by Phil Rickman
A long shadow met his own.
‘Strange, quiet evening,’ Gwyn Arthur Jones said, like they’d been standing here together for hours. ‘Always distrust quiet, see, in a town.’
‘Not good for business?’
‘Unless it’s police business.’ Jones looked across the street ‘Gwenda’s, is it?’
‘Kapoor suggested I called in.’
‘Makes sense, boy. A booksellers’ drinking hole waiting to happen, for many years, and now it has.’
‘I was thinking it had been here since forever.’
‘Couple of years, that’s all. An example of how new people can become accepted very quickly, if they learn the rhythms. Nothing too fancy. Nothing too posh.’
That old Gareth Nunne patter.
‘Booksellers’ bar,’ Jones said. ‘Walked in, with her boyfriend, and hit the Hay zeitgeist, as they say. The worse bookselling gets, the more gets spent at Gwenda’s. Anything happening, you hear about it first in Gwenda’s.’
‘I guess they’ll’ve heard about how Kapoor was nearly killed fixing up our sign.’
‘Boy’s all right, I’m told. Bar the odd bruise. Were you hurt?’
‘No. This was someplace else, he’d sue my ass. All my fault for wanting an oak sign I was never gonna be able to fix up myself. Then I’m just… like standing there, watching it happen.’
‘Hardly be expected to throw yourself at it, in your condition.’
‘That’s the whole point. I’m a goddamn curse.’
Gwyn Arthur was shaking his head, wearing his 2H pencil-line smile.
‘But it’s done?’ he said at last.
‘Me and Kapoor finally held it up between us, the sign, and Gore Turrell took most of the weight.’
‘Strong boy. Comes from swimming in the Wye and running all the way up to Lord Hereford’s Knob before breakfast. Only outsiders do that, of course, as you know.’
‘Not me.’
‘No. I’m sorry. I meant no offence. Anyway, you’re installed. Your name is up there. You exist.’
‘Yeah. I exist.’
Jones was a strange guy. Robin watched him walking away, bent forward like some curious goblin, occasionally glancing to one side or the other like he was looking for a reason for the silence.
26
Nemesis
BLISS STILL AGONIZED, week-to-week, about whether she’d come back.
The Friday night vigil. Although sometimes it’d be Sunday. Or Wednesday, occasionally. He’d be sitting, just like he was now, in his stripped-back living room, on the cheap sofa he’d bought to replace the quality sofa Kirsty had taken. One eye on the clock, although he knew she rarely appeared before dark and British Summertime was why it kept getting later.
Week after week during his so-called recovery period, he’d be sitting here waiting for the darkness or going up to the bedroom, watching through the window for the white BMW which would usually pull in some distance away, down near the kids’ playground.
He’d watch her getting out, shouldering her bag, that aura of official business around her, those sharp, impatient glances to either side before approaching the modern house he’d never liked, on a pencil-box estate in Marden on the Hereford flatlands.
Oh God, Annie…
Always wondering if this was going to be the night when the white car wouldn’t come and he’d just carry on waiting here until he fell into an uneasy sleep and woke up into some steely new day when he and Annie would be history.
Secret history. Mother of God, for years, he hadn’t even liked the way she looked. A metal coat-hanger with tits, Terry Stagg had said. It was clear that Stagg still had no suspicion about Howe and Bliss. Nobody did. It was laughable. You could do a briefing on it for the whole of CID, in simple, witness-statement English, and they’d all look at you like you were insane.
It could only ever make sense if you’d been there on a winter’s night, coming up to Christmas, when they’d dug something smelly out of Herefordshire local government. They had. Him and Annie, suddenly finding they were a double act. Connecting, feeding each other. Then coming back here, that night before Christmas, glowing with result, to the house recently vacated by Kirsty and the kids. Electricity.
Bliss loved replaying in his head how neatly she’d folded her clothes before fitting herself into his bed for what he’d thought was going to be a one-night stand that neither of them would ever talk about, least of all to one another.
