Ash & Bone

by John Harvey

  'Frank Elder.'

  'Don't tell me, you're standing as an independent in the local elections. For sustainable resources and the recycling of waste, against gay marriages.'

  'Is that an issue?'

  'Gay marriages? Not for me. Unless you're about to make me an offer.'

  'For fuck's sake, Anton,' came a woman's voice from the interior, 'stop the second-rate cabaret and let the man in.'

  She was a slim figure in a wheelchair, a shawl round her shoulders, rug across her knees. The chair was battery-operated and she eased the toggle forward to bring herself to the door. Her face, Elder saw, was deeply lined, the skin twisted tight around her unaligned left eye, as though perhaps she had suffered a stroke.

  'I'm Lynette Drury,' she said, her voice a harsh rasp.

  'Frank Elder.'

  'Is this official, Frank? Should I be calling my lawyer out of Mass?'

  'I don't think so.'

  She stared at him with her good eye, as if making up her mind. 'I don't get that much company these days, Frank, I can afford to turn it away.'

  Adroitly, she manoeuvred her wheelchair round and back into the house.

  'Anton, do you think you could demean yourself long enough to find us something to drink?'

  Anton peeled off right, the dog at his heels. Elder followed Lynette Drury into a high-ceilinged room with windows to the back and side, the garden at the rear largely lawn surrounded by shrubs and small, spiny fruit trees, rose bushes pruned well back.

  'You're not the usual kind, Frank, but you've still got the smell about you.'

  'Takes a while to wash off,' Elder said.

  'Ben didn't send you?'

  'No.'

  'George Mallory neither.'

  Elder shook his head.

  'Thought not.' She gestured towards the dark, polished table near the window. 'Get me a cigarette, will you, Frank? Light it for me?'

  She inhaled deeply enough to bring on a fit of coughing and summon Anton from the other room to pat her back and wipe spittle and dark lipstick from her mouth.

  'What?' she said. 'No lecture?'

  Anton shot her a look over his shoulder as he left.

  '"You've got to stop, you're killing yourself,'" she mimicked, then laughed. 'Does it look like I'm alive, Frank? Is that what this looks like?'

  She coughed again, more controlled this time. 'Anton,' she called towards the doorway, ' where's that fucking drink?'

  The answer was the popping of a cork and Anton, moments later, reappearing with two glasses of champagne, the bottle in an ice bucket on a silver tray.

  'Cheers, Frank. Your good health. Got to be some little perks, eh? Otherwise what's the point?'

  'Cheers.'

  'All right,' she said to Anton, 'you can get back to your Gameboy or whatever it is you get up to in the servant's quarters. Polishing the silver.'

  'I've sold it already.'

  'That and your skinny arse.'

  Elder sipped some champagne; if it were high class or £6.99 from Tesco he had no idea. The bells seemed to have stopped ringing. Presumably all the good people of Blackheath were already on their knees.

  'Each month,' Lynette said, 'Ben sends a case of champagne. Saves him coming round in person. Rubs a little Vaseline over his conscience. And he pays for Anton, of course. Though he's probably knobbing him as well. Not that he's queer, don't get me wrong. Ben, I mean. Just doesn't care what he fucks as long as it's tight.'

  She coughed again and some of the champagne spilled across the purple veins at the back of her hand.

  Elder lifted away the glass.

  Anton appeared for a moment at the door, then, reassured, went away again.

  'But my guess,' she said, 'it's George Mallory you're more interested in. More than Ben. Am I right?'

  'Maybe.'

  'Georgie-Porgie, kissed the girls and made them cry. He did that, all right. And now he's running scared, isn't he? Not that he'd ever admit it, of course. He could be standing in the middle of a fire, flames up to his armpits, and swear blind everything was hunky-dory. But he sent that creep Repton round, didn't he? A sure sign. Maurice Repton smarming up to you in one of those neat little suits he likes to tell you are custom-made by some tame tailor out at Winchmore Hill, used to be a cutter in Savile Row.'

  'Maurice with all those questions. Anyone been to see me, sniffing round. CIB or whatever they're called nowadays. Change their fucking names as often as a whore's knickers. No, I says. Number of visitors I get these days, anyone'd think I've got the fucking plague. HIV. If anyone does, Maurice says, you will give us a call? Let us know. Us, like they're husband and fucking wife.'

