Sight Unseen

by Graham Hurley

  ‘He probably wanted to be you,’ I point out.

  ‘Yeah? Well, I’ve met the dreadlocks guy. And believe me, he’s terrifying.’

  I close my eyes again. My head is beginning to thump, not a good sign, but I want to know more. And I know how to get it. My hand finds H’s on the counterpane.

  ‘Undress me, please. Start at the bottom and work up.’

  H does my bidding. I ask him about Mateo.

  ‘He fell into the hands of the insurance people. We all did. That meant O’Keefe. Me and Mateo weren’t impressed, Mateo especially. He wanted to talk to these people himself, do his own deal. By the time O’Keefe got Clemmie back she’d be drawing a pension.’

  ‘So how did Mateo make contact?’

  ‘He got a number. It arrived on his phone from a burner. It was Brodie’s number but he’d no idea who sent it.’

  ‘Malo,’ I whisper. ‘Had to be.’

  ‘Of course. And that’s when things started to shift a bit. Mateo and Brodie got together. The Somalis love Brodie because he delivers, and so does the idiot downstairs.’

  ‘But Baptiste is all over Brodie. Does Franklin know that?’

  ‘I’ve no idea. No offence, but I get the impression that woman is all over everyone. Maybe that’s what turns Franklin on. Everyone to his own, eh?’

  I’m smiling. H is making a very good job of removing my cotton hose. I can feel his thick fingers, remarkably deft, working under the layer of lawn. On his command, I ease my bum up to let him slip the hose off. My legs are now naked under the dress. He stops when he gets to my knickers.

  At this point, he’s telling me everything he learned from Mateo. Clemmie’s dad had discovered that his kidnapped daughter was being held in a remote Spanish finca in the mountains above Granada. The estate, complete with swimming pool and fully equipped gym, turned out to belong to Franklin. Clemmie has been there since she was intercepted by the Somalis in a backstreet in Beckenham, bundled into the back of a van and driven on to a cross-Channel ferry. Her Harley has now been dismembered and bits of it are for sale on a spare-parts site registered to a company on a Luton trading estate.

  ‘And Malo? Our lovely son?’

  ‘I needed to get him out of the way. Once the deal had been agreed and Mateo knew that Clemmie was safe at the finca he was happy to talk to Franklin and make that happen. The boy was all over the place. You must have seen it yourself. He wanted to become a big player in the narco-biz and he fucked up. Call it convalescence. Call it what you like. But he was safer with Clemmie.’

  ‘And he’s OK now? Malo?’

  ‘He says he’s been spoiled rotten. Franklin flew a chef down who knows a thing or two about Colombian cuisine. The boy says we ought to try lechona casera. It’s a kind of pork thing. The chef gave him a recipe.’

  ‘You’ve been talking to him? Malo?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And the deal?’

  ‘Done. Brodie and Dreadlocks get two million US of the marching powder for free. That’s street value, of course. Wholesale it’s way, way cheaper which should keep the insurance people happy. The Somalis think it’s fucking Christmas and you know what? They’re right.’

  I nod. Sick, I think. But great business.

  H is examining the top of my dress. In search of a button or two his fingers brush my breasts. His eyes find mine.

  ‘What do you think?’

  ‘The buttons are at the back.’

  ‘You wanna turn over?’

  ‘I do.’

  I make the move, my face flat on the pillow while H works on the line of buttons. Then comes the lightest knock on the door. H freezes. I lift my head from the pillow.

  Another knock, louder. Then someone tries the handle.

  ‘C’est moi. Vous êtes la dedans?’ It’s Baptiste.

  ‘Tell her to fuck off.’ H’s mouth is very close to my ear.

  ‘Qu’est-ce que vous voulez?’ I ask.

  ‘Toi, chérie. Et ton copain. Ca fait trois. Parfait.’

  I tell H she wants a threesome. H is horrified.

  ‘No fucking way.’

  This is an impasse. For whatever reason, Baptiste has started to sing. It’s the Lament again and she’s word perfect. Dimly I remember that Franklin has ordered a helicopter for tomorrow to fly her to Stansted. She’s off abroad for a while, so maybe this is some kind of farewell treat. Bizarre, I think. Then I have an idea. I twist my head and look up at H. Second thoughts.

  ‘Maybe your guys in the van?’ I whisper.

  ‘You mean the Pompey blokes? Because of her?’

  ‘Yes. That’s why they came, isn’t it? To dig us out if things got sticky?’

  H shakes his head. The thought of Pompey’s finest discovering their boss in fear of a beautiful woman offering sex doesn’t appeal at all. She’ll get bored and go away, he says. We’ll just ignore her.

