The Old Religion

by Martyn Waites

  Noah and most of the travellers had disappeared. No one knew where. No one had heard from them. Rachel was also in custody. She had lost her job with the police force. Despite her contacting him several times, Tom had had nothing to do with her.

  A lot of people were talking of moving away from the area. Tom wasn’t surprised at that.

  And St Petroc hadn’t won the bid for the marina. Probably just as well, thought Tom.

  Then there was Pearl.

  He was unsure whether to go in to work the next day. But Pearl hadn’t phoned him to say otherwise so he had turned up as usual.

  He had made a point of walking through the village. It had the haunted, abandoned feel that he had experienced in villages and settlements in Afghanistan after the collective madness of battle had passed by, leaving only the ghosts, the bereft and the shell-shocked civilians who couldn’t believe they had once tried to be insurgents. Had thought they had a point to make, a war to fight.

  The few people about kept their distance from each other, from him. He had been right: the village was in collective shock. Shame and disgust stopped them looking at each other and barely at themselves.

  He saw that the village shop was open, deliberated, went inside. The same stout, angry-faced woman was behind the till. She usually looked formidable, judgemental but she didn’t look like that today. He could understand her impulse, though. Try to go back to normal. Pretend it had never happened.

  Tom took a loaf of bread from the shelf, placed it beside the till. Her face reddened. She wouldn’t meet his eyes.

  ‘Quiet today,’ he said.

  She stated the price of the bread, waited for his money.

  ‘Was yours one of the cars destroyed last night?’

  She looked like she didn’t know how to respond. Tom stayed where he was, gave her no choice but to address him.

  She nodded.

  ‘The four-by-four or the estate?’

  ‘Estate.’

  ‘Insurance cover it?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘It’s still in front of my house so give me a call when you want to come and get it. Maybe I can give you a tow with my Land Rover.’

  She nodded once more, her face now beetroot.

  He studied her, this woman who usually had an opinion on everyone and everything, now struck silent. Whatever rage he had felt towards her – and the rest of them – had dissipated with the new day. He remembered Afghanistan once more, would-be insurgents in tears as they realised what they had done. Just normal citizens doing what they had believed in, thought was right. Confronted with the enormity of their crimes they had always crumpled. Begged for forgiveness from Tom and his team when it wasn’t theirs to give.

  ‘We’ve all got to rebuild,’ Tom told her. ‘Move forward. Haven’t we?’

  She didn’t reply.

  He left the shop.

  *

  He found Pearl sitting by herself in the bar. It looked dusty and old, light slanting in through the ancient windows, stray beams of illumination that just showed up how dark everywhere else was.

  ‘Closed.’

  She looked up as he entered.

  ‘Oh. It’s you.’ She looked down again, unsure what to say to him.

  ‘Yeah, it’s me.’

  He pulled up a chair, sat next to her.

  ‘You not opening today? The place’ll be overrun with journalists and news crews. You’re missing out on a small fortune.’

  She shrugged. ‘Not bothered.’

  ‘Fair enough.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I was wrong. I was . . . I don’t know why I . . .’ Long-dammed tears began to flow.

  Tom put his arm round her. She sank into him.

  ‘It’s OK,’ he said. ‘Your parents were there, this is your village, you . . . I don’t know, did what you felt was the right thing to do.’

  She said nothing, just cried.

  Eventually she looked up, wiped her wet face with a tissue. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘Just . . . being understanding. My parents have left the village. Don’t know if they’ll ever be back again. Don’t know what I should do . . .’

  ‘Run this place.’

  She shook her head. ‘I can’t . . .’

  ‘Course you can. Take over from what they did. I bet you’ve been turning away bookings already, haven’t you?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Place’ll be rammed soon. Just wait till the tourists get a hold of the story. Proper little goldmine, this’ll be.’

  ‘I’ll need someone to run it with me.’ She looked up at Tom.

  ‘Me?’ He thought. ‘I should . . . keep a low profile.’

