Mainlander

by Will Smith

  Debbie wilted. ‘Oh, God, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to be any trouble. I can speak to her, if you like, and explain—’

  ‘Not sure she’d want to speak to you right now. I know I don’t.’ And, having vented his frustration with Emma at the woman he resented for superseding her in his affections, he strode off.

  He had little recollection of the walk home as he became lost in an ebb and flow of fury, numbness, outrage and indifference. As he mounted the stairs to his flat he was jolted from his thoughts by the sight of Barney Vautier, the detective he’d spoken to at the station two days before, and a younger man, with dark shiny hair and a beaky nose, chatting to Mrs Le Boutillier.

  ‘Here he comes now, Officers,’ she said.

  Vautier walked down the stairs to meet Colin halfway with a proffered hand, an easy smile, and a day’s worth of stubble to add to his moustache. ‘Mr Bygate.’

  ‘You’ve made me look a pretty fool now. I told these officers you’d be at work,’ said Mrs Le Boutillier, wearily.

  ‘I was. Why are you here?’

  ‘We heard you might be leaving work early, sir.’

  ‘What is this? East Germany?’

  ‘Look, we obviously got off on the wrong foot last time. I apologise. I was unprofessional and dismissive. I’d like to make that right.’

  Colin shook his hand. ‘I just want this followed through.’

  ‘We all do. Your headline set off some tremors. Our orders have been written on stone tablets and hurled down from the top of the mountain – find the boy.’

  ‘Is that the boy we were talking about? Is he the one in the paper?’ asked Mrs Le Boutillier, already attempting to descend the steps for a better notion of what was going on.

  ‘Why don’t we discuss this somewhere more private?’ said Vautier to Colin, turning to gesture to his colleague, who immediately began the slow task of leading Mrs le Boutillier back to her flat.

  ‘What’s Mr Bygate got to do with it? He’s such a nice young man. How old are you? I don’t see a wedding ring. I bet all the ladies find you so dashing, being a detective …’ She was returned to her abode with her queries unanswered.

  As they descended to the street they could hear her moving about, drawing curtains and blinds, and when they made it outside she had opened a window and was beckoning to Colin. ‘Sorry, Mr Bygate, I forgot to ask, have you seen Marmalade?’

  ‘I’m afraid I haven’t, but I’m sure he’s fine. Cat,’ he said, turning to the officers.

  It was a short walk to the station. The other man, introduced as Detective Fauvant, proved taciturn, and Vautier seemed keen to focus on small-talk as they ambled along in the brisk sunshine.

  Vautier led them into a dingy café just as the station came into view. ‘You might want to grab a coffee here, Mr Bygate. Not to put too fine a point on it, but the coffee served by the Island’s constabulary is bat’s piss. That’s no lie, is it, Gerry?’

  ‘Not tasted bat’s piss myself, Barney. Can’t comment.’

  Vautier turned to the short round man behind the counter. ‘Two coffees, Mario, one black no sugar, one white three sugars.’

  ‘I know the bloody milk and the bloody sugars, boss, you coming in here every day,’ snapped Mario, in semi-serious rage.

  ‘Easy. I know what your memory’s like. Look around, you forget to clean this place. Might have to shut you down. What can I get you, Mr Bygate?’

  ‘Nothing. I’m fine, thanks,’ said Colin, curtly, frustrated at the delay.

  ‘You all right? You seem a bit on edge.’

  ‘No, it’s just I’m keen to get things moving.’

  ‘Oh, sure, sure, we will. But they’ll move a hell of a lot quicker when I’ve got my caffeine to wake me up. I had a long night. Setting up this investigation. Pretty much five minutes after the Island News came out the Bailiff himself rang my super and called him all kinds of things. Five minutes after that I was in the super’s office, getting what I can only describe as a right bollocking. Apparently it could be heard two floors down.’

  ‘I heard every word, Barney,’ added Gerry, ‘and I was in the car park.’

  ‘I think they were both so touchy, being old Normans. Don’t like to see their hallowed school getting any bad press.’

  ‘I’m sorry if I caused you any trouble, internally,’ offered Colin, uneasy at the tone of the conversation, which had taken on an edge that was noticeably harder yet still deniable.

