Ash & Bone

by John Harvey

  Elder identified himself to the officer on duty. 'I believe you're holding my daughter, Katherine.'

  'Just one moment, sir.'

  Elder caught the wounded man's eye.

  'What the fuck you starin' at?' the man said, his accent raw from north of the border. 'You askin' for a fuckin' kickin', you.'

  The noise from the street abated as the PC walked in off the pavement. 'Kenny, we can't have you hiding yourself in here all evening. You'd best get yourself off to Accident and Emergency, get that seen to.'

  'No wi'out an escort, I'm not. Those are wild women out there.'

  'Mr Elder?' The duty officer had returned. 'If you'll come through. The inspector would like a word.'

  Elder had met Resnick once in the past four years, and then briefly. By reputation, he was a bit of an odd cove, a good thief-catcher nonetheless; not so many years before he had astonished all and sundry by taking up with a young woman from the force, some twenty or more years his junior.

  'Frank.'

  'Charlie.'

  Resnick's grip was warm and strong, the smile quick to his face and gone; his expression as he sat back showed concern.

  'You're working late,' Elder said.

  'It's a poor business, Frank. Your girl. I'm sorry. Especially after what happened before.'

  'Thanks.'

  'I didn't know how to get in touch with you direct. I thought you and Maureen were probably still in touch.'

  'She rang me as soon as she heard.'

  Resnick nodded, awkward in the situation the Drugs Squad had left him to sanitise.

  'Katherine,' Elder said, 'how is she?'

  'Fine. Fine, Frank, all things considered.'

  'I'd like to see her.'

  Resnick scraped a speck of something from the cuff of his shirt, real or imaginary. 'All in good time.'

  'Christ, Charlie. That bastard Keach kept her locked up —'

  'I know, I know.'

  'And now you —'

  'Frank, it's not so straightforward. Hear me out.'

  Elder sat back with a slow release of breath. 'Is it ever?'

  Resnick resettled himself in his chair. 'The car she was travelling in was stopped on Forest Road East. There'd been an incident, Cranmer Street; a firearm discharged.'

  'And they thought she was involved?'

  'Not really. Just stopping everyone. Routine. They'd've been off and away if Katherine hadn't given the officer a piece of her mind.'

  'She'd been drinking?'

  'Maybe just a little.'

  'She wasn't breathalysed?'

  'She wasn't driving.'

  Now we're getting to it, Elder thought.

  'Officers hoiked them out of the vehicle,' Resnick said, 'the pair of them. ID, the usual palaver. Phoned it all in.'

  'The driver,' Elder said, 'he was known to you.'

  'Rob Summers. Two priors. Nothing too serious. Possession of cannabis. Public order. Some kind of argy-bargy at the university. Demonstration.'

  'I've met him. Briefly. I didn't know he had form.'

  'Drug Squad, they've had their eye on him for a while now. Suspected him of handling a little cannabis, spreading it around, friends mostly. Not worth the aggravation of bringing him in.'

  'And now?'

  'Some consideration he might be moving up, apparently. Different league.'

  'They'd like a reason to squeeze him.'

  'Something of the sort.'

  'And that's where my Katherine comes in.'

  'When the vehicle was searched there were a little over five grams of heroin in a small leather bag in the dash.'

  'You're saying it was hers?'

  'Her bag, Frank. Her stuff inside.'

  'She was holding it for him.'

  'Likely.'

  'No way he's putting up his hand?'

  'What do you think?'

  'And Katherine?'

  'Beyond the fact that, yes, the bag's hers and she hasn't the foggiest how the drugs got inside, she hasn't said a thing.'

  'And you reckon holding her overnight might make her think twice, drop him in it, this Summers, change her mind?'

  'Somebody does.'

  'Somebody?'

  'Bland. DI.'

  'Then he doesn't know her very well.'

  Resnick held Elder's gaze. 'How well do you, Frank? Driving round in broad daylight with a suspected drug dealer, sizeable amount of a class A drug in her possession.'

