by M. R. Hall
Two pills weren't enough to put her under. In what was becoming a routine, she lay in the darkness, the duvet pulled up around her ears, flinching at every sound. Mrs Jamal, the missing boys and the corpses in the van paraded behind her eyes and entered her fitful dreams: she and Mrs Jamal chased through a labyrinth of anonymous streets after a fleeing black van which limped along with a flat tyre. Desperate, breathless and exhausted they eventually rounded a corner and found it crumpled against a tree. Blood dripped out from under the sills onto the pavement. While Mrs Jamal wailed and rent her clothes, Jenny steeled herself with righteous anger and wrenched open the cab door. Inside was a young girl who looked up with blood-soaked hands she had wiped across her face. The child split the air with a cry and Jenny recoiled and fled with legs that turned to stone. As she fought to drag one foot in front of the other, a cold shadow stole over her; she heard the disembodied voice of her son: 'You don't know me. You can never know me.' She tried to call his name, to bring him out from his hiding place, but the landscape changed around her and became the street where she had lived as a child. For a brief second she was elated to be safe, then realized that the buildings were empty shells. There were no curtains at the windows, no people or furniture inside. Utterly and completely alone and bereft, she wept.
Jenny woke to a sensation of wetness on her pillow and with a sense of dread that was almost exquisite in its clarity. She sat upright and reached for the light, trying to shake off the image of the girl with the bloodied face. It was four-thirty a.m. She reminded herself it was only a dream, the product of a churning, restless mind that would soon calm down, but it didn't. The girl's face, somehow familiar, lodged like a bone in her throat. She was impressing herself on her, haunting her, pleading to be seen.
She pulled on her robe and made her way downstairs, switching on all the lights as she went. She dug her journal out from the drawer of her desk and started to write, then frantically to sketch the face of the child . . .
She took the slip road off the M48 and drew into the car park of the Severn View service station for her early-morning rendezvous with McAvoy. He was leaning against his elderly black Ford smoking a cigarette. She pulled up in the space alongside and climbed out, the cold breeze biting into her cheeks.
He smiled through tired, red eyes that looked as if they'd seen little sleep.
'Will you look at you, fresh and beautiful at this godforsaken hour.'
'That'd be the three hours in make-up.'
'Modest, too.' He tossed down his cigarette butt and rubbed it out with his toe. 'You truly are one of nature's innocents.' He pushed back his hair with both hands and rolled his stiff shoulders. She could feel his hangover.
'Late night?'
'It's the people I have to do business with. They don't tend to keep conventional hours.' He shivered. 'The air con's busted in this heap - any chance I can come with you?'
'Didn't you say Madog was going to meet us here?'
'That's what I suggested. He seemed a little reticent. But I know he was on the early shift this morning. He should be about due his break.'
McAvoy's smell was an aromatic mix of cigarettes, whisky and a hint of perfume. With the heater on full it filled her little car and conjured images of cheap casinos and topless hostesses.
'Swing round onto the northbound carriageway and we'll end up at the canteen block this side of the plaza,' McAvoy said and opened his window a touch. 'Do you mind?'
'I've got some painkillers if you need them.'
'Thank you, but I'm superstitious about treating self- inflicted pain. I worry the devil'd only give it back to me twice over.'
She smiled and drove on in silence for a short while. 'You're serious?'
'Read your gospel of Matthew - nine separate mentions of hell. They can't all have been metaphorical.'
'You sound like my officer. She goes to an evangelical church—'
'Bad luck. No poetry or humility those people,' McAvoy said, interrupting her. 'Try going to confession once a fortnight and spilling your sins out to a celibate priest. There's something to put you in your place.'
'Is that what you do?'
'I try.'
Curious, Jenny said, 'How do you find that squares with your work? I know criminals need defending — '
'When I was in the jail, you know who visited me, gave money to the wife? My clients. From my upstanding colleagues, not a single damn word. We could have both been rotting for all they cared.'
'Maybe they didn't know what to say.'
