The Vacant Casualty Page 13

  ‘Oh, yes?’ said the man, pulling off.

  ‘Yes, but we got away.’

  ‘Then my car exploded,’ added Bradley.

  ‘Oh dear,’ said the man.

  ‘And we got chased by a huge ogre.’

  ‘An ogre, you say?’ said the man, concentrating on his driving.

  ‘Yes,’ said Sam. ‘Thirty feet tall, and able to smash a wall with its fists.’

  ‘It was terrifying,’ added Bradley.

  ‘Doesn’t sound very pleasant at all,’ agreed the man.

  ‘It wasn’t! But luckily, just before it was going to get us and tear us into shreds, a huge hole appeared in the side of the hill and sucked it down.’

  ‘Oh,’ said the man.

  ‘A huge hole,’ added Bradley. ‘Just like that, out of nowhere!’

  ‘That’s lucky,’ said the man. ‘Where you going to in Fraxbridge, then?’

  ‘The police station,’ said the detective glumly. He and Sam leant against the windows and stared out, watching what they could see of the countryside sliding by in the darkness.

  ‘You mind if I put on Radio 3?’ asked the man.

  They both sighed.

  Chapter Fifteen

  A LOT OF THE TIME being insomniac could be a terrible affliction, thought Mrs Elizabeth Bottlescum, as the clock struck two and she climbed weary and sleepless from her bed to make her way downstairs. But even if one was just a humble old lady in a quiet little English village like this, there were small consolations. For instance, she thought as she climbed back up the stairs, she could perch here by the bedroom window with her bottle of sherry and her Sudoku puzzle on her knee, and watch the moonlit streets.

  In these quiet hours there were many things she could contemplate and allow to wander through her mind. Her childhood in the north London suburbs; the family holidays in rugged, mountainous Scotland; those heartbreaking months of being sent away to live with strangers during the Blitz; and her husband’s absolutely massive, colossal wanger. Thick as a milk bottle and as long as his foot. Amazing to behold. It was a wonder he could get about, she had often thought.

  God, she missed that thing.

  ‘HMS Dreadnought’, he used to call it. That was a bit of a turn-off, of course. And the way he used to show off, using it to change channels on the television, or break empty the bottles of stout on the kitchen counter when he was one over the eight. Five bottles was his record. Bloody idiot.

  ‘Come on, Pocket,’ she said, pouring a splash of sherry into the cat’s bowl.

  She looked out over the rooftops, heard a distant rumble and saw the trees sway in a sudden gust of wind.

  ‘That farting noise again,’ she said. ‘God knows where it’s coming from. Horrible smell too.’ Even in a quiet place like this, she thought, where people were supposed to have everything and be happy, there was always some trouble. She had seen what she was sure was a police detective pottering around – oops! Careful, she told herself. One mustn’t use the word ‘potter’, all the residents knew that. She glanced at the large house at the top of the hill. One didn’t want to displease the world-famous celebrity author who definitely did not secretly live in the locale. She nodded and raised her sherry glass.

  ‘God bless you, ma’am,’ she said, and drank a toast to the fortune that had flooded into the town since she had moved nearby. Admittedly it had meant those shops taking on ridiculous new names – Ye Olde Bakery and such like. She had kept an eye on the semi-secret gay porn parlour that Ralph Tingsdale was running out of his garage in the hope that he would put up a sign reading The Olde Bi-Curiositye Shoppe but to no avail.

  It certainly was blissful living in such a beautiful small place as this. Quiet. Tranquil. And no immigrants. What’s more, beneath the surface everyone was doing each other and trying to make money on the sly, while pretending to be terribly nice all the time. And if there was anything that Elizabeth Bottlescum loved (since the HMS Dreadnought had gone to the great ship-breaking yard in the sky) it was a seething hotbed of gossip.

  And now there was a detective snooping around, asking questions! She scarcely dared wonder what he was likely to dig up. Who was it he was investigating? Oh yes, that Terry Fairbreath fellow. The thought half-stirred something in Elizabeth’s memory and she frowned for a moment, but it refused to come. What was it now? Had she by any chance seen something? She was sure there was something there. Something about someone being on fire . . . Being shot at . . . Bows and arrows, perhaps . . . But quickly the images blurred with the John Wayne Western she’d been watching on the television the day before – which had been just super – and whatever she had been trying to think of was gone.

