Dying to Write (19 page)

‘I'm sure he's just dying to. Tell him I'll be along in a few minutes.'

‘But miss –'

I let myself into my room. Nothing seemed to have changed except that the smell was less fierce. I grabbed my dressing gown and sponge bag. Chris might even hear me singing in the shower.

The water was hot and plentiful. I washed my hair, too. But I didn't sing. I found my face running not with shampoo or conditioner, but with tears. I rebuked myself sharply. Surely, surely I couldn't be weeping because of a rat?

When I emerged from the bathroom, carrying my clothes, my hair still wrapped in a towel, the two PCs shuffled with embarrassment. But it was not the sight of me in my dressing gown that caused their unease. I was sure of it. So I was half prepared. Chris Groom was waiting for me in my room. He was sitting on my bed.

I didn't speak. I merely held the door open for him in a furious parody of a courteous invitation.

He didn't move.

Neither did I.

We maintained our hostile eye contact. Whichever of us gave way would lose the battle. And after this afternoon I did not intend it to be me.

The same thought had occurred to Chris, of course. But I had the advantage that he was clearly in the wrong. I'd obeyed the police despite everything. I was in no way to blame. Perhaps – though I would never admit it – my flight had been foolish, but I had taken the trouble to tell his representative what I was doing. And the treatment to which Hugh had been subjected was deplorable. Unless, of course, he had indeed been trying to kidnap me.

Meanwhile, Chris sat staring at me. And I stood holding open the door.

The longer the silence lasted, the more difficult it would be to break it. But I would not back down. In fact, I would up the stakes slightly, as I would in a confrontation at work. I raised my eyebrows ironically, and made a minute gesture with my head: out.

I thought he was going to hit me, he got to his feet so fast. He jabbed his index finger at me.

I touched my finger to my lips, then jerked a thumb in the direction of the PCs. Did he really want an audience? I asked silently.

‘Certainly, Chief Inspector Groom,' I said, in my classroom voice. ‘I'll be along to the stables in about fifteen minutes.'

I had won. But as I closed the door behind him, I found myself crying in good earnest. I managed to get dressed: the skirt Hugh had requested, and a coordinating polo-neck. But then I had to dry my hair, and all I saw in the mirror was this unhappy face, blotched and puffy.

I did the only thing possible: knelt by the bed and let the tears come. Only when I had cried myself out did they stop.

I was now sitting on the floor, my back supported by the bed. Any moment now I'd be able to gather myself up, finish drying my hair, and try to match Nyree's expertise with make-up. Any moment. But not yet.

And then I thought of Hugh and the ordeal simply being with me had inflicted on him. Enough of self-pity. I pushed myself to my feet, dabbed my eyelids with toner, and finished my hair. Then I started on my make-up.

If I was going into battle with Chris Groom, I'd better get my war paint on.

Before I tackled Chris I gave myself five minutes on the floor with paperback books under my head. I wanted to face him calmly. Then I would have the advantage over him if he was still angry – and somehow I couldn't imagine him doing stress-reducing exercises.

At last I got up and checked myself over. New tights, clean shoes, the polo-neck neat and tidy, and the skirt – the skirt as short as Hugh could expect, if not quite in Nyree's league.

I closed the door behind me and walked coolly along the corridor, not even looking back at the PCs. All the doors in reception sighed at me. The WPC again tried to intercept me, but I ignored her and, letting the front door shut behind me, made straight for the stable block. Although it was no longer raining, the cloud was heavy enough to make it dusk at seven o'clock. All the lights were on, all the computers humming purposelessly away.

Chris sat centre stage, apparently studying a print-out. But he didn't seem to be making much progress. His shoulders were hunched and his head was too heavy for the hand that was supporting it.

Poor Chris! All this strain, and I had added to it. And I was supposed to be his friend.

On the other hand, he was supposed to be mine, too.

I collected styrofoam cups and poured coffee. Three sugars for him, one for me. I parked his and a plastic stirrer on his table, and stood just behind his shoulder, stirring mine.

