by Patrick Gale
Mo stopped outside the fifth door, pressed a button and spoke into a grille in the wall when a green light shone.
‘Barry? Yeah, I’m going into number five now. If I’m not out in ten minutes, come and find me, there’s a love.’ She unlocked the door and went in.
He lay on the bed staring up at the low ceiling. They’d given him a shave in Medical, on the scalp as well as the face, so they could put in the stitches. As Mo sat down in the chair, he turned his head and stared at her.
‘Hello,’ she said, ‘I’m Detective Inspector Faithe. How’s the head?’
‘How can I tell when there isn’t a mirror?’
The voice was educated, as she’d expected. It was also dead and tired.
‘How does it feel?’
‘How would you expect?’
‘Point taken. I’m feeling rotten too, so I won’t keep you long. Just a few questions. What can you tell me about Marina Stazinopolos, Papas Mercouri, Katya Garcia, Seamus O’Leary and Millicent Du Cann?’
He swung himself around into a sitting position and stared back at her.
‘Apart from the fact that they’re all Catholic, they’re a bunch of fakes. Rather, they are; Du Cann was – being dead.’
‘How d’you mean “fakes”?’
‘They make a fortune telling fortunes and telling fortunes is one of the oldest con-tricks in the history of mankind.’
‘You don’t believe in it?’
‘Correct.’
‘Sensible fella. Then why did you break into each of these persons’ flats and steal or destroy items connected with their work?’
‘Not because I believed.’
‘So you admit you committed each burglary?’
‘It would be a lie to deny it.’
‘You’d be prepared to admit to each charge of burglary in court?’
‘Of course.’
‘What do you know about the warehouses in Sandridge Road, Finchley?’
‘I committed an act of arson in one a couple of nights ago, as I recall, which resulted in an accidental death.’
‘Why haven’t you asked for a lawyer yet?’
‘Because my case is plainly indefensible.’
‘Did you break into each property because you had some kind of a grudge against these people? Did you disapprove of them as “fakes”?’
‘I disapproved of them, but my actions bore no taint of personal malice or moral judgement.’ He winced minutely and passed a hand across the stripe of shaven, tapestried scalp.
‘Can you take this, or shall I came back later?’
‘No. Just a twinge. I won’t bore you with details of my work. Suffice it to say that I am, I was, an academic in a field situated somewhere between theology and history. In the course of researching my next book – research that started, let me see, some five or six months ago – I made an alarming discovery. Doubtless this’ll seem unlikely to you. It did to me at the time …’ He stopped suddenly.
‘Go on.’
‘There’s no point in my telling you all this. I’ve admitted guilt. Further details would be irrelevant.’
‘Detection’s over now. This is on private time. You’ve got me interested.’
‘That wasn’t detection, it was a bloody catechism.’
‘You what?’
‘Never mind.’ He smiled for a second and sighed. As he continued, tears began to brim in his eyes and run down his cheeks. He didn’t seem to notice. Mo had seen many a grown man cry in this room. It seemed to be a result of relaxing. ‘I was following up some ideas a colleague of mine had had concerning the powers of mass-hypnosis.’
‘Yeah. I saw the book on your desk.’
‘You’ve been to my house already?’
‘Yes.’
‘How amusing.’
‘Went there on Thursday morning.’
‘You saw my notes?’
‘Yeah.’ She opened her notebook and found the word. ‘What does “psychosomatic” mean, then?’
‘Induced by the power of mind. I was delving into the history of the apocalypse concept, and various men’s views of how the world would end. Then I got side-tracked, at least, it seemed like a side-track at the time, into the realms of prediction by astrology, the Tarot and so forth. It had struck me that, given the idea that something must happen, and given the will – possibly subconscious – for it to take place, the human mind could order its own destiny to a remarkable extent. My colleague had already applied this theory to political genius and the way in which a will to dominate can rise so effortlessly to domination.’
‘Yeah?’
