The Memory of Blood

∨ The Memory of Blood ∧

25

Girltalk

Judith Kramer sat at her dressing table patting powder beneath her dark eyes. Dressed in a loose-fitting black V-neck sweater and jeans, she looked thinner and older than she had at the party. She had tied her hair back and donned plain silver earrings. The effect was severe and unflattering, like that of a New York hostess attending a charity function for want of something more useful to do.

“I’m expected to be presentable,” she explained, noting Longbright’s watchful gaze. “Robert likes his surfaces nice and smooth. He’s very conscious of his image.”

“You don’t approve?” Longbright asked, seating herself beside her.

“I support him.”

“That isn’t what I asked.”

“That’s what I’m here for, isn’t it? To make him look good?”

“Mrs Kramer, I don’t know you and I can’t judge.”

“Oh, but everybody else does. They see the younger second wife come in and watch her struggle to be part of the actors’ conversations. They’re a likeable crowd, you know, but insular. If you didn’t see Helen Mirren in Phaedra or Vanessa Redgrave playing Prospero in The Tempest they’ll happily leave you on the outside. I’m afraid I only know Sir Ian McKellen from Lord of the Rings. I never saw him in Waiting for Godot, so apparently I’m not worth talking to.”

She sat straight and studied her skin in the mirror, as if suddenly realizing who she was. “It seems odd not having to check on Noah every few minutes. Since last July he’s occupied nearly every moment of my day, and now – emptiness. It’s suddenly so quiet. I wasn’t much of a mother. Didn’t have the temperament for it.”

“Not everyone does. It’s no sin.”

“I’m keeping Gloria on for a while, even though there’s nothing for her to do. Robert blames her for taking the night off. And me, for letting the baby alarm turn itself off in my pocket. He has a long list of people and things he wants to blame, but Gloria and I are right at the top. He can’t bring himself to look me in the face. It will always be like this from now on, and I suppose it will break us up. The guilt, the recriminations. I see Noah’s face when I close my eyes, but it’s already changing. Just a crying baby’s face, you see, no real features. Like the horrible little wooden puppet of Punch’s Baby. I never wanted them in the nursery, but they were put there because the room was lockable. Insurance. It’s always about money with Robert.”

“If you’d prefer, I can come back another day. I realize this is a terrible time for you – ”

“Frankly, I’m grateful anybody talks to me at all. Everyone around here is carefully avoiding the subject of the baby, as if I’ll start screaming if they mention his name. I’m sorry – this really isn’t like me. I feel outside of myself somehow. I guess that’s the Valium I’ve been taking. What do you need from me?”

“I thought we’d get to know each other a little. Girl talk.”

“We’re neither of us girls. Besides, I don’t think it’s very advisable. My husband wouldn’t like it.”

“If you prefer, I can just listen. Why don’t you tell me a little about yourself?”

“I’m not used to talking about myself. I’m better at listening, too. God knows I get enough practice in this house.”

“Try it, just this once,” said Longbright. “I think you need a lighter lipstick. Here, use this.” She handed Judith a gold tube of Jungle Amazon Coral Dew that had been discontinued in 1970.

“All right.” Judith pursed her lips, applied the still-fresh lipstick and turned to face the detective sergeant. “I come from a nice Hampshire family. If you don’t like horses or yachting, we feed you then politely wait for you to leave the county. That’s what I did. I came to London with a degree in media studies, which is the equivalent of a proficiency badge in knitting, and ended up taking a job in a telecommunications company, working for one of the directors who played golf with Robert. Robert was still getting over Stella, his first wife. She hadn’t been dead for very long – ”

“How did she die?”

“Pills and booze, nothing very original. She’d always been highly strung, had two modes of operation by all accounts, hysterical laughter and sobbing – very high maintenance. I think Robert disappointed her as well. Everyone said he was very cut up about her death, although I never saw much evidence of that. They lived in this palatial house in Smith Square. Robert had made his fortune in property and I hear she was a bit of a gold digger. Anyway, it was all about keeping up appearances, and they had a very grand lifestyle, but Stella couldn’t handle it. After she died, Robert removed every trace of her from his life. He took down the photographs and burned them, threw away her letters, wiped the slate clean. That’s how he copes. He can’t be seen to lose at anything.”

