Looking for Trouble

CHAPTER TWENTY NINE

The swelling on my ankle had gone down quite a bit by morning, though it was still very tender. I was itching to call on Leanne. The warning, friendly or otherwise, lingered like a hangover, making me uneasy. But I needed to rest my ankle so it’d heal quicker. And I wanted time with Maddie.

The two of us spent most of the day in the garden. Ray took Tom off to Nana Tello’s. We played make-believe. I had speaking parts only. The baddie, the judge, the teacher, the daddy. In between, Maddie messed in the sand-pit and dragged armfuls of toys from the house out into the garden. Maddie chattered away, a stream of consciousness, scolding, informing, protesting. I loved to watch her play. The intensity of it all, the fluidity of her movements; hunkering down to rearrange her teddy, then up in a flowing sequence.

‘Maddie.’

‘And you be the policeman.’

‘Maddie, I want to tell you something.’

‘What?’ She frowned, straightened up and stared.

‘You know your body is yours, don’t you?’

‘Course it is,’ she retorted, as though I’d said something incredibly stupid.

‘And no-one’s allowed to touch you if you don’t want them to.’

‘I hate washing my hair.’

‘I don’t mean that. I mean your private bits, like your fanny or your bottom. You can say no, ‘cos it’s your body.’

‘I know.’ She was impatient, didn’t want to hear me.

‘And if anyone, anyone at all, ever hurts you, or touches you when you don’t want them to, or if they make you touch their body, you tell me.’ I sounded like some health promotion leaflet. ‘I promise I won’t be cross…’

‘Yeah. You be the policeman.’

‘Do you understand?’

‘Yes,’ she shouted. ‘Now play. You be the policeman.’

I sighed. Had any of it got through? Should I have given her more graphic examples and risked frightening her?

‘I’ll be a policewoman instead.’

‘No, a man. You’ve got to be a man.’

‘Why?’

‘Cos there isn’t a policewoman in this game.’

On Sunday, my ankle was strong enough to put a bit of weight on it so I drove over to Bev and Harry’s with Tom and Maddie. Harry looked exhausted; there was a grey tinge to his complexion, purple hammocks under his eyes. Bev was brittle and prickly. Of course, the kids were on their worst behaviour.

After a strained lunch, I dried the dishes while Harry washed. I asked him if he’d any way of checking up on a business I was investigating.

‘I can access data on corporations, holding companies, directors, that sort of stuff. What you after?’

‘I don’t know, anything at all.’

‘That specific, huh?’

‘I don’t even know that there is anything.’

‘But it would be nice?’ He grinned.

I followed him through to the front room and stood behind him as he sat at the console.

‘Okay, what’s the name?’

‘M.K.C. or M.K. Communications.’

He punched it in. Lists scrolled up the screen. ‘There we are.’ He pointed to the initials. ‘So it does exist. Directors…’ He keyed in some more commands and a list of names appeared. The only one I recognised was Fraser Mackinlay.

‘Anything?’ Harry asked.

‘Nothing unexpected.’

‘Okay – sister companies.’ Another list. M.K. Software, M.K. Distribution, Kincoma Products, M.K.C. International.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said, ‘it doesn’t mean anything. It’s a waste of time.’

“S fine. Leave it with me. I’ll print these out for you, run a list of directors for this lot. Leave it at that.’

“Erm.’ I wasn’t sure it was worth the trouble.

‘Won’t take a minute.’

‘Go on then.’

In the back room, Bev had persuaded the kids to set up the clockwork train set.

‘Tom’s ruining it,’ screamed Maddie. He was trying to run the train over the half-finished track.

‘Wait Tom, wait till it’s finished.’

‘Let’s go out the back,’ said Bev. It was hot, but cloudy and close. Storm coming.

‘You look tired,’ I said, once we’d settled.

‘I am. Work’s awful; all this talk of the hospital closing, merging with Wythenshawe. We just don’t know what’s going to happen.’

