Lancaster tried to look relaxed. Bernard Cooke had been doubtful of the plan at first, but as a friend of Gillian’s he’d gone along with it. After all, partly it had been her idea. She was looking pale again. She’d been ordered to rest by the doctors, but had insisted on sticking around. The phone rang again. Lancaster snatched the call.
‘Red Fiesta,’ he said afterwards. ‘Sighted heading for Lower Traherne.’ He fixed his eyes on Gillian. ‘Looks like he’s heading out to your home.’ Then he turned to Duniec. ‘Get on to it, Stefan.’ Duniec nodded and left the room.
This eventuality, too, had been covered. The Websters were in a local hotel, under plainclothes protection. A driver and unmarked car were waiting outside to take Gillian back there. The Minute Man was driving into a trap.
The phone rang yet again, and Lancaster picked it up, glad of something to do. He listened for a moment, a muscle going rigid in his jaw. When he spoke, it was in a dry voice. ‘Put him through, will you? And try to get a trace.’ He then pushed a button on the telephone and replaced the receiver. A small integral speaker crackled into life. A female voice said, ‘You’re through, caller.’ Lancaster swallowed and spoke.
‘Hello?’
‘Superintendent Lancaster?’
‘Speaking.’
Lancaster watched Gillian. She was staring at the telephone. What little colour she had vanished from her face.
‘Don’t bother with a trace, Tom. I won’t be on long, you know that.’
‘We get a dozen cranks a day saying they’re the Minute Man.’
‘You know who I am, Tom.’
‘Why are you phoning?’
‘Because you’ve got the wrong man.’
Lancaster looked to Gillian and Cooke. She looked ready to leap from her seat, while Cooke seemed pinned against the back of his as if by G-force.
‘Have we?’
‘Yes. She’s set him up.’
‘Who has?’
‘The girl.’
‘Why would she do that?’
‘He’s having an affair with her mother. She wants revenge.’
Lancaster forced a laugh. ‘How can you possibly know that?’
‘I know. I know all of it now.’
The line went dead.
‘Christ,’ Cooke said. Lancaster checked with the switchboard, but the Minute Man hadn’t been on long enough to give them a chance. In fact, he’d been on the line for scarcely a minute…
Lancaster got to his feet. ‘I wonder if he still plans to visit Lower Traherne? One way to find out…’
‘I’m coming too,’ said Cooke, rising shakily to his feet. Gillian was still staring at the telephone. Neither man needed confirmation that she had recognised the voice. When Lancaster touched her shoulder she flinched.
‘Come on, Gillian,’ he said. ‘Let’s get you back to the hotel.’
They opened the back door of the car for her and she got in. The engine was running and the car moved off at once, through the car park, past the usual ruck of reporters and cameras, and out of the iron gates of Castle Lane police station. She didn’t want to go to the hotel, not really. She wanted to go home, to Lower Traherne. But she doubted the police driver could be persuaded to take her there. She noticed a walkie talkie on the floor by his feet. Or maybe it was a portable phone. Whatever happened at the house, she’d hear of it. He was looking at her in the rearview mirror. When she looked back, he gave her a reassuring smile. Then she noticed they’d passed the regular turning.
‘We should have gone left there.’
He was still smiling. The car was building up speed. Gillian felt a lump swell in her throat, the fear nearly choking her.
‘I know it all now,’ he said quietly. ‘The way Lancaster spoke, that confirmed it. Oh yes, that balanced both sides of the ledger quite nicely.’
She swallowed, shifting the blockage. ‘Where’s the driver?’
‘ I’m the driver.’
‘The policeman.’
‘You think he’s in the boot?’ He shook his head. ‘I told him his chief wanted him in the press room.’
She was relaxing a little. His voice was calm. It had been calm all the time she’d been his captive. ‘Where are we going?’ she asked.
‘Lower Traherne.’
‘What?’
‘I’m taking you home, Gillian.’
‘But why?’
He shrugged. ‘Just to show them I can.’
She thought for a moment. While she was thinking, he spoke again.
‘It was good, very good, nearly had me fooled. Except for one scared bloke in a pub…’
She felt the words tumble from her mouth, like someone else was speaking. ‘They’ve got the exit roads covered, and there are police at the house, inside and outside. You’ll never-’
‘It’s all right, Gillian. You’ll see, both sides will balance.’
‘What do you mean, balance?’
So for the rest of the journey, the Minute Man tried to explain to her his own particular theories of the principles of accounts.
The Only True Comedian
I suppose, looking back, my schooldays were to blame. Or maybe it was my parents’ genes, which had left me the smallest boy in my year. The popular boys all seemed to be the tough ones, the sporty ones, the ones who weren’t shy, who were good-looking.
I didn’t really fit the bill. So instead I became the comedian. Of course, they weren’t laughing with me – they were laughing at me. I knew it even then, as I told my jokes and made my silly faces and did my funny walks. They told me I was off my head, said I was potty. I didn’t mind: at least they were talking to me. At least they were noticing me.
Which meant I was allowed to participate in their games, or at least watch from the periphery, which was my favoured spot anyway. Watching them, I was able to learn. I learned which kids and teachers I could make fun of. I’d go for the younger kids, even spottier and uglier than I was, or for one of the unlovely girls who stood by the playground railings, sad looks on their faces. Oh, I was ferocious with anyone who couldn’t bite back. It was how I stayed part of the gang.
The other problem was, I wasn’t stupid, but when I became a member of Black Alec’s gang, I had to pretend to be less clever than I was. And this pretence could only be carried off if I started slipping in class, answering questions wrongly when I knew the right answers, my test marks dropping. The deputy head had a word with me. I think she could see there was a problem, she just couldn’t figure out what it was. My parents were summoned to the school for a discussion. They started to take notice of me too, helping with homework and revision. Still I refused to fulfil my potential. Sometimes I would slip up, and answer some question which had stumped everyone else. At these times, the teacher would peer at me, wondering what was going on.
Eventually I was taken to hospital for tests on my brain. They glued all these electrodes to my head. Three washings later, my hair still felt sticky, and the results had failed to throw up any incongruities. When the final exams came, I was in a quandary. We’d all have left school by the time the results were posted. So if I wanted to, I could do as well as I liked. But something made me stay in character; maybe it was the thought that though I was leaving school, the gang would still be there, hanging around their favoured street corner, yelling abuse at cars and pedestrians, running down to the park with a carrier-bag of beer. It was a community I understood, and my chosen role made me unique within it. I was ‘Joker’ or ‘The Comedian’. I wasn’t expected to take part in the occasional massed battles with other gangs. I proved myself by telling jokes and stories, by deriding other gangs (especially with reference to their personal hygiene and sexual habits), and by improving my range of impressions.
Soon after leaving school, however, I found that a lot of the gang had drifted away. Even Black Alec – our leader and mentor – had gained employment as a car mechanic. The merry band had dwindled to a few losers for whom the daily stint at the street corner had become an unwelcome chore. I thought about resitting my exams, going on to college or university. But Black Alec was my next-door neighbour: how could I tell him my plans? He wouldn’t have understood. He’d have asked me to do the walk again, and afterwards his laughter would have had me craving more. More laughter, more acceptance, more of his approval.