Dance of Ghosts (26 page)

She shook her head again. ‘I can’t even
begin
to imagine how you must have felt. It must have been unbearable.’

I sipped my drink.

‘How do you do it, John?’ Bridget asked quietly. ‘How do you keep going when something like that happens?’

‘I don’t know …’ I shrugged. ‘I suppose you either keep going or you don’t … I nearly didn’t.’

‘Really?’

I nodded. ‘I pretty much fucked myself up for about a year after Stacy was killed. I just … I just couldn’t live with it. I was drunk all the time …’ I looked at the whisky in my glass, then glanced up at Bridget, half-smiling. ‘I mean, I know I still drink too much now, but back then I’d start first thing in the morning and just keep going until I passed out. And I wasn’t just drinking either. I was doing all kinds of shit – coke, speed, grass, downers … anything. I even started snorting heroin for a while. I didn’t care what I did. As long as it took me away from myself … as long as it took me away from the reality of Stacy’s death, that’s all I cared about.’ I drank some more. ‘I was looking for oblivion.’

‘What made you stop?’ Bridget said.

‘I don’t know, really … I probably
wouldn’t
have stopped if it hadn’t been for a friend of my father’s, a man
called Leon Mercer. Leon had kept in touch with me after my father’s death, and we’d got to know each other quite well … which was kind of weird, actually, because I’d gone out with his daughter for a while when I was about seventeen, eighteen, so he’d been my girlfriend’s father, and boys are always frightened of their girlfriends’ fathers, aren’t they?’

‘Yeah, I know what you mean,’ Bridget said, smiling. ‘My dad used to scare the shit out of any boyfriends I brought home.’

I nodded, taking another drink of whisky. ‘Anyway, Leon kind of kept an eye on me after my father died, and then when Stacy was killed and I started drinking and everything … well, my life was a complete mess. I lost my job, I lost most of my decency, I lost whatever sense of purpose I might once have had … I lost just about everything. But Leon still kept in touch, kept ringing me up and coming round to see me, and I was probably really fucking horrible to him, just like I was really fucking horrible to everyone else, but Leon didn’t give up. He didn’t try to
change
me or anything, he just kept
being
there for me, looking out for me … caring for me.’

‘He sounds like a good man.’

‘Yeah, he is …’ I said thoughtfully. ‘He really is. When he came to me one day and offered me a job with his private investigation business, I was so fucked up I could barely walk, let alone work. And Leon
knew
that. And he also knew that I didn’t know anything about investigation work, and that I’d probably turn down his offer anyway – which I did at first – but, despite all that, he still made the
offer. And after I’d turned it down, he just told me to think about it, and that if I changed my mind, the offer would still be there … and a couple of weeks later, after I’d cleaned myself up a bit, I
did
change my mind … and that was it, really. Leon took me on, took me under his wing, started teaching me everything he knew about the business, and I gradually started living some kind of life again.’

Bridget nodded. ‘And you stopped looking for oblivion?’

‘Most of the time, yeah.’

She glanced at the drink in my hand.

I shrugged. ‘I still feel the need for some shadows now and then.’

She smiled sadly.

I ran my fingers through my hair, feeling the numbness of my scalp, imagining the skull beneath the skin … that eyeless shell, cold and white … that lifeless lump of bone that guards our life yet forever signifies death …

Walter groaned, stretching his legs, and as Bridget patted his flank, he let out a tiny fart. Bridget smiled – the smile of an embarrassed child – and I couldn’t help smiling too as Walter turned and craned his neck, giving his backside a slightly bemused sniff.

‘Charming, isn’t he?’ Bridget said.

‘Yep,’ I said. ‘He’s a classy guy, all right.’

She laughed.

I drank some more.

The telephone rang.

I leaned down, picked it up off the floor, dropped it, and picked it up again. ‘Hello?’

‘Is that Mr Craine?’ a female voice said.

‘Who’s this?’

‘John Craine?’

‘Who are you?’

‘My name’s Eileen Banner, I’m from the
Sun
. I was wondering if –’

‘Shit,’ I muttered, putting the phone down and disconnecting it.

‘Is something the matter?’ Bridget asked.

