A Line of Blood

by McPherson, Ben

  ‘I’d really like to know what that was about now, please, if you don’t mind.’

  ‘And I’ve explained to you that I can’t discuss that with you, Mr Mercer. I’m sorry, I really am.’ She meant it, the sorry part. For the first time the professional distance dropped away; I could see something like sympathy in her eyes.

  ‘Would you mind if I had a cigarette? I could leave the back door open.’ She smiled. ‘And can I make some more coffee?’

  ‘Of course. I’ll have a cup too, if I may.’

  This was worse. I didn’t want her pity, didn’t want there to be a reason for her to feel sorry for me. My hands shook as I made the coffee, shook as I lit my cigarette, shook as I handed her a cup.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘Lack of sleep. And the fags probably don’t help. We both know we need to stop. For our son if nothing else.’

  She gave me her sympathetic smile again, left her coffee cup untouched. I drank my own coffee and smoked in silence. I wondered where Millicent was.

  ‘Are you all right, Mr Mercer?’

  ‘Yeah, can we get this finished now?’

  We were at it for another hour. The same patience, the same open-ended questions, the same absolute professionalism. But that edge of concern in her voice, the knowledge that she now felt sorry for me – that was unbearable.

  ‘You haven’t really asked me about Max,’ I said, as I realised the discussion was ending.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Are you planning to question him again? Because I don’t think he could take that.’

  ‘Mr Mercer, that would be a very different kind of investigation, and I don’t anticipate that.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘You can draw your own conclusions.’ She smiled, that expression of concern again.

  ‘OK, so what happens now?’

  ‘We’ll be in touch. Unless of course you or Max wish to access any of the support services we have spoken about.’

  ‘No. Thank you.’

  ‘And I must ask you to remain in the country. You will need to reconsider your American trip.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘We’d like you to remain in the country.’

  ‘But you just said, or heavily implied that I, or rather that the investigation wasn’t …’

  She cut across me. ‘Mr Mercer, you are helping us with our enquiries.’

  ‘But I’m not a suspect.’

  ‘Not at this stage.’

  We ended the meeting, and she left me at the kitchen table, paralysed by my thoughts.

  There was a thing, then. Some thing has happened.

  It was the water that stirred me. For a moment I was sure I was wrong, that the tap in the neighbour’s kitchen could not be running. Then I knew that it was, and wondered why the sound troubled me.

  I shook myself from my trance, became aware of my legs, rose slowly, trying to rub the sleep from them as I moved towards the wall that divided our house from the neighbour’s.

  Water. Definitely water.

  I put my right ear to the wall. Short percussive bumps. In pairs. And the water was still running.

  I moved slowly to the sink, tipped wine from yesterday’s glass, shook out the last drops, and returned to the wall that divided our house from the neighbour’s. I placed the base of the glass against the wall, and put my ear in the bowl of the glass. Again those short percussive bumps. The sound was no clearer than before. I moved my head away, looked at the glass. Wasn’t this the way it was done? I turned the glass around, put my ear to the base of it; the sound was still no clearer. Pairs of percussive bumps. Still the sound of the water through the pipes.

  I put the glass down on the table, and returned to the wall, cupped my ear to its smooth white surface with my hands.

  A bump. A metallic crash. No second bump this time.

  A woman’s voice. A cry of frustration.

  I thought for a moment of Millicent, but why would Millicent be in the neighbour’s house?

  I opened the front door and went out into the street.

  ‘Look, sir, look.’

  Mr Ashani was standing on the pavement outside our house. He nodded towards the dead man’s house and made to speak, but I smiled and tapped him on the elbow, walked past him to the neighbour’s front door. Then I saw what Mr Ashani had meant me to see.

  A locksmith had fitted two small steel plates, one to the door, one to the frame. They had buckled slightly, as if under force, and the padlock that had held them had given. Someone had placed the lock on the low wall in front of the house, as if meaning to replace it.

  ‘Oh,’ I said.

  ‘Indeed,’ said Mr Ashani.

  ‘No yellow tape, though.’ Perhaps the police weren’t thinking murder after all.

