The Eddie Malloy Series

by Joe McNally

  A door led to a large wide hallway, well carpeted and ornately furnished. The walls held paintings, mostly of racehorses in the style of seventeenth and eighteenth-century painters; animals with small narrow heads and stretched bodies on stick-like legs.

  Halfway along the hall was a staircase of around thirty steps, fairly steep, the carpet bordered on each side by polished wood. I began climbing, listening…no more cries. Squeaks. Every stair squeaked. My leg hurt. I was bleeding on the carpet. After ten steps, my wounded left thigh would no longer push my body up. I resorted to one step at a time.

  It took me a while to reach the top floor. I checked every room. Most were empty of even a chair, many had no carpets and, even in this early summer, they seemed damp and cold. I wondered why Stoke didn’t just move to a smaller house and furnish all of it.

  As I opened the door of the next room, I heard a sharp intake of breath. Charmain Stoke stood by the bed looking at me. She wore a silk nightgown. Her hair, long and loose, shone as the sun caught it through the window behind her.

  Her face was perfectly made up and her fingernails and toenails were painted pink.

  On her left ankle was a broad gold bracelet, on her right ankle a steel manacle. The chain attached to it lay in coils, its tail anchored to a square steel plate bolted to a side wall. The green curtains, the pale pink of her gown, the yellow of her jewellery and the silver glint of the chain and manacles were the only things in the room that weren’t white.

  The bed was a white four-poster with white linen. The carpet was white and deep…a dressing table, two high-backed padded chairs, a chest of drawers, a wardrobe and a footstool…all white.

  Charmain stood motionless, staring blankly at me. A man she obviously didn’t recognize was in her bedroom, bleeding on the white carpet, yet she seemed perfectly calm.

  Her brow creased, quizzical, though her mind seemed miles away. She spoke quietly, ‘I know you.’

  I nodded. ‘We’ve met before.’

  She turned to face me full on. ‘Why are you here?’

  I shrugged. ‘I want to ask you some questions.’

  61

  Charmain stared at me, her eyes going blank again. I wondered if she was in shock. Taking two steps back, she sat on the bed. Pushing her hands under her thighs, she swung her legs back and forth, as a child might, the chain clinking lightly.

  After a long silence, she glanced sideways at me and the patch of carpet I stood on.

  ‘Is that blood?’ Her voice still carried the flat tones of disinterest.

  ‘I’m afraid so.’

  She got up and walked toward me, the chain swishing through the carpet like a pet snake. ‘Let me see,’ she said.

  I turned and leaned against the door, resting my leg on the toe of my boot to expose the injured thigh.

  She squatted and gently parted the torn material. ‘Did the dog do that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Where is it?’

  ‘The dog?’

  ‘Mmmm.’

  ‘In one of your stable boxes.’

  ‘Did you lock it in?’

  I hesitated. ‘It isn’t your dog, is it?’

  ‘It’s Mister Skinner’s.’

  ‘Well, it’s dead.’

  ‘Did you shoot it?’ Still her voice showed no emotion.

  ‘I stabbed it with a pitchfork.’

  She stood up and I turned to face her. She was smiling. ‘I’m glad,’ she said. ‘I’m glad it’s dead.’

  She wandered over to the window and stood perfectly still, staring out. The sunbeams pierced her gown outlining her body. I spoke quietly, ‘Was it Howard who chained you up?’

  She nodded, ‘And Howard brought the dog,’ she said.

  ‘When?’

  ‘Yesterday.’

  I limped over and stood by her side. ‘Does he always do this when he goes away?’

  She looked through the window at the high gates and the dark trees, the prison grounds. The sun highlighted the fine down on her profile, more noticeable as her top lip quivered. Her eyes glistened wet.

  ‘It’s been worse for a few weeks.’ It came out thickly past the lump in her throat.

  ‘I’ll help you if you want to get out of here,’ I offered. She didn’t reply, didn’t turn to look at me, but the water built up in her eyes till finally she blinked, forcing out a big tear which rolled into the ridge between her lips. The tip of her tongue licked it away.

