Living Proof r-7

by John Harvey

  They both knew, whatever his intentions, he most probably would not.

  Cathy gave him her card regardless and he slipped it down into the top pocket of his coat.

  "See you then."

  "Yes, see you."

  For some minutes he stood and watched her go, a tall woman with cropped red hair, wearing a red silk shirt, blue jeans and heeled boots, walking away.

  At a little short of nine the next morning, Sarah Farleigh was sitting in Resnick's office, black leather handbag resting in her lap. She was wearing a black suit that looked new, hemline stretched across her knees.

  "Asked to see you, sir," Naylor explained outside.

  "In the circumstances, I thought you'd not mind."

  "Okay, Kevin. That's fine."

  There was a moment to look at her, through the glass, before she turned. One of her hands moving distractedly from her side to the brooch on the lapel of her coat, from the corner of her mouth to a stray twist of hair.

  "Sarah." As he entered she rose and came towards him and, although he held out his hand, she moved inside it and gave him a brief hug.

  Where her face had rested on his sleeve, it had left a smudge of make-up and, stepping back, she brushed it away.

  "Is there any news?"

  "News?"

  "The woman have you caught her?"

  "Not yet." Resnick went round behind his desk and sat down.

  "I don't suppose you've any idea why she did it?"

  "Not really. Not till we talk to her."

  "And if you don't?"

  "We will."

  "You sound sure."

  "Murders," Resnick said, 'one area where our clear-up rate is good. "

  "I thought that was usually the what do you call it? family ones?"

  "Domestics. Yes, I suppose it is. More often than not' Sarah had resumed her seat and retrieved her bag from the floor. Now she opened it and took out a photograph, square and a little creased, bent at the edges.

  "I don't know what I was doing, looking through stuff of Peter's, I suppose, and I found this." She leaned forward and placed it on the desk, for Resnick to swivel round.

  It showed Sarah and Ben Riley in a rowing boat, Sarah leaning back, her face, sharper-featured than now, smiling out from beneath the brim of a large, white sun-hat. Ben had the oars in his hands, a cigarette dangling from one side of his mouth. He looked the phrase leapt immediately to Resnick's mind, somewhat archaic, but appropriate – as pleased as Punch.

  "You know where that was taken, don't you?"

  Resnick looked again. There was a small, curved bridge in the background, flowering shrubs.

  "It's up by the university, isn't it?

  The lake? "

  "That's right. And you know who's behind the camera."

  No, I don't think so. "

  "It's you."

  He looked at it once more, trying to cast back.

  "I'm sorry, I'm afraid I don't remember." He made to give the photograph back to her, but she held up her hand and shook her head.

  "Keep it."

  "Well, I…"

  "I thought you might like it. You never know, you might see Ben some time. Or write…"

  "Okay. Thanks." Resnick glanced at it again before sliding it into the drawer to the right of his desk.

  "If you don't find her, this woman, I mean, suppose it takes a long time it could now, couldn't it? – what happens about the body?"

  "As I told you when I phoned, it remains the property of the coroner."

  "But not forever. What if you never find her?"

  "Sarah, I don't think that'll be the case. Believe me."

  "So I can't bury him?"

  "Not yet. I'm sorry."

  For several moments, she closed her eyes; body held taut.

  "A memorial service, then. That's what I'll do. There'll have to be something."

  Resnick was on his feet.

  "As long as you think you're up to it, that sounds a good idea."

  "Thanks." This time, she was the one offering her hand and he took it.

  "You will come?" she said.

  "Of course."

  Sarah smiled her thanks.

  "I'll see you out."

  "Nice car," Resnick said, as Sarah unlocked the Volvo. He said it as much to make conversation as anything else; since leaving his office, she had fallen quiet. Not that that surprised him; he was glad to see her coping as well as she seemed to be.

  "It was Peter's. I've got an old Flat, just for nipping about, locally. Longer distances, I use this if I can. It's a lot more reliable."

  "Well, take care, Sarah. Drive safely. And you will let me know about the memorial service?"

