by Jeff Gulvin
‘Convenient.’
‘It’s violence, Vanner. Your trademark.’
Vanner looked at him then, eyes very cold. ‘Supposition.’
‘Crossmaglen,’ Morrison went on. ‘1983. You tortured an IRA suspect. Is that why you left the Army? You must have had a good career up until then. Pity to blow it all like that. Man of your experience.’
Vanner did not reply.
‘No,’ Morrison said. ‘It wasn’t that was it. It was later. Let me see, February ’84. Your spell as an Intelligence Officer.’
Vanner thinned his eyes.
‘Armagh, Vanner. Thomas Quinlon. Remember DC Farrell? Special Branch? RUC Anti-Terrorist Unit? You were with GSquad, weren’t you?’
Vanner did not reply. Morrison leaned on the desk. ‘Oh, yes. We talked to Farrell. He left the job. Went back to farming with his father. He remembered you though. Had quite a lot to say. Things to get off his chest.’
Vanner still said nothing. Scammell was watching him carefully. ‘You had a go at Judge Staples,’ he said. ‘Why did you do that?’
‘Because he was weak. Because he let a guilty man walk.’
‘And what would you have done?’
Vanner wrinkled his lip.
‘Where’s the gun, Vanner?’ Morrison said.
‘There is no gun.’
‘We think there is.’
‘Then show it to me.’
Morrison sat back. ‘Shoot to kill in Ulster. The beginning of a pattern. I have to say I like the Shakespeare touch. Very poetic’
For a few moments Vanner rocked on the chair. Morrison and Scammell seemed to stalk around him like dogs at a bear pit. He watched their faces, their eyes. ‘Are you going to charge me?’ he said.
‘Why don’t you just tell us, Vanner. We’ll find out. Why don’t you save us the bother?’
‘Are you going to charge me?’
Morrison glanced at Scammell and then he switched off the tape. ‘Not yet. But we will.’
Vanner stood up. ‘Fine. In the meantime I’ll take my leave.’ He waited for them to stop him, half expecting it but knowing they could not.
‘I only need the gun, Vanner,’ Morrison said. ‘I will find it.’
‘Well,’ Vanner said, opening the door. ‘Good hunting.’ Scammell was on his feet. ‘It’s all right, Inspector,’ Vanner told him. ‘I think I know the way out.’
Eleven
VANNER LEFT LOUGHBOROUGH STREET and stood a while on the pavement. He felt alone. The silence of colleagues, their suspicion, disapproval. He tried to shrug it off, but for the first time it was not that easy. Why hadn’t Sarah told him she was no longer on the Watchman team? He started walking, picking his way across the road to the tube station.
Sarah was not home. Working day, of course. Then again, he had not seen her at the station. They probably had her doing some filing somewhere, or holed up in a department store, watching shoplifters.
He moved about her house like a leopard too long in a cage that was too small for him. He paced, shifting from room to room, suddenly at a loss. He could feel Morrison, not alone, but with a whole team of people working against him. He started to make a cup of coffee but he did not really want one. He poked around in the fridge but was not really hungry. In the end he went upstairs and had a shower. He had always been able to think in the shower.
Sharp points of water rattling his skin, he stood with his head down, the spray plastering his hair to his face. Morrison. Belfast. Armagh, all those years ago. Nights in the back of a Black Pig with a pistol pressing against his ribs. Memories flooding back to him; dark streets, glistening with rain water and plagued by last year’s fear. Morrison in Ulster. He remembered the very first time he had clapped eyes on him; squat little bull of a man, with his Marine’s-style haircut, bristling over his scalp like a rash.
Switching off the water, he towelled himself dry and went through to her bedroom. The bed was still unmade from this morning: he sat down on the edge, the towel round his waist. He could smell her. Yesterday’s clothes in a heap on the floor where she had left them. He questioned himself then. He had been here a while now and he wondered if a while had become too long. Yet he did not want to leave.
Getting up, he went to where his bag lay in the bottom of her wardrobe. Opening the zip he fished inside for clean underwear but found that the bag was empty. He stood up and scratched his head. Then it occurred to him that perhaps she had made space for him somewhere in one of her drawers and the sudden emptiness of the bag worried him.
