Dark Vet

by CJ Hannon

  Astrid flops on the seat next to her, plants a kiss on Jenna’s head. Jenna’s absorbed in the screen and for her sake she tries to get into it, but it’s too far in, and asking Jenna for a detailed run down would only piss her off.

  ‘What’s good about this one?’ she says.

  ‘The way she uses space and silence. Like a character in themselves... What happened to your face?’

  Reflexively, she touches her cheek where Gudmundson had kicked her. Had Jenna really not looked at her all this time? ‘It’s nothing.’

  Jenna pauses the movie. ‘Come on.’

  ‘Alright.’ She inclines her head. ‘Raid in Newhaven. Someone tipped them off. Car chase. Air support, sirens. The guy we’re chasing loses it, goes off road across a golf course, crashes his van into a bunker.’

  ‘Get out.’

  ‘I’m serious!’

  ‘So how did you get that shiner? Wouldn’t want people thinking the wrong thing about me.’

  ‘The guy in the van made a run for it. I chased him down, caught a boot in the face as I made the arrest.’

  Jenna nods. ‘You want me to get some ice on that? Probably a bit late, but it might control the swelling.’

  ‘Hell no, I want it to look bad for the interview tomorrow. Psych him out. We’ll stack charges, he’ll freak out, and hopefully co-operate for a lighter sentence.’

  ‘Sounds like you’ve got it all figured out.’

  ‘Yeah, actually, I do. Which reminds me, I’d really like to take you out to Cuckmere Haven for dawn one day. I cycled it the other day and it was breath-taking, the light… you have to see it.’

  ‘Sure.’

  Astrid sniffs. ‘Fuck, I really do need to take a shower though. You be up for a bit?’

  Jenna zaps off the TV. ‘I’m beat actually. I’m going to bed.’

  ‘Come on, I only just got back. I can watch the rest of this thing with you if you like?’

  Jenna winces at the word thing. ‘I hate to throw a film quote at you, but the world doesn’t stop and start at your convenience.’

  She squints, thinking. ‘The Big Lebowski?’

  ‘Cha-ching, another point for Astrid Van Doren. Night, babe.’

  Jenna moves like a cat, dissolving away. Must be tired.

  Astrid gets in the shower, letting the arrows of water pelt her face, pricks of pain on her bruised cheek. She washes her hair and steps out, feeling clean and purified.

  She wraps a towel around her head, wipes the condensation from the mirror with her palm and stares at herself.

  Jenna said she had offbeat good looks, whatever the hell that meant. She wasn’t classically pretty, handsome perhaps, with high cheek bones, but now they are distorted in a house of mirrors sort of way. Puffy, discoloured. Bags under her eyes. She has looked and felt better.

  She can’t stop herself smiling. Damn, it was worth it. What an arrest!

  The next morning she’s out early with a Thermos of decent coffee sitting in the drinks’ holder. Jenna’s liquid drum ‘n’ bass comes on the stereo. She cuts it. She’s given it a fair go, but she likes what she likes. The Boss, Courtney Barnett, The War on Drugs and Kurt Vile. She voice-activates a mix, and her mood instantly rises, singing along to the lyrics.

  ‘Gudmundson is in with his lawyer,’ Smithes tells her, when she gets into Sussex House. ‘He’s appointed Tabitha Matheson.’

  ‘That’s all we need.’

  They talk tactics. Illegal animal breeding doesn’t tend to draw much heat, legally speaking. Fines for the most part and any prison time pitiful. Assaulting a police officer is possibly the most they have to hit him with. Smithes is rightly concerned they haven’t got enough meaty charges to force Gudmundson’s hand into co-operating with them. On the other side of the equation is Sheridan and his reputation for dealing with grasses in a brutal and uncompromising manner. Astrid’s springy mood starts to retract. No easy wins to be had here.

  ‘So, we need to have something more compelling. Something to make the cost of not co-operating outweigh the threat of Sheridan.’

  ‘The way Gudmundson was driving last night, he was desperate. My read is that Sheridan could have paid Gudmundson to kill MK.’

  ‘Highly plausible, sir.’ She admits to the logic. It doesn’t feel quite right, but there is little tolerance for gut hunches in Burrow’s culture. ‘We have no alibi for him yet. He’s a snake breeder, plus there’s a loose connection to the victim. It would fly. Not sure even Matheson could deny we have grounds.’ She’s starting to see where this is all going now.

