A Necessary End (35 page)

She could hear the muffled voices downstairs, as if from a great distance, and they made her think of those times when Seth and Liz Dale had stayed up late talking. How jealous she had been then, how insecure. But Liz was long gone, and Seth, they told her, was dead.

Dead. The thought didn't register fully through the layers of sedative. She thought she should still be crying and gasping for breath, but instead her body felt as heavy as iron and she could hardly move. Her mind seemed to have a life of its own, wandering over events and picking them out like those miniature mechanical cranes that dipped into piles of cheap trinkets and sweets at seaside arcades. You put your penny in—a real penny, large and heavy—and off the crane went, with its articulated grip, inside the glass case. You held down a button to make it swing over and pressed another to make it drop onto the heap of prizes. If you were lucky, you got a chocolate bar, a cigarette lighter or a cheap ring; if not, the metal claw came up empty and you'd wasted your money. Mara had never won anything. Just as well, her father had always said: chocolate is bad for teeth; you're too young to smoke and those rings will turn your finger green inside a week.

But her mind felt like one of those machines now, one she could not control. It circled her life, then swooped and snatched up the memory of the first time she and Seth had met. Just out of the ashram and eager to escape London, Mara had taken on a friend's flat in Eastvale when the friend emigrated to Canada.

She needed a job and decided to seek craft-work before falling back on her secretarial skills, which were pretty rusty by then. Luckily, she heard of Elspeth's shop in Relton and went out to see her. Dottie had just become too ill to work—the pottery workshop was
hers—and Mara got the job of helping out in the shop and the use of the facilities. It didn't bring in much money, but it was enough, along with the commission on the pottery. Her rent wasn't very high and she lived cheaply. But she was lonely.

Then one day after work, she had dropped in at the Black Sheep. It was pay-day and she had decided to treat herself to a glass of lager and a cheese-and-onion sandwich. No sooner had she started to eat than Seth walked in. He stood at the bar, tall and slim, his neatly trimmed dark hair and beard frosted with grey at the edges. And when he turned around, she noticed how deep and sad his eyes were, how serious he looked. Something passed between them—Seth admitted later that he'd noticed it, too—and Mara felt shy like a teenager again. He smiled at her and she remembered blushing. But when he came over to say hello, there was no phoney coyness on her part; there were never any silly games between them.

He was the first person she'd met in the area with a background similar to her own. They shared tastes in music and ideas about self-sufficiency and the way the world should be run; they had been to the same rock festivals years ago, and had read the same books. She went back with him to the farm that night—he was the only one living there at that time—and she never really left, except to give her notice to her landlord and move her meagre belongings.

It was a blissful time, a homecoming of the spirit for Mara, and she thought she had made Seth happy, too, though she was always aware that there was a part of him she could never touch.

And now he was dead. She didn't know how, or what had killed him, just that his body had ceased to exist. Her spiritual beliefs, which she still held to some extent, told her that death was merely a beginning. There would be other worlds, other lives perhaps, for Seth's spirit, which was immortal. But they would never again drink wine together in bed after making love, he would never kiss her forehead the way he did before going to the workshop, or hold her hand like a boy on his first date on the way down to the Black Sheep. And that was what hurt: the absence of living flesh. The spirit was all very well, but it was far too nebulous an idea to bring Mara much comfort. The miniature crane withdrew from the heap of prizes and held nothing in its metal claw.

Downstairs, the voices droned on, more like music, a
raga
, than words with meaning. Mara felt as if her blood had thickened to treacle and darkened to the colour of ink. Her body was getting heavier and the lights in the glass case were going out; it was half in shadows now, the prizes indistinguishable from one another. And what happens when the lights go out in the fun-house? Mara began to dream.

She was alone on the moors. A huge full moon shone high up, but the landscape was still dark and bleak. She stumbled over heather and tussocks of grass, looking for something.

