The Unquiet Dead (10 page)

‘Sir!’ Jessie leapt to her feet and bounded towards him, then checked herself. ‘It’s great to see you.’

‘So great that you can’t even make time for my leaving party?’

Jessie put her hand to her mouth. ‘No. I could have sworn Mark told me it was …’ Her voice trailed off.

‘I think it was, then it got changed,’ said Jones, ever the diplomat.

‘I thought it was a surprise. You’re not supposed to know,’ said Jessie, seeing right through him.

‘Trudi keeps me in the loop.’ Trudi had been
Jones’ assistant for years. Jessie had seen her moping about the corridors since Jones announced his retirement.

‘Has she told you about your replacement?’ she asked hopefully. Jessie believed she and Trudi had always had a certain understanding.

‘Trudi only told me that they hadn’t had time to get acquainted yet.’

Which Jessie interpreted as, Stupid cow hasn’t bothered talking to me yet because I’m a woman and only a secretary.

Jones shook his head. ‘No, Jessie, it wasn’t anything like that at all. Give Carolyn a chance. She appears a little frosty, but she’ll thaw. She’s just nervous.’

‘As nervous as a panther.’

‘Come on, Jessie. Usually you have very good intuition for people in pain. It’s what makes you a good police officer, seeing in people what they are trying to hide from themselves.’

Jessie relented. It was as much the power of the compliment as the word ‘pain’. ‘What happened? Her husband run off with a thirty-three-year-old DI with dark hair who drives a bike?’

‘Drop the bike, and you’re pretty much there.’

‘There’s no hope for me,’ said Jessie, lowering her head.

‘You’ll win her over in the end.’

‘Great,’ said Jessie. ‘By which time I’ll be in an institution. Honestly, guv, why should I be punished? It wasn’t me.’

‘No. You’re just lower down the food chain, that’s all. Now, are you coming to my party or not?’

‘Course I am. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.’

Jones smiled. ‘You nearly did.’

They’d taken over a room above a local pub. There were barrels of beer, bottles of whisky and endless sausage rolls. The three ingredients to make a perfect policeman’s party. There was a huge roar of respect and admiration as Jones entered the room. DCI Moore turned and looked at Jessie and Jones. Jessie smiled and moved straight for the whisky.

‘Is it true?’ asked Niaz.

‘Is what true?’ Jessie accepted a tumbler from the PC behind the table and took a sip.

‘What the SOCOs are saying.’

‘What are the SOCOs saying?’

Niaz lowered his head to one side. Something he did when he was concentrating or confused. Tonight he was confused. ‘Boss, why are you angry? This is a party. DCI Jones has had many years in the service. You should respect that by making sure he has a very good party. And good parties require happy people.’

‘Sorry, Niaz, I fear I’m losing my only ally. I’m suddenly quite afraid,’ she said, speaking honestly before she had the good sense to stop herself.

‘Please, ma’am, don’t speak of such things. I am your ally. I will always be your ally. And before
you respond, remember this: it is just as important to have support from below. A general is nothing without the respect of his foot soldiers. Her foot soldiers.’

Jessie patted Niaz on the back. ‘We’re a small army,’ she said.

‘I grant you that.’ He clasped his hands together. ‘But a strong one.’

A young man approached them. He introduced himself to them both, though they knew exactly who he was: Ed from SOCO. ‘We met in Richmond Park when they found the body of that artist.’

‘Eve Wirrel,’ said Niaz. ‘PC Niaz Ahmet, at your service.’

‘Hello, Ed,’ said Jessie.

‘Hello, Detective Inspector Driver. How’s it going?’

‘Fine, thanks.’

‘Really? I heard you’d unearthed a ghost.’

Jessie frowned.

‘Yeah, rumour has it that place in Soho is haunted. The lads tell me the lights kept flickering on and off.’

‘That’s called a problem with the electrics. Nothing more.’

‘Don’t be so sure. There was a house in our village that was haunted. The light in the top bedroom went on and off for no reason. Story was that a woman gave birth to an illegitimate child. The child was suffocated and it’s the woman who keeps coming back to look for her kid.’

