Read Online Blood Sinister by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Cynthia Harrod-Eagles
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this minute, by the way.’
‘Perhaps. But I can’t stop him without arresting him.’
‘Ah, yes, and he’s not a person to arrest unless you’re sure. Too many friends in high places.’
‘What is he, a dustman?’
‘Laugh it up, guv,’ Atherton warned. ‘It doesn’t stop at Giles Freeman, you know – though that’d be bad enough. Freeman’s one of the Coming Men and doesn’t like anyone to get in his way. But more than that, the Freeman set has the key to Number Ten. In and out like lambs’ tails.’
‘You terrify me,’ Slider said.
‘You’re a political ignoramus,’ Atherton told him affectionately. ‘How do you manage not to know all these things?’
‘I don’t get time to read the papers.’
‘That’s dedication.’
‘Apparently Prentiss didn’t either – or not the
Standard
, since that’s the only place it appeared.’
‘Her name wasn’t mentioned in that anyway,’ Atherton pointed out.
‘True. But wouldn’t you have thought someone would have phoned him and told him? He must know plenty of journalists, and the word must have got round by now.’
‘Maybe they don’t like him. All right, what now?’
‘Back to the factory. With any luck, Norma will have got something from his wife that we can work with.’
In the car, Atherton said, ‘What about the tying up, guv? Do you think it was a sex game that went wrong? Do you see him as the bondage, S&M type?’
‘There’s no point in wondering until we find out if the finger-marks and semen were his.’
‘How much d’you want to bet?’ Atherton said.
‘I’m not a betting man,’ Slider said. He glanced at his colleague sidelong, wanting to ask him about the horse-racing thing, and then deciding it was none of his business. Lots of people gambled. It wasn’t a crime.
Campden Hill Square was on a hill rising steeply from the main road, with a public garden in the centre graced by massive plane trees. Fog now draped their bare branches like cobweb, and made fizzy yellow haloes round the street lamps. The steepness and the narrowness of the houses gave it a Hampsteady feel to Swilley. The houses looked unstable, as though they might topple like dominoes and send two hundred years of architecture rumbling out into the Bayswater Road in a lava flow of bricks and slates. And good riddance, in her view. She had as much respect for old London architecture as the Luftwaffe.
The door of Prentiss’s house was opened by a small, slender woman. In the gloom of the unlit hall she lifted her eyes to Norma’s height with darting apprehension. Her brown eyes, thick dark hair and very white skin reminded Swilley of a lemur.
‘Mrs Prentiss? I’m Detective Constable Swilley of Shepherd’s Bush CID. May I come in and talk to you?’
She said it in her most pleasant and unthreatening tones, but Mrs Prentiss seemed to be struck breathless and wordless.She moved her lips and made an uncompleted gesture of her hands towards her chest, as though her lungs had sprung a leak. Swilley, afraid she was going to faint, reached out and held her elbow. ‘Hang on, love. Sorry if I startled you. You’d better sit down.’
But Mrs Prentiss shook her off and turned away to lean against the banister of the steep, curving staircase, which was all there was in the hall, apart from a glimpse through an open door of a dining-room. The hall was papered in dark green, a William Morris print Swilley just about remembered from her childhood. It was worn in places, and gave an air of shabby gloom that Swilley had come to associate with a certain sort of wealthy person, as if they felt themselves to be above anything as mundane as refurbishment. It was what she would have expected in a place like Campden Hill, and she had no patience with it.
The impatience now spread to Mrs Prentiss, who she felt was time-wasting, and she said firmly, ‘P’raps you could do with a brandy. Tell me where it is and I’ll get you one.’
Mrs Prentiss lifted her head.
‘Perhaps. But I can’t stop him without arresting him.’
‘Ah, yes, and he’s not a person to arrest unless you’re sure. Too many friends in high places.’
‘What is he, a dustman?’
‘Laugh it up, guv,’ Atherton warned. ‘It doesn’t stop at Giles Freeman, you know – though that’d be bad enough. Freeman’s one of the Coming Men and doesn’t like anyone to get in his way. But more than that, the Freeman set has the key to Number Ten. In and out like lambs’ tails.’
‘You terrify me,’ Slider said.
‘You’re a political ignoramus,’ Atherton told him affectionately. ‘How do you manage not to know all these things?’
‘I don’t get time to read the papers.’
‘That’s dedication.’
‘Apparently Prentiss didn’t either – or not the
Standard
, since that’s the only place it appeared.’
‘Her name wasn’t mentioned in that anyway,’ Atherton pointed out.
‘True. But wouldn’t you have thought someone would have phoned him and told him? He must know plenty of journalists, and the word must have got round by now.’
‘Maybe they don’t like him. All right, what now?’
‘Back to the factory. With any luck, Norma will have got something from his wife that we can work with.’
In the car, Atherton said, ‘What about the tying up, guv? Do you think it was a sex game that went wrong? Do you see him as the bondage, S&M type?’
‘There’s no point in wondering until we find out if the finger-marks and semen were his.’
‘How much d’you want to bet?’ Atherton said.
‘I’m not a betting man,’ Slider said. He glanced at his colleague sidelong, wanting to ask him about the horse-racing thing, and then deciding it was none of his business. Lots of people gambled. It wasn’t a crime.
Campden Hill Square was on a hill rising steeply from the main road, with a public garden in the centre graced by massive plane trees. Fog now draped their bare branches like cobweb, and made fizzy yellow haloes round the street lamps. The steepness and the narrowness of the houses gave it a Hampsteady feel to Swilley. The houses looked unstable, as though they might topple like dominoes and send two hundred years of architecture rumbling out into the Bayswater Road in a lava flow of bricks and slates. And good riddance, in her view. She had as much respect for old London architecture as the Luftwaffe.
The door of Prentiss’s house was opened by a small, slender woman. In the gloom of the unlit hall she lifted her eyes to Norma’s height with darting apprehension. Her brown eyes, thick dark hair and very white skin reminded Swilley of a lemur.
‘Mrs Prentiss? I’m Detective Constable Swilley of Shepherd’s Bush CID. May I come in and talk to you?’
She said it in her most pleasant and unthreatening tones, but Mrs Prentiss seemed to be struck breathless and wordless.She moved her lips and made an uncompleted gesture of her hands towards her chest, as though her lungs had sprung a leak. Swilley, afraid she was going to faint, reached out and held her elbow. ‘Hang on, love. Sorry if I startled you. You’d better sit down.’
But Mrs Prentiss shook her off and turned away to lean against the banister of the steep, curving staircase, which was all there was in the hall, apart from a glimpse through an open door of a dining-room. The hall was papered in dark green, a William Morris print Swilley just about remembered from her childhood. It was worn in places, and gave an air of shabby gloom that Swilley had come to associate with a certain sort of wealthy person, as if they felt themselves to be above anything as mundane as refurbishment. It was what she would have expected in a place like Campden Hill, and she had no patience with it.
The impatience now spread to Mrs Prentiss, who she felt was time-wasting, and she said firmly, ‘P’raps you could do with a brandy. Tell me where it is and I’ll get you one.’
Mrs Prentiss lifted her head.
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