by Nicky Black
‘They’re the new O levels as of last year,’ she said with condescension.
‘I know that.’ He didn’t; had never heard of GCSEs.
Miss Lindsay was looking at his open palm and he let it drop. ‘Why are you here, Inspector?’ she asked. ‘Have we done anything wrong? Or are you just after a bit of background on the girl? Because if you are, you’re best off speaking to the head of year. Only, I’d make an appointment next time, he’s got a lot on.’
Her voice had started to sound muffled in Peach’s ears, and he fought hard to maintain his composure. ‘She had a friend,’ he managed. ‘Selina someone.’
‘Selina Blackhurst,’ Miss Lindsay said. ‘Lives in the Old Vicarage on Newcastle Road. Nice girl.’ She offered a lop-sided grin. ‘Mother’s an award-winning architect.’
The dig riled him. ‘You have a duty of care …’ he said, needing to get one last word in, see her come down a peg or two.
‘And so do parents,’ she replied. ‘Sally’s father came in with her. He agreed with everything she wanted to do. Totally irresponsible.’
A hush descended on the room, a chasm of disbelief opening up beneath Peach’s feet. ‘Her father?’
‘Her father,’ echoed Miss Lindsay. ‘Horrible man. Creepy as hell. Now, if you’ll excuse me.’ The pen was back in her hand.
Peach’s face was frozen; he wanted to speak but his mouth was dry as bone. Looking through the window into the school yard, he realised it was alien to him, all of it; as unfamiliar as Timbuktu. He’d never set foot in the place, never dropped Sally off at the school gates, never picked her up, never attended a performance or a sports day. He had never been to her school in the three years she’d been here.
Feeling weak as a newborn, he listed as he stood, holding the arm of the chair to steady himself. He ought to get a description at least, tell the woman that he was her father. But shame shut the words down. ‘I’ll, erm, I’ll need to see her school file,’ he stammered.
‘See Connie,’ Miss Lindsay said without looking up.
The school corridor seemed to lengthen as he walked towards the stairs, the walls gliding past him at a slower pace than his steps. Questions bombarded him like missiles. Where had Sally been every day in her school uniform? The Saturday job, the weekend sleepovers, the studying late at friends’ houses, the notes to say she was at netball practice, drama, choir?
Gathering himself at the top of the stairs, he looked down at the now quiet school reception.
Her father?
Miss Lindsay was mistaken. Either that, or his child was a barefaced liar.
TOMMY
It had been many years since Tommy had experienced peace and tranquillity quite like this. To the north, the hills lumbered upwards in a patchwork of yellow, green, and brown, past the horizon and onwards to Scotland. To the south, they fell away into dense forest. Birds chirped and squawked ceaselessly, interrupted only by the intermittent bleat of a sheep or low of a cow.
Frankie whistled the theme tune to Last of the Summer Wine while they sat on a dry-stone wall eating Betty’s chopped pork sandwiches from Tupperware, Jed tapping figures into a calculator and jotting the numbers onto a spiral pad. Fatty, an orange Mini Coupe, was parked on a gravel path nearby, Frankie under orders from Honest Jim to drive it as far and as fast as possible in a low gear to cause maximum damage. There was a tenner in it for Frankie if Fatty arrived back needing a hundred and fifty pounds worth of work rather than the fifty originally quoted.
Fatty had done nothing for Jed’s street cred, folded into the back seat, his knees high, his head bent low. ‘Two grand?’ Jed had complained, hugging his knees. ‘We’ll need more than that, comrade.’
They would have to call in some favours, Tommy had said.
‘We haven’t paid anyone for the last one yet,’ came Jed’s mumbled reply.
The thought of going back to Paul Smart for more money was making Tommy’s neck itch.
‘Anyhow, what we gonna call it?’ Jed looked up from his calculator.
‘What?’ said Frankie.
‘The rave, numb-nuts.’ Jed went back to his pad of paper and underlined the final figure with a pen, letting out a whistle. ‘Six and a half grand,’ he said.
‘We’ll have to get stuff on credit,’ said Tommy.
‘Your credit ran out long ago, pal.’
It seemed no matter how much Jed manipulated the figures, it was proving impossible to keep to the two-grand budget.
