Waterhouse And Zailer: The Carrier Part 19

"Arrogant b.i.t.c.h," Sean sneers. "You cant bear to fail. Thats what this is about. A man turned you down once, and you have to make him want you-thats all this is, nothing to do with love."

I swallow hard. Id like to sc.r.a.pe his words out of my mind, but its too late. "Make up your mind," I say. "Either you know me or you dont."

"I dont want to know you! I wish Id never met you!"

Sean hauls himself up off the floor, pushes past me on his way downstairs. A few seconds later I hear a loud slam, then the wretched football, noisier than usual. In the bedroom, I shake as I throw things into a suitcase: pajamas, toothbrush, hairbrush, disposable contact lenses, some clothes.

Im never coming back here. I dont want to see any of it again. Sean can keep everything.

I creep downstairs and out of the house, closing the front door gently behind me.

Free.

I run to my car, fumbling with the keys. Nearly there, nearly gone. I push the b.u.t.ton on the key fob, hear the lock spring open. Thank G.o.d.

"Gaby," a voice behind me whispers. Not Sean, not a voice I recognize. I try to turn, but before I can move, theres an arm around my neck, squeezing, and I feel my mind slide out of reach to a pinpoint of bright black.

14.

11/3/2011.

Proust was in his office: good. And no one else was around. This was going to be too easy in every way. Or was Simon kidding himself? If hed consulted Charlie, shed have advised him against, but that didnt make it unwise or impossible. It needed to happen for everybodys sake, even the Snowmans. That was a strange thought: that Proust might end up better off as a result.

From the CID room door, unseen, Simon watched the inspectors motionless bald head in its gla.s.s-sided booth, noticed the way light from the tall lamp in the corner fell on it, as if to draw it to an audiences attention. Silent, unaware of your presence and facing in the opposite direction, Proust still managed to project an aura of "Cross me and your fate will be one of unimaginable horror." Bulls.h.i.t. Only things that didnt exist managed to achieve this level of unimaginability.

Simon stood out of sight, not yet ready to change his relationship with his boss in a way that might prove irreversible, and stared at the dome of shiny pink skin. An ordinary bald head. No one can tell whats inside just from looking. Simon knew what was in there: the worlds largest and most remarkable collection of self-serving strategies. No special powers. Proust might not like what he was about to hear, but there would be nothing he could do apart from sulk and snarl, and he did that anyway. He could try to get Simon fired, but he wouldnt risk losing his greatest a.s.set.

"If theres something youd like to say, Waterhouse, I suggest you get in here, be a man and say it. The taxpayer doesnt pay you to lurk in doorways and stare at me."

Simon walked into the inspectors small corner office and closed the door behind him. He decided to get the work conversation over with first. It would help him to gauge Prousts mood before he raised the subject of Regan.

"I know what Tim Breary said in his first interview with Sellers, and I know you committed fraud in order to hide it from me," he told the Snowman. "I could go straight to Superintendent Barrow."

"Oh, get off your high horse, Waterhouse! I feel sorry for the poor, exhausted creature." Proust was stacking his papers in neat rectangular piles. "Racehorses that trip over Grand National fences and get shot have an easier time of it. And next time, check the evidence before you accuse me."

"Oh, Im sure youve replaced the original interview transcript by now," Simon said. "Doesnt make it okay that you subst.i.tuted another version and ordered Sam and Sellers not to tell me."

"I agree. That would be unacceptable. It would also be your word against mine that Id done any such thing. If you imagine that Sergeant Kombothekra and DC Sellers would back you up, youre more deluded than I thought. Those two havent got a backbone between them. As for the buffoon Barrow, I could tell him as many illuminating stories about your code of professional conduct as you could about mine."

True enough.

"Ill be honest with you, Waterhouse: my mentoring of you is mainly self-centered. I only care about keeping you in your job for as long as Im in mine. The results you get, as a member of my team, reflect well on me."

"You wanted Sam to tell me," Simon said.

"Which he evidently did."

"No. He said nothing." Simon had reached the point where he no longer agreed with his own unreasonable a.s.sessment of Sams conduct, but he wasnt yet ready to relinquish it altogether.

