The left side of Bliss’s head began to pulse all the way down to his shoulder, the top of his arm.
And what about a policeman, Francis? Would she… cop off with a detective, do you think?
He tried to laugh.
‘He’s such a twat, Annie.’
‘I realize he’s a twat. But do nothing about this, Francis, you understand? Do nothing. Because if this comes back on me, we’ve lost everything.’
‘Go on.’
‘Brent thinks you were leading Tamsin along, constructing an investigation – just you and her – with a view to… getting into her knickers.’
‘He actually said that?’
Not Annie’s kind of phrase.
‘He was thinking, what if it all backfired. She rejects you. Maybe she threatens to report you—’
‘And I killed her?’
Bliss found himself striding down the street towards the tourist centre like he was about to take off, leave the world.
‘He’s just flying a kite, Francis. He asked me, as a trusted colleague and someone who’d had dealings with you, if I thought it was too outlandish to consider. Bearing in mind that Winterson seems committed to her job in a way that’s almost unusual these days… and does not appear to have a regular boyfriend.’
‘You telling me I’m on his suspect list for killing… killing a girl who we don’t know isn’t alive and well? Because if that—’
Bliss felt himself lose it. Could almost feeling it squirming out of his head, dancing down the street in front of him, turning round to make faces at him, gleeful fingers in the corners of its mouth.
‘I’m gonna have him for this. I swear to God, I’m gonna take it all the way—’
‘Francis, for Christ’s sake, he said it to me!’
‘And you think you’re the only one he’s said it to?’
‘Yes, I do. So far. He feels sure of his ground with me. You and me, long record of no love lost.’
‘When this is over… I’m gonna dismantle that bastard. Nobody stops me.’
‘Do nothing. Do you understand? Anything you do… anything… will rebound. On both of us… on every level. Just go along with everything he tells you to do. And stay out of Hay when you’re not on duty.’
Bliss was leaning against the bus shelter, numb down the left side, from his temple to below his knee.
‘I’m not on duty now. He sent me home. I don’t wanna go home. I hate home.’
‘You can come here if you like,’ Annie said.
‘So you can keep an eye on me?’
‘Both eyes. And… maybe the rest of me.’
Mother of God, when did Annie Howe start talking like Mae frigging West?
Only when she was genuinely afraid he might do something that played into Brent’s hands.
Not an entirely unfounded fear, he’d concede that.
‘I’ll come over, then.’
‘We can talk about it.’
‘Talk,’ he said. ‘Yeh.’
Not a euphemism. Talk made them compatible. Talking dirty, talking crime. Hard talk, naked talk.
He drove down Oxford Road, for England, but the left side of his head was dragged down with misgivings and the feeling that he wasn’t going to make it to Malvern, that something was too close.
47
Blinded to the rest
BETTY FIDDLED WITH the phone until the picture appeared then she pushed it to the middle of the table, folded her arms and became very still.
Merrily remembered this about her, an ability to withdraw into herself as if she was watching the scene on some inner monitor. They’d met twice since the Radnor Valley witch-hunt, but not in the past year. Her face was firmer than before. Not that much older, but certainly stronger. Her blond hair was back off her face, held by an old-fashioned Alice band, her eyes startlingly clear and focused even in the dim light.
‘Where was it, darling?’
‘Gwenda Protheroe,’ Gwyn Arthur whispered. ‘Proprietor.’
Long wings of thick dark hair. Leaning over the bar, displaying an impressive cleavage.
‘Set into the back of the fireplace, upstairs,’ Betty said. ‘Probably hidden for years.’
‘We’re just looking for a little help here,’ Robin said, ‘if it’s only to eliminate the possibility of Mr Oliver being Adolf Hitler’s long lost grandson.’
The photo in the phone was a close-up, just discernible in the dimness, from where Merrily and Gwyn Arthur were sitting, way back in the shadows. She glanced at Gwyn Arthur, half alarmed; it was like he’d plugged her into some circuit that edited reality, cut to the chase.
‘It is though, isn’t it? Sort of a swastika.’ Gwenda snatched up the phone, hair swinging, then called out, ‘Anybody know about any Nazi stuff in Hay, back in the war? Come on…’