Читать книгу Games with the Dead: A PC Donal Lynch Thriller - James Nally, James Nally - Страница 11

Green Lanes, North London

Thursday, June 16, 1994; 11.00

‘Morning has fucking broken,’ warbles Fintan, my older brother, yanking open the sitting room curtains. Why did I ever give him a key?

I scrunch my dry eyes against the searing white, but the glare scores my sight, summoning splodges and a pulsing star-scape. My day of destiny is here. No doubt Commander Crossley’s already in his office, knotting the rope and oiling the trapdoor. Well someone will have to pay for last night’s cock-up. I’m low-ranking police plankton with an already sullied disciplinary record; he couldn’t have hand-picked a more ideal scapegoat.

I suspect Fintan has already heard all about last night from his fathomless pool of ‘police contacts’. That’s why he’s here, the diabolical cock, to get the inside story. It’s this level of conscience-free cunning that has propelled him to the role of chief crime reporter at the Sunday News, the youngest in their history.

‘Why can’t you warn me before you turn up,’ I croak. ‘You know, like a normal person?’

‘You could’ve done with some of that last night,’ he beams, eyes alive with mischief. ‘Warning, I mean.’

I groan instant and complete surrender, but my own personal Josef Mengele hasn’t even got started.

‘I hear you literally presented the cash to him, on a tray, like some silver-service waiter,’ he mocks in fake shock, shaking his head out of the sheer orgasmic schadenfreude of it all.

‘You’ve taken such a keen interest in this case, Fintan. Especially since they imposed a media blackout.’

‘Good job you’ve got that to hide behind. I can see the headline now: “Bungling cops lose man, money and poor Julie”. There’d be an outcry.’

‘You and your journo pals would whip up an outcry, you mean. Who uses words like ‘bungling’ in real life anyway?’

He’s off on one of his streams-of-tabloid-consciousness. ‘We’d have to describe Julie as “pretty” of course, which is a bit of a stretch, wouldn’t you say, Donal? She reminds me of Linda McCartney, if she hadn’t married a Beatle or given up the sausages. But we can’t call her “lumpen and pasty”, can we? She is the victim, after all. I tell you what though, photos of her make me want to stand on my head while chewing a sack of raw vegetables …’

‘Jesus, Fintan! Have some respect …’ I stop myself, but not quickly enough for old Donkey Ears.

‘You were gonna say “for the dead”, weren’t you?’ he says, turning towards me, nostrils almost winking. ‘What do you know? Have they found her body?’

‘No. I mean we don’t even know she’s dead. I’m just assuming the worst, now he’s had his money. What use is she to him now?’

My voice cracks, straining to contain that geyser of inner terror. What if my stupidity last night led to Julie’s murder? How am I supposed to cope with that? Live with that? I screw the lid down tighter. I know she’s dead because she came to me last night. That’s how this cursed bloody condition works. But I don’t know how or when she died. There’s still a chance he killed her before the ransom drop. That would mean her death is not my fault. It makes no sense at all but, for now, I’ve got to cling to that flimsy hope …

I scold my emotions for running ahead of the facts. All I know for sure is I must have got close to her dead body at some point either before, during or after last night’s ransom drop. That’s the only time the dead play their games with me … when I’ve been physically close to their recently slain cadavers. Poor, poor Julie …

Fintan recognises my pain and changes tack. ‘I heard you got a lot of stick. Don’t feel bad. Crossley should never have put you in that situation, not with your lack of experience.’

‘Gee thanks, Fint, for such a typically back-handed show of, er, support.’

‘It’s not just your fault, Donal. The kidnapper outsmarted you all.’

‘The worst thing is, Crossley just stood there and let them slag me off. After I’d risked my neck for him. Then he told me not to bother turning up for work until he tells me otherwise.’

‘That’s the British upper classes for you, Donal. They see the rest of us as grateful Sherpas, bred to do the heavy lifting that carries them to glory. Now hose yourself down or something so I can take you out in public. Then I’m going to make you eat a solid before flies start circling your eyes.’

‘Don’t spend the day trying to wheedle info out of me, Fintan.’

‘You affront me, Donal. You really do. I come here to offer nothing more than comfort and cheer after your latest dismal and abject humiliation, and this is the thanks I get. Why do you always assume there’s an angle? Jeez. I’ll be outside having a fag.’