Tommy scratched at the skin under his chin with the back of his nails and told Jed to keep trying.
‘Anyway, what did you have to do to get money from Denise?’ Jed nodded at the cash in Tommy’s inside pocket, and Tommy looked away from Frankie’s fleeting glance, the realisation that he would have to lie to Jed settling hesitantly in his throat. He’d never lied to Jed.
‘Ahhh, for fuck’s sake!’ Frankie exclaimed from nowhere. ‘There’s no cake!’ He held the empty Tupperware upside down, the last sandwich firmly clenched in his hand.
‘So, put in a complaint!’ snapped Jed, but his eyes were still waiting for Tommy’s answer.
‘Profit is a great motivator, Gerald,’ said Tommy, ignoring the evil eyes Jed employed when anyone used his full name. He leant into Jed and whispered. ‘She wants no one to know, so not a word.’ Another lie, and he wondered when it might end.
‘Just so long as it’s legit,’ said Jed. ‘I can’t afford to be getting mixed up with shite, not with a proper job on the cards.’
Jed sounded deadly serious and Tommy had to stifle a laugh, not quite sure what to do with the little stab of jealousy that caught him unawares. ‘Better get rid of the knock-off trainers, then,’ he said, cynically. ‘Tucker wants his money. He’s threatening your manhood.’
Jed hadn’t taken the news well that morning, his head banging off Fatty’s roof when Tommy told him of Tucker’s new position in Paul Smart Incorporated.
‘I did,’ said Jed, ‘I used the money to buy the safe.’ It was meant to provoke guilt, and it hit the mark.
‘Christ, it doesn’t have to be Fort Knox,’ Tommy said. ‘Why can’t we just use a safe house?’
Jed indicated the vast countryside with an outstretched arm and Tommy squinted around him, drawing his lips together in acknowledgement. He’d been to the countryside only once before – a school outing to Vindolanda. It was a far cry from Valley Park’s recreation ground, the only piece of green space the estate could boast as a park. He’d walked through the rec that morning to meet Jed, Frankie, and Fatty. Barely ten o’clock in the morning and Trevor Logan and half a dozen street drinkers and junkies were heading towards the protection of the oak tree, little Carl trudging along a few yards behind his brother, straining to pull an old tartan shopping trolley. The group had gathered around the massive trunk of the tree to wait for Carl, T-shirts hanging from their back pockets.
‘Howay, Hulk Fucking Hogan!’ Trevor jeered at Carl, his lackeys laughing like howler monkeys, scratching at their balls, and drawing hard on their fag ends. When Carl reached them, he opened the flap of the trolley and they all dived in, pulling out six packs and cartons of cigarettes.
Trevor held two of the six packs aloft, turning towards Tommy and gyrating his hips in a dance of sorts. ‘Wor bairn!' he shouted. 'Best little thief in Valley Park, eh?!’ Turning back to Carl, Trevor handed him one of the six packs and pushed him away. ‘Now fuck off, you manky bastard,’ he’d spat.
The high-pitched cry of a lone buzzard brought Tommy’s eyes to the cloudless sky now, Frankie shielding his sandwich, afraid the bird would rob the food from his fingers. The sense of space and liberty was overwhelming, and Tommy hopped onto the dry-stone wall, stretching his back, stiff and sore from the buffer machine he’d been tied to that morning, up at the crack of dawn and down at the Metrocentre by six o’clock.
Putting his hands on his hips, he surveyed the fields. ‘We should put the marquee over there,’ he said, pointing to the field to his right. It was huge a
nd flat.
‘No marquees,’ said Jed. ‘All sold out.’
‘Open air,’ Tommy said. ‘Al fresco raving.’
‘Circus tent?’ said Frankie.
Jed baulked. ‘Make that seven and a half grand,’ he said, shoving the calculator into a sports bag that lay at his feet.
The bickering went over Tommy’s head. He imagined the scene: the sky inky-black, stars twinkling, the night alight with colour. Jed was at the decks and people were dancing, sweating, faces aglow. Thousands of people.
‘I’m going to have an office, business cards, the works,’ said Tommy. ‘And youse can all have jobs.’
‘Even me?’ asked Frankie.
‘First refusal, Frankie,’ said Tommy.
