an unwanted child finds a happy home in London or Barcelona-’
He’s building up quite a head of steam. Luther wonders briefly about roid rage, the aggressive hypomania associated with steroid abuse. He fingers the pepper spray in his pocket, moves it round and round in his palm.
‘Is it such a bad thing,’ Sava says, ‘to find out your parents want you so badly they’re willing to pay money for you? To break the law? Put themselves at risk to give you a loving home? How can that be a bad thing? I don’t understand. Please explain.’
‘You don’t sell people,’ Luther says. ‘They’re not cattle.’
‘No?’
‘No.’
‘Twenty years ago,’ Sava says, ‘the news in England shows terrible conditions in Romanian orphanages. Kids are naked, starving, covered in shit. Dying. So thousands of Western families decide to adopt these orphans, okay? Save them from these terrible shit lives. But alongside the legal market, a black market springs up. Romania’s a failed communist state, remember. Everywhere you look, pockets are being lined, palms are being greased. The usual story. So because of this corruption, the European Union puts pressure on the Romanian government. Not to sort out the illegal adoptions but to stop foreign adoptions altogether.
‘All these babies, all these young kids. They’ve been approved for adoption to rich Western families! Officially approved! Rubber stamped! They’re living in filth and squalor, like dogs, but soon they’re going to get out, get away, move to Brighton, Amsterdam, Madrid. But no. This ban means they have to stay in Romania. They don’t get a family. They don’t get nothing. They’re left behind to freeze and starve and be fucked in the ass and in the mouth. Have you ever seen one of these places?’
‘No.’
‘But you think you’ve seen some pretty bad things, right? All coppers say that. It’s part of the image. Oooh, the things we’ve seen. Well, fuck you. And do you know the real irony?’
Luther ponders the malignant pets in their muggy glass tanks, their unblinking eyes under pale grey rocks. One tank is full of crickets. They struggle to crawl over each other like passengers escaping an underground fire. Hundreds of them.
He says, ‘I don’t know. Tell me.’
‘Who goes on to abuse, eh? Who goes on to fuck kids in the ass? People who were fucked in the ass when they were kids! On and on it goes. So fucking high-minded pricks like you with all your morals and all your distaste, telling me it’s wrong to sell people. It’s you who leaves these kids in these terrible shitholes because it’s so dirty to buy and sell a human being. Well, when you go to bed tonight I want you to think about all those kids who didn’t get adopted back in 2001. I want you to think of them being fucked in the ass by men in blue uniforms. Then I want you to imagine those kids going on to rape the kids who were born since 2001. And in ten, twenty years, I want you to imagine the kids born since 2001 raping the kids being born today. And on and on it goes. Because of assholes like you.’
He takes a breath. His hands are shaking. Cables of vein running up his arms. He drains his dainty little coffee.
‘The people who want to do this,’ he says, gesturing to the air above him. ‘English people desperate to adopt children. They’re not monsters. The people they buy the children from aren’t monsters either — not for the most part. And people like me, people whose only crime is to introduce supply to demand, I’m not a monster either. So if you’re looking for someone who’d indulge a man who wanted to cut a baby from its mother’s womb, then fuck you for looking in the wrong place.’
‘Okay,’ Luther says. ‘I can see this means a lot to you. But you need to calm down, okay?’
‘I’m calm.’
He’s not.
‘We’re not looking at you,’ Luther says. ‘But we may be looking for someone you turned away. Somebody who came to you, made the mistake you think I’m making. A monster who thought he was coming to see a monster. Maybe used the name Torbalan.’
‘These men, I don’t deal with them. Not ever.’
‘But you know of them. These men.’
‘If I did, what would happen?’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘The reward. I saw it on TV. A hundred thousand. Is it still available?’
‘Yes.’
‘Do I have to sign anything?’
‘You’d have to make an official statement and put your name to it, yes. If the information you give leads directly to a successful prosecution, the money’s yours.’
‘But there must be other channels, right? Faster ways.’
‘I’m not playing this game. Two minutes ago, it was all about the kids.’
‘No. Two minutes ago it was all about hypocrisy. People like you, who pretend to care — but who don’t really give a shit.’
‘I’m asking nicely,’ Luther says. ‘If you have a name, give me a name. Please.’
‘No.’
Luther looks at Howie and laughs. He says, ‘‘No”?’
‘Bring me money, I’ll give you a name.’
‘What name?’
‘The name of the man who sent Mr Torbalan to me.’
‘You could be saving lives,’ Luther says. ‘Instead, you’re going to do this?’
‘I could have spent the last six years saving lives. And making childless people happy.’
‘I know you’re bitter.’
‘I’m not bitter. I’m poor.’
Luther thinks. He says, ‘Okay. I’ll see what I can do. DS Howie, would you mind stepping outside and calling our commanding officer? Please enquire if it’s possible to arrange an urgent cash payment to Mr Sava?’
Howie produces her mobile, waves it. ‘Will do, Boss.’
Luther and Sava wait in silence until Howie’s gone.
Then Luther loosens his tie.
‘The worst of it is,’ he says, slipping the rolled-up tie into his pocket, ‘you made a pretty good argument back then. Not one I’d agree with, but one I’d be obliged to think about if I was trying to refute it. You’re obviously a smart man.’
‘A smart man who has something you want.’
Luther acknowledges this with a gesture of the hand.
Sava smiles, shrugs.
Luther punches him in the face; a short jab with the weight of his shoulder behind it.
Sava falls to the floor. Luther kicks him in the ribs, then grabs his collar, hauls him to his feet and rams him headfirst into the wall of glass terrariums.
Tanks crash. Liberated crickets dance on Sava’s head and shoulders. They flit and skip across the floor.
The black snake glides down Sava’s arm, onto the carpet.
In one upended tank, tarantulas stir.
Luther drags Sava to his feet and throws him into the iguana tank. It doesn’t break: it’s made of heavy glass. But the impact throws it to the ground.
The floor hops with crickets; it crawls with spiders. A huge cockroach scuttles over Luther’s shoe as he jams Sava’s wrist between his shoulder blades and gives it a twist.
He presses Sava’s face into the hardwood floor. For a moment he’s driven to keep pushing until Sava’s skull fractures then collapses under the weight of his hand.
Luther bends, puts his lips to Sava’s ear. ‘You don’t understand,’ he says. ‘I really, really need your help.’
Howie waits outside in the cold, hands in pockets, stamping her feet for warmth, wishing she still smoked. But no one smokes any more, it’s one of those things. You smoke and people make you feel all weird about it.
