Hooch flinched at the sight of it, glowering owlishly from behind his glasses (as if momentarily whiplashed by this unexpected convergence), then craned his neck nervously after the whirling blue globe as it gradually retreated.
He had every reason to feel anxiety: his white van was parked on a double yellow (just a few feet along from them), half up on the pavement, half off, the back door swung open to reveal a small stove (unlit), two camp-beds, an unzipped sleeping bag, an ice-box, a pair of Wellingtons, two back-packs (his and Doc’s: Doc’s much the larger) a rolled up tent and a clean shirt on a peg.
Only once the jeep had passed into the distance did he turn back towards Doc again and commiserate softly with him, ‘You’ll kill yourself this way, Old Man.’
He spoke fondly.
He offered Doc the mug of tea. Doc half-turned, reaching out his arm for it. ‘Too true. Too true.’
He didn’t sound regretful. Or chastened, even. He embraced his destiny willingly. Tragic or otherwise. He wasn’t particular.
His hand eventually made contact with the cup. But Hooch held on to it, a second longer, as if fearful Doc might drop it. His fingers seemed stiff and hot – paradoxically so, in all of this iciness – burning with a scarlet, puffy-jointed arthritic buzz (early morning and late evening. Extremes of temperature. Always a trial for him.).
‘I saw The Blind Man,’ Doc muttered, nodding towards the retreating jeep to indicate his train of thought, taking the cup, finally, gripping at it tightly and ducking his head in thanks for it, ‘I believe you said he’d turn up.’
This comment seemed to wash over Hooch, initially.
‘You must’ve done twenty-odd miles today,’ Hooch ruminated, ‘or thereabouts.’
‘Yup,’ Doc confirmed. ‘Seventeen for the perimeter and then the rest. Probably eight or more this morning.’
The Old Man sighed once he’d finished speaking, still not breathing easily – getting no pleasure from his calculating (if anything, all the more exhausted by it) – then took a sip of his drink. He sighed again, gratefully, after swallowing.
‘I sometimes wonder,’ Hooch couldn’t resist pushing his luck a little, ‘whether he doesn’t do these ridiculous distances just to take the mick. I mean the island’s perimeter every fucking
day?
What’s the
point
of it? Why’s he doing it?’
Doc chuckled, indulgently, ‘I’ve thought it myself, Hooch, I have. When my toes start their throbbing and my chest starts its heaving. It’s not his usual style – to retrace like this…’ he paused, as if unable –or unwilling –to consider the deeper ramifications of Wesley’s behaviour, ‘but he’s younger than we are and a genuine… well,
adventurer.
He takes real joy in it. And he has all that boundless energy. All that anger. He walks them off. He observes stuff. He –I was only just thinking this, an hour or so ago, to fight off the tiredness while I was Following –he kind of… he integrates himself. He becomes a part of things. And that’s a gift. There’s nothing untoward in it. Absolutely not.’
‘I had a kip in the van,’ Hooch justified his absence on the perimeter walk, with a slight vocal tightness. ‘The spur’s been playing me up a bit lately.’
‘No explanations necessary, Hooch,’ Doc reached out a heavy hand and tenderly caressed Dennis’s chin with it, ‘least of all to me.’
His rebuttal wasn’t entirely sincere. Following was a job, after all, like any other. No margin here for skivers or wasters or half-cocked loafers. Hooch knew it. The corner of his mouth twisted slightly. His eyes narrowed a fraction behind his glasses. He turned and
peered suspiciously after the police jeep again, thereby re-accessing Doc’s earlier allusion, ‘You were saying The Pig turned up this afternoon, then?’
Doc winced, not appreciating the coarseness of Hooch’s language. He took another sip of his drink –to indicate his displeasure –then answered, after swallowing, ‘He did. Joined us just before two-thirty. On his own, he was. Shoes passed the time with him.’
‘What a ridiculous sodding
liability
that man is,’ Hooch sniped, ‘and what an unrepentant bloody
flea.
I told you he’d show his face at some point, didn’t I?’
‘You were right, Hooch,’ Doc affirmed, tiredly.
‘The South East is his manor. The Estuary. He always turns up here, regular as clockwork.’
‘He was affiliated to the docks in Shoeburyness for twelve years, he was telling me. Then close to Purfleet for five. Customs-related stuff, I’d expect. Then a spate at Grain, when his eyesight started going. It’s his patch alright.’
‘His
beat,
’ Hooch spat, ‘and I bet the sightless little tit already grassed us up with that bloody lot.’ Hooch thumbed, grimacing, after the police jeep.
