The Birdwatcher (12 page)

Today, especially, he found himself looking forward to it.

Councillor Sleight was late too. ‘Family stuff,’ he said. ‘My son’s just back from university. Cambridge,’ he said, as if he’d forgotten to mention it before, but South had always liked this vanity; a father who was proud of his son.

Before the meeting began, Ella Mears was complaining about a man she was convinced was a sex offender. ‘You have to tell us if he is a paedo,’ she said. A squat woman with a heavy smoker’s voice, she represented one of the housing associations. South knew the man she was talking about. He had moved onto the estate a couple of months ago. ‘It’s the law,’ she said.

‘Not exactly,’ said South. ‘You can only request disclosure if he’s working with young people, or associating with children. And he’s not.’

She was right though; he was on the registered sex offenders list. He wondered how she had found out. Someone had disclosed confidential information and he would have to keep an eye on the situation.

‘Well the law’s wrong then,’ said the woman. ‘What if he turns out to be a murderer or something . . .?’

‘Move on, Ella,’ said Sleight. ‘Everybody got the minutes?’

Sleight was a good man to have on the panel; he had been in the building trade, then become a property developer before he turned councillor. He had the softened face of someone who had enjoyed his share of good food and fine wine, but he was business-like, a civic-minded man who chaired a committee with simple grace and efficiency.

The first item was traffic control at local schools, but they veered away within minutes.

‘Did you see that on last night’s news, Vinnie?’ Ella Mears asked.

‘Near you, wasn’t it, Sergeant?’

‘Getting so bad round here.’

‘Beaten to death, they said on the telly.’

‘It was a druggie, wasn’t it, I heard, Sergeant?’ said Councillor Sleight, then held his hands up and grinned. ‘Sorry. Off topic.’

‘Round our place is swarming with bloody Romanies or whatever you’re supposed to call them,’ said a man from the Chamber of Commerce.

‘Roma,’ said Julie, the exhausted-looking social worker.

‘Call them what you like,’ said Ella Mears. ‘They’re bloody taking over. And like the councillor says, they’re all on drugs.’

‘Levels of drug abuse among the Roma are on a par with other disadvantaged local communities,’ said Julie.

‘Don’t know why we waste our time at these meetings,’ said Ella Mears. ‘If we hadn’t let them in in the first place we wouldn’t have half the problems. Round my way the kids are up to all sorts.’

‘Order, order,’ said Councillor Sleight, who was supposed to be chairing. ‘We’re discussing obstructive parking outside schools. I’m not sure you can blame the gippos for that.’

‘Roma,’ said Julie, the social worker, again.

‘Just for the record,’ said South, ‘there is no evidence to suggest that the killer of Mr Rayner is from any of the immigrant communities.’

‘Well said,’ said Sleight. ‘Right. Can we continue? We have less than thirty minutes.’

Julie the social worker said, ‘There are issues with asylum-seeker children with poor language skills being placed in unsuitable schools, if you want to discuss that, Mrs Mears.’

‘Shouldn’t be here in the first place. Can’t get our own kids into decent schools.’

Sleight slammed his palm down so hard on the table that the water in their glasses trembled. ‘Enough!’ There was a shocked silence. ‘I will not stand for this. I’m a busy man. I’ve better things to do than listen to this kind of nonsense.’

Ella Mears looked like she’d swallowed a wasp. Sleight glared at her for a few seconds more, then his stern face melted into a smile. ‘I circulated an agenda before the meeting,’ he said, his voice calm again. ‘Can we save any further discussion for Other Business?’

At the end of the meeting, South was still writing up the actions he had agreed to in his notebook when Vincent Sleight said, ‘In a way, Ella’s right. I don’t know why we bother. None of this stuff about parking and litter is solving anything. And like it or not, a lot of it is immigrants. That’s the real pressure round here. Ask an eighteen-year-old lad who can only afford to take a job that pays enough to pay the kind of exorbitant rent people charge these days. Ask him what he thinks of all the Poles and Lithuanians who can afford to work for half the money.’

‘Even in your neighbourhood, Vincent?’ said South.

Sleight laughed. ‘Fair play, but I come from one of those places like Ella’s. Worse than that too.’ Sleight lived in one of the big white houses in the middle of the golf course behind Sandgate. A swimming pool, a guest house and a view south, over the Channel. South had been there only once, three or four years ago, to inspect Sleight’s gun safe after he’d applied for a shotgun licence.

Sleight laughed. ‘Come round for dinner, Bill, sometime,’ he said, as he stood, picking up his briefcase. ‘The wife does a smashing roast. You ever met her?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Come and meet my lad. Back at home now.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Good luck with the murder case, by the way. Are you going to make an arrest?’

‘I think we’re close.’

‘Good man.’ Sleight always invited him to dinner without naming a date; South recognised it as a form of politeness. South was just a low-ranking copper. And Sleight probably knew he wouldn’t have wanted to come, anyway.

Every neighbourhood had them; the big men. Sleight was by no means the worst of them, thought South.

The days after his dad died, it was like something was buzzing away inside his head, making it impossible to think straight.

‘What, Mum? Sorry. Didn’t hear you.’

‘Poor lad. What are we goin’ to do with you?’

He hadn’t dare go back to lift the manhole cover. The nights kept him awake, tying the sheets around his legs as he turned and turned.

‘He’s sleepwalking now,’ she announced to the girl on the till at the Spar. ‘I caught him the other night, out in the garden. I’d take him to our doctor, only the man’s practically senile.’