‘What happened to the PC I was talking to this morning?' I asked, as if we were in the middle of what we were saying. ‘I take it that chalk outline –'

‘– means someone socked him,' said Chris, without hesitation, though he had jumped slightly. His voice was under control too. We seemed to have arrived at the same tacit decision that there was nothing to be gained, and everything to be lost, if we kept up our hostility. ‘Oh, he's all right; he'll live. Back on duty in a couple of weeks or so. But he's got a nasty cut and he was out cold when they found him.'

‘“They”?'

‘Mr Woodhouse, actually.'

‘Did someone mean to kill him?'

‘Hard to tell. Unless you're a real expert it's almost impossible to work out how hard to hit just to lay someone out. And where – the exact point. How thick the skull is. Fortunately Halford's got a thick skull.' He leaned back and smiled slightly, looking up at me.

Yes, we were to be friends still. Maybe we'd have to talk about our anger later. At the moment the bruises were too painful to touch.

I pulled up a chair. We both sat sideways on to the table.

‘Did he contact anyone before he was socked? To pass on my message?'

‘Message?'

‘About my overshirt and Sidney and how I was running away because I was too bloody scared to stay here a moment longer?'

‘Sophie, I'd bet my pension you never told anyone you were scared.'

‘A palpable hit. I told him I was doing a runner but would be back. And I told him to look after Sidney. And I mentioned my shirt. Told him the room ought to be sealed till you'd seen it.'

‘Shazia told us about your shirt. The sight of it brought on Agnes's asthma again. Gimson, out of purest professional etiquette, called a GP from a practice in Sandwell. When he'd sorted her out he said she'd be better away from all these alarums and excursions. So Tina ran her home.'

‘Tina? Bit of a low-grade job for her, surely? And isn't she supposed to be interrogating Courtney Rabone – slowly?'

‘Tina doesn't look like a policewoman; she doesn't sound like one. That's why she's so good on a job like this. Agnes will witter away –'

‘Not Agnes!'

‘OK, she'll talk without realising how much Tina's picking up. Anyway, she'll be back in Leicester by now. She left you a note. Shazia's got it.'

I shook my head sadly. I liked Agnes. Maybe I'd get in touch with her when all this was sorted out. But then, I've been on a lot of courses and exchanged a lot of addresses, and can count on the fingers of one hand how many relationships have actually been followed up.

‘What about Courtney? Have you decided what to do?' I prompted.

Chris crushed his styrofoam mug and hurled it into a bin. It ricocheted out. I lobbed mine in, gently and accurately.

‘Well? Do I gather this is something I shouldn't ask you about?'

‘It's never stopped you before.'

‘What a good job I'm discreet, then. Come on. Courtney's well on the way to being a friend of mine –'

‘A gay, black ex-con! Jesus, Sophie, you don't half choose some weird friends.'

‘I chose you.'

Whatever he'd meant to say, that silenced him. He sighed and then looked straight at me. ‘OK. And I did what I did as much out of respect for your judgement as anything. And it's a hell of a risk for both of us.'

Not sending Courtney straight back could mean the end of Chris's career if he were found out. At best a reprimand so severe it'd blight his chances of promotion for ever.

‘Both of you?'

‘His life, for a start. Tina managed to wrinkle out of him – told you she was good, didn't I? – that the people who used to, er, employ him wish to punish him for talking so freely. Right? Hence the gun, remember. And he had a whisper they might be coming this way. So the official deal is he stays here as bait. Then he goes back up to Durham, where he and the authorities will sort it all out.'

‘If he's still alive, of course,' I said dryly. I wasn't happy at the prospect of Courtney as unarmed target.

‘I hope and pray the chances of a gang attack at Eyre House are remote,' said Chris, seriously.

‘His employers weren't Japanese rat-hating kidnappers, were they?'

At last we both started to laugh, properly, without any strain. A couple of officers at the far end looked round. One of them, Ian Dale, winked at me.

Then I remembered Sidney. I was irritated that such a small and smelly creature should arouse such protective feelings.

‘Speaking of rat-hating –'

‘Ade's been out looking for Sidney,' said Chris, smiling gently.

‘That chalk rectangle represented his cage?'

‘Yes. Empty. But Ade thinks he'll make his way back here, since he's done it twice already.'

‘If he's allowed to,' I said.