  ‘In this country, sir, police tape is blue and white.’

  ‘Well,’ I said, and folded my arms.

  Mr Ashani shot me an uncertain half-smile and went back into his house.

  I rang the dead neighbour’s bell. The door opened. I guessed at once that she was his sister. She was tall, and a little too slight for her frame. Her skin was very pale, and her brown hair hung crisply at her shoulders: the kind of woman my mother would describe as willowy. The kind of daughter my mother’s friends had. Pretty, in other circumstances.

  ‘Alex,’ I said. ‘I live next door.’

  I looked past her. From here I could not see the sink, though I could hear the tap running in the kitchen. I could see the source of the crash, though. She had pulled a drawer out of its mount, and the sides had come away from the base as it landed. Impractical slivers of stainless steel were strewn across the kitchen floor. I guessed that the flat ones were knives, the curved ones spoons. The forks seemed to have only two prongs.

  The words Crime Scene flashed across my mind. She doesn’t know.

  ‘I was making a cup of tea,’ she said. ‘Trying to. Would you like one?’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘I can’t.’

  She stood, uncertain, as if waiting for me to say more.

  Don’t go in.

  ‘Look,’ I said, ‘I’m sorry to ask you this, but you have spoken to the police?’

  She nodded, and pushed the corners of her mouth inwards. ‘But not since the night. Not been feeling very sociable. Haven’t been charging my phone.’ There was a glassy look to her eyes, and I could see she badly wanted not to cry.

  ‘I don’t think you should be in there just now,’ I said. ‘I’m really sorry.’

  ‘Why not?’

  Because the police think I might, just possibly, have killed your brother.

  ‘Did you force the lock?’

  She nodded. Etiolated, I thought. You wouldn’t think there was enough strength in those narrow shoulders.

  ‘I think the police fitted it,’ I said.

  ‘I slightly realised after I’d done it,’ she said. ‘Stupid, isn’t it, what grief makes you do?’

  She looked at me and smiled, as if that explained it.

  ‘I think you need to turn off the tap and leave.’

  ‘Couldn’t you just come in while I get myself sorted out?’

  ‘I’m sorry, no. Is that your bag?’

  ‘What are you saying?’

  ‘You can come and sit with me, if you like.’

  Mr Ashani must have been watching. He sprang from his house, and had his hand on my arm before I reached my front door.

  ‘Mr Ashani.’

  ‘Mr Mercer, I must speak with you.’

  ‘I’m a little busy just now, Mr Ashani.’

  ‘I wish to discuss with you what kind of man this was.’

  Leave us alone.

  ‘I’m expecting his sister for tea. Perhaps we could talk later?’

  ‘This is a discussion we must have, Mr Mercer.’

  For a while I didn’t think she would come. I made coffee and tidied up a little. I could still hear the tap running through the wall, and I guessed from the tiny scraping sounds that she was picking up the cutlery
and trying to replace the drawer. Eventually she turned off the tap, and a minute after that she was sitting at our kitchen table.

  Her name was Rose, and her hands shook as she drank her coffee. Her lower left arm was covered in silver bracelets, which glinted as she moved: a soft metallic sound, like breath. Why hadn’t I noticed before?

  I suggested she speak to the police. I hoped they wouldn’t reveal that I was under suspicion, because there was something genuine about her, and I wanted her to like me. Even in her grief she was sweet and self-deprecating and funny.

  ‘Was it you who found him?’ she asked after a while.

  ‘Yes. And my son. We were looking for the cat.’

  She nodded as if that explained it.

  ‘Thanks.’

  We sat and drank coffee in silence. Then she asked if I minded if she smoked. ‘In the garden, I mean. Would that be OK?’

  ‘You don’t need to go in the garden.’

  She produced a packet of Kensitas Club and offered me one. She took out a silver lighter and tried to light my cigarette, hand shaking.

  ‘You’re not really a smoker, are you?’ I said.

  ‘It’s that obvious?’

  ‘Girls like you don’t smoke Kensitas Club.’ I sniffed the cigarette in my hand. ‘And these are stale. You nick them from a party?’

