Sabbathman (15 page)

The photo looked like a scene from a battlefield. There was smoke drifting in the background. People were advancing pell-mell uphill, their faces down, their bodies bent, as if they were confronting bullets or a particularly vicious wind. And there, in the middle of it all, was this sturdy young doctor with her funny haircut and her muddy jeans, her eyes on the men round the camera, as angry and as guileless as the rest of them. He looked at the photo a moment longer, wondering why on earth anyone would have bothered with a phone tap, knowing that he needed to find out, then he slipped the photo into his briefcase and glanced at his watch. Six o’clock. Rush hour. Time for a pint.

Kingdom was back in Leytonstone by half-past eight, mellowed by the beer. He walked slowly back from the tube station, avoiding the cratered paving stones, and the chip wrappers, and the flattened
smears of dog turd. There were no trees here, nothing to indicate the passage of the seasons, just a succession of ever-earlier dusks and the ceaseless thunder of traffic grinding north, towards the outer suburbs.

Kingdom turned off the High Road, into the maze of streets that led down towards the cemetery. A thin drizzle was still falling, gauzy under the street lamps, shrouding the line of parked cars. In his youth, Kingdom remembered few cars. The streets had been largely empty, a safe playground for the kids. Now, though, there were cars everywhere, ancient Datsuns, dented Capris, big old Bedford vans, builders’ ladders roped to the rusting roof racks.

His father’s house lay at the end of the street. Outside was a car Kingdom didn’t recognise. He paused for a moment, fumbling for the key to the front door. The car was an Escort, newer than the rest, ‘B’ reg. A sticker on the back window read ‘Keep a Smile for the Lord’.

Kingdom let himself into the house. At once, he could hear voices, laughter. A long narrow hall led to the kitchen at the back. To the left was the living room. Kingdom closed the front door very softly and tiptoed down the hall, enveloped at once by the sour, musty smell of his father’s new life. By the door to the living room, he paused, listening. He could hear his father chuckling. He was describing how things used to be in the summer, thirty years back, when Kingdom and his sister were kids.

Auntie Peg, he was saying, used to have a bungalow out on the coast, at Clacton. For a fortnight in August, he and the missus would lock up the house, and march the family down to Stratford Broadway, and take the Grey Green coach to the seaside. Mid-morning, halfway there, the coach would stop at a pub for a drink. He’d have a couple of pints. The kids had crisps and lemonade. The missus drank tea. Kingdom smiled, hearing him talk about it now, totally coherent, back in his mind outside the pub, enjoying the sunshine, chatting with the driver, taking the mickey out of mum for putting too much fish paste in the sandwiches she always packed.

Kingdom leaned back against the wall. He’d loved those holidays, the fun they’d had, the four of them. He’d loved the feel of being away from home, the days they’d spent at the little beach
hut they’d rented, the taste of salt on his drying skin. Clacton was where he’d first learned to swim, first been served in a cafe by a proper waitress, first seen summer fireworks, first kissed a girl. He remembered it all, and so did Ernie, his recall absolutely perfect.

Kingdom went back to the front door, opened it and then pulled it shut with a bang as if he’d just arrived. In the living room, his father looked up from the chair beside the record player as he came in. He was wearing a clean shirt and a pair of trousers Kingdom hadn’t seen for years. There was colour in his face, and a glass in his hand, and the only evidence of madness was a day’s growth of stubble on his chin.

Kingdom grinned at him. ‘Dad?’ he said, ‘Alright, then?’

Ernie blinked up at his son, and for a moment Kingdom thought they were back at square one, mutual strangers. Then he remembered the haircut, and his hand went to his shorn scalp.

‘Bit of an accident, Dad,’ he muttered. ‘Never argue with a barber.’

Ernie nodded, his eyes returning to the figure sitting opposite. ‘My boy,’ he said, ‘Alan.’

Kingdom grinned again, extending a hand. ‘Barry?’

‘That’s right. Good to meet you.’

Barry was a small, plump West Indian. He stood up, taking Kingdom’s hand. He was wearing a yellow and blue hooped pullover and black jeans. He looked about fifty, and had the warmest smile Kingdom had ever seen.

