Still Midnight

She gave an unconvincing half-laugh. ‘What would you know about that?’

‘I’m a law graduate,’ he said, looking unaccountably sad about it.

‘Oh.’ She nodded for a minute, only vaguely aware of the car drawing up behind the boys. ‘Oh. When was your… When did you…?’

‘June,’ he said.

‘Morrow!’ Ba

‘Morrow?’ asked Omar.

‘I’m Morrow,’ she said. ‘Who’s the big guy?’

‘My brother, Billal.’ Omar dropped his chin to his chest and when she looked back she found the brother was glaring at him.

‘Morrow,’ scowled Ba

She blushed high on her cheeks, and turned away, stepping over to him with her head down.

Ba

‘Just talking to the boys…’ She sounded flat, as if she’d done a bad thing herself. She looked for something to attach the feeling of guilt to: ‘Any word from the hospital?’

‘Yeah.’ Ba

‘Her mother with her?’

‘Yeah, we’ve left some cops there. We’ll get a proper statement off her when she comes out of it.’

‘Something fu

‘How do you mean?’

‘Omar, the son? Smokes fags like he’s smoking a joint. Aleesha wears jeans and T-shirts, Meeshra’s embarrassed about it, but kind of suggested that they’ve only recently become very observant. They’re from Uganda originally, traditionally that’s a pretty assimilated pro-British community.’

‘Are they recent converts?’

He wasn’t listening to her. ‘No. They’re not converts, just become more observant.’

Now he wasn’t even looking at her. ‘Yeah, great, Morrow: local knowledge. Let’s get them to the station.’

Omar couldn’t look back at Billal. He seemed to be shrinking under his brother’s gaze.

‘We’re all going to the station,’ Ba

‘The boys saw the van,’ she said. ‘They tried to get a squad-’

‘Yeah,’ he cut her off and called Billal over to his side. ‘Let’s get the boys into a car. We’re going to the police station, right?’

‘Have I to come too?’ Mo was asking Billal.

‘We’re all going,’ Billal said sternly.

Ba

Ba

‘Tell them the truth.’ But Billal was talking in exclamations, so loud he wasn’t really talking to Omar.

The two boys got into the back seat of the squad car and Billal shut the door on them.

Morrow sidled over to him, touching his elbow gently, guiding him away for a moment. ‘Billal, I’m DS Alex Morrow. Can I just ask you quickly: why were they waiting outside the house while it all went on?’

Billal looked at her as if he had misheard. ‘What?’

‘The guys,’ said Morrow, pointing back to Mo and Omar, ‘they were waiting in the car for twenty minutes before they came in.’

Billal looked shocked. ‘Really?’

Ba

‘Yeah,’ said Morrow.

Billal looked at the police tape, along the road, to the open front door of his house, frowning as he tried to answer the question. ‘Where?’

Morrow pointed up the road. ‘There, where those markers are.’

Billal imagined it for a moment. ‘But the gunmen were parked down there.’ He pointed around the corner to the garden path.

‘That’s right.’

Billal frowned. ‘So, they might not have seen them?’

‘They said they didn’t see anything.’

‘And that’s possible?’ Billal looked at Ba

‘Yeah,’ said Ba

Billal looked angrily at the window of the squad car. ‘Good. Good.’

He turned back to look at Morrow and nodded back at the house. ‘Meeshra help you?’

‘Yes, thanks, she was very helpful.’

Billal arched his back slightly at that. ‘She didn’t see very much. She was in the bed the whole time,’ and he nodded, a strange pecking nod, slightly out of time. Morrow didn’t know what it meant. He looked at Morrow’s shoes, curled his lip and turned away, walking away without saying goodbye.

Ba

‘Not much. Do you still think they got the wrong house?’

‘Du

I

Ba

Morrow froze slightly. The skin on her finger was throbbing. ‘Yeah, well it looks complicated. Time consuming. I know your mum’s not well.’

‘Oh, no, no, no,’ he said quickly. ‘She’ll be fine.’ Ba

‘I’m not a child, Grant,’ she said coldy.

He flinched at that and she regretted saying it. His mother wasn’t well and she was being mean.

‘Sorry.’ She said the word so quietly she saw him glance at her mouth for confirmation.

He brightened. ‘Yeah, can’t get a handle on this at all.’ His bewilderment seemed feigned. ‘They seem as straight as anything, no crims in the family, no enemies, nothing. They haven’t even got a big telly.’

He was at it. She’d seen Ba

‘Could be a wrong address…?’ she said weakly.

Ba

Morrow bit the corner of her mouth hard, watching Billal. Fury tinged with shame. Her emotional staples. ‘What do you want me for when we get back?’

He looked at her, his mouth twitching down at the corners. ‘What do you want to do?’

‘I could talk to the young guys…’

‘You think they’re it?’

‘Du

He read her face. She could feel him realising that she did think they were it. He wouldn’t let her near them.

‘No, I think I’ll talk to them. Could you do me a favour and listen to the tapes of the emergency calls? See what you can get off them?’ He smiled, pleased to have thought of a punishment job that was out of the way, time consuming and menial. ‘That would be really helpful, Morrow, thanks.’