Rules of Engagement

by Hurley, Graham

  ‘So what do I do?’ she said. ‘Where do I go?’

  Ingle shrugged. ‘Dunno,’ he said, ‘it’s up to you. The curfew’s off. The squaddies are back in the box. If you can find petrol, you can go wherever you want.’

  ‘Simple as that?’

  He nodded. ‘Simple as that.’

  Annie hesitated a moment and then got up. She was trying to sort out how she felt, and she realized that whatever it was included disappointment, a sense of acute anti-climax.

  ‘What about you?’ she said. ‘All this?’

  She gestured at the table, the two chairs, the last hour and a half, the questions piling up around her, most of them answered, some of them not. Ingle shrugged.

  ‘It’s OK,’ he said, ‘no problem.’

  ‘You got what you wanted?’

  ‘Oh yeah…’ he nodded, letting the phrase expire between them.

  Annie turned on her heel and made for the door. Then she paused again. She turned round. Ingle was back in the seat, behind the desk, looking up at her. He said nothing. Not goodbye. Not good luck. Nothing.

  ‘What did you want?’ she said.

  Ingle didn’t reply, but slumped deeper into the chair, his chin on his chest, his hair falling lank around his shoulders.

  ‘Gillespie’s alive,’ he said, ‘in case you were wondering.’

  ‘Is he here?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Will he stay here?’

  ‘Depends.’

  ‘On what?’

  He looked at her, and yawned, and for the first time she realized how tired he was. He said nothing for a while.

  Then he shrugged.

  ‘It’s a game,’ he said vaguely. ‘Always was, Always will be.’

  Gillespie accepted the second cup of tea, but left the soggy custard creams in the saucer. Outside, the shadows were lengthening in the late afternoon sun. Davidson sat opposite, across the desk, dropping Sweetex into his own tea. His jacket was off, hung carefully over the back of his chair. The atmosphere was quiet, even intimate, two old friends discussing a mutual problem.

  Gillespie sipped at the tea and then put the saucer down beside the pile of photos. The contents of all three envelopes were strewn across the desk. Uppermost, was one of the closer studies of Suzanne, lying on the concrete. He gazed at it for a moment. He’d been alone with Davidson for more than two hours, circling the evidence, the fingerprints in Suzanne’s flat, the photographs he’d taken there, the shots below, beside the body, on the concrete path, even the tiny tell-tale trace of his blood on her cheek. He’d volunteered a blood sample without protest, expressing no surprise when the phone rang, and a voice told Davidson that it was a perfect match.

  ‘I left a flower,’ he said, ‘a rose. I pricked my finger picking it.’

  Davidson had nodded, regretful, a sympathetic listener burdened by the sheer awkwardness of the facts.

  ‘Pity,’ he said.

  ‘I felt sorry for her. Poor bitch.’

  ‘Of course.’

  There was a long silence. At first, confronted with Davidson’s accusation, Gillespie had just laughed. Davidson had said nothing, letting the laughter turn to disbelief, and then to outrage, and then – when the anger had spent itself – to a kind of watchful silence, a refusal to commit himself any further, to risk the scene turning any more surreal.

  Throughout this first hour or so, Davidson had remained carefully neutral. Only when it was clear that Gillespie understood it all, the sheer weight of the case against him, did he attempt to build any kind of relationship between them. That relationship, Davidson knew, was critical. What he required from Gillespie at the end of it all was a careful calculation, a decision governed not by emotion, or by principle, but by raw self-interest.

  Now, Davidson leaned back in the chair, his saucer cradled carefully in his lap. He’d spent lunchtime browsing through Gillespie’s file. Names. Dates. His last month and a half in the Service. Everything would help. Especially the latter.

  ‘McMullen,’ he said, ‘tell me about him…’

  Gillespie looked at him, guarded, wary.

  ‘You’ll know about McMullen. Must do.’

  Davidson conceded the point with a nod.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘of course.’ He paused. ‘Lucky not to go down for that, weren’t you…?’

  He let the question trail away, looking once again at the photo of Suzanne on the desk. Gillespie was still gazing at him, refusing to be cornered.

  ‘Who says I did it?’

