‘I suspect you’re right.’ Jonny nods, solemn. ‘But it’s too premature to judge.’
‘Then why did you … Never mind.’
‘The question, of course, is why Mr Harcourt didn’t fire, if he was going to his door holding a gun. You wouldn’t open the door at all unless it was someone you trusted.’
‘That’s true.’
‘And the other question is who knew Mr Harcourt wasn’t actually out of the country, as his flight booking suggested. Once you find that out, you’ve presumably got who killed him. Or who allowed him to be killed.’
‘Food for thought, Jonny.’
‘Yeah.’
We’ve come to another lift, halfway across the building. Before us is the side looking out onto the riverfront; the side the posher apartments will be on. ‘This will be it.’
The thing about these new apartment buildings is that they’re designed to be as impersonally wipe-clean as a beautiful hotel. The designers try their utmost to showcase the nice parts and hide the shabby ones, including me and Jonny in our fluorescent tabards. It’s not unlike those country houses with secret passages between the walls to conceal the staff.
Anyway, as we step out of the lift onto Davy’s floor, I look back, and sure enough, the service lift has been carefully designed almost out of existence. It’s concealed round a fold in the wall, a subtle partition that any resident here would subconsciously know not to look behind, in case they tripped over someone on minimum wage. Jonny and I have moved from the grubby side – cracked concrete, ill-smelling air, a kind ofaromaof poverty – to the thickly carpeted corridors Davywould have walked. It’s so plush underfoot the sound is deadened, and the lights are gentle enough to make you think you’ve died and are being gently cradled on the journey from this world to the next.
You know, it’s thoughts like the above that make me conclude that in another life I’d have written a cracking update ofDown and Out in Paris and London. Although on reflection, that’s a bit gritty for my taste, and my own provisional title,Fucking Lovely Homes I’ve Sneaked Into, doesn’t quite have the same moral force.
My point is, this building is so luxurious it’s hard to imagine any residents ever having a bad day, or a breakdown, or a divorce.Or being murdered, a little voice murmurs, and I look over my shoulder.
Outside Davy’s door, Jonny reaches into our cart’s bin bag and pulls out a credit-card machine with a dozen leads dangling off it. He plugs one into the keypad, and after about thirty seconds (which I spend doing the most obviously fake dusting you’ve ever seen), there’s abzzz-click. The door swings open.
‘Take the cart in?’
‘Definitely.’ If the supervisor has already seen on the building CCTV where we’ve ended up, it’s too late; but if not, there’s no sense in leaving a bigTHIEVES AT WORKsign in the corridor. We push it through, into Davy’s London flat, and gasp.
It’s breathtaking. I thought a river view was something nice to have; I realise in this moment that I want nothing else in theworld. The apartment’s entire front wall is sheet glass, so clear you feel like you could step out onto the glittering water. A few boats are bobbing at anchor, or chugging between the sparkling wavelets. It looks like one of those paintings of Venice by that guy … Cornetto? That can’t be it.
It’s open-plan. The bedroom is separated from the rest of the room only by a black Crittall window. The bed consists of a huge mattress–headboard combo on a wide podium, making it faintly sacrificial. The decor is impersonal, though. You couldn’t tell from this place whether Davy had liked collecting Victoria Crosses and visiting Flanders war graves, whether he was a wine buff, whether he was a punk as a teenager. There’s almost no character here. I find it hard to picture that big chaotic man living in a flat like this.
The kitchen is ultra-stylish – not a cupboard handle in sight, and the stripped-back cupboards contain some spotless grey Le Creusets. The tap is one of those boiling-water ones where you can scald yourself while making tea – far more convenient than scalding yourself with a kettle – and the fridge door is about fifteen feet square. The countertop also contains one unusual built-in feature – one of those grill devices you get in Japanese restaurants. Davy fancied himself a chef.
Maybe not all the time, though. The only bum note is a half-eaten supermarket lasagne, still in the foil, sitting on the counter with unwashed cutlery beside it. It’s clearly been there a few days. There aren’t enough bacteria in this place to have rotted it yet, but it smells of cold grease.
Jonny nods at the lasagne. ‘Left in a hurry.’
I’ve just had the same thought, although I was considerate enough to keep it to myself. ‘Mm.’
‘Probably worried he was going to get murdered.’
‘Let’s look around, shall we?’
The river wall does have a desk on it, which I gravitate towards. It’s one of those standing ones. Maybe Davy was trying to get in shape, get his life together. I stand at it, grasp the adjustable handles on the sides and—
‘What’s this?’ Jonny has approached from the other side, and reaches into the desk’s innards.
Thisis an old MacBook, which was sitting in a recessed pocket on the desk.
‘Could be useful?’ he asks.
‘Very.’
‘Should we steal it?’
‘Remove. Remove for further study. Yes, Jonny. Good idea.’ Into the base of our cart it goes.
