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What was he doing with hands like Gloria’s?
By six o’clock on Friday evening, Banks was starting to get nervous about his di
Almost ready at last, Banks stood in front of the mirror and ran his hand over his closely cropped hair. Nothing to write home about, he thought, but it was the best he could do with what nature had given him. He wasn’t a vain man, but today he seemed to take longer than a woman getting ready to go out. He remembered how he had always had to wait for Sandra, no matter how much time he gave her. It had got so bad that when they had to be somewhere for seven-thirty, he told her seven o’clock, just to get an edge.
He thought of A
A
Banks went downstairs and lit a cigarette. Miles Davis’s Bitches Brew was playing on the stereo, bringing back more memories of Jem.
During one of those periods when the Met had brought in a new broom, and corruption charges were flying right, left and center, Banks again saw the man he had first seen walking up the stairs on the night of Jem’s death. A dealer. His name was Malcolm, and he had been brought in to give evidence against a certain DS Fallon, who was charged with extorting heroin from importers he busted instead of arresting them. Fallon then set up his own distribution network, which included Malcolm. In Banks’s eyes, that made Malcolm partly responsible for Jem’s death, and when he saw DS Fallon, he recognized immediately the pockmarked face and cynical smile of the cop who had rifled his bed-sit after he’d reported Jem’s death. No wonder no charges had ever been laid.
Fallon was arrested and sentenced. He hadn’t been more than eighteen months in Wormwood Scrubs before a lifer who recognized him stabbed him through the ear with a filed-down length of metal. Karma. After five years or more it was hardly instant, but it was karma nonetheless. Jem would have liked that sense of symmetry.
Banks stubbed out his cigarette and was just heading into the bathroom to brush his teeth when the telephone rang. The sound startled him. He hoped it wasn’t Je
“Why is it, Banks,” growled Chief Constable Riddle, “that you manage to make a pig’s arse out of everything you do?”
“Sir?”
“You heard me.”
“Sir, it’s after six on a Fri -”
“I don’t give a monkey’s toss what bloody time it is, or what day it is. I give you a perfectly simple case to work on. Nothing too urgent. Nothing too exacting. Out of the goodness of my heart. And what happens? All my good intentions blow up in our faces, that’s what happens.”
“Sir, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You might not, but the rest of the bloody country does. Don’t you watch the news?”
“No, sir. I’ve been getting ready to go out.”
“Then you’d better cancel. I’m sure she’ll forgive you. Not that I care about your sex life. Do you know where I’m calling from?”
“No, sir.”
“I’m calling from Thornfield Reservoir. Listen carefully and you’ll hear the rain. And the thunder. Let me fill you in. Shortly over an hour ago, a woman was taken hostage. She had taken a taxi out here and told the driver to wait while she went to look at something. When he thought he’d waited long enough, he went to look for her and saw her standing with a man who appeared to be holding a gun to her head. The man fired a shot in the air and shouted his demand, and the taxi driver ran back to his car and phoned the police. The woman’s name is Vivian Elmsley. Ring any bells?”
Banks’s heart lurched. “Vivian Elmsley? Yes, she’s-”
“I know damn well who she is, Banks. What I don’t know is why some maniac is holding a gun to her head and demanding to talk to the detective in charge of the Gloria Shackleton investigation. Because that’s what he demanded the taxi driver report. Can you fill me in on that?”
“No, sir.”
“‘No, sir.’ Is that all you can say?”
Banks fought back the urge to say, “Yes, sir.” Instead he asked, “What’s his name?”
“He hasn’t said. We, however, have gone into full bloody Hollywood production mode out here, with a big enough budget to bankrupt us well into the mille
“Yes, sir.”
“A hostage negotiator has spoken with him briefly from a distance, and all he says is that he wants to see justice done. He won’t say any more until we get you to the scene. There’s an Armed Response Unit here already, and they’re getting itchy fingers. Apparently one of their marksmen said he can get a clear shot.”
“For crying out loud-”
“Get yourself down here, man. Now! And this time you really will need your wellies. It’s pissing down cats and dogs.”
When Riddle hung up, Banks reached for his raincoat and shot out the door. He had a damn good idea who Vivian Elmsley’s captor might be, and why he was holding her. Behind him, Miles’s mournful trumpet echoed in the empty cottage.
A
What was the gap between her and Banks now? Could it be counted, like that between the thunder and the lightning? She knew she was being a coward, ru
It was all getting to be too much: First, there was the a