Mark Billingham - Death Message

‘I bet the baby keeps her busy.’

‘Chloe’s three ,’ Holland said.

‘You know what I mean.’

Holland looked like he hadn’t the faintest idea. He went to the toilet, and stopped at the counter on his way back to get them both tea.

‘Christ, you’ll be thinking about schools any minute.’

‘Already started, mate.’

‘Anywhere decent round your place?’

‘Sophie wants to get out of London.’ Holland looked down, stirred his tea.

‘OK.’ Thorne wondered how long that idea had been floating around; if it was more than just an idea. ‘You not keen?’

Holland shrugged, certainly not keen on talking about it.

‘Well, hopefully she’s less pissed off with me these days,’ Thorne said. Holland was about to reply, but Thorne stopped him. ‘It’s fine, I know what she thinks. It doesn’t matter.’

‘Why “these days”?’

‘Well, I’m not leading you into quite so much trouble.’ Holland’s face darkened a little, so Thorne tried to lighten things, beckoning with a finger across the table. ‘Not luring you towards the shadows…’

They said nothing else until they got up to leave, when Holland stood waiting for Thorne to get his jacket on, and said: ‘What makes you think you were leading me anywhere ?’

With no further news of any sort, Thorne was tense and jumpy by the end of the day. Unaware of quite how much he needed a drink until it was suggested. He happily joined Stone, Holland and Karim on their way across to The Oak, but when Kitson caught up with him in the pub’s car park he let the others go on ahead.

‘Where’ve you been all day?’ she asked.

‘Trying to stay invisible,’ Thorne said. ‘Why are you so horribly full of yourself?’

‘My mystery woman called again.’

‘Told you she would.’

‘And she’s not a mystery any more…’

‘Go on then.’

‘Harika Kemal.’

Thorne took a second. ‘Sedat’s girlfriend? The one who was in the toilet?’ Kitson nodded. Thorne twisted his face into a parody of confusion.

‘Fuck knows,’ Kitson said. ‘I’m bringing her in for a chat tomorrow and we’ll find out.’

‘Sounds like something to celebrate, though.’

‘God, yes.’ They walked towards the entrance. ‘What about you?’

‘Let’s stick with good news…’

Inside, The Oak was busy for a midweek evening with the noisiest and smokiest pockets indicating the presence of the men and women from the Peel Centre and Colindale, the majority of the pub’s regular clientele. The ‘traditional’ atmosphere and drab decor had remained unchanged for as long as Thorne could remember, thanks to a landlord who now understood that his customers’ tastes did not run far beyond beer and simple pub grub. He had occasionally tried to ring the changes, but usually with little success. A quiz night had ended in a brawl. Two weeks earlier there had been a karaoke evening in the back bar, but two rat-arsed constables caterwauling their way through ‘I Fought the Law’ had forced several of the most hardened drinkers to make an early night of it.

Thorne and Kitson got in their drinks and joined Holland and the others. They congratulated Kitson on the break in her case, wished her luck with her interview, but nobody raised a glass just yet. That would have to wait until she’d made an arrest.

‘What’s it been, then?’ Kitson said. ‘Four, five days, since the last message from Brooks?’

Thorne took a healthy gulp of beer. ‘Five. The Skinner clip.’

‘That might be the lot. He’s got a couple of the bikers, a copper he thinks is responsible for fitting him up. Maybe he’s called it a day.’

‘Maybe…’

‘How much revenge can anyone want?’

‘Depends how much they’ve suffered.’

‘It’s not going to bring back his girlfriend, is it? Or his kid.’

‘Imagine they were your kids,’ Thorne said.

When Brigstocke arrived, the group shuffled around the table to make room, and began to let off steam. They joked about a recent court case which had seen a man prosecuted, having taken payment from a mentally disturbed woman in return for promising to kill her, and then failing to honour the contract.

Karim said it was a waste of money, that somebody in the CPS needed shooting. Stone wondered, while they were on the subject, how much it was costing to play nursemaid to a bunch of ‘hairy-arsed drug dealers’. Holland said that if they really wanted to talk about waste, they should do something about the time and energy he’d had to spend over the past two days filling in mandates and fucking requisition forms. That it was small wonder they weren’t solving more cases…

Stone raised his glass. ‘Here’s your answer, matey. They’ve done research proving that alcohol – in moderation, obviously – can help you think more clearly. I swear. They should just let us all have a drink or two during the day.’ There was laughter, a couple of small cheers from around the table. ‘I’m telling you… stick a beer barrel in the Incident Room, a few optics by the coffee machine, and watch the clear-up rates go through the fucking roof.’

Next to him, Thorne felt Kitson jump when Brigstocke banged his glass down on the table. ‘Don’t talk like a cunt, Andy. Fuck’s sake…’

Everyone watched, dumbstruck, as Brigstocke stood up and stalked away towards the bar. Stone sniggered awkwardly, Karim raised his eyebrows at Holland, and the others shrugged or stared into their drinks.

Thorne got up to follow Brigstocke, but thought better of it halfway there, and made for the exit instead. Outside, in the doorway, he used his prepay phone to call Louise. Told her he was having just the one more, and that he wouldn’t be back too late.

The bell had rung half an hour earlier to clear out the civilians, and Thorne had decided that one more drink couldn’t hurt. He guessed Louise would be in bed now anyway; hoped she wouldn’t think he was avoiding her, after what had happened the night before.

Was he avoiding her?

Kitson had left well before last orders. She wanted to say goodnight to her kids, and sort out the next day’s interview with Harika Kemal. Brigstocke was ensconced in a corner with Stone. Thorne hoped everything was OK, but the conversation looked pretty animated. He had drunk three pints of Guinness but had taken them slowly, in halves. He knew he’d be OK to drive home.

He heard his mobile ringing, reached for his jacket, dug around, but missed the call. He was looking at the details when it rang again in his hand: Bannard.

‘You got Cowans’ mobile number for me?’ Thorne asked.

‘I don’t think that phone’s working any more,’ Bannard said. ‘It got a bit wet…’

Thorne listened, and when the call was finished, he walked across to the bar. Holland was already there, reaching for a fresh pint. ‘They found Martin Cowans,’ he said. ‘Pulled him out of the canal, a few miles up from where we were this morning.’

‘Fuck.’ Holland pushed himself away from the bar. ‘Are we on?’

Thorne was already turning for the door. ‘Poor sod didn’t even make it as far as the coconuts,’ he said.

Hello babe,

Am I in trouble? I feel guilty enough…

I could always tell, the second I’d walked through the door, when I’d pissed you off about something. You had that look, you know? The one that told me I was in the shit, but wanted me to start guessing exactly what it was I’d done wrong.

Seriously, I do feel strange about last night, about what I felt, watching that twisted little fucker. What he was getting. It sounds like something you’d hear someone say in one of those soap operas you always had on, but afterwards, I felt dirty for what I’d been thinking. Really fucking hated myself… still feel like I let you down.