One Deathless Hour (David Mallin Detective series Book 16)

by Roger Ormerod

  I might have guessed. A uniformed constable strolled over as I got out of the car. ‘Can I help you, sir?’

  Desperation measures. I said: ‘Have you got a canteen?’

  He smiled. ‘For authorized personnel only.’

  So I was beaten. Softly the same dull thunder of sound came from behind the solid door up the flight of steps.

  ‘How do I get into the multi-storey?’

  ‘Out the way you came, left, left again, and you can’t miss it.’

  He was right. I parked the Porsche in the vast, open spaces of it, found the stairs and walked down into the shopping precinct. A paper-shop was open, so was a café and the bowling-alley.

  I got a sandwich and a cup of tea at the café, then went to investigate the bowling-alley. The intention there was to confirm that the solid door led from the bowling-alley and therefore might provide access to the police car-park. I was a little thin on inspiration.

  Noise flowed over me. I have never been attracted to this pastime, mainly because of the thunderous rumble of the rolling bowls and the crash of their impact at the end. They had a café there too, but it didn’t look encouraging, a counter with a surround to the murky hole behind it. Even the patrons treated it with contempt, standing in denim stupor with their backs to the hairy character who guarded its mysteries. A skirt or two was visible, but mainly they were an indeterminate phalanx in pale blue jeans. A denim jungle. Three alleys were in use. At the far end the skittles stood in hooded light, beyond which there was a lot of shadow. In this shadow, I guessed, was the solid door.

  As inconspicuously as I could I moved along one wall. I must, I realized, in slacks and a light jacket, have stood out as an alien. But I didn’t look round. My eyes were on the far corner and already I could see that there was indeed a door where I had deduced there should be.

  Now I was opposite the ranks of skittles. The roar and crash of the impacts was deafening. The door was painted red, on it the white legend: EMERGENCY EXIT. It had a push bar to its lock.

  I had no intention of investigating beyond it at that point. I merely rested my hand on the bar.

  A voice behind me said: ‘Going somewhere, Mr Mallin?’

  I turned slowly. Det. Cons. Miller stood in proud array of soiled denim jeans and a denim jacket over a T-shirt bearing a union jack. His battledress for the social conflict? Or was he on duty? He was hefting one of the bowls in his right palm. I wondered how much it weighed, never having handled one.

  ‘Looking around,’ I murmured.

  ‘For places to be thrown from?’

  They were closing ranks behind him. Now I could detect which were female, the ones with eyes sunk in shadowed recesses, from which the eyelashes groped spikily for the light. Whatever sex, they were uniformly not pleased to see me.

  ‘I was just leaving.’

  Then I saw him. He was tall — notice how tall they all are, these days! — tall and thin, shoulders stooped, long solemn face surrounded by massed, untidy blond hair. The tip of his left ear-lobe was missing and looked painful.

  ‘Heh!’ I shouted. I took a step forward.

  Miller dropped the bowl on my toe. It was as heavy as it looked. When I’d stopped dancing I saw that the mournful youth had gone. There was a scuffle at the far end and a door crashed shut. Miller stood in front of me, grinning.

  I turned from him and threw myself at the push bar. The door flew open and I almost fell down the steps just beyond it. As I’d anticipated, this was the police domain, the same copper there.

  ‘Lost your way, sir?’

  I galloped past him, left foot dragging, and up their underpass, then round into the precinct. But of course I was too late. I stood, staring in each direction, and then, from behind and above me, I heard the unmistakable sound of someone revving unsuccessfully at a motor-cycle self-starter. I stumbled up the stairs, hauling myself with a hand on the tubular iron rail. When I was three quarters of the way up, the engine fired, a side-stand clashed up, a clutch was engaged too fiercely and the engine stalled. Panting, I forced myself on faster. Six steps from the top and it caught again. The engine note settled and I burst out onto the floor where I’d left the Porsche.

  A phalanx of bikes were parked against the far wall, leaning like ranks of trees in a wind. As I paused one of them shot free, a big four-cylinder job, weaving with the power pouring into the rear wheel. I had to leap back. He’d had time to throw on a short leather jacket with studs and badges, and his spaceman helmet.

