by Jane Goodall
‘The boy with the fanzines. Calls himself Conker.’
8
Friday was Briony’s first day off in three weeks but she was up at seven to be ready for the call from Gareth, who was ringing from Paris where the clocks were an hour ahead. She had time for a shower and a bowl of muesli before the phone rang right on cue at seven-thirty.
‘Bry. I didn’t wake you up then?’ The voice never failed to work on her, with its Welsh lilt at the end of the question.
‘This is late by my standards. You should remember that.’
‘Perhaps I should, but it’s so long since we actually spent a night together.’
‘I know, I know.’ She had been forced to cancel their last planned weekend to prepare for a court appearance. ‘Only a few days to go now.’
‘So you’re all set then? No last minute emergencies this time, promise?’
‘I promise,’ she said. ‘How was your week? Did you get your Private Eye?’
‘Thanks, Briony. Fifteen pence well spent. Good cover — an elephant with a circus clown in tow — just about sums up the state of Britain, doesn’t it?’
‘Well, don’t blame me for that. What have you been up to, anyway? Are you still on the David Bowie bandwagon?’
‘Me and half the journalists in Paris. That’s what’s so frustrating, see? Everyone’s after the scandal. If they’d only let me write about the feller’s music. You playing the album?’
Gareth had sent her Station to Station for her birthday, together with a designer dressed box of French chocolates. She was toying with its spotted satin ribbon and smiling. ‘Oh yeah. I’m eating champagne truffles and listening to “Wild is the Wind”.’
‘I thought you’d go for that one. I like the title track. Takes a bit of getting to know, but it’s a new direction for him, see? That’s what the whole tour was about. Not that you’d know it from the press coverage here. His last concert in Paris was cancelled — two weeks ago that was, but they’re still trying to beat up the furore about those comments he made in Sweden.’
‘What comments? Sorry, Gareth, but I don’t get to keep up with all the rock and roll news.’
‘We’ll have to see about that then, won’t we? More rock and roll for Briony. You really don’t know what he said?’
‘Tell.’
‘He said, “I believe Britain could benefit from a fascist leader.” Pop stars who try to talk politics! — I mean, they’re asking for it. I could earn a fortune if I wanted to spend all my time trying to dig up evidence that he’s a fully initiated Nazi.’
‘D’you think he is?’
‘Course not. Just a bit of a stirrer.’
‘I don’t like that kind of stirring. I saw someone on the King’s Road yesterday with a swastika dangling from his ear. What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘Playing dress up,’ he said. ‘That’s what the King’s Road’s all about, isn’t it? I don’t suppose most of these kids even know who the Nazis were. They’re just messing about with the image.’
‘That’s probably right, but they’re wide open to manipulation by anyone who’s got something more serious in mind.’
‘Now listen. You’re not going crusading against any local Nazis until after our holiday.’
She laughed. ‘Don’t worry. Things are looking pretty quiet at the station just now.’ Liar, said a voice in her head. But she pressed on. ‘The heat’s put everyone in a daze. All the psychos are lolling around in the parks eating ice-cream and staring at the blue sky.’
‘I wonder if the blue sky stretches as far as Aberystwyth,’ said Gareth. ‘I doubt it somehow. It never used to.’
‘Well it was your idea to go there. Anyway, I don’t care what the weather’s like.’
‘Neither do I. Two whole weeks, Bry.’ It was the longest they’d spent together in a year.
After she’d put the phone down, she went and stared at the overflowing washing basket. At the top were the canvas slacks she’d worn on Tuesday to go poking around the Thames foreshore. They looked beyond it, really. She dropped them into the bin and bundled the rest of the washing into a plastic bag, then opened the wardrobe, wondering what she had to put in a holiday suitcase. Not much. A couple of pairs of jeans — not of the latest cut — beat-up sandals, some limp t-shirts ... and her blue parka, which she’d probably have to wear over everything anyway. The Aberystwyth seafront could be pretty bracing, even in summer. But then again, best be optimistic, as Gareth was fond of saying. Should she take a swimsuit?
