Blood And Honey (53 page)

‘Sure. But a spot of people smuggling suddenly earning him this kind of money?’ Willard gestured at Imber’s figures. ‘You have to be joking.’

There was a long silence. The wind was rattling a loose frame in one of the windows, and Faraday caught the sound of the train that clattered along the pier to the station at the seaward end. Berthing alongside in this weather would be a nightmare for the regular cross-Solent Fast Cat, he thought. Banged-up on the island with the frustrations of
Congress
, there seemed no escape.

There came a knock at the door. Expecting a tray of coffee from one of the Management Assistants, Faraday glanced up. It was DC Tracy Barber. She was beckoning Faraday into the corridor. She needed a word.

Faraday excused himself. Barber was looking unusually tense.

‘I’ve had a call from Lajla,’ she said. ‘She wants a meet.’

‘When?’

‘Now.’

‘So what’s the problem?’

‘There isn’t one, except it might be wise if you came too. She doesn’t want to talk at the home. It has to be somewhere else, in Shanklin. I’ve suggested the caff we went to the other day. What do you think?’

Faraday glanced back at the group around the table. Imber was talking again, doubtless giving Willard yet more ammunition for a halt in proceedings. At this rate,
Congress
would be dead in the water by lunchtime.

Barber was waiting for a decision.

‘She asked for you by name?’

‘Yes. She says she won’t talk to anyone else. I thought you might come as back-up, sir. Stay in the car for a bit. Maybe join us once she’s settled down.’

‘And you think it’s important?’

‘Yes.’

‘She’s not pissing us around?’

‘Definitely not.’

‘OK.’ Faraday reached for the door handle. ‘Give me five minutes.’

Winter awoke late. To his astonishment he felt wonderful. The steady
thump-thump
of the headache had gone. The queasiness it brought had vanished. He rolled over to break the good news but found a note on Maddox’s pillow. ‘Gone into town,’ she’d scribbled. ‘Back later.’ Winter smiled at the line of kisses beneath and then reached for his watch. Nearly half past ten.

He shaved and dressed, resisting the temptation to tiptoe round the edges of this sudden transformation, to disbelieve the evidence of his nerve ends. He’d no idea what governed the complex biochemistry of his brain, what made for good days and bad, but the sight
of yesterday’s CT scan had persuaded him that time was precious. The last thing he intended to do was waste it. Cathy and Jimmy Suttle were right. There were more important challenges in life than Maurice Wishart.

He found a couple of eggs in the fridge and half a loaf from Maddox’s last expedition to the supermarket. Twenty minutes later he was looking for his heavy raincoat and his car keys. The rest of the morning nosing round the shops, he thought, then a pie and a pint and fingers crossed that Maddox would make it back in time for a leisurely afternoon between the sheets. Maybe they’d find time to discuss travel arrangements. Maybe not.

He drove down to Portsmouth, exhilarated by the weather. A lid of low grey cloud had clamped itself over the city, ragged at the edges, and the Subaru rocked in the blast of wind as he crossed the harbour on the motorway. Looking out at the nose of Whale Island, he marvelled at the contrast with yesterday. Boats were heaving at their moorings. The motorway itself was ribboned with seaweed. Even the gulls were having a hard time.

The shopping precinct in Commercial Road was virtually deserted. A scatter of shoppers were battling the wind and the rain but in the city’s centre, thought Winter, it might have been an old-style Sunday. Heartened by this new mood of his, he looked for a present for Maddox. Ottakar’s was the obvious place to start but the longer he spent looking at shelf after shelf of books, the more he realised he was out of his depth. Winter’s taste had seldom extended beyond Robert Ludlum and Dean Koontz. The woman who read him poetry in the small hours wouldn’t be impressed.

He abandoned the bookstore and ducked into the shopping mall beside it. He wanted to get her something she’d remember him by, something that belonged in the space they’d made for each other. His first thought was perfume, or body oils, or maybe a scented candle, but nothing he found seemed to do the trick. A succession of bored shopgirls suggested potpourri or little fancy bags of lavender, shrugging dismissively when Winter wagged his head. Finally, gone midday, he found himself in HMV.

