“You still don’t understand, do you?” Larry said. “Eddie Myers’s wife ID’d the body. He’s supposed to be dead!”
Later, after more explanation and a widening of Susan’s indifference, which Lawrence continued to misread, they walked along the beach hand in hand, hearing the occasional seabird beyond the sounds of the sea and the grunts and giggles from the darkness around them.
“His wife had the body cremated,” Larry said. “Eddie Myers, good night.”
“Did you see her?” Susan asked. “His wife?”
“I don’t remember too much about her. Blonde — I think she was blonde... Maybe I’m wrong.”
“Maybe?” Susan laughed softly. “You haven’t seen Myers for more than — how long did you say?”
Larry caught the implication.
“I just remembered him,” he said. “He was that kind of bloke.”
Susan stopped walking and snuggled close to him.
“What kind?” she said.
“I was very impressionable,” he murmured, cupping her face.
Their mouths were an inch apart when he heard the sound of a boat moving across the water. He stiffened, peering out at the sea.
“Larry,” Susan said flatly. “It’s a fishing boat.”
His face was suddenly close to hers again. He kissed her once, fiercely, then broke away and began running. Susan ran after him, giggling. For the briefest surge of time, running and laughing there in the twilight, they were just the way they were when they had been on their honeymoon. He caught her in his arms, swinging her around, and they kissed passionately. Larry would have liked to have made love to her on the beach, but Susan drew away; she didn’t want herself all covered in sand... but they walked arm in arm, and three times they stopped to kiss and cuddle. They even kissed in the lift going up to their room. Passion at a fever pitch. She even allowed him to unbutton her dress in the corridor, giggling and flirting.
Larry wished he’d taken her there and then on the beach, because somehow in the overcrowded bedroom, with two kids sleeping within two feet, it cramped his style. Susan half wished he had too. If he’d been a bit more forceful she wouldn’t have really minded, but they did make love, muted, afraid that every bed creak would wake one or other of the boys. They were both sweating, and Susan’s sunburn hurt. All in all it was a fiasco. They lay beside each other, and were about to go to sleep, when they had to stifle their laughs as the creaking began from the room above, creaking and moaning with obvious abandonment, and the more it carried on, the more Susan got the giggles. At last the orgasm came as they heard the couple moaning and groaning with each thrust of their bedsprings. Then they heard the shuffle of footsteps as one or other sex machine went to the toilet, and as it flushed, they heard their own toilet repeat the action. Susan yawned, nodding off. “You’ll have to talk to the manager, Larry, it’s disgusting...”
Larry eased the sheet away from his body; he was boiling up, and there was little air from the open balcony. He couldn’t sleep, but didn’t want to get up and paddle through the bathroom, didn’t want to disturb Susan as she was already asleep, her hands cupped together, like one of the boys. He leaned up on his elbow to look down into her face; he could see the red blotches on her skin, the swimsuit straps, and her hair was damp at the nape of her neck. He gently traced her cheek with his finger, and lay back. He loved her deeply. They had been teenagers at the same school, and had married at eighteen, the full works, white wedding, four bridesmaids, and by then he had already joined the Met. It was a good marriage, and they had two beautiful boys. Susan was training to be a hairdresser when the first baby came, so she had given up her job and remained at home. She had never gone back to work. He liked that, liked the fact that she was at home waiting for him, looking after his sons. The house was always immaculate, she was very house-proud, and often did the decorating herself, sometimes assisted by her dad, who ran a paint shop and gave them wallpaper and paint for nothing. He concluded it was a good thing he had going, he was contented...
Larry closed his eyes and his thoughts drifted back over the evening. He could hear himself telling Susan about Eddie Myers, how he had said, “I just remembered him... he was that kind of bloke,” and that he was very impressionable... that was all true. What he had not said was how all the excitement surrounding Edward Myers had been at fever pitch, all the lads desperate to get in with the in crowd. There had been so many arrests, so many men named by Myers, that most of the officers attached to the case had never even seen him. The arrests went down all over London, and Larry would not have actually met him if it hadn’t been for some problem paperwork, and so he had been instructed to take over the statements to... Larry tried to recall the officer heading the Eddie Myers arrest; he frowned, irritated that the name wouldn’t come to him, because everyone had bandied it around, in fact it had been the main topic of conversation for weeks, months even, especially after Myers’s escape. “McKinnes.” Larry said it aloud and smiled, recalling the big man that had been pointed out to him; it was McKinnes, and he had been in deep water after Myers’s escape from custody. Rumor had it that the escape had destroyed McKinnes’s career and little had been heard of him since.
Larry turned on his side. About six months after the escape he had been at Bow Street magistrates court, taking a leak, when an officer had nudged him, and pointed to a window, a small narrow window high up in the wall.
“Myers got through that, must have dislocated his shoulder, how the hell he did it no one knows, he’s a hell of a size, but somehow he squeezed out of there... soddin’ magician.”
Larry had been impressed; it really was a small aperture, and he was a fair size himself. He reckoned he’d never have got his head through, never mind his entire body. He turned onto his back, and pictured himself, recalling the day he had met Myers. He was in the corridor, St. John’s Row station, carrying the file for McKinnes, looking in one room after another asking for McKinnes. He had been instructed to go up the next flight of stairs and to turn right at the top, and as he was hurrying up, two stairs at a time, he was confronted by two uniformed officers like tanks. They simply shoved him aside. His body was pressed against the wall and he saw the thick, heavyset McKinnes appear at the top of the stairs. He turned, gestured to someone behind him, snapping out an order.
“Excuse me, Inspector! I’ve brought these over from Hounslow.”
McKinnes peered at Larry, held out his big, square-knuckled hand, virtually snatching the file. It was then Larry looked upwards, and saw Edward Myers. Handcuffed, between two plainclothes detectives, the three had difficulty moving down the narrow stairs together. Myers was pushed slightly ahead. He seemed to find it all amusing. He was smiling, his body relaxed and perfectly coordinated. He passed within inches of Larry, and it was not until he was abreast of Larry that Myers turned his attention to the young, nervous uniformed police constable.
... Edward Myers had dark, almost coal-black hair, a slight bend to the bridge of his nose, which seemed to accentuate his chiseled cheekbones, and his smile revealed perfect white, even teeth. He smiled at Larry, but there was no possibility of Larry returning the seemingly friendly gesture, because he was struck by Edward Myers’s eyes. Dark as his hair, they appeared to be almost black, hard, and piercing, and they looked through Larry, beyond into the wall. They scared the living daylights out of him, there was such arrogance, such audaciousness in that single fleeting look, and Myers seemed to know how unnerved Larry was, because he laughed, a deep, gurgling laugh, which continued as the men pushed him farther down the stairs and out of sight.