by John Harvey
Knowing that she’d regret it, promising herself she wouldn’t stay too long, Lynn headed across the street to the pub.
“You ask me,” Divine’s voice rose above the noise, “she’s been dead since a couple of hours after she was lifted.”
Lynn wasn’t about to waste her breath telling him that nobody had.
“What about this ransom business?” Kevin Naylor asked.
“Load of bollocks, isn’t it? Some clever-clogs tossing us a-bloody-round. You know yourself, it’s happened before.”
“Come on, Mark,” Lynn couldn’t keep sitting there saying nothing, “her voice was on the tape.”
“So? What’s to stop him forcing that out of her first?”
“All in two hours?”
Divine raised his eyes towards the smoky ceiling. Why were some women always so literal, jumping on every word you said as if it were gospel? “Okay, maybe it was a bit longer. Two hours, four, six, what’s it matter?”
“To Nancy Phelan or to us?”
Divine emptied his glass and pushed it along the table towards Kevin Naylor, his shout this time. “All that matters, what we should be looking for is a body. Never mind all this undercover crap out there in the sticks.”
“Wasn’t what you said at the time,” Naylor reminded him. “Not with another Early Starter on your plate.”
“You can talk! Here, you should’ve seen our Kev and this Gloria, tongue’d dropped any further from his mouth he’d been hoovering up the floor with it.”
Oh, God, Lynn thought, here we go again. “I’m off,” she said, getting to her feet.
“Not now, look, I’m just getting these in. Pint or a half?”
Lynn thought of what was waiting for her at home, half a frozen pizza, a bundle of ironing, her mother’s call. “All right,” sitting back down, “but make it a half.”
A light rain had started to fall, not enough to persuade Lynn to use her umbrella as she took the cut-through beside Paul Smith’s shop and came out by the Cross Keys, opposite the Fletcher Gate car park. Later the temperature was due to drop and most likely it would freeze. Last night, on the bypass out near Retford, a Fiesta had skidded on black ice and collided with a lorry loaded high with scrap; a family of five, mother, dad, two lads, a baby of sixteen months, all but wiped out. Only the baby had survived. She thought about her own good fortune, the car that had come so close to clipping her when she had swung, blinded, wide from her lane.
As she turned through the archway and began to cross the courtyard, the keys were in her hand.
Midway across, she hesitated, looked around. Muted by curtains or lace, lights showed from windows here and there about the square. Soft, the sounds of television sets, radios overlapping. A cat, ginger and white, padding its way along the balcony to the right.
Michael was on the landing, halfway up the stairs, sitting with his back against the wall, legs outstretched, breath on the air, a newspaper folded open in his hands.
“You know,” he said, drawing in his legs, “I can read this thing from cover to cover, front to back, every word, and if you asked me five minutes later a single thing about it, I wouldn’t have a clue.”
Lynn had still to move.
“Here,” he offered the paper towards her, “test me. Name the prime minister of Bosnia-Herzegovina. The Father of the House of Lords. Define once and for all the obligations of the Treaty of Maastricht. I couldn’t do any of it.”
“How long have you been here?” Lynn asked.
“Oh, you know, I haven’t exactly been counting, but possibly one or two hours.”
She turned away, past the chalked graffiti, to look at the light falling in a spiral at the foot of the stairs. Rain drawn across it like a veil.
“You’re not angry?”
“For what?”
“Me being here.”
Angry? Was that what she should be? Looking at him sitting there, Lynn’s shoulders rose and fell and she tried to avoid the smile sidling into his eyes: how long had it been since anyone had waited for her five or ten minutes? “No, I’m not angry.”
He was on his feet in a trice. “Shall we go, then?”
“Where?”
Disappointment shadowed his face. Doubt. “You didn’t get my message?”
“No. What message?”
“About dinner.”
The iron of the railing was cold against her hand. “There wasn’t any message.”
“I left it where you work.”
“You don’t know where I’m stationed.”
“I phoned personnel.”
“And they told you?”
He had the grace to look a little sheepish. “I told them I was your cousin, from New Zealand.”
“Somebody believed you?”
A laugh, self-deprecating. “I’ve always been quite good at accents, ever since I was a child.”
Lynn nodded, moved one step higher, two. “Where was that? That you were a child?”
“What do you think?” he said. “Is it too late for dinner or what?”
He had booked a table at the San Pietro. Red tablecloths and candles and fishermen’s nets draped from the walls. Crooners murmured through the loudspeakers in Italian, more often than not to the accompaniment of seagulls and a mandolin.
“I’ve no idea what this place is like,” Michael said, pulling out her chair. “I thought we could give it a try.”
The waiter appeared with the wine list and a couple of menus.
“Red or white?” Michael said.
“Nothing for me, I’ve had enough already.”
“Are you sure? You …”
“Michael, I’m positive.”
He ordered a small carafe of house red for himself, a large bottle of mineral water for them both. For a first course, he had prosciutto ham and melon, Lynn a mozzarella and tomato salad. They were well into their main dishes-fusilli with gorgonzola and cream sauce, escalope of veal with spinach and saute potatoes-when Michael asked his first question about her day.
