Lifeless Thorne 5

by Mark Billingham

  Sometimes, if it had been a slow night, there was little to get excited about. But usually there was something: a body more often than not, or a missing person who would soon become a body. Something to take Dave Holland’s mind off the fact that he was putting on a bit of weight, or to push some imagined slight to the back of his mind, or to make him forget about the row he’d had with Sophie the night before.

  Saturday morning’s bulletin was usually the best, or worst, of the week. Depending on whether you wanted to be seriously distracted or were just interested in keeping your breakfast down.

  It had been a vintage Friday night …

  A man, age and ethnicity impossible to determine: hog-tied and barbecued in the back of a burned-out Nissan Micra in Walthamstow Forest.

  Two teenage boys, one white, one Asian: the first killed, the second fighting for his life in a hospital after a stabbing outside a club in Wood Green.

  A woman, thirty-four: found at home by her boyfriend after gaffer-taping a twelve-inch Sabatier carving knife to the edge of a table, and pushing her neck against it.

  Two murders, perhaps three; possibly even four. The Homicide Assessment Team would already have signed the Walthamstow killing over to an MIT. They would be waiting to see if the boy carved up in Wood Green recovered. They would certainly be taking a good, long look at the man whose girlfriend had supposedly killed herself so inventively …

  DS Samir Karim walked past Holland’s desk and held up a coffee. “Ready to get going as soon as I’ve got this down me …”

  Holland nodded. He went back to the computer, pulled up the list of visits he’d been allocated to make later that morning, and printed them out. While he waited for hard copy to appear he looked at the details. He studied the names, addresses, and comments attached; aware all the time of those other details, still there in the bulletin window, inactive and partially hidden on the screen.

  While some had spent their Friday night busy with gaffer tape, washing blood from their hands or disposing of petrol cans, others had been safe at home in front of the television, disgusted and entertained by Crimewatch’s crime-lite version of such events, before picking up the phone—four hundred and twelve of them—to do their bit …

  “How come we never get any of the overnighters?” Andy Stone was pulling on his jacket and moving toward him.

  Holland thought that Stone had good reason to be pissed off. Obviously, a great many of the calls that had come in after the program had been made from outside London, so while those in the office liaised with the relevant local forces, members of the team had been dispatched bright and early. Officers were already on their way to Exeter, Aberdeen, Birmingham, and half a dozen other cities. Such interviews were coveted, and with good reason. Holland was one of those who would not have said no to a night away from home; getting a little time to himself and giving his expenses a hammering in the restaurant of a decent hotel.

  “Luck of the draw, mate,” he said.

  “Couldn’t you have swung something with the DCI?”

  Holland thought that he probably could have. He wondered why, in spite of fancying the time away, he hadn’t even bothered to try. Chances are, Sophie would have offered to pack for him …

  “So who are you heading out with?”

  “I’ve got Mackillop,” Stone said. He brandished a

  piece of paper with his own list of names and addresses. “Me and Wonderbollocks are off to waste

  our time in Hounslow, Lewisham, Finchley. All the

  glamour locations …”

  “We’ve got to check out every possible sighting,

  Andy.”

  “I know,” Stone said. “I’m kidding. Yourself?” Holland pointed across to Karim, who waved back

  and dropped what was left of his coffee into a wastepaper bin. “Me and Sam are going slightly more upmarket.”

  “Eales hiding out in Mayfair, is he?”

  “Well, we’ve got a woman reckons she’s seen him

  walking a dog on Hampstead High Street.” “Why are so many of these calls always from

  women?” Stone asked before wandering away. Holland thought it was likely to be something to

  do with women being more observant, and more

  likely to respond to appeals for help. More inclined,

  when it came down to it, to get off their arses and

  make an effort. They wouldn’t even have Eales’s

  name if it hadn’t been for that female assistant adjutant going the extra yard.

