Dance of Ghosts

25

Before dropping me off in town, Cal checked his iPhone to see if the search on Mick Bishop had come up with anything yet. It took him a while — scrolling up and down, reading this, reading that … and occasionally looking up to make sure that he was still on the road — but eventually he shook his head and said, ‘Nope, nothing of any interest yet.’

‘What’s it given you so far?’ I asked out of curiosity.

He shrugged. ‘Not much. I’ve got his landline number, and I know what kind of car he drives, and when he passed his test, and where he lives, and how old he is …’ Cal looked at me. ‘It might take a while to get to the good stuff.’

‘If there is any.’

‘Yeah, well … we should know by the end of the day.’

I glanced out of the window. ‘You can drop me here, Cal.’

‘Sure?’

I nodded. ‘How long do you think it’ll take us to get out to The Turk’s Head?’

‘Not long,’ he said, pulling up at the side of the road. ‘Twenty minutes, maybe.’

‘All right, so if we leave your place at six, we should get there by half-past at the latest. That’ll give us plenty of time to check things out before Bishop meets this guy called Ray.’

‘How are we going to play it when they get there?’

‘I don’t know yet.’ I smiled at him. ‘Don’t worry, I’m sure we’ll work something out.’

He nodded. ‘OK, so you’ll be at my place by six?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Where are you going to be until then?’

‘Around.’

‘Around where?’

‘Just around.’ I opened the car door. ‘Let me know if the search comes up with anything, OK?’

‘Yeah, but — ’

‘See you later, Cal.’

Bridget’s pet shop is situated halfway down Market Street in a pedestrianised area on the west side of the shopping precinct. It’s a small brick-built place, flanked by a confectionery shop that’s always empty and an old-fashioned hardware store with a dusty window display of upright vacuum cleaners, pressure cookers, light bulbs, and dead wasps.

The rain was beginning to ease off as I made my way down Market Street, and in the distance I could see patches of clear blue sky breaking through the purple-grey blanket of cloud. It was unusually quiet for a Saturday lunchtime. The streets were busy, but not so busy that I couldn’t keep walking in a straight line, and it wasn’t long before I found myself standing outside Bridget’s shop, smoking a cigarette, wondering what the hell I was doing there.

Why was my heart beating so hard?

Why was my blood racing?

And why did I have a tiny black planet spinning around inside my chest, whipping out threads of adrenalin?

I smoked my cigarette and stared at the ground.

I didn’t know why.

I didn’t know what I was doing there.

I put out my cigarette and began walking back the way I’d come … but after three or four steps I stopped, turned round, and went back.

I couldn’t help it.

It didn’t matter why.

When I entered the shop, Bridget was at the counter wrapping up bags of greeny-brown pellets for a plump old woman in a threadbare fur coat. The old woman had a huge purse in her hand and a wheeled shopping trolley at her feet, and she seemed to be buying up half the contents of the shop — rabbit food, drinking bottles, bowls, polythene bags full of hay and straw. Bridget was cutting off price tags with a small lock-knife and jotting down prices on the back of a paper bag, but when the bell over the door sounded, she stopped what she was doing and looked over the woman’s shoulder at me and smiled … and just for a second I was sixteen years old again — stupid and pure, a blue-eyed animal, wanting and needing only this moment …

I closed the door.

As Bridget slipped her lock-knife into her back pocket and turned her attention back to the plump old woman, I wandered around the shop looking at things. One wall was packed with pet food and pet accessories, while the other side was reserved for the animals. There were racks of birdcages full of budgies and canaries, there were mice and hamsters in glass tanks, scurrying around in their toilet rolls and sawdust, and on the right-hand side of the shop the entire wall was lined with four tiers of fish tanks. The tanks bubbled and hummed, giving off a wonderful smell of pond water, and as I stood there watching the fish, breathing in the smell of the living water, I remembered the rivers and streams of my childhood — the jam jars full of bullheads, the newts, the frogspawn …

‘Wanna buy a fish, mister?’

I turned at the sound of the voice to find Bridget standing behind me, wiping pet-food dust from her hands. The plump old woman had gone and the shop was empty.

‘I’m just looking, thanks,’ I said, smiling.

Bridget put her hands in her pockets and smiled back at me. Dressed simply in a jade-green jumper and jeans, she looked quite wonderful.

‘How’s it going?’ I asked her.

‘Not bad.’

‘Are you on your own?’

She nodded. ‘Sarah doesn’t work Saturdays, and it’s been so quiet today that I told Melanie to go home.’

‘Who’s Melanie?’

‘She works here part-time. You know, weekends, school holidays …’

‘Right … so what do you do about lunch?’

