Ritual jc-3

by Mo Hayder

  She opened the conservatory door, stepping out into the sunshine. There was the smell of mould, grass clippings and distant cows. She saw he was still shaking, just a little.

  'Are you OK?'

  He nodded.

  'What is it?'

  'Nothing.'

  'Nothing?'

  'I thought you were in trouble, OK? Back then, when you were in that study. I was wrong, but it doesn't change the way I thought I was going to come in and find you-'

  'Yes?'

  He bit his lip and shot her a sideways glance. Although the side of his face nearest her was in shadow there was enough light for her to see him clearly — and she couldn't help staring. His tight, slightly feral face was tired and defeated. 'Not now,' he said turning back to the horizon. 'Not now.'

  She blinked, tried not to stare. 'Is that all? Is that the problem?'

  He shook his head, and now she saw there was something else on his mind.

  'What? What is it?'

  'Jonah.'

  'Oh, Christ,' she said flatly. 'What?'

  'Something his family didn't mention before — something that turns it all round, that makes me scared for him,' Caffery said.

  'Makes you scared?' she whispered, a soft whump of panic under her solar plexus, as if someone had punched her there. 'What? What didn't they mention?'

  'Mallows. He and Dundas's lad-'

  'Oh, shit.' Flea felt as if something was falling inside her. Suddenly she saw it: the same habit, the same background. Of course — of course. They must have known each other. 'Shit. I know what you're going to tell me. Shit, oh, shit.'

  Caffery pocketed his phone, took out his keys and headed away from her, back round the side of the house. She followed at a trot, drawing level with him at the front of the house. He was picking up his jacket from a rusting garden roller. He glanced at her. 'It's OK. You go back to Kaiser.'

  'What are you doing?'

  'I'm going to work.' He put on the jacket and went towards his car.

  'No.' She kept pace with him, walking fast alongside him. 'Wait.'

  'I'll call you as soon as I have anything.' He got into the car and slammed the door. The keys were in the ignition and he'd started the engine when she ran to the front and put her hands on the bonnet.

  He rolled down his window. 'I'm sorry?' he said. 'You're in my way.'

  'Yes,' she said. 'Yes, that's right.'

  'And you're going to stop me leaving.'

  'I want you to wait. Let me get my keys so I can come with you.'

  'Movie stuff, you mean?'

  'Movie stuff.' She pointed at him, an index finger like a gun, trained on his forehead. 'Now, you.' She jabbed the finger at him. 'You don't go anywhere. You wait there while I get my keys.'

  52

  Flea followed Caffery in his beat-up car. He drove it fast through the country lanes, brushing through the lush hedgerows, as the smells of horses and pollen came through her window. She had to concentrate to keep up. Along the A38 to the city and into the side roads near the Easton area, through neighbourhoods with graffitied walls where men sat outside newspaper shops playing chess on trestle tables, under flyovers and past warehouses, until at last Caffery slowed, checking out of the window and eventually stopping at the corner of a residential road.

  She parked her car, locked it and went to him, opening the door and getting into the passenger seat. 'What're we doing here?' she said. Across the road a church, a bookie's and a supermarket were squeezed into one block.

  'The supermarket,' he said.

  She leaned forward and peered at it. 'Eezy Pocket,' said the red and yellow sign. There were grilles on the windows, a newspaper hoarding with local headlines at the entrance, and one or two kids hanging around outside, looking shiftily up and down the street as if they were waiting for someone. 'What about it?'

  'I don't know.' Caffery tapped the steering-wheel thoughtfully. There was a long silence. His shirt was very white against his skin, his dark hair clean but half wild. And she noticed he'd got back that look — the one that made her think he was working hard to hold something in.

  Just when she was about to say it — Christ, I know how you feel — he held up his mobile phone. There was a picture on the screen of a small, ratty-looking black guy with a slopy head wearing a white shirt and a tatty brown corduroy jacket.

  'The multimedia unit scanned it from the CCTV footage at TIDARA. He was with Mossy the last time he was seen alive.'

  'Do you know who he is?'