“I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised you were late, this terrible business, it must be driving you mad.”
Lynn set down the fork she had half-raised to her mouth. “Which business is that?”
“That poor missing girl.”
“What makes you think I’m working on that?”
“Are you not? I suppose I thought you all would be, trying to find her, you know, twenty-four hours a day.”
“Well, I’m not, not directly.”
“But you must know all about it. I mean, what’s going on.”
She lifted up her fork again; the veal was tender, sweet to the taste, the breadcrumbs surrounding it not too crisp.
“This latest business, this ransom that was never collected and everything, isn’t that all very weird? Didn’t I read that setting that trap for him cost so many thousand pounds?”
“You seem to know as much about it as I do.”
“Ah, well, it’s only what I read in the papers, you know.”
“I thought,” Lynn said, “you forgot all that the minute you’d taken it in.”
Michael smiled back at her and summoned the waiter, ordered himself another carafe of wine.
“You’re sure you won’t?”
“Quite sure.”
For the remainder of the meal, he asked her about the damage to her car, her father’s health, talked about plans for setting up on his own again once the recession had really started to turn around. Distribution, that’s the thing, wholesale; anything but stationery, deadly stuff, try as you might, never get it to really move. And he’d glanced up at her, grinning, to see if she’d got the joke.
They were back in the courtyard, the cold biting round them; Lynn with her scarf wound twice around the space between her upturned collar and her hair, Michael’s hands deep in his pockets all the way back from the restaurant, but now …
“You know,” Lynn said, “I don’t think I’m ready for this.”
“What would
that be now?”
“Whatever it is you’re wanting.”
His hand was on her arm, inches above her wrist. “To be friends, is there anything wrong with that?”
“No. Except that’s not all you want.”
He was close enough to have kissed her with scarcely a dip of his head, not a tall man, not really, three or so inches more than she was herself. “Am I so transparent, then?” he smiled.
Something happened to his face, Lynn thought, when he smiled. He came to life from inside.
“And am I not going to get my kiss, then? My little peck on the cheek?”
“No,” Lynn said. “Not this time.”
When she glanced down from the balcony, he was still standing perfectly still, looking back up at her; before she could change her mind, she let herself quickly in, bolted and relocked the door.
Michael only then starting to walk away, whistling softly. Not this time, he was thinking. Well, doesn’t that mean there’ll be another?
The bath as hot as she could take it, Lynn lowered herself through the rising steam. How clearly had he known she had wanted him to kiss her, standing there with little more than their breath between them? His mouth pressed against her, no matter what. So long since a man had thought of her that way, made love with his eyes. Despite everything, she shivered, imagining his touch.
Forty-three
Alice Skelton was in her bathrobe, towel wrapped around her hair, cigarette between her lips. It was twenty past six in the morning. She had heard his daughter-that was the way she tried to think of Kate now, it made things easier-returning home closer to three than two. Not bothering to be quiet about it any more, no more guarded whispers as she gave some youth a last wet kiss and reached down to slip off her shoes. These days-these nights-it was a slamming of doors and a shout of thanks, and whoever had driven her home turning back up the volume of the car stereo before the end of the drive. Alice had lain awake, said nothing, waited for the raid on the fridge, the toilet flush, the bedroom door. Christ, girl, she thought, what would I have done with my young life if I’d enjoyed your freedom? Would I have screwed it up any less or more?
Beside her, rolled as far towards the edge of the mattress as was possible, Jack Skelton slept on, his body twitching every now and then as if cattle-prodded by his dreams.
At four, Alice had given up all pretense and gone downstairs. Sweet biscuits. Ice cream. Coffee with a little gin. Cigarettes. Finally, just gin. She ran an early bath and lay back in it, her head resting against a plastic cushion, listening to the World Service: Londres Matin, the early morning news in French.
Out and dried, she had been considering going back upstairs and getting dressed when the phone rang.
“Hello? Mrs. Skelton? This is Helen Siddons.”
“It’s also practically the middle of the night.”
“I’m sorry, I wouldn’t have called at this hour if …”
“If it wasn’t important.”
“That’s right. Is your husband there?”
If he’s not with you, Alice thought, I suppose he must be. “I expect he’s still sleeping, don’t you? He tires easily these days.”
“Could you get him for me? It is …”
“Important, I know.” She let the receiver fall from her hand and it banged against the wall, bouncing and bobbing at the end of its twisted flex. “Jack,” Alice called up the stairs, “someone for you. I think it’s the massage service.”
Helen had been backtracking through the Rogel interviews, never quite certain what she was looking for but trusting it would leap out at her when she found it. Motive, opportunity, some connection that somehow they had missed. Something which they had failed to find important then, but now …
Those who had been brought in for questioning fell into three broad categories: anyone who might have had a grudge against the three principals involved, known villains with a penchant for extortion, and finally a more haphazard collection of people who had been in the area at the time, possibly acting in a manner that aroused suspicion. In the case of primary suspects, their backgrounds were well-documented, profiles fairly full; other individuals, notably those from the last group, had been lingered over less lovingly. At the time, that hadn’t been seen to have mattered. But when those people were brought into the limelight, the gaps in knowledge were prodigious.