  ‘If it comes, it comes,’ she told herself. ‘I can’t force it.’ She was getting terribly forgetful these days, it was true. There was that rhubarb pie she had left in the oven all night last week. And that boy she had found trapped down a well – once she got home she popped the kettle on and then the thought went right out of her head and only came back a week later. Silly old ditz!

  There came a sudden booming noise, startling her awake. Over the rooftops shone a bright jet of orange flame. She thought at first one of the houses had exploded, but then saw that the flame had taken the shape of an enormous dong-and-balls, flaming there in the sky.

  ‘Oh, those wizard boys down at the school,’ she chuckled to herself. ‘Will the teachers never get them under control?’ She leaned back in her chair, sherry in one hand and the other stroking Pocket on her lap. As her gaze rested on the huge cock in the sky, her mind naturally turned once more to the HMS Dreadnought and the adventures they used to have in the old days.

  Gradually she fell into a doze, a smile on her lips and all thoughts of the fate of Terry Fairbreath quite forgotten.

  Chapter Sixteen

  WHEN THEY REACHED Fraxbridge police station Bradley and Sam signed in and then went upstairs to sit and plan their next move. Bradley knew he should report all that had happened to his superiors and allow the law to take its course, but (on consultation with Sam as to the correct genre behaviour), he decided the case would likely be taken away from him, and he was determined to solve it on his own.

  ‘I don’t care if I have to kick arses and get in trouble,’ he said, ‘but I’ll solve this goddamn case myself and damn the lot of them. How was that?’ ‘Pretty good,’ said Sam.

  ‘Okay, but I’d better fill this paperwork out first or I’ll be for it,’ he added, settling down to his desk and whistling away quietly to himself.

  ‘You sure I can’t help with anything?’

  ‘No, it’s just sixteen pages. I’ll be fine, thanks.’

  ‘Okay,’ Sam sighed, ‘I’ll make a cup of tea, then.’

  ‘Could I be terribly naughty and have a cup of ginseng?’ asked Bradley.

  ‘Lifestyle, lifestyle! You can have black coffee or nothing at all,’ said Sam, walking off.

  He sidled into the kitchen to find a kettle, and then sat in a free chair and watched Detective Brautigan. Although it was the middle of the night the station seemed to be packed. It appeared some big case was coming to a conclusion.

  The superintendent was standing over Brautigan’s desk, his sleeves rolled up, sweat patches under the arms, and with a weary expression. The desk itself was perhaps even worse than it had been yesterday. It was covered with piles of coffee- and ketchup-stained paperwork, photographs of mutilated corpses and cockroach-infested food cartons. In one corner was a mound of unexamined evidence piled in a heap, on top of which was a handgun in a lazily sealed evidence bag and a box with mysterious ticking coming from inside it. There also appeared to be a comatose prostitute handcuffed to one of the legs of the desk.

  ‘So, you finally did it,’ said the superintendent. ‘You cracked the O’Shaughnessy case. He confessed! I never thought you could do it, you tough old bastard.’

  Brautigan nodded wearily and rubbed his knuckles, still red-raw from the interrogation. ‘The streets are going to be a safer place w
ith that guy inside.’

  ‘They sure will. Listen, Brautigan, you should take it easy now. You’ve only got one week until retirement. Take some time off. Reconnect with your wife, who you’re separated from owing to your drink problem and depression. Maybe make a call to little Jenny, your four-year-old daughter, who you haven’t seen in a long while.’

  The superintendent sloped off, and Sam watched as Brautigan took a bottle of whisky from his bottom drawer, and went to top up his coffee with it, before changing his mind. Instead he found another cup, slurped whisky into it nearly to the brim, then diluted it with a splash of coffee in the top, turning it dark, and drank half in one gulp. He loosened his tie, rubbed a hand over his forehead and picked up the (recently replaced) phone.

  ‘Is that Jenny? It’s . . . it’s Daddy,’ said Brautigan, tears flowing freely over his enormous, rock-like face.

  ‘That’s right, Jenny, it’s me, your old dad,’ he said, his shoulders shaking with sobs that he managed to keep out of his voice.