  'Nope. Never seen him before.' He put away the phone and shifted a little in the seat. 'Something else you didn't know,' he said, 'is what I found at a mate of Mabuza's. Guy called Kwanele Dlamini had a bowl of blood in his living room.'

  'Nice.'

  'Yeah — turned out to be human.'

  'Even nicer.'

  'Turned out, in fact, to belong to Mossy.'

  Flea sucked in a breath. Jonah's face came to her. She'd met him only once, at a Christmas party at Dundas's place. He'd shown her his PlayStation and told her that one day he wanted to write video games. Of course, she hadn't had a clue what was in his future.

  Caffery turned his eyes to hers. 'Remember Kaiser said something — he said giving a Tokoloshe blood, that it's a superstition from the East.'

  'You were listening to him, then?'

  He gave a wry smile. 'I called someone in Immigration — they've got an officer attached to Operation Atrium, nice guy. Helpful. He gave me the heads up on Mabuza and Dlamini's status last week.' Caffery patted his pockets, took out a tobacco pouch and put it on the dashboard. 'But I wanted to know more about them-'

  'Like what?'

  'Like did Immigration know if they were from the east of the country? Where the Zulu tribes are.'

  'Because of the thing with the blood?'

  'Because of the thing with the blood. Only problem with that is he can't answer me — not straight off — so he says he's going to ask around. But then he mentions that most black South Africans who come from Zulu territory to Bristol sooner or later end up right over there.' He dug a finger in the direction of the supermarket. 'The guy who owns it is from a Durban slum. He's been running rings round Immigration for years, and his place is where people go when they first hit the streets round here. He does the lot — gets them work, gets them drugs, gets them boyfriends or girlfriends, depending on what they want, the works. Immigration would like nothing better than to get something on him, so they were well up for me having a look.'

  Caffery broke off as a group of schoolkids ambled past, boys of about ten years old, socks gathered round skinny ankles, schoolbags dragging along the floor. Some bent to peer into the car, one grinned at Caffery, threw him the West- Side salute, then strolled off, casual and already as slink-hipped as the older boys.

  'That's the Hopewell estate where Jonah lives,' Caffery said, when they'd gone. He put a finger on the windscreen to indicate the high-rise looming above them a few streets away. 'Not that far, but I can guarantee there are at least twenty of these convenience stores between here and there — so why did he come to this place?'

  'How do you know he did?'

  'Bags. In his bedroom. Unless it's a chain, which it doesn't look like. So he must have been here. And that means someone here knows him, and that means-'

  He was staring at something. Flea followed the direction of his eyes. The boys had crossed the road, passed the supermarket and some parked cars, and were turning into a side-street.

  'What?' she said. Caffery's eyes had narrowed, and she could see from the way his jaw had hardened that he was clenching his teeth. 'What is it?'

  He unclicked his seat-belt, opened the door and swung out on to the pavement. 'There's always someone in a place like this who knows everything. And,' he said, bending to give her a smile, 'I know just who that someone is.'

  He got out his warrant card, took off his jacket and threw it on to the back seat. Ignoring Flea's puzzled frown, he closed the door and crossed the road
to the supermarket. The car he was interested in, a blue Nissan, was parked about twenty feet along next to a postbox, the driver — a fat guy in an England T-shirt — sitting kerbside with his window open.

  Caffery approached obliquely, going casually but keeping himself tucked into the sides of the cars behind so the driver wouldn't notice until he was on top of him. Then he opened the car door and, before the driver could do anything, grabbed the keys from the ignition, pocketed them and slammed the door.

  'Hey — what the fuck do you think you're-'

  The driver scrabbled with the door, opening it as Caffery crossed in front of the car and jumped into the passenger seat. The driver followed him round, as fast as his weight would allow, his chunky arms pumping him along.

  'Hey,' he said, tugging futilely at the passenger door. 'Get out, you cunt. Get out of my car.' He hammered on the window. 'Get out or I'll get the fucking police on you.'

  In the car Caffery took the warrant card from his trouser pocket and slapped it, face out, against the glass. The driver stopped mid-sentence. He didn't have to get close to know what the card was — Caffery knew he'd have seen one enough times. He stopped hammering. His shoulders drooped in defeat and he rested his hands on the car roof. He turned and looked around the street, as if he was thinking of running. Then, as if he'd thought better of it, he trudged wearily to the front of the car and got in, not speaking.