  Davidson didn’t answer the question but sipped slowly at his tea. Then he frowned.

  ‘McMullen was a rapist, wasn’t he?’

  Gillespie looked at him, saying nothing. Davidson sipped at his tea.

  ‘Tell me…’ he said finally, ‘did you assess the risk before you pulled the trigger? Or did you have a rush of blood to the head?’

  Gillespie blinked, stung.

  ‘The man was an animal,’ he said, ‘he liked little girls.’ He paused. ‘Very little girls.’

  ‘You knew that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You saw it happen?’

  ‘Yes,’ he paused again, ‘once.’

  ‘Up in your sangar, were you? Some field or other? Some stake-out? Some hide?’

  Gillespie nodded. ‘Something like that.’

  Davidson looked at him over the rim of the teacup.

  ‘So you executed him,’ he said.

  Gillespie shrugged.

  ‘He was blown away.’

  ‘But you did it. Judge and jury.’

  There was a long silence. Then Gillespie moved in the chair, more relaxed now, back in a chain of events he understood, facts, not fantasy.

  ‘What does the file say?’

  ‘It says you did it.’

  ‘Nothing was ever proved.’

  Davidson smiled. ‘Yes…’ he said, ‘it says that too.’ He paused. ‘But you resigned, all the same.’

  ‘Had to.’

  ‘Quite.’

  There was another silence. On the floor above, Gillespie could hear laughter and the sound of crockery. Warm, domestic noises. A world getting back to normal. Davidson laid his cup and saucer carefully to one side and leaned forward over the desk. He picked up one of the photos of Suzanne.

  ‘Tell me…’ he said, ‘this girl here… Miss Wallace…’ he looked up. ‘What was she like?’

  Gillespie thought about the question, what little he knew, a couple of conversations, a couple of miles in the car.

  ‘She was terrified,’ he said, ‘out of her depth. Just like a kid…’

  ‘Did you feel sorry for her?’

  Gillespie nodded.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘in a way, I did.’

  ‘Like the little girls at Ballycombe?’

  Gillespie looked at him for a long time, and then shook his head.

  ‘No,’ he said, ‘that’s stupid. It wasn’t like that at all.’ He paused, nodding at the photo in Davidson’s hand, taking the conversation back to where it belonged, to the reality of her flat, the up-turned armchair, the spilled blood. ‘She’d got in with some pretty heavy people,’ he said, ‘and she knew too much for her own good.’ He hesitated for a moment, scanning the other photos, littered across the desk. He selected a couple, both featuring Mick and Albie. Cartwright was there, too. A face in the wheelhouse window. He slid the photos across towards Davidson. ‘You should start talking to some of these guys,’ he suggested.

  Davidson eyed the photos with little visible interest.

  ‘Why should I do that?’

  ‘Because they could really help you…’ he paused, ‘assuming you’re interested, of course.’

  It was early morning before Joanna Goodman collected her husband from the Bunker. He looked much better than she’d expected, sitting beside her in the battered old Metro, the kids in the back. They had the radio on, real news again, the old familiar voices. NATO armies were withdrawing to defensive positions the length of the Ce
ntral Front. Norway was having second thoughts about cosy deals with Moscow. Sudden as it was, it all sounded very promising, and although Joanna barely understood most of the jargon, she knew for certain that the portents were good.

  The news over, she patted her husband on the knee.

  ‘So …’ she said, ‘we might make it after all.’

  He looked at her, then leaned across and kissed her gently on the cheek.

  ‘I hope so,’ he said softly.

  Back at the house, she helped him out of the car while the kids danced round in the garden.

  Inside, Goodman collapsed into one of the big armchairs in the lounge. He’d left his NBC suit in the Bunker, but he could smell it on his clothes, a musty, slightly sweet smell, sweat and rubber and the charcoal-like deposit it left on his hands. Soon, he’d have a bath. Afterwards, dog tired, he’d probably go to bed.

  Joanna was at the phone, dialling a number from memory. He looked across at her. As far as he knew, the telephone system was still non-operational, cut off as part of the Emergency Regulations.

  ‘Can you get a line?’ he queried.

  She nodded.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And is the number ringing?’

  She nodded again, grinning at him.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘just leave it to me.’