  Seeing Karim heading over, looking ready for the

  off, Holland began gathering his things together. He

  guessed that he would be spending much of his day

  thinking about Lieutenant Sarah Cheshire, and

  nights away in posh hotels.

  “I’ve put him in one of the rooms upstairs,” Maxwell said.

  Thorne nodded. “I’ll follow you …”

  Maxwell had collared Thorne in the café, explained that Lawrence Healey had found Spike passed out on the steps when he’d arrived to open up. “Not that unusual,” Maxwell said as he led Thorne toward the offices. “Their sense of time gets totally screwed. Sometimes they turn up in the middle of the night expecting to get breakfast and just nod off.”

  They walked up the winding stone staircase. Thorne stared at the face of the boy on a drugawareness poster; the blackness of the mouth inside the smile. He could see that the resilience he’d described to Hendricks was only as temporary as the high.

  “Healey actually thought Spike had OD’d,” Maxwell continued. “He spent twenty minutes walking him around, slapping some life into him.” Maxwell grinned. “Got a decent slap back for his trouble.”

  “Sounds like Spike.”

  “Looking at the state of him, though, I’m guessing it’s only a matter of time …”

  They arrived at a door marked private. counseling in session. Maxwell knocked and pushed it open. “I’ll leave you to it. Give me a shout when you’re done.”

  “Thanks, Bren.”

  Maxwell took a step away, then turned, smiling. “Oh, I couldn’t get much sense out of Phil this morning. He had a bit of a headache for some strange reason. But he did manage to tell me about the two of us going out on a double date with you and Dave. Sounds like fun …”

  Spike’s head was drooping, and the smoke from a cigarette rose straight up into his face. He was sitting on a dirty cream sofa, similar to the one Thorne remembered from the room where he and the others had watched the videotape. Looking around, Thorne realized that this room was virtually identical to that one, save for the absence of a VCR, and the fact that there were AIDS information leaflets on the coffee table rather than the Radio Times and TV Quick.

  “Thought I’d got rid of you,” Thorne said. He flopped into an armchair, leaned forward, and began to drum his fingers on the edge of the table.

  Spike raised his head, grinned, and spread out his arms; croaked a cheer that quickly ran out of steam. He was wearing cammies and his cracked, vinyl bomber jacket. The T-shirt underneath was stained, dark at the neck, and when he let his head fall back, Thorne could see the small, square wad of bandage and the plaster.

  Thorne stroked the side of his own neck. “What happened here?”

  “Abscess burst,” Spike said. “Stunk the fucking place out …”

  The worst detective in the world could have seen that Spike was a long way gone. Thorne could only presume that he was carrying his works with him; that he’d managed to fix up somewhere, since Healey had found him outside the Lift and brought him indoors. Thorne guessed that Spike had spent every waking hour since he’d last seen him as fucked up as he was now.

  “Where’ve you been?” Thorne asked.

  Spike raised his hands to the hair that lay damplooking against his head. He gathered it between his fingers and tried in vain to push it up into the trademark spikes. “Around. Where have you been?”

  “I knew you were upset about what happ
ened …”

  “What happened?”

  “What happened to Terry,” Thorne said. “I knew the pair of you were upset.”

  “I went to see my sister.”

  “It doesn’t matter where you were. I’m happy you’re still in one piece.”

  “She gave me some cash money …”

  It was like talking to someone who was underwater, suspended beneath the surface of a liquid that thickened as they tried to speak. That was setting above them.

  “Actually, in a way, Terry helped out a bit,” Spike said.

  “How’s that?”

  “I needed gear, ’course I did, loads of it. Both of us did. Most of these cocksuckers are hard as nails, like; wouldn’t matter what you said to ’em. But there’s a couple of dealers who’ve sussed that it’s always going to be good for business in the long run. They do me a favor one time, they know damn well I’ll be back tomorrow …

  “So I lay it on a bit thick, right? I tell ’em that my mate’s been killed, for Christ’s sake, and I need to get more stuff. I tell ’em I really need a bit extra, you know, because of how horribly fucking upset I am. See? Simple …”

  Thorne just listened, unable to fill the pauses that grew longer between sentences. He watched as Spike raised an arm up and pointed a finger. Spun it around, making a small circle in the air.

