Mud Pie

by Emma Lee Bole

  Chapter Seventeen

  Hugh

  The club felt different: naked, awkward and embarrassed. The week’s events had stripped it bare of bonhomie. Now it was just a ramshackle, mud-smelling brick box, almost empty, swallowing up the few hushed voices. Even the furniture seemed to turn its back. Not me, said the chairs and tables, not me, said the bar. You, said the kitchen, you with your bloody knives.

  I threw an armful of spuds in the rumbler and set it off just to have the company of the noise. I was determinedly counting plates when a voice spoke behind me.

  “So what’s on the menu today?”

  It was DS Grimshaw, elbows resting on the serving hatch.

  “What are you doing here?”

  He made an act of looking surprised. “Thought I’d come on down and see how things are.”

  “Are you on duty?” I said suspiciously.

  He shook his head. I didn’t believe him, despite his casual clothes. He looked good. Faded jeans, waxed leather boots, big brown jumper not unlike my Oxfam one, only not so ropy. Off duty, my foot. He was in camouflage. Come to pick us over, see what flesh remained on the bones of the club’s social life. Check who returned to the scene of the crime.

  “Do you play?” I challenged him.

  “I’ve played at centre for the police a few times. You’re thin on the ground today,” he remarked, looking round. A straggle of players was drifting through the clubhouse.

  “Third team have cried off. Not enough people turned up.”

  “I thought it might have been the other way around,” said Grimshaw.

  “How do you mean?”

  “I thought you might have attracted a few ghouls. Well, it happens. That was one of the reasons I came down. Since I’m here, can I help?”

  I felt a little warmer towards him. “Any good at peeling spuds? Only AnneMarie’s not turned up again.”

  “Mrs Egan? The one you don’t like?”

  “I never said I didn’t like her.”

  “Didn’t you?” Lifting the hatch, he came and sat on the edge of my table, rather close. I didn’t actually need any spuds peeling – that was what the rumbler was for – but I wanted to see how Grimshaw would react. And put him in his place a little.

  He had a deft way with a Lancashire peeler, but I was still faster with a knife. After a while I became aware that his sharp grey eyes were watching my fingers in turn. Checking for butchery skills.

  “So when will I get my other knife back?” I asked.

  “Do you want it back?” He sounded surprised.

  “Of course I do! It cost me ninety quid, that knife.”

  “What?”

  “Good knives don’t come cheap. I hope you’re looking after it,” I said.

  His eyes narrowed. “Would you really use it again? Not many people could.”

  “The knife didn’t kill Becki. The person holding it did.” This sounded a dubious argument even to my ears, but my knife was precious to me, and not just in terms of money. It had been the first good knife I bought, my ticket out of the streets and into freedom. My friend. “That knife’s my livelihood,” I said.

  “I would have thought it’s what you can do with it that’s your livelihood.”

  “Whatever. But it’s easier to do it with a good knife.”

  We peeled together.

  “Have you heard from your friend Charlotte?” he asked after a while. Picking over the bones, like I thought. But I saw no harm in answering this query.

  “Yes, her shop’s been cleaned and repaired. She’s back in business.”

  “No other trouble, then.”

  “No. But the people who came after me probably think I’m dead. At least, I hope they do. I saw Becki’s name didn’t appear in the papers. Was that your doing?”

  “Her parents. They wanted minimum publicity.”

  “Do you know when they’re likely to hold the funeral?”

  “I expect forensics will release her soon.”

  We both fell back into silence. Release. I pictured Becki imprisoned on a metal shelf in some police morgue one degree above freezing. But of course that wasn’t Becki: that was just her body. I wondered how her parents bore it, and then slid that brief thought back into its own refrigerated drawer. Karl was imprisoned too. I hoped Strangeways was warm.

  “Your brother has settled well at Strangeways, according to the governor,” said Grimshaw, making me jump.

  “Settled? What does that mean? He hasn’t started a riot? He’s doing basket-work?” I took a deep breath. “Has Karl heard of my supposed death?”

  “No, because you’re not dead.”

  “Has anybody asked him if he thinks I am?”

  No answer.

  “Well, haven’t you questioned him? Or the others?”

  Still no answer. Just that ironic, non-committal glance. Grimshaw was getting my back up.

  “So who did it?” I demanded.

  He concentrated on his peeling. “We’re still working on it. We’ve been able to eliminate a few people from our enquiries. Unfortunately that still leaves us with a large number of possible suspects, none of them with an obvious motive.”

