Not a Very Nice Woman Read online

The interview room at the Social Services building was more like a coffee lounge, considered Cori as she entered. Plush sofas, low table, pastel throws – Cori noted that no one piece of furniture directly faced another. There was however, between a toddler’s playpen and a pile of put-away toys, a small glass cabinet that she guessed contained recording equipment. She shuddered at the stories this room had heard.

  ‘Ah, here they are,’ said Catherine, all smiles now the interview was happening, and all tension at the participant’s broader situation necessarily left at the door. Esther entered first: teenage, wary, smartly dressed and with black hair falling straight over her face beneath a polka dot bow. With her was her mother, Maisie, whose lighter and curlier hair made Cori wonder how much effort her daughter put into making hers so.

  After greetings all around, Catherine spoke both to those gathered but also to the room and its recorders, beginning with the date and time and listing those present, before continuing softly,

  ‘Now, Esther, you know that we’re here today to talk about your tutor, Stella Dunbar.’

  ‘She wasn’t just my tutor.’

  ‘Well, that’s what the Sergeant here will go away and investigate after our discussion. Specifically, we’re here to ask you about your meeting with her on Monday of this week.’

  ‘The night she was murdered.’

  ‘Yes, the night she was attacked. We’ll soon get on to that. I also know that the Sergeant is also very keen to learn all she can about Stella as a person; so first, Esther, to give us a perspective: you’d been seeing Stella twice a week after school since the previous term?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And what was she like?’

  ‘She was nice. A bit serious at first, she wouldn’t let you laugh or mess around. “We’re not here to share jokes,” she’d say. I was a bit shocked, she wasn’t like our teachers. I didn’t think I’d go back.’

  ‘But you did?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why, Esther?’

  ‘Because I knew Jeff and Louise would give me hell.’

  ‘Oh, Esther,’ answered her mother, ‘they’ve never given you hell. Don’t be so melodramatic.’

  ‘Oh, Mum, you know what I mean.’

  Catherine smiled at this, at evidence of a rebuilding of a relationship between mother and daughter.

  Maisie turned to Cori, glad it seemed of anyone to make this point to,

  ‘Esther couldn’t have been luckier than having Catherine find the Wheelwrights for her. After I… after the divorce when I couldn’t cope with looking after her alone, Catherine took care of everything. She said, “We have a good family here in town, and I’ll find if they have a space”; and they had.’

  ‘So,’ Catherine turned back to Esther, finding her thread, ‘Stella seemed very serious at first?’

  ‘Yeah, I thought I’d done something to upset her. It was like she was always about to tell me off. I wasn’t used to it, I don’t know anyone else like that. I was nervous and I started giggling, and I think she thought I didn’t care. She said, “Tutoring is a two-way street, young lady: If I’m to make the effort, then you need to too.”’

  ‘But she wasn’t always like this?’

  ‘No, she relaxed later on, once we started working and she could see I was trying.’

  ‘So, did your attitudes to Stella change?’

  ‘Yes, I began to like how she was. It’s hard to explain.’

  ‘Take as long as you need.’

  ‘It was like she respected me, that she took me seriously, took our lessons seriously. “You’ve only got one shot at this, Esther”, she’d say. “You don’t want to be having to retake your exams when you’re older and in work”.’

  ‘It sounds like you responded.’

  ‘I did. It was like,’ she girl took a moment to form her words, ‘I wouldn’t be letting her down by messing around, I’d be letting myself down, but that this would still make her disappointed for me.’

  ‘You believed she cared very deeply.’

  ‘Yes! And she cared about Stacie just as much, even though she wasn’t even her student at first, Stella was just lending her books.’

  ‘Different to your usual teachers?’

  ‘Yeah, they’d just be sarky, or give us books and not care if we read them; or try and be our friends, like we would ever want to talk to them.’

  Her mother shook her head, ‘We’ve had problems with the school even from when I was still her guardian. The divorce took its toll on Esther. In that my ex-husband and I were very selfish.’

  ‘Oh, Mum, don’t say that. It wasn’t your fault.’

  ‘No, love, you were strong, but no one that age should have to be.’ Maisie turned her attention back to Cori, ‘It all took a toll on Maisie’s schoolwork, and she fell down into lower classes. Once stranded there it seemed the teachers couldn’t give a damn.’

  ‘It has been an issue with the school,’ concurred Catherine. ‘Their rates of improvement for underachieving children have historically been very low.’

  ‘And how are you getting on at school now?’ Cori wasn’t sure if she was to ask Esther direct questions; but it was she who answered,

  ‘If anything I hate it even more, but I’m doing better there now. I still can’t stand the teachers though: I look at them like Stella looked at me,’ she gave Cori a Mount Rushmore face, ‘and they think I’m mad.’

  ‘Oh, Esther,’ said her mother attempting to gather her distain.

  ‘Thank you, Esther, that’s given us a great insight into the lessons you shared.’ Catherine was clearly moving the narrative along. ‘But now if you can, could you tell us a little about that last day?’

