The Order of Things (29 page)

Respect. That word again.

‘You see eye to eye? You and Gemma?’

‘Completely. I’m a numbers guy. I crunch the data, turn it into lines on a graph. That’s my job. I sit down for weeks on end and I extrapolate conclusions – likelihoods – from all this stuff. That’s looking forward. Gemma does the reverse. She looks back. That’s her skill, her calling. She sieves all the folklore from the Indian tribes and she figures out what made them so successful, and so
content
. But you know something? There’s a point of fusion between us, and that’s now, right here and now. We sat together during the winter, during the storms. There were nights when we thought the river was coming in the house, nights when we sat watching the news, seeing the damage along the coast, the breach in the railway line over in Dawlish, all that stuff, and it’s at those moments when you realise how little time we’ve got. That change in the name I gave my house?’

‘Two Degrees? Five Degrees?’

‘Sure. That was Gemma’s idea. Except I’m gonna have to change it again. Five degrees is way too high. Four will do it.’

‘Do what?’

‘End it all. Do you mind being frightened? You two gentlemen? We up the temperature by four degrees and you know what happens? What
has
to happen? We lose the Greenland ice sheet, and probably the Western Antarctic sheet as well. That raises sea levels by thirty feet. Which will put two thirds of the world’s cities under water. Forget everything else. Forget extreme weather events – droughts in Africa, bush fires in Oz, anomalies in the jet stream, heatwaves in summer, constant winter storms. Forget crop failures and water shortages and resource wars. Just do the math. Sixty years. Thirty feet. London gone. New York gone. Melbourne. Amsterdam. Hamburg. All under water. All those poor bastards will still be streaming out of Africa and the Middle East and God knows where else, but you know something? They’ll be in the same boat as the rest of us. They’ll have nowhere to go.’

Suttle didn’t know quite what to make of the small, tight smile on Bentner’s face. Did he get pleasure from predictions like these? Was there an ounce or two of satisfaction in pushing his graph lines ever further north? Did he and his neighbour raise their glasses to the end of the world?

‘Sixty years is a single lifetime,’ Suttle pointed out.

‘You’re right.’

‘So why bring a baby into the world?’

‘Because it needn’t be this way. Even now we can still turn the thermostat down. Just.’

Luke Golding shook his head, his notepad abandoned. ‘But realistically?’ he said. ‘Knowing what you know? And knowing what Gemma knows? How greedy we are? How we take everything for granted? How billions of Chinese can’t wait to get two cars in the garage?’

Bentner sat back. He’d moved the interview onto his own turf. He was enjoying this.

‘The difference between two and four degrees,’ he said, ‘is human civilisation, everything we’ve built over the millennia. That’s where you start. You know something? I used to work out in Boulder, Colorado. A fine institution called NCAR. If anyone should know about where we’re headed, it’s the folks in Colorado. They’re canny, they understand the science and they want to make a difference, many of them, yet you know how many fracking operations are going on in that state? Fifty thousand.
Fifty thousand
. Anyone tells you fracking is a free ride, they’re lying. All kinds of bad things happen down the line. Yet on it goes. More and more wells. More and more extraction. However hard the folks who live there protest. So I guess this is the heart of the problem. On the one hand democracy, which is a fine idea. On the other hand money, and big business, and politicians who never get elected without big business paying their campaign bills. Neat, eh? And probably terminal.’

‘So why have a baby?’

‘Because I’m as human as the next guy. We’re at the mercy of our genes, gentlemen. And those genes are heading for the next generation, and the one after that. That’s the way it works. That’s the way we’re programmed.’

‘But you don’t
have
to have a baby. You could just say no.’

‘Sure. But what if my baby, our baby, turns out to be the one who makes a difference? What then? Life’s a lottery. Always has been since way back. Just talk to Gemma. The fact is we’ve loaded the odds against ourselves in ways the Indians would consider deeply foolish. We have to get back to that kind of wisdom. Else we’re fucked.’

‘So be honest. What’s the likeliest outcome?’

‘We’re fucked.’

Suttle nodded. Bentner’s world, he realised, had already become uninhabitable. ‘Gemma agrees with all this?’