‘Does that mean I’m not getting one?’
‘You daft twat,’ said Jed. ‘It means you get the first job offer, you can refuse it if you want.’
‘Nah, nah, I’ll take it,’ said Frankie.
Tommy jumped down from the wall. ‘Space Generation,’ he said. ‘That’s what we’re calling it.’ He reached into the back pocket of his jeans, pulled out a piece of paper and held it up. ‘Wait ’till you see this.’ He unfolded the paper and spread it out on the wall, feeling two lots of breath on his face as his friends put their heads next to his. He’d recreated the UFO drawing, the spaceship now the DJ at his decks, suspended high in the rumbling clouds, spilling liquid light onto a mass of elated faces below. Behind the ship, in a patch of clear, black sky, a bright moon glowed, half of it spherical and cratered, the other half a partial alien face with one wide, tilted eye and half a tiny nose and mouth. It smiled in supernatural triumph.
‘Jesus,’ he heard Jed whisper. ‘That’s the dog’s bollocks.’
‘You’re a goddam genius,’ said Frankie.
‘Who needs marquees, when you’ve got nature?’ said Tommy, clutching the drawing and standing up straight, filling his lungs with the fresh air.
‘And aliens,’ said Frankie.
‘And cake,’ added Jed, bending down and taking another plastic tub from his sports bag.
‘Thank Christ for that!’ said Frankie, grabbing the tub and opening the lid.
They laughed, their voices lost in the breezy air as Tommy folded the drawing and put it into his pocket.
Genius. He could live with that.
PEACH
Unable to take Sally’s file off the school premises, he’d demanded a copy from the receptionist, a demand that had Connie doing the slowest job possible. Eventually, she’d handed him a pile of loose papers with a look that would cut glass.
He’d gone straight to the hospital, his hope of finding Sally alert and able to talk quashed instantly at the sight of her lifeless form. He’d sat with her for an hour or more, just watching, the letters from the school folded into a thick wad in his coat pocket.
At his desk now, he felt sick to his stomach. Among the reports of detentions for bad behaviour were copies of several letters addressed to him. None of them had reached him, and he recalled picking up the post from the doormat the day before, realising it was a task he hadn’t done for some time. He would always leave the house before Sally, and before the first post. She would be home by four o’clock in time to pick up the second. Even on Saturdays he would be at the station more often than not.
According to the correspondence, staff had called to the bungalow on more than one occasion to speak to him, but there’d never been anyone home. The letters painted a grim picture – concern about Sally’s growing absence from class, her aggression, and her propensity to fall asleep at her desk on the rare times she was there. The typed notes of the meeting with “her father” were brief, dated 17 March 1989, stating that Sally, at sixteen, had the right to leave full-time education if she so wished, and that her one remaining parent had agreed to the decision.
There was only one person who could enlighten him, and there was still no change in her condition, the options Doctor Flynn wanted to discuss shunted to the back of his mind. They would have to stay there for the time being, because now there were two men he wanted to string up by their bollocks, and they would require all his energy.
He looked up at the sound of knocking, quickly sliding the papers under the building society file as the door opened and Murphy swaggered his way to the chair opposite the desk. He dropped into it and assumed his usual position: hands clasped on his chest, legs akimbo.
‘Saturday night,’ he said. ‘The rave, boss,’ he added when Peach’s expression remained blank.
Peach frowned. ‘This Saturday?’ Surely, they couldn’t organise something of any significance in just a few days.
Murphy nodded his affirmation. ‘According to the busty young lady at Hitsville USA, yeah. It’s a record shop in town, boss. I bought a tape, got some bouncin’ tracks on it: garage, house, techno, back beats, the lot.’
He was talking gobbledygook.
‘So, where is it?’
‘We’ll have to wait ’till we get the flyers, then we should get a team to sit and call the number. Not too early mind, we’ll have to wait ’till the real punters start ringing.’
Peach scoffed. Team?
‘And they’ll have to learn the lingo an’all,’ said Murphy. ‘None of this, “excuse me, this is City CID, can you tell me where the rave is please?”’
Peach regarded Murphy for a moment: young, hip, if you liked that kind of thing. This was a whole new world, and he suddenly felt his age.