And then six months had gone, seven months, and they still had a dangerous secret. Only coming close to exposure after the cockfight fiasco, when he’d discharged himself from the hospital, walking like a drunk, his eyeballs ringed with blood, and she’d driven him out to her flat in Great Malvern and taken two weeks off to hold him together. The nearest either of them had come to commitment, and he still didn’t know how it had survived. They were both so—
A short, formal tapping on the back door. Bliss jumped up from the sofa. Hadn’t even heard the car. Had he fallen asleep again, without feeling sleepy? He drew a long breath against the creeping numbness down his left side.
The tone of the knock was enough, and it wasn’t yet sunset. He stumbled through and opened the door, and there she was in her long, pale mac, the strap of her overnight bag over a shoulder, and then his mobile blew the evening apart.
A farmer voice. His heart sank. Never happy with farmers.
‘Inspector Bliss, is it? I’m sorry to bother you. Robert Winterson, it is.’
‘Sorry, who?’
‘My sister’s Tamsin – PC Winterson?’
‘Oh, right… Tamsin, yeh.’
‘I’m at my dad’s farm. Where Tamsin lives, with my parents? Only, she was gonner to babysit for me and my wife tonight, and she didn’t turn up. So I rang my mother, and she en’t heard from her. If she’s doing overtime or some’ing she always rings her mother.’
‘Right.’
‘We left it a bit, because she don’t like anyone from yere bothering her at work. And then we called her mobile. No answer.’
‘When was this?’
‘’Bout an hour ago? I know that’s not long…’
‘Could be there was no signal where she was,’ Bliss said. ‘You know what it’s like round there. How did you get my number, Mr Winterson?’
‘It was on her laptop. Everything on her phone she copies into the laptop in case it gets lost or stolen. My mother says she’s been working for you. Nights and that.’
‘Nights?’
‘Been out till late the last two nights. So you don’t know where she is?’
Bliss was unsure how to handle this. When he was a young copper living at home he’d often tell his ma he was working late on a case when he was really out with his mates or some judy. Didn’t want to drop Tamsin in it if she had some unsuitable feller on the go.
‘Well,’ he said, ‘she has been checking on a few things for me, but… you’re sure she’s not on nights?’
‘My mother’s sure.’
‘Look, if I hear from her I’ll get her to ring you ASAP.’
‘Thank you, Inspector. She’s been… quite excited, kind of thing, working for you.’
Except she hadn’t been working for him, not really, had she?
‘She’s a good girl,’ he said. ‘Enthusiastic.’
‘She is.’
‘Tell you what,’ Bliss said. ‘Could you give me your phone number and your mother’s? And do you happen to have Tamsin’s mobile number?’
Should’ve taken it down when he gave her his, but he’d never figured on it being necessary.
‘Sure to,’ Robert Winterson said. ‘I’ll find it now.’
Annie drew the curtains across the window. Bliss called up Tamsin’s phone.
Annie said, ‘Do I know her?’
‘You might’ve seen her if you were up this end.’ Tamsin’s phone was switched off. ‘Red hair, freckles, serious-looking. She was checking out a few things for me.’
‘On what?’ Annie t
ook off her mac, folded it carefully over the back of the sofa. The coat-stand had been Victorian; Kirsty had taken it before he’d changed the locks. ‘Not the bloody drowning?’
‘They’re all talking about that, are they?’
He’d given her the full background over the phone. No secrets from Annie Howe any more. It felt weird.
‘They couldn’t care less about the drowning, just you.’
‘In Worcester?’
‘In Worcester, I get phone calls from Gaol Street questioning your mental health. Not in so many words, but you get the idea.’
‘Brent?’
‘Calls me more often than he needs to. He doesn’t like you at all. And, as he thinks I like you even less, he talks to me without inhibition.’
‘That must be fun.’
‘You’d doubtless find it fun.’ Annie sat down on the sofa, loosening her pale blond hair. ‘I don’t. Can we light a fire?’
‘It’s June, Annie.’
‘Who’d guess?’
This well-concealed domestic side of Annie, he liked that. He found kindling and a copy of the Hereford Times and got down on his hands and knees on the hearthrug.
