Chris Collett - [Tom Mariner 01] (29 page)

It seems to have been quite successful, but with some minor side effects.’

So it wasn’t brand new drug at all, it was old. Obsolete in fact. Mariner could barely conceal his disappointment.

‘Mark, this is Inspector Mariner, West Midlands Police,’ he said. If Mark was surprised that Anna had a policeman in her flat this late in the evening, he didn’t question it. ‘If Pinozalyan was so successful, why did they stop making it?’

‘I expect because it was superseded by something better, more effective. It happens all the time.’

But Mariner wouldn’t let it go. ‘Would there be any way of getting hold of it again?’

‘I doubt it. And if there are better products around, who would want to?’ Mark hesitated, apparently confused by the conversation. ‘Look Anna, if you need anything why don’t you come in and see me. Are you having trouble sleeping?’

Anna laughed. ‘Not me, Mark. If Jamie would let me, I’d sleep for a week.’

‘What would have replaced Pinozalyan,’ Mariner asked.

‘Particularly for anyone with autism?’

They could hear Mark tapping keys at the other end of the line. ‘There are a number of possibilities around just now,’ he said. ‘It would depend on the precise nature of the symptoms, but it could be something like Fenfluromine, or Impramine. There’s a whole group of them, these days they’re commonly referred to as PSTIs.’

‘But they have side effects too,’ Anna said, practically an expert now.

‘Possibly Anna, I don’t know much about them, I’m afraid. I’d have to look them all up individually.’

‘Could you fax through what you’ve got on Pinozalyan?’

‘Sure, and if you wanted anything more, you could try the Barnes Medical Library at the university.’

‘Thanks, Mark.’

Moments later Anna’s fax machine coughed out a single sheet of paper, confirming what Mark had already told them: that, once manufactured by pharmaceutical company Bowes Dorrinton, Pinozalyan was no longer on the market, and hadn’t been for more than twenty-five years.

‘A brilliant theory bites the dust,’ said Mariner, ruefully.

‘But what would have been Eddie’s interest in a drug that had become obsolete so long ago?’

‘You tell me,’ said Anna forcing her mouth back into shape. She was hoping that Mariner hadn’t noticed her stifling the yawn, but apparently he had.

‘I guess it’s one for another day,’ he said, getting up to go. She would have liked to ask him to stay, but what was the point? She had a night of fielding Jamie to look forward to.

The house was dark as Mariner let himself in the front door and he noted, with some gratitude, that it was also quiet.

On the way home, Anna Barham, together with his wandering imagination, had combined to produce the half-mast erection that he could always rely on when it wasn’t needed. Being forced to listen to Knox and Jenny shagging each other senseless tonight would have been more than flesh and blood could stand.

His mind was still buzzing from their discussion, and he didn’t feel much like sleep, so cracking open another bottle of home-brew, he poured himself a glass. It was a big improvement on the lager Anna Barham had kept in her fridge, but then he couldn’t expect everything.

Jenny, he noticed, was beginning to make her mark on the house. A vase of flowers stood on the mantelshelf, and unless Knox had dramatically updated his musical taste, the pile of CDs by the player had to be her introduction.

The table in the dining room was covered in papers too: Jenny’s assignment, an apologetic note to one side explained. Straining to decipher the scrawl, Mariner could see that Jenny already had one major qualification for joining the medical profession. As he stood over the table, his attention was caught by a whole series of striking black and white photographs. At first glance Mariner thought they looked rather like pictures of cauliflower florets, until he realised that they represented a foetus in different stages of development, right through from embryo to fully formed infant.

Underneath were descriptors explaining which part of the baby developed at which stage; at week six, the head, liver, intestines; week ten, the nervous system; week fourteen, the muscles and sexual organs. Greta’s baby was developing like that, Greta’s baby that wasn’t his. Mariner still couldn’t decide whether he minded that or not. Although at the time the prospect of fatherhood had terrified him, the idea of bumping into a ready-made replica of himself had also been an intriguing one. The way things were going, that chance may never present itself again and a tiny part of him regretted that. Maybe it always would.

The phone rang, shattering the silence. Mariner grabbed at it. At the other end was a small voice. ‘Hello. I know it’s late, and I’m sorry to bother you, but could I speak to Anthony please?’ An unmistakable Liverpool lilt.

