Mickey Take: When a debt goes bad...

by Steven Hayward

  Slowly he goes from room to room. Meticulously, every cupboard is searched, every concealed space exposed and every hiding place revealed, so everything is left exactly as it was. Every rug and loose floorboard, every shelf and wonky picture frame, every tin of food and frozen pizza, every bath towel and wardrobe top, every pair of socks and box of condoms, every darts trophy and LP rack. All seemingly untouched.

  After one final search of the front room, he takes the first item from the coffee table and slides it into his other coat pocket. He came hoping to retrieve two things after all. And while it’s not one of them, it might still be useful. He slips out as easily and unnoticed as when he arrived.

  14.

  Friday, 25th

  We stayed in a motel last night. It didn’t seem like a good idea to go home. We’d no doubt managed to piss off just about everyone in a single evening and Grace was paranoid that any one of them would be able to follow us back to either of our places. I tried to reassure her that the only reason I seemed to be of any use to Herb was because he couldn’t track her down in the first place. But that convinced neither of us. For a while I’d been harbouring a nagging doubt that getting me to find her wasn’t his real motive anyway. The more I’d thought about it, the more convoluted that theory had become. It was just so unlikely he would have planted her camera with her undeveloped photographs on it in a run-down old house as a viable means of getting someone like me to find her.

  I was coming to the conclusion that Grace’s sudden appearance on the scene had been a complete, if not unwelcome coincidence. Besides, I didn’t doubt for a second that Herb had the capability to discover both of our addresses, passport numbers and shoe sizes without leaving the comfort of his rural retreat.

  I didn’t like the look on the receptionist’s face when we gave false names. Grace had joked about calling ourselves Mr and Mrs Smith. I said I wasn’t ready for another sham marriage so we gave single names.

  Buck Shot

  Once we’re off the M25 this morning, Grace calls Melville from my phone.

  ‘Hello, I was hoping to speak to Jim,’ she says. ‘Oh, but I thought this was his direct... I see. When will he be back? Okay... No, there’s no message. I’ll call again later.’

  ‘Out on the beat?’ I say. ‘Or out the back polishing his truncheon?’

  ‘Neither,’ she says, disdainfully shaking her head. ‘Not due back until late afternoon.’

  ‘I suppose we could go and see Pinner.’

  ‘Not one of your better ideas,’ she says and turns away to look out the window. We’re through Dartford and I’m about to ask if the trip is really worth continuing. Then she turns around and catches me stone cold.

  ‘Last night, when you said you owed Herb…’ I steal a sideways glance and wish I hadn’t because I can see the question in her eyes before she’s even asked. ‘What did you mean?’

  ‘Oh, nothing really,’ I say. But feeling her glaring at me with the unseen eyes of a priest behind the confessional screen, I’m forced to offer at least some words of contrition. ‘Look… we go way back… ancient history. There’s stuff… Grace, I will tell you but can we talk about it later?’

  ‘Hmm… another one of your long stories, I suppose,’ she says; I’m sure, no pun intended. I’m off the hook again as the road widens into two lanes and I’m grateful to pull out of the traffic, speeding off like the one that got away.

  ‘Anyway,’ I say, reasserting myself against the raised engine noise, ‘as we’ve now got hours to kill and you won’t introduce me to your family, I suppose I could show you mine.’ I’m half joking and expect a similar rebuff.

  ‘Why not,’ she says. ‘That would be lovely.’

  ‘Okay…’ I say. ‘But not a word about recent events, agreed?’

  ‘Oh!’ she says, piling on the sarcasm. ‘I really wanted to tell your nice, conventional parents all about my perfect family background.’

  ‘Did I tell you my mum lives alone?’ I say.

  ‘No, but I did get that impression. Didn’t you also say you had a brother?’

  ‘Yeah. John.’ I hesitate, unsure how far to go with this. I’ve just realised there’s a big risk taking Grace to meet Mum so soon. And I don’t mean the one involving embarrassing baby photos or the awkward references to Sam having been such a nice girl. It doesn’t even worry me that Mum probably still has our wedding photo on the wall. The real risk is that Grace will ask her in all innocence about my dad and my brother. I can either spill the beans now or take a chance it doesn’t come up.