  The sadness lifted from her, and she smiled, making light.

  ‘Busted.’ A glint in her eye. More than just a nice English girl, then.

  ‘Want a proper cigarette?’

  ‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘Thanks.’

  I lit two cigarettes at the stove, handed her one. She gripped the cigarette like a pen, took a drag, watched the smoke as it curled upwards. She was nothing like Millicent but she had something of the same underlying strength, some quality that made me feel I could trust her, almost as if we shared a secret, though if you had asked me to define what I liked about her I would have struggled, would have worried that you thought I was attracted to her.

  ‘Was it awful for you?’ The aching sadness was back. ‘Did it look as if he was suffering? I mean, of course he was suffering. He had to be to do that. But how did he seem?’ I could feel her struggling for the words. ‘Did he look all right?’

  ‘I think it was OK. He looked OK.’ I thought again about that rictus smile. Of course it was awful. The erection. The violence of it. Of course he didn’t look all right. But the poor man was someone’s brother. He was Rose’s brother.

  ‘He looked dignified. He looked peaceful.’

  He looked murdered.

  ‘You’re a good man, aren’t you? Was it really not awful?’

  ‘No,’ I said, ‘I’m not good. Other people are good. And it wasn’t awful.’ I was lying to soften the blow.

  ‘You are good, you know,’ she said. ‘There’s kindness in your voice.’

  She got up, asked if she could use the lavatory. Of course, I said, of course. I hoped we had shut the bedroom door.

  When she came downstairs I could tell she had been crying.

  ‘He really wasn’t a bad man,’ she said. ‘It’s important you understand that.’

  ‘Why would I think he was a bad man?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘You might. For what he did.’

  I told her I understood, although in truth I did not.

  ‘I have to go,’ she said. ‘Thank you for the coffee, and for the cigarette.’

  ‘Coffee and cigarettes is pretty much all I’m good at.’

  ‘Don’t forget kindness.’ She took my hand in hers, then stopped as if embarrassed. ‘Will you come to the funeral, Alex? He didn’t know so many people. Bit of a loner.’

  ‘OK,’ I said. ‘Sure.’

  Then she kissed me on the cheek and was gone.

  I sat down at my computer at the kitchen table.

  Max came home at four. He commented on the smell of cigarette smoke, made his own sandwich, and went up to his room. Then he came back down and asked me for five pounds.

  ‘What do you want five pounds for?’

  ‘We don’t have any milk.’

  ‘Milk doesn’t cost five pounds.’

  ‘OK, two pounds then.’

  ‘All right, Max. Here’s two pounds.’

  ‘Thanks, Scots Dad.’

  ‘There’s nothing mean about me giving you two pounds to buy milk.’

  ‘Do you want the change?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘OK, Dad. You’re not mean at all.’

  I ruffled his hair.

  ‘Want me to come to the shop with you, Max?’

  ‘No, it’s OK.’

  I rang Millicent again. Left the same message again. Added that I missed her and wanted her to come home, then felt foolish and tried to rerecord the message. The answering service cut me off.

  Max came home with a small carton of milk and a packet of Maltesers.

  ‘I don’t remember saying you could buy those, Max.’

  ‘You didn’t say I couldn’t.’

  ‘I said I wanted the change.’

  ‘Here.’ He handed me seven pence. ‘Do you want some Maltesers?’

  ‘Yeah. All right.’

  I pushed my computer to one side. We sat at the table drinking milk and dividing up the Maltesers. Max got a kitchen knife and cut his Maltesers into halves, and then into quarters. He sat dissolving them on his tongue, then sticking out his tongue to show me.

  ‘What do you want for supper?’

  ‘It’s Mum’s turn to make dinner.’

  ‘I’m making it tonight.’

  ‘Fish and chips. From the fish and chip shop, not home made.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘Can you give me the money, and I can buy it?’

  ‘Later, OK?’

  ‘OK, Dad. Dad?’

  ‘Max?’

  ‘Aren’t you going to eat your Maltesers?’

  ‘You have them, Max.’

  ‘OK. Dad?’

  ‘Max?’

