by William Shaw
‘I need you to get an urgent message to Bill South.’
‘He’s here. With me. At Burrowes Pit.’
‘He is?’ Another surprise.
‘Yes. He came by this morning. Said you’d told him to look after me. I’m seventeen, Mum.’ Despite the attempt at resentment in her daughter’s voice, Cupidi could also hear a happiness too. She had grown up; but she was still the same girl who looked for birds, too. ‘I’ll pass him my phone, OK?’
‘Love you.’
‘Shut up.’
Then another voice, hesitant. ‘Yes?’
‘You’re outside, Bill. With Zoë. Thank you.’
A grunt of acknowledgement.
‘Anything good?’
‘Supposed to be some Egyptian geese around, but we haven’t seen them. What did you want?’ Grumpy, truculent.
‘You’re birding. How does it feel?’
‘All right, I suppose.’
‘A favour. Can you go and check on Astrid Miller’s cottage? It’s urgent.’
‘Why?’
‘I need to talk to her and I haven’t time to get back myself . . .’
‘Astrid Miller’s not there.’
‘What?’
‘After you asked about her, I’ve been keeping an eye on the place.’
‘I thought you were just sitting at home feeling sorry for yourself.’
‘Bit of that, too, yes. She came back there this morning in a red sports car, stopped at the cottage.’ Inside, still a copper, still observant. ‘Saw her driving away up the Dungeness Road a couple of hours ago.’
‘Did you get the registration number?’
‘Give me a break, Alex,’ he said.
Moon was saying, ‘What now?’
‘The other boy,’ said Ferriter. ‘One of us should check on him.’
Moon looked from one to the other. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Fair play. I’ll go.’
‘We should probably come with you,’ said Cupidi.
He looked at Ferriter.
‘I’ll be fine on my own, thank you very much.’
‘Suit yourself,’ said Ferriter.
Cupidi hesitated, wondering if she should insist, but the atmosphere between the two of them was so bad, she decided to leave it; besides, there was other work to do. The last they saw of Moon was when he dropped them back at Cupidi’s car. ‘Astrid Miller,’ she said, as he drove away. ‘Come on. I think we need to put a stick into the beehive.’
‘What do you mean?’
Cupidi drove in silence. Astrid Miller was connected somehow to the two shoplifters. None of this made sense. Cupidi remembered Ross Clough’s wall of drawings. Just because, like a zealot seeing visions, Clough saw a pattern where others saw nothing, that didn’t mean there wasn’t one.
FIFTY-ONE
A bright shaft of sunlight fell, stinging Tap’s eyes.
The man called Al had lifted a corner of the curtains and was peering out. ‘I can see you,’ he said. ‘Give me a wave. That’s good.’
He seemed to be speaking on the phone to someone on the street outside.
‘Wait there. I’m almost done. I need to tidy up here. Fifteen minutes. Good girl.’
Tap lay on the bed, trussed for slaughter.
‘Mum.’ His voice was just a whisper.
‘Mum.’
The man’s lip had been bleeding. He approached the bed. ‘Last chance. You have one minute to tell me where the phone is. If you call the ambulance you might be able to save her.’
The man leaned down. ‘I can’t hear you.’
‘Loser.’
The man slapped him. ‘Your mother is dying. She’ll be dead very soon. If you’re lucky, you can call an ambulance for her and they’ll give her something before her heart stops beating. But you have to tell me.’
The man was pretending that Tap could save her but whatever he said, he would kill them both anyway. He was sure of that now. The only good thing Tap could do was to save Sloth by dying without telling the man anything.
‘I had a good time.’
‘What are you saying?’
‘One week. I had a really good time. I was sick. I was hungry and dirty. But, you know what? I had a really good time.’
The man seemed momentarily confused, like an actor being fed the wrong lines. ‘What you on about?’
Sunrise. Exceed. Purpose. ‘Nothing much.’
‘Last chance. You know what happens if you don’t tell me, do you?’
‘Same as if I do tell you. You killed Mikey, didn’t you.’