Annie said, ‘Do I understand from that phone call that you’re pursuing the drowning on an extra-mural basis?’
‘Actually I’m not. Not now.’ Bliss put a match to the paper. ‘Nor had I instructed Tamsin to pursue it.’
‘And you’d given her no reason to think that if she happened to come up with anything it would be gratefully received?’
He looked up at her. She was in jeans and the striped sweater he loved because she’d been wearing it on the electric winter’s night. A little crumpled now, and he loved it even more.
‘You’re saying you think I led her astray?’
‘Not deliberately.’
The kindling caught and crackled. Bliss spread out a few lumps of coal from the scuttle.
‘She told me she had her eye on CID.’
‘And I expect you told her you’d do what you could.’
‘Not in so many words.’
‘In your current condition, that might be the next best thing to a promise.’
‘She’s not daft.’
‘How old?’
‘Twenty-one, twenty-two.’
‘There you go. A young copper with the faint possibility of a murder on her doorstep. She knows she wouldn’t be playing much of a part in the investigation if there was ever a need for one, but she’s thinking what’s it going to do to her CID prospects if she’s missed something under her nose. That didn’t occur to you?’
Bliss hefted the scuttle and slung the rest of the coal on to the flames, Annie wafting coaldust away from her face.
‘How long’s she been missing?’
‘She’s not missing, she just hasn’t rung her mum. Let’s not over-react. When’re you coming back to Gaol Street?’
‘Keep telling you, I don’t want to come back. I don’t want to be your boss any more. Can you understand that?’
Bliss sighed. Strangely, it didn’t matter to him that she was his superior and probably always would be. Could never see himself getting higher than DI, though he could see her making ACC or better. But it didn’t matter, and that surprised him.
‘What might she be looking into?’ Annie said. ‘I mean, if she wanted to come up with something that would impress you.’
‘Annie, she’s in the back of some young farmer’s Land Rover. She’s just using me as an excuse for staying out late.’
‘You don’t know that, though, do you?’
‘All right. It’s conceivable she might be looking to identify possibly the last person to communicate with Rector. A woman, aged about thirty-five who was delivering his groceries. And possibly his dope.’
‘His dealer?’
‘I’d be more inclined to think somebody who deals with a dealer on his behalf.’
‘All I’m saying is, if cannabis found in the home of a man of ninety-odd was enough to make you think there might’ve been something untoward… well, who knows how her mind’s working?’
‘She’d’ve told me.’
‘Maybe she wasn’t sure. Just the way you weren’t sure about what was happening on the Plascarreg, until—’
‘All right!’
‘Who else knows about this?’
‘Nobody. Well, apart from Mrs Watkins.’
He saw Annie’s head go back against the sofa, eyelids coming down, lips tightening.
‘The forensic priest. And she comes into this… how?’
‘As a consultant,’ he said.
‘Oh, a consultant.’
‘I needed an expert opinion on whether Peter Rector was involved in anything iffy. Tamsin said the local kids, of whom she was one not that long ago, thought he was some kind of wizard. Their word. Harry Potter generation. Maybe somebody saw his library, which involves a huge and expensive collection of occult books. And some erotic drawings.’
‘You only told me about the cannabis.’
‘I didn’t think you’d be impressed with the library. There were apparently gatherings at his place involving people the kids liked to call his coven. So I was thinking unbalanced people, maybe doing more serious drugs or hung up on some crank cult thing. I’m thinking what if it involves anybody… underage? I was thinking individuals who, for some arcane reason, might want to drop him in a pool.’
‘And what did Ms Watkins have to say?’
‘She said that while there was no evidence of a temple or whatever on the premises he was certainly some kind of active practitioner of… something. She was gonna try and find out if anything was known about him. Exorcists are well genned-up on what you might call the spiritual byways. Trouble is, once you follow one you wind up in places where, because no obvious crime’s been committed…’
‘The police and the CPS are not equipped to function. And Watkins is?’
‘She can sometimes translate it into a language we can understand, that’s all I’m saying.’
Annie gave him a level look.