It was time to leave. Stupidly, as if in some premature preparation he lifted his bag from the wardrobe. He still stood in the towel. Her chest of drawers was set against the far wall, a small mirror pitched above it. Three drawers; her things; lipstick, body spray, littered across the surface. He opened the top drawer. She had placed his underclothes next to hers, not neatly but all bundled in together so that he had to sort through them. All at once he knew he had to go and yet at the same time a voice in his head asked him why.
As he untangled his things, something shiny at the bottom of the drawer caught his eye. Lifting aside the garments he picked up a packet of photographs. A picture of Sarah, one of Sarah and a man. Who’s this? he wondered. He was a tallish man with dark, curling hair and a 1970s moustache. Not what he would term Sarah’s type at all. He shuffled the pictures and turned up another one. A little white face peered up at him; dimples in her cheeks and wide blue eyes. A tumble of blonde curly hair.
Vanner stared at the picture. He sat down on the bed. Then he got up again and walked down the stairs, still staring at it. His jacket hung on the bottom of the bannister. Fumbling in the pocket, he found the folded print from the microfiche. He laid it on the kitchen table and carefully smoothed out the creases. The same face looked up at him.
Upstairs he dressed slowly. Then, taking both pictures, he went down to the lounge. He poured a large glass of whisky and drank it down in one. Then he sat down to wait for Sarah.
Morrison pored over the photographs from the Lothian killing. Duncan Scott’s body, head all but gone, slumped in the doorwell of his white Ford Escort. He had them laid flat, like an ill-fitting jigsaw puzzle. The body in the car; the car from the other side; the hole in the chassis where the bullet had lodged, and then the blown-up picture of the bullet itself. Pushing aside all the pictures but the bullet, he picked up the telephone.
It seemed to ring forever. He muttered under his breath. They always did like to make you wait, sort of hallmark of their business. At last, though, somebody answered.
‘Laboratory of Forensic Science.’
Morrison asked to be put through to Dr Alan Jones. He had to wait for a few minutes but then Jones’ clipped accent came on the line.
‘Alan. Andrew Morrison.’
‘Ah.’ Jones paused. ‘You want to know about bullets.’
‘You must have read my mind.’
‘Look, I’m sorry, Andrew. I’ve nothing for you yet.’
Morrison squeezed the cord on the phone. ‘I’m sorry to push you, Alan. But this is important.’
‘What isn’t? D’you have any idea how many bullets have passed through here?’
‘A lot.’
‘Well, not as many as Bogotá, perhaps, but yes, one hell of a lot. We’re stretched, Andrew. Very.’
‘Okay. I understand. But this is the Watchman, Alan. If I can find a match I might just find a gun. And I really need a gun.’
Jones sighed. ‘I promise you as soon as I find something I’ll ring you.’
‘Thank you.’ Morrison hung up.
Vanner drank more whisky. He was not drunk but felt calmer than he had done. It was growing darker outside, the afternoon so short this time of year. It occurred to him it would very soon be Christmas. The two photographs of Meggie Hamilton lay before him on the table. He heard the key turn in the lock.
‘Aden?’ She called out. She always called out when she came in, as though she were coming home to him. ‘You i
n?’
‘The lounge.’
She appeared in the doorway, her hair damp; the belt of her coat twisted in a loose knot at her waist. She smiled at him, then looked at the glass in his hand and finally down at the table. ‘What’ve you got there?’ She came closer and then she stopped. Vanner watched her.
‘I found it in your drawer. You know the one where you put my stuff? I looked in my bag but my things weren’t there, so I looked in your top drawer. I found this.’ He picked up the original and held it out to her. ‘What’s going on, Sarah?’
Sarah stood there, looking away from him, her face white all at once.
‘Tell me,’ Vanner said. ‘What the hell’s going on?’
Sarah was trembling. Vanner stood up, still holding the picture. He took her by the arm. ‘What’s going on, Sarah? Tell me why you’ve got a picture of Meggie Hamilton.’
Sarah pulled free of his grasp and pushed her hair from where it hung in her eyes. Fingers trembling, she took the picture from him and held it.
