Scaredy Cat Read online

  ‘What did you come for?’ Palmer asked.

  Thorne beckoned the constable back inside. He leaned forward to take in a gulp of air from the hallway outside before stepping into it.

  ‘Fuck knows . . .’

  Palmer pressed his face against the window. Below him, Thorne emerged through the set of double doors and stood on the grass outside, breathing deeply.

  He took a mouthful of beer from Thorne’s glass and then another. As he drank it down, his enormous Adam’s apple bobbed up and down and a little beer dribbled down his chin, and he closed his eyes to prevent the tears that were pricking at the corner of his eyes from forming.

  When he opened his eyes and looked down again, Thorne had gone.

  He’d always cried easily, even before he’d met Stuart Nicklin. Crying and blushing – he’d had little control over either of them for as long as he could remember. He recalled Stuart dancing around him in the playground, singing, chocolate smeared around his mouth.

  Cherry ripe, cherry ripe . . .

  And him, moving slowly towards the wall behind him, driven backwards by the heat coming off his own face, growing redder and redder . . .

  He recalled the voice of an older Stuart, six months ago, that lunchtime in the brasserie; after those two from work had skulked away and Stuart had spoken to him, and it had all begun again. The voice deeper now, and weathered, but still that laugh in it, the laugh that made you want to be near him, and still that ice inside the laugh.

  ‘Do you ever think about Karen? I never told them you know, Mart. Not everything I mean. There was no need was there? It wasn’t your fault, what happened. Her going off with that bloke was nothing to do with that other business. The business with you.’ He’d stopped then and leaned in close, his face creased with concern. ‘Do you think it was your fault? Course it wasn’t. Yes, she was upset, but that doesn’t mean anything, does it? Mind you, I wonder what people would think, now, if they did know? Do you think they’d blame you? You know what it’s like these days, everybody going on about sex and protecting the kids. People getting hounded . . .’

  Palmer had tried not to let the terror show on his face as Nicklin finished speaking, but he knew he’d failed miserably.

  ‘I’m not saying I’d ever tell anybody Martin, but you know, some people have got fucking sick minds . . .’

  Sally from Glasgow: ‘We only do it for the children anyway, don’t we?’

  Arthur from Newcastle: ‘Why shouldn’t it be commercial? Shopping means a damn sight more to a lot of these kids than Jesus Christ . . .’

  Bridget from Slough: ‘How can we celebrate anything with the world the way it is? People starving. Drug addicts. Folk living on the streets. What about the families of those two poor women shot dead a couple of weeks ago? What sort of Christmas are they going to have?’

  The man who used to be called Stuart Nicklin stuck a small gold bow on to the final parcel, leaned across and turned the radio up. This was a bit more like it. Bridget, up there on her high horse, had every right to be angry of course: it was a very nasty business. Even if one of the so-called ‘poor women’ was completely fictitious.

  Bob, the phone-in host, agreed with the caller. Absolutely. He said a big thank-you for the call, but he was keen to move on to Alan from Leeds who wanted to talk about the shocking increase in the cost of first-class post . . .

  He turned the radio off, stood up and rubbed away the cramp in his legs from squatting on his heels the last half an hour, busy with Sellotape and scissors. This had become something of a tradition – Caroline in bed nice and early, and him up late, wrapping presents.

  Just a few more hours now until it all kicked off. They’d have a houseful tomorrow: Caroline’s parents, her sister, her sister’s three kids running around like maniacs.

  Maybe, this time next year, they’d have one of their own. Not if he could possibly avoid it of course, he was doing his best to duck the issue, but Caroline was bringing it up all the time. Not now though. Not yet. He had a great deal he wanted to do before he went down that road. When he saw himself as an observer might, when he imagined himself in his mind’s eye, he was standing, straight and tall over a body, the blood fizzing through him, the light breaking over him like clouds across the wings of a powerful jet. He was cutting through life, slicing through it, capable of anything. He was mercurial. He would not be . . . lumpen. He would not potter around, hunched over a baby-buggy with milky sick on his lapel. Fucked. That was not him.

