Waterloo Sunset: A Lake District Mystery #4 (Lake District Mysteries) Read online

  He nodded. When the time came for them to part, they’d made a promise to each other. No recriminations and no further contact. At the time he’d feared he wouldn’t be able to honour the bargain. But he’d stayed strong.

  ‘Actually, I met someone else. His name is Jude. No jokes about obscurity, please. Only twenty-seven, but quite a hunk. He has a flat in the Colonnades, a stone’s throw from your place. We keep our own bolt-holes, though I spend nights there when he isn’t away working. He’s an actor, he’s had a few small parts in films.’

  ‘Am I allowed jokes about small parts?’

  She grinned. ‘Don’t provoke me. Come to think of it, you may have seen Jude in Coronation Street.’

  ‘Must have been an episode I missed.’

  ‘I’d forgotten you’re so sarky. No need to be nervous. I haven’t breathed a word to Casper about you and me.’

  ‘I guessed not. Otherwise I’d have been buried under the foundations of the Paradise Project long ago.’

  Her eyes sparkled. ‘We all need a little danger in our lives.’

  ‘I’m too old for danger.’

  ‘Casper’s very respectable these days. His company’s a major sponsor of culture in the city. But you look as though you could do with some fun. How are things?’

  Should he mention the warning of death on Midsummer’s Eve? Perhaps not.

  ‘Same as ever.’

  ‘I wanted to say, I’m so sorry about your brother.’

  Harry’s half-brother had died unexpectedly the previous autumn. He’d been visiting a friend in Bangor when he’d suffered a massive brain haemorrhage. Dead on arrival at Ysbyty Gwynedd. The two of them had never been close; in fact, they’d only known each other for a few years, so Harry had never been able to fathom why grief clubbed him like a back street mugger. Something to do with opportunities missed, he supposed. It had taken months to free himself of the gloom with which the news had enveloped him. Some days, he wasn’t sure if he was rid of it yet.

  ‘Thanks.’ A thought struck him. ‘How did you hear?’

  ‘I like to keep in touch. It must be hard for you. Losing your parents in a car crash when you were a kid. Then your wife. Now this.’

  His gaze settled on the solid bulk of the Liver Building. Maybe he was one more Liver Bird, powerless to tear himself away from the city, no matter what went wrong. Wind rippled the flags on the hotel across the road and blew his hair into his face. He brushed it away, telling himself she didn’t mean to twist the knife, she was only trying to be kind.

  ‘Well.’ She checked her watch. Cartier, wasn’t it? He recalled the care with which she placed it on the bedside table before they last made love. ‘I’d better be going. It’s lovely to see you, Harry. Now that we’re so close, I’m sure our paths will cross again soon.’

  Before he knew what was happening, she’d leaned forward and pecked him on the cheek. And then she was gone, rushing towards the door that led to the private lift for residents, rummaging in her bag for her security fob and key. She disappeared into John Newton House, leaving him with the memory of her plump new lips. They had never felt so cold.

  Chapter Four

  He’d meant to head back home to his flat in Empire Dock, but the encounter with Juliet changed his mind. He wasn’t hungry or in the mood to cook. Besides, his idea of cooking was to rip the clingfilm from a ready-made meal in a box and sling it into the microwave. He’d wander into town for a drink. Maybe two.

  Half a dozen middle-aged Japanese men dressed up to look like John Lennon boogied across Water Street. A bus screeched to a halt in front of them and the driver waved his fist, but they took no notice. There was a Lennon convention this week and the city was packed with tourists singing Give Peace a Chance.

  ***

  He crossed the road and headed for the Stapledon Bar in Drury Lane. It was frighteningly trendy, and the prices chilled his spine, but they served good beer. Accountants and bankers packed the place at lunchtime and for the first couple of hours after work, but now they’d be speeding home to their luxury barn conversions, making way for people from apartment blocks on the waterfront. Later on, chances were you’d be shoved aside by the bulky minders of rock singers and football stars en route for the VIP lounge, accompanied by a swarm of slinky blondes. Flashbulbs kept popping; the bar staff must have a hot-line to the paparazzi. The celebrities basked in the free publicity and the Stapledon boosted its reputation as a happening place. In the fame game, everybody played to win.

