Deadlight (22 page)

‘Owen Hargreaves.’ Yates had caught Faraday’s eye. ‘They’ll have to sub him.’

As the injured Hargreaves left the field on a stretcher, another English player came on, black, West Ham. According to a pimply youth at Faraday’s elbow, this would make all the difference. Scholsie would shift back to his midfield position alongside Butt, and the fucking English would start stroking it around. Faraday followed this prediction as best he could, trying to decide about the wisdom of another pint. He’d got to second in the queue at the bar when a through pass found Michael Owen in the Argentinian penalty area. A defender stuck out a leg and the Nelson exploded. Seconds later, Faraday felt a tug on his arm. It was Yates. Whatever he felt about football, Faraday couldn’t possibly miss the penalty. This had ceased to have anything to do with sport. This was history in the making.

Even Faraday recognised David Beckham. A howl of protest greeted an Argentinian’s attempt to shake his hand as the English captain sat the ball on the penalty spot. Then Beckham was walking backwards, his face in huge close-up as he turned to eyeball the Argentinian keeper. The bar fell silent. Yates ducked his head and shut his eyes. Someone, in a low, urgent whisper, appeared to be praying. Beckham hesitated a moment, took a tiny breath, then five quick steps and the ball was in the back of the net.

The bar erupted. A glass flew across the room and smashed against the far wall. ‘
Argies are shit!
’ went the chant. ‘
Argies are shit
…’ Faraday, no longer interested in another pint, checked out Pritchard and then beckoned to Yates. If Pritchard left the Nelson, then Yates was to follow him and keep Faraday posted by mobile. For his part, Faraday had seen more than enough of England’s
finest hour. He’d sit out the second half elsewhere and be back in time for the final whistle.

Yates looked bemused.

‘You’re
leaving
? When we’re one nil up?’

Faraday nodded, stole a final look at Pritchard, and then headed for the door.

He found the Trafalgar Cemetery exactly where the tourist map had indicated. The sun was out now, blazing from a near-cloudless sky, and it was very hot. Sweating after the climb from Main Street, Faraday slipped his jacket off and loosened his tie. Entrance to the cemetery was through a big iron gate, pitted with rust around the hinges. As far as Faraday could judge, the place was empty.

Ahead lay a litter of tombstones, bleached white teeth bunched together in the tall grass, one seeming to lean against another. Two hundred years of scouring Atlantic weather had reduced many of the dead to the ghost of a name on the crumbling sandstone but here and there it was possible to pick out the details.
Marine Johnny Press. Died of Wounds. Lt Henry Kettle. Died of Wounds. Seaman George Christian. Died of Wounds
.

Indeed, thought Faraday. He walked on, head down, trying to rid himself of the roar of the crowd in the Nelson. He’d never had any taste for mob violence. He loathed the kind of patriotism that wrapped itself in the cross of St George. Why? Because it could so easily lead to places like this.

Just now, in Pompey, it was impossible to drive a hundred yards without another outbreak of English flags or English T-shirts, but privately Faraday shuddered at the message they sent. Football was war by other means, a very welcome substitute, but it carried the same celebratory whiff of cordite and spilled blood. Easy, he thought, if you’d never fought in a war, never seen your shipmates blown apart. He paused in the shadow of the
cemetery wall, hearing the chant of the sailors again. All that aggression. All that lager. All that drunken innocence.
We nicked your fucking islands and you’ll never get them back
.

He shook his head, feeling the warmth of the stones through his shirt, thinking once again of Pritchard.

Winter hadn’t a clue who’d come knocking at his door. Wakened from a deep sleep, he struggled out of the recliner and made his way down the hall. Maybe Cathy, he thought, with something nice to drink. Or bloody Traffic, with a firing squad.

It was Andy Corbett. Winter had seen the face in the bar at Kingston Crescent, asked someone else for a name. Now, on the doorstep, he looked him up and down. Wearing leathers like that on a hot day must be a real pain.

‘Yes?’ he said blankly.

Corbett pushed past without a word. Winter caught up with him in the lounge. The standard lamp was still on, the room curtained, the recliner pooled in light.

‘Something on your mind, son?’

Corbett turned to face him. He was a couple of inches taller than Winter and made the most of the extra height.

‘You’re a fucking disgrace,’ he said. ‘You could have killed her.’

‘Really? And what’s that to you?’