  And so we do. H sorts the last of the buttons and I turn over and extend my hands and let him pull me up until I’m in a sitting position. Then my feet find the rug on the floor and, with H’s help, I stand up.

  He treats me like the child I’ve become. He makes me put my arms in the air while he reaches down, gathers the dress, and slips it over my head. Naked apart from my knickers, I’m aware of his eyes on my body.

  ‘You’re beautiful,’ he says. ‘More beautiful now than then.’

  ‘Then?’

  ‘Antibes.’

  ‘Ah …’ I smile at him. ‘Malo.’

  Baptiste appears to have given up. After a snort of frustration, I listen to her footsteps padding away down the corridor outside. I collapse backwards on to the bed.

  ‘I was drunk last time,’ I mumble. ‘This is becoming a habit.’

  H is looking down at me. ‘You need looking after,’ he says.

  He begins to get undressed. I take a final look at the picture on the wall. For a moment I swear I can hear the Arctic wind keening around the bare masts of that doomed ship, half-wrecked already, and then my eyes close and I’m gone.

  Some time later, I’m aware of the sigh of the mattress as H climbs in. My hand finds his under the sheets, and I give it a squeeze.

  ‘You’re a good man,’ I tell him. ‘Despite everything.’

  FORTY-NINE

  We’re down for breakfast by half past eight. My head is pounding and even the sight of a rack of toast makes my stomach heave. There’s no sign of either Baptiste or Franklin and it appears from the table setting that we shall be eating alone. A single ship’s biscuit on a bone-white plate is the only reminder of last night’s performance. I look hard for weevils but see nothing untoward. Our revels now are ended. And despite a growing urge to throw up, I’m glad.

  Water helps. I drink two glasses, one after the other, and decline the offer of devilled kidneys. H, unlike me, seems to have emerged from last night unscathed. I’m very grateful for last night and I tell him so. If I was a pain, I add, I’m afraid he has to put up with it. One of us has to have a conscience and it happens to be me.

  ‘Conscience?’ The word appears to mystify him.

  ‘Noodle,’ I tell him. His body sprawled on those wet pebbles is the one image I can’t seem to shake. It even eclipses the thought of a Somali machete.

  H calls for more toast and another jug of coffee. There’s still no sign of our hosts but very faintly I think I can hear the clatter of an approaching helicopter. It gets louder and louder until it seems to be directly above the house. Baptiste, I think, off to Stansted. Last night’s rejection must have hurt. She’s not even bothering to say goodbye.

  Abruptly the noise stops and I assume the helicopter must have landed. H, still waiting for the toast and coffee, pushes back his chair and walks across to one of the tall windows that look out on to the front lawn and the ornamental gardens. The landing pad must be elsewhere because there’s no sign of a helicopter and H is about to return to the table when something catches his eye.

  ‘Fuck me …’ I hear him mutter. Then he’s go
ne.

  I sit alone at the table. The coffee arrives. I eye the fresh toast and decide not to tempt fate. Then I hear voices. One of them belongs to H. Another to Franklin. But it’s the third voice, lighter, that makes me blink. It’s a woman. She sounds young. She’s laughing.

  A door opens behind me. I turn in my chair. First into the room is Franklin. He’s wearing jeans and an old T-shirt and a pair of sandals and this time he’s playing the magician for real. He stands aside, one arm outstretched. The rabbit from the hat.

  Clem.

  I get up, overwhelmed. I put my arms round her. She looks wonderful. She glows with health and sunshine and good living. And she’s not alone. Behind her, uncharacteristically quiet, is Malo. He gets a hug, too, maybe longer. I tug them both towards the table. I want them to sit down, to have a slice of toast, to drink coffee. I want us all to be together, to be normal again. The last couple of weeks barely happened. And so here we are.

  H joins us. Franklin, with admirable tact, has disappeared. This, it turns out, is the real point of the invitation. Not to spend an entire evening celebrating a long-ago explorer who blew his chances and lost all those men but to welcome back the most important, the most wilful and the most reckless man in my life.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mum,’ Malo says.

  ‘You bad, bad boy.’ I’m crying now. I give him another hug. ‘Tell me everything.’

  He doesn’t, of course. I get a mumbled account of life in the Sierra Nevada, of days around the pool and chilly nights eyeing the barbecue pit. He’s learned a little Spanish from his new friend in the kitchen at Franklin’s finca and he’s been trying it out on Clem ever since. I nod. I’m aware of a new body language between them. They were always physically close, closer than I dreamed Malo could tolerate, but just now they seem inseparable. Clem has obviously forgiven my son his many transgressions.

