by Zoe Sharp
“Yeah, she said.” Another pause. “Look, we need to meet,” he hurried on. “Roger’s vanished, and I want to get to the bottom of what the hell the other night was all about. Can I come round and see you?”
“I don’t think that would be a good idea.”
He let his breath out quickly and I could hear the frustration in his voice. “Come on, Charlie. So we’ve got history together. Bad history. Well, I’m sorry about that, but nothing I can say right now is going to make it all un-happen. Deal with it and let’s move on.”
I waited half a beat to check he’d finished. “That wasn’t what I meant,” I said mildly. “Garton-Jones and his mob are back on the estate. They seemed particularly anxious to get their hands on you last time. I don’t think absence will have made their hearts grow any fonder, do you?”
“Oh. No, you’re right,” he said in a wry tone. “To be honest, I want to stay put in case Roger shows up, and I don’t want to cause trouble for you, either. Can you get over here again?”
I thought of Jav and his gang. “It’s starting to get a bit dicey going anywhere on foot,” I said. Copthorne, though, was no better. “And I’m a bit reluctant to bring the bike.”
“You’ll be fine.” Sean gave a short, mirthless laugh. “It seems my reputation with the local bad lads somewhat exceeds me.” His voice was full of self-derision. “Nobody will dare lay a finger on you if you’re coming here.”
“OK,” I said slowly, temporarily unable to think of another excuse. “Oh—” I opened my mouth to ask him about Nasir, then shut it again.
“What?”
“Nothing,” I said shortly. “I’ll see you as soon as I can,” and I put the phone down before he had chance to insist on an answer.
If Sean didn’t know about Nasir’s murder, his reaction would be telling. And if he was the one responsible, it might be even more so. Either way, when I told him the news, I wanted to be in a position where I could see his face.
***
The Suzuki was barely warm by the time I pulled up behind the dark blue Grand Cherokee outside Mrs Meyer’s house.
Despite Sean’s reassuring words, I was still aware of being watched on my way into the estate. Eyes followed me all the way up the path, and as I knocked on the door.
This time, it was answered quickly. Sean was dressed in jeans and a jumper, both black. Still, it made a change from either camouflage or khaki from head to toe.
He looked uncharacteristically uneasy as he stood back and waved me into the hall. It seemed much smaller than it had done the last time I was there.
“Go through,” he instructed, and I walked into the cramped living room ahead of him. Madeleine was sitting on the arm of one of the big squashy chairs, and she gave me a tentative smile of greeting. Mrs Meyer was bending down with a teapot to pour a cup for someone sitting on the sofa. It wasn’t until she straightened up and moved aside that I saw who it was.
The sight of Eric O’Bryan gave me a jolt I hadn’t been expecting, but I wasn’t the only one who was surprised.
His hands gave an abrupt nervous twitch. The cup of tea chattered on its saucer, slopping half the contents over the rim. Most of it landed on his shoes, but the rest hit the carpet. He began stuttering apologies immediately, and Madeleine jumped up to fetch a cloth.
“Oh, don’t worry yourself,” Mrs Meyer said placidly. “There’s been far worse than a drop of tea spilt on that carpet, I can tell you. I may not care for the pattern overmuch, but it does hide the stains, you have to give it that.” She brightened as she turned to bustle out and caught sight of me. “Oh, hello again, dear. Would you like a nice cup of tea?”
I smiled and said yes please. Sean flashed me a momentary glance from under his eyebrows that could almost have been a warning.
I returned the gaze flatly. Gone were the days when he could pull rank on me. It didn’t work that way any more. If I thought the Community Juvenile Officer could give me answers, I wasn’t going to hold my tongue.
“Charlie,” O’Bryan said shakily when he’d recovered something of his composure. “You’re the last person I was expecting to meet here.”
I gave him a tight little smile. “Yeah, you too. And on a Sunday.”
“Ah well, needs must,” O’Bryan said now. He sat perched on the edge of the sofa, knees primly together. His eyes flicked apprehensively over the group of us. “You didn’t mention before that you knew Roger’s family,” he went on. There was a hint of reproach in his quiet voice, as though I’d played a cruel joke on him.
“I didn’t realise that I did,” I said. “Sean and I used to know each other. I’d never met his family.” I tried hard just to make it a flat statement, but I must have added something.
O’Bryan glanced at me, trying to read the undercurrents. “Oh, I see,” he said, when clearly he did not. “Well, I assume at least this means you’re not still going to oppose Roger’s caution, then?”
Sean reacted to that one, rounding on me, glowering. “You were going to?”
“Of course.” I stood my ground. “Roger did his best to help kill an old man, who happens to be one of my neighbours. What did you expect me to do?”
O’Bryan cleared his throat. “Well, ah, if you’ve changed your mind that’s good news, anyway,” he said cautiously, interrupting our mutual glowering match.
