Nine Inches Read online

  ‘I told her about the note, but not how serious I thought it was. Didn’t want to worry her. I mean, what if it’s just one of the local kids having a laugh? Feel pretty bloody stupid then, won’t I? You’ll get to the bottom of it, though, Dan, won’t you? You were always the best at sniffing shit out.’

  For all the good it did me.

  Ahead, Dr Leontia and Jimmy were just emerging. He had ice cream plastered across his face. So did Lenny. They were giggling.

  ‘There’s nothing you want to tell me, Jack, some reason someone’s after you that you haven’t mentioned? Better I know now.’

  ‘Swear to God. How can I shut the fuck up if I don’t know what to shut the fuck up about? I talk all day on national radio. It’s what I do. I can’t just zip it, you know, unilaterally.’ He swivelled as the back door opened and his mood lifted instantly. ‘Look at you!’ Leontia lifted Jimmy into his chair. ‘Ice cream everywhere!’

  He reached back with a handy wipe and proceeded to rub.

  ‘Well,’ I said, giving Lenny a wink, ‘what did you manage to wring out of the wee bugger?’

  ‘Starkey.’

  ‘Sorry, Jack.’

  ‘That he was taken into a car and driven around.’

  ‘The bastard!’ shouted Jack.

  ‘Make and model, licence plate?’

  ‘Yeah, right. It was silver.’

  ‘Description of suspect?’

  ‘If I find him,’ Jack snapped, ‘I’ll fuckin’ kill him.’

  ‘Wasn’t a he,’ said Dr Leontia.

  From McDonald’s, it was quicker to drop us back at my car and for me to take Lenny on. She apologised for finding out so little, but Jack was over the moon.

  ‘I got bugger-all squared out of him, so this is a result. Isn’t it, Dan?’

  ‘Certainly is. Narrows it down to half the world’s population and its most favourite car colour. Case more or less closed.’

  But it was something, and something is always better than nothing. I drove Lenny back to her work. I slipped her a twenty. She slipped it back.

  ‘Just doing a friend a favour.’

  ‘Nice touch with the doctor’s coat,’ I said.

  ‘I feel a bit bad,’ she said.

  ‘Balls,’ I said. ‘You have four kids, you know as much about child psychology as anyone.’

  ‘Well, if you insist. Will you be in later?’

  ‘Never know your luck.’

  I winked, and Leontia shut the door and hurried in to start her shift in the Bob Shaw.

  5

  It was gone three on an April afternoon, a light rain falling. It was mild. Mild is the best we ever get. All our weather is varying degrees of mild. And not just the weather. Our mountains are mildly high. Our rivers never rage. Our wildest creature is a badger. A badger would roll a cigarette for you if you asked it nicely. As a people, it is our very mildness that prevents us from dealing with the very few nutters who screw up our country. In Northern Irish terms, shut the fuck up was pretty fucking mild.

  The Malone Road is mild, and inoffensive. Malone and the various Deramores and Bladons that lead off it. The area is dominated by the Royal Belfast Academical Institution’s playing fields, by Methodist College, by people with more sports cars than they know what to do with. Malone is home to millionaire pop stars, celebrity chefs, heiresses and politicians. Home to Jack Caramac. A million and a half for a house in any provincial city isn’t bad going. Jack’s was north of that. Red brick, mature trees, rolling grounds.

  I parked just around the corner, but in a position where I could just about see the lower half of his lengthy driveway. Ten minutes after I arrived, Jack drove out. I gave it a couple of minutes before starting up and driving in. There were still two other cars sitting on the gravelled forecourt, a BMW and a Mercedes. I was hoping to catch his wife, Tracey. I knew her of old. Jack spent so much time projecting his personality and opinions on the radio that when he was off air he didn’t have a huge amount left to say for himself; even with his child momentarily kidnapped, he had been vague on the exact circumstances, on the detail I needed to move forward. Jimmy was missing for a while, nobody seemed to notice, then suddenly he was back with the note. Tracey at least should be able to give me a little more detail. She wouldn’t be able to help herself. She was a motormouth.

