Intermission

by Graham Hurley

  ‘And Mr Malo?’ He knows I’m lying.

  ‘Him, too.’

  The Common, as ever, is deserted. There was rain in the air earlier, but the clouds have parted now and a huge creamy moon hangs over the Solent. The tide is high, and I pause on the seafront, gazing at the rumpled silver eiderdown lapping at my feet. Pompey’s supermoon. As predicted in yesterday’s Portsmouth News.

  So far, I’ve seen no sign of Malo. I hurry on, head down against the keenness of the wind. The brilliance of the moon sheds a magical light on the castle, the harshness of the shadows lifting it into another dimension, and once again I marvel at the simple pleasures of looking at the world with no one else around. Sooner or later, I think, this wonderful sense of exclusivity, of being an audience of one, will have gone.

  The path crests a little hill that leads around the nose of the Castle, and then I’m looking at the long stretch of the empty promenade under the loops of coloured lights. Wave after wave, silver beneath the moon, curls on to the pebble beach and when I look up again, I can see the brief shapes of seagulls, white-bellied, riding the wind. Hallucinatory. Wondrous. Beyond special. I shake my head.

  I’m back on the promenade now, walking quickly to stay warm, one eye on the beach. Maybe Malo’s tripped and fallen sideways on to the pebbles. Maybe he’s gone beachcombing. Maybe he’s as enchanted by the moonlight as his mother. Whatever. On the left of the promenade, away from the beach, are a series of shelters with benches inside. The first three are empty. The next one isn’t. I slow, then stop. A long shape occupies the bench. I can’t be certain but, in the half-darkness, it might be wearing running kit.

  I steal a little closer, nervous now. The body is inert, no sign of movement. It’s turned away from the sea and the promenade, and one arm hangs down, a gesture of helplessness that chills me to the bone. I stop again, staring down. It’s Malo’s watch, definitely, on his thin wrist, and there’s something black-looking on his knuckles that could be caked blood.

  ‘Malo?’

  No response. Already I’m fearing the worst. He’s dead, I think. Something’s happened, a fight, an ambush, some feral presence lying in wait. Or maybe something simpler, the wrong word to a passing stranger, the wrong place on the wrong night, and a sudden flurry of violence with God knows what consequences.

  ‘Malo?’

  He’s within touching distance now, just a fingertip away, and I reach forward, cradling his head. His flesh, thank God, is still warm and I find a pulse in his neck. Then, very gently, I turn his head, and what I see, the face I find, brings a hot gust of something bitter and viscous bubbling up from the very middle of me. Both eyes are closed. His nose has been broken. And through his swollen lips I can see the wreckage of his perfect teeth. I step back and throw up. Twice.

  ‘Malo?’ I’ve wiped my mouth. ‘Malo?’ I’m kneeling beside him. ‘Speak to me. Please God, speak to me.’

  At length, very faintly, I get a reaction. It could be a groan. It could be anything. But at least he’s still alive.

  I look at him for a moment longer, and then fetch out my phone. Dial 999. So simple.

  ‘Your name, caller?’ A woman’s voice. ‘And which service do you require?’

  TWENTY-THREE

  The ambulance is with me within minutes. One paramedic bends over Malo, inspecting his facial injuries with a torch, while the other one takes me aside.

  ‘And you are …?’

  ‘His mother.’

  ‘Name?’

  ‘Enora Andressen.’

  ‘I meant your son.’

  ‘Malo.’

  He nods, scribbles himself a note, and then asks for a contact number.

  ‘But I’m coming with you.’ I gesture towards the ambulance at the kerbside. ‘Aren’t I?’

  ‘It might be possible, Ms Andressen, but we’ll need to be certain that you haven’t been in close contact with anyone infectious.’

  I blink. It’s a matter of record that I’m sharing a flat with a confirmed case of Covid. Pointless, therefore, to pretend otherwise. As briefly as I can, I explain the situation.

  ‘And your son? He’s living there too?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So how come he goes out running?’

  To this I have no answer but the other paramedic has conducted some brief checks and is tapping his watch. Malo needs a hospital. As soon as.

