by David Mark
Suzie disentangles her legs from the quilt. She is still wearing the dressing gown. Somebody has brought her clothes from the side of the hot tub, but she is in no mood to dress as yesterday. She stuffs them in her handbag after removing a long blue dress, spotted with snowflakes and with an owl on the left breast. She pulls it on and wriggles her feet into her boots as the phone begins beeping. Spewing out messages and missed calls.
Closing her eyes, preparing herself, she moves to the conservatory door and slides it open. Takes a lungful of cool, fresh, air. Plugs back into her life against a soundscape of chattering birds and scraping gravel.
The message she seeks was sent ten minutes after the car plowed into the man she had been ordered to fuck.
So sorry. Can’t make it. Will you still go play for me and tell me how he touched you? Wish I could see what a dirty girl you are. Xx
Suzie swallows again. Sneers, ever so slightly, and makes fists with her hands.
His next message was sent early the following morning.
Were you a bad girl last night? Xx
Then:
You’ve gone quiet on me. Did you pussy out on me? Are you a tease?
There is a hiatus of a few hours. Then, angrily:
Knew you would be just like the others. Knew you were all talk.
She scrolls on. Finds his next missive.
Sounds like you had a lucky escape. Bad accident at the rest stop. Lucky girl. x
Finally:
May make an appearance at the party you mentioned. Lincolnshire, you said. Googled it and sounds a ball. Would I be welcome? x
Suzie stares out across the fields. Watches a fat, purple-throated pigeon walk delicately along the wooden fence. Squints, and wonders if the brown creature she can see near the hedgerow is a rabbit or somebody’s discarded UGG boot from the night before.
She sifts through her other messages. Nothing from the police about the accident, but plenty of inquiries from work, from friends, about where she is and what she’s doing. A Facebook alert from her mum.
Her eyes close, almost involuntarily. The sensation of dislocation is dissipating. She is coming back to herself, guided by the pain in her throat and the cold emptiness in her gut. She is unsure, right now, how she feels about herself. She knows that she has let Simon down by accepting his suicide without question. Believes herself to have cheapened their memory by giving in to fear, and never demanding a less palatable truth.
It was the shabbiness of his life that Simon hated. The smallness of it. The inability to shine as brightly or as brilliantly as he wanted to. But such miseries would not claim his life. No, he was killed by somebody he wanted to make happy, and Suzie wants to cry at the thought.
“Somebody wants to kill me, Si,” she says, under her breath. “Somebody who killed you.”
She opens eyes that threaten to fill with tears. “I’m so sorry.”
“Beg your pardon, love?” Suzie turns. Christine has entered the conservatory with a fat ham sandwich and a mug of tea. “Made you a little something,” she says, putting it on the stout table that has been cleared and wiped down sometime between the party and today.
“Oh, I’m sorry, I don’t think . . .”
“You need to eat,” she says. She puts an arm out and gives Suzie a squeeze. “Lovely dress,” she says.
Suzie can barely find the strength to smile. She wants to run suddenly. Wants to get away from these old people, with their sagging flesh and foul-tasting skin and their desperation to touch her and make themselves feel alive. She hates herself now. Hates seeing herself as this link to vitality. This young sacrifice being fawned and pored over, tongued and tasted, by men and women fleeing the grave. She feels disgusted with herself. Here, now, she feels the wrong kind of dirty. Feels the wrong sort of whore.
“I have to go,” she says, bundling out of the conservatory door, spilling yesterday’s knickers from her bag as she fumbles for her car keys.
“Dunc!” Christine is shouting her husband’s name. “Dunc, she’s going . . .”
The big man appears suddenly from behind a white-painted outbuilding. He is all smiles.
“You off, sweetie? There’s no rush. I’ll give you a lift later . . .”
Suzie can’t think of anything to say. She just pushes past him. Runs to where her crappy blue car is parked on a patch of grass. Pulls open the door and climbs inside, willing the engine to work. Now her hands tremble as she turns the key, and she laughs with relief as it bursts into life.
