‘Don’t know, don’t care.’
Another sigh from Katie.
‘Ouch! Jesus, Katie!’
‘Almost done. Keep still. There, you’re done.’
Phil sat up on the sofa and carefully picked his left leg up, and balanced it on his right knee. ‘What a bloody mess.’
Katie shrugged. ‘How long are you planning on stopping here for, exactly?’
‘A few days…’ he answered, not actually having a clue.
‘I’m going to work,’ she said, strutting from the room.
‘Try not to butcher any other poor sod, like you have me,’ he called after her.
She slammed the front door, leaving him alone in her flat, wondering what to do next.
Morton was in the lounge holding a photo of Juliette in her police uniform in front of Grace’s face. ‘Mummy! Mummy!’ he said, drawing out the word.
Grace, in her red and white striped Babygro, crawled away from him. ‘No!’
Morton followed her on all fours, keeping the photo in front of her face, despite her obvious protestations. ‘Mummy! Mummy!’ he repeated.
‘No!’
‘Mummy! Mummy!’
‘Er…morning,’ came George’s voice from the doorway. ‘Sorry to interrupt.’
Morton spun around, his embarrassment amplified by George’s making it apparent that he thought that what Morton had been doing was odd. Maybe it was. In fact, it certainly was. ‘I was just—’
George raised his hands as if surrendering, and left the room, muttering something which included the word “whatever”, which seemed to make the whole situation seem utterly worse.
Morton picked Grace up and followed him into the kitchen. ‘Sleep well?’ he said, trying to sound normal.
‘Pretty good, thanks. I was just going to grab a coffee?’ he said, turning his statement into a question which, because Morton had followed him into the kitchen, now seemed to require his permission.
‘Of course, go ahead,’ Morton urged, ready to say that he would have one, too, if he were asked. He didn’t get asked: George made himself a drink and slunk from the room, back upstairs, leaving Morton with the certitude that his half-brother had some kind of a problem with him. What that problem was, however, he had no clue.
Morton made himself a coffee, which he left on the worktop, and Juliette a tea, which he carried in one hand and Grace in the other, up to their bedroom. ‘Give Mummy a kiss,’ Morton encouraged, placing her down on the bed.
‘No kiss,’ Grace replied.
Juliette groaned and rolled over.
‘I’ve brought you a tea,’ Morton quickly said, pretending that Grace had not actually just said another new word which was not ‘Mummy’.
He sat on the bed, patiently playing with Grace, whilst he waited for Juliette to surface.
Eventually, she sat up and cuddled her cup of tea in both hands, as though she lived on the streets and this was her first warm drink in a week.
‘So, did any more happen with this Phillip Garrow guy? Did they find him?’
‘No, at least they hadn’t by the time my shift ended at two am.’
‘What are they doing about that? Are they trying to find him?’ Morton asked.
‘Oh, yeah,’ Juliette said. ‘We’ve pulled CCTV of the area, got analysts working on Automatic Number Plate Recognition from his home address through to where the offence took place.’ Morton now knew that she was mocking him. ‘And we’ve set up strategic road blocks around Kent.’
‘Very funny. Are you actually doing anything to find him?’
Juliette looked down at her tea. ‘I’m not doing anything, no. You’ve been watching too much television if you think we’ve got the manpower to go searching for someone whose crime amounts to trespassing.’
‘And reporting his car stolen when it wasn’t…’
‘And low-level fraud,’ Juliette conceded. She sighed in a conciliatory way then said, ‘We went to his house. His wife said she hasn’t seen him. We’d no reason to think she was lying. That’s pretty well it. We’ll try the house again and hope he’s shown up.’
‘Right,’ Morton said, disappointed, then an idea came into his mind. ‘What car was it?’
‘An old Volvo.’
‘Watch Grace for a minute, while I make a phone call.’ He headed from the bedroom and, on seeing that the door to Grace’s bedroom—where George was staying—was open and thinking him likely to be downstairs again, decided to make the phone call upstairs in his study.
He pushed the study door shut and dialled the number on his mobile. After a few rings, a breathy voice answered.
‘Hi, Arthur. It’s Morton Farrier, here.’
Morton could hear Arthur breathing as he processed the information about who was calling. ‘Oh, yes—hello.’
‘It was just a bit of a courtesy call, really, to let you know how the case is going,’ Morton lied. He always avoided giving clients an interim report of any kind.
‘Any progress?’ Arthur asked, a hint of interest in his voice.
‘Oh, yes, plenty,’ Morton began, before giving him some of the brief highlights of the case so far. He alluded to Ann Fothergill’s connection to smuggling, but did not go into detail. Then he asked after Arthur himself.
‘Not so bad. Mustn’t grumble,’ he answered.
‘And how’s your nephew—the one that I met at your house? I can’t remember his name, now.’
‘Oh, Steve. Yes, he’s alright.’
‘Oh, that’s good,’ Morton said. He asked his next question, rendered redundant by Arthur’s previous answer, just to be entirely certain: ‘What car does Steve drive?’
‘He can’t drive,’ Arthur revealed. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘No reason. Right, I’ll let you get on and I’ll be in touch in due course.’ He said goodbye and ended the call. There was something that he was just not getting, that he knew he should. The nephew whom he had met at Arthur’s house, Steve, could not have been the man, Phillip Garrow, who had trespassed onto the Bourne Tap. He sat at his desk and closed
