The Trawlerman, стр. 23

‘No. And I’m happy that way, Jill, so don’t start.’

‘Are you?’

‘You’re the one who’s always after a boyfriend, not me.’

At twenty-five, Jill was at that age where she worried it might never happen. ‘I’m not always after a boyfriend,’ she complained. ‘Not, like, every second.’

Jill was up early, eating Zoë’s granola at the breakfast table, her appetite back in force. As always, she looked fresh and immaculate. ‘Is that a clean shirt?’ Alex asked.

‘I always keep one in a bag in the car. And clean knickers. Just in case.’

‘In case of what, exactly?’

‘Shut up,’ said Jill.

Alex looked in the sink. There was already a bowl in it. ‘Zoë up already?’

‘Said she was going to get a lift with Bill to the Wildlife Trust. We had a good little chat, her and me.’

‘What about?’

‘You, obviously.’

‘Obviously.’ Alex sighed, made herself a coffee and sat down beside her. ‘Still no sign of the Unknown Male?’

Jill checked her phone again. ‘Nothing so far. Early yet. I’ll let you know.’ She wiped oat milk from her mouth. ‘I had nightmares too,’ she said. ‘About that bloody starfish.’

‘What do you mean, “too”?’

‘You. Last night.’ She reached out a hand and laid it on Alex’s and gave a sympathetic smile. Alex looked back, warily.

— Let me get this straight. You are concerned that you may be deliberately putting yourself into dangerous situations?

— I wanted to chase after the man. He was clearly hiding for a reason. On a rational level I know it would have been a stupid thing to do. But at that moment I felt . . . I won’t say great, but I felt . . . connected.

— That’s an interesting word.

— ‘Interesting’ as in ‘revealing’?

— Let’s turn it around. Do you not feel connected the rest of the time? When you’re with your daughter? When you’re with me, now?

— Of course I do.

— But you would feel more connected when you are in a situation in which harm might come to you?

— You make me sound like some kind of junkie.

— It’s a question. Why is it important to go to places where you feel harm might come to you?

— It’s a loaded question. I didn’t go there because I wanted a man in commando gear to creep up on me.

— But you did want to run after him?

— I suppose. Fair point.

— OK. Let’s leave that. I don’t want to push you anywhere you don’t want to go. How are the superpowers?

— Coming along nicely. Do you believe in ghosts?

— Have you seen one?

— I’m not sure. Can I get back to you on that?

There was a traffic stop on the Dymchurch Road. Alex cycled past the waiting cars and recognised the lanky figure of Colin Gilchrist leaning towards one of the drivers’ windows.

‘About six foot tall, dressed in military fatigues,’ he was saying to the driver, a woman who had three children in the car who were craning forward in their seats, trying to hear every word.

‘Any luck?’

Colin Gilchrist smiled shyly when he saw her. ‘Sorry about last time.’ In small, unexaggerated movements, he mimed leaning over and throwing up.

Stepping back from the roadside to let another officer take his place, he said, ‘Plenty of people say they’ve seen him. Hard to miss because he dresses like a squaddie. It appears he’s been living rough around here for about six weeks. Even a couple of complaints from farmers about him being on their land, but finding him, not so easy.’

‘He’s always dressed like that, then?’

‘We think it’s a man named Robert Glass. Ex-serviceman, Second Battalion, The Rifles. He was living rough around Folkestone for a while. We’d been aware of him. Minor drug offences.’

‘Somebody who knew about guns,’ observed Alex.

Colin nodded towards the west. ‘If it’s him, I bet he would have trained at Lydd on the rifle ranges.’

The Lydd ranges were just a few miles away on Dungeness.

‘Nice bike,’ he called as she pushed off to head home.

She reached the Dungeness estate in twenty minutes, sweating hard, and slowed on the uneven concrete track.

As she passed the bungalow where Tina and Stella were staying she spotted a third figure sitting next to them. She paused and waved, but Zoë didn’t seem to notice her.

Jill’s Fiat was parked behind the house. Jill had taken one of the pink cushions that she kept on her back seat out of the car and was lying on the shingle slope with her head resting on it.

‘Back so soon?’ Alex wheeled her bike to the small brick shed behind the house.

Jill sat up and removed her Jackie O sunglasses. ‘I’m taking you out for a meal.’

‘Why?’

‘Do I have to have a reason? You’re my mate.’

Alex closed the shed door and walked over to where her friend was lying. ‘What exactly was Zoë saying to you this morning?’

‘I ain’t going to lie, Alex. She said she didn’t think you were eating properly and if Zoë, who seems to live on air, is saying that, things would have to be pretty bad.’

‘Did she know about this? Did she ask you to talk to me.’

‘Yes.’

‘Oh God.’

‘Because she’s worried about you. Go on then. Put something on. I’m not taking you in that cycling gear.’

‘I’m tired,’ Alex said. ‘I don’t feel like being around people.’

Jill put her sunglasses on and laid her head back on the pillow. ‘I won’t tell you what I found out about the Biosfera scam then.’ And with that, she knew she had her.

The meal, however, in the nearby town of Rye, did not go well.