  Smithes nods thoughtfully. ‘Good.’

  ‘Question for you, sir. Say Olaf Gudmundson committed the actual act… would we be willing to do a deal with him if he gave us Sheridan?’

  Smithes appraises her, lowers his voice. ‘Impossible to say at this stage. It would be a big scalp.’

  ‘Good to know our options, if it plays out that way,’ she says.

  With the additional line of questioning, Matheson asks for another hour to consult with her client before the interview, a reasonable request which Smithes grants, not wanting to get combative with the notoriously prickly Matheson. Then, at eleven fifteen, Astrid and Smithes sit down in a boxy windowless interview room.

  Olaf sits, slumped, hands in his lap. On seeing her bruising, he looks away. Disgusted with himself? His lawyer, Matheson is calm, like she knows something they don’t. It’s discomfiting.

  ‘We’ve got quite the list to get through.’ Smithes’ pen hovers over a bulleted list of charges. ‘We’ll begin with the most pressing and most serious.’

  ‘Please do,’ Matheson says, with confidence.

  Before Smithes can lead, as they’d intended, she rests a hand on his arm. ‘May I?’

  He raises an eyebrow and nods.

  ‘Olaf,’ she says. ‘Before we begin in earnest, I’m sure you’re worried about your snakes. They’re all alive and well, and are being looked after by Clive Wilson from the RSPCA.’

  No thanks to your off-road driving, she thinks.

  ‘Thank you for telling me and… I’m truly, very sorry about…’ he points below his John Lennon glasses, to his cheek.

  ‘No,’ Matheson snaps to her client. ‘You were jumped by someone in the darkness, anybody would wriggle and seek to get away.’

  Astrid, incredulous, opens her mouth to say that she had identified herself. That Olaf wasn’t jumped down a back alley on the way home from the pub, he’d been tailed for miles by the police and the helicopter, for Christ’s sake. Who did he think it would be? But, somehow, she manages to bite her tongue, though it galls her to let Matheson get away with this sleight of hand, this little knicker-flash of what her defence would look like in court. Smithes often said there was a time for sledgehammers and a time for chisels. This, undoubtedly, was the latter.

  ‘Apologies, go ahead now, Bill,’ she says, hoping to have unsettled Matheson’s groove.

  ‘Mr Gudmundson, where were you on the evening of the tenth of January between the hours of four thirty and eight p.m.?’

  Olaf looks up. ‘I was in Hull, on business. I stayed the night in a Travelodge. I arrived there about five in the afternoon.’

  ‘What were you doing in Hull?’ Smithes does a good job at hiding any disappointment.

  Matheson shakes her head. ‘Nowhere near your crime scene, Detective Chief Inspector. He has receipts and the hotel will have security cameras.’

  ‘We’ll have it checked out.’ Astrid rests a hand on the table. They’d lost their biggest piece of leverage. Time to play with what they had left. ‘These other charges are stickier though, Olaf. Now, while you might have been in Hull the night of Martin Kitteridge’s murder, you do breed snakes illegally.’

  She waits to see if he’ll say anything, then continues.

  ‘Have you bred and sold any venomous cobra snakes, Olaf?’

  He looks at his lawyer, ‘Yes. I had one, an adult male.’

/>   ‘Until recently?’

  ‘Yes. I sold it.’

  ‘To whom, and when?’

  Olaf opens his mouth, but as expected, Matheson holds up a hand and stares her down.

  Smithes gives her the tiniest of nods.

  ‘Now, I’m sure your highly competent lawyer has spelled out the best and worst case scenarios for the remaining charges against you, which stand little chance of being successfully defended. A skilful advocate Mrs Matheson may be, she’s not a miracle worker.’

  ‘Flattering, I think? But get to the point.’

  ‘If you have material evidence of who you sold or provided a cobra to in the last year, then we may be able to do something about all these other charges.’

  Matheson doesn’t bite just yet. ‘Material evidence? How about an affidavit from my client? Would that suffice?’

  Astrid defers to her superior.

  ‘Would he be willing to take the stand?’

  Matheson, in turn, defers to her client, who gives a curt nod.

