Authors: Mark Pearson
Norrell turned the shower off and wrapped his
towel around himself. He had been in juvenile
detention when he had heard the news of his father's
death, and if he had shed a tear at the time it was
certainly not through grief. As he left the shower
block he nodded at a thickset man who occupied the
cell next door to his. The man didn't meet his eye and
Norrell knew it meant something. But he was ready.
The time was long past when Kevin Norrell was
going to be anybody's bitch. That interfering, bastard
Irish copper was going to make sure of that.
Jack Delaney shrugged. 'So he's not happy where he
is. Why should we give a monkey's toss?'
'He claims he knew nothing about Walker's paedophile
activities. He fears for his safety at Bayfield.'
'The sooner that shite is put down like a rabid dog
the better, you ask me.'
'Not too soon. Norrell claims to know something
about your wife's death. That's his bargaining chip.
He says he'll only speak to you.'
'And you'll let me do it?'
'I will if you're back on the force.' Diane dug into
her pocket and pulled out an unopened letter. 'I never
processed your resignation, Jack. Far as anyone
knows you've been on extended leave these last
weeks.' She smiled once more. 'Emotional problems.'
'You must have been pretty sure about me.'
Diane held the smile like a sniper cradles a rifle.
'Men might not be to my taste, Jack. Doesn't stop me
understanding them pretty damn well.'
Delaney finished his pint and stood up.
'Where are you going?'
'I'm going to talk to him.'
Campbell shook her head. 'Not today. I've
arranged the interview for tomorrow morning. Come
on, cowboy. Sit down, I'll get you another pint.'
Diane Campbell picked up his empty glass and
headed for the bar, threading her way through the
group of young men who had now started singing,
'Get 'em down you Zulu warrior, get 'em down you
Zulu chief.' She had never understood what the song
was about, and the prospect of seeing a naked man,
however young and fit, held as much attraction for
her as a Cherry Cola held for Jack Delaney. She
waited at the bar for the drinks and looked back at
him. She had put her career on the line keeping him
in his job. Bringing down Superintendent Walker,
however guilty he might have been, had not
enamoured Delaney to the senior brass. In fact she
had to outright lie to the powers that be to keep him
out of jail, let alone keep his warrant card. Possession
of an unlicensed firearm was not looked upon with
favour, not to mention the little matter of nearly
killing one of her sergeants. That the sergeant in
question, Eddie Bonner, helped to cover up Walker's
activities was neither here nor there. Sergeant Bonner
was dead and, whatever forensic pathologist Kate
Walker might think, the dead did not make good
witnesses. Diane handed the barmaid the correct
change, flashed her a flirty smile then walked back to
Delaney carrying the drinks carefully through the
packed bar. It might very well come back and bite her
on her bony arse, but she reckoned she had done the
right thing. Delaney was a good man to have in her
camp, she knew that much about him if little else.
Diane handed the Irishman his pint, spying the
barely contained violence in brown eyes and figured
Norrell better not be yanking on the cowboy's
lariat.
Kevin lay on the top bunk in his cell squeezing an
exercise ball, the tendons of his hand standing out
like ropes of wire as he contracted it. The man below
him fidgeted nervously. Norrell didn't blame him.
Like the man in the shower, he wouldn't meet his
eyes. Something was in the air. He could almost
taste the tension. Norrell smiled humorously as he
squeezed the ball again. Whatever it was he would
be ready to meet it, or die trying. One way or another
he was getting out of prison.
Diane Campbell glanced across at the pub windows,
noticing that the rain had eased up a little. She sipped
on her third glass of mineral water and looked across
at Delaney. There was a glassy look in his eyes now,
less anger and a softer focus. Not surprising since had
moved on to drinking Scotch with his Guinness, for
some reason insisting on Glenmorangie rather than
his favoured Bushmills, and had had six or seven
doubles. She wasn't sure that he hadn't slipped in a
quick one or two when she had gone to the Ladies.
Never mind about the ban on smoking in pubs, what
about putting enough cubicles in and banning
women from using the place like a lounge for gossip?