‘I simply applied this concept on a racial scale to prophecy, and deduced that, theoretically, the human race could will itself to an end simply by a preoccupation with the Apocalypse, with a sense of ending. The horror started when I visited a cross-section of the “profession” or read their books. By a disgusting coincidence, patterns of upheaval, an immense change, such as could be taken to refer to the end of the world were lined up right the way across the board as it were. The palmists don’t have much to do with the Jehovah’s Witnesses, who in turn don’t have much traffic with the Tarot readers or the astrologers, but in visiting such people and in doing some supportive “prediction” of my own by their techniques, I saw …’ He broke off, startled by the realization that he was weeping. ‘Oh dear,’ he said, in the same dead voice that he had used all along, and wiped his face and eyes with a handkerchief. When he looked up from doing this his face was quite calm.
Mo’s first impulse was to laugh. There had been such a promising build-up, starting with the discovery of that fat Greek baggage strapped to her chair, that the final motive rang out stupidly in the blankness of the cell. There was something in his dignity that killed the impulse however, and she found herself gazing back in sincere, nervous curiosity, and asking,
‘When’s it going to happen, then?’
‘Tonight. In a few hours. Now I am very tired. Do you think I might …?’ He lay back on the bed and returned to his staring at the ceiling. There was a knock at the door.
‘Boss?’
‘It’s OK, Barry. Nearly through, thanks.’ She slid a hand into her pocket and felt Hope’s letter. ‘That’s why you don’t care, isn’t it?’ she went on. She thought of the huge house in that row of huge houses in NW3, and of the dolly-bird’s photo. He stared at the ceiling.
‘That’s right,’ he said.
Mo stood and walked over to the bed. When he snatched her hand she didn’t flinch. He was helpless. She could break his arm if he tried anything. He snatched her hand and pulled her palm against his cheek. His face was twisted with sobs. His stringy body shook. The hand that wasn’t holding hers clenched and writhed at his side. She sat on the bench beside him, watching his tortured features, letting him press her hand. His face was all bone. He was racked with one last spasm. A faint, wet sighing issued from the back of his throat. The silent wail past, she laid a hand, gentle, on his shoulder.
‘Here,’ she asked, ‘is there anything you want?’
He controlled himself with a deep intake of breath. ‘Can I trust you?’ he managed.
‘I’m all you’ve got. They don’t listen in.’
‘There were several things of mine in my coat and trouser pockets. When I arrived here, that girl with the dreadful hair locked them up somewhere just outside the door. I was pretending to be asleep; I heard everything.’
‘Well?’ asked Mo, with a ghost of a smile.
‘There’s a letter from my wife with some pills in it. Could you bring it to me?’
Mo stared for a while at the empty man who stared at the ceiling, and breathed, ‘Yeah. You’ve earned it.’
She drew her hand from his grasp, and stood. She let herself into the corridor. She glanced along its length. No-one to be seen. She unlocked the small cupboard set into the wall beside the cell door. It said ‘FIVE’ on it. The coat dangled from a hook and the contents of its pockets were set out on a shelf. Mo made
a quick mental note of what was there, then snatched the envelope and locked the door. He didn’t move as she set them on the bed beside his head, but he thanked her and said that he didn’t feel like any supper.
‘That’s all right, my lovely. ‘Course you don’t. We won’t disturb you till the morning.’ She left quietly and locked him in. Outside she pressed the button and spoke into the grille.
‘Barry? Mo. I’ve finished in there now. While I remember, he’s feeling pretty terrible and he doesn’t want anything else tonight so you can tell Bella to leave him off her tea list, OK?’
She walked back to the office, sat at her desk, and quickly typed out a list of the personal belongings, save the letter and pills. Then she took it next door. McEnery was sipping a cup of tea.
‘Tea. Yes, please.’
‘OK, Boss,’ said McEnery.
‘Bad girl, by the way.’
‘What have I done now?’
‘Forgot to make a check-list didn’t we?’ She waved the piece of paper. ‘Most unlike you.’
‘Oh Christ! I’m sorry.’
‘That’s all right. Lucky I thought to check. I’ve done one here, but file it away will you, and put a copy of it back inside his locker when you’ve a second?’
