In the Dark

by Mark Billingham

  ‘You’re probably better off if he stays in your head,’ Kelly said. ‘Frank Linnell isn’t really someone you want to get close to.’

  ‘Now I really want to know.’

  Though Kelly had never actively worked on any Organised Crime Unit, he knew enough to give Helen a potted history: the swathes of south-east London that Linnell’s organisation controlled; the list of charges that never stuck; the methods used to secure contracts for his assorted building and development companies. ‘Not the nicest individual in the world, you know?’

  ‘OK, thanks . . .’

  ‘You doing a bit of undercover work for Organised Crime, then?’ He laughed. ‘It’s a bloody good cover.’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘The whole pregnancy thing. Certainly had me fooled.’

  Helen laughed too, but it was an effort. ‘It was just a name somebody mentioned, I think. Must have been Paul, I suppose. Although he’s never had much to do with any of that stuff, has he?’

  ‘Not as far as I know. But, to tell you the truth, last few months I’ve not had a clue what he’s been up to.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘He was just a bit . . . distracted, I think. What with the baby and everything.’

  ‘What do you mean “been up to”?’

  Kelly sounded reluctant, but Helen pushed until he told her about the amount of time Paul had spent away from the station. His vague explanations when confronted. What he had said about an old case that was causing him some grief. Though Kelly never said as much, Helen could hear in his voice that he hadn’t believed a word of it.

  ‘I’m sure you’re right,’ Helen said. ‘He was probably distracted.’

  ‘Paul wasn’t someone who liked the world knowing his business,’ Kelly said. ‘Fair enough, I reckon. I think he had a bit more on his plate than the rest of us, that’s all.’

  There wasn’t too much more after that, and when she’d hung up, Helen walked through to the bathroom. She showered, then sat down in the cubicle to shave her legs. She tried singing along with one of Paul’s REM albums while she was getting ready for bed, but she couldn’t make out many of the words. When the CD finished forty minutes later she was still sitting on the edge of the bed in a T-shirt and pyjama bottoms, wondering exactly what Paul had had on his plate.

  And why any of it concerned Frank Linnell.

  Frank was alone, watching TV in the kitchen, when Clive arrived; he hadn’t seen Laura for several hours. He took Clive’s jacket and led him down the long corridor that ran off the entrance hall. They walked past the gym that Frank had installed the year before, and out into the conservatory.

  He enjoyed sitting out here in the evenings with a glass of wine and a book of crosswords. Or, if Laura was around, they would sit together and he would talk through his day; maybe ask her advice about some of the places he was doing up. She was good with that stuff, although she’d always told him there were other aspects of his business she’d prefer he kept to himself.

  ‘Hard to believe,’ Clive said. ‘How things turn out.’

  ‘You’ve got that right,’ Frank said.

  Frank had not told Clive about Paul’s death when he’d first heard about it from Helen. He had thought it best to keep it as a private matter, and might well have continued to do so had it not been for the revelations in the newspaper. The manner of Paul’s death had changed everything.

  They stood side by side and stared out at the garden. There were lanterns every twenty feet or so along the path and in most of the flower beds, throwing orange light up into the trees. A thick string of smaller lights ran along the fence and around the edge of a huge shed in one corner.

  ‘I was thinking about that afternoon when he came to the pub,’ Clive said. ‘When that kid came in, remember?’

  ‘Course I do. Why?’

  ‘No reason. You just think about the last time you saw someone, don’t you? How they were and all that.’

  Frank had thought a lot about that afternoon since he’d heard about Paul’s death. They hadn’t fallen out, not exactly, but Paul had gone away dissatisfied none the less. Frank knew that he’d been right to refuse him; but still, he wished things could have been different.

  ‘So where are we with this?’

  ‘I’ve been putting out feelers since you rang, and so has everyone I’ve spoken to. I think we’re getting there.’

  ‘We got names?’

  ‘Like the paper said, nobody even knows if it’s a firm from north or south of the river.’

