Gone

46

Moonlight crept out from behind shredded clouds, the cold canopy of stars reflected in the quarry fading in the blue glare. Sitting in the car on the track at the edge of the water, Caffery watched in silence. He was cold. He’d been here more than an hour. He’d snatched four hours’ dense, uncomplicated sleep at home and snapped awake just before five with the certainty that something out in the freezing night was expecting him. He’d got up. He knew staying at home, wakeful, would only lead to trouble – would probably lead to his tobacco pouch and the whisky bottle – so he’d put Myrtle in the back seat and driven around a bit, expecting to see the Walking Man’s camp over the hedgerow. Instead, somehow, he’d ended up out here.

It was a big quarry, about the size of three football fields, and deep too. He’d studied the schematics. At one point it was well over a hundred and fifty feet deep. The underwater rocks were scabby with plants, abandoned stone-cutting machinery, submerged niches and hidey-holes.

Earlier this year there had been a time when he had been plagued by a man, a Tanzanian illegal immigrant who had followed him round the county, watching him from the shadows like an elf or a Gollum. It had gone on for almost a month and then, as quickly as the man had started, he had stopped. Caffery had no idea what had become of him – whether he was alive or dead. Sometimes he caught himself looking out of the window late at night, wondering where he was. In some perverse, lonely corner of his psyche he missed him.

For a while the Tanzanian had been living here, in the trees around this quarry. But there was more about this place that made Caffery’s skin prickle at every noise, every shift of light around the car. This was where Flea had dumped the corpse. Misty Kitson’s body was somewhere in the silent depths.

You’re protecting her and you can’t yet see what a nice circle that makes.

A nice circle.

A single winter cloud moved across the moon. Caffery stared at it – at the moon. A faint fingernail in white, a tentative but perceptible wash of light on its dark side. Riddle me this, riddle me that. The Walking Man, the clever bastard, always fed him clues. Kept him crawling along, his tongue to the ground. Caffery didn’t think the Walking Man’s anger would last. Not in the long run. Still, Caffery hadn’t found him tonight, and that fact alone felt like a rebuke.

‘Obstinate old shit,’ he told Myrtle, who was on the back seat. ‘The miserable, obstinate old shit.’

He pulled out his phone and keyed in Flea’s number. He didn’t care if he woke her or what he was going to say. He just wanted to put an end to it. Here and now. Didn’t need the Walking Man and his mumbo-jumbo, riddles and clues. But her line went straight to answerphone. He hung up and put the mobile back into his pocket. It had been there for less than ten seconds when it rang. He snatched it out, thinking it was her calling back, but the number was wrong. It was a withheld number.

‘It’s me. Turner. At the office.’

‘Jesus.’ He rubbed his forehead tiredly. ‘What the hell are you doing at this time in the morning?’

‘I couldn’t sleep.’

‘Thinking about all the overtime you could finesse?’

‘I’ve got something.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Edward Moon. Known as Ted.’

‘Who is . . . ?’

‘Who is the younger brother of the fat bastard.’

‘And I should be interested in him because?’

‘Because of his rogues’-gallery shots. You’ll have to look at them, but I’m ninety-nine point nine. It’s him.’

The hair went up on the back of Caffery’s neck. Like a hound with the first scent of blood in its nose. He blew air out of his mouth. ‘Rogues’ gallery? He’s got form?’

‘Form?’ Turner gave a dry laugh. ‘You could say that. He’s just done ten years at Broadmoor under Section 37/41 of the Mental Health Act. Does that count as form?’

‘Christ. That sort of sentence, it must have been . . .’

‘Murder.’ Turner’s voice was calm, but there was an edge of excitement in it. He’d got the scent of blood too. ‘A thirteen-year-old A girl. And it was brutal. Really nasty. So . . .’ A pause. ‘So, Boss, what would you like me to do now?’