Tattoo

by J G Alva

  “Are you having a cappuccino or not?”

  “I’m buying,” Sutton said.

  “Well, of course.”

  “Robin?”

  “No, I’m fine,” she said, putting a hand up. “In fact, if you’ll excuse me a moment…”

  She got out of her chair and in deference Freddie did the same; it was an antiquated affectation that made Sutton smile.

  Sutton went to the counter and bought the drinks.

  When he came back to the table, Freddie nodded to the restroom door that Robin had disappeared through.

  “What’s the story with this one then?”

  “Does there have to be a story?”

  “With you there does.”

  Sutton shrugged, strangely reluctant to reveal the truth to his friend, as if he were disappointing him somehow.

  Finally, he said, “her sister’s been abducted. I’m trying to see if I can find her.”

  Freddie nodded, his expression careful; Sutton knew he wanted the particulars, and he waited for him to ask for them, but he did not. He kept his confidences well, but it was temptation that he was afraid of. After all, temptation had almost killed him once.

  Instead, Freddie took a sip of his drink and sighed with satisfaction.

  “God, that’s good. Once an addictive personality, always an addictive personality, even if it’s only caffeine. Do you know, I sometimes think the reason we’ve remained friends for so long is because we’re so much alike.”

  “Oh? How so?”

  “As you know, I can become addicted to – and dependent on – several types of destructive substances. Whereas you on the other hand are addicted to other things. Less obvious, but just as destructive in their own way.”

  He was looking at Sutton strangely.

  Sutton remained silent.

  “You know what I’m talking about?” He asked.

  “Yes,” Sutton admitted quietly.

  “The danger. You like it. Like this.” He flicked a hand at the restroom door. “I take it this case is not without its perils?”

  “Yes,” Sutton admitted, scratching the back of his head.

  “See. That’s destructive. Although you seem to be reasonably good at dodging knives, or bullets, or whatever else happens to come your way.”

  “Lucky me.”

  “Don’t get pissy.”

  “I’m not.”

  “And women. That’s destructive in another way.”

  “I’m a loner.”

  “But through choice. How many fine ladies have you kicked to the curb because you thought you could find something better?”

  “It’s not better I am looking for, Freddie. It’s...more compatible. I don’t want to spend my time with a woman who doesn’t understand who I am, or why I do what I do. I don’t want to spend all of my time making excuses for who I am. That wouldn’t lead anywhere anyway.”

  “I don’t think you’ve ever let them get that close,” he said.

  Freddie Hopkins was a friend, and friends can get away with saying a lot of things simply because they are your friends, but Sutton could feel himself bristling at Freddie’s attentions on him.

  And Freddie seemed to sense that, for as he leaned back and smiled he said, “I only say these things because I worry about you. It’s in my nature to worry about things. When I don’t have anything to worry about I invent things to worry about.”

  “And you’re worried about this woman you’re going to marry,” Sutton said.

  Freddie smiled.

  “Touché. Funnily enough, no. I have complete confidence in her being who she says she is. What I’m worried about is that she’ll find out who I really am, and that, as they say, will be that.”

  “Nerves.”

  Freddie shrugged.

  “It’s a valid concern, I think. I’m not perfect. Worrying’s just another part of the whole of me. You know what they say in AA: your head’s a dangerous place; don’t go in there alone. Mine especially.”

  “I’ve heard that before.”

  “Hm.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “My fiancé?”

  “Yes.”

  “Lisa.”

  “Profession?”

  “Solicitor.”

  “Jesus,” Sutton said.

  “I know,” Freddie said, laughing. “It’s the oddest fucking thing. I met her a couple of times at Bristol Crown Court, helping out one or another of my guys. We got chatting. She must have seen something in me she liked. I’ll admit, all I saw was her pretty face. But...we hit it off.”

  “Well,” Sutton said, taking a sip of his own cappuccino. “That’s the best news I’ve heard all year.”