  ‘Shouldn’t be too difficult.’

  Clive nodded his agreement. ‘It’s a process of elimination.’

  ‘I need your full attention on this.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I know it’s important.’

  ‘The pubs aren’t going anywhere,’ Frank said. ‘It’s not the end of the world if we come in a day or two late on the refit.’

  ‘All being well we can start bending a few ears tomorrow.’

  ‘First thing,’ Frank said.

  They said nothing for maybe half a minute. The sound of voices on the television drifted down the corridor from the kitchen.

  ‘You seen the foxes lately?’ Clive asked.

  Frank nodded. He had been watching keenly as a pair of foxes had moved into the garden, suspecting that they had built an earth beneath the shed. He told Clive it had got to the point where they were no longer bothered by the movement-activated lights that flooded the lawn whenever they trotted across it.

  ‘I sat and watched them for about half an hour the other night,’ he said. ‘Cheeky sod came right up to there.’ He pointed. ‘Cocked his leg against one of those pots.’

  ‘Nice,’ Clive said, laughing.

  Frank was thinking of that moment, a minute or so after the last fox had disappeared back into the bushes, when the lights would click off. When the garden returned, in a second, to near darkness. He pictured the young men in that car, driving around in the dark and waiting for some well-intentioned mug to flash their lights.

  Like he’d said to Laura, it could not be allowed to stand.

  ‘You need me to stay?’ Clive asked.

  Frank shook his head, said, ‘I need you making more phone calls. Some of the people who know about this are barely out of bed yet.’

  A few minutes after Clive had left, the floodlights came on in the garden. Frank stared out, but couldn’t see anything. Sometimes there was nothing to see. Sometimes, it was just a spider crawling across one of the sensors. But Frank stayed and watched anyway.

  Theo had hung around at the stash house later than normal, lingering in the bedroom once one of the Asian boys had arrived for the evening shift, and moving between there and the toilet for an hour or so until it was darker and a little quieter outside; until he’d stopped shaking and shitting.

  He pulled up his hood and walked quickly down to the Dirty South on Lee High Road. The bar had been called the Rose of Lee before he’d moved down to Kent, a decent, small-scale music venue that had been tarted up while he was away. Some of the live bands weren’t that great, but there was usually a DJ laying down some decent break-beats or grime and a few faces from the crew hanging around late, getting a last one in on their way home or kicking things off if they were making a night of it.

  This was their place, though every so often some idiot from the Ghetto Boys or a few dickheads from the Kidbrooke estate would come in like they didn’t know and try to start something. Always had to watch out for that.

  Theo sat on one of the battered old sofas near the door, with Ollie and another of the runners, a fourteen-year-old girl named Gospel, who Ollie was desperate to fuck. Nobody said too much, staring up at the big screen or watching the pool table. After a couple of drinks they drifted back to Ollie’s place and smoked for a while, until people began to nod off and Theo knew it was time to go home.

  He walked back across the estate towards his flat.

  When he passed the kids by the garage, one of them tilted up his chin,
said, ‘All right, T?’ There were nods from the others. Theo nodded back and kept moving, hearing their murmurs behind him; hearing sirens somewhere in the distance and feeling like something was flopping around inside him, like meat being turned over on a butcher’s counter.

  ‘Now you’re a serious playa, T. Now you’re a cop-killer.’

  Easy hadn’t said too much after SnapZ had come in, brimming with the news and loving it. Theo could see that even he was a little rattled. He doubted that SnapZ and Mikey saw it, but Theo knew Easy well enough to see how he was trying to cover it up; to play the whole thing down. Kissing his teeth and checking his watch. Glancing across at the paper.

  Fuck, if Easy was shaken . . .

  Theo began climbing the stone stairwell up to the third floor, his steps echoing against the treads, the metal handrail cold beneath his palm.

