Quick and the Dead

By Susan Moody

A former detective turned art expert investigates her friend’s disappearance in this British mystery series debut from the author of A Final Reckoning.
 
Former Detective Inspector Alexandra Quick has given up her badge to pursue a career as an art expert. But when her business partner, the acclaimed art historian Dr. Helena Drummond, disappears, Alexandra knows she must once gain put her investigative skills to use.
 
Shortly before she vanished, Helena had complained of being menaced by a stalker, and Alex now regrets having dismissed her fears as groundless. But the more she uncovers, the more Alex realizes how little she really knew about Helena. The woman she had thought of as a close friend had been keeping a great many secrets from her. Now Alex must decide: is Helena a victim . . . or is she a killer?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: May 1, 2016
• ISBN: 9781780107516

Susan Moody

Susan Moody was born and brought up in Oxford, and now divides her time between England and France. A former President of the International Association of Crime Writers, she is the author of numerous crime novels, including the Penny Wanawake and Cassie Swann mystery series.

Book preview

ONE

That year, the weather changed overnight. Fast and hard. On Saturday afternoon, there were blue skies and the weak pee-coloured sunshine of mid-winter. By Sunday morning, it had turned gut-wrenchingly cold: heavy clouds, pavements sparkling with hoarfrost, bone-chilling winds driving in straight from the Russian steppes.

Shivering in my woollen bathrobe as I got ready for bed, I sat in front of the dressing-table mirror. I’d spent the last week hunched over my desk, all day, every day, putting together pictures and text, ready for tomorrow’s meeting, my only exercise the removal of the cork from a bottle of red and the subsequent lifting of a glass to my lips. Probably bad for me, but I was careful not to overdo it, and it helped to keep some of my chronic sadness temporarily at bay. Now, pitilessly examining my grey-faced reflection, as one does, especially if one is on the wrong side of thirty (oh, all right then, thirty-three), I catalogued my assets. No double chin, so far. Rather glamorous red hair, but usually pulled severely back from my face so it wouldn’t get in my eyes. Good cheekbones. Not too many crows’ feet around the eyes. Not too much flab on the hips. Breasts … well, not exactly pert, but then they never had been. I was in good shape, though I knew I ought to go to the gym more often.

But would lifting a few more weights, spending fifteen minutes on the running machine instead of ten, swimming sixty lengths of the pool instead of fifty – would that seriously make any difference to my weight or shape?

I thought not. I was already pretty fit – I kept myself in good nick by jogging. Perhaps I was having a bad day, but something in me rebelled as I stared out at the whipping clouds and the dreary grey sea. Okay, so most of my body parts were moving inexorably southwards or sideways, but I decided that I could not bear the thought of spending even one more minute at the gym. Not today. Not ever. The smell of the changing room, the damp trainers and damper towels, the ghastly cosiness of the other women and their feminine chat about children, menfolk, periods. If there’s one thing I do not want to discuss or hear about, it’s other women’s periods, thank you; I have enough problems coping with my own. And I hated the way they didn’t really mean their grumbles about their husbands, secure because at least they had one, their smug alliance as they slagged off their menfolk – He still hasn’t worked out how to switch on the washing machine, like I was born with an instruction manual in my mouth! Send him to the shops and he’ll always come back with the wrong item! He never leaves the seat down after he’s peed, however many times I ask him to! Choruses of Yes, yes, typical, men, tell me about it! – and only me wondering aloud if they would leave the seat up for him if he asked them to. Cue hostile stares, as though I’d suddenly revealed that my (un-pert) breasts had turned gangrenous and were about to leak all over their leotards.

The Maiden Aunt, I thought suddenly. I stared once more into the mirror. Even though neither of my siblings had so far enlarged the gene pool, I was in danger of becoming a Maiden Aunt. Put me in a gingham apron, hand me a pitchfork, and I could picture myself clearly: Mrs American Gothic, severe face, lips set in permanent disapproval. I needed to laugh again. I needed a man in more ways than one. I needed a fuck.