She didn't envy a man his penis, that was for sure,
but she did admire its functional practicality. She
swallowed her drink. She was desperate for a
cigarette. Diane looked at Delaney pointedly. 'Come
on, cowboy, drink up. I'm taking you home.
Delaney looked at her steadily, the very faintest of
slurs in his voice. 'I've got my car outside.'
'Yeah, and that's where it's staying. You're not
causing anyone else's death this month. Not on my
watch.'
Delaney laughed. 'Did you really just say "not on
my watch", Diane?'
'You heard it, partner. The mule is staying parked
right where you left it, and I'm taking you back to the
High Chaparral.'
Delaney shook his head as he stood up. 'Just drop
me off at a Tube station.'
'Which one?'
'Northern Line.' He drained his pint of Guinness,
coaxed the last drop of whisky from his glass into his
mouth and walked with her to the door. He was
almost balanced.
*
Kate Walker didn't normally take the Tube. It wasn't
so much that she was a snob, she just didn't like the
crammed-in, close proximity of people. It wasn't just
the look of them or the smell of them – which was
bad enough with their wet, rain-sodden clothes – but
she knew what people were capable of, the extent of
their random cruelties. As a forensic pathologist she
knew that far better than most. If she had learned the
hard way that you couldn't trust the people you were
related to or worked with . . . then you sure as hell
couldn't trust strangers. She wouldn't be taking the
Tube at all, in fact, but her car was booked in at
the garage for a service and an MOT, and her
mechanic wouldn't be dropping it back at her house
until the early evening. So she had gone by train and
taxi to the cemetery for the funeral earlier that
afternoon of the caretaker who had been murdered in
the course of Delaney's last case. She was pleased she
had been able to take flowers for the grave, but in all
other ways the journey had been wasted. She had
hoped to be able to speak to Jack, discuss what
happened with them, but she might as well have been
speaking to the dead caretaker for the amount of
emotional response she got from Delaney. The
prospect of going straight home to an empty house
had depressed her even more and so she had spent the
rest of the afternoon shopping and buying nothing.
Nothing fitted. Nothing was right. Nothing shifted
the black cloud of her mood. And so here she was
now, stuck on the Tube with a bunch of people she
neither knew nor felt any inclination to know.
She looked down at her court shoes. Expensive,
chic, sexy, she thought. Black suited her colouring.
The shoes were now spattered with mud and rain and
the shine had come off them, just like the shine had
come off her day.
The train juddered to a halt, mid-tunnel, and the
lights in the carriage flickered and dimmed before
coming back up. She positioned her heel in one of
the grooves that ran along the floor and swivelled
her foot, wondering when they were going to update
the trains. It took just over a couple of hours to get
from Paris to St Pancras on the Eurostar fast link
nowadays, but it could take an age just to go a few
stops on this damned service. The lights dimmed
again; low and yellow. Kate looked along the length
of the carriage. There was something curiously
Gothic about the Northern Line, she thought. Other
lines, other stations had a late-Victorian sensibility
to them, she knew that, but the Northern Line in
places had a quintessentially spooky feel to it. Wood
and brass and strange lamps, transportation by
Hammer House of Horror.
The train shuddered and clanked as the wheels
started turning again. She looked out of the window
as the train flashed noisily through the tunnel once
more and pulled her coat tight about her. It was early
evening and the train was full, its motion, as it rocked
from side to side, throwing the overweight man next
to her against her body every time the train rounded
a corner. He didn't seem too keen to move away,
either, perfectly happy to invade her personal space.
She sighed and gritted her teeth.
She was in a foul mood. Jack Delaney, the son of
a bitch. She didn't know why she let him get to her,
but he did. Kate Walker, in her own opinion, was, if
anything, a woman born of logic, of reason. She was
clinical, sharp; her judgement a precision instrument.
Only that instrument was letting her down
lately, and she didn't know how to fix it. She looked
out of the window again, seeing her reflection
smudgy and blurred, and that was exactly how she
felt. Smudgy and blurred. She wasn't sure quite who
she was any more. She leaned against the side of the
train, putting as much space between her and the fat
man as possible and felt a shiver run up her spine.
Somebody was walking on her grave. Dancing on it.
