Thirteen
Steam was rising from the leafy golf courses and frosty fields as Andrew drove west on the M56. His Aunt Gem was sitting behind him, her faithful pug, Rory, curled up on the passenger’s seat. Andrew had told his aunt that she should sit in the front, but she wasn’t having it. The suggestion of putting Rory in the boot was similarly dismissed with an outraged slap on Andrew’s shoulder, followed by Gem telling him that she’d sit in the boot herself before putting the dog in there.
Andrew knew that people had to wear their seatbelts when in the front, but he wasn’t sure of the law surrounding animals. He was probably breaking a rule somewhere along the line but was getting more grief from his aunt in the back than he was the dog in the front.
‘Oooh, so that’s the airport, is it?’ she said as they passed a signpost that very clearly read ‘Airport’.
‘Yes, Gem,’ Andrew replied.
‘And that’s where the planes go from, is it?’
‘Yes, Gem.’
There was a short silence and then. ‘So that’s where we’ll be flying from next month, is it?’
‘That’s right.’
Another silence.
‘I just don’t know about it all, Andrew. All this flying lark. It’s not natural.’
Andrew fought the urge to turn away from the road. They’d had this conversation roughly five times a week for the past month. Despite being a little into her seventies, Gem had never left the country. She’d barely left Manchester and this was to be her first trip overseas.
‘I’m not arguing about it any longer,’ Andrew said, trying to sound firm but not angry. ‘I’m taking you to Corfu and that’s that. You know my friend Craig’s going to have Rory for the week.’
‘But Reg at bingo was going on about how I’d need special socks for the plane. Something to do with my veins. He said your legs can explode.’
‘It’s not a problem, Gem – and your legs don’t explode. It’s called Deep Vein Thrombosis – but it only happens on really long flights. Ours is only about three hours. If you move your legs around, you’ll be fine.’
She harrumphed, as if she’d been hoping this was something that could get her out of the holiday. Jenny had convinced Andrew that his aunt really did want to travel abroad for the first time, even though everything she said and did made it seem as if she didn’t.
‘We’re not flying Ryanair, are we?’ Gem added. ‘I’ve heard terrible things. Did you know they charge you for a wee? Reg says they charge you for everything. He says oxygen is charged per minute.’
Andrew glanced in his rear-view mirror to see if his aunt was joking. It didn’t look like it. ‘We’re not flying Ryanair,’ he replied. ‘And, even if we were, they don’t charge you for breathing – or weeing.’
Rory pushed himself up and stomped in a circle, creating a deeper divot in the seat before curling up once more. He didn’t seem impressed at the talk of Andrew and Gem abandoning him to swan off to Corfu for a week.
‘But the heat, Andrew,’ Gem said. ‘I’ve heard it’s so hot, you can fry eggs on the pavements out there. I don’t think I’m up to it.’
‘It’s not that hot in May – and you’re definitely up to it. Our hotel has air conditioning, so you can sit in the room if it’s too warm.’
She batted the back of his seat with her hand, annoyed that her new list of arguments against going had proved fruitless. She’d have something else by the next week – probably Reg at bingo saying the exchange rate was terrible and it would cost hundreds of pounds to get a meal, or that the political situation was unstable and she didn’t fancy holidaying in a warzone.
Andrew passed the next junction and there was a merciful period of silence before Gem was off on her next topic.
‘How’s your little friend?’ she asked.
‘Jenny?’
‘Oooh, she’s lovely. I know she’s out of your league, but—’
‘She works for me, Gem. We’re not seeing each other.’ Andrew wanted to add: ‘And she’s not out of my league,’ but that would only start another argument, which he wouldn’t win.
‘A little birdie told me you were back in contact with that ex-wife of yours…’
‘That was me, Gem. I told you.’
‘All right, no need to snap.’
Andrew gritted his teeth. He visited his aunt at least once a week and every conversation ended up heading in a similar direction.
