Dead in the Water (15 page)

“I’m really sorry, Kevin. It really was just a misjudgement. I’ve moved house and didn’t realise quite how long it would take me. I’ll allow more time next Friday.”

“Good.” Branston seemed to be mollified. He switched into his more normal organisational mode. “We’re one down in the kitchen. So keep an eye on the food queues. Hungry people don’t like to be kept waiting. And of course England are pretty much down and out of the World Cup, so who knows how that will affect people’s mood.”

“Sure.” Mullen moved off through the scrum of people. He had noticed on the BBC website that England had crashed to their second defeat the previous night. What with everything else going on in his life, it seemed totally irrelevant. But he knew from his own brief footballing career in the army how easily passions were raised and how much it hurt when your team lost.

“See the game last night?” It was Brian. Mullen liked him. He and his wife Jean were there every Friday doing their bit. He had a pack of loo rolls under his arm. “Urgent delivery!” he laughed. And then he was gone.

It was a subdued crowd that evening. Mullen put it down partly to depression resulting from England’s World Cup disaster. It had been a lovely day, the warmest of the week, and although that meant people were very happily smoking and chatting outside, everyone seemed rather flat. The only person who got excited about the food being slower than usual was a man called Terry who had diabetes and hence a very short fuse at meal times. Mullen got a roll off Jean and made him chew on it. He suspected that Terry was making the most of his condition to try and jump to the front of the queue. He wasn’t having that, but equally he didn’t want unnecessary trouble. He’d bring it up at the end-of-day team meeting in case there were better ways he could have handled it.

But apart from another blockage in the gents loo — this time a combination of a pair of pants and two plastic bags — it was a pretty uneventful evening. After the punters had gone and the clearing and cleaning up had been completed, the team settled down with cups of tea and debriefed.

Terry and Jean complained about the shortage of cloths and cleaning materials, but in general everyone seemed to be keen to get off home. Branston, who had been yawning intermittently through the meeting, called Mullen back as he prepared to leave.

“Hey,” he said. “I understand it was you who found Chris dead in the river.”

“Yeah.” Mullen could hardly deny it. That sort of information was bound to come out eventually, though he was surprised. No-one else at the Meeting Place had mentioned it, which meant that it surely wasn’t public knowledge. He wondered who Branston’s source was.

“That’s quite a coincidence,” Branston continued, looking askance at Mullen. “Do you want to tell me about it?”

Mullen shook his head. “Not really. Maybe after the coroner has passed judgement.”

Branston gave another yawn. His breath smelt of garlic and mints. But he hadn’t finished. “It must have been quite a surprise for you.”

“Looks like you need an early night,” Mullen replied, trying to change the subject.

Branston yawned again. “Ten out of ten for observation, Doug.” He pressed his shoulders back, flexing his arms. “Gina, my wife, wakes me up. She’s always waking up and then she turns on the lights and fusses about getting cups of tea and scanning the internet on her tablet. So I wake up too and then I can’t get back to sleep either.”

“Can’t the doctor prescribe something for her?” A thought was flitting elusively round Mullen’s brain.

“Of course. And they have done. But it’s a dangerous road. I don’t approve myself. You can easily become dependent on them. So Gina saves them for when she’s feeling desperate. As for me, I just move into the spare room when I need an uninterrupted night.”

Mullen paused. He was tempted to ask what drugs the doctor had prescribed for Gina Branston, but something held him back — caution or intuition — and then the opportunity was gone.

“Anyway, we are all done here,” Branston said with finality. “Time to go home.” He turned off the hall lights in order to drive home his point. “See you next week, Doug.”

Mullen nodded and said goodnight. His opportunity had gone, but his suspicions remained.

Chapter 8

The dream began in the usual way. He was back in the army and was opening the door into Ben’s bedroom. There was a smell of joss sticks, which was strange because Ben never burned joss sticks. He was sitting at his small table. The room was dark except for where his red, blue and white angle-poise lamp cast a glaring light down onto a book over which Ben was hunched. Mullen was puzzled. He walked over to the desk to see what the book was because Ben was not a reader of books.