She looked around expecting to see someone
watching her, but, if they were, they had looked
away. Looking away was the English virtue after all.
Never get involved, never show your emotions,
never get off the boat. Maybe Jack Delaney was
more English than he would have liked to admit.
There was a man who was never going to get off
the boat.
Delaney stood in the carriageway, swaying with the
rhythm of the train, holding on to a strap hanger and
keeping his balance, just about, as the train bucked
and shifted under his feet as it rattled noisily through
the underground tunnels.
He should have let Diane Campbell take him
home, back to his sterile new house in Belsize Park.
He should have left the pub after just one drink and
then made a start on the decorating, making the place
a home and not just a house. Somewhere where his
daughter Siobhan would want to visit, would want to
stay a few days with him. But Delaney didn't do one
quick drink, and he hadn't wanted to go home, it
didn't feel like home to him, nowhere had for a long
time. Those dark thoughts hadn't been turned off yet
and he didn't think they would. Not tonight. Tonight
he needed more than alcohol to fight his demons.
He wished he had never visited the cemetery. He'd
told Kate Walker that he'd only gone because he
owed it to the old man who had taken a bullet for
him. But it wasn't true. He'd gone to see her and now
he wished he hadn't. It wasn't a time for complications.
He had a focus now and he needed to keep
that focus, but Kate had set a fire burning, created a
physical thirst that he needed to quench.
A man leaned against him as the train turned a
corner and Delaney looked back at him and the man
quickly moved away, half muttering an apology and
avoiding eye contact.
Delaney watched the man move through the
crowded train, keen to put distance between them
and Delaney didn't blame him. Tomorrow he was
going to take steps. People were going to pay for
what happened four years ago and pay in blood. But
tonight he could taste the iron and copper in his
mouth, could feel the murmurs in his blood like the
low thrumming of a bass string. Tonight Delaney had
another agenda.
He looked ahead, past the crowded-together commuters
who were packed into the carriageway with
the resigned look of cattle being herded to slaughter
and as some stood up to disembark he saw the dark-haired
woman. She was looking at her own reflection
in the window as the train jolted and the lights
dipped, yellow and sulphurous, so that Delaney's
brown eyes smouldered in the low light like a hunting
wolf's.
He came to a decision and reached into his pocket
as the train clattered to a standstill.
Kate walked out of the Tube station scowling as the
wind came howling up Hampstead High Street
sweeping the rain into her face. She stepped back into
the entrance and waited for the weather to abate. She
looked at her watch, still not relishing the idea of
going back to her empty house, but she had a film on
DVD to watch and three-quarters of a bottle of
Cloudy Bay chilling in her fridge. Damn Delaney, she
thought for the hundredth time that day, wishing
again, also for the hundredth time, that she'd never
gone to the funeral. She tried to persuade herself that
she'd gone for the old man, not on the off chance of
seeing that ungrateful Irish bastard. She'd nearly put
her life on the line to save his miserable skin, not to
mention that of his daughter's, and what thanks did
she get? Used and discarded. He made her feel like
the cheap kind of whore he obviously felt
comfortable with. She strode angrily out into the
rain, sod the man, her life had been on hold for long
enough. Time to push the play button, and not on the
DVD machine. She hurried up the street towards the
Holly Bush. Physician, heal thyself, that's what they
said, didn't they? Well, she was going to write out a
large prescription in her own name: vodka-based,
repeat as required.
She crossed the street and, as she did, she felt that
familiar tingle in her spine again, but, as she blinked
the rainwater from her eyes and looked back, she
couldn't see anyone following her. She hurried on up
the slight hill, keeping her face down and angled
away from the rain. Within minutes she was pulling
the old, heavy door behind her, closing out the wind
and the weather, the rainwater dripping from her
black overcoat on to the rough wooden floor of the
pub as she shook her hair and wiped a hand across
her eyes, hoping her waterproof mascara was holding
up and hearing the sweet, soulful tones of Madeleine
Peyroux cutting across the chatter in the room. They
didn't always have music playing; the manager said
that the hubbub of conversation was the real music of
the place and she agreed with him. It was just part of
what made the pub special. Tonight though she was
grateful for the music, it shielded her from other
people's thoughts.