Barry watched Terry play the fruit machines with money supplied by Deacon. "He's a nice lad," he said.
Deacon lit a cigarette and followed his gaze. "He's been living on the streets since he was twelve years old. It sounds as if he has Billy to thank for the fact that he's as straight as he is."
"What will you do with him when Christmas is over?"
"I don't know. He needs educating but I can't see him agreeing to going back into care. It's a bit of a poser really, one of those bridges you only cross when you come to it." He turned back to Barry. "Was he helpful on the photographs?"
"A little quick to discard the improbables, but it doesn't seem to register with him that Billy was much younger than he looked. I had to rescue one or two." He took an envelope from his pocket which contained various prints. He spread them across the table. "What do you think of these?"
Deacon isolated a high-quality photocopy of a young fair-haired man staring directly into the camera. "I recognize this one. Who is he?"
Barry tittered happily. "That's James Streeter, taken twenty-odd years ago when he graduated from Durham University. He was brought up in Manchester so, out of interest, I applied to the local newspapers and one of them produced that. It's extraordinary, isn't it?"
"He's a dead ringer for Billy."
"Only because he was thinner and appears to have had his hair bleached."
Deacon took out his print of Billy and laid it beside the young James Streeter. "Have you compared these two on the computer?"
"Yes, but they're not the same man, Mike. It's a closer match because we're looking at a similar relationship between camera angle and subject, but the differences are still obvious. Most notably the ears." He picked up the cigarette packet and placed it across the bottom half of Billy's face with the upper edge touching the bottom of an earlobe. "It is all about angle, of course, but Billy's lobes are larger than James's and their bottom edge is roughly in line with his mouth." He moved the packet to the other photograph and placed it in the same relative position. "James has hardly any lobe at all, and the bottom edge is in line with his nostrils. If you synchronize the eyes, nose, and mouth on the computer, the ears immediately part company, and if you tilt the angles to synchronize the earlobes then the rest parts company."
"You're pretty good at this, aren't you?"
Pleased color tinged Barry's plump cheeks. "It's something I enjoy doing." He nudged the other prints, artfully isolating a profile shot of Peter Fenton. "Do you recognize anyone else?"
Deacon shook his head. He took a last look at James Streeter, then pushed the photographs aside. "It's a wild-goose chase," he said dispiritedly. "I'm beginning to think Billy's a side issue, anyway."
"In what way?"
"It depends what Amanda Powell's agenda was when she told me about him. She must have known I'd find out about James, so whose story am I supposed to be investigating? Billy's or James's?" He drew thoughtfully on his cigarette. "And where does Nigel de Vriess fit in? Why would he give Amanda's address to a complete stranger?"
"Perhaps he doesn't like her," said Barry, tacitly disclosing his own prejudices.
"He did once. He left his wife for her. In any case, however much you dislike someone, you don't give their address to any old nutter who turns up." He eyed Barry curiously. "Do you?"
"No." Barry looked uncomfortably at the photograph of Peter Fenton. "I suppose it's possible they knew each other from before."
Deacon followed his gaze. "Nigel and Billy?"
"Yes."
He looked skeptical. "Wouldn't he have told Amanda who he was? Why talk to me if Nigel could have given her his name?"
"Maybe they're no longer in contact."
Deacon shook his head. "I wouldn't bet on that. She's not the type a man could forget very easily. And de Vriess likes women."
"Do you like her, Mike?"
"You're the second person to ask me that"-he held the other's gaze for a moment-"and I don't know the answer. She's out of the ordinary, but I don't know whether that makes her likable or ruddy peculiar." He grinned. "She's damn fanciable. I'll say that for her."
Barry forced himself to smile.
*14*
Terry had turned on the overhead light in Deacon's bedroom and was prodding the slumbering man's shoulder aggressively. Deacon opened one eye and looked with extreme disfavor on his protege. "Stop-doing-that," he said slowly and clearly. "I am not a well man." He rolled over and prepared to go back to sleep again.
"Yeah, right, but you've got to get up."
"Why?"
"Lawrence is on the phone."
Deacon struggled to a sitting position and groaned as his hangover hit him behind the eyes. "What does he want?''
"Don't ask me."
"Why didn't you leave the machine to take a message?" growled Deacon, glancing at his clock and seeing that it was six-fifteen in the morning. "That's what it's for."
"I did-the first four times-but he just kept ringing back. How come you didn't hear it? Are you deaf or what?"
With muttered imprecations, Deacon stumbled through to the sitting room and picked up the receiver. "What's so mportant that you have to wake me at the crack of dawn on Christmas Eve, Lawrence?"
The old man sounded worried. "I've just been listening to the radio, Michael. I sleep so little these days. I'm guessing that either you or I or both of us can expect a visit from the police shortly. I know Terry's there because he answered the telephone, but can you vouch for his movements last night?"
Deacon rubbed his eyes vigorously. "What's this about?"
"Another incident at what I assume is Terry's warehouse. Look, find a news bulletin on your radio and listen to it. I may be completely wrong, but it sounds to me as if the police are looking for your lad. Call me back as soon as you can. You may need me." He rang off.
It was the top story, with details breaking as the newscaster was on air. Following an attempted murder and the arrest of a suspect on Friday afternoon, further trouble had erupted among the homeless community in a docklands' warehouse in the early hours of Christmas Eve, when several men had been doused with gasoline and their clothes set alight. The police were looking for a youth, five feet eleven inches tall, shaven-headed and wearing a dark coat, who was seen running from the warehouse following the incident. Although they had not released his name, the police were looking for a known suspect who was believed to hold a grudge against the warehouse community, following the attempted murder on Friday.
For all Terry's surface bravura, he was only fourteen years old. He stared at the radio in tearful panic. "Someone's grassed me up," he stormed. "What am I gonna fucking do? The police'll crucify me."
"Don't be an idiot," said Deacon sharply. "You've been here all night."
"How would you know, you bastard?'' demanded Terry angrily, his fear sparking further aggression. "I could have gone and come back without you knowing anything about it. Shit, you didn't even hear your phone ringing."
Deacon pointed at the sofa. "Sit down while I phone Lawrence back."
"No chance. I'm out of here." He bunched his hands into fists. "I ain't gonna let the fucking pigs anywhere near me."
"SIT DOWN," roared Deacon, "BEFORE I GET REALLY ANGRY!" Afraid that Terry would bolt if he left the room to search out Lawrence's number, he switched to the loudspeaker, pressed one-four-seven-one to give him a voiced number recall of the last person who had phoned him, then pressed three to dial that person back. "Hi, Lawrence, it's Michael and Terry on the speakerphone. We think you're right. We think the guys at the warehouse have grassed Terry, and we think the police will come knocking. So what do we do?''
"Can you vouch for his movements?"
"Yes and no. We got back here at about two o'clock in the morning, courtesy of a taxi. I abandoned my car in Fleet Street because I was over the limit. We were with a chap called Barry Grover until about one-fifteen a.m. We were pissed as rats. The last thing I remember is telling Terry to stop giggling like a schoolgirl and go to bed. I crashed out immediately, and the next thing I knew was Terry giving me grief because you were on the phone. I can't swear he was here between two and when he woke me"-he squinted at his watch-"which means four and a quarter hours are unaccounted for. It's a hypothetical possibility that he went out, but a practical no-no. He could hardly stand when I pushed him into his bedroom, and I am one hundred percent certain that he's been there ever since."