  ‘Tarek said you’re going to send me to a psychiatrist.’

  ‘Why did he say that?’

  ‘I told him what I saw.’

  ‘Well, what you saw was pretty upsetting, wasn’t it?’

  Max said nothing.

  ‘Max,’ I said, ‘Max, if you ever feel the need to talk about what you saw, doesn’t matter where or when, we can talk about it, OK?’

  ‘Is it because of the boner?’

  ‘What do you mean, Max?’

  ‘Tarek said that if you see a grown-up’s willy and it’s a boner then all the other grown-ups go spectrum, and you have to go to see a psychiatrist.’

  I sat, trying to find an answer to this. Tarek had covered a lot of angles in one sentence.

  ‘So do I have to go and see a psychiatrist?’

  ‘I don’t know, I think it might be a good idea.’

  ‘Do you have to go and see a psychiatrist too?’

  ‘No, Max, I don’t think so. But Mum and I will be coming with you when you go for the first time.’

  He bristled at the injustice of this.

  ‘You saw the boner too, Dad.’

  ‘Yes, I did.’

  ‘So why don’t you have to go?’

  ‘Max, you’re eleven.’

  Max rolled his eyes in that way only eleven-year-olds do.

  ‘In the next few years you’re going to be discovering a lot about your body. And about other people’s bodies. And Mum and I want to make sure that you don’t find that scary.’

  ‘I know about sex, Dad.’

  ‘I know you do, Max. But Mum and I want to make sure you’re OK.’

  I tried to take his hand but he pushed me away.

  ‘Are you going to tell Mr Sharpe about the psychiatrist?’ There was humiliation in his eyes; his voice was very small.

  ‘Yes, probably. But he won’t tell anyone else. And if you go for a few times and Mum and I decide it’s not really necessary, then you can stop. OK?’

  He picked up the rest o
f the Maltesers and went upstairs to his room. I sat, feeling worse than ever. I’d be angry with me too if I were him.

  Max and I ate our fish and chips.

  The doorbell rang. My first thought was Millicent without her key, and my second thought was the police.

  It was Fab5.

  ‘Hi,’ I said.

  ‘All right, Alex,’ said Fab5. He went through to the kitchen and sat in my chair, stole a large chip from Max.

  ‘Hey,’ said Max.

  ‘Good to see you too, wee guy.’

  I had hoped Millicent would love Fab5. She never did.

  ‘Fab5? Like, we’re cool and we’re black and it’s 1979? Guy needs to accept his reality.’

  Fab5 thought Millicent lacked a sense of irony; she thought the same about him. If you forced me I would side with Millicent; she saw from the start what I did not: that he had slipped his moorings, that he was adrift.

  Fab5 was my oldest friend, though. True, there was something a little faded about him now, a little stretched around the edges. It was getting harder to laugh at the stories about women and cocaine. He partied a little too hard and his hair had taken on a warm red-brown sheen that doesn’t exist in nature. He knew this, though, and that’s why we were still friends. Behind the laughter there was a wistfulness for a time when he and I were young together, and London, it seemed, lay at our feet: a time before Millicent, in other words. I wondered sometimes if Millicent disliked Fab5 for that reason too – he was a reminder of a younger, less faithful me.

  My wife worries that I might revert to type.

  Fab5 helped himself to one of my cigarettes. ‘You going out like that, Lex? She’ll not be pleased.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Dee, you incorrigible twat.’

  Dee Effingham. The Sacred Cock at seven.

  ‘What time is it? And don’t say twat in front of Max.’

  Max pushed his tongue hard against his cheek and made a two-tone mm-mm sound.

  ‘See, you’re corrupting my wee boy, Fab5.’ Twat was the right word, though.

  ‘It’s six twenty-five, Dad,’ said Max.

  ‘Run, Alex,’ said Fab5. ‘Run like the wind.’

  It wasn’t till I was on Drayton Park that I saw the scarves and the hamburger boxes, and realised it was match day at the Arsenal. Even weaving through the side streets, I couldn’t avoid the football completely. I made the Sacred Cock at five to, but I’d half-run the last five hundred metres.