a meet-and-greet in Northumberland tomorrow. The helicopter leaves at six thirty. You say you’re filming in Norfolk for the next few weeks?’
‘Yes.’
‘I can easily be up at our place there for a couple of nights. In fact, how about next weekend? Do you know yet where you’re staying? I can have a car pick you up on Friday evening and bring you over.’
Zoe had walked to the bureau and pulled out details of the small hotel where she’d be staying for the next six weeks. She wrote the information on a piece of paper and handed it to him.
‘Perfect,’ he’d said with a smile. ‘I’ll give you my mobile phone number too.’ He took a card out of his breast pocket. ‘Here. Please call me.’
‘Bye, Art. It was lovely to see you.’ Zoe had felt awkward, not sure how to end the evening.
‘And you.’ And then he’d reached down for the briefest kiss. ‘See you next weekend. We’ll have more time then. Goodnight, Zoe.’
Eventually, Zoe got out of bed, showered and dressed. She went shopping for groceries and came home having forgotten half of the things she’d gone out to buy. Dreamily, she played a record dating back ten years that she’d not put on the turntable since. She closed her eyes as the strains of Jennifer Rush’s ‘The Power of Love’ filled the room, the words as familiar to her now as they had been a decade ago.
On Sunday afternoon, she took a long stroll through Hyde Park, enjoying the snow-covered trees and walking on the white grass to avoid the treacherous icy paths. Returning home, she called Jamie at school. He sounded very perky, having just won a place in the under-tens’ rugby A team. She gave him the number of the hotel she was staying at in Norfolk to pass on to Matron in case of emergency, and discussed where he and his friend Hugo would like to go for lunch in two weeks’ time when she came to visit him. That evening, she packed much more carefully than she usually would for location filming, thinking about what she might need for next weekend. ‘Good underwear,’ she giggled, packing the La Perla set a friend had given her for Christmas, and which had never yet seen the light of day.
In bed that night, she allowed herself to consider the consequences of what she was beginning all over again. And the raw fact that, as before, there was no hope of any future.
But, Zoe thought sleepily as she turned over, I love him.
And love conquered all, didn’t it?
On Monday morning, Joanna waved Simon off to work, relieved at his departure. After The Kiss, there’d been none of their usual easy banter, and tension had hung thick in the air. Perhaps a week apart would help, and she prayed they could settle back quickly into their old, comfortable friendship.
Joanna closed her mind to how she had felt about last night’s kiss. It had been a very difficult few weeks and she was vulnerable and overwrought. Besides, there were other matters to attend to. And she’d been presented with the perfect opportunity: she had two whole days off.
As soon as Simon left, Joanna grabbed her rucksack and pulled out the photocopy of the letter, the programme and the note from Rose. As she did so, her hands touched cold metal and she retrieved the gold fountain pen. She’d forgotten all about it, what with everything else.
She turned it over in her hand, studying it. I. C. S. . . .
The initials rang a vague bell, but Joanna could not think from where. She sat cross-legged on the sofa bed, studying both the letters and the programme. If Simon thought she was going to curtail her interest in this whole business, then he was wrong. Plus, he’d seemed agitated and nervous on Friday night, most unlike his usual self. Why was he so dead set on her not following this up?
She studied the letter yet again. Who was ‘Sam’ and ‘the White Knight’? And who the hell had Rose been, for that matter?
She made herself a coffee and mulled over the few facts she had at her disposal. Was there anyone else who might know Rose’s surname? Muriel? Maybe she had seen letters addressed to Rose. Surely Rose would have had to sign some sort of tenancy agreement when she took the flat in Marylebone? Joanna dug out her notebook and flicked through it, searching for Muriel’s telephone number. If she could garner Rose’s surname it would make her trip to the local police station that much easier.
She picked up the telephone and dialled her number.
Sadly, Muriel was unable to help her with Rose’s surname. She said she’d never seen Rose receive a single item of post, not even for utilities. The electricity ran on a coin meter and Rose had not had a telephone. She then asked about the address on the letters Rose had given her to post. ‘A couple of them were airmail letters. To somewhere in France, I think,’ Muriel said. That at least fitted, thought Joanna as she remembered the instructions on the pill bottle.
Muriel did pass on the telephone number of their landlord. Joanna duly called the number and left a message on George Cyrapopolis’s answering machine. But for now, it meant she would have to bluff her way through at the police station. She picked up her rucksack and left the flat.
Joanna opened the swing door that led to the front desk of the Marylebone police station. The waiting area was deserted and reeked of stale coffee, the fluorescent lights highlighting the chipped paint and scuffed linoleum floor. There was no one at the desk, so she pressed the bell.
‘Yes, miss?’ A middle-aged constable strolled out of the office behind the desk.
‘Hi, I was hoping someone here would be able to help me discover what’s happened to my great-aunt.’
‘Right. Has she disappeared?’
‘Er, not exactly, no. She’s dead, actually.’
‘I see.’
‘She was found a couple of weeks ago in her flat in Marylebone. She’d fallen down the stairs. The neighbour called the police and—’
‘You think the call might have been taken by one of our officers?’
