Mo Hayder: Poppet

MONSTER MOTHER IS sitting on the bed when the triangle of light under the door flickers. It moves, dancing sideways a little, then settles.

She stares at it, her heart thumping. Something is out there, waiting.

Silently Monster Mother pushes herself out of bed and creeps to the furthest corner of the room – as far away from the door as she can. She presses herself back into the triangle between the walls, trembling, eyes watering with fear. From the window behind her, electric security spots cast tree shadows across the floor. They shift and bend, fingers scratching across the room, finding and touching the shadow under the door. She scans the place – the walls and the bed and the wardrobe. Checks every corner, every crack in the plaster. Anywhere at all that The Maude can crawl in. Monster Mother knows more about The Maude than anyone here does. She’ll never tell what she knows, though. She’s too scared.

It’s still out there. Not moving a lot – but enough to make the patch of light sway. Monster Mother can hear breathing now. She wants to cry but she can’t. Carefully and silently she pushes her shaky hand up under the red negligee and moves her fingers along the skin between her breasts – groping for the thing she needs. When she finds it she tugs. The pain is greater than anything she can remember. It hurts more than cutting off her own arm – or giving birth (something she has done several times). But she continues, pulling the zip down, from sternum to pubis. There is a wet smacking sound as her stomach muscles spring free from her skin.

She grips the edge of the opening and, writhing and weeping, wrenches it outwards. The skin unsticks from her ribs and her breasts and peels down over her shoulders. It tears, it bleeds, but she continues until it hangs from her hips like dripping wax. She takes a few deep breaths and rips it away from her legs.

It gathers in a pool at her feet. A deflated rubber mould.

Monster Mother gathers herself. She straightens – solid and brave – her stripped muscles glinting in the security lights. She turns to face the door, proud and defiant.

The Maude will never find her now.

THE RESTAURANT WAS once the university refectory – and it still has a noisy, peopled buzz to it. High ceilings and bouncy acoustics. Except now the students aren’t sitting and eating, they’re wearing black aprons – slaloming round tables carrying plates, muttering to themselves orders and table numbers. Working off their loans. A ‘skinny cocktails’ neon blinks above the polished concrete bar, chords from a Gotye song drift out of the speakers latched high in the ceiling girders.

The customers are mostly people who’ve chosen this place as a venue – it’s a high enough price tab to be above drop-in scale. The only lone diners are self-conscious – some cradling Kindles over their borscht soup – some sipping wine and casually checking watches, expecting dates or friends. Out of British politeness nobody stares at them, or even acknowledges them.

Only one diner appears to have any effect on his neighbours. Nearby tables have remarked on him and adjusted their seating accordingly – as if he’s a threat or an excitement. A dark-haired man in his early forties breaking myriad unspoken rules. Not just by his attire – a black weatherproof worn over a business suit – the tie removed, the shirt collar slightly open – but by his attitude.

He’s eating like someone who wants to eat for no other reason than that he is hungry – not because he wants to be seen here. He doesn’t adopt an air or scan the room, he eats steadily, his gaze focused on the mid-distance. It is gross misconduct in a place like this, and there’s a kind of satisfaction amongst the others when it all goes wrong for him. Privately they think it’s just what would happen to someone like him.

It’s eight thirty and a table of twenty has come in. They’ve booked in advance and the tables have been arranged at the rear of the space so they won’t disturb the other customers. An engagement party maybe – some of the girls are in cocktail dresses and one or two of the men are in suits. The woman at the back of the group – a blonde in her late fifties, suntanned, dressed in overstitched jeans and a Hollister hoodie – seems, at first glance, to be with the crowd. It’s only when they sit, and she doesn’t, that it’s clear she’s tagged along and has no connection with them.

She moves unsteadily. Under the hoodie her breasts are on display in a low-cut T-shirt. She knocks one of the waiters in her transit through the restaurant – stops to apologize, slurring her ‘sorry’s – resting her hands on his chest as she speaks, smiling confidentially. He shoots a helpless glance at the bar staff, not sure what to do – but before he can object she’s gone, bouncing past the tables like a pinball – her eyes locked on her target.

The man in the North Face weatherproof.

He looks up from the half-eaten hamburger. Registers her. And, as if he knows she means trouble, slowly puts down his knife and fork. Conversation at all the adjacent tables falters and dies. The man picks up his napkin and wipes his mouth.

‘Hello, Jacqui.’ He sets the napkin down neatly. ‘So nice to see you.’

‘Fuck you.’ She puts her hands on the table and leers at him. ‘Just fuck you into next week, you shithead.’

He nods, as if acknowledging the fact he is indeed a shithead. However, he says nothing and that infuriates the woman even further. She slams her hands on the table again, making everything jump. A fork and a napkin fall to the floor.

‘Look at you – sitting here just eating. Eating and enjoying yourself. You don’t have a fucking clue, do you?’

‘Hello?’ The waiter touches her on the arm. ‘Madam? Shall we try to keep this conversation private? And then we can—’

‘Piss off.’ She bats his hand away. ‘Piss right off. You don’t know what you’re talking about.’ She lurches sideways and grabs the first glass she can see. It’s from a neighbouring table and is full of red wine. Its owner makes a futile grab for it, but the woman glides it away and slings the wine at the man in the weatherproof. The wine has a life of its own; it seems able to go everywhere. It lands on his face, on his shirt, in his plate and on the table. Other diners jump to their feet in shock, but the man remains sitting. Completely cool.

‘Where the fuck is she?’ the woman screams. ‘Where is she? You will fucking tell me what you’re doing about it or I will kill you – I will fucking kill y—’

Two security staff appear. A huge black guy in a green T-shirt and a headset is in charge. He puts a hand on her arm. ‘Babes,’ he says, ‘this isn’t helping you. Now let’s go somewhere and have a chat about it.’

‘You think I can chat?’ She pushes his arm away. ‘I’ll chat. I’ll chat until you fall over. I’ll shagging chat until you puke.’

The big guy makes a near-invisible nod, and his staff grab her arms, pin them to her sides as she struggles. She continues squealing at the top of her voice as she is forced back through the restaurant towards the doors: ‘He knows where she is.’ She addresses her fury at the security boss, as if he’s going to give a shit. ‘He doesn’t care. He doesn’t CARE. That’s what the problem is. He doesn’t fucking c—’

The men push her out of the front doors. They lock them and stand, facing outwards, their arms folded, while she squirms on the pavement. The man in the windcheater doesn’t get up or look at the door. If anyone asked him how he keeps his cool he’d shrug. Maybe it’s his nature, maybe it’s from his training. He is police, after all, and that helps. A plain-clothed member of Bristol’s Major Crime Investigation Team. Detective Inspector Jack Caffery, age forty-two. He’s seen and endured worse than this. Much worse.