The Disappeared

by Ali Harper

  No, there was another force at work here. It was time to find out who and why.

  Pants didn’t look any more pleased to see us the second time around. And this time there was no doubt we’d woken him up, even though it was almost two o’clock in the afternoon. He used his left arm to open the door. He had to. His right arm was in a cast.

  ‘Jesus,’ said Jo. ‘What happened to you?’

  ‘Get lost.’

  I winced at the black eye he sported. It made my own eyes water.

  ‘No need to be rude,’ said Jo.

  He tried to close the door but Jo’s faster than that. She pushed her way through the doorframe.

  ‘I don’t want to get involved,’ said Pants.

  ‘You are involved,’ I said, turning round, glancing up and down the street. It looked like a normal Saturday afternoon in Woodhouse. Music drifted from a bedroom window further up the street. Nothing out of place. I turned back to Pants. ‘Brownie?’

  ‘Don’t be stupid.’

  ‘Well, what then? Come on, you might as well tell us. Our offices got turned over last night.’

  He stuck his head out the door and did his own survey of the street.

  ‘We’ve got to find Jack,’ I said. ‘He’s in trouble.’

  Pants took a step back and we entered the hallway. He shut the front door behind us but didn’t ask us any further into the house. ‘Two guys. Showed up yesterday, about an hour after you, asking whether Jack had left something for them.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘They asked for his stuff. I said I didn’t have it.’

  ‘You gave them our card,’ I said, matter-of-fact. I didn’t blame him.

  ‘Didn’t have much choice.’ He held up his broken arm.

  ‘You could have warned us,’ said Jo.

  ‘I spent most of the night in A&E. Six hours to get an X-ray.’ Pants moved backwards and took a seat on the bottom step of the hall staircase. ‘Came to tell you – on my way home. The door was boarded up.’ He took a breath. ‘I owe you an apology.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jo.

  ‘You should have said,’ said Pants, his dark fringe flopped over his black eye. ‘I thought you were Jack’s dealers.’

  ‘I did try.’ I’m not that familiar with the moral high ground, so when I find myself on it, it’s easy to get carried away. I tried to put my own stuff to one side, to focus on the case. ‘You owe Jack the benefit of the doubt too.’

  He sighed but I knew it was a sigh of defeat. I leaned against the hall wall. ‘Who had access to Jack’s room, apart from Jack?’

  ‘No one. He kept it locked.’

  ‘He must have had mates round. His girlfriend?’

  ‘Yeah. And we’d go in there a bit, me, Brownie and Pen, but only when he was there.’

  ‘Who’s Pen?’

  ‘She lives here. Been here ages.’

  ‘Has anyone tried to get into his room, since he left I mean?’

  ‘No. Although …’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Well, when he left, he left his door unlocked. I know, cos after his letter came, I went in his room. Then, couple of nights ago – Wednesday, no Thursday, Ian, a mate of Pen’s, needed somewhere to crash. So we told him he could have Jack’s room.’

  ‘But?’

  ‘But the door was locked. We had to force it to get in.’

  ‘So you think he’d been back and locked his room?’

  ‘Maybe. But then why post us a letter if he’s still in Leeds?’

  ‘But who else would have a key?’ Jo asked.

  ‘And he didn’t take his stuff?’ Now I was really confused.

  ‘Well, his stuff wasn’t there. When the note came, I cleared his room out.’ Pants tilted his chin. ‘It was a right state.’

  ‘You didn’t think he’d ever come back?’

  Pants shrugged. ‘I was pissed off. His note said they’d come looking for him – I thought it’d be better if it looked like he’d packed up and done one. His stuff was all down in the cellar.’

  My pulse rate accelerated. It wasn’t Jack that came back. Jack didn’t know about the money. Whoever did know about the money, whoever put the money in Jack’s drawers, came back. My veins buzzed.

  ‘Can we see the room?’

  ‘There’s nothing in it.’

  ‘Still like to see it.’

  ‘I guess,’ he said, pulling himself up on the bannisters. ‘You’re lucky you caught me. Pen’s had a fit – gone back to her folks.’ He led us up the stairs to the first-floor bedroom at the front of the house, still mumbling as we went. ‘No one wants to stay here now.’

