Original Skin

by David Mark

  “Aector.”

  He turns, one hand on the door handle, rain slicking his hair to his face, soaking his already sodden clothes.

  Pharaoh runs across the puddle-filled car park. She has her jacket over her head.

  “Suzie,” she says, and it is a question.

  “She’s okay,” he says. “Roisin’s making a fuss of her. Sounds like they’re having a sleepover.”

  “She’s at your house?”

  “No. Roisin’s at hers.”

  “The kids.”

  “There, too.”

  “And where are you going?”

  McAvoy looks at her for a while. Watches the rain run down her face. Sees the black mascara pool in her eyes. Sees himself on her pupils.

  “What was all this for?” he asks, raising his voice above the noise of the rain.

  Pharaoh gives him an encouraging smile. “We’ve got a confession. We’ve solved a murder.”

  “Nobody knew it was a murder.”

  “Does that matter? You knew.”

  “Why did I do this?” he asks, and she cannot tell if it is rain or tears that spills down his face.

  “’Cause you’re one of the good ones.”

  He shakes his head. “I don’t feel any better for it.”

  “Is that what you thought would happen?”

  “I don’t know. I feel worse.”

  “Oh, Aector, it’s not your fault. You’re the one that did things right. She’d have killed Suzie, you know that. Tressider had a weak heart. He kept it secret. Thought it would ruin his political chances. You heard her. That’s why she turned to Hepburn.”

  The affair had started a little more than a year ago. Her husband had introduced them at a civic function. Mentioned they had done a little business together, and then left them to share a quiet corner and glasses of tasteless white wine. Hepburn had been vibrant, larger than life. Exciting. Flirty. She had thought he was gay until he asked to smell her perfume and then licked her jawline all the way to her mouth. Had found herself a secret life she did not know she wanted, and to which she became addicted.

  For a moment McAvoy and Pharaoh could do nothing but look at each other, trying to see a better kind of sense in the other’s approach to crime. They turn as they hear a car door slam, a soft, mechanical sound barely audible over the rain.

  They peer over at the side street that leads to the front entrance of the police station. Dressed in a T-shirt that clings to his skin and a pair of nondescript trousers, they almost do not recognize Stephen Hepburn. His shoulders are slumped. He is looking back over his shoulder at the car he has parked haphazardly on a curb.

  He pauses now. Standing by the barrier that blocks the entrance to the staff car park.

  “News travels fast,” says Pharaoh.

  McAvoy is already moving toward the distant figure. He does not bow his head in the face of the gale. Takes the cold and the rain upon his face without complaint or evasion.

  Hepburn sees him coming. Straightens himself. Pulls the damp material from his skin. Pushes a hand through his hair and then drops his arms to his side. They hang there, awkward and limp.

  “Is it true?”

  Hepburn’s voice is a tremble.

  McAvoy stands in front of him, saying nothing. Looks the smaller man up and down. Tries to place this ragged, unremarkable man at the scene of so many stories. Imagines him, for the briefest of moments, rutting with Paula Tressider on the Welton hillside. Imagines him at his keyboard, persuading sexed-up strangers to meet them in hotel rooms and car parks. Remembers the arrogant, cocksure man who curled his lip in halfhearted contempt when McAvoy told him he was investigating a murder.

  “Please,” says Hepburn. “Paula. Did she kill the boy? The one from the party?”

  McAvoy looks him up and down. Stares into eyes filled with bewilderment and tears.

  “You really didn’t know,” he says, and it is not a question. “You just didn’t give a damn, did you?”

  Hepburn opens his mouth to speak.

  McAvoy silences him with a shake of his head.

  “She didn’t just kill him, Councillor. The man who joined you that night in Huddersfield. She did him in, too. She killed anybody who might tell about the time she took her mask off.”

  A stream of water falls from the end of Hepburn’s nose.

  “I didn’t know,” he begins, before protestation gives way to self-preservation. “I had nothing to do with it . . .”

