Nightfall jn-1

by Stephen Leather

  ‘Win or place?’ said the woman.

  Nightingale was sure he hadn’t misheard the first time – she hadn’t mumbled and had looked him right in the eye as she’d spoken. Her voice had been flat and cold, the voice of something not quite alive. But, like everyone else who had told him he was going to hell, she didn’t seem to be aware that she’d said it.

  ‘Win or place, young man,’ said the cashier. ‘I don’t have all day.’

  ‘Win,’ said Nightingale. Had he imagined it? Was his subconscious playing tricks on him? It had started with the dreams of Simon Underwood falling to his death, but maybe now his subconscious had decided that the dreams weren’t enough, that it wanted to torment him while he was awake. Or maybe he was going crazy.

  The cashier handed him a betting slip and Nightingale walked away.

  ‘Jack, are you okay?’ Hoyle called.

  Nightingale reached for his cigarettes. No, he wasn’t okay. He was a long, long way from it. He lit a cigarette but had taken only one drag when an official in a blazer tapped him on the shoulder and told him that smoking wasn’t allowed. ‘But we’re outside,’ he said, waving at the sky.

  ‘It’s a place of work,’ said the man. ‘Health and safety.’

  ‘It’s bloody nonsense,’ said Nightingale.

  ‘It’s the law,’ said the man. He had short, wiry hair and its dark brown hue was so uniform that it had to have been dyed. His cheeks were threaded with burst veins and he had the look of a former sergeant major hankering for the days when he could make life a misery for men who couldn’t answer back. ‘Don’t give me a hard time, sonny.’

  ‘You’re not going to tell me I’m going to hell, are you?’

  ‘I don’t have to use bad language,’ said the man, holding up a small transceiver. ‘All I have to do is call Security.’

  Nightingale dropped the cigarette onto the ground, stamped on it and headed for the bar. He was about to order a beer but changed his mind and asked for a whisky instead. It had just arrived when Hoyle appeared at his shoulder. Nightingale handed the barman a ten-pound note and ordered Hoyle a glass of red wine.

  ‘What’s wrong, mate?’ asked Hoyle.

  ‘Nothing,’ said Nightingale. He downed his whisky in one gulp, and when the barman returned with Hoyle’s wine, he pointed at his empty glass and asked for a refill.

  ‘Clearly,’ said Hoyle. ‘Since when have you been knocking back the whisky like that?’

  ‘What’s happening to me, Robbie? My bloody life’s turned upside down in less than a week. My parents aren’t my parents. The man who was my father claimed he’d sold my soul to the devil. My uncle killed my aunt and himself and…’ He shook his head and picked up his glass.

  ‘And what?’

  ‘That message – the one my uncle wrote in blood. People keep saying it to me.’

  ‘They what?’

  ‘I keep hearing people tell me I’m going to hell.’

  ‘You’re under a lot of stress, that’s all. Have you heard me say it?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘That’s a relief.’ His face went blank and he stared at Nightingale. ‘You’re going to hell,’ he said, his voice a low whisper.

  ‘Screw you, Robbie. It’s not like that.’

  Hoyle grinned. ‘Just trying to lighten the moment,’ he said.

  ‘Cheers, mate.’ Nightingale drained his glass.

  ‘But, seriously, you should lay off the booze,’ said Hoyle. ‘You were never a big drinker. Strictly amateur.’

  ‘I can drink you under the table,’ said Nightingale. ‘And look who’s talking! You’re a bloody wine drinker.’

  Hoyle picked up his glass. ‘You’re just upset because you thought you were a Nightingale, but you turned out to be a Gosling,’ he said. ‘How the mighty have fallen.’

  ‘It’s not funny,’ said Nightingale. ‘My whole life has been a lie, Robbie. My parents lied to me from the day I was born. My uncle and aunt lied. Probably everyone I knew as a kid lied to me.’

  ‘They didn’t. lie to you, they just didn’t tell you the whole truth. There’s a difference,’ said Hoyle.

  ‘That’s lying by omission,’ said Nightingale. ‘Which is still lying.’

  ‘You were adopted. Loads of people adopt and don’t tell their kids. It’s just… simpler.’

