A Place Of Safety (30 page)

‘Exactly.’

The room broke out into general conversation. Everyone talking, offering ideas and suggestions. Chairs were scraped as people turned round to agree or disagree.

‘He wouldn’t take a cab, that’s for sure.’

‘Nobody could be that stupid.’

‘Would he risk thumbing a car?’

Cries of ‘oh, please’ and ‘I thought you said he wasn’t stupid’ followed by ‘the driver’d remember him’.

‘Steal one then?’

‘He’d have to leave it on the outskirts of the village.’

‘Well, he used something. You don’t walk twelve miles in half an hour.’

‘He used a bike, of course,’ said Sergeant Troy, cutting into the general hubbub with a self-satisfied smirk. ‘I believe we’ve already run a check on thefts, isn’t that right, sir?’

Barnaby fished out a sheet of A4 from the clutter on his desk. He waved it with a hint of smugness rather in the manner of television cooks producing out of the oven a dish they’d prepared earlier.

‘There were three stolen in Causton today. A kid’s mountain bike, a bone-rattler some poor old pensioner took to his allotment and a Peugeot Leader Sprint left outside the Soft Shoe Cafe. They’re really lightweight. They can be ridden hard and fast and I reckon that must be the one we’re looking for.’

One or two officers looked rather disgruntled at this conjuring trick. If the chief had worked it out and checked it out, why couldn’t he have just spoken out? Barnaby smiled, indifferent to their discomfiture. If time permitted, he always liked the team to suss things for themselves.

‘A bit of a risk, sir,’ said Sergeant Brierley. ‘What if he hadn’t found one?’

‘Bound to. There’s always several on display outside Halfords, for a start. He was probably making for there when he came across this one.’

‘It’s brilliant, that,’ said DS Griggs. ‘Covers the distance, easy to dump and you can jump off and hide if you have to.’

‘Exactly,’ agreed Barnaby. ‘The machine can’t be far away. I shall organise a search first light in the morning.’

‘Won’t he have nipped out by then and disposed of it properly?’

‘I hope he tries. I’ve a man on the house. From now on wherever Jackson goes, we go.’ No point in spelling out the problems he’d had obtaining this temporary surveillance. His positive conviction sounded like mere suspicion unsupported by a single shred of evidence to the powers that held the purse strings. The lookout having been grudgingly given, Barnaby was told the situation would be reviewed every twenty-four hours. This time tomorrow, Jackson could once more be as free as the lark ascending. If that happens, thought Barnaby, I shall put one of my own team in his place and keep quiet about it.

‘So are we going to give him a tug, sir?’ asked Charlie Agnew.

‘No. He’d walk. There’s nothing to hold him.’ Barnaby stared grimly through his team and directly at the back wall with its hideous montage showing the mangled remains of Charlie Leathers. ‘When I bring that bugger in, he stays in.’

 

Louise was getting ready for bed. So far she had taken over an hour about it and could well take another, the procedure being so utterly pointless. For she would never sleep. She might as well stay where she was now, wrapped in a cream velvet robe and curled into the deep hollow centre of a leather armchair. The chair was a perfect oval without arms or legs, suspended by transparent silk ropes from a glass beam in the roof of the house.

Swinging gently backwards and forwards often helped her to relax, sometimes even induced a dreamlike drowsiness. But not tonight. Tonight it would take a pharmacist of genius or an opiate not yet discovered to bring an intermission to her tormented consciousness.

The news about Ann had been bad enough. Hearing it, imagining the pain and the terror, understanding how near she now lay to death - that was bad enough. But the other thing . . .

When he had first heard the news, Val was deeply shocked and genuinely sorry to hear what had happened. But later that evening, following a phone call from the Rectory, all this emotion was transformed in a crucible of furious indignation to something approaching rage.

‘God Almighty! When are they going to leave that poor devil alone?’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Those sodding policemen. They’ll hound him and hound him until he can’t take any more.’

‘Who?’ She knew, of course.

‘Then he’ll strike out in sheer desperation. Re-offend probably. And they’ll rub their disgusting hands together and throw him back inside.’ Valentine stared hard at his sister, sheer desperation not entirely absent from his own countenance.

