I nodded. Callum Franks was Stacy’s nephew. Over the years he’d often helped me out whenever I needed an extra pair of eyes or legs. He was a quick learner, and very reliable, and when it came to anything technical — computers, phones, recording equipment — Cal was in a league of his own. He could do virtually anything with a laptop … and when I say anything, I mean anything. Legal or otherwise.
‘OK,’ I said, putting out my cigarette. ‘Remind me to pick up the memory card before I go. I’ll give it to Cal the next time I see him.’
Ada stood up. ‘What are you going to do now?’
‘I don’t know. Did you get through to the garage about the car window?’
She nodded. ‘They said they’d send someone out straight away.’
‘Straight away garage time?’
‘I’d imagine so.’
‘What’s that in real time?’
‘Probably about two hours.’
‘Yeah,’ I said, stifling a yawn.
‘Why don’t you go home for a bit?’ Ada said gently. ‘Take a bath, change your clothes … get some rest. I don’t mind staying on for the rest of the day.’
‘Are you sure?’
She nodded. ‘I’ll call you a taxi.’
‘You’re an angel, Ada.’
‘I know.’ She looked at me, suddenly quite serious. ‘Are you all right, John? I mean, you know … in yourself, generally. Are you OK?’
‘Yeah … I’m fine.’
‘Really?’
‘Yeah.’
She looked at me for a long moment, seeking the truth in my eyes, and then — with a far from convincing nod of her head — she reached up and gently took hold of my chin, angling it to get a better look at the swelling on my face.
‘You need to put some ice on that when you get home,’ she said. ‘Have you got any ice in that hovel of yours?’
‘It’s not a hovel — ’
‘Put a few ice cubes in a towel or a flannel, crush them up, and hold it against your face. It should help the swelling to go down. All right?’
‘Yeah, thanks.’
She looked at me again, genuine concern showing in her eyes, then she said, ‘I’ll go and call you that taxi.’
My house — or my hovel, as Ada likes to call it — is in an old terraced street on the south side of town. It was originally a factory house, as were all the homes in Paxman Street, built over a century ago by the owners of the neighbouring engineering plant to accommodate the company’s workers. For a hundred years or more, the mist and steam from the factory across the road has been breathed in by the bricks of the house, and on a hot day, or when a thunderstorm is coming, the walls give out a faint scent of oil. Sometimes, too, in the middle of the night, I think I can smell the tired skin of the factory hands who once lived here. I imagine them as short, dark, melancholy people, with sooted faces and small bitter eyes … and as I lie in bed, listening to their illusive whispers, I wonder if they’re happier now, in their dreams of death, than they were in the toil of their lives.
It’s not much, my house — upstairs, downstairs, two separate flats, a small back garden and an even smaller front yard — but it’s mine, for what it’s worth, and I feel safe and comfortable within the sanctuary of its stained old walls.
I live alone.
But I’m not alone.
When my mother died in 1997, she left me both the family home — the house where I was born and brought up — and the house in Paxman Street, which she’d bought with my father some years ago as a buy-to-let investment. At the time she died, there was only the one tenant in the house, a young woman called Bridget Moran, who lived in the upstairs flat, and as I’d already decided to sell the family home and use the money to set up my own investigation business, it just seemed sensible, and convenient, to move into the downstairs flat.
So that’s what I did.
And I’m still here.
And so is Bridget Moran.
As the taxi dropped me off outside the house, Bridget was just coming out, and I was momentarily stunned to see that she’d had most of her chestnut-brown shoulder-length hair cut off and was now sporting a boyishly short peroxide-blonde crop. My sense of shock was only partly caused by how different — and how amazing — she looked with her new haircut. The main reason, the thing that just for a second had stopped my heart and turned me inside out, was that Stacy used to wear her hair in exactly the same style — short, blonde, spikily cute — and just for a moment, when I’d seen Bridget coming out of the house …
The moment soon passed.
Bridget was with her boyfriend, a vapid piece of meat called Dave. I’d never liked Dave. He had a confident smile, nice teeth, sideburns, an expensive suit and an equally expensive watch. He was the kind of man who keeps a golf umbrella in the back of his company car, the kind of man who wears shoes that squeak. I didn’t know his surname, but I liked to think that it was Dave. ‘Hi,’ I could imagine him saying. ‘Dave Dave, pleased to meet you. Yeah, right, absolutely …’
No, I didn’t like Dave at all.
Not that it mattered …
‘Hey, John,’ Bridget said breezily as we met at the front gate. Then, ‘Shit! What happened to your face?’
‘Oh, nothing … just a stupid accident,’ I muttered, trying not to stare too obviously at her hair. ‘I fell over … down some steps.’
‘You need to put some ice on that,’ she said, looking closer.
‘So I’ve been told.’ I looked at her. ‘I like what you’ve done to your hair.’
She smiled broadly, running her fingers through her hair. ‘Really? You don’t think it’s too much, do you?’
‘No … it really suits you.’
Dave Dave, who’d been gazing idly around the front yard as we talked, feigning indifference, suddenly butted in. ‘Come on, Bridge,’ he grunted, taking her by the arm. ‘We’d better get going.’
‘Yeah, OK.’ She flashed a smile at me. ‘See you later, John. And don’t forget the ice.’
I smiled at her, nodding perfunctorily at Dave, and stepped aside to let them pass. I paused for a moment, wondering if I should turn round and wave goodbye … but after I’d thought about it for a while, I decided not to bother, and I just went on into the house instead.
Bridget’s dog, Walter, was waiting in the hallway when I opened the front door. A big old greyhound, he was sitting at the foot of the stairs with a chewed rubber bone in his mouth. I reached down and scratched his head.
‘Hey, Walter,’ I said. ‘How’s it going?’
His tail thumped, his mouth fell open in a lazy dog smile, and the rubber bone dropped to the floor. I bent down, picked it up, and gave it back to him.
‘There you go.’
He looked at me, took the bone in his mouth, and dropped it again. He was nearly fourteen now. His muzzle was slack and pale, and the brindley grey hair on his back was streaked with white. He was nearing the end of his life. But, for Walter, that wasn’t so bad. Getting old isn’t the same for dogs as it is for us, because — unlike us — dogs don’t know they’re going to die.
I left him where he was and went into my flat.
The familiarity of my living space greeted me, as usual, with its dusty and settled silence. It’s a place that’s always felt lived in: a front room, spacious and high, with plain wooden furniture and solid old walls; heavy double doors leading through into the bedroom; and then a stepped stone archway that takes you down into a cramped little kitchen area at the back. A narrow door at the far end of the kitchen opens through to the bathroom, and twin glazed doors lead out into the brick-walled garden at the rear.
It’s how it is, how it’s meant to be, and that’s how I like it.
And it holds no memories for me.
And I like that, too.
I went over to the old armchair beneath the high window in the front room, and I sat down and lit a cigarette. My eyes were stiff and heavy, and deep inside me I could feel a distant weight of tiredness that at some point, I knew, was going to creep up behind me and drape a blanket over my head — a cold, black, greasy old blanket. And when that happened, I wouldn’t be capable of anything. I’d be in the black place, the place where I can’t move, where I’ve never been able to move … the place where there is nothing else … nothing at all. And when I’m there, I’ve been there all my life, and I’ll remain there for the rest of my life, draped in the darkness. I can’t do anything. I don’t want anything. What’s the point? Fifty years from now, we’ll all be dead anyway. We’ll all be floating back to the stars or buried in the dark underground, caked in clay, riddled with worms and insects, centipedes, chafers, slugs … and nothing that happens now will mean a fucking thing.