‘That’s nonsense, Ed.’

‘My mate here says there was definitely a bad air in the place. And what about the roof falling in just as the body was found?’ Ed nudged his friend, who nodded in collusion. They were joined by others, some of whom Jessie recognised from the Marshall Street Baths search that day. All agreed that the place had a strange feeling about it.

‘It’s a derelict swimming pool in the middle of Soho. Of course it feels weird,’ said Jessie. ‘It is weird. Empty swimming pools always are, even without the slime effect, the echo and, of course, the dead body.’

‘What about those lights?’

‘The caretaker told me the electrics never work properly when it’s raining. And as you are all demonstrating by your damp hair and sodden collars, it is raining at the moment – harder than usual.’

There was sniggering as some of the men picked up a double entendre from nowhere.

‘My aunt lived in this old house in the middle of nowhere, right,’ said a voice from the crowd. ‘One day her daughter – she was seven or eight at the time – said to my aunt at breakfast, “Mum, who is the old lady who comes and sits on my bed every night?” God’s honest truth.’

‘You shivered,’ said Ed, pointing to Jessie.

‘I did not,’ she replied.

‘You’ve got goosebumps.’

‘I’m soaking, what do you expect?’

‘A friend of a friend of mine once …’

Jessie walked away from the group as they began telling each other increasingly far-fetched tales of ghouls and ghosts. Niaz caught up with her halfway across the room.

‘Don’t you believe in spirits?’ he asked.

‘No,’ she said.

‘So you don’t believe in God?’

‘Mine or yours?’

‘Either. They are one and same, it’s just the semantics that are different.’

‘If only that were the case – there would be a lot less murdered people in the world.’

‘Religion isn’t to blame,’ said Niaz.

‘It’s killed more people than any disease.’

‘No. Men have killed in the
name
of religion; that is not the same thing.’

‘I don’t believe that.’

‘What do you believe, then?’

‘That’s a very personal question, Constable.’

‘I think it is a universal question, Inspector,’ said Niaz.

‘All right. I believe in upholding the law. I believe that killing is wrong, as is beating someone to a pulp, stealing a car and killing a baby through reckless driving, strapping a child to a radiator, injecting someone with the AIDs virus, robbing a house and raping the daughter while forcing the parents to watch … Shall I go on?’

‘You didn’t answer the question,’ said Niaz.

‘I thought I just did. And don’t give me that crap about God giving us freedom of choice, because I just don’t buy it. If he’s around, he isn’t listening.’

‘So you do talk to him.’

‘No, Niaz. Trust me, I don’t.’

‘Who do you go to for guidance?’

My mother. ‘Myself.’

‘I concur on one point,’ said Niaz solemnly. ‘No one knows for sure whether we survive death. This is true. But belief in some kind of life after death provides the basis of religions that stretch far back into antiquity. Surely you are too intelligent to dismiss such overwhelming evidence?’

‘It was merely a way to suppress the poor and uneducated and scare them into submission.’

‘You are wrong. God is hope. Their belief is deeper because they have more to hope for.’

‘Please, God,’ said Jessie sarcastically, ‘I hope you will save me from this conversation with Niaz.’

Niaz looked over Jessie’s shoulder.

‘What?’ asked Jessie, knowing a self-satisfied look when she saw one.

‘God works in mysterious ways, but rarely this quickly,’ said Niaz softly, before moving aside. Jessie turned. It was DCI Moore. She was being punished for her sarcasm.

‘DI Driver, you must be terribly sad that Jones is retiring.’

A cunning question. One that required dexterity of mind. To agree meant insulting Moore and
to disagree meant insulting Jones. ‘Surprised, more than anything. I thought he’d be commander of the Met one day. It is a great loss to the entire police force that he is going.’

‘Indeed,’ said DCI Moore. Jessie noticed that she had dressed up even more than usual for the occasion and applied a new coat of lipstick: red. Her hair, dyed and coiffed, had been pinned up in a chignon, and she wore a tight pencil skirt with a silk shirt. Her stockings and high heels were black.