  I charged over to the Porsche, my keys in my hand. I’d forgotten my foot. The engine fired at a touch and I flicked it out in reverse. Then I ran it down the curved ramp so fast that I nearly took away the barrier, which was on automatic because parking was free on Sundays. It scraped the roof as I swerved through.

  The bike was a mere dot. I settled down to reduce the gap.

  I can match most vehicles on the road in that car, but a high-powered bike can lose me if the rider knows what he’s doing. He didn’t, because he headed through town and he hadn’t the nerve to crash the reds. I was soon within striking distance.

  He was taking the road I already knew, up towards Abbott’s place. When we broke through the traffic-lights the advantage became his and apart from an island, which he took too wide, I couldn’t seem to reduce the gap. But our speed was mounting. On one of the corners he was soon going to make a mistake, or so I told myself. He was riding on the back of his twin-seat and his line through the corners was becoming neater. The road surface was good and I began to lose confidence.

  I swept round a corner, piling the power on for a controlled drift and I realized that the black dot was becoming larger. Then I saw that he’d turned and was heading back towards me. I eased the throttle. He seemed to be on my side of the road.

  I maintained a steady line. We were on an extended straight stretch with a wide expanse of grass stretching out on the right and disappearing under trees. At my left was a fence, too close to the road for comfort. I began to realize that I might need all the space I could find on my left. Now, with my throttle almost at tickover point, I could hear the rising howl of his engine as he hurtled straight at me.

  The arrogance of youth! I cursed him. This was a self-opinionated oaf who had to prove his superiority. Now it was a trial of nerves. His weak chin would be jutting against the padded guard, his eyes probably cold with hatred for everything I represented — maturity, possessions and a place in life.

  I kept moving. There wasn’t anywhere I could go. If I stopped he’d still be there, a growing, terrifying projectile, aimed between my eyes. He’d swerve. At the last possible second he would do that, provided he gauged it correctly. At eighty, that takes a lot of experience. He hadn’t had it. He’d left it …

  Then he was leaning over in a forced banked swerve and his tyres must have skimmed mine by an inch or two. The exhausts blatted in my ears and he was gone.

  Cursing, I did a fast circle over the grass and set out after him again. He had disappeared round a far corner in a puff of exhaust smoke on the change down. I pressed the car. I was furious that he’d shaken me.

  Then I saw him again and, blast him, he was having another go. Perhaps two inches wasn’t close enough for him and perhaps he realized that this time I’d got the grass verge to swerve onto when my nerve went. What he didn’t realize was that my maturity and responsibility weren’t holding out. My place in life, just at that moment, was my half of the road, at fifty. Probably my own inadequate chin was jutting.

  This time I was going to do nothing. Keep going at a steady speed and to hell with him. This time his engine note rose in an even shriller scream. I might not have been there. Rapidly, growing in my blurring vision, he came on and I knew, suddenly, that it was my turn to swerve. It was a game I hadn’t played before. We took turns, did we? It was too late to decide. I braked solid, whirled my wheel to the left and spun from the road, the car heaving up on two wheels as we settled. They then thumped down onto the grass and all was
still.

  There was no disappearing engine note. He’d cracked at the exact second that I had, deciding that the grass stretch was the best bet. I couldn’t see how he’d missed me. The bike was over by the trees, with ploughed and chopped turf indicating its progress. The wheels were spinning, but the engine had stopped. The rider was crouched beside it, on hands and knees.

  Shaking, I got out of the car and ran over towards him. He was getting to his feet, a little stiffly perhaps, but all the bones appeared to be intact. Arms too, because he could reach up and unfasten his crash hat, lift it off and shake free a watershed of chestnut hair.

  It was a girl.

  She was smiling at me with sharp, naked teeth, her eyes painted pools and her mouth smeared the colour of dried blood.

  I glanced at her bike. ‘You switched!’ I said accusingly.

  ‘Len does it better,’ she conceded with forced tolerance.

  ‘The one with no ear-lobe?’

  ‘He’s my feller,’ she said. Then she passed out.

