‘Which one?’ asked Black Dress.
‘Mr Upstairs or Mr Downstairs?’ More snickers.
‘Oh, I thought…there’s only one bell.’
‘Landlord’s too bloody tight to give ‘em a bell each.’
Her friend staggered and the two lurched towards me reeking of heavy-duty perfume and cigarette smoke.
‘Is it flats then?’ I asked the woman in black who seemed less prone to hilarity.
She shrugged. ‘Not really, there’s only one bathroom but he sticks a Baby Belling on each floor and lets ‘em out like flats. Same as ours.’ Jules knocked her again and she dropped her bag. The contents scattered; lipstick, perfume and eye-pencil, cigarette lighter, tissues and purse, keys. I helped them gather everything up. ‘Here’s your key.’
‘Ta. So, what do you want?’
‘I need to find out the name of one of the people living there.’
‘Why, you from the social?’ Her eyes narrowed with suspicion.
‘No, no,’ I smiled. ‘He helped me out. I just broke down,’ I waved towards the main road, ‘and he spent ages on my car, got it going again. I’d like to send a card or something, thank him.’
‘Ooohh!’ remarked Jules, lips pursed, all innuendo. I rolled my eyes at her. ‘Do you know their names?’
‘Gary, innit,’ Jules volunteered, ‘Gary Crowther and upstairs is Chris, whass Chris’s name, Mel, something Irish innit?’
‘Scottish, not Irish – McPherson.’
‘I thought he was Irish.’ Jules shook her head. ‘I could’ve sworn he was Irish, innit.’
‘He’s a Geordie, yer div.’
‘You just said he was Scottish.’
‘His name! Scottish name. But he’s from Newcastle.’
‘Can you describe them?’ I interrupted the debate. I kept looking over to the stalker’s house, hoping that the commotion that Mel and Jules were making was a regular occurrence and wouldn’t attract his attention.
‘Gary’s dark hair, Chris’s brown, light brown.’ Mel looked to Jules for confirmation.
‘Yeah, Chris is the good-looking one.’
‘He is not,’ she contradicted, ‘he’s got small eyes. Gary’s better-looking.’
‘What about size?’ I asked, regretting the words even as they left my lips.
‘Size is not important,’ cackled Jules.
Mel snorted with laughter but recovered quickly. ‘Don’t mind her,’ she said, ‘she’s got a one-track mind.’
‘You must be interested in him, aren’t yer? Your knight of the road,’ teased Jules.
‘Shurrup.’ Mel shoved her. “Bout the same, they are. Medium height, medium weight.’
I needed something more definite. The man I’d followed had dark hair, almost black, but hair colour alone wasn’t enough to confirm his identity:
‘Does either of them wear a suit? The bloke who helped me wore a dark suit.’
‘Gary,’ they said in unison.
‘Probably sleeps in it,’ said Mel, ‘had it for years, by the look of it, be back in fashion soon. I said to him the other day, “get some shorts on, kid, let yer knees out”.’
‘You know him then?’
‘She is interested, innit,’ commented Jules.
Mel elbowed her in the ribs. ‘Don’t know him well. Just neighbours, same bleeding landlord. He’s shy, Gary. Wouldn’t say boo to a goose. Goes red as beetroot every time I say hello.’
I smiled. ‘Well, thanks for your help,’ I said, ‘goodnight then.’
‘Will you get this door open,’ complained Jules. ‘I need a fag, innit.’
Once they’d gone in I looked back at Gary Crowther’s house.
Gotcha! Name, address and number plate. I turned on my heel and walked briskly to my car.
I drove carefully home, aware of how tired I was and how easy it would be to make one fatal mistake. I was pleased I could now get things rolling on Gary Crowther, but the pleasure was muted by my overriding need to sleep.
Chapter Twenty-Five
I’d had maybe two and a half hours when Maddie woke me, complaining of earache. I stumbled about sorting her out with Calpol and let her into my bed. She fretted and whined and wriggled about for ages before falling asleep. I hoped she’d be better by morning. I couldn’t take time off to nurse her. I dozed for another hour and woke at half six and gave up on sleep.
Maddie was still in pain when she woke up at seven. It was too early to ring the GP. I had to be in town to meet Dermott Pitt at eight. I knew Ray would be leaving for work at eight so I had to find someone to take Tom into school and someone to mind Maddie till I’d had my meeting. I rang Nana Tello, Ray’s mother, who sounded decidedly grumpy though she always claimed she couldn’t sleep in the mornings. She agreed to look after Maddie for me. I called over the road to Denise, apologised for the short notice and asked if she could take Tom in with her daughter Jade. No problem. Ray would bring Tom across at eight.
There was no sign of the white van when Maddie and I set out. Nana Tello made a fuss of Maddie in a mixture of Italian and baby talk. Maddie was too wiped out to react to it. We settled her on the sofa. The telly was tuned to a sports channel. Nana Tello would be studying the form for the day’s races. I promised to be back by ten.
‘It’s a shame,’ Nana Tello said as she saw me out, ‘when you gotta go rushing off to big meetings and your little girl so poorly.’ It was. But what could I do? I didn’t draw support from the comment either. I’d heard enough of her views on motherhood and work to know that she wasn’t sympathising with my predicament. Thank God she didn’t follow through on her beliefs and refuse to help out when the crunch came. I thanked her again and joined the rush-hour traffic into Manchester.
Queuing to get into the multi-storey car park made me five minutes late. Enough to have me running to the solicitor’s offices and leave me out of breath on my arrival.
You’d never have guessed that Dermott Pitt had worked late last night and risen early in the morning. He looked fresh and neatly turned out when his secretary led me through.
‘Coffee?’ she asked him.
‘Excellent. Ms Kilkenny?’
‘Please.’ Oh yes, please. The smell of it had made me dizzy when I’d walked in.
She must have had it waiting. She returned immediately with an exquisite pair of hand-painted coffee cups on a tray along with a cafetière, a jug of milk, a bowl of multi-coloured granulated sugar and plate of thin, dark chocolate biscuits. I was ravenous. I wanted a fluffy cheese and tomato omelette with wholemeal bread and butter, pancakes dripping with golden syrup and sprinkled with fresh lemon juice. Or a full English breakfast without the sausage and bacon. I don’t eat meat but the rest would do very nicely. Eggs, mushrooms, tomatoes, fried bread, toast and marmalade. There were five biscuits. Who’d get the last one?
‘I have until eight forty-five,’ Dermott announced pompously, ‘I am all ears.’
‘I brought the tape. I think you ought to listen to that first.’
I handed him the cassette and he moved to open one of the antique wooden cabinets to his side. It concealed a state-of-the art midi system. He put the tape in. I knew I’d successfully recorded Joey – I’d checked the end of the recording on my return from Prestatyn. In the past I’d once proudly played someone a cassette which proved their foreman was filching goods, only to find the tape was completely blank. Never again.
Dermott sat back and steepled his fingers. The tape began, birdsong and traffic sounds louder than I remembered. For a moment or two I was embarrassed at the sound of my own voice but it didn’t take long to be drawn back into Joey’s story of the killing.
Pitt indicated that I should help myself to coffee and I did. I inhaled the steam until it was cool enough to sip. Pitt poured his own and took a biscuit. I took a biscuit. Then another. Joey talked about Ahktar smiling, about calling out to him. The story unwound.
‘That’s it,’ I said when the sound stopped. ‘And the man he describes, the big bloke, I think that’s Rashid Siddiq.’