Pix (Volume Book 24) (Harpur & Iles Mysteries)

  Then, Harpur did consider informing Iles about Manse in the back of the Laguna. However, it might not have been Manse in the back of the Laguna. And the Laguna could be thoroughly innocent, its driver scarved up on account of neuralgia. In any case, Harpur had a sort of automatic cutoff mechanism that prevented him telling Iles more than he needed or deserved to know. This, also, was policing – at the highest levels. Harpur preferred asking the ACC troublesome but valid questions. ‘The child – Shale’s child, Matilda. Why did she come to you?’

  ‘A woman officer sat with her in my room throughout, Harpur,’ Iles replied at once. ‘Absolutely throughout. This can be verified.’

  ‘Of course. But why did Matilda have to see you?’

  ‘Didn’t I say – imaginings? She has some strange, childish, totally inexplicable conviction that I’d been in her bedroom at the rectory.’

  They strolled alongside the former dock, now the rectangular lake, towards the old bonded warehouse building. ‘This is a hell of a perceptive youngster,’ Harpur said. ‘She must have had a flash of intuition on first sight that you were the sort who would get into girl-kids’ bedrooms and exude detectable thrill-sweat. She’d have sniffed traces around her wardrobe and dressing table. At least thrill-sweat.’

  ‘She says she knows it was blood at the top of the rectory stairs,’ Iles replied. ‘Oh, the two children go along with the sauce tale because they can tell it’s important to Manse, but they’re both sure that’s a ruse, Col. If you’ve been brought up by Manse Shale you’re bound to have cottoned that wise, repeated lying will be vital now and then. I think Matilda is scared her father might have slaughtered one of the women he had in from time to time on rota.’

  ‘She said that?’

  ‘Of course she fucking didn’t. My deduction. My feeling.’

  ‘Oh, right.’

  ‘She wonders, maybe a fight over Sybil’s promised return, and an auxiliary lady refusing to go. Matilda’s fond of Sybil, yes, naturally, but she’s also fond of Lowri, Patricia, Carmel – kind of surrogate mothers, you see – and had to come from school at a rush and ask me whether I’d seen a body on the stairs if – according to Matty’s mad, mad theory – I watched things from her bedroom. And, if so, whose body?’

  ‘And you said, “Yes, Matilda, I did happen to be in your bedroom at the appropriate time, as might so easily occur, and can tell you that, in fact, the body was a man’s.” Trove’s.’

  ‘I said I’d find all three women for her and prove they’re OK, Col.’

  ‘Because you know they are.’

  ‘We can do this, can’t we?’

  ‘I expect so. They’ll be in Shale’s dossier.’

  ‘Get one of our photographers to do pictures of each on film with a date-time caption. Clandestine if possible. We don’t want them scared. But I owe it to the worried child, after she made such a trek.’

  Iles could be like this – another of those sudden, astonishing streaks of consideration, even tenderness. Harpur said: ‘She won’t want her father to know she’s been putting that kind of hellish, murderous notion into your deductions mill. How will you fix for her to see the pictures?’

  ‘My promise to find the women – find them alive – seemed to stem her worries, poor dear,’ Iles replied. ‘I had them take Matty back to school – in a plain car, of course. I called her Matty to relax her – help the child open up – open up in the sense of talking easily, that is.’

  ‘If she came by bus in her lunch hour she must have already been keen to open up as to talk, mustn’t she?’

  ‘A woman officer present throughout.’

  ‘You’ve said that.’

  ‘I can give you her name. It seemed to me very necessary for her to be there, Harpur. This was a girl in school uniform. The blazer a really rich blue trimmed with black, Col. Tasteful and yet striking. You know how that kind of garb can get to some men – the numerous skirt pleats nuzzling one another busily, and spotless little white socks.’ The ACC’s voice grew phlegmy and his eyes misted. His breathing tightened up and for a couple of seconds he had trouble speaking the word ‘socks’, had to dredge for the cks sound. Harpur wished he’d brought some bottled water, not to throw over him but to loosen the ACC’s severely hormonalled larynx. ‘She sat where you usually do in my room, Col. Distance seemed important.’

  ‘Yes, I like to keep a good gap between you and me.’

  ‘The canteen meal and ginger beer on a tray on her little lap, Col. She ate willingly, yet without champing.’

