Riot Act

Two

It wasn’t until the following morning that reaction to the whole thing set in. On a number of fronts, and none of them good.

The first hit me when I stepped out of the shower in Pauline’s nice centrally-heated bathroom. I reached for a towel from the equally warm radiator and my hand stilled abruptly.

Pauline had gone in for mirrors in a big way in her bathroom. I found this strange considering, much as I liked her, she was a woman for whom the battle with rapidly encroaching cellulite was already a lost cause. I don’t think, in her position, I would have wanted to be constantly reminded of the fact from almost every angle. And certainly not first thing in the morning, that’s for sure.

I didn’t seem to have too much of the wobbly stuff myself, but instead all I saw were the scars.

I was putting together quite a collection of them, it seemed, on my arms and torso. They’d been caused by sharp blades of varying descriptions, all wielded with deadly intent. None of them, I’m sorry to say, were gained during the course of routine surgical procedure.

The most serious stretched round the base of my throat from a point just under my right ear, to my Adam’s apple. A thin pale line, crossed by fading stitch marks, like you’d find on an old cartoon drawing of a Frankenstein monster.

Not exactly the prettiest bit of needlework you ever did see, but it wasn’t the appearance of the thing that worried me. I never considered myself much to look at to begin with. I don’t go for a great deal in the way of make-up, and my hairstyle is one that has to survive being constantly squashed under a motorbike helmet.

No, the thing that bothered me most was what those scars represented. How close I’d come to dying, and the depths I’d had to sink to in order to survive. I’d sworn that I’d never put myself in that position again, and had carefully reorganised my life in an attempt to ensure it.

But, when the necessity – or the opportunity, anyway – had presented itself, I’d jumped straight back into the fray without pause for reflection.

The memory of my actions in Fariman and Shahida’s garden came back to me. The way I’d so easily abandoned reasoned argument in favour of violence. I’d sunk straight back down to Langford’s level. What the hell had I been thinking?

I hadn’t – been thinking, I mean – that was the trouble. I’d been acting on an instinctively triggered response to a perceived threat. No doubt my old army instructors would have been delighted that all those months of training had paid off in such an aggressively Pavlovian style, even when I’d been out of a uniform now for longer than I’d been in one.

As for me, I was terrified.

Eventually, I shook myself out of it for long enough to go and get dressed, venturing downstairs to be greeted by an anxious Friday, who went through his usual performance of trying to convince me that he’d wasted half away during the night. I scooped up the post as I passed the front door, then carried on through to the kitchen with the dog trampling on my heels.

Just to get some peace I dumped a double handful of dog biscuits into an aluminium bowl which the Ridgeback was soon shunting enthusiastically round the lino with his snout. I filled the kettle and glanced at the mail while I waited for it to boil.

Besides the usual junk was a reminder notice for a Residents’ Committee meeting to discuss the rising tide of crime on the estate. The meeting was to take place in the back room of the pub just down the road, at seven-thirty that evening.

Whoever had delivered it must have known my aversion to becoming even peripherally involved in anything that has to be run by committee. They had added a personal persuader to my copy, scrawled in red biro across the top and down one margin.

“Miss Fox,” it said, “we’d all be v grateful (underlined twice) if you’d come to meeting, espec in light of events of last eve. Many thanks.” There was a signature to follow, but it could have been anything.

I read the rest of the leaflet again, but it didn’t tell me much beyond the time and the place. I shrugged. Technically, I wasn’t a resident, so I didn’t think it was a wise move to go along to their meeting and stick my oar in, personal invites notwithstanding.

In the end, I tacked it to Pauline’s kitchen cork board, alongside the slightly blurry photographs of Friday. The pictures had been taken indoors with a flash and either the poor dog was secretly the spawn of Satan, or he’d been badly affected by red-eye.

Also pinned up there were money-off vouchers for tubs of low-fat frozen yoghurt, pages of calorie values from Pauline’s slimming club, and a card giving the date of her next hair appointment. No doubt somebody, more talented than I at the art, could have studied that board and told you everything there was to know about Pauline’s lifestyle and character.

I’d known her for just over a year, but she was one of those people you instantly warm to, full of energy and an enthusiasm for collecting new experiences. I expect that Pauline’s life would have worked out quite differently, had her husband of twenty-five years not run off with a nineteen-year-old telesales manageress some time before.

Where most women of forty-eight would never have recovered from this devastating occurrence, for Pauline it offered up a whole new lease of life. She started going to her slimming group, and dyeing the grey out of her hair. She’d even taken up with a boyfriend who rode a Harley Davidson, and signed up for self-defence lessons.