Sweat had broken out on his forehead. I could see a bead of it making an unsteady bobsleigh run down his temple. I realised that his discomfort came not from a dislike of such emotionally charged scenes, but from fear. He was afraid of Sean.
I suppose I couldn’t really blame him for that.
“So then, Mr O’Bryan, if he’s going to get another caution, that’s the end of the matter, isn’t it?” Mrs Meyer’s voice was puzzled, but hopeful.
The man shook his head. “Unfortunately, as I was saying before Charlie arrived, Roger should have checked in with the police this morning, and he didn’t, which is going to get him into very hot water unless I can straighten things out pretty quickly. I really need to get my hands on him.”
“You’re not the only one,” I muttered.
Sean shot me a dark look, which I ignored.
“Why wouldn’t he have checked in?” It was Madeleine who spoke. Partly, I reckoned, to stop open hostilities breaking out, and partly because she was fishing. I saw the quick glance she exchanged with Sean, and realised that she knew all about the shooting at the gym on Friday night. I had to admire her tactics, if nothing else.
“He’s probably scared stiff, and in hiding, don’t you think, Mr O’Bryan?” I put in.
O’Bryan looked nervous at being put on the spot again. “Erm, why’s that? Hiding from what?”
“Hiding from whatever, or whoever, shot his friend, Nasir Gadatra dead.” I watched Sean’s face while I dropped that particular little bombshell. Not that it did me a lot of good. His expression hardened into a mask. If I’d been expecting a leap of guilt, I was sadly disappointed.
The news was met in a silence that stretched like bubble gum.
“Look,” O’Bryan said quickly after a few moments, “all this doesn’t change the fact that we need to find the boy. If anything, it just makes it more important that we do. I want to keep him out of prison as much as you do, but it’s imperative that we find him. You must tell him that by absconding like this he’s just making things ten times worse for himself.”
He got to his feet and Mrs Meyer, sensing the interview was over, thanked him gravely for coming to see them.
He gave her a weak smile as he shook her hand. “That’s my job.” He pushed his glasses up onto his forehead while he pinched the tension out of his nose like I’d seen him do the first time I’d met him.
We all moved outside onto the pavement to see him off, standing in a semicircle facing him. O’Bryan unlocked the door of a pale green Cavalier which was parked behind the Grand Cherokee. I hadn’t noticed it when I tucked the Suzuki between the two.
“No MG today?” I asked
him.
He smiled, almost relaxing. “No, it turned out it was just the cable that had gone on this, so I didn’t need a complete new clutch. The MG’s more fun though.”
Suddenly, his face stiffened as though his heart had just given out. His eyes focused over my shoulder, beyond where Madeleine, Sean, and I were standing. His mouth dropped open in shock.
We all turned on a reflex. All saw roughly at the same time the figure who’d just stepped round the back of the Cherokee and come to a sudden halt at the sight in front of him.
“Roger!” Sean yelled. “What the hell d’you think you’re doing?”
Roger took one look at the assembled group of us. Recognition flashed across his face, and I saw a naked fear there. Then he turned tail and ran.
“Roger,” O’Bryan shouted. “Give it up, boy. You can’t hide forever!” There was genuine anguish in his tone.
Sean was already sprinting across the road after his brother, a head-down flat run. Roger panicked as he heard the steps behind him. He broke stride to stoop and grab a half-brick from the far gutter, slinging it at the figure chasing him. It was debatable if he even realised who it was.
Sean dodged out of the missile’s way. Any of the rest of us would have been flattened.
“Don’t just stand there,” he shouted back over his shoulder. “Get after him.”
His words galvanised the rest of us into action. O’Bryan jumped into his car, fired it up and wheelspun away towards the end of the road, trying to head Roger off. Instead, the boy darted into one of the narrow ginnels that characterised both the estates. Sean went after him.
Madeleine and I broke into a run at about the same time, heading in a different direction to O’Bryan, so we’d got the exits covered whichever way Roger swerved.
“Why the hell’s he running?” Madeleine gasped as we sprinted along the cracked pavement.
I didn’t reply, saving my breath, but I remembered Roger’s desperation that Nasir should shoot me. His outraged anguish when the other boy had failed to do so. His sudden flight now raised more questions than it answered.
Were we chasing someone who might be a frightened witness.
Or a brutal murderer?
Fifteen
Madeleine and I reached the next corner together, rounded it, and kept on running. We got level with a galvanised steel railing that partially divided the gap between two houses. It was the other end of the ginnel into which Roger had dived, but when we looked there was no sign of either brother in the narrow passageway.
We’d so been expecting to see one or the other, that our stride faltered as though by prior agreement. We dropped back into little more than a trot, looking round at the myriad of different openings and possible exits that Roger could have taken.
“What now?” Madeleine asked, panting.
“It’s traditional that we split up, I suppose.”
She managed a grin. “I’d hate to break with tradition,” she said. She waved an arm at the choice of directions. “Any preferences?”
