In a Dry Season (42 page)

“Pretty good, thanks.”

“Good. I'm glad.”

“I'd rather forget this morning, though.”

“You probably deserved it.”

“Probably.”

“I've got the info on the Rowan Woods personnel.”

“Wonderful.”

“It's a long list, though. It'll take a bit of whittling down. There was more than one person working in the
PX
, for a start.”

Banks sensed that her tone was softening a little. Should he tell her he had missed her last night? Or ask her what was wrong? Better hold off a while. He ventured a tentative, “Is there anything else?”

Annie told him about what happened at Hobb's End. “What were you doing out there?” he asked.

“What does it matter? Maybe I just wanted to see what it looks like in the dark.”

“And?”

“It looks spooky.”

“It was probably just a kid.”

“I thought about that. It didn't look like a kid. And it drove away.”

“I've known ten-year-olds do that. Still, I take your
point. There's not much we can do about it now, though, is there?”

“I just thought I'd let you know. For the record. It was interesting, that's all.”

“Sounds like it. Anything else?”

Annie told him about drawing a blank on trying to confirm Vivian Elmsley's identity through Ruby, Betty and Alice.

“We'd better track her down, anyway,” Banks said. “I've already done that.”

“Now I'm
really
impressed.”

“So you should be. While you've been recovering from your self-inflicted damage, I've been on the phone.” Was there a hint of forgiveness there, perhaps? Depended how he played it: he needed to strike the right balance of remorse and praise, guilt and compliments.

“And?”

“Well, in her case it was easy. She's in the London telephone directory.”

“You didn't phone her, did you?”

“
Please
. Give me some credit. I'm not that gormless.

But I've got her address. What do you want to do about it?”

“We should talk to her as soon as possible. If she really is the one we're looking for, she's holding something back. She might also know the names we want. There was another thing nagging at me a few minutes ago and I've just realized what it was.”

“Apart from the hangover?”

“Yes.”

“All right. What was it?”

Banks explained to her about the call from Major
Gargrave. “It's to do with the gun,” he said.

“What gun?”

“The one Matthew Shackleton's supposed to have shot himself with.”

“What about it? Handguns must have been common enough just after the war. You'd just had hundreds of thousands of
men
running around armed to the teeth killing one another, remember?”

“Yes, but why would Matthew have a gun?”

“I don't—wait a minute, I think I
do
see what you mean.”

“If he was a released
POW
, he'd hardly have his service revolver. I should imagine the Japanese confiscated the weapons from the people they captured, wouldn't you?”

“Unless his liberators gave him one?”

“I suppose that's remotely possible. Especially if they were Americans. Americans feel naked without guns.”

“But you don't think so?”

“I think it's highly unlikely,” said Banks. “Why should they? And why would he still have it when he went back to Hobb's End from hospital? Anyway, it's a minor point, probably doesn't mean a thing.”

“If he did have a gun, though, why didn't he use that on Gloria instead of strangling her and stabbing her?”

“
If
it was Matthew who killed her.”

“Have you considered Gwen as a serious suspect?”

Annie asked.

“Certainly. According to everything we've heard, she was very close to her brother. If Gloria was hurting him, running around with other men, Gwen might just have fought back on his behalf. At the very least she should be able to tell us more about Matthew's relationship with
Gloria after he came back, assuming Gloria was still alive at the time. Fancy a trip to London tomorrow?”

“Who's driving?”

“We'll take the train. It's faster, and the London traffic's murder. If memory serves me well, there's a train leaves York around a quarter to nine that'll have us at King's Cross by twenty to eleven. Can you manage that?”

“No problem. In the meantime I'll see if I can get any more information on the airmen.”

After Annie hung up, Banks walked over to the window and looked out over the square, with its ancient market cross and square-towered church, grey-gold in the sunlight. He thought about Vivian Elmsley. Could she really be Gwen Shackleton? It seemed a preposterous idea, but stranger things had happened. Banks had met a mystery writer once before, a fellow called Jack Barker, who lived in Gratly and wrote about a Los Angeles private eye. Barker had since moved to
LA
after an incredible stroke of luck. A Hollywood
TV
executive had picked up a copy of one of his books at Heathrow on the way home from a business meeting in London, and he had decided it would make a great television series. So far, it hadn't been shown in Britain.

Banks had never actually read any of Jack Barker's books—he usually stayed away from detective fiction, except for Sherlock Holmes, which he regarded more as absurd and exotic adventure stories than exercises in logic—but he decided it wouldn't be a bad idea to have a go at one or two of Vivian Elmsley's before he set off to interview her. Her writing might give him some insight into her character.

He tried dialling Brian's Wimbledon number again.

Still nothing. Ken Blackstone was right, though; all he could do for the moment was keep on trying. Since he was going to London tomorrow, he hoped he might be able to see Brian, have a talk, get things sorted. He didn't want Brian to keep on thinking his father was disappointed in him for what he was doing, the way Banks's own father always made clear his dismay at Banks's choice of career, even now, every time they met.