  ‘Christ!’ On the landing, he nearly collided with someone coming down. They each took a step back. Theo stared and recognised the old man who lived two doors along from his mother. He unballed his fists and lowered his hood.

  ‘Theodore! Scared the shit out of me.’

  Theo mumbled an apology; saw that the old man was carrying his rubbish downstairs. The bags had looked like wings or something in the half light and had scared Theo every bit as much.

  ‘You want me to take those down?’

  The old man didn’t need asking twice, telling Theo that he was a credit to his mother as he trudged back up the stairs.

  Theo cursed under his breath as he went back down again. He hated going anywhere near the big metal bins at the bottom. He hated the smell and the noise of things scurrying about behind them. But the poor old bastard had looked as though he had rocks in his bin-bags.

  Ten feet away from the bins, Theo stood and lobbed in the bags, then turned while the second one was still clattering and took the steps back upstairs two at a time. He waited outside the door to his flat, bunching the keys in his fist so that they would make no noise. He leaned against the door and listened. The baby’s cries sounded hoarse through the plasterboard.

  He couldn’t face it.

  He swapped one set of keys for another as he jogged down two floors and along. He knew that his mother and sister would both have gone to bed ages ago; that he would not have to talk to anyone. Would not have to pretend everything was fine and chat about this and that when he felt like he was still waking up from something.

  Like the worst was yet to come.

  He opened the door to his mum’s place and walked in without switching on any lights. He dropped down onto the sofa, leaned his head back and closed his eyes.

  Helen hadn’t really slept at all. She had started to drift off once or twice, but she’d been aware that she hadn’t turned off the light, that the phone was ringing again, and she’d never quite gone under. Eventually, she’d given up.

  It was nearly three in the morning. She made herself tea and turned on the radio, listened to other insomniacs calling to trade insults with an angry presenter, while she made herself busy. She took the plastic bags she had filled with the contents of Paul’s car and tipped everything out onto the carpet. She binned the empty cans, wrappers and fag packets and tried to sort out the rest.

  Sunglasses, sat-nav, assorted tapes and CDs, map books and tools from the boot, handfuls of paper.

  ‘I think he had a bit more on his plate than the rest of us . . .’

  She carefully laid out all the paper on the table. Lined the pieces up neatly, then arranged them in groups: petrol and supermarket receipts; car park tickets; assorted scraps with scribbled names and phone numbers.

  Then she remembered that the phone had rung while she was failing to get any sleep. She checked the machine.

  ‘I hope I’m not disturbing you, I just wanted to say that it was good to meet you earlier.’ A gentle hint of the North-East. ‘Sorry . . . it’s Roger Deering here, by the way. Should have said. Anyway, I really just called to say that if there’s anything you need . . . please feel free to give me a call. If things get on top of you or whatever. I know it can’t be easy, so . . . even if you just fancy a natter.’

  He left his number, told her she could ring any time, said, ‘God bless.’

  Helen wandered back to the table, thinking that her overall impression of the CSM had been about right, that he was a decent sort, but also aware that her ability to read people had taken as much of a battering as the rest of her. She’d had Deering down as nice enough, then a bit creepy, then nice again, all within five minutes of meeting him.

  She finished her tea and stared down at the pieces of paper, nudging them into line where necessary, straightening them. Letting her eyes drift across them she thought about what Gary Kelly had said.

  The stuff about Frank Linnell. The rest of it . . .

  ‘He was just a bit . . . distracted.’

  About Paul keeping himself to himself: not going to the office when he should have done; being secretive when it came to exactly what he had been doing. She felt oddly relieved that she hadn’t been alone in being given the silent treatment.

  In being lied to.

  ‘. . . Last few months I’ve not had a clue what he’s been up to.’

  Yes, a distance had opened up between them since Paul had found out about the affair; since there had been any question about who the father of the baby might be. But, if she were being honest with herself, Helen had sensed that there was more going on than simple anger and sexual jealousy. Now, there was little point in being anything other than honest.