  ‘Oh, I’m not having a go at you, sir. I just want you to be aware of how seriously we’re taking this now. Five minutes after that I was out of the super’s office, and I’ve been playing catch-up ever since. Hence my need for coffee and, come to think of it, breakfast. Mario, slap on a bacon sarnie for me, would you? Gerry?’

  ‘I’m good, Barney, had me some Weetabix.’

  ‘Mr Bygate?’

  ‘I’ve had breakfast. Look, shall we go over what we know—’

  ‘Best we follow protocol and do it at the station. We’ve got pens and tape recorders and everything there. We shouldn’t really discuss it here, in a public place.’

  ‘Okay, I get it. You didn’t like me going to the paper. I’m sorry, but it has at least got everyone looking for Duncan.’

  ‘Ooh, you shouldn’t have said his name, Mr Bygate. Naming a minor at the centre of an investigation, that breaks all sorts of rules. Still, I’ll let you off with a caution, if you agree to refrain from talking about the case until I indicate that you should do so.’

  Colin was pretty sure that he hadn’t broken any laws, and that it was just Vautier throwing his bulk around, but he grasped the underlying message the detective was conveying: we’re doing this my way, not yours.

  While Vautier waited for his bacon sandwich, Colin looked over the posters for departed summer-season shows, whose age was given away as much by the grease of the Blu-tack showing through as by the out-of-date itineraries. The three of them then headed for the station in silence, broken only by Vautier cursing at the butter that had dripped on to his tie. Colin hoped that by now he had had his fun and that they could go forward on a more even footing. This seemed to be the case: they treated him with formality and courtesy at the station, and ushered him into an interview room where they insisted they would take his statement and begin the search for Duncan in earnest.

  They left him there for an hour.

  When they finally unlocked the door and entered the windowless room, his anger had subsided and he had accepted that he had no choice but to play by their rules. They had broken him.

  ‘Sorry about the delay, Mr Bygate. Some information came in that we had to factor in ASAP. Has anyone asked if you want a tea or coffee?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Can I get you one?’

  ‘No, thanks.’

  ‘I know I slagged off the coffee, but the tea’s not bad. I mean, how can you mess up tea? Bag, hot water, milk, done.’

  ‘Tell that to my mother-in-law,’ added Gerry. His statement had the form of a joke, but his face betrayed no sign of humour.

  Colin shifted in his seat, their obfuscating schtick pushing his irritation back up to previous levels. ‘Do you need the loo there, Mr Bygate?’

  ‘No. I’d just like to get on.’

  ‘Really? Is that ’cause you have somewhere to be?’

  ‘He doesn’t have to be at work, Barney. He’s been sacked.’

  ‘Suspended,’ corrected Colin.

  ‘You should have remembered that, Gerry. We just spoke to Mr Le Brocq and he clarified the situation,’ said Vautier, closing the door and sitting opposite Colin. Gerry joined him and they laid out various folders, notebooks and a tape recorder.

  Colin clenched his jaw, determined not to ask if they’d dragged him in here knowing they were going to leave him to sweat for the last hour.

  ‘You look worried, Mr Bygate.’

  ‘I’m not worried, just tired.’

  ‘We wanted to get you in here to sort out the timeline of events. We�
�ve spoken to other concerned parties, such as Mr Le Brocq just now, and Duncan Labey’s parents last night, so we have a pretty good idea of the movements of the key players. We’d just like to see how you fit into that.’

  Colin nodded, not wanting to say another word. Vautier pressed PLAY and RECORD. ‘Thursday, the fifteenth of October 1987, preliminary interview with Colin Bygate. Present are myself, Detective Barney Vautier, and Detective Gerry Fauvant. Interview begins eleven ten a.m.’ Vautier sat back. ‘Just a bit of background first, if you don’t mind. You’ve been in the Island how long?’

  ‘Three years.’

  ‘And before that you were teaching where?’

  ‘Nowhere. I was training to be a teacher. Normandy College is my first job.’

  ‘And what is your relationship with Duncan Labey?’