  She paused, collecting her breath. Ash fell from the end of her cigarette.

  'Course, like I told him, no one ever came near. Till you.'

  Elder took what remained of the cigarette from between her fingers and replaced it with the glass of champagne.

  'Should I tell them about you, Frank? Maurice and George. What do you think?'

  'I think it's up to you.'

  'We'll see, we'll see. See how you behave, what it is you want. What you want to know. What do you want to know, Frank?'

  'What it is has got Mallory rattled, that would do for starters.'

  She looked at him lopsidedly across the top of her glass. 'Wouldn't it, though? Just wouldn't it.'

  After several moments' thought, Lynette swung her chair around and repositioned it close to the rear window.

  'Bring that over, would you, Frank?'

  'That' was a small rosewood table with an ashtray and a coaster for her glass, which Elder refilled before lighting her another cigarette. He carried across a curved-back wooden chair and set it down close by.

  There was little sign they were a relatively short drive from the heart of London, a short walk down the hill to the tat and turmoil that was Lewisham. Or that visitors, on this fine January morning, would be strolling across Greenwich Park to the Observatory, then down the sloping paths towards the Maritime Museum and the Cutty Sark.

  Out in the garden nothing moved. The faint shadows of bushes, cast by the winter sun, seemed to have been painted, soft grey, upon the grass.

  Lynette coughed before she spoke. 'I had a card from Ben a few days back, Cyprus. The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, to be exact. Sort of New Year's card, I suppose. He did have a place in Paphos, down in the south. Had it for years. Went there every winter, didn't we, for a while. Ben and me. A few others, sometimes. Friends. George and Maurice, for instance, they came out a few times, early on.'

  She released a slow stream of smoke towards the glass.

  'Got too busy, Paphos, too many tourists. Too many fucking expats. That was why Ben sold up, moved across the island. Kyrenia. Lovely spot. And besides, no extradition is there? Turkish Republic' She laughed, a short breathless sound. 'What they gonna do, send in the fucking SAS, drag him out?'

  Elder turned the stem of the glass between his fingers. How far to let her take her own time, go where her own mind took her? When to push?

  'Why aren't you there with him?' he said, gently as he could.

  Another laugh that she washed down with a shaky gulp of champagne. 'Me? Why doesn't he want me? What sort of a stupid fucking question is that? What the earthly fuck would he want me for? Like this?'

  'He obviously cares for you.'

  'He what?'

  'You said yourself, someone to look after you, the champagne.'

  'And you think that's because he fucking cares?'

  'Why else?'

  She grasped his arm, just above the wrist. 'To keep me fucking quiet, that's why. Buy my fucking silence. Buy me off.' Elder thought she would let go, but she tightened her grip instead. 'We had it planned, didn't we, Ben and me? Agreed. More or less from the first. All the time I was with George, even, that never changed a thing. We were going to go off there one winter, Cyprus, and never come back. Retire. Enjoy the rest of our lives in the sun. Look, over there. Above the fireplace.'


  The photograph was in a filigreed silver frame. A younger, almost beautiful Lynette Drury - striking, certainly - lit up by the sun; beside her, a handsome, dark-haired man with a strong, almost aquiline nose and dark eyes that stared out while the rest of his face attempted a smile.

  'That's what it was going to be,' Lynette said, 'the rest of our fucking lives. And no matter how… how filthy it all became, that was what I clung on to. The rest of my life in the fucking sun.'

  Her nails were digging deep into Elder's arm, close to breaking the skin.

  'Well, I'm not, am I? Not going fuckin' anywhere. I'm going to die here in this place with just a poof for company while him and Mallory are out there living the life of fucking Riley after all… after all the…'

  A fresh fit of coughing doubled her forward and Elder prised her hand from his arm, then patted and rubbed her back, low below the shoulder blades. He thought Anton might reappear, but there was no sign; perhaps he was content to listen outside the door.