Music, he knew at once, would be a no-no. Maddox was unlikely to share his passion for Tom Jones and the Everly Brothers. Neither was he confident enough to make any kind of stab at classical music. Lately, he’d found himself listening to Beethoven, surprised by how easy it was to surrender to the music, and there were half-decent bits of Rachmaninov, but he knew that neither was quite right. It had to be something else, something that would bring a smile to her face.

In the section devoted to DVDs, inspecting a rack of all-time classic movies, he knew he’d found it. Only days ago he and Maddox had watched
The Bridges of Madison County
together. Then she’d sorted out a couple of French films. A movie, therefore. Had to be.

He began to browse through the titles, enjoying the short cuts they offered to half-forgotten moments in his own youth. He’d been in his teens the first time he’d seen
The Dam Busters
, and he remembered sitting in the flickering darkness with his first girlfriend, bullshitting her with tales of joining the RAF.
Klute
was another favourite, a seventies cop movie with Jane Fonda and Donald Sutherland in the lead roles. Watching
Klute
was the moment which had first planted the thought in Winter’s brain that he might become a cop himself. Sutherland had played a
detective who’d fallen for a hooker, and with a slight shock Winter realised just how closely real life now mirrored the plot. He smiled to himself, browsing through more titles, wondering if
Klute
might have made it onto DVD. Then he paused.
Casablanca
. Perfect.

Winter felt for his mobile and put a call through to Maddox. Her phone was switched off so he thought for a moment or two, then sent her a text: ‘This afternoon? Usual place? Usual time?’ He added a couple of kisses and took the DVD to the counter. A minute or so later Maddox’s reply arrived. ‘Out with a friend,’ she’d written. ‘
Chez toi
, four o’clock?
A bientôt
.’ Winter read the text, beamed at the girl behind the counter, then checked his watch. He still had three hours before getting back for Maddox. He had no DVD at home so he’d borrow Maddox’s flat for a couple of hours of Bogart and Bergman before heading back to Bedhampton. He produced his mobile again and sent a follow-up text. ‘Here’s looking at YOU kid,’ he wrote, tucking the DVD in the pocket of his coat.

Faraday sat in the Mondeo, perfect line of sight on Munchies Café. Lajla had arrived minutes before, a small, thin figure cocooned in a big quilted anorak. Now she sat in the window, half hidden by condensation on the cold glass, deep in conversation with Tracy Barber. When Tracy judged the time to be right she’d come to the door and give Faraday a wave. Faraday settled down for a long wait.

On the eastern side of the island, Shanklin was protected from the worst of the weather, but out in the bay whitecaps were rolling towards a scatter of moored cargo ships, sheltering from the storm. It had
stopped raining now, and barely feet from the boiling surf black-headed gulls were hanging motionless in the teeth of the wind, surveying the debris thrown up on the beach, looking for likely morsels. Faraday watched them for a moment, marvelling at the way they could ride the strongest gusts with seeming ease. If only, he thought.

On the drive over he’d been aware of Tracy Barber pumping him for the direction that
Congress
might take next. He’d fended her off with a shrug, telling her the truth – that it wouldn’t be his decision – but he knew she hadn’t really believed him. He’d watched her closely over the past couple of weeks, impressed by her diligence and her determination. Faraday himself had never served in Special Branch, never been obliged to deal in the currency of political intelligence, but he was aware of the extra perspective a posting like that could impart.

Barber, it turned out, had spent nearly half her service in SB, and it showed. She had a good analytical brain, a natural flair for making connections that others might miss, and – more to the point – she was excellent in tricky face-to-face situations like these. Faraday watched her now, a blurred figure behind the glass, bending into the conversation, making a point, relaxing, then extending a reassuring hand. Lajla must like her, Faraday thought. More than that, she might trust her.

Faraday turned on the radio, found himself some music. Ten minutes or so later Barber appeared at the café door. Faraday got out and locked the car. Hurrying into the café, he was grateful for the warm fug after the chilly blast of the wind.

Lajla was still sitting at the table in the window, her sodden coat hanging on the back of her chair. She
barely spared Faraday a glance as he sat down, and Faraday had the strong impression that he’d wrecked something intimate.

Barber returned from the counter with two mugs of tea. Lajla’s was barely touched.

