Ash & Bone

'And sexually,' Karen said, 'he didn't ever suggest anything you felt uncomfortable with?'

'No.' Blushing, but just a little. 'What kind of thing?'

'Games, acting out fantasies. That kind of thing.'

'We did act out a bit of Romeo and Juliet once. You know, the balcony scene. After we'd seen the movie.'

'I was thinking of something a bit less romantic'

'I don't understand.'

'Rape fantasies, perhaps.'

'Rape?' Lily wiped her hands down the front of her Waitrose overall, as if they were suddenly sullied. 'You're joking, right? This is some kind of a joke?'

'No.'

'You've got to be.'

'It's something people do, Lily. Fantasies like that. Ordinary people.'

'Not people I know. Not Steve.'

Elder had been thinking about a song by Dire Straits Joanne had played over and over. He was trying to recall their fantasy life, his former wife and himself, if they ever had one.

'If it was so good,' he said, 'the relationship with Steve, how come you stopped seeing him?'

'He went away, didn't he? The Middle East somewhere. For work. This big project, rebuilding a hospital I think it was. Kuwait, maybe. Somewhere they couldn't drink, I know that. No alcohol. I remember Steve joking about it, how he'd have to be careful which airline he was flying with, in case, you know, it was dry. As much free booze as I can get, he said, before the drought.'

'He liked a drink then?' Karen said.

'No more than anyone.'

'And you haven't seen him since then? What was it? Eighteen months ago?'

'Two years nearly. No. He's still there, isn't he? Living there.'

'You've heard from him then?'

'No. Not really. Not since Christmas, Christmas before last.'

They'd thanked her for her time and left her looking wistful and not a little sad.

The third name – Jane Forest – they were still waiting to track down.

***

Karen was sitting on a low-backed two-seater settee, orange with purple and red cushions; Elder opposite in a grey wicker chair. The music was still playing over sounds of traffic and muffled voices from the street.

'Close on two years ago,' Karen said, 'according to Lily Patrick, Kennet went out to Kuwait.' She shook her head. 'I don't think so. Eighteen months ago, or not so long after, he started seeing Jennifer McLaughlin.'

'During which time he was also seeing Maddy Birch.'

'And, presumably, shopping at Tesco instead of Waitrose.'

'Seems to be a pattern,' Elder said.

'So what's the betting while he was going out with Miss Waitrose, he was seeing someone else then too?'

'Somebody whose fantasies ran on the rougher side of Cadbury's Milk Tray and Romeo and Juliet.'

'Most likely. Though even Juliet died in the end.'

'So did Romeo, remember?' Elder sipped his Scotch. 'If I knew my Shakespeare better, I could probably come up with someone more like Kennet than Romeo.'

'Othello,' Karen suggested. 'No, Iago.'

Elder had seen it once, Othello. When he was in the sixth form. The Grand in Leeds. A matinee. He could remember the teacher forever shushing them, then reading the riot act when they got back to the coach; remember the name of the girl he'd sat next to but not a lot about the play. Desdemona? A handkerchief?

'Wait, wait,' Karen said. 'Titus Andronicus.'

'Who?'

She laughed. 'I don't know. I just know there was a lot of blood.'

Stanley Turrentine seemed to have come to an end. It was comfortably quiet.

'I'm sorry about the other night,' Karen said after a while.

'The other night?'

'At your place. You must have thought I was being a bit of a tease.'

'No.'

'You didn't think I was coming on to you and then backing off?'

'I didn't think you were coming on to me at all.'

Karen threw back her head and laughed. 'God! I must be losing my touch.'

'No, it's me. Forgetting how to read the signs.'

'A little rusty?'

'Something like that.'

'Well,' she picked up the bottle of Scotch and tipped some into his glass, 'what you need is a little lubrication.' And then, aghast, 'I can't believe I just said that.'

'You didn't.'

'No, you're right.'

But he was smiling, smiling with his eyes, and though she wasn't certain, having got this far, she kissed him anyway. Once would have been okay, acceptable, within the limits of the situation, a point of some return, but it was more than once: his mouth, his neck, his cheek, his eyes. His hands on her body, her back, her thighs, her breasts. She pulled him towards her from the chair on to the floor. Oh God, they weren't going to do it on the floor? His fingers warm across her shoulder blades, his leg between hers. Some part of her mind flashing warnings. Her diaphragm was in its box in the bathroom, no condoms, and the chances of his having one were less than nil. As his thumb brushed her nipple she repositioned herself. Buttons and zips. She unbuckled his belt. Salt and sour in her mouth. Grabbing one of the cushions from the settee she raised herself up and touched herself between her legs. He kissed her there and there. Her heels drumming on his spine. If screams could only wake the dead.