With Fintan, there is always an angle. Having arrived here in London from the Irish Midlands a few years before me, he sees himself as my protector, especially now Mam is dead. But Fintan is always a journalist first, my brother second and would sell my arse for a scoop without even realising he’s done wrong. Zoe thinks he’s warped, manipulative and amoral, which, most of the time, is hard to dispute.

I shower, dress and catch up with him at the garden gate, where he wheels around theatrically to present a sporty black Porsche convertible, roof down.

‘Where in the name of God did you get that?’

‘There’s a new rich kid on trial on the showbiz desk, son of an earl or a duke or something. Nice enough fella, but thick as pig shit, of course, and hopeless. But the editor thinks he’ll get us into places we’ve never managed to penetrate before, and he’s usually right about these things.

‘Anyway, young Jamie Benson-Smythe finds it all frightfully exciting, especially crime and investigations. The fucker had the gall to march over and announce that he plans to get my job! Any other newbie would be thrown out on his ear for a stunt like that, but not Jamie.’

I’ve had my fair share of toffs at work and nod. ‘They just have this unshakeable self-belief.’

‘Wouldn’t we all, if we never had to worry about paying the rent? Anyway, I don’t blame them for making the most of their advantages. What really bugs me is the way the English middle classes unquestioningly defer to them, bowing and fucking scraping. It makes me almost like the French.

‘So, yesterday morning, I bump into the jumped-up little fucker while he’s parking this up at work. I tell him I need a smart motor for a big undercover job, and he just hands me the keys.’

‘Poor guy. You commandeered his car.’

‘Hey, Jamie’s thrilled, feels like he’s already contributing,’ says Fintan, getting into the driver’s seat.

‘What if it rains?’

‘What if it rains?’ he whines, mimicking me. ‘We put up the bloody roof.’

In heaving North London traffic, we barely make it above ten miles per hour. Each gossamer graze of pedal elicits a thunderous roar, earning us looks ranging from mild irritation to unabashed hatred.

‘We need to get out of town,’ I say, suddenly seeing an opportunity to act on last night’s encounter with Julie. When the dead come to me, I can’t just ignore them. Julie needs me. And, after my schoolboy error last night, I owe her. ‘Why don’t we head to the South Downs? I know some great pubs around there.’

Fintan grins. ‘First we’ve got to pick up our smoking-hot dates.’

I groan.

‘Models, Donal. And I’m not talking unemployed nail bar assistants here. Real models. I knew you wouldn’t come if I told you.’

‘In case you hadn’t noticed, Fintan, I’m in a relationship.’

‘Yeah I saw her note on the kitchen table this morning. Good old Zoe, if she can’t dump Matt on you, she dumps him on her mum.’

‘She doesn’t dump him on anyone. It’s a long day looking after a kid. She craves a bit of adult company in the evening. What’s wrong with that? You’ll see one day.’

‘From what I see, Donal, you’re in a job share. From what you sometimes let slip, I sense it’s now a sexless, joyless job share at that. You told me yourself that even her mum labelled it a failed relationship.’

‘That doesn’t give me a licence to go running around with other women.’

‘We’re just having a bit of craic, Donal. To quote Loaded magazine, “life, liberty, the pursuit of sex, drinking, football and less serious matters”. The thing is, bro, she’s turning you into one of those lonely married men. You know, first you don’t have time for friends, then you can’t find time for hobbies. Next thing you know, you’re a bonded slave reduced to work and childcare. The irony of it all is that your women end up hating you for it. And you’re not even married.’

I turn to him, shaking my head in disbelief.

He grins: ‘You can be my wingman then, okay?’

‘I don’t see that I’ve got any choice. So where did you meet two models?’

‘Sandra’s photo casebook. You must have seen it? Tania and Ellen are the paper’s biggest stars now.’

‘I must never have made it that far through your esteemed rag.’

‘Every week, it features a letter from the problem page, but told as a picture story. It’s always a raunchy storyline about threesomes and secret affairs so that Tania and Ellen can act their little hearts out in their undies. As Sandra herself puts it, something for the girls to read, and the boys to look at.’

‘Never underestimate the intelligence of your readers eh? I can’t believe any woman would actually read your newspaper.’

‘Don’t be such a snob, Donal. And a killjoy. What harm is it doing anyone?’

He pulls up at a smart art-deco block near Angel tube station and beeps the horn. Two skinny women dodder out, all big shades, fake tits and tan, and real attitude. Even from this distance, I can tell they are way out of our league.

