Room 15: a gripping psychological mystery thriller Page 7

  He nods slowly. No son of his, no one bearing the Blackleigh name, is going to be a crybaby and even now I feel a childish pleasure at him noticing my stoicism. ‘Still, you should get that damage looked at.’

  ‘You were expecting my call,’ I say, changing the subject. ‘You weren’t surprised.’ I watch for his reaction. I’m desperately trying to grasp at anything that might make sense of what’s going on, but they are thin straws.

  There’s a slight smile that goes up almost as far as his piggy eyes. ‘I wasn’t sure,’ he says. ‘I thought you might, but then I thought you might not.’

  ‘After I phoned last night.’

  Paul contemplates me long and hard. ‘After that,’ he confides with a small jerk of his can of Carlsberg. He gets up with a throaty wheeze and selects a block of Double Choc from a cupboard. ‘I get hungry this time of night. I thought that was the kind of thing that happened when you got old. I mean, very old.’

  ‘Maybe you’ve got the munchies.’

  He laughs briefly as he sits again. ‘We’re on joking terms now?’

  I don’t know how to reply to this. I don’t remember us being on any terms at all for years. But that’s scarcely my fault. I’ve not done anything to him; if anything, it’s the reverse. He tried to stop me joining him in the police and the way he left the force didn’t exactly help my career. So I just shrug and say, ‘Why not?’

  He takes an enthusiastic bite straight from the bar and wipes the chocolate crumbs from his stomach. And waits. I know he cares, though he’s never been much good at showing it. What I want to do is ask straight out why I phoned him last night, but then I’d have to tell him the truth about my memory. Truth can be dangerous. Truth can be used as a weapon even by a father. Instead I ask guardedly if Gerry’s called him. Paul nods once and says, ‘Yes, it’s been a busy night for calls, quite a telephone exchange going, Gerry and you and the others.’

  I’m careful not to pick up on ‘the others’, laid there quietly like a snare. I just nod and ask what Gerry said, and he says Gerry phoned after I disappeared from hospital. Paul takes a swig of lager and some of the liquid dribbles onto his chin. I feel like I’m eight years old again and about to be given a roasting.

  ‘He asked me to phone him if you made contact. But I haven’t yet.’

  I tip my head back against the lumpy headrest. ‘Why not, Paul?’

  ‘I wanted to talk to you first.’

  He displays no emotion, but then he was always good at that. It was part of his interview technique and I learned that from him too. Stay passionless. Cold. Show nothing, say nothing, and the other man won’t be able to stop himself filling in the gaps. He’ll do your job for you.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Paul says, his eyes on me, small and steady.

  I half suspect he’s guessed already, but then that’s exactly what he’d want me to think. I’m running out of options. I stand up and go to the window. I can see Becks a short distance away, still sitting in his car, staring in the opposite direction.

  ‘I’ve lost time.’ I turn back to Paul. ‘Like I was never there. Things I can’t remember. I don’t remember phoning you last night.’

  So, now it’s out and I half expect him to laugh or to stand up and hit me, but he doesn’t do either. He takes another bite of chocolate.

  ‘How long?’ he asks. ‘How much can’t you remember?’

  ‘Eighteen months, I think.’ I sit again and close my eyes. There’s a relief in having told him. In turning to my father for help, even after all these years. ‘I don’t know what to do. Eighteen months has gone completely. From August the year before last, after I joined the team in Camden, right through to last night. Wandering around Kentish Town with a headache, wearing clothes I don’t recognise, finding someone’s knocked down the house I lived in and going back to a home I’ve never seen before.’ I open my eyes. ‘Don’t tell Gerry.’

  Paul informs me evenly that I can fucking trust him to keep his mouth shut. ‘You’ve told Laura?’

  I nod. ‘So, tell me, what did I phone you about last night?’

  He pushes himself up, breathing heavily with the effort, and plods back into the kitchenette. Takes another beer and offers it, but I shake my head.

  ‘You don’t remember?’

  ‘Nothing. What did I want?’

  He bangs the cupboard door shut. ‘You really want to know?’

  ‘What did I fucking want? Have I wasted my time coming out here?’

