In the meantime, however, she had another idea. As Winnie volunteered to make them all a cup of coffee, Gemma said, “Fanny, do you mind if I have a look at Elaine’s things? I might see something that Winnie missed this morning.”
Fanny gave her a bleak smile. “If something’s happened to her, it won’t matter that she wouldn’t like it. And if she’s okay, she’ll be so furious with me for making a fuss that I might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb. Go ahead.”
Gemma climbed the narrow stairs and looked in the first room at the top. The flowers and antiques identified it as Fanny’s, but it had the desolate feel acquired by rooms whose inhabitants had died. An ornate mahogany dressing table held the personal photos she had expected to see downstairs – Fanny as a girl, posed between a well-dressed Asian couple who looked both proud and rather stiffly formal, as if the portrait had been an occasion. Fanny playing in a garden with a Border collie, laughing into the camera. Fanny alone, in a nursing sister’s uniform, her expression grave. Gemma touched the photo with a fingertip, then went out, closing the door firmly behind her.
She examined the bathroom more closely, this time looking for traces of Elaine Holland. The medicine cabinet held paracetemol, plasters, cotton swabs, a bottle of over-the-counter cough remedy. There were no prescription medications, no hairbrush, no toothbrush. Frowning, Gemma tried the cupboard above the toilet. It held only toilet tissue, tampons, a few bars of inexpensive soap, and a bottle of Boots brand bubble bath.
Perhaps Elaine kept her personal things in her bedroom, Gemma thought, moving on to the third room in the corridor and opening the door. Winnie had told her over lunch that the room was bare, but the description hadn’t prepared Gemma for the bleakness that met her eyes as she stood on the threshold.
In Gemma’s experience, the need to stamp one’s personality on one’s living space seemed a basic human need, one that surfaced as soon as the essentials of food and shelter were provided. She’d seen prostitutes’ rooms decorated with ribbons, pictures – only bits of tat from the street markets, but much loved tat nonetheless. She’d seen nursing-home quarters filled with personal mementos. She’d even known rough sleepers on the streets to guard their few possessions as fiercely as they did their blankets, as if those possessions allowed them to keep a remnant of the identity life had stripped away.
But this room bore no more imprint than a cheap hotel room slept in for a night – it was as if Elaine Holland had vigilantly erased herself every day of the two years she had lived in this house. There were no photos, no books, no magazines or CDs, no clothes left haphazardly strewn across the bed or the chair. Gemma crossed to the bureau and ran a finger across its surface – there was only a light coating of dust.
Methodically, she opened the drawers. At least the woman wore underwear, she thought with a grin, although they were nondescript Marks and Spencer’s cotton knickers and bras. One drawer held a pad of cheap writing paper with matching envelopes, a few stamps, elastic bands, and pens marked with the hospital logo, but there were no bills or personal documents.
She went on to the wardrobe with as little success. A few pairs of sensible shoes, trousers and jackets in neutral colors suitable for work and, Gemma noted, in the same size she wore. A shelf held neatly folded blankets and bed linens. The wardrobe was quite deep, and on an impulse, Gemma lifted down the linens, then pulled over the bureau chair and climbed up on it so that she could reach all the way to the back of the shelf.
Her fingers closed on a small cardboard box and she drew it into the light, exclaiming as she saw the bright colors. It was the manufacturer’s container for an Orange phone, and it was empty.
So, in spite of her protestations to Fanny, Elaine owned a mobile phone. But why had she lied?
Flushed by her success, Gemma climbed down from the chair and stood back, surveying the storage space. There had to be more – she was sure of it. Pushing all the hanging clothes aside, she was rewarded for her diligence. A low door was set into the back wall of the cupboard, a not unusual feature in many old houses. The extra storage space was remarkably easy to access, once you knew of its existence, and the latch was a simple hook and eye.
Kneeling, Gemma swung open the door. A faint odor of old mothballs wafted out, and she saw immediately that she had hit a treasure trove. Some of the open shoe boxes on the floor held strappy, high-heeled sandals, others an assortment of lacy lingerie. Folded over hangers on a low bar were sequined tops and sleek skirts, a few low-cut cocktail dresses, a beaded vintage cardigan.
Gemma sat back, wondering what to make of her find. One thing was certain – there was more to Elaine Holland than her housemate had dreamed.
When asked by her fellow firefighters why she still lived at home, Rose would say the decision was purely practical – there was room in her parents’ house, after all, and why should she waste money paying rent when she could be saving towards a deposit on a place of her own? Living in London was prohibitively expensive, and firefighters’ earnings ranked on the low end of the scale.
She didn’t talk about her father’s unexpected death from heart failure the previous year, nor about her reluctance to leave her mother alone in the house her parents had shared for the thirty years of their marriage. She was even less likely to admit that she couldn’t yet bear the thought of leaving the house that still bore such tangible reminders of the father she’d adored.
The drive from Southwark southeast to suburban Forest Hills usually came as a relief at the end of her watch. With some of the money she saved on rent she’d splashed out on her car, a fire-engine-red Mini with a Union Jack painted on the top. She loved the way the little car handled, and the sense of physical engagement she felt as she drove helped her shed the stresses of her shift. The blokes teased her about the car, of course, but it was the good-natured ribbing of approval. They could understand her attachment to a collection of nuts and bolts.
But today not even the drive had helped her unwind, and as she pulled up in front of the semidetached house not far from the main parade in Forest Hills, she realized she had the steering wheel clenched in a white-knuckled grip. She flexed her fingers and stretched the kinks from her neck, making a conscious effort to ease the tension from her body. It was a ritual with her, trying not to take the job inside, even though she knew her mum would be at work. The house was sanctuary, the one place she could be entirely herself.
She gazed at the familiar curve of the bay window, the gingerbread of the porch gable with the distinctive crosses at the bottom ends, the stained glass of the front door. At work, only Bryan Simms knew she lived in a “Christmas” house, as no explanation would allay the teasing if the rest of the watch were privy to that little tidbit. It wasn’t that she was usually thin-skinned – in most cases she actually welcomed the firehouse banter and the practical jokes because they were a sign of acceptance – but the passion for the house had been shared with her dad, and it was an area still too tender for public exposure.
Edward Christmas’s company thrived between 1888 and 1930, and while his houses weren’t as well known as those by Arts and Crafts architects such as Voysey and Lutyens, they had a wealth of detail and a unique charm. Her parents had bought the place cheaply in the late seventies, before the resurgence of interest in the builder’s work, and throughout her childhood her father had spent his spare time lovingly restoring each distinctive feature. And she’d helped him, becoming comfortable early on with woodworking and power tools, brick pointing and glass repair – all things that had stood her in good stead in the male culture of the firehouse. Hey, will ya look at that? The flower can use a chain saw! The memory of her sub officer’s surprise still made her smile.