A Line of Blood (31 page)

‘Did I say that aloud?’
Please, no.

‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘Yeah, you said that out loud.’

Oh please, no
.
I put my hand against the wall to steady myself. I looked down, and for the second time in a few hours was surprised by my nakedness. Why hadn’t I dressed? When had I taken off my pants?
Christ on a bike.

A thought struck me. ‘Arla,’ I said, ‘did you hear me say “Please, no?’’’

‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘Yeah, I heard you say that. And “Christ on a bike.” And that your penis looks weird.’

‘Oh Jesus. Oh God. It’s me, isn’t it? I thought that was some weird echo from the arrest. It’s me, Arla. We thought it would be Max, but it’s me. I’m the one who’s not coping with this. I’m the madman standing naked in front of you, with my inner censor switched off, sharing stuff that shouldn’t be shared. I’ve become that man.’

‘Alex,’ she said, ‘you’re talking super-fast.’

‘But I’m not.’
Everything is echoes.
‘Am I?’

‘Yes, Alex, you are. I’m going to need you to slow down and breathe. Alex, look at me. You can
not
lose your shit.’

‘I’m scared, Arla. I’m losing my mind.’

‘We are not going to let that happen, Alex. You’re in shock. We have got to get you to land your rocket ship on the right freakin’ planet. And then we need to figure out how to help Millicent. Breathe.’

She got out of bed, stood naked in the middle of the floor, held me in her arms and counted with me as I breathed in for four beats, held my breath for four beats, and breathed out for four beats.

Breathe … two … three … four …

Hold … two … three … four …

Out … two … three … four …

‘Wow,’ she said after a time. ‘Your pulse is really racing. Still. How we doing up there? Any closer to Planet Earth?’

‘A little better,’ I said. ‘Thank you for holding me.’

I looked down at her.
Her skin against mine; her breasts crushed against my ribcage; her beautiful arms.

She looked up at me, frowned. ‘You guys sure have it tough.’

‘You didn’t hear my thought? When I looked down?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘I think maybe your filter is back in place. You did not speak that thought.’

‘I’m a mess. I’m ashamed of what I said to you.’

‘No need, Alex.’ Her voice was candy-store light, but there was a weariness in her eyes, a tightness around the edges of her mouth.

‘I wasn’t trying to sleep with you, Arla,’ I said. ‘I really wasn’t. I think my mind was just trying to side-step reality.’

‘Well, I guess you guys’ reality really does suck right now.’

‘And we’ve pulled you into it. I’m sorry.’

‘Again, no need.’

‘Max mustn’t find us like this.’

‘He won’t, Alex,’ she said. ‘He won’t.’ Then she patted me on the back, brought the embrace to an end, and sent me back to my own bedroom.

I arrived at the police station at nine.

I had left Arla to sleep, called Fab5 and asked him if he could take Max to school. Max hadn’t wanted to go, and we had argued furiously over this.

‘Normality,’ I said, over and over again. ‘We need to keep things as normal for you as possible.’

‘But this isn’t normal, Dad.’

‘I’m really sorry, but this is the nearest thing to normal I can provide.’

‘But nothing’s normal, Dad. Not even nearly.’

Max had eaten his cereal in angry silence, playing a game on my phone; he was dressed and sitting on the staircase when Fab5 rang the bell.

I sat waiting in a large room with white-painted brick walls. In the middle of the room were four blue plastic chairs and a small Formica table. One of the fluorescent tubes overhead was flickering its last, beating out a rhythm that my brain could not lock into. The ceiling was made of suspended plastic panels. There was no window.

Millicent entered with two uniformed officers. I wondered for a moment whether they were the two from the night before, but decided they couldn’t have been. Union regulations. Millicent drew up a seat opposite me. We sat staring at each other across the table. She looked tired, but no worse than I was used to her looking these days.

‘You look good,’ I said.

‘Thank you. I do not.’

I looked around at the officers, who were hovering by the door. What do you do in this situation? Do you kiss? Are you allowed to hug? I reached out and took Millicent’s hand.

‘Sir,’ said one of the officers. Twenty-five. Fresh-faced. Whole career ahead of him. ‘Sorry,’ I said. I withdrew my hand.

