To Dream of the Dead

‘Moderation in all things,’ Bliss said. ‘That’s what my old mam used to say. But they say it doesn’t always work with coke.’

‘He knows some fairly horrible people,’ Kate said. ‘People you don’t want to… I wanted us to move. Sell up, get out. But we’re locked into Hereford. Can’t sell the business because Gyles’s parents own half of it, and they know nothing of this. We were going to… tell them over Christmas.’

‘Didn’t you say your kids were with them?’

‘With my parents. They don’t know, either. We’ve told them we’re terribly busy in the shop — that’s a laugh — and have to work late. You can see the state we’re in. Look at my hands shaking. Some of our older customers are not going to come near us again, are they? And who wants to buy a small shop these days, anyway?’

‘It’s a problem,’ Bliss said. ‘And I’m very sorry for you, but… hard to scrap the charges at this stage.’

‘Not even if we—’

‘We can’t,’ Gyles snapped. ‘He… he’ll take it very badly.’

‘Well, of course he will,’ Bliss said. ‘But look at it this way, Gyles — I’m gonna nail the twat anyway, with or without your assistance. It’s just a question of how long he goes away for. Or if he goes away at all…?’

Bliss crossed his legs, leaned back. Kate started plucking at her cardigan.

Gyles said, ‘We’d get protection?’

‘Just ask your questions,’ Kate said.

At one time there had been an underworld, a criminal community.

Ordinary people had nothing to do with it.

Drugs had changed all that, the ubiquity of drugs. The discovery, by ordinary suburban people who served on the PTA, that snorting a line or two of coke didn’t automatically turn you into a denizen of the gutter.

Thus, the suburban snorters became part of the new Greater Underworld.

As Kate had intimated, it was Steve who had the contacts. Steve coming in from Brum to take up his new appointment with the Herefordshire planning department. Very pleasant chap, Kate thought at first. Steve would flirt with her, in an unthreatening, flattering way. At the time, Gyles had been wanting to double the size of his shop window, to allow for a bigger display of his fine jewellery, but the shop was on the edge of a conservation area and the planners had been inclined to refuse permission.

Until Steve had a quiet word in the right place. Steve tapping his nose at Gyles: between you and me, OK, mate?

So Gyles owed Steve a big one, and that was the start of it.

‘Who arranged deliveries, Gyles, once the basic structure had been set up?’

‘I did. Steve would come round with what he called his shopping list.’

‘And you’d pay Mebus?’

‘Yes. It would come back… threefold. It didn’t seem like crime.’

‘Always for parties?’

‘And personal use. And sometimes he’d come for a large order.’

‘You know what for?’

‘We didn’t ask,’ Gyles said.

‘We didn’t need to.’ Kate sniffed. ‘It was usually before he went away somewhere.’

‘To where?’

‘To something connected with his job. He was on a committee and they went away to thrash out ideas and things.’

‘A blue-sky thinking weekend.’ Bliss smiled. ‘So where’s Stevie now?’

His phone was throbbing in his hip pocket. He placed a calming hand over it.

‘We don’t know,’ Kate said. ‘Birmingham or Gloucester… or London. I really couldn’t say. He has a lot of friends… and a girlfriend who sometimes lives here. Sometimes he brings her back with him.’

‘Not always the same one,’ Gyles said wearily.

‘You think he’ll be back tonight?’

‘’I think so. He says he likes a traditional Christmas. Talked about going to a service in the Cathedral. A place to be seen, I’d guess. And then he’s having a…’

‘Party?’ Bliss said.

‘Inevitably.’

‘Tell me, Mrs Jones, what was his reaction to Gyles getting busted? Sympathy? Some advice about taking it on the chin, pleading guilty and keeping shtum? A gentle warning, perhaps?’

‘Not that gentle, really,’ Kate said.

Gyles, well out of this conversation now, looked like he was about to be sick. Bliss took out his phone and inspected the screen.

‘Right then, guys, I’ll leave you to have a think if there’s anything else you want to tell me. I’ll be just across the road. Someone I need to phone back.’

‘I’m still shaking,’ Karen said. ‘I’d rather abseil down the spire of St Peter’s than do that again.’

‘Good cause, though, Karen.’

‘It better be. Thought I was going to have to sleep with him.’

Bliss stood at the bottom of Gyles and Steve’s shared drive, away from the only street lamp. He had to smile.

‘Karen, I wouldn’t’ve asked—’

‘I know. It’s just I’m not comfortable lying, never have been.’

‘So, cutting to the chase?’

‘The answer’s yes.’

Something throbbed in Bliss’s chest.

‘The wounds?’

‘One through the aorta, but a few more besides. Maybe afterthoughts?’

‘Window dressing.’

‘Yeah. Didn’t fool their pathologist. His feeling was the bloke was dead almost before the knife went in for a second time.’

‘Wooh, wooh, wooh,’ Bliss said.

Between the sporadic clumps of housing he could see the lights of the city, flat as a pinball table, and the silver ball was pinging. Ram another coin into the slot before it stopped.

‘So you asked him for the name.’

‘He said he’d call me back. That was when it got tense. By some incredible good fortune the only guy in the CID room, when he rang to check me out, was Terry Stagg.’

‘He called you back with the name yet?’

‘No.’

‘Give him an hour, then call him again and tell him it’s important we have it.’

‘I so do not want to do this.’ Karen paused. ‘How important?’

‘Well, Karen, I think this might be it.’

‘What’s that mean?’ An edge of panic in her voice. ‘What are you doing?’

‘Turning over stones.’

‘But Frannie, you’re sick.’

Bliss laughed.

‘I mean you’re not part of this, are you? How can you do anything when you’re out there?’

‘I’ll think of something.’

‘It’s Christmas Eve.’

‘Yes.’

He looked across at the city with the thick night clouds on top, like a cold compress. When Karen had gone, as it began to rain, he went back to the car, switched on the radio, low. Sagged back in the seat, closing his eyes as a chapel choir sang Silent night, holy night.

Another idea came to him. He thought about the options, then switched off the radio and rang Ledwardine