Fell Purpose (37 page)

‘Was she crying?’

‘Yeah, she might’ve been.’

‘I see her put her hands up to her face,’ Tyler said. ‘Like this.’ He mimed wiping his eyes. ‘And then I see this man get out the car and go after her.’

Slider breathed a breath of pure happiness. ‘So you got a look at him? Can you describe him to me?’

‘Well,’ Tyler said, exchanging a glance with his beloved which broke Slider’s heart. ‘See, the thing is, when I see him get out, I says to Chantelle, “That bloke’s getting out the car,” and she says, “Bloody ’ell, it’s like Piccadilly Bleeding Circus, let’s go ’ome”.’

‘I was fed up of being stared at, and all these people around,’ she defended herself. ‘If him and this girl was going to ’ave a row, I’d ’ad enough. I says to Tyler, “Let’s go”.’

‘She, like, pulls me arm, so I turned the other way, and we went,’ Tyler said unhappily, realizing he had blown his chance of fame. ‘So I never really got a look at him. He was tall, though,’ he added eagerly, offering a crumb.

‘Anything else?’ Slider asked. ‘How old?’

They both shook their heads. Tyler said, ‘Not young. I mean, he was a grown-up. I dunno how old.’

‘Like me? Older? Younger?’

‘I dunno,’ Tyler said, and Chantelle shook her head again. Evidently the relative age of grown-ups was an esoteric business to them.

‘Was he dark-haired? Or fair?’ Slider persisted.

‘I dunno,’ Tyler said sadly. ‘I never got a real look at him. I just see him get out the car and then I turns to Chantelle and the next thing we went.’

There seemed nothing more to say. After a moment, Slider said, ‘I’ll need you to write down what you’ve told me and sign it. I’ll have someone come and help you with that. But tell me, why didn’t you come in sooner? Didn’t you read about the murder, or see it on the telly?’

They looked at each other. ‘I never fought about it,’ Chantelle said.

Tyler said, ‘This lady come round this morning and spoke to Chantelle’s mum, asking if she’d seen anyfing, an’ that, and her mum told Chantelle when she come in, and Chantelle told her mum about this girl and the bloke in the car, and her mum said we should come in. So Chantelle rung me up, and we come.’ He looked at Slider helplessly. Evidently doing your civic duty simply didn’t come into their thought processes. Police investigations and murders happened in another world, far removed from the one they inhabited. It was like the world of the telly, which was both real and unreal, pertinent and unimportant, in varying degrees and baffling combination. Most of all, Slider supposed, it was the world of the grown-ups, which was not only nothing to do with them, but never would be. Their self-absorption was developed to an evolutionary degree, like a giraffe’s neck or a narwhal’s tusk, the one immediately noticeable thing about them.
Oh, brave new world
, he thought,
that hath such people in it.

Up in his office, Slider wrote on a piece of paper the reg number he had automatically noted from the car parked in front of Markov’s building, and called Connolly in.

‘Good work on finding the Snogging Couple,’ he said.

‘I didn’t think I had, sir,’ she said, puzzled.

‘The mother of half of it received a visit this morning from “a lady” asking for information about the murder. I assume that was you. She mentioned it to her daughter, the daughter admitted she had been there, and the mother propelled her and the boy in our direction.’

‘Oh, that’s good.’ She looked pleased. ‘And did they see anything?’

‘They did indeed. So well done. Your diligence paid off.’ He smiled at her. ‘Don’t let anyone tell you this job requires brilliance. Just dogged determination and the ability to ask the same question a thousand times and still listen to the answer.’

‘You make it sound so glamorous, sir,’ she said, greatly daring.

‘Changing your mind about joining us?’ he said.

‘No, sir. Is there a chance?’

‘A very good one,’ Slider said. ‘Meanwhile, I’ve got a job for you. A bit of research, and I need it asap.’ He gave her the slip of paper. ‘Find out who owns that car, the keeper’s address, how it’s insured, whether there’s any finance on it, involvement in accidents, outstanding tickets – everything you can.’