The other officer, female, plump and cheerful, shook her head in mock approbation. I guessed she was a little older. She said something to her colleague and left the room.

The finality of that gentle metallic slam. Steel door in a steel frame. The young officer locked the door, then collected a chair from by the table, and went to sit in the corner of the room.

‘So I’m in custody, but they didn’t charge me yet,’ said Millicent.

‘They aren’t going to charge you. You didn’t do it. You have your alibi.’

‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I was never in this situation. And I was only at the radio station for an hour, max. What if they ring the radio station, and decide I lied to them? I never knew I was going to have to defend my alibi.’

‘Have you called a lawyer?’ I said.

Millicent shook her head. I took out a list of criminal defence solicitors that I had made from the internet and slid it across the table towards her.

‘Just a moment, sir, ma’am,’ said the officer in the corner. He walked to the table and looked down at the sheet of paper.

I caught Millicent’s eye, mouthed ‘I love you.’

The edges of her mouth twitched upwards. A parody of a smile. ‘I guess I’m lucky you guys didn’t cuff me to the table,’ she said to the officer.

‘Right,’ he said. He picked up the sheet of paper.

‘This is going to be OK,’ I said.

‘We don’t know this is going to be OK, Alex.’

The officer turned the sheet of paper over, held it up to the light. What was he looking for?

‘So far everyone has been really nice and polite. But they didn’t really start to ask me questions yet. Who knows how that’s going to go?’

The officer decided he was satisfied with the sheet of paper. He pushed it across the table towards her and went back to his chair.

‘So,’ she said, ‘I guess at some level I deserve this, don’t you think?’

I drew breath, made to speak, but she cut across me before I could begin. ‘Because what I did to you and to our marriage was bad. I took something that was only a little broken, and broke it a whole lot more. But what I did to Max is worse: I can see that now. Only Max can’t punish me by leaving me, so you will.’

‘Millicent, shut up,’ I said very quietly. ‘Shut up and listen to me.’ I took her hand, but she shook me off.

‘Sir,’ said the officer in the corner. ‘Sir, please.’

‘Sorry,’ I said. I turned to Millicent. ‘I’m sorry, Millicent. I shouldn’t have done that.’ I looked over at the officer in the corner. ‘We need to talk about what you’re going to do.’

‘I’m going to ring a lawyer.’

‘We need to formulate a plan. I don’t know how long they’re going to give us.’

‘And I just told you the plan, so we’re done with that. I’m going to ring a lawyer. Thank you for bringing me the information. You can go.’

‘Millicent, you are not yourself.’

She looked up at the ceiling. The light was still advertising its own imminent death. I wondered if the flickering was making her nervous. It was certainly putting me on edge.

Millicent ran her thumb and middle finger over her eyebrow, then looked me directly in the eye.

‘No. I mean this, Alex. I seriously breached the mother/son clause. And now Max hates me. Doesn’t he?’

‘OK, yes, he hates you.’

She was gulping air now; her nostrils flared; she was fighting not to cry. ‘Well, look at that,’ she said. ‘I guess I was hoping you would contradict me, Alex. Stupid, no?’

‘No, I think you’re right. He does hate you. I hate you too, if I’m being honest.’

I could see the blood pulsing in her neck but the colour had drained from her face; she looked utterly undone. I glanced across at the police officer but he was looking at something on his phone.

‘I hate you a bit, Millicent. Just at the moment.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Look around you. Look where we are.’ The gunmetal door, the painted brick walls, the police officer in the corner. He was staring at us now. I leaned in to Millicent and lowered my voice. ‘It was hard to read what Max wrote. What he knows.’ The door opened and the female officer appeared in the opening. She nodded to her colleague, who got up from his seat and put away his phone, staring all the while.

‘Ms Weitzman, it’s time to go.’ It was the female officer. Millicent stood up. I stayed in my seat.

Millicent looked at me and swallowed hard, sniffed noisily.

‘I hate you
now,
Millicent. I don’t think it’s for ever,’ I said. ‘I can pretty easily imagine a world where I don’t hate you. Max will stop hating you too, although it might take him a little longer. It’s a process, too.’

She considered this. When she spoke, it was in a very small voice, her face very close to mine. ‘It’s too late for us.’

‘It’s never too late. I love you, and no matter what you did, I will always love you. And I understand now that that means I have to forgive you.’