‘So what are you going to do about PC Winterson?’
‘Hope to God she comes back before bedtime. Otherwise, I wouldn’t know where to start.’ He sat down in the armchair opposite her. ‘You’re not making me feel good about this.’
‘I’m sorry. You’re probably right. She’ll be out with some man, or her phone’s run out of juice.’
Bliss leaned forward, hands on his knees.
‘Half an hour ago, I was wondering if I’d ever see you again. Like this.’
He felt tears behind his eyes. Shut them fast, shaking his head. What the fuck had happened to him? He was a friggin shambles. When he opened his eyes, Annie’s severe face had softened, or seemed to, in the lamplight.
‘Oh, I’ll keep coming back. I think you’re my Nemesis.’
‘That a basis for a relationship?’
‘Nearest I’ve ever come to one,’ Annie said. ‘Go on. Do what you have to. Ring Winterson’s brother back. See if she’s home and, if not, get some details. Without alarming him.’
Bliss nodded, groping for his phone.
27
Orange spine
DAVID HAMBLING? Peter Rector? Capel-y-ffin?
Gomer Parry was shaking his head, pulling out his ciggy tin before remembering they were in the Black Swan. He pushed it back into his old tweed jacket, scowled.
‘Can’t be doin’ with them Welshies, see, vicar.’
Merrily tilted her head to one side.
‘But you are Welsh.’
‘No, them Welshies. Some Welshies is all right, not much different to the rest of us. But other Welshies… Oh hell, keep your distance, vicar, that’s my view of it.’
Gomer’s bottle glasses were reflecting milky light from the panes of a small mullioned window in the lounge bar. His cap lay on the table next to his cider, his carrier bag from the Eight-Till-Late at his feet. She’d been absurdly grateful to see Gomer.
‘And it e
n’t about the ole language, vicar, don’t you go thinkin’ that.’
‘Right.’
Some things were better left alone. It was probably a plant-hire issue: somebody quibbling over the bill for a complex system of drainage ditches and tarnishing, in Gomer’s eyes, the reputation of an entire region.
‘But you worked in Hay, did you? That’s Wales.’
‘Oh hell, aye. Mabbe ten years on and off, sure t’be.’
He was smiling dreamily, glasses misted. Radnorshire-born, from farming stock. Gomer Parry Plant Hire dating back long before he was living in Ledwardine, digging Merrily’s graves and cutting hedges on the side.
‘So does that mean…?’ She thought of a book found unexpectedly in Peter Rector’s esoteric library. ‘You ever actually work for Richard Booth, Gomer?’
‘Ha!’
The whole bench rocked, Barry, the proprietor, looked across from behind the bar, his eyepatch lifting, Gomer holding down his frenzied white hair.
‘You ever see that little tin plate I had on the side of the ole digger, vicar?’
‘Don’t think so.’
‘Gwynneth One, it was, or mabbe it was Muriel. Damaged in the fire at the ole depot. Never got round to replacing it. The tin plate, this is.’
‘What did it say on the tin plate?’
There was a half-chewed matchstick between Gomer’s teeth. He took it out.
‘By Royal Commission,’ he said.
‘The King of Hay.’
‘Worked for him for years. Good times, vicar. Sometimes I even got paid. Well, thinkin’ back, you always got paid, one way or another. Even if it wasn’t in actual money. What you gotter understand about the King, see, is he was… what’s that word for all over the place?’
‘Never mind, I think I know what you mean. Oh… chaotic?’
‘Exackly! And he never looked the part. Well, that was part of the joke, ennit? Belly out over his baggy pants, glasses on crooked kind o’ thing. Talks for best part of an hour and you never made no sense of a word of it. But you knowed there was sense there, see. Just that you wasn’t smart enough to get it.’
‘I’ve heard that.’
She remembered Fred Potter, from the Three Counties News Service, saying how difficult radio and TV reporters had getting a usable soundbite from the King of Hay. Like he was speaking in tongues sometimes, Fred said. He could cover four separate issues in the space of a sentence that had more alleyways than Hay itself.