'Totally,' Michael said. 'I totally agree with you.'
'OK, we're on the same page, that's cool.'
'Sure is. Cool'
'Don't get much cooler, right, dude?'
'You got it,' Michael said, trying to humour him. 'So maybe you could lift the lid off for me and we could have a discussion about this face to face?'
'I'm kinda tired now. Think I'm going to hunker down, get me some shut-eye, know what I'm saying?'
Panicking, Michael said, 'Hey, no, don't do that, let's keep talking. Tell me more about the rabbits, Davey.'
'Told ya, I'm the Man With No Name.'
'OK, Man With No Name, you don't happen to have a couple of Panadols, because I've one mother of a headache?'
'Panadols?'
'Yes.'
There was silence. Just the crackle of static.
'Hello?' Michael said. 'You still there?'
There was a chuckle. 'Panadol?'
'Come on, please get me out of here.'
After another long silence the voice said, 'Guess that depends where here is.'
'I'm in the goddamn coffin.'
'You're shittin' me.'
'No shit.'
Another chuckle. 'No shit, Sherlock, right?'
'Right! No shit, Sherlock.'
'I have to go now, it's late. Shuteye!'
'Hey, please wait - please--'
The walkie-talkie went silent.
In the fading beam of the flashlight Michael saw that the water had risen considerably just in the past hour. He tested the depth again with his hand. An hour ago it had reached the knuckle of his index finger.
Now it covered his hand completely.
25
Roy Grace, in a white short-sleeve shirt and sombre tie, his collar loose, stared at the text message on his phone, and frowned:
Can't stop thinking about you! Claudine xx
Claudine?
Sitting in his office shortly after 9 a.m., in front of his computer screen, which was pinging with new emails every few moments, feeling dog tired and with a blinding headache, he was cold. It was tipping down with rain outside and there was an icy draught in the room. For some moments he watched it running down his window, staring at the bleak view of the alley wall beyond, then he unscrewed the cap of a bottle of mineral water he'd bought at a petrol station on his way in, rummaged in a drawer of his desk and took out a packet of Panadol. He popped two capsules from the foil, swallowed them, then checked the time the message had been sent: 2.14 a.m.
Claudine.
Oh God. Now it registered.
His cop-hating, vegan blind date from U-Date of Tuesday night. She'd been horrible, the evening had been a disaster, and now she was texting him. Terrific.
He held his mobile phone in his hand, toying with whether to reply or just delete it, when his door opened and Branson walked in, dressed in a crisp brown suit, a violent tie and two-tone brown and cream correspondent's shoes, holding a capped Starbucks coffee in one hand and two paper bags in the other.
'Yo, man!' Branson greeted him, breezily, as usual, plonking himself in the chair opposite Grace and setting the coffee and paper bag down on his desk. 'Still own a shirt, I see.'
'Very funny,' Grace said.
'You win last night?'
'No, I did not sodding well win.' Grace was still smarting at his
loss. Four hundred and twenty quid. Money wasn't a problem for him, and he had no debts, but he hated losing, especially losing heavily.
'You look like shit.'
'Thanks.'
