Lullaby (22 page)

‘Is your baby here?’ she asked kindly. I stared at her blankly for a second.

‘I wish he was,’ I whispered in the end. ‘I really wish I knew he was in such good hands.’

And she held out a hand to me—but then a nurse hurried down the corridor towards me and I knew that I must go. I clasped the woman’s hand, just for a moment.

‘Good luck,’ I whispered, ‘I’ll think of you,’ and I fled before I did something stupid. Before…but deep down I knew I wouldn’t now—not now I’d seen the
pain in that poor woman’s eyes. How could l even countenance stealing someone else’s baby?

And in the end I went back to Mickey’s room and curled up in the prickly brown chair, which was comfortingly like the one in my old school library, and I slept despite myself, because I was truly more tired than I had ever been.

The sun had sunk and risen once again, and Louis had been missing for six days. When I woke that morning, stiff and cramped, still in the chair, they said that Mickey would be all right, he didn’t have the clot on the brain they’d feared. As they weren’t sure why he’d fitted, they’d sedated him for now. So I sat helplessly beside my husband, watching him sleep, and contemplated the insanity of last night, when I’d actually considered taking someone else’s child to replace my own. And this realisation made me imagine the desperation that might have driven someone to take Louis; to pretend that he was theirs. Somehow the knowledge just made me feel worse.

Then Leigh came and took me to the police station, where I did the eternal press conference. Only this time it was DC Kelly who sat beside me, and thankfully this time no one stood and mentioned bereavement or child-trafficking. And nor did anyone mention potty women who steal babies for their own solace, and for that, today, after my moments of near madness in the depths of last night, I was glad.

The room wasn’t so crowded this time, the journalists’ air more harried and subdued than normal, and
I worried that people were forgetting. There had been some horrendous bombing on a London train that day, though, and so it was good, Egg-belly assured me, that anyone had come at all. And I tried to remember there was another world outside, but it was hard to visualise when every day I grew more desperate and wearier and more maddened by my loss. And I tried not to look for Silver, and I tried not to bite my lip too hard, but in the end I couldn’t help but ask where he was. Egg-belly said he was tied up, and I had an image of Silver’s hands tied behind his back, and then of him tied to me, and I thought I might be finally going mad. And Deb turned up and I was really glad to see her, and she looked all worried after she’d peered at me, and said did I want to see the counsellor again? And I did think about it this time, I really did, because suddenly I didn’t feel I was coping well at all. I kept thinking Mickey was going to die, and I wasn’t even the tiniest bit angry with him about Louis any more, I just wanted them both back.

Leigh got me some tea and she put lots of sugar in. We were just about to go to the car when Deb got a call on her mobile and I guessed that it was Silver from the way she spoke. She took me to his office and there he was. He looked like he hadn’t slept for days; he actually seemed a little rumpled, and I resisted the temptation to remark on it. I thought it was time I got back to a strictly professional footing with him, especially now I’d been reconciled with Mickey. Especially since I’d nearly killed my husband. And then I caught Leigh making eyes at him, and I remembered how Leigh
always got her man. But he asked to see me alone anyway.

‘How’re you doing, kid— Mrs Finnegan?’

‘You’re being very formal,’ I said. I was suddenly aware that I hadn’t had a shower for days; that I’d slept in this old dress; that I probably smelt of sweat and madness and Mickey still.

‘Jessica, then. How are you? I was very sorry to hear about Mr Finnegan’s relapse.’

I thought rather hysterically about making the nearly-shagging-Mickey-worse joke, then decided it was probably inappropriate. I sipped my tea instead. I played at being sedate. I said, ‘I think he’ll be okay. They said he will, anyway. It’s all a bit—’ I couldn’t find the right word ‘–stressful,’ I finished lamely. There was a photo on the desk that was turned more his way than mine, but it seemed to be of three smiling kids. They were tumbling over one another in desperation to reach the camera first, fighting to grin the biggest grin.

‘Your kids?’ I asked, over-brightly.

‘Yes,’ he nodded, but he didn’t expand. It was the one thing he always seemed unhappy about whenever they came up.

‘Are you—’ I was embarrassed to mention it, kept staring at the photo rather than at Silver. ‘Are you going to interview Agnes? Mickey’s ex-wife?’

He shrugged. ‘We’re contacting her just to check her whereabouts, but from what I understand she’s abroad anyway. Did you ask him if he did meet up with her?’

