Roofworld

by Christopher Fowler

  ‘I’ll have a go. I’ll slash the base of the trachea and have a root about.’

  Hargreave smiled cheerfully at Butterworth, who looked up just in time to see Finch absently put the end of his biro in his mouth. He suddenly felt terribly sick.

  ‘Thank you, Mr Finch. In other words, you couldn’t find a more thoroughly pulped piece of meat if you bought it from McDonald’s in a bun. So, my good friends Longbright and Butterworth, thoughts and conclusions…’

  ‘Were there any signs to indicate that he’d been murdered on the ground?’

  ‘Good point, Janice. No, we can assume that the blood on the pavement fell from the body after it had been placed on top of the clock. Large splatters, dropping from a considerable height.’

  ‘So it’s the same as the others. Killed from above?’

  ‘It would seem so.’ Hargreave rounded on Butterworth with a smile that had now assumed grisly proportions. ‘Which brings me to the reason for dragging you away from your bunny-rabbit nightlight, Butterworth, and out into the unkind neon of the morgue.’

  Butterworth gave Hargreave an odd look. He could sense that the game was afoot and that the chief was starting to ride high on the adrenaline of the hunt. Suddenly he had a horrible feeling that he would be asked to do something challenging and possibly injurious to his health. He looked first at Janice, then eyed his boss with nervous suspicion. They walked out in the corridor to the coffee machine and Butterworth swallowed mouthfuls of the scalding liquid in an effort to remove the sickly chemical smell of the morgue from his head.

  ‘The word is out in the West End,’ said Hargreave, peering over the top of his plastic cup at the now yellow-faced detective constable. ‘Our men are picking up a buzz from the pubs and the arcades and the snooker halls. Everybody and his dog seems to know that something bad is going to happen before the end of the week, but nobody—nobody—is willing to say what that event is, or how many deaths it might entail. So what have we got on our hands here? An approaching massacre? Torching a dodgy drinking club, or having a knife fight in a Chinese restaurant, that’s gang warfare. But what do you call torturing people to death and mounting them on public buildings? What are we supposed to conclude from this, eh?’

  He drained his cup and tossed it into a nearby fire-bucket. ‘Perhaps we have a gang of renegade architects on our hands. To hell with post-modernism, let’s give the city a medieval look. Or it might be,’ he wagged his finger at Butterworth, ‘it might be tied up with our mysterious rooftop sightings. Come on, my son.’ He threw a paternal arm around Butterworth, who tried hard not to flinch. ‘We’re going to be up all night. That way, we won’t be accused of napping on the job if something does start to happen. If we start to fall asleep we’ll take some of Janice’s diet pills. They work wonders. Let’s start with a visit to the computer room.’

  As they trotted up the steps of the morgue and out into the bleak night air, Hargreave winked at Janice before turning nimbly to Butterworth and clapping him on the shoulders. ‘You have been chosen to help me in this adventure for two very good reasons,’ he said. ‘Firstly, so that you may get a chance to prove to your father what an excellent detective you will make one day.’ And here he stopped, becoming lost in thought as he walked.

  ‘And the second?’ prompted Butterworth.

  Hargreave looked up, distracted. ‘Oh, it’s the baby face.’ He circled a finger in the air. ‘For some reason it looks as if you missed puberty. If we get any leads, we’ll be able to send you up there with ’em. Don’t worry, you’ll have Janice here and me to protect you. Learn to think of us as your extra mummy and daddy.’

  Beyond the black rooftops of the sleeping city, stars glimmered faintly in the crystalline night air. Below in the morgue, Nick’s earthly remains were sealed back in their drawer to await the heartless ravages of Finch’s scalpel.

  And Butterworth’s face turned an interesting shade of kipper once more as he obediently followed his boss back to headquarters.

  Chapter 25

  Trash

  The empty grey eyes stared straight ahead, interested in nothing and no one. Slowly the lips parted to reveal neat ivory teeth and the mouth curved up in a broad mirthless grin. The face was bland and bloodless and conscience-free, the features set in a square and even fashion which prevented even the slightest sensation from showing through. It was the face of a man who would watch you die without feeling a flicker of emotion….

