“Well now, we don’t know for certain,” Jacob said. He was trying to be soothing, but his voice gave him away. “That was a mate of mine on the phone, does a bit of dealing in modern stuff out towards High Bentham. The police have dumped a bike in his yard this morning, a black and yellow CBR. They pulled it out of a ditch and he reckons it looks like its been run off the road. Got car paint on the fairing and blood on the tank, but no sign of the rider. It’s a local bike, from the plate, and he wondered if I might know whose it was. I said no.”
Sean looked stricken. “I need to see it,” he said. He staggered upright, almost toppled. Both Clare and I put a hand out to steady him, but he waved us away angrily. “I can manage.”
“Sean, don’t be a prat,” I said mildly. “You can’t just bounce straight back into the thick of it, not after what you’ve been through.”
“I’ll run him out there after lunch,” Jacob interrupted smoothly. “You go and see if you can lay your hands on this Jav character, Charlie.”
“Are you going to be OK by yourself?” Sean wanted to know.
“Don’t worry,” I said, “I know just the back-up I can call on.” I glanced down at my rumpled clothes. “But first, I think I’m going to go home for a shower and some clean gear. Am I actually insured to drive your truck?”
“It’s a company vehicle,” Sean said. “Anyone who works for me is covered.”
“Right,” I said. “I’ll consider myself hired.”
***
Despite my apparently cavalier attitude, I drove the Patrol back to Lancaster very slowly and very carefully. It seemed to lean alarmingly round corners, and the bonnet, with great chrome bull bars, went on for miles. By the time I pulled up outside the flat my neck was cranked tight and I had the beginnings of a growling headache spreading up from it like a stain.
I let myself in and headed straight for the shower, stripping off as I went. It wasn’t until I’d emerged from a long stint under stinging needles of hot water, towel-dried my hair and put on fresh clothes, that I thought to check my answering machine.
There was only one message, but it was enough to have me grabbing the keys to the Nissan and running for the door.
“Charlie, it’s Mrs Gadatra,” said a woman’s wavering, frightened voice from the tape. “It’s about Pauline. She’s been attacked in the street. I think you’d better come.”
***
Getting in to Lavender Gardens proved easier said than done. For a start there were a pair of panda cars parked at a slant across the entrance road. One of the uniforms flagged me down and walked up to the driver’s window, head bent to the rain.
I sat paralysed for a second or two, suddenly realising that the Glock was still where I’d carelessly shoved it in my door pocket, and Sean’s blood had dried to a sticky stain on the passenger seat. Thank God the leather upholstery was dark enough for it not to show too badly.
I pressed the down button for the electric window until there was a gap about eight inches deep. “Morning, officer,” I called over the top of the glass, aiming for puzzled cheeriness. “What’s the problem?”
He ignored my greeting. He looked wet, cold, and the kind of tired you get from having had your nerves stretched constantly for hours at a time.
“Have you got business on the estate?” he asked, looking at the Patrol’s nearly-new registration. “Only they’re chucking rocks at anything that moves in there.”
I thought of Sean’s insurance, which had already paid out for a new windscreen in the Grand Cherokee. It wasn’t my problem. “I need to get to Kirby Street,” I said, stubborn.
He shrugged dismissively. “Well, you’ve been warned,” he said, and turned away.
In fact, I got in without encountering any trouble. Kirby Street itself looked much the same as usual, apart from the shell of a burned-out Metro on the corner that nobody had yet got around to shifting. The council obviously hadn’t sent the bin men in that week, either. Cat-torn bags of rubbish slumped across the pavement like couch potatoes.
As I pulled up outside Pauline’s place and hurried down the short driveway, I was aware that a dozen pairs of hidden eyes had noted my arrival.
Friday went apoplectic when I banged on the front door. There was a long pause, then I saw the curtains flutter in the living room window. Finally, the lock was clicked back, and the door opened to reveal Mrs Gadatra, rather than Pauline herself.
“I’m sorry I didn’t get your message until this morning,” I said as she motioned me into the hallway. “How is she?”
Mrs Gadatra jerked her head through to the kitchen. “Come and see for yourself,” she said.
Friday, banished to the living room, had subsided to anxious squeaks and whines. He came sidling up to me as though he knew something was seriously awry. I skimmed my hand over the top of his broad skull as I went past, and was rewarded with a quick wet tongue across my wrist.
In the kitchen, Pauline was sitting at the end of the table, with Aqueel and Gin on either side of her. They seemed to be playing a lively game of snap. Taken aback for a moment, I halted in the doorway, and Pauline glanced up. It was only then that I got a good look at her face.
Whoever had hit her had caught her a belter across the right-hand side. The gauzy dressings taped over bits of her chin and forehead suddenly reminded me of Sean. The cheekbone itself had been left to the open air, and the scabs that had formed over the abrasions there were dark and ugly.
Pauline gave me a cautious, watery smile, as if not sure her mouth would stretch to it.
“What happened?” I demanded.
“Oh, it was just kids, you know, throwing stones,” she said vaguely.
Mrs Gadatra snorted in disgust. “Kids! Stones!” she said, flinging her arms up and shaking her fists so that the bangles she wore on both wrists clashed and rattled. “They threw a brick at her. A brick! It’s a miracle she isn’t dead. Who knows what they might have done after that if she hadn’t had the dog with her.”
Pauline smiled again with remembered affection. “Apparently he wouldn’t even let the ambulancemen get near me for a while,” she said.
That, I reckoned silently, would have done Friday’s mad dog reputation no harm at all. Both Aqueel and Gin looked mightily impressed by it as they carefully gathered the snap cards together.
“Why don’t you come and stay at my place for a few days?” I suggested, perching on the corner of the table nearest to Pauline. “Just while you recover. Let things settle down round here for a bit.”
“We can look after her perfectly well,” Mrs Gadatra said sharply, offended. “Mr Garton-Jones will find the culprits, mark my words, even if the police don’t seem to be doing anything.” She sniffed.
“I don’t suppose you knew any of them?” I asked.
Pauline shook her head.
“It all happened so quickly,” she said sadly. “I didn’t see anybody.”
So much for finding out if Jav was mixed up in this, too. On impulse, though, I asked Mrs Gadatra if she knew the blond-haired Asian boy.
She pursed her lips for a moment. “I don’t think so,” she said. “I may have seen him around the place, but—”
“Jav used to play snooker with my brother,” Aqueel piped up, concentrating on holding the box open so his sister could messily put the snap cards away into it. “He’s a very good player.”
His mother glared at him, and I realised that some subtle shift had taken place since I’d moved off the estate. I was an outsider again, and not really to be trusted with inside information about anyone, or anything.
I stood up, gave her a cool stare as I thanked Aqueel. “I’ll go and look for Jav there,” I told him. “I have some questions that I think he may be able to answer.”
“Is there anything I can help you with, Charlie?” Aqueel asked, with a defiant look to his mother. Since his brother’s death he’d grown up at an accelerated rate. And here he was, determined to show her that he was the head of the family now, his own man, and took orders from nobody.