The Work of a Narrow Mind

by Faith Martin

  He took his drink to a table and sipped it, but barely imbibed any of the liquid. Since he was driving, the last thing he needed was to be pulled over and lose his licence. From time to time he saw the barman watching him curiously, and Jake, with an inner satisfied smile, thought he could understand why. For the bartender, a middle-aged, balding man with an enormous beer gut, was finding it hard to place him. He was not a regular, that was for sure, not when he was wearing more on the little finger of his left hand than the cost of the average semi-detached around here. Nor was he one of Medcalfe’s lads. And he didn’t look like the usual tourist – although he might have been one of those crazy Americans who liked to splash their cash.

  Jake just hoped, a shade uneasily, that he didn’t smell of cop. He didn’t know how true it was that hardened criminals could spot a cop a mile off, and had always been inclined to regard that as something of an urban myth that should be taken with a good pinch of salt. Nevertheless, he consoled himself with the thought that, since he wasn’t a cop, not even technically, he couldn’t possibly look like one. Could he? Unless hanging around the Thames Valley HQ for the past few months had somehow rubbed off on him?

  He was spared further pointless worry when Darren strolled through to the bar, folding a wad of his billiards winnings into his back pocket as he shouldered up to the bar. Jake heard him ask for the barman for the same again, and noticed the older man dip his head and say something quietly into his ear as he handed over a pint.

  Darren sat casually on the nearest barstool and took a gulp and, sure enough, casually turned to glance Jake’s way.

  Jake took a sip of his drink, let his eyes meet those of the skinhead for the briefest of seconds, then casually looked away again. He hoped he’d judged it just right. He didn’t want to come across as a rival gang member off his turf or – worse still a gay man, hopelessly out of his depth and trawling for love and affection in all the wrong places. That would get him a certain part of his anatomy quickly handed back to him on a plate.

  On the other hand, he’d needed to do just enough to be sure that he’d made contact. To have Chivnor clock him, check him out, and wonder about him. And that, Jake was pretty sure, he’d managed to do.

  That was all he needed, for now. He was in no rush, but it meant that, the next time their paths crossed, Chivnor would remember him, and Jake intended their paths would cross again in the very near future.

  He left his drink almost untouched on the table, and got up. That gesture alone ensured that several pairs of eyes turned his way in surprise. Jake would have been willing to bet a four-figure sum that no customer of the Dog and Duck had ever failed to sup up before, and he wondered which of the room’s drinkers would snaffle his glass first.

  As he walked to the door and passed through, he made sure that he glanced at the bar again. Yes! Chivnor was still watching him, his eyes curious and slightly mocking. His gaze, however, quickly dropped to the gold chain around Jake’s neck and Jake clearly sensed the envy in the quality of the narrow-eyed look that returned to his face.

  Jake allowed himself to give the merest fraction of a nod. It could have meant anything. A vague hello, or merely an acknowledgement that his bling had been clocked and duly respected.

  He saw the wiry young thug’s eyes narrow, then he was through the door and gone. His heart was thumping deep in his chest and he felt slightly sick. When he got in the Porsche, his fingers shook just a little as he turned the ignition key. He pulled away a shade too fast, making sure to rev the engine as he did so. He hoped the throaty roar of the sports car had been audible inside. He wanted Chivnor to know that he had a classy ride.

  His mouth felt dry as he signalled left, and in the driving mirror he saw himself give a definitely shaky smile. Hell, if just being in the same room as one of Dale Medcalfe’s goons was enough to give him this many jitters, he needed to toughen up and grow a backbone fast.

  As he drove back to the familiar safety and civilization of his north Oxford mansion, Jake Barnes couldn’t help but think that Hillary Greene would almost certainly have been able to out-stare the skinhead thug without even breaking a sweat.

  The next morning, Wendy Turnbull was definitely feeling the effects of the night before. Usually she didn’t go out much on weekdays, and certainly didn’t push the boat out enough to have to need to take a taxi home, but when she’d got home from work the previous evening, Barbara had been all dolled up and with somewhere far more special to go than the impromptu student mini-rave, which she’d claimed to be her destination. Wendy herself certainly wouldn’t waste a glamorous turquoise onesie on a wind-blown gig in some out of the way barn or skanky warehouse. No, that number just begged for a little one-on-one action.

