The Last Kiss Goodbye (26 page)

Chapter Twenty-Nine

‘So what’s going on with your chap?’ asked Rosamund as they turned off the dual carriageway on to a country lane.

‘I don’t want to talk about Elliot Hall,’ said Abby, trying to follow the GPS in the car.

Out of the corner of her eye she could see Rosamund raising an intrigued brow.

‘I was actually talking about your husband. You said you were separated.’

‘Ah,’ replied Abby, squirming in her seat. She felt herself fall under Ros’s penetrating stare. ‘Honestly, I don’t want to talk about him either.’

‘Why not?’ asked Rosamund.

‘It’s complicated,’ she said finally.

‘Relationships always are.’ She paused. ‘Are you getting divorced?’

‘I think so.’

‘So you’re not sure you want to.’

‘I’m sure I can’t pick up where we left off with our marriage. I’m not sure that I can ever trust Nick again.’

‘So I assume he – Nick – had an affair.’

‘A one-night stand.’

‘I see.’

Abby glanced across at her.

‘You don’t think that’s enough, do you? You don’t think that’s enough of an excuse to get divorced.’

‘You don’t have children?’

‘No, we don’t.’

‘So it should be a fairly clean break.’ It was a statement of fact rather than a question.

‘Yes, I suppose it will be.’

‘And have you thought about what it would be like never to see him again?’

‘Of course. But it’s not like you and Dominic. I know that’s what you’re thinking.’

‘No, Abby. Nick would not be dead, but he’d still be gone, and you have to ask yourself how you’d feel about that. How you’d feel about seeing him across the street one day with another woman, his new wife, children. How you’d feel seeing him live a life that was nothing to do with yours.’

Please turn right in one hundred metres,
said a robotic voice, as Abby’s hands gripped the wheel of her Fiat 500 and she tried to dismiss the image that Ros had planted in her head. An image of the B&B in St Agnes, the shutters painted bright blue, a shabby-chic shack built on to the side of it. She could see Nick, his hair a little longer than it was now, waxing down a surfboard, a woman in a bikini rubbing suncream into a small tanned child, an adorable genetic mix of the two of them. A perfect family living a perfect life by the coast. The life she had always wanted.

She mounted the kerb, the car shaking as she navigated it back on to the road. Ros jolted in surprise and flashed her a look to say that now was not the time to be thinking about it.

Appledore was a care home, but unlike any other Abby had seen around London – those huge converted Victorian houses on busy main roads that always struck her as depressing places to see out your final days. This home was as pretty as its name – a large Arts and Crafts building in endless acres of manicured grounds. Driving the Fiat down the long approach, she saw a sign to an orchard, another to a walled garden, and when Ros wound down the window, letting in the scent of freshly cut grass and roses, Abby thought it smelt as good as it looked.

As they approached the house, she turned her stereo off, as she did when she drove past a church or a cemetery. It was something she had learnt from Nick; a little sign of respect, he used to say.

‘So when was the last time you saw Victoria Harbord?’ asked Abby as she slowed the car to park outside the house.

‘Over fifty years ago,’ said Rosamund quietly, her eyes trailing out of the window, her thoughts lost in time.

‘Were you close?’

Ros shook her head. Abby had suspected that would be the answer. When they had left the National Archives, Ros had immediately suggested that Dominic’s good friend Victoria Harbord might know the identity of the EZ mentioned in the archive document. Victoria apparently knew everyone in the heady days of the fifties and sixties. But the pinched and cold way in which Rosamund had spoken about the great society hostess had suggested that she did not like her very much.

Abby turned off the engine and stretched her arms out in front of her. She expected Ros to make a move, but the old woman just sat there with her handbag on her lap, staring out in front of her.

‘I think you should probably talk to her,’ said Ros finally.

‘What’s wrong?’ frowned Abby, turning to look at her and noticing an unfamiliar look of nervousness in her expression.

‘Vee and I never saw eye to eye,’ Ros said quietly. ‘She might be confrontational, obstructive if I’m there. It’s best if you conduct the interview.’

Abby waved a hand. ‘Come on, Ros. It was all a long time ago. I’m sure she’ll be glad to see you.’

‘No,’ said Rosamund, shaking her head.