'The thing about villains, they live with the consequences. Forget your sociology bullshit, no one understands right and wrong like they do. Your lawyers and politicians and businessmen, it's all arm's length with them. They're sipping Chablis while the wee girl's getting her legs blown off in Africa. It's not the robbers and thieves, it's those suited bastards who are the rulers of darkness of this world.'
She glanced across and saw the tension in his face.
'Sorry,' she said.
'Take no notice. I always rant like a madman when I've a sore head.'
'Only then?'
He gave her a pained smile. 'Shut up and drive.'
As they approached the English end of the bridge, McAvoy told her to pull over next to a single-storey building at the edge of the plaza just short of the toll booths. It was commuting time and traffic was heavy in both directions. He told her to sit tight while he found Madog.
She watched him approach a young woman in toll collector's uniform who came out of the building to light a cigarette. She looked uncertain as McAvoy gave his spiel and glanced suspiciously over at Jenny, before pointing to one of the booths in the middle of the plaza. McAvoy thanked her and cadged a light before hopping out between the queues of traffic, giving the finger to the driver of a Range Rover who took exception to being held up for half a second.
She didn't have a clear view, but she could see enough to realize that Madog was reluctant to stop work. She saw McAvoy rap on the glass and gesticulate, then finally step out into the toll lane and block it off with two plastic bollards. The angry chorus of car horns he provoked brought a supervisor hurrying out of the building. Jenny jumped out of the car and intercepted him.
'Excuse me, sir. Jenny Cooper, Severn Vale District Coroner. My colleague and I need to talk to one of your staff, Mr Frank Madog.'
'What?' He pointed to her car. 'Who said you could park there? It's an access lane.' The supervisor was in his early thirties, pasty, overweight and spoiling for a fight.
She thrust a hand in to her coat pocket and dug out a business card. 'I'm on an official investigation. Mr Madog is obliged to cooperate by law. I'd be grateful if you could arrange for him to come over.'
McAvoy's voice carried over the din, colourfully cursing the driver of the lorry that was nudging aggressively up to his bollards.
Ignoring the card, the supervisor said, 'Who's that bloody lunatic?'
Jenny said, 'I don't know. Why don't you take his registration?'
Judging by the tattoos on the backs of his hands, Frank Madog had a thing for Elvis. He'd swept his thin ginger hair into a semblance of a quiff and there was a hint of finger drapes about his overlong dandruff-scattered blazer, too roomy for his bony shoulders. That wasn't a patch of wall in the module of portable cabins which served as a temporary canteen for the bridge staff that wasn't decorated with a no smoking sign. Deprived of a cigarette, Madog's nicotine- stained fingers fiddled with the frames of his greasy glasses.
'You're not kidding it was a long time ago,' Madog said, 'more 'n eight years.'
'You remember my associate, Billy Dean, coming to talk to you in '03? Big bull of a guy. Bald, red face. Ugly looking.'
'I think so.' He sounded far from certain.
'Come on, Mr Madog, how often does collecting the tolls get you interviewed by a private investigator?'
Madog rubbed his forehead, showing yellow teeth as he grimaced. 'Like I said, I think I remember the man.'
Jenny threw McAvoy a look, urging him to go easy. This was an official visit by the coroner, after all.
He struck a reasonable tone: it was clearly a strain. 'I spoke with Mr Dean at the time, he gave me your details. He said you saw a black Toyota MPV coming through on the night of 28 June 2002. Two stocky-looking white men in the front, two Asian boys in the back. You told him it was an unusual sight - that's why you remembered.'
Madog looked at Jenny with a vague expression, as if this information only rang the faintest of bells. 'He's got a better memory than I have.'
'Actually he's dead,' McAvoy said, 'otherwise we'd have brought him along. His face would've jogged your memory all right.'
Jenny said, 'I would like you to do your best, Mr Madog. I will be calling you as a witness to my inquest.'