‘I haven’t—haven’t really had the chance to talk to Mickey properly yet.’ I had a sudden image of me above
him on that bed last night. I coloured slightly. ‘I guess it’s nothing to do with Louis.’

‘Well, I don’t want to add to your stress, but I’ve had some slightly troubling news.’

My eyes snapped off the photo. ‘About Louis?’ I was on my feet immediately.

‘No, no, don’t worry. Nothing more about Louis, I’m afraid. I think we’ve got to keep operating on the understanding that Louis, whoever he’s with, is fine. They obviously don’t want to hurt him—they just want him.’

‘Not as badly as I do.’ I slumped back down again.

‘No, obviously. But this is about Mickey and his injuries. We’ve had an eyewitness come forward, the landlord of a pub in Bermondsey, not far from where Mickey was found. He recognised the picture of Mr Finnegan from the papers.’ Silver fiddled with the Venetian blind, snapping it open and shut.

‘Actually,’ he swung back to face me, ‘our boys had been in there to question the landlord before, but he had previously been a little—reticent.’

I wished he’d just sit down.

‘Seeing the baby was missing spurred him into action, though.’

‘Not before time, I’d say.’ I fiddled with my polystyrene cup.

‘I just wondered—’ He seemed apprehensive.

‘What?’ I said. If I had a pound for every person nervous of my reaction these days, I’d be a millionaire by now.

‘Is Mickey in the habit of getting into fights?’ he asked.

‘Fights? Hardly. He’s an artist, a businessman. Why would he go round looking for a fight?’

‘It takes all sorts, Jessica. It’s a funny old world.’

I ignored the cod philosophy. ‘Anyway, what do you mean, “fights”? Surely Mickey was attacked?’

‘Well, that’s certainly what we’d been assuming-that whoever snatched Louis also attacked Mickey. Only what this guy at The Mason’s Arms says throws a slightly different complexion on matters.’

‘What
is
he saying?’

‘That Mickey came into the pub on the evening that Louis disappeared, around seven p.m. He was highly agitated.’

Silver flicked the blinds again. I bit my tongue.

‘Well, he would be, wouldn’t he?’ This was going nowhere fast.

‘Yes, well, you would think so. Anyway, he kept asking to use the phone, but the payphone in the public bar wasn’t working apparently. When he realised that, Mr Finnegan started to slam the receiver against the wall over and over again, until some bloke at the bar told him to stop.’ Silver picked up his paperweight and began to lob it from hand to hand. ‘The landlord was round the other side in the snug, but came round to see what was going on. By the time he got there, the first punch had been thrown—apparently by Mr Finnegan.’ He waited for this to sink in.

‘But—I don’t understand. I guess,’ I was thinking frantically, ‘I guess that Mickey was just so stressed that he—he must have lost it a bit. Didn’t know what he was doing. I mean, come on, that’d be natural, right?’

Silver shrugged. I chewed my lip. I’d chew right through it soon.

‘Maybe. But, by all accounts, Mickey was pretty tanked-up.’

‘You mean drunk?’

‘I mean drunk, yes. Not that he’d been drinking in that pub as far as anyone knows. He just came in saying something about his son and using a phone, losing his mobile or something. After the punches started, the landlord threw both men out, but the fight definitely continued outside. Mr Finnegan—well, he took quite a beating.’

I winced. ‘Obviously,’ I said quietly.

‘Yes, well. But then he disappeared, the other guy scarpered, and the landlord forgot all about it. Till now.’ Carefully he replaced the paperweight on the desk. ‘I’m trying to understand why your husband would pick a fight.’

It didn’t make any sense. Why the hell would Mickey have been fighting when Louis was missing? Why was he drunk? I didn’t believe it.

‘It sounds like bollocks to me,’ I said loyally. ‘It sounds like this landlord bloke’s got something to hide and he’s trying to, I don’t know—deflect attention. Perhaps he beat Mickey up himself?’

‘Look, don’t worry about that. Obviously we’re checking him out, and the pub. There’ll be other witnesses if what the landlord says is true. First and foremost we’ve got to find the guy who had the fight with Mr Finnegan. But I just wanted to know if you thought it was at all likely.’

I shook my head vehemently. ‘No, I don’t. Mickey’s just not the violent type. Okay, he’s got a temper, but to be honest,’ I hesitated, ‘to be honest, Mickey would think that fighting was below him.’

Silver raised an eyebrow. ‘Right. So other than being overwrought about Louis, we’ve got to find a reason, a very good reason, for Mickey to pick a fight.’