‘Is that the car under the bridge?’ she asked.

‘I don’t know. That’s what I hope to find out.’

‘It’s like a French farce,’ Atherton said, when he came back from interviewing Mrs Wilding again, and Slider told him what the Snogging Couple had said. ‘You say they saw the murderer but didn’t see Ronnie Oates or Eden; Eden didn’t see them but saw the murderer; Oates didn’t see anyone but the victim. And presumably the murderer didn’t see anyone at all, or he wouldn’t have done it there and then. All of them popping in and out of doors on one small road within one small window of time, and just missing each other.’

‘Such is life,’ Slider said.

‘And death. So where are we now?’

‘I don’t think it was Wilding.’

‘Oh, don’t say that! I’ve invested so much in him. His wife now hates him so much for what happened she’s willing to swear he did it. And he’s softening up nicely in the pokey. Another couple of interviews and he’ll sing like a lark. Chantelle said it was a blue Focus. What more do you want?’

‘Tyler says it wasn’t, and I’d trust him about cars more than I’d trust her,’ Slider said.

‘He had his tongue down her throat at the time and his mind on lower things,’ Atherton said. ‘He was terminally confused. And I really,
really
don’t like Wilding.’

‘Never mind,’ Slider consoled him. ‘We’ve got a terrific new lead. As soon as we get Tyler’s mobile phone record back, we’ll know who Zellah phoned. And therefore, who came to meet her at the common.’

Atherton frowned. ‘But who would she call to fetch her apart from her father?’

‘I didn’t say “fetch”, I said “meet”.’

‘Classic misdirection,’ Atherton said, surveying his boss’s face. ‘You’re up to something. What do you know?’

‘Only what you know. I’m just putting it together differently.’

‘Aren’t you going to tell me?’

‘I’ve just got one more visit to pay.’

‘I’ll come with you.’

‘I won’t be long. You can go home. We can’t do anything until we get the various bits of information in – phone records and DNA results.’

Atherton pretended a sulk. ‘I’ll work it out for myself, you see if I don’t.’

‘I wish you would,’ Slider said. ‘It would give me a bit of confirmation that I’m not completely out to lunch.’

‘Hand me my dressing-gown, violin and the customary ounce of shag,’ Atherton said, ‘and I will bend my mighty brain to it.’

On his way down to his car, Slider had a thought, and diverted his steps to the lock-ups, signed himself in and had Mike Carmichael brought to him. He looked tired and much more frightened, the attitude, sulks and anger all dissolved. He had had plenty of time to think, and realized now, perhaps, how bad things looked.

‘Sit down,’ Slider said. ‘I just want to ask you something.’

‘When are you going to let me go?’ Carmichael demanded, but with more of a plea and less assurance behind it. ‘You can’t keep me here like this.’

‘Don’t let’s get into that again. What’s the matter? You’ve only been here a day and a bit. Aren’t they treating you well?’

‘I don’t wanna
be
here,’ Carmichael said, balling his fists with frustration; but it looked more as though he might burst into tears than lash out at Slider. ‘I’ve not
done
anything. I didn’t kill Zellah! I was . . . I was
fond
of her. She was all right, for a kid. And I hadn’t seen her for months, anyway. Why would I want to kill her?’

‘Take it easy, son,’ Slider said. ‘It won’t be much longer.’

‘What do you want to ask me? I’ve told you everything I know. I didn’t kill her.’

‘Was Zellah in love with you?’ Slider asked, abruptly, in the hope of surprising an answer out of him.

His eyebrows went up, but he thought about it. ‘I dunno. I guess – maybe. When we were going out, she was mad for me. It was a bit scary. But I liked her. She was so clever, and funny in a way, and good fun, but . . .’ He paused, thinking it out.

‘Vulnerable?’ Slider tried after a bit.

He looked up. ‘Yeah, I suppose. It was like – I dunno – like nobody had ever touched her before, or taken any notice of her.’

‘As if no one had ever loved her?’