  Millington met him on the stairs.

  "Call from Sheffield, possible sighting of the Kinoulton woman; sounds promising. Local CID're running it down."

  "Good."

  "Oh, and the report's in on that blouse found at the house. It was blood. And it is the same group as Farleigh's."

  Sheffield, not for the first time, was a wash-out. As were Birmingham, Bradford, the Chapeltown district of Leeds. There was a twice-confirmed rumour that Marlene Kinoulton had been working the streets of Butetown, down near the Cardiff docks. A Vice Squad officer had warned her off, only recognising her from the circulated description when it was too late; a bevy of the local girls had backed her into a corner and given her a tonguelashing, warned her to piss off out of their territory or they'd get one of the pimps to see to her face and legs.

  Millington and Divine drove down to Cardiff; Mark Divine pleased at the chance to make a rugby player's pilgrimage to Cardiff Arms Park.

  It was about the only part of the trip that worked out well. The cooperation which the local force had promised was dissipated in a miasma of broken promises and missed appointments. They did persuade one of the runners working for a high- flown dealer to talk to them over a late-night biriani and chips. Marlene Kinoulton he swore he'd seen just two nights before, sold her the last two rocks he'd had.

  Millington and Divine stayed another couple of days | and, as far as they were able, turned the underbelly of the city upside down.

  Afterwards, only one thing seemed certain: Marlene Kinoulton had been there and now she had gone.

  Resnick allowed Marian Witczak to talk him into accompanying her to a midsummer dance at the Polish Club and, 265 after several generous glasses of bison grass vodka, remembered how to polka. A card from Cathy Jordan, a street scene in Dublin, reminded him that he had still to finish Dead Weight and, between other things, he got not quite to the end, but almost.

  Debbie Naylor waylaid Kevin one night with a bottle of wine and something racy she'd bought from an advertisement in the back of the Sunday paper and now she woke in the mornings with carry-cots and Babygros dancing before her eyes.

  Kate Skelton, who not so long before had driven her parents close to despair, shoplifting to pay for her drug problem, astonished them by getting three good A levels and applying to university.

  Sharon Gamett applied to be transferred from the Vice Squad into CID and her application was turned down.

  Lyim Kellogg came into Resnick's office one morning at the end of July and told him she was seriously thinking about moving back to Bast Anglia and had been sounding out an old friend about a vacancy in a Norwich force. "

  "Can we talk about this?" Resnick said. He felt as if something solid was being pulled out from beneath his feet. He felt something he didn't understand.

  "Of course," Lynn said, and waited.

  "I meant, I suppose I meant, not here."

  "You're busy." His desk was the usual clutter of reports and forms, empty sandwich bags.

  "Yes. No. It's not that. I suppose… well, to be honest, you've taken me by surprise."

  "Yes, well, it's nothing definite yet, although…" She stopped, reminded of the look that had come into her father's eyes, the first time she had told him she was applying to join the police.

  "How about a dr
ink then?" she said.

  "If you want to talk it through."

  "It's a long time since you were at the coffee stall,"

  266 Resnick said.

  "They've just about given up asking where you've got to."

  Lynn smiled; just a little, not too much; just with the eyes.

  "All right."

  Amongst the other things on Resnick's desk, unopened, the invitation to the service at Wymeswold Church dedicated to the memory of Peter Farieigh.

  He thought she'd changed her mind. Several of the stall holders had taken in the goods that hung around the outside of their sections and pulled down the metal sides. Resnick had read the cricket report in the local paper twice.

  "Sorry," Lynn said, a little out of breath, her cheeks flushed with colour for the first time in weeks.

  "Something cropped up."

  "Important?"

  "No, just fiddly."

  "Here," the assistant said, setting down a cappuccino, 'for you the first one free. "

  "Thanks," Lynn said, 'but best not. " She pushed a pound coin across the counter and grinned.

  "Probably consitutes a bribe."

  Now they were there, there was no rush to talk. Resnick sipped his espresso as Lynn tasted the chocolatey froth from a cheap metal spoon. With a thump and clatter, another stall was locked away for the night.