  ‘Why? Who are you really, Tom?’

  He almost told her. ‘Just a friend. That’s all. Hopefully your friend.’ He changed the subject. ‘What would that involve if I did it?’

  ‘I’ll have to run the whole lot, hotel and everything. You can have my old job, bar manager. That’s if you’re not going to disappear. You always said you never knew how long you’d be around for.’

  Tom’s turn to shrug. ‘I’ve got nowhere else to go. Here’s as good as anywhere.’

  ‘So what d’you think?’

  ‘I think you’d better open those doors. There’ll be a lot of thirsty and hungry journalists looking for somewhere to set up shop. Mostly thirsty.’

  She smiled at him.

  *

  The Sail Makers had been busy every day since then. Tom had taken on extra shifts and would do even more in his new role. But there was one more thing – the most important thing – he still had to do.

  He looked across at Lila sitting in the garden, drinking her Coke.

  Now or never, he thought.

  ‘So,’ he said, ‘what d’you want to do now?’

  She shrugged. ‘Drink this. Maybe have another. See what’s on telly later. Why?’

  ‘That’s not what I meant.’

  Lila nodded. Looked away. ‘I know what you meant.’

  ‘Right. Well, I just wanted to say, you’re welcome to stay here. As far as I’m concerned, this is your house as well as mine.’

  She tried to hide how pleased his words made her.

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘I mean, it won’t make everything perfect overnight, but it’s a start. You can get yourself sorted out from here. This can be your home. For as long as you want it.’

  ‘OK, then.’ She nodded. Then looked up. ‘Just one thing.’

  Tom braced himself. He knew what she was going to ask. And he knew he had to be honest with her in his reply.

  ‘Fire away.’ He regretted his choice of words immediately.

  ‘Who are you?’

  He smiled. Just what he had expected.

  ‘I mean, I know your name, Tom Killgannon, but I know nothing about you. I know there’s something gone on in your past and you’re here for a reason, but if I’m going to be living here with you then I need to know who you are. You know everything about me.’

  ‘That’s fair enough. I’ll tell you. And once I’ve told you, I hope you’ll still want to stay.’

  Lila looked apprehensive. Tom began.

  ‘First thing you should know, Tom Killgannon’s not my real name.’

  ‘What is it, then?’

  ‘Doesn’t matter. Really, it doesn’t matter. I don’t use it any more, I doubt I ever will again.’

  ‘How did you come to be here?’

  He poured himself a whisky.

  ‘I told you I was ex-army and that I joined the police force. Right?’

  She nodded.

  ‘And that I got sent up to Moss Side undercover?’

  She nodded again.

  ‘Right. Well, the area had changed so much when I got back. Didn’t recognise it, hardly. I mean, it had always been rough, that’s where I’m from, but it was so bad. Poverty was really biting, no jobs, nothing. No hope. And the place was divided up between the gangs. They
were the only growth industry. Gangs and drugs. And people living in fear. Community? All gone.

  ‘Julie, my sister, was separated from the bloke she’d had a daughter with. And Hayley, her daughter, my niece, was doing her full-on teenage rebellion thing. Driving her mother mad. No one could reach her.’

  Lila smiled. ‘Yeah, recognise that.’

  ‘I doubt it. Not like her. She was really full on. Fifteen and running with the drug gangs and using as well. Horrible to see.’

  ‘So what did you do?’

  ‘Went undercover. That’s what I was there for. No one knew I was from round there. They just thought I was ex-army, home after the Middle East. It worked as a cover story, got me in with them. I mean, it took a while, didn’t just happen overnight, but they eventually accepted me, came to trust me, even. I ended up being thought of as one of their own.

  ‘But obviously I wasn’t. There I was, working my way up in the organisation, but really gathering as much evidence as I could on them. Getting closer to the top guys. And I did some . . . shall we say, morally questionable things on the way. Things I’m not proud of, but that were necessary to get me trusted, to be convincing.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Oh, you don’t want to know.’