  Suddenly Robert was awake. He sat up and looked at the clock on the bedside table. Unsurprisingly, he had overslept. Beyond the confines of the duvet, the flat was bitterly cold. Presumably the boiler was misbehaving again. He climbed out of bed and into his dressing-gown just as the telephone began to ring.

  ‘Robert, are you awake?’ The voice was one which had grown all too familiar in the past forty-eight hours.

  ‘Christ, Rose, don’t you ever sleep? Leave me alone for a few hours. The boiler’s on the blink. It’s like Alaska in here. I’m going back to bed before I get hypothermia.’ Robert pulled open a curtain. The sky beyond the pane was heavy with low cloud, the colour of dead ash.

  ‘You can’t go back to bed. I’ve found her address. The woman who took away Charlotte’s belongings.’

  ‘Well, why don’t you go around there? Let me know how you get on. I’ll just be here chipping the cat out of his basket.’

  ‘Hey, I thought you were the one who wanted to write the screenplay.’

  ‘And wind up dead like Charlotte. Yeah, I did say that, didn’t I? But you can’t write with frostbite. So I’m going back to bed now. ’Bye.’ Robert replaced the receiver and crawled back beneath the quilt.

  Twenty minutes later there was a knock at the door. He stumbled into the hall, unlocked the burglar bolts and before he had time to focus his eyes Rose was inside. She was wearing a black denim jumpsuit which had deep pockets full of spanners and screwdrivers.

  ‘You see, in order to manage my apartment block properly,’ she said, as if there had been no interruption in their conversation, ‘I have to know all there is to know about the workings of the central heating system, including the boilers. You go and make coffee—I’ll do the rest.’

  Too exhausted to argue, Robert bumbled off into the kitchen.

  Rose had a habit of making him feel so damned inadequate. Robert’s lack of practicality had always bothered him. His father, the most empirical of men, had always mocked his efforts when he had tried to win a little admiration and affection. He had eventually given up attempting to emulate the old man and had been forced to face up to the fact that pragmatism was not in his nature.

  As he was setting the steaming cups down on the kitchen table, Rose came through and washed her hands at the sink.

  ‘Heat’s on,’ she said with a smile. ‘Your diverter switch was jammed. You need to get the whole system drained down and descaled. They haven’t been making boilers like that since Rod Stewart was popular.’

  ‘I’d like to know who Zalian’s at war with,’ said Robert, launching an extreme change of subject.

  ‘Presumably we’ll find that out from the other notebook. You realize that he’s using us to find it?’

  ‘True, but you stand a better chance of recovering it than he does. You’ve already met the woman. Where does she live?’

  ‘Other side of the river. Greenwich. You think they’re watching us?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Zalian’s men.’

  ‘I don’t know. I’m more concerned about his enemies.’ Robert watched Rose as she drank her coffee. There was a surprisingly delicate grace in her movements. Yesterday she had travelled among the rooftops like a high-wire artist, cat-like and confident. He couldn’t have said the same for himself….

  ‘They only seem to move about at night. It’s probably too risky during the day. They’d be seen from the ground. Besides, we’re safe over in Greenwich. It’s not like the centre of town—the roads are wider and the buildings are lower. There’s nowhere for them to hi
de.’

  ‘Even so,’ said Robert, ‘let’s try to avoid alleyways this time.’

  —

  They alighted from the bus outside the east entrance to the National Maritime Museum and consulted the slip of paper Rose had in her purse. The soft grey mist from the parklands beyond had moved down into the surrounding streets and hung hazily about them.

  ‘She must have money, living here,’ said Robert. ‘Look at these houses.’ The terraced Georgian properties lining the street were immaculately maintained. Reproduction Victorian interiors glistened behind each window. Every house was fitted with a burglar alarm.

  ‘I bet there’s not a single chip shop around here,’ said Rose. ‘I know what these yuppie areas are like. They’re all right if you need a fluted Edwardian grate in a hurry, but try to buy a decent flip-top bin….’

  The doorbell of number forty-three chimed melodiously as Rose stepped back from the front door and hastily smoothed out her jumpsuit, as if it would make the slightest bit of difference to her appearance. Robert glanced at her and smiled. She looked like a sexy car mechanic.