  There was a bad smell in the car, of sweat and food and old clothes. When the man got in, the car creaked and shifted — it took him some time to get comfortable in the small seat, and by the time he had settled the sweat was running down his face.

  'Well?' he said. 'You can't get me on anything. I'm not on a warning or probation or anything. I'm clean. I can sit where I want when I want.'

  Caffery didn't answer. The gang of schoolkids were trailing away in the distance. He knew it was them the man was trying not to look at. He knew it because he'd got the measure of this guy just from watching him across the road. Maybe it was his curse to recognize a paedophile from a hundred yards. When he didn't answer the man sighed and sat back, crossing his arms. He was wearing shorts, and his fat, sparsely haired legs were jammed up against the steering-wheel.

  'The thing is, I keep telling you guys, we're all the same. On the inside, us men are the same — in our thoughts, in our…' he nodded in the direction of the schoolboys '… in our desires.'

  Caffery clenched his teeth.

  'The only difference,' said the man, smiling, 'is that I've got the courage to be free. To express myself. And you haven't.'

  Caffery took a long, deep breath. Then, when the driver had been silent for some time he turned in his seat and, in one unbroken move, cannoned his fist into his face. The guy's head collided with the seat-belt mooring, his mouth flew open, saliva shot out. He ricocheted back in the seat, both hands clutching his cheek. A line of blood was coming from his nose and tears were in his eyes.

  'Whad'd you do that for?' he said thickly, holding his hand under his nose to catch the blood. 'I know my rights. You're not allowed to do that.'

  'And I'm not allowed to do this either.' Caffery took hold of the guy's football shirt and twisted it so tight that the neck dug into the rolls of fat, making his face bulge.

  'Get off — get off…' He scratched uselessly at Caffery's hands. 'Get off.'

  'Who are you waiting for, dog turd?'

  'No one.'

  'Don't tell me that.' Caffery tightened his grip. 'You're waiting for someone.'

  'No — no, I'm not.'

  Caffery threw him back against the seat, got out of the car and came round to the driver's side. He had a flash frame of Flea, out of the car on the other side of the road, sunglasses off, watching intently. Then he was opening the door and heaving the man out.

  'Get out, slob,' he muttered, struggling with the weight. 'Get the fuck out.'

  The driver plopped on to the street, like a cork coming out of a bottle, falling on to all fours, whimpering, blood dribbling from his face.

  'You can't do this to me — you can't.'

  Caffery put a hand on the back of the man's head and pushed him down so his face was jammed between the postbox and the car's back wheel. He couldn't get Penderecki's face out of his head. There was a dried piece of dog shit on the kerb next to the guy's mouth and, still thinking of Penderecki, Caffery forced his face a little nearer, half wanting to make him eat it.

  'Please stop.'

  Caffery leaned his shoulder against the car and knelt on the guy's back. A voice in the back of his head was reminding him, This is how suspects die. This is how they die in detention. Suffocated. The coroner will find cracked ribs, bruises consistent with the victim being knelt on. They die from not having the strength to lift their ribs and let air into their lungs. And then the voice said: It's what you should have done to Penderecki.

  'This can kill you,' he hissed into the man's ear. 'What I'm doing will kill you — fat though you are. If I stay here long enough you'll die. OK?'

  'Please, please don't. Please…' He was crying now. He couldn't sob because Caffery was too heavy, but tears were rolling out of his eyes and mingling with the sweat. 'Please.'

  'Tell me, you fucker, or we'll be here until you die.'

  The man screwed up his eyes. He put his hands on to the ground and tried to lift his weight off the pavement to suck in a breath. 'OK,' he sputtered. 'Get off me and I'll tell you.'

  Caffery slapped one hand against the car and got to his feet. The driver struggled on to his back, breathing hard, his face pressed against the grimy postbox.

  'There are a few… people,' he panted, 'a few people who come here.'

  'All on the game or do you like to be the one who converts them?'