  He carried his wife’s presents across to the tree and slid them underneath. He straightened up, leaned forward and studied his dim, distorted reflection in a large silver bauble. He still got a shock seeing himself without the beard. He’d been a little worried shaving it off, but he needn’t have been. The dramatically different hairline, the filled out cheeks and the nose-job he’d saved up for all those years ago, still gave him a face significantly different from the one he might be expected to have sixteen years on.

  As it was, he could probably have kept the beard anyway. The pictures he’d seen in the papers and on TV had been so wide of the mark as to be laughable. Palmer’s description must have been all over the shop. Maybe the hormone, or the endorphin or whatever, that was stimulated by fear – was it adrenaline? – maybe it fucked up the memory circuits.

  Perhaps that was how dictators thrived. A line from Robespierre to Pol-Pot, all using terror to keep themselves safe. Make your enemies, and better yet, your friends, so afraid of you that they forget all the terrible things you’re doing to them. The question was, did it work the other way around?

  If they stopped being afraid, would they remember?

  He knelt down to the plug, switched off the lights and stayed there, breathing in the gorgeous smell of the tree and thinking about Palmer.

  He imagined him now, frightened and alone. Some boot-faced bobby keeping the watch, glaring at him, resentful, fantasising about hurting him and doing everybody a favour. He pictured Palmer’s wide, soft, cushion face, his mournful, wide-eyed expression. Staring out into the night, thinking about Karen and waiting to be saved. Chewing on his fat bottom lip and blushing like a girl.

  What do you want from Santa, Martin?

  My head on a plate? My name on an arrest sheet, so that you can slope away to prison, just that little bit less guilty?

  Sorry, Mart . . .

  He thought about sending him a message to cheer him up. Christmas e-cards were very popular after all. Something seasonal and simple. A picture of a robin perched on the handle of a snow-covered spade and a short message.

  I’m thinking about you . . .

  It was a tempting idea but he knew he was just being dramatic. There was no way they could trace it, he was sure about that, but even so it was probably not the right time. He’d get Christmas out of the way first, let things settle down a bit. Then he’d decide what to do next.

  Assuming that the decision wasn’t made for him.

  It was starting to rain.

  Thorne flagged down a black cab on Abbey Road. He was not a million miles from the zebra crossing the Beatles had so famously strolled across more than thirty years before, McCartney barefoot and out of step.

  He opened the door. ‘Kentish Town . . .’

  The driver didn’t even look at him. ‘Triple time now, mate. That all right?’

  Thorne smiled at the strip of tinsel wrapped around the cab’s aerial. Maybe the gesture was ironic. He nodded and climbed in. ‘Yeah, whatever . . .’

  ‘I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday’ was blasting out of the radio. It was a song Thorne loved, one guaranteed to have him rushing out to buy holly and advocaat, but for the first time in his life, he wanted Christmas to be over and done with. Christmas and New Year, condensed, compressed. He wanted, no, he needed, to be shot of them . . .

  He thought a
bout Charlie Garner.

  Would the boy be lying in bed now, listening out for reindeer on the roof, unable to sleep? Or had he been unable to sleep for the last month, and was he lying in bed now listening to his mother screaming?

  The taxi rumbled through Swiss Cottage, down damp, deserted streets, towards Chalk Farm. The cabbie was talking to him, throwing meaningful glances over his shoulder, but Thorne wasn’t listening.

  A boy called Stuart Anthony Nicklin . . .

  Thorne wished the fortnight ahead gone not because of how he was likely to be spending it, nor because of his father, nor Charlie Garner. He needed a leap forward in time to move the case on.

  There was an outside chance that there might be a break over the Christmas period but he seriously doubted it. What he was sure of was that there would be pressure from Jesmond, and from Brigstocke on his behalf. The Powers That Be would demand to know what was happening. When was this stupid idea of his going to yield anything significant bar an astronomical overtime bill?