  They fetch a stretcher from the ambulance and I watch, aghast, as they ease Malo’s limp body off the wooden bench. So far, no one has mentioned the police. I follow the paramedics as they wheel the stretcher across the pavement and lift him into the back of the ambulance. Before they leave, I give them my mobile number and in return I get a direct line that will take me straight to A&E. If I phone tomorrow morning, someone will be able to fill me in.

  ‘On what?’

  ‘Your son’s status, Ms Andressen. We’ll obviously be logging the incident so someone needs to be talking to the police.’

  ‘You mean me?’

  ‘Of course. As next of kin, I’m afraid they’ll need a word with you.’

  Next of kin. I’ve never liked this phrase, so ominous, so potentially final, and just now it promises nothing but bad news.

  ‘So what do you think?’ I’m looking at my son. His head is half-turned from the harsh glare of the lights inside the ambulance, and a thin trickle of saliva from the wreckage of his mouth is pinked with blood.

  ‘It’s hard for us to say, Ms Andressen. If you can wait until the morning, they’ll have taken a proper look at him.’

  ‘And the police?’

  ‘You can do it now, or you can report it tomorrow morning. You might not want to hang around here waiting for them to turn up. It’s your call.’

  With that, the rear doors slam shut on Malo. One of the paramedics has stayed with him, while the other one clambers into the cab and settles behind the wheel. The paramedic in the back is already on the radio but I can’t hear what he’s saying. Does an incident like this have some kind of priority code? Do they call ahead, briefing the people in A&E on what to expect? And if so, how do they really think he is?

  I’m still watching the tail lights of the ambulance disappearing into the city. He’s only hurt, I keep telling myself. It’ll take a while for all of us to get over it, and he’ll certainly need attention at the hands of a good dentist, but no way is he going to die. Not Malo. Not my son.

  Deep down, though, I’m not at all convinced. I know far too much about the lottery that can so suddenly put your life in danger. I know about brain scans, about the patience and skill of the people who stand between you and the Grimmest of Reapers, but I also know that there comes a point beyond which nobody, no matter how clever, can help you. Malo has obviously taken a beating. Maybe his skull is fractured. Maybe he has a bleed on the brain. Maybe, assuming he survives at all, he’ll be permanently damaged. Please God, I whisper, keep my son intact.

  I’m still at the kerbside, numb with the kind of aftershock that steals up on you. Utterly helpless, I seem to have lost the power of decision. The thought of going back to that horrible flat, to that cell of a bedroom I’ve been sharing with Malo, is unbearable. This city, this situation, this evil, evil virus has stolen the person I love most in all the world, and I haven’t got a clue what to do next.

  Booking into a hotel would be tempting, but they’re all closed. Phoning the police would at least give me company for a while but how do I explain breaking quarantine? Not just my son, but me as well? Maybe I should phone Wesley. I know he’d drive down here and fetch me, and he’d very definitely give me a bed for the night, but on what terms? No, there has to be another way. I need someone who’ll lend a listening ear, someone who might be able to make sense of what’s just happened, someone familiar with what Pavel always called the Dark Side.

  I walk slowly back to the promenade and spend a long moment staring down at the bench where I found my poor, broken son. Briefly, I try and picture the chain of events that put him at the
mercy of whoever set about him, but the thought of Malo so alone, so suddenly vulnerable, is too painful to bear and so I tear myself away and cross the promenade and lift my head until I can see nothing but the rags of scudding cloud that soften the harshness of the moonlight.

  The temptation now is to curl up on the pebbles, tucked in beside the seawall, and make myself the smallest possible target for whatever disaster awaits me next, but I know that this is the purest fantasy. If the last few days have taught me anything, it’s the need to keep my wits about me and to try – somehow – to anticipate life’s next move. Pavel would have talked sternly about the importance of holding my nerve, about thinking things through, and now – hearing his thin voice in the chilly darkness – I know he’s right.

  My call to Dessie Wren finds him, once again, in bed. The moment I tell him about finding Malo, he’s trying to remember where he put his car keys.