  McAvoy works his jaw in a slow circle, then clenches his teeth. “You won’t be charged,” he says quietly. “I don’t know what we could make stick. I don’t know if there’s even a charge for what you’ve done. I don’t even know how I feel about you. I don’t know if you’ve done anything wrong. I just know you’ve got away with something and I hope you never forget that.”

  Hepburn looks up into McAvoy’s brown eyes. Sees himself mirrored, fuzzy and indistinct. A dark, shadowy thing, blurred by the storm.

  “I just wanted to play.”

  McAvoy walks away. Is grateful that the rain running into his mouth tastes so foul. It gives him a legitimate reason to spit.

  “All of it,” says McAvoy quietly, as he returns to his car to find Pharaoh waiting, soaked to the skin. “Trying to run Suzie over. Attacking her at the party. Smashing the lad over the head and trying to throttle her. She did all of it just to make sure nobody told.”

  “I think she got a taste for it,” says Pharaoh, choosing not to ask him what he said to Hepburn. “I think she started pushing the boundaries. Maybe this became another game. I don’t believe that shit about burying the past.”

  “What’s going to happen, d’you think?” He asks the question cautiously, as if walking on breaking ice. “Politically, I mean.”

  Pharaoh purses her lips. The bandage on her neck is sodden with rain and she reaches up to smooth it back down. “I think we’ll be okay. We did it with kid gloves, didn’t we? Kept it off the books. Had a look and then got a result.”

  “We should go and see him,” says McAvoy. “Now. He’ll want to talk.”

  Pharaoh holds his gaze. “You think he knew?”

  McAvoy nods. “I think he threw the phone where I would bloody find it. I think I was cheaper than hiring a private detective.”

  11:14 P.M. HULL ROYAL INFIRMARY.

  PETER TRESSIDER is sitting up, limply, in his hospital bed, wearing borrowed surgical scrubs. He appears shrunken. Diminished. Small. There is a clump of hair missing from the side of his head, and red skin glares from beneath the coarse hair at his throat.

  As he enters the private room, McAvoy is put in mind of a skinned bear. The image flashes through his mind unbidden. His thoughts are filled with raw, pink flesh and bloodied fur. He sees the man in the hospital bed as a beast, hunted, wounded, mutilated inside and out.

  “Councillor.”

  Tressider opens his eyes. Looks at his visitors. At Aector McAvoy, soaked to the skin and expressionless in his gaze. At Trish Pharaoh behind him, makeup on her cheeks, rain on her chest.

  “I won’t be hearing that again,” he says softly.

  Pharaoh closes the door behind them. Sits down on a hard-backed plastic chair. McAvoy doesn’t move. Just holds Tressider’s stare.

  “You followed her,” Pharaoh says at length. “Tonight.”

  Tressider swallows. Looks away.

  McAvoy steps to the side, putting himself back inTressider’s eye line.

  “How long have you known?”

  Tressider lifts himself up a little. Rubs his hands in his beard. Lets his fingers fall to his throat.

  “You nearly broke my windpipe,” he says, and coughs as he does so. “When you dragged me off. You’re stronger than you look. And you look bloody strong. Scalped me, too. Pulled half my bloody hair out by the roots.”

 
McAvoy doesn’t speak. There is silence in the room, save the rustle of Pharaoh pushing her hair back from her face, and recrossing her legs.

  “How long have you known, Councillor? We can do this properly, if you’d prefer. Take you to the station. You can call your brief. There may be photographers at the station, though . . .”

  Weakly, as if he is past caring about such things, Tressider waves his hand. “You think I care about all that? You think I ever cared?”

  McAvoy says nothing. Waits for the other man to fill the silence.

  Tressider screws up his eyes. Talks to the image that is playing in his imagination.

  “You’re asking if I knew,” he says, licking his lips. “I’m asking myself, too.”

  McAvoy leans forward. Peers into the councillor’s face like a pathologist examining a corpse.