My mobile buzzed. ‘Quick here,’ I said.

‘Alex, darling.’ It was Dr Helena Drummond, my collaborator. My friend. And, in several ways, my saviour.

‘Hi, Helena.’ I couldn’t help smiling. It was the effect she always had on me.

‘I’m just touching base, because I’m actually on my way out the door, or at least standing at it, waiting for my lift. So what time are we supposed to meet this guy?’

‘I’ve already told you three times. Ten thirty. In the morning. Tomorrow.’ I spoke slowly and clearly, as though she was not only mentally challenged, but also deaf. Neither of which was remotely true.

‘I hope to God this publisher person keeps his place warm, because if not, I’m staying wrapped up at home.’

‘No you’re not. In any case, you’ll never know how high he keeps the heating unless you show up there, will you? And I’m telling you, if you’re late, I shall have to start the meeting without you. And. You. Will. PAY! We cannot afford to risk giving the impression that we don’t care. That we are anything but professional and on the ball.’

‘Oh, God.’ Helena groaned. ‘It’s so cold.’

‘Are you listening to me, dammit?’

‘Yes. But can’t we postpone it?’

‘No,’ I said firmly. ‘Because first of all, I set this up weeks ago, second of all, Cliff Nichols is expecting us, and third, and most important of all, he is almost certainly going to commission us. So tomorrow we are going to work. Work, Helena. If you know what that means.’

‘Darling, so severe! Chee-rist, look at the time.’

‘Where are you off to?’

‘I’m going to a concert in the cathedral, and then having dinner with some friends, including the owner of that antiques shop just off the High Street, the one who has antiquarian books as well as mahogany breakfronts. He’s one of our fans and always keen as mustard to talk us up to his customers. I don’t know how many copies he’s sold for us so far, so I have to be nice even though he’s a frightful old grump. At least he hasn’t tried to get me into bed.’

‘Not yet,’ I said. ‘Don’t get pissed, will you?’

‘Pissed? Moi?’

‘You need to be on full alert tomorrow. Have fun.’ Pointless advice: Helena always had fun. I suppressed a sigh. I liked my own company, which was just as well, but sometimes I wished I had a more vivid social life.

‘You know me, darling, don’t I usually? Anyway, back late tonight – unless I get lucky – sleep like a baby and up betimes to drive – oh Gawd, do I really have to? – all the way to Billingsgate House or whatever it’s called.’

‘Barnsfield.’

‘I suppose I’d better get my stuff for tomorrow sorted before I go to bed.’

‘Excellent idea.’ Although Helena often appeared scatter-brained and out of it, in fact she was usually pretty well organized. As someone on the part-time teaching staff of three different universities, she had to be. ‘And don’t forget to bring your portfolio with you.’

‘It’s already in the car, Bossy Lady. I’ll be setting off around eight-thirty tomorrow, to leave myself plenty of time, given the latest weather forecast. Snow, groan. Sleet and frost, double groan. But I ought to reach the place just about on time, unless the traffic’s bad. So fingers crossed and see ya tomorrow, babe.’

‘Right. And don’t be late.’

‘I won’t be – unless I’m kidnapped or something.’

‘Any possibility that you might be?’ I stared again at my reflection, wishing I could be more like Helena. More carefree. More insouciant.

‘Well, I’ve told you I’m being stalked, haven’t I?’

‘Several times.’ I had never taken her seriously. Not after the time I had digested with horror the dramatic news that Helena had stomach cancer, only to be airily informed later that it was just a mild attack of food poisoning after all.

Her tone changed. ‘You think I’m joking or making it up, don’t you?’

‘Of course I don’t,’ I lied.

‘Well, I’m not. I’ve seen him standing outside in the dark, watching the house, trying to spook me. But what if,’ Helena said, ‘tonight’s the night he decides to get proactive?’

‘Tell him to come back the day after tomorrow.’

Afterwards, of course, my flippancy haunted me, filled me with guilt of the worst kind. If I’d taken her seriously, if I’d only listened, asked more questions, how differently things might have turned out. But to what was likely to prove my eternal regret, I had not.

