“And
that’s not changed. It’s just that your suspect went booloo when he saw our
suspect and that’s a connection that needs exploring in a very thorough
interview. Might be relevant, might not, but I need an investigator of
exemplary qualities to winkle the truth out of this guttersnipe………..”
“Alright,
enough blather already. We’ll do it,” said Tomkins, including his admin
assistant who nodded without looking up. “But it’ll cost you.”
“Ok.
If you can get me something worthwhile, I’ll get you both on the enquiry team
and off shift for as long as it takes to bottom it out.”
“Done.
I was only going to ask for a bag of doughnuts.”
Harkness
felt dismayingly like an underpaid limousine driver for some dissolute
celebrity. Determined to keep his lips buttoned, his hands on the wheel and his
eyes on the sluggish traffic, the presence of Firth, reclining with his
plastered leg outstretched on the back seat, nevertheless gnawed at him. Any
minute now, he’d have to open the door for him again, hold his crutches, help
him up, accord him a degree of civility and refrain from wringing his neck.
It
might have been a relatively painless chore. The wheels had been well greased
in the custody suite. Bailing even the lowliest shoplifter after an
unproductive night in the cells would elicit scholarly arguments about
expeditiousness and proportionality from sergeants doing their grudging stints
in the cells while still fresh from promotion exams. Yet this time he’d been
prompted for nothing more than a convenient return date, with the nodding
approval of the Chief Superintendent from the back office where she
occasionally installed herself to glad-hand the troops.
Firth
had been duly produced, alert but stubbornly impassive even when told he was to
be bailed. Could he really have been expecting anything other than a long day
of badgering interviews? Harkness had avoided eye contact, but he needn’t have
worried as Firth’s gaze remained fixed in the middle distance. He’d made one
brief show of emotion; melodramatically raising his hands to be cuffed before
exiting the barred gate, only to grin broadly and drop his arms just as
Harkness began to explain that he was in fact no longer in custody. The game
hadn’t ended, Harkness had told himself; this is half-time. Firth couldn’t hope
for a win or draw in the second half.
The
mass return to work seemed to be a tardy affair. Even at 1030, what should have
been a ten-minute drive to Pemberton Court had so far taken twenty minutes.
Harkness inched the ancient pool car up Yarborough Road, one more link in a
chain of jaded commuters, oppressed by weather that had long outstayed its
welcome. Harkness had to speak. The stewing silence suited Firth but was giving
him a headache.
“You’ve
played it well, Nigel, I’ll give you that. Play the system, wind the clock
down, take the free advice, make the most of whatever luck comes your way.
Can’t say I’d do anything different in your shoes.”
Firth
met his eyes in the rear-view mirror of the pool car but said nothing.
“Here’s
something new for you to chew on: I actually feel sorry for you. Murphy was a
shitehawk whichever way up you look at it. Punishing him is at least
understandable. And I’ll grant you that even with the Byron Street job, you had
your reasons. I’m talking about sexual inadequacy and a big, fat, childish
tantrum, but reasons nonetheless. Daphne, was it? Yep, I thought so.”
Firth
frowned and stared into the footwell. A hit, a veritable hit, thought Harkness.
“But
this time, to murder the man’s family. I mean, Christ on a bike, that’s heavy
weather, even for you. You’re the twisted fire-starter; I know you’ve got a
reputation to think about, but you’ve got your code, your reasons, your
pretexts. You’re lethal but you’re not psychotic; I’ve read the psychiatrist’s
report.”
The
muddy stream of traffic surged forwards by more than one car length, causing a
surprised Harkness to jerk the clutch out before his right foot, curled up and
going numb beneath the cramped dashboard, could stab enough power out of the
unwilling engine. Firth emitted an involuntary gasp as his injured leg was
slapped backwards and forwards against the back seat of the bunny-hopping car.
“Oops.