At last she came to a village and went into the pub. It was the Black Sheep, but the place was all modern, with video games, carpets and bare concrete walls. A jukebox was playing some music she didn't understand. She asked for the farm, but everyone turned and laughed at her, so she ran out.

This time it was daylight outside, and she was no longer in Swainsdale. The landscape was unfamiliar, softer and more green, and she could smell a whiff of the ocean nearby.

In a hollow, she saw an old farmer holding wind chimes out in front of him. They made the same music as the jukebox and it frightened her this time. She found her voice and asked him where Maggie's Farm was. “Are you the marrying maiden?” he asked her, smiling toothlessly. “The basket is empty,” he went on, shaking the wind chimes. “The man stabs the sheep. No blood flows. Misfortune.”

Terrified, Mara ran off and found herself in an urban landscape at night. Some of the buildings had burned out and fires raged in the gutted shells; flames licked around broken windows and flared up high through fallen roofs. Small creatures scuttled in dark corners. And she was being followed, she knew it. She hadn't been able to see anyone, just sense darting movements and hear rustling sounds behind her. For some reason, she was sure it was a woman, someone she should know but didn't.

Before the dream possessed her completely and turned her into one of the scavengers among the ruins, before the shadow behind tapped her on the shoulder, she struggled to wake up, to scream.

When she opened her eyes, she became conscious of someone sitting on the bedside pressing a damp cloth to her forehead. She thought it must be Seth, but when she turned and looked closely it was Zoe.

“Is it morning?” she asked in a weak voice.

“No,” said Zoe, “it's only half-past nine.”

“He really is dead, isn't he, Zoe?”

Zoe nodded. “You were having a nightmare. Go to sleep now.” Mara closed her eyes again. The cool cloth smoothed her brow, and she began to drift. This time there was only darkness ahead, and the last thing she felt before she fell asleep was Zoe's hand gripping hers tightly.

III

“Anything wrong?” Larry Grafton asked, pulling Banks a pint of Black Sheep bitter.

Banks glanced at Burgess, who nodded.

“Seth Cotton's dead,” he answered, and felt ears prick up behind him in the public bar, where most of the tables were occupied.

Grafton turned pale. “Oh no, not Seth,” he said. “He was only in here this lunch-time. Not Seth?”

“How did he seem?” Banks asked.

“He was happy as a pig in clover,” Grafton said. “That young lad was back and they all seemed to be celebrating. You're not telling me he killed himself, are you?”

“We don't know yet,” Burgess said, picking up his pint of Watney's. “Anywhere quiet the chief inspector and I can have a little chat? Police business.”

“Aye, you can use the snug. There's no one in there.”

The snug was aptly named. Hidden away behind a partition of smoked glass and dark wood, there was room for about four people, and even that would be a tight squeeze.

Banks and Burgess made themselves comfortable, both of them practically draining their drinks before even reaching for smokes.

“Have a cigar,” Burgess said, offering his tin.

“Thanks.” Banks took one. He didn't enjoy cigars as a rule, but thought that if he tried them often enough he might eventually come to like them.

“And I think I'd better get a couple more drinks in before we start,” Burgess said. “Thirsty work, this.”
He was back in a moment carrying another pint of bitter for Banks and, this time, a pint of draught Guinness for himself.

“Right,” he said, “I can tell you're not happy about this. Don't clam up on me, Banks. What's bothering you?”

“Let's take it at face value, for a start,” Banks suggested. “Then maybe we can see what's wrong.”

“Suicide?”

“Yes.”

“But you don't think so?”

“No. But I'd like to play it through and see if I can pin down my ideas.”

“All right. Cotton murdered Gill, then he was overcome with remorse and slit his ankles. Case closed. Can I go back to London now?”

Banks smiled. “But it's not as simple as that, is it? Why would Cotton murder PC Gill?”

Burgess ran a hand through his greying, Brylcreemed hair. “Bloody hell, I thought we'd been through all this before. We're talking about a political crime; call it an act of terrorism. Motive as such doesn't apply.”