‘Still no Angeline?’ he said.

‘I’m afraid not. Like I said on the phone, she’s sick.’

‘And you’ve had to stand in?’

‘A pleasure, sir. A real pleasure.’

He gestured at Ernie. Ernie beamed up, then reached for another of the cans of Guinness on the table beside him. Barry was already on his way to the kitchen, looking for a glass.

‘Son?’ Ernie said, offering the can.

Kingdom hesitated for a moment, unbuttoning his coat. Then he sank into the other armchair.

‘Why not?’ he said.

*

Barry stayed the rest of the evening, while father and son worked their way slowly through the rest of the Guinness. Kingdom hadn’t a clue where the cans had come from, and didn’t care. The neatly stacked plates on the draining board in the kitchen, and the remains of a sizable salad in the fridge told their own story. Barry had taken over. Barry was in charge. Somehow, this round-faced, cheerful little soul had stirred the embers in Ernie’s fire and brought him back to life. When it came to the here and now – wheezing upstairs to the toilet, trying to remember where he’d left his Rizlas – the old man was still clueless, but that didn’t matter because Barry had returned to him the bits of his life that were still crystal clear. And when Ernie began to talk about these episodes – especially the courtship that the war had turned so suddenly into a marriage – Kingdom could hear again the voice that had shaped so much of his own childhood. The father he remembered, the dad who’d never left without a chuckle and a hug, was back in the armchair, whole again. Quite how Barry had worked the miracle, Kingdom didn’t know but when the little West Indian finally got up and looked at his watch, Ernie looked heartbroken.

‘Off?’ he said, ‘Already?’

‘Quarter past ten, Ernie. My wife will kill me. I told you. She’s a monster.’ He stooped to pick up the empty tins. ‘Back tomorrow, eh?’

‘Yeah?’ Ernie was beaming up at him. ‘What time?’

Barry glanced at Kingdom.

Kingdom took the cue. ‘Early, Dad,’ he said. ‘I’ll sort it out with Barry.’

‘You sure, son?’

‘Of course.’

Kingdom followed Barry into the hall. The empties were already in the kitchen bin. Kingdom held out a hand.

‘You’ve been brilliant,’ he said. ‘I’m amazed. Honestly. Amazed.’

Barry gazed up at him. ‘No problem,’ he said, ‘we’ve a lot in common. Your dad, he was in the markets. Mine, too.’

‘Here? In London?’

‘Kingston. Back home. My dad’s family all worked on the plantations. My dad used to sell some of the stuff.’

‘So did Ernie’s dad.’

‘I know. He told me. So I guess we were similar kids, me and your dad. The things we got up to, you know, the way you do …’

‘Damn sight better, eh?’

‘Better than what?’

‘Better than now.’

Barry frowned. ‘You mean your dad?’

‘No, just …’ Kingdom shrugged. ‘Everything. I used to work the markets, too, as a kid, helping Dad. It was different, that life.’

He smiled bleakly, wondering how far to pursue the thought, but Barry was already at the front door. He paused, looking back down the hall at Kingdom.

‘You OK?’he said.

‘Fine, I’m fine. Just worried about Dad, you know.’

‘You sure?’

‘Yes.’

Barry was still looking at him. He had a pair of car keys in his hand. ‘You believe in God, Mr Kingdom?’

Kingdom shook his head. ‘No.’

‘Ever thought about any of that stuff?’

‘No, not really.’

‘Think you should? Think it might help?’

‘With Dad, you mean?’

‘No. With you.’

Kingdom laughed, shaking his head again, reaching for the door handle. Outside, the rain had stopped.

‘The money’s no problem,’ he said, changing the subject. ‘That envelope I asked you to find. It’s …’ He shrugged, ‘… all there.’

Barry was getting into his car. Kingdom could see Ernie in the front window, staring out, one thin hand raised.

‘You back tomorrow?’ Kingdom said. ‘Only I should give you a key.’

Barry wound down the car window and smiled. ‘I’ve already got one,’ he said, nodding at Ernie and lifting a hand in response to the old man’s wave.

