Kill For Love

by Ray Connolly

  Chloe accompanied her down to their cars after work. "It'll come right in the end, I'm sure," she consoled.

  "Are you saying you think he's right, that I'm not ready to go back yet? Do I make people nervous?"

  "All I've heard is that you blame yourself too much for what happened, and you don't have to.”

  "So why?"

  "My bet is Fraser's being leaned on. You know how it is...insurers, doctors, maybe even shareholders. It doesn't look good when a star reporter ends up in the bin with battle fatigue, no matter how many prizes she's won." And Chloe smiled.

  For the first time all day Kate laughed. No one had described the expensive private hospital she'd been admitted to on returning from Owoso as the “bin” before. "But I'm better," she said.

  "All you have to do is convince your employers."

  Her little street was in darkness when she arrived home, the yellow sodium light that normally illuminated her corner having recently developed a fault. Leaving the Citroën under a plane tree, she made her way across to her house.

  It was only as she reached her front door that she sensed his gaze. Someone was watching her. She turned around. Nothing moved. She waited. Then turning back to the door, she slipped her key into the lock and stepped quickly inside.

  Immediately her shoe touched something in the dark. Delicately she transferred her weight to the other foot. Then, reaching for the switch, she turned on the light. Lying on the mat, on top of the afternoon’s junk mail, was a Snickers bar.

  She picked it up and smiled. She’d guessed right. Switching the light off again, she peered out of the narrow hall window. Across the road the dark shape of a youth emerged from behind a tree in the front garden of one of the grander houses on the opposite corner. Then, apparently satisfied with his evening’s vigil, he trotted away, back into the shadows of his life.

  Tearing the brown wrapping paper from the chocolate bar Kate watched him go. “All right, Jeroboam, forgiven,” she murmured to herself as she took a bite. “So long as you didn’t steal this, too.”

  Chapter Five

  The days moved forward uneventfully. She was angry at no longer being a foreign correspondent, but, if a term working in London was required, she would make the best of it. Bending to Seb Browne’s persuasion, she even returned Petra Kerinova’s call, but wasn’t surprised when told she was unavailable. Instead she took an assignment following ponies from a New Forest horse sale to a French slaughterhouse, on to a pet food cannery, and back to a supermarket…on the fringe of the New Forest.

  That took up most of the week, after which there was a trip to Cambridge to see a young academic who'd locked himself in his flat after his research grant had been taken away. He was a tall American mathematician with thin, fair, frizzy hair called Chris Zeff, and the story she was following was the result of his hobby. He was a computer hacker.

  “It isn’t like I stole anything or gave away secrets. I just wanted to take a look at what Cambridge had on me,” he complained indignantly. “Can you believe, they just took everything about me word for word from my Yale files! And they were wrong.”

  “You hacked into your Yale files, too?”

  “Of course.”

  “Anywhere else?”

  “Well, yes, maybe…” he said vaguely, which sounded to Kate as though he’d had a look at anything and everything he could find on Chris Zeff. “It seems to me I have a right to know what errors these people are holding on me. Don’t you think? I didn’t change much.”

  “You changed things, too?”

  “Only the mistakes. I just wanted to make sure that everything they have is right. I was doing them a favour.”

  Brilliant as he was, there was a dotty innocence about him. The university authorities wouldn’t even have known he’d hacked into their system if he hadn’t grumbled too loudly that their information was incorrect. Now there was a possibility of criminal charges.

  "What are you going to do?” she asked, sitting on his bed, watching as bailiffs took away his computer, while his heavily pregnant girl friend, Zena, silently served them herbal tea from a thermos flask.

  "Go on a hunger strike, I guess."

  “Well yes, that’s an idea, I suppose. But before you do let’s go and get something to eat, shall we.” And she hauled the couple and the cameraman off to a pasta bar on

  Newnham Road

  . “The thing about computer hackers,” Zeff explained as he ate his fettucini, “is that we aren’t all criminals. There can be an ethical dimension, too.”