  ‘Will it get around via the woman officer that some schoolgirl with a nuzzly skirt thinks you slipped into her bedroom and emanated?’

  ‘Matty said clearly in the officer’s hearing that she was not present at the time – during her fantasy, I mean.’

  ‘And she wasn’t. You’d left them at Severalponds.’ They could see Chandor’s offices. Harpur again watched for the Laguna on a rerun.

  ‘Ah, Severalponds! Changes since then, yes, Col? Why I say a shift in patterns. Syb back and Manse persona grata at Low Pastures. An immense turnaround. But maybe not altogether good, Harpur. Maybe totally bad, Harpur. It tells us that the settled state of things here is vulnerable, is possibly threatened. You’ve heard of the circle of wagons meant to repel attacks out West, Col. That’s Ralphy bringing Shale to Low Pastures. And if Ember’s worried to this degree, so are we, aren’t we, Harpur? The peace I’ve – we’ve – built here begins to shake and topple. I said, seismic. I can’t accept it. These strangenesses at the rectory, the missing Londoner, the collapse of Ralph’s rigid standards for Low Pastures – indicators, Col. It’s this fucker, Chandor, yes? Disruptive somehow? Why I want to see him, Col, and get him at least terrorized and possibly persuaded to up sticks altogether and bugger off back to Metroland.’

  ‘If he won’t?’

  ‘I’d like him gone.’

  ‘If he refuses?’

  ‘He shouldn’t do that, Harpur.’

  ‘But he might.’

  ‘This could be dangerous for him.’

  ‘In what sense, sir?’

  ‘Oh, yes, dangerous.’

  ‘Danger from where?’

  ‘Oh, yes. For instance, does he realize the peril he could be in from, say, Manse Shale?

  ‘Or?’ Harpur replied.

  ‘Will we get gunfire on our streets?’

  ‘Will we?’

  ‘A bevy of possibilities, Col.’

  ‘Manse has become more settled lately.’

  ‘Did he seem settled on that fucking transcript, Harpur? If some sod leaves a body on your stairs would you feel settled? I think you’d want to get back at him,’ Iles said.

  ‘Which body is that? Which stairs? Is all this related to what the child, Matilda, Matty, so comically fantasized?’

  ‘And the lad who’s missing – Trove. A link to Chandor? A London link?’

  ‘Nothing on the computer.’

  ‘When you ran across him, did you ask yourself whether this might be a lad liable to cut a man’s throat, and perhaps cut the throat of someone who came asking too persistently about that man?’

  ‘He was with friends,’ Harpur said.

  ‘And did they look to be in that sort of line?’

  ‘One was Director of Strategic Planning. The other, Personnel.’

  ‘They did look to be in that sort of butchery line, did they?’

  ‘Maurice. Rufus.’

  ‘Their mothers and fathers will have thought considerably before giving them names like that, Col. These lads went out to their careers buoyed by the good hopes of such parents. Maurice. Rufus. Assertion there. Resonances there.’

  In Chandor’s big, third floor office overlooking the dock/lake, Iles said resonantly: ‘What we’re doing, Mr Chandor, is maintaining a practice – a fine practice in my opinion, not to mention Harpur’s – yes, what we’re doing is maintaining a practice established by the previous Chief here, Mr Mark Lane, now justly lifted to the Inspectorate of Constabulary, but gratef
ully remembered by all of us, indeed esteemed. It was Mr Lane’s view that the marina development emblemized a kind of rebirth for this city, and, as such, those who came to set up their businesses in it should be given a proper, hearty, though informal, welcome. In his day, he offered that welcome in person. He would visit all newcomers and wish them well. Sometimes I accompanied him and, as a result, learned the importance he gave to such courtesies. I resolved that, should Mr Lane leave us – as seemed likely, owing to his multitudinous and massive talents – yes, resolved that if he went I would carry on this delightful tradition, as well as I could, pick up the, as it were, baton.

  ‘And I decided also that when possible I would bring Harpur along with me so that he, in his turn, might learn the form and intricacies of the little unceremonious ceremonies. I believe he will respond. He has the right instincts, though they might not be immediately apparent in his demeanour and tailoring. It was Harpur who reminded me, after, I gather, running across you earlier today, Mr Chandor, that I had yet to bring you greetings, although you have been in place here now some little while. I knew I must correct that omission immediately, and so here we are.’

