Dead Wrong (7 page)

My mobile rang when I was halfway across town heading for the buses at Piccadilly Gardens. It was Debbie Gosforth. The stalker was back.

There’s a black Hackney-cab stand near the statue of Queen Victoria. I asked the driver to drop me at the bottom of Chorlton Green. From there I could walk along Debbie’s street. I needed a way to loiter without looking suspicious. Nothing occurred during the journey. The driver chatted about the Euro 96 results. I was aware that the Championship was on and that Manchester was full of European football supporters, but I hadn’t joined Ray in watching any of the matches on the television.

The sun was hot but there was a light breeze, just enough to stir the branches of the trees on the main road. There was no one about on Debbie’s street and I felt conspicuous as I walked along.

He was there. My heart kicked in my chest. I stopped to tie my lace before I got too close. Debbie’s description had been accurate. Slim, dark hair, probably late thirties or early forties. In his suit he looked like a displaced bank clerk or estate agent. Presumably he didn’t have a regular job if he turned up at all times of the day and night.

I straightened up and carried on purposefully, past Debbie’s house to the crossroads at the corner. I looked up and down the side street for some inspiration, something to do, somewhere to wait where I could keep an eye on him without drawing too much attention to myself. Nothing. No phone box, no bench, no shops. Certainly no convenient vantage point. I turned left and walked along until I was sure he couldn’t see me then I rang Debbie’s number.

‘Debbie, it’s Sal. I’m round the corner on Royal Avenue. I’ve just walked past him. There’s nowhere here I can wait, I’m not in the car. Can I get to yours the back way?’

‘Yes, down the alley.’

‘What’s your gate like?’

‘Green – look for the climbing frame.’

‘OK, see you in a minute.’

It was easy to find. The small back yard held the climbing frame on a patch of parched grass and a wheelie bin. Debbie was on the back doorstep.

‘Thanks.’ She looked completely washed out. ‘You can watch him from the front room,’ she said.

‘Are you all right?’

She didn’t speak for a minute. ‘Not really, no. Last night, he kept ringing. Every few minutes, on and on. I’m so tired. I left the phone off the hook in the end. I hate doing that. If my Mum needed anything…’ She was close to tears.

‘We can report it,’ I said, ‘was it a payphone? Have you tried 1471?’

She shook her head.

‘Can I? Has anyone rung you since?’

‘No.’

I dialled the call-back facility. The recorded voice told me that a call had been made at 3.43 and that the caller had chosen to withhold their number. Great.

‘Have you got a phone book…the ordinary one?’ She went to the cupboard where she’d kept the letters and returned with the one book. I showed her the section in the front where the number was given for malicious calls.

‘Ring them,’ I said, ‘explain that the calls are from someone who is following you and harassing you, and that you’ve already been to see a solicitor. I’m sure they’ll be able to help. They can monitor your calls or they might give you a new number. You could go ex-directory.’

‘Yes.’ She didn’t seem exactly galvanised by my suggestion. For a moment I wanted to shake her, encourage her to show some of her anger instead of this depressed resignation, then reminded myself that she’d hardly slept and that it probably felt to her as though things were just getting worse in spite of outside involvement.

‘We will sort it out, you know,’ I said, ‘though it might feel hopeless at the moment. What did he say on the phone?’

‘At first he was just going on like the letters. I kept hanging up. He got angry. He said…’ she swallowed and her hand pulled at the gold chain around her neck. ‘He said I was betraying him and I’d pay for it.’ Her voice squeaked and she turned away. ‘Would you like some tea?’ She needed to cry but she didn’t want company.

‘Yes, please. No sugar.’

I sat on the arm of the chair in the front room. From there I’d a clear view of the man opposite. I carry a small camera with a zoom lens whenever can. One of the tools of the trade. I thanked my lucky stars that I hadn’t taken it out of my bag when I’d gone to town. I set it up, moved the vase of dried flowers from the windowsill, which left a clear section beneath the scalloped nets, and focused on the stalker. He was almost immobile, only shifting occasionally from foot to foot. He stood like someone at a formal service, a funeral or a wedding, arms hanging down in front, hands together, fingers laced. He waited slightly inside the alleyway so he was only easily visible from across the road. I snapped half a dozen shots of the man. Had any of Debbie’s neighbours noticed him yet?

She came back with my tea. Her hand was shaking as I took it from her. I was parched; I blew the steam to cool it down enough to drink.