  “But how do those who hold the information know that the guy hacking in understands that ethical dimension and isn’t a robber or a terrorist?” Kate asked, amused.

  “They don’t. But if you could see how much material they have on you, you’d be amazed at how much isn’t quite right. And if it’s not right it has to be wrong. And that can’t be right either, can it?”

  Alongside him, Zena shook her head solemnly.

  Kate left it at that. Telling him to get in touch if there were any further developments, she wished him luck and returned to London to put together what, if she was being honest, was an over-sympathetic package. His boyish honesty had got to her.

  She had nothing against stories like this: they were the bread and butter of news television. But they weren’t how she saw herself.

  She spent most of Saturday shopping in the West End. Fraser had mentioned her doing some anchor work in the studio, so, she reasoned, she would need some anchorwoman clothes, sensible suits and blouses, items she would claim on her WSN expenses. And then, unable to resist it, she bought an expensive new party dress, too. In cornflower blue cotton, too flimsy and too low cut to wear in England except on hot days, it was sheer extravagance. She wouldn’t be able to put that on expenses. Then, laden with bags, she popped into HMV at Fulham Broadway on her way home.

  Jeroboam was waiting on her doorstep when she got back, a book in his lap. Next door, her neighbours, the Motts, stood at their window watching him with suspicion.

  "Well, well, you're early," she said as she opened the car door. She was relieved to see him. She'd been half afraid he might stop coming.

  "Not really," he replied, and helped take her shopping from the car.

  Reflecting that if his mother hadn't been able to give him much of a start in life, she had at least taught him good manners, she smiled her thanks. Then, irked by her neighbours' stares, she turned the smile on them.

  Embarrassed to be caught snooping, the Motts waved awkwardly and pulled back, exchanging words. They were a couple in their mid-thirties, employed by the same merchant bank, in the services of which they left home at seven every weekday morning, not returning until after nine at night. They loved their jobs and presumably each other, but they did not, they’d made clear, love Jeroboam's habit of hanging around waiting for Kate to come home.

  "He litters the street, loafing around outside in the rain like that," pear-shaped Lois Mott had complained one day, when enquiring who he was.

  "He wouldn't if you asked him in," Kate had retorted.

  As they entered the house Jeroboam would, she knew, be wondering what was in the HMV bag, but he wouldn't ask. Someone must have once told him it was rude to ask questions.

  "I thought we'd treat ourselves today," she said as, reaching the kitchen, she pulled out some crumpets and put them into the toaster. She'd bought them especially for him.

  Jeroboam beamed, put the kettle on, then took down a cup and saucer for Kate and the yellow M&Ms mug he liked for himself.

  She watched him fondly. It took so little to make him happy. On a whim, she opened a bag and held up her new dress. "What do you think?"

  He looked surprised, probably unused to having his opinion sought on women's clothes.

  "You do like it, don't you?"

  "It's very nice," he murmured at last, his face bright with embarrassment.

  "That's all right then. For a moment I thought it might not suit me and I'd have to tak
e it back." And putting the dress away, she took the crumpets out of the toaster and began to butter them.

  Jeroboam made the tea. He would never be a good looking boy, his Afro-Filippino face was too squashed for that, his nose too flat and his mouth disproportionately wide: a funny face really. But he had a guileless charm. Once, while trying out a new lens, she'd taken some photographs of him, but he was camera shy and the results had been disappointing. Now she was of the view that he probably looked his best in the police mug shot held in his file at the Hammersmith and Fulham Youth Offending Scheme offices.

  “Anyway, have you had any time to read by yourself?” she asked as, sitting at the kitchen table, he finished the last of the crumpets.

  Tentatively Jeroboam opened his book. It was his favourite, Bill And Harry, an anthology of stories about two twelve year old boys on the slippery edge of delinquency who lived on a sink estate in Liverpool.

  "Bill and Harry at the Zoo. I've read that."

  "Very good. Let's see how we get on then, shall we?"

  He flinched nervously, then began to read, slowly and carefully. "One day in the school holi-days, Harry th-th-thought it would be a good...id..."