  I rang the doorbell. It played ‘Lady in Red’. For a long time. I wanted to smash it with a hammer. But I had no hammer. It would keep. After an eternity, a girl, probably no more than nineteen, twenty, opened up; she had Jimmy in her arms.

  I said, ‘Hiya, Jimbo, long time no see.’ He gazed at me without any semblance of recognition. So I said, ‘Is Tracey in?’

  ‘No.’

  I said, ‘Oh. I was hoping to catch her. You’re . . .?’

  ‘I am nanny.’

  ‘Is that your name or your occupation?’

  Nanny the nanny wasn’t absolutely impossible.

  ‘I am nanny.’

  Okay, it was going to be one of those ones. Her face was pale and expressionless. She was in tracksuit bottoms, a buttoned bally jersey and slippers. Every few seconds she gave Jimmy a little jiggle with her arm. There wasn’t a lot to pin her accent on, but it was probably somewhere west of Carnlough and east of Krakow.

  I said, ‘I’m Dan – I’m working for Jack. About what happened to Jimmy . . . him disappearing?’

  ‘Not my fault.’

  ‘I didn’t say . . . Do you mind if I come in and have a wee word with you? I need—’

  ‘No come in. Come back when they are here.’

  ‘It’s just a couple of questions.’ I delved into my jacket and took out one of my business cards ‘That’s me, that’s my name.’

  She looked at it, nodded and handed it back. ‘It is card. Anyone can have card. You could be serial killer.’

  ‘Well if business doesn’t pick up . . .’ I stopped that one almost as soon as I started. Talking to someone with only a basic understanding of English is like speaking to a moron. I said, ‘You haven’t noticed anyone hanging around, maybe checking the place out?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘You.’

  ‘I mean—’

  ‘Come back another time. No thank you. Nice day.’

  She closed the door. I stood there, mildly damp. I was not unused to rejection.

  I walked back down the drive, past my car and out on to the main road. As a reporter, I had spent many unhappy hours knocking on doors asking questions. You get kicked back all the time. Reporters make Jehovah’s Witnesses look popular, and they’re a bunch of bloodless cunts. At least then I could legitimise my enquiries with a nice laminated NUJ badge. Now I was just being nosy, with only a dodgy business card out of a cheap machine to back me up. But it had to be done. Once in a very long while you hit paydirt.

  To the left of Jack’s, there was a half-built house leveraged into what appeared to be a patch of ground that was too small for it. Certainly the outer edges of the building butted up against the perimeter trees and hedges of its neighbours. There was no sign of workmen, or large construction equipment; a cement mixer sat neglected, with weeds growing up around its base. Across the city there were many similar developments destined never to be finished. The world economy was in the shitter. Everyone had a different theory about who to blame. With my luck, I was surprised nobody had pinned it on me yet.

  To the right, there was another large dwelling, considerably older than Jack’s, with a hint of neglect about it. Opposite was a row of six more recently constructed townhouses: I had a vague memory of the fine old house that had been knocked down to make way for them. C’est la vie.

  I decided to try the townhouses first. My eyes were immediately drawn to the one on the far left with the silver car in its short driveway. I knocked on the door. An elderly man with wispy hair answered. I showed him my card. It seemed to confuse him. It seemed to confuse many people. But he was friendly enough. He lived alone. The car was his. He hadn’t noticed anyone lurking. Nobody was at
home in the next four. The final door was opened before I knocked. A young woman, maybe thirty, in tight jeans and a white shirt with her hair tied back and sunglasses pushed up, was coming out in a hurry.

  She said, ‘Oh!’ nearly bumping into me. ‘Sorry!’

  Make-up perfect, lovely smile.

  I gave her my card and asked if she’d heard that someone had tried to lure a child into a car across the road. It was close enough to the truth. She made a horrified face and said, ‘Here . . .? Oh my God! Where?’

  I pointed to Jack’s house. ‘Their four-year-old. He’s fine, but it could have been worse.’

  ‘Wee boy?’ She was nodding across the road. ‘I see him running about their garden, and seen him out on the road a couple of times. Walked him back in once; it’s a busy road. They have like a young girl, teenager, walks him up and down in a stroller sometimes?’

  ‘Nanny,’ I said.