“How did you meet? Just at work?”

“No. It was Boat Race Day and we were at a very grand party in Henley-upon-Thames, and we kept bumping into each other after that. We always seemed to be surrounded by crowds of people, and I thought, one day I’ll get him alone, but I didn’t. I never did, not even after we were married. Ridiculous how women think they can change men, and of course we don’t. We simply become more and more prescriptive until they finally go away from us.”

“It sounds like you’re being rather hard on yourself.”

“Am I? I honestly don’t know what I brought to the party. He certainly didn’t need me. All my friends thought he was a good catch. I have no idea what he saw in me then, and I still don’t. Which is what makes it all so much worse.”

“What do you mean?”

“Please dignify me with a little intelligence. I’m not stupid, I’m just not very interested in the theatre. I know that you know. I’ve seen who you’ve been talking to. It was me who continued the affair, not Marcus. I needed someone to talk to, and it was obvious Robert would never be my friend. But by then the wedding preparations were already under way and I couldn’t back out. I suppose it suited my purposes, but if a woman says that, everyone thinks she’s a bitch. Strange how it’s fine for a wealthy man to keep a mistress.”

“You think your husband has a mistress?”

“Of course he has. Why else would he slip off after the theatre shuts and come home at four in the morning? He doesn’t even bother to wash the perfume off. I suppose it’s the lack of effort he puts into deceiving me that makes it so galling.”

“Do you think he’s in love?”

“I very much doubt it, if his track record is anything to go by. He’s spending more nights with this one than anyone else he’s seen, but I think that’s simply because he doesn’t want to come home to a wife and a crying baby. Well, he won’t have to worry about that now. The affair will come to an end eventually, he’ll be in a bad mood for a few weeks and then he’ll come creeping back to me with a new pair of diamond earrings, something obvious like that, and I’ll still have Marcus. I’m sure you know all this anyway. Actors are such gossips, and you did take statements from them.”

“We heard plenty of unsubstantiated rumours.”

“I assume one of them concerns the paternity of my son.”

“Yes. You don’t have to tell me any more, unless you think it has a bearing on the case.”

“For all I know it might. I assume you’re like a priest? You can’t repeat what’s said outside this room?”

“I can if it incriminates you in the case under investigation.”

“I imagine it incriminates me for stupidity, if nothing else. Marcus is – was – Noah’s father. The baby wasn’t planned, but Robert was desperate for a son, so I thought it would all work out – until now.”

“You think someone did this to get back at you?”

“Well, what do you think, Detective Sergeant? Let’s see now, who would be the most upset to find out that Noah was not his son after all, but the product of his unfaithful wife and her lover?”

“That’s a very serious accusation, Mrs Kramer.”

“Everything I’ve ever done has been about survival. I suppose I thought that having a child with Marcus would help me to survive a loveless marriage. I hadn’t counted on my husband finding out the truth.”

“You can’t be sure that he has.”

“It certainly looks that way, doesn’t it? You should see him this morning. He looks like he’s just met his own ghost.”

“You mean because he’s upset about Mr Baine.”

“They used to be best friends until Robert started thinking that Gregory was cheating him. Gregory was always getting them into financial scrapes. I imagine Robert is very upset, because he won’t have his money man to bail him out this time. Even if he finds another producer, it’ll be a nightmare trying to put everything right. I heard there’s no question of cancelling the play. They’re going on.”

“My boss thinks your husband really believes in the Punch legend,” Longbright observed. “Do you think he does?”

Judith Kramer paused to think, qualifying her words. “He certainly believes in good and bad fortune. That’s why there’s a puppet in the play that comes to life. It appealed to Robert. He was raised in a very odd family. His mother filled his head with all kinds of nonsense. You’d be surprised how superstitious successful men often are. For all I know, he honestly believes Mr Punch stepped down from his hook and murdered his child. I assume that was the desired effect, and it has been achieved.”

Longbright studied the sallow face before her and could see that Judith Kramer was still suffering from the effects of over-medication. “How is your husband coping?”

“You’ve spoken to him, you should know. I’m not sure anything really touches him. His main goal in life has always been to make something of himself. Now that he’s achieved that, I can’t imagine anything else matters.”

