He waited until the street was empty, then got out of the car -- his coat slung over his forearm -- and went to the boot. He took out the bolt cutters and slipped them under the coat, then slammed the boot closed. He walked to the garage door. He looked left and right, then applied the cold beak of the bolt cutters to the padlock chain. He gripped the long handles in his fists and leaned into them with all his weight.
It was harder than he expected, much harder than they made it look on television. He was sweating when the chain finally gave, and there was a band of pain across his chest and under his armpit and across his guts.
He edged into the garage and turned on the lights. He closed the door behind him and slid the bolts closed. The Audi wasn't there: Bob had sold it. He'd yet to buy another car and the garage was weirdly empty, except for the old Workmate and the utilitarian shelving and the rusty, humming freezer. It smelled of damp concrete and spilled oil and old exhaust.
He examined the freezer. At the rear, it was connected to the r
breeze-block wall by thick, dusty cobwebs. Nathan took a moment, then employed the bolt cutters to the small padlock on the freezer lid: they took it apart with comparative ease.
Nathan lifted the freezer lid. Its cold exhalation chilled the sweat on his face and the front of his shirt. He lifted aside the baskets of frozen peas and sweetcorn, setting them carefully on the floor.
He wondered if there was time to burn Elise's clothing before his meeting with Bob. The bones he could pulverize, then soak in quicklime: it was the semen-steeped clothing, those fungal rags, that presented the biggest threat.
Nathan leaned deep into the freezer.
But the taped-up plastic parcel was not there.
The bones and the clothes had gone. Bob had moved them.
33
He left the garage door hanging open like a broken limb; perhaps Bob would suspect local kids of breaking in. He threw the bolt cutters into the thick bushes and walked back to the car. He started the engine then spun the wheels up to 60 miles an hour, screeching to a halt at the lights.
He tapped the steering wheel, waiting for people to cross the road.
Pulling away, he drove less aggressively. He didn't want to get arrested. He drove around the corner to Bob's flat and parked outside, across the road. Then he walked to the pub.
Outside, he paused to straighten his t
Bob was hunched over a table, reading The Times.
Nathan sat down, saying, 'Blimey.'
He loosened his t
'Fuck have you been?'
'I've got a life, Bob. I've got a mortgage to pay.'
Bob nodded at a pint of lager sitting on the table opposite him. 'I got them in.'
Nathan watched bubbles unlatch themselves from the base of the lager glass, leaping for the unknown surface. He took a sip. He wanted to smash the pint glass on the edge of the table and grind the remains into Bob's face.
He said, 'Look. We can't talk here. Let's go back to your place.'
'I thought my place scared you.'
'Not at all.'
Bob grinned, knowing the l
'Shall we finish these?'
'Fine,' said Nathan, and downed his pint in seven or eight gulps.
Bob watched him, then raised his glass.
'One more. Same again. Your round.'
So Nathan got them in.
After the pub, they stopped off at an off-licence. Nathan bought a bottle of whisky, eight cans of Guinness, cigarettes. Then he and Bob trudged home.
They paused in the stone doorway of the Victorian mansion block, overgrown with weeds and wet, black trees. Bob dangled his house keys from an index finger: made them dance.
'Are you sure?'
'About what?'
'Going inside.'
Nathan tutted and followed Bob into the mouldy, darkened hallway.
The light was on a timer; halfway down to Bob's flat, it turned off. Nathan and Bob stood while their eyes adapted to the sudden dark. Sounds of their breathing, the clinking of the whisky bottle in the carrier bags.
Bob went down. He found his keys and opened the door. Pale light sneaked into the stairwell. Nathan went down, into the bedsit.
He walked straight to the kitchenette and broke the seal on the bottle of Macallans.
Bob told him, 'Use water. I finished the ice.'
So Nathan poured whisky into two cloudy tumblers. Topped them up with a dash of water from the tap.
They sat down.
Bob nursed his glass. 'Can you feel her?'
Nathan said, 'No.' Swirling the whisky, he said: 'For years after it happened, I thought she was there. But she wasn't, Bob.'
Bob drained his drink and stumbled to the kitchenette to pour himself another, no water. He wandered back to his seat, clutching the bottle. He looked blue-jowled and exhausted.
Nathan glanced at the reel-to-reel tape recorder and said, 'You're going through exactly what I went through. You're just going through it a bit later, that's all. You were able to cope with . . .'
His voice fell. He was too aware of the way it echoed from the low ceiling.
'.. . you were able to cope with it first time round. I don't know the proper word for it, the doctor's word for it. But you buried it. Do you know what I mean? You buried it. And now it's all bubbling to the surface.'
'To haunt me.'
'Yeah.'
'So, it's all in my mind?'
'It's all in your mind.'
Nathan watched Bob struggling to light a cigarette, then went to examine the books, as if it were a CD collection. Breakthrough! Life After Death: the Truth. Whispers From Beyond. Grave Secrets.
'I thought you'd've given this stuff up years ago.'
Bob grinned secretly into his glass.
'No.'
Someone whispered into Nathan's ear.
He stepped away from the bookshelves, away from the reel-to-reel recording machine.
'What does that mean - no ?'
Bob's smile widened into a grin, and the grin widened into a leer.
'Come on.'
Nathan had a feeling in his stomach.
'What?'
'The dark woods,' said Bob. 'The running water. Lovers' lane.'
'Bob, I'm not sure what you're telling me here.'
'The thing about ghosts; you go looking for one, you're already contaminating the data - by looking here and not there, choosing this site over that one. You're not being objective.'
'Ghosts aren't real, Bob. They don't exist.'
'One of your most common forms of haunting, it's actually the roadside ghost. In England, anyway. Usually it's the shade of a young woman. She died violently, after sex. She's been buried on unhallowed ground. Usually