‘Who?’
‘Uncle Mikey. He told you it was us who stole your phones, didn’t he? You killed him anyway.’
‘You shouldn’t have nicked the phone.’
‘No. Shouldn’t.’ Tap was crying now.
One hand shot out and pressed on Tap’s throat, choking him. ‘If you don’t give me that phone, you have literally destroyed millions of pounds. Up in fucking smoke. It’s that you should be crying about.’ There was a quiet fury in the man’s voice. ‘You worthless little shitters. Making everything around you worthless too.’
The man straightened, walked a little way across the room, and turned his mother’s bedside radio on. It was tuned to BBC Radio 2. Worst music in the world. Katy Perry. His mum loved it though. He hoped she could hear the song still.
The man knelt down again by Tap’s side. Something shone in his hands.
Tap’s heart jolted. That’s how he would die.
He had watched execution videos. All the boys had. He had never understood how the victims seemed to accept their fate, allowed themselves to be killed in such a way. And yet now it was his turn, he had no struggle in him at all. It seemed inevitable.
Mum lay beside him on the bed. She was still. There was foam on her lips.
But he didn’t use the knife. ‘Here you go. Open wide.’
The round pill was a pretty pale blue. Holding it in one hand, he grabbed Tap’s hair and tugged his head backwards. Tap clamped his mouth shut.
‘It’s OK. It’s not a bad way to go,’ said the man. ‘Better than you deserve. They pay good money for this kind of stuff out there. It’s your lucky day. Open wide.’
The hand with the pill, concealed in the glove, clamped over his nose again.
Tap lasted as long as he could, but a finger probed in his mouth, released a pill, then the palm clapped tight again across his lips.
‘Swallow.’
Tap shook his head, not because he thought he could win, just because it was the only power he had left. Instantly the chemical was bitter on his gum.
‘It doesn’t matter if you don’t swallow. You’ll be absorbing it already.’
He was right. His mouth was already coated with the bitter taste. He felt a dizziness. Was it that strong?
Tap was trying to spit saliva onto Al’s gloved palm, but the man was still holding it tight against his mouth, and it was hard to eject any liquid. A warm white blanket was already wrapping itself around him.
Nobody would be that surprised, his mother overdosing. She had been a substance user for years. It would be in the papers: Mother and Son Die in Drug Tragedy. The kind of thing that happened, round here.
He had to hold on as long as he could. The man seemed in no hurry either. He turned him over and sawed through the belt, threw it away. It wouldn’t look like an overdose if he was tied up. That’s what the knife had been for. Then the man produced another pill.
And then there was a banging on a door somewhere far away.
The man swore as he dropped the second pill, watched it bounce away under his mum’s bed.
A door handle rattled.
The thumping again, louder, then it stopped.
‘Open up,’ shouted a voice.
The man knelt by him, his hand clamped still to stop Tap from saying anything.
‘Police officer!’
Police? Tap sucked air in through his nose to try and shout. ‘Mmm.’
The man pressed harder ag
ainst his face to prevent any sound escaping. Tap tasted blood in his mouth.
Another yell. ‘Anyone there?’
Tap struggled harder. The man reached for the bread knife he had cut the belt with, allowing him to twist away in the bed. He fell to the floor with a loud thump.
The man’s face betrayed fear.
Tap kicked out one last time, catching a mannequin that stood by the side of the bed, covered in glad rags. It crashed to the floor.
Would the police have heard it? The man fumbled in his brown jacket for his phone, pulled it out again.
‘You still there?’ he whispered. ‘How many police are there? Where are they?’
Whatever the answer, the man looked puzzled.
The sound of a window breaking somewhere. They were coming in.
Unsure of himself, the man loosened his grip.
Tap spat, then tried shouting, ‘Here. I’m up here.’ But his voice was weak.
The man smacked him hard, moved round the bottom of the bed, towards the door, scrambling to find a place to hide.
‘Up here,’ Tap said woozily.
He turned his head to see a look of confusion on the man’s face, as they heard the noise of someone climbing the stairs.
