Six hours later Gunther walked up a long street of detached Victorian villas in Esher, the key to Mrs Muncaster’s house in his pocket. Yesterday’s fog had gone but it was a cold, dank afternoon. He had phoned the estate agent that morning, saying he represented a Swedish company interested in entering the English property market, renovating old houses. The agent had been very keen, and when Gunther arrived in his office had been delighted to give him the keys so he could go and look round for himself. ‘You’re wise to get into the housing market now,’ the agent had said with a sort of cheerful desperation. ‘Everyone says it will go up next year. The house does need a lot of work, an old lady lived there alone for years. It’s ideal for a developer. The solicitor for her estate hasn’t got probate yet, so I’m afraid we haven’t been able to clear out the house.’ Good, Gunther thought. ‘The beneficiary who instructed the solicitor and us lives in America,’ the agent continued. ‘It’s holding things up. But if we got an offer in I’m sure we could move things along.’
When he reached it Gunther saw the agent was right; the house was noticeably run down, paint flaking off the windowsills and door, the gate half-rotten and the front garden rank with weeds. It was big for an old woman living alone. When he opened the front door his nostrils were filled with a smell of damp and old dust. The house was dim and gloomy and the electricity had been switched off. Something in the atmosphere reminded Gunther of Muncaster’s flat.
He wandered from room to room, looking into drawers and desks. The house hadn’t been painted inside for years. In the kitchen he saw some plates and cups left to dry on the draining board. Two people had been here, not that long ago; Muncaster and the brother probably. A big room at the front was a doctor’s consulting room, with equipment that looked forty years old. Mrs Muncaster must have left it as it was after her husband died. Stupid woman, Gunther thought, she should have sold up and moved somewhere smaller. He opened the drawers of the doctor’s desk but they were empty. In a bureau in the lounge he found a drawerful of household accounts and some old photographs, which again looked as though they came from before the Great War. This was disappointing. He coughed; the dust and damp were getting to his nose and throat.
Gunther fared no better upstairs; there were a couple of bedrooms with single beds, maps and pictures of trains on the walls, small boys’ rooms. A large bedroom must have been Mrs Muncaster’s; there was a wardrobe full of dark clothes, already starting to smell musty. On the wall was a photograph of a solidly built, good-looking young man in academic cap and gown; it must be Edgar, the brother. Gunther had seen no photographs of Frank anywhere.
Gunther felt thwarted now; there was nothing here, no information about either brother. Another brick wall. It was getting dark, becoming hard to see properly. He opened another door, the last. It was another small bedroom. Another single bed, a Victorian chest of drawers. But there was a table by the window as well, and on it he saw something unexpected and strange: a large photograph of a woman, in a big silver frame covered in black crêpe. In front of the photograph a candle stood in a silver candle-holder; there were spent matches in the bowl. Gunther went over and picked up the photograph, the crêpe falling off it. The woman was middle-aged, with short, tight curls, a rope of pearls round her neck. Her face was striking: big fleshy features and sharp-looking eyes. Not a trustworthy face, his policeman’s instinct told him. In the right-hand corner of the photograph was a signature: Ethel Baker, 1928, and the words ‘The spirits are with us’.
Gunther put the photograph back on the desk. The room looked like some sort of shrine; it made him feel uneasy. Gunther believed in reason, order, the clear light of historical destiny. He had no truck with fancies and imaginings, but standing in the room the sadness of the house appeared to thicken and a horrible, seeping darkness seemed to gather. He had a strange mental picture of desperate broken-backed creatures crawling towards him over the dusty carpet. Suddenly he felt the whole world was full of them and soon there would be nothing and nobody else left. He shook himself angrily, went out and left the house, slamming the door shut. He had found nothing there, nothing at all.
Chapter Twenty-Six
THAT EVENING, AFTER WORK, David went to Soho again. He had had a message from Geoff; Jackson wanted to meet them tonight. David had telephoned Sarah, saying he had to work late once more. She had asked, angrily, whether he really had to. He knew she was still shocked by what had happened on Sunday. He was apologetic, reassuring and promised to be back as soon as he could.
A day had passed since Hubbold had spoken to him about the missing file. Nobody had mentioned it further, but he guessed Hubbold was speaking to others and that he had told them, like David, to keep the matter confidential. When he went up the corridor to the lift to go to lunch he had seen Carol sitting smoking at her desk, a blank, vacant look in her eyes. For once, she did not even see him. She must have been questioned, too.
It was a cold, raw evening. The exotic Soho grocery shops were closing, assistants in brown overalls packing away stock and pulling down shutters. A couple of young men in trilby hats and coats with wide shoulders passed him, talking Italian. Under one of the tall, glass-panelled streetlamps a man in his forties, dressed like David in a dark coat and bowler hat, stood looking round him nervously. David guessed he had come to find a prostitute. The street girls wouldn’t be out until later. The man met his eye and looked away quickly. David turned into the alley beside the coffee bar.
He was about to ring the bell when the door opened and a tall, attractive young woman appeared. She wore a green coat and had striking red hair under a fashionable saucer-shaped hat. She looked at him with bright green eyes, then smiled. ‘You’re one of Natalia’s friends, aren’t you? I’m Dilys from the other flat. I’m just going out to the shops, I thought you was an early client. It’s all right, I was given pictures of all of you, to memorize. I watch out for you all, you know. Go on up,’ she added, a little reproachfully. David realized he was blushing.
‘I – thank you.’
She smiled at his embarrassment, then walked away down the alley. David went upstairs and knocked on Natalia’s door. She opened it a little, peering out at him anxiously for a second before she recognized him and her face cleared. She let him in.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I didn’t ring the bell. The – Dilys let me in, she was on her way out. She knew me, she said she had pictures of us.’
Natalia nodded. ‘Yes, Dilys is important. We would not have this place but for her. She is a good friend.’
Natalia wasn’t wearing her painter’s smock tonight but a thick grey sweater that set off the paleness of her skin. ‘How are you?’ she asked, looking at him with concern.
‘There’s been a bit of a problem at work.’
‘So I understand. Don’t tell me about it, wait until Mr Jackson gets here.’ She gave her sad, wry smile. ‘That’s the way he likes to do things.’
‘I know.’
There was a charcoal sketch on her easel, a narrow cobbled street with tumbledown houses on each side, figures walking along. She came and stood beside him. ‘I started that yesterday. After our talk. It is the old Jewish Quarter in Bratislava.’
‘It looks a run-down sort of place.’
‘It was where the poorer Jews lived, shopkeepers and bootmenders, labourers.’
David said, ‘My father told me after my mother died that my Jewish grandfather was a furniture-maker, a carpenter. It’s not the sort of job you associate with a Jew somehow.’