Vacuum (10 page)

‘It's
because
we don't know anything much about her that she's interesting,' Hazel said. ‘Why was she keeping stuff from us?'

‘Which stuff?' Jill said.

‘That's what I'm getting at, Thicko,' Hazel said. ‘There's stuff she's not telling us, and this makes us wonder what this stuff is. So, we're interested. If you think about, say, a vicar with a sermon, we're not interested because we've heard it all before and he puts it out again in front of us. But with this Karen Lister, she's holding something back, and we'd like to get at it and to know why she's holding it back.'

‘Although you didn't recognize her at first, Dad, I was wondering if as soon as she talked to us you suddenly remembered who she was,' Jill said. ‘It's well known that can happen with people's memories – they may be given a jab by something, and it all comes back to them. Say, for instance, when she spoke her name.'

‘If it's her true name,' Hazel replied.

‘The memory can do some weird things, yes,' Harpur said.

‘Or it might be perfume,' Jill said.

‘What might be?' Hazel said.

‘It's also well known that we could be looking at something and not able to remember it, such as a face and so on, or listening to a voice and not remembering that either, but then another sense takes over from sight and hearing, that is, the nose, and smelling something particular with it, a familiar scent, or once familiar,' Jill said. ‘And this causes the memory to wake up and bring everything back, not just the memory of the smell, but the whole thing. This smell sort of opens a door to all sorts of other things in the memory, like opening the door to a pantry. I don't think the scent she had on today was too bad. It might have been her favourite for a long while – such as Chanel's “Allure”, or “Red” by Giorgio Beverly Hills – and when somebody gets a whiff of it now it is as though time returns, like, automatically to the first day or night he or she met the smell of this scent, sketching out that whole earlier scene, which is very helpful in the matter of recalling. Yes, Dad, memory is rather a tricky item.'

‘You don't need “like, automatically”,' Harpur replied. ‘“Automatically” will do.'

‘Did that scent send your mind back automatically to the first time you smelled it one day?' Jill said. ‘Or, of course, night. Some women do more scent at night owing to socializing and so on. I think she'd be an Allure fan.'

‘No,' Harpur said.

‘No, what?' Jill said. ‘You think, not Allure? Something else? Red? Or something else altogether? You know, do you? Which scent was it, then?'

‘No, I didn't recognize her scent – any scent,' Harpur said. ‘How could I if I've never met her?' And scent wouldn't figure in her file.

‘That's what we're talking about, isn't it, Dad?' Jill replied.

‘What?'

‘
Did
you know her, but have forgotten you knew her, and the scent might remind you you knew her,' Jill said, ‘leading to a complete memory of that previous meeting? This is the kind of thing memory can do. Why I said “tricky”.'

‘No,' Harpur said.

‘Why didn't she just ring up and arrange to see you, Dad, not street-loiter?' Hazel said. ‘We're in the book.'

‘Some people don't trust phones,' Jill said.

‘So she displays herself in Arthur Street instead? If she was wearing sandwich boards with “I'm looking for Col Harpur” on she wouldn't have been more obvious,' Hazel said. ‘She leaves her car out of sight, so you might think she knew something about security and undercover, but then she struts along in front of the house, and then struts away from the house so fast anyone would know she's only in the street because of number 126.'

‘Desperate people do things that aren't always very brainy,' Jill replied. ‘She said she “bumped into” Dad, though we know she'd been on the prowl, so that wasn't very brainy either. I suppose she had to say
something
to explain why she was there. But because of stress she chose something stupid.'

‘Do you think she's to do with the Shale situation, Dad?' Hazel said.

‘This is a case with many sides,' Jill replied.

‘There
are
difficulties with it,' Harpur said.

‘If you regard her as just a nuisance, there's no need to go back to the house immediately, even though it's arranged,' Jill said. ‘She'll call there, but if you didn't show she'd realize that wasn't the way you wanted to do things, such as a police matter, a work matter. It should be dealt with at the nick. Too bad she doesn't like going there. If she wants something she got to follow the right procedure. Pity she's not here now. I'd say, “Sorry, Karen, but that's the picture.”'

