Dusk had fallen and for the first time there was an autumnal nip in the air. Although it was some time before the clocks went back, the heat wave was over and one could already feel the insidious approach of winter.
The walk from the bus stop seemed endless. There was hardly any traffic and not a single person in sight. Something was wrong with the street lights, not one of them was on! It was also very quiet, oh so quiet! Olga thought it the deepest silence she had ever known since she had started living in London. It felt heavy and oppressive. One can’t see a silence but she did; she imagined it as a great dark beast lying sprawled over the neighbourhood, over the street and the houses, deadening every sound beneath its soft fur …
There was a story that used to terrify her when she was a little girl, about the man who was coming to get you when you were upstairs in bed. Now the man was on the first step. Now he was on the second step. Now he was on the third, the fourth, the fifth step … and now the man was on the twelfth step, which was the last, crossing the landing and opening your door and creeping in – and now he was standing by your bed … Got you! It was her old ghoul of a grandmother who told her the story, each time making Olga laugh and scream.
What was the reason for that particular memory? Why had it come to her now? Well, it was dark – she was feeling a little sad and a little nervous and a little scared – and there was someone walking behind her.
Yes. She could hear footsteps. Left, right. Furtive, yet determined and purposeful. No. They were perfectly ordinary footsteps. Left, right. Just someone like her going home.
She wished it wasn’t so dark!
Olga peered over her shoulder. She saw no one. But she thought she caught a movement.
The street was flanked with trees, so perhaps the person had dodged behind a tree? Her stalker wanted to remain unseen. Could it be Mr Bedaux? (Mr Bedaux had been very much on her mind.) Or perhaps it was Joan? Perhaps Joan intended to scare her. She had done it before, when she followed her and Charlie all the way to the Royal Albert Hall. Olga hadn’t seen Joan for some time and Charlie said she’d given up her pursuit, but what if she hadn’t? At one time Joan seemed to believe Olga could be persuaded to drop Charlie …
Who else could it be? Not any of her friends trying to give her a fright, she didn’t think. Neither Inge nor Simona would play such silly games with her! They knew what it felt like to be on the receiving end of unwanted attentions. Besides, neither Simona nor Inge would have been able to keep it up. They’d have giggled by now! No, it wasn’t them. The only games Inge and Simona played were the games their clients demanded of them.
Mr Bedaux had given them very careful instructions. Do not frustrate the gentlemen with any pretence of maiden blushes. Mr Bedaux spoke like that. Thank God she had never had any clients. She hated the idea of clients, of strange men who paid to have you in their houses. She had been extremely lucky. She was not a slut. She could have become one out of dire necessity, of course she could, but she had met Charlie and that had been her salvation. It was unfortunate that Mr Bedaux should have fallen for her too …
She had told Mr Bedaux she loved him, but that was a lie. Well, she’d had no choice but to lie. She had depended on Mr Bedaux, to start with. He had given her money, provided her with a place to live as well as with jobs, mainly in catering.
She should have gone to college, continued with her education, that’s what her mother wanted for her more than anything else in the world. Olga’s dream was to be an actress. Perhaps she could still go to drama school in London? Charlie said she could. Each time mother phoned, she told her she had to be a good girl. Mother worried about her all the time. ‘You are in a foreign country, Olga, so be a good girl, don’t do anything bad or they will send you back …’
Be a good girl … Funnily enough, that’s what one of Inge’s regular clients, a very rich old gentleman who lived in Bayswater, told her each time she went to his house. Be a good girl and you will have nothing to regret …
The old gentleman wished to be known as ‘Mr X’ and he never expected more than to be allowed to brush her hair, Inge said. He was really kind, a real old English gentleman with white hair, very neat, perfectly dressed, always wearing a silk cravat and a matching silk handkerchief in his breast pocket. Sometimes he would brush her hair for half an hour without stopping. He would put on a pair of surgical gloves first, which was a bit creepy, but Inge said she didn’t mind. Mr X used an exquisite brush with an ivory handle that had belonged to his late mother, or so he told Inge …
Mr Bedaux still believed nothing had changed between them. He couldn’t possibly know what Olga had done, what she’d said, could he? It wasn’t as though he had been in the room when she made her confession to Charlie. Mr Bedaux had seen her holding Charlie’s hand but he thought that she was still acting. Well, she was a good actress. She always spoke English in a silly way, mispronouncing words and phrases, the way she’d heard some of the other Lithuanian girls speak, but she did it on purpose. She made herself sound like a halfwit. She didn’t want to show she was clever. She always felt it was safer that way …
Back in Charlie’s room at the clinic she had been aware of Mr Bedaux’s eyes on her … It had made her nervous … He had kept looking at her, as though he suspected what she had done, as though he knew …
What would he do if he knew?