‘That was a reporter from the
Sun
,’ I told her, pulling my mobile from my pocket as it started to ring. The screen read
UNKNOWN SENDER
. I cut off the call and turned off the phone. ‘This is what I meant earlier on,’ I said to Bridget. ‘You know … about this affecting you.’

‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘The press, TV people … now that Bishop’s thrown them a bone they’re all going to be after me like dogs. I can keep the phones turned off, and I can keep away from my office, but sooner or later they’re going to start coming round here. And if I don’t talk to them, which I won’t, they’ll just go looking for someone else … you, for example.’

‘Me?’ Bridget frowned. ‘But I don’t know anything –’

‘You don’t have to
know
anything. The media don’t give a shit about
knowing
anything. All they ever want is something to talk about, something to write about … it doesn’t matter what it is.’ I looked at Bridget. ‘If they come round here, and you open the door, they’re going to link you with me whatever you say, or don’t say … and the next thing you know you’ll be “the mysterious blonde now
living with the husband of the serial killer’s first victim”, and everyone’s going to want to know all about you.’

Bridget just shrugged. ‘So I won’t open the door.’

I looked at her, struggling to focus now, and I wondered if I should warn her about the possibility of the media picking up on her resemblance to Stacy. And as I thought about that, I suddenly realised that not only was she roughly the same height and shape as Stacy, with the same short blonde hair and blue eyes, but she was also about the same age that Stacy would have been …

‘Are you OK, John?’ she said to me.

‘What?’

‘You don’t look so good …’

‘Uh, yeah …’ I mumbled. ‘I think I’m a bit …’

‘Drunk?’

I smiled. ‘Yeah … sorry. I didn’t mean to … I was just …’

‘Looking for shadows?’

‘Probably, yeah … something like that. But look –’

‘It’s all right,’ she said, getting to her feet and coming over to me. ‘I won’t answer the door to anyone I don’t know, I won’t talk to anyone, and I’ll try not to let anyone take any pictures of me. But I’m not going to move out or anything, OK?’

‘Yeah, no … I didn’t mean that –’

‘Whatever happens, I’ll deal with it.’

‘Keep your curtains closed.’

‘Stop worrying, I’ve got it all in hand.’ She was leaning over me now, helping me out of the chair. ‘You need to go to bed.’

‘Yeah, sorry …’

‘And stop saying sorry.’

‘Sorry,’ I grinned.

‘Come on, up you get.’

I don’t really remember the rest of it. I have a vague recollection of being slightly embarrassed as Bridget took me into the bedroom and helped me into bed, but I’m not quite sure what I was embarrassed about. I assume that part of it was simply that I felt so stupid about being so drunk, but I’ve got a feeling that there was more to it than just that. There was the touch of Bridget’s hand on my arm as she helped me into the bedroom, and then the dimly dawning realisation that I was in my bedroom with Bridget, and that she was putting me to bed … and that I didn’t know what was going to happen next. What did she want to happen? What did I want? What did she expect? Something? Anything? Nothing?

It was an embarrassing train of thought.

But nothing happened.

Almost nothing.

I remember her whispering, ‘Go to sleep … I’ll see you later.’

And then I felt her lips on mine – a brief but gentle kiss.

And it moved me. It made me want to be with her, to hold her, to have her hold me. And with the touch of her lips still sweet on mine, I reached out for her …

But she’d already gone.

It was dark when I woke up, and it took me a minute or two to work out where I was, what day it was, what time it was … why I was lying in bed, fully dressed, with an aching head and a bone-dry mouth and a familiarly sour taste in the back of my throat … and then I remembered.

‘Shit,’ I groaned, looking at the clock beside the bed.

The LED display read 19:32.

‘Fuck.’

I got out of bed, went to the bathroom, then into the kitchen for a glass of water and four paracetamols. I lit a cigarette and went into the front room. The lights were off, the curtains closed (did I do that?). I reached out for the light switch … and paused. I was beginning to remember everything now, and as I stumbled through the dimness over to the window, I could hear myself slurring drunkenly to Bridget about the press and the TV people –
now that Bishop’s thrown them a bone they’re all going to be after me like dogs
, I’d told her.
I can keep the phones turned off, and I can keep away from my office, but sooner or later they’re going to start coming round here …

I stood to the side of the window, pulled back the edge of the curtain, and glanced outside. Across the street, a handful of reporters and a TV crew were hanging around
by a streetlight at the far end of the factory wall. I watched them for a while, then closed the curtain and stepped back from the window.