‘Got an idea, chief,’ said Murphy. ‘Wanna hear it?’
Peach barely nodded, bone tired.
‘How about I do a ring around, call some of the forces down south, see how they’re handling it? I could get some inside information, stuff they don’t talk about in the press.’
‘That’s not how we do things,’ Peach replied, disappointed at the futility of the idea. ‘What happens here, stays here.’ Not only that, but he could do without being the laughing stock of the well-heeled forces south of the M25.
‘Well, I get that, boss, it’s the same in Manchester. But what if I said I knew the Deputy Commissioner in Laandon, innit?’
Peach sighed, losing patience. ‘How on earth would you know him?’
‘She’s me mam, boss.’ Murphy didn’t hide his grin when Peach’s eyebrows shot up. 'You just say the word,' said Murphy, tapping his nose and getting to his feet.
Thankfully, Peach's desk phone rang, and he picked it up brusquely as Murphy left the office.
‘Sir, there’s a couple of ladies in reception to see you,’ Sharon said.
In the reception area, two women were sitting with handbags on their laps, covering the rolls of belly flab they’d rather not have. One was in her sixties, drowning in a blue twin-set. The other much younger, mutton dressed as lamb.
‘Yes?’ Peach said.
‘I’m Mrs Bailey, this is Denise Morris. We’re from the Tyne Building Society,’ the older woman said proudly.
His witnesses. But only two of them, where the hell were all the others? Too lazy, too scared.
‘Follow me,’ he said.
DENISE
They were a good ten minutes into the interview before the inspector’s fingers started to tear at his moustache. It hadn’t taken long to give their account of that day: they’d gone to work, had a cuppa, served the early morning customers and suddenly there they were – three men brandishing weapons. They’d done as they were told, got onto the floor, and then the men were gone.
Denise had relayed this information in twenty seconds flat, Mary Bailey taking up the remaining minutes – who she’d made tea for, how they took it, who preferred coffee et cetera et cetera. It was no wonder the man was starting to cause himself pain.
She was here for one reason, and one reason only. To make sure the police were put well and truly on the wrong track. The armed robber in the coat and the bowler hat had said nothing, and she wasn’t entirely sure she was right, but there was something so familiar about the man’s posture, the wa
y he stood as if he owned the place. Paul had been too curious about her job, more interested in that than her own life. But still, she wouldn’t let him go down for it. He’d had enough pain in his life already. Denise had watched enough cop shows to know not to incriminate herself or raise suspicion, to wait for the right questions, and it didn’t take long for them to come.
‘Any specific accents?’ the copper asked. ‘Stammers, lisps?’
Mrs Bailey had to apologise; her memory wasn’t what it was, but Denise set her face to pondering.
‘The tall one wasn’t local,’ she said. ‘Sounded foreign to me, do you not think, Mary?’
Mrs Bailey was looking at the inspector, her not-what-it-was memory reeling back in time. ‘Eeeh, I don’t know.’
‘When he told us to get down,’ Denise insisted, her tone just on the right side of encouragement. ‘Remember that?’
‘Yes, yes,’ said Mrs Bailey, ‘now you come to mention it.’
‘What sort of foreign?’ Peach asked. ‘American? French? What?’
He was irritated, she could tell. They weren’t giving him what he wanted.
Denise shrugged. ‘Just foreign. Not Geordie, that’s a definite. And his eyes were brown.’
He kept on about the other one, the one who ran to get the money, but their noses were touching the carpet by then, and she'd already said it once and didn't appreciate repeating it again.
The inspector sighed and jotted all of three words on a note pad – Not Geordie. Brown.
Then the trainer was produced, a scuffed old thing that all the kids were wearing. He picked it up from the chair next to him and placed it on the table. ‘One of the perpetrators was wearing a pair of these. Recognise it?’
‘Never seen it before,’ said Denise, looking away. She done her bit, now she needed to go.
Mrs Bailey, however, concentrated on it. ‘Seen something like them on our Janice’s lad,’ she said eventually. ‘You should see him, mind, got this thing, here, stuck in his nose, and a thing, here, right through his eyebrow.’ She hoisted up her breasts in a way that reminded Denise of Les Dawson. ‘You got bairns, Mr Peach?’ Mrs Bailey asked.
