Part 14 (1/2)

'You're a fine one to talk. Alma hasn't forgiven you for b.u.g.g.e.ring up her Bedford van.'

'We were stuck in a snowdrift, Arthur; it's hardly surprising the radiator cracked. Any next of kin listed?'

'None, but there's a social services officer. Actually, it's someone we've dealt with before: Lorraine Bonner, the leader of the Residents' a.s.sociation at the Roland Plumbe Community estate. At least we know where to find her.'

'Then that's our next stop.' May paused, uncertain. 'Do you still want to see Jane?'

'Yes, I'd like to.'

May led the way upstairs and through the cheerfully painted corridors, to a ward separated from the rest of the floor. Nodding to the duty nurse, he headed toward the corner room and gently pushed back the door.

'Jane, it's me.' There was no answer. 'I've brought somebody to see you. You remember Arthur Bryant, don't you?'

She wore a tightly drawn fawn cardigan over a long pleated skirt. Her white sneakers had no laces. She had kept her figure and removed any trace of grey from her auburn hair, but when she turned around, Bryant saw the pain and confusion of the intervening years etched under her eyes and around her thin mouth. There was a loss of focus in her face, as though she was searching for something she could not quite make out. After a moment of composure during which she absently touched a hair into place, she drew a breath and seemed to straighten a little.

'Jane, do you remember Arthur?'

She raised a finger at him and tried to smile. 'Yes, we've met, but I'm afraid I don't know wherea”'

'I came to your wedding,' said Bryant gently.

'My wedding. How nice. Of course you did. You were always so kind.' The smile held, the eyes even twinkled, but her concentration was disturbed by the movement of branches beyond the window, the sc.r.a.ppy flight of a magpie above the grounds, a murmur of conversation in the corridor. 'I wonder ifa”' She stopped, a cloud of anxiety crossing her features. 'We could go to the coast. I'd like that, John. On a day when it's sunny, a day like today. I'd like to walk on the cliffs. But it must be warmer.'

'I know you don't like the cold, Jane, but spring will be here soon. I'll come for you then.'

'You've always been so good to him, Arthur.' She reached out for Bryant's arm, gently plucking a thread from his sleeve. As she did so, he glimpsed the scribble of scars whitening the flesh of her inside arm. 'I felt sure you would have both retired by now.'

'Oh, no, we're in this together right until the bitter end.' There was indulgent gaiety in Bryant's chuckle, but he could see a lasting winter in her eyes.

'Well, I feel terribly special today. It's good to see you both. I'm very privileged. Perhaps you'll come back another time. Come and see me again.'

The audience was over. Her attention had started to diminish, like a boat pulling away from the sh.o.r.e. She started to turn away. 'I'm quite happy here. I know everyone. You needn't rush back, not if you don't want to.'

'Jane, did you meet a patient here, a gentleman called Tony Pellew?' Bryant could not stop himself from asking.

Her waning interest was suddenly checked. Here was something she could grasp, someone she could recall from re-cent days. 'Of course I did. He spoke to me.'

The answer had come too quickly. He doubted she was telling the truth. 'Really? You knew him?'

'Long brown hair, slight, under-nourished. They let him out.'

'That's right.'

'He seemed decent enough, very bright, but such a mother's boy. There was something too soft in his eyes. He talked about his mother all the time. He told me that when she died, all the clocks in the pub stopped at two minutes past eleven.'

'What pub?'

'Where she lived. They let him leave. He wasn't well enough, in my opinion. You can tell which ones are well enough to go.' She pulled her cardigan a little tighter. 'How is my little girl?'

May looked guilty. 'She's well, Jane. Much better than she's been in years.'

'You must take very good care of her. She's all I have now.' She looked away, touching a finger beneath her eye. 'Perhaps one day you can bring her here.'

'We discussed this, Jane. If the doctor feels you can copea”' 'I know, I know, it's a stupid idea.' Her features set in a smile of practised hospitality. 'Well, I must go now, or I'll miss my lunch.'

Bryant looked back once as he walked away, and wished he had not seen her. The tiny, hunchbacked figure framed against the window bore no resemblance to the woman he remembered laughing between their linked arms. The tragedy of losing those she loved had robbed her of the right to happiness.

29.

WRAITH.

L.

orraine Bonner was a broad black woman with a laugh like someone unbunging a sink and enough courage to make the surliest delinquent think twice about disrespecting her. They found her surrounded by cardboard files in the chaotic first-floor office of the council estate's main block.

'I didn't think I'd see the two of you again,' she said, pouring thick brown tea from a steel pot the size of an upturned bucket. 'I thought that thing with the Highwayman was all over.'

'It is, Lorraine, but Mr May and I have a new problem,' said Bryant, 'and we thought you might be able to help us.'

'Can you walk with me while I do my pensioners?' Mrs Bonner delivered meals to the mobility-challenged seniors on the estate every lunchtime. When their own relatives could not be bothered to look after them, she was there to dispense patient kindnesses that had sophisticates sneering, while offering such practical help that they felt ashamed. May explained their mission as she manhandled her protesting trolley into the corridor.

'A lady from the Broadhampton phoned Islington Council to add Tony Pellew to my roster,' she informed them. 'They'd got him a one-bedroom apartment on the De Beauvoir estate. He didn't want to live in South London. His family was originally from around there. Normally we try to return home, don't we? It's only natural. You'll want the address of his flat.'

'How can we get that?'

'My filing system's in my head, love.' She took a card from May and wrote on the back of it. 'When did you last see him?'

'Well, I got him settled in and popped over a couple of times during the first week, but two weeks ago he went missing. He didn't have many belongings, just enough to fill a back-pack, but the wardrobe was emptied out and the bed hadn't been slept in.'

'How do you know he wasn't staying at a friend's?' asked May.

'His shoes were all gone. You don't take all your shoes unless you're not coming back, do you? I had to make a report to his probationer.'

'What was he like?' Bryant wondered, intrigued.

'Very quiet and sad, needed fattening up. The sort of man an older lady would like to take under her wing, you know? I heard he'd had a difficult upbringing. I'm not trying to excuse what he did, you just want to understand, don't you? Well, it's only human nature, isn't it?'

'Do you have any idea at all where he went?'