Chapter One
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Death's Autograph
I have my own personal nightmare. It's dark, of course, and I'm lostin the corridors of a strange building. The walls are lined withdoors: all of them are shut. My mother is waiting for me somewhere,and I creep from one door to the next listening for her voice, butall the unseen rooms are silent.
It happened like that once, when I was four or five and went withher to visit a friend. Obviously she opened a door and found me,because here I am, thirty-two years old, complete with my own nameand history. But being lost in the dark comes back in nightmares nowand then.
I wasn't really lost that April night--I knew that my ancient Volvoestate was heading eastward in the tangle of minor roads betweenBanbury and Milton Keynes, with the M1 motorway which was my routehome somewhere ahead. Nameless villages and invisible hills lurkedin rain-swept darkness beyond the headlights, but this unknownsecondary road would lead me sooner or later to the motorway, whichin due course would bring me down perfectly safely into London. Soalthough I didn't know which stretch of wet and empty road I wasfollowing at that moment, I could reassure myself. No problem.Nothing important enough to distract me from the creeping certaintythat I'd spent the evening making a fool of myself.
Dido Hoare, the world-famous-soft-touch antiquarian book dealer.
The back of the estate car was crammed to the roof with slightlydamp cardboard boxes. They held the collection of books I'd boughtthat evening, with great difficulty, from the optimistically greedyheirs of a retired Oxford University professor of Englishliterature, recently buried but once known to (and thoroughlydisliked by) my father, Barnabas.
In order to clinch this deal I'd had to close the shop early, drivethe eighty miles from north London to Banbury through slashing rain,and spend hours persuading the family that the dead man's shelvesheld no volumes that could possibly be expected to make them richbeyond the dreams of avarice.
There's nothing unusual in this. As I learned several painful yearsago, most people believe that any book more than ninety years old isworth hundreds of pounds. Unless of course it happens to be bound inrotting leather, in which case naturally you multiply that figure byten. Nineteenth-century Bibles printed in their hundreds ofthousands, yellowed late editions of Tennyson's collected poems,volumes of sermons by eighteenth-century preachers who on a goodSunday reduced whole congregations to slumber: these are the bookdealer's horrors.
There was a time, BD of course, when I used to think that kind ofthing myself. The way history is divided into BC and AD, my life is"BD"--before Davey--and after.
"Who taught me everything I know," I heard myself say aloud to thesmeared windscreen. Even now, the bitterness in my own voice shockedme. There were things about my ex-husband that I couldn't bear torecall.
After the process of persuasion, they (that is, the sorrowing heirs)had announced, "Now, we'll just pick out a few things forourselves." They had seemed injured when I explained that in thiscase I (the honest purchaser) would actually have to reduce theprice I'd offered. After four years in the trade, it still bothersme that people can't accept me as just a fairly successful,reasonably straight, possibly well-meaning antiquarian bookdealer--not a feather-brained bimbo or a harpy gnawing the bones ofwidows and orphans.
Rather a harpy than a fool, damn it.
It had taken three hours and more patience than I knew I had beforethey condescended to accept my money. Then they wanted cash. Thedaughter-in-law had counted it slowly. Then they'd left me to do allthe packing and loading. Fair enough, but now it was the middle ofthe night and I was still miles from home, my shoes were soaked(probably ruined), there was an ache in my shoulders, and I wasslowly realizing that I couldn't remember one single volume that Ireally wanted to own. The eyes that stared coldly back at me fromthe driving mirror told me I'd been a soft touch.
I know.
You know? Then why did you do it?
Because I couldn't bear to go all that way for nothing.
So you bought a load of rubbish.
It's not rubbish, it's perfectly good, solid stock. People want thatkind of stuff all the time.
You gave them at least a hundred too much--at LEAST.
They were such awful people.
Oh, I see. That's all right, then.
Shut it.
And then you missed the turning to the M40.
I was tired.
And couldn't be bothered to turn around. So now you're in the middleof nowhere. What happens if the car breaks down? Because she was duefor servicing last month.
I couldn't afford it. Anyway, this car is a lady. She never lets medown.
In my rear-view mirror suddenly there was a pair of dippedheadlights about three hundred feet behind. One winked out for amoment, then reappeared. A lecherous wink aimed at my car's statelyrear end? When I'm tired, my sense of humour plays tricks. Ithappened again a few minutes later. I felt for the music tapes andpushed one at random into the stereo. The opening bars of the TroutQuintet flowed gently into the darkness.