Madog's Adam's apple rose and fell in his crêpe throat. 'Look, I might have told your friend I saw a car, but I've had a lot of nights out since then if you know what I mean.' He tapped his temple. 'The old memory slips a cog now and again.'
Jenny sighed. 'Are you saying you don't remember the four men in the black Toyota? It's very important you tell the truth, Mr Madog.'
Madog looked from Jenny to McAvoy, and back again, his mouth beginning to work but failing to produce a sound.
Admiring Madog's tattoos, McAvoy said, 'It's his gospel stuff I like best. "Peace in the Valley" - you know that one?'
Madog gave a cautious nod.
McAvoy said, 'Do you remember how it goes? I've forgotten.'
Madog and Jenny traded a look.
'Come on, Frank,' McAvoy said, 'You know that one. Let me see now . . . "Well the morning's so bright and the lamb is the light, and the night is as black, as black as the sea.'" He began to sing, the words coming back to him in an unbroken stream. ' "And the beasts of the wild will be led by a child, and I'll be changed, changed from this creature that I am, oh yes indeed . . ."' He smiled. 'A beautiful message of hope. We're all going to change, Frank, and if he managed to avoid the hot place, even my friend Mr Dean'll have cheeks sweet enough to kiss by now.'
Jenny felt her face redden with embarrassment, but McAvoy was in full flow and not in any mood to stop.
'You see, the King was a deeply religious man, Frank, which is why I believe he did get to heaven despite all the drugs and girls and what have you. And I'm sure you'll agree that any true fan would hate to sully his precious memory by telling a lie, especially about such a grave and important matter.' He leaned forward across the table and placed his hand on top of Madog's. 'Can you imagine meeting him on the other side and trying to tell him why you didn't tell the whole truth? There's a mother down the road crying for her lost boy, Frank.'
Madog slowly eased his hand out from under McAvoy's.
'So what have you got to tell us?' McAvoy said.
'Who were they?' Madog said. 'What's this all about?'
Jenny said, 'As far as we know, they were just two young university students. They went missing, the police couldn't trace them and it's my job to find out if they're alive or dead. And if they are dead, how they died.'
'Oh. Right.' Madog rubbed his temples.
McAvoy gave him a moment, glanced at Jenny, then said, 'Someone else has spoken to you about this, haven't they? You're among friends now, Frank, we'll start with that, shall we?'
Madog looked up at Jenny. 'What happens with this information?'
'It helps me to find the truth. And if there's criminality involved, it may be used to assist a prosecution.'
'You are the coroner?'
'You've seen Mrs Cooper's picture in the Post, Frank. Check out her website - she hasn't even had herself airbrushed.'
Madog nodded. 'OK. Only your friend told me he was a detective. That's the only reason I spoke to him. He threatened to charge me if I didn't.'
McAvoy said, 'I apologize posthumously on his behalf. He was good to his wife and kids.'
Jenny opened the legal pad she had waiting in front of her, 'All right, Mr Madog - when you're ready.'
'It was like I told your man way back when - I saw a black Toyota, two white fellas in the front, about eleven o'clock at night. One of them, the driver, was kind of thickset with a shaved head. The passenger had a ponytail.'
'What age were they?' Jenny said.
'Thirties . . . And the two lads in the back were both Asians. Bearded, but young looking - teenagers almost.'
'What made you notice them?'
'I suppose they seemed scared. One of them looked at me with these big brown eyes almost like he was trying to say something.'
'Did anyone in the car speak to you?'
'Nothing. Not a word. That's another thing - you usually get a thank you. I make a point of being cheerful to the customers . . .' He paused to recall. 'No, this fella had a face like thunder. A real tough nut.' He swallowed, anxious. 'But it was the other one who came after me.'
Jenny glanced up. 'What?'
'About a week later. I was leaving the house with my granddaughter. Six years old she was at the time. I was taking her home to her mammy's on a Saturday afternoon. We'd got in the car outside the house and this fella with the ponytail knocked on the passenger window. I wound down the window and he leaned in, smiling, and said, "Anyone asks, you never saw us." Then he brings out this can of orange paint and sprays it all over my granddaughter's hair. She was screaming. He didn't stop . . .' Madog shook his head. 'I had to wash it out with turpentine. Took all morning.'
