Some by Fire (29 page)

‘They’re going back today, are they?’

‘Mmm.’

‘Shame about the wedding.’

‘Isn’t it just? Give me a ring, will you, please, Les, as soon as you have something.’

‘Will do.’

After that we’d have a big meeting with Tregellis and the prosecution service to prepare the case against Kingston. That was something to look forward to. If I allowed an hour to Manchester airport I’d have to pick Melissa up at about ten thirty. Call it ten to be on the safe side. I went up to the top floor to tell Gilbert as much as he needed to know.

They were waiting for me, eager to be back in the Land of the Free, where the streets have no pavements, and you have to carry your driving licence with you and a disapproving look given to a skateboarding youth can end in gunfire. I pressed the lever to unlock the boot and Slade lifted it open. I got out and walked round the back but he didn’t need any help. He wouldn’t have received any, but he didn’t need it. They were wearing the same outfits they arrived in, which was reasonable enough, you need to be comfortable when faced with a long plane ride, and she was made up like a Kikuyu warrior. They both climbed in the back. I could see the edge of his face in my rearview mirror, but she squeezed into the corner, out of sight.

I thought about taking them the scenic route, but decided not to. The M62 was quicker and that’s all I was interested in. Cruising at seventy in the middle lane, I tilted my head to see him better and asked: ‘You been to England before, Slade?’

He glanced at me in the mirror and replied: ‘Nope. First and last visit, God willing.’

‘You don’t sound impressed.’

‘You goddit.’

‘What didn’t you like?’

‘The beer’s like warmed-up hoss piss, the beefburgers rot your brain, you’ve never heard of
air-conditioning
and the women’re ugly.’

I had to chuckle. Well, I did ask. ‘Melissa’s not ugly,’ I said. ‘There’s an English rose lurking underneath all that muck she covers herself with.’

‘Just fucking drive, Priest,’ she snapped. ‘We gave you what you wanted, now get us out of this dump.’

I stretched my neck but she was ducked down and I couldn’t see her. What I didn’t know was that she was holding one of the blades from the little feminine razor that she shaves her temples with, and was systematically slashing my back seat with it. I discovered that three days later, when I found the razorblade she’d thoughtfully left embedded in the upholstery. I wish I’d known; it would have helped me make a decision.

Meanwhile, the hangover had gone and I was
feeling almost light-headed. ‘We arrested Kingston yesterday,’ I said.

‘Congratulations.’

‘Thought you’d like to know.’

‘You were wrong.’

‘Oh, and Mo Dlamini asks to be remembered to you.’ He’d prefer to forget all about her, but I was in a mischievous mood.

There was a silence, then she said: ‘Mo?’

‘Mmm.’

‘You’ve talked to Mo? About me?’

‘That’s right.’

‘What did he say?’

‘I wouldn’t dream of repeating it.’

‘Who else have you spoken to?’

‘Just about everybody you went to school and university with. Everybody remembered you. Maybe it was the purple hair.’

After another pause she said: ‘Did you speak to Janet? Janet Wilson?’

‘Er, I’m not sure,’ I lied.

‘It was her, wasn’t it?’ she declared. ‘She put you on to me, the two-faced cow. She tried to come between me and Nick, but it didn’t work. She was just another notch on his bedpost, and she’s hated me ever since.’

I’d asked for that. I was in the outside lane and traffic was bunching up on my left. A big blue sign flashed by before I noticed it, and I said: ‘I think this
is ours.’ I squeezed across into the slow lane behind a minibus loaded with suitcases and didn’t speak again until we were lifting theirs out of the boot.

It could have been different. She might have said: ‘Look, Priest, I don’t like you and you don’t like me, and that will never change. I admit I’ve done some bad things in the past, things you’d never believe, but it’s all behind me now. This is a new start for me, and I’m going to make the best of it.’ That’s what she might have said, but she didn’t. She was arrogant, unrepentant and vindictive, all the way. And the decision I had to make was that much easier for it.

I parked in the short stay and Slade found a trolley for their luggage. ‘We can manage from here,’ he said. ‘We’ve done airports before.’

‘I’ll see you aboard,’ I told him. ‘That’s my orders.’

‘
Just obeying orders
, hey, Priest,’ she said. ‘Always do as you’re told, do you?’

‘It makes for an easier life,’ I replied.