Chris nodded. ‘They say the rat in the fridge died of natural causes by the way. The business with the head and feet came later.' He looked at his watch. ‘Fancy a pint?'

‘Love one. But supper –' Supper and Hugh.

‘OK. Another time, maybe.'

There was a lot of pain in those syllables. Friendship or lust? I compromised: ‘I'll find out what time it'll be ready, shall I? There might be time for a quick half.'

By a stroke of fortune, the sci-fi freak had been so immersed in his work that he hadn't turned up till five, and the girls had not unreasonably refused to do all the work. So supper wouldn't be ready till eight thirty. Until then, Shazia said, Matt and Hugh were doing tutorial work for those students who wanted it. Tabitha would no doubt be having immense difficulties that couldn't be solved by Matt, I told myself sourly. But I applauded Hugh's decision to work after the afternoon's ordeal. The Black Country Nonconformist work ethic at its best.

So Chris drove me down to a pub: the Miner's Lamp. It was clean and warm and they served good Bank's, and I settled down gratefully with a half of mild. Chris had a pint. Our eyes met as we toasted each other across the small round table.

‘To friendship,' I said.

‘Friendship,' Chris repeated. ‘You know, you really had me scared, Sophie. I thought he'd got you. And I know those lads overreacted, but I think I'd have done the same. And I think you would, too.'

I smiled. Perhaps he was right. It was the nearest I'd ever get to an apology, anyway.

‘But why pick on Hugh?'

‘Because you left at much the same time. Coincidence, maybe, but there have been too many coincidences.'

I looked at him hard. There was something he hadn't told me. ‘Go on.'

‘OK. Another coincidence. He drives a big red car. Not a Seven Series BMW, but a Five Series BMW. And I remember you telling me –'

The big red car at the main gates; the big red car down by the motorway. Could the man investigating the ice house have been Hugh? I drank and swallowed carefully. Perhaps it could. But if Hugh had been around Eyre House before he arrived officially …

‘– of course, a lot of people drive big red cars,' Chris continued. ‘And there's absolutely nothing in our records to suggest Brierley is anything except a decent, law-abiding citizen.'

‘A very rich law-abiding citizen, if he drives that sort of car.'

‘You're not going to go all Marxist on me and claim there's no such thing as an honest rich man?'

‘Eyes of needles,' I said lightly. ‘Was Christ the first Marxist? Here, let me get you another.'

‘Just a half.'

With luck my hands would no longer be trembling when I carried our glasses back to the table. To give myself a little longer to settle after the news about Hugh, I tried to buy some crisps, but they'd run out. The barman offered two alternatives: pork scratchings, the traditional Black Country snack, or cellophane-wrapped baps. I didn't fancy the cholesterol in the scratchings, wonderful though I'd thought them when I was a kid.

Chris picked up the bap suspiciously when I dropped it on our table.

‘Try it. You ought to have something to eat. Bet you missed lunch. And you're driving, remember.'

I watched, amused, as Chris picked at the cellophane which enclosed chicken tikka, according to the label. A line from a poem or song worried at the back of my brain – something about feeding your man. But one of the ways I like to show my affection is to offer my friends food; Chris was no exception.

He eyed the bap with misgiving.

‘Better than an empty stomach,' I prompted him.

‘My brother would quote that bit from the Old Testament about oxen and herbs,' he said.

‘“Better is a dinner of herbs where love is, than a stalled ox and hatred therewith,”' I said. ‘And before you gasp at my knowledge of the Bible, Brontë quotes it in
Jane Eyre
. Any more tourists, by the way?'

I refused to touch on the love part of the quotation. Even to make a joke. And the tourists still bothered me.

‘There was a little fracas this morning,' he said.

‘I know. I sneaked out past it.'

‘But that was –' He sounded immeasurably relieved. Hugh must have left later.

‘Horribly early. Anyway, these 'ere tourists,' I prompted.

‘I'm sure you're right. They're not just here for the photo opportunities. But I've no idea what they do want. We've asked Lloyd House to find us an interpreter. Next time someone turns up we can question them properly. By the way,' he added, an edge to his voice, ‘do you know why a CNN reporter should telephone from Japan?'