‘
Has
to follow the right procedure,' Harpur replied.

‘Yes, she has to,' Jill said.'

‘I believe she's a moll of some sort,' Hazel said.

‘What's that?' Jill said.

‘In a crook's crew, or partner of a crook,' Hazel said. ‘It's the mixture of breeziness and nerves. These I noted in her.'

‘I'll probably see her briefly at home,' Harpur replied.

‘I don't think it's wise, Dad,' Jill said.

‘Why?' he said.

‘It doesn't seem  . . . well, it doesn't seem very suitable, that's all,' Jill said.

‘Why?' Harpur said.

‘Yes, unsuitable,' Jill said.

‘I agree with Hazel,' Harpur replied. ‘This woman has troubles. We're here to give help when there are troubles.'

‘Which “we” is that?' Jill said.

‘Police,' Harpur said.

‘Or what if Ilesy suddenly calls at 126, like, not expected one bit, the way he does?' Jill said. ‘Even now when he's not after Haze any longer and flashing his crimson scarf.'

‘Creature,' Hazel replied.

‘So?' Harpur said.

‘You're there with another woman in the house, not old. Older than Denise, but not old,' Jill said. ‘Purple slingbacks. Boobs.'

‘In the way of business,' Harpur said.

‘He'll believe that?' Jill said. ‘This is why I say unsuitable.'

Harpur pulled in at the judo. ‘Pick you up here at the usual time,' he said.

‘Maybe I should come back with you now,' Jill said. ‘Haze can stay. If Des Iles called in it would be all right then, because I'd be in the house as well, saying I had to miss judo because too much homework.'

‘No, it will be fine,' Harpur said. He put their sports bags out on the pavement.

‘You seem in quite a hurry,' Jill said.

Of course it pissed him off now and then, this obsession of theirs with women he met, but he understood where their uneasiness came from and so didn't show he resented it and felt monitored by it. If you were the single parent in a single parent family, you ought to try to avoid too much single-parent rattiness, otherwise the children would come to regard rattiness as natural to being a parent: they'd have no other current experience of parenthood for comparison. He drove back to the house and tidied up the place a bit.

Although, these days, he liked the big sitting-room, it used to darken his soul and cause him shortness of breath when Megan was alive because she had her books on hardwood shelves, floor to ceiling, around all four walls. He thought the spine-names on some of these pitiless volumes would have depressed almost anyone, not just himself. He kept a few of the titles fully and accurately in his head so he could relish the fact they'd been carted away free on a strictly non-return basis by a dealer. It used to buck him up when he felt forlorn if he made his mind recall, one by fucking one, these gloriously gone works:
Old Fortunatus
,
The Rules and Exercises of Holy Dying
,
Edwin Drood
,
The Virtues of Sid Hamet the Magician's Rod
,
U And I
. He'd had the shelves removed, and the room redecorated, a decent, respectful while after Megan's death. It would have been crude and unfeeling to do an immediate chuck.

Jill had wanted a couple of the collection for herself – one on boxing,
The Sweet Science
, and one the diary of a playwright called Orton – but the rest went. He would have hated for this woman, Karen Lister, to come into the house seeking help and get unnerved, even panicked, by sight of that smug, engulfing, interminable book depot.

He drew the curtains after he led Karen in. She'd expect that. The sitting room had windows on to the street, and she wanted this visit discreet, not blatant under lights. It was usual to close the curtains on autumn and winter evenings, so the kids would not be able to kick up about crafty concealment for something sexual.

Karen Lister said: ‘I'm trying to work out where you stand in all this.'

‘All which?'

‘The drugs tableau.'

‘I'm a police officer.'

‘So is the one called Iles mentioned by your daughter. Everyone knows he has his own views re drugs. He thinks decriminalize, doesn't he, with more money for treatment? Like in Portugal.'

‘Mr Iles is concerned with big-time strategy.'

‘How about you?'

‘I'm a police officer.'

‘And then this new Chief,' she replied. ‘A dawn raid on Ralphy Ember's house. You were there, weren't you, and Iles, although the operation was run by someone else. Symbolic, your and Iles's presence? So, where are we?'

