Michael Robotham - Suspect

The small bedside table is stacked high with ring-bound notebooks. I take the top one and open it. Neat, concise handwriting fills each page. The left-hand margin logs the time and date. Alongside are details of my movements, including places, meetings, duration, modes of transport, relevance… It is a how-to manual of my life. How to be me!

There is a sound on the deck above my head. Something is being dragged and poured. I switch off the light and sit in darkness, trying to breathe quietly. Someone swings through the hatch into the saloon. He moves through to the galley and opens cupboards. I lie on the floor, squeezed between the bulkhead and the end of the bed, feeling my pulse throbbing at the base of my jaw.

The engine starts up. The pistons rise and fall, then settle into a steady rhythm. I see Bobby's legs through the portholes and feel the boat pitch as he steps along the sides, casting off the lines.

I glance toward the galley and saloon. If I move quickly I might be able to get ashore before he comes back to the wheelhouse. I try to stand and knock over a rectangular frame leaning against the wall. As it topples, I manage to catch it with one hand. The painting is frozen momentarily in the light leaking through the curtains: a beach scene, bathing sheds, ice-cream stalls and a Ferris wheel. On the horizon, Charlie's stout, gray whale.

I fall backward with a groan, unable to make my legs obey me. They belong to someone else.

The narrow boat rocks again as the footsteps return. He has cast off the bowline. The engine is put into gear and we swing away from the mooring. Water slides along the hull. Pulling myself upward, I ease the curtain open a few inches and lift my face to the porthole. I can only see the treetops.

There is a new sound-a whooshing noise, like a strong wind. All the oxygen seems to disappear from the air. Fuel runs along the floor and soaks into my trousers. Varnished wood crackles as it burns. Fumes sting my eyes and the back of my throat. On my knees, I crawl down the boat into the gathering smoke.

Pulling myself through the U-shaped galley, I reach the saloon. The engine is close by. I can hear it thudding on the far side of the bulkhead. My head hits the stairs and I climb upward. The hatchway is locked from the outside. I slam my shoulder against it. Nothing moves. My hand feels heat through the door. I need another way out.

The air feels like molten glass in my lungs. I can't see a thing, but I can feel my way. On the benches in the workroom my fingers close around a hammer and a sharp, flat chisel. I retreat along the boat, away from the seat of the blaze, ricocheting off walls and hammering on the portholes with the hammer. The glass is reinforced.

Against the bulkhead in the cabin there is a small storage door. I squeeze through, flopping like a stranded fish until my legs follow me. Oily tarpaulins and ropes snake beneath me. I must be in the bow. I reach above my head and feel the indentation of a hatch. Running my fingers around the edge, I search for a latch, then try wedging the chisel into a corner and swinging the hammer, but the angle is all wrong.

The boat has started to list. Water has invaded the stern. I lie on my back and brace both my feet against the underside of the hatch. Then I kick upward… once, twice, three times. I'm screaming and cursing. The wood splinters and gives way. A square of blinding light fills the hold. I glance back as the petrol in the cabin ignites and a ball of orange flame erupts toward me. At the same moment, I drag myself upward into daylight, rolling over and over. Fresh air embraces me for a split second and then water wraps itself around me. I sink slowly, inexorably, screaming inside my head, until I settle in the silt. I don't think about drowning. I'll just stay down here for a while where it's cool and dark and green.

When my lungs start to hurt, I reach upward, grasping for handfuls of air. My head breaks the surface and I roll onto my back, sucking greedily. The stern of the boat has slipped under. Drums in the workroom are exploding like grenades. The engine has stopped, but the boat is turning slowly away from me.

I wade toward the bank, with mud sucking at my shoes and pull myself upward using handfuls of reeds. I ignore the outstretched hand. I just want to lie down and rest. My body twists. My legs bump over the edge of the canal. I am sitting on the deserted towpath. Giant cranes are silhouetted against gray clouds.

I recognize Bobby's shoes. He reaches under my arms and grabs me around the chest. I'm being lifted. His chin digs into the top of my head as he carries me. I can smell petrol on his clothes or maybe on mine. I don't cry out. Reality seems far away.

A scarf loops around my neck and is pulled tight, with a knot pressing into my windpipe. The other end is tied to something above me, forcing me up onto my toes. My legs jerk like a marionette because I can't get any purchase on the ground to stop myself from choking. I squeeze my fingers inside the scarf and hold it away from my throat.

We are in the courtyard of an abandoned factory. Wooden palettes are stacked against a wall. Sheets of roofing iron have fallen in a storm. Water leaks down the walls, weaving a tapestry of black-and-green slime. Bobby shifts away from me. His face is damp with sweat.

"I know why you're doing this," I say.

He doesn't answer. He strips off his suit jacket and rolls up the sleeves of his shirt as if there is business to be taken care of. Then he sits on a packing crate and takes out a white handkerchief to clean his glasses. His stillness is remarkable.

"You won't get away with killing me."

"What makes you think I want to kill you?" He hooks his glasses over his ears and looks at me. "You're a wanted man. They'll probably give me a reward." His voice betrays him. He isn't sure. In the distance I can hear a siren. The fire brigade is coming.

Bobby will have read the morning papers. He knows why I confessed. The police will have to reopen every case and examine the details. They will cross-reference the times, dates and places, putting my name into the equation. And what will they discover? That I couldn't have killed all of them. Then they'll begin to wonder why I confessed. And maybe-just maybe-they'll put Bobby's name into the same equation. How many alibis can he have tucked away? How well did he cover his tracks?

I have to keep him off-balance. "I visited your mother yesterday. She asked about you."

Bobby stiffens slightly and the pattern of his breathing quickens.

"I don't think I've met Bridget before, but she must have been very beautiful once. Alcohol and cigarettes aren't very kind to the skin. I don't think I met your father either, but I think I would have liked him."

"You know nothing about him." He spits the words.

"Not true. I think I have something in common with Lenny… and with you. I need to take things apart-to understand how they work. That's why I came looking for you. I thought you might help me figure something out."

He doesn't answer.

"I've got most of the story now-I know about Erskine and Lucas Dutton, Justice McBride and Mel Cossimo. But what I can't fathom is why you punished everyone except the person you hate the most."

Bobby is on his feet, blowing himself up like one of those fish with the poisonous spikes. He shoves his face close to mine. I can see a vein, a faint blue pulsing knot above his left eyelid.

"You can't even say her name, can you? She says you look like your father but that's not entirely true. Every time you look in the mirror you must see your mother's eyes…"

A knife is gripped between his fingers. He holds the point of the blade against my bottom lip. If I open my mouth it will draw blood. I can't stop now.

"Let me tell you what I've worked out so far, Bobby. I see a small boy, suckled on his father's dreams, but polluted by his mother's violence…" The blade is so sharp I don't feel a thing. Blood is leaking down my chin and dripping onto my fingers, still pressed against my neck. "He blames himself. Most victims of abuse do. He thought of himself as a coward-always running, tripping, mumbling excuses; never good enough, always late, born to disappoint. He thinks he should have been able to save his father, but he didn't understand what was happening until it was too late."