  “I’ve told her enough stories about you, she’s dying to meet you. We’ll have curry. You’ll come round, and we’ll chat, and my curry will take the roof of your mouth off.”

  Robin returned then, sitting in the chair at Sutton’s elbow.

  “Sounds good,” he said.

  “Then it’s settled.”

  “How’s the shelter going?”

  Freddie made a large expressive gesture meant to convey the confusing tangle of modern day living.

  “I lack funds, I suffer robberies, abuse, court action. Every couple of weeks or so the police call on me to identify a body. It’s the same as it’s always been.”

  “Thought about moving upmarket?” he asked.

  “I’ve thought about it,” Freddie admitted. “When it was just my own skin I didn’t really worry. But Lisa worries, and I don’t want her to. It’s very important to me that she’s comfortable. I think she’s afraid that one day she’s going to come home and find out that someone stabbed me in the heart with a fork over a fight about gruel while I was at the shelter. But for now we’re okay. It’s where I feel I’m doing the best that I can do, under the circumstances. I won’t be moving for a while.”

  Sutton stared at him.

  “How good’s your memory?” He asked.

  Freddie looked at him over his cup. The light reflecting off his glasses hid his eyes for a moment.

  “I was wondering when you were going to get round to it,” he said.

  “What?”

  “The reason you’re here. You drop by less and less. It’s like you’ve got to have a reason to see your friends.”

  Sutton glanced uneasily at Robin; he didn’t need her to hear this.

  “That’s not true.”

  “You’re retreating.”

  “Can we cut the analysis for just a moment?” He said stridently.

  There was a moment’s uncomfortable silence, and then Freddie smiled. He looked at Robin, including her in his amusement at his friend’s foibles.

  “What’s the matter? Afraid it’ll take?”

  Sutton laughed. He couldn’t help it. Freddie the joker. Some things never change. Why say it straight when you can put a humorous spin on it?

  “So, come on. What is it you want me to remember?”

  Sutton glanced briefly at Robin, and then dug in his pocket.

  “A man named Arthur Tinman,” he said, and slid the photograph toward Freddie, but Freddie did not react to the name or to the photograph. He stared at it, but no light of recognition brightened his features. Sutton hadn’t really expected him to remember that far back anyway. “About five years ago he might very well have been hanging around your shelter. Late forties, blonde hair. Tall.”

  “Five years is a long time,” Freddie said, studying the photograph. “What do you want him for?”

  “Arthur Tinman’s body was discovered this morning.” Sutton tapped the photograph with his fingertip. “The man who abducted Robin’s sister, this might very well be one of his victims. It’s a shot in the dark, as we’re not really sure it’s his work, but I’m looking at everything.”

  “Jesus Christ, I wish I could help,” Freddie said, looking between the two of them. “I wish most of the more significant parts of my grey matter hadn’t been destroyed by hops and barley
. But I don’t recognise him. I can ask around, but…” Freddie shrugged; he was trying to tell them that the odds of turning anything up on Arthur Tinman were probably slim to non-existent.

  “Freddie, it’s okay. We know it’s about a million-to-one that you would remember him. But if you can ask around, and if anybody remembers anything, who he was hanging around with, where he was hanging around…”

  Freddie looked struck with inspiration.

  “Lindsey Calhorn,” he said.

  “What?”

  “She’s about the only one I’m still in contact with from the old days,” he said. “I could ask her. She’s a nurse now. Up at the BRI. Been working there for three years now, I think. She’s good at it; she’s got a caring nature.” He looked at them, smiled. “And her memory’s a hundred times better than mine.”

  “Good. Can you get this photo to her? See if she remembers him?”

  Freddie nodded.

  “I’ll have to dig out her address. She used to pop back and help out a bit, but not so much now.” He scratched his forehead. “I think she got married.”

  “Must be a bug going round,” Sutton said, amused.