  * * *

  Katherine lay curled on the narrow bed, knees drawn up and pressed against the cell wall, the collar of her oyster-coloured jumper pulled up close to her neck. If there had been a belt with her tan jeans it had been punctiliously removed. Her feet were bare.

  'Kate?' His voice was loud in the fetid, airless room. 'Katherine…'

  A slight tensing of her muscles and nothing more. A tray of food, uneaten, lay nearby on the floor.

  'Talk to me.'

  A silence, unbroken, and then, muffled by her arm, so that Elder had to strain to hear: 'What for?'

  'I want to help.'

  She laughed then, a harsh sound that raised her head and broke into a jittering cough. Elder moved closer and sat, perched, near the end of the bed; when his leg inadvertently touched her foot, she pulled it, sharp, away.

  'You want to help,' she said, not looking at him, her voice small and dry.

  Times he had sat like that when she was a child, four, rising five; his hand would touch her cheek and, as he spoke and said her name, she would slowly stroke his lower arm, her fingers smooth and warm and small. His eyes smarted with the beginnings of tears.

  'Of course I do,' he said.

  The laugh again, harder this time. 'You mean like you did before?'

  Elder flinched as if he had been hit.

  For an instant he must have looked away, because suddenly he was aware of her staring at him, her gaze, the awful flatness of her eyes.

  'Katherine…' he began.

  But by then she had turned again towards the wall, head buried in her arms.

  Elder stayed where he was, not moving, awkward, listening to her breathe. When the custody sergeant called time, Elder bent over her once more, stopped short of kissing her, stood and turned aside, the sound of the door closing behind him like the clenching of a fist.

  She's alive and you're some great hero, your picture all over the papers, all over the screen every time you turn on the bloody TV.

  Joanne's words.

  29

  Martyn Miles answered the door. 'She's in a bad way, Frank. Shaky at best.'

  Joanne was sitting at one corner of the settee, legs pulled up under her, face drawn, a half-empty wineglass in her hand. A cigarette was smouldering in an ashtray on the floor. 'You've seen Katherine?' she said.

  'Yes.'

  'How was she?'

  'Confused, angry, upset. Take your pick.'

  'When I went to see her, she kept her face to the wall. She wouldn't tell me a thing.'

  'The drugs they claim she had in her bag,' Miles said. 'Planted, like as not.'

  'Martyn,' Joanne said. 'Please stay out of this.'

  He carried on as if she hadn't spoken, as if he hadn't heard. 'No offence intended, Frank, not to you, but the police, you know what they're like, some of them.'

  'Martyn,' Joanne said. 'I'm warning you…'

  'All right, okay. Calm down, why don't you? Just calm down.'

  Ash spilled down the front of Joanne's dress and she brushed it casually away. 'Heroin, Frank,' she said. 'What would she be doing with heroin?'

  'These days —' Martyn began.

  'Don't get to thinking she's like those skinny models you're so fond of.' Joanne said, her voice shrill. 'Doing cocaine and God knows what else every five minutes of the day.'

  'One of your fantasies, sweetheart, not mine.'

  'Fuck you,' Joanne said, swigging down what was left in her glass.

  'All I'm saying is, Frank,' Miles went on, 'these days you can never tell. Well, you'll kn
ow that yourself, better than anyone.'

  'For Christ's sake, Martyn, stop trying to get him on your side.'

  'I didn't think it was a matter of sides.'

  'No?'

  'No.'

  'Because if it is, why don't you tell him what you told me when you heard Kate had been arrested. See how far he's on your side then.'

  'Oh, for Christ's sake, leave it out, Joanne…'

  'Why? Because it doesn't suit you now? For Frank to know what you really think?'

  'Now you're being stupid.'

  'Am I?'

  Miles gave Elder a look as much as to say, You see how unreasonable she's being.

  'I think,' Elder responded, 'I might like to know what it was you said.'

  'He said it was no more than she deserved.'

  'What I said was, it might not be such a bad thing.'

  'Why was that, Martyn?' Elder said. 'I'm not sure I understand.'

  'You know, Frank. These past months, the way she's been. And now it seems drugs as well.'

