Caffery checked over his shoulder to see if the Walking Man was listening. He wasn’t. He was looking out across the countryside in the opposite direction, a small smile on his face, as if he had already decided what Caffery was going to do.
‘Where’ve you been? The CSI are going crazy. E District’s had people over at your house trying to find you. You’re not answering your phone. They’ve been trying all night.’
‘I know. I saw the messages.’
‘My guess is you’ve been with your snout. Am I right?’
‘Yes. He’s unearthed something.’
The line went quiet.
‘It’s credible,’ Caffery said. ‘Very credible.’
Again there was silence. In a dry voice, Powers said, ‘Give me an outline, then.’
‘Gerber. Gerber did Kitson too.’
‘No. No fucking way.’
He looked up at the line of smoke. He didn’t know why but it comforted him, that black smoke coming from someone else’s fire. It was as if the world wasn’t such a lonely place at all. ‘She had an appointment with him. Used a fake name – we don’t know what. Maybe she talked him into not recording it. Didn’t want the press getting hold of it. But as soon as everyone wakes up, when everything comes on-line, I suggest you get some soil people out to Gerber’s place. There’s a couple of spots out there they could run a ground radar over.’
‘Are you sure? Are you absolutely sure about this?’
Caffery didn’t answer for a few moments. The wind had caught the black smoke on the far hill and was moving it slowly across the sky. When he’d killed that man in London he’d had his reasons, reasons that still seemed sound and good. Flea’s reasons would be clear too, they’d be as understandable as his were. There was nothing in the ground at Gerber’s house – nothing except the opportunity to buy some time. Time enough to do as the Walking Man said, to see the whole picture and decide whether to go at things the straightforward way. Or whether to leave Flea in peace, to make her own mistakes and atonements.
‘Yes,’ he said calmly. And something in his chest seemed to lift a little as he said it. ‘I’ve never been surer of anything in my life.’
About the Author
After leaving school at fifteen, Mo Hayder worked as a barmaid, security guard, film-maker, hostess in a Tokyo club, educational administrator and teacher of English as a foreign language in Asia. She has an MA in creative writing from Bath Spa University.
