Maxwell's Revenge (16 page)

‘I’m rostered tomorrow,’ Jacquie said.

Henry Hall was a kind man at heart. He didn’t consider the hours of work it would take him to replace her with a policeman who didn’t exist. He just said, ‘I’ve rearranged it. Take all the time you need.’

‘Henry, I could kiss you.’

It was only because it was Maxwell speaking that Hall did not allow it. Just this once.

It was nice to be home. Ninja, boot polish touched up suitably, was making tea in the kitchen. Nolan sat in state on the sofa, with Metternich spread defensively across his lap. Nobody would have given his Boy a lolly if he’d been there. Only a parent could see how the afternoon had affected the lad. He had hold of Metternich’s right ear between the finger and thumb of his right hand. The middle fingers of the other hand were firmly in his mouth. He kept nudging Jacquie and Maxwell with a bare toe every once in a while, as if to check they were still there, sitting on the floor on either side of his makeshift throne. Henry Hall sat opposite him, on the pouffe that usually held either his father’s feet or his cat.

‘Nole,’ Maxwell said quietly, ‘Mr Hall would like to ask you a few questions about this afternoon. Is that all right, mate?’

Nolan turned his eyes without moving his head and regarded his father solemnly. He let go of his sucked fingers for long enough to murmur, ‘S’all right, Dadda.’

‘Right. Now, if the questions make you worried or sad, you must just say so and you can stop.’

‘Is like a quiz?’

Hall raised an eyebrow at Jacquie.

‘Yes, poppet. A quiz.’

‘You do quizzes?’ the policeman asked Maxwell, the tone of amazement unmistakeable.

‘Well, yes. Nothing hard. Colours. Teletubbies. The role of the lumpenproletariat in Hegel’s dialectic. That sort of thing.’

Hall knew his man by this time. So he knew that it was a possibility that one of those was a joke. ‘Right.’ He turned to Nolan. ‘So, Nolan, like Mummy says, this is a quiz.’

‘Awright,’ Nolan said around his fingers.

‘Take your fingers out, poppet,’ Jacquie said, ‘or Mr Hall might not hear what you say.’

He looked at her with big eyes and for a moment she just wanted to grab him and take him upstairs to wrap in blankets and look after him while she had breath. But, right now, there was a killer to catch. He slowly let his fingers drop out of his mouth and wiped them dry on the cat. He turned his big eyes on Henry. ‘OK,’ he said. ‘Numb’one.’

Henry got the idea. ‘Nolan,’ he said. ‘Question number one. Did a man or a lady speak to you when you were walking with Granny today?’

‘I wen’ with Ninja for a walk,’ Nolan offered.

‘I’ll give you a point for that,’ Henry said. One small thumb went up in the air. ‘Did a man or lady speak to you when you were walking with Granny?’

‘Ninja talk to some men.’ A smile crept over his face and he giggled. ‘They were funny men.’

‘That’s another point,’ said Henry. Maxwell and Jacquie could only watch in amazement. Was this the bland Henry Hall they knew and sort of liked? He seemed quite human. ‘Why were they funny, Nolan?’ he asked.

The little boy squirmed with the pleasure of remembrance. ‘They were funny,’ he said again and pointed to his legs. ‘They had trousis like Nolan.’

‘Shorts,’ said Jacquie. ‘Mum said they were walkers.’

‘Right.’ Hall turned his attention back to Nolan who was beginning to lose interest. ‘Did a funny man speak to you, Nolan?’

‘No.’

‘No? Not at all?’

‘He gived me a lolly.’

The adults’ heads went up as they sniffed a clue at the waterhole.

‘Good boy. Two points for that!’ With care and
muttering under his breath, Nolan triumphantly displayed all four fingers and his thumb. So what if he had inherited his father’s maths acumen? The child was being helpful and Hall went with it. ‘Did you eat the lolly?’

Nolan pulled a face and shook his head. ‘No.’

‘What?’ It was like Greek choral speaking – every adult voice in the room raised in query.

He looked from his mother to his father, then back to Henry Hall. He leant forward as if to impart a secret. He dropped his voice, almost to a whisper. ‘It was hobble. Yeuch.’ He shook his head and did a whole body shudder.

Everyone held their breath as Henry Hall asked the 64,000 dollar question. ‘What did you do with the lolly, Nolan?’

The little boy threw himself sideways, convulsed with laughter, much to the annoyance of Metternich who had only put up with the shuddering out of laziness. With a snicker of annoyance he left the sofa, via Henry Hall’s knee.

‘Ow,’ the policeman said, absently. What were a few flesh wounds when he might be on the verge of a breakthrough? ‘Go on, Nolan, you can tell me.’

Nolan shook his head solemnly, then his expression brightened. ‘I tell
Dadda
,’ he said. ‘I whipser.’ Maxwell leant forward, as did Hall.

‘Don’t bother,’ Jacquie advised quietly.
‘Whipsering is a little ad hoc at the moment.’ And indeed, Maxwell looked poised for sudden flight as he leant there against his little one’s mouth.

