Knifing a man to death in cold blood while he struggled to understand what the hell was going on, then sentencing his relatives to years of torment by removing all traces of his existence; making him vanish into thin air, like Molly Hagger and who knows how many other lost souls. Whichever way you chose to look at it, it was a shameful way to make a living.
I picked up my coffee, went to take a drink, then decided I needed something stronger. A lot stronger. Outside, the day had become grey and cloudy, and it had begun to spit with rain. There was a half bottle of Remy in the cupboard so I poured myself a couple of fingers, and filled a pint glass with the contents of a can of Heineken from the fridge. There didn’t seem any point in doing things by half measures, and I had nowhere to go for the rest of the day.
I drank the brandy down in one, lit a cigarette, and took a good draw of the beer. I smoked the cigarette down to the butt, finishing it at about the same time I finished the beer. I poured myself some more brandy, drank it down, lit another cigarette. I didn’t feel any better. I could still picture Barry Finn. I could hear the noises he made as he died: that horrible gasping as he fought for breath through punctured lungs. Futile. All futile. I thought of the pleasure Raymond had taken in the murder, like a kid playing his first ever PlayStation game. I’d never really taken him for a sadist before, but I wouldn’t underestimate his potential for cruelty again. Would he have worn that same smile had he been killing me? Somehow I felt sure the answer was yes. Maybe he was even now planning my demise with his mysterious associates; men adept at making bodies disappear.
And how close were the coppers to me? Had the young cop at the roadblock talked to the investigating officers? Were they checking my background, viewing me now as a possible suspect? Had they gone further? Was I under surveillance even as I sat here getting drunker and drunker?
Paranoid thoughts were suddenly swarming through my brain like steamers on a tube train. There seemed no end to them, and no way to escape the strength-sapping fear they generated. I’d never had a panic attack before, but I could feel one coming on.
I filled the brandy glass again and found another can of Heineken in the fridge. I drank the one, then took a long gulp from the other. I tried to imagine what it felt like to take a knife in the gut. I’d read somewhere once that it was like being hit with a cricket bat, except twice as bad. I got the feeling it was plenty worse than that, especially when you were being held in a vice-like grip by someone you’d never met before and the one doing the knifing was your employer, someone you knew and trusted. Christ, I hated myself; for just a few seconds, I truly hated myself. I was no amoral bastard who didn’t give a fuck about his actions. I felt guilty. I knew I’d done wrong, I really did, and that was what was getting to me.
At some point the drink hit me hard. Cricket-bat hard. I came over very tired and knew I was going to have to lie down. In a way, it was a relief. I lay back on the sofa and let the weariness wash over me, finally ridding my mind of its demons.
I don’t know for how long I slept. Maybe a couple of hours, something like that. I needed it anyway, however long it was.
I was woken by the sound of the phone ringing. It was pitch black in the room and I could hear the rain coming down outside. My mouth was desert-scrub dry and I had a headache, a result of the fact that I’m not used to drinking brandy during the day. I closed my eyes again and waited for the call to go to answerphone.
It was Malik. I picked up as he was starting to leave a message.
‘You sound in a bad way, Sarge,’ he told me in a manner that was far too cheery for my liking.
‘I’ve been asleep. You woke me up.’
He started to apologize but I told him not to worry. ‘I needed to wake up anyway.’ I yawned. ‘Where are you phoning from?’
‘The station.’
‘What are you doing down there? It’s your day off.’
‘Just doing a little bit of overtime.’
‘Very conscientious.’ And sensible too, now that he was on the verge of promotion. It was important to show enthusiasm while you could still manage it. ‘So, what can I do for you on this shitty, wet evening?’
‘We’ve found the murder weapon in the Mark Wells case.’
I was suddenly more interested. ‘Oh yeah? Where was it?’
‘In a park not far from Wells’s flat. It was in some bushes. A kid looking for his football found it.’
‘Prints?’
