The Magus of Hay(57)

Robin stood on the edge of the terraced area, near the Granary, where he’d eaten earlier, alone. Across the junction, discreetly recessed, dimly but enticingly lit by a wrought-iron hanging lantern, was Gwenda’s Bar.

The clock said it was gone half-nine. He hesitated. Circumstance had flattened the old confidence, which he now saw as brashness, unlikely to endear an American to the Brits, whether he was trying to sell them a house or a second-hand book.

A long shadow met his own.

‘Strange, quiet evening,’ Gwyn Arthur Jones said, like they’d been standing here together for hours. ‘Always distrust quiet, see, in a town.’

‘Not good for business?’

‘Unless it’s police business.’ Jones looked across the street ‘Gwenda’s, is it?’

‘Kapoor suggested I called in.’

‘Makes sense, boy. A booksellers’ drinking hole waiting to happen, for many years, and now it has.’

‘I was thinking it had been here since forever.’

‘Couple of years, that’s all. An example of how new people can become accepted very quickly, if they learn the rhythms. Nothing too fancy. Nothing too posh.’

That old Gareth Nunne patter.

‘Booksellers’ bar,’ Jones said. ‘Walked in, with her boyfriend, and hit the Hay zeitgeist, as they say. The worse bookselling gets, the more gets spent at Gwenda’s. Anything happening, you hear about it first in Gwenda’s.’

‘I guess they’ll’ve heard about how Kapoor was nearly killed fixing up our sign.’

‘Boy’s all right, I’m told. Bar the odd bruise. Were you hurt?’

‘No. This was someplace else, he’d sue my ass. All my fault for wanting an oak sign I was never gonna be able to fix up myself. Then I’m just… like standing there, watching it happen.’

‘Hardly be expected to throw yourself at it, in your condition.’

‘That’s the whole point. I’m a goddamn curse.’

Gwyn Arthur was shaking his head, wearing his 2H pencil-line smile.

‘But it’s done?’ he said at last.

‘Me and Kapoor finally held it up between us, the sign, and Gore Turrell took most of the weight.’

‘Strong boy. Comes from swimming in the Wye and running all the way up to Lord Hereford’s Knob before breakfast. Only outsiders do that, of course, as you know.’

‘Not me.’



‘No. I’m sorry. I meant no offence. Anyway, you’re installed. Your name is up there. You exist.’

‘Yeah. I exist.’

Jones was a strange guy. Robin watched him walking away, bent forward like some curious goblin, occasionally glancing to one side or the other like he was looking for a reason for the silence.





26

Nemesis


BLISS STILL AGONIZED, week-to-week, about whether she’d come back.

The Friday night vigil. Although sometimes it’d be Sunday. Or Wednesday, occasionally. He’d be sitting, just like he was now, in his stripped-back living room, on the cheap sofa he’d bought to replace the quality sofa Kirsty had taken. One eye on the clock, although he knew she rarely appeared before dark and British Summertime was why it kept getting later.

Week after week during his so-called recovery period, he’d be sitting here waiting for the darkness or going up to the bedroom, watching through the window for the white BMW which would usually pull in some distance away, down near the kids’ playground.

He’d watch her getting out, shouldering her bag, that aura of official business around her, those sharp, impatient glances to either side before approaching the modern house he’d never liked, on a pencil-box estate in Marden on the Hereford flatlands.

Oh God, Annie…

Always wondering if this was going to be the night when the white car wouldn’t come and he’d just carry on waiting here until he fell into an uneasy sleep and woke up into some steely new day when he and Annie would be history.

Secret history. Mother of God, for years, he hadn’t even liked the way she looked. A metal coat-hanger with tits, Terry Stagg had said. It was clear that Stagg still had no suspicion about Howe and Bliss. Nobody did. It was laughable. You could do a briefing on it for the whole of CID, in simple, witness-statement English, and they’d all look at you like you were insane.

It could only ever make sense if you’d been there on a winter’s night, coming up to Christmas, when they’d dug something smelly out of Herefordshire local government. They had. Him and Annie, suddenly finding they were a double act. Connecting, feeding each other. Then coming back here, that night before Christmas, glowing with result, to the house recently vacated by Kirsty and the kids. Electricity.