Matt Brolly - Dead Eyed

Over the years, Klatzky had been the only one who had tried to keep the group together. There had been the occasional impromptu reunion every few months after they’d graduated but the get-togethers had never been successful. They would initially start off well but after a few drinks it always became apparent that everyone was avoiding talking about Billy Nolan; it would reach the point where someone would mention his name just to break the tension.

Then the bad memories would return and the drinking would intensify until everyone reached a state of maudlin drunkenness which would occasionally descend into bouts of violence.

The others had all managed to put the Nolan incident behind them to one extent or another. Lambert knew getting the group together again would only reignite bad memories.

They caught a taxi from the long line of black cabs outside the station. ‘You’re a bit young to be students,’ said the rotund taxi driver, after being told their destination.

‘We’re alumni,’ said Lambert, his tone suggesting that all forms of communication between the driver and his two passengers should now cease. Lambert had only returned to Bristol occasionally over the last eighteen years, mainly for work. The city had transformed in that time but the changes had been gradual. Lambert couldn’t date any of the buildings. It was only when the taxi pulled up outside their destination that he felt a stab of nostalgia. Klatzky was almost tearful as they left the car.

‘Can’t you feel it in your bones, Mikey?’ he said, stretching his arms out as if he wanted to embrace the building.

Memories came to Lambert. Glimpsed images of the numerous nights out he’d enjoyed with his friends, of the girls he’d kissed, each memory tainted with the image of Billy Nolan, dead in his room.

Inside, Lambert had to produce his old warrant card before the grey-haired man behind the security desk would allow them entry into their old hall of residence. They took the unsteady lift to the fifth floor, Lambert enduring the odour which resulted from Klatzky’s lack of personal hygiene. ‘When did you last shower?’

‘I was out all night before I met you at Paddington.’

‘Of course you were,’ said Lambert. Lambert had yet to tell Klatzky about Terrence Haydon. Klatzky was in too fragile a state at the moment to take in the news that he’d once known the latest victim.

None of them had known Haydon well. He’d been an odd character who, like the report suggested, kept himself to himself. The other students had considered Haydon as somewhat of an eccentric. He’d studied Religious Studies and always carried a Bible with him, though Lambert could never recall him trying to push his views on anyone. He wasn’t even sure Haydon had been that religious. He couldn’t remember him being a member of the Christian Union.

Although the halls had been refurbished they looked essentially the same to Lambert. More memories came to him, mostly childish recollections of late-night drinking, water fights in the corridor, desperate early mornings of coffee-fuelled revision and the occasional romantic encounter. Klatzky was once again close to tears. Lambert knew the man’s hangover was intensifying his emotional response but it didn’t make it any easier to endure.

‘Why are we here, Mikey?’

‘I thought it would do good to reacquaint myself,’ said Lambert. He didn’t want to explain to Klatzky that he wanted to revisit the beginning from a professional viewpoint. He had been in his early twenties when Nolan’s life had been taken. Lambert had been just another dazed student at the time. Although it was nearly twenty years later, Lambert thought there might be the opportunity to see something afresh. Something he may have missed, or had not been looking for all those years before.

A middle-aged woman in a blue checked apron stopped them both. ‘Can I help you?’ she asked, in a deep West Country accent.

Lambert flashed his old warrant card. ‘I wanted to see Room 516,’ he said. When the cleaner showed him to a room halfway down the corridor Lambert realised the room numbers had been rearranged. The fifth floor had a rectangular corridor and Nolan’s room had been on the left-hand side corner with the window facing east onto the main road. Lambert followed his memory to where Nolan’s room should have been. On the door where Nolan had once lived hung a sign marked Storage Cupboard .

‘How long has this room been a cupboard?’ asked Lambert.

‘It’s always been a cupboard,’ said the woman.

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ said Klatzky indignantly.

‘Listen, I’ve only been working here six years, love,’ said the woman.

‘It’s fine, it’s fine,’ said Lambert. ‘Could we possibly look inside?’

‘Suit yourself,’ said the woman, producing a key. ‘I haven’t all day, mind you.’

Shelves full of cleaning material and crisp folded sheets filled out the room. It bore no resemblance to the untidy and poster-ridden room which had once been Billy Nolan’s. The change of use had destroyed the room’s potency. Lambert had feared he would be overcome with more memories of that day. Now it was hard to believe the incident had ever occurred in such a space.

‘Let’s go,’ said Klatzky. ‘This place is giving me the creeps.’ His eyes sagged towards his cheeks, his lips trembling beneath the random spikes of black and grey hair which sprung from his sallow face.

‘Simon, go and get a coffee or something down in the cafeteria. I’m going to have a look around. I’ll meet you in ten minutes.’

Klatzky slumped off towards the lift. Lambert thanked the cleaner who locked the store cupboard giving him a confused and pitiful look. Once Klatzky was inside the lift, Lambert walked up the stairs to the sixth floor. He made a full circuit of the floor but couldn’t summon the memory of where Haydon had resided. A nagging sense told him that Haydon had lived almost directly above Billy Nolan but he couldn’t be sure. It felt too much of a coincidence. Before joining Klatzky for coffee, Lambert called Bristol CID and asked to be put through to DI May.

‘Can I ask what it’s regarding?’ enquired a female voice on the other end of the line.

‘Tell her it’s about the Terrence Vernon case,’ said Lambert. Thirty seconds later a strong deep female voice said, ‘DI May, how can I help?’

Lambert explained his position, telling May he was a former police officer who had important information about the Vernon case. Lambert presumed May had already discovered that Terrence Vernon was originally called Terrence Haydon, but wasn’t about to discuss the matter over the phone.

‘Where are you now?’ asked May.

‘In Clifton.’

‘Okay, there’s a little café on The Triangle called Liberties. Could you meet me there at midday?’

‘Done,’ said Lambert.

Chapter 4

Klatzky sat alone in the student cafeteria, woefully out of place. Facedown, he nursed a small coffee occasionally giving the students a suspicious look. He was at once vulnerable and unsettling, and the café’s patrons subconsciously sat as far away from him as possible.

After Klatzky declined his offer of a second coffee, Lambert ordered a large black Americano from a young man behind the counter. Klatzky looked up at him with sullen eyes when he returned. ‘I thought I’d enjoy being here, Mikey, but there are way too many memories. Being here makes it feel like it happened yesterday. I can remember everything, what that sicko did to his body.’ Klatzky sipped at his coffee. ‘Christ, and the smell, Mikey. I can taste it now more than ever. Do you ever feel like that? It’s part of me now. The blood and the smell…what was that stuff called?’

‘The incense?’