  ‘Yeah, she’s a strange one. I tried to talk to her once about the boy wandering and she didn’t want to know.’

  ‘She’s foreign,’ I said.

  ‘Yeah, I know, but still.’

  ‘So you haven’t seen anything unusual?’

  ‘Not that I can think of. Sorry, I’m in a bit of a rush.’

  ‘No problem. Sure, keep the card; if you think of anything, give me a bell. Or just give me a bell.’

  She kind of half laughed, and looked at my card anew. ‘Dan Starkey? I know that name.’ She studied my face. ‘Didn’t you used to be big in newspapers?’

  ‘I’m still big,’ I said. ‘It’s the newspapers that got small. Tabloid, mostly.’

  She nodded uncomprehendingly. ‘So what’s this? Like a wee retirement job?’

  ‘No,’ I said.

  6

  Lenny was gone by half one. Some nights the Bob Shaw has a late licence, some nights not. They aren’t always the same nights. She uses this to confuse her husband so that we can grab some time together at my place. It works for me, and it seems to work for her. We call it the Happy Hour.

  I took a Bushmills out on to the veranda and watched her wend her way through the drunks. She had a taxi pre-booked to pick her up outside the bar. It always came at the same time, and so did we.

  I woke shivering at four, and there was another pizza crust, this time in my lap. I was turning into late-night sport for someone. I went inside and cranked up the heat and poured another whiskey and listened to some more Jack Caramac and sat with a notebook, making lists of callers’ names and what they were whining about. Later, I managed a couple of hours’ sleep and then a shower and shave before wandering across the city centre and up Great Victoria Street, on to the Lisburn Road and my office. I could have worked from home, but it was too easy. It seemed important to make the effort to get out.

  I was in position by ten. I had coffee from Arizona, a few doors down, and a Kit Kat from Nestlé. I read the papers online and then moved on to Facebook. I had discovered, by bumping into them in Starbucks two weeks earlier, that Patricia was meeting one of her work colleagues for coffee. She swore that there was nothing in it, but they looked shifty enough for me to suspect the worst. We were separated, though not legally. We – and when I say we, I mean I – had always played fast and loose with the marriage vows, but nevertheless, this was a knife to the heart. His name was Richard McIntosh. I shook his hand and passed idle chit-chat for all of thirty seconds before pretending I had to take an urgent call and fleeing. In years gone by, fists would have flown and I would have ended up in Casualty feeling miserable, so I was quite proud of the way I dealt with her treachery. I was older, more mature. When I got home, I went online to find out what I could, but there wasn’t much beyond a couple of photos on Google Images of him playing rugby for a work team. He wasn’t even on Facebook. So I created an account for him, uploaded his photo and set about asking random strangers from around Belfast to be his friend. People rarely say no to such requests, so before very long I’d acquired more than one hundred and fifty new mates for him. Then, working tirelessly, I went through the photo collections of many of these new friends, adding pithy comments on his behalf. Things like: love the chins, fatty; see you’re keeping incest in the family; those are fucking big ears, Dumbo, and yer ma’s yer da. The level of abuse that appeared on his wall in response was quite incredible. Every time he was removed from a list of friends, I found him another. According to Patricia, her strictly platonic friend Richard had been punched twice in the face by random strangers in the past few days while out and about in the city. It was such rewarding work.

  The buzzer sounded at eleven. A vaguely familiar voice said, ‘Hi, I’m from Cityscape FM. Jack asked me to pop round with an envelope for you.’

  ‘Oh right, come on up.’

  I was hoping it was Cameron, but it wasn’t. It was the other one. I tried not to look too disappointed. She was equally gorgeous. She had on a black Puffa jacket and purple jeans. Her hair was dirty blonde and short. I put my hand out and told her I hadn’t caught her name yesterday.

  ‘Evelyn. Evelyn Boyd. I’m Jack’s producer.’

  ‘Oh right – I thought you were just like one of those dizzy blonde girls who ran around doing things.’

  She gave me a look and said, ‘No.’

  I smiled. ‘Have a seat.’

  ‘I have to—’

  ‘Kettle’s broken, but I can offer you one quarter of a Kit Kat.’