‘Shit.’

I remained motionless for a minute, digesting what I’d just seen, then I inched open the curtain again and took another quick look. I got the impression that they’d been there for some time, which either meant that they were waiting for me to come out, or that they didn’t know I was in and they were waiting for me to come home. And from the way some of them kept glancing up and down the street, I guessed it was the latter. They’d probably arrived a few hours ago, and they’d probably rung the bell and been hammering on the door, and in my drunken stupor I simply hadn’t heard anything. And with the curtains closed, and no one answering, they must have assumed that I was out.

I wondered where Bridget was …

And what she thought of all this.

And me.

What did she think of me?

And did I care?

I went out into the hallway and stood at the bottom of the stairs, gazing up into the darkness. No lights, no sounds …

‘Bridget?’ I called out.

No reply.

‘Bridget?’ A little louder this time.

Still no reply. And no barking either. Which either meant that she was out somewhere with Walter, or that they were both up there pretending to be out. Either way, there was no point in me going up.

I went back into my flat, put on my shoes and coat, then went out into the backyard. It was a cold night, the air damp and sullen under a starless black sky, and as I headed down the pathway towards the back wall, I realised it must have been raining quite heavily while I was asleep. Bushes were dripping in the darkness, the path was scattered with the debris of a hard downpour – washed-up soil, slugs, worms, bits of stick – and the sodden earth was alive with the sound of tiny wet things clicking and popping.

At the end of the path, I clambered up onto an old metal bin, hoisted myself over the wall, and dropped down into my neighbour’s backyard. It was a yard that had evolved over the years into a flagstone shanty town of broken sheds and greenhouses all cobbled together with discarded wooden doors and acres of corrugated plastic sheeting. The sheds, I knew, were packed with crates and rusty tools and scraps of wood rescued from skips, and the greenhouses were piled high with empty seed trays and plant pots.

There was no one around. It was
EastEnders
time – or
Coronation Street
or
Emmerdale –
and the deaf old man who lived here would be stuck in front of his TV, just like everyone else, engrossed in a world of twisted love and daily disasters …

I made my way round the back of the house to a bin-cluttered alley that led me out into the street that runs parallel to mine. It looked almost identical to my street – the same terraced houses, the same frontyards, the same cracked pavements lined with too many parked cars … the only thing missing was a handful of reporters and a TV crew.

I lit a cigarette and headed for the nearest taxi rank.

Leon Mercer lived with his wife, Claudia, in a grey-walled four-storey house in a secluded avenue at the edge of town. It was a pleasant area, the gardens well-tended and the broad pavements planted with lime trees, and as I got out of the taxi and headed up a block-paved driveway towards Leon’s house, I remembered the first time I’d ever been here. It was about a month or so after I’d started going out with Imogen. I was seventeen years old then, anxiously visiting my girlfriend’s home for the first time, scared to death that I’d do something wrong, or say something stupid, or that her parents just wouldn’t like me. And I remember feeling quite intimidated by the size and relative splendour of the house. I didn’t know much about Leon Mercer then, but I knew that he was a police officer, like my father, and I was pretty sure that they were both the same rank, and so I couldn’t understand why we lived in a modest semi-detached house in a very average street while the Mercers had a four-storey detached place in one of the wealthiest parts of town. I found out later that the house actually belonged to Claudia Mercer, a gift from her father, who’d made a pile of money from a string of retail sports shops …

I’d reached the front door now – a huge oak thing, set in an old stone porchway. I rang the bell and waited. A cold rain had begun to fall, and in the bright-white glare of security lights blazing from houses along the avenue, I could see the twist of yellowed leaves fluttering in the wind. There was a hint – perhaps imagined – of bonfire smoke and fireworks in the air, and as I stood there in the autumn
night, the distant memories of childhood Guy Fawkes’ nights drifted into my mind. Black horizons arced with rocket lights and starburst blooms … jumping jacks, roman candles, catherine wheels … a roaring bonfire, snapping and popping and crackling, the glowing red embers drifting up into the night …