That was where I came in, because at that time I was teaching regular classes to groups of women all around the area. She wasn’t quite at the end of her first course when the events of last winter overtook me, and my teaching career had come to a rather abrupt end.

She’d kept in touch while I was out of action, even held my hand at the inquest. I wasn’t always glad to see her, I must admit, but it was difficult to be depressed for long with Pauline around. Afterwards, I felt I owed her one, and house-sitting for her was the least I could do. Even if it did mean braving the little horrors of Kirby Street.

When Pauline had moved in to number forty-one, Kirby Street hadn’t yet started on its downward course. It was one of a maze of streets of ugly brick and pebbledashed semis built in the fifties on reclaimed marshland, down near the River Lune. As far as anyone knew, the area had never been remotely cultivated, despite the picturesque name.

For the past twenty years, Lavender Gardens had been slowly taken over by the local Asian population. Mainly Pakistani, they’d moved into the streets one house at a time as they came up vacant. And, as is so often the way of these things, the more the Asian numbers swelled, the faster the other houses seemed to come up for grabs, and the lower the prices fell.

For as long as I’d lived in Lancaster, the place had been known as Lavindra Gardens. At least, that was one of its more repeatable nicknames.

Pauline wasn’t remotely Pakistani, but she’d stayed put. “I get on all right with them,” she’d informed me stoutly. “I just don’t stick my nose in where it’s not wanted, particularly with the kids, and they leave me well alone.”

She didn’t appear to make any connection between this wide berth and the presence of Friday, who had the run of the house when she was at work. The dog had arrived as an abused puppy not long after Mr Jamieson had departed and, in the long run, Pauline reckoned she’d got the better end of the deal. If nothing else, he was the best home security system you could wish for.

The Ridgeback was big, and totally aware of his own strength. Besides, he had the much-envied local reputation of once having chased an imprudent dustbin man up onto the roof of the shed in the back garden, and kept him up there all morning. Part of the reason I was staying at Pauline’s was so that Friday could stay in residence, and on guard.

So, I’d moved in to make sure his food came in tins rather than in trousers. I’d agreed to keep lights on in the evening, and the curtains opening and closing at the appropriate hours.

I’d also promised not to interfere in local problems. Not to take sides. Not to get involved. After all, I was only going to be there for a relatively short period. The last thing I’d wanted to do was draw attention to myself.

But it looked like I’d managed it, just the same.

***

After I’d let Friday tow me round the block on the end of his lead, my conscience got the better of me. I bundled him back into the house and crossed over the road to go and bang on the faded varnish of Fariman and Shahida’s front door.

It took a long time for anyone to answer. When the door was finally opened, it wasn’t Shahida who stood there, but an Asian teenager. He was one of those beautiful Indian boys with almost androgynous features, flawless skin and a slender body. It was emphasised by the tight, but grubby white T-shirt he wore, along with dusty jeans, ripped at the knees.

I vaguely recognised him, but seeing him out of context, it took me a moment to put a name to the face. Nasir, that was it. His widowed mother, Mrs Gadatra, actually lived next door to Pauline. Although I’d seen and talked to her two younger children, the elder boy was rarely home, and remained aloof when he was.

I realised that he hadn’t spoken, and was eyeing me with apparent disfavour, as though something with a faintly unpleasant smell had crawled onto his upper lip.

“Yes?” he said at last, sharply, and totally without the grace his appearance would have suggested.

“Hello Nasir. I’m here to see Shahida,” I said, somewhat uncertainly, and when that didn’t seem to impress him, I added, “to find out how Fariman is.”

The boy glowered a little more. “Wait,” he said. “I’ll ask.”

He turned and stalked away up the hall, not quite shutting the door in my face, but making sure I knew I wasn’t invited over the threshold. I hovered, uncomfortable, and almost regretted the impulse that had made me come over.

I glanced around and noticed, with a knot in my stomach, the net curtains twitching in the houses opposite.

After less than a minute another figure appeared round the door, almost completely filling the narrow hallway. He was unusually large for an Asian man, with huge callused hands, but he was squeezed into a suit that, if I was any judge, hadn’t come off a market stall.

“Yes?” he said, too, but with less aggression than Nasir had injected. His voice was oddly high-pitched.

I repeated my inquiry about Fariman and he eyed me bleakly for a second.

“You heard about what happened, then?”

“I was there,” I said.

“You are Charlie?” he asked.

When I nodded he paused for a moment, considering, then swung the door open and gestured me in, but laid a heavy restraining hand on my arm before I could advance much further. “Fariman’s condition is not good,” he said quietly. “One lung collapsed and his leg is badly burned, and there is some talk of infection in the wounds. Please do not upset Shahida with your questions.”

I nodded again, and the weight was lifted from my arm.