  ‘So, who did you supply cobra snakes to, Mr Gudmundson?’

  ‘Not snakes. Snake. Just one. And–’ Matheson silences him with a gesture.

  ‘Nice try. Now. Let’s have it all official before my client talks. Call me sceptical, but let’s keep the motivation strong on both sides of the table, shall we?’ She turns to Olaf. ‘Until I’ve read it and okayed it, you don’t say a word. Got it?’

  He bobs his head up and down twice, still looking into his lap.

  Astrid can’t help but like Matheson, adversary that she is. A real old goat of a woman and if she was ever in trouble, exactly the sort of person she’d want in her corner.

  45

  Melody

  She must have got back to sleep eventually. Right now, it doesn’t feel like it. Her neck feels like a sumo wrestler had been kneeling on it all night. She tips her head this way and that to soothe it. No good. She must upgrade from the couch soon, for all concerned.

  She retrieves her phone from the floor where it had been charging, and plugs Kathy’s lamp back in. She listens. The flat feels quiet. Empty. Once this is all settled, she could work as a locum vet. Begin again. Kitteridge’s already feels like a lifetime ago.

  Coffee. But first she has to pee and maybe take a shower. Melody opens the door to the bathroom and instantly realises her mistake. Kathy shrieks, her towel drops from around her body to the floor.

  ‘You could have knocked!’ Kathy snatches up the towel from the floor.

  ‘You could have locked,’ Melody retorts. She stares at Kathy.

  She has a meandering tattoo of a cobra winding up from the curve of her hip to the back of her shoulder. ‘Kathy… what is that?’

  Kathy pales. ‘Oh God, Melody. It’s just a tattoo, okay?’ She turns, lowers the towel slightly so Melody can see the snake head a bit clearer. The detail of the forked tongue. ‘Look how it’s starting to fade. I got it years ago, it’s just a horrible coincidence–’

  ‘Kathy.’ Melody draws on years of surgical and emergency experience and maintains a level head. ‘I know you’d never do anything to hurt us. It’s just a tattoo.’

  Kathy fans herself with a hand. ‘You don’t know what a relief it is to hear you say that.’

  The shower head drips, drips, drips.

  ‘Right…’

  ‘OK, then.’

  ‘I’ll just…’

  ‘Yes.’

  Kathy’s squeezes past. Almond and honeymilk on clean, taut, young skin.

  Melody closes the door, slides the bolt over and rests her back against the door.

  A cobra tattoo? Strait-laced Kathy? Never in her wildest dreams could she have imagined that. Melody showers, unable to think of anything but the tattoo. It was so fluid, beautiful.

  She monopolises the bathroom, applies foundation, and black mascara. The effect darkens her brown eyes, which normally are a Red Earth number 64 by Farrow & Ball, but today are a darker Spanish Brown by Little Greene.

  She pulls her hair up into an austere bun that pulls at the skin of her face, tightening it, making her look and feel younger. In the lounge there is a simple black dress, that she just about squeezes into, and a black shawl, which she drapes over her shoulders. Her ensemble is completed with smart black flats and the biggest sunglasses she owns.

  The crematorium is packed.

  Ally and Tristan, and Howard and Susan share the front row with her. Ally squeezes her hand.

  ‘You know I don’t like that.’

  ‘Sorry. We’re here for you, that’s all.

  ‘I know. Listen. This morning I walked in on Kathy in the bathroom. She has a tattoo of a cobra.’

  ‘Get out! You’re kidding?’

  Melody scours the room, catches Kathy’s eye and gives her a nod. ‘It was most unexpected.’

  ‘Hi, Melody,’ Hugh holds up a hand. Austin sits towards the back, the other rows packed with Kitteridge family friends, Martin’s godparents, clients, present and former, some of Martin’s old Cambridge friends. Betsy had come too; they hadn’t spoken in years. At the back she sees Detective Van Doren. Their eyes meet. They give each other a curt nod.

  Just let this be over with.

  Martin wasn’t a religious man, but Susan has arranged for a preacher to lead the service. Not a word goes in.

  On the dais, the coffin is a tasteful teak. Martin’s final home.

  Suddenly she hears: “The Power of Love” by Huey Lewis & the News. The priest stops, and a murmur passes through the congregation. It’s her ringtone.