‘Give the poor sod a break, will you?’ Doc put his mug of tea down, grimacing exasperatedly. ‘Herb’s an ex-cop and he’s
blind.
How the hell could he be expected to know you were parked illegally?’
‘He’d sense it,’ Hooch pretended to be joking, but he wasn’t entirely, ‘he’s like a damn bat. He has a bat’s radar.’
Doc merely snorted, choosing not to fuel Hooch’s psychotic imaginings any further.
‘Wesley hates him. I know that much,’ Hooch muttered, resenting Doc’s flagrant lack of involvement, determined to provoke him further.
‘You
don’t
know that.’
Doc was immediately engaged again.
‘I do. He can smell a pig at fifty paces.
Loathes
them.’
‘Ex-pig,’ Doc corrected, ‘and a loyal Behindling.’
In the distance the police jeep’s brake lights were sparking. It stopped. It indicated. It began a slow but inexorable three-point turn.
Damn
‘So whereabouts exactly did he catch up, then?’ Hooch asked, a touch of real tension entering his voice.
‘Just after you left us. Just beyond the hotel.’
‘And how did he know where we were?’
‘Now
there’s
a question…’ Doc was tense now, too. ‘Probably used his…’ He tipped his head towards the blue light.
‘I
knew
it. The swine. And did he tell you anything?’
‘Nope,’ Doc lifted his tea out of the way and then slowly began pulling his socks on again, ‘I already said Shoes kept company with him. They were a distance behind me. The going was heavy. And the fog…’
He impatiently mopped some cold sweat off his forehead, ‘I lost Wes at the putting course. He put on a spurt. Got away from me there.’
‘Did you see the new girl afterwards?’
‘I did. Not fifteen minutes since. On the High Street. With the boy. Outside the pub. Climbing into an old brown Mini. Thick as thieves they were.’
‘I still can’t get over Wes talking to her like that,’ Hooch grumbled (as if this simple act had been a terrible offence to him, personally).
‘It was certainly a little…’ Doc paused, ‘
odd.
’ He shrugged. ‘They’ll both be up here in a minute, I shouldn’t wonder.’
‘Not if the little rapscallion sees…’ Hooch tipped his head, morosely, towards the approaching police vehicle.
Doc finished yanking on his boots then set about rapidly re-tying his laces, ‘You’re on the bloody money there.’
Hooch nodded sagely to himself, gazing over the road towards Katherine’s bungalow (the lights were on but the curtains were drawn. The stained glass in the front door was glowing brightly).
‘And now Wesley’s back here again, you reckon?’
‘Yup,’ Doc affirmed, ‘I lost him on the fourteenth mile or thereabouts, so I don’t know for certain. But it’s what I’m assuming…’
‘Perhaps he’s considering renting from her,’ Hooch said, almost joking, but with a slight edge of anxiety.
‘Never. Not our Wes. And why the silly tart’d give him house-room –even overnight –after what he did to her…’
Doc had removed his pager from his inside pocket and was frowning at it, bemusedly, as he spoke. He gave it a shake. ‘Something’s definitely up with this thing today.’
‘It’s not just that,’ Hooch told him, ‘I tried the info-line earlier. Didn’t get any answer. No updates, anyway. And the last message deleted. Which’ll go some way to explaining why the weekend crowd haven’t made an appearance yet.’
‘I’ve had dozens of text messages,’ Doc half-smiled, ‘but I haven’t responded. I like it quiet. Makes a nice change, eh?’
‘
Snap,
’ Hooch concurred.
‘It’s never happened before,’ Doc opined, ‘at least not in my memory.’
‘Then your memory’s getting shaky, Old Man,’ Hooch seemed delighted to set Doc straight on the matter, ‘because it happened the February before last. In Skeggy. Skegness. Went down for two days then, remember? We were freezing our arses off in that three man tent with Martin Hopsmith, just before he got cancer.’
‘Good old Mart.’ Doc turned off his pager again and stuck it into his pocket, scowling as the police jeep pulled to a standstill in front of them.
‘Estate agent at two o’clock,’ Hooch spoke –barely moving his lips –over the sound of the engine, ‘check it out.’
Doc glanced over. Sure enough: the estate agent, pushing aside Katherine’s living room curtains, then the nets, spotting the police car, frowning, letting them swish gently back together again.