‘None of your business, but I’ll tell you something else. If you weren’t such a pathetic old bastard, I’d sort this out here and now. You know what you’ve done to that girl? You’ve turned her into a basket case. Can’t think straight. Can’t sleep properly. Can’t stand the thought of going back to work.’

‘You’d know that, would you?’

‘Yeah, I would.’ He poked a finger in Winter’s face. ‘And if I were you I’d shut my mouth and just fucking listen for a change. You know what the blokes on the job
say about you? They say you’re fucking bent. Well, I can live with that. That gives me no fucking problem whatsoever, Mr Winter, but what I can’t stand is fucking Mickey Mouse blokes like you thinking they’re big-time cops and pulling a stunt like that. Where I come from, you’d be pensioned off. You’d be put out to grass. You’d be down in the West Country somewhere in a field of donkeys where you can’t do anyone else any damage. And good fucking riddance.’

Winter eyed him for a moment, amused.

‘Finished, have you?’

‘No.’ Corbett stepped across to the window and tore the curtains back. Sunshine flooded the room. ‘You live like this all the time? Dossing in the dark? Only Dawn said you had some strange habits.’

‘Sure, like she’d know.’

‘But she does, Mr Winter, she does. And what makes it even more pathetic, she actually likes you. Can you believe that? Some fat old git can’t even keep a car on the road?’ He came very close, pushing his face into Winter’s. ‘Fucking Skoda, wasn’t it? Just about sums this place up.’

He stepped back, looking round the lounge. Only last week, Winter had come across an old photo in one of the bedroom drawers next door. It showed a much younger Winter, flares and leather jacket, posing on the seafront half a lifetime ago with a couple of other DCs. He’d propped it on the mantelpiece next to his lottery tickets, meaning to find a frame. Now Corbett picked it up, holding it out at arm’s length.

‘Sad.’ He shook his head. ‘What is it about this place? Half the guys I meet have never been off the fucking island.’

‘Maybe we like it. Maybe we’re that simple.’

‘Yeah, maybe you are, too. You know how I spent most of yesterday? Running round Somerstown after a bunch of inbreds. And that’s just the blokes I have to work with.’

‘Their privilege, son. I’m sure you’ll teach them lots.’

‘Fat fucking chance. You think I’m staying here a day longer than I have to? I signed up for CID, not Punch and fucking Judy.’

‘Do you mind?’ Winter reached for the photo and put it back on the mantelpiece. His arm was throbbing again and he had a splitting headache.

Corbett wanted to know what Winter intended to do about Dawn.

‘Do?’

‘Yeah. She’s talking legals. She wants compensation. Money.’

‘You mean you’ve been talking legals.’

‘No, Mr Winter. I mean she’s fucking angry, and fucking hurt, and she’s not about to sit around and let you get away with it. Neither should she. The way she tells it, you were off your head, totally unreasonable, wouldn’t listen to a word she said. That says serious money to me and I’ll bloody make sure she gets it. People like you should come with a health warning. You’re dangerous, Mr Winter. And that’s another reason they shouldn’t let you anywhere near the job.’ He nodded at the photo. ‘How they ever took you on in the first place is beyond me. They must have been fucking desperate.’

Winter gazed at him a moment, then took him by the arm and steered him towards the door. He’d had quite enough of Andy Corbett but the last thing he was going to offer was the satisfaction of a full-blown row. On the front doorstep, Corbett shook him off. He’d said his piece but that wouldn’t be the end of it. Just now he was off to work, but Winter shouldn’t think for a minute that this was the end of the story.

‘I’ll be back,’ he promised. ‘Bend your fucking ear again.’

‘Really?’ Winter offered him a cold smile. ‘And what makes you think I’m interested in listening?’

FRIDAY
, 7
JUNEM
, 2002,
15.00 bst

It was half an hour after the final whistle before Faraday and Bev Yates could get close enough to Pritchard to have a decent conversation. The Nelson Bar was still packed, knots of swaying sailors toasting Michael Owen, toasting David Beckham, toasting Sven Goran Eriksson, toasting each other. The English had stuck it to the Argies, no more than those bastards deserved. After Maradona’s hand of God and Beckham’s sending off at St Etienne, justice had finally been done.

Pritchard looked up as they approached. His eyes were brimming. Faraday counted four empty glasses stacked at his elbow.

‘Brilliant, or what?’ he mumbled.

He made a long, expansive gesture with his right hand. Yates, accepting the invitation, sat down beside him.

‘Man of the match?’ he enquired.

