by William Paul
‘Yeah.’
‘When we had sex it was like that.’
‘Was it?’
‘Not the first time, but the second time we did it. Remember, in your flat with the suitcase of money by the door. That really had an edge for me. How was it for you?’
Fyfe struggled to find a suitable answer. ‘Pretty good,’ he said.
‘That moment when we climaxed was like being in combat. Don’t you agree? Life and death were wrapped up in it because it was at the extreme. We were under fire. You saved my life. Don’t you see, David? Don’t you see?’
Angela was pawing at his forearm, demanding Fyfe look at her. He felt as if he should duck to avoid the volley of emotional intensity emanating from her. His face was burning from the gradual infusion of blood that had accompanied her description of sex as a form of warfare. He worried that she was speaking too loudly and other people would be able to hear. He agreed it had been an exciting night, the element of integral danger and illegality lending it an edge he would never forget. He certainly wasn’t going to argue with her. He nodded and grabbed her hand before she scratched him and drew blood. She took it as a sign of affection and visibly relaxed, smiling beatifically as if she had reached a climax and slipped through into the afterglow. Fyfe was mentally measuring the space between him and Angela, imagining himself crossing to half-way, and then half-way for the remaining distance, and then half-way again, and again. Never reaching her. There was no paradox involved in this particular situation. It was the exception proving the paradoxical rule. It was the way things really were.
Angela ended the reunion abruptly by getting up from the table. She slipped her arm through Fyfe’s and led him back to the reception area. She kissed him on the cheek and wiped off the lipstick mark with her thumb.
‘By the way, how are your dogs?’ she asked brightly.
‘Fine,’ he replied. ‘Never better.’
‘And your wife?’
‘I didn’t get round to marrying her a second time.’
‘It must be true love then.’
‘Something like that.’
‘You’re still together?’
‘Up until last night anyway.’
‘Take my advice. Keep it that way.’
‘Will I hear from you again?’ Fyfe asked.
‘Maybe not in this lifetime.’
‘After Felippe falls by the wayside?’
‘Don’t worry, Dave. I won’t be making any claim on you.’
‘I thought we were comrades in arms?’
‘We were.’ She laughed at some private memory. ‘If I do ever come back it will be another lunch. Will you come?’
‘I wouldn’t want to miss it.’
‘Good. See you around then, comrade.’
‘And you.’
She kissed him and again had to wipe away the lipstick. Fyfe retreated through the hotel’s revolving doors, watching Angela’s white form fade away through the patterned glass. The doorman tipped his hat, motioned to a waiting taxi on the rank and stood aside when Fyfe shook his head. The rain had turned to sleet. It was whirling in long lines down Lothian Road, its whiteness vanishing into the darker wetness of pavements, roads and vehicles. A snowflake struck his cheek and slid over the skin like a razor-sharp blade slitting it open. He put his hand up, expecting blood but finding only melting snow. The shock of its icy touch seemed to wake him from a day-dream, but he could still taste the wine on his tongue. He blinked rapidly and started to walk, feeling himself dragged reluctantly from somewhere infinitely far away back into the harshness of the real world. He put Angela out of his mind and began to think about how he was going to handle the Ramensky situation. As soon as he turned on his mobile phone it rang. Matthewson spoke to him.
‘We’ve solved Zena’s paradox,’ he said.
‘Congratulations.’
‘It wasn’t Randolph.’
‘I know.’
Fyfe realised they must have found out about Ramensky so the self-imposed dilemma of whether or not to protect him was gone, melted away like the snow off his face. Sadness mingled with relief that he no longer had to make a choice of what to do.
‘Sir Duncan cracked the case, believe it or not. He’s going to explain all to the team, make it a big set-piece occasion. Kick off is four. He’s like a dog with two tails.’
‘Is it rock solid?’
Fyfe hailed a free taxi. It braked hard, swerving in close to the side of the road just past him, spraying his trouser leg with slush.
‘We have hard evidence and a signed confession.’
‘And you did it all without me.’
‘Afraid so. Want to know the details?’