‘No, but you can’t have everything, can you? It’s definitely the weapon that killed her. A butcher’s knife with a ten-inch blade. It’s got her blood all over it.’
‘How do we know it belongs to him?’
‘He threatened people with a very similar knife on two separate occasions in the weeks before the murder. It’s his knife, Sarge. It’s definitely his.’
‘Shit.’ And, you know, I still wasn’t convinced.
‘They’re doing a load of other tests on it as well. Just in case he left any DNA traces.’
‘I’m glad that bastard’s going down. That’ll teach him to hit me.’
‘And that’s not the only thing. Wells’s brief came in today.’
‘He’s recovered from his injuries, has he?’
‘No, it’s a different one now. He sacked the other guy. Anyway, he comes in and says that Wells has been thinking about this business of the shirt and he reckons he did own a shirt like the one we found once, but that he gave it away a long time back.’
‘He gave away his shirt? Who the hell does that?’
‘Yeah, and get this. He reckons he gave it to one of his girls.’
‘Which one?’
‘Well, that’s the thing. He said he gave it to Molly Hagger.’
We both agreed that this sort of story wasn’t going to get Mark Wells very far in court, especially as, conveniently, the person he’d supposedly given it to had disappeared into thin air. I wasn’t entirely sure whether this new information cemented the case against him or not. The fact that I’d only just woken up, having not long consumed nearly half a bottle of brandy mixed with beer, didn’t make matters any easier.
‘Have you seen Carla Graham yet?’ he asked.
‘No, not yet.’ I resisted the urge to tell him I’d made an appointment with her. ‘I don’t suppose I’ll bother now. It doesn’t look like there’s much doubt it’s Wells, and there’s no point raking up stuff that’s got nothing to do with the murder.’
‘It’d be interesting to see why she lied.’
‘Yeah. Maybe I’ll ask her if I ever run into her again.’
The conversation moved on to other things, all of them brutal. Malik told me that we had another possible murder inquiry on our hands. An eighty-one-year-old lady had held on to her handbag after a gang of young muggers had decided to relieve her of it, and had fallen on her head during the struggle. She was now in intensive care and the doctors were doubtful she’d pull through. Two people had been glassed the previous night in a pub fight, and one was going to lose his eye. One arrest: a nineteen-year-old who was already on bail for another assault. I recognized the name but couldn’t picture his face. Three more suspects were still at large.
I asked Malik about the Traveller’s Rest case. Had he spoken to his mate about it again? He said he hadn’t, and laughingly told me that the e-fit bore a startling resemblance to my face.
‘Do you think so?’ I asked him.
‘What? Don’t you?’ He said it in a manner that suggested he couldn’t believe I couldn’t see it.
I reluctantly agreed that there were similarities, but assured him I’d had nothing to do with it. ‘But if you don’t see me Monday, it means I’ve fled the country.’
‘Somehow I think I’ll be seeing you Monday, Sarge.’
I told him he didn’t have to call me that any more, not now he was a DS.
‘Oh yeah, I suppose I don’t. See you Monday then, Dennis.’
I think I preferred Sarge.
I said my goodbyes and rang off. I
t was almost six o’clock, and I had nothing to do. I don’t really have many friends, as such. It doesn’t usually bother me. I’m not the sort to get bored. I work fairly long hours and I don’t mind my own company. But tonight I didn’t feel right. I wished there was someone I could talk to about my predicament, though Christ knows what I’d say. That I was a part-time professional killer as well as a copper; that I’d murdered more people in the past week than some self-respecting serial killers manage in the whole of their wicked careers; and how things were now spiralling out of control and my life was in danger. I’m not sure I’d have got much in the way of sympathy. I certainly didn’t deserve any.
I’d bought myself some more of that creamy prawn risotto, so I made that for my supper, and washed it down with a couple of glasses of sparkling mineral water. Then I had a long shower, cleaned my teeth, and put some fresh clothes on.