Mrs Creedy was standing behind them, clutching a bottle of bleach. She said, ‘Poor little soldier. He’s got to be brave, like his daddy was.’

Billy tugged at his mother’s coat, but she was still waiting for her change.

‘Our community has lost a great man,’ continued Mrs Creedy. She was dressed in the housecoat she wore in the chip shop, reeking of fat, with her black hair all blowdried upwards. Please shut up, thought Billy, but there was no stopping her. Lowering her voice, she said, ‘A great defender of the Union.’

‘Which union is that, exactly?’ said his mother loudly, staring her in the eye. ‘I know all about my husband and his unions.’

Mrs Creedy reddened. ‘I was only trying to show respect,’ said Mrs Creedy.

The women in the queue behind were all pretending to look away. Billy pulled harder. But his mother said, ‘Respect, is it? I’m surprised you have any of that left at all. You and half the women in this town.’

Nobody said a word; the girl behind the till stared at her feet as she held out the 80p change.

‘The big men,’ she said as they walked away as fast as they could, pushing past the prams and shopping trollies. ‘They all love the big bloody men.’

And Billy thought about the other two men the gun had killed. He imagined them kneeling at the country roadside awaiting the bullet, or chased down dark alleys.

If it had happened to him, he would have run. He was pretty fast. He had heard if you zigzag there was less chance of the bullet actually hitting you. They’d all practised running like that in the playground, him and all his mates at the school.

It was now two weeks after the funeral and he was back at school. People stared and pointed. Most attention anyone had ever paid him. At break, Patrick Hamilton caught him by the outside toilets. ‘What was it like, Billy? Did ye see them shoot your da? Rusty says they shot at you too. Did they?’

After school, he and Rusty ran up past the checkpoint.

‘Can I come an’ play at your house?’ asked Rusty, panting for breath.

All his schoolmates were making excuses to call round. They wanted to see where his dad had been killed.

‘Me mam’s in Armagh buying a wedding dress for my sister. I forgot me key an’ I’m locked out till five. Oh g’an,’ pleaded Rusty.

‘Can’t Stampy let you in?’

‘Nah. He’s off at the hospital doing fizzy therapy.’

‘OK,’ said Billy, Rusty tailing after. Billy was just about to turn in to walk onto the estate when he heard the car coming up behind them.

He expected it to pass them on the road but it didn’t. Instead he heard it slow right down and begin to crawl along behind them. Guessing it was the police, Billy paused to pretend to do up his shoelaces to give him a chance to glance backwards. The car had stopped too. It was an old grey Morris Oxford being driven by a fat-faced man with a quiff, with a young man in dark glasses sitting next to him. Definitely not the police; worse.

He stood and started walking. The car began moving too. Oh crap.

Rusty hadn’t even noticed it. He was going on about
Star Wars
. ‘When the big spaceship whizzed over at the beginning . . . it was amazing.’

‘Come on, Rusty. Pick it up.’

‘My sister Bridget ducked. It was that realistic. She’s a ninny. She cried all the way through.’

‘Run, Rusty.’

‘Why?’

Billy took Rusty’s arm and started yanking him forwards.

‘What’s the rush?’

Billy broke into a sprint.

The grey Morris Oxford revved up behind them. They were almost at the estate now, where the kerbstones ahead turned red, white and blue.

‘Wait for me, Billy,’ called Rusty.

But Billy was far ahead of him now, at the playground, when the car passed them and stopped, just ahead.

The guy with dark glasses stepped out of the car, grinning. ‘So. You’d be Billy, then?’

‘Who’s asking?’ he said.

‘Don’t be clever. It don’t suit ye. Your ma said to give ye a lift home,’ said the driver; you could tell he was an Elvis fan from the hair. The younger man opened the back door. ‘Get in.’

‘I can walk,’ said Billy. ‘Don’t need a lift. It’s only over there. I’ll be there in a minute.’ He pointed up the hill.

‘Your mammy told us to pick ye up,’ repeated the man in the dark glasses calmly. Fat Elvis had got out of the car now and was walking slowly around to Billy’s side. ‘She said it’s real important,’ the driver said.

And then Billy saw a figure in dark tweed pushing her bicycle up the hill towards them and he had never been as pleased to see Miss McCrocodile as he was then.

‘Afternoon, Miss McCorquadale,’ he called.

‘Afternoon, Billy.’ She looked at the two men. ‘And who would these gentlemen be?’

Elvis said, ‘We’re friends of the family, aren’t we, Billy?’

Billy was about to say that he’d never seen these men in his life, when the man in sunglasses took them off and said, ‘Remember me, Miss McCorquadale? You taught me at Sunday school. I’m Donny. Donny Fraser.’

‘Donald Fraser? My. You’ve grown. How’s your father?’

‘He’s great, thank you Miss M.’

Rusty stayed a few yards off, not wanting to come too close.

‘I was a friend of Billy’s daddy. I promised I would help the family out now his daddy’s passed away.’

McCorquadale relaxed a little. ‘A terrible thing,’ she said.

‘Appalling.’ The man who had called himself Donny Fraser shook his head. ‘We were all shocked rigid, Miss McCorquadale.’

‘These are shocking times, Mr Fraser.’

‘Indeed they are. We better be going, though, Miss M. Come on, young Billy. In ye jump.’

The door was wide open. Billy hesitated. He looked at Miss McCorquadale, who was frowning, as if she wasn’t sure things were quite right.

‘We promised his mammy we’d give him a ride,’ said Donny Fraser.

Miss McCorquadale relaxed a little. ‘Come and see me any time, young Billy. You’re in my prayers.’