  ‘Simpler? Or do you think that the fact they bought me from a Satanist might have had something to do with their reticence?’ Hoyle didn’t answer. ‘Anyway, can we change the subject?’ said Nightingale. ‘I’ve had it up to here with Ainsley bloody Gosling.’

  Hoyle sipped some wine. ‘Jenny said business hasn’t been so good recently.’

  ‘She did, did she?’

  ‘She said it was a bit quiet, yeah.’

  ‘It’s a dry spell, that’s all,’ said Nightingale. ‘It happens. Peaks and troughs. Swings and roundabouts. Everyone’s cutting back because of the recession, so the corporate side is down – but divorce work’s up. We’re doing okay.’

  ‘I don’t know why you’re bothering with the marital-strife stuff. You’re better than that, Jack.’

  ‘Like I’ve got a choice.’

  ‘You were a great negotiator – the best. You should be working for one of the kidnapping insurance firms. Or in-house security for a multinational.’

  ‘The last guy I negotiated with exited through a twenty-storey window, let’s not forget,’ said Nightingale. ‘That doesn’t look great on the old CV.’

  ‘I’m serious,’ said Hoyle. ‘You’re better than this. You know you are. Two years in the wilderness is enough. It’s time to come back in.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  Hoyle slapped him on the back. ‘You know I’m right, mate. Oh, one bit of good news for you. Your man Turtledove is the real McCoy, he’s been a solicitor for nearly forty years and there’s never been a complaint against him. So, whatever’s going on, it’s not a con. Now, come on, the next race is about to start.’

  ‘Do you believe in hell, Robbie?’

  ‘Who was it said that hell is other people?’

  ‘I’m serious,’ said Nightingale. ‘Do you believe in a place called hell?’

  ‘I’ve been to Harlesden, mate. That’s as close to hell as I ever want to go.’ Hoyle put his arm around Nightingale’s shoulders. ‘No, Jack, there is no such place as hell. You can trust me on that.’

  Nightingale finished his whisky. ‘Let’s go see these dogs run,’ he said.

  30

  Joel McBride had thought long and hard before he decided to kill himself. He had no children, his parents were long dead, and most of his friends were his wife’s and he was sure they would side with her. McBride loved his wife and had done since the day they’d met, when she was a sales representative for a children’s books publisher and he had been working in the Trafalgar Square branch of Waterstones. She’d walked in wearing a short skirt and a low-cut top ready to extol the merits of her firm’s three new authors, and within an hour they were having coffee at Starbucks over the road. Two nights later they were in Leicester Square and on the next they were in bed together.

  They had been married less than six months when McBride had injured himself. They had been on a riding holiday in Spain. His wife was a keen horsewoman but it had been his first time. His first and last. They had gone trekking through sand dunes, six holidaymakers and two girls from the stable, and had rounded off the afternoon with a gallop along the beach. The stable girls knew McBride was a novice and had told him to hold back, but he’d wanted to show off to his wife so he’d given the horse its head. It had been a combination of bad luck and bad judgement: the rein had snapped, McBride had fallen and the horse had trodden on him when he’d hit the sand. His spinal cord had been severed. The holiday insurance paid for the hospital in Spain and the flight back to London, but he had never walked again and never would.

  Things had changed after the accident, of course. He could get himself in and out of his wheelchair and manage the toilet, and he could
drive a specially adapted car, but he was still a cripple and, worse, a cripple who couldn’t get an erection. Sex was out of the question – or, at least, the sort of sex they’d enjoyed before the accident. He did his best to please her with his hands and tongue but it wasn’t enough. He’d known that one day she would take a lover but had hoped she’d be honest enough to tell him, and reassure him that she still loved him, that she was his wife and would be for ever.

  He’d suspected for weeks that she’d embarked on an affair, but she’d denied it when he’d asked. But he knew in his heart that she was planning to leave him. She might stay for a few more weeks, maybe months, but there had been a growing coldness in her eyes and long silences in front of the television, so he had asked Jack Nightingale to check up on her.

  McBride had confronted her with the evidence – the phone records and the video of her checking into the hotel, – and had asked if she was planning to leave him. She hadn’t said anything. Instead she’d put on her coat and walked out of their house. He had waited all evening and all night but she hadn’t returned – and she’d switched off her mobile phone. McBride knew he couldn’t bear to live without her.

