Scaredy Cat (22 page)

Tughan said nothing. He stood up and threw Hol and a look, tel ing him to do the same. 'If we send a car for you tomorrow could you come down to Edgware Road and work with one of our computer artists?'

She nodded, and picked up a passing cat as she got to

her feet.

SLEEPYHEAD 209

When they reached the front door Tughan stopped and looked at her. She smiled nervously at him.

'Why did you wait so long before reporting this matter?' Tughan said. 'I mean, you even waited for four days after the reconstruc6on went out on TV.'

She pul ed the cat close to her neck. Hol and stepped forward, putting a hand a little too forceful y on Tughan's shoulder.

'We'd better get going. Thanks for al your help.'

The gratitude in her eyes was obvious. She took hold of his sleeve. 'Was it him?'

Tughan was already on his way to the car. Hol and watched him deactivate the alarm, climb in and slam the door. He turned back to her. 'I think you were very lucky, Maggie.'

She smiled and gripped his sleeve a little fighter as her eyes began to fil with tears. 'It would be the first time...'

I'm in a much better mood now. I don't mean general y, that's stil up and down. Tim said l was moody before and he's probably right. But now, in here, I can be a right bitch. I think that's fair enough, though. I think I deserve a medal for the few

nice moods I do have.

lnyway . . ..

Eve in here there's always something that can cheer you up. It's not exactly Carry On Doctor but there's laughs to be had if you look for them. Sick ones, usual y, but you can't be too fussy. There's this nurse, Martina, who's taken it upon herself to make sure I look pretty al the time. Under normal circumstances, of course, I'd tel her that you can't improve on perfection, but granted, she's got a job on her hands. To be honest, I think she's doing it to get a break from the catheter and arse work, which is hardly brimming with job satisfaction, is it? At first I didn't mind when she was trimming my hair and cutting my toenails but she's started getting a bit ambitious. I think she's a failed beauty therapist or something. She painted my nails the other day and the colour was fucking revolting and yesterday afternoon she decided that a bit of lippy might cheer me up. Putting lipstick on somebody else is like trying to have a wank with your left hand. Forget it. I looked like a clown in a coma, or a tit in a trance, as my nan used to say.

I think she was trying to make me look like one of those hideous women who work on the makeup counters in department stores - you know, the ones who spend al day surrounded by cosmetics and haven't got a fitcking che how to put them on.

SLEEPYHEAD 211

Here's a tip. Don't use a trowel. I always want to creep up behind them and shout, 'Mirror! Use a mirror!'

I didn't plan what happened this morning, I swear, but I quite wish I had. Obviously some of the other nurses had noticed that Martina was spending al her time tatting me up instead of doing any of the dirty work and she got lumbered with cleaning out my breathing tube. I can ful y understand not wanting to do it, it's bloody foul. So Martina is supposed to pul it out and clean out al the muck or something so it doesn't get blocked. Imagine somebody was waggling, a tube around in your mouth. Wel , it's pretty much the same when it's straight into your neck. You'd want to cough, wouldn't you? Coughing isn't one of my best things, these days, but I must have been saving it up. There's Martina trying to be al efficient and [just let one go. I couldn't help it. I coughed out of my neck, for Christ's sake.1

Like 1 said, it wasn't on purpose and she didn't help by screaming the place down, but this enormous lump of phlegmy glop just splattered on to her forehead.

I hope she might stay away for a bit now. Or maybe just stick to the rear-end stuff. At least you know what's coming at you/Come on, though, pearl nail polish?

Everything's moving along on the blink front. Another smal complication is that sometimes I screw things up by blinking just because my brain thinks it's high time I did. Same reason you do. That doesn't help. I'm spel ing away, then I suddenly throw in an X or a J for no good reason. Like suddenly shouting, 'Bol ocks," in the middle of a conversation.

It's like Newcastle on a Saturday night.

TWELVE

Rachel sat at the desk in her room, the chemistry textbook in front of her long since invisible. She knew that this was what being involved with someone was about. Highs and lows.

She'd gone out with a boy for nearly six months when she was a fourth-former and stil remembered the dul ache of the phone that didn't ring and the stabbing agony of the undelivered note. This was much worse, though.

