Scott Mariani - The Bach Manuscript

‘He was virtually farming it,’ Forbes said. ‘Tell me, Mr Hope. How long has your friend been dealing drugs?’ He folded his arms smugly, as if he could already see the headline. Thames Valley police unmasks kingpin drug lord. ‘It’s obvious this was a deal gone bad. Happens all the time.’

‘You’re dead wrong, Forbes. He used the cannabis for arthritis pain. You can verify that with his doctor in about three seconds. He’d already tried every type of conventional medication going. But I can’t blame you for wanting to wrap this up nice and easy. That’s what a hack like you does best, isn’t it?’

Forbes turned a shade of purple. He took a step closer to Ben, which forced him to look up as he scrutinised Ben’s face. ‘Do I know you from somewhere?’

The fact was, while they’d been talking, Ben had remembered where he’d seen Forbes before. Take away the moustache, give him some more hair on top and knock off twenty-odd years, and the memory was as sharp in Ben’s mind as though it had happened yesterday. Ben allowed himself a cold smile as he played it back. He was pretty sure that Forbes’ colleague McAllister would enjoy the story. For the moment, he decided to spare Forbes the humiliation.

‘Something amusing you?’ Forbes said.

‘My friend just died. I’m not in a laughing mood.’

‘Then why are you looking at me like that?’

Ben leaned closer to him and sniffed. ‘Thought I could smell something. Must be my imagination.’

‘I’ve had enough of this nonsense,’ Forbes said. ‘Let me remind you, Mr Hope, that you’re trespassing on a crime scene. So I suggest you bugger off before I do pull you in for questioning.’

Ben melted Forbes with a long, hard glare that lingered so long that McAllister was starting to get edgy. There was nothing more to be said. Ben turned and walked away.

Outside, the police SOCO unit had erected a forensic tent over the railings. The ambulance had gone, and the broken glass on the pavement was all cleaned up. All that was left of Nick was the blood congealing in the gutter.

Ben walked slowly across the street to his car and drove back through the city of dreaming spires. By the time he stepped out of the Alpina in the college car park the first light of dawn was breaking, washing the trees of the meadow and the old limestone buildings of Christ Church with red and gold. The air was fresh and sweet, and Ben filled his lungs with it to try to flush out the sour taste of death and violence that wouldn’t go away. Maybe it never would.

As he made his way towards Old Library he paused in the cathedral cloister. Listening to the silence of the organ that Nick Hawthorne would never play again. It was too late to go to bed, and even if it hadn’t been, Ben knew he couldn’t have slept. He wondered if the killers were sleeping.

First Simeon and Michaela. Now Nick too. All gone. Ben was the last of the gang left.

Someone was going to wish he wasn’t.

The independent cinema off Cowley Road in east Oxford was called the Penultimate Picture Palace, and it was famous for several reasons: for belonging to a guy who was equally notorious for having a life-size replica shark sticking out of the roof of his house, and for screening the kinds of movies the corporate cinema chains didn’t show, like Bertolucci’s Last Tango in Paris .

Young Ben Hope didn’t care about sharks any more than he did about watching the middle-aged Marlon Brando dressed like a hobo act out sordid rape fantasies with a teenage Maria Schneider. What appealed to Ben about the PPP was that it was famous for being the kind of rough and ready joint where you could smoke and drink to your heart’s content and nobody would hassle you. And if you could survive the late-night walk back to college through the jungle of east Oxford without getting mugged or poisoned by the temptations of the kebab vans, it all made for a fine evening out.

At nineteen, he could already see that the world was changing. One day these places would be sanitised out of existence. Until then, he intended to experience them fully.

It was after pub closing time when Ben and Michaela left the cinema, along with the small crowd who’d just sat through the epic double bill screening of Fellini’s Roma and Satyricon back to back. Michaela’s choice of movies, because she was into all that arthouse stuff. Ben hadn’t objected. He had a pack of Woodbines and a quarter bottle of Teacher’s blended scotch, because his student allowance didn’t extend to the single malt stuff, and that had been plenty enough to keep him contented through the four-hour marathon even if he hadn’t been able to understand a damn thing that was going on. The night was warm and the stars were out, they were young and in love and they set off towards home at a slow walk, hand in hand, talking and laughing about stupid things.

He felt good in her company. It was a perfect moment for him and he wanted it to go on forever.

The bikers had gathered outside a fish and chip place on Cowley Road that was closing up for the night, munching greasy food out of paper wrapping and knocking back cans of lager as they stood around ogling their row of Harleys and Jap cruisers parked on the kerbside. Eight or nine of them, hanging tough. Studded leather and cut-off denims and long hair and tats, the whole works, designed to demonstrate what badass outlaws they were.

As Ben and Michaela ambled closer, she tugged his arm and looked at him with worried eyes that glistened in the streetlights.

‘Maybe we should cross to the other side.’

He chuckled. ‘What are you worried about?’

‘They look nasty.’

‘Don’t be silly. They’re all for show. The tattoos probably aren’t even real.’ He squeezed her hand reassuringly. They walked on. A couple of the bikers stared at Michaela. Ben looked at the motorcycles and wondered what it would be like to ride one.

Then a biker with a bushy beard and an overhanging gut called out raucously, ‘Show us yer tits, love.’ It must have been the best witticism his mates had heard all night, because the rest of them all fell about racked with mirth.

Michaela tugged at Ben’s arm again and she shrank close to him, wanting to quicken her step to get past them. But Ben slowed his. He gazed at the fat biker. ‘Why don’t I show you something else instead?’

What came next was more than Ben had intended to happen. But it couldn’t have worked better if he’d planned it that way. Still holding Michaela’s hand he stepped off the kerb, planted one foot against the side of the nearest motorcycle, and gave it a push. The machine toppled off its sidestand and fell over, bumping into the one next to it. Which fell also, and hit the one next to it in turn.

The bikers watched in dumbfounded horror as the entire row came crashing down in a perfect domino effect. Mirrors crunched. Handlebars twisted. Lovingly polished chrome exhausts scratched and dented. The worst disaster imaginable.

Michaela was boggling at Ben, almost as aghast as the bikers were. Scarcely able to believe what effect one little push could have, he burst out laughing. Which perhaps, in retrospect, was adding a touch too much insult to injury.

The fat biker let out a shrill scream. He dropped his beer can and went waddling over to rescue his Harley as if it were an infant trapped under the rubble of a collapsed house. The rest of his mates joined him, yanking at crumpled handlebars and cissy bars in a desperate attempt to disentangle and right their beloved machines. But everything was so badly locked together that they’d need a crane, and maybe an angle grinder too.