  Quietly, I asked again. ‘Charmain, do you want me to help you get away?’

  She nodded slowly and on the third nod, her head stayed down and she sobbed softly. Six inches beyond Charmain’s reach with the chain fully extended Stoke had hung the manacle key on a small hook. I gave her the key, and putting her foot up on the bed, she freed herself.

  She was suddenly brighter, more positive. ‘Can we go now?’

  ‘You’d better get dressed. I can wait outside.’

  ‘I haven’t any clothes.’

  I looked at the thin pink gown.

  ‘It’s all I have left. Howard burned all my clothes two days ago.’

  ‘Okay, we’ll have to find you something when we get out.’

  Charmain supported me as I hobbled down the stairs. I pictured her climbing the big gate in her nightgown. I pictured me climbing it in a bandage and a lot of pain.

  ‘Is there a key for the main gate?’ I asked.

  ‘I think there’s one on the ledge of the mailbox’.

  There was.

  We walked round the bend under the dark trees to the car.

  ‘Should I drive?’ Charmain asked.

  I gave her the key. She adjusted the seat and rearranged her gown as I lowered myself into the passenger side.

  Mechanically, she checked face and hair in the mirror. Some level of confidence was coming through, replacing the quiet resignation she’d shown when chained up in her room. She turned to me. ‘Ready?’

  For the first time in months my sense of the ridiculous took over and I laughed, albeit quietly, and rolled my head on the headrest. Charmain didn’t speak, she just looked at me, waiting for an explanation.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘I can’t make up my mind whether this is a murder mystery or a farce.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Me bleeding through a hole in the seat of my pants, you wearing nothing but a silk nightgown ready to drive us to God only knows where and you don’t even remember my name.’

  ‘I do. You’re Eddie Malloy. You used to fancy me at school.’

  ‘How did you know I fancied you? I never told you.’

  ‘You didn’t have to, I…’

  ‘You what?’

  ‘Nothing. It doesn’t matter. But I do remember you from school.’

  ‘But that was years ago, I could have turned into a madman for all you know, I could be taking you anywhere for any purpose.’

  She glanced down. ‘I doubt you’ll be doing much in your condition,’ she said. ‘I think I can cope.’

  She started the engine, and released the hand brake. Then she pulled it on again. Reaching to the floor below her seat, she brought out a small pink nylon case, something between a purse and a cosmetics bag.

  I hadn’t noticed her carrying it from the house. She looked inside, closed it again, stuffed it under the seat then picked slowly away into a neat turn.

  ‘Where are we going?’ she asked.

  ‘I don’t know. Let’s just get away from here.’

  She didn’t look back. I did, at the big white prison with the green curtains and I remembered where I’d seen that colour before – on the jockey who rode the Champion Hurdle winner, Alan Harle. The colours belonged to the phantom owner who retained him to ride all his horses, Mister Louis Perlman.

  The sun, though sinking, was still bright, the road clear and straight. We decided to visit the nearest hospital so I could get some treatment and Charmain, wearing an old raincoat I always carried in the boot, could call a friend whom she reckoned would take her
in ‘until the heat died down’. God knows when that will be, I thought. Once Stoke discovered she’d gone, the temperature could only rise.

  ‘Doesn’t Howard know this friend?’ I asked. ‘Won’t he go there looking for you?’

  She shook her head confidently. ‘Doesn’t know her. I haven’t seen her myself for ages.’

  The Greenlands Hospital Casualty Department was empty when we arrived and the doctor saw me within five minutes. Half an hour later, I returned to the car and sat tenderly on eleven stitches and an anti-tetanus injection.

  Two paracetamol were supposed to have made things easier, as yet they hadn’t.

  Charmain looked much more anxious than when I’d left her. She stared straight ahead through the windscreen, biting ferociously at her lip.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ I asked.

  ‘Kate’s gone to Italy.’

  ‘Your friend?’

  She nodded.

  ‘When’s she due back?’

  ‘Next month.’

  I cursed silently, selfishly, knowing what the outcome of this would be. ‘Is there anyone else?’

