No Lovelier Death (49 page)

‘One other thing, boss.’ He raised a hand. ‘The stuff on Ault’s hard disk. Does that raise any new issues?’

Parsons shook her head. ‘There’s no offence involved. I’ve seen the images. This isn’t kiddie porn. There’s no abuse involved, no violence. It appears to be consensual sex.’

‘But aren’t they young? Rachel’s age?’

‘It’s hard to tell. In Mr Willard’s view it’s something of a blessing.

He’s been wondering why Ault hasn’t been more vocal about our performance last weekend.’ She offered Suttle a bleak smile. ‘Now we know the answer.’

SUNDAY, 19 AUGUST 2007.
14.28

Winter had never been so glad to get home. He dumped his bag in the hall, circled the big living room, threw open the French windows, stepped onto the balcony. The weather had cheered up at last and the sunshine was hot on his face. Malaga without the aggravation, he thought, beaming fondly down on a young mum trying to teach her toddler to stay upright. No Westie. No London hit men on ten grand a body. Just an hour or two trying to restore some sanity to this life of his.

He made a pot of tea. The Pompey phone directory was under a pile of
Telegraph
magazines beside the sofa. Nikki Dunlop’s number was listed. He rang her on the cordless, ready to hang up if she answered. After a while her recorded voice invited him to leave a message. Glancing at his watch, he swallowed the rest of the tea, found his car keys, and headed for the door.

Parking was hopeless in Adair Road. He found a space on the nearby seafront and walked back. He knew it was possible that Nikki was in but hadn’t answered the phone. Equally, she might have come back. Either way, he was prepared to take the risk. He wanted this thing sorted.

He tried to visualise her tiny kitchen. The baby he’d heard crying through the party wall had been on the seaward side of the property. He crossed the road and knocked at the house next door. After a while a curtain twitched. He knocked again, then a third time. At last the door opened. A young woman stood blinking in the afternoon sunlight. She was wearing a grubby T-shirt and a pair of shorts. She had curly dark hair and a lousy complexion. She looked as if she’d just woken up.

‘Please?’ Foreign, Winter thought.

‘I’m from the council.’ He flashed his plastic driving licence. ‘Do you mind if I come in?’

He stepped past her without waiting for an answer. By the time the door closed behind him, he’d squeezed past the buggy in the front room and found himself some standing room beside a pile of laundry. A fan heater was whirring beneath the drying rack and there was a single mattress lying behind it, upended against the wall. The room felt like an oven.

‘The council?’ He knew she didn’t believe him.

‘That’s right. I’m sorry to call on a Sunday. You are … ?’

She shook her head. The last thing she owed Winter was a name.

‘What do you want?’ she said.

‘I work for the Noise Abatement Section,’ he said. ‘We’ve had a complaint from next door.’ He nodded at the wall that adjoined Nikki Dunlop’s house.

‘Complaint?’

‘About the noise. The lady next door … she says you’re very noisy.’

‘Me?’ She was outraged.

‘Yes.’

‘She says that? About me? That I make too much noise?
She
says that.’

‘I’m afraid so.’ Winter softened his tone. He wished he’d brought a clipboard now, really got into it. ‘I know it can be hard with a new baby.’ He nodded at the buggy. ‘I’m not blaming you, love. I’m just here to establish the facts.’

‘Nadja’s one year old. Maybe she cries a little but only when she’s hurt. Or maybe when she can’t sleep. You know where we sleep now? Both of us? Here. In this room. And you know why? Because she’s so noisy. Not me. The lady next door. So why don’t you ask her?’

Winter was eyeing the single armchair. The frame and fabric looked knackered but she’d done her best to brighten it with a couple of cushions.

‘Do you mind?’ He settled himself in the chair. He was right. It had lumps in all the wrong places. He gave her a smile. ‘So tell me more.’

The woman needed no encouragement. First there was the little dog, always barking. Then, because the walls were thin, she could hear every detail of her neighbour’s life.

‘Everything?’ Winter had found a gas bill in his jacket pocket. He began to make notes on the back of the envelope. ‘Like how?’

‘Like what she does all the time, what she says. There’s a man in there with her, a younger man. Sometimes they shout. At night too.’

