Alex Gray: Pitch Black

‘Her solicitor is bound to ask for bail to be granted, pending a full investigation. We’ll see what happens in court tomorrow, but I have my doubts.’ Mitchison passed over the case file. ‘Don’t expect you’ll have too much bother with this one.’

Famous last words , Lorimer told himself as Mitchison left the room. Whether it was that quirk of fate placing him at the scene of her arrest on Mull or the victim’s high profile, the DCI had a strong feeling that this case was going to be anything but straightforward.

The woman had been brought back from Mull and placed in the police cells for one more night until she could be brought to court and officially charged with Nicko Faulkner’s murder. Lorimer waited outside as the duty officer unlocked the cell and stood aside. The first thing he noticed was the smell. It wafted towards him, a mixture of stale sweat and something more pungent that he recognised as menstrual blood. He’d smelt it before from women banged up over long weekends without any facilities to shower or change their clothes. Janis Faulkner was sitting in a corner of the bunk, feet together, head down and clutching her stomach. A movement as the cell door was opening made him realise she had looked up for a split second but now her expression was hidden under that curtain of damp hair.

‘Anyone thought to give her some paracetamol?’ he asked the uniformed officer.

‘Hasn’t asked for it,’ the man shrugged. ‘What’s she want it for anyway?’

‘Just go and get some,’ Lorimer told him, ‘and a drink of cold water.’ He let the man close the cell door behind them and stood waiting for the woman to look his way.

‘Feeling bad?’ he asked, as if she were an old acquaintance and not a stranger who was also his prisoner. He heard the sigh first, then Janis raised her head and looked at him. There was a brightness in her eyes that spoke of unshed tears. Her little nod and a flicker of recognition were all Lorimer needed to know he’d begun to win her confidence.

The door clanged open and the uniform strode in, proffering a tumbler of water and a strip of foil containing two painkillers. Both men watched as she unwrapped them, her fingers shaking as she clutched the glass and tilted back her head, then swallowed.

‘Thanks,’ she said, her voice hoarse. But it was to Lorimer that she spoke, to Lorimer that she handed back the empty tumbler.

‘You’ll have been told that we have to keep you here till tomorrow?’ he asked quietly, a hint of apology in his voice. She nodded again, but her head had drooped once more and Lorimer sensed she was withdrawing into herself, just as Mitchison had described. ‘You can talk to me if you want to,’ he told her. There was no response at all this time and as the minutes ticked past he realised that there was little point in trying any longer.

As he turned to leave, the silence inside that cell was redolent of misery.

‘Hi, anybody home?’ Lorimer shut the door behind him. As if in answer, a questioning meow came from somewhere near his feet and he looked down to see a ginger cat regarding him with interest.

‘Maggie! There’s a cat in the-’

‘I know, I know. It’s okay. He’s just staying over for a bit.’ Maggie was there, smiling at him from the kitchen doorway, one eyebrow arched in amusement.

‘ He ? Who does he belong to?’ Lorimer was already hunkering down to the cat’s own level. A tentative outstretched hand was met with a furry rubbing against his fingers and the beginnings of a purr. As he began to stroke the soft pelt, the cat reared up slightly, butting its head on Lorimer’s knee.

‘Friendly enough, I’ll say that for him. Where did it come from?’

‘Ah.’ Maggie came into the room and perched sideways on a chair, swinging her bare tanned legs. ‘Now that’s a good question, Chief Inspector,’ she began pertly. ‘Don’t actually know yet. He just appeared in the garden and he’s been with me all afternoon.’

‘It must belong to somebody, surely? I mean, look at the coat, it’s in good condition.’

‘He was really hungry, though. You should’ve seen the way he wolfed down a whole tin of tuna. Must have been starving, eh, boy?’ Maggie slipped off the chair and knelt down beside them. At the sound of her voice the cat turned its attentions from Lorimer and began rubbing the side of its face on Maggie’s ankles.

‘Well, seems he knows which side his bread’s buttered on,’ Lorimer muttered.

The cat shifted suddenly and sat, looking at him with green, unwavering eyes. It’s waiting for me to make the next move, Lorimer thought, recognising a tactic he often employed himself. He was aware of Maggie keeping very still, holding her breath. The ginger cat continued to stare at him, its front paws neatly together. A sigh came from Lorimer’s chest, breaking the spell, and he reached out and picked up the animal, cuddling it closely. Burying his face into the warm fur, he felt the thrum of purrs reverberate into his chest.

‘Looks like we’ve got an overnight guest, then,’ he murmured and looked up to catch Maggie’s grin. You’re as big a softy as me , her look seemed to say.

‘I’ll phone the local vet tomorrow, see if anyone’s lost him. You never know, he might be microchipped.’

‘And if nobody claims him?’ Lorimer’s question hung in the air.

‘Well, I thought …’ Maggie’s eyes were on him, beseeching. ‘We can’t send him to a cat rescue place. Imagine being banged up in this weather.’

Lorimer had a vision of Janis Faulkner’s face. She was incarcerated now on this hot July evening and Lorimer had a sudden urge to release her back into the wilds of Mull to wherever she had been going. As if aware of the change in his mood, the cat slipped out of his arms and strolled towards the kitchen and the open back door.

Staying still had its advantages. If she did try to change position then the numbness in her limbs would wear off and she might remember what it felt like to be alive. That moment by the lochside, when the fresh morning breeze had wakened something inside her, seemed to be from a different age now, not a mere couple of days ago. She’d travelled up to Oban with a renewed sense of purpose; Lachie had said to come up any time. Why not? she’d asked herself. It would have given her a little respite, time to lick her wounds. Her mouth curled into a sardonic smile. Some wounds never healed. A little sigh escaped her and one leg moved as if of its own volition.

The springs of the other bed creaked, only inches from her face, and Janis froze. What if the woman were to wake up and try to engage her in conversation again? She might be a plant, for all Janis knew. Okay, her imagination was working overtime but she had reason enough to be paranoid. Running away from it all hadn’t been the answer; it had only delayed the inevitable. Now silence seemed to be her only option. Silence here and now in this cell where the only sound was of another person’s breathing; silence before all of their questions. She’d learned a long time ago to switch off her emotions. Nicko had been an unwitting teacher, not beating her into submission so much as driving her out of the place where everything hurt. It was a trick she could manage whenever things became too much, slipping into that other place where no voices could reach her, no eyes force her to face what she had chosen not to face ever again. They’d all tried already; a female solicitor they’d dug up from somewhere — a whey-faced woman with untidy hair escaping from a failed attempt at a French pleat — the police who had pressed her with questions for hours and now these prison officers with concern in their eyes and bunches of keys inside their pockets.