The Trawlerman, стр. 17
‘That’s true.’
‘So I don’t mind at all. In fact, I should probably thank you.’
‘Really,’ she said, standing. ‘I should go.’
‘I’m here most days if you want to talk some more. In all weathers. Out there or here at the bar.’ He stood and shook hands, rather formally. When Alex was at the door she looked back. He had sat down again, alone at the table.
She found Loftingswood Grange easily. It was a red brick Victorian house set in its own grounds, about fifteen miles north of the Younises’ house. A discreet sign on the road announced it simply as a ‘Private Nursing Home’.
Here, above the marsh, the landscape was softer, more obviously English. A giant cedar sat in the middle of sweet-smelling newly cut lawns.
The countryside was criss-crossed with ancient footpaths. She took one that ran alongside a hedgerow, parallel to an iron fence at the side of the grounds that skirted the house. Tortoiseshells and painted ladies fluttered around the hedgerow. Somewhere close, a grouse cried, then flapped into clumsy flight.
Pausing at a gap in the hedge, she looked down the slope towards a new wing, built onto the side of the house; it was low and flat, with large French windows that stood open onto the lawn so that residents in their wheelchairs could navigate their way out into the garden with ease, or be led there. There were three people sitting outside in their electric chairs. Two seemed to be asleep. The third sat fidgeting. Alex wondered if one of them was Callum, but it was too far away to see clearly.
It looked calm and placid; not the worst place to be. A young man dressed in a blue nurse’s uniform held a bottle to one patient’s mouth, giving him something to drink.
A crack of a stick ahead of her. Alex looked up. Coming towards her was a young woman, dressed like a serious birdwatcher, in jeans, a T-shirt and a utility waistcoat, carrying an SLR camera around her neck. The camera was dwarfed by its lens. ‘Afternoon,’ the woman muttered as she approached.
Instead of moving aside, Alex stepped into the middle of the narrow path, blocking her way. ‘Get anything?’
The woman stopped. ‘What you mean?’
‘Out looking for anything in particular?’
The woman smiled. ‘No. Just seeing what’s around.’ A small gap in her teeth lent her face an unexpected charm.
‘I hear there are some lesser spotted wood pigeons around,’ said Alex.
Twelve
‘Lesser spotted wood pigeons?’ said Alex again.
The woman put one hand over her camera, as if protecting it. ‘Didn’t manage to see any,’ said the woman eventually. ‘Just my luck. You?’ She stepped forward, expecting Alex to move aside, but Alex stood her ground.
‘What about a great booby?’
‘Sorry?’
‘A little bustard?’
The woman seemed to consider this for a second, then said, ‘Are you actually taking the piss?’
Alex stepped forward, closer to the woman and said in a low voice, ‘That’s a very big lens. You know it’s illegal to take photographs of people inside their own homes without their permission, don’t you?’
The woman frowned. ‘I don’t know what you’re on about.’
‘I think you probably do.’
The two women stood, toe to toe on the narrow path. ‘Who do you think you are?’ asked the photographer.
‘Nobody,’ said Alex. She took out her phone, held it up and quickly took a photograph of the young woman.
‘What the are you doing, doucheface?’
Alex replaced the phone in her bag. ‘Public space. It’s fine for me to take your picture here. Bit rude possibly, but not actually illegal, because this is a public footpath, clearly marked as such, so there is no expectation of privacy. And if any photographs of Callum Younis turn up in a newspaper, I’ve got a photograph of you, so people will know who took them.’
‘You got some nerve,’ said the woman.
‘Thanks,’ said Alex.
The woman hesitated; her tone was suddenly less hostile. ‘You know Callum, then?’ she asked.
Alex laughed. ‘Got to hand it to you. You’re a trier.’
‘Aren’t we all these days?’ In a single swift movement she lifted the camera, adjusted the lens and fired off five or six quick shots.
‘Do you know, I suppose we are.’
The woman looked at the screen on the back of her camera and gave a small smile. ‘Well. Do you? Do you know him?’
‘I should introduce myself. I’m a police officer. At least, that’s what I try to be. How about you?’
The woman smiled, showing that cute little gap again. ‘Shit,’ she said.
‘You’re OK,’ said Alex. ‘I’m not on duty. Besides, the offence would be publishing the photographs in a newspaper, not taking them, so there wouldn’t be much I could do.’ Alex hitched herself up onto the iron railing that ran alongside the path, tucking her feet onto the bottom rungs, leaving room for the photographer, but now the woman seemed less anxious to get past.
‘So what are you doing here, then?’
‘I can’t give you a decent answer either. Not one that makes any sense. What about you? How did you know the Younis boy was here?’ She nodded at the house.
‘Was at the pub in Rye last night. I had an unexpected windfall. Little bit of money came my way and I went out to celebrate. One of the nurses from the home was in there drinking and after a couple he was on about Callum. Poor lad. Can’t do anything for himself except piss and shit, apparently. Bit indiscreet, I know, but the nurse was upset about it all. He’s