FIFTY-TWO
‘You don’t want to ring Evert Miller first?’ Ferriter said.
‘No. I don’t.’
From the lane, Long Hill looked deserted.
‘Aren’t we going in?’
‘Ross Clough said there was a public footpath. I want to see where he walked.’
‘Why?’
‘Because it’s a nice day.’
‘Really,’ said Ferriter. ‘You’re serious?’
Something else from Ross Clough’s drawings was starting to make sense now, too. If she remembered rightly, the public path by which Clough had got into the estate lay a little to the north of the lane that served as an entrance to it. Parking the car by the main gate, she walked back down the road a little way until she came to a small gap in the hedge.
A dead elder branch had been laid across the entrance, as if it had fallen there, but there was no elder tree nearby. Someone must have placed it there deliberately to disguise the path. At her feet in the undergrowth was a sawn stump. She guessed it had once been the post that had held the sign to the footpath.
The rich liked privacy.
‘This way,’ she said.
‘God. Not again.’
Cupidi pulled back the branch and moved down the path.
As she passed under the tree, Cupidi noticed the small wireless security camera, mounted on the trunk. She paused, gave it a small smile and a wave.
The woods were little more than a copse, hiding the estate from the lane. On the far side the land opened out into gently rolling open country, rich with wild flowers.
‘Wait for me,’ said Ferriter.
The countryside was so quiet around here. No surprise, perhaps. It was a hot Sunday.
The path was barely visible. Discouraging ramblers had worked. Another, newer woodland lay ahead. From behind it they heard the sound of gently lapping water.
The public footpath merged with one that looked more familiar, this one newly cut back. They entered another copse. Damselflies hung in the air, iridescent in the sunshine. There was a buzz in the grass around them, and again, from a distance, they heard the gentle splash.
As they rounded the corner, they could see Evert Miller’s head above the water. Zoya Gubenko, lying glamorously on a sunbed in nothing but a pair of white shorts, was the first to hear them. She sat up, squinting, making no attempt to cover herself.
‘Evert,’ she said, warning him.
Turning in the water, Evert Miller looked, then frowned. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘You invited me for a swim, remember?’
‘It’s Sunday. I hope you’re on overtime.’
He turned again, swimming a casual breast stroke towards the opposite edge of the pool where the cabanas were. Cupidi wondered if he was naked, but not for long. When he reached shallow water he found his feet, and his buttocks emerged from the water.
‘Where’s Allan?’ Zoya Gubenko asked. Allan Mulligan, the security man, Cupidi guessed. He was supposed to be here, protecting them from intruders.
‘I don’t know,’ said Evert Miller.
‘You should sack him,’ Gubenko said. ‘He’s become so unreliable recently.’ She stood, handed Miller a light brown towel as he emerged. He turned, using the towel on his hair but leaving the rest of his body uncovered. His land, his rules.
‘This is nice,’ said Cupidi.
‘Fancy it? Or your lovely friend.’
‘Creep,’ muttered Ferriter.
‘Looks bloody cold to me,’ said Cupidi.
‘It is. That’s what’s so invigorating.’
Finally he lowered the towel, wrapped it around himself.
‘To what do I owe?’
‘Your wife.’ She looked at Gubenko. ‘I need to contact her urgently.’
‘Why?’ He pressed the towel against his groin, as if drying it. Patting his genitals in front of them seemed to be intended to communicate some kind of mastery of the situation.
‘I can’t say. But it’s urgent.’
Another security man arrived, heavy-footed in boots, hot in his uniform, down the path from the houses.
‘Sorry, Mr Miller. Didn’t see them getting in.’
Only now there was staff present did Zoya Gubenko wrap the towel around her breasts. ‘Where’s Mr Mulligan?’ she demanded.
‘Said he had an emergency at home.’
‘My wife, for reasons that may be becoming obvious to understand, is not speaking to me,’ said Evert Miller.
‘Because you’re having an affair with her assistant, presumably.’