‘Well, you’re a bigger person than I am.’

‘Ms Weitzman, now.’ A hand in the small of Millicent’s back, a uniformed arm, guiding her towards the door.

She stood in the doorway, the officers towering over her in her plain clothes and her flat shoes; I wanted to tell Millicent that everything would be OK, that we would fight this.

Instead I said, ‘Do you think I could say goodbye to my wife?’

The officers exchanged a look. The WPC nodded at me. ‘You do have that right.’

‘Can I hold her?’

‘I think that’s more a question for your wife.’

I looked at Millicent. She nodded cautiously, stood stiffly as I held her in my arms.

‘You’re strong,’ I said. ‘You’ll be out soon.’

‘Yeah,’ she said, ‘maybe,’ and stepped backwards out of the embrace.

The sadness in that tight little smile as they led her from the room.

I looked at the open door. I looked at my chair. Was I supposed to wait here? No one had said. I sat back down at the table. After five minutes the female officer returned and led me back through countless corridors towards the front desk.

‘When can I collect her?’

‘That depends, sir.’

‘There’s nothing to charge her with.’
Why have you stopped being cheerful?

The officer came to a stop, and for a moment I thought perhaps I had spoken my thought, but she simply said, ‘Your wife is under arrest on suspicion of murder, sir.’

‘When can I come for her?’

‘The custody clock started at 03.00 hours.’

‘So I come and get her at three tomorrow morning? You let her go after twenty-four hours, don’t you?’

‘That’s not for me to say, sir. Really her lawyer should be advising you on that.’

I considered this. Perhaps I should have taken control. Perhaps it had been a mistake to expect Millicent to choose her own lawyer.

‘Alex.’ A hand on my arm. I turned and found myself eye to eye with the female detective. June.

‘Oh.’

‘I’ll take this, Pamela,’ she said.

The uniformed officer brightened. ‘Cheers, mate.’ She walked off along the corridor.

‘Well,’ I said, ‘this is awkward.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You arrested my wife. I was just leaving.’

We walked in silence to the door of the police station, stood on the top step, looking at each other’s shoes. The sky was overcast and the humidity unbearable, as if London were projecting a hangover back on to me.

‘Alex,’ said June, ‘have you ever come across the notion of the gendering of crime?’

‘OK, June … What is the gendering of crime?’

‘Men and women kill in different ways.’

‘What, you mean men murder strangers they don’t like the look of with knives and guns, and women murder lovers who mistreat them with poison, and smother babies they can’t take care of with pillows?’

‘Something like that, statistically speaking, yes.’

‘Bit reductive. What’s your point,
June
?’

‘The iron.’

I laughed. I laughed as I had when I discovered the corpse of the neighbour, all rictus and dick and discordant limbs.

The detective looked consternated. ‘Generally speaking, women use what’s to hand in the home.’

‘Really, June? That’s your case?’ I was laughing hard now. ‘You think Millicent is the kind of woman who uses an iron? I mean, do we even look like the kind of couple that owns an iron? Because I promise you we don’t. You really don’t know my wife.’

Absurd. Completely absurd.

‘It was a Black and Decker iron. Practically a tool. How much more manly can an iron get?’

‘Alex,’ she said. ‘Listen to me …’

She looked so serious, standing there sweating in her pinstripes.

‘No, June, you listen to me.’ I composed myself for a moment. ‘I mean, I suppose she could have stabbed him with her nail file, or beaten him about the head with her hairdryer, or tickled him to death with her makeup brush. Except, guess what, she doesn’t own any of those either.’

Tears were filling my eyes now. I rubbed them away with the back of my hand, made myself tall, forced myself to stop laughing.

‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘I really needed that.’

‘Alex,’ said the detective, ‘I’m not sure you appreciate the seriousness of your situation.’

‘Yes, June, if there’s one thing I appreciate, it’s the seriousness of my situation. And of Millicent’s. You think I’m not gravely concerned? But – unlike you, it seems – I know the difference between serious and absurd. And this is – and I’m sorry, because I’m trying really hard to keep the swearing in check – this is fucking absurd. I mean, I don’t want to tell you your job or anything, but
Ms Mercer? In the bathroom? With an iron?
Are you out of your mind?’