  It seemed clear there were things Paul hadn’t told her; not because he didn’t feel like it, but because he couldn’t.

  On the radio, a woman was talking about global warming and the host suggested it might be a massive conspiracy theory. Helen wondered if she should get on the phone first thing tomorrow and call some of the numbers Paul had scribbled down.

  ‘Hi, this will probably sound strange, but my boyfriend’s just been killed and I know there are other things I should be thinking about, but your number was on a scrap of paper on the floor of his car and . . . well, basically I’m a nosy bitch, so . . .’

  She noticed that two of the car park stubs were from the same place: an NCP on Brewer Street, in Soho. She moved the stubs together and tried to think why Paul would have been going into the West End.

  A Friday afternoon, then the Friday evening one week later. A fortnight before his death.

  She went to fetch her diary and checked out the dates; thought back and realised that the second Friday had been the night Paul had come home late with garlic on his breath. She remembered lying there pretending to be asleep and wondering if he was seeing someone else. Kidding herself that he’d been out with people from work.

  Way back, when she was wet behind the ears, she’d been out drinking with some old soak from the Murder Squad with too many years on his clock. Several pints in, he’d started on about the realities, the strangeness of dealing with violent death.

  Helen had never forgotten it.

  ‘Thing is, we only get to know these people after their deaths; after the poor buggers have been shot or stabbed and what have you. We don’t even know what they look like, not really. Not their expressions, not how they walked and talked, not how they were. Sometimes, we find out all sorts of shit, rooting around in the nooks and crannies. We get to know what they were really like, even when we’re not looking for it. And sometimes, so do the people they’ve been living with.’

  Helen picked up the pair of NCP tickets and carried them to the table by the front door. She laid them side by side again, ready for the morning. Then she turned off the radio and walked back into the bedroom.

  Ten minutes later, lying in the dark, she said, ‘What’s your fucking game, Hopwood?’

  SIXTEEN

  The CCTV monitoring centre that covered most of the West End was based above the Trocadero, a shopping centre and entertainment complex running between Coventry Street and Shaftesbury Avenue. Whi
le people three floors below them pissed away their wages on shoot-’em-ups and ‘I ♡ London’ T-shirts, or further afield on any of the assorted pleasures that Oxford Street, Soho and Leicester Square had to offer, a private security company paid by Westminster Council watched, and recorded their movements for posterity.

  Or sometimes, as evidence.

  Once she’d visited the toilet, Helen showed her warrant card at the reception desk and filled out a form detailing the dates and locations for which she wanted to see footage. She’d been through the process before, knew that it would take fifteen minutes or so to set up. There were a couple of magazines to read while she waited; Kandinsky prints on the walls to look at if she fancied it.

  It was a bright Thursday morning. She walked to the window, enjoying the sun on her face as she looked out across Piccadilly Circus, the treetops of Green Park just visible in the distance.

  ‘DC Weeks?’

  The woman who stepped from the lift and called out Helen’s name was probably younger than she looked. Helen hoped, for the woman’s sake and for the sake of everyone who knew her, that she wasn’t as miserable. She heaved herself up from the sofa, clocked the woman’s expression.

  People’s reactions to her pregnancy - the touching, the giving of unsolicited advice, the patronising comments - were often unwelcome. Nevertheless, Helen found it disconcerting to see someone so visibly unimpressed; to be looked at as if she were . . . showing off.

  She smiled and tried not to judge. She came into contact every day with those who could not have children, or had lost them: unborn; as babies; and older - to drugs, abuse or violence. She knew there were plenty of people around for whom her swollen belly would be anything but beautiful.

  ‘A bit more notice would have been nice.’

  Mind you, this one was a sour-faced cow . . .

  They travelled in silence to the top floor and Helen was shown into the viewing suite. The carpeted floor and wall tiles absorbed most of the sound and the woman raised her voice a notch or two, which wasn’t pleasant: ‘Say when and I’ll run the first tape.’