TWENTY-THREE

1995

The book antiquarian had approximately three strands of hair, one the color of rancid butter, one a dark Jamaican ginger, and the last one pure white. All three strands had been lovingly pasted across an age-spotted pate. His face hung from his skull in folds, and his mouth was loose and overly wet-looking. He spoke with a nasal twang and used a pince-nez to examine the book he held in his hands.

“Amazing,” he said, “totally incredible. Where did you find this?” He said it accusatorily, as though he suspected she had stolen it from the bedstand of a wealthy dowager that very morning.

“It was left to me,” Betty said, “by my grandmother.”

He nodded and put the pince-nez back to the bridge of his wizardly nose. “It’s a second edition. Nowhere near as valuable as a first edition. But not inconsiderable, except—oh dear . . . ” He turned the frontispiece over and stared disconsolately at Arlette’s handwritten inscription. “Was your grandmother famous?” he asked.

“No.”

“Shame. Inscriptions from people of note can actually add to the value of a book. But this”—he ran a finger across Arlette’s immaculate handwriting—“rather detracts, I’m afraid. Still, beautiful, beautiful book. I could sell it for you in a flash.”

Betty gulped and looked at him curiously yet innocently, as though the value of her grandmother’s heirloom could not be of less interest to her.

“Yes, I could put this out for you, ask about forty, forty-five pounds for it?”

Betty gulped again. The exact price of the hairdressing appointment she so badly required. But she had not come here to sell it; she had come to see if it held any clues.

“Little Miss Pickle,” said the man, closing the book gently and running a finger down the spine. “Who’s that? Is that you, then?”

Betty shook her head. “No. It’s a bit of a mystery. There’s someone called Clara Pickle mentioned in her will, but nobody in the family knows who she is.”

“Sounds wistful, don’t you think?” The man held his pince-nez at an angle and eyed Betty almost fondly. “Like she’s writing to someone she hasn’t seen in a long time. Or maybe someone she never saw at all. When did she die?”

“About two months ago,” Betty said somewhat vaguely, thoughts crowding her head.

“Interesting,” he said. “Fascinating. I do love inscriptions. They always tell a story. Pickle.” He smiled. “I wonder who she was.”

“I was hoping there might be a clue. In the book,” Betty said hopefully.

He turned it over, back to front, and said, “Sadly, no. It could have come from anywhere.”

Betty took the book away with her, clutched tightly to her chest inside her shoulder bag. It held no clues to the identity of Arlette’s benefactor, but she was a hundred percent sure that Arlette had fully believed that Betty would one day put it into the hands of its rightful owner. Whoever the hell she was.

The fur, the book, the name and address of a man in South Kensington.

Betty had assumed these were all random: a hastily assembled group of things that bore no relationship to one another. Now she was not so sure. She was remembering the Arlette of yesteryear, the sharp-as-a-pin Arlette, the woman who did not bear fools gladly, who cut a swath and made a fuss and always got exactly what she wanted. The essence of that woman had been there in September 1988, so it stood to reason that she must have put the items there deliberately. Without the folded piece of paper and the inscription, they were just a coat and book. With them, they were clues. Betty had spent too long finding her place here in Soho, and she knew without a shadow of doubt that it was time to get serious, time to find Clara Pickle.

• • •

She forced the twenty-pence piece into the slot at the sound of the man’s voice. “Hello, is that Mr. Mubarak?”

“Yes, it is. Who is this, please?”

“My name’s Betty Dean. I came to see you a few weeks ago. I was asking about a man called Peter Lawler.”

“Oh, yes, of course. I have not forgotten you! What can I do to help you?”

“I was wondering . . . you said that Peter Lawler had gone to hospital when he left his flat. Can you remember which hospital? And if possible, when this was?”

“That is simple. I remember because I went to visit him. And it was a terrible journey. Out in Fulham somewhere. Two buses, and it was the coldest day since records began, and on the way home, I had to wait nearly fifty minutes for my return journey, and it was one of those miserable days that stamps itself in your head permanently.”

“Fulham?” she asked, trying to curb her impatience.

“Yes, the big hospital there. The Charing Cross Hospital.”

“In Fulham?”

“Yes. I do not know why it is called this, but it is. And it was January. I remember that. The arctic freeze. The whole world was cold. January 1985.”

“What ward was he on?”

“It was his liver. The drink. So, now, what would that be called . . . I used to work in a hospital, I should be able to remember this . . . Oh, yes, hepatology. He was on the hepatology ward.”

Betty smiled and popped another twenty-pence piece into the phone. “That’s totally brilliant. Thank you.”

“You are still trying to track him down? This mystery man?”

“Yes,” she said. “I’m really hoping he’ll be able to help me with another mystery. If he’s, you know . . .”

“Alive, yes, that is not at all certain. Listen, I am so glad you called. I had been hoping that you might, because after you went the other day, I found his original rental agreement. I can tell you two more things about him. Do you have a pen?”

Betty caught her breath. Why hadn’t she called earlier? “Yes. Yes, I do.”

“I can tell you that his old address was Flat 2, 23 Battersea Park Road, London, SW11 2GH. I can also tell you that his middle name was John. Peter John Lawler. Did you get that? Peter. John. Lawler. Is that useful?”

“Yes!” said Betty. “Yes. That’s brilliant. Absolutely fantastic! Thank you so much.”

“Remember, Miss Dean, I am here at your disposal should you have any more questions or needs or problems. At your disposal.”

“Thank you, Mr. Mubarak. Thank you. That’s really kind of you.”

