by David Mark
‘You’re right,’ he says, rubbing the bridge of his broken nose. ‘I’ve seen better days.’
For a moment McAvoy just listens to the sound of the waves, breaking on the shingle and sand.
‘Here, I brought you something,’ he says, suddenly. He reaches into his jacket pocket and removes a small glass jar full of pink ointment. He puts it on the table in front of him. ‘I mentioned to my wife you were looking a bit tired. She made you this. You rub it under your eyes and it takes the darkness away.’
Owen says nothing for a moment, though there is a half-smile playing on his lips. Then he laughs and takes the pot with a nod of thanks.
‘I’d forgotten she was into that stuff,’ he says, sitting forward and looking a little more animated. ‘Lotions and potions and herbal stuff.’
McAvoy nods. ‘She could make a career out of it, if she had the time.’
‘Still just the one kid?’ asks Owen.
‘Two now,’ says McAvoy. ‘Lilah Rose. My princess. She’s coming up to three. Running me ragged.’
Owen nods, looking genuinely pleased. ‘Still living on Kingswood?’
McAvoy is about to tell him that they have moved to a new house on Hessle Foreshore but suddenly remembers that they’re not two old friends catching up over a pint in the pub. Owen has been in prison for four years because he helped McAvoy find a killer. And there’s every chance that Owen has wished every kind of horror on him in return.
‘We’ve moved,’ says McAvoy, clumsily. Then: ‘I wasn’t sure you’d agree to see me.’
Owen shrugs. ‘Not a lot I can do about it. You’re a copper. You can see me whenever you decide to.’
‘I’m not really here as a policeman,’ says McAvoy, shaking his head. ‘Well, sort of . . .’
‘It was a surprise, seeing you yesterday,’ says Owen. He seems to be ruminating on something.
‘Surprise for me too.’
‘Good or bad?’
‘Just a surprise.’
They say nothing for a while. Eventually, McAvoy lets out a breath.
‘I can’t tell you how sorry I am,’ he says, willing himself to hold Owen’s gaze.
Owen remains impassive. ‘You can try,’ he says, after a moment.
‘I was in hospital. I was dying. By the time I got out it had already happened. You pleaded guilty.’
‘They told me that it was taken care of. If I pleaded guilty to the gun possession they’d drop the other charges. I’d get a suspended sentence. It was a set-up. It was all Roper.’
McAvoy feels an urge to flinch at the mention of the man who betrayed them both. Fights with himself to keep his voice steady.
‘He never had that kind of power.’
‘Did then. Does now.’
‘He was a corrupt cop but he’s not a cop any more. He’s gone.’
Owen’s nose wrinkles, as though he can smell something vile. ‘Gone, is he?’
‘He’s in London now. Consultant for some security firm. Lives the good life but he hasn’t got a warrant card. We got rid of him.’
Owen looks at him and through him. Shakes his head.
‘That’s what you tell yourself, is it?’
‘That’s the truth.’
Owen’s posture changes. The tension in his shoulders takes hold of his entire body. To McAvoy’s horror, a tear runs from the corner of his eye and drops on to the collar of his prison-issue T-shirt.
‘Four years, Aector,’ he says, his voice a tremble. ‘Two of them in Lincoln, getting the shit kicked out of me every time my bones healed. A year in Durham, stuck among the rapists and the child molesters, sharing a cell with a man who told me every night I’d be dead by morning. And then here, where I’m supposed to be getting rehabilitated and preparing for life back on the outside. What life? She’s gone! My career’s gone. The house is gone . . .’
‘You can get it all back,’ begins McAvoy, hating the feebleness of the platitude.
‘He did this to me,’ says Owen, spraying spit. ‘Roper. He promised me he’d do it too. Told me that once I got inside he would use all the influence he had to make sure that I bled each and every day.’
McAvoy is so consumed with guilt that he feels sickness in his belly.
‘I should have come before now,’ he says, mumbling into his shirt collar. ‘I’m so sorry.’
Owen throws himself back in his chair. He looks as though he wants to kick the table but his eyes flick up to the camera on the wall behind McAvoy and he reins in his temper.