She had her own locker now in the sixth-form common room, and had to fight the urge to run and open it every five minutes to check her phone. By the end of the day there would always be at least a text message. She saved them al and reread them constantly. A voice message was always better, though. She loved his voice especial y.

She walked over and slumped down on the bed, picking

up her phone from where it was recharging as she went. She listened to the message again, that strange part of her that she knew was common to everybody, savouring the pain of it.

Like gnawing at a mouth ulcer.

He wasn't sure if he could make it tonight. He might be able to but he didn't want to let her down at the last minute. He was sorry. It was a work thing he couldn't get out of. They'd better cancel. He'd cal tomorrow.

SLEEPYHEAD 213

As always, she was offered the option to delete the message. She saved it, although it was saved, anyway, in her head. She lay there endlessly pul ing to pieces every phrase and analysing every nuance. Had he sounded distant? Was this the start of letting her down gently? He'd cal tomorrow, he said, not later tonight. She wanted to cal him but knew she wouldn't. The idea of being clingy made her sick. But she knew that if it came to it she would be.

She desperately wanted a cigarette but couldn't risk it. She'd had a couple in the garden the night before when her mum had been out screwing the policeman. She sometimes climbed up on the desk and opened a window to blow the smoke out but her mum would be coming to bed any time. Her mum who smoked, but said that she could n't. Very fucking fair.

She'd speak to him tomorrow and everything would be fine and she'd feel like a pathetic sad cow.

She wasn't a stupid little girl any more. That was why he wanted her.

The carpet fibres that Thorne had scraped from the inside of Bishop's boot were in a smal plastic bag. He knew he couldn't take them to Forensics himself and he didn't feel he could ask Hol and yet. But there was somebody he could ask.

When the plastic bag dropped on to the pool table, Hendricks didn't shift his gaze a mil imetre as he lined up the shot, the cue sliding easily back and forth along the cleft of his chin. He casual y potted the eight bal and straightened up. 'That's another river.' His eyes shifted to the bag and its contents. 'Where did you get 'em?'

214 MARK BILLINGHAM

Thorne handed over the money and put his cue down

on the table. 'Where d'you think I got them?'

'Al right, smartarse, how did you get 'em?'

'The less I tel you, the less chance there is of you opening your big Manc gob.'

'I haven't said I'l do it yet, and you're not exactly asking

very nicely.'

Thorne knew Hendricks would do it, but stil felt bad about asking him. He'd put him up plenty of times, they'd done each other favours, lent each other money, but this was work. This was asking a lot. Hendricks was sharp. If he agreed to do it, he'd do so knowing the risks. He wouldn't lose his job, but he might find himself having to take on a bit more lecture work. He was also sharp enough to see that it was a lot of effort for what would probably be precious little reward.

'If you're so sure it's him, then why are you bothering?' Two teenagers who had been hovering, waiting for a game, stepped forward. One slapped a fifty-pence piece down on the edge of the table. Thorne moved to the bar. Hendricks picked up the plastic bag and fol owed him. He was chuffed at the thought of the two teenagers watching them go, convinced they were witnessing a deal in some

strange new drug.

'Wel ?'

'Because it's only me that' sure.'

'Fair enough, and when they do match up what does

that tel you? Fuck al . We're pretty, sure the kil er drives a Volvo and I don't think the carpet in the back of each one is individual y produced. I know they're nice cars, but come on...'

'Tickets to Spurs-Arsenal, on me.'

SLEEPYHEAD 215

Hendricks took a long slow drink of Guinness. 'I want a box.'

'How am I supposed to do that?'

'How am I supposed to march into the forensics lab with a plastic bag ful of carpet fibres I've produced out of the sodding ether?'

'I'l see what I can do. Listen, Phil, you know that lot, they won't ask questions. They're scientists not taxmen. Just tel them you're trying to help and you've got a mate who drives a Volvo.

In fact, take in some other fibres from the back of your car or something - you know, like a comparison.'

'I don't recal a single witness seeing a beige Nissan Micra, do you?'

Hendricks had a point. He did perhaps own the single

most repel ent vehicle on the road in Greater London. 'Thanks, Phil.' 'Remember, a box!' 'Yeah, yeah...'