The following morning, I looked out at the rime-frosted communal lawn in front of my second-floor flat, each grass blade edged with ice, at the hard-packed soil of the flower-beds, dead leaves hanging brown and lifeless from withered stalks whipping to and fro in the raw breeze. Beyond the garden wall was the promenade, and then the stony beach. Beyond that, the sea churned restlessly, bleak and drab, waves crashing occasionally against the shingle, throwing up high curtains of white spray.

Mrs Gardiner, from one of the ground-floor flats, was walking along the seafront, bent forwards against the buffeting wind, her whole posture indicating cold and discomfort. Her three hairless dogs skittered along beside her, their little paws click-clacking gingerly across the frosty tarmac. Each one was wearing a grey tweed coat edged with red or holly-green, already anticipating Christmas. At Easter, their coats would be bordered with yellow and lime.

Even inside the flat, with the central heating cranked up, I felt cold. I groaned at the thought of having to go out into the freezing air, get my car started, then set out on roads that the weather forecast had already warned would be treacherous. But business was business … Yet again I checked the papers lying on my bed, including the roughs for two further picture-and-text compilations, then placed them carefully into my leather briefcase, a gift from my sister.

I had gasped with pleasure when she gave it to me. ‘It’s beautiful!’ I said, stroking the satiny leather.

‘I know. Now that you’ve set up your own company, you need to look like a professional,’ Meghan said. ‘First impressions are one of the most important parts of your pitch, if not the most important. Leo says that if a would-be client can’t be bothered to create a good impact right from the get-go, then what else won’t he bother about? In other words, he’s probably not someone we want to work with.’

Meghan and her husband lived in Florence and ran a small and very exclusive leather-goods company, which supplied Harrods and Fortnums and, behind the scenes, Mulberry. They had recently secured contracts with Bloomingdales and Saks in New York.

Perhaps I should add that Meghan is not her real name, any more than mine is Alexandra. Thanks to the proud heritage handed down from my ancestor, Elaward de Cuik, generations of Cuiks had given their children ludicrous Anglo-Saxon names. When I was ten, my sister had called a council of war for the three of us. ‘I absolutely refuse to be called Ethelburgha for a single nother second,’ she’d stated. ‘They’ve started calling me Cheeseburger at school. It’s the last straw.’

‘I rather like being Hereward,’ said my brother.

‘Well, I hate Frideswide,’ I said. ‘What a terrible name.’

‘Loaded with history,’ my brother pointed out.

‘This is what I’m going to do.’ My sister spoke loudly. ‘I’m going to tell them twice – because they won’t listen the first time – that from now on my name is Meghan, and I won’t answer to any other name. What about you?’ she said to me.

‘Alexandra,’ I said promptly. ‘That’s what I’m going to be called. There’s all sorts of famous people called that. Athletes and princesses and stuff.’

Now, I glanced at the clock on top of the bookcase. Cripes! I would be running late if I didn’t leave in the next fifteen minutes. And I wasn’t even dressed! I rushed into the navy-blue business suit I’d retained from my Detective Inspector days, the white silk blouse, the navy tights. I clasped the pearls my parents had given me when I turned twenty-one round my neck, stuck matching studs in my ears, and ran down the stairs. Power dressing. Equipped for battle.

Before I left the house I telephoned Helena again. I could just imagine her swearing loudly as she hopped about her bedroom, trying to get into a pair of tangerine-orange or peacock-blue tights, dragging a brightly patterned dress over her head, shrugging into a quilted satin jacket covered in stars, flinging a multi-coloured scarf round her neck, shoving her feet into cabbage-green ankle boots in need of a good clean. That was if she had even bothered to get out of bed.

There was no answer. She must be on time for once; must, indeed, already have set out. Good. The coming meeting was of particular importance.