  Did Babs really think she was that dumb?

  Instead of calling her on it as she should have done, she’d chickened out and let her go off, blithely spouting her lies and promises to be home by one. Which she hadn’t been of course. Wendy had tossed and turned till gone four before the little madam had wandered home, smelling of a perfume that had somehow miraculously morphed into a different brand from the one she’d been wearing when she’d left.

  Wendy, of course, had pretended to be sound asleep when the Chinese girl had slid ever so carefully into bed beside her.

  Now, as she drove into work, she was still berating herself for being an emotional coward. At some point there’d have to be a showdown. She just couldn’t have Babs thinking she could two-time her whilst at the same time living rent-free at her place, using her like a sugar-mommy. Wendy was far too strapped for cash herself for that! Love was one thing; keeping a dolly bird was another thing altogether!

  At least she’d had enough self-respect not to stay in all night pining for her, Wendy thought now with some satisfaction. She had, in fact, ventured into Oxford to paint a few nightclubs red and, as a result, just might have picked herself up an admirer.

  Trev Ballantyne. A nice name, Wendy thought now, recalling his face through something of a wine-blunted fuzz. A student from Brasenose College, or so he claimed. Mind you, Wendy hadn’t been so sozzled that she’d just taken that claim at face value. Around Oxford, a lot of low-lifes pretended to be something they were not, and all of them with an eye to the main chance. On the other hand, he had been in with a bunch of mates, all around his age, whom he claimed were his rowing buddies. And when Wendy had checked with some of the waiters, they’d confirmed their bona fides.

  Now, as Wendy parked her Mini in a careful spot near an end row, thus diminishing her baby’s chances of picking up any dings or dents from other careless parkers, she shut off the engine with a world-weary sigh.

  Tall, strapping, Trev Ballantyne certainly had a rower’s upper body strength, with a mop of attractive blond hair to top it off. He spoke with something of an upper class accent, true, but then, Wendy supposed with a sigh, it was Oxford. What else could she expect? On the plus side, he was studying juris-prudence, and had seemed genuinely interested in her job working with the police.

  Of course that might have been just a come on, a bit of mindless flattery to butter her up with an eye on a mere one-night stand, but Wendy hoped not. At least he’d been gentlemanly enough to see her into a taxi, and had asked her for her tele-phone number, which were all good signs.

  She just wished she could remember whether or not she’d given it to him. By the end of the evening, things were becoming a little vague.

  Still, she realized, with a spurt of sudden practical thinking, she knew where she could find him if she wanted to make the first move. Brasenose wasn’t a college that she knew particularly well, but with a bit of luck, she soon might. It had been quite some time since she’d bothered with some boy-on-girl action, so it was high time she got back into the swing of it. And a hunky, blond Sloane-Ranger rower was just what she needed to show Babs that two could play at that game.

  She was still smiling gently around her slightly thumping head when she walked down the stairs and into the rabbit-wa
rren of a basement, where the CRT hung out. When she walked into the communal office however, everyone was already there ahead of her, and Hillary Greene was standing in the doorway, chatting to Jimmy.

  Wendy shot a panic-stricken glance at her watch. She’d not been too drunk to remember to set her alarm, but perhaps the hangover had slowed her down? She felt a brief rush of relief when she saw that it was not yet nine.

  Jake Barnes grinned at her over Hillary’s shoulder, making the boss look around and make room for her.

  ‘Guv,’ Wendy said brightly, as she slipped by, hoping her gold-and-black eye make-up had successfully hidden all signs of last night’s ravages and excesses from her face. She’d pulled on a heavy leather studded jacket over a pair of black leggings, patterned with tiny crucifixes, and a red and black lace bustier. She’d dyed the tips of her spiky hair red to go out last night, and she was confident that it still looked good.

  Hillary eyed the Goth in full regalia and smiled. Given the girl’s outfit, the following few hours should prove very interesting indeed. ‘Ah, Wendy, just the woman I was looking for. Fancy going to prison?’ she asked brightly.