  ‘What does he do?’ Grace asks, making the decision for me.

  ‘At this moment,’ I say, ‘he’s probably peeling spuds.’

  ‘Oh, he’s a chef.’

  ‘Some days,’ I reply. ‘And other days he gets to be a listener.’

  ‘What’s a listener?’

  ‘It’s when someone’s on suicide watch and he sits with them to help them through it.’

  ‘Oh, he works with offenders. Sounds like an interesting job,’ she says.

  ‘Yeah, that’s one way to put it. It depends what privileges he’s earned.’

  ‘Oh God,’ she says. ‘He is a prisoner.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Mickey, your mum and dad must have been devastated.’

  ‘Mum was,’ I reply, building up to the big punchline.

  ‘Is your dad... no longer alive?’

  ‘Oh, he’s alive alright.’

  ‘But he isn’t still with your mum?’

  ‘No, they’re divorced.’

  ‘I’m sorry, that must have been terrible,’ she says. ‘Was there someone else involved?’

  ‘No, he didn’t stray like that, but the deceit was probably worse.’ Grace says something and puts her hand on my arm. I don’t really hear her and just kept talking. ‘For over a year she thought he was still working the nightshift. We all did. He’d been laid off and couldn’t bring himself to tell her. Seems he just retrained as a housebreaker. I think she could have got over the lies and the sense of foolishness, even the shame of it. She probably would have stood by him.’

  ‘But she didn’t?’

  ‘No,’ I say as we take the slip road off the A2 and head towards Wombwell Park. ‘By the time she knew about it, he’d moved up to bank robbery and had roped her eldest son in with him.’

  ‘Oh God,’ she says again. ‘Are they both inside?’

  ‘They were. Forty years between them. Dad’s been out on licence for five but he stays away. John’s still got at least five to do.’ I look out the side window and try to compose myself.

  ‘Jesus,’ she says, blaspheming a third time. ‘What did he do, kill someone?’ I almost swerve into the central reservation.

  ‘The security guard... at their first bank job,’ I say, exhaling slowly through trembling lips. I really want to leave it at that, spare her the grim details, but her silence eggs me on and I take another deep breath. ‘He pulled Dad’s mask off, just as they were leaving. John was already outside. He could have got away. Dad came out and told him and they panicked. John went back in and shot the man in the face.’

  Grace is now silent as I take the right turn into Hamilton East.

  ‘He was only twenty,’ I say, as we pull up outside the glowing hearth of my family home. ‘Now he’s a lifer. Minimum twenty-five years. No guarantee of parole. And Mum’s disowned him.’

  I look across at Grace. Her face is ashen and she has a hand over her mouth.

  Mamma Mia!

  The pristine white tablecloth is adorned with best china. Plates, cups and saucers I didn’t even know Mum had. Within minutes of us accepting her invitation to stay for lunch, fresh sandwiches, a bowl of tossed salad and another one full of crisps have appeared as if they’ve been waiting in the wings. They’re followed by a delicate cake stand, half a dozen fondant fancies, arranged colourfully around its tiered edges, and an elegant teapot wafting aromatic steam from its spout. Mum’s face is beaming like the proverbial Cheshire cat and
she seems to float in and out of the room with every new delivery of food. Each time, she looks at us sitting together and smiles, and each time Grace smiles back.

  They’ve already had an awkward hug on the doorstep. I wish I could have given Grace more time to get her head around my family history before she stepped over the threshold, but she seemed to put it out of her mind once I’d made the introductions.

  I can understand this is a bit strange for them both. Mum’s so used to fawning over Sam on our infrequent visits together, and I know she’s still really upset that Sam would cheat on me. I think she felt more deceived than I did because she’d only ever seen the outward appearance of a happy marriage and thought Sam was the perfect daughter-in-law. God knows, my mother needed some family bliss to be proud of back then.

  ‘Mum, come and sit down and stop fussing,’ I call after her as she heads back to the kitchen. She returns with a big tin of assorted Belgian chocolate biscuits that were almost certainly tucked away somewhere out of reach for Christmas.