  “You know the motive. It was meant to be me.”

  “You’re still totally convinced of that, are you?”

  “Of course I am,” I said heatedly. “Have you checked the side fence? We’ve had kids climbing over that before.”

  “Not on that evening.”

  “How do you know?”

  Grimshaw put down his potato. “There’s no sign of damage to the vegetation there. And it had rained the previous day: near the fence, it was a mud-slick. There were a few washed-out footprints close by, but nothing fresh.” That needling glance again. “I’m afraid your theory doesn’t work.”

  I was silent for a moment. “They must have come round the car-park.”

  He raised a cool eyebrow. “Past the open side door, with everyone standing around and watching?”

  “There weren’t people standing there all the time. Anyway, they could have skirted the far edge of the car park in the dark.”

  “They could indeed.” Grimshaw’s voice was equable. “Or they could have walked right round the perimeter of the field, if they had the time and inclination. But even if they did, there’s another thing that bothers me. Why would your presumed drug dealers stab Becki with her own knife?”

  “My knife,” I said automatically.

  “Your knife, which we have to assume in your scenario she was holding, for some reason unknown to us. Why not use whatever weapon they must have brought for the purpose?”

  “Guns are noisy. If there’s a big sharp knife to hand...” I shrugged.

  “But why was it to hand? What had she taken it out for?”

  I shrugged again, uneasily. Becki had coveted my knife. She tended to borrow things she liked. But to put this to Grimshaw would sound both feeble and vindictive. “She probably just picked it up without thinking.”

  “And the goose?” he demanded.

  “Got in the way.” I wasn’t happy. I stared at the vat of potatoes, judging quantities. I was good at that. I wasn’t good at judging motives for murder.

  £300 wasn’t a motive for murder, in my opinion, not here. I didn’t think jealousy over a dance was a motive for murder either. But then what did I know? I just knew I didn’t want to start worrying about motives for murder when I already had a perfectly good one to hand.

  Slightly shame-faced, I said to Grimshaw, “I told Niall about my theory. I couldn’t help it. I thought he knew my history already, about Karl. He did know some of it, just not as much as I thought.”

  Grimshaw seemed unalarmed. “How did he react?”

  “It cheered him up.” Disconsolately I began to unpack the sausages. Locally made Lincolnshire, nicely brown and speckled with herbs. The local Cumberland were rubbish. From the corner of my eye I noticed Tamara drift past with a resigned air.

  Tamara meant Hugh. Jumping up, I abandoned
Grimshaw to the spuds and left the kitchen to give Hugh a sausagey hug. Tamara immediately drew close and linked arms with him.

  “You’re looking tired,” I said. Hugh’s face was drawn, with blue shadows round his eyes. I hadn’t seen him look so miserable for years, not since the end of the cocaine days, and it wrung my heart.

  “A bit.” His voice was hoarse. “I’m not sleeping so well since last week. Bad dreams.”

  “Oh, poor darling,” said Tamara, reaching up to push back his hair, and filling me first with exasperation, then with pleasure that she didn’t appear to know how Hugh slept. She stroked his cheek with a manicured hand which Hugh caught and held on to.

  “All right, sweetheart,” he said.

  Grimshaw approached to greet Hugh formally. They made a striking pair, of much the same age, though Hugh was the taller and less conscious of his looks. Tamara fluttered her eye-lashes at Grimshaw and then said with pretend sternness,

  “I hope you’re not going to do that interview thing all over again. Poor Hugh, his birthday will never be the same.”

  “You’re not playing today?” I asked him.

  “I thought I’d just come and watch,” said Hugh. “It didn’t seem right to play.”

  “You will play again in future, though, won’t you?” I wasn’t just anxious for my Saturdays, but for his: I didn’t like seeing Hugh so weighed down.

  “There are so many things to do at the weekend,” put in Tamara. “Hugh might not feel like it, poor love, might you? Not after all that dreadful business. He might need a change of scene.”

  I would have preferred to hear Hugh’s own views, only Grimshaw stepped in.

  “Let me get you a drink,” he suggested solicitously. He was looking at Tamara and turning on the charm, a cool, appreciative brand quite unlike Hugh’s affable good manners.

  “Just a Coke, thanks,” said Hugh.

  “I don’t know,” said Tamara, head on one side. “I shouldn’t. Do they do breezers here?”

  “Let’s go and see.” She did not demur as Grimshaw guided her over to the bar, which was manned by Sammie in a black jumper and red-rimmed eyes. Poor Sammie; she said every step she took behind the bar was treading in Becki’s footprints. She burst into tears when she found one of Becki’s IOU’s in the till, and refused to throw it away.

