by Anya Lipska
She pulled a sympathetic face – the bitterness in his voice clearly wasn’t directed at her. ‘That sucks. Especially when it’s got nothing to do with you.’ She noticed that even the skin on his earlobes was starting to peel.
‘And now it’s kicking off all over again, isn’t it?’ He shifted tentatively against the pillow.
‘Well … I can’t really say. I’m just a junior cop.’
‘It’s my brother, isn’t it?’ Sebastian Duff said the words like someone else might say ‘rattlesnake’.
Kershaw gave an embarrassed little shrug, as if she’d like to say more but couldn’t. He patted the bed, inviting her to sit, and she parked herself on the edge. ‘Between you and me?’ she said confidingly. ‘Yes. We know he’s back in the country and we need to talk to him.’
‘Good luck with that. He’s good at disappearing. Leaving other people to deal with the fallout.’ He put his fingers to the blisters on his lips, his touch as tender as a lover’s.
‘I got the impression that Joey and your mum, they’re … close?’ It was a shot in the dark, based on Sebastian’s resentful tone – and the nauseating portrayal of the first-born Duff in the oil painting downstairs.
‘“Like peas in a pod”.’ He said it in a mocking, singsong tone, as if quoting someone, presumably his mother. ‘For years, we got on fine without him – now it’s all “Joey says this” and “Joey thinks that”.’
Kershaw decided to take a risk. ‘I don’t suppose you’ve got any idea where we might find him?’
Instead of replying, Sebastian suddenly tipped his head, his eyes focusing somewhere over her shoulder. Bemused, she sent him a questioning frown, but then she heard it, too. The thunk of one of the doors off the hallway closing, followed a second or two later by a soft click as the next one was opened. The sound of someone checking out the bedrooms – just as she’d done a few minutes ago.
Their eyes met and he mouthed ‘Go!’ – jabbing his finger towards a nearby door. Needing no further encouragement, she made it there in three soundless strides, grateful for the thick carpet. Found herself in a wetroom, lined in a pinkish veined stone.
Her heart was beating so fast it felt like it was spinning in her chest: what if Joey Duff was in the house, after all? She wrapped her arms around her ribs. Last time she’d been cornered like this, she’d been just seconds away from getting stabbed.
Stop. Think. She scanned the place – no window. Made a monumental effort to steady her breathing, reminded herself that the Sarge was downstairs – if she hollered good and loud, he’d hear her. No sooner had she formed this comforting thought than she heard a noise. The distant but distinctive clunk of a car door closing. Streaky’s car door. The interview with Katherine Duff must have ended.
Fuck!
Then came the sound of Sebastian’s bedroom door opening.
‘Don’t you ever knock?’ – his voice was petulant.
‘Sorry, sweetheart. Have you seen a girl up here?’ The fag-raddled tones of Katherine Duff.
‘Don’t be ridiculous. What girl?’
‘The police have been here, harassing us again. You sure you haven’t heard nothing?’
‘Yes, Mother – I’m quite sure’ – the word ‘mother’ iced with teenage venom. ‘Why don’t you look in the study? Isn’t that where all the deep dark secrets are hidden?’
In the agonising silence that followed, Kershaw stared down at the bathroom doorknob, bracing herself to see it turn. Instead, the silence was split by a cascade of chimes: the front door bell.
‘Fucking hell!’ Katherine Duff’s voice. ‘I bet it’s that fat ginger cop again …’ Kershaw heard the volley of abuse receding as she left the room.
Seconds later, Sebastian opened the wetroom door, wearing a robe.
‘You’d better get going,’ he murmured. ‘Turn right in the hall and take the back stairs. There’s a door at the bottom that’ll bring you out in the parking area.’
‘Thanks,’ she said, sending him a smile of genuine gratitude. She could hear Streaky from the front door step, talking loudly – keeping Old Ma Duff busy.
Sebastian’s cheeks grew even redder. ‘That’s okay.’ He thrust a folded pink Post-it note in her hand. ‘My brother’s new number,’ he said. ‘I overheard them on the phone a couple of days ago. When she read it back to him I wrote it down.’
‘Why?’
