A Lesser Evil - Lesley Pearse [160]
‘What is it?’ Fifi asked, thinking perhaps she’d heard something outside.
‘It is no good, I theenk I’ave to tell you,’ Yvette said.
‘Tell me what?’ Fifi pulled the blanket round her again.
‘That I killed Angela.’
Chapter eighteen
Late on Sunday evening Dan escorted his in-laws back to their hotel in Paddington.
‘Stay and have a nightcap with us?’ Harry suggested.
Dan really wanted to go home. His nerves were frayed and he could see that the hotel bar was full of foreign tourists. He didn’t think he could stand their jollity, or the cacophony of different languages, but he was afraid he would seem churlish if he refused.
‘Just a quick one then,’ he said wearily.
It had been the worst weekend of his life. Coming face to face with Clara Brown again, with all the unpleasant things she’d said about him at their first meeting still ringing in his ears, was so hard. To be fair to her, she hadn’t said one harsh word this time, even though he was sure she must be secretly blaming him for Fifi’s disappearance, but the fear in her eyes and the tremor in her voice were somehow worse.
Harry had been easier to deal with for he was a logical man and he controlled his emotions. Every time Dan felt himself coming close to breaking down, Harry would put his hand down firmly on his shoulder, a silent message that they were in this together, bound by their love for Fifi.
They had spent most of Saturday hanging around at the police station, with Dan going through books of mug shots to see if he could pick out any faces he’d seen in Dale Street. In the evening they went into the Rifleman as Dan had the faint hope that by introducing the Browns to some of the regulars, some bit of useful information would surface.
Even if Dan had always had a close relationship with Harry and Clara, it would still have been difficult to cope with the strain of being constantly in their company. But to all intents and purposes they were strangers, and Dan had to be constantly on his guard. He felt he had to watch what he said, how he behaved, steer Harry and Clara away from alarmist and rough people. And he had to try to keep them optimistic, when he was in the depths of despair himself.
Today they had been interviewed by several reporters and that had distressed them all even more. At first the reporters had seemed so caring and sympathetic, but Dan had soon become aware that what they really wanted was juicy sensation. When Clara blurted out that Fifi had married Dan in secret, their eyes lit up, guessing at a family estrangement, and Dan had to step in to stop Clara from revealing things she’d be horrified to see in print.
The sky had been like lead all day, with a cold wind, and Dan had a constant picture in his mind of Fifi lying in a cold, dark place, terrified out of her wits. He had always thought he could cope with just about any situation life threw at him. But this waiting around, unable to do anything constructive to find his wife, was too much to bear.
They found a spare table and Harry ordered the drinks from a waiter. ‘I’ll just check if there are any messages,’ he said as the waiter went off. ‘And I’ll quickly phone home too.’
Dan observed how Clara’s eyes followed her husband as he walked back across the bar to the foyer and the phones. She had held up well, but every time Harry went out of the room her eyes became full of panic as if she were afraid he would vanish too.
Dan knew now that he had been very wrong in thinking the Browns’ marriage was more or less an arranged one, without real love. They had revealed their feelings for each other many times this weekend. Love was there, as sturdy as a rock, he’d noticed it in the way they fumbled for each other’s hands when one of them became upset or frightened, the looks they exchanged, the little caresses. He felt somewhat ashamed that he’d once thought Clara’s problems with Fifi were caused by jealousy.
He had also observed many similarities in their characters. Clara thought she knew best about everything,