"Then who did? Sellers wouldnt have dared, and no one else-" Proust broke off, visibly angry with himself for having allowed an admission to slip out.

"No one else knew? Are you sure?"

"Who?" Proust spat the word at Simon. The phone on his desk started to ring. He switched off his full-beam glare as he answered it, harrumphing at whichever m.a.s.o.c.h.i.s.t had dialed his direct line. He kept his eyes on Simon and made notes on an inconveniently positioned pad without looking at what he was writing. Rather than move the pad, he crossed his right arm over his chest awkwardly, as if trying to straitjacket himself.

Simon recognized a perfect opportunity when one came along. Proust wasnt solely focused on him. This was his moment; it would never be easier to say than now. "Your daughter knew," he said. "Amanda. She told me."

- "Gibbs! Been looking for you everywhere." Having found him, PC Robbie Meakin had blocked Gibbs path, an acne-spattered obstruction with an annoying grin. Coming back to work after an afternoon spent skiving in the Brown Cow was always a mistake, one Gibbs had only made because if hed turned up at home before seven, hed have been unable to avoid his twins bedtime or the post-bedtime tidying of the house. He wanted to avoid both those things more than he wanted to avoid work or his colleagues-even Meakin, the nicks very own happy and proud Super-Dad. Meakin had three kids. Gibbs had heard him . . . what was that word Liv liked? Pontificating. Hed heard Meakin pontificating in the canteen about how the whole kids thing was such hard work, oh, yes, but so worth it. f.u.c.king creep. Gibbs wouldnt have objected if hed been talking only about himself and his own experience of being a parent, but it was clear he wasnt; there was nothing Meakin enjoyed more than telling new dads how they should feel and soon would, if they didnt already.

"Got a second?" Meakin asked.

"Not really," Gibbs said curtly.

"Believe me, youll want to see this. It involves Tim Breary."

Gibbs held out his hand for the papers that were in Meakins. He knew without looking that they were all hed need, as surely as he knew that Meakin would insist on taking up more of his time than was necessary.

"Shall we grab a cup of tea and then Ill talk you through it?" Meakin suggested.

There was probably a way of getting the information while simultaneously denying Super-Dad his moment of glory, but Gibbs couldnt be bothered to manipulate the situation. "All right," he said. "Youre buying."

"Saving the pennies, are we?" Meakin laughed as they walked along the corridor toward the smell of lamb and cabbage left over from lunchtime. "Shocking how expensive kids are, isnt it?"

Dont say it. Dont f.u.c.king say it.

"Worth every penny, though, right?"

"Too early to tell." Gibbs didnt see why he should have to lie to suit Meakin. By the time his twins grew up, Debbie would have kicked him out for sure, and she and her mother would have turned them against him. However hard he tried, Gibbs couldnt persuade himself that fatherhood was a sensible investment, financially or emotionally.

"You dont mean it." Meakin laughed again. "Dont worry, you can admit you love em to bits. I wont tell anyone."

Theyd arrived at the canteen. "Why dont I look at what youve got there while you get the teas in?" said Gibbs, holding out his hand a second time. There was a long queue at the serving hatch; itd be good to have something to do while he waited.

"Ill only be a sec." Meakin clung to the bundle of papers that made him temporarily more important and interesting than he normally was. "Why dont you have a seat? Ill push in and grab the teas."

Gibbs sat at the only empty table in the room and took his red ball out of his coat pocket, along with some new bands hed picked up on the walk back from the Brown Cow. He stretched them around the ball. Meakin had joined the back of the queue. Why say he was going to push in and then not do it? Who was that likely to impress? Idiot.

"Gibbs." Sergeant Jack Zlosnik appeared beside him. "Robbie Meakins looking for you."

"Hes found me." Gibbs nodded toward the serving hatch.

"And youre still sitting here? He hasnt told you, then?"

"No, he hasnt. Any chance you can tell me while I wait for him?" Gibbs glanced over at Meakin, who was busy staring straight ahead and had no idea that Zlosnik was about to make all his careful foreplay redundant.

"It seems your murderer Tim Brearys been tweeting on Twitter from prison."