‘Why did you come, anyway? Was it just so that every copper-hating bastard on the wing could see me being helpful with your enquiries? Did you want to make life that little bit more difficult?’
McAvoy pauses. He’d been unsure whether to wait for regular visiting hours and approach the prison as a civilian. But those were days away. He phoned the prison yesterday evening, while Pharaoh was pulling strings with Lincolnshire Police, the Coroner’s Office and the Health and Safety Executive to get hold of all the reports into Will Blaylock’s death. He arranged to speak to Prisoner HN 8761 first thing in the morning. Set off at 7.30, having held Roisin hard enough to squeeze the air from her lungs. Be careful, she said. Let him say what he needs to. Don’t let him make you hate yourself . . .
McAvoy pushes a hand through his hair, pulls out his phone and flicks through the emails in his inbox until he finds the photographs. Looks at the shot of William Blaylock lying on the floor of a farm building: limbs like a swastika; his entire trunk a mess of bone and flesh. He looks at the image as if to remind himself. Puts the phone down on the table, face down.
‘William Blaylock,’ says McAvoy. ‘I got the impression he was your friend.’
Owen looks at the back of the phone like a gambler trying to read an opponent’s cards.
‘His inquest was yesterday. Accidental death. Nobody to blame. You’re too late. Again.’
‘I thought that might not be your opinion,’ says McAvoy, quietly.
‘I’m a convicted criminal. My opinion doesn’t matter.’
McAvoy gives it a moment. Feels his temperature rising.
‘If my boss was here she’d be getting sick of you playing silly beggers right about now.’
‘Shame she’s not,’ says Owen, rudely. ‘Pharaoh, isn’t it? I knew her when she was a DCI. Tasty. Hard. Can’t imagine you two are the best of friends.’
‘Think what you like,’ says McAvoy, allowing the first stirrings of temper to show in his face. ‘I came here to help you. I can go.’
‘You came here because you feel guilty,’ says Owen, jaw locked. ‘You thought you’d put a bad memory to bed and then yesterday you ran slap-bang into me. And because you’re a decent bloke it all came flooding back. And you wondered if there was any way on earth you could make it up to me. So you pulled Will’s file and convinced that great ginger head of yours that you could atone for leaving me to rot by getting some justice for Will. But you know what, Aector? Life isn’t like that. And the thing I want you to take away from today is that the only person who has surprised me in my whole cynical fucking life is you. I knew Roper would make my life hell. I knew deep down Tony had something wrong with him. But I never thought you would leave me here. I never thought it would take you four years.’
McAvoy wants to press his hand to his chest. He can feel his heart thumping inside him.
‘I couldn’t,’ he says, wheezy and indistinct. ‘I couldn’t even think about what happened without my legs giving way. It took every ounce of strength to get myself back to work. And a year after that somebody tried to kill me in those same damn woods. I just couldn’t.’
Owen looks at him. Keeps the snarl on his face, even as his eyes soften. He slows his breathing. Reaches forward and flips over McAvoy’s phone. He closes his eyes after a moment. ‘What makes you think there’s more to it than the official verdict?’ he asks, in little more than a whisper. ‘Seriously. I know you want to make things right between us but put that aside. Tell me what you�
�re thinking.’
McAvoy rubs his eyes. Tries to get himself together.
‘It seems to have been sorted too quickly,’ he says, thinking aloud. ‘Dead in the summer, inquest tied up at the beginning of December? No real cross-examination of witnesses. No real explanation of what he was doing with the auger.’
‘You know what they are?’
‘I grew up on a croft. My dad looked at manuals of farming equipment the way most people look at pornography. Yes, I know what they are. I know you can get dragged into them by your hair or your shoelaces or by loose-fitting clothes but unless you’re juggling with them it’s damn hard to drive them through your chest.’
Owen is looking at McAvoy curiously. His pupils are pinpricks.
‘He didn’t deserve what happened to him.’
‘You were there.’
‘I held him.’
‘As he died?’
‘He was long gone.’
‘You raised the alarm?’