‘Yes. I’m recently back from Australia. I’d got her address from my dad and thought I’d go and visit her. But when I arrived, it was too late.’ Joanna allowed her voice to break. ‘If only I’d have called round sooner, then . . .’
‘I know, miss. It happens a lot,’ nodded the constable kindly. ‘I presume you want to know where she was taken, that kind of thing?’
‘Yes. Only there’s a problem. I’ve no idea what her surname might be. It’s likely that she had remarried.’
‘Well, let’s try and find her under the name you knew her by. Which was?’
‘Taylor.’ Joanna plucked a name out of thin air.
‘And the date she was found dead?’
‘The tenth of January.’
‘And the address at which she was found?’
‘Nineteen Marylebone High Street.’
‘Okay.’ The constable tapped into a computer on the desk. ‘Taylor, Taylor . . .’ He scanned the screen, then shook his head. ‘Nope, nothing doing. Nobody of that name died that day, not that our station dealt with anyway.’
‘Could you try Rose?’
‘Okay . . . We have a Rachel, and a Ruth, but no Rose.’
‘Those ladies both died on that day too?’
‘They did. And there’s another four local deaths listed here. Terrible time of year for the elderly. Christmas is just past, the weather’s cold . . . Anyway, I’ll check the address. If we were called to an incident that day, it’ll be listed here.’
Joanna waited patiently as the constable studied his screen.
‘Mmmm.’ He scratched his chin. ‘Nothing there either. You sure you got the right date?’
‘Positive.’
The constable shook his head. ‘It might have been that another station took the call. You could try Paddington Green or, better still, the public morgue. Even if it wasn’t us who dealt with the incident, your aunt’s body would have certainly been taken there. I’ll write down the address and you should pay them a visit.’
‘Thanks for all your help.’
‘No problem. Hope you find her. Rich was she?’ he grinned.
‘I have absolutely no idea,’ she said curtly. ‘Bye.’
Joanna walked out of the swing door, hailed a passing taxi and directed the driver to the morgue.
The Westminster Public Mortuary was an unassuming brick building next to the coroner’s court on a quiet, tree-lined street. Joanna entered, not quite sure what to expect, and shuddered at Alec’s favourite description of it as the ‘local meat factory’.
‘Can I help you?’ A young woman on the front desk smiled at her cheerily.
What a god-awful depressing job, Joanna thought as she explained her story again.
‘So the constable thought my great-aunt would probably have been brought here.’
‘Sounds likely. Let me have a look for you.’
The young woman took similar details to the constable. She looked up the name, the date and the address. ‘No, I don’t have a single Rose on that day, I’m afraid.’
‘Maybe she was using another name?’ Joanna said, beginning to run out of options.
‘I’ve put in the address you’ve given me and that’s not showing anything up either. Maybe she was brought here a day later, though it’s doubtful.’
‘Could you check anyway?’
The woman did so. ‘No, still nothing.’
Joanna sighed. ‘Then, if she didn’t come here, where would her body have gone?’
The woman shrugged. ‘You could try some of the local funeral homes. If there was family you were unaware of, they might have had her taken away privately. But usually, if there’s been a death and a body is unclaimed, they’ll end up here.’
‘Okay. Thanks very much.’
‘No problem. I hope you find your auntie.’
‘Thanks.’
Joanna caught a bus back to Crouch End and went to her flat to pick up her post. Her fingers trembled when she put the key in the lock, and as she closed the front door behind her, she thought how sad it was that what had once been her refuge and her sanctuary now made her feel the polar opposite.
Leaving swiftly and walking up the hill towards Simon’s flat, Joanna wondered whether the best thing might be simply to move somewhere else. Especially with Matthew gone, she doubted she could ever be comfortable there again.
When she arrived, she saw there was a message on the machine from George Cyrapopolis, Rose’s landlord. Joanna picked up the telephone and dialled his number.
‘Hello?’ She heard a crash of crockery in the background. ‘Hello, Mr Cyrapopolis? It’s Joanna Haslam here. I’m your deceased tenant’s great-niece.’
‘Ah, yes, ’ello.’ George Cyrapopolis had a deep, booming voice with a Greek accent. ‘What is eet you are wanting to know?’
‘I was wondering whether Rose signed a tenancy agreement with you when she first moved into the flat she rented from you.’
‘I . . .’ There was a pause. ‘You’re not the Eenland Revenue, are you?’
‘No, I promise, Mr Cyrapopolis.’
‘Hmmm. Well, you come ’ere to my restaurant and show yourself to me. Then we can talk, okay?’
‘Okay, what is your address?’
‘I at number forty-six on the High Road in Wood Green. The Aphrodite restaurant, opposite the shopping centre.’
‘Fine.’
‘You come at five, before we open, okay?’
‘Yes. See you then. Thanks, Mr Cyrapopolis.’ Joanna put the telephone down. She made herself a coffee and a peanut-butter sandwich and spent the next hour calling every funeral home listed in central and north London. No Rose was recorded, either on that day, or two days after. ‘Then where on earth did they take her?’ she mused, before calling Muriel once more.
‘Hello, Muriel. It’s Joanna. Sorry to bother you again.’