  The elderly man who came to open the door looked at them with all the mistrust that the old have for the young.

  ‘I hope we’re not disturbing you,’ said Robert, stepping forward. ‘We’re looking for Mrs Russell.’

  ‘I am her husband.’

  ‘She’s related to a friend of ours,’ said Rose. Robert noted that she was making an attempt to refine her cockney accent. The resulting manner of speech was odd, but rather endearing, rather like Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins. ‘We wondered if it would be possible to speak to her for a few minutes.’

  ‘I’m afraid it wouldn’t,’ said the old man wearily. ‘Mrs Russell is in St Peter’s hospital.’

  ‘I’m very sorry to hear that,’ said Rose. ‘What’s wrong with her?’

  ‘She was attacked two nights ago. We don’t know by whom.’

  ‘I hope it’s not serious.’

  ‘Who knows, at her age? She had concussion, a broken arm, some cracked ribs. You’re not safe anywhere these days.’

  ‘Perhaps we could…’ began Robert, but Rose stamped on his foot. ‘Thank you for telling us, Mr Russell,’ she said. ‘I hope your wife is feeling better soon. Please let her know that Rose Leonard sends her best wishes.’

  ‘I’m going to see her later. I’ll tell her.’ The door closed.

  As they walked away from the house Robert hobbled, massaging his foot. ‘What did you have to do that for?’

  ‘You were about to ask if we could visit her, yes?’

  ‘So?’

  ‘What if he had said no? You could see how suspicious he was of us. It’ll be better if we find out the visiting times and go along there by ourselves.’

  ‘And what if we run into her husband?’

  ‘We’ll get there early and be gone before he arrives.’

  —

  The hospital ward was just about as inhospitable as such a place could be. The distant clip-clop of sensible shoes echoed between rows of great iron beds and bounced from the murky green wall tiles, stirring forgotten schoolday fears. In fact, the vast room was so spartan, so lacking in anything which could be defined in modern terms as comfortable that Florence Nightingale herself might have looked on and wished for a little more luxury.

  At first it surprised Robert that Mrs Russell had not opted for a private room. Then he remembered the haste with which she had stripped Charlotte Endsleigh’s belongings from her home and realized that they were not dealing with a generous woman.

  ‘Mrs Russell, do you remember me?’ Rose leaned forward over the bed. Visiting hours had just started and as yet few people had entered the ward. The old lady peered up at her from a valley of white linen and forced a smile. One eye was covered with a gauze patch. She looked in a bad way.

  ‘Rose.’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Is Teddy with you?’ Rose presumed Teddy to be her husband. She shook her head. ‘No, but I’m sure he’ll be along any minute now. Who did this to you?’

  ‘I’ve already talked to the police,’ she said in a voice that was little more than a croak. ‘It was skinheads, two of these skinheads. Like him.’ She pointed at Robert.

  ‘Oh, great,’ muttered Robert, ruffling his hair until it stood up. She was the second person this week to make a reference to his receding hairline.

  ‘Do you have any idea why you were attacked, Mrs Russell?’

  ‘I came out to empty the dustbin. They were outside, waiting. One of them hit me in the stomach.’

  ‘What about the other one? What did he do?’

  ‘Kept shouting.’

  ‘Do you remember what he was shouting about?’

  ‘I couldn’t understand him. He kept shouting in my face. Over and over…’

  ‘Then what happened?’

  ‘I hit him across the nose with my poker.’ Robert was forced to stifle a laugh. One up to the old broad. ‘I keep it just inside the door.’

  ‘That’s the way, Mrs Russell. We think we know what they were after. You remember collecting Charlotte’s belongings? Do you recall seeing a blue notebook?’

  The old lady turned her head aside. Rose could not tell whether she was thinking, or if she no longer wished to be reminded of the event. She persisted.

  ‘It looked like a school exercise book. It’s very important that you try to remember.’

  ‘That was it. I think that was what they were asking me about,’ she said softly. ‘There were a few things of Charlotte’s I didn’t keep. Bits of paper, nothing important.’