She turns the car in a ragged semicircle, scattering the neatly raked gravel, and puts her foot down. She feels alive suddenly. And so very scared of death.
The trees and hedgerows fill her windows as the car bumps and jerks down the rutted path. She is barely looking at the road. Instead, she fiddles with her phone. Scrolls through her numbers. Finds the number she could have called six months ago.
Rings the auntie of her dead friend.
Doesn’t even manage a hello.
“Simon was murdered,” she says.
And in this moment, a sluice gate opens inside her. The tears finally come.
“ARE YOU NOT GOING TO EAT IT?”
McAvoy holds the plastic Tupperware box on his lap as if it were a ticking bomb.
“Maybe on the way back.”
“It’ll get cold.”
“It’s nice cold. It’s fine.”
“If you’d done as I’d said, you could have sat down to dinner with the rest of us.”
“I wasn’t that long. I just wanted a quick shave . . .”
Pharaoh has a little smile on her face during the exchange. She is not deliberately trying to embarrass him but is enjoying having a little play with his shyness. Likes these married-couple chats that they too rarely have the opportunity to indulge in.
“She wasn’t cross, was she?” he asks, his eyes closed, like a toddler trying to make himself invisible.
“Aector, I don’t think she could be cross with you if she found you nuts deep in a squirrel.”
McAvoy is grateful he is already looking out of the window. This way he does not have to disguise his blush or his smile.
Pharaoh stayed for lunch. Sat down to roast lamb and minted peas and potatoes while McAvoy was upstairs showering, shaving, and slipping into a brown tweed-effect three-piece suit. He is not wearing a tie. It is his concession to working on a Sunday.
“There’s a lot to hate about your wife,” says Pharaoh chattily as she turns the little sports car onto Anlaby Road and slams down the clutch with her bare left foot.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Gorgeous. Slim. Lovely. I should hate her.”
McAvoy, who had swiveled his head toward his boss, looks away again. “Oh.”
“Seriously, Aector. If that lamb knew how well his body would be treated, he would have handed himself in at the abattoir. I have never had gravy like that. Could I take a slice home for a sandwich?”
McAvoy holds the lunch box a little tighter. Of all the crimson hues that his cheeks have taken this past week, none was as deep as that which exploded in his face when his wife handed him a Tupperware box with his roast dinner inside it, kissed him on the cheek, and told him to have fun.
“We had a nice chat,” says Pharaoh devilishly. “Can’t believe we’ve let it go this long without ever properly meeting.”
McAvoy splutters a little. “Yeah, well, next pub quiz or something . . .”
“No, I owe you a dinner now. We’ll have you over to ours.”
He does not know how to reply. Has never been able to picture his boss’s home life, or felt comfortable enough to ask about it. He knows only that she has teenage children, and a wheelchair-bound husband, though whether his condition is from injury or disease, he has never ascertained.
“What’s your specialty?” he asks her, by way of conversation.
“The wine list,” she says, her eyes on the road. “Up here?”
McAvoy gives a nod. “Yep. Second right, then pull in.”
In the past two hours Simon Appleyard’s death has become a murder. They are taking the first tentative steps toward telling the top brass in CID that the violent-crime statistics for last year are going to show another unlawful killing. They have only briefly mentioned the discovery of Leanne Marvell. Neither wants to address it. Neither wants to question whether they could, or should, have done more. They will visit her, together, when this is done. Help her somehow. Make it better . . .
“These are all right,” says Pharaoh, pulling into a space and looking up at the properties. “Small, but neat enough.”
“Three hundred fifty pounds a month, or thereabouts,” says McAvoy. “One-bedroom, but properly looked after. All the same landlord.”
They disentangle themselves from Pharaoh’s two-seater sports car. It is as close-fitting around McAvoy’s bulky frame as a tailored suit, but Pharaoh adores the vehicle and wears it far more comfortably than her sergeant.