  ‘You called about two nurses.’

  ‘Nurses?’

  ‘Nurses. Like you find in a hospital.’

  I don’t understand.

  ‘Out of nowhere. The first time you talk to me for how sodding long? You phoned sounding like you were wild, out of your head.’

  ‘Why?’

  He mulls over my question. ‘There were these two women who were in danger. And you were going to save them.’ He disappears round the corner again and it goes very quiet. I’m about to jump up and follow him when he comes back, opening the can and drinking deeply.

  ‘What exactly did I say? What were my precise words?’

  ‘This is weird,’ he says, licking the foam off his lips. ‘You really don’t remember, Ross?’

  ‘Not a thing.’

  Paul stands, contemplating me over the top of his lager. ‘That was what you said: you had to save them. That someone was going to kill them.’

  I stare up at him. ‘So?’

  ‘You didn’t know where they were. You thought I could give you a lead.’

  ‘Why you?’

  ‘You didn’t trust the station.’

  ‘What does that mean exactly?’ But we both understand there’s only one reason why I wouldn’t trust the station. I feel more afraid than ever, but I need to know more. ‘So what about the nurses? Were you able to help me? Were you able to draw on that vast mental database of yours?’

  He gives a deep sigh. His face is puffier than I remember and his eyes more pink. ‘You were only able to name one of them, Ross.’

  ‘And?’

  He stares at me, impassive. ‘I’d heard of her.’

  ‘What was her name?’

  The trailer creaks and shifts as it settles. A train horn sounds in the far distance. And he gives me the name I was dreading. The name of the dead nurse in the hotel. Amy Matthews.

  14

  Paul is staring at me and I realise I’ve been tapping my empty mug repeatedly on my knee. I place it on the floor, next to a pile of old copies of the Police Review.

  I always wanted to be a copper. I remember watching Paul go from uniform to plainclothes and Gerry Gardner work his way up the ranks behind him. I was starry-eyed and felt it was my duty. I followed every cop show on the box: The Bill, Hill Street Blues, NYPD Blue, you name it. I even had a policeman’s outfit for Christmas, when I was six. Though I wouldn’t tell anyone about it now.

  I found it thrown away seven months later. Someone had stuffed that outfit in the bin. It was my birthday and it was July and the sun was shining and I found it pushed down into the filthiest bin, stinking of rancid meat and stale wine, as deep as it could go.

  The wind begins to gust, buffeting the trailer windows behind me, whining through small gaps in the frames. I think of the body in the hotel with the horrific unblinking eyes fixed on the doorway. Then I ask Paul what he was able to tell me about Amy Matthews and he considers and says that after I phoned, he made a couple of calls and rang me back with what he could find. ‘It took me about ten minutes.’

  ‘And what?’

  Paul wheezes and wipes his mouth. ‘I’d seen her around a year ago, when I was escorting Chinese clients who were looking for a bit of fun. She used to drink at one of the illegals in the borough, buy a little blow. This and that.’

  ‘A year ago? Not since?’

  ‘A few times.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Is this an interrogation, Ross?’

  ‘So far you’re the only person who can h
elp me. I wish it wasn’t the case. I don’t want to be here asking these questions, believe me. Why did I think you’d know her?’

  He contemplates me. ‘She’s an agency nurse. Sometimes she’s out giving advice to the local tarts and smackheads. Sexual health clinic, that kind of thing. Let’s say we have mutual acquaintances.’

  He stops and takes a sip.

  ‘You sold blow to her?’

  ‘For fuck’s sake, no. I’ve got a little more sense of self-preservation.’

  I ask which illegal she’d buy her coke at and he shakes his head sadly. ‘I don’t know where she gets it now. The one I saw her at got closed down shortly after. But when I mentioned she used an illegal club you didn’t sound surprised. You told me you’d raided a new one last Christmas.’

  ‘Did I think that was the one?’

  ‘You didn’t say. You just rang off. I don’t remember you saying “thank you” either.’ He gives a sour grimace.