  'Ben and I, we were living together. Not married, not official, but it had been a long time. I was running this place in Streatham, girls, you know, young, some of them, almost as young as they looked. That was when I met George Mallory. One of the girls, she had a bit of trouble with this punter. Went for him with a knife. Panicked. Next thing you knew, emergency services everywhere. Ambulance. Police. George was there. Promising to make it all go away. And he did. Only there's payback. Wants me to be his snout, doesn't he? No way, I tell him, I'm not turning Ben in, not for anyone, but he says no, that's not what he means. Play this right, and we all stand to gain. Your Ben, he knows what's going on, got his nose in the trough. Have a word with him, see what he says. So I do, and Ben says fine.

  'Couple of months later there's this robbery, Hatton Garden. Diamonds. Big reward. Ben knows who took it down. He tells me, I tell George, they're caught cold, most of the stuff recovered. The Yard only passes on five grand to me, right? Reward money for giving the information leading to the arrest. George and me, we split it down the middle. Lovely. Six months later, more of the same. Next thing I know he's coming on to me. Wants to set me up in a flat somewhere. I told Ben, thinking he'll tell him to fuck right off, but instead he says, yes, why not? Not going to do us any harm, is it, you and me having someone like Mallory in our pockets?'

  She stared out of the window, sipped more champagne.

  'That's how it was, for years. Favours going back and forth. Little celebrations. Parties. Pop singers and second-rate movie stars. Yanks, some of them. Hollywood, you know. Rubbing up against real villains, loved that, didn't they? LSD, horse, cocaine. Boys and girls, all hand-picked, paid for. And George, he was in the thick of it, wasn't he? Lapping it up. Girls, especially; he liked girls, did George. Two or three at a time. Young girls. Not, you know, really young, he's not some bleeding paedophile. That kind of thing I won't go near it, won't touch it, makes my skin crawl, but young, you know, fifteen, sixteen, not been around the block too many times. In the end it all went too far. You don't want to know how and I'm not telling you. Not ever.'

  Elder was about to ask anyway, but Lynette didn't give him the chance.

  'Things settled back down,' she said. 'Went on pretty much as before. Ben got hooked up with Will Grant and they pulled off a couple of tasty scores. Tasty himself, Will Grant, I'll say that for him.' She gave Elder what would once have been a coquettish glance. 'Once or twice the law got too close and George had to straighten things out, make them go away. Then, a few years back, there was this big falling-out after they done this job at Gatwick. Law comes sniffing round, as per usual, and someone's only dropped Grant right in it, name and number, and of course he thinks I've grassed him up. Reckons George has persuaded me to roll him over. It's not true, not for a bloody moment, but Grant's not having any, real paranoid by now, thinks they're both out to stiff him of his share of almost a million, Ben and George both. Won't be persuaded. No way to turn him round. Oh, when the case fell apart and they all walked free, he let on it was okay, all pals again together, forgive and forget. But no, whatever trust there'd been had gone. George, especially. Always figured Grant for a loose cannon after that.'

  She stubbed out her cigarette.

  'Grant had threatened him, that was the problem. I know where the bodies are buried, George, remember that. Said he had something could put George inside for life.'

  'You know what that something was?'

  'Me? No, no idea. Just talk, more'n likely. But George, he believed him, I know that. I'd not often seen him worried, really worried, but that's what he was.'

  'Worried enough to kill Grant if he got the chance?'

  Lynette looked at him with her good eye. 'George would kill his own mother if he thought she might turn against him.'

  Anton had come back into the room. 'Time for your nap before lunch.'

  Lynette swore and smiled and brought the wheelchair back around. 'Nice to have met you, Frank. Come and see me again some time.'

  'I'd like that.' He placed a card on which he'd written his London address and mobile number down on the arm of her chair.

  'Lying bastard.'

  Elder smiled and raised his glass.

  46

  Karen Shields and Mike Ramsden were gradually wearing Kennet down, chipping away at the carapace of half-truths and denials he'd constructed around himself, teasing out each incident in which he had broken into the flats or houses of various women living alone, some whom he knew well, others whom he scarcely knew at all. They persuaded him to talk, sometimes haltingly, sometimes, despite his own best interests, almost with relish, of the sexual life he had persuaded, cajoled, or bullied the women in his life to share: fantasies of forced sexual activity and rape which were often played out in public places where the risk of discovery added an extra frisson.

