Acid Lullaby (38 page)

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Authors: Ed O'Connor

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‘Yes,
mummy.’

‘You
did
so
well
tonight
Maxy,
I’m
very
proud
of
you,’
she
had
said.

‘Was
my
costume
easily
the
best,
mummy?’

‘Oh
definitely!
’
Elspeth
exchanged
a
smile
with
her
husband.

‘Did
I
really
look
like
a
god?’

‘I
would
say
so,’
Robin
Fallon
replied.
‘You
should
thank
your
mother
for
making
such
an
excellent
costume.’

‘Thank
you,
mummy!’

‘It’s
a
pleasure,
darling!’

The
Land
Rover
turned
right
and
headed
south,
parallel
to
a
tributary
of
the
Yamuna
River.
The
lights
of
the
city
glowed
on
the
black
water.

‘That’s
Rohini
up
ahead,’
Robin
Fallon
explained
to
his
wife, pointing at a row of houses ahead of them. ‘We’ll cross
the
river
there.’

‘Home
soon,
baby,’
Max
heard
his
mother
say
to
him.

The
Land
Rover
suddenly
lurched
to
the
left.
Max
remem
bered
being
thrown
against
the
cold
glass,
then
he
felt
the
sensation
of
falling
forwards,
his
mother
screaming,
his
father
wrestling
with
the
steering
wheel,
the
car
sliding
down
an
embankment
and
sliding
into
water.
Max
saw
himself
flailing
against
the
hard
edges
of
the
car,
fighting
for
breath,
then
suddenly
climbing
free
through
the
darkness
as
if
he
was
scaling
the
side
of
a
vast
black
mountain
under
a
vast
black
ocean.
He
remembered
lying
on
a
hard
road
with
faces
swirling
above
him,
voices
shouting
in
a
language
he
didn’t
understand.
He
remembered
his
father
clambering
from
the
water.
He
remembered
his
mother
had
died.
His
mother
had
died
in
Rohini.

Doctors moving over him. White coats and unfamiliar inquisitive faces. His hands were tied down. The memory had gone.

In another hospital, a dream changed that afternoon and the dog-man receded into the waters of oblivion. As the white lights of the recovery ward softened around her, Mary Colson rose above the quagmire of her pains and drifted.

She dreamed she was back at home, in her favourite armchair at 17 Beaumont Gardens. The room was wonderfully familiar, like falling into the arms of her husband. She allowed her eyes to wander along the mantelpiece, absorbing the faces of her friends and family long gone. There had been a time when she had resented outliving them all; when she had hated the idea of going on alone. Now it no longer troubled her. She had been the keeper of their memories. She had stood in the light of wisdom and experience and drawn conclusions about their personalities and lives. Time had been a luxury not a torture.

She heard voices and imagined she was standing at a family party: words and fragments of conversation billowed around her. She heard her husband’s soft north-eastern accent, her sister’s musical laughter, her mother and father, babies burbling and crying. She was happy to be home.

The tea trolley came by at 5.30p.m.

But Mary Colson was dead.

Alison
Dexter
checked
her
watch.
It
was
half
past
nine.
She
only
had
half
an
hour
to
wait.
She
wondered
if
she
should
feel
nervous:
a
sense
of
anxiety
at
what
was
about
to
happen.
However,
having
examined
the
situation
front
every
conceiv
able
angle
during
the
previous
day
she
eventually
surprised
herself.
She
felt
nothing
at
all.

The
night
had
filled
with
fog
beyond
her
window:
like
smoke
in
a
glass.
It
reminded
her
of
the
noxious
haze
that
always
hung
in
Paddy
McInally’s
office
at
Leyton
nick.
CID
had
been
filled
with
chain
smokers
and
the
stench
had
clung
to
her
hair
and
on
to
her
hands.
Every
night
she
used
to
spend
an
eternity
scrubbing
the
stink
from
her
skin
in
the
bath;
after
a
year
of
exposure
she
felt
that
she
had
become
permanently
stained
with
nicotine:
like
the
once
white
walls
of
a
pub
or
like
McInally’s
teeth.
Mark
liked
to
watch
her
in
the
bath.
He’d
sit
on
the
toilet
seat
with
a
glass
of
red
wine
and
just
watch.

She
crushed
the
memory
and
kicked
it
away.

Mark Willis drove as fast as he dared through the swirling white mist. The terrible conditions had scared most other traffic away but he sensed that the prize was close. Inexorably he accelerated until he could see beyond the bonnet of the car.

The sign for Norbury Services suddenly loomed out of the mist. He indicated left, swinging across two empty lanes onto the slip road. Ever suspicious and deliberately early, he
reduced his speed and drove his Freelander around the entire car park checking for concealed squad cars. Willis had an imported addition to his car radio that allowed him to hear local police radio chatter over their Mainscheme VHF radio network. It seemed to be a quiet night: the only incident of importance was a crash near Newmarket. Willis parked next to an articulated lorry and listened for a moment to the radio chatter. It almost made him nostalgic:.

‘… RCIU on scene,’ a voice squawked. ‘AMBO in transit.’

Willis smiled at the terms. The plods loved their jargon. ‘RCIU’ was Road Crash Investigation Unit, ‘AMBO’ was police shorthand for an ambulance.

‘… Pedestrian injury,’ the same voice continued, ‘Mobile unit has one on board. You are not required.’

‘Acknowledged despatch,’ replied a female office.

Willis could picture the scene. Some half-witted local failing to stop at a junction most likely. Some poor bastard trying to get home ends up in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. ‘One on board’ meant that the squad car at the scene had a prisoner in the vehicle.

‘Rather him than me,’ Willis mused, looking suspiciously out into the murk.

But
there
were
other
memories
too,
Alison
Dexter
told
herself,
terrible
scarring
memories.
20th
November
1994.
She
had
spent
an
entire
working
day
trying
to
bury
her
fear
in
paperwork;
to
push
the
baby
inside
her
to
the
edge
of
her
consciousness.
It
hadn’t
worked.
Irritated
and
exhausted,
she’d
gone
to
wash
her
face
in
the
ladies’
toilet.
The
cold
water
shocked
her
into
a
terrible
state
of
panic.
She
had
studied
herself
in
the
washroom
mirror,
wondering
how
long
it
would
be
until
the
baby
began
to
show.

Dexter
had
decided
to
buy
a
Coke
from
the
dispenser
adja
cent
to
the
coffee
room
on
the
CID
floor.
She
had
cracked
the
can
eagerly
and,
enjoying
the
sugar
as
it
massaged
her
mind,
had
rested
her
head
against
the
refrigerated
dispenser.
There
was
raucous
male
laughter
emanating
from
the
coffee
room.
Dexter
tried
to
ignore
it.
She
found
that
men
in
general
and
male
coppers
in
particular
seemed
to
enjoy
repeating
the
same
conversation
over
and
over
again:
‘so
and
so
got
pissed
…
so
and
so
got
laid
…
so
and
so
fucked
up.’
To
begin
with
she
didn’t
notice
the
words
of
the
discussion,
concentrating
instead
on
the
blissful
cool
of
the
drinks
machine
against
her
forehead.
Then
by
some
terrible
osmosis
their
meaning
began
to
sink
in.