“But Seth Cotton was perhaps the least political of the lot of them,” Banks argued. “Except maybe for Mara, or Zoe Hardacre. Sure, he was anti-nuclear, and he no doubt believed in social equality and the evils of apartheid. But so do I.”

Burgess sniffed. “You might be the murder expert around here, but I know about terrorism. Believe me, anyone can get involved. Terrorists play on people's ideals and warp them to their own ends. It's like the brainwashing religious cults do.”

“Do you think Gill's death was calmly planned and executed, or was it a crime of passion?” Banks asked.

“A bit of both. Things aren't so clear-cut in this kind of crime. Terrorists are very emotional about their beliefs, but they're cold and deadly when it comes to action.”

“The only thing Seth Cotton cared passionately about was his carpentry, and perhaps Mara. If he did commit suicide, I doubt it was anything to do with politics.”

“We have his note, don't forget. It's a confession.”

“Let's leave that for later. Why did he kill himself? If he's the kind of person you're trying to make out he is, why would he feel remorse after succeeding in his aim? Why would he kill himself?”

Burgess doodled in the foam of his Guinness. “You expect too many answers, Banks. As often as not, there just aren't any. Can't you leave it at that?”

Banks shook his head and stubbed out the cigar. It tasted like last week's tea-leaves. He swigged some more Black Sheep bitter to get rid of the taste and lit a Silk Cut. “It's because there's too many questions,” he said. “We still don't know much about Cotton's political background before he came to the farm, though if there'd been any subversive activity I'm sure Special Branch would have a record of it. And what about his behaviour over the last few days? How do you read that?”

“They said he seemed happy when Boyd was released. Is that what you mean?”

“Partly.”

“Well, of course he'd be happy,” Burgess said. “If he knew the kid wasn't guilty.”

“Why should he care? It'd be better for a cold-blooded terrorist to let someone else go down for what he'd done. So why kill himself?”

Burgess shrugged. “Because he knew we'd get to him soon.”

“So why didn't he just disappear? Surely his masters would have taken care of him in Moscow or Prague or wherever.”

“More likely Belfast. But I don't know. It's not unusual for suicides to appear happy once they've decided to end it all.”

“I know that. I'm just not sure that he was happy because he'd decided to kill himself.”

Burgess grunted. “What's your theory, then?”

“That he was killed, and it was made to look like a suicide.”

“Killed by who?”

Banks ignored the question. “We won't know anything for certain until the doc does his post-mortem,” he said, “but there's a few things that bother me about the note.”

“Go on.”

“It just doesn't ring true. The damn thing's neither here nor there, is it? Cotton confesses to killing Gill, but doesn't say why. All he says
is, ‘I don't know what came over me.' It doesn't square with what we know of him.”

“Which is?”

“Precious little, I admit. He was a closed book. But I'd say he was the kind who'd either not bother with a note at all, or maybe he'd explain everything fully. He wouldn't come out with such a wishy-washy effort as the one we saw. I think he'd have used Gill's number, too, not his name. And I don't know if you had a good look, but it seemed very different from that business letter on the desk. The pressure on the characters was different, for a start.”

“Yes,” Burgess said, “but don't forget the state of mind he must have been in when he typed it.”

“I'll grant you that. Still . . . and the style. Whoever wrote that suicide note had only very basic writing skills. But the business letter was more than competent and grammatically correct.”

Burgess slapped the table. “Oh, come on Banks! What's the problem? Is it too easy for you? Business letters are always written in a different style; they're always a bit stuffy and wordy. You wouldn't write to a friend the same way you would in a business letter, would you, let alone a suicide note. A man writing his last words doesn't worry about grammar or how much pressure he puts on each letter.”

“But that's just it. Those things are unconscious. Someone used to writing well doesn't immediately become sloppy just because he's under pressure. If anything, I'd have expected a more carefully composed message. And you don't think about how each finger hits the keys when you're typing. It's something you just do, and it doesn't vary much. Why leave it over in the typewriter, too? Why didn't he put it on the bench in front of him?”