‘I shouted. Two of the farmhands came. They went running and brought the boss. He saw what had happened and went to phone an ambulance.’
‘He went away to do that?’
‘No phone signal in the outbuilding. Had to go and use the landline.’
McAvoy nods. The register of calls is among the documents mailed to him late last night.
‘Tell me about Will,’ he says, picking up the phone and looking again at the boy’s ruined body.
‘We were room-mates at first,’ says Owen, sighing. ‘He was an OK lad. Bit out of his depth, but I could sympathise with that. I’m sure the Hull Mail will say he was this terrible specimen but he wasn’t like you think. He dealt, yeah, but to his friends. It was mostly cannabis. His mum had arthritis and he got into growing it for her. Sold some extra to help pay the bills. He did a year of university before he made the mistake of thinking he’d found himself a more lucrative career. He started supplying people who were much worse than him and he got busted the second a half-decent copper heard about his operation. He confessed the lot. He did eight months in Nottingham before coming here and we were roomed together. He was a clever lad. He was in the quiz team me and some of the other thinkers put together. He was good company. Funny.’
McAvoy sees genuine warmth in Owen’s eyes as he talks about the young lad. He keeps his questions gentle.
‘He took work on the farm?’
‘He liked the outdoors. The prison used to have its own farm on site but there are temporary cell blocks there now because of overcrowding. That meant the authorities needed to find somewhere inmates could work. The old boy at Gilberdyke seemed a neat fit. Prisoners go there in a bus in the morning and come back at night. Same arrangement at four other farms, a bit closer to here.’
McAvoy tries not to let his surprise show. Every time he thinks about prisoners being allowed to hold down jobs and earn money and then go back to their prisons for a movie and bed, he wonders whether there is any point to his job. Then he talks himself round. He understands the need for rehabilitation; abhors the idea of people being left in cells to rot. It always troubles him that his first instinct is so different to the opinion he holds after three seconds of rational thought.
‘You worked the farm too?’
‘First three months at an open prison you don’t leave the site. Then you can be considered for work outside. I worked in the Sentence Management Unit at first, getting files ready and making cups of tea and stuff. Pretty OK.’
‘But you ended up on the farm?’
Owen looks away. ‘Contraband found in my cell. I lost privileges. Nearly got shipped back to Lincoln.’
‘What was the contraband?’ asks McAvoy.
Owen gives a little laugh. ‘Herbs,’ he says, softly.
‘Herbs? You mean cannabis?’
‘No, I mean fucking herbs.’
McAvoy raises his eyebrows, waiting for more.
‘Will was into all that herb stuff, like your missus. It was meant to be a nice gesture. I swapped a couple of phone cards with one of the kitchen staff and they added some extras to the weekly order. Dill. Lemongrass. Speedwell. Thyme. They were found in my cell. I ended up on the farm, picking bloody sprouts and turnips and sweating so much I thought I was going to die.’
McAvoy isn’t sure what to say so he starts flicking through the files in his phone. He finds the inventory of Will’s possessions, cleared from his cell after two-hundred-plus inmates helped themselves to the bits they fancied. A few photographs of family members. A desk globe that doubled as a pencil sharpener. A bottle of Sarson’s vinegar. Four pairs of socks. A flyer for a comedy night, signed by the comedian. A box of pencils and a sketch pad containing no sketches.
McAvoy looks back up. Owen is staring at him, wet eyed and white faced.
‘He wasn’t sharing his cell with you at the end,’ says McAvoy, reading the report.
Owen shakes his head. ‘He was moved after a month or so. In with another couple of lads.’
‘I can’t see their names,’ says McAvoy, looking again at his screen.
‘Spear,’ says Owen, blankly. ‘Kremlin. They both slept with one eye open but it didn’t do Kremlin any good.’
‘Mitchell Spear?’ asks McAvoy, carefully.
‘Yeah. Released on licence last summer and hasn’t been seen since.’
‘Why did he move cells?’
‘I told you,’ says Owen, looking away. ‘People like to play with my head.’
‘And Kremlin?’
‘Real name Flemyng. Heir to the throne, or so he thought.’