  ‘He is a pupil in my A-level English class.’

  ‘Do you see much of him out of class?’

  ‘Not at all. I mean, I see him around the school, might stop for a chat, but no contact at all outside school.’

  ‘And you noticed he was missing when?’

  ‘He’s been absent from school since last Friday. I mean, I told you all this on Tuesday, and I’m sure Le Brocq has told it again to you just now. When you had me in here waiting as part of your mind games.’

  ‘Mind games. You think that’s what this is?’

  ‘Totally. You’re giving me the runaround because I made you look bad in front of your superiors.’

  ‘I’m not sure we’re the ones in this room playing mind games. You see, when you first came to see me, yes, you told me that Duncan Labey had last attended school on the Thursday, absent since the Friday. But when we spoke to Mr Le Brocq just now, he told us that you had told him that you’d seen Duncan Labey out at Grosnez on the Thursday night. Yet you never mentioned this to me.’

  Gerry took the invisible conversational baton. ‘Didn’t mention it now when we asked if you had any contact with him outside class.’

  ‘I don’t have any regular contact.’

  ‘You said “no contact at all outside school”. I can rewind the tape if you like.’

  ‘You were asking me general background questions. Obviously I was going to mention it when we came to the specifics of his disappearance.’

  ‘And why didn’t you mention it to me when we first spoke?’

  ‘As you’ve acknowledged, you were pretty dismissive. There wasn’t time to go into details, and I didn’t want to overcomplicate things—’

  ‘You think it would overcomplicate things to let us know you were the last person to see the boy alive?’

  ‘No, that would be his parents on the Thursday evening. I dropped him home.’

  ‘Yes, so we gather. Again, not from you. Thing is, his parents were already away that night. So that really does make you the last person to see him alive. Unless someone’s had some contact with him since.’

  Colin felt faint. ‘He dropped a letter at my flat on Friday.’

  ‘You know, you’re the third person to tell us that. After your neighbour Mrs Le Boutillier and your headmaster Mr Le Brocq. I’d have thought you’d want to be the first person to tell us. Why did you hide the fact of the letter from us?’

  ‘He been to your flat before?’ Gerry took another cue.

  ‘No. Look, can we accept I made a mistake in not being up front from the beginning, and talk about what I’ve found out since then?’

  ‘Still got the letter?’

  ‘It’s at home.’

  ‘And what does it say?’

  ‘That he wouldn’t come back to school, that the boy needed to step outside the bubble—’

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s from a Paul Simon song. We listened to it on the way to his house. He wanted me to meet him back at Grosnez on Friday evening, but I read the letter too late. My wife forgot to give it to me.’

  ‘And why do you think he wanted to meet you?’

  ‘He said he wanted to tell me something.’

  ‘Why you?’

  ‘I like to think it’s because he trusts me.’

  ‘You don’t think he blames you?’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘Hard to say without reading it. Guess we’ll have to take your word for it.’

  ‘You can read it. I can go and get it, or you can send someone.’

  ‘And how will we know for sure that he wrote it?’

  ‘Who else would it be from?’

  ‘Maybe somebody wrote it so it would look like they were trying to help.’

  ‘You think I forged the letter?’

  ‘Did you?’

  ‘No. Why do you think I would do something like that? It makes no sense.’

  ‘If people only did things that made sense, then I’d be out of a job.’ Vautier leant back in his chair and put his hands behind his head. ‘You too probably, Mr Bygate. You teach books, plays, that sort of thing, correct?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And if people only did what was expected, well, you’d have some pretty dull stories. Everyone would be exactly as you find them.’

  Colin found himself digging his toes into the soles of his shoes.

  ‘Indulge me if you don’t mind, Mr Bygate. Say you had a villain in a drama, someone who’d done something really quite bad, he might try to cover that up by looking like a good person. Gerry, you’re a cultured man – well, his wife drags him to all the local am-dram plays – you know what I’m on about.’

  ‘Yeah, saw an outdoor Shakespeare with something like that.’

  ‘You see, Mr Bygate, we even have Shakespeare on our little arland.’ Vautier gave ‘island’ the local pronunciation with a leer. ‘Outdoors as well, just like they do in some of the parks in your big old London. What was the play, Gerry?’

