reluctant. “You will let me know of any changes, won’t you, Charlie?”
“Of course,” I’d said, smiling at her.
Now, sitting and thinking while I drank too much bad coffee, my mind went round and round what might have happened until it felt like a washing machine on a fast spin cycle. And, tucked away right at the back was the sneaking guilty suspicion that it might have been all my fault.
Or at least something that I could have prevented.
***
Sometime during the week before I’d seen Slick Grannell for the last time at Devil’s Bridge, I’d had another visitor. One even less welcome and not just for the message he brought.
I’d been taking down the old lathe-and-plaster ceilings upstairs, ready for knocking the dividing walls out. My local builder had finally deigned to put in an appearance for long enough to install a pair of whacking great RSJs to prevent the far gable collapsing into the field alongside the cottage. My aim was to have the whole of the front bedroom ceiling transferred into the skip I had parked in the lane outside before I quit for the day. Achievable, if I put both mind and muscle to it.
I’d been working steadily all afternoon. I told myself I was simply taking advantage of the extended daylight hours and the lack of neighbours but privately I could admit there was a lot more to it than that. The harder I worked the less time I had to think. And the better I slept at night.
Dr Yates, the psychotherapist my father had cajoled me into seeing, would have been proud. Or exasperated.
I’d heard the car coming and, as I’d done later with Sam’s Norton, I’d hung out over the upstairs front window sill and watched it arrive. A large official-looking dark green Rover saloon with a large official-looking driver. I’d recognised the car for what it was without knowing the occupants and had felt the first stirrings of unease.
The passenger door opened and a slim man in his mid forties stepped out, a neat figure with an air of unassuming authority about him, in a sober dark blue suit. He tipped his head back to meet my gaze and a pair of piercing muddy green eyes locked with mine. I resisted the urge to squirm.
“Detective Superintendent MacMillan,” I greeted him coolly. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”
“Charlie,” he returned, his voice chillingly pleasant. “I’d like a word, if you have a moment?”
It was politely put, but to my ears it still sounded like an invitation from the Stasi. I had a sudden perverse desire to make him meet me on my own terms so I waved towards the front door. “Be my guest,” I said. “But you’ll have to excuse the mess.”
MacMillan paused and a smile almost made its escape across the thin lips. “Burglars?” he asked, reminding me of the first time we’d met, when two men had trashed my old flat on St George’s Quay in Lancaster. They’d had a pretty good go at trashing me at the same time.
“No – builders. They steal just as much of your money and wreck the place, but at least they leave the video,” I said dryly. “Come on up. The coffee’s on.”
He left his driver in the car and made his way upstairs without undue haste. He reached the first floor and made a deceptively thorough inspection of the alterations I’d made so far in the time it took me to pour him a coffee from my filter machine and add milk and sugar.
As I handed it over his gaze settled on me, sharp and assessing to the point of unfriendliness. I felt a sudden desire to confess to something.
“You’re doing some major work, Charlie,” he said. “Have you been living here long?”
If he’d pulled my driving licence records or run the bike’s registration in order to find me, he would have known that but it was interesting that he felt the need to make idle conversation. The Superintendent was not normally one for small talk.
“Only since the beginning of May,” I said, playing the game. “I’m turning the whole place upside down.”
He smiled briefly again, little more than a flicker that came and went like a flashlight. “I can see that.”
“No, actually that wasn’t an exaggeration,” I said. “The views are all from upstairs, so I’m opening out the first floor and moving the living room and kitchen up here. Both bedrooms and the bathroom are going downstairs.”
He frowned, eyes sliding away for a moment while he gave the plan some thought. “Interesting,” was all he said, so I didn’t really know if he approved or thought I was mad.
“You didn’t come here to talk about DIY, Superintendent,” I said. I leaned against the partly-exposed stonework of the chimney breast and took a slug of my coffee. “What have I done now?”
“Why should you think that? Although, now you come to mention it, the last time your name came up in conversation I believe you were at the top of the FBI’s Most Wanted list,” he said, and he was only half joking.
When I didn’t dignify that one with a reply he took a sip of his own coffee, stilled a moment as though he hadn’t expected it to be any good, and took another before continuing. Then he said, “What do you know about Devil’s Bridge?”
Not quite what I’d been expecting. “Devil’s Bridge?” I repeated blankly. “I never saw you as a born-again biker, Superintendent.” And when he frowned at me I added, “It’s just a biker’s hang-out. Nothing heavy – no gangs, no Hell’s Angels – just a lay-by near the river at Kirkby Lonsdale where we go to meet up on a Sunday. Why? Not been demoted to Traffic, have you? Who did you piss off?”
That smile nearly made it out again, but was quickly snuffed.
“On the road between Lancaster and Devil’s Bridge there have been twelve fatal crashes involving motorcycles so far this year and the Chief Constable’s been getting stick about it,” he said, his voice flat. “We have reason to believe there’s more to it than just bad luck or bad judgement.”
“Like what?”
“Like some kind of organised illegal road racing. We’ve put in a number of new fixed safety cameras along
