Maxwell's Retirement (3 page)

Shouldering the dining room door open and balancing a tray, Maxwell could only marvel again at the woman he had married. She was sitting next to Julie, who was now noticeably calmer. They were looking through the thin volume of Maxwell and Jacquie’s wedding photos. Julie was cooing and pointing wordlessly, to emphasise some esoteric fashion speciality invisible to Maxwell and to men everywhere. She looked up as he came in and set down the tray, her eyes still red-rimmed but her mouth now in an uncertain smile.

‘These are lovely photos, Mr Maxwell,’ she said. ‘You look very smart.’

‘Oh, yes,’ he said, passing her her Coke, with ice and a slice. Jacquie got her tea just as she liked it; in a mug and thick enough to stand on. He sat down opposite and smiled. ‘I polish up quite well, don’t I?’

Julie was one of the Sixth Form girls who
actually thought that, ancient as he was, Mad Max would stand up quite well with the likes of … well, that was always a difficult list to start, but with the old actors her mum liked – Sean Connery, that was one. Piers Brosnan, he was all right. She looked up under her lashes and admitted that Mad Max wasn’t quite in their league, but he looked very nice in his wedding photos and very proud as well. Mrs Maxwell was nice as well. Really understanding. Tears stood in Julie’s eyes again and Jacquie patted her hand.

‘Come on, now, Julie. Explain to Mr Maxwell what you have just told me.’

The girl looked at Jacquie doubtfully. ‘But, Mrs Maxwell … will, I mean, does Mr Maxwell …?’

Jacquie smiled and looked at her husband, sitting in a posture of confused alertness opposite. ‘I think what Julie means, darling, is that she isn’t sure you will quite get what she is talking about. It’s a bit technical.’

‘Technical?’ Maxwell was puzzled. ‘You’re not doing CDT, are you, Julie? IT? Anything like that?’ Encyclopaedic though his knowledge was, Maxwell could not keep
all
his students’ timetables in his head.

‘No, Mr Maxwell. I’m doing English, Geography and History. It’s nothing to do with my subjects. It’s this.’ She held up her mobile phone, which obediently bleeped for an incoming message. She dissolved into tears
again. ‘It just keeps on and on. I can’t stand it.’

If Maxwell was confused before, he was totally at sea now. ‘Can’t you just turn it off?’ This was, after all, his own preferred method.

‘That doesn’t help, Max,’ Jacquie said, absently patting Julie on the back. ‘The messages are there when you switch the phone back on. They’re not like calls. They are automatically stored on the phone.’

‘I think I knew that,’ Maxwell said, uncertainly. A distant memory from a long-ago reading of an instruction manual rose to the surface. ‘I seem to think you can block a caller.’ His hatred of the moronic interrogative prevented him from making the statement a question, but it was one, nonetheless.

Julie and Jacquie looked at him, their eyes big with concern. Their worlds had rocked on their axes. Jacquie was the first to recover the power of speech.

‘Yes,’ she said, only just biting back the ‘well done, dear’. ‘You can do that, but not when the caller withholds their number. You can block all withheld numbers, but of course that means that anyone you
know
who habitually does that would be blocked as well.’

‘Yes,’ Julie said. ‘That’s the problem. My stepdad is a doctor and he withholds his number. He often has to ring me, or text, and so I can’t block withheld numbers.’

Maxwell seemed to see a simple answer just in front of their noses. ‘Can’t he
unblock
his number when he texts or rings you?’ It seemed too simple to be true.

‘It’s a bit of a faff,’ Julie said. ‘He wouldn’t always have the time. Anyway …’ she looked at Jacquie, asking for help.

‘Julie hasn’t told anyone about this,’ she said, giving Maxwell what he had learnt to consider The Look. ‘She hasn’t even told her friends. The texts are not very friendly, Max. In fact, they are really very disturbing.’

‘Can we see one?’

‘I delete them straight away,’ the girl said. ‘I just don’t want to have them on my phone. It’s spoilt everything, you know,’ she burst out. ‘I used to love it when I got a message.’ She looked at Jacquie. ‘I had a little bird tweeting for when I got a text. It made me really happy, somebody wanted to say something to me, even if it was just “Hi”. But now, I just dread it. I don’t have my little bird any more. Just a beep.’