  We arrived at a bedroom door on the first floor. It had a Yale lock fitted to the door – the kind of lock you’d expect on a front door. I pushed the door open with my foot. The metal clasp that housed the lock on the other side of the doorframe was gone. I glanced at Pants. ‘You kicked it in?’

  ‘Ian needed to crash.’ He looked sheepish. ‘We were a bit pissed.’

  I stepped inside the room. There was a mattress on the floor in the corner, with a duvet on top and a sink in the corner of the room. The furniture was cheap and mismatched – a chest of wooden drawers and an empty bookcase, with a pinboard above it. Other than that, the walls were bare.

  ‘So, who would have a key to this room?’

  ‘Jack.’

  ‘His girlfriend?’

  ‘Maybe.’ He sounded doubtful.

  ‘Anyone else?’

  ‘He wasn’t that social a guy.’

  ‘If someone came in and locked the door, they must have had a key.’

  ‘Not necessarily. They could have just let the clasp down,’ said Jo as she fiddled with the lock. ‘It’s a Yale.’

  I tried a different tack. ‘Where’s Brownie?’

  Pants slumped against the wall, like standing was a strain. ‘He’s not answering his phone. We were supposed to be doing Morrisons this morning.’

  ‘How long has Jack been using?’ I asked.

  Pants exhaled. ‘I was in Peru last summer. Things haven’t been right since I came back. Things that didn’t add up.’

  ‘Did you talk to him about it?’

  ‘No. I wasn’t sure. Not until the break-in.’

  ‘“Break-in”?’

  ‘Last month. We got back from The Brudenell and someone had smashed the kitchen window and spray-painted, “Pay Up” on the kitchen wall.’

  ‘You might have mentioned that earlier,’ Jo said.

  Pants turned and limped back down the stairs. I took one last look at Jack’s room and then followed him.

  ‘Tell us about it. It’s important.’

  ‘It was three, maybe four, weeks ago. A load of us came back after the gig – Brownie, Jack, Pen, and Martha. Someone had taken a baseball bat to the back door.’

  ‘Who’s Martha?’

  ‘Brownie’s latest.’ He led us into the kitchen.

  ‘And a person in her own right,’ said Jo. Pants frowned.

  ‘Is Brownie doing smack as well?’ I asked.

  Pants didn’t look at me. Instead he picked up the cardboard box that was on the kitchen table and put it on top of an identical box that was on the floor. I noticed the new lock on the back door. ‘Jack and Brownie are inseparable. Jack does what Brownie tells him to. Or at least he used to.’

  ‘“Used to”?’

  Pants crouched down to the cupboard under the sink. He pulled out a roll of bin liners and a mop bucket. ‘Jack’s got his stuff, you know? Issues. Who hasn’t? But, lately, he seemed to be getting his shit together.’

  ‘He met Carly.’

  Pants looked up. ‘You know about Carly?’

  ‘We are private investigators,’ I said.

  Pants closed the cupboard door and stood up again. ‘She’s good for him.’

  ‘What does Brownie think?’ asked Jo.

  Pants shrugged. ‘Brownie does what Brownie always does when he doesn’t want to deal with something. Ignores it. Pretends it’s not
happening.’

  ‘If they’re inseparable, and both into drugs, then along comes a girl, Jack starts cleaning up his act … Stands to reason Brownie might be feeling a bit left out.’

  ‘Jack keeps Carly out of it. Doesn’t want her getting messed up in it all, I guess. Wish he’d done the same for us.’

  ‘What’s Brownie’s girlfriend like?’ I asked.

  ‘Who? Martha?’

  ‘What’s with the eyebrows?’ asked Jo.

  ‘Don’t think girlfriend’s the right word.’

  ‘What is?’ asked Jo.

  ‘They’re on and off. More off than on.’

  ‘Where does she live?’

  ‘No idea.’

  ‘Think Brownie might be with her?’

  He wrinkled his nose as he put the mop bucket in the sink and turned on the hot tap. ‘Brownie’s more your love ’em and leave ‘em kind of guy. ’Course, she’ll have been in Jack’s room quite a bit.’

  ‘Come again?’ said Jo.

  I knew what Jo was thinking. We’ve both hung out with anarchists long enough to know they’re forever jumping in and out of bed with each other. I’m not judging, just saying.