He looked cautious at the use of the word. ‘Yeah, maybe. Sort of. But we never talked about love, you know. I never promised her anything.’

‘I didn’t suppose you had,’ said Slider.

He seemed to take that as a criticism. ‘She was just a kid! I was fond of her, but that was it. What do you want from me?’

‘Did she ever tell you she loved you?’

‘Yeah, but that was just talk. Anyway,’ he went on defensively, ‘
she
broke up with
me
. I didn’t dump her.’

‘But you would have.’

‘I don’t know. Probably, in the end. I mean, it wasn’t a lifetime commitment. It wasn’t like we were going to get married or anything.’

‘What did you think when she broke up with you? That she’d met someone else?’

‘That’s what Olly said. But I didn’t see her after that, not until that Sunday, so I didn’t know.’

‘We’ve got the records from her mobile phone, and she rang you up at the beginning of June – one phone call, after quite a gap. What was that about?’

He looked surprised and then puzzled, and then his brow cleared. ‘Oh yeah. I remember. She just rang me out of the blue. That was weird. I’d not seen her for a couple of weeks, then suddenly she rings and she’s, like, just sort of chatting. And I said d’you want to meet up, and she says no, that’s all over. She says she can’t see me any more. Well, I thought it was a bit cool, but I didn’t care, really. You know, I’d sort of moved on. So I said, whatever you like, babe. And then she says, “I’m happy now. I just wanted to be sure you were.”’

‘Those were her words?’

‘Fact,’ he said. ‘“I’m happy, I just wanted to be sure you were.”’

‘What did you think she meant?’

‘
I
don’t know. I tell you, she was one messed-up kid.’ He looked thoughtful. ‘I’d forgotten about that until you mentioned it.’

‘Did she
sound
happy?’

‘Yeah, now I think about it, she did.’ He frowned. ‘But that Sunday, she was different. I couldn’t make out what was going on with her, but I tell you one thing: she wasn’t happy. You know, I was angry yesterday that she got me into this. But now I just feel sorry for her. Poor little cow.’

Slider felt again that unwanted sympathy. Carmichael wasn’t the unmitigated villain he ought to have been in the circumstances.

‘There’s one other thing I wanted to ask you. While Zellah was at your flat, did she make a phone call?’

He thought for a moment and then said, ‘Yeah, she did.’

‘When, exactly?’

He frowned with effort. ‘We’d been talking. Then we cuddled a bit. Then when I tried to kiss her she pulled away. Then she went to the bathroom, and when she come out she said she had to phone someone. I said she knew where the phone was, and she went.’

‘Did you hear any of the conversation?’

‘No. The phone’s in the kitchen.’

‘You didn’t ask her anything about it?’

‘No. She used to have to check in with her dad now and then. I assumed that was what she was doing.’

‘So you don’t actually know it was her father she phoned?’

‘Why? Does it matter?’

‘Was it before or after the phone call that she said she wanted to go to the fair?’

He stared. ‘After. It was after. You mean . . .?’ He was thinking hard. ‘She phoned him – the other bloke – and that was when she made the date with him?’

‘I don’t know,’ Slider said. ‘It’s possible. When I get your phone records, we’ll see what number she dialled.’

His anger was returning, darkening his face. ‘She did that? Rang him up from my flat, while she was with me? The sly little bitch! She really played me for a fool!’

‘Oh,’ said Slider sadly, ‘I don’t think that’s what she was doing.’

NINETEEN

100-What Brain

T
he Mossmans lived in Doyle Gardens, between Harlesden and Kensal Rise, areas which were in any case so close together it was impossible to say where one began and the other ended. It was a large semi-detached house in what had once been quite a posh street, but was now creeping arthritically downhill; but the house had a large garden which backed on to the sports ground, which perhaps accounted for the family’s staying put. There was an elderly but well-kept Mercedes saloon on the hardstanding, and a space where the ghostly outline on the paving said another car was customarily parked. Slider, detective faculties working at full tilt, deduced that Mrs Mossman was home but Mr Mossman was still at his place of business.