‘I’m sorry,’ Mariner began. ‘There’s no one…’ A penny fell from a great height, spun where it landed and came to rest. ‘Ah, You mean Tony. Er, I’m sorry he’s not around just now. Can I take a message?’

A pause, then, ‘No. There’s no message.’ Another pause, then the voice even lower. ‘Is he still with her?’

‘I’m not sure.’ Technically it was the truth. Mariner couldn’t be certain that at that precise moment they were together, but all the same as he said it he still felt like a shit.

That night, Mariner dreamed he was climbing Tryfan, way up high above the snowline, the spectacular view bearing an uncanny resemblance to the Himalayan range. He was on a steep and narrow winding path, a knife-edge that he had to cling to with both hands, but when he looked down he saw Greta with a whole gaggle of kids, skipping along carelessly like the family Von Trapp from The Sound of Music. Sporting brilliant white, beaming smiles, they were waving at him but as he raised his hand to wave back he lost his balance and fell, tumbling down the mountainside until he woke with a jolt to see the first pale traces of dawn creeping over the sky outside.

Almost immediately he became aware of a gentle rhythmic creaking from the bedroom above. He felt a sudden buzz of excitement, but for once it had nothing to do with sex. During the night, in that slow osmotic way that thoughts form and consolidate, Mariner had developed the ghost of an idea about why Eddie Barham had been killed.

Details eluded him and, thanks to his late night drinking session, his head felt as though he’d made a recent investment in ear-to-ear cavity wall insulation.

He would need Anna’s help in confirming what he thought, so he had to be sure of the logic of what he’d already worked out. He couldn’t plough in there at half cock (ho ho!). For one thing it was bad policing and for another it would raise her hopes, but most of all, and he even admitted this to himself, Mariner wasn’t eager to make a total idiot of himself in front of her. That would come later perhaps. What he needed now was some fresh air and time to think.

Pulling on an old pair of combats, he drove through the empty streets to the outer limits of the city to where the Lickeys, a huddle of rolling hills that straddled Birmingham and Worcestershire, rise gently out of the urban sprawl.

Leaving his car at the Rose and Crown, Mariner put on his boots and strode out on a cushion of brown pine needles up the steep incline through dark conifers, the raw early morning air searing into his lungs and the dank smell of vegetation invading his nostrils. It was a dull and misty morning, and on the climb up he passed no one except a couple of conscientious dog walkers, the impression of isolation dispelled only by the permanent auditory backdrop of the rumbling motorway traffic.

From the castle-like monument on the summit, Mariner looked out over the conurbation spread out at his feet like a bluish grey patchwork, intricate in its detail. It was an unspectacular sunrise, the skies too grey and overcast to be anything more than a sluggish paling of the sky to the east, and at first only the geological features were discernible: to the west the rise of Dudley Castle hill, the north of the city marked by the mound of Barr Beacon. But, little by little, landmarks emerged in the developing daylight, linking together to form the coherent whole, as the facts of Eddie Barham’s death continued to take clearer shape in his head.

Back home, enervated, Mariner showered and ironed himself a clean shirt; a habit he’d clung to since his return to the civilised world all those years ago. When he went downstairs again, Jenny was in the kitchen, wearing what looked like one of Tony Knox’s sweaters. It barely covered what it needed to.

‘Hi,’ said Mariner, keeping his eyes above shoulder level.

She gave him a sleepy smile in return. ‘Hi.’ Then, noting that he was fully dressed. ‘You’re keen this morning, aren’t you? Want a coffee before you go?’

‘No thanks,’ Mariner said, raising his half-drunk mug.

‘But there is something you can help me with, Jenny. I noticed your project…’

She grimaced. ‘Oh, I’m sorry about that. It’s just that there’s more space here than in hall. I will tidy it up today, promise.’

‘No, it’s not that. There’s something I wanted to ask you. The endocrinal system, that’s hormones isn’t it?’

‘A medical student in the making.’ Jenny smiled.

‘If you took something, some form of medicine that impacted on the system in adults, does it follow that it would also have an effect on the same system in an unborn child?’

‘Wow, this is heavy stuff for eight o’clock in the morning. Actually, I couldn’t say for sure. Pharmacology isn’t until year four, but it would seem logical that it would.’

