Belinda Bauer - Darkside

He got back in the car and turned towards Shipcott.

‘What about the pub?’ Marvel said a little petulantly.

Jonas said nothing.

They drove in silence to the stables and the Land Rover swung round in the yard and gravelled to a halt.

Marvel snorted when he saw that Reynolds was back with the car. He could have waited an hour, avoided getting kicked by a dying horse, and still have had a couple of pints.

He got out of the Land Rover and peered back in at Jonas. He hoped he wasn’t going to start up about Peter Priddy again, but the man looked distant and tightly wound. Probably thinking about the paperwork he’d have to do tomorrow on the police Land Rover.

‘Thanks for the drink.’ Marvel was half joking, but because Jonas said nothing in ironic response, the words hung there and then soured into something far more sarcastic – even bullying.

What the fuck. The night had been a disaster from start to finish. He should have stuck with Tracy Barlow.

Marvel swung the door shut and watched the young policeman drive away.

It felt like four in the morning but it was only 10.30pm. Through a chink in Reynolds’s curtain he could see his DS was watching Who Wants to Be a Millionaire . Marvel almost laughed out loud. Typical! The bloody clever clogs! Showing off even when he was alone! Still, he felt like company – felt like sharing his adventure. He was about to knock when he saw Joy Springer’s kitchen curtain twitch. On a whim he went over and knocked on her door instead. She opened it a hair’s breadth and glared at him.

‘We hit a horse up on the moor,’ he said.

‘So?’ she said, while ash drooped dangerously off the end of her cigarette.

Marvel wasn’t in the mood to beat about the bush.

‘I’m a bit shaken up. You got anything to drink?’

She poked her head outside so she could make sure he wasn’t about to bring in a whole legion of freeloaders, then opened the door.

The kitchen was stiflingly hot – just the way Marvel liked it. Joy Springer got two odd mugs off the dresser and poured from a bottle.

‘Sit down if you want,’ she said.

Underfoot were flagstones covered in a virtual rug of cat hair. There was a cat on the kitchen table and, with only a brief glance, Marvel noticed another four dotted about on various mismatched armchairs and a sofa. He chose one end of the sofa and almost fell through its sagging bottom. She handed him a drink and he took a sip and grimaced.

‘What the hell is that?’

‘Dubonnet,’ she said spikily. ‘If you don’t want it, you can pour it back in the bottle.’

He shrugged and took another sip. ‘I’ve got some Jameson’s in my room.’

‘We’ll have that tomorrow then,’ she declared.

The bathroom at Rose Cottage was quick to steam up and slow to clear, so that the moisture hung in the air for ages, like an extension of the moor itself. It was so thick that the windows were curtained with steam, and they never bothered with the blinds, even at night. Jonas stood utterly still and let the shower cleanse him of the night’s activities, just as he let the sound of the water drown out his memory, leaving him pristine and empty. He stood like that until he felt the chill of death leave every part of him, then turned the water off, grabbed a towel and stepped over his clothes, which lay in a damp pile on the bathroom floor.

He wrapped the towel around his waist and did his teeth. Habit made him stare into the mirror while he brushed, but the glass was opaque and he didn’t bother wiping it. Instead he watched the diffuse half-shape that was also him moving in time to his own ablutions. It was hypnotic and comforting, like a distant twin who was living another life behind the steam, similar but different to his, where all the edges were comfortingly fuzzy and nothing had to be faced in harsh focus. Jonas brushed for longer than normal, until his mouth burned with minty freshness. He stuffed his clothes into the laundry basket and – despite the hour – cleaned the bath and the basin. It was one thing to tick off his list of chores.

Lucy was asleep in bed. She liked to make the effort to get upstairs even if he wasn’t there to help her. Sometimes she could crawl up quite fast; sometimes it took her half an hour. She’d taken to leaving a book halfway up the stairs so she could stop and rest without getting bored. The book there at the moment was a novel called Fate Dictates . Like his woolly thinking on the afterlife, Jonas was unsure about whether or not he believed in Fate. Who knew how life was going to work out? What weirdness was just around the corner? Could it be controlled? And if it could, would you want to control it?

He towelled his short, dark hair hard and fast and slid into bed beside Lucy before he could lose the wonderful warmth of the shower.

As he did, she stirred and rolled towards him.

‘Where were you?’ she murmured sleepily.

‘Wet and cold and not with you,’ he whispered, stroking her hair.

‘I’m glad you’re home.’ He could hear the lazy little smile in her voice and felt her hand sneak on to his hip. He smiled in the darkness at the way it made the night’s events disappear behind him as if they’d never been.

She lifted his hand and placed it over her small round breast.

‘I’m glad you’re home too,’ he said, and kissed her with intent for the first time in months. At the same time, he whispered into her mouth: ‘I’m sorry.’

Jonas walked down into the village at eight o’clock the next day feeling truly happy for the first time in many weeks.

The morning was so bright it hurt his eyes. The sky was already a pale Mediterranean blue, while the moor below it sparkled like quartz under a thick frost. Every breath he took was menthol in his nostrils. His work shoes were still soaked from the drama the night before, so he’d put his walking boots on, with three pairs of socks for warmth.

The fall-out from last night had been minimal. The Land Rover’s bull bars had protected the lights and bodywork, and he’d reported the dead horse to Eric Scott, the local park ranger, first thing this morning. Then he’d called Bob Coffin, the huntsman with the Blacklands Hunt, to tell him where he could find the carcass. His headache had gone so completely that Jonas could barely imagine what a headache felt like, and although Marvel had not exactly said he’d leave Peter Priddy alone, at least Jonas had raised the alibi with him as he’d promised he would.

Mostly, though, he felt better for having failed to take Marvel to the pub. It was a childish victory but a victory none the less. Of course, thanks to Marvel he now had all day to stand on the doorstep and savour it, while waiting for that wholly predictable killer to return like iron filings to the magnet of the crime scene.

Jonas smiled ruefully.

Oh well. At least it wasn’t raining.

The boys were skating as he came down the hill. In the quiet air he heard them before he saw them – a sound like little trains on short journeys, each ending with a clatter, a laugh, a sound of approval or a sharp expletive that floated faintly upward from the playing field. The ramp came into view below him. Three boys. Steven Lamb, Dougie Trewell and one of the Tithecott boys. Chris? Mark? He couldn’t tell from here.

Jonas stood and looked down on them for a moment, admiring their lazy grace – even all bundled up in their thick winter jackets, their motions were elegant. He’d seen plenty of bad skaters on that ramp since coming back to Shipcott – had taken Lalo Bryant and his broken ankle to hospital himself – but these three boys were good to watch, especially on a morning like this, where the white playing field around them was painted orange by the late-rising sun, and their tracks through the frost gave the scene a festive feel. The reminder of the Christmas just past made Jonas uneasy. The silence; the tight white face of Lucy’s mother bustling up and down stairs; the false smiles and season’s greetings, the unwrapped gifts under the unlit tree. Most of all, the sight of Lucy – wan and silent – in their bed, when she could just as easily have been dead. Before Christmas Day even dawned, Jonas had pushed the tree nose-first into the bin, lights, tinsel and all.