The Shadow of the Soul (10 page)

‘You okay?’ the officer asked her.

She nodded. She unfolded her hand. She’d been gripping it so tightly the object had left an imprint of its familiar shape against her palm. A pen. An ordinary black ballpoint pen.

More voices.

‘Get this place sealed off now!’

‘You people there, don’t move! You’re perfectly safe—’

‘—don’t
move
. That includes you, sir. No, you can’t leave—’

‘Who saw this man? Who saw what happened?’

‘You? You stand there, please.’

An ordinary pen. She clicked the end, no fear of what might happen. The nib slid out at the bottom. She clicked again. It withdrew.

‘What the fuck are you doing?’ Hands took it from her. ‘What the fuck are you doing?’

‘It’s just a pen,’ she said. She didn’t look up. She didn’t look anywhere. ‘No detonator. Just an ordinary pen.’

C
ass made the call to Cory Denter’s father himself. The conversation was stilted, but this time there was no hint of aggression. The Denter family had perhaps decided overnight that any
why
would be better than living with the thought of their son killing himself for no reason they could fathom. The older man listened quietly. For Cass, they were words he’d used too many times to count:
We’re going to have to run some tests on your son’s body. We will have to do a full post-mortem. We’ll be in touch when we can release him back to you. No, I can’t give you any further information at this time, but as soon as I can, I will
. For some reason, the clinical nature of the phrases soothed. They took some responsibility for the grief out of the next-of-kin’s hands. Unfortunately, that grief had to go somewhere, and that meant it usually landed squarely on Cass’s shoulders.

A short text came through from Artie Mullins: a time and a place to meet, and Cass left Armstrong to speak to the other families and supervise the exhumation arrangements, while he headed into Soho to meet his sometime friend. As his car sat in the London traffic that had become even more interminable since the bombings, he rang Perry Jordan.

‘I think it’s time we step up a gear looking for Luke. Is that okay?’

‘Not a problem this end. But how come? Thought you
wanted to wait until the trials were done and dusted?’

‘You know me, I’m impatient.’ He wasn’t going to tell Jordan about the note Marlowe had delivered. ‘It’s still only you and me, though, not official. I just want to do some probing. All I need from you is the admin. I don’t have time for that.’ He really didn’t want Jordan involved any more than necessary. This was his shit to deal with. Family stuff. The Jones family and
They
.

‘Sure, I’ll be your secretary – but don’t expect me in heels.’ Jordan laughed. ‘So what do you need?’

‘I want a list of all the people working in the maternity ward that night, and their contact details. Same for security – in fact, get me as many staff names as you can. Especially anyone with any kind of authority. Also, I want the details of anyone else who had a baby at approximately the same time. Boys only.’ Christian had been at the bedside at Luke’s birth, and Jessica had definitely delivered a boy. There was a possibility he’d simply been swapped with another child – why they would do that, he didn’t know, but then, there was nothing about the Network he understood. And they’d have needed to get a new-born baby from somewhere; so either they brought one in, or swapped one from the ward.

‘I’ve got some of that already. You around later?’

‘No, I’m on a new case. It’s going to wipe out most of today.’

‘Let me guess – the weird teenage suicides in the paper?’

‘Yeah, that’s the one.’

‘Whoever wrote that article loves you, don’t they? I didn’t recognise you from the description. Had to keep checking the name to be sure they weren’t writing about someone else.’

‘Oh, you’re a funny fucker.’ Cass kept his tone light. He
still felt unnerved by Armstrong’s actions, although he wasn’t really sure why. The newspaper stunt was something he might have done if he’d had the connections – and trusted them. Maybe it was seeing his own ruthlessness reflected in one so young that unsettled him. He knew where it could lead.

‘Yeah, sadly that’s what all the girls say. I’ll get on the rest but I’ll stick what I’ve already found through your letterbox when I’m out later. As soon as I’ve got more I’ll let you know. And just call if you’ve got any questions.’

‘Cheers, Perry. That sounds fine.’

There was the briefest moment of hesitation and Cass wondered if the other man had already hung up.

‘Take care, Cass.’ Perry Jordan didn’t sound so funny. He sounded almost grown-up. Serious.

‘I always do, Perry. I always do.’

Artie was at a tucked-away table at the far end of the pub when Cass arrived. He was already sipping from a pint of lager, despite it being not yet eleven.

