The Burning Girl-4 (20 page)

Another train had begun rushing past, and she'd turned to watch. Her reflection had danced across the windows of the train as it flashed by. After it had gone, she'd stared at her face, floating in the darkness on the other side of the glass, and noticed that she was crying.

The most painful thing, of course, was feeling useless. Being surplus to requirements. It was knowing that she'd got it wrong, and that she would play no part in putting it right again.

She'd heard the swish of the carriage door as it slid back, and watched the man moving towards her, reflected in the window. Watched as he'd weaved slowly back towards his seat with a bag from the buffet. Watched as he'd stopped at her table .. .

"Are you al right, love?"

In the bathroom, Chamberlain raised her head as she heard footsteps on the stairs. They stopped, and she heard Jack cal out her name.

There'd been a few days, a couple of weeks earlier, when she'd begun to feel like a copper again; when she went in with Thorne to see Gordon Rooker; when the two of them had confronted Bil y Ryan outside his arcade. Then, once they'd begun to deal with Rooker, she'd been eased gently aside, and it had felt as bad as when she'd handed in her warrant card seven years before. It was only to be expected, of course. Friday night round at the flat in Kentish Town Thorne showing her the CCTV footage had been a favour and nothing else. She knew that there weren't likely to be any more .. .

She dropped slowly to her knees and reached into the cupboard under the sink for the cleanser and a cloth.

If anybody else was going to sort things out for Jessica Clarke, she'd be happy for it to be Tom Thorne. But she didn't want anybody else to do it... The footsteps on the stairs started again, and grew closer. She held the dry cloth under the tap for a few seconds, told herself to start worrying about dead bookies and stop being so bloody ridiculous.

The knock came, softly, as she squeezed a thick line of pale yel ow cleanser around the rim of the bath.

"Are you al right, love?"

14 March 1986

Taking over a year out of school is real y starting to cause a few problems. Now that Ali and Manda and the rest have moved up, I'm stuck with people who are younger than me that I didn't real y know before. I can talk to most of the girls in my own year about everything. About the ops and the grafts and al the rest of it. But I only see them in the playground at lunchtime, and some of them are already a bit distant because they're one year higher up the school and are acting like they're one year older or something.

The girls in my class are trying too hard. I think that's basical y the problem. I know bloody wel they've been spoken to about what to say and what not to say. I also happen to know that someone from the hospital came to the school to see the teachers the week before I came back, and some of them are better at appearing natural about it than others.

My new class teacher is pretty cool, though.

There are a couple of girls I think are OK in the new class, but a lot of the time I can't stand most of them. Maybe I'm being unfair because I know it's a bit awkward. I remember feeling a bit strange around a girl in junior school who had a harelip. I can remember trying not to ignore her, then gabbling when I spoke to her and going red. Actual y, with some of the girls it's real y hard to tel the difference between fear and shyness. There's a few, though, who are just going way over the top in trying to be my new best friend and a couple are just ignorant bitches.

Maybe things wil settle down a bit in time.

Shit Moment of the Day

Hearing it go quiet when I took my shirt off before PE.

Magic Moment of the Day.

Mum thinking she was being subtle when an advert for the Nightmare on Elm Street video came on, and she stood in front of the TV so I wouldn't see Freddy Krueger's face.

FOURTEEN

The elegant row of substantial Victorian houses would not have been out of place in Hol and Park or Notting Hil , when, in point of fact, it was part of a conservation area in the middle of Finchley. The sunlight could easily have belonged to a warm August day, but the temperature was in single figures, and the first day of spring was stil a fortnight away. The man on the green enjoying the afternoon with his dog might have been a pil ar of the community. As it was, he was anything but.

Walking towards him, watching him smile as the Jack Russel ran and slid and jumped at his knees, Thorne doubted that Bil y Ryan enjoyed as uncomplicated and loving a relationship with any other living creature.

"I'm surprised," Thorne said. Td've thought a Rottweiler or a Doberman. Maybe a pit-bul .. ."

Ryan didn't look overly concerned to see him. "I've got nothing to prove. I don't have an undersized cock to compensate for. And I like smal dogs."

