Lost (3 page)

The real y strange thing is what I imagine I remember. For instance I recal seeing silhouettes against bright lights; masked men wearing plastic shower caps and paper slippers, who were discussing cars, pension plans and footbal results. Of course this could have been a near-death experience. I was given a glimpse of Hel and it was ful of surgeons.

Perhaps if I start with the simple stuff, I may get to the point where I can remember what happened to me. Staring at the ceiling, I silently spel my name: Vincent Yanko Ruiz; born December 11, 1945. I am a Detective Inspector of the London Metropolitan Police and the head of the Serious Crime Group (Western Division). I live on Rainvil e Road, Fulham . .

.

I used to say I would pay good money to forget most of my life. Now I want the memories back.

2

I only know two people who have been shot. One was a chap I went through police training col ege with. His name was Angus Lehmann and he wanted to be first at everything—first in his exams, first to the bar, first to get promoted . . .

A few years back he led a raid on a drug factory in Brixton and was first through the door. An entire magazine from a semiautomatic took his head clean off. There's a lesson in that somewhere.

A farmer in our val ey cal ed Bruce Curley is the other one. He shot himself in the foot when he tried to chase his wife's lover out the bedroom window. Bruce was fat with gray hair sprouting from his ears and Mrs. Curley used to cower like a dog whenever he raised a hand. Shame he didn't shoot himself between the eyes.

During my police training we did a firearms course. The instructor was a Geordie with a head like a bil iard bal and he took against me from the first day because I suggested the best way to keep a gun barrel clean was to cover it with a condom.

We were standing on the live firing range, freezing our bol ocks off. He pointed out the cardboard cutout at the end of the range. It was a silhouette of a crouching gun-wielding vil ain with a white circle painted over his heart and another on his head.

Taking a service pistol the Geordie crouched down with his legs apart and squeezed off six shots—a heartbeat between each of them—every one grouped in the upper circle.

Flicking the smoking clip into his hand, he said, “Now I don't expect any of you to do that but at least try to hit the fucking target. Who wants to go first?” Nobody volunteered.

“How about you, condom boy?”

The class laughed.

I stepped forward and raised my revolver. I hated how good it felt in my hand. The instructor said, “No, not like that, keep both eyes open. Crouch. Count and squeeze.” Before he could finish the gun kicked in my hand, rattling the air and something deep inside me.

The cutout swayed from side to side as the pul ey dragged it down the range toward us. Six shots, each so close together they formed a ragged hole through the cardboard.

“He shot out his arsehole,” someone muttered in astonishment.

“Right up the Khyber Pass.”

I didn't look at the instructor's face. I turned away, checked the chamber, put on the safety catch and removed my earplugs.

“You missed,” he said triumphantly.

“If you say so, sir.”

I wake with a sudden jolt and it takes a while for my heart to settle. I look at my watch—not so much at the time but the date. I want to make sure I haven't slept for too long or lost any more time.

It's been two days since I regained consciousness. A man is sitting by the bed.

“My name is Dr. Wickham,” he says, smiling. “I'm a neurologist.”

He looks like one of those doctors you see on daytime chat shows.

“I once saw you play rugby for Harlequins against London Scottish,” he says. “You would have made the England team that year if you hadn't been injured. I played a bit of rugby myself. Never higher than seconds . . .”

“Real y, what position?”

“Outside center.”

I figured as much—he probably touched the bal twice a game and is stil talking about the tries he
could
have scored.

“I have the results of your MRI scan,” he says, opening a folder. “There is no evidence of a skul fracture, aneurysms or a hemorrhage.” He glances up from his notes. “I want to run some neurological tests to help establish what you've forgotten. It means answering some questions about the shooting.”

“I don't remember it.”

“Yes, but I want you to answer regardless—even if it means guessing. It's cal ed a forced-choice recognition test. It forces you to make choices.” I think I understand, although I don't see the point.

“How many people were on the boat?”

“I don't remember.”

Dr. Wickham reiterates, “You have to make a choice.”

“Four.”

“Was there a ful moon?”

“Yes.”

“Was the name of the boat
Charmaine
?”

“No.”

“How many engines did it have?”

“One.”

“Was it a stolen boat?”

“Yes.”

“Was the engine running?”

“No.”

“Were you anchored or drifting?”

“Drifting.”

“Were you carrying a weapon?”

“Yes.”

“Did you fire your weapon?”

“No.”

This is ridiculous! What possible good does it do? I'm guessing the answers.

Suddenly, it dawns on me. They think I'm faking amnesia. This isn't a test to see how much I remember—they're testing the validity of my symptoms. They're forcing me to make choices so they can work out what percentage of questions I answer correctly. If I'm tel ing the truth, pure guesswork should mean half of my answers are correct. Anything significantly above or below fifty percent could mean I'm trying to “influence” the result by deliberately getting things right or wrong.

I know enough about statistics to see the objective. The chance of someone with memory loss answering only ten questions correctly out of fifty is less than five percent.

Dr. Wickham has been taking notes. No doubt he's studying the distribution of my answers—looking for patterns that might indicate something other than random chance.

Stopping him, I ask, “Who wrote these questions?”

“I don't know.”

“Guess.”

He blinks at me.

“Come on, Doc, true or false? I'l accept a guess. Is this a test to see if I'm faking memory loss?”

“I don't know what you mean,” he stammers.

“If I can guess the answer, so can you. Who put you up to this—Internal Affairs or Campbel Smith?”

Struggling to his feet, he tucks the clipboard under his arm and turns toward the door. I wish I'd met him on the rugby field. I'd have driven his head into a muddy hole.