“Hello, mate,” Ben said, turning his head. Mullen didn’t dare look at him because he knew what he would see. That black hole where his mouth and nose should be. He bent down and closed the book so that he could see what it was. An animal’s face stared out at him:
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
. Then he became aware of a ringing sound. Half awake, Mullen felt for his mobile and answered the call.

“Who’s that?”

“Fitz,” said a thick Glaswegian accent. “You said to ring. It’s about Chris.”

Mullen’s somnolent brain woke up, identifying the guy to whom he had given the last of his supply of cigarettes. “Yes?”

“You promised twenty quid.”

“OK. Where shall we meet?”

“There’s a good café in St Giles. In half an hour.”

“Half an hour? Not sure I can be there that soon.”

“I’ll wait outside.” He hung up.

* * *

Fitz was sitting on the pavement, legs crossed, eyes cast down and a cap laid upside down in front of him. There were half a dozen coins in the bottom, but only one of them was silver.

“Fitz?”

As soon as Mullen spoke, the man leapt to his feet with surprising alacrity, scooping up hat and money as he did so.

“Thought you weren’t coming.”

“You know what thought did,” Mullen replied, quoting something that his teacher Miss King used to say to him without ever explaining further.

“I’m hungry.”

A full English breakfast was clearly part of the deal as far as Fitz was concerned. Mullen didn’t mind. He ordered himself one too. It was a welcome change from Muesli. And as long as Fitz was waiting for and then eating his breakfast and drinking his tea, he was a captive audience.

“So, tell me about Chris.”

“Hungry,” Fitz said.

Doug shrugged and waited. Two mugs of tea were soon delivered, but Fitz remained sullen and silent. The teas were followed, with impressive speed, by two plates piled with the sort of fry-up a man would die for. Mullen dug in, pushing a fork piled high with bacon, egg, sausage and toast into his mouth. He shuddered with pleasure. He looked across at Fitz, who grunted rhythmically as he swallowed three mouthfuls of food in quick succession. At that rate, Mullen reckoned, he would be done and dusted within minutes and then out of the door. Maybe this was a mistake, another dead end up which he had been led. Fitz jerked his head up as if he had read Mullen’s thoughts and gave a toothy grin.

“He was a tight bastard.”

Fitz took another slug of tea from his mug and belched. Mullen sipped at his tea and waited.

“Tried to borrow off me. He pretended he was skint. I was stupid enough to give him a tenner, but I never got it back.”

“If he didn’t have any money, why do you say he was tight?”

Fitz pushed another fork-load of food into his mouth and chewed it more slowly, maybe spinning out his pleasure. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and looked across at Mullen again, this time without a trace of a grin.

“I was in Costa, the one in Queen Street. Some old lady took pity on me and bought me a coffee and a sandwich. Nice old girl. She even stopped and chatted for a while and watched my things while I went to the loo. But she said she had to catch her bus, so I sat tight for a bit longer, dragging it out for as long as I could. It was raining outside. Then I saw Chris. He was coming down the circular stairs and he paused halfway down. He had a wodge of notes in his hand. He was counting them — there were twenty at least, I’d say.”

“What value were the notes?” Mullen had begun to wonder if Fitz was just giving him a run for his money, making up a good story to ensure he got the promised reward. Asking about the detail seemed a better way of finding out the truth than challenging him directly.

“Twenties,” Fitz said instantly. “I reckoned he must have had the best part of five hundred quid with him.”

“Did you speak to him?”

“No.”

“Why ever not? You could have asked for your tenner back couldn’t you?”

Fitz returned to his food, shovelling in a couple more mouthfuls. Then he drained his mug and leant back in his chair. “You promised me twenty quid.”