McAvoy sees the way Owen’s eyes twitch and shift, glancing at the door and over the bigger man’s shoulder. He wonders whether he has any right to accuse the man of being paranoid after so many years and so many beatings.
‘You’re saying he was moved because you were his friend?’
Owen shrugs. ‘It was a shame. We were getting on. But we still hung out. He was still in the quiz team.’
McAvoy looks confused. ‘Who do you actually play?’
‘The guards. Other prisons. It’s taken pretty seriously.’
‘I’ve never heard of that.’
‘Why would you? This is a prison. There’s a rock band and a badminton league and a pool table and if that got in the Daily Mail it would mean headaches for the governor.’
‘He was clever?’
‘For a young lad.’ Owen nods.
‘Too clever to start playing about with an auger he didn’t know how to operate?’
Owen gives a gesture somewhere between a nod and a shrug. He looks suddenly tired. Takes the pot of ointment and starts passing it from hand to hand.
‘How did he find his new cellmates?’ asks McAvoy, as the wheels in his mind begin to turn. ‘Were they into the same things he was?’
‘The hippy stuff? No chance. But he knew his stuff. If you asked him nicely he’d tell you what your alternative sign was.’
‘Alternative sign?’
‘Yeah, like whether you were a hazel or an oak or a birch. He knew which plants were good when your back was sore. Told me once that if you rubbed a red chilli against a red candle and stroked it from base to top, it would get anybody who breathed it in in the mood for love. You can imagine how most of the lads in here would respond to that.’
McAvoy wonders if he should ask whether there was anything more between Owen and Will than friendship. Even as he decides not to, Owen reads it in his eyes.
‘Not guilty, your honour,’ he says, smiling. ‘Even after four years I can’t say I’m tempted. And neither was he. Nothing against those who are, it’s just not for me.’
McAvoy isn’t sure what to do with the information so he goes back to playing with his phone. Outside, the wind is picking up and it feels as if the Portakabin is shaking on its foundations.
‘Imagine if we took off,’ says Owen. ‘You and me, whizzing through the air like Dorothy and Toto. Let’s hope to Christ we land on Roper, eh?’
The two men sha
re their first genuine smile in four years. It feels nice. They were never exactly friends but they liked one another, back before it all went wrong. They would exchange knowing looks at police press conferences and McAvoy liked the funny little texts Owen used to send when the press pack were waiting at crime scenes for progress reports. It was McAvoy Owen turned to when he found himself accused of attacking a young woman operating on Doug Roper’s instructions. It was Owen McAvoy approached when he made his discoveries about Tony Halthwaite. If not for all the blood, they could have become close.
‘You’re really going to make some enquiries?’ asks Owen.
‘Do you think I should?’
Owen sits for a long moment. He lets his eyes flick to the camera in the corner of the room. He hunches forward, body language changing.
‘That camera’s recording us, Aector. It’s got pictures but no sound. If I’m seen helping you then my life gets fucking worse. There’s so much I want to tell you. So much you should know but you don’t. Thing is, everybody in here does know. If you put half a dozen ex-convicts in charge of the police force you’d soon solve every single crime. We all know what happened to Will. But it will happen to me if I help you. Everything you need’s in your reports if you read between the lines.’
‘Was he murdered, Owen?’
Owen sighs. ‘You haven’t got a clue. I don’t know what to make of you. Never bloody have.’
‘I was going to go to the scene,’ gabbles McAvoy, as he senses Owen preparing to leave. ‘To speak to the farmer.’
Owen gives a slight nod. Looks at McAvoy with something in his eyes that might be pity.
‘You ever skip?’ he asks, out of nowhere. ‘Remember those old playground chants. Salt, pepper, vinegar, mustard. I’ve had the song stuck in my head since before he died. It won’t leave. Keeps the spirits away, eh? You should ask your wife.’
McAvoy opens his hands, seeking more.
‘They took what they wanted from his cell when he was gone,’ says Owen, quietly. ‘Nothing that mattered was there anyway.’
‘He kept his treasured possessions with you?’
‘What treasured possessions?’
