Peter Lovesey: The Headhunters

‘Did my lips move?’ Rick asked.

‘So what do you do when you’re not ten-pin bowling?’ Gemma, too, seemed to have decided Jake needed a break from the ribbing.

‘Me? I’m a chartered surveyor. I can tell you when your house needs money spending on it.’

‘All the time.’

‘How did you guess? And you work at the printer’s out at Fishbourne.’

She flushed scarlet. ‘Who told you? Jo, I suppose.’

Jo gave a shrug and a smile.

Someone had to compensate for Jake’s non-existent social skills, and Rick was doing his damnedest. ‘Hey, I heard all about this creepy boss you want to do away with. Mr Cartwright, Yeah? Between us we ought to be able to help you out. I was saying to Jo, it’s not enough to top him. You’ve got to think the whole thing through. Make him disappear as well. That’s the biggest challenge. I was telling her about the case of a woman-’

‘Rick, don’t,’ Jo cut in. ‘We don’t want to hear it.’

‘We only ever hear about murders that get discovered,’ Rick said. ‘Those are the failures. There are plenty that go undetected. Hundreds, if not thousands. Think about all the people who go missing and are never seen again.’

Gemma’s eyes widened. ‘Do you think some murderers get away with it?’

‘You’re joking. All the time.’

‘The perfect murder?’

‘I wouldn’t call it that. Getting rid of a body is no big deal. All it wants is some planning. In my job, for instance, I visit building sites, roadworks, motorways. When the foundations go down, they have to be approved. I get to know when a piece of ground is ready to be laid over with a few tons of cement. Come to that, I’ve surveyed old cemeteries that are getting turned into car parks and supermarkets. Who’s going to know?’

‘You’ve still got to get on the site and bury the body. I wouldn’t care for that,’ Gemma said.

‘Better than keeping it in your front room.’

She laughed. ‘Well, yes, but there must be easier ways.’

‘I’m sure there are. Take Jo’s job.’

‘What?’ Jo said. She’d been listening to this and wishing Rick would shut up. ‘This is nothing to do with me. He’s not my boss.’

‘She works in a garden centre,’ he told Gemma as if she didn’t know already. ‘All she has to do is stick him in a raised flowerbed in one of the glasshouses and cover him with compost. You can get stuff to rot anything down. He’ll be pushing up next summer’s bedding plants and no one will be any the wiser.’

‘That’s ridiculous,’ Jo said.

‘She’d find it difficult on her own,’ Gemma said.

‘You’d help her, wouldn’t you?’ Rick said. ‘It’s your boss we’re knocking off.’

Gemma exchanged a look with Jo that said, some men never know where to draw the line. ‘I meant it wouldn’t be easy moving his mortal remains.’

‘What are those little carts for that they have in garden centres?’

Gemma burst out laughing again.

Jo had heard more than enough. ‘If you think I’d risk my job to carry out your crazy scheme, you’re nuts.’

‘Lighten up, babe,’ Rick said. ‘I was only using you as an example. Who knows? You might need our services if your boss turns nasty. We’d better think up a team name.’

‘The Cretins?’ Jo said.

‘I was thinking the Headhunters.’

Gemma said, ‘Neat.’

Rick gave her a smile and continued stirring. ‘Between us, we’ve got it made. Take Jake, for instance. I expect he goes out in a boat looking at his waterfowl. I guarantee he knows places where you could shove a body overboard and it would stay there. What do you reckon, Jake?’

Jake appeared to ponder the matter for a while. Finally, he said, ‘I don’t dance.’

A real conversation-stopper.

Rick frowned. ‘Get with it, mate. We’re dumping a body.’

‘No problem, Jake,’ Gemma said. ‘Jongleurs is a comedy club as well. You can sit and have a laugh. And if we do some dancing no one’s going to notice you. It’s too crowded.’

‘Don’t know about that,’ Rick said. ‘He would stand out in a crowd.’

Gemma giggled again. It seemed unkind.

Jo said, ‘We don’t have to go dancing. We could see a film.’

‘Bor-ing,’ Rick sang out.

‘You haven’t even checked what’s on.’

‘March of the Penguins,’ Jake said at once, belying the impression that he was slow.

‘That’s a documentary, isn’t it?’ Rick said. ‘Came out yonks ago.’

‘I didn’t see it,’ Jo said. ‘It’s supposed to be a classic.’

‘What else is on?’ Rick said. ‘There must be something better than a line of bloody penguins walking across the screen.’

‘It’s good,’ Jake said.

‘What-the penguin film?’ Rick said. ‘How do you know, mate? Have you seen it?’

Jake nodded.

‘You wouldn’t want to see it again, then.’

‘Would.’

‘Oops, I’m forgetting. Hands up anyone who wants to look at the penguins with the bird man of Chichester.’

Jo hesitated. She’d become increasingly irritated by Rick’s attempts at humour. She said, ‘If you and Gemma would rather see something else, maybe we can all meet up after.’

A pivotal moment. Rick looked shocked, Gemma disbelieving. To Jo it seemed obvious that she wasn’t making a play for Gemma’s Neanderthal boyfriend, and at this minute she didn’t care what Rick thought. Besides, Gemma hadn’t declared yet. She had the chance of seeing the penguins if she chose.

Rick recovered enough to say, ‘Fair enough, but count me out. Don’t know about you, Gemma, but I’d like to find out what else is on.’

‘Suits me,’ Gemma said.

SO IT WAS that Jo found herself seated next to Jake in a dark, almost empty cinema. He watched the film intently. Jo, too, was absorbed in the drama of the penguins’ long treks across the ice. It was only towards the end that her attention strayed as she tried to think of her strategy for when the lights came on. She couldn’t get up and walk away. The others had gone to see the latest Russell Crowe on Screen 3 and she’d noticed the running time was at least an hour longer than the penguins.

‘Amazing,’ she said after the credits had rolled. ‘What an existence.’

‘Migration,’ Jake said.

‘I know, but under those conditions.’

‘They get on with it.’

‘Yes, I suppose it’s a mistake to think of them in human terms, but I can’t help sympathising with them. How about you?’

‘I’d like-’ Jake said, and stopped.

‘Yes?’ She almost completed it for him by saying, ‘A drink?’

‘-to turn off the commentary.’

She had to think for a moment. ‘But it needs explaining to people, doesn’t it, or we wouldn’t appreciate the distances they march and the reasons?’

‘I can watch the pictures.’

‘True, but… ’

‘Don’t need the voiceover.’

‘I suppose it would grate a bit if you’ve seen the film before.’

‘Five times.’

‘Five?’ She laughed and Jake gave a faint smile. Next time you’d better take earplugs. Do you fancy a bite to eat? After all that ice and snow I’d like to get something warm inside me. The others won’t be out for some time.’

He thought about that and gave a nod.

They went to Frankie amp; Benny’s, where the music was from the fifties. A Johnny Mathis CD was playing.

‘How did you and Gemma meet?’ Jo asked.

‘Print job,’ he said, as if that explained all. She wasn’t going to get the romantic version, for sure.

‘I think that boss takes advantage of her,’ she said. ‘He leaves all the decisions to her and if there’s any credit going, he takes that for himself. I wonder if she’ll leave.’