‘Talk to me, Sarah?’
She opened her mouth, breath pushed out audibly but she did not speak.
‘It’s Meggie Hamilton,’ he said. ‘The girl from the paper in Newcastle.’
‘No it isn’t.’
Her eyes bunched then and tears fell from them. Her mouth crumpled red in her face. Vanner stared at her; her pain a physical thing that ate up the air around them. She shook her head and then sat heavily in the chair by the fireplace.
‘What d’you mean?’
‘Her name isn’t Hamilton. It’s Kennett.’
Vanner felt as though someone had stabbed him. He had expected something, but not that. ‘Your daughter?’
She nodded. ‘Hamilton was her father’s name.’
He sat down slowly on the settee, feeling the taut energy that had coiled for so much of the afternoon, thin and drain from him in a moment. ‘You better tell me,’ he said.
She did not say anything, just kept staring and staring at the picture.
‘Tell me, Sarah. For heaven’s sake just tell me.’
For a moment longer she considered the photograph. Her tears had stemmed and she sat further forward in her seat.
‘We were lovers,’ she said. ‘We never married.’
‘Hamilton.’
She nodded. ‘We had Meggie.’ Again her eyes wrinkled and for a moment she sucked in breath. ‘She was so beautiful. The most beautiful child. When she was born I was so happy—I …’
‘Was she planned—you and this man?’ Vanner heard himself ask the question and at the same time wondered why it mattered.
‘Not exactly.’ Sarah had control of herself again. She laid the photo down and fetched herself a tumbler. Vanner poured a whisky for her and she stood in front of the unmade fire and sipped at it.
‘What happened?’ he asked her.
She stared out of the window, eyes glazed, the glass lopsided in her grasp. ‘Meggie was just three. We’d had a party for her two weeks before.’
‘You lived with Hamilton?’
‘Yes. We rented a flat.’ She bit her lip. ‘It was on a Saturday, early evening, December. We were in Otterburn, visiting friends.’
Vanner recalled the town from his days in Lothian. He had driven the A68 to Newcastle on more than one occasion, a border town thirty miles or so north of the A1.
Sarah walked with her arm through John’s, as evening gathered and the road glinted with the first flaking of ice. He pushed Meggie in the buggy and they talked. She was listening to the sound of his voice, the warmth she could hear in it. It took the edge from the chill that descended with the coming of evening.
Smoke curled from the chimneys of the houses that bordered the road, only to hang as if weighted above the rooftops. Meggie chattered away to herself in the buggy and Sarah thought how complete her life seemed today.
The town was deserted. Over the road, the landlord of the pub was preparing to open for business. Somehow Sarah did not expect he would have much custom. They paused to glance in the window of the antique shop that butted the bend in the road. John was admiring a set of oak dining chairs and Sarah huddled against his arm, imagining a little cottage in a glen with wood piled outside and smoke lifting. In her mind’s eye she could picture Meggie playing quietly before the fire, and perhaps a brother or even a little sister. In the distance a car was approaching.
John seemed to echo her mood, for he slipped his arm about her shoulders and nodded to a black Victorian fireplace in the corner. Both of them stared in the window; both of them imagining.
The car drew nearer; the engine labouring as if somebody was forcing it through the gears with a vengeance. In the buggy Meggie unclipped the strap that secured her.
No one else was on the street, the winter twilight banishing people to their firesides and the early evening television. Sarah hugged John and he delighted in her warmth, the uncluttered nature of her affection. Meggie wriggled out of her strap and settled tiny feet onto the pavement. The sound of the car grew louder.
‘We could get the fireplace,’ John was saying.
‘We haven’t got the house yet.’
‘Does it matter?’
Sarah laughed then, and he bent and kissed her hair. Behind them, unseen, Meggie tottered along the kerb-side.
‘We should get a cottage—out here somewhere,’ Sarah said.
‘Or north if I go on the rigs.’
‘In a glen.’
‘Aye, lassie. A glen.’
The car slewed round the corner.
Meggie stepped into the road.
Sarah turned as the sudden noise shattered the intimacy of the moment.
The car ploughed into Meggie.