He smiled wearily. ‘If you’d grown up in my family, you’d know that information is power. Look, I hope you find him. And do me a favour?’
She cocked her head.
‘Make sure they throw away the key this time.’
Thirty seconds later, she was back at the car, wondering if her heartbeat would ever return to normal. When Streaky came back he climbed into the driver’s seat whistling. It was only once they were off the Duff premises and back onto the main road that he turned to her.
‘So where the fuck did you get to?’
She admitted what she’d done, bracing herself for a proper bollocking. Instead, there was a moment’s silence, before the car filled with a strange wheezing sound. It was the sound of Streaky cracking up.
Thirty-Two
While Kershaw and Streaky were driving back from Essex, Janusz was on the phone to Stefan, pressing him on whether he’d been able to crack the password-locked USB stick.
‘I ran a series of combinations of the name and possible birth years that you suggested,’ said Stefan.
‘And?’
‘You were right. It only took me a couple of dozen attempts. It’s Larissa1989.’
Just like Janusz, it seemed the Russian who lived above the launderette had used an obvious, and woefully inadequate, password: his girlfriend’s name and birth year.
‘That’s great news!’ said Janusz.
‘I wouldn’t break open the Bollinger just yet. The files are encrypted, too.’
‘Kurwa! Can you unlock them?’
‘Decrypt them. Well, for a disagreeable moment, I thought they might be PGP-encoded but it’s actually just a standard Windows package.’
‘So, can you do it?’
‘Promises are like babies: easy to make, hard to deliver,’ he quoted. ‘Give me a little more time, I’ll do my best.’
After Janusz hung up, it struck him that he hadn’t spoken to his boy Bobek since Kasia had gone missing. He wouldn’t win any prizes for world’s greatest father but a few years ago he’d taken a private vow to call him once a week, without fail. What had begun as a small gesture to make up for the long periods of absence from the boy’s life had become something he’d grown to look forward to – even now that Bobek had entered his troublesome mid-teens. Just thinking of the boy, Janusz felt his mood lift. The Easter holidays were only a few weeks away: he could come over to stay for a week or so. Kasia would surely be back by then and Bobek liked her, might even have a little crush on her, Janusz suspected.
Back at the apartment, after feeding Copetka and putting the kettle on, he called the boy’s mobile.
‘Czesc, Tato.’ The boy sounded a long way away.
‘You don’t sound very pleased to hear from me,’ said Janusz.
‘Sorry.’
Janusz still hadn’t got used to the deep voice – its timbre almost that of a man’s – his little boy had recently acquired. ‘So, what have you been up to?’
‘Nothing.’ He spoke in a bored monotone and Janusz could visualise his awkward shrug as if he were only an arm’s-length away. He reminded himself how he’d felt at that age: the feeling that your skin didn’t quite fit, the constant anxiety that perhaps it never would.
‘I was thinking, it would be great to see you at Easter.’
‘Are you coming to Poland, then?’
‘Nie. I meant you coming to London, for a bit of a holiday, if your mama will let you out of her sight?’
Silence.
‘Well? Did you swallow your tongue?’
‘I arranged to see my friends at Easter’ – a whiny note entering
his voice.
‘You see your friends all the time,’ said Janusz, trying to keep his voice light and reasonable, ‘and I haven’t seen you since Christmas.’ The boy’s monosyllabic responses only made his desire to see him, to give him a hug, all the more powerful. ‘We could go to the London Aquarium again – you loved it there last time.’
There was a painful silence. Idiota, he chided himself, the boy will have grown out of penguins, for Christ’s sake.
Bobek sighed theatrically. ‘Anyway, they’re bound to give us tons of homework.’
Janusz felt a flare of irritation. ‘Bring it with you – Uncle Oskar and I could help you with it, like we did last summer.’
‘No way!’ The boy’s tone suddenly sounded amused. ‘I lost marks on my biology project because of Uncle Oskar!’
‘Naprawde? How come?’
‘You know I had to do that diagram of a frog?’
‘Yes …?’
‘After I handed it in, I found out he’d written “Kermit” on it – without even telling me!’
They laughed together over 1,600 kilometres of cable.