  She bent to the telephone and began to talk. It was their GP at the other end. She was telling him about Martin. The stresses. The strains. She’d be grateful if he could come over. Nothing desperately urgent. Just a precautionary check. A sleeping tablet, perhaps. Or a mild tranquillizer. She smiled, and thanked him, and put down the phone, another brick in the wall she was building around them.

  She crossed the room and bent low over the back of the chair. She was wearing an old T-shirt, loose at the neck. He could see the swell of her breasts, smell the perfume she wore. She kissed him on the forehead, lightly, along the line of the Elastoplast. He felt her hands on his face. He smiled up at her.

  ‘Tea?’ she mouthed.

  He nodded.

  ‘Please.’

  She kissed him once more and left the room. He lay back, eyes closed, mind empty, treasuring the silence and the peace. He’d lived through the worst three days of his life. He’d faced the impossible, confronted it, kept his nerve, and now – like everyone else in the city – the nightmare was nearly over. Three days. Seventy-two hours. The world performing a giant loop, and then righting itself again, ready for the next ten thousand years. Perhaps now they’d really do something serious about disarmament, revive the spirit of glasnost and the memory of the dead Gorbachev. Perhaps now they’d sort the whole thing out. No more call for new generations of weapons. No more need for holes in the ground.

  Outside, in the street, he heard the whine of a car changing down through the gears. It sounded familiar. He got up and moved slowly to the window. A pair of headlights were nosing in through the gate. Tyres crunching over the gravel. The low, sleek, familiar shape of the Rover. The car stopped outside the front door. The engine died. A face turned towards him. Evans.

  Goodman went to the front door, and out, into the darkness. He bent to the driver’s window, heard the whine of the electric motor deep in the door. Evans looked out.

  ‘Sir?’ he said. Flat. Neutral.

  Goodman frowned.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ he said. ‘What do you want?’

  His voice sounded more hostile than he’d intended. Hostile and a little anxious. Evans looked up at him curiously, taking his time.

  ‘Mr Quinn’s idea,’ he said. ‘Thought I might keep an eye on you.’ He smiled coldly. ‘Just in case.’

  By the time Davidson found Quinn, the policeman was back in his office in the city’s Central Police Station. The office was up on the fourth floor, a wide, spacious room, browns and creams, with framed photos on the wall: Quinn in the class shot at the Bramshill Staff Command Course, Quinn the captain of the CID football team, Quinn the city’s new Police Chief, an official portrait commissioned the week he’d been appointed.

  Now, he sat behind his desk, studying an open file. He’d managed a shower and a change of shirt since Davidson had last seen him, and there was a tumbler of whisky at his elbow. He looked up. In his own office, he seemed even more solid, even more sure of himself. The alpha male. Unquestionably in charge.

  He waved Davidson into a chair beside the desk. Davidson didn’t bother with the formalities.

  ‘This body of yours…’ he said, ‘the girl at the flats…’

  Quinn nodded. ‘Yes?’

  ‘What’s going to happen?’

  Quinn frowned, fingering the glass of Scotch.

  ‘Have you seen the report? The one I sent round?’ Davidson nodded. ‘Then the answer’s academic.’ He glanced down at the file. ‘She’d been drinking. There was some kind of fight. She fell from the ninth floor.’ He shrugged. ‘We have prints. Blood. Forensic’ He paused. ‘You’re looking at a murder inquiry.’

  Davidson nodded.

  ‘Suspects?’

  ‘Naturally.’

  ‘Goodman?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Anyone else?’

  Quinn hesitated a moment, returning to the file.

  ‘Maybe the other chap,’ he said, ‘Gillespie.’ He paused. ‘Though I doubt it.’

  ‘Why?’

  Quinn shrugged.

  ‘Wrong profile,’ he said, ‘no motive.’

  ‘So what was he doing at the flat?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ He hesitated again. ‘But it’s hardly relevant, given the state of our friend in the Bunker. Did you see him last night?’ He laughed, a short, mirthless bark of laughter. ‘Looked like a man who’d fallen out with his mistress?’ He paused, the laughter turning to contempt. ‘Didn’t he?’

  Davidson didn’t answer for a moment. Then he leaned back in the chair.

