‘What’s happens now?’ Tom asked.
‘You’re under arrest and you won’t be going anywhere, and you won’t be dealt with until I can get you into a custody office. I won’t be questioning you, so we’re all going to have to sit tight until the weather clears and we can get out of the village.’
‘What a joke. Suppose I just get up and walk?’
‘You won’t,’ Henry promised him.
‘I want a phone call.’
‘Who to?’
‘A friend.’
‘Which friend?’
‘Just a friend.’
‘Denied,’ Henry said.
‘I want a doctor.’
‘Alison will take a look at you.’
‘I said a doctor.’
‘She’ll have to do.’
‘And I want a brief.’
‘Who would that be?’
‘Jacobson in Lancaster.’
‘I’ll find the number for you.’
‘And I want a shower. I need to clean off this blood.’
‘That can be arranged.’
‘I want it now,’ Tom insisted and held up his connected wrists. ‘Cut these things off, please. I can’t shower with them on.’
Henry, Flynn and Alison were on the landing. Henry was weak and woozy, the pain in his shoulder severe. Tom had been allowed to use the shower in the en suite off the main bedroom, which was where he presently was. They could hear the sound of the shower running, hear the combi gas boiler firing up to heat the water. Henry leaned against the wall and glanced at his shoulder. Little flowering spots of red were blossoming through the clean shirt like tiny flowers as the peppered wound continued to seep.
‘Are you going to hang around and help out?’ The question was directed at Flynn. ‘Once I know, then I can plan a bit better.’
‘I’m staying,’ Flynn said. ‘He killed my friend.’
‘OK, but no rough stuff. I think he’ll continue to be a handful, but I don’t want any OTT reactions. Everything measured, everything justified. I want to hit him as much as you.’
‘Fine.’
‘Right… what I need to do is call all this in and bring control room up to speed, see what the latest weather forecast is and find out how soon we can get assistance. Then I think it’ll probably be easier to get Tom downstairs, cuff him to a chair in the office and keep an eye on both men in one location. Even though I’d like to keep them apart, it’ll be easier for us.’
‘I’ll have that,’ Flynn agreed.
‘Alison.’ Henry turned to her. ‘If you’d be good enough to dress Tom’s cut face, that’d be great. Then you can head back down to the pub. You don’t have to stay here and I imagine you’d rather be down there with Ginny anyway. You’ve done more than enough. Thanks.’
‘Are you saying you don’t want me?’ she said, mock offended.
‘Not at all.’
‘I’ll see. I’ll phone Ginny after I’ve seen to Tom.’
‘OK.’ To Flynn, Henry said, ‘Can you stay up here with one foot in the bedroom? When he’s finished showering, have him get dressed, then bring him down to the office.’
‘Will do.’
‘And thanks,’ Henry said genuinely.
Flynn shrugged modestly. He glanced at Henry and Alison, sensing something between them, which meant he didn’t stand a chance with her. He shrugged mentally as Alison smiled at him.
The two went down the stairs, leaving Flynn at the bedroom door.
In the hallway, Henry paused and turned to her. ‘I hope this doesn’t sound sexist, but I could really do with a coffee. Would you mind seeing if you could rustle something up in the kitchen? I know I sound a bit pathetic, but I need a shot.’
‘Not a problem.’
Henry glanced into the office and saw Callard on the floor by the radiator. After all the action, he had fallen asleep again and was snoring. Something else caught Henry’s eye, but before he could even begin to realize its significance, there was a knock on the front door.
He opened the door.
On the front doorstep stood a young woman, no hat, the snow covering her head and shoulders. She looked forlorn, lost and unsure. Henry thought there was something familiar about her, but could not quite place her. At the same time, his mind was elsewhere, nagging him about what he had seen in the office, and even as the girl was on the step in front of him, he knew he wasn’t giving her his full attention.
‘Yes?’ he asked sharply.
‘I’m sorry to bother you,’ she said apologetically.
‘Is there a problem?’
‘Are you a policeman?’ Her eyes took in his appearance, widening as they saw his blood-speckled shoulder.
‘Yes.’
‘Please can I come in?’
‘Er, yeah, sure, sorry.’
She stepped into the hallway and stomped the snow off her boots. Henry put her at about twenty years old. She had a pretty face, spoilt slightly by an angular chin and a harsh look in her eyes.
‘What can I do for you?’ Henry asked, hoping it was nothing. He glanced distractedly into the office again, frowning.
‘My name’s Laura Binney.’
Henry forced his attention back to her. ‘I’m Detective Superintendent Christie.’ Then he pointed at her and exclaimed, ‘You’ve been sat in the pub all day.’
‘Yeah.’
‘What’s the problem?’
‘I’m looking for my boyfriend.’
‘Right… and?’ A domestic situation was the last thing Henry needed. He estimated it would only be a few more seconds before he was propelling her back out the door. ‘Look,’ he said apologetically, ‘I’m just a bit busy right now. Can it wait?’
Her eyes moistened and searched Henry’s face. Her mouth quivered. ‘No.’
‘I’m afraid it might have to.’
Without further warning, she burst into tears with a loud wail, surprising Henry. ‘Hey, what’s up? Surely it can’t be that bad. You had an argument with him.’
‘It is bad,’ she blubbered through a torrent of tears. ‘I think he’s dead, I think he’s been murdered.’
The words, important as they were, desperately as they had been spoken, did not really register in Henry’s distracted mind. The thing that had caught his eye in the office suddenly made sense to his worn-out brain.
‘Shit — sorry love, hang on one second.’ He held up his right hand, palm out, in an ‘I’ll be back’ gesture, and rushed into the office. There was a cordless telephone on a base on the desk and a tiny red light on the base unit was flashing — blink, blink — indicating the line was in use somewhere else in the house. ‘Sugar,’ Henry uttered, thundered back out of the office, past the emotional and bewildered young woman, who watched him slack-jawed.
Alison came to the kitchen door, a puzzled expression on her face. ‘What is it, Henry?’
‘He’s got a phone up there,’ he said, then yelled upstairs, ‘Flynn — he’s got a phone in there.’ He started to leg it up, jarring his injured shoulder painfully with each footfall.
By the time he reached the bedroom door, Flynn was already at the door of the en suite, trying the handle. ‘Locked,’ he said.
‘Boot it down,’ Henry ordered, crossing to him and glancing at the bedside cabinets, noticing the empty base of a cordless phone on one of them. Somehow Tom had managed to sneak the phone into the shower room.
Flynn stepped back. He had kicked down lots of doors in the past, loved doing it. Something he missed. He lined himself up and flat-footed the door by the gold-plated handle. It was a flimsy interior door and splintered spectacularly as it disintegrated and crashed back on its hinges, which only just stayed screwed to the frame.
Henry pushed his way past and found Tom, who had not even stepped into the shower, though he had turned it on in order to fool Henry. He had the cordless phone in his hand and his thumb was frantically pressing buttons. Henry strode to him.
‘Give me the fucking phone,’ he demanded and tried to snatch it.
Tom jerked it away, thumbed the last button, the phone beeped, and then he handed it calmly to Henry, with a sly grin of triumph.
‘Who’ve you phoned?’ Henry asked.