‘Poor Jax,’ said Louise quickly. She had almost forgotten the role she had so recently started to play. ‘What is it this time?’

‘The usual. Trying to tie something on him he couldn’t possibly have done.’

‘Not . . .’ Louise had to reach blindly behind her then for support, waving her arm through the air before half sitting, half falling into a seat.

‘That’s right, the attack on Ann Lawrence. They’ve even taken the clothes he was wearing when it happened.’

‘Oh no.’ Dizziness overwhelmed her. ‘Val, it can’t be true.’

‘Of course it isn’t true. He was at the Rectory all day. Try telling them that.’ Finally his sister’s ghastly pallor registered. ‘Sorry, Lou. I’m a selfish sod. She was your friend, wasn’t she?’

‘Yes.’ Louise was perfectly clear on that one. Ann had been her friend. How could she ever have thought otherwise?

‘I’m going to get you some brandy.’

Louise remembered now that she had drunk the brandy. Swallowed it like water and with much the same effect. When the shock had receded enough for her to be able to stand, she had excused herself and come upstairs. She had bathed, wrapped her still shaking limbs in the cream robe then rocked endlessly back and forth to a lonely rhythm of desolation.

She told herself she might have been mistaken. He had gone by so fast. A cyclist, all in black. Leggings, long-sleeved jumper, gloves, knitted hat pulled right down covering his hair and forehead. She’d parked, just for a minute, on a double yellow outside the bank. Was on the point of getting out, even had the door slightly open, the road behind showing clear. And there he was in her wing mirror. Far away, then present, then gone. Barely a second from start to finish. But, because of the mirror, she had seen his face. And recognised it.

At least she thought she had. But now Val said he was at the Rectory all day. Said he himself was actually with Jax when the savagery took place. So she must have been wrong. In despair Louise, who had stopped believing in the Almighty even before she had stopped believing in Father Christmas, prayed. Awkwardly, with burning, passionate clumsiness, not knowing quite what to say.

‘Please God,’ she mumbled, ‘let it not be him.’ Then, feeling this was too vague, she forced herself to elaborate. She even said his name and felt it, squatting like a toad, on her tongue. ‘What I mean is, let the man I saw today on a bicycle in Causton not be Jax.’

There was a cold emptiness inside her mouth. And she knew the words were sterile. What was the point? Louise climbed out of her chair and stood, staring through the roof at the almost black sky scattered with sparkling points of cold light. How could anything or anyone even exist up there, let alone be taking the slightest interest in her anguished pleading?

Even so, even while understanding that the whole procedure was a pointless, hopeless waste of time, she could not stop one final request.

‘And please, God,
please
look after Val.’

 

As Barnaby turned into Arbury Crescent, he felt like Sisyphus finally giving up on the boulder. Standing aside, watching it roll away, bouncing and tumbling back down the mountainside while he strode on towards the summit, light of heart.

That moment in the incident room when the tape of Ann Lawrence’s emergency call had started to play, when it became plain that he had possibly been barking up an entirely mistaken tree for the entire investigation, had struck the DCI hard. He knew he had given the impression of recovering quickly. He was good at that and it was important that he should be. Disheartenment was an infection that spread like lightning. But it was a false impression. In truth he was feeling very disheartened indeed.

Also he was in grave danger of becoming personally involved. Never recommended, it still sometimes happened. When the cruel mistreatment or murder of a child occurred, for instance, few policemen were able to remain completely detached. But this was not the death of a child. This was the death of an extremely unpleasant old man who had been attempting blackmail.

So why the hatred? Barnaby realised with a shock that this was the correct word. He had begun to hate Terry Jackson. Hate his merry smile and shameless posturing, his conversation which danced back and forth as lightly as a featherweight, a spiteful jab here, a feint - the sham attack which made a fool of the recipient. And, just as it did, the real attack. A serious blow, fast and heavy, to the solar plexus.

Hatred sparkled too when he thought of the man’s appearance. Dwelled on that spare, tawny flesh and hard muscle, and the shining navy blue eyes with strange golden pupils. The only physical flaw in this Apollonian perfection, as far as Barnaby could see, were the teeth which had never been properly cared for. But no doubt once this need for cosmetic dentistry was brought to Fainlight’s attention the omission would be quickly rectified.

