In the Flesh Read Free Page A

ants.'

     

     

    'Ants?'

     

      'Whole estate's infected. From Egypt, they are: pharoah ants, they're called. Little brown sods. They breed in the central heating ducts, you see; that way they get into all the flats. Place is plagued with them.'

     

      This unlikely exoticism (ants from Egypt?) struck Helen as comical, but she said nothing. Anne-Marie was staring out of the kitchen window and into the back-yard.

     

     

      'You should tell them - ' she said, though Helen wasn't certain whom she was being instructed to tell,

    'tell them that ordinary people can't even walk the streets any longer - 'Is it really so bad?' Helen said, frankly tiring of this catalogue of misfortunes.

     

     

      Anne-Marie turned from the sink and looked at her hard.

     

     

      We've had murders here,' she said.

     

     

    'Really?'

     

      'We had one in the summer. An old man he was, from Ruskin. That's just next door. I didn't know him, but he was a friend of the sister of the woman next door. I forget his name.'

     

     

      'And he was murdered?'

     

     

      'Cut to ribbons in his own front room. They didn't find him for almost a week.'

     

     

      'What about his neighbours? Didn't they notice his absence?'

     

      Anne-Marie shrugged, as if the most important pieces of information - the murder and the man's isolation - had been exchanged, and any further enquiries into the problem were irrelevant. But Helen pressed the point.

     

     

      'Seems strange to me,' she said.

     

     

      Anne-Marie plugged in the filled kettle. 'Well, it happened,' she replied, unmoved.

     

     

      'I'm not saying it didn't, I just - '

     

     

      'His eyes had been taken out,' she said, before Helen could voice any further doubts.

     

     

      Helen winced. 'No,' she said, under her breath.

     

      'That's the truth,' Anne-Marie said. 'And that wasn't all'd been done to him.' She paused, for effect, then went on: 'You wonder what kind of person's capable of doing things like that, don't you? You wonder.' Helen nodded. She was thinking precisely the same thing.

     

     

      'Did they ever find the man responsible?'

     

      Anne-Marie snorted her disparagement. 'Police don't give a damn what happens here. They keep off the estate as much as possible. When they do patrol all they do is pick up kids for getting drunk and that. They're afraid, you see. That's why they keep clear.'

     

     

    'Of this killer?'

     

      'Maybe,' Anne-Marie replied. 'Then: He had a hook.'

     

     

    'A hook?'

     

     

      'The man what done it. He had a hook, like Jack the Ripper.'

     

      Helen was no expert on murder, but she felt certain that the Ripper hadn't boasted a hook. It seemed churlish to question the truth of Anne-Marie's story however; though she silently wondered how much of this - the eyes taken out, the body rotting in the flat, the hook - was elaboration. The most scrupulous of reporters was surely tempted to embellish a story once in a while.

     

     

      Anne-Marie had poured herself another cup of tea, and was about to do the same for her guest.

     

     

      'No thank you,' Helen said, 'I really should go.'

     

     

      'You married?' Anne-Marie asked, out of the blue.

     

     

      'Yes. To a lecturer from the University.'

     

     

      'What's his name?'

     

     

      'Trevor.'

     

      Anne-Marie put two heaped spoonfuls of sugar into her cup of tea. 'Will you be coming back?' she asked.

     

      'Yes, I hope to. Later in the week. I want to take some photographs of the pictures in the maisonette across the court.'

     

     

      'Well, call in.

     

     

      'I shall. And thank you for your help.'

     

     

      'That's all right,' Anne-Marie replied. 'You've got to tell somebody, haven't you?'

     

     

      'The man apparently had a hook instead of a hand.'

     

     

      Trevor looked up from his plate of tagliatelle con prosciutto.

     

     

      'Beg