‘Don’t spoil the chief’s big moment. Where have you got Ramensky?’
‘How the hell did you know about Ramensky? I was just getting round to telling you about him.’
Fyfe was in the back of the taxi. The driver was looking over his shoulder waiting for instructions on where to go. The wine in Fyfe’s belly made him feel warm and contented. He was very pleasantly drunk.
‘I’m a detective. It’s my job. Where have you got him?’
‘He’s in the cells at St Leonards.’
‘No one will object if I take a detour and visit him, will they? Maybe he will confess to me as well.’
‘That would make things very interesting,’ Matthewson said.
‘Good then. See you at four. Book me a ringside seat.’
Chapter Forty-Two
Monday, 15.09
Sandy Ramensky lifted his head and the yellow walls around him turned from vague fuzziness to rigid solidity. He sat up and the movement made the walls spin furiously. He had the impression he was at the centre of a musical carousel, surrounded by galloping ponies and smiling clowns’ faces in a whirl of clashing musical chimes. Then the painted eyes and lips were abruptly wiped off one of the circling faces and he was looking directly at David Fyfe, the man who knew what he had done, who almost certainly knew exactly what he was thinking.
‘I didn’t do it,’ Ramensky said.
‘Neither did I,’ Fyfe replied.
‘I thought about it.’
‘I know.’
‘I went to see the man.’
‘I know. MacDuff told me.’
‘He threw me out.’
‘So he says.’
‘That was it. I didn’t do it.’
‘Didn’t you?’
Ramensky blinked. The walls stopped rotating. The imaginary music stopped. He felt unshaven, unkempt, and sore all over. Fyfe was standing casually in front of him with his hands in his pockets, smiling slightly. He sat down on the edge of the bunk and seemed to be shaking his head in amused exasperation. What did that mean? That Fyfe didn’t believe him? Fyfe knew about MacDuff. He knew why he had gone to Donaldson MacDuff. He knew what MacDuff’s reaction had been. So why didn’t he believe him then?
Ramensky let his head sink back. The thin mattress offered little cushioning from the hard surface of the platform beneath. He was, he realised with a tiny throat-scouring snort of frightened laughter, in the same cell he had woken up in earlier that day. The same graffiti was on the walls, and the same single light bulb hung from its flex on the ceiling. They had taken his trouser belt and his shoe laces again. He remembered walking out but after that everything was a complete blank until he came round and found himself back in the place he thought he had left. Suddenly, a sense of disorientation and imminent disaster crowded in on him as though the cell walls had tilted inwards. He rubbed his eyes and massaged his dry lips. He felt weak and unsteady even though he was lying on his back. His tongue was sore but the swelling seemed to have subsided and he was able to speak properly. He could taste a residue of sweet dark rum that coated the inside of his mouth.
‘I didn’t do it,’ he repeated.
‘We know exactly what you did,’ Fyfe answered. ‘We could have worked something out, Sandy. Why did you have to go and confess?’
Maybe Fyfe did
know what he had done, Ramensky thought. Maybe he knew better than Ramensky himself. After all, he had no recollection of what had happened to him since leaving the police cell. Perhaps he had never left it, never got away from the land of the putty-faced people. It could be false, the memory of his belongings being poured out of the brown envelope, the point of the pen slowly scraping his name on the release form, the door opening on to the cold air of the outside world, and the friendly slap on his shoulder as he passed through. His inability to make himself understood could be a false memory too. It had all been a disjointed dream. MacDuff could be an imaginary character, another clown face conjured up on the spinning carousel. Perhaps he hadn’t gone on a binge the previous night either, or perhaps he had and the death of Zena McElhose was an untrue invention of his short-circuiting brain.
Confusion caused Ramensky’s throbbing headache to get worse. What was this confession Fyfe talked about? He sat up on the bunk, supporting himself in the corner, and moved his fingers up to his forehead and pressed hard to try and ease it. But it made no difference. There was no dispute that he was here in the police cell, so he must have done something to warrant being arrested. He had first met Fyfe when being questioned about old Zena’s death, so she must be dead. And Fyfe knew about MacDuff, mentioning his name unprompted, so he had to be real too. Ramensky let his fingers slide up into his hair, gripping it and pulling. The ache inside his head rippled like a wave passing along a length of rope until the sudden sharp whip-crack at the end which made him grunt with pain as his whole body tensed and shuddered.