“I’ve read his statements. The only thing that puzzles me is his move from property into the theatre.”

“Why?”

“Theatre people seem – irrational. They’re not known for their pragmatism.”

“Well, of course they’re steeped in odd beliefs. They see ghosts and touch wood, ban the mention of Macbeth and wish each other bad luck before performances. If anyone whistles backstage they have to go out of the room, come in, turn around three times and swear in order to lift the curse. But have you ever noticed? The more money people have, the odder they become, and my husband is extremely rich – or at least he was until Gregory died.”

“There’s no indication that your husband is in any way involved. I have physical evidence against that.”

“What kind of evidence?”

“I can fully account for his time at the party, and I hear he has an alibi for last night. He was with you.”

“Was he? I don’t think I noticed. Anyway, I didn’t say he would do it himself.” Judith gave a bitter laugh. “Robert never does anything himself. He’d hire someone to handle the problem for him. I’m surprised he proposed to me in person.”

“A lot of men are like that.”

“Oh, my husband is unique, I assure you. Robert purchased the Punch and Judy puppets just after his first big sale. It was very important that he beat everyone else at the auction, and he didn’t care that he paid far too much for them. There are lots of ugly stories about how he made his money. In one of these tales, he set up a holiday flat-share website for students, bringing a million contract users to it on the promise that he would never charge them for the service. Then he sold the site to a company that immediately started charging them via a loophole he had deliberately left in their log-in forms, and sued them when they defaulted.”

“He wasn’t at all bothered by that?”

“I suppose he has the morality of a typical City boy. They’re all opportunists, aren’t they? It doesn’t pay to be sentimental. Anyway, with the money he made, he bought a Victorian theatre called the Putney Empire from two widowed sisters, on another supposedly unbreakable promise – that they could stay as sitting tenants in the property next door while he restored the building’s fabric to its former glory.”

“I assume he didn’t keep his promise.”

“No. He cheated the building regulations, paid off the council, hired some thugs to kick the sisters out and tore both the theatre and their house down. I heard they died penniless, although that may be an exaggeration. While the case dithered in the courts he rented the site as a coach park. He used the money from the vehicle leases to build a block of flats and opened his first nightclub. He was just twenty-one years old.”

“If nothing else, it sounds as if he’s been consistent.”

“Robert has every version of the Punch story on his bookshelves because he believes in its message. Morality is just sentiment, challenge the world with righteous anger; that’s how he thinks you should live your life. I wonder just how much of his tainted wisdom he’d have imparted to Noah if he’d lived. I wonder if I’d have liked my son once he’d grown.”

“How is Marcus?”

“He’s rather more like Robert than he realizes. He doesn’t have time to think about anything or anyone other than himself. Not even the child he fathered. I don’t really mean that as a criticism, it’s just the way he is. Maybe one day he’ll look back with regret. Once he starts to age. I don’t suppose I’ll still be with him. It’s exhausting loving someone more than they love you. But since Monday’s… event… I don’t think I want to see him any more. I don’t know what I want.”

“These are early days.”

Judith moved the conversation away from herself. “I suppose you see a lot of tragedy in your job. You’re trained for it.”

“Yes, but if there’s one thing I know, it’s that this part is the worst, and it slowly gets better, to the point when you’ll look back and see something harmful and distant – like a fading thunderstorm.”

“That’s a poetic thought.”

“I have to ask you, Mrs Kramer. Do you think – ”

“You’re going to ask me if I think my husband could break the law and get away with it.” Judith gave her appearance a final check and turned from the mirror. “I know he could, because as far as I can tell, he’s been doing so all his life. He never seems to have any regrets. Do you know what’s wrong with all the people who pass through this house? Nobody ever cries. There’s no real emotion here, it’s all hidden away. And I’ve broken yet another rule by bringing it out. Oh, and did I tell you I mentioned the Scottish play on the night of my son’s death? So I brought a curse down on the house. I’m starting to see why Robert’s first wife killed herself. It must have seemed a viable option.” Judith Kramer wiped her cheek, closed the lipstick and handed it back. “Thanks for the girl talk.”