  “So, Terry dies, and I need the stuff … and I get the stuff because I tell everyone how upset I am … Then I work out what a sick bastard I am for doing that to get the stuff … And I hate myself.” He screwed up his face, put inverted commas round hate with his fingers. “So then I need even more stuff … and round and fucking round …”

  Thorne waited until he was fairly sure there was nothing else. He had no way of knowing if Spike was aware of the tears, any more than he was of the cigarette that was no more than ash and filter between his fingers. “Where’s Caroline?” he asked.

  “Will that bloke call the police ’cause I clocked him?”

  “Healey, you mean?”

  “She’s in Camden …”

  Thorne laughed. “I feel like the quizmaster on that Two Ronnies sketch.”

  Spike looked blank.

  It had been Thorne’s father’s favorite : Ronnie Barker as the man on a quiz show whose specialist subject was answering the previous question.

  “What is the last letter on the top line of a typewriter keyboard?”

  “The Battle of Hastings.”

  “Hosting a dance or enjoying yourself might be described as having a … ?”

  “P.”

  “What’s in Camden?” Thorne asked.

  Spike began pulling at a loose thread on the cushion next to him. “Dealer’s place.”

  “How long’s she been there?”

  “A couple of days.” He pulled the cushion to him, folded his arms tight across it. “I took her round …”

  Round and fucking round …

  Thorne understood that Spike and Caroline had both been desperate. That each had found their own way of getting as much as they needed. “Let’s go and see her,” he said.

  Spike moaned and shook his head.

  Thorne stood and stepped across to him. He raised Spike’s hand, lifted it until it was over the table, and squeezed until the burned-out nub end dropped into an ashtray.

  “Where exactly are you from?” Stone asked.

  The barman turned from restocking an optic. “Wellington.”

  “Have you got some identification on you?”

  The barman sighed, started rooting around for his wallet. “I’ve got credit cards …”

  Stone took another glance at the photo he was carrying with him, a composite of the original Ryan Eales photo and the digitally aged version. He looked back at the man behind the bar. “Forget it, mate. It’s okay …”

  He walked back to where Mackillop was sitting. The woman next to him, who’d called to say that the man behind the bar of her local pub might well be the one they were after, looked up eagerly.

  “He’s fifteen years too young and he’s from New Zealand,” Stone said. “He’s got a bloody accent.”

  The woman, fifteen years older than she wanted to be, and from Hounslow, was less than delighted. “I never said I’d spoken to him, did I?” She sat there for a few seconds more, then snatched up her handbag. “I suppose I’m buying myself a drink, then …”

  Mackillop and Stone watched her at the bar. “We could get something to eat ourselves while we’re in here,” Mackillop said. “It’s near enough lunchtime.”

  Stone looked at his watch and stood up. “Actually, I’m meeting someone for lunch, so I think we’re better off splitting up for an hour or so.”

  Mackillop looked thrown. “Right …”

  “If we do Finchley next, you can drop me off in Willesden on the way and I’ll meet you there.”

  “Fair enough.” He followed Stone toward the door. Lewisham, the other location on their list, would have been closer, but Mackillop wasn’t going to argue. Especially when it dawned on him exactly how Stone was planning to spend his lunch hour.

  They grabbed cold drinks and a paper from a newsagent’s, then walked across the road to a small pay-and-display behind a branch of Budgens. “Fucking New Zealand,” Stone said.

  He hung up his jacket in the back of the car, then turned on Capital Gold while Mackillop waited for his chance to nose the Volvo into traffic. “So, you spend an hour or so in a caff or something?”