Sorry about that. At least I got you to open your mouth. Where was I? Oh yes. You’ve
got ways of justifying things so you can sleep at night. Like prison algebra:
‘a’ does ‘b’ to me so I get to do ‘x’ and ‘y’ to ‘a’ and the sum works itself
out. But, oh dear. Turns out you’ve killed three people who’ve done nothing to
you. And two of them were kids.
“Suzanne
– that’s the name of the woman you killed - was certainly knocked about by
Murphy, and you know what that’s like. He might have had a go at the kids too.
Perhaps even in that special way you know all about. So get your brain wrapped
around this fact, Nigel: Not only were all three of your victims innocent of
any transgression against you, but they were also fellow sufferers at Murphy’s
hands. I’d give you a round of applause but I’m a strictly ten-to-two man
behind the wheel.”
Harkness
stabbed at the brake pedal with his still tingling right foot, causing Firth,
still bent forwards as if touching his leg could magically dispel the pain, to
bounce his forehead off the seat in front of him.
“Polo?”
asked Harkness, racking the handbrake and turning to offer Firth a mint from a
packet that could have been in the car since the nineties. Firth responded by
turning and spitting vehemently out of the half-open window. Judging by the
pallor of his face and the grinding of his jaw, maybe he’d coughed up some of
his own vitriol.
“Still,
you’re an uncommonly bright lad, Nigel, and you may well have heard of
‘transferred malice’ as a legal concept. So the fact is this: regardless of who
you intended to hurt, if anybody at all gets hurt, you’re just as screwed.
“Course,
Nigel, could be you were sending a message. Maybe you thought, what with nice
modern houses having smoke alarms and whatnot, you’d give the bastard a few
grand’s worth of property damage to worry about and everyone would escape with
minutes to spare.
“The
trouble is, young sir, that your Marcel Marceau act in interview helped you not
one jot. If damage was all you had in mind, then you’re minutes away from
losing your chance to get a credible account on the record. ‘No comment’ makes
you a squirming murderer ‘cause nobody knows any different. But if you haven’t
got the backbone to say nay to a lawyer who’s more interested in his fees than
your welfare…..
“Fuck
you,” bellowed Firth, those two words the finalists from a thousand auditioned
thoughts.
“Thar
she blows,” laughed Harkness, with more genuine satisfaction than he’d
expected.
“This
is good, Nigel. We’re engaging now. But if you keep chattering away, I won’t
have chance to finish my story. Do you see? I thought you would? Where was I?
“Ah
yes, my favourite scenario. You leave the pub. Murphy follows, spots you and
gives chase. You get the better of him on the bridge and push him to his death.
He’s a stocky bugger but you’re no shrimp yourself and you survived prison,
despite being a borderline nonce – and it wasn’t on his terms any more,
flailing about in a tiny cell with cuffs and a uniform and back-up just a
whistle away.
“You
could make an argument for self-defence, but that window’s closing; I refer you
to my point about ‘no comment’ interviews. He made quite a mess by the way. On
impact. Like somebody picked up a concrete bridge and hit him with it.”
Harkness
nudged the car along by another car-length, finally making out the temporary
road-works ahead of them. Five tanned men with fluorescent tabards over bulging
biceps and beer-guts protected a small hole in the road; two of them
occasionally swivelling ‘stop-go’ poles at either end of their vast enterprise,
one drilling pneumatic holes through Harkness’s tender forebrain, and the other
two drinking tea and scratching their testicles in a touching display of
mirroring.
“Look
at these bozos, eh Nigel? Working slobs, sweating their lives away on futile
tasks they’re doomed to repeat ad infinitum, just for a bit of vulgar money.
Are you above and beyond all that, somehow? You’d like to think so, wouldn’t
you? But it doesn’t quite work, does it? This serenity’s just a mask, your way
of pretending you know something the rest of us don’t.”
Firth
had wedged his head against the rear window frame and closed his eyes,
retreating and keeping control.
“Nice
try. Maybe you could block your ears up. I’ll lend you some gum. Come on, admit
it: It’s good to talk. Really nice that we can open up to each other and have
these chats. Back to the bridge then.