  “Hugh.” I would have taken his hand if mine hadn’t been so greasy. “Nightmares about Becki?”

  He shook his head. “All sorts. Nightmares about nightmares.” His drawn eyes stared across the clubhouse at something I couldn’t see. “The inspector kept asking me what I remembered. But I had the mother and father of a hangover the next day, and I couldn’t tell her anything much at all after the buffet. I remember Becki and Bob pogo-ing. Did I dance with Becki?”

  “You did. And with me.”

  He sighed. “I feel responsible. If it hadn’t been my birthday, it would never have happened, and now the whole thing’s just a blank and I can’t even remember Becki’s last evening. Nothing left but nightmares.” He grimaced. “Bloody hell.”

  My heart ached for my cheerful, carefree Hugh. This wasn’t fair. I’d let the rats in to destroy his sleep and gnaw at his happiness, when he should be free of all those drug-ridden demons. It wasn’t his fault.

  So, since he already knew about my death-threats, I said,

  “Hugh, I think the killers were after me. I think Karl sent them, or Karl’s friends. It had nothing to do with your party.”

  “What? You think so?”

  I nodded. It would give Hugh something to hold on to.

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’m positive. I know they’d tracked me as far as Fylington, because a letter came to the pub. You know, like the letter they sent Charlotte. They must have followed me to the club and then got the wrong girl.”

  “Do you know, that never occurred to me.” His face seemed to lighten a little. “I suppose I should have thought of it myself, after all that nastiness with Charlotte’s shop.”

  “Have you seen Charlotte lately?” I asked. She would help him more than Tamara would, I was sure.

  “She’s been busy. Got a lot on her plate at the moment.”

  “She’s never in when I ring.”

  “No, she’s moving out,” said Hugh absently. “She’s going to live with Father and Jane for a while.”

  “Why?”

  “She lost two weeks turnover,” he said with mild reproof, “to say nothing of the repair costs. The insurers haven’t paid up yet.”

  “Oh, God! Poor Charlotte.” I felt guilty at not knowing, at being so wrapped up in my own concerns I had all but forgotten hers. Then I looked at the clock and forgot hers again. “Shit! Oranges. It’s nearly half-time!”

  I fetched the bag of oranges and began to chop frantically. Hugh went to join Tamara and Grimshaw at the bar. Niall slouched gloomily over to me, waiting for the orange wedges, which were a pointless but apparently traditional half-time feast.

  “I see that bloody garda’s here again,” he said.

  “He’s just being sociable. What’s the score?” I passed him the tray.

  “3-6. Terrible game. Did you go to see KK?”

  “Yes, I did. And no, I didn’t find anything.”

  He lowered his voice. “But did you look everywhere?”

  “No, I didn’t have the chance.”

  “Then maybe later on you could–”

  I cut him off. “No way. I’m not going through that again. Do it yourself.” Niall was about to retort, but as a bunch of spectators trooped past he shut his mouth and scuffed out with his oranges like an overgrown sulky schoolboy. I set the sausages on low and went to watch the second half.

  It was weirdly subdued. KK was the only one going in hard for the tackles. There was scarcely any shoving in the line-out, and the scrums were positively genteel. All very restrained.

  So was the audience. Instead of bellowing like maddened bulls, they murmured their suggestions at the ref discreetly. Brendan was looking grave, hands behind his back like a politician at a funeral. Bob let out one “Hand in the ruck!” at full blast and then winced in shame. Becki would have thought it hilarious; but of course Becki wasn’t there. That was the whole trouble.

  Hardly anyone stayed on after the teas. The players picked at their plates as if hunger would have been impolite, and then drifted away. I saw Hugh leaving with Tamara, and managed to catch him in the doorway.

  “Come back,” I begged. “Don’t give up the rugby. What will they do without you? You’re the Road Runner.”

  “Well,” said Hugh. He looked lost. I gave him a hug, and my new mobile number, while Tamara glared.

  “Anytime you want to talk,” I said, ignoring her. “Or come round, even. Any time at all.”

  Hugh nodded, and Tamara dragged him away. Grimshaw also departed, having nobody left to charm or interrogate. Niall, inspecting the contents of the till, said,

  “Jesus, takings are way down! Things had better pick up next week. The club’d go down the drain if every Saturday was like this.”

  “If only,” said AnneMarie quietly beside me. She’d arrived, as usual, too late for the teas.