‘Well, listen, kolego, you’re a big boy now and I understand you wanting to hang out with your friends. How about I come over there for a weekend in May, instead?’ The weather would be picking up by then and Janusz knew a homely inn on a nearby lake where he and Kasia could stay. It would be a good time to tell Bobek the news – that soon he’d be getting a little brother or sister.
‘Mega! You can come and watch me play football.’
The boy launched into a convoluted story about a recent critical match, and the goal he’d definitely have scored if he hadn’t been fouled by a kutas called Slawek. Janusz smiled to hear him prattling on, suddenly as unselfconscious as a six-year-old, the surly teenager gone.
‘Dobrze, Bobek. Tell your mama I’ll call her so we can work out a good weekend to come over.’
‘Spoko. Ummm. Dad?’
‘What is it?’
‘I wanted to tell you, nobody calls me Bobek any more.’
‘Why not?’
‘Everyone calls me Piotr now, even Mama. It’s my real name after all.’
‘Why the change?’
‘Bobek’s a baby’s name.’
Afterwards, Janusz sat for a long moment with the phone in his hand, feeling as though someone had reached up under his ribs and given his heart a sharp tug. He and Marta had nicknamed their son Bobek – little berry – when he was just a few months old – a round and cheerful baby whose favourite mode of locomotion was scuttling around on his bottom.
His mind drifted to last summer, when he’d taken Bobek – Piotr – go-karting in Romford. The boy had turned out to be a bit of a speed freak, and Janusz had struggled to keep up with him, sweating in the cramped kart, leaning into the corners. He felt that way again now – as if he were straining every sinew just to keep him in view.
A tentative tap at the flat door interrupted his reverie. It was probably his next-door neighbour, moaning about the mattress he’d left by the bins. Janusz opened the door, his expression arranged into a semblance of neighbourly cordiality – only to be met by a fist full in the face. He staggered backwards, his vision darkening, with no idea who’d hit him. Kurwa mac!
He threw a wild right hook, only to receive a vicious crack on the wrist. Reeled back against the wall, blinking rapidly. When his vision cleared, he found himself facing a stranger holding a metal baseball bat. Opening his bomber jacket, the guy let him see the well-worn grip of a pistol holstered against his ribs. After this brief and wordless exchange he used the baseball bat like a cattle prod to direct Janusz into the kitchen, where he nodded him into a chair.
‘About our friend Steve Fisher,’ said the man, as if they were picking up a long-running conversation. Taking in the reddened face – as pocked and pitted as a firing squad wall – Janusz suddenly recognised him: it was the guy who’d chased him, after tailing him on the tube. Sadly, it appeared his fracas with the mail van had left him with no lasting injury. ‘I know you’ve been looking for him. So where the fuck is he?’ His accent was one that had always made Janusz think of sloe berries bubbling on a low gas. Russian.
Fighting a gust of nausea, Janusz said nothing. Leaning across the table, the Russian gently rapped the surface between them with the baseball bat, a gesture as eloquent as it was economical. Janusz realised what he should have guessed from the first encounter – this guy was a professional, and it had only been a matter of time before he turned up on his doorstep.
‘I’d love to help you out,’ growled Janusz. His upper lip throbbed, already thickening, and he could taste the salty tang of blood. ‘But I’ve been looking for the guy for a week now and no one has a clue where he is. It’s like he evaporated.’ No point lying about his search – too many people knew he’d been sniffing around.
‘What do you want with him?’
‘I’m a private detective,’ said Janusz. ‘I’ve been hired by a client to find him, someone he owes a pile of money to.’
Crack! The guy whacked the bat on the table before shoving it in his chest. ‘Wrong answer, Polak. The dogs in the street know you’re fucking Fisher’s wife, so quit jerking me around.’
Janusz needed a moment to think. ‘Okay, okay. But I need a smoke.’
The guy cursed in Russian, but threw him a pack of cigarettes. ‘You can light me one while you’re at it.’
After lighting their cigs, Janusz said, ‘Look. I couldn’t give a flying fuck about Fisher. But he kidnapped my girlfriend because she was about to leave him. My only interest in finding him is to get her back.’