  “Speak to me, sir.” He says it softly. “So we understand her. So we understand Paula. So we understand the woman you loved.”

  Tressider’s eyes lock on McAvoy’s. Both see the other, reflected in their pupils.

  He breathes out, and there is a sickliness to the sound. A weariness. An approach of the grave.

  At length he reaches to his bedside and takes a sip of water. Savors it.

  “I knew when we got married that she was full of life,” he says, staring up at the ceiling with its gray tiles and garish lights. “I knew she had fire in her. Did I know she was playing around? Not at first, no. I didn’t think that way. We were happy. Whatever we had, it worked. She seemed to love me, I know that much. Seemed to enjoy our lives . . .”

  “But you began to suspect?”

  Eyes still closed, Tressider nods. “She got a second mobile phone. The first one we got through the business. Claimed the tax back on her business calls, you see. All aboveboard. But when you live with somebody, you can’t hide everything, can you? I saw it in her handbag. Knew she had hidden it from me. You can’t help but think the worst, can you?”

  “Did you confront her?”

  Tressider swallows painfully. Shakes his head. “I don’t know if I wanted the truth. Not really. Not then.”

  “What happened, Councillor?”

  Tressider opens his eyes. There are no tears, but his face is pale and drawn, his lips gray. He is a pencil sketch of himself.

  “I tried to stop thinking about it,” he said. “Told myself that whatever we had, it worked. Tried to be a modern man, I guess. When she got pally with Steve Hepburn, I told her to go for it. To enjoy herself. I thought having a flamboyant, gay friend like that would appeal to whatever part of her I wasn’t satisfying. They hit it off. She even suggested we put some money into one of his businesses . . .”

  “The phone, Councillor. Simon Appleyard.”

  Tressider smoothes down the front of his pajamas. Presses his lips tight together.

  “She got a phone call. A few months ago. We were sitting at home and she answered a call on our home phone. Came back white as a sheet. Wouldn’t speak. Wouldn’t tell me anything. I tried to cheer her up, but I knew something was wrong.”

  “The blackmailer,” says McAvoy, turning to Pharaoh. “Connor.”

  “She was weird for days. Told me she was just feeling under the weather. Told me to leave it to her and to concentrate on work. On council work. The authority. Getting into the good books with the party . . .”

  Tressider’s bottom lip shakes. He bites it, willing himself to be strong.

  “What is going to happen to her?” he asks.

  McAvoy rubs his hands through his hair. Picks the damp material of his trousers from his legs.

  “She’s going to be charged with murder, Councillor Tressider.”

  Tressider swallows again. Says nothing for a full ten seconds.

  “The pond,” he says at last. “Connor’s in the pond.”

  McAvoy turns to Pharaoh. Back to the man in the bed.

  “You put him there?”

  He gives a shake of his head. “I found him there. Staring up at me. Eyes like headlights . . .”

  McAvoy needs to move. Has held himself still too long. He crosses to the window and stares, through his own reflection, at the lights of the city. At the yellows and blues that flicker and glare in the darkness and the rain.

  “You were a member of the Police Authority and didn’t think to call the police?”

  He feels Tressider’s eyes upon him. Refuses to turn.

  “I knew,” he says flatly. “Knew what she had done.”

  Pharaoh clears her throat. “You didn’t confront her?”

  “I wanted to,” says Tressider, and his voice is almost a wail. “But she seemed so happy suddenly. Gleeful. Bouncing, almost. I kept telling myself we’d just have a few days like that, and then we would talk. But days became weeks. We were happy.”

  McAvoy turns from the window, face red. “There was a dead man in your pool, Councillor! You must have needed to know.”

  Tressider wipes his nose with the back of his hand. “I tried to forget . . .”

  “And then the happiness stopped,” says McAvoy. “She started behaving strangely again.”

  “It was that damn magazine,” he spits. “She was so bloody proud of us. Kept flicking through it. Loved the thought of what we were going to become. And then she changed. Became cold. Stopped talking . . .”