  His house, their house, the house they’d lived in for more than six years, was just a mile from the canal. That was the best way, he’d decided. He had painkillers but he’d checked on the Internet and an overdose wouldn’t kill him straight away. He’d die, but from liver failure, and it would be a long, lingering death over several days. His doctor would probably prescribe sleeping pills but it usually took at least three days to get an appointment with him. He thought of cutting his wrists but the idea of slicing through his flesh with a knife made him feel sick. The canal would be simple and quick.

  McBride’s wheelchair wasn’t powered so he used his hands to propel it along the pavement. He hadn’t bothered to put on the fingerless leather gloves that usually protected them and his palms were soon muddy and sore. It had rained earlier that evening and the wheels made a swishing sound as he rolled along. The canal wasn’t deep, McBride knew, five feet at most, but standing up wasn’t an option for him. He’d found a length of chain in his garage, left there by the man who had sold them the house. It was heavy, the links the thickness of his thumb, and he had wrapped it around his waist, fastened with a padlock, in case he changed his mind at the last minute.

  He rolled up the steep concrete ramp from the pavement to the muddy towpath. To his left there were banks of nettles and beyond them a tall hedge threaded with blackberry bushes. The canal was to his right. A narrow-boat was moored there, dark blue with circular brass-framed portholes and skylights. McBride kept going until it was out of sight, then pulled the chair around so that he was facing the water. He closed his eyes and swallowed. ‘Our Father, who art in heaven,’ he whispered. He hadn’t been inside a church since his wedding day, and had never thought of himself as religious, but he wanted to die with the Lord’s Prayer on his lips. He continued to mumble it as he propelled himself forward. He had to push hard to get the wheels over the edge but he rocked himself back and forth until he pitched head first into the cold, dark water.

  McBride had thought he was alone, but there was one witness – two if you counted her dog, which would be reasonable because the dog was watching as McBride wheeled himself to the edge of the canal and into the water. She was wearing Goth black and had upside-down black crosses dangling from her ears and an Egyptian ankh around her neck. She wore a black leather motorcycle jacket, black leather jeans and high-heeled black boots. The dog barked and looked up at his mistress. She smiled down at him and stroked his head, concentrating on the spot he liked, just behind his ear. ‘Not one of ours,’ she said. The dog panted, drooling a little and showing a fleshy pink tongue. He was wearing a black leather collar with a silver buckle and studs, and hanging from it was a small silver pentagram.

  31

  The Hillingdon Home sounded grand but it wasn’t. It was a sixties-built concrete block with rusted metal-framed windows and graffiti spray-painted across the doors. As Nightingale finished his cigarette, he peered up at the top floors. Blank faces stared from some of the windows, white smudges behind the glass. It was a local-authority home on the outskirts of Basingstoke, about fifty miles south of London. The car park was full so he had left the MGB in the street, a short walk away. In his left hand he held a bunch of flowers. He had decided he ought to bring something and that flowers were the best bet. He dropped the butt of his cigarette onto the ground and pushed open the double doors that led to the reception area.

  He’d phoned ahead to let the home know he was coming and an overweight West Indian woman in a floral dress took him to the office. The administrator was stick-thin with dyed chestnut hair and thick-lensed spectacles perched on her nose. She sat behind a large desk that bore an old-fashioned computer and a plastic nameplate – Elizabeth Fraser. ‘I have to say, it was a bolt from the blue when you called,’ said Mrs Fraser. ‘Miss Keeley hasn’t had a visitor in the ten years she’s been here.’

  ‘We lost touch,’ said Nightingale.

  ‘I’ll say,’ said Mrs Fraser. She tapped on her keyboard and frowned. ‘We don’t have anyone down as her next of kin.’

  ‘As I said, we’ve been out of touch.’

  She peered at him through her glasses. ‘And the different surname is a concern,’ she said.

  ‘I think she gave me up for adoption when I was born.’

  ‘I see,’ said Mrs Fraser. ‘Would you have any paperwork to substantiate that?’

  Nightingale shrugged. ‘I’m afraid not, it was a private adoption.’

  ‘I have to say, Mr Nightingale, I’m a little reluctant to allow you access to Miss Keeley without some sort of evidence that you’re a family member.’