‘Rows, you mean? They’re shouting at each other?’

‘
Da.
’

‘What do they say?’

‘Say?’

‘I have to have details. For the report.’

‘You make a report?’

‘Of course.’

‘But I can’t help you. My English … not so good.’ She raised her hands, angry at herself. ‘All I know is they shout. And then my baby, Nadja, she cries.’

Winter nodded, looked concerned, scribbled himself another note, then looked up.

‘What else?’

‘Everything. The television. The music. So loud. Even the washing machine.’

‘Washing machine?’

‘
Da.
She has the washing machine upstairs, maybe in the bathroom.

It makes a big noise, a very big noise. The other night she does the washing at half past one in the morning time. You think I’m crazy? I tell you no. I look at the clock. Half past one. Dark outside. When the washing machine …’ She frowned, making a circle with her finger.

‘Spins?’

‘
Da,
it spins, for the drying, then the house … it shakes.’ She nodded. ‘Half past one. Dark outside. And you come knocking on
my
door?’

‘When was this? Can you remember?’

‘With the washing machine?’

‘Yes.’

‘It’s important?’

‘Very.’

‘For the report?’ She was looking at the envelope.

‘Of course.’

She nodded, frowned, had a think. Then she nodded again.

‘Last night,’ she said. ‘Last week.’

‘Last Saturday?’

‘
Da.
Saturday. I tell you true. Half past one. When it comes dark.’ The finger again, spinning. ‘Everything shaking, like in a storm, everything mad.’

Everything mad.
Winter grinned to himself. The woman’s name, he’d finally discovered, was Jenica. She was Romanian. Her immigration status was uncertain but she said she had an English boyfriend, the father of her daughter. He worked in the oil business. She’d met him in Romania, in Ploesti. Now he was working on a rig off the south coast of Ireland. They were saving up for somewhere nicer. One day she hoped they’d have a house back in Romania.

Before he left she’d offered him a glass of juice from the carton she kept in the fridge for the baby. She was worried about the report, what the woman next door might say, but when Winter explained that the council had special procedures in cases like this she appeared to believe him. As he left the house, Winter glanced back to see her crossing herself and genuflecting before a creased picture pinned to the living-room wall. He’d seen the picture earlier and hadn’t realised it was the Virgin Mary.

Now he debated what to do. It was nearly half past three. He stood on the seafront, wondering whether Nikki Dunlop had decamped to the beach again. Under a near-cloudless sky the sea looked inviting enough and he lingered a moment or two longer, watching a bunch of students daring each other to be the first in. Then he turned on his heel and dug in his pocket for the car keys, shaking his head. Hayling Island, he thought.

 

Misty Gallagher was on a lounger by the pool when he arrived. He’d parked the Lexus out front and followed the footpath round the side of the house. He heard the radio before he rounded the conservatory at the back, Celine Dion at full throttle, and marvelled that she could doze through a noise like that. Apart from gold bikini briefs, she was naked. There were drips of coconut oil beside the lounger and her body gleamed in the afternoon sun. He looked down at her for a long moment.

‘Mist?’

His voice startled her. She struggled upright on the lounger, covering her breasts, then reached for the towelling robe she’d abandoned earlier.

‘Don’t do that,’ she said. ‘You’re supposed to phone first.’

She wasn’t pleased to see him. He shuffled sideways until his shadow fell over her eyes. When she asked what he wanted, he reached down and lowered the volume on the radio.

‘The thing I gave you the other day?’ he said.

‘You want it
now
?’

‘Yeah.’

She stared at him a moment longer, then got up and left the patio. Barefoot, she stalked across the lawn. At the bottom of the garden, tucked behind a trellis at the water’s edge, was a garden shed. She disappeared inside and re-emerged seconds later. She had a garden fork in one hand and a pair of wellington boots in the other. She dumped them both on the lawn and beckoned him down with an impatient wave.

‘These belong to Baz.’ She nudged one of the boots with a bare toe.

‘The soil’s still soaking after all that rain. I’m buggered if I’m going to dig it up.’

She led the way to a patch of garden closer to the house, looked at one spot, then another, then a third. Winter, still wondering why she was being so hostile, began to suspect she’d forgotten the hiding place.