‘Do you know what the best bit was?’ she went on. ‘Do you know what made this trip worthwhile? I’ll tell you. It was the look on your face when you learnt that we were married. I’ll cherish that for a long time.’

I shrugged my shoulders. ‘Win a few, lose a few,’ I said. ‘It’s just a job; we don’t take it personally.’

‘Ah, but you do, Priest, don’t you?’ she asserted. ‘Well, tough shit.’

I followed them at a polite distance through checking-in and into the departure lounge. He had a beefburger and coffee, she sipped a mineral water. All those brains, I thought, all that talent, and the intelligence of a woodlouse. I found a seat and watched people for a small eternity.

The Air 2000 charter flight we’d squeezed them on was called through into the boarding area and I showed my ID to the immigration officer and followed the crowd. I stood with my arms folded as the seat numbers were announced and watched groups of tourists rush to be first on, as if their bit of the plane would take off before the rest of it. They were a
cross-section
of working-class Britons and their offspring, off for a fortnight of fast food and fun. Football shirts were the dress of the day, with a good smattering of back-to-front baseball caps. And these were the dads. They carried surfboards, deflated lilos, raster-blasters to annoy the neighbours and rolled-up windbreaks. Windbreaks! I almost wished I were going with them.

An indecipherable announcement was made and Melissa and Slade rose to their feet, hoisting hand luggage on to their shoulders. Melissa saw me and couldn’t resist coming over. ‘Just thought I’d tell you,’ she said, ‘that it hasn’t been a pleasure knowing you. Goodbye, Priest. I hope all cops die in pain.’

‘
Au revoir
, Melissa,’ I replied.

‘It may be a small comfort to you,’ she went on, ‘to know that seven hours crushed in a plane with all these ghastly people is my idea of hell, but it’s worth it to escape from this dump. You’re paying the fare, after all.’

‘Oh, it’s a large comfort,’ I told her.

She went back to Slade and put her arm around his waists. He put his across her shoulders and they moved towards the girl at the desk and showed her their boarding passes. She gave them a well-used smile and they stepped into the gangway.

I moved across so I could watch them follow the file down the boarding tunnel. They stood behind a little knot of passengers until it was their turn. The hostess looked at the seat numbers on their cards and pointed, and they vanished from view. Ten minutes later the plane door was closed and the gangway pulled back. I turned and made my way up to the observation area.

It’s a curious mixture of bracing fresh air and kerosene fumes up there. There’s a theory that enthusiasts for old cars and aeroplanes and other things mechanical are really addicted to hydrocarbon vapour. I don’t believe it. There’s a romance in watching the big jets surrounded by the service vehicles, like worker ants around the queen. They replenish it with fuel, evacuate the waste and restock the kitchen with four hundred
meals: two hundred of them chicken; one hundred and ninety-nine beef; and a vegan for the Hindu in row six. One by one they move away until the queen stands alone. A tiny figure with headphones makes a hand signal and you see the pilot return it. That’s the bit I like best; the romance of travel captured in a single wave. The engine note rises to deafening and she edges backwards.

I elbowed a youth with a thousand-millimetre lens to one side and leant over the rail. Strange vehicles, each designed for one specific task, were scurrying back and forth haphazardly, yellow lights flashing. The BA 767, next stop Miami, followed one of them at a snail’s pace out on to the expanse of concrete. I watched it creep towards the far end of the runway and vanish from sight. Five minutes later it reappeared, gathering speed. They were on their way. Hear the mighty engines roar… The engines, on full power, were a distant rumble as it lifted off, climbed on stubby wings and banked into the clouds. See the silver wing on high… I looked at my watch. They were bang on time.

‘You again,’ the immigration officer said as I entered his office. ‘You’ll be asking for a job here next.’

‘I couldn’t stand the excitement. Do you mind if I make another telephone call, please? It’s to America, I’m afraid.’

‘Business, I presume.’

‘No, I want to tell my mother-in-law that it’s twins.’

‘That’s all right then. Help yourself.’ He pointed to a vacant desk.

‘Thanks.’

I pulled the second message from my inside pocket and dialled the number I’d written on it. I’d no need to. I could have screwed the sheet of paper into a ball and tossed it into a bin, and that would have been the end of it. But I dialled the number. This time the message form had been fully completed. It was from FBI Agent Kaprowski and addressed to me. It read:
Reference Jade Slade, aka Wes Wesson, born Norman J. Lynch. Married in 1979 at Dade County, Florida. Not divorced, wife still alive, two children. Has gone through two more marriage ceremonies since then, in 1989 and 1993. Both partners still alive, no divorces, several children. Marriage to Melissa Youngman therefore bigamous and invalid. Hang in there. Mike
.