  I bent over her. Her mouth was stark against a dead-white face. I tried her pulse. Steady, but fast. The car was ten yards back. I got hands under her knees and shoulders and hoisted. She was heavier than she looked. Good bones, she had. Well covered too. I got her to the car. It wasn’t easy levering her into the seat.

  I had noticed that we’d passed the Abbotts’ only a mile back and in the circumstances it seemed the best place to head. It took me two minutes and she had not stirred. The Morris Minor was not in the drive, so Abbott was not back, which could make it difficult. Bella had not struck me as being level-headed.

  I rang the bell, bracing myself for a bout of hysteria. She opened the door. At first there was a startled look, her eyes going at once past my shoulder — the glance of the nervous, any unexpected caller being assumed to be the bearer of tragic news.

  ‘Victor … ’

  ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Abbott, but there’s been an accident … no, not your husband. A young lady. If I could bring her in …’

  ‘Oh yes, yes.’ She thrust me away from her, on my heels, anxious to lose no time. ‘Where is she?’

  I opened the car door. She gave a short gasp of distress.

  ‘She does look poorly. Bring her in. What happened?’

  ‘She fell off her motorbike.’

  It was even worse getting her out. I staggered. Mrs Abbott retreated backwards in front of me.

  ‘If they will ride those things … It’s not a very feminine thing to do, I’ve always thought. Careful over the step, now. Better bring her in here. Oh, the poor dear! On the settee, I think. There … gently. She is a big girl, isn’t she!’

  She stood beside me as I panted, unable to speak for the moment. Her hands were locked together against the apron she was wearing. We both stared down at Len’s young woman.

  ‘I’ll phone the doctor,’ Bella suggested. ‘An ambulance …’

  ‘No,’ I gasped. ‘I don’t think … there’s anything seriously wrong, not from the way she moved. It’ll be shock.’

  ‘Do you think so?’ Her face was turned and tilted, examining my expression intently to judge my sincerity. Her dependence on my judgment was absolute.

  ‘She’ll come round in a minute.’

  I bent and patted her cheek. Her nostrils flared. Her lips moved in a tiny whisper.

  ‘Brandy?’ I asked quietly.

  ‘Oh yes … ’ There was a gentle flutter, then Bella’s voice was firm. ‘I’ll get some.’

  The girl had just about recovered by the time Bella returned. I was crouched beside the settee, her beautiful soft hair on my arm, watching her eyes flutter open. Bella spoke from behind me.

  ‘Don’t startle her.’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘She’ll see nothing but your face.’

  I drew back, glanced at her. She was absolutely serious, her face solemn, perhaps only a hint of humour behind her eyes.

  I took the glass from her and put it to the girl’s lips. She coughed. A brown smear of lipstick clung to the glass. She opened her eyes fully.

  ‘We should,’ decided Bella quietly, ‘have run a wet flannel over her face, while she slept.’

  The girl’s lips opened. ‘You leave my soddin’ face alone.’

  I stood. The voice had been coarse, a metallic tang to it, as though she’d been sucking a coin. The dimple deepened in her chin.

  ‘You’re going to kill yourself one of these days,’ I said.

  She stretched like a great cat and there was a flash of white from those feral teeth. ‘So what? You gotta live. What else is there?’

  I grinned at her. I understood the bravado. You cocked a double finger at the world and also at the worst it could throw at you — including death. But perhaps death, for these youngsters, was not the worst.

  ‘That’s a wicked thing to say,’ said Bella severely.

  The girl made a sound very close to a snarl and moved one hand in disgust. She appeared to be quite recovered, but disinclined to move. I thrust the glass in her hand and stepped back. There seemed a chance she’d throw it in my face, but she simply stared past it with contempt.

  ‘You ’an your brandy and your bleedin’ condescension! And you don’t even know what it’s all about. Or you think it’s about something, when it don’t mean nothin’ at all. What’s it matter if I killed myself? It’d be better, would it, if I lived a bit longer and died in a bloody fire or somethin’? Or a bit longer still and picked up pneumonia wi’ me pension?’ She shrugged. ‘Nah! It ain’t when y’ go that matters, it’s how.’

