Ritual

53

Caffery swivelled in his seat to stare at the guy. 'Fuck,' he murmured. 'I think that's him.'

'What?'

'The one on my phone.'

The figure was heading towards the blue Nissan. He stopped at the bin, dipping his head briefly, then carrying on his way, stopping at the Nissan and using a thin hand to knock on the window. A thought came to Flea: I know him. Where do I know him from? But then Caffery was out of his seat, rolling up his sleeves, and everything started happening so fast she forgot it.

From the Nissan came a bellow, primeval-sounding: 'Police!' It was the driver yelling, waving his hand out of the window. 'Get out of here! The police!' Then two things happened at once: the small figure in the oversized jacket ran clumsily back in the direction he'd come while Caffery hit the roof of the car — like a declaration of intent — and sprinted after him.

Flea was trained for all of this, but everything drained out of her head instantly. Caffery was rounding the corner out of sight and she didn't know these streets. She fumbled for her phone, dropped it, picked it up and realized the back had cracked — the SIM card and the battery were hanging out. She threw herself on to the driver's seat, groping under the steering-wheel, saw the keys weren't there and wrenched herself back the opposite way, clutching the phone and battery in one hand, fumbling her keys with the other.

She rolled out of the car, raced back to the Focus and jumped in. The car leaped forward, almost into the path of a delivery truck. She braked, clutching the wheel and swearing while the truck drove leisurely past, then raced the car across the road to the opposite side, taking the left-hand turning.

The street stretched ahead of her, one of those Victorian terraces that made her think of the north, red-brick and featureless. She let the car idle, not knowing which way to go. Caffery and the little guy might have been anywhere. And then she saw them, about a hundred yards down, bursting out from the line of parked cars, first the figure in the ridiculous jacket, then Caffery, his white shirt like a flag. She pushed the car forward, drawing level with them as they skidded sideways into an alley.

She reached over and pulled out her A-Z of Bristol, fumbled furiously to the index, then ran her finger down to Hopewell. Behind her a car was hooting, wanting to get by, but she ignored it. Jamming the book between her knees, flicking through to the page, she spread it on her lap. She saw where they were, and that the alleyway ended on the Hopewell estate. The driver behind her wound down his window and was screaming something about why was it always women who fucked with the rules of the road, and what was she doing? Putting in a Tampax? She gave him the finger and flung the car into gear.

The back-streets were narrow, only room for one car in one direction at any time, but she wove and spun the Ford through the warren in less than a minute, and came out braking hard on a wide street with grass verges at either side and wire-enclosed saplings planted at intervals. She was at the entrance to the Hopewell estate, and from her calculations the road to her right led down to the alley. She opened the window and sat forward, heart racing.

At first she thought she'd missed them. But then she heard footsteps racing towards her. The little man in the jacket burst out of the street, straight past her — she glimpsed thin limbs and a drawn face — then he was out on to the scrappy square of grass, racing across it, the shadows of the tower blocks flick-flacking across the crown of his head. She unsnapped her seat-belt and started to get out of the car, because there was no Caffery behind him and she'd been sure he'd be on the guy's heels. But then, just as she was about to take off, he appeared, walking now, his finger to his mouth when he saw her, waving her back into the car. She sank into her seat, keeping her feet on the pavement but pulling the door half closed against her calves as he walked past.

She watched him, mind twitching, eyes darting around, taking it all in. She didn't know the roads to the east, where the supermarket was, but she knew this estate. It was arranged around six behemoth tower blocks interconnected with figure-of-eight cast-concrete walkways, surrounded by triangles of grass. She could picture it from above, like a town-planner's model. And from the way the little guy was running, she guessed he was heading to the North West Tower, the notorious drug-trading tower. She waited a moment, her heart thudding against her ribcage. Then, the moment Caffery disappeared in the lee of the South West Tower, she swung back into the car and fired it up, steering round the little car parks and rubbish depots.

She was taking a risk — they could have gone in any direction — and when she shot out almost at the foot of the North West Tower she thought her gamble had backfired. The place was deserted, just the empty entrance to the estate covered with flypostings and graffiti, a row of recycling bins with filthy carrier-bags bulging from their mouths. Not a soul.

And then, like a burst of light on her retina — how come she hadn't seen him before? Caffery was standing about ten yards away, staring at her.

She threw open the door and jumped out. 'Jesus Christ! What is-'

He held up one hand to her, warning her to be silent. But the other arm was extended in the opposite direction, the fingers arranged in a neat point, telling her to look that way. And when she saw what he was pointing at, it was like having something dark and nasty go through her, because now she knew where she'd seen the guy in the jacket before. She'd seen him here. In exactly the place Caffery was standing now. It had been brief, only a moment's glimpse, but she remembered it clearly because it had been only a couple of days ago that he'd briefly walked past her. She looked again at the door Caffery was pointing to.

And suddenly nothing, nothing, was as it should be.