TT12 The Bones Beneath

by Mark Billingham

  It’s so ironic, really. Considering what I did, the journey I’ve been on to get here. It breaks my heart that we never got a chance to come here together. To do so many things.

  He glanced to his left, saw Jenks lick the end of a finger and slowly turn a page. Fletcher was talking to Nicklin about football and Nicklin was pretending to be interested. The rise and fall of chit-chat was still drifting in from the next room.

  This place would actually make the perfect prison, you know that? Like Alcatraz or somewhere. Like Robben Island, where they kept Mandela, where you talked about going, remember? I was thinking how awful it must have been, being a prisoner somewhere like that. Somewhere like this. So much space around you, such a big sky. That’s so much crueller in a way than how things are now. Don’t you think? I mean, I reckon I’ve had it fairly easy compared to that, all things considered.

  Bearing in mind what I did. How wrong I got it all.

  It’s weird how easy I find it now, talking to you like this and yet I still haven’t got a clue what I’m going to say to your mum later on. I keep going over it, trying to come up with a few lines, but everything just sounds corny and rubbish. I can be like that with you though, because I just imagine you rolling your eyes and telling me how ‘sad’ I am. The way you and your sister did if you saw me dancing or if I didn’t know what some piece of slang meant or something.

  It’s what dads do, isn’t it? What they’ve always done. We’re hard-wired to embarrass you and to grumble about you coming home late and using the place like a hotel. We’re on safe ground with all that stuff, aren’t we? We know how we should behave.

  It’s the other things.

  The things nobody should ever have to deal with.

  When we don’t know what to do because your heart is broken, and when the pain you’re in is so real and so raw and we can’t do anything to make it better. When we walk into your bedroom and find you… you know? And afterwards, when your mum’s making a noise that’s not like anything we’ve ever heard before, like something’s being torn out of her.

  Finding out the truth about what actually happened was terrible, I can’t pretend that it wasn’t. Like tumbling into the pit. But there’s some consolation in knowing that because I got it so wrong, you’re loved up there as much as you ever were here. As cherished.

  Right now, I’m cold and I’m scared, but that’s a real comfort.

  He looked up at a noise from across the room and understood that Nicklin was talking to him.

  Sorry, Jode, I’ve got to go.

  He nodded, hating him. Hating being dragged so roughly up and away from her. From a perfect, waking dream of death to a nightmare of shadows and shit and something terrible in the dark.

  ‘You never been a football fan then, Jeff?’

  Love you, baby.

  ‘Jeff?’

  Love you, love you, love you…

  FORTY-EIGHT

  ‘I just came to see how you were getting on,’ Markham said.

  Thorne nodded, but hadn’t really listened. ‘Were you in the back garden a few minutes ago?’

  ‘No.’ She looked confused. ‘Are you…?’

  Thorne had already turned and was on his way back round to the rear of the property.

  ‘Is everything OK?’

  ‘There was someone out there,’ Thorne said. ‘I saw a torch.’

  Markham followed a pace or two behind, pushing through the long grass at the side of the cottage. ‘Maybe it was my torch reflecting off something,’ she said. She emerged into the garden and noticed the generator. ‘Off that, for a start.’ She turned round and nodded back towards the front of the cottage. ‘Could it have been the lighthouse, maybe?’

  Thorne said, ‘No. I don’t know. Maybe…’ He was in much the same spot he’d been in a few minutes earlier, shining his torch around the garden, raising it to throw the beam on to the base of the mountain directly behind. Markham did the same, though neither torch was powerful enough to see much beyond the line of rocks and small bushes twenty or thirty feet up.

  ‘So, how’s it looking inside?’ Markham asked.

  Thorne turned and looked back at the cottage. ‘Well, it’s not exactly five-star,’ he said. ‘Probably still better than a Travelodge though.’

  ‘You got all the beds sorted?’

  Thorne shook his head. ‘Just had a look around and put the lights on, basically.’

  ‘Come on,’ Markham said. ‘I’ll give you a hand.’

  She pushed open the back door and Thorne followed her through the two kitchens into the parlour. She took one look at the fireplace and immediately began opening cupboards until she found a small cache of old newspapers and kindling, a few logs and a box of firelighters.