‘Is there any news about work?’

‘No, it’s complete chaos. Jack, he’s the owner, he’s been into the Town Hall and got his pass but he couldn’t even get in to see the place till yesterday. He says it’s a right mess, the stock’s ruined. There’s loads of water damage with the sprinklers going off. The insurance company won’t give him a straight answer yet. I’m laid off, officially. Unofficially…’

‘He’s moving,’ and I hadn’t even had my tea. Talk about inconsiderate. I jumped to my feet. The man had set off towards the main road. ‘I’ll ring you later. Watch and tell me when he’s out of sight, I don’t want him to see me coming out of here.’

She moved up to the net curtains as I went through to the front door.

‘Debbie,’ I called, ‘is the door locked?’

‘Oh, yes.’

She ran through with the keys.

‘You’re best with just the Yale on when you’re in,’ I said, ‘and the chain. If there was a fire…’

She looked at me, her mouth tight. ‘I feel safer.’

And if anyone broke in the back way she’d be trapped.

She ran back into the lounge. ‘He’s gone.’

I opened the door and walked briskly out to the pavement. My stomach was tightening in excitement. He was up ahead. Now I’d got him. Trail him home, get the address, a word with the neighbours or the local shop and I’d have his identity. Get it to Rebecca along with details of the harassment and she could start the proceedings. In the distance he’d reached one of the side roads to the left. He turned into it. I was puzzled. Why wasn’t he heading for the bus stops on the main road at the end? Did he live locally, perhaps? I ran to the corner, slowing as I reached it. There he was, fifty yards down on the left. He’d stopped. Hands in his pockets.

I watched him turn, stoop, open the car door, get in and drive away. A blue car, a Ford – a Fiesta, perhaps. I got part of the number plate. Then he was gone.

Shit, shit, shit.

No tantrums, no whining, no bickering. Just good food and good company. The height of luxury. Diane was a foodie, she loved to eat and had the figure to prove it. Big. And was happy to flaunt it. She dressed adventurously and spent a small fortune on haircuts; her current one was a blue-black urchin look.

She’d set out the table in the middle of her studio-cum-living room. The place was chaotic; canvases, paints and inks, screens, sewing machine, headless dressmaker’s dummy, PC, telly in the corner, couch. She lived and worked downstairs and slept upstairs. After twelve years the neighbours had got used to the harmless eccentric in their midst. A couple of them had even commissioned small pieces from her for birthday presents.

‘Sit down,’ she said after I’d handed her the bottle I’d brought. ‘It’s ready.’

We exchanged news and gossip as we demolished a plate of cracked olives, tomato and basil salad and hunks of sesame seed bread. But she saved up the best titbit till we’d wiped the plates clean.

‘I’ve had a date,’ she announced.

‘When? Why didn’t you tell me? Who?’ I was all indignation.

‘A soulmate.’

‘What?’

‘In the Guardian, lonely hearts?’ she smiled.

‘What was he like?’

Her smile faded. “Orrible,’ she sighed, ‘we went for a pizza in town, then to the pictures.’ She made it sound like a trip to the dentist. ‘He’s a teacher, recently divorced, three kids. Oh Sal, it was awful. He was obviously depressed and looking for someone to save him.’

‘Couldn’t you tell, from the ad?’

‘No, or I wouldn’t have gone. It was one of these where you ring them up, listen to a message. He sounded quite perky.’

‘Perky?’ I pulled a face.

‘Well, you know, lively. I left a message and I made it clear, I really did, that I wasn’t looking for anything deep and meaningful, right? Just a bit of pleasant company, no big deal, nothing serious. OK. He rings me up, makes a date. I get there. He wants another wife, virtually said so, probably wants another three kids and all.’ She shuddered. Diane had made her mind up in her early twenties that motherhood was not for her. She’s never wavered from that belief. ‘In fact,’ she scooped the plates up, ‘I reckon he wants the wife he had before, the kids, the lot. Oh, it was miserable.’ She took the plates through to the kitchen.

I filled our glasses. ‘Will you try again?’

‘I expect so.’ She came and sat down again, and took a drink. ‘You ought to have a go.’

‘Oh no!’ I was horrified. ‘I couldn’t.’

‘Why not?’

‘It’s so…’

‘Obvious? Well, how else are you ever going to meet anyone?’