  ‘Christ!’ Ally hisses, ‘turn it off, Mel.’

  She removes it from her clutch. Unknown number. She silences it.

  Susan is leaning forward, trying to catch her eye, ready no doubt to shoot daggers; but Melody isn’t playing.

  Howard is invited up to the lectern, notes trembling in his hands.

  ‘No father should ever…’ he begins, then stops, a sob caught in his throat. ‘My boy,’ he says, looking at the coffin, and then shakes his head and returns to his seat.

  Melody feels a single tear roll down her cheek, and she catches it with her index finger. Her in-laws haven’t asked her to speak, rightly guessing she would have declined.

  Then they rise to sing – and she can barely believe it when she sees the crib sheet – the jaunty schooltime hymn, “All the Animals I Have Ever Seen”.

  She keeps her mouth clamped shut throughout.

  Then it is time.

  The light hum of machinery, the faint suggestion of flames in the gaps as the coffin lowers into the oven.

  She mutters a goodbye to her husband under her breath.

  And that is it.

  He is gone.

  The congregation pack into the pub, filling the bar, the seating areas, even spilling outside to brave the late January cold to vape, smoke, and tell stories. She stands with Ally and Tristan, nibbling at a salmon sandwich. Kathy comes and gives her a big, unwelcome hug. She accepts it with rigidity.

  Kathy’s face is raw. ‘I can’t bear it.’

  ‘Here, have this. It’ll help.’ Melody hands over her double vodka on ice. ’I’m not going to drink it. No hope of getting a proper drink in here.’

  Kathy runs her wrist under her eye, accepts the glass. Sniffs it, and pulls a face.

  ‘Kathy. Get yourself on the books of an agency, pick up some locum work.’

  ‘It won’t be the same.’

  Susan pushes past, not meeting her eye, talking to her husband in tow, ‘…and would you believe she didn’t even have the common decency to turn off her phone.’

  Ally snorts at her drink. ‘Wow.’

  ‘Was that the most blatant attempt at passive aggressiveness in the world?’ Tristan says.

  ‘What?’ Melody says.

  ‘I wouldn’t worry about it. The priest only mentioned about turning off your devices twice before starting,’ Ally says.

  It doe
s remind her though. She checks, and sees there is no voicemail, but there is a text message.

  You can’t hide forever.

  A chill plays over her spine. Martin might be gone, but his legacy still has its hooks into her.

  Kathy gasps and squints into the bottom of her now empty glass. ‘That was horrible.’

  ‘I’ll have you over sometime, Kathy. I make a Bloody Mary to die for.’

  ‘She really is an artist,’ Ally says.

  Someone clears their throat. She turns. It’s Detective Van Doren. There’s an ugly bruise on her cheek.

  ‘Fancy a smoke?’ She offers a pack of Marlboro Lights, a single cigarette popping its head up in invitation.

  Melody pauses, then accepts the cigarette. She trails Van Doren through the crowd by the bar. Austin’s there, with an enormous glass of rosé, looking at pictures of his wife and Lucky on his phone.

  ‘Austin?’

  He’s slow to turn. ‘So much loss,’ he mumbles.

  ‘Yes, well…’

  ‘They say it comes in threes.’

  ‘Austin. Tell me you’re taking a cab home.’

  ‘What? Yes, of course.’

  ‘Promise? Or do I need to confiscate your keys?’

  ‘Scout’s honour.’

  Outside, it’s a pleasant but breezy day. Seagulls gather on the mossy roof of the pub, Van Doren sits on her hands on a damp-looking brickwork wall.

  ‘Poor Austin.’ Melody lights up, hands the lighter back to Van Doren.

  ‘Are you close?’ Van Doren asks.

  Melody exhales. ‘He was Martin’s friend. But I know him from our Cambridge days. Austin’s exceedingly clever, perhaps one of the most intelligent people I’ve ever met. Here.’ Melody hands back the packet.

  ‘Keep them. I only smoke socially. When my girlfriend quit, so did I.’

  ‘The power of partnership.’ She taps ash into the shrubbery. ‘It was good of you to come today.’

  The detective runs her hand under her undercut, a habit, it must feel nice. ‘Important to pay your respects. Plus, on a police officer’s salary, you can’t say no to a free spread.’