  ‘Woman make fire,’ she said.

  ‘What’s the point?’ Thorne asked. ‘Once we’ve brought the others over from Chapel House, we’ll be going straight to bed. I’m not envisaging cocoa round the fire.’

  Markham knelt and began tearing off sheets of paper, twisting them into knots and tossing them into the grate. ‘Might as well,’ she said. ‘Even if we just keep it going for half an hour or so now, it’ll take the chill off. You’ll all be sleeping in your overcoats otherwise.’

  ‘I suppose,’ Thorne said.

  Before he could do a great deal to help, Markham had got a decent blaze going. She stood up and admired her handiwork.

  ‘You’ve done this before,’ Thorne said.

  She said, ‘It’s all fairly basic,’ then looked and saw that Thorne thought it was not basic at all. ‘God, you’re a real city boy, aren’t you?’

  Before Thorne could answer her, another of the ghostly seal-calls echoed from the other side of the island. ‘Can you blame me?’ he said.

  Markham threw another log on to the fire and wiped her hands off on the back of her jeans. ‘Right,’ she said. ‘Let’s go and have a look at these bedrooms.’

  They moved from room to room, lighting the lamps; pulling pillows, sheets and duvets from protective bin-liners, turning mattresses and making up beds.

  ‘We had a place in the country when I was a kid,’ Markham said. ‘Me and my brother hated it most of the time. Moaned like mad and drove my mum and dad barmy, going on about how boring it was. Still, I learned how to make a fire up, how to skin a rabbit, all that.’

  Thorne looked at her.

  ‘I’m kidding,’ she said. ‘This was the Cotswolds, for God’s sake. You were never more than fifty feet from Waitrose or a tea shop.’

  Thorne tossed a pillow on to a single bed. ‘No, I’m not the biggest fan of the countryside. My ex used to talk about getting out of London. She was Job too, so we talked about relocating every so often, but I just can’t imagine being a copper and not being in a city.’ He began stuffing a second pillow into its pillowcase. ‘I mean, what the hell are you supposed to do all day in the countryside if you’re a copper? Nick people for being pissed in charge of a muck-spreader?’ Markham laughed and he enjoyed hearing it. ‘Patrol the village fête and make sure there’s no drug-cheats at the duck racing?’

  ‘Trust me,’ Markham said. ‘I’ve been at plenty of seriously nasty crime scenes in places like this.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Well, not like this. You know, the countryside, but in places where there are actually some people around to do things to one another.’

  Thorne dropped the second pillow down, straightened it. ‘It’s not for me,’ he said. ‘Too much fresh air, I get dizzy.’

  ‘Your ex…?’ Markham said.

  Thorne looked at her. Each was holding two corners of a duvet cover; the final one of six. They shook it out.

  ‘Ex, because she was a copper too? I can understand how tricky that is.’

  ‘No, there was other stuff,’ Thorne said. Stuff he had no intention of talking about. That he had only recently begun talking to Helen about.

  A lost baby.

  A grief that had gone unexpressed until it was far too late.

>   He let go of the duvet cover, stood back and watched Markham wrestle a duvet into it. ‘Actually, I’m with another copper now,’ he said. ‘So…’

  ‘Helen,’ Markham said.

  ‘Right.’ Thorne guessed that she had got the name from Karim. ‘Yeah, she’s great.’

  Markham looked at him and nodded, as though she knew he had said that to try and counteract the potent fantasy that was unfolding in his head and working elsewhere. Images that had been taking shape and growing more elaborate since he and Wendy Markham had walked into that first bedroom.

  To water down the guilt a little.

  Once the final duvet had been laid in place, they made their way back downstairs. In the parlour, the fire had died down somewhat, but it was noticeably warmer.

  ‘You were bang on,’ Thorne said.

  They stared at the flames for a few moments, the shadows moving on the wall behind them; across painted stone and watercolours of seascapes in heavy, wooden frames.

  ‘So, who gave you that then?’ Markham asked.

  ‘Sorry?’

  She lifted a finger, touched it to Thorne’s chin. The short, straight scar that ran along it.