An unfamiliar thought occurred to her. She could go shopping. It was her day off, so why shouldn’t she? She could shame the devil and actually go and buy some clothes. Nice ones, in colours that went together. She looked at her reflection as she shut the wardrobe. At least the regime of all work and no play was keeping her lean. Not so bad for thirty-three and a few days, was she? Yes, she would buy a swimsuit.
She dragged the washing bag down to the laundrette, then took the bus to Oxford Street and had a pleasant morning wandering about trying things on, letting the shop assistants play at putting things together for her.
‘That looks fabulous on you,’ said one of the girls in Miss Selfridge. Inspecting her image in the mirror, Briony thought she wouldn’t go quite as far as to say that, though the short khaki skirt with matching espadrilles suited her, for sure, and the loose cut cheesecloth top suited the skirt. And the wide plaited belt was a nice touch.
‘What about these?’ The assistant captured a string of heavy amber coloured beads from a stand on the counter and slipped them over Briony’s head. ‘Perfect!’
‘All right,’ she said. ‘You win. I’ll take the lot, but I really came in to look at swimsuits.’
She was persuaded to buy a one-piece, smooth and sleek in dark brown lycra, with almost no back.
‘Good cut for your figure type,’ they advised her. She had to agree, then let herself get talked into a matching sarong, with swirls of warm yellow through it.
As she left the shop with brightly coloured bags swinging from both hands, she felt half elated, half embarrassed. What was she doing, indulging herself like this, when so many people in London didn’t even have anywhere to live? But all around were other women just as loaded up with purchases, who didn’t look at all worried about what they were doing. She went into a cafe and sat down, arranging her bags under the small table. Besides, she thought, it wasn’t only for herself. Gareth would like to see her in the clothes. She imagined meeting him at the station, wearing the little skirt and the espadrilles.
It was after two when she got home, and the phone was ringing as she opened the door. She made a dive for it.
‘Briony?’ Steve Latham’s voice. Oh, why couldn’t she have just let the damn thing ring out? Latham had developed a bad habit of ringing her at home to ask about things that she thought were none of his business. But when he was a special adviser to the area commander, he could make out that pretty much anything was his business. ‘Sorry to catch you at home,’ he said. ‘Actually I’ve been trying to get you for the past couple of hours. Can we have a chat?’
‘Well I suppose so. Fire away.’
‘I mean, can we meet? There’s a couple of things I need to show you. Could you be at your office in an hour?’
‘It’s my day off, Steve. Can’t it wait?’
‘No.’
‘Then at least tell me what it’s about.’
‘Can’t. Not over the phone. This one’s a Macready special. But if you don’t want to go in to the station, I can meet you at the pub. Six o’clock in the Drapers Arms on Hampstead Road. That’s near enough to you, isn’t it?’
She put down the phone feeling really annoyed — with herself mostly. She had to stop letting Steve control the agenda like this. It was a habit that went back five years, to the time when they both worked on Macready’s team at Vine Street. She’d made a conscious effort to move on in her new position at Chelsea, though being the new area commander, Macready was still there as o
verseer. And Steve was set on continuing as Macready’s right-hand man, still wanting to draw her in as a rival and sparring partner.
9
The day started clouding over after that, and by six o’clock it was starting to rain. They needed the rain, Briony consoled herself, but it would be just her luck if the weather broke before her holiday even started. She arrived at the Drapers Arms in her old raincoat, feeling that the morning’s indulgence belonged to a distant fantasy life. Steve was already there, ensconced in a window seat and looking out at the passers-by.
Analysing them, no doubt. He never stopped doing that, and since he’d got his PhD he was determined to revolutionise CID work in the Met according to the gospel of behavioural psychology. He’d been given a post at Hendon with a brief to use his new expertise in redeveloping the curriculum, but he also had an office in Paddington Green, where Macready called on him regularly for specialist advice. She tried to be brisk and casual as she said hello, and asked if he needed a refill. She noticed he’d already drunk most of his pint.
‘No,’ he said. ‘Not a refill. But I wouldn’t mind a whisky.’