Mullen opened his wallet and removed three ten-pound notes, but he didn’t hand them over. “Why didn’t you speak to Chris in Costa? Or follow him outside?”

“I was going to.” Fitz belched and then licked the fingers of his left hand. “I stood up and got my clobber. But there was a guy coming down the stairs a few steps behind him. I knew him — sort of. When he got to the bottom, he spotted me. He came over and said ’hello,’ so I had to ask him how he was and all that stuff and by the time we’d finished Chris was out of sight.”

“Who was he, this guy?”

Fitz said nothing. He had returned to his breakfast, shovelling it in as if he was in ‘Cinderella’ and the clock had started to strike twelve.

“Who was he?” Mullen repeated quietly, leaning forward.

Fitz picked up a final piece of toast in his fingers and wiped it around his plate, determined not to waste even a smear.

“Kevin,” he said eventually. “Runs the drop-in down in Cowley. I used to go there, but I prefer to stay in town now. Gatehouse, Archway. They’re better. More convenient.”

“Describe him,” Mullen said. Not that he needed a description of his boss at the Meeting Place, but it was a way of checking if Fitz was for real or not.

“Round face. Dark hair.” Fitz chuckled. “I think he was a bit offended I’d stopped coming to his place.”

“Did he speak to Chris as he came downstairs?”

Fitz shrugged and began to pull his anorak on. “Don’t think so.” He stood up. “I reckon I’ve earned my money, and more.” He held out his hand.

Mullen nodded towards the counter. “See the guy there. I’m giving thirty quid to him. He’ll keep it on a tab for you. It’ll buy you a few good meals.”

Mullen didn’t get up, but he tensed himself nevertheless because it was impossible to know how Fitz would react. It would have been much easier to give Fitz the cash and let him spend it on booze or drugs, but that went against Mullen’s code. “I thought that would be a good way of keeping the money safe for you,” he said, trying to head off any trouble. “No-one can nick it from you when you’re asleep.”

Fitz didn’t reply. He turned away, pushing past a student who had just entered the cafe. He was angry, but Mullen was pretty sure he’d come back when he was hungry.

* * *

Mullen didn’t know Branston’s address, but he knew he cycled to work on a not very flash bike, so the chances were he lived locally. A search for the name Branston on his smart phone (Mullen was gradually getting smarter in its use) came up with just two results and only one of these could possibly be Kevin: KL Branston, living in Crescent Road, Oxford. It didn’t ring a bell with Mullen, whose knowledge of the city was curate’s-eggish. But BT provided a convenient ‘Map’ link and within moments Mullen could see it was a long straggling road in Temple Cowley. He studied the surrounding streets for several seconds, imprinting the area in his brain, before stuffing his phone in his pocket and striding off down St Aldates in search of his car. He had briefly considered ringing Branston to see if he was in — he had his mobile number in case of work issues — but he had dismissed the idea almost instantly. He wanted to apply pressure and he reckoned that appearing unannounced on his doorstep would be a good way of doing that, especially if his wife was at home.

The house was stuck in the middle of a long terrace — red Victorian brick, white sash windows with peeling paint, dark blue door with cobwebs above it, a single bike (Kevin’s) chained to a metal bar bolted to the wall. A woman opened the door almost immediately — maroon tracksuit, unbrushed brown hair and grey eyes set inside dark rings of exhaustion, medication or both.

“Mrs Branston?”

She nodded.

“I work with Kevin. Is he in?”

She frowned as if the question was too hard. She leant forward and looked up the road. “Gone to the shops.” Mullen followed her gaze, but could see only a couple of people and they were women with buggies. “He’ll be back,” she said and withdrew inside, leaving the door open behind her. Mullen took this as an invitation and followed her along a short corridor that led into a long kitchen diner. The near end was the kitchen and every surface was covered with stuff — mostly food (packets, boxes, tins, jars, bottles), but also with books, newspapers, a large grey fairy holding flowers which had been painted a variety of yellow and orange hues, a brass hand-bell and an assortment of kitchen implements and machines.

