No Lovelier Death (24 page)

‘Tell me,’ he said.

‘I was with Bazza’s lot. On appro.’

‘I know. That was the last time we had a drink. It was in the Buckingham. Round the corner. Remember?’

‘Sure. And you gave me a hard time. “Disappointment” was the word you used. Or maybe it was disgrace.’

‘Bloody right. And so you were.’

‘Thanks.’ Winter held his gaze. ‘Fucking thanks.’

‘So what are you telling me? That I’d got it wrong? That you hadn’t got pissed? That you hadn’t been chucked out on a DUI? That Mackenzie hadn’t come along and hoovered you up? Along with the rest of the rubbish?’

‘Great, son. Really sharp. And to think I had you down as some kind of detective. Brilliant. Just fucking brilliant.’ For once Suttle knew Winter wasn’t bluffing. He was upset. Seriously upset.

‘So tell me,’ Suttle said again. ‘Tell me where I got it so wrong.’

‘You really want to hear?’

‘I just asked, didn’t I?’

‘OK, son. I’ll tell you this once, and once only. And I’ll tell you because believe it or not you mattered to me. All the stuff out in America? All that medical shit?’ He touched his head. ‘You pulled me through. I don’t know whether you realised at the time but you played a blinder.’

‘Sure. Thanks. So tell me about Mackenzie.’

‘It was a sting, son. Willard’s idea. The DUI was a set-up, not that the woollies knew. Three times over the limit and I was out on my arse. And you were right about Bazza. He couldn’t help himself. All I had to do was wait for the phone to ring.’

‘So what was the plan?’

‘It doesn’t matter. All you need to know is that Willard fucked up.

Big time. Willard and the twat D/I from Covert Ops who was running me.’

‘Who was that?’

‘A woman called Parsons. I was inches away from getting myself totally fucking blown. And in the kind of company I was keeping, you’d only do that once.’

‘So what happened?’

‘I told Willard to stuff it. Sweetest conversation I ever had in my life. Lasted about ten seconds.’

‘And after that?’

‘I felt a whole lot better. He and Parsons nearly got me killed.

They’d deny it but it’s true. Working for Bazza, doing it for real, is sanity compared with where I was this time last year.’ He nodded, reaching for his drink.

Suttle took a while to absorb this conversation.

‘How do I know you’re not still U/C?’ he said at last.

‘You don’t, son, but it’s a fucking good question. Proves you’ve still got a brain in that head. As it happens, I’m not. I’m seriously bent and I work for a man who makes me very happy. If you can put up with the company, I’ll buy you a curry. Here’s to crime.’ He raised his glass. ‘Cheers.’

Moments later Winter disappeared to the loo. Suttle rang Faraday on his mobile and asked about progress in Merrivale Road. Faraday told him there’d been no response from the ground-floor flat. The people upstairs had confirmed that a girl with a shaven head was living down there but they hadn’t seen her since Saturday. Faraday himself was now in the process of getting a search warrant sworn. Parsons thought there was no percentage in staking the place out in case Bonner returned. In her view the girl had probably fled the city.

Seeing Winter returning from the loo, Suttle brought the conversation to an end. A curry, he’d decided, would be good. Preferably a takeout.

‘My place then.’ Winter was finishing his drink.

 

They walked the half-mile back to Gunwharf. Stepping into Winter’s apartment, Suttle felt a strange sense of déjà vu, of time telescoping backwards. Back in the pub he’d never seen Winter so emotional, so raw. Something had hurt him badly, Suttle realised, and that something had to do with the times they’d spent together.

While Winter busied himself in the kitchen Suttle stood at the big picture window staring out at the gathering dusk on the harbour. He’d always had respect for Winter. More than that, especially after the onset of the brain tumour, he’d felt affection for the man. He’d never met anyone so alone, anyone with less need for other people. He wasn’t solitary in the sense that Faraday was solitary. On the contrary, Winter had an immense gift for mateyness, for making people trust him. But a year working together had revealed another side to the man, an empty space inside that was very close to loneliness, and it had been Suttle’s pleasure to become a kind of son. He’d kept an eye on the old boy. They’d had a lot of laughs. And in return Winter had taught him a very great deal.