There were the footsteps again – following her!
Olga stopped abruptly and turned round. This time she saw a figure, though not at all clearly. A long coat – a hat? A woman? It looked like a woman, yes. Was it Joan? The figure had stopped too. Olga stood looking into the darkness.
She wondered if it could be Mr Bedaux. Mr Bedaux had told her once that he liked to dress up in women’s clothes sometimes. He liked to wear ‘drag’. That was the English expression. He also told her he could talk like a woman too, if he chose. And he could also mince like a woman. That was very creepy, very scary.
Charlie had said, leave it to him, he’ll deal with Bedaux, but Charlie wasn’t well yet. Charlie didn’t seem to take the murder plot seriously enough. He had laughed. ‘So you and Bedaux have been plotting to kill me?’ Charlie had then called Mr Bedaux a ‘snake in the grass’.
Mr Bedaux was the age Olga’s father would have been if he hadn’t drunk himself to death. She’d pretended to enjoy Mr Bedaux’s kisses, but she’d really hated being pawed by him. But she was a good actress, that’s why Mr Bedaux had never suspected the truth. It was Charlie she liked and loved and that had nothing to do with his money and his big house, nothing at all …
Once more Olga wondered what Mr Bedaux would do when he realised that she had lied to him. Sooner or later the truth would come out. Charlie had told her that it would be all right. He had told her not to worry. He’d get rid of Bedaux, he said. But she was worried, very worried. Mr Bedaux was creepy. She was scared of him. One never knew what went on inside Mr Bedaux’s head. She didn’t even know his first name!
Mr Bedaux would be very angry with her. He would be furious. He would want to hurt her. He might do something horrible. She hoped he wouldn’t take it out on Inge and Simona. Poor Inge and poor Simona still very much depended on Mr Bedaux. Rich men, that’s what Mr Bedaux specialised in. Rich clients.
She had been waiting for a chance to break away from him. Well, the moment she had seen Charlie in his hospital bed, looking so pale, so ill, all because of Mr Bedaux and her, she had made up her mind. Enough lies! She had realised how much Charlie loved her and how much she loved him. How much she wanted to be with him …
The footsteps seemed to have stopped. Had her pursuer gone away?
Her house was at the end of a narrow cul-de-sac. Ruby Road. Lovely name. No one seemed to live in any of the neighbouring houses. Charlie had chosen a place where she wouldn’t be disturbed by prying eyes …
Olga stood in front of her little house. Charlie had bought it for her. Philomel Cottage. Lovely house with a lovely name. ‘Philomel’ meant nightingale, apparently.
She unlocked the front door and let herself into the hall. She switched on the light. She gave a great sigh of relief. Home is the one and only really good, warm, safe place, that’s what her mother always said …
She had heard a scratching sound … The kitchen door was open … There seemed to be someone in the kitchen … She stood very still … There it was again … Scratching …
The next moment she remembered – the kitten! Charlie had given her a kitten! It was very young and very, very silly. It was still without a name.
Olga gave a sigh of relief. She smiled.
She was still smiling as she started walking towards the kitchen …