Briony waited till she’d turned away from him before raising her eyebrows. Whisky? Since when did officers in the Met ask their workmates to buy them a whisky? Pint or a half-pint, that was the unwritten rule.
She returned to the table with a whisky and water, her own half of shandy and a packet of crisps. Steve made a grab for the crisps, ripped them open and picked out a large one.
‘Cheese and onion. I don’t go a bomb on these synthetic flavours, you know. It’s all a kind of placebo effect, to make you think you’ve eaten real food.’ He bit into the crisp and massacred it noisily, as if to prove his point.
She sat forward in her chair. ‘Okay then, what have you got to tell me?’
He took a sip of the whisky and made a face. ‘That’s got water in it. All right. Do you know what fanzines are?’
It was her turn to make a face. ‘What?’
‘Thought you wouldn’t. Short for “fan magazines”. Here.’ He pulled out some papers and handed them to her. They were bright yellow, stapled together down one side and covered in wild collages: drawings, photographs, graffiti-style print. On the front the word YELLER stood out in heavy, misshapen letters and underneath was the photo of a man with his mouth wide open and DESTROY pasted into a speech bubble. His stark white hair stood vertically on his head in long sharp points, like a parody of a crown, and his eyes were shielded by white-framed sunglasses. He was skeletally thin and bare-chested to show off the look, which was accentuated by an assortment of chains that he wore across his chest.
She turned the page and was confronted by the slogan SUMMER OF HATE in the same seasick style of print, which seemed to express the message more effectively than the words themselves. She flicked through, registering muddy photographs of rock groups accompanied by crudely printed slogans that crossed the pages in all directions. Bollox. The Stranglers. Barn barn barn. Live Without Dead Time. Beat the Crap. Stick it up. The Sex Pistols. Dyer ever get the feeling someone’s watching you?
She stopped at a photograph of a man in a zipped leather mask with ‘Mr X’ painted on the forehead in white. ‘So what exactly am I supposed to be looking at?’
‘In a way, all of it. If you haven’t seen this sort of thing before, you ought to know about it.’
‘Of course I’ve seen this sort of thing before, Steve. It’s broken out down our way like a bad rash. “Punk rock” is the latest badge for it. There’s an American mag called Punk that’s been going the rounds. It’s a bit more snazzy than this, but every new thing they come up with spawns a heap of imitations.’
He met her eye for a moment, then picked up his glass and took another gulp. ‘Clubs office have been making a special collection of these fanzines from the joints around Piccadilly. This particular one started to arouse a bit of interest with the West End Central CID.’
‘Why? I can’t see what’s so special in this.’
‘Not that actual issue — that particular fanzine. Yeller.’ He picked out another one, folded it back to display a page in the middle and held it up, showing a collage of images that were all too familiar to Briony. Charles Manson, Ian Brady, Maxwell Tremlay. ‘They seem to be a bit fond of famous killers, see? And they publish lyrics, sometimes, like these.’
He handed it to her and she scanned the lines of blunt, uneven print.
Garbage is falling out of the sky
Better get outa here, don’t ask why
There’s no tomorrow
For Sodom and Gomorrah
If ya turn around, you’re only gonna die
Ah ya don’t get nothing cos there’s nothing left
But we know what yer asking for
Sudden deff
Down in the dark satanic mills
Where the wheels keep turning over iron grilles
Don’t look now
You’ll never see how
London’s invisible machinery kills
Ah ya don’t get nothing cos there’s nothing left
But we know what yer asking for
Sudden deff
‘You see’ Steve was looking at her again in a way that reinforced her feeling that he was set on playing one of his little mind games. ‘I don’t know if you’re aware of it, but that’s what’s in fashion around some of the clubs. Doctrine of anarchy and mayhem.’
