Christopher Fowler - The Water Room

‘So the bloke’s doing a bit of untaxed freelance. Workers in the grey economy don’t keep documentation. What does May think we’re going to find? Receipts?’

Bimsley rocked on his heels and looked at her. ‘You came up from Greenwich, didn’t you?’

‘Yeah, I’ve done Greenwich, New Cross, Deptford, Peckham, all over south London. Great catchment areas if you like arguing with drug squads and dealing with complicated social structures involving “respect” in all its gruesome manifestations, but not if you’re interested in anything more sophisticated than gunshot and knife wounds.’

‘What made you come in for the PCU position?’

‘I wanted to work on crimes with causes, not club stabbings where the motive is always “He gave me a funny look.” I heard some of the local lads talking about this unit, slagging it off. Thought it sounded interesting.’

‘Bryant and May know a lot of people. They’ve made plenty of enemies, and some loyal friends. John’s great, but Arthur can be dangerous.’

‘In what way?’

Bimsley thought for a moment. ‘They spent twenty years looking for some lunatic who called himself the Leicester Square Vampire. Bryant pushed the case too hard. The story goes that he persuaded John to use his own daughter as a decoy. Something went wrong, and the daughter died.’

‘Christ. How come they don’t hate each other?’

‘I don’t know. Nobody seems to know the full story. Longbright must, but she’s not talking.’ Bimsley slapped his mitts together. ‘Come on, it looks like it’s going to rain again, let’s wrap this up.’

They worked in silence as the night deepened and a diaphanous mist began to dampen their hair and clothes, settling on the grass like threads of silk.

‘Your interview result isn’t enough to keep the Ruth Singh file open after its verdict, is it?’ asked Meera. ‘No conclusive forensic evidence, no real suspects, all friends, relatives and neighbours accounted for on the night in question.’

‘Yeah. Bryant must be disappointed.’

‘Why?’

Bimsley dug deeper, shining his torch into the bottom of the last bag. ‘Oh, he wants the answers to life’s mysteries. Why people die, what makes them evil, how corruption takes root. It’s a hiding to nothing, because you never truly find out, do you? You don’t get to the source. May doesn’t look for meanings all the time, he just accepts what he sees and deals with it.’

‘And which do you think is best?’ asked Meera.

Bimsley shrugged. ‘We’re the law, aren’t we? You’ve got to accept it all on face value or it’ll drive you bleeding mad.’

‘Nietzsche said, “There are no facts, only interpretations.” If you believe that justice can be meted via a simple binary system, you’re cleared from any moral responsibility.’ Meera’s sharp brown eyes were steady and unforgiving.

‘Look, I know what’s right and wrong, but I’m not going to go around with a chip on my shoulder about it, pissed off at never getting closure.’

‘It’s human nature to try and understand your environment, even if it only leads to more questions. Nietzsche also said, “Every word is a prejudice.” ’

‘Oh really?’ Bimsley was starting to get annoyed. ‘What does Nietzsche have to say about the chances of you and I not killing each other?’

‘He said that for a man and a woman to stay friends they have to find each other unattractive. So we should be great pals.’

‘You and Bryant are going to get on like a house on fire. Sorry, bad choice of words, seeing he managed to burn the unit down.’

‘How did he do that?’

‘Long story. Be thankful they didn’t close the place permanently.’

When Meera looked up, her face widened with an unexpected smile. ‘You think there are no answers? Here’s one.’ She dangled a sodden piece of paper before him.

‘You’re going to kill yourself if you don’t get down from there,’ warned Alma Sorrowbridge. The Antiguan landlady had been as plump and lush as a breadfruit in her golden days, but now appeared to be shrinking. She flattened her grey curls and folded her arms and watched in annoyance as Bryant balanced at the top of the steps, batting his stick into the back of the shelf units.

‘I know it’s up here,’ Bryant called. ‘You wouldn’t understand. If you had an ounce of kindness you’d help me get it back.’

‘I don’t do steps at my age,’ Alma told him. ‘I’m a landlady, not a trapeze artist. And I’m not your keeper any more, since you decided I’m not good enough to come with you to your fancy new apartment.’

‘You wouldn’t like it, Alma. It’s hardly fancy. I needed a place to think, something as bare and ascetic as a monk’s cell.’

‘You mean you got no ornaments?’ asked Alma, appalled. ‘What have you done with them all?’

‘They’re objets d’art, thank you, and I’ve taken them to my office to replace the ones that were destroyed.’

‘Poor John. I don’t even know what it is you’re looking for, or why you had to put it in such an awkward place.’

‘Agh.’ Bryant pulled down the doll and wiped it with his sleeve. ‘Help me down.’ Alma held the steps while he descended. He was carrying a miniature representative of himself, made out of cloth and accurate in detail down to the missing button on his tweed overcoat. ‘It’s my achi doll. It was made by one of my enemies and sent to me. I had to keep it up there, out of the way, to prevent anything from happening to it. It contains part of my soul, and if it gets damaged, so do I.’

Alma made a noise of disgust. ‘You don’t really believe things like that, Mr Bryant.’

‘Well, of course not, but he was a nasty customer and my evidence got him convicted, so I’m not taking any chances. I’m putting this in my new office safe. If you had helped me to move, I wouldn’t have forgotten it in the first place.’

Bryant’s ingratitude never ceased to amaze her. She had devoted a large part of her life to making him comfortable. She had even stood by as he uprooted himself from her beloved Battersea apartment, where the river sunlight wavered across her kitchen ceiling, and moved to his shabby, gloomy conversion in Chalk Farm, where, according to John May, the shadows never left the rooms and the bedroom windows were brushed by the decayed fingers of dead plane trees. It was love of a sort that had allowed her to put up with his abuse, even now. If anyone else dared to speak to her in the same way. .

‘Go on, take a good look at it.’ Bryant bared his ridiculous false teeth in a rictus as he passed her the doll.

Alma grimaced, but accepted the offering. ‘Why did he give it to you? Why didn’t he just tear its head off?’

‘Oh, he didn’t mean to harm me,’ Bryant explained airily. ‘He was planning to petition the medical board for parole at the earliest opportunity, and as I was the only person fully conversant with the facts of his case, he was providing himself with some insurance-these things are as much about the prevention of misfortune as the reverse.’

‘It’s a good job John doesn’t believe in all this rubbish.’ Alma gingerly handed back the doll.

‘I’ve been meaning to ask you for years.’ Bryant stepped from the ladder and stood before her. ‘Why don’t you ever call me by my Christian name? You always have done with John.’

Alma sighed. It was a matter of respect, but she wasn’t prepared to tell him that. ‘There’s nothing Christian about you, Mr Bryant. If there was, you wouldn’t spend all your time trying to find out things that don’t concern decent people. You could come with me to church.’

‘Thank you, Alma, but I think it’s a little late for my redemption, don’t you?’