The Water Room

8. RISING VAPOURS

‘Oh God, this is so disgusting.’

Meera Mangeshkar found herself holding a pair of paisley-pattern Y-fronts as large as a shopping bag. ‘What kind of man chucks his pants in the dustbin? Is this the best job May could find to keep us out of circulation?’ Rooting carefully within the bin, she pulled out the remains of a Marks amp; Spencer family fruit pie, some haddock heads, a broken pink dental plate and a brassiere, the cups of which were filled with sponge cake. ‘I haven’t been given rubbish duty for years.’

She and Bimsley were on their knees in the back garden of a house in Belsize Park, sifting through half a dozen binliners. Under normal circumstances, the bags would have been removed and examined at a secure site because of the danger from contaminated sharp waste, but Banbury’s steel micromesh gloves were proving a success, even though they were cold to wear. It was nearly one a.m., and the hours they spent here would be added to the next shift’s time-sheet, protecting them further from requisition.

‘Pass me your torch-mine’s fading.’ Bimsley held up an empty jar and sniffed it. ‘Foie gras-goose, not duck. There was a magnum of Veuve Cliquot earlier. He’s been living well.’

Meera narrowed her eyes at him. ‘You know Arthur Bryant only made you finish the doorstepping in Balaklava Street because the victim’s brother is a mate of his. He’s granting preferential treatment to his pals.’

‘Let it go, Meera. I don’t know what you’re so angry about. There was no one else around to do them, and besides, I don’t mind if it reduces duty like this. I got interviews with all three remaining residents, and one of them told me Ruth Singh had received a visitor that night. So it was worth going back. Information that could lead to an arrest, as they say.’

‘Yeah, right, that’ll happen.’

‘Well done, Meera, a triple positive to make an emphatic negative-nice use of English.’

‘What are you, my grammar coach? Nobody likes a smart-arse.’ Meera sat back on her haunches and raised the white polystyrene mask from her mouth. She made a sour moue as she tipped the last of the bag’s reeking contents on to the grass. ‘I’m beginning to wonder if I made the wrong decision in transferring.’

‘Bryant thinks this sort of work is character-building,’ Bimsley assured her. ‘When he gets his teeth into something, he won’t let go. Even when the cases are cold and closed, he’ll go back in and find something new. They say he and May never officially accepted senior titles because they didn’t want to become separated from groundwork.’

‘Well I’m used to a proper hierarchy, teams and briefings, method stuff without too many nasty surprises. Instead, I’m on my knees searching through garbage. I’m not even sure what we’re meant to be looking for.’

‘You heard Mr May. One of his academic colleagues from the Museum of London has come into dodgy money. He must have reasons for thinking there’s something illegal going on. Academics are usually broke, so how come he’s dining on foie gras?’

‘So the bloke’s doing a bit of untaxed freelance. Workers in the grey economy don’t keep documentation. What does May think we’re going to find? Receipts?’

Bimsley rocked on his heels and looked at her. ‘You came up from Greenwich, didn’t you?’

‘Yeah, I’ve done Greenwich, New Cross, Deptford, Peckham, all over south London. Great catchment areas if you like arguing with drug squads and dealing with complicated social structures involving “respect” in all its gruesome manifestations, but not if you’re interested in anything more sophisticated than gunshot and knife wounds.’

‘What made you come in for the PCU position?’

‘I wanted to work on crimes with causes, not club stabbings where the motive is always “He gave me a funny look.” I heard some of the local lads talking about this unit, slagging it off. Thought it sounded interesting.’

‘Bryant and May know a lot of people. They’ve made plenty of enemies, and some loyal friends. John’s great, but Arthur can be dangerous.’

‘In what way?’

Bimsley thought for a moment. ‘They spent twenty years looking for some lunatic who called himself the Leicester Square Vampire. Bryant pushed the case too hard. The story goes that he persuaded John to use his own daughter as a decoy. Something went wrong, and the daughter died.’

‘Christ. How come they don’t hate each other?’

‘I don’t know. Nobody seems to know the full story. Longbright must, but she’s not talking.’ Bimsley slapped his mitts together. ‘Come on, it looks like it’s going to rain again, let’s wrap this up.’

They worked in silence as the night deepened and a diaphanous mist began to dampen their hair and clothes, settling on the grass like threads of silk.

‘Your interview result isn’t enough to keep the Ruth Singh file open after its verdict, is it?’ asked Meera. ‘No conclusive forensic evidence, no real suspects, all friends, relatives and neighbours accounted for on the night in question.’

‘Yeah. Bryant must be disappointed.’

‘Why?’

Bimsley dug deeper, shining his torch into the bottom of the last bag. ‘Oh, he wants the answers to life’s mysteries. Why people die, what makes them evil, how corruption takes root. It’s a hiding to nothing, because you never truly find out, do you? You don’t get to the source. May doesn’t look for meanings all the time, he just accepts what he sees and deals with it.’

‘And which do you think is best?’ asked Meera.

Bimsley shrugged. ‘We’re the law, aren’t we? You’ve got to accept it all on face value or it’ll drive you bleeding mad.’

‘Nietzsche said, “There are no facts, only interpretations.” If you believe that justice can be meted via a simple binary system, you’re cleared from any moral responsibility.’ Meera’s sharp brown eyes were steady and unforgiving.

‘Look, I know what’s right and wrong, but I’m not going to go around with a chip on my shoulder about it, pissed off at never getting closure.’