  "Your dad," Resnick finally said.

  "Is that the problem?"

  "How d'you mean?"

  "The reason you're thinking of moving back."

  "Oh, partly, yes. In a way."

  "I thought he was better. Doing okay. Stable, at least."

  "He is. But cancer, you know, so hard not to think, whatever the doctors say, it's not going to come back. Somewhere else."

  "There's no sign, though?"

  "No, not yet No. Touch wood." She glanced around. The couple who ran the corner vegetable stall were laughing together, lighting up, just for a moment holding hands.

  "It's my mum, more."

  She's not ill? "

  Lynn shook her head.

  "Just works herself up into such a state."

  Resnick finished his coffee; wondered if there were time for one more.

  "That's the reason, then? To be near your mother, close?"

  Lynn drank some of her cappuccino.

  "Not really, no."

  Something had begun pressing against the inside of Resnick's left temple, urgent, hard.

  Lynn tried to choose her words with care.

  "Ever since what happened.

  When I was. taken prisoner. I can't stop, haven't been able to stop myself, well, thinking. "

  "That's only natural…"

  "I know. Yes, I know. And Petra says… That's my doctor. Petra Carey. She says I have to take time, open myself to it; she says there's a lot I have to talk myself through."

  'like what? "

  "Like you."

  Resnick's left eye blinked. If the assistant turned around, he would order another espresso, but, of course, the man continued stubbornly washing down the counter at the other side.

  Lynn was speaking again, her voice measured, trying to talk the way she would to Petra Carey if Petra Carey were there.

  "Tied up there at night, in the caravan, never knowing when he might come in. Knowing what had happened to that other girl, knowing what he'd done, what he might do. I was scared, of course I was scared. Terrified. Though I knew the last thing I could afford to do was show it. To him. And underneath it all, somehow I'm not sure, I was dreaming a lot of the time, I think I must have been; trying not to let myself fall asleep, but not being able to stop myself-but somehow there was always this idea that it would be all right, that someone no, you – that you would come and God, it sounds pathetic now, doesn't it, hearing myself say this but that you would come and save me." For a moment, Lynn pressed her face into her hands and closed her eyes.

  "Except," she went on, 'it wasn't always you. It wasn't as straightforward as that. Sometimes, I would think it was you but then when I saw your face, it was my dad.

  You were. my dad. " She shook her head, low towards her hands, which were folded over one another now, beside her cup.

  "It isn't even that simple. There are things, other things, I can't, I don't want to say."

  Resnick put one hand over hers, ready to retract it if she pulled away.

  "I haven't been able to talk to you," Lynn said, not looking at him, looking away.

  "Not really talk, not since it happened."

  "I know."

  "I just haven't felt comfortable, being with you."

  "No."

  "And it's difficult. So bloody difficult!" With surprise, the assistant looked round at her raised voice.

  "And I hate it."

  "Yes," Resnick said, taking away his hand. And then, "So this is why you want to go; this rather than your mother, anything at home."

  "Oh, they want me back there, of course. My dad doesn't say so, but my mum, she'd love it. But if it wasn't for this other business, no, I don't think I'd go."

  "And you don't think we could work it out. Somehow, between us, I mean. Maybe, now you've started talking about it?"

  "That's what Petra says."

  "That you, we, should talk it over?"

  Lynn nodded, still not looking at him.

  "Yes." And when Resnick was silent, she asked him what he was thinking.

  "I was wondering why you hadn't felt able to come to me before?"

  "You're hurt, aren't you?"

  "By that? Yes, I suppose I am."

  "She said you would be. But, I don't know, I just couldn't' " You were afraid of what I'd say? "

  "No. What I would."