  Wendy drove happily through the Berkshire Downs towards Hampshire, her mind teeming with images of what a Victorian prison should be. She knew that the place they were going to wasn’t one of the really high-security places, as Robbie Grant was in for robbery, not murder. But the penal place down by the coast was one of the older specimens, and therefore must still retain some of the brooding menace of her imagination.

  Think Sherlock Holmes on Dartmoor with an escaped convict on the loose, or Bram Stoker’s mental institution in Dracula, she thought happily, as she urged the Mini on towards the south coast.

  Beside her, Hillary was far more prosaically reading Robbie Grant’s rap sheet. As DI Jarvis had reported, he’d started off with the usual petty stuff – shop-lifting, mugging, before, not long after his sixteenth birthday, progressing to burglary and then robbery.

  He was currently inside for holding up a post office in Swindon. His sawn-off shotgun, however, had proved to be unloaded, which had resulted in him getting a three year stretch instead of the ten she, and everyone else in law enforcement, thought that he should have got. He’d been inside for six months, and, with the over-crowding situation in prisons being like it was, she wouldn’t have been accused of undue cynicism if she expected him to be out sometime in the middle of next year.

  Next time, the shotgun might be loaded.

  ‘Sometimes I despair.’

  She only realized she’d spoken the thought out loud, when Wendy said curiously, ‘Despair of what, guv?’

  ‘Our judicial system,’ Hillary said shortly. ‘You need to turn off the main road up here.’ She’d had to visit this particular example of Her Majesty’s Pleasure on a number of occasions before, and vaguely remembered the way. And she’d rather trust her memory than the satnav, any day.

  About half an hour later, Wendy found herself pulling up to a set of chain-link gates. Suddenly, she felt unaccountably nervous, her hands on the steering wheel becoming damp with sweat.

  Beyond her, the prison was everything that she could have hoped for. The dark brooding November sky was filled with threatening rain-clouds, and the mammoth, brick-built building, with its rows of anonymous, small, barred windows, gave her the delicious shivers. But there was something far too normal and banally realistic about the modern guardhouses and barriers, and the uniformed prison guards, which ruined the experience for her.

  The whole place seemed to reek of dispirited realism, rather than Gothic grandeur.

  After they’d been thoroughly vetted, and had their IDs checked and been allowed to park the Mini in the requisite car-park, Wendy could feel her heart begin to thump unpleasantly. She tried to tell herself that it was just the result of her lingering hangover, but she knew it wasn’t. There was definitely an air of institutionalised apathy and hopelessness about the place that dragged her down.

  Inside, the feeling of unease grew worse. The old, bulging, cream-plastered walls should have radiated cold menace, but instead radiators made it pleasantly warm. Too warm; she felt herself beginning to sweat. The floors of undistinguished grey lino smelled cleanly of Flash floor liquid, and the men who were pushing mops about, and looked up at them curiously as they passed, looked less mad, bad, and dangerous to know, as merely listlessly bored. Nevertheless, Wendy could feel them watching her. Without realizing it, as they followed their escort down to the day room, where the prisoner was expecting them, Wendy moved a little closer to Hillary in a subconscious plea for protection. Her heart thumped a little harder, and she felt the beginnings of an itch of panic creeping up her spine.

  Hillary, who hadn’t missed the girl’s growing unease, glanced across at her sympathetically. ‘Feeling a little claustrophobic?’ she commiserated quietly.

  Wendy shot her a thankful look. ‘I suppose I am, guv. A little bit sick, too, if I’m honest.’

  Hillary nodded. ‘Don’t fret it. Everybody feels the same way when they first come to one of these places. I know I did. You can’t help but get the notion in the back of your head that perhaps some kind of really hideous mistake will be made, and they won’t let you out again.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Wendy breathed out explosively, and managed a not-quite amused laugh. ‘Like there’ll be the giant computer cock-up of all time, and my name will somehow jump from the visitors’ section to the inmate section. And then some female warden who looks like Ernest Borgnine will welcome me to a cell and tell me that I’ll be collecting my old age pension before I see the light of day again.’