Abby looked at her with exasperation. She knew that Ros had spent the past twenty-four hours trying to track down Victoria; she couldn’t believe she had cold feet now that they were minutes away from meeting her.

‘Ros, we’ve come all the way to Kent to see this woman.’

‘Victoria Harbord tried to sabotage my relationship with Dominic. I was convinced she was a little in love with Dominic herself and didn’t like the Jewish interloper making off with the grand prize. I always swore that if I ever saw her again in my life it would be too soon.’

‘But she might know who EZ is,’ said Abby, feeling duped and angry. She felt more confident with Ros by her side, in the same way that she had enjoyed the
Chronicle
investigation working alongside Elliot. Anything else made her feel painfully aware of her position as a novice, a fraud.

‘Come on, Ros. If you want to find out the truth about Dominic, you have to come with me now.’ Her stern tone surprised even herself. She had no idea what had happened to the mousy archivist; Abby felt as if she was kicking ass.

‘You speak to her,’ said Ros just as firmly. ‘I’ll wait in the car.’

‘Ros, please. We’ll only be ten minutes.’

‘Just go,’ she said with a look that told Abby she was not going to budge.

Abby sighed as she got out of the car, and looked back at Ros sitting defiantly in the passenger seat. She knew she might have a point. If there was bad blood between the two women, that might colour the interview. As she studied Ros’s expression – the lines on her face creasing a little deeper, the anxious downturn of her mouth – her reluctance to come face to face with her old rival was clear to see. It made Abby think about what it would be like if she were to confront the woman that Nick had had sex with in Stockholm.

She walked into the house and announced herself at the nurses’ bay. A woman in a blue uniform introduced herself as Tracey and asked Abby to follow her down the corridor.

She knocked on a door at the far end of the house.

‘Lady Vee, you have a visitor,’ she said, popping her head around the door.

Abby was glad that she had phoned ahead. Not wanting to turn up at Appledore unannounced, she had rung and arranged an appointment with Victoria Harbord, explaining that she was a journalist friend of Rosamund Bailey’s.

At first she could see no one in the room. Her eyes moved around the space, taking in long French windows, a small double bed with a floral duvet, a desk covered in a dozen silver-framed photographs. Finally her gaze rested on a wing-backed chair facing the garden, and she could just make out the profile of a tiny woman, so pale that she almost faded into the background.

‘Er, Lady Harbord. Hello. My name is Abby Gordon.’

The old woman appeared to be hard of hearing and took a second to register Abby’s voice.

‘Ah, yes. Come and sit. Get a chair and move me around a little.’

Abby adjusted the position of Victoria’s chair and put her own opposite so they could talk.

‘What a pretty girl you are,’ Victoria said in a soft, plummy voice. ‘I like the colour of your dress.’

Ros had supplied Abby with a few details about Victoria Harbord. Apparently she had been quite the glamour puss in her day, with an exotic house in the South of France, a country estate in Buckinghamshire and closets stuffed with haute couture. Abby was quite shocked at how geriatric the woman looked, though it wasn’t really surprising considering she was touching ninety years old. Unlike the much younger Ros, who was mature but well preserved, everything about Victoria Harbord was ancient. She was so slender she looked as if she might snap. Her skin was crêpey, a series of lines and contours on her face like the ageing maps in the RCI archives. But she was immaculately dressed, with a huge diamond ring on her finger and pearls the size of petit pois in her ear lobes.

‘So, a journalist begs to see me,’ she said more archly. ‘I haven’t had that since
House and Garden
persuaded me to do a cover story on Batcombe in the seventies.’

‘Did you say yes to them too?’ asked Abby.

‘Oh yes. It was a glorious twenty-four-page spread. Then again, Batcombe was worth it. They described it, quite rightly, as one of the most beautiful homes in Europe.’

Her wistful eyes rested on Abby.

‘Still, I’m glad to have visitors these days. Batcombe was always full of people, but things are a little different for me now.’

She paused.

‘So you work for the
Chronicle
,’ she said. ‘I recognised your name. You wrote the piece about Dominic, didn’t you?’

‘Actually, I work at the Royal Cartography Institute. But I did find the photo of Dominic and Ros in our archives, and I collaborated with the
Chronicle
to promote our exhibition.’

‘It was a beautiful photo,’ nodded Victoria. ‘I was never aware of it.’