Banks went back to his desk. For about the third time since the case began, he spread out the objects found with Gloria Shackleton's body in front of him. Not much for the remnants of a life, or the detritus of a death: a locket whose original heart-shape had been squashed and bent; a corroded wedding ring; clips from a brassiere or suspenders; a pair of tiny, deformed leather shoes, which reminded him of the ones he had seen at the Brontë parsonage once; a few scraps of blackout cloth; and the button from Adam Kelly, greenish blue with verdigris. Superintendent Gristhorpe might be able to tell him a bit about the button, he thought. Gristhorpe was something of an expert on military history, especially the Second World War.

Banks grabbed his jacket and was just about to leave the office when his phone rang.

“Hello, Alan.”

A woman's voice.

“Yes?”

“It's me. Jenny. Jenny Fuller. Don't you recognize my voice?”

“Jenny. It's been a long time. Where are you?”

“Home. Just got back yesterday. Look—”

“A bit early, aren't you?”

“It's a long story.”

“I'm glad you called. I need some advice.”

“If it's personal, I'm the last person to ask, believe me.”

“Professional?”

“I might be able to manage that. The reason I was phoning is, I know I shouldn't bother you at work and all, but I'm in town and I wondered if you've got time for lunch?”

Banks had intended to drive out to Lyndgarth to see Gristhorpe, who was taking his annual holidays at home, but that could wait until after. “Queen's Arms, half-twelve?”

“Wonderful. I'll see you there.”

Banks smiled as he put down the receiver. He hadn't seen Jenny Fuller in almost a year, not since she'd decided to take a leave of absence from the University of York to teach in California. That was around the time he and Sandra had split up. He had received a couple of postcards asking how he was doing, but that was all.

Jenny was one of the two women his colleagues expected him to sleep with after Sandra left. Perhaps he would have slept with her if she had been around. But timing is everything. Jenny was spending most of her time in California these days, and there was a man at the bottom of that. The other friend, Pamela Jeffries, feeling restless and hemmed in, had taken off to play with an orchestra in Australia, of all places, and he hadn't seen her for months. Again, he got the occasional postcard from such exotic locales as Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth. It made him want to travel more, too.

Now he and Jenny were having lunch in about an hour's time. Just enough time, in fact, to prepare his questions on
Matthew Shackleton and nip over to Waterstone's for a couple of Vivian Elmsley's novels.

For some reason I was standing out in the street to check the window display (which was pretty meagre) when I glanced to my left and saw him coming across the fairy bridge. I had just heard the train arrive, so I assumed that he had come from the station. The wind howled around the chimneys and clouds as black as a Nazi's heart besmirched the sky like grease stains. There was nobody else about. That was why I noticed him. That and the fact that he was wearing only an over-large, baggy brown suit and carrying no luggage.

He was tall but stooped, as if suffering some affliction of the spine, and he walked with a sturdy stick. He moved slowly, almost as a figure in a dream, as if he knew where he was going, but felt no hurry to get there. His frame was thin to the point of emaciation. As he came closer, I realized that he wasn't as old as I had first thought, though his lank, lifeless hair was tinged here and there with grey, or white.

The wind tugged at my hair and clothes and chilled me to the marrow, but something about him compelled me to stand and watch, as if in a trance. When he got within a few feet of the shop, I saw his eyes. Deep, hollow, haunted eyes, turned completely inwards, as if subjecting himself to the most intense and unflinching scrutiny.

He saw me, though, and he stopped.

I don't know when the truth dawned on me; it could have been seconds; it could have been minutes. But I started to shake like a leaf and it had nothing to do with the cold. I ran to him and threw my arms around him, but his body felt stiff and unyielding as a tree. I caressed his cheek with my palm, noticing the puckered white scar that curved up from the side of his mouth in an ugly parody of a grin. Tears were pouring down my cheeks.

“Matthew!” I cried. “Oh, my God. Matthew!” And I took his arm and led him inside to Mother.

Banks walked into the Queen's Arms a couple of minutes before twelve-thirty carrying two of Vivian Elmsley's paperback mysteries in his Waterstone's bag. He bought a pint and sat down at a table near the empty fireplace. Jenny was always late, he remembered, opening the bag and looking at the books.

One was a suspense novel called
Guilty Secrets
—certainly an interesting title from Banks's point of view— which bore review quotes from
The Sunday Times
, S
cotland on Sunday
, the
Yorkshire Post
, and the
Manchester Evening News
, all to the general effect that it was an “amazing” and “disturbing” achievement by one our best mystery writers, a true equal of P.D. James and Ruth Rendell.

The other was called
The Shadow of Death
and featured her regular series character, Detective Inspector Niven. In this one, he was called on to investigate the murder of an upmarket Shepherd's Bush restaurateur. Banks didn't even know that such a creature existed. As far as he could remember, there weren't any upmarket restaurants in Shepherd's Bush. Still, it was a long time since he'd been there, so he gave her the benefit of the doubt. Anyway, the novel was praised for its “compassionate realism in the portrayal of ordinary people” and its “believable depictions of policemen's lives and police procedures.” Banks smiled. He'd see about that. On the cover was a picture of the handsome, craggy-faced young actor who, so the blurb
informed Banks, played
DI
Niven on the television series. And got paid far more than a real copper did.