Helen wondered how assiduously some of these stories had been checked-the first alibi but not the second or third? And what was known about them once they had been eliminated from the inquiry? She guessed, very little. In some cases, nothing. How easy, then, for one of them to lie low a short spell, up tracks, and move away. Start over again somewhere else.
“Take someone with you,” Skelton said. “Another detective, someone who can do some leg work if it’s needed. Divine, for instance. He could drive you.”
Mark Divine was less than happy, playing chauffeur to a sodding woman! Still, at least he was getting a decent motor; top a hundred in the fast lane with no trouble.
“Divine,” Helen Siddons said. She was wearing a dark suit with a mid-length skirt, her hair pulled back and severe. Divine had in mind she’d not have been out of place in that video he’d rented last night: Death Daughters From Hell. He could just picture her wielding a whip.
“Yes, Ma’am.” Divine coming to mock-attention, giving her as much of a come-on as he dared with his eyes. Never knew, if they got a result, might not be above letting her hair down on the way back.
“One word out of turn from you, Divine, and I’ll have your balls cut off and dried and strung up for auction at the next divisional dinner-dance. Understood?”
Lynn had sifted through the mass of material on and around her desk, checked the CID room notice board, the message log; during the course of the morning, she contacted the officers who had rotated duty on the desk, got through to the switchboard, and asked them to go through all incoming calls. Finally, it seemed incontrovertible-no personal message had been left for her inside the past thirty-six hours. For whatever reason, Michael had lied.
“Problem?” Resnick stopped by her desk on his way back to his own office. A bulging brown bag from the deli was leaking gently into his hand.
Lynn shook her head. “Not really.”
“Worrying about your dad?”
“Sort of, I suppose.”
“Any news when he’s going in for the operation?”
“Not yet.”
Resnick nodded; what else was there he could say? He had promised to call the Phelans this afternoon with a progress report, not that any progress had been made. Whoever had sent the ransom tape, they were in his hands. Every other trail, such as it had been, had long gone cold. Behind his desk, he opened the bag and stemmed a rivulet of oil and mayonnaise with his finger, then brought it to his mouth. Only a few drops fell over the Home Office report on responses to private policing. How long was it since he had spoken to Dana? He should ring her, make sure she was all right. If she suggested meeting for a drink, well, what was wrong with that? But the number snagged in his brain like a wedge of ill-digested food stuck in his throat.
Lynn spent the afternoon with several copies of Yellow Pages and the other business directories. On her eleventh call, the receptionist said, “Mr. Best? He’s often out on call, but if you’ll hold on I’ll see if he’s available.”
“Excuse me,” Lynn said quickly. “But that is Mr. Michael Best?”
“That’s right, yes. Can you tell me what it’s pertaining to? If he’s not here, perhaps someone else can help.”
“Look, it’s okay,” Lynn said. “Don’t bother now. I’ll catch up with him some other time.”
That evening she turned down all offers of a drink, left pretty much to time, skin beginning to tingle as she neared home. But there was nobody stretched out across the stairway reading the newspaper, no note slipped beneath her door. So many times she went to the window and looked down over the courtyard, always expecting him to be there. At about quarter pas
t nine, she realized that she’d dozed off in the chair. By ten she was in bed and asleep again, surprisingly unconcerned.
Forty-four
As if it weren’t enough of a liability being born black, her parents had to christen her Sharon. One of the few names in current English instantly recognized as a term of abuse. “Don’t want to waste your time with her, right little Sharon!” In addition to all the innuendo and insinuation she’d grown up with from childhood, to say nothing of the outright bigotry, the head-on insults-“Black scrubber! Black cow! Black bastard!”-for the past five years she had been the butt of Essex girl jokes too numerous to mention. The fact that there was no resemblance whatsoever to this mythical blonde in a shell suit with breasts where her brains should be seemed to make little difference. It was all in the name. It could have been worse, she sometimes consoled herself, she could have been Tracey.
Sharon Garnett was thirty-six and had been a police officer for seven years. She had trained as an actress, two years at the Poor School, worked with theater companies, mostly black, doing community work on a succession of shoe-string grants; two small parts in TV soaps, the obligatory black face with a heart of gold. A friend had made a thirty-minute video for Channel 4 with Sharon in the lead and for five or ten minutes it had looked as if her career might be about to take off. Six months later she was back in a transit van, touring a piece about women’s rights from an abandoned hospital in Holloway to a youth center in Cowdenbeath. And she was pregnant.
It was a long story: she lost that baby, sat at home in her parents’ Hackney flat, day after day, not speaking to anyone, staring at the walls. One afternoon, between three and four, the sun shining and even Hackney looking like a place you might want to live-she remembered it well, right down to the smallest detail-Sharon went into her local nick and asked for an application form.
“Open arms where you’re concerned,” the sergeant had said, “racial minorities, you’re actual flavor of the month.”