  “I’m surprised you bothered coming,” I said. I was even more surprised she’d bothered to come and join me in the kitchen.

  “It’s worse home alone with the kids. Drives me out of my head.”

  Ah, that was why. She wanted someone to moan at. Her kids didn’t seem that bad to me, apart from leaving a confetti of crisps wherever they sat.

  “So what’s the difference here?”

  “The effect’s diluted,” said AnneMarie. “At home there’s no let up. Honest to God, they don’t give you a minute. Sometimes I can’t stand it.” She offered me a cigarette, although she knew I didn’t smoke.

  I felt reluctantly sorry for her. The hand holding the cigarette packet was shaking slightly, as if she was in a bad way. Maybe she really did find motherhood hell, although I wasn’t a good person to adv
ise her there, my own mother not exactly being a brilliant role model.

  “You could have brought the kids down earlier,” I said, “and sat them in front of the telly while you gave me a hand with the teas.”

  There was a few seconds’ delay before she reacted. Then she snatched a hand to her mouth. “Oh my God, was it my turn again already? Sorry, Lannie.” She wasn’t.

  “Shall I give you another copy of the rota?”

  “God, no! I’ve got one up at home. I just didn’t think to check it. My memory.” She shook her head. “It’s the medication.”

  “Medication?”

  She lit another cigarette before answering. “Post-natal depression. I got it when Aoife was born.”

  I was a bit staggered. “But Aoife’s, what? Four, five? What are you on?”

  “Nearly five. Diazepam.”

  “For that long? And your doctor lets you?”

  “God, no!” said AnneMarie. “He stopped prescribing years ago. Thinks I’m weaned off it. But I can’t manage without. So I had to find an alternative supply.” She took a long, hungry pull at the cigarette and looked at me sidelong.

  “Where from?”

  She glanced around before she answered. “Becki.”

  “What? Becki sold you Diazepam?”

  “Don’t shout it around!” she hissed.

  I lowered my voice. “But what was Becki doing with Diazepam?”

  “What do you think?”

  “No, come on! Becki never...” I stopped. I was going to say, Becki never did drugs, but how did I know? I only knew she didn’t do them in front of me.

  “She wasn’t a dealer,” I said helplessly.

  “No, of course she wasn’t. Did I say she was a dealer? She just sold a few on,” said AnneMarie. “She offered me something called Whizz first off, as if I’d be interested.”

  “Becki sold speed?” I said blankly. I felt like AnneMarie had just pulled back the carpet and uncovered a trapdoor. But I should have known it was there all the time. Of course Becki was on speed. I remembered how excitable and restless she used to get; how huge and black her eyes were at the party.

  And those favours she said she’d done Anne-Marie, that she never got thanked for... And AnneMarie asking her if she’d scored. Don’t I always, said Becki. Bloody hell. My heart sank.

  Anne-Marie took another drag on her cigarette. “But I’ll have to look somewhere else now. Find another supplier. You couldn’t help me out, could you, Lannie?” The urgency was unmistakable.

  “Me?”

  “You don’t know anyone...? The thing is, Niall happened to mention that your brother was, what shall I say, involved with drugs.”

  “He was. I’m not,” I said curtly, inwardly damning Niall.

  She stared at her cigarette, her voice tight. “And you can’t get hold of anything for me? You must know some other people...”

  My hand clenched around my tea-towel. “No. Absolutely not. I don’t have dealers for friends, and I’ve never been one myself.”

  “All right, all right, don’t get so bloody uptight! I’m not talking heroin. It’s not exactly earth-shattering stuff, is it, a few tranx? It didn’t matter to Becki.”

  “Well, it matters to me. Did she deal a lot?”

  “She wasn’t a dealer,” said AnneMarie angrily. “I don’t go to dealers. She was a friend doing me a favour. Helping me out. She was the salt of the earth, Becki, she would have done anything for anybody, not like some, she was a lovely girl. It’s terrible what happened to her. Simply terrible.”

  I wondered how much of this was sincere and how much was just dutiful bollocks. Mostly the latter, I guessed.

  “I can’t help you,” I said curtly. “Go back to your doctor.”

  “He won’t give me anything, he’ll just tell me off.”

  “Go back to your doctor,” I repeated. The old rage was rising in me, so that I had to turn my back.

  “It’s only tranquillisers, for fuck’s sake! It’s only keeping me from slashing my wrists! Bloody hell! Sorry I asked.” AnneMarie got up and stalked away.