Maxwell reached across the table. Political correctness be blowed, he just wanted to hold her hand. He racked his Head of Sixth Form brain to try and recall her family situation. Stepdad, obviously, she had just told them that. But, who else was part of her family? Slowly, the details emerged. Stepfather, quite high-powered at Leighford General and very driven.
Had clearly had a radical humourectomy at an early stage. Mother, blonde, socially mobile from the Barlichway estate to a detached executive home and looking for more. She used her one brain cell for that sole purpose. One sister, older and at university. Two half-brothers, twins and as precocious and unpleasant a pair of
seven-year
-olds as Maxwell had met in his many long days marching. They had come to the Christmas concert and had almost single-handedly – perhaps ‘double-handedly’ was more appropriate – led one of Santa’s little helpers the rest of the way to the nervous breakdown begun by her being Head of Social and Religious Studies. They reminded him of the Boys from Brazil. But he didn’t say any of this.

‘Julie, I know you find it difficult, but your friends love you and so do your family. You must let them know what’s happening.’

The girl snorted. ‘Friends! Well, they wouldn’t care. And as for family – I don’t think they’d notice if I just disappeared. Puff of smoke. The first thing they’d know would be when they needed someone to collect Neeheeoeewootis and Vaiveahtoish from skating or riding or swimming or any of the other million things the little dears do.’ Bitterness dripped from her as she spoke.

Jacquie laughed. ‘Great nicknames. What are their real names?’ As she spoke she caught Maxwell’s expression and tried to claw back her
question. ‘I mean, ah ha, we called Nolan Nolan, but we call him Nole and …’

‘Don’t worry, Mrs Maxwell,’ Julie said. ‘It’s a common mistake. They
are
their real names. They are Native American and Neeheeoeewootis means “high-backed wolf” and Vaiveahtoish means “alights on a cloud”. Don’t ask me what they were thinking when they chose those names. Everyone calls them Nee and Vee now. Except me. I don’t see why they should be let off the hook.’

‘Don’t your friends call you Zee?’ Maxwell asked mildly.

She rounded on him. ‘Yes, they do,’ she snapped. ‘But that’s my
friends
do that, not my family. They call me Julie. Or, my mum calls me Jules, because that’s what Jamie Oliver calls his wife and they went to his restaurant for an anniversary and so she likes to think they’re mates. Oh,’ she buried her head in her arms and her voice came out muffled, ‘I hate my family.’ She sniffed and raised her head. Jacquie and Maxwell could almost see her physically pull herself together. ‘I’m sorry to be such a nuisance.’ She reached round behind her for her coat on the back of the chair. ‘It’s nothing, just a bit upset about stuff. I’ll go home now.’

Jacquie put a hand on her shoulder, half Woman Policeman, half mother, all Jacquie. ‘You most certainly will not. You got a text just then.
I can’t let you go without seeing it. I’m sorry.’

The girl clasped her hands tightly round her phone. ‘No!’ she cried. ‘You can’t.’

Maxwell leant forward. ‘Julie, Mrs Maxwell is a police person, as I’m sure you know. If she lets you go without looking at the text, she could be in a lot of trouble down at the station.’ It had started out as an impression of George Dixon, but he remembered the girl’s age and swapped, in mid-sentence, to Gene Hunt.

Julie looked from one to the other, checking.

‘He’s right, Julie,’ Jacquie said. And then, because she preferred the truth, ‘And anyway, I want to help you. Let me see. I won’t show Mr Maxwell if you don’t want me to. I promise.’

Reluctantly, the girl opened her hand and Jacquie took the phone. It was quite a new model, rather more sophisticated than many, but simpler than some. Jacquie clicked a key and the screen sprang to life. She touched the jog wheel and the text appeared.

‘Hi Z. Bin an wile. RU doing wot I sed? Wdnt like 2 think UR still wearing panties. I no wt U do. I’m watching U.’

Jacquie looked at Julie and then tilted the phone towards her. Gently, she said, ‘It’s not that bad, is it? Might it be one of your friends, messing about?’

The girl read it. ‘That’s one of the mild ones. He’s been on and on about … well, what it says.
The other things are worse. And he says he’s watching me. I’m so scared.’

‘Of course you are,’ Maxwell said. ‘But how can he watch you all the time?’

‘He can,’ she whispered. ‘He knows where I’ve been, who I speak to, everything.’

Jacquie raised an eyebrow at Maxwell and he nodded. ‘Look, Julie, Mrs Maxwell will go outside and have a look. She is trained in this, she will know if there is anyone watching. Trust me.’ He tapped her hand and she looked up. ‘Trust us, Julie. It’s all right.’

Jacquie got up and left the room, then they heard her feet on the stairs. She went through the lobby and out of the back door.

‘Cheer up, Julie. Mrs Maxwell is really good at her job. I’ll tell you what, let’s go and see if Nolan is stirring. He’ll be up for a game if he is.’