In the end, I didn’t bother going anywhere. It was raining too hard, although on the weather forecast they said it wouldn’t last. Apparently a cold spell from Siberia was on the way. Nice. Die Hard 2 was on one of the Sky movie channels so I watched that for a while, glugging steadily on a bottle of red wine until I finally fell asleep at about the time the evil South American dictator murders his guards.
I’d seen it twice before, so I wasn’t worried. I knew he’d get his comeuppance and Bruce Willis would see that justice was done, just like a true copper should, not by following a load of bureaucratic rules and resigning himself to remaining a shitty little cog in a large and inefficient machine, but by bypassing the courts, the probation service and the prisons – those eternal obstacles to true punishment – and just blowing the heads off the baddies instead.
Which, if you’re honest with yourself, is much the best way.
22
Danny phoned just after midnight, as I was emptying the ashtray into the bin in the kitchen. I thought about letting it go to answerphone but, given the circumstances, anyone phoning was probably worth talking to, and I picked up after the third ring.
I was disappointed to hear his voice, and the obvious fear in it.
‘Dennis?’
‘Danny. What is it? I thought you’d taken my advice and taken off for a bit.’
‘Look, I saw the picture—’
‘Careful what you say, Danny,’ I said firmly. ‘If you want to talk, do what we did last time, OK?’
‘I’m scared, Dennis. Really fucking scared. And this time I’m not exaggerating. I’ve booked a flight, right, like you said. I’m off to Montego Bay tomorrow on the eleven-thirty flight out of Gatwick . . .’ His words were tumbling out. I stepped in to interrupt him again, fearful he was going to say something stupid, but he was determined to speak. ‘But I was out tonight, down the pub for a quick drink, and I was on the way home just now and this car pulls up outside my flat with these two blokes in it. They slow right down, and clock me, and then one of them reaches down to pick something up.’
‘All right, all right. Where are you now?’
‘I’m at home. As soon as I saw them I was down the steps like shit off a stick. I got the key in the lock just as one of the blokes appeared at the top of the steps. He had something in his hand. I think it was a gun or something. I just turned the key, ran inside and double-locked the door behind me.’
‘Has he gone, this bloke?’
‘Yeah, yeah. I think so.’
‘And you’re pretty sure it was a gun he was carrying?’ I was conscious that someone could be listening in to this call, but I knew I was never going to get him to a payphone now.
‘It looked like it, yeah. He had a long coat on and he had one hand in his pocket. He was pulling something out of it. I thought it was a gun.’
‘But you didn’t see for sure?’
‘No, but I’m not fucking around, Dennis. This bloke was after me. I’d bet my fucking life on it.’
‘OK, calm down. What did he look like?’
‘I didn’t get much of a look. It was dark and I was trying to get away. He was dark-skinned—’
‘Asian?’
‘No, more Mediterranean or Arab.’
‘And you’d never seen him before?’
‘No, never.’
‘How old?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe thirty.’
I tried to collect my thoughts for a moment. ‘All right. Stay put. Make sure all the locks are shut on the doors and windows.’
‘They are. I’ve done all that.’
‘Good. I doubt if they’ll hang around, whoever they are. No point getting people’s suspicions up. All you need to do is stay put tonight, and catch that plane tomorrow. Just keep your wits about you when you leave the flat.’
‘Who do you think they were, Dennis? Anything to do—’
‘I told you,’ I snapped, ‘careful what you say. To be honest with you, they could be anyone. There are enough fucking criminals about. I can vouch for that. They may just have been opportunistic robbers.’
‘No. They were definitely after me.’
‘Well, whoever they are, they didn’t get you, so keep calm. And remember, tomorrow night you’ll be sitting on a beach sipping cocktails, away from all this shit and knowing that everyone’ll have forgotten about it by the time you get back.’
‘Look, Dennis. Can you come over? Just to check things are all right? You know, I’d appreciate it. It’s just that I’m on my fucking own here.’