  He’s down on the seafront to collect me within half an hour. I wave him down from the kerbside and get into the car.

  ‘You OK?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Cry if it helps.’

  ‘It doesn’t. I tried.’

  ‘So where do you want to go?’

  ‘Anywhere but that bloody flat.’

  He suggests we go back to his place and I agree. It’s a huge relief to be out of the city, and I tell him so. By now he’s got the whole story – Malo’s injuries, the ambulance coming, my exchange with the paramedic – and when it comes to the police, he tells me to leave everything to him. Gratitude, or maybe relief, is too small a word. I’m still terrified by what tomorrow’s call to the hospital might reveal, but at least, fingers crossed, I won’t be arrested.

  At home, in his bungalow in Cowplain, Dessie pours me a large glass of brandy. By now, it’s occurred to me that I’m already on a police file somewhere for breaching lockdown rules, but when I tell him about being stopped on the motorway that first time I drove down, he doesn’t seem to think it matters. Hindhead, he says, is in Surrey, different force, different database. No one talks to anyone else these days, and there simply aren’t enough bodies in or out of uniform to start chasing around after delinquent film stars.

  If the latter phrase is designed to cheer me up, it works. Calling Dessie, I’ve already concluded, was a good decision. There’s something about him, maybe his sheer physical presence, that is deeply comforting. This man, I suspect, has been in some very tight corners and has learned a thing or two about getting by. I also like the phrase ‘delinquent film star’.

  ‘You’ve Googled me?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Should I be flattered?’

  ‘Christ, no. I’m a nosey bugger. I do it all the time. It used to go with the Job. Now it’s become a habit.’

  He wants to know about my favourite film, my favourite location, actors and actresses I admire, scenes I regretted having to play, and what difference the Frenchness in me makes when it comes to – in his phrase – ‘scoping’ a particular part. This is a more acute question than it might seem, and one that no one else has ever asked me before, and after a second glass of brandy I find myself telling him about the work I’ve already done on Dimanche, and how right it feels to be playing a French cop.

  This latest scalp on my belt absolutely gets his attention. He nods in all the right places, laughs at the funnier bits, and it’s a while before I realize exactly why our conversation has taken this turn. He wants me to stop thinking about Malo, about what tomorrow might bring, about having to phone the hospital, how circumstances have so suddenly kidnapped my precious boy. This, to me, is a very Christian act. More to the point, it takes some guile to pull it off. Chapeau, I think.

  ‘Do you regret not having kids?’ I ask. ‘Be honest.’

  ‘What’s that got to do with any of this?’

  ‘I’m just curious. You’re a gifted listener. You’ve got a great deal of patience. You’d make a terrific dad.’

  He shrugs – a gesture, I sense, of mild embarrassment. Maybe I’ve just touched a tender spot. Or maybe he’s faking it. Either way, I want to know more.

  ‘What about your wife? Did she want kids?’

  ‘Definitely.’

  ‘But they never happened?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And did that become a problem between you?’

  ‘Yes, one of many if you’re really asking. Having your husband away at sea for three months was never an easy gig. You get extra pay on submarines, and she loved that, but she needed someone around to moan at and I was never there.’

  ‘And afterwards? Once you’d left and become a cop?’

  ‘I was still on the lam, still going absent without leave. CID is the perfect alibi, believe me, if you never want to go home.’

  ‘And that happened?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So, where were you?’

  This time he won’t answer, simply shakes his head, but my question has sparked a playful little smile which, after the second brandy, is all I need.

  ‘H says you were a famous shagger. Is he right?’

  ‘No comment.’

  ‘He is right?’

  ‘More?’ His hand has found the bottle of Armagnac.

  I shake my head, conscious that I’ve gone way too far, broken every rule in the book. This kind of dialogue with the likes of Wesley Kane would give him the green light to take any number of liberties, but here and now, cocooned by the brandy, I can’t imagine anyone less predatory than Dessie Wren. Nonetheless, I tell myself I have to draw the line. Tomorrow, for better or worse, I’ll find out about Malo. I’ll also press Dessie for clues about who could possibly have hurt him so badly. But for now, safe in this man’s hands, I badly need a good night’s sleep.