The wipers thumped. Beyond them, the Volvo's lights glimmeredfaintly on hedge and ditch as the road twisted sharply. Some of theboxes behind me whispered and shifted. When I glanced into themirror again the road was dark, but after a moment the headlightswere there again, further back.
You, back there--time you were home and in bed. (Time, more thantime, for me too. How long--another hour, with luck?) I was thinkingwith unusual longing about my flat above the shop. Oh, damn--I'dforgotten to feed Mr. Spock before I left. Something else toreproach myself for.
Davey had named him. Why do you call your cat "Mr. Spock?" Becausehe has pointy ears, of course.
I shook myself.
Feed the cat. Then a drink. Warmth . . . a bath, maybe . . . Thebooks could stay in the car until morning. Not even in Islingtonwould anyone be desperate enough to break into the old Volvo forwhatever rubbish could be found in such tattered boxes.
Still, remember to set the car's alarm.
At some point, the music had stopped. I yawned, caught myself,rolled down the window. Wet air slapped my face.
Something flashed in the hedge ahead. My lights picked out areflecting sign, a name--but the car had passed before I could readit. I was in a dim village street. The dashboard clock hadn't workedfor months, but when I snatched a glance at the luminous dial of mywatch, it was after two. I let my speed rise and then had to brakewhen something small ran across the road almost under thewheels.
The winking light was back. The other car was probably heading forthe motorway too. It couldn't be far away. And then, as the Volvoreached the summit of a shallow rise, the idea slid into my mindthat I was being followed.
Pull yourself together, Dido!
I pulled, but my eyes slid back to the rear-view mirror for a momenttoo long, and my tyres rumbled on the broken verge. The thought ofupending in a wet ditch under a rain of old books made me morecareful.
But I wanted to find out. I raised my right foot gradually so thatmy speed drifted down to a sedate forty . . . thirty-five . . . andthe headlights closed in behind me.
Then, after all, fell back.
Perhaps they didn't want to risk overtaking on this narrow road? Ishifted down, and the acceleration pressed me against the seat. Atfifty-five I changed into top gear. The Volvo hurtled throughanother unlit village. The headlights kept their distance.
The Volvo was a heavy metal box, solid and strong, safe. So whateverhappens, I told myself, I won't stop. Not out here, not alone . . .
But there was light--an unexpected loom of brightness ahead. Perhapsan all-night filling station? Or only some lights left on bymistake? The black bulk of a building masked the source, but at thelast moment I saw the lighted sign and a forecourt with a solitaryfigure in a glass kiosk. I twisted the wheel, swerving too sharplyand braking hard between the rows of pumps. I glimpsed a startledface in the kiosk before I turned and looked back at the road intime to see a white car, one of the thousands of little,over-powered hatchbacks that were everywhere that year, flash past.There had been no tell-tale brake lights. I switched off my engineand sat in the abrupt silence, listening to my heart growquieter.
It was an effort to open the door and crawl out; I'd stiffened up onmy slow journey, and I fumbled the line and splashed fuel as Itopped up the Volvo's tank. The cashier, an old man with a white,night face, stopped staring at me when I went to pay. He bent hiseyes on his greasy magazine.
I said, "Is there a telephone?" Of course there was--in some officein the darkened garage building.
He slammed the cash drawer and pointed back west. "Box half a mileup the road."
But anyway, who could I phone at two thirty in the morning? NotBarnabas, the way things were now. Or my sister, Pat, asleep besideher husband in their St. Albans house not so far away. (I couldalmost hear her big, outraged voice saying, "For God's sake, Dido,it's the middle of the night and you've woken the boys . . .") Thepolice, to explain, "There was a car. I thought they were followingme. They've gone now . . . ?"
Once I would have phoned Davey, just for the pleasure of speaking tohim.
I gritted my teeth and shut myself into the Volvo. While I wasmaking sure that the doors were all locked, I wondered why mythoughts were so out of control tonight. Usually I go for dayswithout thinking about Davey. And I hadn't even asked the old manhow far it was to the motorway. But then knowing wouldn't bring itany closer.
I looked again at the door catches and caught myself at it. Damn it,what was wrong with me? I was so tired that I wanted to put my headdown on the steering wheel and howl. If the Volvo broke down. Therewas a woman, that last winter, who broke down on a motorway andsomebody . . . They hadn't caught him. I listened to the engine'smutter. It seemed normal enough.
I had almost passed it before I noticed the pale shape waiting undera hedge. They must have been sitting with their engine running. Inthe mirror I saw the headlights come on.