‘Sandwiches, usually. Why?’ She grinned. ‘Are you offering to buy me dinner?’

‘Well, yeah, if you want …’

‘Why don’t we just stay here?’ she suggested. ‘I’ve got enough sandwiches for two.’

‘I’m not really all that hungry, to tell you the truth.’

‘Neither am I,’ she said quietly, stepping closer to me. ‘But why don’t you stay here for a while anyway? I can close the shop for an hour or two.’ She reached up and gently ran her fingertip down the side of my face. ‘We don’t have to do anything if you don’t want to,’ she whispered. ‘We can just talk.’

I nodded. I didn’t want to talk.

Bridget smiled at me for a moment, then she cupped my face in her hands and kissed me lightly on the lips, before turning round and crossing over to the door. As she put the CLOSED sign up and locked the door, I said, ‘Where’s Walter?’

‘Upstairs.’

‘What’s upstairs?’

‘I’ll show you,’ she said, taking my hand and leading me through a doorway at the back of the shop.

The doorway took us into a small room that seemed to double as a kitchen and a storeroom. There was a sink, a water heater, a kettle and cups on a counter, and everywhere I looked there were stacks of cardboard boxes piled high against the walls.

‘This way,’ Bridget said.

I followed her up a narrow wooden staircase that brought us out onto an equally narrow landing where, halfway along, Walter lay curled up in a cushion-strewn dog basket.

‘Hey, Walter,’ I said.

He looked up at me and thumped his tail a couple of times, but he didn’t make any effort to move. And given how warm and comfortable he looked, I thought that was fair enough.

‘What is this place?’ I asked Bridget, looking around. ‘Does anyone live here?’

‘Not at the moment. Sarah stayed here for a while after she left her husband, but she’s moved back in with him now.’

‘Why did she leave him?’

‘He used to hit her. Still does, probably.’

‘So why’s she gone back to him?’

‘God knows. She says she loves him …’ She shook her head, dismissing it from her mind. ‘Anyway,’ she said, opening a door, ‘this is the sitting room.’

I followed her through the door into a cramped but cosy-looking room. There was a small gas fire in front of a small settee, an armchair, a half-moon dining table, rugs and cushions on the floor, and at the far end of the room, a small bay window looked out onto the street below. The whole room seemed to have an air of timelessness to it.

‘Very nice,’ I said.

‘Would you like to see the bedroom?’

I nodded, not trusting myself to speak.

She led me across the room to an adjoining door, opened it up, and ushered me into the bedroom. It was about the same size as the sitting room, and it had the same haunting sense of timelessness to it, but there was something else about this room, something else altogether. I didn’t quite understand it, but as the pale autumn light filtered in through the curtains, illuminating the whiteness of an old-fashioned bed beneath the window, I felt as if I was in another country.

‘Are you OK with this?’ Bridget asked softly, closing the door.

‘Yeah …’ I said. ‘Are you?’

She didn’t say anything, she just took me by the hand and led me over to the bed.

She was pale and beautiful and she smelled of straw.

Afterwards, lying together in the waning light, we both retreated into our own quiet thoughts for a while. It was a good silence, a silence of breaths and comfort, and I felt no need to break it. Although the street was only a dozen or so feet below, the room seemed muted and still. There was no traffic noise, no footsteps, no human sounds at all — just a faint, indefinable whisper, like the hush of a coming wind.

I listened to a clock ticking, not caring what time it was.

My head was empty.

Thoughtless …

I was close to happiness.

After a while, Bridget nudged me with her foot. ‘I’ll have to get back to the shop soon.’

‘Why?’ I said, smiling at her.

‘Because if Sarah finds out that I closed up, she’ll kill me.’

‘How’s she going to find out?’

‘You don’t know Sarah …’

I rolled over and reached down for my jacket, patting the pockets until I found my cigarettes. ‘Do you mind?’ I asked Bridget, taking one out.

She shook her head. ‘There’s a bottle of whisky somewhere. Sarah’s always liked a drop of good malt … I think it’s in the cupboard over there. Just help yourself if you want.’

‘I’m all right, thanks,’ I said, lighting the cigarette.

‘Sure?’

‘Yeah.’

She smiled again.

I looked at her. ‘I haven’t done that for a long time.’

‘What — refused a drink?’

‘No, I meant — ’

‘I know what you meant, John,’ she said, laughing gently. ‘And I kind of guessed you hadn’t.’ She half sat up, looked me in the eye for a moment, then she lowered herself down, resting her head on my chest. When she spoke, I could feel the whisper of her words on my skin. I never thought this would happen.’

‘Neither did I.’

‘But it did.’

‘Yes.’

‘Are you glad?’

‘Very.

‘Good.’