  The sofa on which I’m sitting looks like it might convert into a bed, and even if it doesn’t, all I need is a blanket and a cushion, but Dessie shakes his head. He has a spare bedroom, everything I could possibly need, and he insists I use it. While he hunts out a towel and a brand-new toothbrush he’s stored somewhere, I wash out the glasses in the kitchen.

  Hunting for a tea towel, I notice a small, framed photo of a little boy, propped against a line of cookery books. He looks no more than seven or eight. He’s wearing football kit, black and white stripes, and the camera has caught him half-kneeling while he re-ties a lace. He’s looking up, and there’s something so spontaneous about his grin that it takes me back to my early days with Malo.

  ‘His name’s Stuart. Everyone calls him Titch.’ Dessie is standing in the doorway, a folded towel in his hand. ‘He’s my godson.’

  ‘And you took the photo?’

  ‘I did, yes.’

  ‘Recently?’

  ‘Years ago. It was just before Christmas. They were cocky as hell and they lost four–nil.’

  ‘You went to every game?’

  ‘Christ, yes. That little boy would give me serious grief, otherwise.’ He smiles. ‘He played striker. He was good, too, he had all the moves, and he was brave, given his size.’

  ‘He lived locally?’

  ‘He lived in Southsea. I got to see him most weekends, especially in the winter.’ He hands me the towel. ‘If I were you, I’d put a call through to the flat and tell them what happened. It might get awkward if they report you both missing.’ His gaze returns to the photo of his godson, and he smiles again. ‘Who’d have thought, eh?’

  Who’d have thought?

  I’m looking at him, wondering exactly what doors this little boy might have opened in Dessie Wren’s life, but when I raise an enquiring eyebrow, it’s obvious that he doesn’t want to take the conversation any further.

  ‘Second door on the right,’ he says. ‘The toothbrush is on the shelf over the hand basin.’

  TWENTY-FOUR

  I seem to spend most of the night dreaming. The dreams, to begin with, are incoherent, wildly associative, my memory and my imagination ganging up on the rest of me, something I can only put down to the aftershocks of findin
g Malo last night.

  The first sequence of dreams feel like a meteor shower, sudden spasms of intense light tracking across the darkness inside my head, and it finds me at a house I’ve never seen before. It’s big, as big as Tony Morse’s place but somehow different, and the moment I step inside – don’t ask me how – I know with complete certainty that it belongs to H. This is Pompey in the early days, I tell myself. Probably Southsea, maybe even Craneswater Park. This is how he spent those first millions he was making from the cocaine trade. This is the way he announced his arrival in this teeming city.

  In the basement of this house is a swimming pool that also serves as a dining table. The water is imperfectly hidden beneath a spread of folding wooden panels, highly polished with a deep grain, but they don’t fit properly. There are blue bits around the edges where he’s added dye to the water, and there’s a powerful smell of chlorine. Characters come and go around this table, swimming briefly into focus like rogue chords on Dessie’s piano. With the exception of a younger version of Wesley Kane, whom I recognize immediately, these men are all huge and heavily tattooed, cheerful Pompey braggarts running to fat, most of them versions of Dave Munroe before obesity and liver disease put him in a wheelchair. I circulate among them, unseen, unremarked, ghost-like. I want to find my son, I explain. But none of them are listening.

  Upstairs, the house is empty, though I can still hear laughter from below. I wander from room to room, calling Malo’s name, telling him that everything’s fine, that he’ll be safe, that he should trust me, but there’s no sign of him. A huge staircase winds upwards from floor after floor, exactly the kind of statement H would have relished making. No one’s bothered to carpet it, another of H’s fingerprints on the crazy abandon of this house, but when I get to the very top I suddenly find myself in a room walled entirely in glass. It’s broad daylight by now, and sunshine floods across the bare boards. There are trees outside, and lots of wind, and in the far corner of the room, very briefly, I think I spot a jigsaw. The Battle of Trafalgar? I’ve no idea because the moment I take a proper look, it’s gone.