“You
think you’ve killed him. You can’t be sure, but it doesn’t look too survivable,
even in the dark with all that undergrowth. Maybe the tramp whose home Murphy
wrecked on the way down screamed out the right kind of shock and awe. So you’re
rattled, desperate, maybe still human enough for a spot of anguish, maybe more
than a little confident that the power of retribution is finally yours to
dispense. Just so you know; he didn’t die right away, it took hours and
involved paralysis, pain and terror.
“Yet
still you destroy his home; it wasn’t enough to kill him, you had to wipe his
home and family off the map. That is cold-blooded. I’d love to be in court to
watch the jury’s faces when that’s spelled out to them. They don’t like
collateral damage, you know. You kill someone who somehow had it coming, that
might not upset them too badly; but you get indiscriminate with you’re killing,
well they sit up and realise it could have been any one of them. Once that
barrister gets a bit of empathy going…..”
“You’re
wrong, you know.” Firth didn’t seem to have moved or opened his eyes and it
took Harkness a second to realise he wasn’t listening to his own inner
monologue.
“Brilliant.
You’re engaging.” His bid for a confession was desperate, self-serving and
evidentially toxic, but he was committed now. He couldn’t hope to use any of it
formally, but if he could make Firth jump tracks, he wouldn’t need to. “So,
tell me how it was then. Help me get it right.”
Firth
laughed, surprising himself, as if he couldn’t remember when he’d last heard
the sound.
“What’s
funny?”
“You.
This. All of it. All your talk. All your sweat. All your protect the public
bollocks. But you didn’t. You couldn’t. That’s not what you’re interested in
now. And you’re still wrong. Most of what you say – just talking to yourself
‘cause it means shit to me.”
“So
tell me how. So don’t put up with my bullshit. Correct me. ”
“I’ll
help you. You need help. I’m not going to tell you anything. But I’ll show you
the answer, when the time’s right.” Firth laughed again.
“Fuck.
Fuck you. Fuck it all.” Harkness lashed out at the dashboard, scratching his
knuckles and cracking an air vent. Jamming the car into gear, he stamped on the
throttle and flung the car towards the road-works, narrowly missing the yawning
youth as he turned his pole from ‘go’ to ‘stop’.
Slowey
savoured the last bite of his ham and cheese sandwich, sweetened as ever by the
fact that someone who loved him and worried about him had made it at some
unholy hour of the morning. He always got maudlin when he was this tired,
particularly if he allowed work to overlap with his home life, two sides of the
self that shouldn’t mix in one another’s circles. The receding echoes of
concussion also kept him off-balance. If he didn’t keep both feet firmly
planted on the ground and one hand on whatever he was sitting on or standing
next to, his body told him he’d either fall over or be flicked off the planet
altogether.
He’d
felt no pity or horror at the first Murphy post mortem. It would have been
natural to visualise his own brood, tiny and frangible beneath those sheets,
but the thought hadn’t crossed his mind until now. His reaction was simpler
than empathy; he was utterly determined that he and his family should be placed
forever beyond the filth and corruption and evil he saw every day. If he
dreaded anything, it was the fledging of his wilful chicks as they hurled
themselves from the nest into Christ knows what.
A
private education for his girls had flowed logically from this decision. Sooner
or later, they’d have to learn to mix with the rabble, but he would deal with
that, somehow, when he had to. He’d give them a high place to start from so
that if they stumbled, he’d have the chance to catch them.
There
was of course a price tag. Danielle had helped by inheriting a prodigious
musical talent that must have skipped a generation or three and securing a
music scholarship. But the Slowey family still had its newer members to
finance, from prep school right through to the university places they’d be
taking up, whether they intended to or not. So he grabbed all the overtime he
could stand. Family cars were always on the cusp of an MoT failure; their
clothes and luxuries were handed down, shared and traded up on the internet
when no other option appeared; and their house was hammered at, refurbished and
extended rather than sold.