  "Idea... A good idea..."

  "...a good idea to go to the zoo and steal a...mo...monk-ey."

  Kate smiled.

  "'What will we do with a mon-key?' Bill asked. 'Well,' said Harry, 'monkeys have very long arms and are good jump-ers. If we had one of our own we could trai...train it to be a goal-keeper...'" He was already giggling, although it was apparent he must have practised reading the story several times. "'Why would we want to do that?' asked Bill. 'Well', said Harry, 'if it was any good, we could sell it to Man…ches...ter...'"

  "Manchester."

  "'Manchester Un...ited...for twenty mill...million pounds', said Harry." Now Jeroboam laughed out loud.

  Kate laughed with him.

  "'But won't they not-ice that it's a monkey?' asked Bill. 'It won't matter,' said Harry. 'He'll fit in there. They're all monkeys at United.'"

  "Well done," she enthused. She meant it. Somehow Jeroboam had been left behind when learning to read, but all he really lacked was confidence and practice.

  His face puckered in pleasure and he took a gulp of tea. Then he continued with the story.

  It would never have occurred to her to teach remedial reading before her breakdown. "Perhaps it would help if you had something to take your mind off yourself," a nurse at the Princess Diana Hospital had suggested one afternoon as Kate had stared into the abyss. She'd dismissed the idea, as she'd dismissed everything during those weeks, but the nurse had persisted. "Seeing as you read so much, why don't you lend a hand with people with reading difficulties and show them what they're missing," had been the next suggestion.

  Again Kate had brushed the thought aside. And so it had gone on, until, if for no reason other than to shut her up, she’d eventually promised to make enquiries when she was well enough.

  The following day the nurse, a New Zealander of pioneering zeal, had brought her a booklet from the education department of the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham. “Volunteers are always needed,” she'd explained.

  Jeroboam had been kicking a football against a wall, when, discharged from hospital, Kate had gone to meet him at the education centre. She'd assumed at first he was younger than fifteen, and only on being introduced had she noticed the soft down of an adolescent moustache. His mother, Maria Elena, was Filippino and his father something else, but never a factor in the boy's life, anyway. When Maria Elena had first come to Britain she'd worked as a nanny, sending money home to Manila. Now she cleaned the trains overnight for London Underground, mother and son living near the top of multi-storey block on a council estate. It wasn't the best start in life, but a bright child might still have done well. Jeroboam was not very bright. Too insignificant to be bullied, he was a fringe person who watched the games of the world from the sidelines.

  They read about Bill and Harry for over an hour, and with every chapter he improved.

  "I'm going to have to get you another book," Kate said as he turned the final page. "You're really doing very well now."

  He blinked with pride.

  She changed the subject. "What about your mother? Did she give you a hard time over the CDs?"

  The smile disappeared.

  "Did she shout? As bad as I did?"

  "Worse."

  "She loves you. She worries about you."

  He didn't reply.

  "You never told me why you took the CDs when you haven't got a CD player?"

  Now he was embarrassed.

  She took a guess. "Was it to play them to me? To show me why you liked them?"

  His brown eyes misted with tears.

  She got up from the table. "Well, I shouldn't really reward you, because it really was pretty bad, but...well, you left me a Snickers bar, so..." Going to her shopping she put her hand inside the HMV bag, took out a Twist-O and the Koolboys CD and went across to the player.

  Jeroboam watched in astonishment.

  "Hey, come on, don't you dare look so surprised. If I can teach you to read, you can teach me about hip hop.” And sitting down next to him she waited for the music to begin.

  It did. With a vengeance. Putting a hand to one ear, she quickly turned the volume down, then back up a little, when she saw his worried expression. Politely she listened, tapping her foot occasionally when she thought it appropriate, smiling when Jeroboam smiled at some joke in the lyrics, looking pretend disapproving when the words became violent or sexy. Throughout, Jeroboam listened, transfixed, as only teenage boys can be by overloud rock music, smiling up at her occasionally, reassuring himself that she really was enjoying it.