From experience, she knew it was a mistake to show she was riled, but it was hard to keep the impatience out of her voice as she responded. ‘Okay, Steve. This is the kind of thing they play at the Triangle in the King’s Road. We do keep an eye on those places, you know. Whoever came up with these lyrics may be trying to bring on the end of the world, but that’s not an offence in any of the books I know, not as such. There are groups springing up all over the place right now. They call themselves antichrist, stick pins in themselves, wear rubber masks, congratulate the IRA, insult the Queen. It’s all part of a fashion. I can’t see anything to attract interest at commander level. What’s got Macready excited?’
‘I’m getting to that, Briony.’ Steve sat back and felt in his pockets, as if looking for cigarettes, then grabbed the whisky glass instead and knocked back what was left in it.
Suddenly, she twigged. ‘Not like you to run out of fags. Is the whisky some kind of substitute?’ She laughed.
But Steve didn’t join in. He picked up the empty glass and spun it on his palm, then got up. ‘I’m going to get another drink. What’ll you have?’
‘I haven’t finished this one yet.’
As he disappeared in the direction of the bar, Briony checked her watch, wondering how much of her evening would be left by the time he got to the heart of the story. He had her captive now, and he was going to make her hear it to the end before he told her why Macready thought she should be brought in on it. What was this building up to? Was a major case about to open up the week before she was due to go on holiday? It’s not just the holiday, she thought. There’s a whole lot more at stake for me and Gareth. Do I get a life outside the Met, or is this it?
As if by way of reply, Steve plonked an unasked-for half-pint in front of her and resumed his seat. ‘No point in putting this off, is there?’ He opened another of the fanzines and handed it to her. Across the centre-spread this time was the heading DEFF ROW and there were three portrait photographs, side by side, showing the mottled grain of the newspaper from which they’d been torn. The faces that looked out were Macready’s, Steve’s and, between them, with the centreline crease running through it and a staple down the nose, her own.
‘Never knew I was so famous,’ she said. She looked at the words scrawled in ugly handwriting underneath the photographs. ‘What does this say? Something about horses and “tygers”. Why have they spelt tigers with a y? ‘The tygers of wrath are wiser than the horses of instruction.’ That’s William Blake. So is that line about the dark satanic mills in the song they’ve printed.’
�
��Very good, Briony. I wouldn’t have thought Blake was quite your thing.’
‘Why not? We studied Blake when I was doing A-level art. And I went to see the Tate exhibition last year with Gareth. Anyway, what’s this about?’
‘Look at the back cover.’
It was a photograph of a man dressed in black, standing under a streetlamp. The face she still occasionally saw in dreams stared out at her. Maxwell Tremlay. Five years older. His skin was coarsened, showing deep lines across the forehead and hollows under the eyes. With steady control, she put her glass back on the table.
‘You’re not going to tell me the Walker’s got out.’ She spoke these words as an order rather than a question, and Steve’s comeback was instant.
‘Keep your cool. Maxwell Tremlay’s not going anywhere. He’s a Cat A and they’ve been unable to transfer him from solitary on account of his social skills appear to be permanently evacuated. I paid Tremlay a visit, as a matter of fact. It wasn’t a pleasant experience.’
‘Were you expecting it to be?’ There was a pause. ‘So, did you talk to him?’
Steve sat back in his chair, looked at the ceiling for a moment, then at her. ‘You know, I wonder if anyone’s ever had a conversation with Tremlay. I mean, a genuine conversational exchange. At any rate, it’s not going to happen now because he’s given up talking altogether. Gone silent, like a Trappist monk.’ Another pause. ‘Doesn’t look much like the bloke we arrested. Remember that look?’
‘Yeah, well. I’d rather not, if it’s all the same to you. What’s the connection with this little rag then? Is he getting a cult following or something?’
‘Most of these fanzines are put together by students, who print them up on the art school photocopier overnight. We’re pretty sure Yeller originates from that new anarchist scene down in the World’s End. As for how they got hold of the photo ... ’ Steve rolled his empty glass between his hands. ‘Macready went for a confidential chat with the prison governor. There’s been two official photos of Tremlay since he was put away, and that isn’t one of them. On our analysis, it’s more recent, and taken with a different lens. So who’s had access to him? Answer, pretty well no one — except the prison staff and the doctor who was called in when he sprained his ankle.’