"Possible, but highly unlikely," said Gibbs. "Unless hes overpowered a guard and nicked his iPhone, and thats not Brearys style." Thanks to Liv, Gibbs knew all about Twitter. He knew that no one who used it would say, "tweeting on Twitter." Liv had been determined to sign him up, insisting that hed miss out otherwise. Hed chosen an hadnt added a picture of himself to his profile to replace the anonymous white egg image. Hed tweeted once so far, to Liv, to say that he was missing her. Shed told him off. Had he forgotten Twitter was public? No, he hadnt; he didnt give a s.h.i.t.

When he couldnt see Liv in person and his frustration was making him want to head-b.u.t.t a hole in a wall, he read her Twitter timeline. She mainly tweeted about books and publishing, back and forth with a load of people who did the same. There was often an issue under discussion that Gibbs couldnt imagine ever giving a toss about: were literary agents becoming superfluous? Were publishers becoming superfluous? Authors? Readers? High Street bookshops? Physical books? Apostrophes?

Gibbs thought Livs fiance Dominic Lund was superfluous. Occasionally he wondered if any of Livs publisher or journalist Twitter cronies would care to discuss that with his white egg alter ego.

"All right, then, someones been tweeting under Brearys name," said Zlosnik. "Someone rang it in because of the nature of what was being said."

"Which was?"

"An SOS, basically. Something about a woman being attacked outside her house. An address in Silsford-Silsford nick spotted the Tim Breary connection and-"

"What woman? Was there an address?" Gibbs was on his feet. "Have Silsford sent a car? Theyre f.u.c.king useless, that lot."

"I dont know. Horse Fair Lane, Silsford. Course, the tweeter could be messing about, mistaken . . ."

Gibbs was halfway to the canteen door.

"Victims names Gaby Struthers," Zlosnik called after him.

- Proust slammed down the phone, having contributed no more than the occasional affirmative grunt to the final ten minutes of the conversation. Come to think of it, perhaps the call had ended much earlier, and those last ten minutes had been a sham for Simons benefit; Proust wasnt that good a listener.

"You were saying, Waterhouse? I told Sergeant Kombothekra and DC Sellers not to tell you, but really I wanted them to tell you? Why would I do that?"

Why this question instead of the one you should be asking? Hadnt he heard Simon say, "Your daughter told me?" Hed even said her name. Her old name: Amanda. Could Proust have missed it?

"This might come as a surprise to you, but we dont all ask for the opposite of what we want. Thats one of the many differences between you and me, Waterhouse. Thats why, when the prospect of marriage to Sergeant Zailer-she of the many careless owners-filled us both with horror, you proposed to her and I didnt."

Simon wished that someone would murder Proust. He wished he had the mental strength to do it and take the consequences. The world would be a better place.

"It wasnt about making me doubt Tim Brearys story, was it?" he said. "Drawing my attention to something he said that probably means he didnt kill his wife-trying to look as if youre hiding it from me, so that when I find out, it seems more significant than it is. It wasnt about any of that."

Proust groaned, leaned back in his chair and folded his arms behind his head. "Youve lost me, Waterhouse. This happens every time we speak: you beat a path to your special private land at the top of the lunacy tree, and I dont understand a word you say from that point on."

"You dont believe Brearys a murderer."

"In fact, I do."

"No, you dont. I dont either. But if hes confessed, if everyone else in the house that day backs him up, if all the forensic evidence falls into line and supports his story, what have I got to work with? You know Im stubborn, but maybe this time thats not going to be enough to break through the wall of lies. So you decided to give me an extra incentive."

"Wall of lies?" Proust muttered. "Is that the one that borders the orchard of obsession that contains the tree of lunacy?"

"Brearys been charged. That worries you. Never happened before, has it-that Ive failed to get to the truth in time to stop the CPS charging an innocent man? You must have worried I was losing my touch."

"Do you want to start race riots in the Culver Valley, Waterhouse? Is that what youre trying to do?"

What did race have to do with it? Simon said nothing. Hed fallen into enough of Prousts traps in the past to know the warning signs. An obtrusive non sequitur was the verbal equivalent of flashing neon.