  I try blearily to process the information. ‘I was called to a hotel this evening. In King’s Cross. One dead woman. It was her.’ I take out my mobile and hand it to him, showing the pictures I took of Amy Matthews’ body. ‘Have a look.’

  ‘I’ve seen dead bodies–’

  ‘No, take a look. What do you see?’

  ‘I know, she’s been shot and–’ He squirms slightly. Doesn’t like looking at the body. He must have seen hundreds in his time in the force, but I admit this one is more horrific than most.

  ‘Look again,’ I say. ‘Cheap old dress, woollen coat and moon boots. No make-up.’

  ‘I see her and I get what you’re saying. Whatever she’s doing there, it’s not about clubbing.’

  ‘So what was she doing?’ He doesn’t answer. I close my eyes again. The wind gusts louder and the gash on my neck throbs. ‘Why did I think she was in danger? Did I find her? Did I get this trying to save her?’

  He grunts and says, ‘It’ll come back in time.’

  ‘You think?’ There’s something I’m missing here. ‘And the second?’

  ‘The second?’

  ‘You said I told you about two nurses. One’s been killed. What about the second?’

  ‘You only gave me the one name.’

  ‘Come on, Paul. Did I say anything about the other one at all?’

  ‘Not a thing.’ He puts down his empty can.

  ‘For fuck’s sake, if I was trying to find two nurses, I must have said something about the other one. Who she is? Where she might be? Think.’ I want to shake him. ‘This nurse is in danger. Whoever killed Matthews might not have found her yet.’

  Paul shrugs and his complacency makes me even angrier.

  ‘Isn’t there anything else you can tell me? I don’t want to walk into another hotel room and find another woman splattered all over the furnishings.’ But there’s no point, I realise. I’ve got from him all I’m going to get. I stand and go to the door, then look back at him sitting in his fusty half-furnished trailer lounge. ‘You sure you’re okay?’ I ask. ‘You need anything?’

  ‘I’m not old. I can still get onto the internet to rent DVDs.’

  I open the door and feel the cold from outside. ‘Did I ever mention a copper called Becks?’

  ‘Yes. He’s your main man.’

  ‘You ever met him?’

  ‘Only a couple of dozen times. He’s the one who’s sitting outside right now in the red Vauxhall freezing his balls off.’

  I turn back. ‘That’s certainly who he says he is. Do I trust him?’

  ‘You really don’t remember a thing, do you? That guy would die for you. He might look a mess, but I’ve never seen a copper I’d trust more.’

  I’m still not sure. ‘The man who attacked me in the hospital, the man who tried to kill me – he knew who I was. But nobody knew I was at the hospital except the police.’

  ‘What about the hospital staff? They knew you were there.’

  I shiver. ‘You always taught me to go for the simplest answer.’

  ‘I never taught you sodding anything. Not willingly.’

  I think of replying. After all, I’m still a policeman and he isn’t. I’m the only Blackleigh left in the force, even though he never wanted me to be there. Then again, I know he’s proud of my career and what I’ve achieved, even though he’d rather die than tell me so. And, despite everything, he’s my father.

  So I say nothing, just step out and close the door behind me.

  As the man who calls himself Becks drives out of the trailer park, I wedge my body into the corner of the passenger seat, resting my head on the web of the seat belt, and keep an eye on him. Despite the pain and tiredness and the continual fear I’m going mad, I’m getting my focus back. Somewhere there’s an answer to what’s going on. He asks where to go. I need time to think so I simply say, ‘Into town. Quickly.’

  Though it’s still mournfully dark when we rejoin the A1, the traffic is building: a thin scattering of delivery trucks and early Sunday workers. The Lord’s Day, a day of rest and worship. I don’t see much resting going on, and I ask myself what it is, precisely, that’s being worshipped. A supermarket shipment of frozen foods. Petrol for filling stations. I envy the orthodox Jews and the Seventh Day Adventists for their belief in a special day. Like Christmas, but every week. There could be something soothing about seeing shops closed, lorries parked. Knowing someone somewhere still allows time for not making money.

  The night’s snow has frozen solid and I can feel the wheels slipping dangerously as Becks hits the roundabouts.

  ‘I want you to call into the station now,’ I say. ‘I want you to find out if any women have been attacked tonight.’