  ‘I wanted you to know that I love you, my little girl, and to say . . . Daddy’s coming home. That’s right! And I’m going to bring you a big doll to play with. The biggest doll in the whole wide world!’

  ‘Have I really got to listen to this?’ asked the prostitute, raising herself off the floor on one elbow.

  ‘Just a minute, Jenny,’ Brautigan said, pressing his hand over the mouthpiece with elaborate care. ‘SHUT THE HELL UP, YOU GODDAMN WORTHLESS PIECE OF CRAP, BEFORE I PUNCH YOUR STUPID HEAD OFF!’ He unloosed his grip on the receiver and adopted the same saintly expression as before.

  ‘That’s right, Jenny, we’ll have ice cream. Lots of ice cream. Chocolate, your favourite flavour! Okay, bye now. I love you . . .’ He gently placed the receiver on its cradle without making a sound and sat back in his chair, taking a long deep breath and letting it out in a great sigh of relief.

  Then another cop walked by his desk and dropped a file in front of him.

  ‘Another prostitute murdered. The Full Moon Murderer strikes again. Guess O’Shaughnessy wasn’t our guy after all . . .’

  Brautigan’s face crumpled.

  Sam went over to check on Bradley and see if he was nearly finished.

  ‘Yes, almost done,’ said Bradley. ‘Let’s find somewhere to eat and talk over the case there. I can’t concentrate with all this racket going on.’

  They went out into the street just in time to see a typewriter smash out of an upper window and fall, along with a shower of glass, into the car park. It landed on a mattress that had been skilfully placed in exactly the right spot, and was scattered with other pieces of office furniture.

  ‘There’s an all-night cafe near the station,’ said Bradley. ‘At least I hope it’s all-night – it would be unbearably depressing to have to sit in KFC at this time.’

  ‘SO,’ SAID BRADLEY when they had sat down. ‘I want to consult your experience of how these crimes work. You know more about this than me.’

  ‘Okay. Right, what do you want to know?’

  ‘What tips do you have about how an experienced detective would go about solving this, based on what we’ve seen?’

  ‘It’s not really a case in the classic mould, from what I’ve seen.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, ideally, for a really juicy one, it would be a locked-room mystery.’

  ‘I see – so the mystery is, who locked the door?’

  ‘No, of course not. It’s where a dead body is found behind a locked door, and the victim was clearly murdered. It’s the purest kind of mystery.’

  Bradley looked confused. ‘I don’t understand why. Surely the murderer just did the murder and then locked the door after him?’

  Now it was Sam’s turn to look confused. ‘No, wait . . . Oh, right. The door’s locked from the inside.’

  ‘From the inside? But that’s impossible!’

  ‘Exactly, Detective. That’s what makes it a profound mystery.’

  ‘So what would the solution be?’

  ‘From memory, it’s a wild monkey that killed the victim and escaped up the chimney.’

  Bradley pulled a police radio from his pocket and pressed the broadcast switch. ‘DI Bradley to Sergeant Percival. Percival, you there?’

  The receiver let out a short blast of static. ‘Pschht! Receiving, Guv.’

  ‘Er, it’s me, Percival. Can you check round the nearby zoos, please, and see if there have been any monkeys that have escaped recently?’

  ‘Psht. Yes, Inspector, no problem. Monkeys or all types of primate?’

  ‘Er, just monkeys for now, thanks, Spencer. Unless they have gorillas small enough to fit down a chimney.’

  ‘Pfffshhhhhhchtach! Down a chimney. Got that, Guv.’

  ‘What are you doing?’ asked Sam.

  ‘Following your advice,’ said Bradley. ‘Why?’

  ‘We haven’t even found a body yet! I was just outlining the perfect murder mystery. Cancel that call.’

  Bradley nodded and raised the radio again. ‘Er, Bradley to Percival, are you receiving?’

  ‘Pfffschhtt. Yes, Guv.’

  ‘Cancel that last order. Stand down on the zoo search.’

  ‘Psht. Got it, Guv. Call off the monkeys.’

  ‘Over and out,’ he barked into the radio. ‘Sorry about that, Sam. It’s just I’ve got to solve this case, you know? I haven’t slept, I’ve been chased and beaten up, I’m hungover and eating terrible food. I feel like crap but it’s exhilarating – I feel like a real cop, and God damn it I’m going to solve this case! How’s your Zinger Tower Burger, by the way?’