Jessie fiddled with her hair. Now her smart trouser suit felt dowdy. She couldn’t win with this woman.

‘I’m glad to see that the leather trousers you were wearing yesterday have been discarded. Not very officer-like.’

‘Sorry to disappoint, but I wear them more often than not.’

‘Really? That’s fashionable, is it?’ she said as if she were talking to a sixth-form student.

‘No. But it’s safer.’

‘Safer for whom?’

‘Me. I ride a bike to work.’

‘Really. And you wear leather for a bicycle?’

Jessie laughed. ‘It’s not a bicycle.’

‘Oh, I see, a moped –’

‘No, ma’am, it’s a motorbike. A Virago 750cc –41 horsepower, 0–60 in 3.2 seconds,’ she said, unintentionally puffing out her chest.

DCI Moore eyed Jessie up and down. ‘You’re a
biker,’ she said incredulously. Then she seemed to relax, looked at Jessie’s hair and nodded to herself. ‘OK, I see,’ she laughed. ‘They always say you shouldn’t believe everything you read in the papers. My mistake. I should have known – the hair sort of gives it away.’

Jessie was momentarily confused. ‘Gives what away?’

DCI Moore didn’t respond.

Then it washed over her, the horrible creeping feeling that she knew what Moore was referring to. But she couldn’t believe it. She repeated the question. ‘Gives what away – that I ride a bike? Is that what you mean, boss?’

‘It’s all right, Driver, settle down. Whatever your persuasion may be is none of my business. However, I think you should move away from the …’ She paused, seemingly unable to find the appropriate words for what was an entirely inappropriate comment. ‘No need to wear it on your sleeve. From now on I expect to see you in skirts. You can leave the leathers for the weekends when you’re out with your …’ she paused again, ‘… friends.’

Jessie couldn’t believe it. As she watched the departing back of her new boss, she caught Jones watching her. Jessie shook her head very, very slightly. He mouthed the words, ‘You’ll be fine.’ He was wrong, thought Jessie, sneaking out of the room. Jones was wrong for the first time since she’d met him. She was now working with two bigots, and one of them was a woman. Worse, she
was her boss. Her life at CID was about to become intolerable, she thought as she left the party, and intolerable wasn’t how she planned to live her life. She walked angrily down the deserted street. As she clicked open her phone to call Bill, it rang.

‘DI Driver.’

‘Jessie?’

The line was unclear.

‘Bill, is that you?’

‘Who the hell is Bill?’

It was P.J. Jessie was stunned into silence. Her heart did a decisive round in her chest.

‘Don’t put the phone down, please. Jessie, are you still there?’

‘Yes,’ she said meekly.

‘I’m back in London and I was wondering, I know it’s late, but how do you fancy dim sum and champagne? I know what you’re like about being seen in public with someone as sleazy as me, so I thought I’d pick up the food, pick up the booze, pick you up and we could order the driver to cruise around a bit. Before you turn me down, it’s a limo. Lots of leg room, the glass is tinted and the driver can’t see anything. What do you think?’

No. No. No. No. No. ‘I’m tired, P.J.’ She was struggling to get the words out.

‘Well, I’d offer you a fat line of coke, but somehow I don’t think you’d be interested.’

‘Ha. Ha.’

‘Come on, Jessie. I’ve been surrounded by sycophants for weeks, no one to put me on the
spot, insult me, tell me how it is. I’m in withdrawal.’

If only. ‘You mean everyone thinks it’s a good idea you getting rich on the back of your murdered wife.’

‘Rich
e
r.’

This was a really bad idea. ‘I’m busy.’

‘Come on, I was only joking.’

‘Well, I’m not. Sorry, P.J., but I am busy.’

‘No you’re not.’

‘I am.’

‘Don’t be so petulant. You’re walking down a dark street, alone, with no one to go home to since that flatmate of yours got famous on the back of
her
brush with death.’ Jessie turned around instinctively. A set of headlights flashed at her.