  The taxi squealed to a halt at some lights. A gaggle of drunken revellers crossed the road in front of them, waving and singing. The cabbie waved back, muttering, ‘Wankers.’

  The cab roared away from the lights and swung right into Camden. Thorne leaned back and closed his eyes. Two weeks mollifying the PTB would at least kill the time, and he wanted it killed. He wanted it stone dead.

  If he was going to get pro-active, he couldn’t do it while the rest of the world was on holiday. And some people took longer holidays than others . . .

  Thorne had decided that in order to move forward, he needed to go back.

  He was going to go back to where it had all started.

  PART THREE

  THE FACE

  TURNED AWAY

  THIRTEEN

  The school stood in a quiet, leafy part of Harrow, only a mile or so from a slightly more famous school – one with its own theatre, farm and golf course – which boasted Byron, Nehru and Churchill among its former pupils. As the car moved slowly up the drive towards the main building, Thorne knew that King Edward IV School for Boys would soon have even less reason to be proud of its Old Boys.

  A week into 2002. The investigation in dire need of a kick up the arse.

  The fortnight or so since Christmas had gone much as Thorne had feared: very little progress, lots of grief. The holidays had covered a multitude of sins – the inactivity in the case would have been exposed to a far greater degree at any other time, but coupled with the demands on manpower, it still drew unwelcome attention from the Powers That Be.

  Brigstocke was clearly copping it from above and he seemed to take great delight in passing it on to those beneath him.

  ‘Patience is running out, Tom.’

  ‘Theirs or yours?’

  ‘Same thing.’

  ‘Right. Got it. Look, as soon as the schools go back, I’m—’

  ‘What? Going to check Nicklin’s truancy records? See if he got into detention much?’

  ‘You got any better ideas?’

  ‘You’re the ideas man, Tom. We’re just waiting to see one of them fucking amount to anything . . .’

  ‘Is this still about the arse on the fence remark? Look, I’m getting tired of saying sorry.’

  ‘Well I’m not tired of hearing you say it, OK?’

  Pupils were moving aside to let the car through as Thorne drove slowly up the long drive and swerved into the car park. The boys looked smart in grey trousers and blue blazers trimmed with claret piping. If the school had an inferiority complex, it didn’t show from the outside.

  Holland stepped out of the car, widening his eyes.

  ‘Not like my school . . .’

  Nor mine, thought Thorne. He pictured a short, stocky lad jumping off the bus, thoroughly delighted with his feather cut, his new, five-button bags and his star jumper. Thorne watched him trudging up the hill singing ‘Blockbuster’ and ‘Mama Weer All Crazee Now’, wearing platforms instead of beetlecrushers, needing that extra inch or so. He smiled as the boy swaggered into the playground and chatted to his mate. Making up stuff about the weekend, swearing, talking about music and Saturday’s results.

  The school bell rang, and as Thorne followed Holland towards the entrance, he glimpsed the same boy again, disappearing into the distance. Thirteen-year-old Tom Thorne was hoisting his dirty green rucksack across his shoulder. The canvas was emblazoned with the names of bands and footballers – Slade and Martin Chivers – the bag crammed with games kit and Marmite sandwiches, and maybe even the odd exercise book covered in wallpaper . . .

  The school secretary was like every school secretary that Thorne remembered or had ever imagined. Maybe they bred them somewhere, taught them how to put their hair in a bun and look down their pointed noses, before sending them out into the world with a pair of big glasses, a fondness for tweed and something uncomfortable up their backsides.

  ‘Mr Marsden won’t be a minute. He knows you’re here.’

  Thorne smiled at her. ‘Thank you so much.’

  He and Holland were seated on brown plastic chairs outside the headmaster’s office. Opposite them sat a boy of about twelve, looking absolutely terrified. Thorne made eye contact, but the boy looked away.

  ‘This takes me back,’ Holland muttered.

  ‘What, sitting outside the beak’s office? Can’t imagine you were ever in too much trouble, Holland.’

  ‘I had my moments.’