‘It’s human nature to try and understand your environment, even if it only leads to more questions. Nietzsche also said, “Every word is a prejudice.” ’

‘Oh really?’ Bimsley was starting to get annoyed. ‘What does Nietzsche have to say about the chances of you and I not killing each other?’

‘He said that for a man and a woman to stay friends they have to find each other unattractive. So we should be great pals.’

‘You and Bryant are going to get on like a house on fire. Sorry, bad choice of words, seeing he managed to burn the unit down.’

‘How did he do that?’

‘Long story. Be thankful they didn’t close the place permanently.’

When Meera looked up, her face widened with an unexpected smile. ‘You think there are no answers? Here’s one.’ She dangled a sodden piece of paper before him.

‘You’re going to kill yourself if you don’t get down from there,’ warned Alma Sorrowbridge. The Antiguan landlady had been as plump and lush as a breadfruit in her golden days, but now appeared to be shrinking. She flattened her grey curls and folded her arms and watched in annoyance as Bryant balanced at the top of the steps, batting his stick into the back of the shelf units.

‘I know it’s up here,’ Bryant called. ‘You wouldn’t understand. If you had an ounce of kindness you’d help me get it back.’

‘I don’t do steps at my age,’ Alma told him. ‘I’m a landlady, not a trapeze artist. And I’m not your keeper any more, since you decided I’m not good enough to come with you to your fancy new apartment.’

‘You wouldn’t like it, Alma. It’s hardly fancy. I needed a place to think, something as bare and ascetic as a monk’s cell.’

‘You mean you got no ornaments?’ asked Alma, appalled. ‘What have you done with them all?’

‘They’re objets d’art, thank you, and I’ve taken them to my office to replace the ones that were destroyed.’

‘Poor John. I don’t even know what it is you’re looking for, or why you had to put it in such an awkward place.’

‘Agh.’ Bryant pulled down the doll and wiped it with his sleeve. ‘Help me down.’ Alma held the steps while he descended. He was carrying a miniature representative of himself, made out of cloth and accurate in detail down to the missing button on his tweed overcoat. ‘It’s my achi doll. It was made by one of my enemies and sent to me. I had to keep it up there, out of the way, to prevent anything from happening to it. It contains part of my soul, and if it gets damaged, so do I.’

Alma made a noise of disgust. ‘You don’t really believe things like that, Mr Bryant.’

‘Well, of course not, but he was a nasty customer and my evidence got him convicted, so I’m not taking any chances. I’m putting this in my new office safe. If you had helped me to move, I wouldn’t have forgotten it in the first place.’

Bryant’s ingratitude never ceased to amaze her. She had devoted a large part of her life to making him comfortable. She had even stood by as he uprooted himself from her beloved Battersea apartment, where the river sunlight wavered across her kitchen ceiling, and moved to his shabby, gloomy conversion in Chalk Farm, where, according to John May, the shadows never left the rooms and the bedroom windows were brushed by the decayed fingers of dead plane trees. It was love of a sort that had allowed her to put up with his abuse, even now. If anyone else dared to speak to her in the same way. .

‘Go on, take a good look at it.’ Bryant bared his ridiculous false teeth in a rictus as he passed her the doll.

Alma grimaced, but accepted the offering. ‘Why did he give it to you? Why didn’t he just tear its head off?’

‘Oh, he didn’t mean to harm me,’ Bryant explained airily. ‘He was planning to petition the medical board for parole at the earliest opportunity, and as I was the only person fully conversant with the facts of his case, he was providing himself with some insurance-these things are as much about the prevention of misfortune as the reverse.’

‘It’s a good job John doesn’t believe in all this rubbish.’ Alma gingerly handed back the doll.

‘I’ve been meaning to ask you for years.’ Bryant stepped from the ladder and stood before her. ‘Why don’t you ever call me by my Christian name? You always have done with John.’

Alma sighed. It was a matter of respect, but she wasn’t prepared to tell him that. ‘There’s nothing Christian about you, Mr Bryant. If there was, you wouldn’t spend all your time trying to find out things that don’t concern decent people. You could come with me to church.’

‘Thank you, Alma, but I think it’s a little late for my redemption, don’t you?’

‘Our pastor says it’s never too late.’ She eyed him doubtfully. ‘Although in your case I think he would have met his match.’

‘You must come and visit me in Chalk Farm,’ he offered.

‘No, thank you.’ She refolded her arms, determined not to show her true feelings. ‘I’m just getting used to not seeing you.’

He sat down on the brow of Primrose Hill, between the globe lights that illuminated pools of glittering emerald grass, and faced the conjurings of his mind. ‘Something is rising to the surface,’ he told May, hunching his shoulders and burying his mittens deep in his pockets. ‘Unhealthy vapours. You know how I get these feelings. Death is so powerful that its presence can be felt whenever someone sensitive is in close proximity.’

‘You’re a miserable sod. Birth is powerful, too-why don’t you feel babies being born? Always the morbid mind. These presentiments-you must know by now that they don’t always mean harm will fall. We can stop things happening.’

‘Not this time, John,’ said Bryant, pulling his ratty russet raincoat a little tighter.

‘Well, thanks for that warning from Doom Central. What’s prompted this?’

‘I’m not sure. The weather forecast, perhaps. There are storms on the way. Traditionally, harmful events in London are associated with prolonged bouts of low pressure and high moisture content in the air.’

‘You’re making that up.’

‘I promise you I’m not.’

‘Then it’s time to stop believing in evil omens,’ May decided, climbing to his feet. ‘Come on, I’ll buy you a pint of bitter at the Queen’s Head and Artichoke. Perhaps, just this once, there will be nothing bad for you to enjoy.’