The Chelsea Murders Read Free Page A

possible? ‘Hello, sorry, Vicar,’ she said. ‘Urgent call there. Can I ring you back later?’
    ‘Well, I wonder if the editor could –’
    ‘Of course,’ Mooney said. ‘I’ll see he gets the message. I’ll make a special point of it.’
    She shot off down the stairs and got her bike. It was in the narrow passage at the foot of the stairs next to the advertising department. There was hardly room to squeeze it in and they always kicked up a row. She’d told them, the best thing was to widen the passage. She wasn’t leaving it outside. She got her plastic off the hanger and wound it round her. She hated the shitty place. A regular little artisan’s cottage.
    They’d been kicked out of the King’s Road, together with the Chelsea News , after seventy years. The leases had fallen in. Boutiques had taken over at twelve times the rent. The same thing was happening all over Chelsea. Now they were chronicling events (to give the activity a name) from the middle of Fulham. All the management had done was tart up the ground floor with plate glass and carpets and a rubber plant and put a sign over the top, CHELSEA GAZETTE . It looked like a poofish dry-cleaner’s or a travel agency. The editorial, above, remained in its pristine squalor. Never mind.
    She trundled her vehicle out to the street, and slammed the side door behind her. She’d save on a taxi (60p there and 60p back, with any understanding at the Globe end), and it would be quicker by bike, anyway.
    Mooney was six feet tall and thirty years old, a divorcee. She had a heavy long Spanish face which attracted the wrong kind of person. She knew about this as about a lot of things. Her journalistic career had been interrupted by marriage and motherhood (and divorce and bereavement, respectively), and she had since learned to cope with a number of problems, including the contraction of the Fleet Street Press which made it difficult for her to get a job there. She had returned to her first job on the Chelsea Gazette , at minimum rates, turning a penny here and there with extras as a stringer for the London Press, a lot of which involved getting rain in your face.
    She turned in before World’s End at Stanley Street, with The Gold Key on the corner, and right away saw the fuzz flexing outside.
    ‘Morning,’ she said politely, wheeling her cycle and standing it outside the Gents’. ‘I wonder if I could ask you to keep an eye on that.’
    The constable didn’t say anything, but when he saw her going to the side door and pressing the bell, he came up to her.
    ‘What did you want?’ he said.
    ‘Mr Logan,’ she said. She’d suddenly remembered the name from the little gilt sign above the door, Gerald Logan, Licensed to sell Beers, Spirits, Wines & Tobaccos.
    ‘Oh, yes?’ the constable said.
    In one joyous burst she realized that nobody had got here yet. ‘Gerry,’ she said.
    ‘Was it anything special?’ the constable said.
    The door opened and a skinny little woman in an overall was standing there.
    ‘Hello, dear,’ Mooney said, nodding most warmly. She’d never cast eyes on her before. ‘Tell him I’m here. It’s Mrs Mooney.’
    The woman and the constable were both looking at her anxiously.
    ‘I came the moment I could,’ Mooney apologized.
    After looking anxiously at her, the fuzz and the help were now looking at each other. ‘How is he?’ Mooney said. An advantage of her heavy eyes and long Spanish chops was that, despite her gangling figure, she could transform at will into Our Lady of Sorrows. ‘In a dreadful state, I’m sure.’
    ‘Well, he is,’ the help said. She was scratching at a little wart on her lip. ‘Just a minute, I’ll see.’ She looked nervously at the constable and went.
    ‘What, er, actually was it?’ the fuzz said.
    ‘It’s at times like these,’ Mooney said, dropping him a look of bottomless compassion, ‘that we’re really needed.’ While dropping him it she uneasily recalled having seen him knocking about