‘Him!’ She patted Neate’s stomach as he tried to wriggle free. ‘Well we all knew about him.’
She took out a packet of cigarettes from her jeans and lit up, offering one out. Dryden shook his head, and so did Neate, but he rolled his tongue along his bottom lip.
‘That’s just gossip,’ said Neate, trying to stop her hands worming inside his overalls, unable to hide his embarrassment.
‘Well, well,’ she said. ‘Since when did you not enjoy bad-mouthing someone from the Ferry?’
She grabbed the hair at the nape of his neck. ‘You’re right,’ she said, turning back towards Dryden. ‘It probably was just talk. That’s all we had at the Ferry – talk. It was the village where nothing happened.’
‘Except something happened in the end,’ said Dryden.
‘We can’t help,’ said Neate. ‘I need to get started on the Yank’s engine,’ he said, walking away.
She looked for a long moment into Dryden’s eyes. ‘Don’t mind Jimmy, he’s not the sociable type. But the best mechanic in the Fens according to his dad – very proud of him, is Walter. In fact that’s all Jimmy really cares about, making sure Dad’s still proud of him. He comes out sometimes from the home, sits in a chair and watches the traffic go by. That’s what counts as fun for the Neates.’
Dryden looked around. ‘So Walter’s never lived out here?’
She shook her head, coiling the hair behind one ear. ‘A few years. A home now, council geriatric unit at Ely. Not much of a memory our Walter, lucky if he can get the season right. He’s sixty-six, looks a decade older, mind. Jimmy visits and they talk about cars, that’s the kind of family it is, you see, close – but superficial. As long as Jimmy thinks Walter’s proud of him he’s happy.’
She smiled, and Dryden tried to guess how quickly the good looks would fade to match the cynicism.
‘So what did they say about Colonel Broderick?’ said Dryden.
‘Like Jimmy says, villages are all about gossip. Colonel Broderick lived alone; charming, polite, with an interest in flowers. He employed young men to work his fields. What d’you think they said about him? Ask me, I don’t think the old bloke had it in him. Doesn’t mean to say it didn’t go on – you’d be surprised, a little place like the Ferry.’
They watched as Neate threw up the hood on the pick-up and began noisily to examine the engine within.
Dryden tried another line. ‘You there the last night – at the village?’
She gave him a sideways look. The lower lip, as full as the top, jutted out.
‘Wouldn’t have missed it for the world. I was fifteen so we got to dance in the Methodist Hall, what more could a young girl want? Orange squash all round and choccy biccies for the neat and tidy. Good job they didn’t smell the cigarettes we were smoking round the back. Most of the lads were allowed in the pub, but not the girls. That’s the crappy bit about living in a small place, you can’t lie about your age. Place was medieval.’
‘Jimmy take you to the dance?’
She laughed. ‘Nope. I was chasing him. In fact I chased him all night.’
‘Catch him?’
‘Not that night. He had other things on his mind. Took me ten years to corner him, but I got my man. Lucky me.’ She bit her lip.
Dryden would have asked the next question but Neate was walking back, kicking up the red dust with his boots. He went to the back of the cab and, down on one knee, looked under the wheel arch.
‘The exhaust is hanging loose, I could see from over there. It’ll be off soon. I could do that for you – and fill the dent.’
Dryden nodded, opening the passenger side door. ‘Thanks. But I think he likes it that way.’
Humph woke.
‘The man wants to fix the car,’ said Dryden. ‘The exhaust is gonna drop off.’
‘Let it,’ said the cabbie, firing up the engine.
As they drove off Dryden watched them in the rear-view mirror. Jimmy Neate broke away quickly, his head and shoulders back beneath the hood of the pick-up. But Julie Watts watched them go, her weight on one leg, a hand shading her eyes from the sun.
16
DI Shaw spread the pictures on the wooden trestle table, which was the only furniture in the detective’s office – the old bottle store behind the bar of the New Ferry Inn. Each print was set precisely and neatly apart, a gallery of disfigurement. Dryden sipped bitumen-strong coffee from a mug that Shaw had given him marked THE TEAM. At the firing-range gate he’d got a lift in Shaw’s car, an immaculate black Land Rover with the multicoloured sail of a windsurf board and a beach-kite furled on the roof like emerging butterflies. The interior had been unnervingly neat and well ordered, a characteristic which made Dryden anxious. The pictures made him anxious too, calling up an unspecific sense of guilt. He didn’t lean forward but his eye was drawn to that first print, which Shaw was tapping rhythmically with a ballpoint.
‘Daughter of the company’s on-site assistant chemist,’ he said. Shaw was early-thirties, white open-necked shirt and an outdoor tan, the skin like slightly creased quality leather.
‘Mary Christine’s the name. The company, Lincoln Life Sciences, tests cosmetics for the big corporates, using rabbits, guinea pigs, rats and dogs. It’s been the subject of low-level animal rights interest for some years. We knew that extremists based in the East Midlands had become interested and so security at the site was increased.’
He tapped the picture again. ‘Unfortunately that wasn’t where they struck. Mary Christine opens the post at