‘Broadly, yes. She’s spunkier than me. She has energy to burn. Hook that woman up to the national grid and we could do without power stations. I always tell her she’d have made a fine general. Maybe the American Civil War. Or maybe Napoleon.
On s’engage. Et puis on voit
. First you get stuck in. Then you see what happens. You’re looking at a woman who can think on her feet. She’s tough, she’s fearless, and she doesn’t care who she hurts. Thank Christ she’s on our side.’

‘Our side?’

‘Me, and her … and Harriet.’

‘Harriet knew her too?’

‘Of course.’

‘They got on?’

‘Sure. Gemma likes women with opinions.’

‘I get the impression she likes women full stop.’

‘You’re telling me you think she’s a lesbian?’

‘Yes.’

‘You’re right. Men don’t do it for Gemma. In that respect I’m an honorary female.’

‘Meaning?’

‘We like each other’s company, do each other favours, look out for each other. I guess it’s a neighbourly thing. Maybe more than that.’

‘How much more?’

‘I dunno. It can be tough living in a small village. Folks who’ve been there for generations are fine. Gemma calls them the Native Indians. The blow-ins, people like us, can be a problem. Work, work, work. Spend, spend, spend. Hamsters on the wheel. I guess that’s the problem. No time to look up and sniff the wind. You tell them sixty years, and they roll their eyes. They think sixty years doesn’t matter because we’ll all be dead. Yeah. True. Except they’re more right than they know.’

Suttle bent to his briefcase and produced another evidence bag. The sight of Harriet Reilly’s travel diary caught Bentner’s attention. Suttle slipped it out. He’d already bookmarked the relevant pages.

‘Harriet sometimes wrote about someone she called ND.’ He bent to the diary. ‘“A. bad this morning. D & V plus a determination not to talk to me any more. As a doctor, not good. As his mate and favourite bedfellow, deeply worrying. Am I right about ND? Is she as mad as I think she is?”’
He looked up. ‘A. would be you. Am I right?’

‘I guess so. And D & V is diarrhoea and vomiting. We were in the jungle. I wasn’t at my best. She misinterpreted the signs, the symptoms. A fine doctor, Harriet, but sometimes she got it wrong.’

‘And ND?’

‘I haven’t got a clue.’

‘But she’s talking about a specific person, isn’t she? Someone you’d both know?’

‘No idea. The heat? The humidity? A climate like that can get to you.’

‘You’re suggesting she was the mad one?’

‘I’m saying it was somewhat hot out there. Makes it hard to think straight sometimes.’

Suttle nodded, said nothing. Then he turned the page.

‘You’re in Oregon this time. It’s earlier this year. March. Harriet has just discovered she’s pregnant. She writes this: “A. over the moon. Me, too. ND? Who fucking cares?”’ He looked up. ‘ND again?’

‘Pass. I’ve just told you.’

Suttle glanced at Golding.

‘We think it may mean next door,’ Golding said.

‘Like a code?’

‘Yes.’

‘Sweet. Meaning Gemma?’

‘Yes.’

‘Meaning Harriet thought Gemma was some kind of threat?’

‘Yes.’

‘How?’

‘You tell us.’

‘Emotionally? Sexually? This woman is a thousand-per-cent lesbian. Other women? She eats them for breakfast. No way would she ever bother with me.’

‘So maybe we’re not talking sex.’ Suttle this time. ‘Maybe it’s more complex than that. Gemma is a powerful woman. Plus she’s a kind of soul mate when it comes to all the stuff you have in common. That can be a threat. First of all to Harriet. And maybe to Gemma too.’

‘You think so?’

‘It’s a suggestion. I’m asking.’

Bentner frowned, gave the proposition some thought. Then the huge head came up.

‘Harriet was a tough woman. She was very sure of herself.’

‘It doesn’t sound that way. Not in the diaries.’

‘That was a tricky time in her life. Her guard was down. She was talking to herself.’

‘So she must have meant it, mustn’t she? About ND?’

Bentner shrugged. Said he didn’t know. Then he asked about the other half of the proposition. Gemma and threat, two words that didn’t belong in the same sentence.

‘How come she could ever feel threatened?’

‘Because she maybe wants all of you.’

Bentner didn’t respond. He ducked his head. Golding said he was sorry about what had happened to Harriet. You wouldn’t wish a scene like that on anyone.

Bentner nodded. Agreed. Studied his hands. Suttle was watching him carefully.

‘Harriet took a holiday recently,’ he said.

‘That’s right. Tenerife.’

‘And you didn’t go. Why was that?’

