Chapter 33 Madeleine
With my hair freshly coloured, I stare up at the symmetry of Madeleine Rook’s Kensington mansion. This elegant combination of stucco, bricks, and stone is the epitome of heritage, wealth and power. One day soon, we might own this, too, and the thought pleases me immensely.
I am dressed for the occasion in a black Alexander McQueen suit with red enamel brooch; I look a little like a black widow spider.
Not intentionally, I might add. The door opens and a maid in a traditional white apron and black dress invites me in and takes my coat.
I thank her and hand her a large bunch of foxgloves for Madeleine.
I’m shown into the drawing room, gestured towards a seat, and asked for my preferred beverage.
I state a strong preference for herbal tea, on this occasion.
The room is tasteful and harmonious. Dark blue walls, Louis XVI marble clock, Regency rosewood table, a pair of Chippendale armchairs, and portraits of dead people and dogs.
The maid returns with my flowers beautifully arranged in an Imari vase. She smiles as she leaves, and returns a few minutes later with a teapot and two china cups on a silver salver. The maid asks if she should pour, and I tell her that I will wait for the lady of the house.
Once she has closed the door, I take a small white envelope from my handbag. Inside it are several foxglove leaves that I removed from the bouquet earlier and cut up like tea. I open the teapot, slip the leaves into the water, and stir.
Madeleine appears a moment later, dressed impeccably in a cream and navy vintage Chanel suit dress. I am again surprised at how small the woman is, given how large she features in my thoughts.
‘Good afternoon, Lalla.’ She pauses at the doorway, and with a steady glance and slight arch of her eyebrows indicates that I should stand.
Against my better judgement, I get up and offer my hand. She looks at it with an almost imperceptible shake of her head, indicating that I’ve made another error. With a finger she points to her right cheek. I lean in and make the sound of a kiss.
‘How’s life in the provinces?’
‘We’re all coping with the drudgery,’ I say.
‘Oh, good, and to what do I owe the unusual pleasure of your company?’ she says, with an impatient flourish of her hand, indicating that I should sit, which I do. She stands, framed by two enormous windows, and looks down at me.
‘I brought you some flowers. I thought you might need cheering up. Stephen says the anniversary has hit you hard.’
‘No, I don’t think so.’
‘He seems to think you’re inconsolable with grief.’
‘I don’t know any woman who’d consider herself worse off if their husband died. I have all his resources, and none of his annoying habits.’
‘I’m pleased you’re so rational about it,’ I say, although she clearly paints a different picture for Stephen.
‘Now, you didn’t come here for my welfare. Either someone’s terminally ill, or you need money, which is it?’
‘We need a million to secure the house in Hampstead, and Stephen wouldn’t ever ask you himself.’
‘Because he’s got class, while you’re quite shameless.’ She peers at me under hooded eyelids.
‘I’m simply trying to ensure your son and grandchildren are suitably homed. You’ve always detested Muswell Hill.’
‘I’m sure,’ Madeleine says, and walks from one piece of ornate furniture to the next as she contemplates my request. ‘I could help you, of course, but I wonder what you might do for me.’
‘Anything within reason,’ I say.
‘Leave him,’ she says.
‘Why would I do that?’
‘Because you’re not who you say you are, are you, Lalla?’ she says and smiles. This is not going to plan.
‘What does that mean?’ I say, trying to buy time to think.
‘Presumably, you received the old newspaper article in the post?’ she says, watching my response closely.
‘I did and have no idea what it’s about,’ I say.
‘I thought that’s why you were here,’ says Madeleine. ‘Smoked out of your den.’
‘I don’t know a thing about it,’ I say.
‘Roger once bought a Monet without provenance,’ she says. ‘I advised against it, of course, but he was taken in by the traumatic history of the painting, which included a Nazi theft, tragic deaths, and forty years hidden in the loft of a farmhouse.’
‘And was it real?’
‘Absolutely not. A complete fake. No provenance, you see. Worthless, just like you. You say your parents died, you went to a school in Geneva that since closed, you’ve lost touch with all your relatives, and you had that accident that wiped your memory.
If you were a painting, I’m afraid Sotheby’s would put you in a bin sale. ’
‘Is this a feature of your declining faculties, or do you simply have too much time on your hands?’
‘Who are you, Lalla? When Stephen fell under your spell, I wanted to check you out, but Roger stopped me. I always wondered what you had over Roger. Did you offer yourself to him in exchange for protection?’
‘I think Roger was just delighted that Stephen was happy, because he’d never managed to find love and happiness in his own marriage.’
‘Anyone can see you’re not from money, and certainly not educated at an elite Swiss school. You’re leaking sawdust all over the carpet.’
‘Have you been poisoning Stephen with these lies?’ I say.
‘Lies, are they?’ she says, puffing herself up like a peacock. ‘You know how I found out? Your greed. I found a series of payments to someone called Lola Wells in one of Roger’s bank statements after he died. He kept everything, you see. They appeared around the time of your engagement to Stephen.’
‘Just another woman he was sleeping with for comfort, no doubt.’
‘I thought so, too, but I asked a private detective to do some work for me to find Lola Wells,’ she says, which immediately makes me think it was her who hired Jason Mercer.
‘Not an easy task,’ she continues, ‘until I realized I had another piece of the jigsaw. Once I gave him your date of birth, things started to open up. He found the birth certificate of a girl called Lola Wells, born on the same day as you, in Banbury. Her parents were called Brian and Margaret Wells. They later appeared in this rather sordid news story, when their daughter was taken into care. She’d be thirty-nine today.
I couldn’t find a photo of her, sadly. She disappeared from records after the murder.
I expect she changed her name and made up a new one. ’
‘You’ve wasted your money. That’s not me,’ I say with a dismissive laugh, but I feel as if I’ve been punched hard in the gut. ‘Why are you so determined to split up a happy marriage?’
Madeleine laughs. ‘Happy? Have you seen your husband lately? I’m going to share my research with him and let him draw his own conclusions. You do understand that you’re on borrowed time now, don’t you?’
‘You’re delusional,’ I say.
‘I don’t think so. I’m quite sure that I’m on the right track.’
‘Tea?’ I say.
‘How civilized,’ she replies, and takes out a cigarette from a silver case. As she lights her cigarette, I open the teapot, stir vigorously, then pour carefully into the two delicate cups.
‘I know it’s naughty to smoke, but I only ever have one to celebrate,’ says Madeline, and she puffs a large cloud into the room.
‘Milk?’ I ask.
She shakes her head. ‘It’s herbal tea, Lalla, not Tetley. I expect you’ll find it quite bitter.’
‘Oh, I’m used to that, Madeleine,’ I say and pass her a cup.
Madeleine puts her cigarette down, sips her tea, then smiles broadly at me. ‘Not drinking yours, I see?’
‘You were right about the bitterness,’ I say. ‘It’s not to my taste.’