Moments later and it was as if the previous part of the exchange had never happened. ‘Did I tell you about Marie’s cataracts? Poor woman…’
Gem had indeed told Andrew about Marie’s cataracts – three times. At least fifty per cent of her topics for conversation seemed to revolve around people and the illnesses they had. Someone she knew had recently had a stroke, there was Reg’s osteoporosis, another person was on a waiting list for a new hip.
Andrew ummed and ahhed where it felt like he should. He’d heard it all before and didn’t really have a reply then. What could he say other than, ‘That sounds nasty’?
Mercifully, they reached the junction towards which Andrew had been heading and Gem stopped listing illnesses, instead pointing out potential hazards. Those included a stationary traffic cone, a horse in a field roughly two hundred metres away and three cars on the opposite side of the road. She also pointed out the speed limit sign, even though Andrew had not only seen it, he’d already slowed.
Andrew followed the signs for the car boot sale, bumping over a ramp onto a field and waking Rory once more. Gem pointed out that they were in a field and then started pointing to gaps between stalls, trying to claim Andrew could park there and then telling him off for snapping when he said it was for stallholders only.
It was a typical morning with his aunt.
Eventually, Andrew parked in a proper spot and then helped his aunt out of the car before putting Rory on a lead. Rory plodded along like a little barrel on stumps as Gem slotted in at Andrew’s side. She wasn’t much better at barely five feet tall, shuffling along while her feet hardly seemed to leave the ground.
‘It’s very big,’ she said.
‘It’s the biggest car boot sale in Europe. I did say that when I asked if you want to go.’
‘Yes, but you didn’t say it was this big. I mean there’s big and then there’s big.’
It wasn’t long before Andrew was regretting inviting his aunt. It was nice to get her out of her poky flat for a morning, it really was, but it was also hard work. She wanted to stop at every stall, regardless of the nature of the tat that was being sold. She wanted to buy a lamp that was broken, solely because the teenager selling it ‘had a nice face’. Andrew managed to talk her out of most of the impulse buys, primarily because she’d have to carry it back to the car. In reality, he knew that he’d be carrying it back to the car. She wanted a cassette player that had been made forty years previously – plus the fifty tapes it came with. That was all well and good until Andrew pointed out it would be a good fifteen minutes to carry it.
Ultimately, he couldn’t talk her out of buying a new set of cutlery that came in a polythene bag for two quid, or Shakin’ Stevens’ autobiography for fifty pence.
‘Are you ever going to read that?’ Andrew asked as she dropped it into a bag for life.
‘Maybe,’ Gem said. ‘He had that Christmas song, didn’t he?’
‘Nobody reads celebrity biographies, Gem. You should come here the week after new year. It’s full of people trying to get rid of Christmas presents they didn’t want in the first place. Someone else buys one of these books for a couple of quid and then they never read it either.’
Before he knew it, Gem was walking Rory and Andrew was carrying two bags for life overloaded with tat.
Gem stopped for a sit-down every few minutes, with the spring sunshine just about the only redeeming factor.
It was at the fourth sit-down close to a stall selling polystyrene cups of tea for fifty pence that Andrew finally saw the thing he’d come for. He bought
Gem a drink and a cookie and left her with the bags, while he and Rory headed off towards a stall that had been set up next to a battered BMW. Three tables had been pushed together, with rows of slightly squished boxes at the front. There was the usual hotchpotch of market fare – notepads, pens, cleaning supplies – but the items that had drawn Andrew’s focus were at the far end of the stall.
The stallholder was busy trying to find change for a customer at the other end of the tables, so Andrew picked up the violin and flipped it over. It was the only one he’d seen at the boot sale. He took out the photograph Braithwaite had given him, comparing the violins. There was no ‘LK’ etched into the wood of the one on the stall and it had all the strings – but, otherwise, from what he could tell, they were similar. The wood grain looked alike and the varnish was the same chestnut brown.
Andrew pocketed the photo and waited for the stallholder to notice him.
‘Where’d this come from?’ Andrew asked, as the man strolled across.
The man behind the tables was skinny with a too big tracksuit and a face like a chipmunk. ‘House clearance, pal.’
