Peter Robinson: Wednesday's Child

And The Barleycorn was a typical estate pub, right from its unimaginative name and its squat flat-roofed exterior to its jukebox, video games and poorly kept keg beer.

Banks pushed open the door and glanced around. Little Richard’s “Good Golly Miss Molly” was playing too loudly on the jukebox. The cash register rang up another sale. Most of the tables were empty, and only a few diehard drinkers stood at the bar.

As the door shut behind him, Banks noticed the people look in his direction, and suddenly one man took off towards the back. Banks dashed after him, bumping his knee on a chair and knocking it over as he went. He caught the man by the shoulder just before he had reached the exit. The man tried to pull free, but Banks kept his grip, spun him around and hit him hard, just once, in the solar plexus. The man groaned and doubled up. Banks took him by the elbow and helped him to a table the way one escorts an elderly relative.

As soon as they had sat down, the barman rushed over.

“Look, mister, I don’t want no trouble,” he said.

“Good,” Banks answered. “Neither do I. But I’d like a small brandy for my friend here, just to settle his stomach.”

“What do you think I am, a bloody waitress?”

Banks looked at the man. He was about six feet tall and gone to fat. His nose looked as if it had been broken a few times, and old scar tissue hooded his left eye.

“Just bring the drink,” Banks said. “I won’t have anything myself. Not while I’m on duty.”

The barman stared at Banks, then his jaw dropped. He shrugged and turned back to the bar. In a few seconds he came back with the brandy. “It’s on the house,” he mumbled.

Banks thanked him and passed the glass over to his companion, who sat rubbing his stomach and gasping for breath. “Here’s to your health, Les.”

The man glared at him through teary eyes, knocked back the brandy in one and banged the glass down hard on the table. “You didn’t need to have done that,” he said. “I was only off for a piss.”

“Bollocks, Les,” said Banks. “The only time I’ve seen anyone run as fast as that to the bog they had dysentery. Why were you running?”

“I told you.”

“I know, but I want you to tell me the truth.”

Les Poole was well known to the Eastvale police and had been a frequent guest at the station. He had congenitally sticky fingers and couldn’t stand the idea of anything belonging to anyone else but him. Consequently, he had been in and out of jail since Borstal, mostly for burglary. No doubt, Banks thought, had he the intelligence, he might also have risen to the dizzy heights of fraud and blackmail. Les had never held a job, though rumour had it that he had, in fact, once worked as a dustbin man for six weeks but got the sack for wasting too much time rummaging through people’s rubbish looking for things he could keep or sell. In short, Banks thought, Les Poole was little more than a doodle in the margin of life. At least until now.

Les was an odd-looking character, too, like someone who had fallen through a time warp from the 1950s. He had greased-back hair, complete with quiff, sideboards and duck’s arse, a triangular face with a Kirk Douglas dimple on his chin, a long, thin nose, and eyes as flat and grey as slate. About Banks’s height, he was wearing a black leather jacket, red T-shirt and jeans. His beer-belly bulged over the belt. He looked as if he should be playing stand-up bass in a rockabilly band. Why he had always been so attractive to women, Banks couldn’t fathom. Maybe it was his long dark eyelashes.

“Well?” prompted Banks.

“Well what?”

Banks sighed. “Let’s start this again, Les. What we’ll do is we’ll back up and lead nice and slowly to the question. Maybe that way you’ll be able to understand it, all right?”

Les Poole just glared at him.

Banks lit a cigarette and went on. “I came down here to ask if you know anything about young Gemma’s disappearance. Do you?”

“She was taken away, that’s all I know. Brenda told me.”

“Where were you when it happened?”

“Eh?”

“Where were you yesterday afternoon?”

“Out and about.”

“Doing what?”

“Oh, this and that.”

“Right. So while you were out and about doing this and that, a man and a woman, both well-dressed and official-looking, called at your house, said they were child-care workers, talked their way inside and persuaded Brenda to hand over her daughter for tests and further examination. Now what I want to know, Les, is do you know anything about that?”

Les shrugged. “It’s not my kid, is it? I can’t help it if she’s so fucking daft she’ll give her kid away.”

The barman appeared at Banks’s shoulder and asked if they wanted anything else.

“I’ll have a pint, Sid,” Les said.

“Bring me one too, this time,” Banks added. “I feel like I bloody well need it.”

After the barman had brought the beer, which tasted more like cold dishwater than real ale, Banks carried on.

“Right,” he said, “so we’ve established you don’t give a damn about the child one way or another. That still doesn’t answer my questions. Where were you, and do you know anything about it?”

“Now come on, Mr Banks. I know I’ve been in a bit of bother now and then, but surely even you can’t suspect me of doing a thing like that? This is what they call persecution, this is. Just because I’ve got a record you think you can pin everything on me.”

“Don’t be a silly bugger, Les. I’m not trying to pin anything on you yet. For a start, I couldn’t picture you in a suit, and even if you’d managed to nick one from somewhere, I think Brenda might still have recognized you, don’t you?”

“You don’t have to take the piss, you know.”

“Let’s make it simple, then. Do you know anything about what happened?”

“No.”

“Right. Another one: what were you doing?”

“What’s that got to do with anything? I don’t see what that’s got to do with anything. I mean, if you don’t suspect me, why does it matter where I was?”

“Got a job, Les?”

“Me? Nah.”

“I don’t suppose you’d want me to know if you did have, would you? I might tell the social and they’d cut off your benefits, wouldn’t they?”

“I don’t have a job, Mr Banks. You know what it’s like these days, all that unemployment and all.”

“Join the rest of us in the nineties, Les. Maggie’s gone. The three million unemployed are a thing of the past.”

“Still…”

“Okay. So you don’t have a job. What were you doing?”

“Just helping a mate move some junk, that’s all.”

“That’s better. His name?”

“John.”

“And where does he live, this John?”

“He’s got a shop, second-hand stuff, down Rampart Street, over by The Oak…”

“I know it. So you spent the afternoon with this bloke John, helping him in his shop?”

“Yeah.”

“I suppose he’d confirm that?”

“Come again?”

“If I asked him, he’d tell me you were with him.”

“Course he would.”

“Where’d you get the nice new television and stereo, Les?”

“What do you mean? They’re Brenda’s. She had them before she met me. Ask her.”

“Oh, I’m sure she’ll back you up. The thing is, they don’t look that old. And Fletcher’s electronics warehouse got broken into last Friday night. Someone took off with a van full of stereos and televisions. Did you know that?”

“Can’t say as I did. Anyway, what’s all this in aid of? I thought you were after the kid?”

“I cast a wide net, Les. A wide net. Why did Brenda wait so long before calling us?”