  ‘This is a considerable honour you do myself and the company,’ Chandor said.

  ‘I have to apologize for the delay,’ Iles said.

  ‘I mentioned the view to Mr Harpur,’ Chandor said. He walked to the big window and gestured towards the water and new buildings beyond. ‘This seems to give us an, as it were, context – a context established by city effort before our arrival, yes, but a context into which we can happily fit.’

  ‘I think I’d prefer you fucking didn’t,’ Iles replied, ‘either happily or not.’

  ‘Obviously, I wondered what was the significance of all that bullshit,’ Chandor said.

  ‘Which?’ Iles said.

  ‘The opening spiel,’ Chandor said. ‘The general verbiage. I’m told you considered Lane a total twerp and drove him mental.’

  ‘Dim prick, I needed some rubbish tale to get things going, didn’t I?’ Iles said.

  ‘You’ve been asking your data bank about me, us, I suppose,’ Chandor said. ‘But nil return. My condolences.’

  ‘I’ve heard you described as “of Nordic appearance”,’ Iles said.

  ‘Folk say that of you, too, sir,’ Harpur said.

  ‘Which folk?’ Iles said.

  ‘Many. I should think at Staff College you were known as Desmond of the Fjords,’ Harpur said.

  ‘I expected something cleaner cut, and with less off-putting skin,’ the ACC said.

  ‘This is a bully call, yes, Iles?’ Chandor said. ‘You bring the frighteners?’

  ‘You’ll remember, I was invited,’ Harpur said.

  ‘Where are the other two derelicts, Maurice and Rufus?’ Iles said.

  ‘They would have nothing to say to you,’ Chandor replied.

  ‘This I believe,’ Iles said.

  ‘We also picked up a tale you look after people, Iles,’ Chandor said.

  ‘Well, I hope so. What else are police officers for?’ the ACC said.

  ‘That you look after some people more than others,’ Chandor said.

  ‘ “Look after” in what sense?’ Iles said.

  ‘Look after,’ Chandor replied.

  ‘It’s true that some people I wouldn’t want to look after at all or ever,’ Iles said, ‘though I might do them the honour of getting to their funeral if they died early.’ He stood and walked to the big window, standing companionably alongside Chandor. ‘Yes, a magnificent setting. Emblematic.’

  ‘I have to admit, Mr Iles, I’m proud when showing it off,’ Chandor replied. ‘But perhaps forgivably proud.’

  ‘Oh, entirely,’ Iles said. ‘You really mustn’t blame yourself.’

  ‘I’m so pleased you could visit, and I’m sure Maurice and Rufus will be, also, when I tell them.’

  ‘Would I had been able to meet the two,’ Iles said. ‘Mr Lane liked to get what he termed “the full flavour” of a new company, and I follow him in that.’

  Chapter Seven

  Now and then, Manse Shale wondered about that psychiatrist woman with great legs in The Sopranos on TV. Shale could think of a lot of private things he would like to discuss with someone who had her kind of training re minds, and who did not go spreading what she heard. People in that job made a famous oath to keep their mouth shut about patients. Of course, her patient in the TV show, Tony Soprano, was just a total, savage fucking gangster and thug. All the same, Mansel did see two similarities with himself and his own position lately, especially lately.

  First, certain troubles had begun to do his head in a bit, including a phone call from the school, and the mess-up of the Laguna project. Second, the troubles had to stay confidential – or as confidential as they could be. If he had a psychiatrist like that, flashing thigh at him in what would be known as ‘an advisory capacity’, he would not try anything on, regardless of how suitable the consulting room was with upholstered settees, but he would just explain his problems to her and listen quietly to whatever she said back. And he would pay the fees – probably big, it didn’t matter – he would pay the fees straight off out of his Medical Fund (Personal) without expecting anything more than these conversations. As Manse saw matters, a woman psychiatrist could have good legs or ordinary, but they was not the chief aspect of the meetings, which concerned conditions inside the brain. That’s what psychiatrist meant – someone who knew about minds.