‘That’s all right, love. Any joy findin’ your aunt?’
‘No, nothing. I just wanted to double-check who it actually was that took Rose away.’
‘I told you, an ambulance came for her. Said they were taking her to the local morgue.’
‘Well, they didn’t. I’ve tried that and the police station and every single funeral home in the district.’
‘Oo-er. A lost body, eh?’
‘Seems so, yes. And they didn’t ask you if you knew of any family?’
‘No. But I did tell ’em the old duck had mentioned they lived abroad.’
‘Mmm.’
‘Tell you what, though,’ Muriel chirped. ‘Have you tried the local registrar’s office? I had to go there after my Stanley passed away. Someone would have had to register Rose’s death.’
‘That’s a good idea, Muriel. I’ll try it. Thanks.’
‘Any time, love.’
Joanna hung up, then looked up the address of the local registrar’s office, grabbed her coat and left the flat.
Two hours later, she emerged from Old Marylebone town hall feeling completely bemused. She slumped down on the steps outside and leant against one of the large columns. At the registrar’s office, she had tried every possible permutation that her information would allow. There had been three dead Roses registered in the two weeks after the tenth of January, but none at the right address and certainly not of the right age. A young baby, only four days old – just reading of her death had brought a lump to Joanna’s throat – as well as a twenty-year-old and a forty-nine-year-old, none of whom could even conceivably be the Rose she was looking for.
The woman who had helped her said there was usually a five-working-day deadline to register a death, unless the coroner had not released the body. But as there had been no record of Rose’s body at the morgue either, this seemed unlikely.
Joanna shook her head in agitation as she headed for the tube station. It was as if Rose had never existed, but her body had to be somewhere. Was there an avenue she still hadn’t explored?
Emerging from the tube, Joanna walked along Wood Green High Street – a mishmash of betting shops, restaurants and thrift stores – looking for the Aphrodite restaurant. It had already grown dark, and she pulled her coat more tightly around her to ward off the biting chill. She caught sight of the restaurant’s neon sign and opened the entrance door.
‘Hello?’ she called, seeing the small, brightly decorated interior was deserted.
‘’Ello.’ A balding, middle-aged Greek man emerged from behind the beads strung across the doorway at the back of the restaurant.
‘Mr Cyrapopolis?’
‘Yes.’
‘I’m Joanna Haslam, Rose’s great-niece.’
‘Okay. Sit down?’ He pulled two wooden chairs out from the table.
‘Thanks.’ Joanna sat. ‘I am sorry to bother you, but as I explained over the telephone, I’m trying to find my great-aunt.’
‘What? You ’ave lost the body, ees it?’ George could not stop himself from grinning.
‘It’s a complicated situation. All I wanted to ask you is whether my aunt Rose signed a tenancy agreement with you. I’m trying to discover her married name, you see. And I thought it might have been on the agreement.’
‘No. There was no agreement.’ George shook his head.
‘Why? If you don’t mind me asking? I would have thought it in the landlord’s best interests to have one.’
‘Of course, usually I do.’ George removed a packet of cigarettes from the breast pocket of his shirt. He offered one to Joanna, who declined, then lit up himself.
‘Then why not with my great-aunt?’
He shrugged and leant back in his chair. ‘I place an advertisement in the Standard as usual. First call ees from old lady who wants to view. I meet her there that evening. She gives me one and half thousand pound cash.’ He took a deep puff of his cigarette. ‘Three months’ rent upfront. I know she was safe. I mean, not going to throw wild parties or vandalise the place, eh?’
Joanna gave a small sigh of disappointment. ‘So you wouldn’t know her surname?’
‘No. She said she deedn’t need no receipt.’
‘Or where she moved from?’
‘Aha!’ George tapped his nose as he thought. ‘Maybe. I was at the building a few days after she move een. I see van coming. The lady – Rose, you say? – tell van men to put wooden boxes in flat. I stand at the door and help men and I notice they have foreign steeckers on them. French, I theenk.’
‘Yes.’ At least this, coupled with the pill bottle and the airmail letters, confirmed where Rose had come from. ‘Do you know exactly when it was Rose moved in?’
George scratched his head. ‘I theenk November.’
‘Well, thanks very much for your help, Mr Cyrapopolis.’
‘Not a problem, mees. You want to stay for some gyros? Very nice lamb, juicy,’ he offered in a cloud of cigarette smoke, patting her hand with his nicotine-stained one.
‘No thanks.’ She stood up hastily and wandered towards the front door. ‘Oh, just one last thing.’ She turned to him. ‘Did you clear out the flat after Rose had died? I mean, for new tenants?’
‘No.’ George looked genuinely puzzled. ‘I went down a couple of days later to see what was happeneeng and poof! Everything gone.’ He regarded Joanna. ‘I thought eet was her family who had taken her theengs and cleaned up, but eet could not have been, could eet?’
‘No. Well, thanks for your time anyway.’
‘That’s okay.’
‘Have you rented out the flat again now?’
He nodded sheepishly. ‘Someone called. No point haveeng it empty, was there?’
‘No, of course not. Thanks again.’ Joanna smiled weakly and left the restaurant.