‘Owen. Has to be. Hadn’t got a fucking answer, had they? Couldn’t touch him.’ Pritchard shook his head, gazing at the mill of sailors. ‘Magic. All the way, now, all the fucking way.’

Yates was pressing the claims of Nicky Butt. In his view, he’d never played a better game in an England shirt. He’d worked his socks off, tackling, harrying, probing forward, passing, containing.

‘He took Veron out of the game,’ he concluded. ‘Marked him off the pitch. Wonderful. Wonderful.’

Pritchard had his arm round Yates now, hugging him. After the solitary excitements of the last couple of hours, he’d finally found a friend.

‘You back here tomorrow, are you? Fancy the Brazil game? Few bevvies?’

‘No question, mate. It’s Italy–Croatia, too. That Robert Prosinecki is something else.’

Faraday, suspecting Yates could keep this up all day, took the spare seat across the table. Pritchard squinted down at the proffered warrant card. Clearly, he hadn’t a clue what it was.

‘We’re policemen,’ Faraday said slowly. ‘CID. From England.’

‘Yeah?’ Pritchard was trying to digest the news. ‘On holiday, are you?’

‘I’m afraid not.’ He leaned forward across the table, aware of a couple of sailors watching them. ‘We need to talk to you, Mr Pritchard.’

The fact that this stranger knew his name caused Pritchard more confusion.

‘I don’t get it. Do you want a drink or something?’ He fumbled in the pocket of his jeans and produced a crumpled twenty-pound note. ‘Here. My shout.’

Faraday shook his head. Yates likewise.

‘Not for me, mate.’

‘But …’ Pritchard was frowning now. ‘We won, didn’t we? Stuffed the bastards?’

‘We did.’

‘Let’s all have a drink, then.’ He looked slowly from one to the other. ‘No?’

‘Afraid not.’ Faraday glanced at his watch. ‘We really do need a little chat.’

Pritchard stared at them a moment longer, then shrugged and struggled to his feet. Faraday had phoned ahead, asking Frank Melia for transport, and a white minibus was waiting at the kerbside. There were two policemen inside and they helped Pritchard clamber into the back. The sight of the uniforms clearly puzzled him.

‘Mates,’ Yates muttered.

‘They see the game, too?’

‘Yeah. Loved it. Eh, guys?’

The taller of the two policemen nodded, flinching when Pritchard squeezed his leg.

‘Fucking one nil.’ He closed his eyes and let his head fall on to Yates’s shoulder. ‘Magic.’

Pritchard was still asleep, minutes later, when they turned into police headquarters. The chance of a decent kip with someone to keep an eye on him, and the man would be ready to accompany Faraday and Yates to the Panorama Hotel for a search of Pritchard’s room. After that, back at police headquarters, would come a formal interview.

It took Pritchard a couple of hours to sober up. When Faraday and Yates stepped into the cell where Pritchard had been sleeping it off, the Alhambra’s manager was sitting on the single iron bed, rubbing his eyes. Only the stench from the lavatory in the corner of the cell suggested any aftermath from half a gallon of export-strength lager.

Pritchard gazed up.

‘What is this?’

‘A CID investigation, Mr Pritchard.’ Faraday once again offered his warrant card.

‘CID?’ Pritchard looked startled. ‘Am I under arrest?’

‘Absolutely not. But we do need to talk to you.’

‘No problem. Be nice to know what’s going on, though, eh?’

Faraday hesitated a moment. Then he suggested that Pritchard come with them to the hotel. Pritchard shook his head at once.

‘No chance.’ He nodded at the lavatory. ‘Dodgy gut. The lager here gives you the shits.’

‘All the same, we still need to take a look at your room.’

‘Be my guest – but do us a favour, eh? Come back here and tell me what the fuck this is all about?’

Faraday glanced across at Yates. Pritchard wasn’t exhibiting the least sign of guilt. On the contrary, Faraday had rarely met anyone so peaceably disposed after a couple of hours in a police cell.

‘You’re sure you don’t want to come with us to the hotel?’

‘Positive.’

‘Do you mind putting that in writing? Just for the record?’

‘I’ll do any fucking thing.’ Pritchard got up and stepped towards the lavatory. ‘Just give me a moment, though, eh?’

The Panorama lay at the far end of Line Wall Road, a three-storeyed confection in pre-stressed concrete that did nothing to raise the architectural tone. Frank Melia drove them down in the Landcruiser and introduced them to the manager. Pritchard’s room was on the third floor. On Melia’s instructions, it hadn’t been cleaned since yesterday and Faraday was welcome to the key.