  She shook her head in short sharp jabs.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ I said, with more confidence than I felt. ‘We’ll find somewhere.’

  She turned to me, the hunted look already etched deep in her face. ‘Where?’

  I shrugged. ‘With me, if needs be.’

  It didn’t ease things for her. ‘But doesn’t Howard know you?’

  ‘He knows me all right but he’d have no reason to suppose you were with me.’

  Eyes vacant, she nodded, not really taking it in. ‘Okay,’ she said, starting the car. ‘Which way?’

  ‘That way.’ I pointed west and we lowered the visors against the setting sun.

  It was all I could think of. Returning to the cottage for any length of time was out of the question.

  Stoke’s men would eventually come looking.

  62

  During the next hour, Charmain grew increasingly agitated, biting her nails and rubbing her mouth hard with the back of her hand like she was wiping saliva away.

  When she let the car stray over the central white lines on the road for the second time, I spoke to her. ‘You okay?’

  She looked round suddenly at me, as though I’d just appeared beside her. ‘Yes…yes. I’m okay.’

  Her skin was pale. She didn’t look okay. ‘Will your husband be at York till Friday?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘What were you supposed to do for food while he was away?’

  ‘He leaves a supply of fruit in the cupboard.’

  ‘Fruit! For three days?’

  She was rigid in the seat, neck stretched, arms dead straight on the wheel as though trying to hold a runaway horse. ‘Howard said it helped me keep my figure.’

  ‘Why didn’t you leave him?’

  ‘I had my reasons.’

  I waited.

  ‘He’s not an easy man to leave,’ she said.

  ‘Has he always used Skinner’s dog as well as the chain?’

  ‘Today was the first time. He told me it was there but I only half-believed him.’

  ‘What has he got on Skinner?’

  ‘Skinner owes him a lot of money. Howard lets him run up big debts then calls in his favours.’

  ‘What kind of favours?’

  She shrugged. ‘I don’t know specifics, but Howard’s seen a lot of Skinner lately.’

  The talking seemed to relax Charmain and she leaned forward into a more natural driving position. Her next question surprised me.

  ‘Is it Skinner you’re after, or Howard?’

  ‘Who do you think?’

  She kept staring at the road. Since we’d started the conversation, she hadn’t looked at me. She shrugged and frowned. ‘Well, I don’t know.’

  ‘But I should be after somebody?’

  ‘You must be. People don’t go around killing dogs and breaking into houses for nothing…And asking questions.’

  ‘I’m trying to find out who killed Alan Harle.’

  Our speed dropped suddenly as her foot eased off the gas then surged as she realized what had happened. Her knuckles were white on the wheel and she bit hard at her bottom lip.

  ‘You knew Alan.’ I made it a statement. Still she wouldn’t look at me.

  ‘I’m very tired,’ she said. ‘I feel faint. Can we stop a while?’

  ‘Okay, pull in at the next lay-by.’

  That suggestion seemed to stress her even more. ‘No, not a lay-by, somewhere with a toilet, somewhere I can eat. Maybe a cup of sweet tea, something like that.’

  ‘Fine, wherever you want.’

  She nodded, but the tension didn’t ease and by the time we stopped at a small transport café, her concentration had deteriorated so much she couldn’t have driven any farther.

  The place looked all right for truck-drivers but not for pretty women in pink nightgowns. Charmain didn’t seem to mind. If anything, her stress diminished as she reached for my old coat in the back.

  ‘Can I use this again?’ she asked brightly.

  ‘Why don’t you wait in the car and I’ll go and get some food?’

  ‘No!’ She almost shouted. ‘I can’t wait in the car…I have to go to the toilet.’

  I looked at her. She avoided my eyes. ‘Okay, you go to the toilet. I’ll get some food and drinks.’

  She nodded, stepped out, pulling the coat round her shoulders, picked up her little pink bag and hurried off toward the white pebbledash buildings.

  Suspicion had been growing, but I knew then she’d return calm, smiling and self-assured.

  I was right.

  Charmain sipped tea but wouldn’t eat. The colour had returned to her cheeks and she was bright and chatty. Her eyes shone.

