They were probably the bride’s old schoolfriends, boys and girls. I was always tall for my age. These days, I’d be considered average. Junk food must be good for you. The girls wore baggy T-shirts that reminded me of those sheets they drape over new models in car showrooms, hiding, but hinting at, the bodywork concealed underneath. One wore fishnet tights, and her legs were so long they resembled twin, if upside-down, Eiffel towers.
My free hand was in the pocket of my leather jacket, and I fingered the keys of the finest bird-pulling car God ever invented. I did a little calculation and smiled, wistfully. Biologically speaking, and possibly legally, too, I was old enough to be her granddad. I let go of the key and reached out for my glass.
Aunty Gwen hit me as I finished my last drumstick. She was too much of everything. Too much Estee Lauder, too much make-up, too much…Aunty Gwen.
The group was playing seventies stuff, so I allowed myself to be dragged on to the dance floor and pretended to enjoy it. Twenty minutes later the sweat was running down Aunty Gwen’s face like a flash-flood in the Kalahari and she begged to sit down again.
That’ll learn her, I thought, and went back to my wall, collecting an orange juice on the way.
I stayed a polite hour, wished the happy couple all the best and turned to leave. The bride’s father followed me. At the door he said, ‘Er, Charlie. Thanks for stepping in like you did. It was good of you. Made her day. A hundred and twenty, was it?’ He pulled a roll of notes out of his top pocket and offered them to me.
‘Don’t be silly,’ I said. ‘Call it a wedding present.’
‘Nonsense. You can’t be expected to do it for nothing.’
I took the roll from him, peeled the first twenty-pound note of it and popped the rest back in his pocket. ‘That’s fine,’ I said, waving the twenty.
‘Are you sure?’
‘I’m sure. It was a good excuse to polish the car and it’s been a bit of a change for me.’
‘Smashing. I’ll say the rest’s a present from you, eh?’
‘Good idea.’
‘Oh, and, er, sorry about our Gwen.’ He laughed.
It was drizzling outside. I turned up my collar and walked between the parked cars out into the main road and up the side street, lined with the overspill. The trees still had leaves on them, blotting out the feeble street lights. As I turned the next corner the sound of the group inside came through an open window as they started playing the hokey-cokey. Thank God I’d left. Trouble was, I was wideawake. Blame it on the afternoon nap, the music, those legs. Eggs, chips and a pot of tea on the motorway sounded inviting, so I decided to take the Jag for a burn-up.
Several other late-comers had parked behind me, and the E-type is so low you don’t see it until you’re there. As it came into view it seemed to be leaning. The camber must be bad, I thought. And it wasn’t shining like it should be.
It was like a fist in the stomach. I stood and looked at it, gasping for breath. My lungs were empty, but I couldn’t inhale. I dropped the keys and sat on the low wall, forcing my head down, trying to drag the cold night air into my chest.
It had been done over. They’d slashed three of the tyres, poured a gallon of brake fluid on it, smashed the driver’s window and razored the leather seats.
I forced my breathing: in, out, in, out; until I’d calmed down. ‘It’s only metal and rubber,’ I said over and over to myself.
The glove box is lockable, so they hadn’t been in there. I retrieved my portable and rang Heckley nick. I needed Jimmy Hoyle and his breakdown truck, fast, but didn’t carry his number around with me. They passed the message on and told him it was urgent.
‘How about the SOCO giving it a going-over,’ the sergeant asked.
‘Not here,’ I told him. ‘I want it away before anybody else sees it. No point in ruining everybody’s day. It’ll have to be at Jimmy’s, in the morning.’
Jimmy Hoyle and I played in the same football team, a long time ago. We were in a cup final against Halifax Town juniors, who we regarded as professionals. Jimmy scored what should have been the winning goal in the last period of extra time, but I let in a penalty in the closing seconds. We were thrashed, four-nil, in the replay.
‘Chuffin’ ’ell!’ he exclaimed when he saw the Jag. He’d done most of the restoration, so it hurt him as much as me. ‘Aw, Charlie, you must be gutted.’
‘It’s only metal and rubber,’ I asssured him, without conviction. ‘Just get it away, quick as pos.’
We winched it aboard his truck and fifteen minutes later left the Masonic Hall behind us, the strains of the Gay Gordons filtering through the ventilators. I realised what I was missing and didn’t feel too bad.
Jimmy said he could manage to unload it, so he took me straight home. All the neighbours peered through their curtains as I jumped down from the cab and waved him off, his yellow flashing light washing the fronts of the houses with waves of jaundice.
Sleep was impossible. I watched a movie on TV, followed by a couple of CDs. Then I turned the lights off and stared into the fire until the birds started singing. It wasn’t the car. That could be repaired. Earlier in the day, twelve thousand miles away, Justin Davis would have been getting off a plane, or maybe the highway patrol pulled his car over. A stranger’s hand would have fallen on to his arm in a show of sympathy. ‘Could you come with us, sir,’ they’d have said. ‘I’m afraid we have some bad news for you.’
How in the name of evil do you tell a man that his wife was found in the bath, dead, with her throat slashed?
Superintendent Isles released Dominic Watts and circulated an APW for his son, Michael Angelo Watts, backed by a warrant for his arrest. We’d do him for drugs, if not murder. I spent the rest of Sunday on household chores and gave my little patch of grass what I hoped was its last cut of the year. I had a key to Annabelle’s, so I took my mower there and gave her a short-back-and-sides, too. I removed the mail from behind her door and came home. It had only been an excuse to see if she was back. I don’t fool myself, most of the time.
On Monday morning Mr Isles admitted that no forensic evidence to link either of the Wattses with Lisa had come to light. Her telephone number was in Michael’s Filofax, that’s all, and he could have dropped the telephone anywhere. Information was coming through that he was hiding in Chapeltown, Leeds. Makinson had interviewed K. Tom and Ruth Davis. K. Tom claimed Lisa rang him about her agency and problems she was having with her VAT payments. He did her tax returns for her, he said. She’d rung back later to confirm a figure. Ruth had gone to bed early with a migraine, and Makinson reported that their relationship appeared strained. How jolly astute of him.
‘Did he ask what the VAT figure was?’ I wondered.
‘What, and cast doubts on the man’s integrity?’ Les answered sourly. ‘He couldn’t do that. Today we’re interviewing Lisa’s agency girls,’ he continued. ‘That should be interesting. Might even do them myself. DCI Makinson can talk to Michael’s friends.’
‘Ha! Good idea,’ I agreed. ‘If I can get away I might have a ride over to Brid. See if I can find this Jimmy the Fish character that went to see Cliff Childs.’
‘It was Childs who lifted the Hartog-Praat bullion?’
‘That’s right.’
‘OK. Give it some priority, then, Charlie.’
‘Will do.’
‘Have you seen the papers?’
‘Not yet. Is she in them?’
‘You’re in for a treat,’ he sighed.
Most of the troops were out. Several of them collect a morning paper on their way to work, for the football results, the pin-ups and a lightning resume of the news, in that order. Their choices are depressing. I wandered round their desks, collecting a small forest’s worth of bumfodder, and took them into my office.
One or two had done the crosswords, presumably while waiting at the traffic lights. I refolded them all and spread them out, front pages uppermost.