  Pants let the water run for a few moments before he switched off the tap and lifted the bucket out. ‘Jack’s room used to be Brownie’s room. They swapped.’

  ‘They swapped bedrooms?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Jo and I glanced at each other. The significance didn’t escape either of us. ‘Why?’

  Pants turned back to face into the room, a puzzled look on his face. ‘Students next door. One of ’em moved his girlfriend in. The sound of them banging away all night kept Jack awake. He couldn’t hack it. So, Brownie offered to swap.’

  I could hardly bear to look at Pants. His swollen eye made mine sting. I focused on his chest instead. ‘When?’

  ‘I dunno. Don’t keep a calendar of what goes on around here. Last few weeks have been mental.’

  ‘Recently?’

  ‘Yeah, last couple of weeks.’

  ‘What’s this Martha look like?’

  ‘Spiky hair. She’s older, thirty maybe. Skinny, bit moody.’

  ‘What’s she do?’

  ‘Student, I think. Post-grad.’

  ‘Anything else you can tell us about her?’

  ‘She wears a ring.’ He touched his right nostril to demonstrate where she wore it. ‘Small, silver.’

  Pants asked if we’d given the two guys the tin of Old Holborn containing the smack. I said we hadn’t been there to hand it over. ‘They’ll be back,’ he said. ‘Be careful.’

  ‘Have you told the police?’

  ‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘I’m off to London. I’m done with Leeds.’

  We left Pants packing up what was left of the squat. I’m not sure what I think about anarchy. It sounds fairly cool, but perhaps we all need the structures to live by. I once spent a long weekend in an attic with an anarchist called Martin. He had the tautest belly and pierced, dark brown nipples. Christ, he was good in bed, but the stink of his tiny kitchenette pervaded the whole flat and eventually it got too much, and I had to leave. I’m not exactly a cleanliness freak but there are limits.

  Chichini’s on Hyde Park corner is perfect for a late breakfast. Jo drove us there, and we both ordered a full English and I wrote notes while we waited for it to arrive. I knew things were starting to add up. I just didn’t know what kind of sum they were making.

  ‘Perhaps we ought to go to the police,’ I said to Jo.

  ‘No way.’

  ‘Because?’

  ‘Because they’re the pigs.’ Jo paused as I pulled a face at her. ‘It’s the principle.’

  I didn’t ask where her principles were when she was seeing Andy. I may take risks but I’m not stupid. ‘OK, comrade.’ I raised a clenched fist. ‘But it’s pretty obvious the bad guys are going to be back for the tin.’

  Jo interlaced her fingers and stretched her knuckles till they cracked. ‘And the cash.’

  I shook my head. ‘They don’t know about the cash. I don’t think anyone knows about the cash.’

  ‘Someone does,’ said Jo. ‘The person who put it there.’

  We were interrupted by the arrival of breakfast. My stomach growled at the smell of it. I couldn’t remember when I’d last eaten and I was starving. I picked up the ketchup. ‘Who’s going to hide twenty-four grand in your sock drawer, without telling you?’

  ‘Your fairy godmother.’

  I let my mind wander. ‘Your pimp.’

  Jo forked an entire sausage, spearing it like a fish. She bit off the end, chewed and swallowed before speaking. ‘A very satisfied client.’

  ‘Someone who loves you a lot.’

  ‘Think we should visit Carly again?’

  ‘Maybe.’ I shook my head, trying to get my thoughts to settle. ‘They swapped rooms. Maybe whoever put the cash in there thought it was Brownie’s room. And Pants said Brownie had been trying to ditch his woman, what was she called?’ I checked my notes. ‘Martha. Maybe she’s trying to buy him back?’

  ‘At twenty-four grand for a man?’

  ‘Depends what kind of man.’

  ‘Ain’t no man alive worth that kind of cash,’ Jo said.

  We ate in silence until our plates were clean. I sat back and undid the button on my jeans. Jo flicked a baked bean off the table. It sailed through the air landing a good couple of feet away. ‘Still don’t see why someone would stash all that cash and not tell anyone?’

  ‘True.’ I took a slurp of the orange tea Chichini’s is famous for. A thought had occurred to me over my breakfast and the more it played in my mind, the more sense it made. ‘Maybe they did. Only, they didn’t tell Jack, they told Brownie.’

  Jo considered this for a moment. ‘Brownie thinks Jack’s run off with the money and goes mental.’