‘Fuck this weather,’ he said, nodding Cass to the chair opposite and the pint that waited for him. ‘Where the fuck is autumn? If I wanted year-round sunshine I’d go and live on the Costa del Crap.’ He smiled at Cass, but his eyes were slightly wary. Cass figured his own expression was much the same. They hadn’t seen each other in a while. Mullins looked exactly the same though; weather-beaten and indestructible.

‘I took the liberty of ordering for you.’

‘Thanks.’ Cass took a sip. There was nothing like cool lager on a hot day.

‘Stick your hand under the table, mate. Let’s get the formalities out of the way.’

Cass did as he was told. Artie’s thick fingers met his and the small bag of powder was exchanged.

‘How much do you—?’ Cass started awkwardly.

‘Fuck off, Jones. You think I want your money?’

‘With things being as they are …’ Cass sighed. ‘I know I’m not your favourite person right now.’ He felt like he had during his first days as Charlie Sutton, awkward … stupid.

Artie watched him for a long few seconds, then sniffed. He took a swallow of his beer. ‘This shit will pass. It always does. I was around long before the bonuses even existed, remember? Fuck, I’ve been around since before you had the dumb idea to sit the fucking police exam, or whatever it is you have to do to get in on your side of this fence.’ He leaned forward and smiled. ‘We always managed before. This ain’t the end of the world. Right now there might be no money changing hands, but you can be sure as fuck no one wants to make any enemies. We’re all just treading water, Jones, haven’t you noticed? No one’s really coming near us.’

‘I haven’t been getting much in the way of cases. Too much legal shit going on.’

‘There’s your fucking punishment, mate.’ Artie laughed, and Cass could almost taste the cigarettes that fed that throaty rattle. ‘When does that shit Bowman go to court? That fucker won’t last five minutes inside.’ He winked. ‘I can guarantee you that.’

‘No date’s set yet,’ Cass said, ‘but rumour has it they want him in the dock in the next couple of months. PR and all that shit. I just want it done. Then I can lay the whole thing to rest.’ He hoped so anyway. He still dreamed too much – of Kate, and Claire. And all of the rest. But mainly of those two women. He took a longer swallow of his beer. The light buzz felt good.

‘So, we okay then?’ he asked.

Artie sniffed again. ‘We’re okay. You’re a fucking liability, Jones, but you didn’t bring this shit down on purpose. But we still need to keep any meetings we might have low-key. You’re not the only one getting hassle from lawyers, you know. We’re all claiming innocence, pushing the blame onto Macintyre and those fucking Chechen cunts, but I can live without being seen with you. Same as, I guess?’

‘Yeah, same as. They need me squeaky clean for this case.’

‘Well, that’ll take more than Daz and a hot wash.’ Artie laughed at his own joke and Cass smiled along. The wariness was leaving him. He’d underestimated Artie Mullins and he shouldn’t have. Artie was something else; always had been.

His phone vibrated and as he pulled it out of his pocket, he slipped the baggie in.

‘We’ve got another dead student,’ Armstrong said.

Cass stood and turned his back to the table. ‘Where?’

‘Soho. The flat above a shop called “Loving It” on Old Compton Street.’

‘I’m five minutes away. I’ll meet you there.’

The call ended and Cass found Artie watching him.

‘They letting you work something proper again?’ The gangster smiled.

‘Not through any choice of their own, trust me. Sorry about the drink.’

‘No problem,’ Artie said. ‘I’m a busy boy myself. You take care, Cass Jones. You know where I am.’

As he headed back out into the sticky heat, Cass wondered why everyone was feeling the need to express their concern for his wellbeing today. If there was one thing he’d always been more than moderately good at, it was looking after Number One. That wasn’t going to change now.

*

The mystery of how a third-year student, most likely weighed down with debts, could afford a Soho address was answered within seconds of Cass passing the constable standing across the narrow doorway and heading up the tatty stairs to the flat. The sex shop ‘Loving It’ had looked sleazy enough, the grime on the unwashed windows visible even against the blackout on the other side of the glass, but the flat was basically a shit-hole. After twenty minutes inside, Cass felt ready for a shower, and he hadn’t even touched anything. Dust lay thick at the edges of the carpet, and in the kitchen there were thick rings of grime in the sink. The rubbish bin was over-filled and a take-away carton of some description sat, half-full and rotting, on the side. On the lino, the foodstains were hard to distinguish from the original pattern, if there in fact was one. Cass thought someone would have to pay him fucking good money to open the fridge.