  ‘Ah… that was a woman with a knife.’ He nodded when he saw Markham grimace. ‘Believe it or not, a woman I was actually in bed with at the time.’

  Markham’s eyes widened. ‘Blimey. You must have seriously under-performed.’

  ‘No, it wasn’t that.’

  Something else Thorne most certainly did not want to get into. The wound a prelude to an event that even Helen did not know about yet.

  ‘She got stroppy,’ he said, ‘when I refused to sleep in the wet patch.’

  A log crackled and spat and Thorne bent to grab tongs and retrieve a smouldering ember. When he straightened up, Markham was smiling and now it wasn’t only his proximity to the fire that was making Thorne’s face hot.

  ‘Some women are just plain bloody selfish,’ she said.

  FORTY-NINE

  When Thorne and Markham got back to Chapel House half an hour later, dinner was finished and Karim had returned to his less than pleasant duties at the chapel itself. Holland – relieved in every sense – was talking to Bethan Howell while Barber, having finished clearing things away, had continued the necessary arse-kissing by volunteering to wash up in freezing water.

  Once Thorne was back, people began gathering in the cottage’s large sitting room. Extra chairs were pulled in from the parlour and around the dining table. The fire was in need of some attention, which Markham was happy to provide and, within a minute or two, she had worked the same incendiary magic as had been conjured at the Old House a short time before.

  ‘That’s lovely,’ Nicklin said. He raised cuffed wrists, as though to warm them at the fire. ‘No crumpets in those plastic bags, were there?’

  There were nine of them crowded into the room. Markham had been quick to get one of the bottles of wine open and pour glasses for herself, Howell and Barber. With everyone else present on duty or in handcuffs, they were the only ones drinking anything stronger than tea. Thorne was on the last of the coffee from the school, already resigned to the fact that he would not be getting a great deal of sleep.

  Truthfully, Thorne was uncertain as to the best way to proceed. It was only a little after nine o’clock and, though he was not exactly comfortable with everyone sitting around as though they were all on holiday together, it was still too early to go to bed. There was an hour or so yet before he would want to move the prison party across to the Old House for the night and he was happier killing the time somewhere warm.

  ‘We’ll stay here for now,’ he said. ‘It’s more comfortable and I’d prefer it if we all stayed together as long as possible.’

  There were several murmurs of approval. Markham muttered something to Howell about ‘opening that other bottle.’

  Nicklin seemed keen to endorse Thorne’s decision. ‘Yeah, definitely better to be together,’ he said. ‘We should make the most of it anyway, because it’s back to reality tomorrow.’

  All eyes in the room were on him, but nobody said anything.

  ‘It feels a bit unreal this place, don’t you think?’ Nicklin looked from face to face, seeking a response. He shrugged. ‘Well, it always felt that way to me.’

  Thorne grunted, made no attempt to disguise his contempt. ‘So what, when you were killing Simon Milner and Eileen Bennett, that just felt like a dream or something, did it?’

  ‘Killing always feels a bit like that to me,’ Nicklin said. ‘Like I’m watching someone else do it.’

  Suddenly, Thorne’s mouth was very dry. Something about the casual way that murder was being described, like any hobby, humdrum and unremarkable. That, and the tense being used.

  Feels, not felt.

  Nicklin smiled. ‘I always enjoy the view, though…’

  A shocked silence settled for a minute or so after that but, as soon as it had been broken, conversation in the room quickly splintered into assorted hushed and simultaneous exchanges: Holland asking Thorne what time he thought they’d be back in London the following day; Fletcher and Jenks talking holidays; Howell and Markham laughing as the wine continued to go down easily and they whispered about Sam Karim and Andy Barber.

  In a moment of quiet, Markham said, ‘Come on then, who’s got a good story?’ When Thorne looked across, she added, ‘Last night, we sat around telling stories. It was a laugh.’

  ‘Nothing scary,’ Howell said. ‘Well, not very scary, because we didn’t want to frighten Barber too much.’ Fletcher muttered something and she looked across. ‘What?’

  ‘What are we, Girl Guides?’

  Jenks laughed, said, ‘Girl Guides.’