  ‘Come on, a policeman’s son?’

  Holland laughed a little but then began to think of something and the laughter quickly faded. Thorne thought about his own father. He found it hard to remember him as a teenager’s dad. Jim Thorne was in danger of becoming for ever associated with worry and duty, and strange conversations.

  ‘Happy Christmas, Dad. Is Eileen looking after you?’

  ‘She overcooked the sprouts . . .’

  ‘Right. Did you like the video? I didn’t know what else to get you.’

  ‘Name all the reindeer.’

  ‘You can watch it later maybe . . .’

  ‘There’s nine of them. Nine reindeer . . .’

  ‘Dad . . .’

  ‘Go on. I’ll give you Rudolf, that’s the easy one. Dasher, Vixen, Comet . . .’

  Thorne closed his eyes and searched for an image of his father from his childhood. He could smell disinfectant, taste semolina, hear the squeak of a plimsoll on a gymnasium floor, but a picture of his old man as a young man was temporarily unavailable.

  He opened his eyes to find the frightened boy staring at him before quickly looking away again.

  Thorne didn’t see fear on the faces of kids any more. Not the ones he had cause to talk to. Maybe they just hid it very well or maybe they just weren’t scared. What he saw was arrogance and scorn, sometimes even something like pity, but he couldn’t remember the last time he’d put the fear of god into a kid.

  Thorne looked at the clock above the secretary’s door, then back to the boy. ‘It’s only just gone nine, son. How can you be in trouble already?’

  The boy looked up at him and opened his mouth but Thorne would never get an answer to his question. At that moment the door opened and a ludicrously tall man with a shock of white hair stepped from the room.

  ‘I’m Brian Marsden. Come in.’

  Thorne and Holland did as they were told.

  The next ten minutes were among the most bizarre of the entire case. Marsden knew full well why they were there, knew about Palmer and Nicklin, and yet proceeded to treat Thorne and Holland more like prospective parents than police officers on a murder investigation. He handed them each an expensively produced brochure containing an outline of the current syllabus, details of the school’s impressive array of sports facilities and even a sample lunch menu. Before either of them could stop
him, he launched into a potted history of the school. It had been a basic state grammar until the late eighties when it became grant maintained. This confirmed several things Thorne already knew: Palmer and Nicklin had both earned their places at the school on merit; Nicklin, despite being brought up by a single parent on a nearby council estate, had passed the necessary exams to get into the best state school in the area. He was a very bright boy.

  Things Thorne already knew . . .

  A knock at the door stopped Marsden in full flow. He stood up as another teacher entered the room. This one was short and hesitant, and Thorne thought he looked a little embarrassed to be there at all. Marsden marched across to the door to usher them all out again.

  ‘Andrew Cookson is our Head of English. He’ll be showing you round, answering your questions. Perhaps you’ll pop in again before you leave . . .’

  Cookson led Thorne and Holland back past the secretary’s office and into the main reception area. The place stank of floor polish mingled with a hint of sweat.

  ‘Actually,’ Holland said, ‘we don’t really need the tour.’

  Cookson nodded slowly. He looked a little confused.

  Thorne had other ideas. ‘No, it’s fine . . .’ Holland looked at him as if he were mad, but Thorne just shrugged. He thought getting a feel of the place couldn’t hurt and he actually quite fancied having a look round.

  ‘Right, follow me,’ Cookson said. ‘There’s something you’ll want to see in the main hall, then we’ll have a quick scoot round and then I’ll hook you up with Bowles.’ He held out his hands. Fair enough? Thorne nodded and Cookson smiled. Thorne could see instantly that he’d be a popular teacher. The smile was huge and infectious. Thorne also saw, suddenly, that Cookson’s dark eyes were mischievous, and that even though he must have been in his late twenties or early thirties, he still had the energy, the vigour, of a child.

  As he’d thought he might, Thorne hugely enjoyed being shown around. Cookson’s wry commentary was highly entertaining, as was the look of boredom on Holland’s face.