Stephen Leather - Nightfall

‘And said what? That he jumped to his death rather than talk about how he killed my parents? Chalmers already thinks I’m a vigilante killer after what happened to Underwood.’

‘The police will come, Jack. There were CCTV cameras, remember?’

‘They might not check if they’re sure it was suicide.’ He drained his glass. ‘Another whisky, darling,’ he called to the barmaid.

Jenny put a hand on his arm. ‘Jack, come on, you don’t have to do this.’

‘Do what?’

‘Drink like this. It isn’t helping.’

‘It’s making me feel better, and that’s what counts.’

‘You should have stayed and talked to the police,’ said Jenny. ‘They would have believed you.’

‘Only someone who’s never dealt with the cops would say that,’ said Nightingale. ‘Cops make mistakes like everyone else and, as I said, Chalmers is already gunning for me.’

‘You’re not a killer, Jack. You couldn’t kill somebody, not in cold blood.’

Nightingale smiled thinly. ‘You don’t know me, Jenny.’

‘I know you couldn’t deliberately kill somebody.’

‘I was in CO19, Jenny. I carried a gun. I was trained to kill people.’

‘There’s a world of a difference between firing a gun as an armed cop and pushing someone off a balcony. The police would understand that.’

‘Maybe,’ said Nightingale.

‘What’s wrong, Jack?’

The barmaid put a fresh glass of whisky in front of Nightingale and he nodded his thanks. ‘I don’t know. Maybe I’m just going crazy.’

‘You’re not crazy,’ she said. ‘A bit confused, maybe. And knocking back double whiskies isn’t helping.’

‘My father was crazy,’ said Nightingale. ‘Ainsley Gosling claimed to have done a deal with a devil and blew his head off with a shotgun. My mother, my birth-mother, was in an asylum for most of her life and hacked her wrists over dinner. So I’m the product of two people who were both clearly deranged. With DNA like that, what are the chances that I’m going to be normal? Pretty bloody slim, I’d say.’

‘You’re stressed out, that’s all.’

‘People keep telling me I’m going to hell, Jenny.’

‘It’s an expression. It’s just something people say. They don’t mean it literally.’

Nightingale shook his head. ‘No, they say it but it’s not them saying it. It’s like someone’s using them to get the message to me. My uncle wrote the words in blood in his bathroom and so did Barry O’Brien, and that night in the Chinese restaurant it was written in the fortune cookie.’ His words tumbled into one another, and he banged his glass on the bar.

‘It’s because Underwood said that to you before he died,’ said Jenny.

‘My subconscious is playing tricks with me? Is that what you really think?’

‘What’s the alternative, Jack? Messages from the grave? Spirits speaking through the living? The devil playing games with you?’

The barmaid glanced at them and Nightingale pointed at his empty glass. ‘I’m starting to think that maybe Chalmers is right,’ he said. ‘Maybe it is me.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I went to see Barry O’Brien and he’s dead. I went to see my aunt and uncle and they’re dead. Maybe…’ He lowered his head.

‘What, Jack? Maybe what?’

Nightingale sighed. ‘Maybe I did kill them,’ he whispered. ‘Maybe I killed them and blocked it out. Maybe two years ago I did kill Underwood. And maybe I pushed Harrison off the balcony and I’m blocking it now. Hysterical amnesia. Or my subconscious is just refusing to admit what happened. Look at it from Chalmers’s point of view. Barry O’Brien killed Robbie so I’d want him dead. George Harrison killed my parents so I’d want him dead. My uncle and aunt lied to me so I’d want to hurt them. I’ve got the motive, and I had the opportunity, and I was at all three crime scenes. And it started two years ago when Simon Underwood went flying through the window.’

‘Except you didn’t do it, Jack. You didn’t do any of it.’

‘But I don’t know that for sure, Jenny. Don’t you get it? The more I think about it, the more it feels like I might have done it.’

‘Are you saying you remember killing them?’

Nightingale shook his head. ‘No. It’s a feeling, not a memory. Like maybe I could have done it.’

‘Your mind’s playing tricks on you. It’s stress.’

The barmaid came over with another whisky and ice. Jenny ordered two black coffees. Nightingale reached for his glass but Jenny put her hand on his. ‘Take it slowly, Jack, please.’

‘You know what I’m thinking, don’t you?’

She nodded.

‘Maybe I’ve done this before,’ he said. ‘Maybe what’s happening now is a rerun of what I did to Simon Underwood. I get angry, I lash out, and then I block out the memories.’

‘I was with you today, Jack, remember?’

‘But you don’t know if I pushed Harrison or not.’

‘I know you’re not a killer, Jack.’

‘You think I’m not a killer – it’s not the same thing.’ He pulled his hand away and picked up his whisky.

The barmaid brought over the coffees and placed them on the bar. ‘You guys okay?’ she asked.

‘It’s been a rough day,’ said Jenny. She waited for the barmaid to leave, then leaned in to Nightingale. ‘It’ll work out, Jack. I promise.’

‘Jenny, you don’t know that. First rule of negotiating, don’t make promises you can’t keep. You don’t know it’ll work out. Look, today’s Monday and my birthday’s on Friday. Maybe at midnight on Thursday a devil’s going to reclaim my soul in which case I burn in hell for all eternity. Or maybe Gosling was just mad and I’m mad too and I’m going to spend the rest of my life in prison. Either way, it won’t work out.’

‘You don’t believe in this devil nonsense, do you?’

‘I wish I did,’ said Nightingale, ‘because at least that would explain what’s happening to me. Because if it isn’t the devil screwing with my life then maybe I’m doing it myself.’

‘You’re not a killer, Jack.’

‘I might be, Jenny. I might be. And that’s what scares me.’

‘You’re going to hell, Jack Nightingale,’ said Simon Underwood, his eye blazing with hatred.

‘How do you know my name?’ asked Nightingale. ‘I didn’t tell you my name. How do you know who I am?’ Underwood was wearing a dark pinstripe suit that fitted so well it could only have been made to measure. There was a gold Rolex on his left wrist, a gold signet ring on his right hand and a pair of designer glasses on his nose. He was in his forties with a touch of grey at the temples. He was holding a mobile phone and pointing it at Nightingale as if it was a gun. ‘How do you know my name?’ repeated Nightingale.

Underwood turned towards the window behind him. It ran from the floor to the ceiling and gave a panoramic view of the tower blocks of Canary Wharf, home to some of the world’s biggest financial institutions.

‘No!’ said Nightingale, knowing what would come next. ‘No!’ he screamed.

The phone that Underwood was holding began to ring. It was a regular ringtone, an insistent bell, and it got louder and louder until the sound was deafening. Nightingale opened his eyes and groaned as he groped for the phone on his bedside table and squinted at his bedside clock. It was eight o’clock in the morning. ‘Mr Nightingale, this is Alice Steadman. I didn’t wake you, did I?’

Nightingale sat up. His head was throbbing. He had drunk three double whiskies in the pub with Jenny and she’d driven him home where he’d finished off half a bottle of Macallan malt. ‘Who, sorry?’

‘Alice Steadman. From the Wicca Woman store in Camden.’