  ‘What a thing to say!’ cried Bella. ‘You come into my house and say … say …’

  But she wasn’t sure what the girl had said. I thought I understood a little better. I’d seen it around and brushed against it, the despair, the total lack of any foreseeable future, not a sight of any useful purpose or direction to their existence. They lacked personal identity and the horror of it invaded them. And all they had to offer against it was the same thing that in the end had always fought its way to the fore — guts. They opposed with aggression and violent pride, not yet mature enough to control it. It was all they had to hold onto, a thread. Snap the thread and they’d be in chaos.

  ‘I want to meet your friend,’ I said. ‘Len, was it?’

  Her eyes retreated. ‘He ain’t got nothin’ to say.’

  ‘I’d like to hear that from him.’

  ‘He’d spit in your eye first.’

  ‘He’s not so tough. Otherwise, why’d he clear off and leave it to a mere girl … ’

  Her feet came round to the floor. I’d inflicted the double insult, to her feller and to herself. She spat at me.

  ‘Bastard!’

  ‘Language!’ Bella appealed.

  But I realized that this girl was exercising great control. Get her started on her normal mode of speech and her adjectives would scorch the upholstery.

  ‘What’s your name?’ I asked.

  ‘Natasha,’ she said derisively. ‘Nackarova to you.’ Which seemed to amuse her.

  ‘Come on, Natasha, I’ll take you home.’

  ‘Take me back to the bike, buster.’

  ‘It’s probably scrap.’

  ‘It ain’t, then,’ said a voice behind me and when I turned he was standing in the doorway, complete with half an ear-lobe. The other one, his right, I was interested to see, was adorned with an ear-ring, a sleeper, I think they’re called.

  Our mode of entry into the house had necessarily meant leaving the front door open. He stood, now, with his legs apart, firmly on the balls of his feet, not quite managing the insolence he was clearly aiming for.

  ‘Comin’, kid?’ he asked. ‘I’ll run you back.’

  She laughed and got to her feet.

  ‘I want a word with you,’ I said.

  They ignored me completely. She strolled over to the door and he barely moved to allow her to thrust past him. He eyed me up and down, expressing contempt.

  Bella moved at
my shoulder. ‘This is him?’

  ‘I think so. Look at his ear.’

  ‘Young man!’ Her voice was crisp. ‘We helped your girl …’

  He sketched a brief gesture of thanks, grinning.

  ‘Now we need your help,’ she said simply.

  ‘Life’s short.’

  ‘Help for my husband.’

  ‘That crazy moron!’

  ‘So it’s true,’ I said quickly.

  He lifted one shoulder, poised now to leave. ‘Sure he’s crazy.’

  ‘You know what I mean.’ I could feel he was aware of the pressure. In a second I’d lose him. ‘You must have met him at a bad time.’

  ‘Never met him.’ His voice was dull. ‘Just heard he was crazy.’

  ‘Oh, come on. You know what happened on Tuesday. There was a shooting — a murder. Mr Abbott might need an alibi and you could be it.’ I watched his impassive face and appealed to his rejection of authority. ‘Or maybe the pigs’ll get him.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘You were there at nine.’

  ‘Nah!’ His tone was violent.

  ‘He’s explained how you lost the tip of your ear.’

  ‘He don’t know.’

  ‘But he does. Wait here and he’ll recognize you.’

  ‘He’s never seen me.’

  ‘Then how did you get that wound, laddie?’

  He hesitated. He moved his head. ‘Go’n wait with the bike, kid.’ She’d been hovering in the hall. He waited a moment, then slid a foot towards us, tentatively, wary of a trap.

  ‘I’ll tell yer. Din’ want you to be all jealous-like. Too busy fightin’ ’em off already. The guys. All got their eyes on her, they have. Have to keep fightin’ ’em off.’

  ‘Which is why you needed a gun?’ I asked solemnly.

  ‘Don’t get cute wi’ me, buster. I’m telling yer, ain’t I! That kid out there, she’s somethin’, mister. Get her goin’ and she moves. You know? She burns, she … Christ, pop, don’t look at me like that. She’s got it where it matters and she can hand it out …’