  Howell stared daggers at Fletcher across the top of her glass. ‘I don’t think you’d have been tough enough for the Girl Guides.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Thorne said. He could easily imagine the forensic team sitting around the previous evening, putting the red wine away and swapping tales, but this was a very different line-up of potential storytellers. ‘Not sure it’s a good idea.’

  ‘Why not?’ Markham asked. ‘It helped to pass the time.’

  ‘Still.’

  ‘That’s all I was thinking.’

  Thorne looked hard at her, in the hope that Markham might see what he was driving at. The slight shake of her head and widening of her eyes made it clear that she didn’t.

  ‘I know a fantastic story,’ Nicklin said.

  Thorne pointed at him. ‘That’s why it’s not a good idea.’

  ‘No, seriously.’ Nicklin leaned forward in his chair, excited. ‘This is an absolute cracker, I promise you. It’s got the lot… it’s tragic, but it’s also funny. There’s a murder, obviously, I know you wouldn’t expect anything else, but it’s also got pathos, mystery… and there’s a twist at the end I guarantee you won’t see coming.’ He nodded. ‘Best. Story. Ever.’ He looked at several of the faces now turned to his. ‘Well?’

  ‘I got no problem with it,’ Fletcher said.

  Nicklin turned to Thorne. Said, ‘It’s only a story.’

  ‘This better not piss anybody off.’ Thorne looked to Markham and Howell but saw no sign of anxiety, no inclination to object. ‘If you upset anybody…’

  ‘What are you going to do?’ Nicklin asked. ‘Send me to bed?’

  Thorne was hugely irritated to see Fletcher and Jenks smile, half-expecting the latter to moronically repeat, ‘Send me to bed.’ He gave Nicklin the nod, stared down at his coffee.

  Nicklin cleared his throat. ‘Now, I should point out before I start that this isn’t really my story at all.’ He nodded across to where Batchelor was still sitting on one of the sofas next to Alan Jenks. ‘It’s Jeffrey’s.’ Heads turned towards Batchelor, but he continued staring at a spot on the worn carpet a few feet in front of him, as he had been doing for as long as anyone else in the room could remember. ‘I promise to try and do it justice, Jeff.’ Nicklin waited, shrugged when Batchelor gave no
response. ‘So, you all know why Jeff’s sitting over there in handcuffs, do you? How a nice, mild-mannered history teacher like him ended up in Long Lartin with a bunch of murderous nut-jobs like me.’

  Thorne raised a hand. ‘OK, that’s enough.’

  ‘It’s background,’ Nicklin protested. ‘It’s important if the story’s going to make any sense.’

  Thorne glanced at the man Nicklin was talking about. If Batchelor was bothered by what was being said about him, there was no sign of it.

  ‘Come on,’ Fletcher said. ‘What’s the big deal? I don’t think anyone here seriously thinks he’s in prison for not returning library books, do they?’

  ‘Whatever,’ Thorne said.

  ‘Right,’ Nicklin said. ‘Well… the sad truth is that Jeff walked into his eldest daughter’s bedroom one morning and discovered that she’d killed herself.’ He spoke quietly, without colour. ‘I’m sure I don’t need to tell you how horrible that was. Just unthinkable, especially for those of you who’ve got kids.’ He looked at Holland, gave a small nod. ‘Now, the agony that Jeff must have felt that morning is not even something I can begin to put into words, but it turned into something else when he found out why his daughter had hanged herself. It turned into rage.

  ‘Seems that Jodi, his daughter, had been dumped by her boyfriend.’ He shook his head. ‘Little scumbag she was going out with decided he wanted nothing more to do with her, and instead of telling her face to face, he’d sent her a text. That was it. Jeff’s little girl woke up one morning, saw that text message and it felt like her life was over.

  ‘So, she took the cord off her dressing gown, put it round her neck and five minutes later it was.

  ‘Now… bad luck usually plays a part in stories like this and it was Jeff’s bad luck that he ran into Nathan, the aforementioned little scumbag, at the bus stop, the day after Jodi had killed herself.’ There was more in Nicklin’s voice now as he began to relish the telling, reaching a part of the story he found especially appealing.

  A view he enjoyed.