  ‘But a notebook. Think hard.’

  ‘I don’t know….If there was one, it’s gone now.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘When I opened the door. I was putting the rubbish out when they came at me. Throwing out the last of Charlotte’s papers. I had no use for them.’ The old lady appeared to be drifting off to sleep. Rose shot Robert a glance.

  ‘Mrs Russell, when does your rubbish get collected?’

  ‘What day is it?’ Her voice was faint and frail.

  ‘Thursday.’

  ‘Today. Gets collected today.’

  Rose and Robert nearly collided with a bewildered Teddy as they slid on the polished tiles at the end of the ward.

  —

  As they reached the corner of the old woman’s street, their worst fears were confirmed. They could hear the whine of the garbage truck and the hissing of pistons as its steel jaws closed over the contents of the neighbourhood’s bins and digested them. On the back step of the truck, the dustman shook a bin free of black plastic bags, newspapers and potato peelings and stepped back from the edge of the lowering teeth. It took a few seconds for them to realize that they were too late. Another dustman was just replacing two empty bins on the doorstep of number forty-three.

  ‘Wait!’ shouted Robert suddenly, launching himself after the truck as it began to move off down the road. ‘Don’t go yet!’

  The dustmen failed to hear him over the grinding of the compressor. A moment later, Rose looked on in horror as Robert vaulted the low barrier at the back of the truck and vanished into the garbage that was about to be pulped. Shouting, she ran after him as the truck continued on its way. The low whine of the compressor rose as the curved steel jaw started to descend. One dustman was leaning into the pulping area shouting obscenities while the other ran around to the front cabin.

  Robert was on his hands and knees, shovelling aside bundles of old magazines and squashy piles of rotten fruit. In the reeking mess below he could see what appeared to be a blue cover. He pulled at it, but the slime on his hands prevented him from getting a good grip. There were only seconds left. The whining sound above him reached a new pitch as the steel jaws suddenly began to descend much more quickly than he had anticipated.

  With one final desperate pull the book came free and he stumbled back towards the fresh air and the waiting arms of an irate dustman. His foot was caught.
The jaws of the compressor had closed over his heel and were tightening. Kicking wildly, he decided that the sacrifice of his shoe was better than losing his foot at the ankle.

  As they helped him out, the dustmen expressed their extreme annoyance. One of them uttered a phrase that was so colourful and original in its use of sexual imagery that Rose later wrote it down in her diary.

  ‘I’ve got the book!’ he said, running down the street ahead of Rose, which, considering what he had been wading about in, was the way she preferred it.

  ‘I thought I was going to die when you jumped into the trash,’ she called. ‘Don’t ever do anything like that again.’

  ‘Why, would you miss me?’

  Rose waved a hand in front of her face. ‘Right now, nobody could miss you,’ she said.

  They were walking across the broad stone piazza where the tea-clipper Cutty Sark sat in dry dock when they became aware that someone was following them. Two dark shapes had separated from the shadow of the ship and were closing in at a brisk pace.

  ‘Keep looking straight ahead,’ said Rose. ‘It’s probably nothing.’

  ‘They could be Zalian’s men,’ suggested Robert hopefully as he quickened his step.

  ‘No,’ said Rose. ‘Skinheads, two of them.’

  ‘Why didn’t they think of looking in her trash?’

  ‘Are you kidding? They’re skinheads. Come on.’ They rounded the vast black bow of the ship in the direction of the river’s edge. Behind them came the abrupt sound of running footsteps. Rose glanced over her shoulder.

  ‘Shit—Robert!’ she shouted, as he turned around and saw one of them drawing a razor-gun from the inside of his sweatshirt.

  ‘Down into the foot tunnel!’

  The curved glass dome housing the lift which descended to the foot tunnel beneath the river lay less than thirty yards ahead on their left. Rose reached it first. She did not wait for the enormous creaking lift to arrive, but galloped down the wide spiral staircase as fast as she could. Robert reached the entrance and slid over, the sole of his remaining shoe still slippery from the trash compressor. Picking himself up, he kicked it free and headed down the staircase as Dag and another of Chymes’ men, known as Reese, reached the top step.