Mo Hayder - Poppet

‘Can you get back then? A job’s come in.’

‘A job?’ Flea digs her fingers into her stomach muscles, where they ache. ‘A diving job?’

‘No – it’s a search. MCIT.’

MCIT – Jack Caffery’s unit. She resists an urge to look over her shoulder to where he’s sitting. ‘What do they want?’

Wellard sighs. ‘A search. Misper. I’m guessing it got kicked up by the review team because it’s one we’ve done before – Misty Kitson.’

‘Misty Kitson.’

‘That’s what I said.’

Flea takes her finger off the button. She breathes in and out – dragging the air down into the bottom of her lungs. Her heart rate, which should be slowing, has picked up at the mention of that name. Misty Kitson.

‘Boss? You there?’

She coughs. Hits the button. ‘Yeah, yeah – I’m here.’

‘I was saying – Misty Kitson – they want us to search near the clinic again. They’re going to extend the parameters.’

‘Yeah, I heard you.’

‘Can you come back to the office? Start thinking about staffing?’

‘I’m on my way.’

She snaps the radio into the holster and stands for a minute, her heart thudding. Misty Kitson. A search for Misty Kitson. The only officer at MCIT who would have issued a request like that is the one who was the Senior Investigating Officer on the case. DI Jack Caffery.

Slowly she turns in the direction of the shaded pathway where he sits.

But this time the lamplight shines on an empty place. Caffery – if it was him – has disappeared.

AJ HAS SURPRISED himself by managing another two hours’ sleep. The night shift are going home now, but he’s stayed in his office, drinking industrial-strength coffee, trying to wake up. By seven a.m., when Melanie arrives at the unit, he is buzzing and alert. He stands at his window and watches her cross the car park, the security lights picking out the silvery bullets of rain sweeping past her. Dressed in a beige raincoat and red wellingtons, she holds a newspaper over her head and ducks as she hurries towards reception. As soon as she’s inside he withdraws from the window. Scratches around trying to keep himself awake with coffee and paperwork – giving her twenty minutes or so to get her head together.

At seven twenty he gathers himself. Straightens his clip-on tie and walks resolutely down the corridor. Knocks on her door.

‘Yes?’

‘AJ.’

There’s a pause. A slight sound of something moving in there. Then: ‘Come in.’

He opens the door. She is sitting at the desk behind a pile of papers, her glasses on. She’s taken off the wellies and rain-spattered coat, and now she is wearing a blouse with drooping, lace-embellished cuffs that make her look like something from the court of Louis Quatorze. The reason for the cuffs, of course, is the bandaged hand. Putting the lid on the rumour mill.

‘AJ?’ Her smile is kind, but reserved. ‘Thank you for yesterday. You were a marvel. Have you been working all night?’

‘Can I come in?’

‘Of course.’ She nods at the seat in front of her desk. ‘Please.’

He comes and sits – feeling again like a pupil in the head-mistress’s office. She was sleeping with one of the OTs, mate. Don’t forget that. Getting down and dirty with one of the great unwashed. Not quite as professional as she seems …

‘I’ve got some results from the Home Office on those tribunals last week,’ she says brightly. ‘Good news – we’ve got a free bed on pre-discharge tomorrow.’

‘Oh?’

‘Isaac Handel. We thought he’d be going – they’ve rubber-stamped it. So I guess we’ll want to be thinking about who’s coming out of Acute and where the next referral will come from, so I …’ She breaks off. Tilts her head to one side. ‘AJ? Is that what you were here about?’

‘No.’ He clears his throat, uncomfortable. ‘No – actually, I, uh, I wanted to talk about – you know – about what we were talking about yesterday. The delusions – among the patients. The M-word.’

She lets out a long sigh. ‘Oh, OK.’

‘We – I mean, the unit – we’ve always taken a middle-of-the-road attitude to it. We’ve reached our conclusions and stuck with them. Easy conclusions to reach if you’re dealing with this population: mass hallucination, hysteria, etcetera.’

‘Are there any other conclusions to reach?’

‘Yes. There are.’

She lowers the paper she’s holding and stares at him, her cheeks suddenly red. Her eyes are magnified behind the glasses. ‘AJ,’ she says levelly. ‘Or Mulder, should I say? Is this you crossing over to the dark side? Jacking in your sceptic credentials? Are we now a Maude believer?’

‘No. In fact the ugly sceptic in me has just drunk a case of Red Bull and carjacked a Ferrari. I’m Scully, Scully to the hilt. More Scully than Scully is. Scully could have been based on me.’

She takes her glasses off and lays them carefully to one side. She clasps her hands together and leans forward, looking at him like a judge. Eyebrows raised, waiting for an explanation.

‘A power cut,’ he says. ‘Every time The Maude appears, there’s been a power cut. There was a power cut the night Zelda self-harmed and the night she died.’

‘I know. Sometimes I watch Ashes to Ashes and think, Wish I could do that – rewind to the eighties when the unit was being built. There are a few people I’d have a full’n’frank with. The electricians, to start with.’

‘And I think there may have been a power cut when Moses wrote those things on his walls. I remembered he said he smelled burning fish.’

‘From the kitchen? I don’t remember that bit.’

‘Well, I thought about the kitchen – but have you ever smelled a fuse blowing?’

‘Yes, it’s like …’ She frowns. ‘Like burning fish.’

‘Some of the security staff think there was a power cut when Moses had his episode. Do you remember?’

‘I wish. I can’t remember my own name these days – let alone back that far.’

‘Who has records of things like that?’

‘Maybe maintenance – except, no, their records get cleared every year.’ She shrugs. ‘Christ knows. Ask Moses?’

‘Have you tried asking Moses about anything that happened that day? It’s as if this is Guantanamo, and you’re going to water-board him.’ She shrugs again and reaches for her glasses, as if she’s about to lose interest. He sits forward and says, ‘A power cut equals no CCTV – the emergency generator doesn’t feed the CCTV, I’ve checked with central security. Delusions, hallucinations and fantasies? The Maude? That’s Mulder’s world – independent of the nuts and bolts of reality. But cruelty and power cuts? That’s Scully stuff. My camp.’

Melanie sets the glasses down again, leans forward, her ridiculously blue eyes locked on his. ‘AJ,’ she says calmly, ‘I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about.’

‘No CCTV – no evidence.’

‘I still don’t get it.’

‘Well, duh, Melanie, sorry to be rude, but think about it. Moses was a nuisance – so was Zelda and so was Pauline. They pissed people off. What I’m saying is – could it be the delusions aren’t delusions? Could it have happened the way they said? Could it be someone in the unit – a real live human – one of the other patients, or the staff even, trying to shut them up?’ He pauses, letting the implication settle on Melanie. ‘I mean, Moses? Zelda? Pauline? Who wouldn’t?’

‘No, AJ – what crap, if you’ll excuse the expression. They would have told us.’

‘It was dark – how could they see who came into their room? And what if someone had titted around with their medication? They’re already dosed up to the eyeballs anyway – what if they’d been given even more sedative than they usually had? Have you not thought about that unattributable heart attack? Secondary to obesity – was that what it went down as? I’m sure the pathologist wasn’t looking for crush injuries to the heart, because who would have said anything?’