He was on the phone now, shouting orders to some takeaway or other. Joannie, Winter’s wife, had been dead for years. He’d sold up the bungalow in Bedhampton and had no kids. Maybe Mackenzie’s filled that gap, Suttle thought. Maybe that’s why he’s ended up on the Dark Side.

Winter stepped back into the lounge.

‘Chicken jalfrezi? ‘ he said. ‘Pilau rice with a side order of sag? Have I got that right?’

‘Perfect, boss.’ He accepted a can of Stella. ‘Tell me about Matt Berriman.’

Winter settled himself on the sofa, slipped off his shoes.

‘He’d been with the girl forever. You’d know that.’

‘You mean Rachel?’

‘Yeah. Baz was close to Berriman’s mum once. Nothing intimate, just friends. He did her a favour, way back. He knows the boy but not well.’

‘And you think … ?’

‘I think the boy was pissed off with losing the Ault girl. I think he wanted her back. Turning up at the party had a lot to do with that.

But did he kill her? Did he find himself a knife and do the business? Make sure no one else ever had a dip? No way.’

‘Why not?’

‘He was still at the Aults’ place, for a start. Baz turns up, gets himself into all kinds of shit … Who digs him out? Our man Matt. By that time Rachel and the boy Gareth are probably next door, time-expired. ’

‘How do you know that?’ Suttle raised an eyebrow.

‘I don’t. I’m guessing. But the way I see it, Berriman wasn’t there.

Berriman was next door partying. Until Baz arrived.’

Suttle conceded the point. The image of Berriman in the interview suite had stayed with him. He’d dominated the tiny space. He’d been sure of himself.

Winter had another question: ‘What’s the forensic on Berriman? You seized his gear?’

‘Of course.’

‘And?’

‘It’s too early to say. He’s priority but we’re still talking five-day turnaround. Nothing changes.’ Suttle paused. ‘So we rule out Berriman? As far as Rachel Ault’s concerned? Is that what you’re saying?’

‘Definitely.’

‘Because?’

‘Because he wasn’t next door. And because there’s no way a guy like him would have done that. Not to her. Not the way he felt.’

‘You’ve talked to him?’

Winter studied him a moment, then raised his glass. It looked like Scotch.

‘What do you think, son?’

‘I think yes.’

‘You’re right. And so am I. He’s off the plot.’

Suttle took a sip of lager. The temptation was to share the pictures from the upstairs bathroom, to tap Winter on the shoulder and ask him why - barely an hour before - Rachel would have been on her knees saying a private thank you to her former boyfriend, and why that same Matt Berriman would have promptly sent the evidence to Gareth Hughes’s mobile. That was the kind of situation that might easily have led to a confrontation. And the consequences would have been incalculable.

Winter sensed his reservations. When Suttle said nothing, he raised another name.

‘There’s a girl called Jax Bonner.’ he said. ‘You’ll know the name.’

‘Would I?’

‘Don’t piss around, son. You know who she is.’

‘I do?’

‘Of course you do. If you don’t, you should try looking at that Facebook page of theirs. She shaves her head. She’s got a knife. She slashes pictures to bits. Nothing too subtle.’

Suttle didn’t react. In the end he knew they’d have to trade information but he wanted to stay in the driving seat.

‘There’s another name we’ve come across,’ Suttle said at length.

‘Scott Giles?’

‘Go on.’

‘You know him?’ Winter shook his head. Suttle knew that meant nothing. ‘He’s Jax Bonner’s brother. He went down for five years a couple of months ago. Possession with intent.’

‘Five
years
?’

‘Half a kilo of the laughing powder in a lock-up. He’s always claimed someone fitted him up. I was just wondering … given the company you keep …’ Suttle was happy to leave the rest of the thought unvoiced. There was a subtext here. He was commissioning Winter to make a few enquiries, to have a poke around. There’d doubtless be another meet and another after that. It wouldn’t be easy, and it certainly broke every rule in
Mandolin
’s book, but it might offer another route to Jax Bonner.

There was a buzz from the video entryphone in the hall. Winter got to his feet. Chicken jalfrezi, Suttle thought.

Winter waited in the hall to sort out the guy from the delivery service. Suttle heard a murmur of voices then Winter was back with the curries.

‘Your blokes boshed Bazza’s kitchen, didn’t they? Scenes of Crime? Full service?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Got anything back yet?’