Thorne watched Ryan shake his head and wave to someone behind him. He turned to see his friend the receptionist climbing back into a Jeep parked at the other side of the green.

Thorne gave the man a jaunty salute but got nothing very friendly back.

"Afternoon off, Mr. Ryan?"

"Perk of being the boss." He smiled, adjusting the frames of his lightly tinted sunglasses. "I reckon I've earned it."

"Right

Ryan bent to take a slobber-covered bal from the dog, who growled and wrestled until it was torn from his mouth. Ryan faked throwing the bal in one direction, then threw it in the other.

Once the dog had started chasing it, Ryan walked slowly after him.

Thorne moved alongside him, nodding towards the car. "Is he al you've got?"

"How d'you mean?"

"I'm sure he's tooled up and al that, but even so. Surely you must think you're a target now, Bil y."

Ryan was wearing a long black cashmere coat over a red wool scarf. He pul ed the scarf a little tighter to his neck. "Now?" he said.

"After Moloney."

Ryan gave him a sideways look, but turned away again before Thorne could even begin to read anything into it. "That was a shame," he said.

"A shame how he died? A shame that he was kil ed? Or a shame that he was a copper?"

"Pick one."

"You didn't send a wreath," Thorne said. Moloney had been buried quietly the weekend before. His wife had refused the ful Police Service funeral that had been offered.

Ryan shrugged, expressionless. "Shitty way to go, I'l grant you. Not exactly a hero's death. But he did rather put himself in the firing line, wouldn't you say?"

"Who did the firing, do you reckon?"

"I'm not doing your job for you .. ."

The dog had returned with the bal . Ryan hurled it away again and carried on walking.

"Puts you in a tricky position though," Thorne said. "There's obviously a need to strike back, or at least be seen to strike back .. ."

"Strike back against who?"

'.. when, actual y, retaliation would be pretty bloody ironic'

"Let's pretend you're not talking bol ocks for a second."

"Yes, let's."

"Why would it be ironic?" The soft brogue had hardened suddenly. The end of the word bitten off and spat, as Ryan stopped and turned.

Reflected in the lenses of Ryan's aviators, Thorne could see the expanse of green at his back, and the tiny figure of the dog racing towards them. Because it was you who had him kil ed, you murdering prick. "Because he was a police officer, obviously," Thorne said.

This time, Ryan snatched the bal from the dog and stuffed it into his pocket. The terrier yapped a couple of times and then wandered off, its nose to the ground. He wasn't the only one on the scent of something.

"You didn't answer my question," Thorne said.

"Which one?"

"About you being a target for the Zarif brothers."

"The who brothers .. .?"

"You seem very relaxed, which is strange, considering you were bleating about protection the other day."

"I've never bleated in my fucking life, and I was talking about my family."

"My mistake .. ."

Ryan took off his sunglasses. As the sun had certainly not gone anywhere, Thorne could only assume that it was some kind of gesture. Maybe Ryan wanted Thorne to see his eyes.

"You don't get to the top in business by walking away when that business is threatened. You stand your ground or somebody takes it."

"Kevin Kel y walked away," Thorne said.

The sunglasses went back on. "Before your time, son. You know nothing about it.. ."

Thorne smiled. "I know people who were there."

"Aye, right, course you do. Where is Miss Marple today, anyway?"

"Kevin Kel y walked away and handed the whole shebang over to you. Pretty lucky, considering you hadn't done much to deserve it. The way I understand it, there were others in the firm who might have had a greater claim. Faces who'd done a bit of time, got a decent reputation, you know? Stil , it's up to the boss, and when he decides he's had enough, he gives it al to you. You must have done some serious brown-nosing to get the nod, Bil y .. ."

Ryan said nothing. The sun highlighted the sheen of lacquer on his hair.

"So, Kevin Kel y buggers off to the country, thankful that his little girl isn't the one who looks like the Phantom of the Opera, and the Kel y family becomes the Ryan family."

"The old woman's memory must be going," Ryan said. "I remember different.. ."

"What happened at that school, terrible as it was, disgusting as it was .. . did you a bit of a favour, I'd say."

Somewhere in the trees at the edge of the green, a dog was barking, but Ryan didn't take his eyes from Thorne. He nodded knowingly. "I wondered when you were going to bring up Gordon Rooker again."

