Free Friday on My Mind by Nicci French Page A

the key in the lock and pushed open the door, stepping into the cool hallway with the same relief she always felt. But now she saw her house – the living room with its chess table and the fire she lit each day in winter, the bathroom with the magnificent bath her friend Josef had installed without her permission and with a large amount of chaos, the small study under the roof where she sat and thought and made pencil and charcoal drawings – with fresh eyes. She didn’t know when she would see it again.
    She made herself a pot of tea and sat with it, the tortoiseshell cat she had unwillingly inherited on her lap, thinking, making a list in her head. There was so much she had to do. For a start, someone would have to feed the catand look after her plants. That was simple. She picked up the phone and punched in the number.
    ‘Frieda, is me. All good?’ He was from Ukraine, and although he had lived in London several years now, his accent was still thick.
    ‘There’s something I need to ask you.’
    ‘Ask anything.’ She could picture him laying his large hand over his heart as he spoke.
    ‘Tomorrow morning I have an appointment with the police. They are going to charge me with Sandy’s murder.’
    There was a silence, then a loud bellow of protest. She couldn’t quite make out what he was saying, but certainly threats of violence and pledges of protection were in there.
    ‘No, Josef, that’s not –’
    ‘I come now. This moment. With Reuben. And with Stefan too, yes?’ Stefan was his Russian friend, who was large and strong and of dubious occupation. ‘We sort it out.’
    ‘No, Josef. I do need your help, but not like that.’
    ‘Then tell.’
    ‘I need someone to look after the cat and –’
    ‘The cat! Frieda. You joke.’
    ‘No. And water the plants. And,’ she continued, over his yelps, ‘there is one more thing I want to ask you.’
    She went through her list: first of all, she wrote a long, careful email to her niece Chloë, whom she had kept a close eye on over the years since Chloë’s father – Frieda’s estranged brother David – had left Olivia. Chloë had been a troubled child, a reckless and needy teenager, but was now twenty and had dropped out of studying medicineand was planning instead to be a carpenter and joiner. She then wrote a much shorter but equally careful email to Olivia, whom she didn’t want to talk to: Olivia would become hysterical, then probably drunk and would want to rush round and weep. She was about to call Reuben but he beat her to it, having been told by Josef what was going on. To her surprise Reuben was calm. He offered to come to the police station with her the next morning but she told him her solicitor wanted to meet her beforehand. He said he would come round at once, to be with her, but she said that she needed to be alone that evening and he didn’t press her. He was steady, consoling, and she was reminded of what a good supervisor he had been to her, all those years ago.
    After she had put the phone down she sat for several minutes, deep in thought. No one – not her solicitor, not Karlsson, not Reuben or Josef – had asked her if she had killed Sandy. Did they believe that she had, believe that she hadn’t, not wanted to know or not dared to ask? Or perhaps it was irrelevant: they were standing by her whatever she had or hadn’t done, unconditionally. She stared blindly into the empty fireplace, as if she could find an answer there.
    There was one more person she had to tell, and a phone call or email wouldn’t do. Her heart felt heavy.
    Ethan’s nanny, Christine, answered the door. Frieda had met her several times before but only briefly. She was tall and vigorous, with strong arms. Her hair was always tied back, then held in place by multiple grips; she seemed very businesslike and strode around the house with an air of purpose. Frieda got the impression that Sasha wasintimidated by her and she wondered what Ethan made of her.
    ‘Yes?’