And sure enough, they heard clearly, through Maxwell’s head like a buzz saw. ‘I put it in Ninja’s handbag.’ Then he beamed around the room. ‘Have Nolan won the prize?’

Henry Hall leant forward and tickled the boy’s toes. ‘You certainly have, Nolan. What do you usually get?’

‘Hmm.’ The boy put a finger theatrically to his chin. ‘What do userly get, Mummy?’

Jacquie looked at Henry Hall. ‘Well, we usually leave it to the quizmaster, don’t we?’ It was usually a sweet of some kind, but that didn’t seem appropriate somehow. ‘A small toy, perhaps?’

Nolan looked Hall in the eye and repeated, ‘A small toy, haps?’ with a tilt of the head.

‘Well, I’ll tell you what,’ Hall said. ‘I have given Mummy some days off to spend with you, Nolan, so I’ll give her some money and she can take you shopping on Monday and you can choose something nice.’

‘Thank you,’ said Nolan and suddenly uncoiled from his seat and wound his arms round Henry’s neck. The smell of that small neck and the damp kiss on his cheek was the best thank you Henry Hall had had in years. He stood up,
wearing Nolan like an exotic necklace, then handed him gently back to Maxwell. Jacquie had turned her back and was surreptitiously wiping her eyes.

‘Take care of him, Max,’ said Henry. Then, tipping his head at Jacquie, ‘Of both of them.’

‘Will do, Henry. Um, I’ve something to ask you. Can I see you out?’ And hefting Nolan up onto one hip for comfort, he led the way out onto the landing.

Jacquie sat curled up in the corner of the sofa, letting relief wash over her. There was a clink of cups and her mother was there with a tray of tea.

‘Sorry to take such a long time,’ she said. ‘It took me a minute to find everything. I like to use cups and saucers in the afternoon, rather than mugs.’

Jacquie lifted her head. ‘I’ve got cups and saucers?’ she asked in amazement.

‘Well,’ her mother pursed her lips and looked a trifle disapproving, ‘there were some in the cupboard, at the back.’ The unspoken corollary was that they belonged to Maxwell, left over from another life, one that had mostly happened while Jacquie was at junior school.

‘Oh, there’s all sorts of stuff in there if you look,’ she replied. There was no good trying to argue this one; it would always be there in the background. Her mother seemed to resent the
fact that neither she nor Jacquie could ever know everything about Maxwell, and not because he hid it on purpose. It was just that it takes time to tell a person every single thing that has ever happened. Just filling each other in on the day they were still in often took until the wee small hours of the next one, let alone what happened in June of 1967.

‘Has Mr Hall gone?’

‘Yes. He needed to get back to the nick to rearrange the rota and make a few notes.’ Jacquie sipped her tea.

‘Didn’t he want to question me at all?’ Her mother looked hopeful. ‘He is such a gentleman, don’t you think? I had no idea from what you’d said.’

Jacquie mulled that one over. Yes, on sober reflection, he was quite a gent, in that he, like Maxwell, tended to treat everyone the same. It was just that he treated everyone as if they were another potential number in the police computer; Maxwell treated everyone as if they were sentient human beings until it was proved otherwise. Henry must have really pulled out all the stops to impress her mother. Finally, she said, ‘Yes. I could have much worse for a boss, that’s certain.’

Her mother leant forward and touched her knee. ‘Are you all right, dear? Only, this afternoon has been a bit eventful, hasn’t it?’

Jacquie’s tea did a vertical take-off. ‘Eventful?
Eventful
? Please, mother, don’t get me started! You took Nolan for a simple walk, with simple instructions. We end up in A&E. If he wasn’t so picky about what he eats, we could be now mourning our son. So don’t give me eventful.’ Her voice rose to a scream. ‘I don’t know why I even thought you could do this. I needed help and what did I get? Well?’

The buzz of male voices on the landing had stopped, Jacquie’s screaming had stopped. Had a pin chosen that moment to drop, they would all have heard it. Instead, Maxwell and Nolan came through the door, bouncing horse-riding style from the head of the stairs.

‘Hello?’ Maxwell said, innocence personified. ‘What have we here, Nole? Mummy and Ninja. Well, ladies,’ he raked them with a warning glance, ‘Nolan has just remarked that he is feeling a bit peckish but he doesn’t want any sweeties, or any of Ninja’s toast.’ He looked at his mother-in-law-to-be and smiled. ‘Nole and I agree about wholemeal toast, Ninja, if that’s OK. We did win the war, after all. He wants …’ he jiggled the boy up and down, ‘he wants … Well, Nole, what’s it to be?’

‘Dippy and egg,’ he crowed, with his arms in the air, then, more seriously, ‘not Ninja toast vo. Dadda toast!’

‘White bread rules,’ Maxwell said. ‘Play nicely, girls, while we cook,’ and off they rode, the Lone
Ranger and Silver to the life, into the kitchen, where crashing noises almost immediately began.