I felt her hand moving down my body.

We slept for a while, half-slumbering together in the late afternoon stillness, and for the first time in years I didn’t feel the need to be somewhere else. I didn’t feel the need to be anything at all — someone else, something else, anything but me …

For now, I was perfectly content with who and what and where I was.

For now.

But the clock was still ticking, and I knew that nothing lasts for ever.

It was around 4.30 when Bridget sat up in bed, endearingly covering her breasts with the duvet, and nudged me with her elbow.

‘I really have to get up now,’ she said. ‘If I don’t cash up and get the money to the bank, Sarah really will kill me.’

I sat up and lit a cigarette. ‘I’d better get going too.’

She looked at me, not saying anything, but I could see the question in her eyes.

‘I have to meet someone,’ I explained. ‘My nephew-in-law.’

She smiled. ‘Nephew-in-law?’

‘He’s called Cal. He works with me sometimes.’

‘Oh, right … so you’re working tonight?’

‘Kind of.’

‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I’m just being nosy. You don’t have to tell me — ’

‘No, it’s all right,’ I assured her. ‘I don’t mind you asking … it’s just … well, it’s not really work, as such. It’s just something I need to sort out.’

‘Is it to do with that man?’

‘What man?’

‘That policeman … what’s his name? The one who came round to our house.’

‘Bishop?’

‘Yeah, him.’

‘What makes you think it’s about Bishop?’

‘I don’t know,’ she shrugged. ‘I just got a feeling about him, that’s all. When he came to the house, and when I saw him on TV …’ She shivered. ‘I don’t know … he just didn’t seem right, if that makes any sense.’

‘It makes a lot of sense.’

‘Yeah, well … just be careful, OK?’

I smiled. ‘OK.’

She kissed me, ruffled my hair, then got out of bed and started to get dressed. I lay there and watched her. In the dusky light, her hair was edged with a dust-pale shine and her skin was creamy white. There was a faint scar low on her belly and a small bruise just below her left breast. Her shoulders were broader than I’d imagined, spanning the ridge of her back with a delicate strength that mirrored the curve of her hips, and her backside was full, like a pale sun on a winter’s morning. It was a body that deserved to be naked. And as she slipped into her underwear, then pulled on her jumper and climbed into her jeans, I wondered if I’d ever see it again.

‘Have you seen my socks?’ she said.

‘Try under the bed.’

She found her socks and pulled them on, then went over and examined herself in a mirror on the wall. She ran her fingers through her hair, then leaned in close and plucked something from her lip with a hooked little finger.

‘What time are you meeting your nephew-in-law?’ she asked.

‘Six o’clock.’

She came over and sat on the edge of the bed and bent down to put on her shoes. ‘Are you going to be busy all night?’

‘I don’t know. It depends …’

‘Sorry,’ she smiled. ‘I’m being pushy again.’

‘No, it’s all right. It’s just that I really don’t know how long I’m going to be … why don’t I ring you later on?’

‘Yeah, that’d be nice.’ Still bent over, she tied her shoelaces in a double knot, brushed at the toes of her shoes, then lightly stamped her feet. Finally, she sat back up and looked at me. ‘If it’s not too late,’ she said, almost shyly, ‘maybe we could go out somewhere?’

‘I’d like that.’

‘Good.’

I smiled at her.

‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘I thought you were getting up?’

‘I am.’

‘Go on, then.’

‘I thought you had to go downstairs to cash up?’

She shook her head. ‘You watched me getting dressed, now it’s my turn to watch you.’

I stared at her, stupidly embarrassed, not sure what to say.

She smiled. ‘It’s all right, I’m only joking. I’ll let you get dressed in peace.’

She glanced over her shoulder at me as she left the room, and the look on her face — a carefree smile of intimate amusement — sent a tingle through my heart.

It was quiet in the pet shop downstairs. The daylight was fading outside, shops were closed or closing, shoppers were on their way home. It was that time of day when the town gets a chance to rest before the bedlam of the night begins. In the shop, Bridget was cashing up, birds were fluttering softly in their cages, and the fish tanks were bubbling quietly in the evening light. I stood by the door, breathing in the musty smell of straw and grain, the rubbery tang of dog toys, the fresh leather scent of collars and leads …

I didn’t want to leave.

I wanted to stay here.

I didn’t want to be anywhere else.

‘You’ll ring me later then?’ Bridget said.

‘Yeah … I don’t know what time it’ll be — ’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ she smiled. ‘Just call me when you can.’

I looked at her for a moment, remembering the scent of her skin, the touch of her lips, the breath of her whispered words …

‘Go on,’ she said softly. ‘I’ll see you later.’

I unlocked the door and stepped out into the twilight.