PART THREE
THIRTY-THREE
Rufus is sprawled in a sun-bleached wooden chair, tucked away in the overgrown garden at the rear of his home, attempting to allow an unfamiliar sunlight to undo some of the damage that his lifestyle has done to his face. It isn’t working. He’s just hot and sweaty and half asleep. He isn’t normally fond of hot days: preferring to see the beauty in grey skies and bleak, zig-zagging rain. But the school holidays have filled the house with teenagers, and the only place he feels able to sit, and think, and drink himself insensible, is in the little tangle of wildflower-strewn grass between the courtyard garden and the orchard. It’s a pleasant spot – the apple trees forming a lacy parasol overhead and the shadows moving with a pleasingly haphazard choreography. He has his eyes closed. There is a cigarette clasped between his lips: a dog-turd of ash threatening to tumble onto his stubbled chin. He’s wearing a wrinkled linen shirt, shorts that won’t fasten over his belly, and deck shoes with broken backs: his feet having stamped them flat. In the twists of bluebell, dandelion and cowslips that surround the rickety chair in which he reclines, hardback books form colourful stepping stones. Two wasps are slowly dying in the sticky residue of his home-made elderflower gin. He knows they will die happy.
‘Not a bad spot, this. If I didn’t know your financial situation I’d think you were doing well for yourself.’
Rufus sits forward, opening an eye like a dog asleep in front of the fire. He recognizes the voice. DC Ben Neilsen. He’d expected as much. He hasn’t returned any of his phone calls or made arrangements to give a statement, as requested, so the handsome detective’s presence at Rufus’s home in North Yorkshire comes as no surprise.
‘Pull up a tuffet,’ says Rufus, grimacing as the sunlight makes his head spin. ‘You want a drink? Do you like your elderflower gin with or without wasps?’
Neilsen stands directly in front of him, blocking out the sun. Rufus raises a hand to his forehead. He’s sweating. Everything aches. He’d hoped vitamin D would be some miraculous cure-all but he just feels hot and tired. His thoughts seem to have been dulled by the sun. He wants to sleep. To roll into the soft grass and doze off with the smell of spring suffusing his senses.
‘You didn’t call me back,’ says Neilsen, with a sigh.
Rufus looks him up and down. He looks like something from a magazine. He wears a light grey suit with a pale shirt and open collar. There’s not a bead of sweat upon him and he looks as though he has just been professionally cleaned. Rufus would hate him for it, if he had any energy for the task.
‘Your wife said I would find you out here. She didn’t seem surprised to see me.’
Rufus feels ash patter onto his chin. Removes the dog-end and rubs his hand across his bristles. ‘I don’t think Shonagh has the capacity for surprise, Ben. I think the juice ran dry on that score a few years ago. Gave too many feelings away too freely, you see. All the good ones. Compassion, lust, sense of humour, creativity – let them gush when we first met. Now the barrel is empty. Still got a few kegs of bitterness and disappointment left though. She can spray that around like an elephant spraying water.’
Neilsen looks around and locates an old stone birdbath. It’s heavy, but he picks it up without much effort and moves it nearer to where Rufus is sprawled. Sits himself down and peers at the books which surround him.
‘You’re re-reading Metamorphoses?’ he asks, drily. ‘Psychopath textbooks. The Gates of Janus? That’s by Ian Brady, isn’t it? Not exactly light reading, Rufus. Anybody would think you were studying for an exam. Heading on Mastermind, are you? Chosen subject: true evil.’
Rufus runs his tongue around his mouth, wishing that somebody, anybody, liked him enough to bring him a glass of water. He sighs, and tries to sit up. There’s an unpleasant sound as he unpeels his sweaty skin from the wood of the chair. He laughs at the absurdity of it all. At the ridiculousness of the picture he must present.
‘I spoke to Ruth this morning,’ says Neilsen, conversationally. ‘She was trying to get the address of a certain Wilson Iveson. Considering a profile, she said. Trying to drum up a piece about the man who helped create a monster. I don’t think she’ll get very far. He’s properly gaga now, and that’s a genuine diagnosis. We had a couple of local bobbies go chat with him at the care home. Barely knew his own name, poor sod. The idea that he’d be hiding Cox, or have anything useful to say – it’s laughable.’
Rufus licks his dry lips. ‘So you still haven’t found him?’
‘Divers have been down three times, but the currents there are erratic. It could be weeks or months before he washes up. Found the car, but no useful forensics. Found the spot where it went in, too. No tyre marks on the road or pavement. Didn’t even hit the brakes before it left the road.’
‘Good job you’ve got Annabeth’s statement,’ says Rufus. ‘Would be quite the wild-goose chase if not.’
Neilsen nods, giving nothing away. ‘Of course, we’re still making enquiries. There’s the chance that he got out. The chance he’s out there somewhere. It would be nice if we had the manpower for a major investigation but resources aren’t what they were. We’re watching the ports and airports, just to be sure. He has contacts in Italy, as we understand it.’
Rufus nods. He’s spent the past week familiarizing himself with Griffin Cox. He fancies he’s better informed about the escaped prisoner than anybody on the investigation team.
‘Naples,’ says Rufus, smoothly. ‘The