  “I might just grab a sandwich,” Mackillop said.

  “Whatever. I’ll meet you outside the Finchley address, two o’clockish. Maybe just after.”

  “How are you going to get there from Willesden?”

  “I’ll call a cab,” Stone said.

  “Straight up the North Circular, I would have thought. Piece of piss this time of day.”

  They drove along the London road through Brentford and turned north along the edge of Gunnersbury Park.

  Stone sang along to an Eric Clapton track, put finger and thumb together as if holding a plectrum during the guitar break. “If you get there before me, just park up and wait,” he said. “I’ll call to find out where you are.”

  Mackillop tried his best to keep a straight face. “Wouldn’t it be simpler if I just tagged along to your lunch meeting?”

  “You can fuck right off,” Stone said. “Mind you, she’d probably be up for it.”

  THIRTY-ONE

  Thorne sprang for a couple of tube tickets and he and Spike traveled the half a dozen stops to Camden Town. Spike was asleep, or as good as, most of the way, while Thorne was stared at by a young mother who hissed at her two kids and made sure they stayed close by her. When they stood to get off, the woman smiled at him, but Thorne saw her arms tighten around her children’s waists.

  Spike dragged his feet and was easily distracted as they walked along Camden Road toward the overground station. He stopped to peer into the windows of shops or talk to strangers, few of whom seemed fazed at being drawn into conversations with a junkie and a tramp. As places in the capital went, Camden was pretty much a one-off.

  Despite Thorne’s efforts to urge him forward, Spike sat down next to someone he actually knew, who was begging outside the huge Sainsbury’s. Thorne stepped away from them and stared at his reflection in the glass of the automatic doors. His hair and beard were surely growing at a much faster rate than they normally did. He wondered if it was anything to do with exposure to air, fresh or otherwise. Though the bruises had faded, so had the rest of his face. The marks were still visible against the skin, like ancient tea stains that stubbornly refused to shift from a pale, cotton tablecloth. He inched across until he was right in the middle of the doors; until he could enjoy himself being split down the middle whenever anyone walked in or out.

  A security guard was eyeing him with intent, so Thorne decided to save him the trouble. He moved away and yanked Spike up by the collar of his jacket. Spike’s friend moved to get to his feet, caught Thorne’s e
ye, and lowered himself to the pavement again.

  Thorne wrapped an arm around Spike’s skinny shoulders. “Time to go and see Caroline,” he said.

  They walked farther away from the high street and the market, minutes from Thorne’s own flat in Kentish Town. Halfway between the million-pound houses of Camden Square and the more modest accommodations of Holloway Prison, they stopped. Spike shook his head, like he was about to have teeth removed, and pointed toward an ugly, three-story block set back from the main road.

  “Up there,” he said.

  They stared across at the green front doors for a minute or two; at the brown balconies and multicolored washing strung from their railings. “Do you want me to wait here?” Thorne asked.

  “Wait here for what?”

  Thorne was starting to run out of patience with Spike’s sulky attitude; with the drug and with the hunger for it. He wanted to grab him and tell him to get up to his dealer’s flat and do something. To pull Caroline out of there, or smash the place up, or get down on his knees and thank the poxy shitbag who was fucking his girlfriend so they could get a bit higher for that much longer. Anything …

  “I don’t know,” he said.

  Spike leaned against a parking meter. His breathing was noisy; cracked and wheezy. “You could maybe come up, stand at the end of the corridor or something.”

  “Come on, then …”

  They moved across the road like old men, with Spike talking to himself, then spitting at an Astra whose driver had leaned on his horn, furious at being forced to brake. At the base of the low-rise building, on a small square of dogshit-and-dandelion paving, a kid on a skateboard looked at Spike as if he’d seen him before and Spike looked back.

  As they entered the pungent cool of the stairwell Thorne looked round, watched the boy pull out a mobile phone as he kicked his board away.