let’s have a proper night out. The four of us maybe. You, me, Brendan, and Dave. Brendan likes Dave. Actually, I think he fancies him a bit, but he always denies it.”
“That would be good,” Thorne said.
Hendricks was ready to go. He looked from one end of the street to the other.
Thorne pointed to the right. “Kingsway.”
“Kingsway,” Hendricks repeated. He turned and pointed himself toward the main road. Walking quickly, like someone trying too hard to look sober.
Thorne shouted after him. “Cheers, Phil…”
Hendricks raised a thumb, without turning round.
The drunk with the traffic cone was now playing something vaguely recognizable, though Thorne couldn’t put a name to it. Wondering if the man did requests, Thorne toyed with shouting across; asking if he knew the horn part to “Ring of Fire.”
He took out his sleeping bag and tried to get settled for the night. Opposite, the man with the cone grew in confidence and technique. He played “Mack the Knife” and “When the Saints Go Marching In.”
After five minutes, Thorne stood up and shouted at him to piss off.
His eyes snapped open and he stared at the figure standing above him: a shape stooping out of shadow. Thorne cried out and kicked his legs forward, pushing himself away from danger, driving himself back against the wall.
“What’s the matter with you, you daft fucker?” the man said.
Thorne gulped up his heart. Felt it thump against his teeth.
“For fuck’s sake, you silly twat!”
The breath he’d been holding exploded from Thorne’s mouth. “Oh Christ, it’s you.”
Jim Thorne chuckled. “You thought I was the killer, didn’t you?”
“What am I supposed to think?” Thorne gestured angrily at his father. “Standing there in the dark…”
“Standing in the dark and pissing myself laughing, watching you scuttle away like a fucking girl.”
Thorne was still breathing heavily. He shuffled forward and moved to one side. His father stepped forward and sat beside him, groaning with the effort as he lowered himself onto the concrete.
“Anyway, son, I’m the one person you can be pretty sure isn’t the killer, right? You’ve not sussed much of anything out so far, but I should hope you’ve worked that much out at least. Yes?”
Feeling like a kid, answering the question quietly, the sarcasm sounding childish and petulant as he spoke. “Yes. I know that much.. .”
“You know all sorts of things. All sorts. You know who the killer really is, for a kickoff.”
Thorne stared. His father’s face was expressionless. “You’ve got worse since you died.”
“You know his name, son.”
“Tell me…”
“Hold your horses. Let’s have some fun with it.”
Thorne saw where it was going. “Oh, please God, no. Not a fucking quiz.”
“Don’t be so boring. Right, list all the people who it might be.” He leaned over and tapped at the side of his son’s head. “You’ve got all the names up there.”
“I’m tired,” Thorne said.
“Come on, I’ll give you the first couple to start…”
Thorne listened as his father gave him the first name, paused, and then gave him a second. Thorne was impatient. He couldn’t help asking, though he knew his father would say nothing until he was good and ready. “Is either of those the man behind the camera? Is one of them the killer, Dad?”
The old man smiled, enjoying his secret. He began to list more names, and with each one Thorne felt himself drifting further toward sleep…
Then back toward consciousness. And by the time he’d woken up, thickheaded and shivering, Thorne couldn’t remember a single name.
THIRTY
There was nothing like a grisly death or two for putting things into perspective.
Holland sat at his computer, logged on, and cast an eye across the daily bulletin. Each morning he did the same thing: scanning the reports on serious crimes that had come in overnight. It was useful to see what other teams were doing of course; to get a sneak preview at what might be coming his own team’s way. And to get a graphic reminder-good and early in the day-that, all things considered, life could be a hell of a lot worse…
Sometimes, if it had been a slow night, there was little to get excited about. But usually there was something: a body more often than not, or a missing person who would soon become a body. Something to take Dave Holland’s mind off the fact that he was putting on a bit of weight, or to push some imagined slight to the back of his mind, or to make him forget about the row he’d had with Sophie the night before.
Saturday morning’s bulletin was usually the best, or worst, of the week. Depending on whether you wanted to be seriously distracted or were just interested in keeping your breakfast down.
It had been a vintage Friday night…
A man, age and ethnicity impossible to determine: hog-tied and barbecued in the back of a burned-out Nissan Micra in Walthamstow Forest.
Two teenage boys, one white, one Asian: the first killed, the second fighting for his life in a hospital after a stabbing outside a club in Wood Green.
A woman, thirty-four: found at home by her boyfriend after gaffer-taping a twelve-inch Sabatier carving knife to the edge of a table, and pushing her neck against it.
Two murders, perhaps three; possibly even four. The Homicide Assessment Team would already have signed the Walthamstow killing over to an MIT. They would be waiting to see if the boy carved up in Wood Green recovered. They would certainly be taking a good, long look at the man whose girlfriend had supposedly killed herself so inventively
…
DS Samir Karim walked past Holland’s desk and held up a coffee. “Ready to get going as soon as I’ve got this down me…”
Holland nodded. He went back to the computer, pulled up the list of visits he’d been allocated to make later that morning, and printed them out. While he waited for hard copy to appear he looked at the details. He studied the names, addresses, and comments attached; aware all the time of those other details, still there in the bulletin window, inactive and partially hidden on the screen.
While some had spent their Friday night busy with gaffer tape, washing blood from their hands or disposing of petrol cans, others had been safe at home in front of the television, disgusted and entertained by Crimewatch ’s crime-lite version of such events, before picking up the phone-four hundred and twelve of them-to do their bit. ..
“How come we never get any of the overnighters?” Andy Stone was pulling on his jacket and moving toward him.
Holland thought that Stone had good reason to be pissed off. Obviously, a great many of the calls that had come in after the program had been made from outside London, so while those in the office liaised with the relevant local forces, members of the team had been dispatched bright and early. Officers were already on their way to Exeter, Aberdeen, Birmingham, and half a dozen other cities. Such interviews were coveted, and with good reason. Holland was one of those who would not have said no to a night away from home; getting a little time to himself and giving his expenses a hammering in the restaurant of a decent hotel.
“Luck of the draw, mate,” he said.
“Couldn’t you have swung something with the DCI?”