  Nightingale took out his wallet and removed his driving licence. He gave it to the administrator. ‘This proves who I am, Mrs Fraser,’ he said. ‘As to proving that I’m her son, well, short of a DNA test, I’m not sure how I’d go about doing that. But I’m guessing that if she’s in a local-authority home she doesn’t have any money so it’s not as if I’m here to rip her off. I don’t have any proof that she’s my mother but I was hoping that if I talked to her… I don’t know, Mrs Fraser. My life’s been pretty much turned upside-down over the last week and I just want some answers. I’m hoping I might get them from Miss Keeley.’

  Mrs Fraser smiled. ‘You’re correct about the money,’ she said. ‘Miss Keeley doesn’t have a penny to her name.’ She fed Nightingale’s details into the computer, then gave him back his driving licence. ‘I must warn you not to expect too much,’ she said. ‘Miss Keeley was in a psychiatric hospital before she came here, and while she isn’t what we’d classify as mentally ill now, she is uncommunicative. In fact, she hasn’t said a word since she was brought here. From what we were told, she didn’t speak in her last institution either. Not a word. The reason she was moved here was because there was no suitable medical treatment available and she was no longer considered a danger to herself or others.’

  ‘How long has she been in care?’ asked Nightingale.

  ‘Well, as I said, she’s been with us for around ten years, and in the hospital for six years, but prior to that her records are patchy. Apparently there was a fire in the home where she lived before she went into the hospital.’

  ‘So she might have been institutionalised all her life,’ said Nightingale.

  ‘That’s a definite possibility,’ said Mrs Fraser. She stood up. ‘I think you’ll understand once you’ve seen her.’

  She led Nightingale out of her office and down a corridor to a flight of stairs and walked up to the third floor where a male nurse was sitting at a desk reading the Daily Express. He nodded at Mrs Fraser.

  ‘Everything okay, Darren?’ she asked.

  ‘No worries, Mrs Fraser,’ he said. He had an Australian accent. He was in his late twenties, well over six feet tall, with wavy blond hair, a fading tan and a small diamond earring in his right lobe.
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br />   ‘We’re here to see Miss Keeley. Is she okay?’

  The man smiled. ‘She never changes,’ he said. ‘I wish they were all as amenable.’

  Mrs Fraser took Nightingale along the corridor and stopped outside a door on which a clear plastic box contained a white card. She took it out and looked at it, then put it back and knocked on the door. She opened it. ‘It’s only me, Miss Keeley,’ she said. ‘I have a visitor for you.’

  As she opened the door wide, Nightingale saw a hospital bed, neatly made, and a bedside table with a water glass and a paperback book. It was the New English Bible, he realised, and it was well thumbed.

  ‘This is Jack Nightingale,’ said Mrs Fraser. ‘He’s come to have a chat with you. That’s nice, isn’t it?’

  The woman was sitting in an armchair. Her hair was grey and tied back in a ponytail. She was wearing a shapeless pale blue dress and fluffy pink slippers. Her hands were clasped in her lap and she was staring out of the window, her lips pursed as if she was about to blow a kiss.

  Nightingale stepped into the room and Mrs Fraser closed the door. ‘He’s just come to say hello, and he’s brought you some flowers,’ said Mrs Fraser.

  Nightingale held them out but the woman didn’t react. Her face was lined, there were dark patches under her eyes and her hands were wrinkled and hooked, like claws. ‘She’s only fifty, right?’ said Nightingale.

  ‘Yes,’ said Mrs Fraser.

  ‘But she looks so… so old.’

  ‘The drugs can have that effect, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Drugs?’

  ‘She’s had a lifetime of tranquillisers, anti-depressants and anti-schizophrenia medication.’

  ‘But she’s not on medication now?’

  ‘She’s still on anti-depressants, and she has developed diabetes so she has to have regular insulin injections. There’s also a high-cholesterol problem and she takes medication for low blood pressure.’ She patted the woman’s arm. ‘I’ll leave you alone with Jack for a while, Miss Keeley,’ she said. She smiled at Nightingale. ‘I did warn you not to expect too much,’ she said. ‘They’ll bring her a meal at four o’clock, and you’re welcome to stay until then. Just let Darren know that you’re leaving.’