His accent was so broad that Andrew needed a few seconds to understand what he’d said. Andrew pointed at the flute in an open case next to the violin. ‘This too?’
The stall owner swept a hand towards the pile of instruments. There were two recorders, a tambourine, a bongo, plus a triangle for good measure. ‘Everything came from the same place, pal,’ he added.
‘You got anything else?’
He shrugged. ‘Whatcha after?’
Andrew pointed at the violin. ‘Any more of these? I’m looking for more than one.’
The human chipmunk scratched the bum fluff on his chin. ‘I’d have to make some calls. Come back next Sunday and I’ll see what I can do.’
‘Any chance of getting one sooner?’
The man eyed Andrew and then peered down at Rory. He continued scratching his chin and then shook his head. ‘Nah. No way, pal. I prob’ly can’t get any more, like. Don’t find many of them in clearances, y’know?’
Andrew didn’t know. He hoisted up the violin. ‘How much for this?’
The stallholder didn’t even look at it. ‘Fifty quid.’
Andrew flipped it around and held it to his chin, acting as if it might be for him. As if he didn’t have fingers like cheap supermarket sausages. He knew he should probably haggle, get the guy down to thirty quid or something, but he couldn’t be bothered. He dug into his wallet and fished out the money, handing it across, where chipmunk face snatched it like a man who couldn’t believe his luck.
Fourteen
After a long, long morning, Andrew dropped a well-walked Rory and Gem back at their flat. They lived on the first floor of a housing block that wouldn’t have looked out of place if it was surrounded by high-chain fencing topped with barbed wire, enormous floodlights and a lookout tower for escaping prisoners. He hefted Gem’s bags for life up the concrete steps and then followed her to her front door as she told him how some nice little ginger kid had been round days previously, offering her half a dozen frozen beef Wellingtons for a fiver. Andrew wondered whether, deep down, Gem knew about the amount of nicked goods that got traded around her, or if she was genuinely naive to it all. He liked to think she was simply trusting of everyone.
Rory toddled past Gem into the flat, no doubt ready for a lengthy lie-down. Gem, meanwhile, fiddled with trying to get her shoes off before crossing the threshold.
‘I’ll put a lamb joint on,’ she said.
‘I can’t stay for dinner,’ Andrew replied. ‘I’ve got to work today.’
‘But it’s a Sunday!’
‘I know – but I still have things to do.’
Gem dotted the four points of a cross on her front, even though Andrew had never known her go to church. ‘Even God rested on the seventh day, Andrew.’ She poked at his ribs. ‘And you’re getting so thin. Just look at you.’
Her opinion on his weight was not one shared by the scales in Andrew’s bathroom. ‘I’ll come round in the week,’ he replied. ‘I’ll take Rory out for a walk and then we can eat together afterwards. I’ll call you.’
‘You’ll do no such thing. I know how much it costs to call from those mobile things.’
‘We’ve had this conversation, Gem. It’s not that expensive.’ Andrew stepped away, knowing that if he hung around much longer, he’d get drawn inside as inevitably as a spider gets stamped on. ‘I’ll call you in the week,’ he said, still walking backwards.
He somehow managed to get away without being ticked off for snapping and then Andrew set off away from the estate on foot. He passed through a familiar selection of ginnels and lanes that snaked around the blocks of flats, until he passed under a set of double arches. He crossed a paved forecourt that was overgrown with moss and then reached a row of small bungalows that looked utterly out of place among the surrounding identikit towers.
Before Andrew could knock, one of the doors was flung open, revealing a chunky, tall man with rugby-player shoulders, squat ears, thin blond hair and a granite jaw. Craig was one of Andrew’s friends and wearing his ever-present Doc Martens, with jeans and a Henley T-shirt.
‘Got your text,’ Craig said, stretching out his hand for Andrew to shake.
They turned and headed towards the arches, walking on autopilot.
‘What it is this time?’ Craig asked with a laugh.
‘Huh?’ Andrew replied.