  I must do the same, H tells me, once they’ve gone upstairs for a shower. The deal is done. The police remain out of the loop. Brodie and Franklin will doubtless get richer by the minute, but just now that’s none of our business. The boy and Clemmie are home safe. And that’s all that matters.

  It’s at this point that Franklin joins us again. He appears to have forgotten my attempt to kill him. The chopper, he tells us, will be taking Clemenza to London where Mateo is waiting to greet her. In the meantime, the Spitfire is at my disposal. Exeter Airport is a forty-minute drive away. We could be airborne by mid-morning.

  I shake my head and make my excuses. I got a great deal off my chest last night and this man knows exactly how I feel about the life he’s chosen for himself, and for others. My son and his lovely girlfriend are back in one piece. And – possibly more important – I’m not at all sure my stomach could handle another gut-wrenching spin from God knows what height.

  This news appears to come as no surprise to Franklin. He’s already mentioned this morning’s expedition to Malo and said there might be the possibility of a spare seat.

  ‘And?’

  ‘He jumped at it.’

  Listening, H can only shake his head. The boy – our boy – has given us nothing but grief for what feels like an eternity. He’s tried to play the apprentice drug baron and failed completely. He’s forced H into corners of Brixton he never wants to smell again, and he’s left me on the receiving end of a possible prison sentence. Yet here we are, as silly and complicit as ever. Relief is too small a word. Love might be better.

  ‘This shit can’t go on.’ H is beaming. ‘There has to be a better way.’

  At the end of the week, at H’s insistence, Cleggie flies me to Glasgow again. By now I’ve decided to try to learn to fly. The medical might be tricky, and the statutory tests will have to await the next CT scan, but in the meantime Cleggie is only too happy to let me handle the straight and level bits as we head north. He even talks me through the slow descent to the grey smudge that is Glasgow, and only takes over once the runway is in sight.

  We get a cab to the hospital. When Cleggie offers to accompany me into the spinal injuries unit, I shake my head. Franklin has given me an assurance that my problems with the Somalis are over. They, like Brodie, are too busy celebrating the deal they’ve pulled off.

  Pavel, when I finally make it to his bedside and stoop to kiss him, is very pleased I’ve come. There’s a little colour in his face, which is a surprise, and when I ask why, he nods at one of the windows across the ward. The window faces due south and at certain times in the afternoon the sun comes streaming in. The nursing staff, aware of his love of sunshine, have been wheeling him over to the open window on a regular basis and the result is a modest tan.

  ‘Not just outside but inside.’ Pavel’s smile is another transformation. Wonderful.

  I settle down and tell him everything. He especially likes the costume games and role-playing at Beaufort House. When I do my best to describe the way the house looks inside – so many caps doffed to Sir John and his doomed expedition – he seems transfixed. People should do more of this, he tells me. We need to get out of our tiny selves. We need to think hard about being someone else. This kind of make-believe isn’t just free, it isn’t just fun, it can be a liberation.

  ‘From what?’ I ask him.

  He ponders this question for a while. Finally he says we all need to shed a layer or two, free ourselves from the dead weight of being who we are, turn life on its head and take a proper look. On the face of it, this sounds like a charter for some far-out loony cult, but it’s impossible to be with someone in Pavel’s state and not realize why it might be so important.

  It also reminds me of another development. ‘You remember my dealings with the police? Over the boy who ended up on the beach?’

  ‘Noodle.’ He nods. ‘So what’s happened?’

  ‘The post-mortem showed death by drowning. No other damage.’

  ‘And the tox? They did the tox?’

  ‘They did. Heroin and crack cocaine.’

  ‘Supplied by you?’

  ‘Helped along by me. NFA.’ I’m smiling. ‘No further action.’

  Pavel is deep in thought again. He remembers every detail of the various accounts I’ve shared with him.

  ‘Brodie,’ he says finally. ‘He saw you in the car park that night. He checked the tent on the beach. The boy was out of it. He weighs nothing. He’s light as a feather. Brodie carries him into the sea and holds him under.’ He offers a nod of approval. ‘As a way to go, not at all bad.’ His eyes find mine again. ‘You agree?’

  I do.

  ‘Something else.’ I edge the chair a little closer. ‘H wants you to turn all this into a movie. He’s fallen out of love with Cotehele and he doesn’t want a period piece any more. He wants the real thing, real life. This is on our doorstep. You can be you, H can be H, Malo can spend all the money, and I can be me. How does that sound?’

  Pavel takes a while to consider the idea. Finally he closes his eyes. ‘Perfect,’ he whispers. ‘Because real life is one of those propositions you have to take on trust.’ He summons the flicker of a smile. ‘Sight unseen.’