‘I couldn’t. I had commitments.’

‘Did she want you to go?’

‘Of course. Why on earth wouldn’t she?’

‘I’ve no idea. I just find it odd that you couldn’t find the time to join her. She’s pregnant. She’s carrying your baby. I guess the word that comes to mind is support.’

‘Harriet looked after herself.’ The smile was cold. ‘Always.’

There was a long silence. Out in the corridor someone was cursing the drinks dispenser.

‘So what happens next?’ Golding asked. ‘Once everything’s resolved?’

‘To me, you mean?’

‘Yes. Will you still bail out of the Hadley Centre? Bin the job? Go up to Scotland?’

Bentner studied him for a moment then shook his head. ‘No way. That was always for the three of us.’

‘So you’ll stay in Lympstone? Next door to Gemma?’

‘Yes.’ He nodded, that same chilly smile, recognising the trap Golding had sprung. ‘But don’t read too much into it, my friend. There’s lots to be done.’

Thirty-Two

T
UESDAY, 17
J
UNE 2014, 19.04

Luke Golding turned up at Lizzie’s place in the early evening. Michala had just gone. She and Lizzie had walked the half-mile from the café beside the station and spent the rest of the afternoon at The Plantation. Revisiting Kelly’s death had shaken Michala to the core, and she’d been grateful for the chance to share more about the good times they’d had. Lizzie, trapped in a lie of her own making, had done little more than listen, but she felt genuinely sorry for the depth of Michala’s loss. Kelly had meant everything to her. And now she was gone.

Luke Golding was standing in the rain. Was it OK to come in?

‘Of course.’ Lizzie was curious. ‘Is this business?’

‘Sort of.’

‘Do I need a lawyer?’

‘No. I’m here to mark your card. Think Citizens’ Advice. Never fails.’

They sat in the big living room. Looking around, Golding was seriously impressed.
No wonder Suttle’s in the shit
, he thought. A house like this, with all its potential, could send any marriage back to the mender’s.

‘So what’s all this about?’ Lizzie enquired.

Golding took his time. He said the situation was difficult. He said he was piggy in the middle. And then he said that his bosses were less than comfortable with the way Lizzie had been interfering in stuff that belonged to
Buzzard
. There was a feeling that homicide was a CID responsibility, not the business of any passing journalist. If Lizzie wanted to register as an informant, no problem. He’d even brought a set of forms.

‘You’re here on a mission? Is that it?’

‘Kind of.’

‘You mean they haven’t got the bottle to tell me themselves?’

‘That’ll never happen. They’ll have you nicked first.’

‘You’re serious?’

‘Always. I know these people. They think journalists are a joke. And not in a good way.’

The word joke did it for Lizzie. Earlier she’d been tempted to pick up the phone and share what she knew about Harriet and Kelly with Jimmy. If the
Buzzard
squad were looking for fresh leads then surely the passing of Kelly Willmott was a prime contender. Now, though, she found herself in a different place.

‘So what are they really saying? These bosses of yours?’

‘They’re telling you to back off.’ He frowned. ‘And there’s something else too. I know your private life is none of my business …’

‘You’re right. It’s not.’

‘Sure. But I get the feeling you might be making some kind of play for Jimmy.’

‘Have your bosses told you to ask that too?’

‘No. This is me talking. No one else.’

‘I don’t believe you. Everything in your world has to do with your fucking bosses.’

‘Wrong again. All I’m saying is that Jimmy is really happy just now, really sorted, and you’re talking to someone who knows.’

‘How come?’

‘Because he nicked my woman. Her name’s Oona, and she’s seriously bonkers about him, which is nice to see, and the really great thing is he feels exactly the same way.’

‘Is that right?’

‘Yes.’

‘So why has he been sleeping with me?’

‘You
what
?’

‘He was here earlier in the week. I was down at his place a couple of nights ago. Crap wallpaper and a nice view? Ring any bells?’

Golding was still staring at her.

‘Men are stupid,’ he said at last. ‘They let their dicks do the thinking. Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed.’

‘So what would Oona say?’

‘You wouldn’t.’

‘How do you know?’

‘Because you care about Jimmy, about that head of his. Because you’re brighter than we are. You’ve got a lovely house. Loads of profile. You could have anyone you wanted. You’re on a roll. A woman in your position shouldn’t be going backwards.’