  But on Maddy Birch's murder, they could not shake him. He remained adamant he was not involved. And as long as there was still no evidence, other than the circumstantial, to link him to the crime, they were stymied.

  'Bastard keeps it up,' Ramsden said, 'he'll have me halfway believing he's telling the bloody truth.'

  'About Maddy? Maybe he is.'

  'You reckon?'

  'In here, no. I think he's guilty as hell. But unless we can prove it, break him down…'

  'Yeah.'

  'We've got to find out what he was doing, Mike. The night she was killed. If he wasn't watching Jackie Chan and downing a few pints on the Holloway Road, what was he doing? Maybe he was drinking somewhere else? Somewhere closer to where Maddy was killed. Filling in the time till she was through with her yoga. Getting himself up for it, who knows? Let's have Lee and Paul back round the pubs with a photograph, Tottenham Lane, Crouch End, Hornsey Rise.'

  'Okay.'

  'And Mike, another thing. That story of his about getting up early the next morning to go to work - if he was, to all intents and purposes, still off on holiday, why was he going to work? And where?'

  'Self-employed, isn't he? Work when you feel like it.'

  'Even so. Let's nail it down.'

  'That's a joke, right?'

  'What?'

  'Nail it down. Building. Kennet's job…'

  'Mike?'

  'Yes?'

  'No time left for jokes.'

  Attention to detail, Karen thought, check and double-check. That's what brought most cases to a satisfactory conclusion. That and sheer luck. She hoped their luck hadn't run out.

  Meanwhile, the process by which Grant's assets would be claimed by the Crown had begun its slow and tortuous progress. His bank accounts had been traced and were being examined; the sale of his penthouse flat would eventually be negotiated. There were no records of him having had a safety deposit box.

  The clothes and paraphernalia that had been removed from the flat itself were sitting in a succession of cardboard boxes, which it took two officers a good half-hour to locate and transfer to a room where Elder could examine them, article by article, piece by piec
e.

  Suits, jackets, shirts, shoes. Toiletries, gizmos, histories of Stalingrad, Berlin and both the First and Second World Wars, some, as far as Elder could tell, unread, their spines uncracked. A few vinyl albums with bent and ragged sleeves: the original Dusty in Memphis, Otis Redding's Otis Blue. CDs that mixed Phil Collins and Simply Red with pop singers from the sixties, more Dusty, Lulu, Sandie Shaw. Some Aretha Franklin. The Temptations. A couple of DVDs: Titanic, Pearl Harbor. And videos: The World at War in a boxed set, Cross of Iron, Apocalypse Now, Das Boot. A slew of old musicals: Funny Girl, Top Hat, Follow the Fleet, An American in Paris, Carousel. A stationery box which had once housed A4 paper and now held photographs.

  Elder spread them out across the table. Holiday snaps, beaches, umbrellas, tanned bodies, exotic plants; celebrations, faces mugging for the camera, champagne, cigars. Three men standing outside a nightclub, slightly the worse for wear, dressed to the nines, startled by the sudden flash of light: Grant, Mallory and a man Elder recognised from the framed picture in Lynette Drury's house as Ben Slater. There were photographs also of Grant and Slater in the changing company of others: in restaurants and bars, relaxing round the pool, the race track, the dogs, a hospitality box at Chelsea, the departure lounge at Heathrow.

  Elder shuffled them around.

  Grant and Mallory ringside at a boxing match - Elder lifted it up and turned it towards the light - Maurice Repton in the background, almost edged out of the frame.

  Grant and Mallory.

  I know where the bodies are buried, George, remember that.

  Something could put Mallory inside for life.

  How far did it go? How thick the stew?

  Elder tapped the photos back into piles and replaced them in the box.

  Close to two hours later it was all being resealed and replaced.

  * * *

  Vicki Wilson was sharing a flat near Gloucester Road with two others. Andrea was a make-up artist, working mostly on corporate videos and the occasional pop promo for MTV; Didi, real name Deirdre, was a dancer at a revue bar in Soho. When Elder called, Andrea was out filming and Didi in bed sleeping.