  ‘Pretty uplifting toilets, those,’ I said.

  ‘Mmmm.’ She smiled.

  ‘Take away hunger and tension and tiredness. Think a visit would do my leg any good?’

  She just kept smiling, reached for the handle and reclined the seat, perfectly relaxed.

  ‘I know where I can stay,’ she said.

  I waited.

  ‘A friend of mine has a boat. It’s on the Oxford canal near a little village.’

  I wondered for a moment if she meant Skinner but I didn’t think so. ‘What’s your friend’s name?’

  ‘Phil Greene, he’s a jockey.’

  ‘You’ve got a short memory, Charmain, Phil Greene’s hardly cold in his grave. You were at his funeral.’

  Eyes still closed, she frowned for a few seconds then smiled again. ‘It’s all right. I’ve got a key.’

  ‘For what?’

  She looked at me. ‘The boat.’

  ‘So, it doesn’t matter that Phil Greene’s dead as long as you have a key to his boat?’

  ‘I’m not saying it doesn’t matter. He was a sweet kid and he would have wanted me to stay at the boat if I was in a spot.’

  ‘So why didn’t you think of that first before you rang your friend?’

  She shrugged. ‘I forgot.’

  ‘You forgot or you didn’t realize how short of heroin you were?’

  It didn’t faze her. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean that until you went into that toilet and shot some of the stuff into your arm you didn’t realize how little you had left.’

  She looked at me, her smile replaced by a hardness.

  ‘So?’ she said.

  ‘So, you obviously think Phil had some on the boat somewhere. What was he, your official supplier, by appointment, after Harle disappeared?’

  She lay back again, closed her eyes and smiled. ‘What’s it to you?’

  ‘Nothing to me. It’s your life. Why should I care if you screw it up like Harle and Greene and end up the same way?’

  ‘Don’t worry, Mister…I’ve forgotten your name?’

  ‘That’s all right. You won’t be seeing me again anyway, once I’ve dropped you at the boat.’

>   She opened her eyes and sat up. ‘You said you’d help me.’

  ‘Don’t give me the Little Miss Helpless act. I’ll help you hide, help you keep away from your husband for as long as I can, but I won’t help you kill yourself.’

  ‘You’re overreacting.’

  ‘Maybe, but that’s the way I feel. I’m sick of all this crap. Of being scalded and bitten and shit on by idiots like Harle and Greene and you. You’re not worth it.’ I opened the door, struggled out and went to the driver’s side.

  ‘Move over,’ I told her. ‘I’ll drop you at the boat.’

  ‘But your leg!’

  ‘Move!’

  ‘It’s a long drive! It’ll be dark soon!’

  ‘Move or get out!’

  She moved.

  63

  Someone was on the boat. A thin beam of pale yellow shone through a gap in the curtains as we drove down the hill. I cut the engine and the lights and coasted silently, steering by moonlight, until we stopped by the white cottage.

  Eyes wide, Charmain tensed in her seat.

  ‘Who do you suppose it is?’ she asked, whispering.

  ‘I don’t know.’ I slid the key from the ignition, ‘Wait here,’ I said.

  She grabbed my arm ‘Hold on!’ A harsh whisper now. ‘Leave me the car key!’

  I tried to shrug her hand off. ‘No.’

  ‘Yes!’ She gripped harder. I turned to face her. She was corpse-pale. ‘No,’ I said.

  ‘You must!’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘They might get you…I’d be stuck…they’d get me too.’

  ‘Too bad. I’m taking the key. I don’t trust you.’

  ‘I’ll wait for you. Honest, I will!’

  Putting the key in my pocket, I prised open her grip. ‘If you weren’t a junkie, Charmain, I might believe you. Stay here and keep quiet. I’ll be back soon.’

  I hobbled down the path to the side of the boat. The night was cool and cloudless. The boat lurched gently from side to side, the water lapping rhythmically with the sway.

  The window at the end was open. I heard the rising and falling tones of conversation. Crouched below the window I could hear the voices clearly. Two men. Recognizable accents: one West Midlands, the other a West Country burr.