‘Our relationship has always been an open one,’ said Miller.
Ferriter snorted.
‘So you have no idea where she is?’
‘No.’
‘That’s what you told me last time. You knew where she was all the time. When I last saw her, she appeared to be scared of something.’
‘You saw her? When?’
‘Last week.’
‘Where?’
Cupidi hesitated. ‘At her cottage in Dungeness. You knew that.’
‘No. I didn’t. I swear.’
For a second, Cupidi was confused. Allan Mulligan had certainly known she was there. But Evert Miller hadn’t? ‘You didn’t?’
‘Why would I lie?’
Zoya Gubenko turned her back and pulled a white T-shirt over her head, then turned back to face them.
‘She hasn’t been answering phone or email. I don’t know where she is.’
But Allan Mulligan had? Sweat prickled on the back of Cupidi’s neck. She felt suddenly overdressed in the heat of the spring day. ‘Has she behaved like this before?’ she asked.
‘Actually, no. Not like this. She’s disappeared, but never for this long.’
‘You don’t seem particularly concerned about her.’
For the first time, Miller looked unsettled. ‘Of course I’m bloody concerned about her,’ he said.
‘Yeah, right,’ whispered Ferriter.
‘We think she may be in some . . . danger. We’ll need her car registration number.’ They needed to find her, but she did not want to be found. Why? ‘Have you ever heard of a seventeen-year-old boy called Joseph Watt?’
‘I think it’s time you left,’ said Evert Miller.
‘Have you?’
‘No. I haven’t.’
‘When you hired Abir Stein, were you aware he had been involved in money laundering?’
Miller frowned. ‘I want you off my property now. I’m going to contact my lawyer. I’d advise you that any further communication must now go through the proper channels.’
‘I need the car registration. I’m serious. Your wife may be in serious danger.’ Someone was blackmailing her and it was connected somehow to the missing boys,
the stabbing of Frank Khan, and the death of Abir Stein.
‘My lawyer will be in touch. Get the hell out,’ said Miller.
They had no choice. They walked the way they came, branches swatting on their faces.
‘How did you know that was going on – that he was shagging that woman?’
‘I didn’t. But it fits now. Ross Clough had hinted he was about to find a major backer. He’d figured out the affair before we did and I think he’s blackmailing Evert Miller into supporting his artwork.’
Cupidi tried calling Moon as they made their way back through the hot grass. ‘Funny,’ she said. ‘Moon’s not picking up.’
‘Because he hates us.’
Just as they were getting back into the car, a text arrived. It was from Zoya Gubenko’s number.
When Cupidi opened it, it contained some numbers and letters. A vehicle registration.
Then a second message came through from Gubenko: Pls don’t tell Evert I sent this.
‘Interesting,’ said Cupidi.
She called Moon again. It rang a while, then went to voicemail.
‘Maybe he’s driving.’
She tried again. Then called the incident room.
‘I’ve got a vehicle registration number. Can you check ANPR and get back to me with where it was last seen?’
A fourth time she called Moon, but there was still no answer.
‘What an arse that man is,’ Ferriter said. ‘I can’t believe she ever married him. He’s going to kick up a stink, isn’t he?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, now you’re in the shit tomorrow morning too. He’s going to make a complaint about you, I’ll bet.’
*
The day was the hottest so far; humid, too. Cupidi pulled over at a lay-by off the A2.
‘Why are you stopping?’
Cupidi pointed at the ice-cream van, parked ahead. She wasn’t the only one who had thought of it. There was a queue of half a dozen people.
Ferriter wrinkled her nose. ‘Don’t like ice creams. They use pig skin, you know, as thickening agent.’
‘Yum,’ said Cupidi.
Ferriter’s phone went. She picked it up, listened. Her mouth opened wide. ‘You’re shitting me,’ she said.
‘What?’ demanded Cupidi.
Ferriter ended the call. ‘Incident room said they’ve just had a ping from Astrid Miller’s car on ANPR. Fifteen minutes ago. And bloody guess where it is?’