  'No.' He swallowed. 'No. They're all professionals.'

  'And black? You like them black? Is that what your record will show? Young and black?'

  He nodded miserably, a line of spittle hanging from his mouth.

  'What?' Caffery put both hands on the car so he was stretched over the driver. He could sense one or two people watching him from outside the supermarket, but he didn't look up. 'What did you say?'

  'I said yes.'

  Caffery felt in his pocket for his mobile, pulled up the picture the multimedia unit had sent him and thrust it into the guy's face. 'This one. Fucked him too, have you?'

  He glanced at the picture and away. 'Yeah,' he muttered. 'He's one of them.'

  'Name?'

  'Changes. Jim, Paul, John, whatever he feels. There's something wrong with him. He's not really twelve, he just looks it… Really he's eighteen — I swear. He's got a condition that makes him smaller…'

  Caffery remembered a boy in London, a twelve-year- old, who used to advertise saying, 'I am an eighteen-year-old who had an accident that has left me looking just eleven years old.' Designed for all the old nonces who wanted to get away with their dirty child-rape habits. 'I've heard that story before, you piece of shit.'

  'It's true.' The man stared at him. 'It's true. Ask anyone. Any of the ones who hang out here, they all know him. He dressed for me like a schoolkid, but he isn't, really. I swear he isn't. I don't do that any more — you know, with the kids.'

  'Sure you don't.'

  'Don't tell him I was the one who told you. I think he's got — friends. Family.' He wiped his nose, gulping down tears. 'Please don't tell him I told you.'

  Caffery raised his head. Outside the supermarket three kids in board clothes were staring at him. When he met their eyes they turned away, pulling up their hoodies. 'So,' he said, 'when's he coming? Today?'

  'Maybe.' He sniffled. 'Sometimes he comes at lunchtime, but if not him there'll be others.' He wiped the tears out of his eyes. 'Please don't say I told you. I don't want to upset anyone.'

  'If you don't want to upset anyone, then stop fucking little boys,' Caffery said. He put his hands in the small of his back and flexed his shoulders, letting them click so his tense muscles would release.
/>   'All right,' he said, helping the man to his feet. He opened the car door and shoved him towards it. 'Wait there. Don't move. Any of your other boyfriends come along you send them on their way, even if you and your sad little hard-on have to sit there all day. When he comes, act like nothing's happened. Get him in the car — I'll do the rest.'

  'What about my keys? What am I going to do without my car keys?'

  'Jesus Christ. I'm telling you to help me because you're a piece of shit and you owe something to society. Not because I've turned into the archangel fucking Gabriel. Now. Get. In. The. Sodding. Car.'

  Caffery was sweating when he came back. 'It's a waiting game now,' he said, grabbing the tobacco pouch and beginning to roll up. 'The clue we're looking for will walk right up to that car in about ten minutes.' He licked the paper and lit the cigarette.

  Flea watched him smoke. She could feel the last two days tugging her down and she had an overwhelming urge to cry or sleep, she couldn't tell which. Next to her Caffery smoked the whole of the cigarette, watching the blue Nissan in silence. Then he crushed the butt in the ashtray, rolled up the pouch, put it on the dashboard and said, in a level voice, 'When I was eight my brother disappeared.'

  'I'm sorry?' she said numbly.

  'My brother went missing,' he said calmly, as if he was telling her what he'd had for breakfast. 'I was with him when it happened. We had… There was a fight, and he left, walked out the bottom of our garden into a railway cutting. It wasn't dangerous because we'd been there a million times. Except this time…' For a moment it was as if he'd forgotten he was speaking. 'Except this time he didn't come back. There was a convicted paedophile lived on the other side of the railway. We didn't call them that then — called them child-molesters, kiddy-diddlers. Everyone knew it was him, but no one could prove it. That was thirty years ago and I still don't know where my brother is.'

  She stared at him, her heart thudding. He'd heard. He knew what had happened to Mum and Dad — someone in the force must have told him how her life had been changed by the accident, that she'd never get her life back. She took a breath. 'Why are you telling me this?' she said, her voice small. 'Why?'