Driving carefully over treacherous roads, I reviewed the steps which had brought me to this point. At university, I had joined various leftist groups and come out after my three years with a reasonable degree and, although not a liberal idealist, a vague desire to do good in some form or another. Someone had mentioned the police, which seemed to tick all the right boxes. Do you have the ambition, determination and vision to accelerate into the senior ranks of the police service? the literature had asked, and, feeling that I did, in spades, I joined the force on a fast-track programme, rising rapidly through the hierarchy to become, after six years, one of the youngest Detective Inspectors in the country. I discovered from practical experience how to run a team, how to keep it together, when to chivvy, when to sweet-talk, when to praise and when to admonish. Although it was supposed to have been wiped out, there was still plenty of lingering misogyny in the police force, but I was lucky enough not to experience anything worse than the odd sexist remark or the occasional show of resentment from some disgruntled junior officer who felt it was inappropriate to be taking orders from a woman. I ignored the Playboy images of spread female legs placed centrally on my desk, countering them by pinning up raunchy shots from gay magazines, not giving a toss if that brought me down to their level. If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. The minor harassment stopped soon after that.

Above all, I learned to observe, whether it was picking up tensions between the members of my team, or an overlooked detail at a scene of crime. I also learned that not every officer is equally dedicated to truth, justice and the rooting out of evil. But all my hopes and ambitions, my dedication to the job, and, yes, my real ability, came to an end when I got married.

I had fallen in love with Jack Martin, a colleague as aspirational as I was myself, and for nearly three years I had been completely happy. I had truly loved him. Like W.H. Auden, I thought that love would last forever, and like him, I was wrong. Two life-changing events occurred. Firstly, I found myself pregnant. Secondly, I discovered that Jack was having an affair – had, in fact, been involved with the same woman since very shortly after our wedding. I had confronted him, saying it was either his pregnant wife or his mistress, and had been both humiliated and completely heartbroken when he’d chosen the mistress, adding that in any case, he wasn’t ready yet to be a father, couldn’t guarantee that he ever would be. I wondered how I could have once been so deluded as to believe that the sun shone out of his backside.

There was still the baby. Determined not to display my mortification at being rejected, I resigned from the force, hating the possibility of running into Jack the Love Rat, Jack the Shit, almost as much as I hated leaving a job I cared passionately about and wanted to go on doing until I retired. And then a month after Jack had moved in with his lover, a beautician with her own salon, I woke in the night, my back aching, dull cramps in my stomach which gradually morphed into a severe abdominal pain. I had been experiencing discomfort, especially in the lower back, for the past three or four weeks, for which my GP had prescribed a mild painkiller. So that night, I took two tablets and went back – eventually – to sleep. I woke to find my bed drenched with what I at first took to be perspiration but – on pushing back the covers – saw, with horror, was blood. I knew at once what it was. I called the hospital and an ambulance was sent immediately. They took every possible care but they couldn’t save the baby. They told me he was a boy. I was completely crushed. Emotionally broken.

So there I was, in my late twenties, unemployed, unmarried and childless. And very unhappy. The maisonette flat I had once shared with Jack and from which I could not afford to move (at least I had been able to keep it as part of the divorce settlement) was almost too strong a reminder of happier times. I changed. I grew a cynical carapace over my vulnerable heart, determined that I would never again be hurt the way Jack had hurt me. My friends and family wondered aloud where the real Alex had gone. I shrugged. Murdered, was the answer. Dead and buried. Burned in the ashes of a faithless love.

With nothing much else to do, I decided to carry on putting together a book similar to one I had been given by a godmother when I was ten. It had contained paintings by famous artists, with a fictional story woven around the people inside each picture. I’d been trying to produce something similar for my coming child. When I lost him, it gave me a purpose, something to concentrate on, something to divert my mind. I called it Tell Me a Story. A small local publisher took it and had a gratifying success with it.

I started another book, along the same lines. Given the wealth of material out there, I decided to concentrate on pictures of babies, or parents and babies. I talked about it to the man in the local bookshop, who was very encouraging. ‘It’s a terrific idea,’ he said. ‘And unusual. You shouldn’t have any difficulty selling a concept like that.’ He’d smiled at me. ‘I’ll order a dozen for the shop.’