‘I’d like to speak to Agent Kaprowski,’ I said to the telephonist who answered. After a delay I was told that he was in a meeting. I know all about meetings.

‘I’m Detective Inspector Priest,’ I told someone else, ‘and I’m speaking from England. It’s important and I’d appreciate it if you could get him to a phone.’

They found him. ‘Hi, Charlie,’ he said. ‘Didya get my message?’

‘I certainly did, Mike, and I’ve just seen her take off. I hadn’t the heart to break the news to her myself. She’ll land in Miami at about four thirty your time.’

‘Righty-ho. I’ll have a word with immigration and they’ll put her straight back on board. Seems a waste of a return ticket.’

‘Not a bit of it,’ I assured him. ‘If anybody grumbles I’ll pay for it myself. If they just happen to take a video of her face when they tell her, I’d appreciate a copy.’

‘Ha! I like your style, Charlie. I’ll see what they can do. Listen, I’ve been asking around and we’ve had a few queries raised over here about JJ Fox’s business methods. Any chance of letting us have a copy of the file?’

‘No problem. I’ll sort something out and put it in the post.’

‘That’d be great. Unless you wanted to bring it in person. We could easily fix you with accommodation.’

‘That sounds inviting,’ I said. ‘I might take you up on it.’ I could go jogging in the woods, and take pot-shots of cardboard effigies of Al Capone as they popped up, and practise my diving roll. Maybe not, but I would like to visit Arlington, to pay my respects to JFK. I’d think about it.

I drove home the scenic way, which was a
mistake. It’s a twisty road and my shoulder started aching. I saw a chemist’s in Tintwistle and bought some paracetemol. They did the trick. There’s a country-and-western song called ‘I’m Just an Okie from Muskogee’ that’s a satire on redneck values. The Committee to Re-elect President Reagan didn’t recognise it as a piss-take and adopted it as their official campaign song. So a Texan singer/songwriter called Kinky Friedman penned an alternative version, worded so that there could be no mistake this time. It’s called ‘I’m Just an Ass-hole from El Paso’, and that’s the only line I know, but I sang it continuously, all the way back to Heckley. Most of the time it was silently, in my head, but occasionally out loud, and I launched into the full Pavarotti once in a while.

Sparky was holding court when I arrived back at the office, telling a story about this chap who died and went to hell. ‘So he sat there with the sewage over his ankles, and they dealt him a hand of cards, and he thought: This isn’t too bad, I can bear this for the rest of eternity. But just then the door opened and the Devil walked in. ‘Right lads,’ he said. ‘Tea break’s over for this century. Back up on your heads.’

‘Hi, boss,’ he greeted me as I sat down with them. ‘We were just discussing the possible effects of European union on sentencing policy.’

‘Great,’ I said. ‘And what have you decided?’

‘We’re agin’ it. Did you see her off OK?’

‘You bet.’ They were all drinking coffee, but there were no spare cups. I took Kaprowski’s message from my pocket and handed it to him. ‘Read that while I fetch my mug,’ I said.

It was on my desk, where I’d left it, and laid alongside was a roll of big sheets of cartridge paper that I didn’t recognise. I slid the rubber band off and spread them across my desk. The top one was a symmetrical blur of black ink, with a white line, an axis, down the centre. It was the anal print, and there were three similar ones. They reminded me of Rorschach images, which was disturbing. I rolled them up again and went back into the main office.

Annette took the mug from me and I said: ‘Thanks, love.’

Dave had passed the message to Nigel. ‘Does that mean…she’s not an American?’ he asked.

‘That’s right.’

‘So they won’t let her back in?’

‘No way. Immigration have been tipped off to watch out for her.’

‘So what’ll she do?’

‘I don’t know. Either spend the rest of her life in Arrivals at Miami airport or fly somewhere else. Back here, I assume. She won’t be having grits and pancakes for breakfast with the Waltons, that’s for sure.’

‘That’s fantastic!’ Nigel exclaimed, passing the note on.

‘Bloody ‘ell!’ Dave added. The DC reading the note said: ‘Some of us don’t know what all this is about. You’ve been a bit secretive lately, boss, if you don’t mind me saying.’