‘And I suppose these cardboard cut-outs are now eyeing Hollywood stardom?’

Fintan waves to them, muttering under his breath: ‘Funny you should say that. They can’t wait to meet a heavyweight TV drama producer. Like you.’

I groan loudly. ‘There’s no way I can pull that off …’

‘It’s the only way I could get them to come. Just use words like “rushes” and “the cutting room”, you’ll be fine.’

‘Jesus.’

‘What do you think of the wheels, ladies?’ he bawls.

‘Like, what if it rains?’ says Ellen.

‘Like, we put up the roof,’ snaps Fintan. ‘God that’s exactly what my brother Donal here said. Talk about glass half-empty.’

‘What you mean he’s a pessimist?’ says Tania.

‘No,’ says Fintan. ‘I mean he’s a roaring alcoholic.’

That gets a good laugh.

‘Donal knows a nice pub near Brighton and he’s going to treat us to lunch. You good with that, girls?’

‘Yay,’ they coo as I give Fintan the eyeball and mouth: ‘You’re fucking paying.’

We roar off for all of 50 yards before getting snarled up in yet more traffic. Fintan somehow manages to trump the awkward silence with a truly cringeworthy question. ‘So, ladies, what do you look for in a man?’

‘Vingt-cinq,’ purrs Ellen and they cackle hard.

Schoolboy horrors come flooding back; the wink-and-elbow language of cruel-girl delight.

Ellen finally composes herself. ‘We were at this party in Paris a few years back, this really sexy guy sidles up to me and whispers “Vingt-cinq” in my ear. I’m thinking twenty-five? Well he might be talking about his age …’

More cackling.

‘Then he says in the sexiest French accent I’ve ever heard, “Not ma age. My size. You don believe me?” And I say, frankly, no. I mean a twenty-five inch penis would be some sort of world record. So, he gets his friend over …’

Tania butts in: ‘Who’s even sexier.’

‘And he says: “Oui, it is true. And I too am twenty-five.” He can tell we’re not buying it, so he says, “You wan me to pull down my pants and show you?” and I say …’

They might now actually expire out of sheer mirth.

Tania finally comes up for air: ‘Ellen says, “If you’re twenty-five, you don’t need to drop your trousers, just lift them up at the ankles!”’

We all laugh now.

‘I’d forgotten about metric!’ says Ellen. ‘Mind you, once you’ve had twenty-five centimetres, you don’t want less,’ she adds quietly.

Fintan and I share glances of mild horror.

‘Right, so physique is your thing, Ellen,’ editorialises anchorman. ‘What about you, Tania?’

‘Money,’ says Tania, refreshingly unashamed. ‘The love peters out, the sex peters out, so you might as well be with someone who’s loaded, make your life easier.’

‘And you’ve found someone, haven’t you darling?’ says Ellen. ‘Show ’em what he bought you yesterday?’

A spindly orange arm appears between the front seats. Perched on the tiny wrist, a green-faced vintage Rolex with a brown leather strap.

‘Men who wear a certain brand of watch guide destinies,’ announces Fintan to confused looks all round. ‘It’s their slogan,’ he adds impatiently.

‘Very understated. Classy,’ I say.

‘That’s exactly what I thought,’ says Tania, holding my eye for a second, then smiling bashfully.

‘Yeah and then you got it valued, you shallow bitch,’ cackles Ellen. ‘Eight grand. Can you believe it? Wear it? I wouldn’t let it out of my house.’

As we speed along ‘Sunset Boulevard’, wind noise renders conversation mercifully impossible, so that I can turn my thoughts back to last night. If we retrace my journey from yesterday, maybe something will click and lead me to Julie’s body. That must have been what last night’s macabre, raven-based cabaret had been all about. I’ve just got to get down there and follow my gut.

It starts to rain just outside Croydon. Fintan pulls up at a lay-by but, of course, the convertible roof won’t go up. Something is stuck or maybe he’s pressing the wrong buttons. The girls moan, so Fintan guns it until we see a covered petrol station. As we shelter in eye-watering fumes, he sets to work on the roof mechanics until they’re well and truly butchered.

‘Like, what if it rains all day,’ says Ellen.

‘Like, we do something indoors,’ snaps Fintan, and we sit in glum silence for twenty minutes.

The shower mercifully clears. Even with the girls along, I’m sticking to my plan and direct Fintan to Underhill Lane. As the track narrows and branches start scouring the paintwork, I call halt.