Thorne looked equal y knowing. "I didn't," Thorne said.

He didn't need to see Ryan's eyes to know that they had darkened. Ryan began walking towards the trees, quicker this time.

Thorne stayed a pace or two behind, raising his voice as he fol owed: "I don't know whether you heard what happened to Mr. Rooker. You know, seeing as you mention him. He was attacked in prison apparently. Stabbed in the stomach. While he was painting, of al things. He's al right now, in case you were worried. He's safe now .. ."

Ryan stopped. He was trying to smile, but his lips were pursed, his teeth wel out of sight. "Is this official?"

Thorne considered the question. He noticed that Ryan was shuffling his feet and remembered that he'd done the same thing outside the arcade, waiting for his car. "Wel , I'm being paid for it.. ."

"Because there's real y no fucking point to it, is there? Whatever it is you're expecting me to say, even if I say it, it won't get you anywhere. Not unless you're recording it and, to be honest, mate, even then, there are people getting paid by me who make sure that kind of shit doesn't stand up. So, I think we're done chatting .. ."

"I'm not recording anything," Thorne said. "Real y, I'm just interested in where you stand on a few issues, and I'm trying to be up front about it." He grinned, pushing his hands deep into the pockets of his leather jacket. "Who can be arsed going round the houses? The term we use is "being lawful y audacious"."

"The term I use is "pushing your fucking luck"."

Ryan stuck two fingers in his mouth, and whistled as he marched off towards the car. Thorne wasn't sure whether he was whistling for his driver or for his dog. Either way, both came running.

Outside, it was cold and dark, and the traffic on the North End Road was nose to tail. Inside the car, Thorne was warm, and in a remarkably good mood.

The rest of the day, back at Becke House, had gone pretty wel , notably because Tughan and the rest of the Projects Team were spending it over at Barkingside. Thorne had begun scaling a mountain of paperwork. He'd got up to speed on some of the cases that had been nudged on to the back burner over the past few weeks.

He had also caught up on the investigation Hol and and Stone had been making into the visitors on the Park Royal security tape.

"Sod al of any significance," Hol and had said. "The wife and the daughter are what you'd expect: neither of them's Mother Teresa, but I think they're harmless enough. Philip Simmonds, the prison visitor, is definitely a bit spooky, but most of those types are, if you ask me .. ."

Stone had nodded, added his own observations: "Wayne Brookhouse, the youngest daughter's ex-boyfriend, is a bit dodgy. No less than you'd expect from a mate of Rooker's. Nothing worse than that, though. Tony Sol inger's dead. Bowel cancer, three weeks ago." He'd looked up from his scribbled notes. "How did it go with Ryan, Guv?"

Thorne had been pleased with his afternoon strol in Finchley, and so too was Brigstocke, having final y succeeded in persuading Tughan that they should at least be letting Bil y Ryan know that they were stil around. It was predictable that Tughan had needed talking into a slightly more forceful approach. It was also ironic, as in theory that was just what the Projects Team was supposed to have. It was the team's bad luck that its DCI thought 'pro-active' was something you took for constipation.

As it happened, most of the teams that made up the Serious and Organised Crime Unit were pro-active to some degree. The Flying Squad TV's Sweeney were the most wel known.

Using careful y nurtured intel igence sources, they could occasional y prevent armed robberies from taking place, or even catch the vil ains with the guns in their hands going across the pavement which was the most highly prized result of al .

For Thorne, and others on murder squads, the situation was slightly different. Those who hunted kil ers could only ever be reactive. You could find out where a robbery was going to take place or which security van might be getting blagged, but you never knew where a body was going to turn up. Usual y, of course, you never knew when, either, but, as things stood, Thorne could hazard a guess that one or more would be turning up sooner rather than later .. .

He was coming down through Belsize Park, past the overpriced delicatessens and organic greengrocers', when he suddenly decided that he was going to have an early dinner. He took a left just before Chalk Farm tube station, then cut across to Camden and pointed the BMW towards the Seven Sisters Road. He cal ed Hendricks as he was approaching Manor House and told him that he would be eating out.