  ‘I do. If I’m living here under the same roof as you, I want to know.’

  Tom sighed. Told her the truth. ‘Punishment beatings. Drug distribution. Even arranging arson against potential enemies and competitors. All sorts of shit.’ He looked up at her. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Well, that made them trust me. I got a reputation as muscle. Intelligent muscle, though. And I was there for nearly two years.’

  ‘So what happened? I’m assuming something happened.’

  ‘Oh, yeah, it happened all right.’ Tom paused, blinked away a mental image that came fleetingly to mind. Continued. ‘There was a shipment due. They needed my help with it. A big shipment. The kind that could break the whole gang, if they had someone on the inside that knew what was happening. Which they did, of course. So I informed my handlers and when it arrived, the police were waiting. But of course, nothing ever goes right.’

  He paused, took a mouthful of whisky. Another one. Lila said nothing, waited for him to continue.

  ‘There were more people around that night than I’d expected. Many more. One in particular.’

  ‘Hayley?’

  Tom gave a sad smile. ‘Yeah, Hayley. And more guns than anyone was expecting. The whole thing was a bloodbath. And I contributed to it as well.’

  Another sigh. Another mouthful of whisky.

  ‘And when all the smoke cleared and the bodies were counted, Hayley was one of them.’

  He stopped, his mind right back in that night. He had never forgotten it. Never would.

  ‘I don’t know who did it, I never found out. There was crossfire . . .’ He stopped, wiped back tears. ‘Crossfire. And . . . she was dead . . .’

  ‘But you didn’t kill her.’

  He looked up, fresh tears in his eyes. ‘I might have done . . .’

  ‘I don’t think you did. And you can’t blame yourself for it.’

  Another sigh. ‘But I do. I could have got her out of there. Told her who I was, what I was doing. Got her out. But I didn’t.’

  ‘You couldn’t,’ said Lila. ‘You had a job to do.’

  ‘Yeah, some job. Took some drugs off the streets, some gangsters, so what? A new batch of drugs arrived after that, a new load of gangs to distribute them. But Hayley was gone for ever . . .’

  Lila looked at him, understanding something for the first time.

  ‘Anyway,’ said Tom, keeping going, ‘my work was commended. I’d amassed enough evidence against the gang to put them away. And then I was given a way out, because I’d burned all my bridges in Manchester. Give evidence anonymously, be seen as striking a deal, let them take all the blame. Ghost away. I said yes. But there was a catch. I’d have to go into witness protection. Or UK Protected Person Service, to give it its full title. Get a new identity, leave the police force, move somewhere where I was completely unknown. Here seemed as good as anywhere.’

  ‘You told me you were from Middlesbrough the other night.’

  Tom smiled. ‘Yeah, that’s what I have to tell people. Tom Killgannon is from Middlesbrough, to all intents and purposes. They sent me there after Manchester to get used to the place for a few months, so if anyone asked me anything about it I’d know what I was talking about. But there was one other thing.’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘They thought I was too good at my job to let me go completely. A plausibly deniable asset. So I had to agree to what they wanted if they were to leave me alone. If I wanted to come to terms with what I’d done, what had happened to Hayley, have any chance at a new future, all that.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I have to be here when they want me. Ready and willing to be recalled. Push a button and up jumps Action Man.’

  ‘Did you agree?’

  ‘I had no choice. So here I am.’

  ‘Did you talk to your sister?’

  ‘I tried. Sent her a message explaining that I’d been working undercover, that I did what I’d done because I was police. And that I was genuinely sorry for Hayley’s death, for the grief and anguish I’d caused her and if I’d contributed to it I hoped that she could find it in her heart to forgive me. All of that.’

  ‘And did she?’

  He sniffed, drank more whisky. ‘Never heard back.’

  He looked up, directly at Lila. ‘So there you go. That’s who I am.’

  She returned his stare, unblinking. Nodding. Eventually she spoke.