‘But what about the campaign? It’s so popular…’

She shrugged. ‘It is. But whether it’ll actually stop them closing us down in the long run…We’ll be the last to find out. On top of all that, Harry’s driving himself into the ground with the Salford stuff – he’s hardly here and when he is, he’s plugged into that bloody machine. I’m sorry Sal. I just hate living like this. It was never part of the plan.’ She smiled ruefully.

I’d heard a lot about the plan. Bev and Harry had wanted to raise their children jointly. They’d both taken part-time work; Bev at the lab at Withington Hospital and Harry with his free-lancing. They’d been poorer as a result and hadn’t been able to go up the career structure like full-timers. But, from the outside, it seemed to have worked, till now.

‘I hate having to do all the childcare,’ said Bev. ‘I don’t understand how single parents cope. How did you manage before Ray moved in?’

‘I don’t know. You just do, you have to. You’re always, always knackered. But worse than that, there’s no-one to talk to, no adult company. And you’re skint all the time so you can’t go to nice places with your child.’ I shuddered at the memory.

‘Sal,’ Harry sounded surprised, ‘look at this.’ He came out clutching a printout. ‘These names here,’ he pointed, ‘recognise any of them?’

‘Only Mackinlay. Why?’

‘Kenton, Eddie Kenton. It has to be the same guy. You remember Operation Sadie?’

I shook my head.

‘Four, maybe five years back. Big police operation uncovered a pornography network: Holland, Germany and here. Eddie Kenton was the brains behind the Manchester end of things. He was arrested, along with a few others. Lived out in the sticks, Mottram way, built himself a big house up there. He ran a production company; educational films, training and that; did very well out of it. But he also used it to front the porn movies. Eddie’s case never got to court; police had taken short cuts with the warrants that were used. They couldn’t touch him. Of course, he had to clean his act up, lay low for a bit. They probably still keep an eye on him.’

‘What’s he doing on the list?’

‘He’s a director for one of Mackinlay’s firms, Kincoma Products.’

So, maybe Fraser Mackinlay and Martin Hobbs were mixed up with this Kenton character, producing porn movies? It would explain Fraser’s reluctance to talk or let me see Martin. And if JB had discovered that when he’d been asking round the clubs…

‘Here,’ said Harry. ‘Trading out of an industrial unit in Longsight – might be worth a visit.’

‘What do they do?’

‘Ring ‘em up and see,’ Harry smiled. ‘Tell ‘em Sadie sent you.’

I was scrubbing new potatoes when Clive made his appearance. Only two days late. He poked around in the fridge. I don’t know why. He hadn’t put any food in it for over a week. I was quietly pleased that it was empty – I’d just chopped up everything that was left over, for Sunday tea.

‘What a weekend,’ he groaned, ‘started at a rave and then this house party last night – talk about gross! This girl whose house it was…’

‘Woman.’

‘Yeah, well, she’d got this awful music, really naff. And she thought she could dance…God,’ he snorted with derision.

‘Clive, we were supposed to have a meeting on Friday.’

‘This Friday?’

I didn’t believe that incredulous tone for one moment. I nodded.

‘God. Sorry. You have to remind me of these things. Head like a sieve.’ He foraged in the bread bin. Took out the end of the loaf and began slicing it up.

‘So let’s have it tomorrow,’ I said.

He hummed. Spread jam on the bread. Took a mouthful. Chewed it over.

‘Or Tuesday?’ I persisted.

‘Mmm.’ He nodded. ‘Tuesday’s better. Yeah, Tuesday.’ He turned to go.

‘Clive, can you go and get some bread? – we need it for the kids’ sandwiches.’

‘Oh, trouble is, ‘fraid I haven’t any cash…erm…’ He batted his pockets. Grimaced inanely.

I bit the side of my cheek, walked slowly to my bag and fished a pound coin from my purse. Handed it to him. He winked and wheeled away. I wanted to slap him.

The weather broke during the night. The clouds opened. I woke in the early hours to the steady beat of heavy rain. In the distance, cars whooshed like irregular waves. So that was summer done and dusted.