‘You could always ring the fucking thing,’ she said at last.

‘You looked in the bag then?’

‘Of course I did. I think it’s here.’ She indicated an area of recently turned soil beside a rose bush. Winter took his shoes off and struggled into the boots. They were very tight.

‘Baz phoned a couple of hours ago,’ she said.

‘And?’ Winter was poking at the soil.

‘He was round on Wednesday night. You remember Wednesday night?’

‘Of course I do.’

‘Apparently he turned up late, really late, half past three in the morning.’

‘Did he say why?’ Winter had stopped digging.

‘No. But that’s not the point, is it? I wasn’t here. I wasn’t in bed.

I wasn’t where I was supposed to be. The last thing Baz saw of me Wednesday evening was in the restaurant, pissed. He’s not stupid, Baz. He might be a headcase sometimes, but the man reads me like a book.’

‘So what did he say? On the phone?’

‘He wanted to know where I’d been.’

‘And what did you tell him?’

‘I told him I’d gone to Trude’s.’

‘Trude’s in the fucking Canaries.’

‘I know. I forgot.’

‘Blinder, Mist. Just what I need.’ Winter gazed down at the soil, aware of Misty watching him. Finally he shrugged and set to again, digging very carefully, trying to feel for something solid.

‘How far down? Give me a clue.’ He looked round, expecting an answer, but she was already halfway across the lawn, heading back towards the pool. Seconds later came the click of her lighter as she settled back on the lounger. This time the robe stayed on.

 

With
Mandolin
at a standstill and J-J’s return to London all too imminent, Faraday got back to the Bargemaster’s House in time to catch Gabrielle and J-J debating a change of plan. Last night J-J had been intending to catch a late-afternoon train back to Waterloo but Gabrielle had just made a call to check departure times and discovered that chunks of the journey would be served by a bus service. Now, given the weather, J-J had decided to stay on until Monday. An early train, he signed to his dad, would be perfect.

Gladdened by the prospect of another evening together, Faraday suggested an expedition into the country. There was a stand of trees on Thorney Island that became a daily roost for hundreds of egrets. J-J, like Gabrielle, had always been mad about these stately little birds. High tide was at seven o’clock. They could take the car over to Thorney, park up, then follow the sea wall deep into Chichester Harbour. By seven the trees would be white with the egrets. Gabrielle hadn’t seen them since last year. After yesterday’s confusion over the spoonbill, she’d be back with the real thing. How did that sound?

J-J was grinning.

‘Perfect,’ he signed for the second time.

 

Bazza Mackenzie was cleaning his swimming pool when Winter turned up. According to Marie, Baz had been in a strop for most of the afternoon.

Winter watched him through the kitchen window. When Bazza was angry he had a habit of doing everything very fast. Just now he was moving at the speed of light, pacing up and down the pool, scooping up the odd leaf with his special net, pausing to examine tiny stains in the plastic liner. He was wearing shorts and a pair of flip-flops. Winter noticed that he’d begun to put on weight.

Marie wanted to know about Spain. Bazza had spun her a line about giving some old mates a good time but she knew that Westie had fled on Wednesday night and was far too bright not to have drawn the obvious conclusion.

‘Successful, Paul?’

‘Yeah, I suppose so.’

‘Business trip?’

‘Yeah.’

‘So will Westie behave himself?’

‘Definitely.’ Winter nodded, turning away, wary of where this conversation might lead.

‘You want to tell me more? Only talking to Baz is hopeless just now.’

Winter shook his head. Then he opened the kitchen door and stepped out into the sunshine.

Bazza was on his knees, scrubbing away at the side of the pool. Hearing Winter’s footsteps, he barely spared him a glance.

‘I was on to Mist a couple of hours ago,’ he said at last.

‘I know.’

‘Then you’re a cunt. And don’t tell me different, because you are.

Helping yourself ain’t on, mush. Not now, not ever. When I say it’s OK, then that’s cushty. Otherwise you leave the fucking woman alone. I don’t care how pissed she was. You’re a fucking disgrace.’ He was scrubbing harder now, his face reddening with the effort. ‘Don’t bother fucking denying it either. Only scumbags pull strokes like that. I should sort this here and now, shouldn’t I? I should fucking offer you out.’