"Because if you carry on in this vein, Im going to pitch myself out of the window. People will film me on their mobile phones, and the local news will get hold of the story, and then the national news, and everyone will think Spilling police station has been attacked by a jihadi-hijacked plane, which will fuel both Islamophobia and Islamic extremism. All that will be your fault, Waterhouse."

"Did you think Id work better if I felt everyone was against me?" Simon asked. "Maybe youre right: set me against Sam and Sellers and Ill need to prove myself all over again, like I used to have to when no one gave a f.u.c.k what I said about anything."

"'Not leaping flames, not a falling ceiling, not colleagues screaming in agony," Proust spoke into his empty "Worlds Greatest Granddad" mug as if it were a microphone. "'Our information suggests that poor DI Giles Proust leaped to his death in order to put an end to his conversation with Simon Waterhouse, because it was the only way."

Simon ignored the show. "You decided I needed a new enemy to bring out the best in me. That Id work better against Sam than with him."

"Perhaps youre right, Waterhouse. I cant say for certain. I remember none of my thoughts beyond Please make this stop, O Lord."

"You knew Sam would tell me," said Simon. "You also knew he wouldnt tell me straightaway, and you knew how Id react when I found out he hadnt. And you were right. You wanted this reaction from me and youve got it. Im not working with Sam anymore, not on this case. Im not telling him f.u.c.k all: not where I am, not what Im doing, nothing. He wont know what Im thinking, what my plans are . . ."

"Youre not going to tell him what youre thinking?" Proust snapped. "My white-hot envy of the man is indistinguishable from hatred. If the invertebrate sergeant were here now, Id end up doing something to him that I wouldnt regret."

"Everything Ive said applies to Gibbs too," Simon told him. "Hes working with me."

"I wondered when the ventriloquist would mention his dummy. That red ball your dummys so fond of-gift from you, was it?"

"I should be thanking you," Simon said. "Without Sam and Sellers mediocrity dragging us down, well get there faster. Youre right to be in a good mood. Your plans going to pay dividends. If Ive lost a friend because of it . . ." Simon shrugged. "You dont care about that, and neither do I. Sam cant have been as good a friend as I thought he was."

The harder he was on Sam now, the easier it would be for Simon to make peace with him at some point in the future. It was important that the worse behavior should be his, Simons. It was the only way hed ever manage to forgive anyone. He didnt expect Proust to understand. Or Charlie, for that matter.

"Theres no denying that Sergeant Kombothekra is subprime on almost every level," the Snowman agreed. "Though you might hold him in higher esteem when you reach the purge stage of your cycle. In case you havent worked it out, Waterhouse, you have a bulimic ego. It binges on self-regard until it becomes so bloated it cant take any more. At which point it spews up all the self-esteem its spent the last however long gobbling up, leaving you feeling like the lowest of the low." Proust stood up, stretched and walked over to the window. "Tell me Im wrong," he said.

Simon would have loved to. The words werent there.

"It wont be long before you decide that you and Sergeant Kombothekra are about as worthless and immoral as each other. Youll soon be propping him up again, helping him to pretend hes a fully fledged person, and h.e.l.l be doing the same for you. One setback: thats all itll take to set your next ego purge in motion."

"Ill be able to tell you who killed Francine Breary in one weeks time, maximum, and Ill be able to prove it," Simon heard himself say. He didnt care that hed backed himself into a corner; he was about to do it again. "You asked me who told me about the interview transcript-your little conspiracy. I had a visitor last night. She told me."

"She?"

Had Proust still not worked it out? Had he really not heard Simon say "Amanda" before?

"Does the name Regan Murray mean anything to you?"

The inspector frowned. "Murrays my daughters surname. I dont know any Regans."

"Regan Murrays your daughter. Shes changed her name. Legally. She couldnt stand to keep the name you chose for her."

Simon watched the Snowmans Adams apple do a jerky under-the-skin dance. "Shes too scared to tell you shes not Amanda anymore. Regans a character from King Lear, by the way: Lears daughter who doesnt give a s.h.i.t about him but pretends she does. Sound familiar? Shes also too scared to tell you about the psychotherapist shes seeing."

"No member of my family would waste money on psychotherapy," said Proust, still facing the window. Simon couldnt see his face.

"Youve cast a shadow over her life. She feels trapped in it. Thats why shes having therapy."