A Coffin for Charley. Gwendoline Butler

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СКАЧАТЬ she met her killer there. Bear it in mind.’

      Coffin just held the door without answering.

      Job Titus hesitated, then moved towards the door. ‘Goodbye, Stella, goodbye, Letty. Mrs Coffin, I suggest you tether your husband.’

      ‘What did he mean by that?’ said Stella as Coffin came back.

      ‘Tame, tie up, he was just being offensive. He’s frightened, I think.’

      Stella started to mop up the wine. ‘I wish he hadn’t come here. I don’t like it when your work and mine cross.’

      ‘He’s a madman,’ said Letty. ‘Attractive, but mad. Did he kill the girl?’

      Coffin shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’ He was watching his wife: she had not failed to notice the phrase about the man trying to get to know Marianne.

      ‘It’s your job to know.’

      ‘It takes time. He may have had a hand in it.’

      Stella said: ‘I think we had better eat at Max’s. The casserole got away from me.’ She spoke of it as if it was an animal she had been training. No wonder she had trouble cooking, Coffin thought, if she’s always trying to tame the meat.

      ‘I booked a table while I was out,’ he said. ‘Let’s go. Coming, Letty?’

      ‘Why do you think I am dressed in Versace? I knew that casserole would never come to the table. I too booked a table. You’re my guests, by the way. I’ve got something to discuss.’

      Over the prosciutto and chilled melon, Letty said: ‘I wanted to tell you that my daughter has disappeared and that I have engaged a private detective to look for her.’

      Coffin opened his mouth to speak but Letty stopped him.

      ‘Don’t say it. It is not a matter for the police. Elissa is eighteen, she sent a letter telling me she was going, and she has the money from a small trust fund. I don’t think any police force is going to spend any energy looking for her, not even yours, brother.’

      ‘Did she say why?’

      ‘I am too dominating, too successful, she needs to lose me.’

      ‘I see.’ He wondered if he did. It was a fair description of Letty: successful, bossy. But were daughters supposed to mind that?

      ‘But really, I think, she is our mother’s descendant. Every so often she must shake herself free and depart.’

      ‘You are taking it very well.’

      ‘No, I’m not. I’m trembling with fear inside. Which is why I have engaged a private detective to find her. Just locate her … Stella recommended one.’

      ‘Did I?’ Stella was surprised.

      ‘Well, you talked of him. Tash. You probably know of him?’ She turned to her brother.

      ‘He’s known,’ said Coffin tersely. The Tash Agency had been around for some time.

      ‘He’s seems efficient and to have a good reputation. I inquired around. And he’s attractive. I like him for that. Lovely fair hair with bright brown eyes, and well groomed. I didn’t want a seedy, backroom sort of man.’

      ‘Certainly not that,’ said Coffin. ‘But he’s pretty much a one man band. Can he cover the field?’

      ‘I think he can do it; he has some help. I’m convinced she’s still in London. He thinks not.’

      Coffin still looked doubtful. In his opinion London was no place for a girl of eighteen to roam around in. Was she on drugs? Did she have a boyfriend? He considered asking Letty but decided now was not the moment. ‘You can always call on me.’

      Letty smiled at him and nodded. ‘So now you know why I am taking the state of near-bankruptcy and the decline in the theatre with relative calm.’

      Stella put her hand gently on Letty’s arm. ‘I too have a daughter.’

      ‘But you know where she is?’

      ‘Yes, she’s putting together a play for the Edinburgh Fringe. She’s in the family business, I’m afraid. I had a card from Fife. She was there last week.’

      A small crowd was leaving the precincts of the Theatre Workshop as they came home. Most of them were young people and they were talking loudly and cheerfully.

      Coffin raised an eyebrow. ‘What’s this?’

      ‘The Friends of St Luke’s Theatre are auditioning for their summer play. They’re throwing it open to all this year because we’re using it as preparation for the Drama School. See who comes in, sniff out talent, get local interest.’ Money, she meant.

      The Friends, a redoubtable group of local ladies, would be one of the great supports of the new Drama School if she was lucky.

      ‘What are they doing?’

      ‘Oh, an Agatha Christie mystery. It usually is.’

      In bed that night Stella turned to her husband. ‘It’s nice on the top of the tower like this. I think I prefer it to my place.’

      Both the animals had come up with them, Bob on the bed and the cat watching from the window through which he would shortly depart on to a lower roof.

      ‘Open the window for Tiddles.’

      Coffin, who was making a neat pile of his possessions on his bed table, coins stacked, clean handkerchief beside the pile, keys by a pad of paper with a pencil, obliged.

      ‘Funny business about Letty and the daughter,’ said Stella. ‘I don’t always understand her.’

      ‘Who does?’

      Letty was his much younger sister, child of his errant mother and an American serviceman. There was a third sibling called William, issue of yet another father, who was a successful lawyer in Edinburgh. The one thing you could say about his disappearing mother (who must be presumed dead) was that her offspring were surprisingly different and surprisingly successful. He himself had lived in ignorance for years of his true parenthood and of the existence of Letty and William. Even now, he found it hard to believe in them. Well, not Letty. She was around so much. But he still felt surprise sometimes when she walked through the door.

      ‘Did you believe what she said?’

      ‘Well, you can never tell with Letty … No, not altogether.’

      ‘What’s this private detective like?’

      ‘You know him,’ Coffin said tersely. He did not like to be reminded.

      ‘I met him once and I paid his bill, that’s all. Is he honest?’

      ‘As far as I know.’

      Stella settled back against the pillows. Without any conscious effort, she had turned what had been a bachelor’s masculine bedroom СКАЧАТЬ