‘I know what you’ve done, Sandy,’ Fyfe was saying. ‘I would have helped you. I would have seen you all right. Look at you now. You’re a mess.’
Ramensky frowned. Keeping his eyes narrowed stopped his senses being flooded with too much light but it also made Fyfe a blurred, insubstantial figure. Ramensky didn’t understand. What was Fyfe telling him? He knew how he had gone to Donaldson MacDuff to ask him to kill his employer, Zena McElhose, for a cash payment. MacDuff had refused and Ramensky couldn’t get away quickly enough, although later he had considered going back to explain about his daughter Lorna and how he was only trying to save her by stealing old Zena’s life force. Okay, it had been a crazy idea, but he was a grieving father wildly clutching at straws that he hoped would magically cure his dying daughter. Who could blame him?
‘I understand, Sandy,’ Fyfe said. ‘I understand what you were trying to do. Believe me, I understand.’
It had been a crazy idea, Ramensky thought, yet maybe he had been crazy that night. He saw himself on his way home from work fighting off his attackers in the park, experienced again the mind-blasting rush of adrenalin that only gradually faded, like a tide going out. And he saw himself standing at his front door, looking up through the darkness towards the big house with its widely spaced security lights and thinking he saw furtive shapes dodge round the corner leading to the path to the rear. He thought there were two of them moving in single file but they were nothing more than a fleeting impression on the very fringe of his vision. And when he tried to look more closely, he noticed the big seagulls wheeling overhead that were sending shadows scuttling in different directions. He went inside and went to sleep. He didn’t know what woke him in the morning, probably some kind of premonition because he had got out of bed much earlier than usual and was standing over Lorna’s cot when he heard Marianne scream. Moments later he was standing over Zena McElhose’s dead body and his first thought was that her death wouldn’t help little Lorna at all. It was pointless. It had been a waste of time and effort for whoever had committed the crime.
‘Why did you have to admit to it, Sandy? I would have helped you. You should have held out.’
Fyfe was on his feet. He went to the wash-hand basin, ran the tap. Water rattled noisily against the stainless steel making it vibrate. Ramensky wondered if, that night, he had indeed killed old Zena but then blacked it out in his own mind. Suppose he had followed the housebreaker inside, seen his chance to help Lorna and escape the blame by leaving a scapegoat behind, complete with murder weapon in his hand and incriminating balaclava. Ramensky tried to remember but it was all an impenetrable blank. He tried hard but the aching in his head screamed too painfully into a void and he couldn’t handle it.
‘Is that how you did it, Sandy?’ Fyfe was asking, waving his hands in the air to dry them. ‘Did you arrive back from work and see somebody up at the big house? Did you follow the bloke Randolph inside? Seize your chance in the hope of saving Lorna? Did you bludgeon Zena to death and then go for poor, unfortunate Randolph who got his kicks less bloodily just by breaking into houses? You definitely frightened him, Sandy. You must have thought your luck was in when he conveniently dropped down at your feet with a heart attack and you were able to put the mallet in his hand and go back to bed to wait for Marianne to discover the body.’
The sink gurgled loudly as the water ran away. Ramensky pulled his knees into the circle of his arms and trembled. It was uncanny how Fyfe read his thoughts and told him what he had done. He had been sleepwalking. He remembered writing his signature. He had thought it was a form to collect his belongings. It must have been a confession. He had thought he had seen Zena McElhose dead in the kitchen. He must have killed her in the kitchen the night before. Even if he couldn’t remember it must be true.
‘Why did you confess so easily, Sandy? I would have looked after you. At the very least I could have delayed things so that you could stay with Lorna. I would have done that for you. We could have worked something out. Pity. It’s too late now.’
