Mean Spirit

‘But having said that, Grayle, it’s incredible how things what comes out in the heat of the moment do turn out to be quite prophetic. I believe in all that stuff.’ Seward swivelled, spreading his hands. ‘I mean, let’s be frank about this, a short time from now, the two of you will have died three times between you.’

The fluorescent tube in the ceiling zizzed and popped along with the famous monotone laugh.

‘I mean, you know, how else is it supposed to end? What else can I do, the position you put me in? It’s your own fault, innit?’

Grayle looked at him, frozen-faced, her skin blue-white under the strip light, her hair tangled on her shoulders. Maiden wondered desperately how he could get her out of this. Being nice to Seward didn’t seem an option.

‘I mean this is an omen, yeah? The two of you here: a young lady what was recently told she was dead and a geezer who was dead.’

‘Mmm,’ Maiden said, ‘that is really uncanny.’

‘What can I tell you? You’re gonna die. You are gonna die. We all die. Your time has been brought forward, that’s all. How I always look at it. Bringing forward the inevitable. That’s all it is.’

‘I never thought of that before,’ Maiden said tonelessly. ‘That’s amazingly profound.’

Gary Seward tucked a fast fist into Maiden’s undefended stomach.

‘That the spot, Bobby?’

Maiden retched, folded in agony.

‘You scumball!’ Grayle screamed. ‘You knew he was hurt!’

‘But I digress,’ Maiden heard Seward say, across the pain. ‘What I was about to say is, by the time you check out I hope we’ll all know more about the actual business of death and what follows. The reality. You ever meet Clarence Judge, Bobby?’ Seward bent to him. ‘Eh?’

Maiden shook his head.

‘We can fix that.’ He turned and pushed open the oak door, stepped back. ‘Go through, would you, please?’

Ballantyne and his colleague blocked the passage in each direction. Ballantyne signalled Maiden into the room.

Where Maiden saw what he expected to see. A richly carpeted area with a red sofa and five chairs around a table. A little bit of Cheltenham.

What he didn’t expect to see, in one of the chairs, was Ron Foxworth.

LI

The table was of creamy, polished yew, the seating around it an inelegant mixture: two straight-backed wooden dining chairs, three red brocaded Edwardian fireside chairs. In one of which sat Foxworth.

He barely glanced at Maiden. He still wore his old black anorak with the rally stripes. He looked slightly absurd in this opulently furnished cellar.

But then the island of opulence itself looked absurd. All around, it was still a cellar. The walls had been patched up with cement. A strip light buzzed and flickered near the top of a wall. A dusty unlit bulb dangled from a brown Bakelite rose in the centre of the low, grey ceiling.

It was this hanging bulb, more than anything, which made it look less like a filmset than a display hurriedly flung together in a furniture warehouse.

‘He holds this very much against you, Bobby.’ Seward tilted his head to peer at Foxworth as though he was a child in a pram. ‘Don’t you, Ronny?’

Maiden saw that Foxworth was also handcuffed but with his hands in front. He saw a tall, expensive Chinese vase on a table pushed against the furthest wall. On either side of it, two oil heaters faintly smoking below a jacket on a hanger on a hook in the wall.

‘All this talk of the Festival of the Spirit, you really whetted Ron’s appetite, Bobby. Thinkin’ about you and me and how we all fitted into the picture. Had to come over and check it out, didn’t you, Ronny?’ Seward smiled at Foxworth and then at Maiden. ‘It’s his obsessive personality.’

Ron Foxworth didn’t speak. Ballantyne directed Grayle and Maiden into the red chairs on either side of Ron.

‘Course Ron sticks out a bit. Not very New Age. Not like you, Bobby, by all accounts. Now, you tell me — what was I supposed to do? It’s one of those moments, one of those signs. Detective Superintendent Ronald Foxworth visits the Festival of the Spirit. Life’s too short to ignore it. You know you got to react quick or you miss it. So … soon as we established he was on his tod, we had him. Lifted him clean, banged him up.’

Ron cleared his throat, didn’t look up. Maiden thought he’d never seen a man look so destroyed.

‘Surprised?’ Gary Seward slid into a wooden chair, crossed his legs, did his one-tone laugh. ‘Very surprised indeed, wasn’t you, Ronald? I mean, it don’t happen, do it? A senior officer, a distinguished detective? Should have heard the bluster, Bobby. You really done it this time, Seward. Big, powerful detective, this. Spent half his life trying to pull Gary Seward. Now I’ve pulled him. Exquisite. But it goes deeper, don’t it, Ron?’

Foxworth looked up. His eyes were pale and bloodshot. He didn’t look at anybody, his focus point seemed to be in a haze about eighteen inches from his face. But, at some stage since he was lifted, Ron had learned about the consequences of failing to answer direct questions.

‘Gary thinks I was once uncivil to Clarence Judge.’

‘Masterly understatement, Ron. What happened was … there was a siege situation yeah? Late Seventies, Ron? Seventy-nine, eighty, around then. Clarence, I think he done a post office for pocket money or alimony, some minor cash-flow thing. Course, Ron looks at Clarence, sees Gary Seward, know wha’ mean? Obsessive. Goes in mob-handed, SAS-style. Absolute overreaction, utterly uncalled for. Poor Clarence thinks he’s for the jump, killed trying to escape, some’ing like that. Thinks he’s fighting for his life. Well you would, wouldn’t you?’

Ron rallied. ‘He had a copper’s ear between his teeth. DS Earnshaw. Took four men to tear his bloody face away. Had half the ear in his mouth and if they hadn’t made him cough it up he’d have eaten it.’

Seward ignored him. ‘So, back at the station, what does Ron do but invite three of DS Earnshaw’s colleagues to pay their respects to Clarence in his cell.’

‘He was smashing up his cell,’ Ron said to his chest. ‘He was also in danger of injuring himself. Judge had no pain threshold.’

Seward half-turned, pointed the finger. ‘You, Ron, are a lying toerag. What are you?’

Maiden closed his eyes. Don’t make him say it.

‘Nah,’ Seward said. ‘He knows what he is. He humiliated Clarence that day. He stood and watched while those pigs hurt my poor friend in all the places what didn’t show. But, worst of all, they hurt his pride, and that’s the severest thing you can do to a man like Clarence, and it cannot be tolerated long term. I says, leave it, Clarence, don’t do nothing. ‘Cause he never had no finesse, see, the poor love. You leave it, I says. But one day I will see to Ron for you, I promise. And Gary Seward keeps his promises, and this is that day and Clarence is going to be here to see it. Matthew …?’

Ballantyne closed the oak door.

Oh God, Maiden thought.

‘Let’s make ourselves comfortable.’ Seward bent down the side of his chair, came up nursing black metal. ‘We’re gonna get cosy. There will be no resistance, otherwise the inevitable gets brought forward, know wha’ mean?’

Shotgun. Sawn-off. Maiden estimated that if Seward let that thing off in here he could kill one of them, maim the others with a single shot.

‘Stand up, Miss Underwood.’

Seward ambled over, placed the twin barrels against Grayle’s temple. ‘Oh God.’ Her voice was like a startled bird taking flight from a branch. Maiden began to breathe hard.

‘You too, Ron, Bobby. Up. Now, what we do, we close our eyes and we keep the fuckers closed.’

‘I can’t,’ Grayle said.