  Resnick's intention, that evening, had been to go along to the refurbished Old Vie and listen to the new Stan Tracey Duo. But by the time he'd fed the cats, fiddled around with a smoked ham and stilton sandwich, he didn't seem to feel like going out. Sitting on the back step with a bottle of Czech Budweiser, he found out how Annie Q. Jones was getting on, embroiled in plot and counter-plot in the last fifty pages of Dead Weight. Poor Annie, sapped on the head from behind, going down a narrow side street in pitch darkness at least she had her lover to provide a little comfort in the small hours.

  His neighbours, also enjoying the light, pleasantly warm evening, had thrown open their windows and were treating him to muffled television laughter and the smell of chicken frying. Resnick finished his beer, took the book back inside, page at the start of the final chapter folded down, and set off to walk down into the city.

  He arrived at the pub in time for the last two numbers. Stan Tracey, bunched over the keyboard, angularly maneuvering his way through "Sophisticated Lady', taking-the tune into seemingly impossible blind alleys and then escaping through a mixture of finesse and sheer power. Finally, Tracey and an absurdly young-looking Gerard Presencer on trumpet had elided their way along a John Coltrane blues, the audacity ofPresencer's imagination more than matched by his technique.

  Just once, in the middle of the trumpeter's solo, eyes closed, Resnick had seen a perfect vision of Lynn, her face, round and open and close to his. And then it had gone. While the applause was still trickling away, he lifted his empty glass and set it down by the end of the bar, nodded towards the landlord, and made his way towards the door.

  Back home again. Bud nestled in beside his feet, Resnick finished the book: / know that Reigler has suffered another stroke, but still I'm not prepared for what I find. One side of his body seems totally paralysed, the same side of his face sunken and lined, one dark eye staring out. His speech is slurred, but I get thejist. As confessions go this one's pretty simple and to the point. He nods when he's finished and I switch off the tape that's been resting on one arm of his wheelchair.

  Seems he's got one more request.

  I don't know why I should raise a finger for him and then I find out what it is.

  The gun is in the drawer and I'm careful only to handle it with the gloves
I conveniently have in the pocket of my coat. There's a wind got up from the ocean and the temperature has plummeted. There's one shell in the chamber and just a moment of doubt when I think it might be intended for me, but one more look at his wrecked body and I know that's not the case.

  The trigger mechanism seems light, though even so, I'm not convinced, the state that he's in, he's going to be able to find enough pressure, but I figure that's his problem, not mine.

  I hear the gunshot as I'm climbing into my car, and I guess it's worked out all right. I don't go back. There'll be a call box on my way home and I can pull over and perform my anonymous civic duty. I risk the last ten miles way above the limit. I know Diane's going to have something ready, maybe even something we can eat in bed. and I don't want to keep her waiting.

  Well, no longer than she finds enjoyable.

  So that was how it ended, he thought, clear-cut and happy, no loose ends. With a wry smile, Resnick closed the book and reached across to switch off the light.

  Forty-eight

  The church was small and most of the pews were filled with the Farleigh family and neighbours, Peter Farleigh's colleagues from work and a few representatives of organisations he had regularly supplied.

  After several hymns, carefully chosen but randomly sung, the vicar spoke with a pious briskness of Peter's devotion as husband and father, his dedication and selflessness as a breadwinner, the admiration and respect with which he was held within the community.

  The managing director of Farleigh's firm, who turned out to be Japanese, talked briefly and in perfect, Oxford-accented English of his late- lamented model employee. Then the youngest Farleigh daughter, wearing a long, loose-skirted floral dress, sang "Where Have All the Flowers Gone', accompanying herself on the guitar.

  People cried.

  Resnick stood in line to grasp Sarah's hand and kiss her on the cheek, express his condolences to her children, strung out awkwardly beside her.

  "You will come back to the house afterwards?" He looked into her red-rimmed eyes and agreed.

  There were scarcely more than a dozen there when Resnick arrived: immediate family, and the vicar, exchanging pieties with Peter's mother, who had the good fortune to be profoundly deaf.

  Resnick ate several skimpy sandwiches, making them more palatable by taking separate triangles of tongue and cheese and pressing them together. He chatted in a desultory manner with Peter and Sarah's son, who replied in monotones and couldn't wait to get away.