‘Pull up outside,’ Paternoster said. ‘I’m going to find out when they’ll be finished.’
Obediently, but with a cynical expression, Mark Tuckwell halted right in front of the house. Paternoster jumped out and approached the officer.
‘Hi, this is my home.’
‘I’m afraid you can’t go in, sir,’ she said.
‘I know that — when are you going to be finished?’
She shook her head. ‘This is a crime scene.’
A bright flash caught his eye, and he noticed for the first time two photographers, standing near, snapping him.
‘Oi, get lost!’ he yelled at them, then turned back to the officer. ‘I know I can’t go in but I need a change of clothes.’
‘If you need anything from the house, sir, like wash things and clothes, give me a list and I’ll ask if someone can bring them to you.’
‘Yes, and where do I sleep? In a shop doorway?’
‘Perhaps with relatives or friends — or in a hotel, sir.’
‘Great, I’ll get a suite at the Grand and charge it to Sussex Police, shall I?’
‘I’m afraid I can’t answer that.’
‘No, of course you can’t.’
‘What I can tell you, sir, is we should be finished by tomorrow.’
There were more flashes. He shielded his face, but well aware it was far too late. Turning, he hurried back to the taxi and jumped in.
‘Unbelievable!’ he said. ‘Go! Drive!’
‘Anywhere in particular?’
‘Just drive.’
‘No problem,’ Mark Tuckwell said. ‘Your shout — I’ve kept the meter running.’
‘You what?’ Paternoster looked at the dash and saw, to his astonishment, that it was.
£24.30 was clocked up.
‘Tell me you’re joking?’
As he drove away, Tuckwell said, ‘I suppose you’ll be wanting to add one night’s board and lodging to your bill? Full English included? Egg, sausage, bacon, black pudding and fried bread?’
‘Eden doesn’t approve of full Englishes. She calls them heart attacks on a plate.’
‘You sure you’re going to need to worry about her approval any more?’ Tuckwell said with a strange expression, which Niall Paternoster did not like. His friend had always seen through him.
‘Funny,’ he said, but it came out flat.
‘In case you do, Cheryl does a vegetarian option — it’s very popular.’
Paternoster didn’t respond.
64
Roy and Cleo sat once more in the Relatives’ Room outside the ICU. An empty carrier bag was on the floor at Cleo’s feet. As suggested by Imelda Bray, they’d brought from home Bruno’s favourite clothes, which the counsellor had collected from them when they’d arrived.
Grace was reading through the consent forms, on the table in front of him. He paused to glance at his watch. Coming up to 1 p.m. Ordinarily, he might have been thinking about lunch, but he had no appetite. He sipped a plastic beaker of water someone had brought him, his mind churning, despite his decision. Questioning it. He held his personal phone in his hand, googling once again the words coma, and then brain death.
‘You’re torturing yourself, darling,’ Cleo said.
She was doing exactly the same on her phone. She had it in her hand now.
‘And you’re not?’
She shook her head. ‘I don’t want this to be something that comes back repeatedly to haunt us. I don’t want either of us to wake up tonight, or any other night, and say, What if? That’s all.’
‘I guess — I’m the same.’
‘So.’ She turned and looked at him. ‘Your entire working life revolves around evidence that ultimately has to be presented in a court of law. Would it help to role-play now?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Let’s say you are Bruno’s lawyer, fighting me, the Crown Prosecutor. You’re arguing the case against donating Bruno’s organs. You already know my opening argument.’
‘That there is no chance, not the slightest chance, of Bruno coming back from where he is?’
‘Yes.’
Grace stared at her for some moments. He tried hard to return with a cogent argument. ‘People say medicine is a very inexact science,’ he came up with lamely. ‘There is always the possibility of a misdiagnosis.’
‘From what you know, Detective Superintendent Grace, what percentage chance would you put on Bruno making a recovery? One hundred per cent? Fifty per cent? Twenty-five per cent? One per cent? Less than one per cent?’
He was silent for a long while. ‘Less than one per cent,’ he said finally.
‘During the course of your career so far, how many suspects have you let go on the balance of a less than one per cent probability that they were innocent?’
For the first time in several hours he smiled, albeit bleakly.
At that moment the door opened and Imelda Bray, accompanied by the transplant coordinator, Charlotte Elizabeth, came in.
‘How are you both feeling?’ Imelda Bray asked.
Grace looked up at her. ‘Pretty awful,’ he said, picking up the pen that had accompanied the forms, signing and dating them. He handed them to the coordinator. ‘I think I’ve signed everywhere you indicated.’
She checked them through briefly. ‘Yes, you have, thank you.’
The counsellor said gently, ‘Let’s try to focus now not on your loss, but on all the good your generous decision will give. You’ll need to grieve and we are here to provide you with all the help and support you will need. For now, would you like to come in and say goodbye to Bruno?’
Grace turned to Cleo for confirmation. She gave it with a single nod and a grim smile.
They both stood up.
65
A few minutes later, feeling like his shoes had lead soles, Roy walked with Cleo through into the Intensive Care Unit. They followed Bray and Elizabeth along past three occupied beds and stopped at the curtains surrounding Bruno. They were ushered in and heard the swish of fabric closing behind them.
Grace stared down at his son, who was looking tinier than ever amid all the apparatus, and felt a knot in his stomach at the sight of him now dressed in the red shirt and shorts of his beloved Bayern Munich football team strip. A large white T with four small white squares, and two smaller emblems, were on the shirt, and the emblems were repeated on the shorts.
Bruno’s eyes were closed and he looked, as before, pale and peaceful. His hair was a tousled mess. Roy Grace bent down and kissed him on the forehead and Cleo did the same.
‘Hey, chap,’ he said. ‘Cleo and I are here. Can you hear us?’
Bruno showed no reaction, and nor, from what Grace could see, did any of the digital displays. It was as if he was in a deep, peaceful sleep.
‘Hey, chap!’ he said again, louder. Desperate at this last minute for some sign to show that Bruno was reacting to them, that he still had brain activity, that he might yet, against all the odds, pull through.
But nothing changed.
Some minutes later Imelda Bray indicated for them to follow her back outside.
Along with Charlotte Elizabeth, they walked along the unit, past other patients in their beds, and stopped by the nursing station, well out of earshot of Bruno.
In a quiet voice, Bray said, ‘We’re going to leave you alone with him now. Let us know when you are ready.’
A few moments later, the two women departed.
Roy and Cleo returned to Bruno’s bedside. His grandparents had already been in to say their goodbyes and had now left. They had agreed, after an initial reluctance, with the decision to donate Bruno’s organs, having been persuaded they would get some small comfort knowing that their grandson would help others to live.