  “Or something in the water. I’ll call her.”

  “Thanks, Freddie.”

  Freddie shook his head, disappointed with himself that he couldn’t help them more, and then picked up his cappuccino, turning it in his hands and examining it.

  “Anything you can get might be of some help,” Robin said.

  Freddie stared at her.

  “You have my sympathies,” he said, and clutched at her hand.

  To Sutton’s surprise, Robin grasped his with both of her own, and something in her face seemed to melt; Freddie had done in ten minutes what Sutton had been unable to achieve in the last eight hours: get through Robin’s defences.

  Sutton felt a bright stab of envy, which dismayed him; he had thought himself too mature for such childish emotions.

  *

  As Robin came out of the café on to Broadweir, she suddenly had questions she would ask Sutton; Freddie had made her look at him in a different light. She was beginning to wonder if there wasn’t more to Sutton Mills than met the eye.

  But outside the café, Sutton had turned to stone.

  He was staring at Castle Green with such a look of fierce, fixed concentration that for a moment Robin felt afraid.

  “Sutton?”

  He came back to himself, and turned those dark eyes on her.

  “We have to go back to my place,” he said.

  “Why?”

  “We need to get a few things. A torch. And a crowbar.”

  Robin was baffled.

  “Whatever for?”

  There was a strange light in his eyes then.

  “I think I’ve worked out what the tattoos mean.”

  Robin felt excitement and fear stab her heart in equal measure.

  “The tattoos? What-“

  “I think I know where he is going to dispose of his next victim.”

  *

  CHAPTER 9

  When Guy got back to the house, carrying the dirty green holdall, his mood was dark, brooding, and testy.

  He sat down at the kitchen table and took the diary from his jacket pocket and began writing:

  I often wondered what it would be like to be with a man, if it would make more sense to me, be EASIER, if my assignations were not meant to be with the opposite sex. The first time didn’t count but…now I know. Women only ever make me feel uncertain…men make me feel dirty. I never want to feel like that again. Perhaps it was unfair to take my disgust out on Marcus Firth, but if it’s any consolation he was dead before I stuck my knife in his anus. Fucking queer.

  He had been staring at the same page for ten minutes, his mind churning with a mixture of shame, regret and disgust, when the phone in the hall rang. He got up to answer it, and then stared at it stupidly through five rings, not able to guess who could be ringing – he didn’t have any friends – before he picked up the receiver.

  “Hello?”

  “I knows who you is,” a voice said, without preamble.

  For a moment Guy thought the voice was referring to his brief flirtation with homosexuality, and his face went hot with shame…until he realised that the voice could not possibly know anything about that.

  “Excuse me?”

  “I know what yus been up to.” The voice was thick with Bristolian, like a stew; Guy did not recognise it. “I don’t know why – as far as I is concerned, you is seriously fucked up – and I don’t care. But there is people I reckon might be interested to know who you is, where yus live.”

  Guy felt a burst of totally misplaced excitement erupt within him. No one could possibly know…could they?

  But this had not been in any part of his daydreams, and the diversion from the script was a pleasurable jaunt into the unknown.

  He hesitated a moment before answering, his throat suddenly gone dry; he had to swallow to free his tongue.

  “I think you must have a wrong number, I really don’t-“

  “Don’t fuck with I, Mr. King. I aint fuckin’ interested in bein’ dicked around.”

  So they knew his name.

  He expected to feel afraid, waited for it, but it didn’t come. It was curious, but he felt almost overjoyed instead, that somebody knew what he had been doing, knew what he was capable of.

  It was almost as if he had a friend.

