‘Well, I’m sorry you’re not enjoying it.’
The petulant pout turns into a flirtatious grin, tugs at the corners of her mouth.
He says, ‘Listen. I don’t have time for all this. I’m on a clock. I wouldn’t have come to see you if I wasn’t desperate. So what do you want?’
‘Internet privileges.’
‘That’s not going to happen. Not for the kind of offence you’re in here for.’
‘It can be supervised. I just want to get to my message boards. I like cats. And pottery.’
‘Nope.’
Her smile widens, shows ivory-yellow teeth. He knows that if he ever sleeps again, his dreams will be infested by spectres of this woman.
He wonders how many children see her in their dreams, then tucks the thought back inside himself, like a prolapse.
Then he glances meaningfully at his hand, flat on the table before him.
He waits until she’s followed the line of his gaze, then raises his thumb. He reveals a baggie of cocaine.
‘You’ll never let me have that,’ says Sweet Jane Carr.
Warders watch from the far corner.
‘You never will,’ she says.
‘Well,’ says Luther. ‘I’m a desperate man.’
He slips the bag to her. She takes it with a swift, practised movement.
‘There’s more to come,’ he says.
‘What do you want?’
‘Henry Grady,’ he says. ‘Where did he live?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Where did you meet?’
‘He always came to my place.’
‘How did he contact you?’
‘By text.’
‘Never by email?’
‘He didn’t do emails.’
‘What about his car? What kind of car did he drive?’
‘A normal car. Like a Ford Focus or something.’
‘What colour?’
‘Dark.’
‘Blue? Black?’
She shrugs.
‘Old? New?’
‘Oldish.’
‘Inside, was it tidy or messy?’
‘It was like new. It smelled nice.’
‘Can you remember the registration?’
‘Of course I can’t, silly. What do I look like?’
He smiles. Tempted to answer.
‘Tell me about what you did together.’
‘Well, first of all, I had to pretend to be a social worker,’ she says, widening her eyes. ‘We’d knock on a door, go in like Mulder and Scully.’
‘Go in where?’
‘Houses with new babies.’
‘How did he choose the houses?’
‘I don’t know. But he said he’d done it before, loads of times in the nineties. But never in such posh houses.’
‘Can you remember the areas?’
‘Off-hand, no.’
‘And what did you do, once you were in these houses?’
‘Ask to see the baby. Say there’s been a complaint. Scare the shit out of them.’
‘And what was the intent?’
‘To get a baby out of the house.’
‘And it never worked?’
‘No. Nobody ever let us in. The paperwork wasn’t good enough. They’d want to see ID, all the rest of it.’
‘How many times did you try this?’
‘Six or seven times.’
‘Over how long?’
‘Not long. Two weeks. He got more and more annoyed.’
‘Annoyed?’
‘He’s a very angry man.’
‘What makes you say that?’
‘Because he was. He hated everyone. Dykes. Queers. Darkies. Pakis. Americans. Homeless. Paedos. He hated paedos the most.’
Luther’s heart stops for a moment. ‘What does that mean, he hated paedos?’
‘He said anyone who hurt a kiddie should be strung up for it. But first they should have their balls cut off in public.’
‘What did you say to that?’
‘That I sucked my first cock when I was three and it was yum yum in my tum tum.’
Luther looks down at his hands. He knows this woman’s madness has seeped into him like the stink of cadaverine. It’s impossible to wash off. You can wash and wash and wash. You have to wait until it fades away.
‘You told him this?’ he says.
‘Oh, yeah. I hate it when people get on their high horse about paedos. It’s all hype. Kids love it.’
He grips the edge of the table. Counts down from five. ‘How did Henry react, when you told him this?’
‘He got angry.’
‘How angry?’
‘He went absolutely tonto on me. Ranting and raving, his hair all sticking up. He reminded me of Hitler. He says no kid can enjoy it, it’s not physically possible, they’re too young to understand. And I said: If they’re too young to understand, what’s the big deal? ’
‘And what did he say to that?’
‘That paedos come from defective genes. That they should be banned from breeding.’
‘He say that about anyone else?’
‘Everyone else. Murderers. Rapists. Jews. Arabs. Blacks.’
‘They should all be-’
‘Bred out.’
‘That’s what he said, is it? Those are his words. “ Bred out ”.’
She nods, enjoying herself. ‘For the good of the human race.’
‘Backtrack a bit,’ he says. ‘This argument. Where did it take place?’
‘In the front seat of his car.’
‘Exactly how angry did he get? Angry enough to hit you?’
‘No.’
‘Did you feel in any danger?’
She gives him a faint, patronizing smile. ‘A man attacks you,’ she says, ‘you go for his eyes and his bollocks. I don’t care how strong he is. Eyes and balls. They’re a man’s weakness. In every way.’ She squeezes her breasts, does the Marilyn pout.
‘Why were you in the car?’
‘Because we were on the way to this self-help group. The infertile couples thing.’
‘Okay,’ says Luther. ‘When did he take you there?’
‘This is like a year after the social workers idea. He said that wasn’t going to work. He couldn’t get the kind of baby he wanted that way. He was really pissed off.’
‘What did he mean, “the kind of baby”?’
‘He wanted a good one.’
‘A good one?’
She smiles and nods, as delighted as Luther is horrified.
‘So he took you to an infertility support group?’
‘Yes.’
‘And that didn’t seem weird to you?’
‘Not really. He had his eye on this one couple-’
‘The Lamberts?’
‘That’s them. He said they were going to the support group even though she was pregnant. He was really excited. He said it was the best way to get to know them.’
‘Backtrack again. “He had his eye on this one couple”. What does that mean?’
‘It means, he had like a shortlist of people he wanted to take a baby from. A newborn baby.’
‘What shortlist?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘How many people were on it?’
‘I don’t know. I wasn’t interested. I didn’t ask. But I do know the Lamberts were his favourites. He like, loved them.’
‘He loved them? He was in love with Sarah Lambert? With Tom Lambert?’
‘With them. Together. He said they were perfect. He showed me a tape of them fucking. I think it was them. It was difficult to see in the dark. But he said it was them.’
Luther has a feeling in his gut. ‘He had a tape of the Lamberts.. being intimate.’
She nods, delighted.
‘Taken without their knowledge?’
‘Lots of them. Yes. Tapes of her on the loo, tapes of him shaving. Tapes of them watching TV. Tapes of them screwing.’
Luther’s hand is shaking. He sets down the pen.
‘He had lots of tapes,’ Sweet Jane says. ‘Lots of families.’
‘What families?’
‘Fucked if I know. He just wanted to show them rutting each other. He thought if I saw normal people having normal sex the way normal people do, he’d make me normal.’
‘Is that the word he used? “Normal”?’
‘It was his favourite word. Everyone’s got their thing, right? Everyone’s got something that turns them on. His was being normal. He just wanted to be normal.’
‘How many couples did he show you?’
‘I don’t know. Ten? Twelve? It did nothing for me. Except this one couple… the wife was a tiny little thing. Shaved snatch. No tits to speak of. Nipples like threepenny coins. She was a bit of yum.’
‘And these weren’t films downloaded from the internet?’