  The entrance to the Stapledon was inconspicuous, but the bar area was much larger than you would have guessed from outside. The walls were covered with huge murals depicting a graphic artist’s lurid interpretations of scenes from sci-fi classics. A kraken waking alongside a horde of extra-terrestrials wielding ray guns, a troop of triffids that looked like refugees from the foyer at John Newton House. On half a dozen TV screens suspended from the ceiling, Tom Cruise fled from Martian invaders in The War of the Worlds. A synthesised buzz hummed in the background; Harry recognised the theme from Blade Runner.

  A notice by the door explained that the bar was named after a Thirties sci-fi novelist, Merseyside born and bred, yet boasting the unlikely first name of Olaf. He wrote novels about forms of intelligent life beaten down by an indifferent universe. A theme refined, Harry suspected, during Olaf Stapledon’s wage-slave years, spent clerking at the Blue Funnel Line’s office, round the corner from here.

  Someone tapped Harry on the shoulder. The way today was going, he half-expected to come face-to-face with something slithery out of Alien. Not quite, but a short balding man with a wispy moustache and protuberant eyes between small rimless glasses. If he hadn’t been wearing a blue and white football shirt, he might have been mistaken for a cryogenically unfrozen Dr. Crippen. This was Victor Creevey, the building manager from John Newton House.

  ‘What will you have, Harry, my old friend?’

  They weren’t old friends. Harry doubted they ever would be, and not only because Victor supported Everton Football Club, but where was the harm in a drink or two? This evening he could use the company.

  ‘Pint of Cain’s, thanks.’

  ‘You were last out?’

  ‘From our office, yes. There was a cleaner…’

  ‘I don’t count the cleaners,’ Victor said. ‘The supervisor has a key to the alarm system so they can come and go as they please. Usually they knock off half an hour early, but I turn a blind eye.’

  ‘This girl seemed in distress.’

  ‘Lithuanian, was she?’ Victor asked, as though this explained everything. ‘The agency keeps sending kids from places you’d never believe. Estonia, Latvia, wherever. Illegals mostly, but it’s not for me to ask questions if the contract price is right. Most of the girls don’t speak proper English, you know.’

  Harry knew plenty of English people who didn’t speak proper English, but he let it pass. ‘She’s not Lithuanian.’

  Victor shrugged. ‘You know what these kids are like, Harry. She’ll have rowed with her boyfriend or one of her mates. Happens all the time. I only hope she hasn’t hung around after the rest of them have gone and triggered off the alarm.’

  ‘She left before I did.’

  ‘There you are, then. Nobody stays later than you and Jim Crusoe. The other folk usually scoot out the door by half five. The developers have only signed leases on a couple of other offices. You rattle around like peas in a tin. At least it makes my job easier.’ His grin revealed small discoloured teeth. ‘That’s why it doesn’t hurt if I play hooky once in a while.’

  ‘The flats are moving, aren’t they?’

  Victor wrinkled his snub nose. ‘Seen the prices they’re asking? You could buy a five-bedroom detached in Woolton Village and still have change. When the agents released the first phase of flats, two dozen were snapped up. Buy-to-let speculations. Take a gander at John Newton House from the Strand one night. You won’t see many lights. It’s like the Marie Celeste.’

  ‘I ran int
o someone who lives on the top floor this evening. Woman called Juliet May.’

  ‘Keep your hands off, mate,’ Victor leered. ‘Do you know who she used to be married to?’

  Harry was all innocent surprise. ‘Mr. May?’

  ‘Not any old Mr. May, my friend.’ Theatrical pause. ‘Casper May himself.’

  ‘Ah.’

  ‘Not a man to cross, Harry, take it from me.’ The drinks arrived. ‘Good health, mate.’

  ‘But you said they are divorced?’

  ‘Casper still likes to keep a close eye on her. Trust me.’

  Harry tasted the beer, torn between the urge to find out and knowing that it was prudent to keep his nose out. Of course, there was only one possible outcome.

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘Why else would he install his ex in a penthouse at the top of a building he owns? Nice arrangement, if you ask me. Saves on alimony and if he fancies a trip down memory lane, he has a spare key. If you follow my drift.’

  Harry winced. ‘Casper May owns John Newton House?’

  ‘Didn’t you realise?’