  ‘It’s horrid. And I can’t believe I got coleslaw as a side. I should have gone for beans – such a beginner’s error. Now what I’m going to do is take you through the basic scenarios as I understand them, okay?’

  Bradley nodded eagerly.

  ‘Okay. So, there are a handful of conventional solutions to a dastardly murder such as which we may be ourselves investigating. If “such as which” is a phrase, and I’m too tired to work out whether it is or not.’

  ‘Okay, great. Sock them to me,’ said Bradley.

  ‘Fine, so listen. Of all the solutions to murder mysteries, there are a number of famous solutions. Number one, the butler did it.’

  Bradley was staring at him with such intensity he was practically goggling. He appeared to be making rapid mental calculations. Sam could readily understand that if he had spent his whole life as a village policeman, under the strict control of his wife (and he could hardly imagine what such a woman would be like), this must be the height of excitement. Bradley was wild-eyed, almost crazed-looking, like a teenager, thrilled and sleepless at their first festival.

  For Sam’s own part, he felt as fresh as a week-old cowpat. There were severe aches all the way up his back and legs. He had firmly come down from whatever that pill had been and had a hangover from the four pints and six whiskies he’d drunk earlier. Now he was dehydrated, tired, demoralized, scared, feeling queasy and short-tempered and meanwhile Bradley was making a spectacle of them both into the bargain. As far as he could tell, he was in need of just about every kind of medical and spiritual encouragement that the world had to offer, and his mental checklist of immediate needs ran something like this, in no particular order:

  A crap.

  A drink.

  Three or four pints of water.

  At least twelve hours of sleep in a comfortable bed.

  Several thousand pounds.

  As many strong painkillers as would likely not prove fatal.

  A hot bath.

  A massage.

  A week in Spain.

  A good novel.

  Some excellent food.

  He decided that a rest break was in order and, warning Bradley that he would be a few moments, retired to the disabled toilets of the KFC.

  This might be the moment to reflect that none of us knows what others get up to in toilets once the doors are locked. We may suspect variou
s unedifying and morally regrettable acts, but we never can know. And for some people (Sam being one of these) the very act of clicking the lock into place turned the drab, square, white-tiled space into a temporary home, where for a few minutes he might act exactly as he pleased without making concession to any idea of normality. Therefore, with the pain ringing all the way up and down his legs at every step like a pianist running the back of his hand up and down the keyboard, Sam first removed his mud-soaked socks and shoes, then splashed his poor feet with water from the sink and dried them with paper towels.

  ‘If there’s one thing I know how to do,’ he muttered, ‘it’s take a rest break.’

  He took a miniature of Jameson from an inside pocket, cracked it open and downed it in two swift glugs. Then he refilled it from the tap and swigged down three strong ibuprofen. It was the first peace and quiet he had known since arriving in the allegedly peaceful countryside, and silence beckoned him to rest his head on the cistern for a moment, when he lost consciousness. He roused himself what felt like a second later, with an unsettling doubt in the back of his mind that fifteen or forty-five minutes might easily have passed, and so he concluded his business as quickly as he could, tipping out a long thick line of the white powder he had been sold the previous day, wondering for a minute if there was not substantially less than he remembered when he’d bought it, then cast the doubt aside and hoovered it up in a quick, stinging snort.

  Exiting the room a minute or so later (and briefly casting glances left and right to detect any suspicious looks coming from others), he asked for three large cups of tap water and one of orange juice from the counter. He sat alongside Bradley, who didn’t seem even mildly perturbed by the wait (however long it had been), and was talking rapidly into his phone. The detective seemed excited rather than scared, so Sam concluded he either wasn’t talking to his wife, or he was, and with his altered persona had already established some ground-breaking new protocols with her.

  Sam’s restoration was nearly complete, but still lacking its final ceremony, which he now enacted with as much solemnity and care as if he had been celebrating a sacrament. Setting the four cups in front of him, he cracked an extra-strong Alka-Seltzer into the first cup of water, and poured a sachet of Dioralyte into the second. The third he gulped straight down and then sipped the orange juice as he let the two potions settle. Then, once his arid system had absorbed the first cup’s worth of water (which took about ninety seconds), he demolished the hangover cure and the diarrhoea treatment in short measure.