‘Lajla and I have agreed some rules.’ Barber sat down. ‘I’ve told her that what she’s got to say is better said in front of both of us. She knows you’re in charge of the case. Pelly’s told her that too.’

‘He thinks you’re a good man. Wrong but good.’ Lajla’s voice was low, barely a whisper.

‘Who does?’

‘Rob.’

Faraday raised an eyebrow. A compliment from Pelly was the last thing he’d expected.

‘He knows you’re here?’

‘No.’ For the first time she looked up. ‘I didn’t say anything.’

‘Tell Mr Faraday what you told me.’ Barber reached for her hand. ‘I think that’s important.’

Lajla nodded, bit her lip, ducked her head again. Even like this – cornered, uncertain – she had a definite presence. Faraday could sense what an impact she must have made on the young Corporal Pelly, visibly pregnant, struggling through the snow with her plastic bags while the jeering Serb soldiers looked on.

‘You have to understand,’ she said at last. ‘It’s important you understand.’

‘Understand what?’

‘Understand how such a thing can happen. There was no choice. We had no choice. We didn’t want him here. We told him that. Rob told him that. He wrote. He phoned. Email. Everything. He wouldn’t listen. Rob shouted at him on the phone. Said not to come.’

‘Who?’ Faraday was leaning forward across the table. ‘Who are we talking about?’

He waited for an answer but Lajla said nothing. Tracy Barber caught his eye and signalled for him to back off. In her own time. Slowly.

Faraday nodded, easing away from the table. Mention of email took him back to the cluttered basement room in Southsea – Wowser Productions, the thin, pale, bearded youth who’d quarried his way into Pelly’s hard disk and emerged with fragments of a six-month-old correspondence. Lajla had never sent a single reply, he thought. Not one.

‘You know about the Balkans? The war? Bosnia?’ Lajla again, her voice stronger.

‘I know you were a refugee.’ Faraday reached for a lump of sugar. ‘I know you had to flee from the Serbs.’

‘They stole everything. They stole my life.’

She nodded, her chin tilted in Faraday’s direction, a sudden blush of colour in her face.

‘Some of them I knew, the soldiers. They were boys. People I knew from the village.’

‘Serbs?’

‘Yes. We Muslims stuck together. Some of our men the Serbs killed. Not all of them. My father, one of my brothers, Muharem … they survived. Except my father was like me. Dead inside.’ She touched her heart then her head. ‘He’s mad, my father, crazy. You can mend a broken leg but the mind stays broken for ever. The Serbs made him that way.’

Faraday nodded.

‘Were there no good Serbs?’

‘Of course. Of course there were. There are good people everywhere. But in war bad people take what they want.’

‘Rob?’

‘He was a good person. He still is a good person. That’s why I come here today.’ She gestured round at the empty café.

‘You want to tell us something about Rob?’

‘I want you to understand.’

She ducked her head again, began to play with a plastic spoon. Long, thin fingers. Beautiful nails. A single silver ring. Then her fingers tightened briefly on the spoon and she talked about the day the soldiers came, the faces she recognised from her youth, faces she’d grown up with. Afterwards, she said, girls of a certain age were taken to the school. Because she had her period she was spared the first few days but watching was even worse. She felt what her father must have felt. Madness.

‘We stayed at the school most of the summer. It was very hot. The soldiers came most nights, often different faces. I remember every one of them. I have a camera in here …’ She touched her head again. ‘You never forget.’

By the end of the summer she knew she was pregnant. It made no difference. Only when she started to put on weight did the soldiers lose interest. By then it was much colder. She thought the soldiers would kill them all. When, months later, they put the women on the coaches, she thought it was the end.

‘They even sold us tickets,’ she said. ‘Eighty Deutschmarks to be pushed out of my own country.’

The coaches dumped them at the border. They walked to Travnik, to the refugee camp. Soon, her baby came. Older women helped her, did their best. She met Rob. He spoke a little Serbo-Croat. She could manage OK in English. He looked after her – brought her blankets, rusks for the baby, even some books. Angry with the army, angry with the war, he came to
the camp one day and said he was leaving, going back to England. She remembered crying, the baby too; then he said he’d be back, as soon as he could. And that’s what happened. He came with a beaten-up old truck. He wasn’t wearing a uniform. He asked her to come back to England with him. She said yes.