  No, Harry didn’t have the faintest idea. Casper doled out work to half the lawyers in Liverpool and Jim was among those who traded properties on his behalf. Jim didn’t know about the affair with Juliet, but he’d sensed that Harry didn’t care for Casper and never discussed what his client was up to. Harry’s idea of hell was reading leases or balance sheets and he left the business side of the practice to his partner. Suddenly he understood how they could afford the rent. Jim must have done a deal on his fees to secure the premises on favourable terms.

  ‘We signed an agreement with the developers.’ He reached back into the trivia warehouse of his memory. ‘Culture Capital Holdings, something like that?’

  ‘Spot on. Casper May is chairman.’

  Harry took a swig of beer as an aid to digesting this news. Jesus, he’d cuckolded his own landlord. For all he knew, this was a breach of one of the covenants spelled out in the small print of the lease that he’d never bothered to read.

  ‘Bad day, mate? Why don’t you come over and join us? Barney will be wondering what’s happened to his dry martini.’

  Victor gestured to one of the plush semi-circular booths at the back of the bar. The lighting was sepulchral, but Harry made out a tall, skinny figure in a dark suit, cradling a glass beneath a scene of manic book burning inspired by Fahrenheit 451.

  ‘Don’t let me interrupt your evening.’

  ‘No problem, Barney will be made up to meet you.’

  This seemed unlikely, judging by the tall man’s languid pose, one long leg hooked over the other, but Harry followed as Victor bustled over. In the background, Vangelis had given way to Richard Strauss. Also Sprach Zarathustra, definitely the only tone poem Harry had ever stored on his iPod. As he exchanged cagey smiles with the man in the booth, he caught a pungent whiff in the air. A strange and unpleasant smell, yet somehow familiar.

  ‘Didn’t I tell you that Harry Devlin had moved into John Newton House? Meet the man himself! Harry, this is Barney Eagleson.’

  Barney didn’t stand up to shake hands. His grip was weak, his palm moist. Long dark hair flowed on to his shoulders and a nose stud glinted in the gloom. He wore a raffish black velvet jacket and had the hollow-eyed look of someone who’d just stepped out of a poem by Baudelaire.

  ‘Harry Devlin himself, eh? Victor tells me you’ve been mixed up in lots of murder cases.’

  ‘I’m a criminal lawyer. It’s part of the job.’

  ‘You’re supposed to be a bit of a detective yourself.’

  ‘That was a long time ago.’

  ‘You’ll have heard about the murder?’ Victor asked.

  ‘The body at Waterloo?’

  ‘They say a serial killer is at work. Is that right, Barney?’

  Barney put down his glass and raised a finger to his lips.

  ‘Trouble is, Harry,’ Victor sighed, ‘This chap’s an oyster, the soul of discretion. He won’t say a word about what’s happening with the investigation, even though he does have the inside track.’

  ‘You work with the police?’

  ‘Not exactly.’ Barney’s nose stud twinkled.

  Victor leered. ‘He’s a mobile embalmer.’

  A wild vision sprang into Harry’s mind. Barney driving a van emblazoned with the slogan Stop Me and Bury One.

  ‘I prefer to call myself a freelance restorative artist,’ Barney said. ‘I’m not tied to any particular undertaker. I’d rather be self-employed. I like the freedom. The hours aren’t bad and weekend working doesn’t worry me. Sorting out the tax and pension side is a small price to pay. You’re in the service sector, Harry, you know what I’m talking about.’ He dug into his trouser pocket. ‘Take my business card. The website address is on there as well.’

  ‘Website?’

  ‘It’s all about marketing these days, isn’t it? Public relations. Have a look at my blog. I like to reach out beyond the embalming community. As a matter of fact, I’ve tidied up one or two of the corpses in cases you’ve been involved with.’

  Harry didn’t want to talk about the past. He tucked the card into his wallet and took a swig of beer.

  ‘The body on the beach won’t have been embalmed yet.’

  ‘You’re right. Denise Onuoha, though, she was one of mine.’

  One of mine. The words hung in the air.

  ‘Don’t bother trying to persuade him to let on what the murderer did to her,’ Victor said after a pause. ‘Waste of breath, he’s not telling.’

  ‘I have to keep mum,’ Barney said. ‘Once an embalmer gets a reputation for…a loose tongue, he’s finished.’

  He gave Harry a cheeky wink, as though daring him to participate in a secret game. But Harry didn’t know the rules

  ‘They were saying on the radio that a serial killer’s on the rampage.’ Victor’s small eyes shone with excitement. ‘I heard an interview with Professor Maeve Hopes, the profiler. She says the first crime is the key. That’s when the murderer makes most mistakes, before he’s honed his skills. Fascinating, huh?’