  'And you think being locked up in a police cell will make her see the light?'

  'It might scare some sense into her, yes.'

  'Don't you think she's been scared enough?'

  'That was a year ago, Frank. She can't keep hiding behind that forever.'

  'Listen to yourself,' Joanne all but screamed. 'Just bloody listen to yourself. You don't understand a bloody thing.'

  'And you do?'

  'Yes, I fucking do.'

  'That's it. That's it. Get hysterical,' Miles said. 'Great help all round.'

  Tears welled in Joanne's eyes.

  'Martyn,' Elder said. 'Maybe you should let Joanne and I talk.'

  'Fine.'

  * * *

  The lanterns on the patio shone small candles of light through the window, their reflections doubled and redoubled in the glass. Nursing a fresh glass of wine, Joanne stood close against the window, staring out, and Elder wondered if in some way it made her feel invisible. Or was it something to do with how she felt, what might happen at a touch? He could see her face, its contours in the glass, not quite real, white against the dark. The small triangle of skin where the hair parted at the nape of her neck.

  It was past midnight by now, Elder thought, closer to one.

  The reflection of his face slid over hers and merged. Slowly, he touched her shoulder with his hand.

  'Frank.'

  When she said his name a small circle of mist blurred the glass before her face. She said his name again and turned and when she turned it was into his arms. Eyes closed at first, he held her close, her head beneath his chin, feeling her heart race against his chest.

  Minutes passed.

  Minutes passed and her breathing steadied and she lifted her face towards his. 'I'm sorry,' she said.

  With a slow shake of his head, he stepped away.

  'I need a cigarette,' she said and crossed the room.

  Elder went through into the kitchen and ran the tap, drank water from a glass. Whoever Joanne had in to clean had worked hard on the bottoms of the burnished pans, hanging in perfect order from a polished metal rail high on the wall.

  In the living room, Joanne was sitting at one end of the settee and he sat opposite her on a pale curve of cushioned chair that gave a little with his weight.

  'What will happen?' Joanne asked.

  'To Katherine?'

  She looked back at him as if to say, What else?

  'They could charge her with possession with intent to supply, in which case she'd almost certainly be released on police bail. But I don't think they will.'

  'Because of you?'

  'That wouldn't matter one way or another.'

  'What then?'

  'I don't really think it's Kate they re interested in. It's him. Summers. I think they were hoping if they pressured her, she'd give them something they could use against him.'

  'And she won't?'

  'It doesn't look that way.'

  'God.' Joanne took a last drag at her cigarette and ground it out in a hollow globe of glass.

  'How long has she been seeing him?' Elder asked. 'Summers. D'you know?'

  Staring at the floor, Joanne shook her head. 'I don't know who she's been seeing, Frank. Not recently. She won't talk to me. About anything. And if I ask her, she just flies off the handle and storms out. Martyn's right, she's been running wild and I don't know what to do.' She looked at him then. 'She's our daughter, Frank.'

  'I'll talk to her. If I can.'

  Joanne pulled a folded square of tissue from a pocket in her dress, dabbed her eyes and lit another cigarette.

  'You'll stay, Frank.'

  'I don't think so.'

  'This time of night…'

  'I'll go to a hotel'

  'There's no need.'

  He shook his head. 'It's easier.'

  'Martyn won't be back, not tonight.'

  'It isn't that.' He crossed towards her and aimed a kiss at the top of her head. 'I'll see you tomorrow, okay?'

  'Okay.' She reached up for his hand but he was already on his way towards the door.

  Outside, any wind there'd been had dropped and the air, as he walked back down through the winding criss-cross of roads towards the city centre, was heavy and still.

  30

  Against all odds, Elder slept like a stone. The radio alarm on the small bedside table woke him with inane chatter, slightly off station. In the bathroom mirror his face looked tired and drawn; a thin scar, where Adam Keach had cut him with a knife, ran from the centre of his forehead down along the bridge of his nose, stitch marks like tiny perforations to each side.