  ‘No, really, I—’

  ‘Is this them?’ I nodded at the envelope she still held in her hand.

  ‘Oh. Yes.’

  She handed it over.

  I said, ‘Thanks for bringing them. You didn’t have to come up.’

  ‘Yes I did. You don’t appear to have a letter box.’

  ‘Good point. My mail gets left with the butcher downstairs. When I pick it up, it’s usually bloodstained. It adds a certain frisson.’

  She smiled hesitantly. ‘I should be—’

  ‘No, seriously, take the weight off. Not that you . . . I mean, I wanted to have a word anyway. Jack said it would be okay.’

  ‘Did he?’

  ‘Absolutely. He said you were the first and last line of defence between him and the great unwashed.’

  She sat. She smiled. ‘Really?’

  I nodded. He hadn’t, but he should have. It’s good to appreciate. I was appreciating now. If I was ten years younger. And she was ten years older.

  ‘I take it he’s told you what this is about? The threat, his kid.’

  Evelyn nodded. ‘He’s very worried.’

  ‘You must talk to a lot of cranks.’ She held my gaze for a moment before nodding. ‘How do you sort them out? You let some of them on air purely for entertainment purposes?’

  ‘Course we do.’

  ‘And what about those who don’t make it; do they not just get crankier?’

  ‘We try to be kind. We just say there’s such a high volume of calls that we’ve run out of time. And actually, it’s usually true.’

  ‘Do any of them ever turn up at the station, try to confront Jack?’

  ‘Rarely. We don’t really advertise the address; we have a post office box number. Of course if people want to find us, they generally will, but most of our callers haven’t . . . the wherewithal, if you know what I mean.’

  ‘What about when he’s out and about? Does he get approached much, maybe threatened, asked for autographs? You know, like John Lennon?’

  ‘Not really, no. Jack’s a radio man, so his face isn’t that widely known. It’s one reason he avoids doing TV, so he can preserve that anonymity. Again, you can Google him and get as many pictures as you want, but he hasn’t got that kind of recognisability that goes with genuine fame. He can get about pretty much unmolested.’

  ‘What about in the station itself?’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘Would he have enemies there?’

  ‘Enemies?’

  ‘Someone who might want to give him a scare, put the frighteners on him?’ />
  ‘No, of course not.’

  ‘A jealous presenter with an eye on his slot. A chairman who resents paying him so much. A blonde who’s been sleeping with him and hates the fact that he won’t leave his wife.’

  Evelyn raised an eyebrow. ‘Of course other presenters are jealous of him; he’s got the number one show, best time slot, highest paid. But they’re also aware he keeps them in work, because he’s the only one making the station any money.’

  ‘The golden goose who lays the . . . what about that?’

  ‘What about what?’

  ‘Is he getting laid? A woman scorned and all that.’

  ‘No. Absolutely not. And I’d know.’

  ‘Fair enough. Had to ask. How would you know?’

  ‘Because I’m with him from the moment he walks into the station until the moment he walks out. And the rest of the time he’s with his wife.’

  ‘Sure about that?’

  ‘No reason to believe otherwise.’

  ‘Trudy.’

  ‘Tracey.’

  ‘That’s what I said. You know her well?’

  ‘No. A bit. She comes to station functions. Jack has a New Year’s party. She’s . . . okay. Protective.’

  ‘Possessive?’

  ‘Protective.

  ‘And older.’

  ‘Older?’

  ‘Than the general age of blondes you’d find working in a radio station.’ Before she could respond to that, I followed it up sharply with: ‘Jack has a certain reputation. For being awkward. Hard to work with. Egotistical. Mean. Given to rages. In fact, people say he’s a bit of a cunt.’

  Evelyn’s eyes widened. ‘I don’t like that word.’

  ‘I’m sorry. No wish to offend. Is wanker any better?’

  ‘I’m not sure I like your tone, Mr Starkey.’

  ‘Please, nobody calls me Mr Starkey.’

  ‘I’m not sure I like your tone, Mr Starkey.’

  We stared each other out. I quite liked her, but sometimes people have to be pushed and prodded, even the attractive ones.

  ‘He’s a star. All he wants is to be treated like one.’