‘No, I’ll have to go through the University of Clincham. Though whether there’ll be anyone around there at the weekend, I don’t know.’
‘Good luck.’
‘Don’t worry, Jude. I’ll sort this out. There’s no way I’m going to let you get a life sentence for a crime you didn’t commit.’
To Jude this sounded a little over-dramatic. But it did address the basic source of her anxiety. And to know that she had Carole fighting her corner was very comforting.
It was about half-past five when the telephone next rang in Woodside Cottage. ‘Hi, Jude, it’s Zosia.’
‘How lovely to hear you.’ But Jude recognized the tension in her voice. She remembered from her last visit to the Crown & Anchor how down the girl had been looking. ‘Everything all right?’
‘Yes,’ Zosia replied instinctively, but her tone told another story.
‘Are you sure?’
‘No, I am not sure.’ After dedicated study and classes, she now spoke perfectly grammatical English. But her accent remained, and grew thicker when she was in an emotional state.
‘Is it something you can talk about?’
‘Yes. It is something normally I would have talked to Tadeusz about, but obviously I cannot do that.’ The pain caused by her brother’s death did not go away.
‘If talking to me would help …’
‘Please. I like to. But not on telephone. I need to see you to talk.’
‘That’s fine. Would you like me to come to the pub?’
‘No. Saturday night it is already filling up. We are booked out for dinner. It will be a busy evening.’
‘Well, tell me when you’d like me to come.’
‘Please, it is easier if I come to you. Tomorrow morning? I do not have to be on duty till twelve.’
‘Fine. You remember where Woodside Cottage is, don’t you?’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘Say ten thirty?’
When she put the phone down, Jude felt a warm glow. It would be good to concentrate on someone else’s problems for a while.
And if she was under police surveillance, they couldn’t object to her being visited by Zosia. The girl had nothing to do with Burton St Clair’s murder.
SEVENTEEN
Carole reckoned she’d done everything she could to get in touch with Nessa Perks. Without any personal contact, she could only make an approach through the University of Clincham website. She went to the Creative Writing degree course section and discovered that her quarry was listed as ‘Professor Vanessa Perks’. This confirmed a trend Carole had spotted. Every professor interviewed on Radio 4’s Today programme nowadays seemed to be female and American.
No direct email addresses for any of the teaching staff were listed, so Carole sent a message to the English and Creative Writing Department, marked ‘FAO Professor Vanessa Perks’. Whether it would reach its destination, and how long it would take to reach that destination, she had no means of knowing.
It was frustrating not to be able to move her investigation on more proactively, but she reconciled herself to the fact that there would probably be no reaction from the University of Clincham at a weekend. So, the highlight of Carole’s Sunday would have to be a Skype conversation with her granddaughter Lily in Fulham. (Initially wary of all new technology, but manically enthusiastic once she had embraced it, Carole had now become a devotee of Skype.) And though she wished she saw more of Lily and her younger sister Chloe in the flesh, she did relish engaging on the screen with her older granddaughter’s increasing articulacy.
Zosia arrived at exactly ten thirty. When she took off her fur-lined parka, she revealed her work uniform of white shirt and black trousers. Her make-up and pigtails were perfect and Jude was struck by how pretty she was. She can’t have lacked for interest from the young men of Fethering but, so far as Jude knew, she hadn’t had a boyfriend since she’d been working at the Crown & Anchor. Maybe the hours of a bar manager weren’t conducive to an active social life, but Jude reckoned the girl’s single state was more a result of the long mourning process she was going through for her murdered brother.
Once they were both supplied with coffee, Jude asked directly, ‘What’s the problem?’
‘It is my uncle Pawel. My mother’s brother.’
Jude didn’t know that Zosia had an uncle, but made no comment. She could recognize when someone needed to talk, and let the girl run on.
‘He has come to England only six months ago. He had much unhappiness in Poland. He lost his job. My mother thought he might have more chance of getting another job here in England, but it is not easy. Uncle Pawel is maybe sixty-five years old; it is as hard for him to get a job in England as it was in Poland.’
‘What’s his profession?’
‘I don’t think you would call it a profession; it is a job. In Poland he was a builder. Not a builder who runs projects, just a building labourer. So now he is old, although he would never admit it, he does not have the strength for the heavy work any more. That is why he lost his job in Poland. And it is the same here. Even if he were English, he would not get a labouring job here.’
‘“Even if he were English”?’ Jude echoed.
‘You know what I mean.’
‘You mean that there is prejudice in this country against the Polish?’
‘Of course. If you work in a pub, you hear a lot of it.’
‘I’m sorry. I thought you were quite settled here.’
‘I am, yes. And I have good friends, and I know many people who do not care what country I come from. But in the pub, you know, there are many Polish jokes.’
‘Jokes about the Poles being stupid?’
‘Yes, yes, of course.’ Zosia dismissed the subject. ‘It doesn’t worry me now. Maybe it would worry me, if I thought I was stupid.’
‘You are far from stupid.’
‘I know this. So for me it is sometimes an irritation, but not a problem. For Uncle Pawel, whose English is not so good, the problem is bigger.’
‘Where does he live?’
The girl grimaced. ‘Since he has been in England, he has lived with me. He sleeps on a sofa bed in my sitting room.’
‘That doesn’t sound ideal.’
‘No, it is not, Jude, but it is how it has to be, at the moment. He is family. He is my mother’s brother.’ The way she spoke suggested that she had never questioned the obligation such a relationship placed on her.
‘Of course. So, is that what the problem is: finding somewhere else for him to live?’
Zosia sighed. ‘That is part of the problem. Only a small part.’ She took a deep breath, preparing herself for the next section of her narrative. ‘The fact is, Jude, that Uncle Pawel has always had a problem with alcohol. In Poland too, yes, the vodka. But when he was working, it was fine. Yes, he drank a lot, but the physical work kept him fit. He never turned up late, he never failed to do his work. It was not a problem for his boss, it was a problem for his family.’
‘Is he married?’
‘Was married,’ Zosia replied glumly. ‘Finally, his wife could not put up with the drinking, so she left. Now they are divorced. He had become violent, you see, which is not in his nature. Uncle Pawel is a gentle, simple man, until he gets the vodka inside him. Then he changes, you know, like Jekyll and Hyde.’
Jude was impressed by the girl’s command of British literature, as she went on, ‘I have tried to stop him drinking, but it is no good. He does not want to stop. At first he thought that, because he has a niece who works in a pub, that will be a source of free drinks for him. I pretty soon stopped him thinking on those lines. Now he is banned from the pub. But there are plenty of other places you can get alcohol.’
‘Legally?’