  “Really,” Guy continued, pleased by the steadiness of his voice, “you must have the wrong number-“

  “Shut the fuck up. Listen. Either you gis I fifty thousand quid, or I goes to the police about you abductin’ those women. Awright? That’s all it is: fifty thousand quid. You can spare it. I seen that house of yours. All you have to do is sell some of those gadgets in the Livin’ Room” – who was he? he had been inside his house, that much was clear, but for the moment Guy had absolutely no idea who he was talking to – “maybe get rid of a car or two.” And he had seen the garage, seen his Grandfather’s vintage cars. Who was he? “I aint greedy. Fifty thousand quid is all I need from yus, all I need to guarantee I don’t visit the pigs.”

  Guy licked his lips. His heart was hammering wildly.

  “Alright,” he said hesitantly. “What if I agree to pay? What do I get in return? What guarantees have I got that you won’t tell the police anyway? Or that you won’t come back and demand more money from me at a later date?”

  It was great, like an incredibly elaborate game…and he did so enjoy games.

  “I told yus, I aint greedy. And I hate the fuckin’ pigs, prolly as much as you do. I don’t want to talk to ‘em if I don’ aff to.” The unidentified person on the other end of the line thought for a moment. “You prolly hate the pigs more than I, actually.”

  Guy liked this man, whoever he was. He was funny.

  “That’s not good enough.”

  The man paused before answering.

  “It’ll fuckin’ aff to be.”

  “No. What if we were to-“

  The man was suddenly angry.

  “I aint fuckin’ round here. Either you is gonna gis I the-“

  “Look,” Guy said interrupting him, but hesitated again. “What if we were to meet? Face to face? I’m an excellent judge of character and if we could just meet and you could tell me to my face that you would not tell another soul about…what I do, then I’d know whether you were telling the truth or not.”

  The man hesitated.

  “Nah, I aint fuckin’-“

  “Please?”

  Another pause. Was he debating?

  Guy continued.

  “And I could give you the money at the same time. I have it, I’m prepared to give it to you – I mean, you’ve outwitted me fair and square, and I salute you for that. Let’s face it, you deserve the money. I’d just like to meet you face to face, that’s all. Is that so much to ask for £50,000?”

  Let him believe he was mad. If he thought Guy was truly mad, then he’
d think it was a quirk of his character, not a devious ploy to draw him out into the open.

  The man paused again.

  When he spoke, he sounded angry.

  “I aint fuckin’ stupid.”

  “I never said you were, I-“

  “We aint goin’ to meet-“

  “I don’t believe-“

  “Shut up. Shut the fuck up. We aint goin’ to meet. Is that understood? What we is goin’ to do is, you is goin’ to drive down to the centre. You got a mobile phone? Gis I the number.”

  Guy hesitated, and then recited the number to him from memory.

  “Right. Drive down to the centre and dump your car somewhere.”

  “The centre? Where?”

  “By the Hippodrome, fuckhead. I’ll call yus when I gets down there. Understood?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. Don’t do fuckin’ nuffin that’ll piss I off in the meantime, or I’ll go to the police. I don’t want to, but I will, if I thinks you is playing games with I. Now get going. I’ll call yus in twenty minutes.”

  *

  Guy parked the van in the car park next to the Carling Academy building, behind the Hippodrome, and speedily made his way to the centre. He did not know what to expect, but that sense of excitement stayed with him. He was like a child on the night before Christmas.

  Guy stood on the corner down from the Colston Hall, next to the traffic lights, the holdall in his hand, and did not know what to do. A bus went passed, startling him. What was he meant to do, wait here for him to call, or go somewhere, or…what? He shifted his grip on the bag; its weight was reassuring. He looked around. Was he being watched? Guy scanned the faces going passed him, not many, the rush hour had ended some time ago, but none of them seemed to be interested in him. Now, nervousness was replacing the excitement, and he just wanted to move, he didn’t want to just stand here –

  His mobile rang.

  He looked at the screen before answering: number withheld.

  “Good, yus made it,” the Bristolian voice said.

  Guy tried to look everywhere at once, paying special attention to those people that were on their mobiles, but nobody seemed to be paying any special attention to him.

  “Where are you? Are you here? Why don’t we just-“