Mrs Branston went over to the surface to the left of the cooker, pushed some things aside and switched on a kettle.

“I’m Doug,” he said.

She turned and looked at him. She had a half-smile on her face, but she emanated sadness. “Gina.” She ran her eyes up and down him slowly, as if she was uncertain as to who or what he was. She pursed her lips. “I could paint you,” she said and turned back to the kettle.

Mullen moved a couple of steps deeper in. The far end of the room, he now realised, was populated with her painting equipment, though in a more ordered manner: an easel with a blank canvas on it; boxes of what he took to be oil paints laid out on a long flat trestle table which stood along the left-hand wall; brushes and pallet knives; a plate of fruit and a couple of small blue and white vases which he imagined may have been the subject of a still-life; jam jars and bottles of linseed and white spirit. All the paraphernalia was there, but no sign of any painting in progress.

“I could paint you naked,” she continued, talking to the wall, “but Kevin is a bit of a prude.”

Mullen wasn’t sure how to react. He looked around. There was only one painting on the walls; it hung over the trestle table. He went and stood in front of it: a head and shoulders portrait of a younger, thinner Kevin, half-turned towards the artist, yet avoiding her gaze, looking beyond her. It was the sort of pose that photographers favour, endowing their subject with a distant, thoughtful look. But in this case, with the sharp differentiation of dark and light around Kevin’s features, Mullen thought he could see something else, a shiftiness, an inability to look his wife squarely in the eye. Or was that his own interpretation, based on his own suspicions with regard to Branston and Diana Downey?

“Sit down.”

Mullen turned to see that Gina had crossed the room and was holding out a mug of tea. She picked up a camouflage jacket lying on a tall stool and tossed it aside. “There,” she said, pointing. “I want you to look directly at the wall. Below the portrait, not at it.”

Mullen did as he was told. She picked up a pad and a couple of pencils from one of the jars, walked back to the main kitchen table and perched on its edge. “You can drink your tea and you can talk if you want, but otherwise I want you to keep still.”

Mullen didn’t talk. He sat and sipped and concentrated on a dark smudge on the white wall. He could hear her pencil gliding across the paper, long strokes and short strokes, wild flourishes and careful hatching, and occasionally moments of inactivity when the only sound was her muttering not quite soundlessly to herself.

“Now look at me,” she said, ripping a sheet from the pad and setting it down beside her. “And put your tea down.”

He obeyed. He had never had anyone do this to him before and it felt unsettling, as if he was being examined and found wanting. He watched her face, as her eyes constantly flicked between his face and her pad, absorbed in the present. An ambulance went past outside, but there wasn’t even a flicker of distraction. The front door opened. Mullen’s eyes moved and took in the puzzled outline of her husband.

“Doug,” she snapped, forcing him to face her again. There was exasperation in her voice and she scratched harder and faster with her pencil, fearful that the opportunity was almost gone.

“What’s all this then?” There was surprise in Kevin Branston’s voice.

“I’m drawing Doug,” she said, still wielding her pencil with an air of desperation. “Isn’t it obvious?”

“What are you doing here, Doug?” Branston clearly wasn’t pleased.

Mullen said nothing. He had reverted to looking at Gina, giving her his fullest attention. He felt irrationally angry that Branston had returned and interrupted her. But the spell had been broken and Gina gave a sigh of disgust. “I haven’t finished!”

For a moment Mullen wondered if there was going to be a full-scale argument, but Branston shrugged as if this was normal. “OK. I’m off to the loo.” And he turned back along the corridor, taking his newspaper with him, and trudged up the stairs.

Gina returned to her sketch, head bent so low over it that her hair hung down like a curtain. Mullen knew he had to ask his question now or he never would, even if it was a leading one and deceitful too. But the thought had been there ever since the previous evening, and it had put down roots.