‘Being overwrought about your missing baby is a pretty good reason, I’d say. If that man’s telling the truth,’ I muttered.

‘If that man’s telling the truth,’ he agreed.

I looked at the photo again. Definitely just three kids, no wife. Three happy, smiling faces. ‘And what happened about Maxine’s new bloke?’ I asked.

Silver had the good grace to flush gently beneath his waning tan. ‘Not Moldovan. Turkish. Bit dodgy possibly, definitely a bit flash, but no obvious links to any sort of gang.’

‘Obvious links? That doesn’t sound very reassuring.’ I finished the last of my tea.

‘Don’t worry,’ he stood up and stretched. ‘It’s all under control.’ His pristine shirt came slightly untucked, exposing a strip of tanned skin. I stared down at my cup in discomfort, suddenly fascinated by the way my teeth left grooves around the rim when I bit it gently.

‘We’re bringing him in for questioning,’ he went on. ‘Maxine says that it’s all over anyway; they had a big row apparently. She’s a bit of a flirt, isn’t she? Friendly little minx, that one.’ He tucked his shirt back in meticulously, adjusted his snazzy tie in the mirror. ‘Got a lift home?’ he asked over his shoulder.

I was dismissed. I chucked the cup at the bin, but it fell short. ‘Look at that,’ I said, super-polite. ‘I’m as bad at throwing as you are at reading character.’ I opened the door. ‘A “little minx”, eh?’ Then I closed the door behind me, a little harder than I might have.

Deb was waiting in the corridor, chatting to Leigh about some reality show that had started last night. I wandered off down the corridor. Then I stopped short. Deb caught up with me; Leigh was probably hovering for a look at Silver.

‘Deb,’ I muttered, ‘I think I might need to talk to someone again.’

‘DI Silver?’ she said, wrinkling her brow.

‘No. Definitely not him.’

She didn’t understand, cocking her curly mop enquiringly. I lowered my voice to a whisper. ‘You know, that nice lady at the hospital. The German one.’

‘Oh, I see.’ Deb was enthusiastic. ‘The therapist. Yes, I think that’s a very good idea.’

‘Do you?’ I hoped no one else had heard. I said as casually as I could without screaming, ‘I think I—I threw her card away. Would you be able to help me find her number?’

It was Maxine’s arse that I saw first. Storm clouds had gathered outside and the afternoon was dim, dark even, so when I opened the living-room door and saw those shining buttocks thrusting up and down, it took me a minute to focus. I couldn’t understand quite what I was looking at; I struggled to adjust my eyes.

Maxine was riding her supposed ex-boyfriend Gorek like he was a rodeo horse—the boyfriend she’d just told Silver she didn’t even like—on my expensive sofa. Agnes’s £2,000 sofa. They were fucking soundlessly beneath the picture of Louis that I had begun to worship since he went. I was so angry that I couldn’t speak, and then I sort of yelped and Leigh, who was bringing shopping in for me, dropped a bag. Something smashed as my sister came up behind me.

‘What the hell?’ she said, as Maxine slid inelegantly off the bloke, who was still prostrate, scrabbling with his trousers, swearing in what I assumed was Turkish. Leigh began to laugh. My prudish sister actually thought it was funny Unfortunately, I didn’t.

‘This is the final straw, Maxine. Get the hell off my sofa and get your bloody clothes on,’ I demanded, stepping over her scarlet g-string to get up very close. ‘And then get the hell out of my house. If you want to fuck him, do it somewhere else, okay? Not in my living room.’ I was practically spitting with rage, nose to nose with her, except she of course was taller. God, I was sick of being short.

‘Mais—pourquoi?’
she asked rather arrogantly, with a shrug of her bare, sloping shoulders. She reminded me of a gaudy butterfly that had shed its wings, leaving just its naked body behind. My skin crawled. Then she pulled her tiny little skirt on. ‘I was doing nothing wrong. I have no duties right at this moment,
non
?’

For a moment I was stupefied. I could have punched her right then, right on her button nose. ‘I don’t care. I want you to go, now, please,’ I said when I could speak again. Deb was beside me now, holding my arm gently.

‘Calm down, Jess,’ she said. ‘Let’s talk about this.’

‘Could you pass me my underwear please, Jessica,’ Maxine said to me, and then she smirked. So I did it. I slapped her right across her smug face: I don’t know who was more surprised, me or her. She held her cheek, staring at me for a moment like some realisation was dawning. I thought uncomfortably about the first week she was here, and I turned away quickly.