'Did you know that the Volvo is the only commercial y produced car you can't kil yourself in? I mean, obviously you can drive one into a wal if you fancy it, but it has a cut-out device, you know, so that you can't tie a hose to the exhaust, and sit inside and asphyxiate yourself.'

Thorne grunted. 'Pity.'

Thorne had left the pub twenty�five pounds poorer but without the plastic bag that had been burning a hole in his pocket. He'd had a good night.

He hadn't drunk a thing.

Ten minutes after he got in, Hol and rang. The DC spoke quietly, almost in a whisper. He told Thorne that Sophie was asleep in the next room and he didn't want to wake her.

216 MARK BILLINGHAM

He didn't want her to know who he was cal ing. Thorne listened as Hol and told him about Margaret Byrne. She might have been his first victim if the kil er hadn't panicked for some reason. He told him what she'd said about the kil er's voice. Nice, she thought. Posh. And soothing, probably, thought Thorne. Gentle.

When he heard about the phone cal , Thorne pressed the receiver against his ear so hard that it hurt. Bishop bleeping himself?. He dismissed the idea. It didn't make any sense. It was When he heard about the phone cal , Thorne pressed the receiver against his ear so hard that it hurt. Bishop bleeping himself?. He dismissed the idea. It didn't make any sense. It was possible, he knew that, but what was the point? There was no record anyway, so why go through the motions?

Dave Hol and shrugged off Thorne's question about how he'd got on with Tughan. A flippant remark did the job. He had been trying to forget the discomfort, the unease that had permeated every corner of Margaret Byrne's front room whenever the Irishman had opened his mouth. He wasn't sure whether the unease had been his or Margaret's, but it was stifling.

It had stayed with him, fol owing him around for the rest of the day like something rank.

Thorne didn't seem particularly interested in Margaret Byrne herself. When he announced that he'd phoned and arranged to see her the fol owing morning, Hol and understood why. He tried to dissuade him. What was the point? They'd already spoken to her and she was coming in anyway to knock up an e-fit. '

Thorne was wel aware that they'd already seen her.

But they hadn't got a picture of Jeremy Bishop in their pocket.

Anne enjoyed the drive home in the dark. There was usual y a play on the radio or a short story or something.

SLEEPYHEAD 217

Often, in the forty-five minutes or so from Queen Square to Muswel Hil , she'd become so engrossed that she'd have to sit in the car outside the house and wait for it to finish.

She kept the radio off tonight. She had enough to think about.

That morning, in Alison's room, she'd found the photograph of Jeremy. It was lying on the smal table in the corner of the room, probably put there by a nurse. It was obvious to her what Thorne had been doing in Alison's room the day before while she was fetching them coffee and she couldn't bring herself to think about what it might mean. She knew somewhere, of course, what it migkt mean. It could hardly mean very much else, but she could n't bring herself to even try to deal with it.

Not now.

Feelings for two men. For one man those feelings had been shifting, settling into something else over a period of time. For the other they'd changed overnight.

Her relationship with Jeremy had not been the same since Sarah was kil ed. They'd always shared everything, which she knew had been the cause of so much tension between herself and David, but since the accident Jeremy had become reserved. His aloofness could be amusing, but had begun to wear her down a little. And recently he had become arrogant.., more arrogant, and occasional y unpleasant. The work seemed a chore to him. He was going through the motions. He would always be a fixture in her life, she knew that, and so would the children, but there was no joy in it any more. She felt.., dutiful.

Even so, the things Thorne must be thinking were so shocking. They were unimaginable.

218 MARK BILLINGHAM

She drove along Camden High Street. She was five minutes from his flat.

If she'd found that photograph twelve hours earlier there would have been a confrontation. She would have demanded to know the answers to questions she could no longer ask. And she would not have slept with him. Might not. The sex had changed everything. She knew it was a horribly old-fashioned outlook on things but it was hers. It always had been and it had cost her too many years of unhappiness to remember.

Now she had to... compartmentalise. She needed to ignore a side of the man she was sharing a bed with. It seemed to threaten everything. Her feelings for Thorne gave her little option and those she was losing for Jeremy might just make it possible. For the time being at least she had to make a choice. She could not think about a future with Thorne while having to reconcile herself to the damage he seemed determined to do to her past. And a future with him, however short, was what she felt she should go for.