“I don’t know.” Paul was out of breath and his voice 18
sounded shaky. He took off his jacket and hung it on the hook at the back of the door. “I ran back by myself over the moors.”
“But that’s more than four miles. What’s wrong, Paul? Why didn’t you wait for Seth and the others? You could have come back in the van.”
“There was some trouble,” Paul said. “Things got nasty.” He took a cigarette from his pack of Players and lit it, cupping it in his hands the way soldiers do in old war films. His hands were trembling. Mara noticed again how short and stubby his fingers were, nails bitten to the quick. She rolled another cigarette. Paul started to pace the room.
“What’s that?” Mara asked, pointing in alarm to the fleshy spot at the base of his left thumb. “It looks like blood. You’ve hurt yourself.”
“It’s nothing.”
Mara reached out, but he pulled his hand away.
“At least let me put something on it.”
“I told you, it’s nothing. I’ll see to it later. Don’t you want to hear what happened?”
Mara knew better than to persist. “Sit down, then,” she said. “You’re driving me crazy pacing around like that.”
Paul flopped onto the cushions by the wall, taking care to keep his bloodied hand out of sight.
“Well?” Mara said.
“The police set on us, that’s what. Fucking bastards.”
“Why?”
“They just laid into us, that’s all. Don’t ask me why. I don’t know how cops think. Can I have some wine?”
Mara poured him a glass of Barsac. He took a sip and pulled a face.
“Sorry,” she said. “I forgot you don’t like the sweet stuff. There’s some beer in the fridge.”
“Great.” Paul hauled himself up and went through to the kitchen. When he came back he was carrying a can of Carlsberg lager and he’d stuck an Elastoplast on his hand.
“What happened to the others?” Mara asked.
“I don’t know. A lot of people got arrested. The police just 19
charged into the crowd and dragged them off left, right and centre. There’ll be plenty in hospital, too.”
“Weren’t you all together?”
“We were at first, right up at the front, but we got separated when the fighting broke out. I managed to sneak by some cops and slip down the alley, then I ran all the way through the back streets and over the moor. I’m bloody knackered.”
His Liverpudlian accent grew thicker as he became more excited.
“So people did get away?”
“Some, yes. But I don’t know how many. I didn’t hang around to wait for the others. It was every man for himself, Mara. The last I saw of Rick he was trying to make his way to the market square. I couldn’t see Zoe. You know how small she is. It was a bleeding massacre. They’d everything short of water cannons and rubber bullets. I’ve seen some bother in my time, but I never expected anything like this, not in Eastvale.”
“What about Seth?”
“Sorry, Mara. I’ve no idea what became of him. Don’t worry, though, they’ll be all right.”
“Yes.” Mara turned and looked out of the window. She could see her own reflection against the dark glass streaked with rain. It looked like a candle flame was burning from her right shoulder.
“Maybe they got away,” Paul added. “They might be on their way back right now.”
Mara nodded. “Maybe.”
But she knew there’d be trouble. The police would soon be round, bullying and searching, just like when Seth’s old friend Liz Dale ran away from the nut-house and hid out with them for a few days. They’d been looking for heroin then-Liz had a history of drug abuse-but as far as Mara remembered they’d just made a bloody mess of everything in the place. She resented that kind of intrusion into her world and didn’t look forward to another one.
She reached for the wine bottle, but before she started pouring, the front door burst open again.
20
II
When Banks went downstairs, things were considerably quieter than they had been earlier. Richmond had helped the uniformed men to usher all the prisoners down to the cellar until they could be questioned, charged and released. Eastvale station didn’t have many cells, but there was plenty of unused storage space down there.
Sergeant Hatchley had also arrived. Straw-haired, head and shoulders above the others, he looked like a rugby prop-forward gone to seed. He leaned on the reception desk looking bewildered and put out as Richmond explained what had happened.
Banks walked up to them. “Super here yet?”
