‘Nothing to do with you?’
‘No.’
‘You wouldn’t have been thinking of doing me in or shooting me or anything clever like that, would you?’
‘No,’ he said, sweating.
I reversed back down the verge and swung back round the way we’d come.
Foot down, I said, ‘So who the fuck were they?’
‘I don’t know. Honest.’
‘Eric, you’re a dirty fucking copper. An old hack like me turns up on your doorstep and asks for five grand, you just going to roll right over? I don’t fucking think so.’
Eric Hall said nothing.
We drove back past the George, the Volvo gone.
‘Who you tell?’ I asked him again.
‘Look,’ he sighed. ‘Pull up, please.’
I went a little way on then parked near a church on the Halifax Road.
For a bit we just sat there, silent, no sun, no rain, nothing.
Eventually he said, ‘I’m up to my bloody neck in it as it is.’
I said nothing, just nodded.
‘I’ve not exactly played by the fucking rules, you know what I mean? I’ve turned a blind eye every now and again.’
‘And not for free, eh?’
He sighed again and said, ‘And who the bloody hell ever has or ever fucking would?’
I said nothing.
‘I was going to pay you, straight up. Still will, if that’s what it takes. Not five grand, I haven’t got it. But I got two and half for the car and it’s yours.’
‘I don’t want the fucking money, Eric. I just want to know what the fuck’s going on?’
‘Them blokes in the car park? I haven’t a fucking clue, but I’m betting they’re something to do with that cunt Peter Hunter and his investigation.’
‘What did they suspend you for?’
‘Backhanders.’
‘That all?’
‘It’s enough.’
‘Janice Ryan?’
‘Shit I could do without right now.’
‘When did you last see her?’
He sighed, wiping his palms on the tops of his thighs, and shook his head, ‘Can’t remember.’
‘Eric,’ I said. ‘Fuck the money and tell me. By time Hunter’s finished with you, you’re going to need every fucking penny you can get your dirty little hands on. So start by telling me some fucking truth and save yourself two and half grand.’
He looked up out the top of the windscreen, up at the black steeple in the sky, then he put his head back in the seat and said softly, ‘I didn’t fucking kill her.’
‘Did I say you did?’
‘Two weeks ago,’ he said. ‘She called me, said she needed money to get away, said she’d got some information to sell.’
‘You meet her?’
‘No.’
‘You know what kind of information she had?’
‘About some robberies.’
‘Which robberies?’
‘She didn’t say’
‘Past or future?’
‘She didn’t say’
I looked at the fat frightened face, saw it sweating in my passenger seat.
‘You tell anyone this?’
He swallowed, nodded.
‘Who?’
‘A sergeant from Leeds. Name’s Fraser, Bob Fraser.’
‘When did you tell him?’
‘Not long after.’
‘Why’d you tell him?’
Eric Hall turned his face my way and pointing at his eyes said, ‘Because he fucking beat it out of me.’
‘Why’d he do that?’
‘He was pimping her, wasn’t he?’
‘Thought that were you?’
‘A long time ago.’
‘That magazine, those pictures? What do you know about them?’
‘Nothing. Straight up. She never mentioned them.’
I sat at the wheel, lost.
After a while, Eric Hall said, ‘Anything else you want to know?’
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Who the fuck killed her?’
Eric Hall sniffed up and said, ‘I got my fucking theory.’
I turned to look at him, at that fat fucking slug of a man, a man happy to save himself two fucking grand though his soul was racked with lies, though hellfire and only hellfire awaited him.
‘Do tell, Sherlock?’
He shrugged like it was no big deal, like it was on the front of every fucking newspaper, like the fat slug lived to fight another day, and smiled, ‘Fraser.’
‘Not Ripper?’
He laughed, ‘The Ripper? Fuck’s that?’
I stared up at the cross above us and said, ‘One last thing.’
‘Shoot,’ he said, still smiling.
The cunt.
‘Ka Su Peng?’
‘Who?’ he said, too quickly, not smiling.
‘Chinese girl? Sue Penn?’
He shook his head.
‘Eric, you’re Bradford Vice right?’
‘Was.’
‘Sorry, was. But I’m sure you can still remember all your girls. Specially ones Ripper had a fucking pop at right in the middle of your bloody patch. No?’
He said nothing.
I said again, ‘It was Ripper, yeah?’
‘That’s what they say’
‘What about you? What do you say?’
‘I say let sleeping dogs lie.’
I started the car and turned back the way we’d come, driving in a fast silence.
I pulled up outside the George.
He opened the door and got out.
‘Kill yourself,’ I whispered.
‘What?’ he said, looking back into the car.
‘Shut the door, Eric,’ I said and put my foot down.
I dialled her flat.
No answer.
I hung up and dialled again.
No answer.
I hung up and dialled again. No answer.
I hung up.
Back into Bradford, out of Bradford, back into Leeds, foot down all the way: Killinghall Road, Leeds Road, the Stanningley bypass, Armley.
Under the dark arches, tempted by a last afternoon drink, succumbing in the Scarborough, a quick whisky into the top of a pint, down in one in the shadow of the Griffin.
Into the end of the afternoon, a breeze blowing through the centre, plastic bags and old papers round my shins, looking for a telephone that worked, just one.
‘Samuel?’
‘Jack.’
‘Any news?’
‘They let Fraser go.’
‘I know.’
‘Well, don’t let me keep you.’
‘Sorry.’
‘Don’t suppose you know where he is?’
‘What?’
‘He was supposed to check in at Wood Street Nick this morning, but he never.’
‘He never?’
‘He never.’
‘Anything else?’
‘One dead darkie.’
‘Ripper?’
‘Not unless he’s started on blokes and all.’
‘No, anything about Ripper?’
‘No.’
‘Bob Craven in?’
‘You sure?’
‘Put us through, Samuel.’
Two clicks and a ring.
‘Vice.’
‘Detective Inspector Craven please,’
‘Who’s calling?’
‘Jack Whitehead.’
‘Hang on.’
Two fingers over the mouthpiece and a shout across the room.
‘Jack?’
‘Been a while, Bob.’
‘It has that. How are you?’
‘Well, and yourself?’
‘Keeping busy.’
‘Got time for a pint?’
‘Always got time for a pint, Jack. You know me.’
‘When’s best for you?’
‘About eightish?’
‘Yeah, fine. Where do you fancy?’
‘Duck and Drake?’
‘Eight o’clock it is.’
‘Bye.’
Through the dirty afternoon streets, the breeze wind, the plastic bags birds, the newspapers snakes.
I turned into a cobbled alley out of the gale, searching for the walls, the words.
But the words were gone, the alley wrong, the only words lies.
I walked up Park Row and on to Cookridge Street, up to St Anne’s.
Inside the Cathedral was deserted, the wind gone, and I walked down the side and knelt before the Pieta, and I prayed, a thousand eyes on me.
I looked up, my throat dry, my breathing slow.
An old woman was leading a child by the hand down the aisle towards me, and when they reached me, the child held out an open Bible and I took it from him and watched them walk away.