‘You only turn up when you want something.’
‘Not always but, er…’
‘I don’t mind,’ Craig said. ‘Keeps me busy.’
They passed a small huddle of teenagers under the arches who hadn’t been there a few minutes before. They each nodded in Craig’s direction and one of them risked an ‘all right’, which was returned.
‘I wish I could do that,’ Andrew said. ‘Whenever I see kids hanging around together, I always think I’m going to get mugged.’
‘Have you ever been mugged?’
‘No.’
‘So what is there to be afraid of? Too much Daily Mail. Not all kids are bad – in fact hardly any of them are. Not all adults are bad, either. If you see a bunch of mothers hanging around the school gates, do you think they’re going to mug you?’
‘No.’
‘So there you go.’ Craig spoke with a matter-of-fact laugh – but it was easy for him to say. He’d been in the army and was built like a shed. Not even one of those cheap sheds from B&Q that blow over at the first sign of a bit of wind – a proper one with bricks, foundations and a general sense that a nuclear blast wouldn’t take it down.
‘How’s Gem?’ Craig asked.
‘Same as ever. I just took her and Rory for a ride to the car booter out Bowdon way. She wanted to buy half the stuff there, broken or not.’
Craig laughed. ‘Your aunt’s an absolute cracker. You’re lucky to have her.’
‘Aye, I know.’
They continued walking, passing a play park in which all the equipment was miraculously still in place, and then finding a bench near to the swings. Craig sat, so Andrew followed, even though the voice at the back of his mind urged him to go for one of the swings. They weren’t being used, after all.
On the far side, some lads were playing football, using their coats as goalposts and taking it far too seriously, given the way they were sliding in on one another.
‘So…’ Craig said. ‘What is it?’
‘It’s a weird one,’ Andrew replied.
Craig pressed back onto the bench and stretched his legs.
‘Have you heard anything about stolen musical instruments?’ Andrew asked.
Craig snorted in confusion, rather than humour. ‘Instruments? Like flutes and all that?’
‘Specifically a violin – but there might be other things, too. A keyboard, recorders, trumpet. Anything like that.’
Craig ran a hand through what little there was of his hair. ‘Instruments? I thought you were some big-shot inves
tigator. Suicidal girls, nutters in woods, shootings in the city centre… now you’re trying to find some instruments?’
Andrew didn’t have a defence because he felt the same way. ‘I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important…’
Craig leaned forward and then turned to Andrew, apparently now convinced he wasn’t being wound up. ‘A violin…’ He spoke almost with a sigh, nodding back towards the way they’d come. ‘Look, I love this area as much as anyone. This is my home and always will be – but I’m not going to pretend this is the type of area where you’ll find a nicked violin. At best, you’ll have some kids strumming a guitar and hoping to be the next Oasis.’
‘Can you ask around anyway?’
Craig shrugged apologetically. ‘Course – but don’t hold out much hope. You’d be better off asking around the music schools, that sort of thing.’
‘It’s got to be hush-hush.’
As his eyebrows rose, Craig placed a hand on Andrew’s shoulder. It was a gesture so unexpected that Andrew shivered, before apologising.
‘You in trouble?’ Craig asked. It felt like the air had been sucked from Andrew’s lungs.
Andrew shook his head.
‘Anything I can do?’ Craig added.
‘Ask around. If you hear anything, come back to me.’
Craig spent another few seconds examining Andrew before turning to face the footballers. They were setting up what at first glance appeared to be a penalty competition – except that, rather than a goalkeeper, some poor sod was standing in the centre of the goal, bent over with his arse as the target.
‘Why this estate?’ Craig asked.
‘I’ve seen the CCTV of the break-in and I don’t think it’s pros. Just blokes in hoodies thinking they might be able to nick things more valuable than they end up with. I wondered if the violin might have been stolen to order but… I don’t think so. I might be wrong.’
‘So you reckon that it’ll just be blokes with goods to get rid of?’
Something Buried: An absolutely gripping mystery thriller Page 9