‘Poor car,’ I say. ‘Shall we walk?’

‘There’s a pub down here?’ squints Fintan.

‘Just around the corner,’ I say, setting off before anyone has time to object.

I lead the way towards the bridge, Fintan just behind. The girls are way back, heels floundering in mud.

‘Is this where it went down last night?’ says Fintan, his antenna as keen as ever.

I nod. The silver painted block still sits on the wall, above the white cross. After Julie’s performance last night, I’m bringing that hunk of shiny concrete with me. Somehow, it must be significant.

I rewind the rest of Julie’s pageant through my mind … the axe, the church bell, the birds, the shepherd’s crook.

‘There must be a church in the village,’ I say, picking up the block. ‘Let’s take a quick look.’

‘Why are we looking for a church? And what exactly are you planning to do with that block, Donal? Jeez, I know the girls can get a bit irritating …’

‘I’ve just got a feeling about it,’ I say.

‘Hey girls,’ I shout. ‘My mistake, the pub’s the other way.’ They don’t answer, just turn and totter with all they have back to the sludge-free sanctuary of the car.

I place the block in the boot.

‘Is this pub far? I’m starving,’ moans Ellen.

‘Donal here has you down as a fan of Norman architecture,’ says Fintan. ‘He always takes his dates to a cemetery. I mean if you’re going to corpse, you might as well do it somewhere appropriate.’

‘Just drop us off at the pub,’ sighs Ellen.

‘Oh, come on, Ellen,’ urges Tania. ‘I love old churches and graveyards.’

‘Wow,’ says Fintan, ‘you and my morbid brother here should get on like a funeral pyre.’

The car growls and Ellen yowls all the way through Pyecombe. I’m first out at the Church of the Transfiguration.

Fintan mumbles in my ear, ‘You know Julie’s dead, don’t you? You’ve had one of your whacko dreams.’

‘Oh come on, Fintan, you don’t believe in any of that old codology, do you?’

‘Jesus, don’t find her now, Donal. We’re well in here.’

‘You think? Maybe if I find the 175 grand and you undergo some penile transfiguration of your own.’

‘I know what you mean. Jesus, we’d struggle to make vingt-cinq between us.’

Built into the wooden gate, a metal hook identical to the one in Julie’s post-mortem performance.

‘I think she’s here,’ I say.

‘This is creeping me out,’ says Ellen.

‘Why don’t you two wait here and admire this lovely gate?’ says Fintan.

‘God, you’re a patronising pig,’ snaps Tania.

‘Well said,’ I nod.

My eyes are drawn to the far corner of the graveyard and a pair of all-business ravens. They’re patrolling a candy-striped bundle under a creaking oak. As I get closer, I see it’s a pink-and-white striped sheet trussed up with green cord. The sheet ends are tied together and stained dark. The rope winds about the package three times widthways and once lengthways.

‘Expertly wrapped,’ says Fintan.

‘Got anything sharp?’

‘Try these,’ he says, handing me the car keys.

I tear a strip in the sheet. The stench knocks us backwards. A black cloud of flies descends.

‘What is that?’ screams Ellen.

‘It’s Julie,’ I say, turning to her and, despite my best efforts, failing to suppress a smile. But what I’ve just smelled means I’m not responsible for her murder. ‘Looks like she’s been dead for at least twenty-four hours. Thank God,’ I sigh, shaking my head out of sheer relief.

Fintan leans in close: ‘I think we’d better make an anonymous call.’

We turn to see Ellen jabbing at her mobile phone.

‘No wait,’ I say, but she’s already spilling to a 999 operator.

I look at Fintan. ‘How the hell are we going to explain this?’

‘We need to get away from here,’ he mumbles. ‘I’ll suggest the pub. We let them walk ahead, as soon as they get around the corner, bolt for the car.’

Ellen ends the call: ‘Don’t worry, Tan, the police are on their way.’

Fintan pipes up: ‘I don’t know about you ladies, but I suddenly really fancy a steak. Why don’t we wait for the plod in the pub?’

Ellen plants one hand inside her handbag, raising the other defensively. ‘If you or your weirdo brother take one step closer, I swear to God I’ll set off my rape alarm.’

‘Understood, loud and clear,’ says Fintan brightly. ‘Can I just say though, Ellen, as a parting line to a double date, that may never be topped.’