‘Bait dog?’ Howie says.
‘Old dogs that’ve lost the will to fight,’ Luther says. ‘They chain them down. Let other dogs practise on them.’
Howie looks at the dog’s wide triangular head, its beady little eyes, its absurdly muscular chest. She feels a twinge of pity for it. Its hot tongue lolls in the corner of its mouth.
‘Are we okay to come in?’ Luther says. ‘He’s not going to bite, is he?’
Bixby shakes his head and steps aside. ‘He’s got no bite left in him, have you, boy?’
He means it literally. Most of the dog’s teeth have been removed.
They enter a cramped flat; floral curtains and psychedelic carpet that surely belonged to the previous occupant; the kind of armchair usually destined to be garnished with antimacassars, now blackened and greasy. A fat TV on a spindly coffee table. Canine kitsch: porcelain dogs, plastic dogs.
Bixby sits with his hands writhing between his bony knees. He asks why Luther and Howie are here.
Luther says, ‘Your name’s been mentioned in connection with an investigation. And we’d like to speak with you about it.’
‘What investigation?’
‘What investigation do you think?’
‘I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking.’
Luther watches Bixby’s fretful hands. ‘You must be thinking something, Steve. It’s difficult not to think something.’
‘I haven’t done a thing.’
‘Well, like I say. Your name came up.’
‘Then someone’s lying to you. Speak to my supervisor, go see my probation officer. Speak to my shrink; I’m in counselling — group counselling and voluntary one-to-one. I accept full responsibility for my previous offending. I stay away from high-risk situations. I’m really trying here.’
‘Trying to what?’
‘Get better.’
‘Do men like you actually get better?’
‘Do you know what it’s like, being me? Do you think I like it?’
His eyes search Luther’s face, then Howie’s. See nothing. No judgement. No pity.
‘I used to drink,’ Bixby says. ‘To blank it out. I’d see a picture of a girl who’d been kidnapped and all I could think was yeah, I could see why he took her. She’s lovely. I’d go to family birthday parties and I’d be singing happy birthday and the whole time I’m thinking: I’d love to take your daughter away and fuck her. What do you think that feels like?’
Howie looks at the shelf of DVDS. Top Gear. Bear Grylls. The Matrix Trilogy.
‘I don’t know,’ Luther says.
‘I’ll tell you. It makes you hate yourself and want to die.’
‘Yet somehow, here you are. Not dead.’
Bixby looks at Luther as if he’s been slapped. ‘Fuck you,’ he says. ‘Fuck you.’ He wrings those skinny hands at the end of bony wrists. ‘Have you ever tried to be someone you’re not? Hating every thought in your head, having them go round and round and round like a fucking train, and you can’t stop them?’
‘I know exactly what that’s like, Steve. But you don’t have to act on those thoughts, do you?’
‘I didn’t,’ he says. ‘I never even touched a child. Not once. Are you gay or straight?’
‘Straight, if it matters.’
‘Then can you imagine what it would be like, never to touch a woman? To have craved it since you were ten or eleven years old, to see women every day, beautiful women, sexy women? And never, ever, be able to lay even a finger on them, let alone make love to them? Not ever. To die a virgin. To know that your most loving touch would ruin them.’
‘No,’ Luther says. ‘I can’t imagine that. But then, I can’t imagine trading in child pornography either.’
‘I did that, yeah.’
‘So you hurt kids second-hand. Did it ever occur to you that the kids in those photos would never have been hurt if there wasn’t a market of people like you waiting to buy the pictures?’
‘I think the people who took those pictures might have thought twice about selling them,’ Bixby says. ‘Not taking them.’
‘So,’ Luther says. ‘You ran a network. People would come to you. You’d put people in contact with other people. People with similar interests.’
‘Not any more.’
‘I know. But we’re looking for a man who may have come to you. A while ago maybe.’
‘When?’
‘I don’t know. But he’d be a man who wanted something very specific.’
‘They all want something very specific. That’s their curse.’
‘You love children, right?’
‘Yes.’
‘Do you watch the news?’
‘Sometimes.’
‘Did you watch it today?’
‘I think so. I don’t know. Why?’
‘I think you know why.’ Luther leans forward. Speaks low, the same way he did to the dog, forcing Bixby to lean in closer.
The dog shifts uneasily on the carpet. Whines low in its throat.
‘Night before last, somebody cut a child from its mother’s womb,’ Luther says. ‘A man like that, a man who’d do that sort of thing — I think you’d know him. Or know of him. I think part of you’s been waiting for a knock at the door since this happened. Because you know who this man is.’
Bixby blinks. He pats his lap. The old dog struggles into the chair. Bixby strokes it.
‘Yeah, I knew a lot of these men,’ he says at length. ‘But the thing about them, about us, you have to remember, there’s no such thing as a “paedophile”. Same way there’s no such thing as a “straight man”. Some straight men like high heels, or underwear, or bondage, or being submissive, or dressing as babies — whatever. I don’t know. Sexuality is a broad church, okay?’
Luther nods. Lets him talk.
‘It’s the same with men who want sex with children,’ Bixby says. ‘There are a million and one variations — heterosexual, homosexual. Men who want to kill children. Men who idolize them, who honestly can’t accept that it’s impossible for a child to feel sexual desire for them. That was my problem, and I’m working with it.’
‘And babies?’
‘It’s rare, but it exists. But for all that I’ve seen, I never, ever, in all the thousands of hours I spent communicating with these men, not once did I hear anybody fantasize about cutting a baby from a mother’s womb for the purposes of sexual gratification.’
‘So what are we saying?’
‘That the man you’re looking for isn’t a paedophile.’
Luther takes a moment. ‘So you do know him?’
Bixby looks away. Luther looks at his frantic hands, tickling the dog’s sternum, scratching its angular head. Every now and again he leans in to nuzzle its neck.
The dog stares at Luther.
Luther says, ‘DS Howie, would you mind waiting in the car?’
Howie doesn’t look at him. She says, ‘I’m okay, Boss. It’s nice and warm in here.’
Bixby reads the vibe between them.
Luther says, ‘Steve. It’s important you tell me what you know about this man.’
‘I don’t even know it’s the same man.’
‘But you’ve got a feeling it might be, right?’
Bixby bites his lower lip and nods.
Luther says, ‘Then I don’t understand your reticence.’
‘Aiding and abetting.’
‘Did you help this man in some way?’
‘I think I may have.’
‘And you’re worried about going back to prison?’
‘I’d honestly rather die.’
‘We’ll see what we can do to avoid that. If you help us, right here and right now.’
‘I want immunity. From prosecution.’
Luther laughs. It startles the dog. It gets down from the sofa. Stands in front of Bixby’s spindly legs, protecting him.
‘Everyone wants something,’ Luther says. ‘Except a dog. A dog’s just happy to be here.’
‘Do you know what happens in prison?’ says Bixby. ‘To men like me?’
‘I don’t know. Poetic justice?’
‘I see. So rape’s all right as long as you hate the victim.’
The dog barks — or tries to. Its throat has been damaged. It glares at Luther with its good eye.
‘This man, your friend, is going to kill someone,’ Luther says. ‘Maybe tonight. You know that. You saw it on the news, you listen to the radio. Been on the internet.’