I shook my head, and she disappeared off towards the nearest ginnel. I couldn’t find it in me to like Madeleine as much as I probably could have done, under different circumstances. But on the other hand, I couldn’t bring myself to really dislike her, either.
I headed the opposite way, jogging to conserve my energy. Sean was built like a sprinter, and he’d always been fast, but it looked like his younger brother had the edge on him. I knew I didn’t stand a chance of catching them unless they’d slowed down first. There didn’t seem any point in going at it like an idiot.
I reached another corner, tossed a mental coin over which way to turn, and pressed on. By the time I’d made another three or four such arbitrary decisions, winding deeper into the estate with every one, the uneasy feeling grew that I wasn’t ever going to find my way out again.
Even by Copthorne standards, the streets I was moving into looked shabby, and run down. The cars parked by the weed-encrusted kerbs were rusting and half dismantled. I doubt they could have rustled up a valid tax disc between the lot of them. One had the entire front end missing, including the engine, leaving the inner wings and chassis poking up like a cannibalised jawbone.
“What are you doing here, Fox?” said a sudden voice. It was close enough behind me to make me start, and the tone was sneering. “Bit outside your territory, isn’t it?”
Memory clicked. “I go where I’m needed.” I didn’t need to turn round to identify the speaker, but I did so now anyway. “Hello Langford,” I said quietly.
He had popped up out of nowhere and was leaning against a gatepost a few feet behind me, grinning. The vigilante was wearing jeans and a heavy check shirt, which was the first time I’d seen him without his camouflage gear. He didn’t look any smaller, or less menacing, even in his civvies.
“You’re a real thrill-seeker, aren’t you, Fox?” he said. “Coming down here, wandering around in my territory, after that lucky punch you landed. Aren’t you scared I’ll hold a grudge?” He moved closer as he spoke, hands flexing by his sides.
“Enough people know where I am to make me feel safe,” I said, trying to stay calm and hoping that it was true.
Langford considered that one for a moment. I don’t know if the bush telegraph had told him who I’d been visiting on Copthorne, but if so, Sean was right about his reputation warding off evil.
It was enough to make Langford back off doing anything physical, at any rate. “Anyone causes me grief, I take care of them,” he said meaningfully, emphasising the point with a stabbing finger. “You just remember that, Fox.”
I ignored the irritating digit. “Like you offered to take care of Nasir Gadatra, you mean?” I let that one settle on him for a moment, then added, “You certainly found one of his ‘areas of weakness’, didn’t you, Harvey? Breathing, was it?”
He stiffened, but whether it was having his own words thrown back at him, or because I’d used his Christian name, I couldn’t tell. He decided, for the moment anyway, to let my over-familiarity ride.
“He was an interfering little git, and he got what was coming to him,” he said, but this time there was less conviction in his tone. He must have heard it, and went for bluster. “You ought to remember that, too, Fox. What happens to the nosy ones.”
I knew I ought to stop there. We were alone, in Langford’s province, and pushing him like this was a stupid, dangerous game to play, but I’d come too far to let the opportunity slip now. “He was nosy, was he, just like that Asian kid a few years back?” I reminded him, my voice cool and deliberate. “The one you set fire to?”
Langford straightened up, head on one side, and studied me through narrowed lids. “You want to be careful, making unfounded accusations like that,” he said at last. “It might get you into big trouble.”
“I don’t think it’s going to get me into trouble, but did Mr Ali know all about your National Front connections when you and he worked out your nice cosy little deal?”
Langford was standing close enough so that I could actually see him start to sweat. “Of course,” he said now, but he was lying. His association with Mr Ali gave him not just money, but influence, and Langford liked his power plays. He pulled a crumpled cigarette pack out of his shirt pocket, and lit one of the contents while I eyed him in silence.
“OK, Fox,” he said tightly, letting out the first gush of smoke, “how much do you want?”
I was surprised, and tried not to show it. “I don’t want your money, Langford, I want information. Give me a bigger fish than you, and I might not post a file full of your old newspaper clippings to Mr Ali.” Or improve my relationship with Superintendent MacMillan by dumping you straight into his lap, I added silently.
He nodded. “Like who’s really behind most of the crime round Lavindra Gardens, you mean?”
I hadn’t been expecting that one, either. “It would be a start,” I agreed.
He regarded me through the haze of smoke again. “If I get you that – an
d I’m not saying I can, mind,” he added quickly, “you’ll lay off Ali?”
“You’ve got my word on it.”
His smile was a twisted parody containing no trace of humour. “And I’m supposed to trust that?”
“You don’t have much of a choice.” I knew as soon as I’d spoken that it was a bad idea to provoke him too far. There was a dark glitter in his eyes that sent a spark of fear through me.
He snuffed out the end of the cigarette with a forefinger and thumb, then advanced a step. “I could always just make sure you’re not in any fit state to talk to anyone,” he said, sly.
“You can try it if you like,” said a cold voice from the other side of the narrow street, “but I wouldn’t recommend it.”