I called it Baby, Baby. A way of easing my pain. Distancing myself from Jack’s defection. The man at the bookshop – Sam Willoughby – was right. Months later, when the book was finally put together, the same small local publisher who had produced Tell Me a Story had enthusiastically taken it on, offered a reasonable advance, and asked for more of the same, perhaps losing the fictional element and gearing it towards adults. ‘Gorgeous painting on the right-hand side,’ he’d said. ‘Beautifully presented text on the opposite page.’ His face had gleamed with fervour. ‘Oh, I can see it clearly.’ Unfortunately, shortly after I’d signed the contract, his company went belly-up and he disappeared to Scotland to take over his father’s farm.

But at least I had finally felt a lifting of the murk which had surrounded me since my divorce and subsequent miscarriage. And then I came across Helena.

Barnsfield House, headquarters of ArtWorld Books, lay down a rural lane deep in the Sussex countryside. It was an unassuming country house, surrounded by woods and fields. I pulled up in front of the place, heart sinking a little as I registered the fact that Helena’s ancient black Humber wasn’t there. I shook my head. Typical Helena.

‘Please don’t be late,’ I said aloud. ‘At least, not too late.’ Through the windscreen I could see a piece of crumbling wall, not connected to anything else, which I judged to be pretty ancient. I could also see a small burial ground along one side of the house, complete with yew trees, mossy headstones and carved granite crosses. Kind of gloomy, I thought. I remembered a visit to Haworth and the Brontë family’s Parsonage, and the way they practically lived in a cemetery. When I have fears that I should cease to be … I hoped Mr Nichols would not turn out to be some lugubrious Dickensian character with a high stiff collar, a dark suit and a waistcoat embellished with egg stains.

After checking my appearance in the mirror, I climbed out of my car, thanking the weather gods that the rain-snow-sleet had abated for a few seconds. I ran across a courtyard of sandy yellow gravel into a porch with gothic windows and oaken seats on either side. I was just about to press the brass-encircled bell at the side of the front door when it opened.

‘Alex Quick! How very nice to see you.’ Hand out, a man stepped forwards. ‘I’m a huge admirer.’

‘I take it you’re Mr Nichols.’

‘Indeed. But I must insist that you call me Cliff.’ He stepped back. ‘Do please come on in.’

‘Thank you.’

He stared beyond me. ‘And your partner?’

‘Helena’s coming across from Canterbury. I’m afraid she’s not the best timekeeper in the world, but she should be here any moment,’ I said, as confidently as I could. We stepped into a panelled hall with various doors giving off it.

‘This way.’ Nichols ushered me into a library full of books and ancient oriental carpets. A plump woman stood at a large round table in the middle of the room, with a heavy silver tray in front of her which held coffee pots and cups and jugs of warm milk.

‘This is Elaine, my … uh … chief assistant,’ Nichols said.

And what else …? I nodded at her. Smiled.

‘Weren’t there supposed to be two of you?’ she asked.

‘There were, but my collaborator may be a few minutes late.’ Inwardly, I cursed Helena. This meeting was so important. It could determine the next few years of our lives.

‘Let’s have coffee while we wait,’ Nichols said.

The three of us settled at another table, a long rectangular one of centuries-polished oak, with papers laid out as though for a board meeting.

‘And let me explain about this place,’ he said, ‘before you start wondering …’

About what?

‘… I inherited this house from my godfather, lock stock and barrel, five years ago, and it seemed the ideal place to run a small business from, with London rents and house prices getting more and more absurd. So down we came. Me, Elaine, our secretary Shan …’

‘Old Uncle Tom Cobley and all,’ put in Elaine. She laughed loudly. I laughed too, though I couldn’t see it was all that funny.

‘And it suits us down to the ground,’ Nichols finished.

Again I nodded. There was something about the two of them which I couldn’t put my finger on. Something off-kilter – so much so that I wasn’t even sure whether it was a positive something or a negative one. If I had been interviewing him as a witness in a crime scene, I wondered what questions I might have asked him.