  Tony Soprano, out strolling one day, thought ugly dead fish on a shop slab turned into men he knew and spoke to him, so anyone could see he needed a psychiatrist. Nothing of this sort at all happened to Manse, and, in fact, he never went near a fishmonger’s, but he felt confused and would of been glad of advice. That call from the school certainly upset him, plus how Harpur snuggled up to Chandor and his charmers on the marina pavement that failed Laguna day, like true mates. Some deal there?

  Shale did not like the way the headmistress suggested it would be better not to use the phone for what she had to say, but could he come to see her? This made it sound like she believed Manse was the kind who would have a police tap on his line. He found it a damn slur, coming from a teacher. There might be smirks and winks in the staff room if someone mentioned his name, like for Al Capone or Tony Soprano or Frank Sinatra. How could that school head know anything about the commercial scene that Manse glittered in and collected in?

  But he did not argue with her. Perhaps she’d get difficult about letting the children stay on at Bracken Collegiate if he turned roughish. And, of course, cleverest not to chatter too much because there could be a police tap on his line. Why did Iles and Harpur turn up at the rectory like that otherwise, staring at the redecoration? Fucking telepathy? But Manse did not want some snobby, interfering headmistress from the private sector to behave like there would obviously be a police tap on his line, even if there was. This he considered a smear and very hurtful in view of the fees he had to pay.

  And then women as women – another aspect that confused him. Always Manse had tried to treat them decent. He truly believed you should do what you could to give equality and some gentleness. Often this would cost you nothing. He definitely considered quite a few women deserved proper regard. There was many a type of woman. But think of the one who arrived so unexpected at Ralphy Ember’s place with the picture of that nearly decapitated lad who Manse naturally recognized right off from his staircase. He could not tell her this, could he? Didn’t that whole incident have to stay secret?

  It seemed hard, though, to say he didn’t know nothing about him and let her go on searching and hoping, taking holiday time from work. She obviously loved that lad or she wouldn’t be so sorrowful and keen to find him. But then, look at it different. Would it of been kindness to answer, ‘Oh, yes, as a matter of fact I seen this one not long ago with his throat cut in my place, the day the pictures went from the walls?’ All right, Manse could agree it might of been done more gradual and tender than this, bu
t at the end it came out the same, didn’t it? If he had said to Meryl Goss, like slowing it down and softening it: ‘Ah, yes, I believe he does remind me of somebody I saw not so long ago, as a matter of fact,’ she would grow excited and ask, ‘Oh, are you sure? Please say you’re sure.’ His reply: ‘Yes, pretty sure.’ Goss: ‘But where? Was he all right, Mr Shale?’

  Then he could not dodge no further and must reply: ‘In the rectory. On my staircase, first floor.’ She would cry out in amazement, maybe with a little puzzled laugh, ‘On your rectory staircase?’ Ralphy and Margaret and Sybil would also probably of cried out the same, ‘On your rectory staircase, Mansel?’ By then they’d have the idea that something must of been wrong with him, to be on a staircase – not moving on a staircase, up or down, just on. And this would mean Meryl Goss felt prepared a bit better for what had to come next. She might ask again, ‘Did he seem all right?’ Manse would have to say, ‘I regret I got to tell you, Meryl, no.’ ‘Oh!’ Margaret would say, or Sybil, or both. Goss might sense things and ask, ‘Dead?’ And perhaps Margaret or Sybil or both would whisper sadly, ‘Oh, don’t say that, please don’t say that,’ but knowing it must be right.

  Ralphy might ask, ‘Dead how?’ because he was one for details and into tactics and action replays. Manse would still hold back and say, ‘Dead.’ ‘But how?’ Ralph would say, keeping on and being dogged. ‘Dead,’ Manse might reply again. Eventually, though, she would of had to be told, ‘I’m afraid with his throat cut causing bad stains to the stair carpet and wallpaper, though please don’t feel guilty about that, in the awful circumstances, Meryl.’ Even if he could spin it out like this, as far as eventually, she would still get a rotten shock. He could not decide now whether it was more tender or less tender to say the way he did say at Low Pastures after dinner that he never seen the lad in the picture before, and shaking his head to pile on the no-ness of the ‘No.’ This was the kind of thing he meant by confusion. This was why if he went to a psychiatrist he would want her to keep all of it very tight under her bonnet.