We went through into the small, neat front sitting room. Nasir was slouched by the netted window, scowling at life in general, and me in particular.

Shahida was sitting on the sofa, looking utterly dejected. She barely glanced up as we came in. Nasir’s mother was sitting next to her. She was holding both Shahida’s hands in her own as though she could impart inner strength that way.

“Shahida,” I said gently, after a few moments of silence, “I’m so sorry.”

She looked up slowly, as though only just registering my presence. “I begged him not to do anything stupid, Charlie,” she whispered.

The sense of guilt rose quickly, had to be swallowed back down. It stuck like dust in my throat. “I tried,” I said, “but when Langford and his bunch joined in, it all got out of hand so fast.” As excuses went, it sounded pretty lame to my own ears.

“So, why did you stop them beating the boy?” Mrs Gadatra demanded suddenly, her normally placid face fierce. “Look what he did to my sister’s husband. He needed to be taught a lesson, or where will it all end?”

Nasir pushed himself away from the window ledge abruptly, as though he couldn’t maintain his silence any longer, and agitatedly raked his hands through his hair. “You think that, but there are others who deserve to be beaten more,” he said with quiet feeling, starting to pace jerkily. “He’s not the one who was behind this attack.”

“Nasir!” protested the big man, his voice more squeaky than it had been before. “Just remember, boy, it wasn’t so long ago when that could have been you.”

Mrs Gadatra paled visibly at the man’s words, but Nasir twisted to face him. “I know who’s behind this,” he said, vehement, “and I’m going to see they get what’s coming to them.”

“Nasir!” It was his mother who broke in this time, her voice hushed with outrage. “Show some respect to your employer. Mr Ali has kindly brought you away from work to see your aunt, and this rudeness is how you repay him? You should be ashamed.”

I vaguely remembered an over-the-fence conversation with Mrs Gadatra when she mentioned that Nasir was training to be an electrician, and had a good job with a local builder. Mr Ali had built up his business from nothing and Nasir much admired him. You certainly saw enough of Mr Ali’s green and purple painted vans driving round to vouch for his success.

The man himself dredged up a weak smile for Mrs Gadatra, fluttering a hand to show that it really didn’t matter. There was only a slight tightening round the corners of his mouth, a stiffness to his neck, that called him a liar.

I didn’t get the chance to express my doubts. He pointedly checked his gold wristwatch and glanced at Nasir. “We have to go now,” he said, smiling at the women to belie the hint of steel in his thready voice. “I have a meeting, and you are needed back on site, Nasir,” he said.

Nasir nodded sullenly, head bowed. The fight seemed to have gone out of him.

Mrs Gadatra got up to see them out, the soft folds of her bright silk sari rustling as she moved. “I’m sorry about my boy,” she said to Mr Ali, flashing Nasir a speaking look, but unable to stop defending him, even so. “He is upset about his uncle.”

“I’m sure the police will do everything they can to bring those responsible to justice,” Mr Ali said, but his voice held little conviction.

“I’m sure they will,” Mrs Gadatra agreed, but she sounded less convinced, or convincing, than he had. She turned to her son as he moved past her. “I want to hear no more talk of retribution, Nasir,” she said sharply. “Let the police take care of things.”

Just for a moment, the fire was back in Nasir’s eyes. “They don’t know what’s going on, and they don’t care,” he muttered. He brought his head up, oddly seemed to look me straight in the face, as he added, “Maybe you should be asking who really profits from trying to rob an old man?”

Mr Ali shot a quick, nervous glance to Shahida to see what effect the boy’s inflammatory words were having, but she was still sitting frozen on the sofa, and seemed oblivious. He grabbed hold of Nasir’s shoulder and practically hauled him out of the room. The front door banged shut behind them a few moments later.

I would have turned and gone back to Shahida, but Mrs Gadatra laid a hand on my arm. It was half the size of Mr Ali’s, but it had the same detaining effect, nevertheless.

“I think you should go now, too, Charlie,” she said to me, more softly than the tone she’d used on her son. “My sister has been through a lot. I’m sure she appreciates your calling, but she needs some peace.”

There wasn’t an easy way to argue with her and, I must admit, I didn’t even try.

Nasir’s words troubled me as I walked back over the road to Pauline’s. Surely there wasn’t anything more sinister behind the attack on Fariman than a group of frightened kids who’d panicked when they’d been cornered, and who had lashed out blindly.

So, what did he mean about working out who’d profit from robbing an old man?

I shrugged. It was rubbing me up the wrong way, but part of me just wanted to hope that Fariman recovered from his ordeal without any lasting side-effects, and to forget about it. Besides, I’d promised Pauline I wouldn’t do anything rash and, at that point, I really did fully intend to keep my word.

Ah well.