She did not cry out, just the screaming of brakes and her body somersaulting into the air like a rag doll tossed by a child.
Sarah stared, mouth open, a scream rising and rising until the sound split her ears. Meggie’s fragile body, tumbling through space with the hood of her jacket billowing about her head like a parachute. For a moment she seemed to be floating, arms flailing in silence. And then she fell to the ground with a sharp, sudden crack.
Vanner saw the horror, sharp against her eyes like unrelieved pressure which had built and built until there was no more room for it. Her hands still clutched the glass, knuckles the colour of bone. He saw it all in her eyes as she relived it over again.
‘She didn’t move,’ she whispered. No tears now, her face frozen. ‘He didn’t stop. The driver. Just carried on. It all happened so quickly we didn’t even get his number. One moment she was there in the buggy, the next she was lying in the road with her body all thrown out in the wrong places. She was dead when we got to her. Her eyes were open but she was dead. As I held her she got colder and colder.’
Vanner looked helplessly at her. ‘Why have you never told me?’
She seemed to sneer at him then. ‘You just wanted to fuck me, Aden. Remember?’
Vanner stared at the floor, biting down on his lip.
‘I never told anybody,’ she said more quietly.
‘It’s not in your file?’
‘Of course it’s not. I hid it. It wasn’t hard. She had John’s name. The flat we shared was his. As far as the job is concerned I never had a daughter.’
‘Why though?’
‘Oh come on, Aden. You think they’d have let me in?’
He nodded, and then a thought occurred to him. ‘Robert Black?’
‘What about him?’
‘Newcastle.’ He stared at her. ‘Did you …?’
‘Of course not.’ She finished her drink, poured another and took a cigarette from his pack.
Vanner half-closed his eyes. ‘JH,’ he said, then shook his head as if not believing himself. ‘Sarah, your ex-boyfriend’s the Watchman.’
She sucked smoke audibly into her lungs.
Vanner tried to be gentle. ‘It must’ve occurred to you …’ Then he thought about it, mind unclogging itself. ‘Jesus, Sarah. You�
��ve been feeding him information. You must’ve known all along.’
‘NO!’ Sarah’s eyes blazed. ‘I haven’t known all along. I haven’t fed him information. I just haven’t mentioned him, that’s all.’
He stared coldly at her.
‘Oh, Aden.’ She sat down. ‘It’s not the kind of thing you want to think about. Once upon a time I loved him. We had a child together.’
‘But Sarah, you must’ve …’
‘We split up,’ she said. ‘After Meggie was killed we broke up. He couldn’t handle it.’
‘Have you seen him since?’
She did not reply. Vanner watched her, watched her face. ‘Sarah?’
Still she looked away.
‘Have you seen him? Come on, Sarah, you’re a policewoman for Christ’s sake. Do you realise how this looks?’
‘I don’t care how it looks.’ She looked evenly at him now, her grief seemingly gone. ‘Of course I’ve suspected. Half of me hoped it was him.’ She shook her head bitterly. ‘He didn’t stop, Aden. The bastard just drove away.’
Vanner walked to the window. ‘I want to know if you’ve seen him,’ he said. ‘They’re trying to hang me for this, Sarah. You have to tell me if you’ve seen him?’
She was quiet for a moment, then: ‘Yes, I’ve seen him.’
‘Where?’ He stepped towards her.
She looked away again, placing her glass on the coffee table.
‘Sarah.’ He caught hold of her hands. ‘Where have you seen him?’
And then it dawned on him. Roughly he pulled her round so that her face was lifted to his. ‘Who’s your tenant, Sarah? Tell me, who is your tenant?’
Morrison studied the rifling pattern on the two bullets. He held the pictures, huge blow-ups, right against the light and pinched up his eyes to look at them.
‘See?’ Jones indicated the markings with his pen. ‘The same.’
Morrison frowned. ‘It was a long shot, just an idea, I never expected.’
Jones smiled. ‘Hunches. Who says they’re not part of modern policing?’
Morrison was not listening to him. He was still staring at the images, scrutinising every line, every mark. ‘You found this very quickly in the end,’ he stated at last.