I sighed. ‘Danny, it’s gone midnight and I’ve drunk enough to sink a fucking battleship. I doubt if I’d be in a position even to find your place—’
‘I’ll pay for a taxi, don’t worry about that.’
‘Come on, what is this? You’ll be all right. They’ll be gone now, I guarantee it. And if you hear anything later, anyone trying to break in, just dial nine-nine-nine. Seriously, it’ll be OK.’
Now it was Danny’s turn to sigh. ‘OK. OK, I’ll do that. I just wanted to run it by you, that’s all. If I’m in danger, then you’re going to be too. Maybe you ought to think about a holiday as well.’
‘Maybe I will. Perhaps I’ll join you on the beach at Montego Bay in a few days. Look, take care, eh? And call me when you get back.’
‘No problem,’ he said, which were the last words he ever uttered to me. For all I know, they could have been the last words he ever uttered, full stop.
I hung up and walked over to the window, looking out across the quiet, rain-swept street. Nothing and no one moved down there. Part of me felt guilty that I hadn’t gone over to see him, but what could I have done? The advice I’d given him was as good as he was going to get, and I genuinely didn’t believe he was in any danger, not now that he was safely inside his flat.
At the same time, however, I think I already knew his experience had been more than a simple street robbery. It was just that I didn’t want to admit it to myself. Because, as he pointed out, if they were after him then, for all Raymond’s protestations to the contrary, it meant they were almost certainly coming for me next.
23
At half past ten the following morning, I phoned Danny and got his answerphone. I didn’t leave a message. I tried him on his mobile but it was switched off. I tried both numbers again an hour later, and again got no answer. In the cold light of day, I decided that he’d got off all right and was now thirty thousand feet above the Atlantic heading for the sunny Caribbean.
At a quarter to twelve, I went out and got some breakfast at a café I know on Caledonian Road, trying hard to forget my many troubles.
Carla Graham lived on the top floor of an attractive white-brick Edwardian townhouse set in a narrow cul-de-sac that had too many cars parked along it. I paid the sullen-faced cab driver a twenty and wasn’t offered any change so, rather than argue, I left it at that and walked up the steps to the front door.
It was five to eight, and the night was cold and clear with an icy wind that found its way right through to the bones. There was a flashy-looking video entry system and I rang the buzzer for number 24
C. After a few seconds, Carla’s voice came over the intercom.
‘Hello, Dennis,’ she said, sounding not too displeased that I’d made it.
I smiled up at the camera and said hello, and she told me to come straight up the stairs to the third floor. The imposing-looking front door clicked open and I stepped gratefully inside. It locked automatically behind me.
She was waiting for me at the top of the stairs with the door open behind her. Although only casually dressed in a black sweatshirt and track-pants, she still looked close to stunning. It was something in the way she carried herself. Hers was a natural beauty, the sort you can tell looks just as good at six a.m. as it does at six p.m. Her hair looked recently washed, and once again I noticed a light aroma of perfume as we shook hands. What she was doing in the grim and worthy world of social work remained as much a mystery as ever.
‘Please come in,’ she said with a smile, and led me inside, through the hallway and into the lounge. ‘Take a seat.’ She waved her arm, indicating that I could park myself anywhere.
It was a sumptuous room with high ceilings and big bay windows that gave it an airy feel, even on a cold winter’s night like this one. The floor was polished wood and partially covered with thick Persian rugs. All the furnishings were obviously expensive yet tasteful, and the walls were painted in a light, pastelly green that shouldn’t have suited it but somehow did. Normally I wouldn’t have noticed any of this, or very little of it anyway, but this was the type of room that demanded attention.
‘This is very nice,’ I said. ‘Maybe you should have been an interior designer.’
‘It’s one of my hobbies,’ she said. ‘It’s a lot of work, and it costs a bit of money, but it’s worth it. Now, what do you want to drink?’
The Business Of Dying Page 18