Afterwards, they lay side by side. Somehow Karen had contrived to turn the music back on again. 'More Than You Know'. Elder was amazed at the colours of her skin, everything from dark chocolate to iron grey.

'I'm going to have a shower,' Karen said eventually, scrambling to her feet.

Elder lay there wondering what the time was, whether he'd be expected to stay the night. Whether he wanted to.

She came back five minutes later wearing a cotton robe, glass of water in hand, broad smile on her face.

'What?' Elder said.

'Wasn't so long ago, I could have got dressed up, really fit, put on my face, got myself down to the Funky Buddha, Sugar Reef, Chinawhite. Pulled some rising rap star or a brace of Premiership wannabes. And what do I end up with?' She laughed. 'Tired white meat.'

'Thanks. Thanks a lot.'

'My pleasure.'

'You've got a mouth on you, you know that.'

'You should know.'

Elder shook his head. 'Look, I should go.'

'Okay. You need a hand up off the floor?'

He looked at her to see if she were being serious and couldn't tell. When he was in the shower his mobile rang and Karen answered it.

'Here,' she said, handing it to him as, water off, he reached his hand around the shower curtain. 'A woman. Young.'

He knew it was Katherine before he heard her voice. 'Dad. I need to see you. It's important.'

'What about?'

'When I see you, okay?'

'All right, but I'm not sure when -'

'Dad, if it weren't urgent, I wouldn't have asked.'

He knew it was true.

'Tomorrow morning then,' Elder said. 'Nine thirty, ten?'

'Make it ten. The Castle. I'll meet you in the grounds.'

'Katherine -'

'Tomorrow.' And she finished the call.

'Trouble?' Karen asked once he was dressed. She was in the process of making coffee.

'I've got to go up to Nottingham tomorrow. My daughter again. I'll be back down as soon as I can.'

'Don't worry. We'll keep after Kennet. See if we can't trace this Jane Forest. Meantime, it's my turn to call you a cab, okay?'

Elder nodded. 'Okay.'

She kissed him at the door, nothing lingering. 'Not so tired,' she said, grinning. 'Just very white.'

37

It was a peerless winter's day. Elder had considered driving, but in the end had opted for the train. Not so much over an hour and a half, an hour and forty minutes, and he was in the centre of the city, walking past the canal and then the bus station, one edge of the Broad Marsh Centre taking him on to Lister Gate, Castle Gate and Maid Marian Way. The Castle sat on rock, not a child's idea of a castle with turrets and narrow windows and now-crumbling arches, the castle of Robin Hood and King John, sword fights and bows and arrows, but something more recent, more four-square and municipal.

The grounds were as neat and cared for as Elder remembered, the earth in the flower-beds newly turned, the wood of the bandstand looking as if it might have been given a fresh lick of paint, or maybe that was just the untrammelled winter sun, pale but warm enough to lift the chill.

Katherine was standing by the lower wall, leaning against the parapet, staring out. She turned her head as Elder approached, what looked like a man's fleece zipped up almost to the neck, trainers, baggy jeans.

Elder hesitated, bent to kiss her cheek and, as she turned her head aside, kissed the ragged crop of her hair instead.

'Not a bad morning,' he said, needing something to say. 'Nice coming up on the train. Bright, you know. Quick too. No sooner've you glanced at the paper, had a cup of that dreadful tea, than you're here.'

He was babbling.

There were the same dark patches around her eyes that he'd noticed before. The oversized fleece made her look undernourished and small. Unwell. Not so much more than a year ago she'd been running for her county, she'd been… He stopped himself, stopped the thought.

'Last night,' he said. 'You sounded worried.'

'Yeah, well… Let's walk. Can we just walk?'

They set off slowly along the path that would wind them, eventually, up to the Castle itself.

'You've got to promise me,' Katherine eventually began.

'Promise what?'

'You've just got to promise, that's all.'

'What?'

'That you won't snap your rag, get angry. Just let me… let me finish, okay?'

'All right.'

