Nightingale took a deep breath. ‘This is going to sound crazy, but he saw himself being hit by a taxi.’
Jenny’s face hardened. ‘That’s not funny, Jack,’ she said.
‘I’m not joking,’ said Nightingale. He pointed at the shards of glass on the floor. ‘He was so shocked that he dropped it.’
‘Jack, listen to yourself. You’re saying Robbie saw his future. You know that’s impossible.’
‘I’m only telling you what he told me, Jenny. And if you’d seen the look on his face, you’d know how serious he was.’
‘He saw himself being hit by a cab?’
‘That’s what he said.’
‘It’s crazy.’
‘Everything about this is crazy,’ said Nightingale. ‘This basement is crazy, the DVD Gosling left me is crazy – killing yourself in a magic circle isn’t exactly a sign of sanity.’
Jenny flopped down onto a leather sofa. ‘Are you okay?’
‘In what sense?’
‘You’ve just found out your parents weren’t your real parents, that your real father killed himself with a shotgun and your birth-mother has spent most of her life in a psychiatric institution. Your uncle and aunt are dead and you’ve just buried your best friend.’
Nightingale lit a cigarette and sat down beside her. ‘Yeah. It’s been a stressful few days,’ he said sarcastically.
‘And how are you going to deal with it all?’
Nightingale held up the cigarette. ‘Nicotine and alcohol, same as usual,’ he said.
‘Do you want to talk about it?’
‘With a therapist?’
Jenny laughed. ‘With me, you idiot.’
‘I’m okay,’ said Nightingale. ‘I’m in bits about Robbie, but I’m an adult, I can deal with it. The parents thing is confusing me a bit, but I’m not the first person to discover they were adopted, and I can deal with it.’
‘And your mother?’
‘She’s not my mother, Jenny. She’s…’
‘She’s what?’
Nightingale shook his head. ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘Yes, she gave birth to me, I’m sure of that now, but she’s nothing to me and never will be. My mother was Irene Nightingale and she’s been dead almost fifteen years. And Bill was my father. Nothing will ever change that.’
‘And the DVD? Gosling’s message to you?’
‘The ramblings of a suicidal madman.’
She looked at him earnestly. ‘You’re sure that’s how you feel?’
‘Why do you ask?’
‘Because what you’ve been through is traumatic. And you seem to be taking it all very calmly.’
‘I was a cop for almost ten years, Jenny. It takes a lot to faze me.’ He blew smoke at the ceiling. ‘Trust me, I’m fine.’
42
When Nightingale woke on Friday morning he lay in bed for almost half an hour staring up at the ceiling. He had acted on impulse when he’d asked the detective inspector for the name of the man who had killed Robbie Hoyle, but once he had it he knew that nothing would stop him going to talk to him. Nightingale wanted to know if Hoyle had died immediately or if he had lain in a pool of blood, begging to be saved. He wanted to know why O’Brien hadn’t stopped or swerved, why he had just mown Hoyle down. He wanted to know what had happened, even though that knowledge wouldn’t change anything. Hoyle’s death didn’t make any sense but, in Nightingale’s experience, few deaths did.
He booted up his laptop and logged on to Tracesmart, an online service that provided access to electoral rolls around the country. There was only one Barry O’Brien living in Hammersmith. He made a note of the address and called Jenny to tell her he’d be late in. ‘I’ve things to do at Gosling Manor,’ he lied. ‘I’ll be with you during the afternoon. If there’s anything important, I’ll be on the mobile.’ He ended the call, feeling suddenly guilty. He didn’t like lying to Jenny, but telling her what he was really doing would only worry her. Nightingale had always been much more comfortable asking questions than answering them.
He shaved, showered and put on a clean shirt and a dark blue suit that had just come back from the drycleaner’s. He made himself a cup of black coffee, smoked a Marlboro, then drove to Hammersmith.
O’Brien’s house was in a terraced street and a black cab was parked in front of it. Nightingale found a space for the MGB about fifty yards away. He climbed out and walked over to the cab. There was no damage to the front, no blood, not even a scratch – nothing to show that the vehicle had ended the life of Robbie Hoyle. Nightingale wasn’t surprised. A London cab weighed more than 1600 kilograms and flesh was no match for that amount of steel moving at speed.
A middle-aged housewife walked by with a white poodle on a lead. She was holding a screwed-up plastic bag and cajoling the animal to do its business. Nightingale flashed her a smile and she glared at him as if he was a child-molester.
A flight of half a dozen stone steps led up to the front door of O’Brien’s house. Nightingale pressed the bell and heard it buzz in the hallway. He went back to the pavement and looked up at the bedroom windows. The curtains were drawn. Nightingale wondered if O’Brien had worked through the night and was now sleeping. He rang the bell again. When there was no answer, he took out his mobile phone and dialled the number he’d been given by Directory Enquiries. He heard the phone ring inside the house. He let it continue for a full thirty seconds, then ended the call and put the phone back in his pocket.
He stood on the pavement, considering his options. If O’Brien was asleep, he’d answer the door eventually. He obviously wasn’t working because his cab was in the street. Maybe he’d taken the day off and gone somewhere without it. If that was the case, then Nightingale was wasting his time.
He went back up the steps. There was a letterbox in the middle of the door. He pushed it open and bent down to shout through it. ‘Mr O’Brien?’ The door moved forward. Nightingale frowned. He straightened and pushed it open.
There were half a dozen envelopes on the carpet, mainly bills, and several garish leaflets. Nightingale stepped inside. ‘Mr O’Brien? Are you there?’ There was no answer, but Nightingale could hear a soft buzzing, like an electronic hum, coming from upstairs. He closed the door. He knew he shouldn’t be in the house, but he also knew that something was wrong. People didn’t leave their front doors open in London. He walked down the hallway and checked the living room, then the kitchen. There were dirty dishes in the sink and a half-drunk cup of coffee on the draining-board. He touched the kettle. It was cold.
He went back into the hallway. ‘Mr O’Brien? Are you upstairs?’ A large bluebottle flew around his head and he swatted it away. He headed up the stairs, peering up at the landing above. ‘Mr O’Brien, is everything okay?’
The buzzing got louder. Two more large flies circled Nightingale’s head. As he reached the landing he saw that the bathroom door was ajar. There were half a dozen flies on the wall by the light switch and as he moved closer more flew out through the open door. The buzzing was much stronger now, like a faulty electric circuit.
There was a bad smell in the air, an odour Nightingale had encountered many times during his years as a police officer, a smell that was difficult to describe but could never be forgotten. Before he even pushed open the bathroom door, Nightingale knew what he would find.
The man had been in the water for at least a day, probably longer, and had already started to swell. There were deep cuts in both arms and the savage wounds were filled with flies. They were everywhere, feeding and laying their eggs, buzzing around Nightingale as if they resented his appearance at their banquet.
O’Brien had filled the bath with water and cut his wrists with a Stanley knife, which was lying on the floor, the blade covered with blood. There were smears across the wall and the floor where arterial blood had sprayed but most had gone into the bathwater. O’Brien’s eyes were still open, staring up at the ceiling. Nightingale didn’t know