“Going to be a nice one,” says Pharaoh, looking up at the blue sky. “Any more rain on the way, Farmer Boy?”
McAvoy smiles. Gives a sniff of the air. “Maybe a bit of drizzle tomorrow.”
“And what perfume am I wearing.”
He inhales again. “Issey Miyake. And roast lamb.”
McAvoy straightens his clothes and checks that his notebook is open on a fresh, dated page.
They stand for a moment on the pavement outside the little apartment block. Springfield Court in Anlaby. A nice enough neighborhood with decent schools and a couple of twenty-four-hour supermarkets. Flats for young couples saving for a deposit on a starter home, and for singletons content to rent.
“Still nothing from the landlord?” asks Pharaoh.
McAvoy checks his phone and shakes his head. He has left a message for the property owner, but has heard nothing back. A quick search of the electoral register indicates that Simon’s old flat is now occupied by a Mr. Paul Essex, though how precise the information is, they cannot say.
“Flat two B, yeah?”
“Or not.”
“What?”
“Hamlet. Forget it.”
Pharaoh rings the bell. They stand for a moment on the step, staring at the white paint. Out of habit, Pharaoh tries the door handle. It doesn’t move.
“In bed or out, you reckon?”
McAvoy considers the crisp blueness of the day, and doubts that the door will be opening anytime soon.
“Try the neighbor,” says Pharaoh, stepping back from the door to peer up at the second-floor window. Net curtains obscure the glass.
McAvoy moves around to the other side of the building. Rings the next bell. Stands for a time, tapping his foot, then rings again.
“Luck of the Irish, you, ain’t you?” says Pharaoh snappily. She sighs. Cocks her head. “Can you hear that?”
McAvoy listens. He can hear guitar music coming from inside the ground-floor flat. He struggles to place it. It sounds Spanish. Classical. “‘Asturias,’” he says, nodding.
“What?”
“The piece.”
“Aector, you’re a fucking idiot.”
Pharaoh pushes him aside and hammers on the door with her fist. The music stops. She lifts the letterbox. “Police,” she yells, then looks at McAvoy. “Sort of.”
A moment later the door is answered by a lad in his early to mid-twenties. He is short and thin with curly red hair and a pale, freckly complexion. He is wearing a faded black shirt and tight jeans with sneakers, and he holds a battered guitar in his right hand.
“Seriously?” he asks, halfway between a curse and a sigh. “Does this have to be now? I was caught up in the moment.”
“That’s okay,” says Pharaoh. “I get like that when I’m Hoovering.”
She puts her foot on the step and muscles him back into the cramped hall, which is littered with discarded sneakers and a mountain of takeaway leaflets.
“We just need a moment,” says McAvoy by way of explanation. He follows Pharaoh down the hall, the bewildered lad following with much huffing and protestation. They arrive in a small, busy living area that does not appear to have been decorated to the occupant’s own tastes. The carpet is a gray cord, and the wallpaper is patterned with floral swirls. A pink two-seater sofa covered in sheet music and draped in drying T-shirts is pushed back against one wall, and the open-plan kitchen to their right is home to a mountain of dishes and polystyrene chips cartons.
“If you don’t like the mess, you can tidy before you leave,” he begins, aggressively.
“It’s okay, sweetheart, I’m not your mum.” Pharaoh looks around her. Decides she will not sit down. It’s not overly dirty here, but she feels like she is in a teenager’s bedroom, and is wary about sitting on anything that will not rub out with a wet cloth.
“What’s this about?”
“Your neighbor,” says Pharaoh, turning to him, with a bright smile. “Bit on the dead side.”
The boy looks strangely relieved. Gives a shrug. “Lad from two B?”
“Simon,” says McAvoy. He feels claustrophobic in the little room. Is grateful the electric heater is not switched on.
“You know him?” asks Pharaoh.
The lad sits down on the sofa. Holds his guitar comfortably in his lap. His expression is unreadable, but not unfamiliar. McAvoy has seen it too many times. He has interviewed too many youngsters who truly do not give a damn about anybody but themselves. He has looked into the eyes of too many people who truly do not give a damn.