THURSDAY two
On what appeared to be the first day of a heatwave, the vestry was mercifully cool. Seth’s suit jacket hung from the back of his chair; he had no intention of putting it on until the last possible moment. He suffered from the heat, and knew that, once surrounded by over-dressed, sun-shocked bodies, he would melt. His violin lay on a chair beside him, tuned to perfection. Twice over. He sat forward, his elbows resting on his knees to keep his armpits exposed to the remaining minutes of cool air. His nose and cheeks prickled, for he had fallen asleep in a deckchair that afternoon. The day had passed by at a rush, but now, as he sat listening to Jemima’s performance, all was still. To the other side of the door a churchful of impassive bodies and serene, motorway faces stared at her: soon they would be staring at him. He stirred himself to check once more that his fly was secure and his nostrils void.
As they prepared to go their separate ways in the churchyard, Mother to talk to friends, he to tune up, she had thrust a small packet into his palm, with a ‘Happy Sixteenth in advance, because you’re a brave boy,’ and then left him to his nerves. A watch. Oddly enough, his first. Restrained, with no innovations beyond a window where the date appeared, the present circled his wrist.
The last movement of the Beethoven sonata (Jemima’s adaptation) came to an end and the vestry caught the applause. Seth stood at once. He had momentarily lost concentration. He whipped on his jacket, lifted instrument and bow, then stood a few feet from the nail-studded door. He was poised and calm now, but for safety’s sake, as the old latch lifted and the oak mass started to swing towards him, he muttered between his teeth.
‘Yes please, God. But not for me.’
Venetia had helped Harry with his day’s chores at the farmhouse, and drunk hibiscus tea with him in his room. Then the two of them had escaped the communal meal – an early one on account of the recital – driving over to Saint Jacobs. Seeing that the Volvo was still parked outside La Corveaurie, she had made him turn into a field by the crossroads and there they had waited, plunged in helpless giggles by their conspiracy, as mother and son drove past them to Trenellion a few minutes later. During the short wait, she had praised his lecture in detail and he had reiterated an invitation to his motherland; both were now effervescent as a consequence.
‘Now,’ she declared as they walked into the deserted house, ‘if we’re going to have a real Soirée des Prolétariats we have to start it by getting in the mood. So, off with crappy Radio Three and on with something boppy.’ She twiddled knobs on the stereo system and found her way through the haze of interference to a disco goddess singing, with panache and scant evidence of regret, of her failure in love. Smiling, and feeling younger in the company of this heady blossom, Barnes lounged on the sofa.
‘Wooh!’ went the blossom, tapping her feet, ‘and now,’ she smacked her slender hands together, ‘we’ve got to have a beer and a packet of crisps!’ She skipped to the kitchen, where she clicked the radio on as well, and sang along to the song as she fished some crisps out from behind the bread bin and found some beer in the fridge.
‘If only I’d realized that this was our last time, I’d have hugged you ‘n’ kissed you until you was all mine,’ sang the Goddess. Venetia joined Harry at the sofa where he was dipping into a catalogue of a recent exhibition of Victorian pornography at the Hay ward.
‘Uh-uh,’ she said, snatching the publication away and tossing it to the floor, ‘books is streng verboten. All you can have is beer from the can, my gorgeous body and,’ she scrutinized the packets, ‘Prawn Cocktail or Bar-B-Q flavour crisps.’ Harry moaned delightedly and raised his can.
‘To next summer,’ he toasted.
‘Up yours ‘n’ all,’ she replied, and they drank.
She took a handful of crisps and stuffed them into his mouth.
‘Aren’t they filthy?’ she cried, ‘Mummy made such a fuss about being seen with the things in the supermarket queue – macrobiotics and indestructible bags and all that – so I pacified her by saying that I was trying to give our visitor a genuine cultural experience.’ He giggled and puffed crumbs on to the sofa. Venetia fell back and wailed. At last he recovered and asked, with a faint note of sarcasm in his honey and sun-cream voice,
‘Say, won’t your kid brother be a bit sore at you missing his concert? I’d have thought it’s a bit special to be playing in the first one of the festival.’