'You didn't report this to the police?' Jenny said.
Madog said, 'If you'd've been there you wouldn't ask that. I'm telling you, he was spraying that paint and smiling:
'But did you tell all this to Mr Dean?'
'Not the paint bit. I swear to God, to this day even my daughter still doesn't know.'
'This man must have really scared you,' Jenny said.
'Yeah, he was like a . . . like—'
'The devil in disguise?' McAvoy said.
'You shouldn't take that kind of crap from people,' McAvoy said. 'You're the coroner, for God's sake - more powers than a High Court judge.'
'Hardly.'
'Look 'em up. If you'd got the balls you'd use them.'
Jenny glanced across at him as she swung the Golf back up the slip road to the service station. He was good-looking in a battered kind of way, but not a man you'd trust to mind your handbag. There was something of the con artist about him: the suit was good, but you couldn't be sure if that wasn't all there was to him.
'So what are you going to do? This guy with the ponytail sounds like an evil son of a bitch. A real professional, thought all the psychology through. Spray paint on a kiddy's head - sweet Jesus.'
'I'll get my officer to take Madog's statement and call him as a witness.'
'And what are the jury going to do with that? You've got to find this Toyota surely, and the ponytail fella.'
'A black Toyota? There must be thousands of them.'
'You'd be surprised. Probably only a few hundred the same model. Break them down geographically. There aren't many places you'd be going over the old Severn Bridge to get to - all the road does is head up the border country.' He slammed his hand on the dash for emphasis. 'You've got to find out who these people are, not give them a chance to get away by wheeling Madog into court before you've tracked them down. I'll give you a hand, it's got my blood up again.'
Jenny thought about it. His passion was infectious. 'Maybe it wouldn't hurt. Most of the jury didn't look in any hurry to get back to their day jobs.'
'That's the way.' He grinned. 'Good girl.'
Jenny turned into the near-empty car park, her mind swimming with questions about who the men in the front of the Toyota might have been. But could she even be sure Madog was telling the truth? She glanced at McAvoy again and realized she didn't know what to believe in his presence, he seemed to alter reality around him. She wouldn't be able to think straight until she'd got away. She pulled up next to his car.
'Buy you a coffee?' he said.
'I'd better not. Work, you know—'
'I took you for a free spirit, Mrs Cooper.'
There was suddenly an atmosphere between them. The way he was looking at her with smiling, perceptive eyes, he seemed to know her, to reach under her skin. She felt hot and mildly panicked.
'Another time. I'll be in touch . . . And thanks.'
McAvoy nodded as if he understood the many reasons for her reticence entirely. He reached for the door handle, then paused. 'Oh, I forgot to mention it to you - standing in the inquest yesterday, I remembered Mrs Jamal once saying she suspected Nazim had a girlfriend.'
'She knew about Dani James?'
'No, I think she was talking about earlier, months before that.'
'She hasn't said anything to me.'
'Ask her.' He smiled, said, 'God bless,' and stepped out into the freezing wind.
Alison was still smarting from the premature adjournment of the inquest. Jenny guessed that she'd had Pironi on the phone asking what the hell was going on, and that in the conflict of loyalties Pironi had won. She had evidently spent her first two hours at work tidying: her office was immaculate apart from the overspilling tray on the corner of her desk reserved for Jenny's messages and mail.
Sorting the critical items from the merely urgent, Jenny ignored her officer's frostiness and told her about her trip to the toll plaza with McAvoy. Alison listened, unimpressed, as Jenny announced that she had decided to make finding the Toyota and its occupants a priority before resuming the inquest.
'And when might that happen?' Alison said.
'I thought we'd agreed Monday.'
'Have you any idea how long it takes to get any joy out of the vehicle licensing people at Swansea? It's like Stalin's Kremlin.'