“How long have you lived here, Mr. . . . ?”
“Woodmansey,” he says. “Darren. Been here just under a year now.”
“So Simon was your neighbor.”
Woodmansey gives a grunt. Sighs, like a teenager being asked if he has done his homework. “Haven’t we done this? Back when it happened?”
“You’ve spoken to a detective before?” asks McAvoy.
“Dunno about detective. He was a copper. Fella in uniform. Told him I barely knew him.”
“You knew his name was Simon?”
Darren looks up, mulling this over with exaggerated wariness. “Yeah, I think so. I mean, I know now, what with the inquest and everything. But yeah, he introduced himself.”
“What was your opinion of Mr. Appleyard?” asks Pharaoh, crossing to the window and looking out at the neatly tended grass verges and hedges that border the little group of properties. She watches a pigeon pecking at a discarded piece of takeaway fried chicken. Wonders if it qualifies as cannibalism. She turns back. “Did you get on?”
Darren smiles a little and plucks at the guitar strings. “Can’t say I had much of an opinion of him at all,” he says. “Not in a bad way, like. He was just there. I was just here. Y’know? People come and go. Who fucking cares?”
“Ever go in his home?” asks McAvoy, watching the young lad and trying not to let himself imagine putting him over his knees. He suddenly remembers he hasn’t showed him his warrant card, and does so now, if only to remind himself who he is and what he does.
“Round for dinner, you mean?” asks Darren, with an attempt at a laugh.
“Round for whatever, sweetheart,” says Pharaoh. “It’s like this one, isn’t it? Same layout?”
Darren shrugs. Appears to think. “I helped him carry a mini-oven up there about a month after I moved in. Was struggling with it when I got home, so I gave him a hand.”
“Neighborly of you,” says Pharaoh.
Darren shrugs again. It is an irritating habit—a display of affected nonchalance that McAvoy considers inappropriate. “He spotted me. Asked. I couldn’t get away.”
“And his flat? Layout like this, yes?”
“Far as I can recall,” Darr
en says, and strums a complicated-looking chord.
McAvoy nods. Moves into the kitchen. Looks at the knife rack screwed into the wall next to the drainer. According to the crime-scene photos and the incident report, it was a mooring just like this that Simon Appleyard hanged himself from. Tied a belt around his neck, the other end here, and leaned forward until he was dead.
McAvoy taps the plasterboard wall with his knuckles. Catches Pharaoh’s eye. She nods, and reaches into her pocket for her purse, retrieving a twenty-pound note and wordlessly handing it to the guitarist. “Sorry,” she says.
McAvoy grabs the knife rack and pulls. There is barely a moment’s resistance before the screws are wrenched free and the object clatters onto the draining board: knives and ladles spilling noisily over the linoleum floor.
“What are you doing?” asks Darren, angry and shocked. “This place isn’t mine. It’s rented.”
“Bit of grout and a deeper screw, and it will be okay,” says McAvoy, distractedly. “It can take a bit of weight.”
“But not a body?” asks Pharaoh.
“No.”
McAvoy and Pharaoh hold each other’s gaze. McAvoy takes over.
“We’re trying to find out a little more about Simon’s death,” he says, crossing back to the seating area and deliberately looming large over the small, seated young man. “There is evidence to suggest he might have been murdered.”
Darren looks from one officer to the other. He appears genuinely bewildered.
“What? Who?”
“That’s what we’re trying to find out. We’re led to believe that Simon was promiscuous. Do you remember seeing many other people calling at his home?”
Darren puts the guitar down. “I’m not the Neighborhood Watch,” he says, masking his discomfort with a mild attempt at aggression.
“Mr. Woodmansey . . .”
“Yeah,” he snaps. “Yes,” he corrects himself, looking up at the towering police officer. “There were knocks on the door sometimes. And I’d see the odd soul come and go, like.”