‘Gossip gets around.'

‘When I say, “Where are we?” what I mean is, are Ralphy Ember and his firm to be wiped out?'

Yes, if Upton could manage it, Ember was to be eliminated as first stage in something larger. ‘I'd be interested to know where you pick up your rumours,' he said.

‘The changes – potential changes – bewilder me,' she said. ‘They're frightening.'

He made tea and served it in proper china cups decorated with blue leaves and tendrils, plus matching saucers. He was keen on china and thought he might do some systematic study and buying when he retired. He loved how, with the best examples, something solid like the side of a cup could be almost transparent.

‘So?' Hazel had said when he spoke admiringly of it one day. His daughters considered this interest an affectation and ‘salon snobby', as Hazel termed it. Jill didn't seem to get what ‘salon' meant, but she agreed about the snobbery. He'd seen them pour tea out of the cups he'd used when they had company and into stubby beige mugs.

For the meeting with Karen Lister, he'd also marged some slices of currant bread and arranged these on a large plate from the same set. She seemed to enjoy the snack. Hazel usually made sure some of the bread in the cupboard was reasonably fresh.

‘You've got a file on me, I expect,' Karen Lister said.

‘I deliberately don't go ex-directory so that anyone with a problem who thinks I might be useful can look me up in the book and get in touch,' Harpur replied. ‘I'm glad you took advantage of that.'

‘I try to imagine what that file would record,' she said. ‘
Karen Louise Lister, born January 1985, no convictions, live-in girlfriend-slash-partner of Jason Ivan Claud Wensley, number three or possibly four in the Shale hierarchy.
There might be amendments to that last part since Manse has withdrawn. Jason's probably number two now, after Michael Redvers Arlington, aka General Franco.'

Yes, as far as Harpur could recall, the entry might be something like that. It would be brief, with little on her physical appearance. She signified only as a side item to the boyfriend: no need for a lot of identification stuff. Jill was right about the fair-to-mousy cowlick. Behind it, the rest of her hair hung straight to just above her shoulders. Jill was also right about the slimness, along, though, with what she called ‘boobs'. Lister had dark-blue eyes, a short-nosed, wary looking, strong cheek-boned face, fine skin, full lips, and small, even teeth. It all assembled into something as near to beautiful as anyone was likely to get. But he doubted whether that wary look was wary
enough
. Did she know how she was risking herself? That is,
really
know. She knew it sort of logically, theoretically, and had kept alert in case she had a tail. But did she know the perils in the way real perils were known – by feeling them continuously at her centre, a non-stop burn?

With corpses, he'd always found a display of small, regular teeth in a part-open mouth especially awful, as though that mouth still wanted to say something, perhaps joke, or amend, or bite a slice of currant loaf.

She sat straight-backed on the chesterfield, occasionally lifting or replacing her cup and saucer on a coffee table. She'd be about five foot nine inches tall, getting towards six feet in the slingbacks. Her accent wasn't local. He thought maybe anglicized, educated Welsh.

‘That assault on Low Pastures – people are bound to ask what it signifies, aren't they,' she said, ‘after all the previous non-intervention by Iles and the rest of you. It's like ravaging a cathedral. Until now, a kind of reverence for the place, Ralphy and Margaret Ember's shrine. Iles looks after them, just as he tried to look after Manse Shale. All right, the Embers can be charming, perhaps earn some special treatment. There's Ralph with the young Chuck Heston glow. And Margaret is sweet – gave us a lift home one night from The Monty when we'd drunk too much celebrating someone's suspended sentence.'

‘
Which
people are bound to ask?'

‘Two possibilities lie behind all this, don't they? Maybe three?' she said. ‘First, Ralphy has upset Iles somehow, so that's the end of tolerance. This would devastate Margaret. Second, Iles has been overruled by your new Chief who hates the ACC's blind-eye drugs policy and will work to end it, and make you and he work to end it: maybe the new Chief has been posted here with particular orders to smash the drugs set-up. Third, Iles has himself lost belief in that policy – maybe because of the Shale killings – and decided permissiveness doesn't function after all.'