‘That’s all?’
‘That’s all.’
The Russian squinted sceptically at Janusz, but after a moment his face relaxed into an expression of mocking amusement. ‘You’re going to a shitload of trouble just for a piece of pussy, aren’t you?’ Janusz didn’t rise to the bait. ‘So, loverboy, have you got any idea where he would take her?’
Janusz guessed that his best hope of surviving this exchange would be to hold out some hope of success. ‘Nothing concrete, but I’ve put the word out with a bunch of contacts, people who might know where he’d go. He can’t hide for ever.’
‘Like the people he hangs around with in that shitty pub in Stratford?’ He locked his eyes onto Janusz’s face.
‘I talked to a few of them, at the beginning, but I’m pretty sure they don’t know where he is either.’
The Russian gave a little nod to himself – as if Janusz had confirmed his own analysis of the situation. ‘So who are these contacts of yours?’
‘You know, guys he’s worked with in the past, mostly on the building sites.’
‘Family?’
‘Nope. His parents are long dead, and he’s got no brothers and sisters.’
‘Does the name Duff mean anything to you?’
‘Duff? No, that’s a new one on me.’
‘What about Simeon?’
‘I’ve heard of him, but I can’t trace him. I think he’s done a runner, too.’
Leaning across the table, the Russian gently tapped the side of Janusz’s face with the baseball bat. ‘You wouldn’t be fucking with me, would you, Polak?’
Tap, tap, it went, cold and insolent against his cheekbone. The only thing that stopped Janusz from grabbing it and shoving it down the skurwysyn’s throat was the thought of Kasia.
Hearing a clattering from the window behind him, the Russian whipped round. It was Copetka, who’d just come in through the cat-flap onto the kitchen worktop. He stood to reach for the cat, who lashed out, claws raking the back of the stranger’s hand. Mother of God! Janusz rose from his seat – if the skurwiel hurt his cat …
Instead, the Russian turned to him, a delighted smile on his face. ‘Holy fuck! He’s got some balls.’ He tried again to stroke the ginger fur but Copetka sank his stomach to the worktop, his spine as sinuous as a snake’s, before bolting out through the cat-flap. Watching him streak down the
fire escape stairs, the Russian chuckled. ‘That’s a nice animal. I’ve got a Siberian Forest Cat at home. Great little hunter – he brings back rabbits, squirrels, pretty much every day.’
He pulled up his sleeve to examine the bloody scratch, revealing his forearm for a second or two – long enough for Janusz to glimpse an indigo-coloured tattoo on the inside of his wrist. Two characters – ‘IV’.
Sitting down again, the Russian gave Janusz a long considering look. ‘I could persuade you to tell me who these “contacts” of yours are … but then I’ll only have to go find them, get them to talk. So, I’m thinking, why make extra work for myself? I hear you’re pretty good at finding missing persons.’ He leaned forward. ‘Listen, loverboy. Steve Fisher has stolen something that I need to recover. You’ve got forty-eight hours to locate him and deliver him, and what he took, back to me. Alive. Understood?’
‘How can I do that, if I don’t know what he stole?’
The Russian put his tongue in his cheek, thinking it over. ‘A USB stick. Looks like a bullet. Don’t even think about opening it. I hear the cops are looking for Fisher, too, so you need to get a move on.’
Janusz took his time grinding his cigarette butt out in the ashtray. ‘My usual charge for a missing person job is five hundred a day. Sterling.’
‘I see you’ve acquired an English sense of humour,’ said the Russian, with a cold smile. ‘So let me explain the deal. You deliver Fisher – and you and your girlfriend get to walk off together into the sunset.’
‘On your word as a gentleman?’ Janusz made no attempt to hide his sarcasm.
‘Listen, Polak. From where I’m sitting, you don’t have a lot of choice in the matter.’ He pulled out his phone and scooted it across the table. ‘Put your number in there. And I’ll send you mine.’
‘All right,’ said Janusz.
‘You know, we have a common interest here. You find Fisher and that USB stick he stole, and I guarantee he’ll never bother you or your girlfriend again.’
‘And if I can’t? Find him?’