“Not at all, my dear. Not at all.”

• • •

Number 23 Battersea Park Road was a dry cleaners called Smart’s, and the entrance to the flats above was up an alley that ran behind the parade of shops. Betty felt rather nervous as she turned off the main road and onto this dead end of overflowing paladins and grimy back windows. She rang the doorbell and glanced warily around while she waited. Eventually, a woman came to the intercom. “Hello.”

“Hello, I’m looking for someone who might know someone who used to live at this address? A Peter Lawler?”

The voice on the intercom went silent, but Betty could hear breathing. “Hello?”

“Yes. Hello. Sorry. Who is this?”

“My name’s Betty. I found Peter’s name and address in my grandmother’s possessions. I think he might be able to help me find someone. I was wondering—”

“Wait,” said the voice, “wait there. I’m coming down.”

Betty turned away from the door and faced the alleyway. A black cat appeared from behind an upturned milk crate and scurried past. The door behind her was unlocked, and she found herself face-to-face with a middle-aged woman with fiercely dyed black hair and a baby in her arms. “Hi,” she said, “I’m Liz. I used to be married to Peter.”

“Oh,” said Betty. “I’m Liz too—well, sort of. I used to be. I’m Betty now. Nice to meet you.”

The woman’s face softened. “I think I might be able to help you,” she said. “Do you want to come in?”

Betty followed Liz up a scruffy flight of stairs and into a claustrophobic living room overlooking Battersea Park Road. The woman put the baby down on a play mat and offered Betty a drink. She left the room and returned a minute later with a cardboard box in her arms.

“That’s my grandson,” she said, sitting down with the box on her lap and nodding at the baby. “Zac, the love of my life.” She smiled fondly at the baby, and he kicked his legs at her with excitement. “I have him every Tuesday and every Thursday. Don’t I, my lovely boy?” The baby kicked his legs again, and Liz sighed happily and turned to the contents of the box in front of her. “I’ve been waiting for this moment,” she said, “half expecting it. This was basically all I got after Peter died.” She stroked the cardboard box absentmindedly.

“Oh,” said Betty. “Peter’s dead?”

“You didn’t know?”

“I thought he might be. I got this address from his old landlord, who told me he’d been very ill.”

“Yeah. Very ill. We were already divorced then, been divorced for ten years, but he never met anyone else, and this was the last place he lived before he moved out. I was still his next of kin. It was me they called when he passed away.”

“What was it, in the end?”

“Emphysema. Of course. Stupid bastard. Had so much. Chucked it all away. When I met him, he was the most handsome man I’d ever seen in my life. Couldn’t believe he wanted to be with me. But I soon realized the looks were just a frame, the picture was a mess.”

“So. What’s in the box?”

Liz snapped herself from the reverie and looked down. “This is all the paperwork from his last unsolved cases, the ones we couldn’t send back, the ones without addresses.”

“Unsolved cases?”

“Yes. Peter was a private detective.”

“Oh! Wow! Really!”

“Yes, I assumed you’d have known.”

“No. Had no idea. I found his name and address in my grandmother’s coat pocket. After she died.”

“Your grandmother. I see. What was her name?”

“Arlette Lafolley.”

Liz flicked through the green cardboard folders in the box. “Lafolley, Lafolley,” she muttered. “Ah, here.” She pulled a folder free. “I remember this well. Another one with no address.” She passed it to Betty.

“What was he doing for her?” said Betty. “Do you know?”

“Trying to find someone, I’d imagine,” Liz replied. “That was what Peter did. He tracked down missing people. Usually for legacies.”

Betty squeezed the bulging file and peered inside it. A photograph wallet from Boots, photocopied listings from the Yellow Pages, a vintage photo album smelling of old paper and mildew, and a program for a jazz concert featuring a trio called Sandy Beach and the Love Brothers. She pulled it out and read it. They were three handsome black men with gelled-back hair and tuxedos, one holding a double bass, one brandishing a fiddle, and the other with a clarinet. They had played a concert at a club called the White Oleander in Windmill Street on Thursday, January 8, 1920. Betty could feel the glamour bristling from within this record of a long-dead moment. She opened the program and read the copy.

Sandy Beach and his Love Brothers, Bert and Buster, are all members of the world-famous Southern Syncopated Orchestra. Tonight, we welcome them in a rare arrangement as a trio to the White Oleander. So, for one night only, sit back, sup up, relax, and let Sandy and his Love Brothers take you onto the dance floor for a night you’ll never forget!

“Wow,” she said softly.

“Anything interesting?” asked Liz.

“I’m not sure. Can I take these? Take them away and look at them at home?”

“Yes, absolutely. Please. I just wish everyone would come and take their files. I hate having them here. All those unfinished stories.”

The baby began to grumble, and Liz got to her knees to pick him up from his play mat and bring him to the sofa. “So,” she said, “your grandmother. Any idea who she was trying to find?”

Betty glanced down at the program, at that luscious suggestion of postwar decadence, of mink stoles and hackney carriages, of cigarettes in holders and feathered headdresses. She sighed. “Someone called Clara Pickle,” she said. “That’s all we know. Clara Pickle. Used to live in Soho. A total mystery. Arlette never even came to London.”

“Oh,” said Liz, kissing the top of her grandson’s head and smiling, “you never really know a person until after they’re dead. That’s when it all comes out. All the stuff they locked up in boxes. All the secrets, all the lies. That’s when you know the truth.”

Betty smiled and gripped the folder to her chest. She wondered how true that might be.