  ‘It’s so nice to meet you,’ she says to Grace for the second time when she finally sits down at the table.

  ‘I’ve been looking forward to meeting you, Mrs Field. Mickey’s a lucky man to have such a lovely mum.’

  ‘Mums are supposed to be lovely, that’s our job,’ she says and beams even brighter as she looks across at me before turning back to Grace. ‘And… how’s your mum?’

  ‘Oh, I was adopted,’ Grace says surprisingly confidently and gives Mum a very upbeat version of her life story. At the end of it you’d be forgiven for thinking Terry Pinner is the people’s champion and Simon is angelically following in his father’s footsteps. I look across at her and try to hide a knowing grin. She smiles back at me and reaches across to gently squeeze my hand.

  ‘So tell me, how you two met,’ Mum says, offering Grace another sandwich.

  ‘Oh, you know,’ Grace says. ‘The usual things, a furtive look across a crowded bar, a clever opening line, the offer of a drink.’

  ‘Michael always was good at chatting up girls before... well, when he was younger.’

  ‘I bet he was.’ Grace winks at me. ‘Then we got chatting and soon realised we had a lot in common. We were both looking for the same thing. I suppose you could say we just clicked.’

  I almost choke on a crisp at Grace’s camera pun, but she continues to describe the second time we met and takes great delight in telling Mum how I conned my mates out of their money. I start to protest my innocence and realise there’s no good way of telling that particular story. Pretty soon the two of them are nattering away as if they’ve known each other for years and I sense that Grace is grateful for the chance to relax in the homely glow of a mother’s love. There’s just a danger we’re getting a bit too comfortable. It’s not until we’re onto our second cup of tea, having made a serious dent in the Christmas biscuits, when Mum snaps us both back to reality.

  ‘Michael, have you heard from Herb yet?’

  ‘Yes,’ I say.

  ‘Oh, you have. Is he okay?’

  ‘He’s fine, Mum. He sends his regards.’

  ‘Where’s he staying?’ She looks at Grace. ‘He’s an old neighbour of ours whose house burned down last week. We’ve been worried about him, haven’t we Michael?’

  Grace smiles and nods.

  ‘He’s been with family, Mum. He’s fine. There’s no need to worry anymore.’ She looks at me with relief in her eyes and turns back to Grace.

  ‘Poor old chap. Some say he’s a bit of a rogue,’ she says, and before I can stop her she adds: ‘Even the police said they were worried he might be involved with handling photographs of children.’ Grace’s eyes widen and she shoots me a questioning look.

  ‘Mum!’ I say with a withering glare. ‘All they asked was whether he’d ever offered you any photographs?’ Out of the corner of my eye I can see Grace’s jaw drop, but Mum doesn’t let that deter her.

  ‘And…’ she says, indignantly, ‘they made it sound like there was a young girl in his house that day. How do you explain that?’ Grace is about to say something but I cut her off.

  ‘Mum. He’s old school. He’s not like that.’ She sees me looking furtively at Grace.

  ‘Well, I hope you’re right,’ she says, lowering her voice. ‘He’s always been very pleasant to me.’

  ‘There you go then,’ I say.

  ‘But he did start…’

  ‘Mum, I’ve seen him and he’s okay. He’s staying in a nice, big house out in the country and someone’s there looking after him.’ I give her a pained expression and look sideways towards Grace.

  ‘Oh, don’t mind me dear,’ she says to Grace, seeming to take the hint. ‘I have to say it like it is. Honesty’s the best policy. Nobody likes being lied to, do they?’

  ‘No, Mrs Field, you’re right.’

  ‘But he was acting strange before he disappeared.’ She makes a point of finishing the sentence I’d interrupted, before adding. ‘And the police did say there’d been a girl in there.’

  ‘Well I expect…’ Grace says, before I cut her off again.

  ‘Mum!’ I say, ‘Can we change the subject, please?’

  ‘Mrs Field?’ Grace says, looking daggers at me. I hold my breath.

  ‘Yes dear? And please call me Annie.’

  ‘Mickey told me you haven’t been well. Are your legs feeling better?’

