Chapter 5
16th July
She smiled at him from the doorway and gave him a little wave, clutch bag still in hand. He sat and listened to her clip-clopping carefully down the stairs. At the window, he watched her walk along the mews towards the main street then picked up the plates and cutlery, rinsing them in the sink.
She wasn't his usual type. A couple of years younger than him, he'd noticed her and smiled back. After a while, she'd joined him at the bar then took him to a nearby jazz club; cellar deep and death defyingly smoky. Four people played all the right notes in the wrong order whilst a fifth seemed to be making it up as he went along.
He suggested somewhere slightly less toxic but tactfully agreed the music was wonderful. He preferred Sinatra and Munro but now was not the time to be partisan. Well, one thing led to another. She was down from Oxford, an intelligent girl doing a DPhil, looking for a bit of intellectual 'rough'. How could he say no?
Anyway, the morning hadn't been wasted. His other visitors were usually gone by 6 am, if not before. But she'd stayed and was still game so he thought he'd treat her to beans on toast as a breakfast reward.
He turned the immersion heater on, took his suit onto the flat roof, hanging it to air from the washing line and rang Reg. A saunter down to the newsagent's for a paper followed by a bath, shave and listen to the news then he headed into the office.