The jeep was driven by a young officer. He was accompanied by a diminutive female wearing casual gear. The officer unwound his window, opened his mouth, but before he could say anything, Hooch had bounded forward onto the roadway. ‘I’m
right
on the case, lad,’ he shouted, indicating with his thumb towards the van, ‘just picking up my old pal here…’
He bent his knees slightly to try and confirm eye-contact with the un-uniformed female, ‘If you’re from the Social, love, and it’s the boy you’re after, he’s just down the road a-way, outside the pub. We saw him there not ten minutes since…’
The woman frowned back at him, blankly –
Love?
The police officer, meanwhile, had turned off the ignition, unfastened his seat belt and jumped out of the car. He glanced over his shoulder for any sign of traffic, then strolled over.
‘I’m not here about the van, sir,’ he told Hooch curtly, ‘but I’m sure you can appreciate that this is a busy road and as such…’ he paused, closely inspecting the still-seated Doc, momentarily losing his thread, then promptly relocating it, ‘it’s always our priority to keep it clear.’
While he was speaking his right hand made the slow but ineluctable journey from his side to his front pocket, ‘In all good conscience,’ he smiled (an edge of steel in the artificial glow of the streetlight sparking off his fillings), ‘I should be writing you out a ticket.’
Hooch hopped back onto the pavement, plainly appalled by this possibility. ‘I’m right onto it, officer,’ he told him, needing no second warning. ‘Coming Old Man?’
The officer’s head snapped around at the sound of Doc’s familiar nomenclature. Doc was grumbling to himself under his breath as he untangled the dog’s lead with his uncooperative fingers. Once it had been neatly unwound, then applied, he tried to stand up, unleashing an almighty grunt, staggering slightly.
The officer put out a firm hand to steady him. Doc contrived to ignore it.
‘Doc,’ the officer said.
‘Don’t wear it out,’ Doc mumbled, making brief but furtive eye-contact, then looking down again, sullenly (he always pushed his luck with the local constabularies. He noticed himself doing it, disliked himself for it. But irascibility was one of the few real advantages old age afforded him. Seniority was his trump card; he played it, unstintingly.
And anyway… Anyway, Behindlings were no lovers of authority. Behindlings were harassed by the forces of the law, traditionally… Although they were so good when… The Welsh lads… so sympathetic when…)
No
‘Might I trouble you with a few questions, sir?’ As if on cue –but for no explicit reason –Dennis suddenly bounded forward towards the officer (bowing cheekily, bottom in
the air, his small stump wagging provocatively). This unexpected manoeuvre very nearly toppled the Old Man over. He tripped two short steps after the animal, cursing him furiously.
‘Are you alright there, sir?’
Doc crossly yanked Dennis to heel again, swiping his stiff fingers through the air, ‘I’m perfectly fine,’ he snapped, ‘and stop “siring” me. I was a scaffolder for thirty-five years. A working man and proud of it. Destroyed my bloody hands at it. And my knees.’
He resentfully showed his free hand to the young officer, as if its heinously arthritic state was somehow his personal responsibility.
‘And anyway, like Hooch just said,’ he rumbled, his voice unexpectedly deepened by a heavy bubble of phlegm rising, ‘if she’s with social services…’ he indicated, contemptuously, towards the un-uniformed female (clearing his throat, noisily –the persistence of his catarrh making even Hooch flinch a little), ‘and it’s the young lad –Patty –you’re after, then he’s down by the pub. He…’
Doc turned his head sideways and expelled a dark globule onto the pavement, brusquely apologised for it, then glanced sharply off to the far right, alerted by an unexpected movement on the edge of the roadway.
It was the girl, Josephine, walking quickly towards them, her coat overlaid by a pair of red and yellow braces –nauseatingly reflective –like the kind of protective garb cautious cyclists wore, at night, in out of the way places.
‘In actual fact,’ his voice brightened, ‘you should have a quick word with this young lady,’ he pointed, ‘she was keeping company with the little bugger a short while earlier.’
Josephine was walking in the gutter, her arms folded tightly, the hood on her duffel coat up, her chin down, her nose glowing coldly.
‘
Josephine,
’ Doc boomed. ‘Where’d Patty get to?’
Jo jumped (as if having had no expectation of seeing anyone on the path ahead) then stopped, confusedly, before starting up again and walking rapidly towards them, ‘I just drove him to Benfleet, to the train station…’
She paused, mid-flow, noticing the police car on the other side of the road with its lights off and the officer standing –perhaps a little uncomfortably –alongside the others.
‘
Uh…
It’s a fair old trip home for him,’ she bundled on, clumsily. ‘Bolton or Derby or somewhere…’