Ramensky shook his head. He watched Fyfe go over to the cell door. There was the sound of a key turning and it swung open. A pony’s face with bared teeth leapt at him. A set of human teeth grinned. He flinched and held an arm in front of his face. A truncheon with the legend A Present from Malaga came flying towards him. He covered his head. The carousel above Lorna’s cot spun into a blur. It went quiet then. Nothing else emerged to threaten him. Slowly he let his hands slide down his face until he could see through the spaces between his fingers and saw Fyfe standing in the doorway, shaking his head sadly.
‘Too late now,’ Fyfe said and then he was gone.
Chapter Forty-Three
Monday, 16.05
There were more than thirty detectives in the incident room for Sir Duncan’s big announcement. John Sapalski’s desk had been emptied and tidied up. The time of his funeral was posted on the noticeboard. Fyfe had discovered that nobody seemed to know what was going on. Even the turnkeys at St Leonards were unaware of any charges being made against Ramensky. They had no knowledge of him being questioned in connection with the McElhose murder. According to them, he had been lifted off the streets for fighting the night before, released in the morning, and brought back later, pissed out of his head once more. Somewhere in between he must have confessed to murder. Fyfe couldn’t quite fit in the inter-connecting details but no doubt all would be explained when the Chief Constable told them how they should have been doing their jobs.
Fyfe waited in his own frosted-glass partition office until there was something for the crowd of standing and sitting bodies to focus on. He had tried to find Matthewson before the event but he was nowhere around. Now he appeared along with Graham Evans flanking Sir Duncan who was, for some reason, in his full dress uniform, polished silver buttons, peaked cap and all. Superintendent Les Cooper patted the air with his hands to quieten everybody down. The Chief Constable stood at the end of the room and waited for silence. Then he held up a plastic bag containing a white lump. Fyfe peered closely. From his distance he could not make out what it was, except that it was some kind of indistinct moulded shape.
‘This’, said Sir Duncan, his voice booming melodramatically, ‘is a white soapstone parrot bookend.’
The roomful of detectives looked at each other surreptitiously during the pause that followed the statement. Nobody laughed, although a few raised their eyebrows. Others began to make connections.
Fyfe frowned, thinking back to Ramensky staring at him in bewilderment from the corner of the yellow-walled police cell. Sir Duncan turned the plastic bag in towards his face to check its contents. Then he went on.
‘It was one of several objects found in a cupboard at the home of Gregor Runciman, a senior partner in the law firm of Randolph and Runciman of which the late Valentine Randolph was also a senior partner. The parrot, this parrot, is one of a pair we know to be stolen. Its partner was found among a set of similar disparate objects in a cupboard in the home of Valentine Randolph when it was searched after he was discovered unconscious not far from the murder victim, Zena McElhose. Gregor Runciman has confessed to murdering Mrs McElhose.’
Fyfe’s jaw dropped in astonishment. A trail of saliva had begun to run out of the corner of his mouth. He wiped it dry and kept his hand up at his face to hide his embarrassment. So Ramensky was innocent and the all-knowing performance of the wise detective in front of him an hour before had been totally unnecessary and wrong-headed. Fyfe had been absolutely convinced. An hour ago he would have bet his life savings, everything under the shed floor, on Ramensky’s guilt and, from what he was being told, he would have lost the lot. Matthewson looked over at him and gave a barely discernible nod of confirmation. Hasn’t Hunky Dunky done well, he silently implied.
‘It seems that Val Randolph and Gregor Runciman spiced up their outwardly respectable lives by regularly going out at weekends to break into the houses of friends and acquaintances. It was, apparently, the revival of a game they played while studying law together at university and which had fallen into abeyance before the death of Randolph’s wife started it up again. They had a strict policy of targeting people they knew socially or in a business sense and of breaking into houses they had already visited, often stealing and copying keys so that entry would be relatively simple. They also took inconsequential items that the owners would hardly notice were missing and, even if they did, would never bother reporting to the police. I know, both Randolph and Gregor Runciman have been dinner guests at my home. The parrot bookends are my property. Funny, isn’t it, what some people will do for weekend entertainment?’