Just playing games. Don't let yourself be scared. Be angry! Two canplay games, shit-head . . . I clutched at a feeling of outrage sothat it couldn't escape and pressed down the accelerator, waitingand being angry.
Safe in the middle of another of the dead villages with the whitecar fifty feet behind, I braked. The lights behind jinked and fellback even as I was shifting down and up again, driving now the wayDavey had taught me, watching the broken white line in the middle ofthe road, gluing the offside front wheel to it, holding the heavycar steady on the straight and then braking and skidding andaccelerating through the curves.
The other car was lighter and faster. Brightness filled the back ofthe Volvo and the headlights themselves grew closer and thenvanished because they were so close--two or three feet ofnerve-wracking space between our bumpers. There was no time or spaceto be frightened. The white car was light and quick, but the Volvowas a solid old monster, its rear end ballasted by half a ton ofbooks. I stopped thinking, gripped the wheel and braked hard. Butafter all something in my head didn't believe that I'd decided to doit, and I felt my own flicker of hesitation. Nice girls don't try tosmash up other people's cars. Almost before the Volvo's brakes bit,the other car was skidding away and I was changing up through thegears again. At eighty, I looked into the mirror. Now there was onlya single headlight, perhaps a quarter of a mile back. The wink hadbeen abolished. It felt almost like a small victory.
The darkness had changed. Not dawn, but something pale stretchedacross my horizon: the haze of motorway lights.
I didn't notice when the white car came back, and even when Inoticed, it was as though I was awake again and could ignore it. Theblue motorway signs slid past. A quarter of a mile to the slip road. . .
They pulled out, driving beside me on the wrong side of the road.Not trying to overtake. The road ahead was empty. I dragged myimagination away from the image of crumpling metal. I thought Iwouldn't give them the satisfaction of noticing them, but it wasimpossible not to turn my head. Their dashboard lights touched twoshapes, two pale faces turned towards me. My fingers were clamped tothe steering wheel.
They cut in, braked insanely close. My own tactics. My body tookover, braked, felt the engine jerk and die, heard the boxes shift.The car felt airless and the ignition had frozen. Time stopped.
Five yards away, the white car went dark. In the instant whennothing moved, my eyes had time to see that they had a comic stickeron their back window. In the glow from my headlights I read it ascarefully as though it contained essential information:caution--mother-in-law in boot. I wondered through my astonishmentthat this was really happening, wondered what this strangelyindependent body of mine would do when they got out of theircar.
I'd been trying to turn the ignition key the wrong way. I reversedit and the engine caught and as it did the white car moved. Theydidn't turn their lights on until they were two hundred yards downthe road. It was then of course that I remembered that I ought tohave taken their number.
I sat with the engine running until I'd almost stopped shaking. ThenI turned the Volvo sedately on to the motorway.
Even at this hour the London-bound traffic was heavy. Safety innumbers, but I couldn't stop looking for the white hatchback,because now that it was over the anger came back: I wanted to seethem crash, see them hurtling through the side barriers, crumpling,burning. (Just watch the road, Dido. Steer the car and get a hold ofyourself before you do some hurtling of your own.)
It had turned cold. I switched on the heater and filled my lungswith warm, stinking air. By the end of the motorway, I'd stoppedshivering.
It was an easy run through the northern suburbs and on down theHolloway Road. At Highbury Corner a white car ahead of me shot offtoward Barnsbury, and I was so distracted that the Volvo's wheelsbanged the kerb.
Even in the early hours, Upper Street is full of people, ordinarypeople going to the all-night supermarket or walking home. The twofrom that winking car could easily be there. Anywhere. Any time. Youcould go crazy thinking about it. I took a grip and told myself thatit had been a nasty experience, casual and unlucky. Just somebodyhaving a perverted joke. Hey, I was coming home last night late andthere was this woman driver creeping along the back road at aboutfive em pee aitch . . . Nothing had happened. I was already
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beginning to doubt the whole business. They could have been kids outpartying, having a laugh, showing off. I'd jumped to conclusions.Anyway, it was over and no real harm done: not as bad as being hitby a drunken driver and left bleeding or dead. It's a dangerousworld, but most of the time you just have to live with it becausethere isn't really any choice.
There was kerb space just in front of my door, and I jammed theVolvo into it with a sigh of relief and exhaustion. At least theunloading wouldn't be too bad. And now I'd give myself a good bigcognac, and feed the cat, and sleep. Suddenly every muscle hurt.Even so, I sat for a moment and looked up and down the street beforeI could make myself get out and cross to my own door. At least therain had stopped. |