  ‘Accuses Jack of running off with his PlayStation or Xbox or whatever – that’s just a cover – what he’s after is the cash.’

  Jo wiped her fingers on a napkin and reached for the tobacco tin. ‘We’re back to the beginning. We need to find Brownie.’

  ‘And Martha.’ I underlined the two names in my notebook.

  I glanced at the clock above the counter. Almost four o’clock. Jo must have caught my thought.

  ‘We’re late for our phone call with Mrs Whatever-the-fuck-her-name-is-Wilkins.’

  The streets outside were filling up as students made their way to the Hyde Park pub – Saturday night drinking started early round here.

  I didn’t want to speak to Mrs Wilkins on the phone. I wanted to meet her, eyeball to eyeball. ‘How do we find her?’

  ‘Tell her we’ve found Jack.,’ said Jo, handing me her mobile. ‘She’ll come.’

  I pulled the piece of paper I’d scribbled her number on from my pocket. She answered before I’d even heard the phone ring.

  ‘You’re late.’

  ‘Sue me,’ I said.

  ‘You’ve got news?’

  ‘We need to meet.’

  ‘You found him?’ Was it hope in her voice, or desperation?

  ‘Yes. Yes, we found him. The Parkinson Steps. Thirty minutes. Make sure you’re alone.’

  Chapter Fifteen

  I wouldn’t have recognized Mrs Wilkins if we’d fallen over her, which was a bit odd given as how we’d arranged to meet her. And she was in the right place and bang on time. The Parkinson Steps lead up to the front of the Parkinson Building, which marks the beginning of the university campus. Jo and I had been standing inside one of the cheap sandwich cafés across the road, watching and waiting for her to show up. We’d seen no one suspicious. Just the usual bunch of students traipsing in and out – the Parkinson Building is home to the university library.

  Thirty minutes came and went. There was a lot of activity, even though it was Saturday, because everyone arranges to meet at the Parkinson Steps – part of our reason for choosing it. Students come out of the library for their fag breaks, or to grab a sand
wich. The steps face south, towards to the city centre, so if there’s any sun, you’re always sitting in it. I’d clocked a student, dressed in blue jeans, trainers and wearing a university scarf but I’d not paid her much attention. Only complete geeks wear university scarves. And, although it was obvious she was waiting for someone without wanting to look like she was waiting for someone, she looked nothing like Susan Wilkins.

  But as time slipped past and Mrs Wilkins didn’t show, I returned to study the student. I noticed she kept going inside and coming out again. She had short dark hair, clipped back off her face, and her jeans were tight, clinging to her skinny frame. She looked fit, like she exercised, because the bulge of her calf muscles was noticeable, even from our location on the opposite side of the road.

  Having made two Cokes last the best part of an hour, Jo and I left the café and crossed the road. It was only as we climbed the stairs and I caught the look on the geeky girl’s face that I realized. I started, opened my mouth to say something, to alert Jo, but Mrs Wilkins shook her head, as if to warn me to keep quiet. I felt Jo grab my arm, and I knew she’d made the connection too. We both stood there, gawping, while our client turned and slipped inside the doors. I glanced at Jo and she pulled a face at me before we followed into the foyer of the Parkinson Building.

  ‘You’re late,’ was the first thing she said.

  ‘You’re a different person,’ I said.

  I don’t like change. I hate it when people I know get haircuts. I like certainty. Maybe it’s something to do with having a mother who rarely dressed. Predictability is what I know.

  Of course, I’ve had to learn to be more flexible, mostly because Jo likes to experiment. One day she’ll bleach her hair, the next she’ll get cornrows. She’s dyed her hair every colour from blue to pink, sometimes both at the same time.

  I’m a creature of habit and visits to hairdressers weren’t high on my mother’s list of priorities. I’ve got the lowest maintenance hairstyle possible. Long, dark hair, tied back in a ponytail. No fringe. Washed once a week. Usually Sundays.

  But while I remain constant, I’ve tried to get used to the fact that women change. Might surprise you. Might suddenly show up in a red jacket when they’ve always worn black. Susan Wilkins made my jaw drop. Her hair was dark and glossy, and you’d never have known the wig was a wig. In fact, I wondered, which was the wig – this or the blonde do, the one she’d had when I first met her?