  “The phone,” says Pharaoh. “Where did you find it?”

  Tressider turns to her. Tries to scowl, but lacks the strength. “I followed her,” he says, breaking eye contact. “One Sunday, a month before Christmas. She’d come home in a taxi. Said the car had broken down and needed towing near Anlaby. She had no reason to be there. What was she doing? I couldn’t stand it. She said she needed to clear her head and went out again almost as soon as she got in.”

  “Where did she go?”

  “The dale,” says Tressider, lost in memory. “Top of Welton. Pretty place.”

  McAvoy nods. He knows the area. Steep-sided and tree-lined, and scented with bluebells and cow parsley, fresh air and dirt.

  “I saw her bury something,” Tressider says. “Pulling up clumps of dirt with her bare hands. She was crying. I wanted to hold her . . .”

  “But you wanted to know what she was doing.”

  Tressider falls silent.

  “You dug it up,” says Pharaoh.

  “Not at first,” says Tressider, as if that’s important. “I tried to stop myself. Tried to tell myself that it was all over. Waited for her to get happy again, like before. But she didn’t. She was colder than ever. Always on the computer, out at all hours.”

  “You went back.”

  Tressider nods. “I dug up what she had buried. Dug up the phone.”

  “It was broken,” says McAvoy. “You couldn’t make it work. You couldn’t get answers.”

  “I tried,” says Tressider, and his hands make fists around the bedclothes. “But I didn’t know what to do . . .”

  “You asked Hepburn,” says McAvoy. “That day. The first meeting of the Police Authority. You tried to get answers. Wanted to know what he knew . . .”

  “He told me they had been having an affair,” he says, and snatches away a tear. “He didn’t hide it. Said he wasn’t as gay as people thought. Said he was sorry. Said he hoped we could all move on.”

  Pharaoh pulls herself out of the chair. Crosses to his bedside.

  “And you decided that you could,” she says icily. “You decided you could live with the body in the pool. You could forgive her whatever she had done. And you threw the thing in the river.”

  Tressider turns away from her. Stares at McAvoy.

  “I saw you,” he says softly. “Had this glimpse of what I thought the police should be. I suppose I trusted in fate . . .”

  McAvoy scoffs openly. Sneers with contempt. “Did you want me to find it?” he asks, m
aking fists. “Did you leave it for me? Was I your fucking errand boy?”

  Tressider looks down at himself. Gives a half laugh as he takes in the sight he presents.

  “I don’t know.”

  McAvoy spins back to the window. Presses his head against the cool glass.

  “Tonight,” he says, and his breath fogs the pane. “You followed her to the hotel.”

  In the reflection he sees Tressider nod.

  “You read her phone.”

  Another nod.

  “You thought she was meeting another man.”

  Softly: “Yes.”

  McAvoy licks his lips, lets his eyelids close. He is suddenly exhausted.

  “You’re done,” says Pharaoh behind him, and though she addresses her comments to the councillor, it is McAvoy who feels the sting of her words.

  His thoughts turn to love. To utter, blinding devotion. To Roisin. He asks himself how much he could forgive. How much he could tolerate. How much pain he would endure to make her love him, and never leave.

  He turns away from the window. Stares into Tressider’s eyes.

  “She loved you best,” he says softly. “All the things she did were to protect you from people finding out that she had strayed. She wanted you to get all you ever wanted.”

  Pharaoh looks at him quizzically, taken aback by the sudden gesture of compassion.

  “Yeah,” she says scornfully. “She was all fucking heart.”

  McAvoy holds Tressider’s gaze. Breathes out slowly and pulls open the door. Gives a nod to the uniformed constable in the corridor, and stomps, damply, down the hall. He takes the stairs, two at a time. Crashes across the reception area and bursts into the storm beyond the glass.

  “McAvoy!”

  He doesn’t turn, but the sound of Pharaoh’s boots on the linoleum is unmistakable, and she pulls him back by the arm.