  ‘So I remind you of her, is that it? Your dead niece.’

  ‘Well, no . . .’

  ‘You couldn’t save her so you’ll save me instead? Is that it?’

  ‘It’s not like that.’

  Anger rose within her. ‘Well, it sounds like that to me. I’m just some . . . I don’t know what I am, what you think of me.’

  ‘No, it’s not like that,’ said Tom, raising his own voice. Then softening it again, thinking. ‘Well, I don’t know. Maybe. Partly. But I couldn’t just stand by and not help you, could I? Everything you’ve been through. You didn’t deserve all that.’

  ‘Really? Didn’t I? Sometimes I think I do. I’ve done some bad things. Look what I did to Danny.’

  ‘Self-defence. And you didn’t kill him.’

  ‘But I helped to get that student killed.’

  ‘No, you didn’t. But when you realised you’d done something wrong, you tried to put it right. That’s the act of a good person. You don’t deserve what you got, Lila. And I would hate to see anything more happen to you.’

  She kept staring at him, took her time to reply. ‘Well, if anything did happen to me, it would be my fault, right?’

  ‘Yeah, of course.’

  ‘Not yours, mine.’

  ‘Absolutely.’ He sighed. ‘I meant what I said, though: this is your home as well as mine. For as long as you want it. No strings, no questions. OK?’

  Lila thought. ‘OK,’ she said after a while. Then she thought some more, smiled.

  ‘What?’

  ‘You. You look like this big strong bloke, but you’re not, are you? You’re as much of a fuck-up as I am.’

  ‘You reckon?’ Tom smiled.

  ‘I reckon. I don’t think it’s you looking after me – I think I’ll have to look after you.’

  He laughed.

  Lila looked round at the garden. ‘You know, you could really make something of this. Something really decent here.’

  ‘You think? Maybe. I’d need help, though. Couldn’t do it on my own.’

  She smiled at him.

  ‘OK, then. Deal.’

  A crow sailed overhead, cawing. They ignored it.

  They sat in silence. Both drinking, both smiling.

  Acknowledgements

  Firstly, t
hanks to Jade Chapman for suggesting that I might like to look westwards for inspiration.

  To my agent Jane Gregory and everyone at Gregory and Company for getting in the ring and going the full ten rounds on my behalf.

  To everyone at Bonnier Zaffre for making me feel so welcome and doing such a great job on this book. With special and huge thanks to my wonderful editor Katherine Armstrong for giving so much and making me up my game to match her vision. If you enjoy this book, you’ve got her to thank.

  And to my wife, Jamie-Lee. You turn research trips into adventures. You turn everything into an adventure.

  About the Author

  Martyn Waites was born in Newcastle Upon Tyne. He trained at the Birmingham Sch-ool of Speech and Dr-ama and worked as an actor for many years before becoming a writer. His novels include the critically acclaimed Joe Dono-van series, set in the north-east of Eng-land, and The White Room, which was a Guardian book of the year. In 2013 he was chosen to write Angel of Death, the official sequel to Susan Hill’s Woman in Bla-ck, and in 2014 won the Grand Prix du Ro-man Noir for Born Un-der Punches. He has been nominated for every major British crime fiction award and has also enjoyed international commer-cial success with ei-ght novels written under the name Tania Carver.

  Read on for a conversation with Martyn Waites . . .

  Where did the character of Tom Killgannon come from? Is he based on anyone you know?

  Not really. I suppose, as someone once said, your series character is always a version of yourself but five years younger. As I’ve got older it might be ten. Or twenty . . .

  But no. I knew for this new book that I needed a new central character and I had to make him interesting enough to base a whole series on, if readers wanted to stick around for that. I’d just moved to the south-west after spending most of my adult life in and around London so it was quite a change. I decided to create a character who could mirror that sense of dislocation I was experiencing. Looking at a place with an outsider’s eye. Although, it must be stressed, my background is very different to Tom’s.