‘Yes, I suppose it is. I guess so,’ she mocked his accent because he liked it, ‘but Seth prefers it if I don’t go to his recitals. He says that it’s too painful knowing how bored I am. Besides, he’s playing something I’ve heard before. If he ever gets “sore”, I could get “sore” back at him for not reading my essays and for only coming to plays that feature good-looking sensitive types. Oh God! It’s this. I love this song! Dooboo ba da da Dee doobee doo bawa,’ she sang along, clicking her fingers for a while, then took some more beer. ‘It’s really great. I think it’s meant to be based on some old Zulu chant about freedom, or something. No … while I remember. You reminded me.’
‘You are excited, aren’t you?’
‘Of course. I’m spending a night on the town all alone with a famous novelist. It’s about Seth. You were quite right.’
‘Really?’
‘Well, I think so. At least, he was picked up well after midnight last night by that rather dishy hunk who’s been making angels for the church.’
‘No! Not the blond with the broad back and the biteable chin?’
‘Don’t tell me you fancy that prick?’
‘Well, no. I was admiring him as a purely aesthetic object.’
‘Have some more crisps.’
‘Thanks.’
She rocked to and fro with her legs up on the sofa and felt the conversation lapse. The euphoria threatened to burn out too soon. She stared at the smiling face on the cover of Tatler and complained,
‘God! I could really do with some coke right now.’
‘Surely you’re forgetting that we’re honorary members of the Prole Front for the evening. I don’t think Happy Dust is quite their scene.’
‘True. Very true.’ Her concentration had faltered quite. He smiled and opened the breast pocket of his shirt.
‘But,’ he said, smiling as her interest rekindled, ‘but I do have these,’ he said, passing one over, ‘and these I think they could afford.’
‘Grass?’ she laughed with disbelief in her eyes.
‘Home-grown, hand-rolled, and very Prole.’
‘Wooh! Tacky, man. Got a light, babe? Thanks. Oh, this is so Seventies!’ And she was happy again. She took a few drags, glad that he didn’t notice her failure to inhale, then jumped into action.
‘My God, we can’t sit around here getting mellow, we
’ve got a night to organize. Now where’s the local paper? A film, then a fish’n’chiperama, then a bop.’ She found the paper and squatted on the floor, scanning the entertainments column. In seconds she was shrieking with pleasure.
‘Yes! Emmanuelle and the Sisters of No Mercy, followed by Sex in a Women’s Penal Colony.’
‘Wonderful.’
‘OK? Won’t make you park a custard or anything?’
‘I managed the crisps, I can manage anything.’
‘Great. Then we can go to the Happy Dolphin. Actually the fish is really good and fresh there. Then I thought the Tintagel Palais. It’s full of fags on Thursdays.’
‘How do you know?’
‘I spent a happy afternoon with Josh once, flipping through a dreadful gay guide he’d found.’
‘Which is he?’
‘Just another of your rivals for my affection. Now look, we’ve got to get our skates on or we’ll miss the local adverts and they’re the best bit. I would suggest taking the bus a) so you could drink and b) so as to savour the true mindless tart experience of catching the last one home, but I think we’re too late. You’ll just have to drive really fast to make up for the want of authenticity.’ So saying, the Virgin and her Fairy set off for a good night out.
After the final chord, Seth froze for a moment, then dropped his arms to his sides and was engulfed in clapping. His mouth twitched involuntarily into a smile and he gave a little bow. There was a cheer from the back of the church where some late-comers had been forced to stand. He turned to Grigor to bow again with him, but his accompanist had moved obstinately behind the piano, and stood smiling. As Seth tried to wave him over, he merely smiled more broadly and began to join in the clapping. Defeated, Seth gave one more shallow bow, and started for the vestry. Then he remembered his music and stumbled back to pick it up and tuck it beneath his arm. There was a friendly burst of laughter amid the applause. As he closed the vestry door and leant against the chill stone of the wall to recover, he heard the rumble of displaced seats and a burst of pent up conversation. Mother and Jemima would be round soon. Still slightly dazed, he strapped his violin into its case and stood gazing across the churchyard as he loosened his bow.