‘No. Netley’s swamped. The fingerprint guys are talking gridlock.’

‘Shame.’ Winter grinned down at him. ‘Extra chutney?’

 

Faraday found the note propped against a bag of vegetables in the kitchen. When Gabrielle was in a hurry, she didn’t bother with English. ‘
Cheri. Il me faut sortir. Rentre plus tard. Sais pas quand. Les pommes de terre et les tomates sont parfaits. Sers-toi. Vas-y. XXX
’

Faraday looked in the bag. The new potatoes were fresh from the garden, still dusted with soil. The tomatoes as well were home-grown. He popped one in his mouth, realising how hungry he was. She was right.
Parfait.

He checked his watch. It was late, nearly ten, and he wondered whether to knock up some kind of salad and wait for her return. She rarely went out by herself in the evening, and when it came to time she was punctilious, which made the note all the more surprising.
Back later? Don’t know exactly when?

He frowned, spotting her laptop, bagged on the kitchen table. Normally he’d never dream of snooping, of opening up her emails, of prowling through her interview files, but something in last night’s exchange had planted a small seed of doubt. She was meeting kids on the inner estates. Some of those same kids clearly knew a thing or two about Saturday night in Sandown Road. It would have been in Gabrielle’s nature to have pressed them for details, to have cocked her head and smile her French smile, and laugh at the funny bits. She was brilliant with other people, just the way she’d been brilliant with him.

He remembered the first time they’d met. She’d stepped onto a country bus in northern Thailand, up in the mountains near the Burmese border. The bus had been packed but she’d found a space on the seat in front of him. She’d perched on the seat, sideways on, one brown arm looped over the seat back as they lurched from corner to corner, and within an hour Faraday seemed to have told her his life story. She had a voracious appetite for other people, for the journeys they’d made, for the conclusions they’d reached, and she made the act of sharing deeply pleasurable. At the time Faraday had sensed that he could talk to her forever, and the way it had turned out, he was right.

He found a half-empty bottle of wine in the fridge. He poured himself a glass, trying hard not to visualise what she might be up to. He got the impression that some of these kids were young, barely adolescents. Where would you meet them at this time of night? How would you win their confidence? And what kind of sense would all this material make by the time you’d finished?

He knew she was looking for patterns, for the kind of templates she might apply to other social groups on the very edges of the planet. She’d worked with the Inuit in the high Arctic, with Berber tribes-men in the Mahgreb, with Pathans in the wilder parts of Afghanistan, returning from these expeditions with hundreds of pages of notes and a wealth of photos. To date she’d authored half a dozen academic papers and a slim volume that had been published only last year. This extended essay had sought to apply the lessons of her travels to urban societies in the West, winning applause from the review columns of
Liberation
and
Le Nouvel Observateur.
One of the few copies she possessed had found its way onto the shelf that Faraday reserved for especially treasured books and the sight of it nestling beside
Birds of the Western Palearctic
still gave him a little jolt of pleasure.

From a world that increasingly defied analysis she’d somehow fashioned order. In a society that had become atomised she’d knitted together a powerful case for the warm, complex comforts of kinship. To even attempt a challenge like that demanded not just intelligence but an optimism all the rarer for being so natural, so unforced. All you had to do, she’d once confided to Faraday, was to hide the candle from the draught. He nodded to himself, knowing how much she’d changed this life of his. She was the flame, he decided. And he was the candle.

Faraday’s gaze returned to the laptop. To even turn it on would be an act of trespass. To settle down and go further, an act of betrayal. And yet. And yet.

He shook his head, emptied the bottle, made a start on the potatoes, forcing himself back to
Mandolin.
The duty magistrate had sworn a search warrant on the address in Merrivale Road. Inside, he and a couple of D/Cs had taken a cursory look at the flat. To his surprise, it had been clean and reasonably tidy. One of the bedrooms had obviously belonged to the brother, while the girl Jax seemed to have occupied the other. She’d stuck a photocopied picture of herself on the wall above the bed and left a couple of unopened letters with her name on the front on the tiny table beneath the window. There was a pile of her clothes at the foot of the double bed and a stack of CDs beside the player in the corner. The younger of the detectives, eyeing a poster for a band called Achtung Everybody, pitied whoever lived upstairs. His own kid sister had similar tastes in Pop-Punk and it was driving his mum bonkers.