‘The Royal Geographical Society and the RCI have a huge collection of photos from hundreds of expeditions over the years,’ explained Abby. ‘Generally, if an expedition had some sort of sponsorship or financial support, a photographer would be sent along to get pictures. You knew Dominic well?’

‘Very well,’ smiled Victoria, with a hint of smugness. ‘People used to joke that the two of us should marry. Perhaps that would have happened except for two minor details. I was already married to Tony, and I don’t honestly think Dommy ever thought of me like that.’

She looked at Abby, her expression sharp, pointed.

‘Aren’t you going to pull out one of those dreadful dictaphones?’

Abby hadn’t thought to buy one. She had brought a notebook and pen, though goodness only knew if she could keep up with what Victoria was saying. Remembering that her phone had some sort of recording device, she plunged her hand into her bag, pulled out her Galaxy and fiddled around with it.

Victoria smiled as she waited.

‘I thought you young people knew all about new technology,’ she said, appearing genuinely fascinated.

‘So,’ said Abby finally, pressing the record button, ‘did you read the
Chronicle
story about Dominic?’

‘I did,’ said Victoria, taking on a more self-important look.

‘And do you believe he was a Russian spy?’

Victoria Harbord frowned. ‘Miss Gordon, this was all such a long time ago, I wonder what the purpose is in dredging it up again. You’ve sold your papers, your photographs . . .’

‘But do you believe that Dominic Blake was a spy? You knew him better than anyone,’ Abby said, flattering the old woman.

She expected Victoria to vehemently deny it, but she did not.

‘Perhaps. There were rumours about a lot of our crowd. I mixed with influential people, Miss Gordon.’

‘Do you know who EZ was? He was Russian. I found his initials and mentions of espionage in a document in the National Archives.’

Victoria gave a tiny shrug. ‘That could have been Eugene Zarkov. He was a naval attaché at the Russian embassy. He was a bit intense but rather dishy. Came to my house a number of times.’

‘I think he was a Russian spy,’ said Abby flatly.

‘Entirely possible.’

‘Is he still alive?”

‘You’re the journalist.’

Right now, Abby felt wholly ill-equipped and out of her depth. It was fine in St Petersburg, when she’d had Elliot at her side leading the interview, but she really didn’t know what to ask. She felt a grudging respect for him.

‘Do you have any idea where I could find Zarkov?’

‘No,’ said Victoria simply.

Abby felt a flutter of panic, as if sand were running through her fingers. She couldn’t come away from here with nothing. If Victoria, one of Dominic’s closest friends, couldn’t shed any light on his involvement with the KGB, she wasn’t sure where she could turn next.

‘So you’ve met Rosamund?’ said Victoria finally. ‘When you called, wanting to meet me, you said you were friends.’

Abby nodded, not wanting to give away that Ros was waiting in the car. As old and withered as she was, Victoria’s poise and sharp tongue were still intimidating, and Abby could understand why her friend did not want to be here.

‘How is she?’ asked Victoria.

‘She is a wonderful woman.’

‘Yes, she is.’ Victoria nodded, her expression full of emotion.

‘You know, she’s desperate to know what happened to Dominic.’

‘We all were. Dommy was one of my dearest friends. But I think perhaps we should just remember him the way he was. I know you want to help, Miss Gordon, but it’s better that those who loved him accept that he’s dead and cherish the memories that we have. Including Ros.
Especially
Ros.’

Tracey popped her head around the door to tell Victoria that she needed her walk, and Abby knew that their meeting had come to a close.

‘Send her my very best regards,’ said Victoria slowly.

Abby nodded, shook the old woman’s thin hand and left the room with a heavy sense of disappointment. Wandering down the dark corridor, she thought about what she should do next. She had a sense that Eugene Zarkov could be the key to finding out what she wanted, and she wondered how she could go about tracking him down.

She stopped as she saw Rosamund standing by the nurses’ station. She was reading a selection of birthday cards propped up on the shelf that Abby had noticed on her arrival.

Abby smiled as she approached. Clearly the older woman had had a change of heart. She’d known Ros was not the type to stay in the car; no matter how difficult it was going to be for her, she had decided to come and confront Victoria. Abby felt a flutter of pride for her new friend as she stopped in front of her and watched her take one of the birthday cards off the shelf.