*

Next morning, Kingdom was at the bank by half-past nine. He gave Steve’s replacement cheque to the woman at the counter and told her he needed the money transferred as quickly as possible. She told him there was a fee for express clearance, but even so, it would still take a couple of days. Kingdom frowned, looking at the cheque.

‘Couple of days?’ he said. ‘But it’s drawn on the same bank.’

‘Makes no difference.’

‘So what are you saying?’

‘I’m saying it makes no difference.’ The woman paused, then shrugged and slid off her stool. ‘I’ll just check,’ she said. ‘Maybe we could do something.’

She disappeared behind a partition. The ribbed glass blurred the outline of her body but Kingdom could see her bent over a computer screen. He watched her, thinking of Ernie again. He’d been up and dressed before Kingdom was properly awake. He’d even made them both a pot of tea. Barry was coming. Maybe they’d take a drive out towards Ongar, stop at a pub, have a pint or two. The woman returned. She was still holding the cheque. She gave it back to Kingdom.

Kingdom frowned. ‘What’s the problem?’ he said.

The woman looked at him a moment, then nodded at the cheque. ‘That account’s empty,’ she said.

‘Meaning?’

‘Your cheque just bounced.’

PRELUDE

The first time she saw him, she thought nothing of it. Another bird-watcher. Someone else with a flask of coffee, and sensible camouflage, and a pair of powerful binoculars. Someone else dug in for the day, making the most of the glorious September weather.

An hour later, he was still there, tucked into a hollow amongst the saltmarsh, a small khaki rucksack by his side. This time, she took a closer look. He was wearing jeans and some kind of smock. The smock was olive green, but she only saw the back of it because he was looking out to sea, away from the estuary and the teeming flocks of waders that were feeding on the exposed mudbanks. She thought this a little odd, and she tried to follow his eyeline with her own binoculars, wondering what she’d missed. Maybe the greenshanks and godwits were arriving early. Or maybe he was simply looking for something else.

She adjusted the focus on her binoculars, and a distant blur resolved itself into a motor cruiser. The boat had just entered the buoyed channel that dog-legged into the river mouth. It was modest in size, sturdily built, with an open cockpit at the back and a rubber dinghy bobbing in the wake. She knew virtually nothing about boats, and this one looked much like the others she’d seen already, butting upriver on the flooding tide.

She went back to the figure in the saltmarsh again, still curious. He was kneeling over the rucksack. He’d taken something out, something small and square and black. Funny colour, she thought, for a sandwich box.

A cormorant passed her, flying low, hugging the shoreline, and she followed it with her glasses for a full minute, forgetting about
the sandwich box and the man in the saltmarsh, fascinated as always by the flight of the bird, how sure it was, how certain, suddenly climbing for height, scanning the water below, then plunging down for a fish or a sand-eel. She fiddled with the focus again, waiting for the cormorant to surface, distracted by a gaggle of oystercatchers pecking at the nearby mussel beds.

She could hear the motor cruiser now, the solid thump-thump of a diesel engine. She looked round. It was nearly abreast of her, no more than a quarter of a mile away across the marram grass. Here, the channel was narrowed by a series of exposed mudbanks. On the Exmouth side of the channel, the beach was dotted with people. Bodies sprawled in deckchairs. Kids playing football. Even the odd swimmer.

She trained her glasses on the little motor cruiser. There was a man in the cockpit. He was wearing a white pullover with a deep ‘V’ neck and he had a little red hat on the back of his head. He was standing up, one hand on the wheel, the other nursing a mug of something or other. Idly, she began to wonder where he was heading, where he’d come from, how long he’d been at sea, when the image abruptly disappeared. In its place, a monstrous blossom of flame, growing and growing, and a second or two of silence before the roar of the explosion rolled over her, and the ground shook beneath her feet and the air was suddenly full of the flap-flap of beating wings.

She gasped, finding herself flat on her face, her mouth full of sand, a ringing in her ears. Slowly, with great care, she raised her head above the lip of the hide. Where the motor cruiser had been there was nothing but wreckage and a glassy pool of spreading oil. On the beach beyond, through the billowing smoke, she could hear someone screaming. She blinked, not quite able to believe it, wondering about the man in the saltmarsh, whether he was alright.