I’d done my job, bar the photos. I hadn’t promised Jimmy Achebe photographic proof of what I discovered but it always helped to have hard evidence to back up the facts.
I loitered near the hotel for another hour watching people come and go and feeling faint from hunger before the man I’d seen emerged. He was in his forties, I guessed. Tall and slim. He wore an expensive camel coat and his brown hair was swept back from his face. He had a creamy complexion, clean-shaven. I got a shot of him in profile and another, full length, facing me. I swung the camera around and clicked the skyline just in case.
I soaked up nearly another hour of steady drizzle. My bladder began to ache, and my shoulder, too, a gnawing pain, a reaction to the tension. Tina came out. I snapped her twice then put my camera away. I stuck with her until she reached the platform at Piccadilly from where the train for Levenshulme left, then I called it a day. I had a blissful pee in the ladies’ at the station, bought a huge sandwich, a rich chocolate bun and a large fresh coffee. Only when I’d eaten my fill and warmed through did I get the train myself. It was an old model, shabby and seedy. People were returning from work. I sat crushed in with the smell of wet wool and hair, and the windows grey with condensation. The train lurched to Levenshulme. I walked back and got my car. I didn’t relish telling Jimmy what I’d found out. If Tina’s meeting had been with a man at a café, a pub or a restaurant there may well have been an innocent explanation. But a hotel? A private room with a bed?
My job was done. Their troubles were just beginning.
I’d arranged for the kids to go hom
e with school friends. On the way to get them I dropped the film in at a photo shop I know where they boast processing within the hour. I didn’t need it that urgently. I’d collect it in the morning.
I reached the children at five.
‘I could’ve given them tea, you know,’ said Jean.
‘We want tea, stay for tea,’ Maddie began to chant and the others joined in.
‘No, not tonight. Maybe some other time,’ I said. I thanked Jean for offering, wishing she’d not mentioned it in front of the children. Now I was the mean, horrible Mummy who wouldn’t let them.
After ten minutes of gathering up paintings, coats, lunch boxes and shoes I managed to remove Maddie and Tom, ignoring the protests and complaints.
It only took fifteen minutes to get tea on the table: three-minute macaroni and cheese sauce, tomato salad and bread and butter. Once fed the children crawled off to play puppies with Digger. The dog treated the whole thing with detached caution, poised to remove himself if any indignities were committed.