‘I’ve seen your little boy,’ Julie said, without much enthusiasm.

‘He’s not like your two little mon— brothers,’ Maxwell said. ‘Not at all. Come and meet him,’ and he ushered her into the sitting room, where Nolan was just stirring, unlike Metternich, who was asleep on his back with his legs in the air, one eye disconcertingly half open.

Nolan woke up as he did everything, with calm good humour. The crying started when he forgot his little adventure and rubbed his chin with the back of a podgy fist.

‘Whoops,’ Maxwell said, scooping him up. ‘OK, mate, let’s be like brave soldiers, now. Look, Julie has come to see you.’

‘’Lo, Julie,’ the boy muttered, wiping his eyes and nose lavishly on Maxwell’s shoulder. ‘Are you a babysitter?’

‘No,’ said Julie, smiling in spite of herself. ‘I’ve just come to visit your mummy and daddy.’

Nolan’s eyes clouded. ‘Where is Mama?’ he asked.

‘Don’t worry, Nole. She’s out running an errand for Julie. She’ll be back in a minute. Do you fancy a game of any sort?’

Nolan wriggled down out of his arms and made for the TV. ‘Mario Kart?’ he said, pulling out the Wii from the drawer in the TV table.

Maxwell made a face. ‘Oh, come on, Nole. You know I’m hopeless at that sort of thing. I had in mind three-dimensional chess, something like that.’

But Nolan knew an opportunity when it presented itself and he held up the handset to Julie in mute query.

She had plumped herself down beside him in seconds and they were off, leaning round the corners, accelerating into the bends, skittering off the obstacles before Maxwell could plug in his Atari II ping-pong console.

‘Right,’ he announced. ‘I’ll just sit over here then, shall I?’

‘Uh huh, Dads,’ said Nolan absently. ‘I’m a bit thirsty, could I have a drink?’

‘Of course,’ said Maxwell the butler. ‘Anything else? Crisps? Caviar? Roast suckling pig?’

The boy chuckled and risked a quick glance over his shoulder. ‘Crippies, please, Dads. And some for Julie, please.’

‘Your wish is my command, oh master,’ and Maxwell, transformed from Jeeves to the Genie of the Lamp, went off in search of food and drink. He found Jacquie in the kitchen, the phone cradled in the crook of her neck. She put her finger to her lips. The tinny sound of an answerphone could just be heard through her head. She seemed about to leave a message, then decided against it and replaced the receiver.

The Genie wafted out with the refreshments but was back in the twinkling of an eye. ‘Well?’

‘I was trying to reach Henry.’

The image flashed into Maxwell’s mind. Henry Hall was Jacquie’s boss, the DCI up at the nick, the
capo di capi
, all blank glasses and solemn, immobile face.

‘I guessed that much. Why?’

‘Well, to see if we’ve had any complaints from parents about the Internet, or texts, that sort of thing. I’ve been busy with this burglary case and I haven’t really had time to keep my ear to the ground. I just wondered if Henry knew anything.’

‘I gather he wasn’t there.’

‘Well, not picking up the phone, anyway.’ They stared at each other with wide eyes for a second. She immediately corrected herself. ‘That’s right. Not there.’ Neither of them could countenance for a moment the idea of Henry Hall sitting calmly and letting the phone ring and ring.

‘So, what are your thoughts on who this is, without Henry’s input?’ Maxwell said, casting a glance over his shoulder.

Jacquie drew a big breath and let it out slowly. ‘Obviously, my first thought was kids being nasty.’ Maxwell put in an understanding nod. In his experience,
all
kids were nasty. ‘But, on the whole, I don’t think so. I think the text was a bit adult in its content, the whole panties thing rather smacks of a flasher in a mac, or perhaps I am being ageist. And sexist too, I suppose.’

‘And weatherist?’

She gave him a flick with a tea towel. ‘That too. Also, the text-speak was rather half-hearted. A text from a youngster really is like a foreign language. There isn’t a single whole word in the thing. This was rather stilted, not followed through.’

‘It’s a shame we don’t have it.’

‘We do.’

‘Well, yes, heartsease, I am not denigrating your memory …’

She waved her mobile at him. ‘I forwarded it to myself.’

‘I didn’t see you do that.’

‘Ah, the quickness of the Woman Policeman deceives the Head of Sixth Form,’ she said. ‘I went on the suofam course.’

‘Suofam?’

‘Sneaky use of a mobile,’ she smiled. ‘Anyway, I’ll try to get a meeting with Henry and a few of the IT mob tomorrow. I’m assuming Nolan is awake?’

Screams of hilarity filtered through from the sitting room.