Barnaby yanked his attention away from this idea. Because it would never happen. There were no upmarket dentists whitening and capping and straightening in the Scrubs. Or in Albany or Strangeways. And that’s where Jackson would be ending up.

And you’d better believe that, you heap of festering slime. Realising he had spoken aloud and was now gripping the steering wheel as though his very life depended on it, Barnaby slowed down almost to a halt. Because it was not good, this feeling. Hatred could blind you, narrow your options to nothing, obscure evidence that might be right under your nose. Not to mention sending your blood pressure into a spin.

He remembered what Joyce had said to him the other morning, that, once on a case, he was like a dog with a bone, gripping it between his teeth, anxious that no other dog should get a taste. He had been angry at the time. He wondered again if it was true and decided it was. Well, partially. Barnaby had a strong sense of self-worth, he would not have risen to his present rank otherwise, but he believed he was also prepared to listen. In this, although not unique, he was very much in the minority. Still in second, he turned into the driveway of number seventeen.

And then things started to get better as they always did. Whatever foul muck he’d been up to his oxters in during working hours, this was where it started to fall away. It was a strange process, not forgetfulness so much as a psychological cleansing, and he never quite understood it.

It could have been the verdant sweetness of the garden (even in winter there was always something irresistibly beautiful to look at) or the familiar warmth of the solid, red-brick building where he had lived contentedly for over twenty years. But overwhelmingly, of course, it was Joyce. Wherever she was, he was happy to be.

Barnaby never took this good fortune for granted. You didn’t, with a job like his. Anyway, complacency was an absolute magnet for disaster. He had heard the words, I never thought this would happen to me, almost more often than any others. He would never say them. Or believe that never doing anyone any harm was a talisman against disaster. Barnaby reached out and touched the walnut dashboard before getting out of the car.

Cully’s Dyane, yellow and mermaid green with a huge sunflower painted on the boot, stood under the laburnum tree. Barnaby’s step, already eager, quickened. He had hardly put his key in the lock when she opened the door.

‘Dad! Something wonderful’s happened!’ She seized his hand. ‘Come on.’

‘Let me take my—’

‘No. You’ve got to come
now
.’

The kitchen door was wide open. He could see Joyce smiling, Nicolas looking tremendously proud, golden-foiled bottles and champagne glasses. Public rejoicing. He looked down at his daughter’s shining face and knew what she was going to tell him. He put his arm round her and caught the sweet fragrance of her hair. His little girl.

‘Cully. Oh, darling, what can I say?’ Barnaby realised the backs of his eyes were prickling. So what? It wasn’t every day one became a grandfather. ‘Congratulations.’

‘It’s not me you have to congratulate, silly. It’s Nico.’

‘Nico?’ Barnaby rearranged his expression quickly but the disappointment sliced across his heart. They went into the kitchen together.

‘I’ve got into the National, Tom.’ Nicolas laughed, raising his glass, plainly not for the first time. ‘Isn’t it wonderful?’

‘Wonderful.’ Barnaby formed the word through stiff lips. He said ‘Congratulations’ again.

Cully poured him a glass of Veuve Clicquot and smiled at her mother. ‘Dad thought I’d got the shampoo commercial.’

‘Did he?’ said Joyce and caught her husband’s eye. Not that she had needed to.

‘I speet on shampoo commercials!’ cried Nico and started laughing again, draining his wine, throwing the glass into the air.

‘Do you know what you’re going to play?’ asked Barnaby, having long since learned the correct responses to any news of a theatrical nature.

‘As cast. But that could mean anything,
anything
. They’re doing Pinter,
Antony and Cleopatra
,
Peter Pan
!’ cried Nico.

‘And a new Terry Johnson comedy all about Sid James,’ said Cully.

‘
Carry on Camping up the Cottesloe
.’

‘It’s not called that surely,’ said Joyce.

‘You could play Barbara Windsor, darling.’ Cully blew her beloved a kiss.

‘Yes! I’d look brilliant in drag.’