All the Rage

Adam Fawley
2 April 2018
12.17

Alex pours me a glass of juice and leans back against the worktop. The remains of her lunch are on a plate on the draining board. Chicken salad: brown rice, lean protein, leafy greens `“ she's ticking all the boxes. But there's too much left on the plate and her face looks thin. Thinner than I'd like.

`˜The health visitor just texted me to say she's running late so as long as the mysterious Mr Asante is on time, we may just wing it.'

She's goading me now. She's been curious about Asante ever since I first mentioned him.

`˜He's not mysterious, Alex. He's just not that easy to read. Not like Gislingham `“'

Her smile broadens; she's very fond of Gis.

`˜Or Quinn.'

A grimace this time. `˜Thank the Lord for that. This town ain't big enough for more than one Quinn.'

I move over to the kettle; Alex's current beverage of choice is cherry bakewell green tea. We must be draining Waitrose dry.

`˜I'd just prefer not to have anyone from work coming here right now. I haven't told anyone yet `“ about the baby.'

Alex squints down at her belly. `˜OK, I'll make sure I stay sitting down.' She makes a rueful face. `˜Let's just hope he's not much of a detective.'

`˜I'm sorry `“ I know it's a bloody pain in the neck, but he insisted on coming `“'

She reaches out and touches me gently on the cheek. `˜Don't look so worried. I was joking.'

By the time the doorbell rings Alex is curled up on the sofa with her tea. She grins at me as I go past, and pulls a cushion on to her lap.

Asante is on the doorstep. He has a laptop under one arm. Immaculate suit, white shirt, deep-red woven silk tie. I can see the edge of the label: Burberry. It occurs to me suddenly that a lot of Quinn's dislike may be nothing more than preener's envy.

I step back to let him in, and he waits, courteously, for me to close the door.

`˜We'll go through to the kitchen.'

I steadfastly refuse to look at Alex as we go by, but I sense a minute slowing of his pace behind me, and then he says, `˜I'm sorry to disturb you.'

`˜Occupational hazard,' she says; I can hear the laughter in her voice.

In the kitchen Asante refuses tea but accepts water, and I find myself reaching for the bottle in the fridge rather than just running the tap. I suspect he has that effect on people quite a lot.

He sets up his laptop on the island and the screen opens to the same bland factory-issue screensaver I have on mine. Gislingham has his toddler son, dressed in a Chelsea strip; Ev has her cat; Quinn has some tropical beach he'd like us all to think he's been to. But Asante's is quietly and deliberately anonymous. Another fact for my mental file.

He pulls up a stool and I realize suddenly that I've left the ultrasound picture the midwife gave us on the island, barely three feet from where Asante is now taking a seat. I reach for it quickly and put it in my back pocket. If Asante notices, he gives no sign.

He finishes with his keyboard and turns it towards me. It takes a few minutes for it to hit me, what exactly it is I'm reading. But when it does it's like an iron bar to the throat.

* * *

The wind has got up again by the time they park the car. Everett turns round and looks at the girl. She's in the back seat, looking out of the window. She'd agreed to come, but now they're here she looks less sure. Though at least there's hardly anyone else around: it's the middle of the day and the Marston Ferry Road allotments are practically deserted. The only life Ev can see is two elderly chaps in almost identical caps and sweaters, sharing a thermos and a vape on a bench by the skips.

`˜Are you still OK to do this, Faith?' she asks.

`˜It's fine,' she says quickly, pushing open the door. `˜Let's just get it over with before Mum gets back and I have to start explaining where I've been.'

Somer, meanwhile, has got out of the car and is examining the ground. A few yards away there are deep tyre tracks where someone has driven off fast. And recently. She looks up at the clouds `“ they're lucky these marks are still here and they'll need their luck to hold for just a bit longer: forensics need to get a record of this before it rains again. She gets her phone out and walks a few paces away to put in a call to Alan Challow. The ground around her is thick with sandy red mud. The same mud they found splattered over the shoes they now have sealed in an evidence bag in the back of the car.

Faith is staring. At the upturned wheelbarrows, the ramshackle sheds, the bare earth, the dull twiggy plants. Everything seems either dead or withered.

She shivers suddenly. And it isn't just the wind. `˜I think I know why he let me go. I remember now `“ there were sirens `“ I heard sirens `“ they were getting closer and closer. That's when he left.'

So that explains it, thinks Everett. Out here, with no one around to hear or help, it's little short of a miracle Faith's attacker didn't finish what he started. The driver of that emergency vehicle is an accidental hero.

Somer walks slowly back towards them, her boots crunching on the patches of gravel. She nods a message to Everett: CSI are on their way.

`˜So what happened after you heard the siren?' asks Ev.

Faith glances at her. `˜I heard him open the shed door and a few minutes later the sound of an engine and then the van drove away. Fast. Like the wheels were spinning.'

`˜And then?'

Faith takes a deep breath. `˜I just started screaming, hoping someone would come. I didn't know where I was `“ I didn't know no one could hear me.'

Somer tries not to imagine what that was like `“ lying there, the bag around your face, no underwear, the panic as you struggle to breathe `“

`˜It wasn't on that tight,' says Faith, guessing her thoughts. `˜The bag.' She bites her lip. `˜I thought, afterwards, that he can't have wanted me to die. Not really. Not if he left it that loose.'

Or perhaps he just didn't want it to be over too quickly, thinks Ev. She feels her jaw tighten; they need to find this bastard, and fast.

`˜How did you escape?'

`˜I managed to squirm about against the ground and drag the bag off that way. That's when I realized it was a shed. There was garden equipment and stuff. I looked about a bit and managed to find a pair of secateurs. I wedged them against the bench and tried to cut the ties but I kept dropping them. It took ages.'

`˜Which shed was it, Faith? Can you show us?'

`˜It was that one,' she says, pointing. `˜Over there. The one with the barrow outside.'

`˜What about the bag `“ do you know where it went?'

`˜It's probably still there `“ I didn't take it. It was a Tesco one. If that helps.'

Somer pulls out her gloves and starts towards the shed.

`˜We need to preserve the scene,' explains Everett. `˜There might be DNA. Or fingerprints.'

`˜I think he was wearing gloves,' says Faith gloomily. `˜His hands felt all plasticky.'

`˜Like rubber gloves, you mean, those Marigold things?'

She shakes her head. `˜No, sort of fatter than that. Bigger. Perhaps gardening gloves or something.' She sighs. `˜So there won't be any fingerprints, will there.'

`˜He'll have messed up somehow, just you wait. And that's how we'll catch him.'

`˜I kept hoping someone would come,' says the girl softly. `˜But no one did. No one ever does, do they? Not when it matters. Not when you really need them.'

* * *

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