  Wiggle Room

  We’ve decided I’ll go in alone to see DS Melville while Grace waits in a coffee shop. After my pathetic attempt to take control of her reunion with Herb last night, I’m amazed she even suggested it. But here I am, counting ceiling tiles for what must be twenty minutes, before the meeting room door finally opens.

  ‘Sorry to keep you, Mr Field. Has anyone offered you a coffee yet?’ I’m surprised at his courtesy, given the nature of our last conversation.

  ‘No, I’m fine. We’ve not long had lunch with Mum.’ I cringe at the unnecessary detail and keep talking to disguise my embarrassment. ‘Look, about last night. There was a bit of a misunderstanding. I honestly thought Grace was in danger and I couldn’t think who else to call.’

  ‘I take it she’s safe and well?’ he says, taking the seat opposite me, across the table, before leaning forward on his elbows; so much for an informal chat.

  ‘Yeah, she’s fine; just a bit shaken up,’ I say and ease back in the chair.

  ‘I gather she wasn’t in the house when the Met arrived.’

  ‘No. She managed to get away when they heard the sirens. Just as well… for what good that lot did.’

  ‘Hmm, I gather Long was happy for them to have a look around and, apart from the place being a bit run down, they didn’t see anything there to give them cause for concern,’ he says, ignoring the irony in my laugh and the shake of my head. ‘By the time I arrived everything was deserted.’

  ‘Right,’ I say. ‘But I thought you said you couldn’t come.’

  ‘Yes, well I just wanted to be sure. Anyway, I was hoping to talk to her.’

  ‘She’s okay, really,’ I say. ‘She asked me to come and explain everything. She’s feeling a bit upset and confused at the moment. She thought you’d understand.’

  ‘Yes, that’s all very well,’ he says leaning further forward, ‘but I do have some questions I’d like to ask her.’ I shrug my shoulders and he adds, ‘Well… as you’re here perhaps we could run through the things I wanted to talk to you about?’

  ‘Sure,’ I say, slightly less anxious about discussing that than trying to articulate the nature of yesterday’s rendezvous at Bleak House. He seems to have let me off lightly on that one, but my sense of relief is short-lived.

  ‘So, what do you know about the arson at the property belonging to Herbert Long… the one in Gravesend?’ He looks straight into my eyes. I blink and look away to give myself time to construct a reply, conscious of having reminded Grace earlier that I wouldn’t be mentioning the stranger who answered Herb’s phone.

  ‘Well… ’ I
say, trying to stay calm and laidback, in spite of beginning to feel like the chair’s infested. ‘I drove past the house last Friday morning on the way to see my mum and saw the fire damage.’

  Melville leaves the silence unfilled and I fall into his trap and start rambling. ‘I didn’t know it was arson, although I noticed it was all sealed off like a crime scene, so I suppose I wondered if there were suspicious circumstances. That’s really all I know.’

  ‘So you just happened to drive down to see your mother that morning?’

  ‘Yeah. She’d worried me a bit the day before. She seemed anxious about something.’

  ‘And it was her you were concerned about?’

  ‘Well, yeah. Just something she’d said. I knew she was worried and I wanted to make sure she was okay.’

  ‘Something she’d said about Herbert Long?’

  ‘Maybe,’ I say, pushing myself up on the arms of the chair. ‘But like I said, I was concerned about her. After what she’s…’ I manage to stop mid-sentence.

  ‘Been through.’ He finishes it anyway, nodding sagely. ‘Yes, I can understand that.’

  ‘Good,’ I say. Although I’m now sitting upright, he’s still towering over me. And the room suddenly feels much smaller.

  ‘So presumably you came from the Dartford Crossing?’

  ‘Yeah,’ I say with a shrug. ‘And down the A2.’

  ‘What, towards the golf course?’

  ‘That’s right.’ I try to disguise the frown that’s pinching my forehead as I stare back at him.

  ‘Bit of an indirect route isn’t it… to get to your mother’s house?’ Now I’m hoping the slits of my eyes at least conceal the cogs and wheels that have gone into overdrive in my head.

  ‘Yeah, well… we used to live in Sussex Road, didn’t we?’ I say, relieved my wits haven’t completely deserted me. ‘Sometimes I like to go past the old house. Big deal. What’s your point?’