Swinging my legs out of bed, I put one foot on the floor. The linoleum is cool and slightly sticky. Gulping hard on the pain, I slide my forearms into the plastic cuffs of the crutches.

I'm supposed to be using a walker on wheels but I'm too vain. I'm not going to walk around in a chrome cage like some geriatric in a post office queue. I look in the cupboard for my clothes. Empty.

I know it sounds paranoid but they're not tel ing me everything. Someone
must
know what I was doing on the river. Someone wil have heard the shots or seen something. Why haven't they found any bodies?

Halfway down the corridor I see Campbel talking to Dr. Wickham. Two detectives are with them. I recognize one of them: John Keebal. I used to work with him until he joined the Met's Anti-Corruption Group, otherwise known as the Ghost Squad, and began investigating his own.

Keebal is one of those coppers who cal al gays “fudge-packers” and Asians “Pakis.” He is loud, bigoted and total y obsessed with the job. When the
Marchioness
riverboat sank in the Thames, he did thirteen death-knocks before lunchtime, tel ing people their kids had drowned. He knew exactly what to say and when to stop talking. A man like that can't be al bad.

“Where do you think you're going?” asks Campbel .

“I thought I might get some fresh air.”

Keebal interrupts, “Yeah, just got a whiff of something myself.”

I push past them heading for the lift.

“You can't possibly leave,” says Dr. Wickham. “Your dressing has to be changed every few days. You need painkil ers.”

“Fil my pockets and I'l self-administer.”

Campbel grabs my arm. “Don't be so bloody foolish.”

I realize I'm shaking.

“Have you found anyone? Any . . . any bodies?”

“No.”

“I'm not faking this, you know. I real y can't remember.”

He steers me away from the others. “I believe you, Vincent, but you know the dril . The IPCC has to investigate.”

“What's Keebal doing here?”

“He just wants to talk to you.”

“Do I need a lawyer?”

Campbel laughs but it doesn't reassure me like it should. Before I can weigh up my options, Keebal leads me down the corridor to the hospital lounge—a stark, windowless place, with burnt-orange sofas and posters of healthy people. He unbuttons his jacket and takes a seat, waiting for me to lever myself down from my crutches.

“I hear you nearly met the grim reaper.”

“He offered me a room with a view.”

“And you turned him down?”

“I'm not a good traveler.”

For the next ten minutes we shoot the breeze about mutual acquaintances and old times. He asks about my mother and I tel him she's in a retirement vil age.

“Some of those places can be pretty expensive.”

“Yep.”

“Where you living nowadays?”

“Right here.”

The coffee arrives and Keebal keeps talking. He gives me his opinion on the proliferation of firearms, random violence and senseless crimes. The police are becoming easy targets and scapegoats al at once. I know what he's trying to do. He wants to draw me in with a spiel about good guys having to stick together.

Keebal is one of those police officers who adopt a warrior ethic as though something separates them from normal society. They listen to politicians talk about the war on crime and the war on drugs and the war on terror and they start picturing themselves as soldiers fighting to keep the streets safe.

“How many times have you put your life on the line, Ruiz? You think any of the bastards care? The left cal us pigs and the right cal us Nazis. Sieg, sieg, oink! Sieg, sieg, oink!” He throws his right arm forward in a Nazi salute.

I stare at the signet ring on his pinkie and think of Orwel 's
Animal Farm
.

Keebal is on a rol . “We don't live in a perfect world and we don't have perfect police officers, eh? But what do they expect? We have no fucking resources and we're fighting a system that lets criminals out quicker than we can catch them. And al this new-age touchy-feely waa-waa bul shit they pass off as crime prevention has done nothing for you and me. And it's done nothing for the poor misguided kids who get caught up in crime.

“A while back I went to a conference and some lard-arse criminologist with an American accent told us that police officers had no enemies. ‘Criminals are not the enemy, crime is,' he said. Jesus wept! Have you ever heard anything so stupid? I had to stop myself giving this guy a slap.” Keebal leans in a little closer. I smel peanuts on his breath.

“I don't blame coppers for being pissed off. And I can understand when they pocket a little for themselves, as long as they're not dealing drugs or hurting children, eh?” He puts his hand on my shoulder. “I can help you. Just tel me what happened that night.”

“I don't remember.”

“Am I correct in assuming, therefore, you cannot identify the person who shot you?”

“You would be correct in that assumption.”

My sarcasm seems to light a fire under Keebal. He knows I'm not buying his we're-al -alone-in-the-trenches bul shit.

“Where are the diamonds?”

“What diamonds?”

He tries to change the subject.

“No. No. Stop! What diamonds?”

He shouts over me. “The decks of that boat were swimming in blood. People died but we haven't found any bodies and nobody has been reported missing. What does that suggest to you?”

He makes me think. The victims probably had no close ties or they were engaged in something il egal. I want to go back to the diamonds, but Keebal has his own agenda.

“I read an interesting statistic the other day. Thirty-five percent of offenders found guilty of homicide claim amnesia of the event.” More bloody statistics. “You think I'm lying.”

“I think you're bent.”

I reach for my crutches and swing onto my feet. “Since you know al the answers, Keebal, you tel me what happened. Oh, that's right—you weren't there. Then again—you never are. When real coppers are out risking their lives, you're at home tucked up in bed watching reruns of
The Bill
. You risk nothing and you persecute honest coppers for standards that you couldn't piss over. Get out of here. And next time you want to talk to me you better come armed with an arrest warrant and a set of handcuffs.” Keebal's face turns a slapped-red color. He does lots of preening and flexing as he walks away, yel ing over his shoulder. “The only person you got fooled is that neurologist.

Nobody else believes you. You're gonna wish that bul et did the job.”