Over the rim of my coffee cup, I studied him as he chatted to Elaine about a book they were in the middle of producing. Nice-looking, youngish, somewhere in the mid-forties, wearing the standard country-dweller’s uniform of corduroys, a checked shirt and a sweater. Short-cut brown hair, hazel eyes, some kind of dark birthmark beneath his left eye. I tried to analyse what exactly had set my antennae quivering but failed to come up with anything convincing. Was it because he had greeted me by name, when he’d not met me before and I might easily have been Helena for all he knew? That didn’t hold water. He looked like a man who did his homework, so he could have found our photographs from various sources. Was it because he’d insisted that I call him Cliff? There was no need for him to insist, since I was quite ready to call him anything he pleased. And why should he presume that I might wonder about his house – why offer any explanation at all when it was none of my business in the first place?

I wished that Helena would get here. Even though I was the practical one who dealt with contracts and negotiations, drove bargains, hard or otherwise, demanded concessions I knew we wouldn’t get, in order to be conceded ones we might not otherwise have been offered, I also suggested paintings, researched pictures. But I wanted my collaborator at my side. Especially since Helena was adept at coming up with the pertinent question which could make all the difference to a contract.

A grandfather clock in one corner of the room wheezed and puffed and finally chimed twice. The half-hour. Where on earth was Helena?

‘Would you mind if I tried to call my partner?’ I asked apologetically, wishing that the word hadn’t now taken on the suggestion of Significant Other. ‘My business partner, that is. She should be on her way, but perhaps there’s been a pile-up on the motorway. And she did mention she was suffering from a bit of an upset stomach.’ Not a lie, not really. She’d certainly mentioned such a thing a week or three ago.

‘Or maybe she’s stuck behind a herd of cows.’ Nichols laughed. ‘Happens quite a lot round here. Drives our staff mad.’

‘Or the road conditions are too difficult, thanks to the weather,’ said Elaine.

‘Yes, we did kind of wonder if you would ring to cancel or postpone.’

What? And lose the opportunity to strike while the iron was hot? No way. I pressed in the numbers of Helena’s mobile and listened to it ring until the answerphone message came on. I tried her home number, too, just in case she hadn’t yet left for some reason. Again I was sent directly to her answerphone. What on earth was the wretched woman up to? I looked across the table at the other two. ‘Look, I’m terribly sorry. I hate wasting your time like this,

Reviews for Quick and the Dead

[fictionzeal · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

If we are honest with ourselves, we’d all like a friend with bluntness like Alex Quick. As a friend, she’d tell you what you need to hear; not necessarily what you want to hear. But, with her dear friend, Dr. Helena Drummond, she called it wrong. For some time, Helena had been trying to tell Alex she felt as if someone was stalking her. Since Alex knew her friend’s flair for the dramatic, she’d not paid attention. Then, Helena had not shown up for an important meeting with a new client. She went to Helena’s home in Canterbury and let herself in as they’d exchanged keys. She found her mutilated body on the bed … No, wait … it wasn’t Helena. Alex experienced two thoughts simultaneously. Where was Helena? Who was this dead woman?Alex and Helena were collaborators at Drummond & Quick Ltd, working to produce high-quality art book anthologies. Before this, Alex was a Detective Inspector. She had cop instincts. While the police were engaging the thought that Drummond may have been the killer, Alex knew her friend better than that. At least she thought she knew her. As she began answering questions for the police, she was finding just how little she really knew about her friend’s life.The biggest complaint I have of this story is a feeling that Alex, as an ex-cop, should have called the police a little sooner. Instead, I felt she allowed herself to enter the room and contaminate what would become the scene of the crime. I really liked Alex’s personality, her rough exterior, and her unwavering faith in her friend. The story was told at a fast pace and held a nice twist. Some aspects of the story were not explained fully to my satisfaction. For the faint of heart, the crime was a bit graphic. Bottom line, though, is that I’d love to read more of Alex Quick. Rating: 3.5 out of 5.