  The hotel dining room was busy with business people in dark suits, enjoying the full English behind the Telegraph or the Mail. In the buffet, the scrambled eggs were congealed and the catering tomatoes swam in a sea of their own juice. The toast, brought to the table too soon, was scarcely brown and almost cold.

  'Coffee or tea?' the waitress said with a charming smile, her heavily-accented voice, to Elder's ears, from South America or Spain. Though he asked for coffee, she brought him tea regardless, and he had neither the heart nor the energy to complain.

  He met Maureen Prior in the Starbucks on Lister Gate, close by the entrance to the Broad Marsh Centre. She was seated at a table in the rear when he arrived, unobtrusively dressed in brown and beige. He might have seen her in bright colours once, but couldn't easily remember when. Her hair, medium-length, mid-brown, softened the sharp oval of her face.

  'Good to see you, Frank.'

  'You, too.'

  He went to the counter to collect the coffee he'd ordered, carried it back and sat down.

  'I'm sorry about Katherine,' Maureen said.

  'Thanks.'

  'She's been charged?'

  'No, thank God.'

  'Special pleading then.'

  'Not on my part. No favours asked.'

  'She's your daughter, Frank. Five grams in her bag. Difficult to see her walking away else.'

  Elder told her what had happened, what little he knew, and she listened carefully, breaking off pieces of muffin almost absent-mindedly with one hand.

  'They think she's lying, obviously,' she said when Elder was through. 'Covering up for Summers.'

  'You know him? Anything about him?'

  Maureen shook her head. 'Drug Squad, any idea which officers are involved?'

  'Resnick mentioned a name. Bland.'

  Maureen smiled. 'Ricky Bland.'

  'You know him?'

  'By reputation.'

  'Which is?'

  'Bit of a chancer. Gets results. One way or another. Came up from the Met, oh, good few years back now.'

  'You don't like him.'

  'I said, I don't know him.'

  'You know what I mean.'

  Maureen ate some of her muffin. 'What I've heard, let's say he sails close to the wind. Came under investigation once, him and a partner. Eaglin? I'm not sure of the name. Quantity of crack cocaine confiscate
d and then disappeared. There was some rumour Bland and whoever had sold it back to the dealer they'd taken it from in the first place.'

  'Nothing proved?'

  Maureen laughed. 'Answer that for yourself, Frank. They're still out there, working. Putting the bad guys away. Some of them, at least.'

  'You think they were guilty?'

  The laugh transposed into a smile. 'You know me well enough, Frank. Everyone's guilty in my eyes.'

  Watching Maureen eat had made Elder hungry and, seeing him eyeing the plate, she pushed it towards him. 'What about you, Frank?'

  'What about me?'

  'How's it going in London?'

  'Not so badly.'

  She looked at him seriously. 'When it's over, you ought to consider coming back up here.'

  He shook his head. 'It's too complicated. Besides, if I wanted more there's plenty where I am. Devon and Cornwall have just brought four detectives out of retirement and they're scoping round for more.'

  'Sheep rustling at a premium, is it?' The smile back on Maureen's face. 'Someone playing fast and loose with the mackerel fleet?'

  'Six murders in eight days. One of them specially nasty, couple in a garage badly beaten, then shot.'

  'You're not tempted?'

  'Not what I went down there for.'

  'If you were up here you'd be near Katherine.'

  'Not where she wants me to be.'

  'You think she means it?'

  'I know she does.'

  Maureen resisted the temptation to say more. 'Ricky Bland, you're going to see him? I could come with you if you like.'

  'It's good of you, but no, it's okay. An address though, just in case he isn't pulling overtime.'

  Maureen was already reaching for her mobile. 'Just let me make a call.'

  * * *

  The house was in Mapperley Plains, a once-new development near the golf course, UPVC windows and frosted-glass aluminium-framed doors. A blue Audi A6, dented, stood outside the garage. The front lawn was in need of a final mow, the grass already beginning to clutter up with leaves.

  Elder knocked on the door and rang the bell.

  Nothing seemed to happen.

  An arthritic Honda saloon came cautiously along the street, slowed down almost to a halt, then continued on its way. Neighbourhood watch, Elder thought.