  Hillary grinned. ‘Don’t worry. This place is still currently men only. So even if some mad hacker with a grudge against you somehow managed to fiddle the system, somebody would smell a rat.’

  ‘Yeah. Unless they think I’m in drag,’ Wendy muttered, her eyes still on the back of the prison officer in front of them. He was a tall, fifty-something man who had a bearing so military, that he might just as well have had ‘old soldier’ tattooed on his forehead. Although she was only speaking in a whisper, she had the feeling that he was listening to their conversation, and probably laughing up his sleeve at them.

  They passed through several barred, locked gates, and every time the prison officer had to use one of the keys in the vast bunch that was chained to his belt, Wendy flinched.

  The further they went inside, the more she felt the panicky feeling threatening to overwhelm her. Knowing that she wasn’t the only one who’d ever felt this way, did little to comfort her. So when they stepped into a square, brightly lit room, scattered about with tables and chairs, and with daylight streaming in on two sides, she felt a little better. There was table tennis set-up in one corner, and a large, wide-screen television was going in another. Several men, with women and children who were obviously visiting family members, sat around the tables, chatting. It reminded Wendy vaguely of any sort of day room at either a hospital, or a college, or some other public building. The prisoners weren’t even wearing any kind of a uniform, but normal clothes. There was the smell of coffee in the air, and several kids were playing in an area that had obviously been specially designated for them, and kitted out with simple plastic toys in bright, primary colours.

  Only the presence of several men dressed in black trousers and white shirts with black epaulettes, standing at the doors and keeping a watchful eye over the people within, told the true story of where they were.

  ‘Grant is over there.’ The prison officer spoke and led them to a table where a lone male sat watching them approach. He was in his late twenties, Hillary gauged, and looked nothing like his mother. No doubt Mary Rose was thankful for that now, and remembering the woman living her respectable new life in her swanky new house, she couldn’t see her ever visiting here.

  ‘Robbie Grant?’ Hillary asked, nodding a ‘thank you’ to the prison officer, who turned and strolled casually towards a hatch area set back in the far wall, no doubt to have
a cup of coffee and keep an eye on them. She held out her ID to Robbie Grant, who stirred himself enough to actually look at it. Not easy, when he looked almost terminally bored.

  He had lanky brown hair and vaguely brown eyes, and was draped over the hard-backed chair as if he was boneless. Dressed in faded jeans and a black T-shirt, he was one of those men who looked as if they were constantly smirking at the world, the sort that made you just itch to kick their shins to get rid of that couldn’t-care-less attitude.

  His eyes shifted to Wendy, and widened at little at the Goth outfit. Then the smirk was back.

  ‘I was told you wanted to see me. About my gran, yeah?’ He absently scratched his chin, which needed a shave. ‘You still trying to find out who done her in then? I thought you lot had given up. On account of it was too much for your poor coppers’ brains.’

  Hillary sat down and indicated for Wendy to do the same. ‘No murder case is ever closed, Robbie. I’m a retired DI, and I work cold cases. I’m going to do my best to get justice for your grandmother. Do you care about that?’

  She looked across at him steadily. He managed to rouse himself out of his terminal lethargy enough to actually shrug one shoulder. ‘I s’pose,’ he drawled.

  Hillary knew why he’d agreed to see them of course. A visitor, any visitor, relieved the monotony of their day-to-day existence, so she didn’t pay his Oscar-winning performance of indifference much mind. Inside, he was as alert and interested as a cat at a mousehole, of that she had no doubt. Their visit was probably as much entertainment as he’d had since arriving here.

  ‘Did you do it?’ she asked flatly. ‘Did you kill your old gran?’

  For a second his eyes flashed, then he smirked again. ‘Nah. I liked the old bird, didn’t I? She always gave me money for fags when I was a nipper.’

  ‘Had you seen her recently? Before she was murdered?’

  ‘Nah. Hadn’t been around … dunno. Might have seen her the Christmas before. She usually bought me something nice, Christmas and my birthday, like.’