  ‘I don’t recall, Barney. I was dozing on the mulled wine. Had a chappie blacked up.’

  Colin couldn’t help himself. ‘That’s Othello. He’s a Moor. An Arab. But the character you’re referring to is Iago.’

  ‘Why, thank you for that, Mr Bygate. And he would be a villain, would he?’

  ‘The audience see him as a villain, but Othello is oblivious.’

  ‘What a devious bugger. Well, I can tell you it’s not just in plays. Oh, no. Plenty of times we find a wrong ’un hiding in plain sight. Go to a house fire, most likely the arsonist will be there offering to start a bucket chain. And are you aware that most killers are known to their victims? They’re the ones who sob the loudest. At least, that’s what my colleagues on the mainland tell me. We average one murder a decade here. Which brings me to you. You’ve been making a song and dance about this Labey boy from day one. What are you hiding?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Nothing? Aside from the fact you met him on a cliff, dropped him home and then he delivered a letter to your flat. Doesn’t strike me as nothing.’

  ‘I didn’t meet him on a cliff. I bumped into him. You’re making it sound prearranged.’

  ‘What were you doing on the cliff?’

  ‘Looking at the view. Thinking.’

  ‘We understand that your wife has moved out,’ said Gerry, blankly.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘May I ask why?’

  ‘You can ask, but it’s a private matter.’

  Vautier brought his fist down on the tape recorder, which stopped with an echoing click. ‘There are no fucking private matters, you stupid piss-slick.’ Vautier leant forward, his eyes narrowing.

  ‘It concerns a relationship. That’s all I’m saying.’

  ‘With a pupil?’

  ‘No. Turn that tape recorder on again, please. I’m not comfortable with this.’

  ‘Two things I hate – queers and liars. I think you’re both.’

  ‘I am neither.’

  ‘I think you fell in love with Duncan Labey and he wouldn’t suck your cock so you pushed him off that cliff.’

  Colin choked down a scream of denial, and forced it into a hoarse and emphatic ‘
I told you, I drove him home,’ discarding all attempts to conceal his contempt for the man who was taunting him so viciously.

  ‘We don’t know that. His parents were away that night.’

  ‘I’m telling you the truth.’

  ‘Maybe I’ll send some divers down to see if you are.’

  ‘Oh, Jesus, this is ridiculous. He’s not down there, and if he was the currents would take him somewhere else.’

  ‘You an expert on bodies and currents?’

  ‘I’m not saying anything else.’

  ‘You want a lawyer?’

  ‘No, because I’ve done nothing wrong. Why the hell are you treating me like this? You should be speaking to Aidan Blampied.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because he allegedly caught Duncan with cannabis, which is what sent Duncan off the rails. And Mickey Rouain.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘I’ve been told he sold Duncan the drugs. He’s some kind of local dealer.’

  Vautier turned to Gerry. ‘You heard of a Mickey Rouain?’

  ‘Could be Alain Rouain’s boy, Michael.’

  ‘Oh, yes. Well, he’s no choirboy, but he’s no dealer either.’

  ‘I’ve heard differently,’ insisted Colin.

  ‘These are very serious allegations you’re throwing about, Mr Bygate.’

  ‘So are the ones you’re throwing at me.’

  ‘Mickey Rouain picks up the odd parking ticket. Aidan Blampied I’ve no time for, he’s a preening pillock, but Mr Le Brocq tells us he’s behaved with the utmost discretion and professionalism. Unlike yourself.’

  ‘Is Le Brocq still here? Get him in this room and let’s have it out.’

  ‘We spoke to him on the phone.’

  ‘So you haven’t interviewed him officially? This is ridiculous.’

  ‘I told you, my super and the Bailiff are Old Boys. You think I’m going to drag their headmaster in here in public? Imagine the grief I’d get!’

  ‘Well, what about Duncan’s parents? What did they say about Blampied? About what happened between the two of them? Because something did, and you should get them both in a room and find out what.’

  ‘The Labeys want their son back. What they don’t want is private matters being splashed across the front of the Island News.’