Ash and Bone

50

By the time he had arrived downstairs, whoever had delivered the package was nowhere in sight. A padded envelope the size of a hardback book, with his name printed on the front. Elder shook it, prodded it, carried it back upstairs. Inside the envelope the contents were swathed in bubble wrap, a video tape with a title handwritten on the edge. Singin' in the Rain. Just that and a date.

Who, Elder wondered, was sending him home-taped movies and why?

Not certain when he'd last eaten, Elder thought he'd do it right; phoned out for a pizza and some garlic bread and, when they arrived, opened a bottle of Becks from the fridge.

A mouthful of pizza, and he slotted the tape into place; pressed 'play' and leaned back. For a copy, the picture quality wasn't too bad. Fine, in fact, until the scene, maybe a quarter of the way through, when Debbie Reynolds, in her pink cap and little pleated skirt, pops up out of the cake. Then abruptly the image twisted, caught and jarred, and changed to black and white. An interior, blurred and poorly lit. Some kind of party scene. Men in dinner jackets, black tie; others with jackets discarded, white shirts, braces. Women in low-cut dresses. Champagne. And, as if on cue, a face Elder knew. Like watching a veteran actress in her heyday, cigarette in one hand, glass in the other, wearing a pale dress that reached to the floor, Lynette Drury crossed the room and, for one moment, looked directly at the camera, as if she were the only person present who knew that it was there.

Elder pressed 'pause' and searched the screen for someone else he recognised, but no. When he moved on, the picture changed: the same room later. Kneeling at the low table in the centre of the room, a young woman, naked save for a bracelet in the shape of a snake on her upper arm, snorted cocaine through a rolled-up banknote, while a man, trousers round his knees, fucked her from behind.

A starburst of static and what had to be another camera, six people sitting round another table in another room, a poker game. And amongst them faces Elder knew: Mallory, Slater, Grant, and standing just behind Mallory, at his shoulder, Maurice Repton. Younger, all of them. A decade ago, Elder guessed. Possibly more.

The image broke again and reformed.

A bedroom, sparsely lit. Elder adjusted the brightness with the remote control but to little effect. Shapes moved naked across the bed, arms, legs. Three bodies, intertwined; two women and a man. One of the women detached herself and stood beside the bed. Not a woman at all. A girl, slim-hipped, no breasts to speak of, long fair hair. The man reached out for her and she evaded his hand, turning away. Surfacing from the bed, he seized her arm and pulled her back. As his arm tightened around her neck, the other hand pulled at her hair. Silently, head swivelling towards him, she shouted or screamed.

Elder could see her mouth, opening wide, but heard nothing.

He moved closer and peered at the screen.

The man had the girl in his grasp, increasing pressure, and now the other girl, similar but with shorter, darker hair, started hitting him, pummelling his back and shoulders, trying to get him to stop, but to no avail.

Suddenly, without warning, the man released the first girl and swung round towards the other, smashing his forearm into her face with such force that her head was jolted back and round and she tumbled over the edge of the bed towards the floor.

Imagining that he heard the impact, the clash of bone against brittle bone, Elder held his breath.

Now the man caught hold of the girl's ankles and dragged her back on to the bed, legs spread, and lifted himself above her.

The fair-haired girl gouged her nails down his back and, spinning, his elbow struck her full in the face so that blood shot from her nose. Grabbing her, he forced her down. His hands at her neck, squeezing, as he leaned down with all his weight.

Elder stopped the tape, rewound and watched again, looking for the moment when the fair-haired girl's body went limp, and Mallory pushed her to the floor and she lay, lifeless, as no unbroken body could have lain.

Mallory.

If there'd been doubt in his mind before, it was no longer there.

The dark-haired girl was just visible in the far corner of the room, mouth slightly open, silent, staring, one arm tight across her breasts. And for a second, possibly two, a shadow fell across her, followed by the partial figure of a man, fully dressed, walking into the room, the frame. Then nothing.

Fade to white.

To black.

To nothing.

Treasure trove.

Elder went into the kitchen on less-than-steady feet and poured a shot of whiskey, the neck of the bottle rattling against the glass.

His call to Framlingham found him in Hampstead, a terraced cottage in the Vale of Health, a hop, skip and a jump from the Heath itself. The woman who let Elder in was in her late forties, tall, wearing a generous green needlecord dress. Dark hair turning gracefully grey. Imposing was the word that came to mind.

She made no attempt to introduce herself and neither did Framlingham when he appeared, stooped, in the doorway, carpet slippers on his feet.

They sat in the small living room, not much more than an arm's length from the screen, sipping twelve-year-old Macallan and watching as the girl fell, again and again, to the floor.

'This is what Mallory was afraid of? What Grant had threatened him with?'

'I assume so.'

'There has to be more.'

'You think so?'

'We need more than just the tape, Frank. We need a place, we need names. If there are bodies buried, we need to know where they are.'

'There's a date,' Elder said, 'written on the label, along with the name. Singing in the Rain. 17th May 1996. Could be when the film was recorded – we could check the schedules – but I doubt it. If you look at them carefully, date and name, I'd say they were written at different times.'

'Then that's the date of the video, the party?'

'It's a good bet.'

'The raid at Gatwick, the one which linked up Grant to Slater, that was when?'

'1995.'

'And the case was thrown out of court?'

'A year later.'

Framlingham smiled. 'Celebration party, then.'

'Could well be.'

'For Mallory, too. Thanking him for his assistance. Let him win a few hands of poker, throw him a couple of girls.'

Elder shivered inside, remembering. 'When I was talking to Lynette Drury, she said that was what Mallory liked, young girls.'

'And that was her, Drury, at the party? You've no doubt?'

'None.'

'We should talk to her, then.'

'Sooner or later.'

'Where the bodies are buried, you think she's the one to know?'

'If they're buried.'

'If.'

Elder was thinking of Lynette Drury's face, the pain behind her eyes. And no matter how filthy it all became, that was what I clung on to. 'Yes,' he said. 'I think she knows.'

'You think she sent you the tape?'

'It's possible, yes.'

'She'll deny it.'

'Of course.'

Framlingham wound back the tape again.

'There, Frank, the man who comes into the room at the end – what are the chances that's Repton?'

'You think have another go at him first?'

'Why not?'

Framlingham rose, slightly awkwardly, to his feet. These chairs, this room, they weren't intended for a man his size. 'I'll see if I can't organise some coffee. Don't want you falling asleep at the wheel.'