‘Who says I want to meet anyone?’ I retorted. ‘I might be perfectly happy as I am.’

‘Huh!’ She snorted. ‘Are you?’

‘Yes, most of the time.’ I swigged my wine. ‘There’s a lot to be said for being single,’ I went on. ‘I don’t have to negotiate with someone all the time, I can be as selfish, independent…’

She burst out laughing.

‘What?’

‘Sal, you live with two children, a man, a lodger and a dog. You can’t move a muscle without checking out childcare or whether you’re out of milk. You’re hardly the embodiment of a free spirit.’

‘You know what I mean.’

‘Whereas I actually am a free spirit. I don’t even have a budgie and I could do with a bit of passion.’ She fetched a newspaper from the corner. ‘Here, look at these.’ Some of the ads had been circled.

‘How do you pick them?’

‘Knock out all the g.s.o.h.’s – good sense of humour. I reckon it’s a code, means they’re total prats who like practical jokes and toilet humour. And I knock out all the super sporty ones and the very rich ones and the attractive twenty somethings.’

‘Why?’

‘I want a man,’ she swivelled her shoulders, ‘not a boy. Read what’s left.’

While she sorted the meal out I read out the five remaining entries. We got giggly reading between the lines. They all sounded inoffensive; one or two were more interesting. One was a keen gardener.

‘You see,’ she pointed at me with the serving spoon, ‘he might be able to help you with your pruning.’

‘Ha ha.’

She brought in the main course. A glistening Spanokapita, spinach, curd cheese and nuts in a delicate filo pastry, baby new potatoes and a crunchy sprouted salad. Our conversation lulled while we piled up our plates.

‘It’s wonderful,’ I told her.

‘You busy?’

‘Yes, all of a sudden.’ I told her about my week, the gruesome discovery at Mr Kearsal’s, the press follow-up. The bomb.

‘I felt it here,’ she said, ‘the blast. I felt the windows move.’ She shook her head. ‘I hated that building, but…’

We were quiet for a moment, the atmosphere in the room suddenly charged with emotion.

I talked to her about the two cases I now had. I know I can trust her not to gossip to anyone else about my work.

Some more wine, some apricot fool and some fierce coffee, and it was time for home. I cycled back slowly. It was cloudy, no stars to gaze at, but the gardens were full of night scents; sweet stocks, the tang of honeysuckle, heady tobacco plants. Cats were out and about, darting across the roads, creeping under hedges. I passed a dead hedgehog. There wasn’t much traffic on the side roads and I could drop my guard and relish the sensation of the air on my face and the tingle in my leg muscles as I built up speed.

The two witnesses who had allegedly seen Luke Wallace stab Ahktar Khan were Sonia and Rashid Siddiq. They lived in Whitefield not far from Prestwich in one of those new townhouse developments. Tall, thin houses with integral garages clustered round a central courtyard. Two or three-bedroomed properties, twenty of them, each with a tiny spit of land smaller than the old back yards of the redbrick Manchester terraces. There were plenty of olde-worlde features to distract from the economies of scale; mullioned windows, carriage lamps, wood stained fencing, studded doors. But this was the end of the twentieth century, and each house sported a burglar alarm and a satellite dish.

There was a car parked in the driveway of number 18 – a smart white Saab. The lion’s-mouth door-knocker made a frightful din that echoed round the courtyard. Most houses looked deserted, their owners out at work. A woman at the far end was loading small children into a hatchback.

I was about to knock again when the door opened, just a few inches.

‘Mrs Siddiq?’

She was young. Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. ‘Yes?’

‘My name is Sal Kilkenny, this is my card.’ I passed it to her. ‘I’m a private investigator.’

She examined the card carefully as if it could reveal the nature of my enquiry.

‘I’d like to ask you a few questions.’

‘What’s all this about?’ she snapped.

‘You witnessed an attack on Ahktar Khan.’

She blanched. What else did she think a PI would be calling on her for?

‘I’ve already told everyone about that. The police, the lawyers.’ She made a move to shut the door.

‘Please,’ I said, ‘I need to know what you saw. I’ll try not to take up too much of your time.’

She hesitated. I took the chance to keep talking.

‘I’m sorry to ask you to go over it all again; it must have been very traumatic, but your evidence is crucial. And whatever happened, my client has the right to a fair hearing. It’s my job to go over all the evidence and talk to all the witnesses.’