  ‘Victor is passionate about crime scene and forensic stuff,’ Barney murmured. ‘Can’t get enough of it, he’s a walking encyclopedia. You name it—bite mark analysis, decoding the pattern of scattered bloodstains, Victor is your man.’

  As he exchanged a grin with the building manager, Harry again sensed that he’d been excluded from some private joke. He gulped down the rest of his pint. A fascination for forensics was fine for a bloke who resembled Dr. Crippen, but Harry didn’t fancy an evening in the company of a murderer’s look-alike.

  ‘I’d best be going. Must prepare for court tomorrow.’

  Victor wagged an admonitory finger. ‘You work too hard!’

  ‘Lovely to talk,’ Barney said. ‘I’m sure we’ll meet again.’

  Harry shook hands again. No question, the man reeked of something strangely distinctive. He felt a frisson of repugnance.

  ‘Don’t worry, he’s not sizing you up for a cold slab,’ Victor said. ‘Barney often drops into John Newton House. In between bodies, so to speak.’

  When Harry reached the pavement outside, he halted to take in a lungful of evening air. Victor Creevey’s words reminded him of that terrible morning all those years ago when he’d first encountered the smell that clung to Barney Eagleson.

  In a chilly mortuary, gazing down at the waxed features of his dead wife.

  The man stank of formaldehyde.

  ***

  The light on the answering machine flashed as Harry walked into his flat. He wasn’t expecting a call. It was bound to be bad news. Those clients who weren’t in trouble with the police were having their lives shredded by divorce or being ground into dust by the mills of litigation. They’d have to wait.

  The flat was in sore need of a spring cleaning. Harry was a hoarder, though he couldn’t explain even to himself why he was so reluctant to throw things away: books he’d not read for years,
music seldom played, shirts too unfashionable even for him. He walked under the shower, sluicing away the stench of the morgue. His waist was thickening; it wasn’t imagination that his suit trousers felt tight. In days gone by, he’d knocked back the pints and scoffed the chip butties without a second thought. They never made any difference. But things had changed.

  ‘You’re getting old,’ he said to the misty bathroom mirror.

  His reflection glowered back at him.

  Not exactly Tom Cruise, he was forced to admit. He’d never been vain about his appearance. Too lazy to bother too much about it. Somehow he’d attracted Liz, and later Juliet May, and they were women who could pick and choose. In the end, they both chose to live with someone else.

  Was Jim right, did he fancy Ceri Hussain? Irrelevant; he was out of her league. She’d taken a first at Cambridge, shone at both medicine and law, and written a learned treatise exploring obscure crannies of the Coroner’s Rules. Close to forty, she was as glamorous as she was successful. When conducting an inquest, she was calm, sympathetic, patient, mistress of her own emotions while relatives of the bereaved succumbed to tears and rage. He’d learned from their chat that they shared a few things in common. Ceri might be keen on ballet, Battleship Potemkin and Bartok, none of which set Harry’s juices flowing, but she also confessed to a weakness for Dionne Warwick, Don’t Look Now, and Dashiell Hammett. For an hour in the bar at the Adelphi, she’d seemed at ease in his company, but he’d made no attempt to see her again, or even contrive a chance encounter that might lead to something.

  ‘Feel the fear and do it anyway?’ he asked himself.

  His reflection cringed. Had it come to this, Harry Devlin quoting a management consultant? And what did management consultants know about fear, come to that?

  He towelled himself dry and flung on a tee shirt and shorts. The flat looked out on to the Mersey and he opened the double window and spent ten minutes gazing at the river. It was the closest he ever came to therapy. He and Liz had flown inside the Grand Canyon and been serenaded in a gondola under the Rialto. But no question, this was his favourite view in the world. He loved to watch at sundown, when it seemed to him that the shades on the water differed subtly every time. Bathed in a peach-yellow haze, even the oil depot at Birkenhead on the opposite shore took on a mystical splendour. Not long ago the United Nations had categorised the Mersey as a dead zone, because of pollution rather than the homicide rate. But their statistics were thirty years out of date; maybe they should concentrate on securing world peace. These days salmon leaped in the Mersey, although Harry wasn’t sure he was ready to swim in it.