  ‘So where is he now? Our ex-Controller?’

  ‘At home. With his wife.’ Quinn paused. ‘Evans is outside. Keeping an eye on him.’

  Davidson nodded, reaching for his briefcase. He slipped open the catch on the side, then looked up, as if struck by a sudden thought, pure chance, the longest shot.

  ‘Maybe she committed suicide,’ he suggested lightly.

  Quinn frowned again.

  ‘Chairs upturned? Blood on the carpet? Bruises all over her?’

  Davidson shrugged.

  ‘She was depressed,’ he suggested, ‘she was drunk. She thought the world was going to blow up.’

  Quinn’s frown deepened. ‘I’m not with you,’ he said. ‘I’m a policeman, not some bloody novelist. It’s facts you have to deal with. Not suppositions.’

  ‘Of course.’

  Davidson smiled, apologetic, and slid a photograph from the briefcase.

  ‘What’s that?’ Quinn said.

  ‘A little souvenir.’ Davidson offered him the photograph. ‘Your wife’s the one in the middle.’

  Quinn picked up the photograph, recognizing his wife and children at the quayside, Harry Cartwright shaking her hand.

  ‘Where did you get this?’ he said.

  ‘Gillespie. He took them at the dock. He collects them. He’s got the whole set.’

  ‘And what does he want to do with them?’

  ‘He wants to publish them. He wants to put them in the papers. On television. He wants the whole world to know.’ He smiled. ‘He thinks the thing stinks. He’s quite old-fashioned that way.’

  Quinn paused, gazing at the photo. He took the tiniest sip of whisky, his tongue moistening his lips.

  ‘So what are you saying?’ he said, looking up again.

  Davidson took his time.

  ‘I’m suggesting it’s not in your interests to have these published,’ he said slowly. ‘At best it looks inefficient. At worst…’ he shrugged, letting the sentence trail away. ‘Cartwright was in for six figures,’ he said, ‘and Gillespie has the evidence to prove it.’

  ‘What evidence?’
r />   ‘A fax.’

  ‘I see.’ Quinn nodded slowly, gazing at the photograph again. Finally he looked up. ‘And you?’

  ‘Me?’ Davidson smiled. ‘I’m less than eager to see Martin Goodman arrested for murder. Circumstances being what they are.’

  Quinn nodded.

  ‘So?’

  ‘So…?’ Davidson shrugged, eyeing the open file, his voice edged with a faint regret. ‘So I suggest she committed suicide.’ He reached down for the briefcase and snapped the lock shut. ‘N’est-ce pas?’

  The GP had come and gone by the time Goodman put Evans to the test. The doctor had given Goodman a thorough physical examination – pulse, blood pressure, chest, eyes, ears – and had asked him a series of questions, trying to establish the exact degree of stress. Goodman had explained the abrupt transition to war, the administration uprooted, the Bunker suddenly operational, and the GP had nodded, smiling, saying he was lucky not to have suffered a complete breakdown.

  The GP had departed after forty minutes, leaving a supply of Valium – high dosage for two days, low dosage for ten – and strict instructions not to return to work for at least a month. After that, fingers crossed, all should be well.

  ‘It’s a question of confidence,’ he told Joanna, before stepping out into the dark. ‘He’s had a bad knock or two. It’ll all come right if we’re careful. Oh…’ he smiled, ‘and no booze.’

  Now, downstairs again, slacks and an old pullover, Goodman could hear his wife singing in the kitchen. She’d promised him scrambled eggs on toast. She said she was determined to look after him. The TV was on, and the news was uniformly good. Negotiations in New York were to start at once. The Security Council would sit in all-night session. The President was back in the White House, and there was footage of spontaneous street celebrations in Moscow. Regrets, relief, and goodwill on every side. Maybe even a second chance for Glasnost.

  Goodman got up and walked to the window. Evans was still there. Goodman hesitated a moment, then crossed the room and went into the hall. He took a coat from the hook on the wall, and stepped out into the night. He’d barely walked five yards on the gravel towards the gate when he heard the door of the Rover open. He stopped. Evans came towards him. He was wearing civilian clothes, a light jacket, dark trousers.