  He glances at me, surprised.

  ‘Earlier this evening, a woman was shot in a hotel in King’s Cross. I want to know if there have been any others.’

  ‘Are you going to tell me why?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Was that your father you just saw?’

  ‘Yes. Make the call.’

  He scratches the top of his head, then dials, as I close my eyes and try to think. There’s a second nurse in danger and if she’s still alive I don’t know how long I have to save her. It could already be too late. She could already be lying in another room like Amy Matthews, dead or bleeding to death. Failed by me because I can’t remember. The thought sickens me.

  Becks hangs up. There’s been the usual batch of women bruised by their partners, a raped prostitute and the standard Saturday night hen fights, but, apart from Matthews, nothing else. We approach South Mimms, where we left Laura’s Prius.

  ‘You want to stop and get your car sorted?’ Becks asks, slowing for the slip road.

  ‘Keep on into town as fast as you can.’

  ‘No problem, sir. I love being a taxi driver.’

  I ignore him and take out my notebook with the idea of writing down what I know so far, but after Matthews and Second nurse? I stop, feeling blank and foolish. I know nothing about them aside from what Paul told me. That Amy Matthews used to go to an illegal. I write Illegal.

  ‘We raided an illegal in December…’ I begin.

  Becks doesn’t take his eyes off the road. ‘Lonely’s?’

  ‘Lonely’s.’ I write the name in the hope it might trigger a memory. Illegals are pop-up clubs with no licence. There’s no sign outside, no webpage or Google listing. One minute you find one in a disused factory, next month it turns up in a crumbling basement on the other side of town. You close them down, they spring up again a few days later. But this name means nothing to me. ‘I want you to find out where it’s gone to now.’

  Becks concentrates on avoiding a motorbike before he answers, speaking slowly.

  ‘But we know, boss. We found it again four weeks ago.’ He glances across. ‘You told me to hold back and keep it to ourselves, because you thought they’d been tipped off the time before.’

  ‘Take me there,’ I say and he shoots me another look but doesn’t question me.

  I watch the motorw
ay signs flash past as we enter the suburbs. Two women under threat. One dead. Someone in the station involved. I need help, but who do I trust? Starting with this man next to me, the man who calls me boss. I see the tan of his skin, the dark hairs on the side of his neck. Who is he? What is he thinking? What is he not saying that I should know?

  Of course, it occurs to me, if Becks isn’t what he seems, I could be helping the killer find his next victim.

  ‘Every time it snows, my dad talks about how they walked through the mountains to get out of Iran,’ Becks says suddenly, as if he’s guessed I’m thinking about him. He overtakes a Scottish furniture van at speed and relates how his parents owned a factory that made belts and handbags under the Shah. It seems he’s telling me this piece of family history as some kind of conciliatory gesture. Or perhaps he feels if he opens up to me, I’ll open up to him. It’s an old con artist’s trick: give them your confidence and they’ll give you theirs.

  ‘Then the Revolution happened,’ he continues, despite my total lack of response. ‘My parents were young, only just married, but my father was well known for his dislike of the new guys. He decided to leave before it was too late. Walked across the mountains with each other and almost nothing else. They came here, took whatever small jobs were on offer, saved every penny and finally bought a newspaper shop in North Finchley. They loved Margaret Thatcher and still dream of their only son returning one day to make leather goods in Isfahan.’ He laughs to himself. ‘Sadly, business has never been my thing,’ he says a moment later, taking one hand off the wheel to gesture apologetically.

  I sense Becks’ thing is getting out and doing stuff, breaking down doors, nicking people. Not a man who wants to sit and reason things out, let alone develop a product line of Iranian fashion accessories. I grunt in sympathy, but if he’s after my own personal reminiscences, he’s out of luck. I close my eyes once more, resting my head against the door frame. I must keep using what memory I have. I think about Amy Matthews’ eyes. Staring through me. What was she seeing? A partner who turned violent? An ex with a grudge? She was shot five to seven times. A fight took place by the door. But every time I try to imagine the shooting, there’s something that feels wrong, something that’s escaping me.