It was a while more before she began again. 'When you came up before, the heroin, it was Rob's, you were right. Well, not his exactly, he was holding it for someone. No, wait, wait. Remember what you said. Calm down, okay? Chill.' Katherine stopped, head down, arms hanging loose by her sides. 'I knew this was a bad idea.'

'No, it's fine,' Elder said. 'Go on, go on.'

They set off again, walking slowly.

'It was my fault, really stupid, if I'd kept my mouth shut we'd have got away with it, nothing would have happened. But once we were at the station and that bastard from the drug squad got involved…'

'Bland?'

'Yes. Him. He'd been on Rob's case for ages, picking him up for this and that, you know, threatening him. How they were going to find him with this huge stash in his possession, get him sent down for a long time. Never actually doing anything – I mean, he could have arrested him plenty of times for little things, but all he ever did was keep on needling him.'

Katherine stopped on the curve of the bend, looking back down towards the gate and over the town.

'Then, after last time, when you came round, he was there a few days later, half-six in the morning, him and some pal of his…'

'Eaglin?' Elder interrupted, recalling that Maureen had mentioned his name.

'I don't know. They didn't stop for much in the way of formal introductions. Turned the place upside down. Rob, he tried to stop them and they punched him, knocked him down and kicked him.'

'They had a warrant?'

'So they said.'

'You didn't see it?'

'I didn't see anything. Just crashing and shouting from upstairs while I was trying to see to Rob. He was bleeding from a gash to the head.'

'And this was when?'

'Two days ago. Monday.'

'What happened then?'

'They came back down, grins all over their rotten faces, waving this bag of crack cocaine. Got you, you bastard. Talk your way out of this one. Claimed they'd found it under the boards in the bedroom.'

'Is that where he kept it?'

'They'd planted it. It wasn't his.'

'Like the heroin in the car wasn't his.'

'No.'

'No? It's no use covering up for him, Kate…'

'I'm not. Not this time. Not about this. I mean…' Angling her head up towards the sky, down towards the ground, avoiding his eyes. 'I mean, that was where he kept stuff, yes, all right, sometimes, but not crack, he didn't deal crack, not ever, hardly ever, and honestly it wasn't his. It wasn't.'

There were tears running down into the hollows of her cheeks. While Elder fumbled in his pockets for a clean tissue, Katherine wiped her face with her sleeve.

'What happened after they arrested him?' Elder said.

'That's it, they didn't.'

'Why not?'

'Because they wanted him to make a deal.'

'What kind of deal?

'They wanted him to give them information.'

'About what?'

'What do you think?'

'Who was supplying him. Other dealers, maybe. I don't know.'

Katherine had started walking again. 'Suppliers, yes. If there was a safe house they used. That was what they seemed to want more than anything.'

'And he told them?'

'There wasn't a lot else he could do.'

They were at the high wall which overlooked Castle Boulevard, the canal and the Meadows. A small flock of birds, six or seven, too white almost to be pigeons, took off from the rock face and scattered out in a random curve before alighting on the roof of the Brewhouse Museum below.

'Rob gave them the address of this flat in Forest Fields, he didn't think they were still using it, it was all he could think of to do. Turns out they were. Bland and his mate went round just as it was getting dark. What we heard they got close on nine thousand in cash and God knows how much crack. H too. If they ever find out it was Rob gave them away, they'll kill him.'

'Where is he now?'

'In hiding.'

'As well as the money and drugs, Bland and Eaglin, did they make any arrests?'

'Not as far as I know.'

For a moment she let him hold her hand.

'Where are you staying?' he asked.

'At Rob's, why?'

'Go home. Go home to your mum's.'

'No.'

'Do it, Kate.'

'But if he wants to get in touch with me…'

'He'd be stupid coming there. He can ring you on your mobile, surely?'

'I suppose.'

'Is there anything you need to collect?'

'No, not really.'

'Then go now, I'll walk along with you.'

'And then what?' Her face thin and pleading. 'Is there anything you can do?'

'I don't know. I can try. What I can't do is promise. Okay? You understand?'

She nodded, sniffing, hands in pockets, so forlorn she was a child again, agonising over a broken toy, a favourite doll lost, her friends had refused to play with her at break time, or she had lost a glove, grazed her knee. He'd never come to terms with loving her as much as he did: never would.

'Come on,' he said. 'Let's go if we're going.'