Playing With Fire

The woman who came with the flat was every bit as much of an expensive package and a designer’s wet dream – beautiful, chic, petite, dark-haired, thirty at most, with intense blue eyes and a pale, flawless complexion. She was wearing ivory silk combats, high-heeled sandals and a delicate lace top that didn’t quite obscure her skimpy black bra.

She bade Banks sit on the modular sofa and sat opposite, on a matching armchair, the color of which Banks couldn’t name. Pink, or coral, came closest, but even they were a long way off.

“It’s all right, Mrs. Keane,” said Banks. “There’s no need to be nervous. As far as I know, nobody’s done anything criminal. I’d just like a bit of background information, if you don’t mind.”

“About what?”

“Your husband.”

She seemed to relax a bit at that. “Philip? What about him? I’m afraid I don’t know where he is right now.”

Banks noticed a trace of an accent. It sounded vaguely Eastern European to his untrained ear. “How long have you been married?” he asked.

“Three years now.”

“How did you meet?”

“At a club.”

“Where?”

“In the West End. I was working there. It was a gambling club. A casino. Philip used to come there to play cards. We talked once… he asked me to di

“Where are you from?” Banks asked.

“Where from?”

“Yes. Your accent.”

“Ah. Kosovo,” she said. “But everything is legal.”

“Because of the marriage?”

“Yes. I have a British passport now. Everything is legal. Philip did that for me.”

“But when you met?”

She smiled. “You know… I was Jelena Pavelich then, just another poor refugee from a war-torn country trying to make a simple living.” She gestured around the room. “Now I am Helen Keane.”

“It’s a nice flat,” Banks said.

“Thank you. I designed it myself.”

“Is that what you did? In Kosovo?”

“No. I studied at university there. Languages. To be a translator. Then the fighting came. My parents were killed. I had to leave.”

“How did you escape?”

“People helped me. It was a long journey. One I want to forget. I saw many terrible things. I had to do many bad things. But you said you wanted to know about Philip?”

“Yes,” said Banks. “Do you know what he was doing before you met?”

“He said he was working abroad. In galleries and museums, in Italy, Spain, Russia, America. Philip is very clever. He has traveled all over the world.”

“Yes, I know that,” said Banks.

Helen’s eyes narrowed as she studied him. “Has he taken your girlfriend? Is that why you want to ask me about him?”

Banks felt himself blush. “Why do you say that?”

She smiled the way women do when they think they’ve gained the upper edge, put their finger on your weakness. “Because Philip is a very attractive man, no?”

“I suppose so,” said Banks. “But what makes you think he would have another woman? Has he been unfaithful before?”

She laughed. It was a deep, hoarse, almost crude kind of laugh, not at all the sort of sound he would have expected from such an exquisitely petite woman, but more like the way you’d laugh at a dirty joke in a smoky pub. Banks liked it. It made her seem more human to him, less of an ethereal beauty. “Philip always has other women,” she said.

“And it doesn’t bother you?”

She made a little moue, then answered, “Ours is not that kind of marriage. We do what we want.”

“Why stay together, then?”

“Because we like one another. We are friends. And because, well…”

“Go on.”

She looked around the flat and ran her hand over her lace top, all the way down over the rise and fall of her small breasts. “I like nice things. Do you not think I’m pretty?”

“Very.”

“I think for Philip I am a business asset also, no? He likes to be seen with his pretty young wife on his arm. All his friends and colleagues envy him. They all want to go to bed with me. I can tell by the way they look at me.”

“And Philip enjoys that?”

“Yes. We go to openings and di

Banks agreed that it was. For some reason, marriage gave the semblance of both conservatism and stability that people require from a business. Potential clients were much more inclined to be suspicious of a bachelor of Phil’s or Banks’s age than they were of a married man. And the fact that his wife was a mysterious Eastern European beauty would certainly do no harm in the circles he moved in. If anything, it might make him seem a little more daring than most. Not too much, but just enough of a risk-taker to be worth ru

Yes, if Phil Keane wanted everyone to think he was a traditional, solid and dependable sort of fellow, he could do a lot worse than step out with Helen on his arm. And for her part, she had already indicated that she loved the trappings of wealth, the opulent lifestyle. Perhaps she had lovers, too? It seemed to be an open sort of marriage, according to what she had said, so no doubt she had plenty of freedom. Banks felt a little uncomfortable now as his eyes strayed to the outline of her skimpy bra under the lace top, and the exposed black strap against her pale shoulder. He found himself wondering just how much Phil Keane’s lifestyle cost him, and whether ArtSearch made enough to support it.

“Did your husband ever mention a man called Thomas McMahon, an artist he knew?”

“No.”

“You never met anyone called Thomas McMahon?”

“No.”

“What about William Masefield?”

“No.”

“Leslie Whitaker?”

“I haven’t heard the name. But Philip never talks about his friends. If he’s not here, then I have no idea where he is or what he’s doing.”

“Does he have many close friends?”

“Close friends? I don’t think so. Mostly it is work.”

“You mean colleagues he’s met through work, in the art field?”

“Yes.”

“Does he have any partners, anyone he works closely with?”

“No. He says he doesn’t trust other people. They only mess things up. If he wants to do something, he does it himself.”

“Does Philip ever take you to the family cottage in Fortford?”

“What family cottage?”

“Apparently it belonged to his grandparents. In Yorkshire. He inherited it.”

“I know nothing about any grandparents. All Philip told me about his family is that his father was a diplomat and they were always moving from one country to another when he was young. Where did you hear about these grandparents? Who told you?”

“It doesn’t matter,” said Banks. “Did you ever meet his parents?”

“They’re dead. They were killed in a plane crash ten years ago, before we met.”

“And he never said anything about owning property in Yorkshire?”

“Never. Whenever we go away we go to California or the Bahamas. But never to Yorkshire.” She hugged herself and gave a little shiver. “It is cold there, no?”

“Sometimes,” Banks said.

“I love the sun.”

“Helen,” said Banks, mostly out of exasperation, “do you know anything about your husband?”

She laughed again, that deep, throaty sound, then spread her hands as if to display her body. “I know he likes the good things in life,” she said, without a hint of false modesty.

Banks realized there was nothing more to be learned from her, so he said his good-byes and made a speedy exit, more confused than when he had first arrived.