  At last the record ended.

  "Yes, well, that was...really good, wasn't it...? I mean, interesting…sort of rhythmic more than melodic, I suppose. But, yes, I think I can see what you like about Twist-O and the Koolboys."

  "Do you really like it?"

  "Yes. Sort of. I mean, not as much as you, obviously. But I don't suppose you're crazy about…well, Coldplay, are you?"

  "Coldplay!" He looked at her as though she'd said a dirty word.

  "Don't worry, just teasing.” Suddenly a thought struck, and she dived back into the bag for a couple of other CDs she’d bought. "What about Jesse Gadden? Do I get street cred if I listen to him? Is it still called 'street cred'? It sounds a bit old fashioned. I don't want to get the terminology wrong."

  Jeroboam screwed up his face as he looked at the records.

  "You don't like him? Millions of people think he's the best thing since, well...the last best thing! But I don't know." And opening the cover she slipped a disc into the CD player.

  Miserably the boy waited. After a moment Gadden’s high voice razored through the room.

  "This one makes dogs' eyes water," she joked weakly.

  Jeroboam wasn't amused. He got untidily to his feet.

  She turned the music down. "You're leaving? Don't you want to listen?”

  He shook his head, already on his way out.

  “Okay! I'll keep your CD here, if you like, and we can play it again next time."

  She followed him to the door, wondering what she'd done to upset him. "Anyway, it's been an excellent day. What about next week? Do you want to call to make a plan?"

  He nodded.

  "Right! I'll wait to hear from you. You don't like Jesse Gadden, is that it?"

  He shook his head. Then opening the front door he stepped quickly out, and trotted away down the road.

  Some people can be very precious when it comes to their taste in music, she grumbled to herself as she closed the door.

  Then, pouring herself a large glass of wine, she turned the volume of the CD player up. Jeroboam might not like Jesse Gadden, the Motts next door probably didn't like Jesse Gadden, she wasn't even sure that she liked Jesse Gadden, but if this interview with him was ever to happen she was going to make sure she was thoroughly
prepared.

  She read right through the evening, curled up on the cream sofa in her living room. While she'd been out reporting during the week, Beverly, the intern, had been scouring the websites and cuttings for biographical information on Gadden, the result being a thick folder stuffed with print-outs and photostats. The girl had been proud when she’d handed it over, but, as the evening wore on, Kate became increasingly disappointed. There was so little hard information.

  Fetching a notepad she compiled some basic facts. Born in l975 in Waterford and christened Jesse Gadden Monaghan, a Wikipedia biography suggested his mother might have been a traveller. Neither a father nor any other family members were mentioned. The only certainty was that his mother had died when Gadden was five. After that there’d been a series of orphanages and boys’ homes. Then there were references to performing as a folk singer in Galway and Dublin in the nineties. He'd also, it was rumoured, hustled a living in Paris and Amsterdam and busked on the London Underground, but there were no dates for this. As for friends there were no details, other than the name of his first manager in Dublin, Kevin O'Brien. Then at some point Petra Kerinova had appeared.

  "KERINOVA," she jotted down. "WHO IS SHE? WHAT FOR? LOVER?"

  On this there were no hints. Indeed for a rock star the amount of gossip about Gadden's sex life was paltry. There were none of the usual groupie tabloid tell-tales, no paternity claims, and no paparazzi photographs catching him backstage with cocaine stretched models. Given the sparseness of facts, it wasn't surprising there'd been no proper biography on him, the couple of Jesse Gadden paperbacks Beverly had come up with being scarcely more than details of recordings, tour dates, song lyrics, photographs, publicity hand-outs, a few quotes and names of charities supported.

  One thing about him, she thought as she read through the list of charities, and noted the photographs of him shaking hands with the good, the great and the powerful, he was certainly generous.

  But what of the missing eighteen months before the farewell tour? What had he been doing then? Where had he been? There were no clues. In a world groaning with information technology it was amazing that Gadden had managed to keep so much of his life secret.