‘I converted the main bedroom into a bedsit when things started getting tight.’ Neil Newton, the live-in landlord and shop owner, was an over-cologned effete who was clinging to his younger days by wearing a styled shirt that was too tight across his growing pot belly. It wasn’t working. He was clearly in his mid-forties – long past dead in gay years.

‘We shared the bathroom.’ His hands trembled, his cheap gold chain bracelets clinking, as he gestured around the dirty flat. ‘He had his own cooking facilities in there, but I never minded if he wanted to use the bigger kitchen.’ Newton swallowed. ‘We’d become friends.’

Cass left him in the hallway and peered through the door to the other room. Joe Lidster, twenty-two, Media and Communications Studies student at South Bank University – the second of South Bank’s kids to die – was lying on the double bed, on top of the neat spread that matched
the two cushions behind his head. His pale arms were stretched out sideways, displaying the deep cuts in his wrists. Blood had darkened a circle of the bed under him, and had created two pools on the thin carpet either side, where his fingers hung over the edge. They were no longer dripping. There were also no shiny black shoes for the drips to land on. Cass was glad about that.

The rest of the room, although cheaply furnished, was meticulously clean and neat. There was a small fridge and a hob along one wall, and a wardrobe and chest of drawers with a TV on top. It was dust-and mess-free. Cass thought that if this boy had shared the bathroom with Newton, then that would probably be spotless too – and it would have been all the student’s doing.

Beside the bed a piece of paper was tacked to the wall. The words written on it in thick black marker were clear even from the doorway.
Chaos in the darkness
. It hung slightly to one side. If Lidster had been alive, he would no doubt have wanted to straighten it.

Cass looked again at the room and couldn’t help but remember standing in a similar bedsit not so many months ago. There were no dead flies here, and no rotting puppy, just poor dead Joe Lidster, bled out and cold in a shit-hole in Soho.

‘With all due respect,’ he started as he turned back to Newton, ‘how did he come to be living here when he could have got something cheaper and better down by the South Bank?’

The applied grease in Newton’s hair merged with small beads of sweat on his forehead. Cass wasn’t sure if it was due to the heat or the situation, or if it was just Newton’s normal appearance. The latter wouldn’t have surprised him; the man wore enough cologne to hint at attempts to cover
a sweat problem; he sure wouldn’t want to be standing too close to him by the end of the day.

‘He was at first. But you know what these students are like. He had a bad break-up, got himself into a financial pickle. Then he got a part-time job here, and I offered him the room.’ His eyes darted past Cass to the body. ‘He was a nice boy. It worked well.’

Cass was sure Newton had
loved
having the young man around.

‘I think he liked being in the middle of Soho,’ Newton continued. ‘It’s where all the media types are, after all. He’d just got a job as a runner for one company actually. Well, I say
job
– they didn’t actually pay him anything. But still, he seemed happier.’ He sniffed. ‘I don’t know what could have made him do this. I really don’t. Perhaps if I’d been in last night instead of at my sister’s, this wouldn’t have happened. I feel awful.’

‘Thanks for your help, Mr Newton.’ Cass blocked the bedroom doorway. ‘Now, if you wouldn’t mind waiting down in the shop while we do what we have to do here?’

‘Of course.’ His mildly disgruntled facial expression disagreed with his words, but he did as he was told.

Armstrong emerged from the bedroom, holding a clear plastic evidence bag. ‘We’ve got a mobile phone. It was by the bed. Do you want me to go through it?’

‘Yes – and send someone to get any mobiles the families might have for the other suicides. Cross-reference the numbers and see if we can find a link that way.’

‘No problem.’ Armstrong was talking into his own phone within seconds, quietly instructing someone back in the Incident Room to get to work. Efficient as well as ruthless. And always so calm. Cass’s jury was still out.

In the bedroom, Dr Marsden, the new ME, moved round
the room, silently photographing the dead man. He was a quiet man; precise. He lacked Farmer’s ambition, but given what had just gone down at Paddington Green, that was probably no bad thing.