Neither of the women spoke for a moment. It was inevitable that the elder would break the silence first. ‘I told him not to speak to anyone. I told him not to take anything from anyone.’ It sounded pathetic even as it left her mouth.

‘How old do you think he is, Mum? He’s a
little, tiny boy
for God’s sake.’

‘Yes, but … he just seems so grown up.’ She grabbed for Jacquie’s hand. ‘I just got talking. They were nice people. Walkers, you know, serious ones with maps and everything. I don’t know round here and I just thought,’ she sobbed and had to pause, ‘I just thought they could tell us a nice walk, that’s all.’ She looked up through tear-filled eyes. ‘I didn’t think any of them would hurt him. They …’ her voice fell to a whisper, ‘they were just some nice people, Jacquie.’ She put her head in her hands and cried.

Her daughter reached over and patted her knee. Hugs were not on the menu just yet. ‘No one said that the murderer would be wearing a badge, Mum. That’s why Max said
no
food out,
no
sweeties from anyone. We’re not health food loonies as you must have spotted already. We just can’t trust anyone. Any of us.’

Ninja gave a sniff and blew her nose for good measure. ‘Have you wondered why Nolan got the lolly?’ As a way of shifting both blame and
attention from her, she had hit on a cracker of a theory.

‘I beg your pardon?’ Jacquie was aghast. ‘What do you mean?’ A cold hand clutched her heart.

‘Well, the place was crowded out this afternoon. The weather is lovely, and some of the posher schools are still on holiday, plus the Saga louts like me who take holidays a bit later. There was practically a queue for the kissing gate at the car park end. There were children everywhere with mums, dads, grannies, you name it. But
Nolan
was the one who got the lolly. Statistically, as I’m sure a colleague of Max’s could prove quite easily, it is ridiculous.’

Jacquie had gone white. ‘It was deliberate,’ she whispered. ‘The poisoner singled out Nolan. He tried to kill
my
baby. Not anyone’s, but
mine
.’

‘Or Max’s,’ her mother added. To her, that was the more obvious version. Her daughter was a policewoman, true, but, put it how you liked, Maxwell was rather high profile and more than a bit annoying. Especially if you happened to be a criminal. Or a student. Ex-student. Colleague. Ex-colleague. The list could go on and on.

Jacquie didn’t know where to run. To her husband and son. To Henry Hall. To a dark cupboard under the stairs. In the end, she compromised. She called Maxwell into the sitting
room. She phoned Henry Hall. The call was transferred to the front desk.

‘Leighford Police. How can I help you?’

She knew the voice. ‘Bill. It’s Jacquie. Is DCI Hall in the building? I mean, he’s just left mine. But is he back yet?’

‘He’s just gone home.’ The desk sergeant couldn’t sound more disinterested if he tried.

‘Thanks, I’ll ring him there.’

Meanwhile, Maxwell and Nolan had come in and were standing hand in hand in front of her. ‘Yes, ma’am?’ Maxwell asked. ‘You rang? Only, Nole’s egg will get hard.’

‘Mum,’ Jacquie said. ‘Could you take over the egg? Go with Ninja, poppet and have your egg. Mummy will be in in a minute.’

Her mother took him by the hand and they went out to the kitchen, Nolan generally laying down the law on how to cut soldiers. He was taking no risks on her toast skills. He was with his father on the bottom of budgie cage properties of wholemeal, even if he didn’t yet know what the old man was talking about.

Maxwell sat on the sofa and turned to face his wife-to-be. ‘What is it? You’re as white as a sheet, woman.’

‘Mum has just said something which has really shaken me.’

‘She’s moving in?’ He made the sign of the cross.

‘No, worse than that.’

Maxwell bridled in mock horror. ‘There’s nothing worse than that, dear heart, so don’t play me false.’ He toyed for a moment with reaching, with a palsied hand, for the Southern Comfort. ‘What did she say that could be so bad?’

‘She said,’ she dipped her head and summoned up all her policepersonly skills of control, ‘she said why did
Nolan
get the lolly? Why, with all the kids and other people there, did it get given to him?’ She watched his face with care. It became impassive while he weighed up the possibilities.

‘There are two, or perhaps more ways of looking at this,’ he said at last. ‘The first, of course, is why shouldn’t he get the lolly? He’s a cute kid. If I was going to give a random lolly to someone, I would most probably choose him rather than some snaggle-toothed, snotty-nosed tyke. He’s just more attractive. Although, since it seemed to have been doctored with something nasty, you’d have to be a bit warped to give it to the cute one. However, I digress. Another is that there was more than one lolly. We don’t know what happened to other kids. Why should we? Not every granny would scream like a steam whistle and take her grandchild to casualty. Some of them wouldn’t even bother to hold its hair while it threw up. Then there is the possibility, which can’t be discounted until we hear back from the lab, that the lolly is totally harmless and
Nole is allergic to cyanomothprooferphilicophilos or whatever the thing is coloured with. And then, finally …’ He paused and she filled in the gap.