“According to Phil, we’ve already had sightings from St Austell, King’s Lynn, Clitheroe and the Kyle of Lochalsh.”
Hatchley laughed. “It was ever thus. Tell me about him. He sounds interesting.”
Banks told him what Barney Merritt had said and what he and Jenny had discussed late afternoon.
“Reckon he’s done her, the kid?”
Banks nodded. “It’s been over a week, Jim. I just don’t like to think about what probably happened before he killed her.”
Hatchley’s eyes narrowed to slits. “Know who the tart is? The blonde?”
“No idea. He picks them up and casts them off. They’re fascinated by him, like flies to shit. According to what Barney could dig up, his full name’s Jeremy Chivers, called Jem for short. He grew up in a nice middle-class home in Sevenoaks. No record of any trouble as a kid. No one can figure out how he got hooked up with the gangs. He had a good education, moved to work for an insurance company in London, then it all started.”
“It’s not hard for rats to find the local sewer,” said Hatchley.
“No. Anyway, he’s twenty-eight now, apparently looks even younger. And he’s no fool. You’ve got to be pretty smart to keep on doing what he does and get away with it. It all satisfies whatever weird appetites he’s developing.”
“If you ask me,” said Hatchley, “we’d all be best off if he found himself at the end of a noose.”
Banks remembered his early feelings about Hatchley. That comment, so typical of him and so typical of the burned-out, cynical London coppers Banks had been trying to get away from at the time, brought them all back.
Once, Banks would have cheerfully echoed the sentiment. Sometimes, even now, he felt it. It was impossible to contemplate someone like Chivers and what he had done to Carl Johnson?if he had done it?and, perhaps, to Gemma Scupham, without wanting to see him dangling at the end of a rope, or worse, to make it personal, to squeeze the life out of him with one’s own hands. Like everyone who had read about the case in the newspapers, like everyone who had children of his own, Banks could easily give voice to the outraged cliche that hanging was too good for the likes of Chivers. What was even worse was that Banks didn’t know, could not predict for certain,
what he would do if he ever did get Chivers within hurting distance.
The conflict was always there: on the one hand, pure atavistic rage for revenge, the gut feeling that someone who did what Chivers did no longer deserved to be a member of the human race, had somehow, through his monstrous acts, forfeited his humanity; and on the other hand, the feeling that such a reaction makes us no better than him, however we sugar-coat our socially sanctioned murders, and with it the idea that perhaps more insight is to be gained from the study of such a mind than from its destruction, and that knowledge like that may help prevent Chiverses of the future. There was no easy solution for him. The two sides of the argument struggled for ascendancy; some days sheer outrage won out, others a kind of noble humanism took supremacy.
Instead of responding to Hatchley’s comment, Banks gestured for the bill and lit a cigarette. It was time to go home, perhaps listen to Mitsuko Uchida playing some Mozart piano sonatas and snuggle up to Sandra, if she was in.
“Ah well,” sighed Hatchley. “Back to the in-laws, I suppose.” He reached into his pocket, pulled out a packet of extra-strong Trebor mints and popped one in his mouth. “Once more unto the breach, dear friends… .”
IV
The piece of luck that Banks had been hoping for came
at about six-thirty in the morning. Like most police luck,
it was more a result of hard slog and keen observation
than any magnanimous gesture on the part of some
almighty deity.
The telephone woke Banks from a disjointed dream
full of anger and frustration. He groped for the receiver in the dark. Beside him, Sandra stirred and muttered in her sleep.
“Sir?” It was Susan Gay.
“Mmm,” Banks mumbled.
“Sorry to wake you, sir, but they’ve found him. Poole.”
“Where is he?”
“At the station.”
“What time is it?”
“Half past six.”
“All right. Phone Jim Hatchley at Carol’s parents’ place and get him down there, but keep him out of sight. And?”
“I’ve already phoned the super, sir. He’s on his way in.”
“Good. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
Sandra turned over and sighed. Banks crept out of bed as quietly as he could, grabbed the clothes he had left folded on a chair and went into the bathroom. He still couldn’t shake the feeling the dream had left him with. Probably something to do with the row he had with Tracy after he got back from dinner with Jim Hatchley. Not even a row, really. Trying to be more understanding towards her, he had simply made some comment about how nice it was to have her home with the family, and she had burst into tears and dashed up to her room. Sandra had shot him a nasty look and hurried up after her. It turned out her boyfriend had chucked her for someone else. Well, how was he supposed to know? It all changed so quickly. She never told him about anything these days.
As soon as he had showered and dressed, he went out to the car. The wind had dropped, but the pre-dawn sky was overcast, a dreary iron grey, except to the east where
it was flushed deep red close to the horizon. For the first time that year, Banks could see his breath. Already, lights were on in some of the houses, and the woman in the newsagent’s at the corner of Banks’s street and Market Street was sorting the papers for the delivery kids.
Inside the station, an outsider would have had no idea it was so early in the morning. Activity went on under