She hadn’t said no.

Knox appeared, looking equally dozy. ‘Any chance of a fry-up love?’ he asked.

From the expression on Jenny’s face, it didn’t look much like it and the atmosphere suddenly thickened.

‘You haven’t got time for that,’ Mariner said, partly to relieve the growing tension. ‘We’ve got work to do.’

‘Like what?’

‘Like when you get into the station, I want you to get hold of whoever dealt with the paperwork on Susan and Malcolm Barham’s accident.’

‘What for?’

‘I’m short of light reading material. See you at the shop.’

And, swigging back the rest of his coffee, Mariner picked up his keys and strode purposefully out of the house.

From the station, the first thing Mariner did was to phone Anna.

‘I’m sorry, she’s not in the office yet,’ said her secretary.

‘Can I take a message?’ Mariner asked that she should call him back. His mind on other things, he checked his emails while he waited for Knox to put in an appearance.

Eventually, there was a knock on the door and Knox entered clutching a manila folder in one hand and a half eaten canteen bacon sandwich in the other. Add assertiveness to Jenny’s many talents.

‘Managed to tear yourself away from love’s young dream, then?’ said Mariner.

Knox only grunted in response, so Mariner turned his attention to the information the constable had come up with. The car accident in which Anna’s parents had been killed had occurred over the border in Worcestershire and so had been handled by the West Mercia force, renowned for their paperwork efficiency.

True to form, they had been able to provide the accident report in a relatively short time and Knox had recorded the details of one of the officers who had dealt with it. But half an hour later, as Mariner listened to the gentle Worcestershire burr at the other end of the line, his optimism began to fade.

No, there had been nothing suspicious about the accident.

Malcolm Barham’s car had run off the bridge and into the canal, in treacherously icy conditions. From the pattern of skid-marks the investigators had concluded that he had suddenly lost control of the car, perhaps braked suddenly to avoid hitting something in his path, a badger or a fox, before veering off the road. Yes, the vehicle was checked over and no, there were no overt signs of any tampering or faults to the braking system, although the car was eight years old, so there was the usual wear and tear; some damage to the back of the car suggesting that Malcolm Barham had been in some kind of previous accident.

Like a shunt?’ asked Mariner.

‘Could have been I suppose,’ the officer agreed. ‘I remember one other thing, too,’ he added. ‘There was this bloke who kept phoning up for months afterwards, claiming to be a work colleague of Malcolm Barham. Wanted to know if Barham’s briefcase had been recovered, and could we let him know as soon as it was.’

‘And was it?’

‘No, never. Which was surprising, given that the canal wasn’t specially deep at that point, and there wouldn’t have been any current to wash it away. Besides, apart from the cracked windscreen, the car was still completely sealed.

That was how they got the kid out alive.’

‘Jamie Barham was with them?’

‘I don’t remember his name, but there was a young lad in the car, yes. He suffered a minor head injury, but otherwise…’

‘So what do you think happened to the briefcase?’

Mariner broke in.

‘Mr Barham obviously didn’t have it with him, did he?’

‘That’s a bit strange, isn’t it? I thought he’d been lecturing that night?’

‘As Sherlock Holmes used to say,’ the sergeant spoke as if the fictional detective had once numbered among his personal friends, ‘if you eliminate the impossible, then what remains, however improbable, must be the truth.’

Mariner couldn’t really argue with that one.

‘Do you remember this guy’s name, the one who kept phoning?’

‘We would have logged it, he was a persistent bugger.

Hang on a sec’ A clunk and the line went quiet for several minutes. ‘Yes, here we are. Todd. Andrew Todd.’ Mariner knew exactly where he’d seen that name before.

‘And there were no other witnesses to the accident?’ he asked.

‘No. But then it’s not a particularly well-used road, which is probably why it was so icy. It was a bit of a mystery why Malcolm Barham had taken that route. It’s not the most direct way from Droitwich to Birmingham.’

‘But it passes close by the radio transmission masts?’

‘Yes, it runs right alongside for about two miles.’

Then that was why. The young Jamie Barham was obsessed with masts and pylons. And whoever had shunted into the back of Malcolm Barham’s car, causing it to skid off the road, would certainly have known that. Not that there was a shred of proof, naturally.