  ‘Yes, that’s what we’re here for, that’s what I’ve got to tell you.’

  ‘Easy, girl,’ her mother chided, ‘All in good time.’

  ‘Now, Sergeant, you’ll want to ask Esther some questions?’

  ‘Thank you. Hello, Esther. So, yes, could you tell us about your first visit to the Cedars that day?’

  ‘So you know I went back?’

  Cori nodded, ‘You bumped into a resident on the stairs? He gave us a statement.’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ she said, as if genuinely only now remembering it.

  ‘But going back a bit, to that first visit…’

  Yet Esther didn’t speak, instead she looked down, part-fearfully/part-shamefully it seemed to Cori,

  ‘Esther,’ Catherine jumped in, ‘Something happened on that first visit, didn’t it?’

  The girl remained in her defensive attitude, before reaching into the bag she had been clutching throughout, and taking out what looked like a crumpled letter.

  ‘What’s this?’ asked Cori as it was offered to her.

  ‘That’s what I found, when I went to my lesson that day. I’d knocked on the door but there was no answer, so I called her name from the hall…’

  ‘The door was open?’

  ‘Stella always left it ajar when she was expecting one of us. Anyway, she wasn’t ready yet which wasn’t like her. “Take a seat,” she said, “I’ll be in in a minute.” – she always made us a cup of tea. So I went to the table and she hadn’t put the books out yet, they were still in the pile with the others; and that was on the table.’

  Cori read silently, the others evidently knowing the contents. The letter, dated only Friday, bore the crest of a London auction house, and began:

  Dear Ms Dunbar,

  It is always a pleasure to write to such a valued and longstanding customer, and we trust this letter finds you well. Our autumn silverware auction catalogue will be sent to you in July as usual, and we of course hope to see you again in the capital for the event this year.

  However, in the meantime, a most intriguing matter has come to our attention that we must communicate to you. Some months ago we were contacted by a collector of the Canadian artist J. W. Barrow, requesting details of any of that artist’s works to have passed through our hands over the years. Relatively little has, in
fact; though there is a record of us selling a piece, Bear Rearing at Hunters, to a Mr S and Mrs S Mars in Nineteen Seventy-two.

  Communications to the address we had on file for Mr and Mrs Mars were returned undelivered; before our longest-serving steward, Greaves, remembered that you had once been known to him by that name; and sure enough we found a copy of the original receipt for the sale of Bear… still pinned to your file.

  It goes without saying that, short of confirming the fact of the sale, no further details of the buyer were revealed to the collector; and never would they be without first speaking to our customer themselves.

  The collector is very keen to see the piece however, and furthermore has asked us to relay the fact that any indication that it may be put back on the market would prompt a more than generous offer.

  Should you wish only to reaffirm your right to confidentiality, then this will of course be communicated to them. In the eventuality that you have since parted with the painting, that is of course a private matter between yourselves and the new owners, though the collector would be grateful if you could pass this invitation down the line.

  It only remains for us to advise you, were you not already aware, that Barrow’s star has risen these past decades, and that any reasonable offer for Bear Rearing at Hunters would be likely to be in the tens of thousands of pounds. Needless to say, we would hope that you would employ us as agents for any sale.

  We wait on your instruction.

  The letter was signed by one of the partners of the auction house. This was what had been in the envelope found in Stella’s room; while the first letter the auction house sent must have been to the first home the Mars family shared before moving to Mansard Lane. Cori re-read certain key passages, then looked up to the group.

  ‘A copy of the letter has been attached to the case file,’ said Catherine to the microphones; as Esther started,

  ‘I didn’t mean to read it, I wasn’t being nosey.’

  ‘She knows you didn’t, Honey.’ Her mother put her hand over Esther’s.

  ‘It was the name of the picture, Bear Rearing at Hunters.’

  Maisie comforted Esther as she explained,

  ‘My daughter knows that painting, Sergeant. We all do, any of us who survived that house. Patrick has it hanging over the fireplace. It’s his proudest possession.’

  And still there now, Cori remembered from Ludmila’s more recent description.

  ‘The name of the picture just jumped out from the letter.’

  ‘She knows, Honey, she knows.’

  ‘What did you do, Esther?’ asked Cori.

  ‘Stella was out making us tea, so I grabbed the letter and dashed off, calling through that I was ill and I’d catch up next week. She called after me, asking what was wrong, but I had to get out. I went to the benches by the cedar trees, out of view of the flats, and sat and read it through. And realised.’

  ‘What did you realise, Esther?’

  ‘It didn’t come clearly at first, it was all a jumble. I tried to read it properly, slowly, as she taught me to do with books, to make sure I understood every line before moving onto the next one; but I couldn’t, my eyes were jumping over the page, I couldn’t get the sentences straight.’

  Cori noticed Esther was suddenly shaking, her mother’s arm around her shoulders attempting to dampen the juddering movement.

  ‘Sergeant, it might be a good idea if we had a break,’ whispered Catherine.

  ‘Of course, of course.’ Cori gladly acceded.

  Chapter 23 – The Scene at the Mars House