The Trawlerman, стр. 31

‘Why would you want to do that?’

‘I need a career change,’ she said.

When Curly laughed it was like sun breaking out behind clouds. ‘Seriously. Why?’

‘From Monday morning, I’m going to be stuck behind a desk.’

His smile vanished as quickly as it had appeared. ‘Is this about Frank Hogben? You were asking Bill about him.’

‘Yes. It is.’

‘He fell overboard. He wasn’t much of a fisherman.’

A gull landed on the cab of Curly’s truck, head cocked, one eye on the fish boxes.

‘I just want to see.’

‘See what?’

‘I don’t know.’

He thought about this for a while. ‘Working boats aren’t big. They don’t usually take people who aren’t crew.’

‘I understand.’ She stood a little while longer.

A second gull landed on the roof and the two birds started bickering loudly.

‘It was just a thought.’ She turned and started to walk back to her car.

She was almost at the track when she heard the crackle of tyres behind her. When he was alongside her, he leaned out of the window. ‘I could ask around,’ he said. ‘If that’s what you want.’

‘I’d appreciate that.’

When he reached the track he floored the accelerator, sending black smoke out of his exhaust. The speed limit around here was twenty miles an hour. Curly had been born here and didn’t think regulations like that applied to him.

And then she saw two cars, blue lights flashing, coming down the road towards them and watched Curly slow, as if he thought they were coming for him.

The first car sped to the end of the track, pulling over to park just after the old lighthouse. The second slowed as it approach Alex.

There was a woman she didn’t recognise behind the wheel, but Colin Gilchrist was in the passenger seat.

‘What’s going on?’

‘They found signs of someone camping up at the firing ranges. They think it’s Robert Glass . . . the suspect. We’re heading that way up the beach.’

The army firing ranges were huge, taking up the whole of the north-west of the spit of land up to Camber. Finding someone there would not be easy.

‘What’s his story? Robert Glass.’

The woman next to him coughed. ‘Dunno. Listen. We have to go.’

Alex leaned a little closer. ‘By the way, I think we have a mutual acquaintance. Georgia Coaker.’

‘Oh,’ he said.

She had checked Facebook. Georgia Coaker and Colin Gilchrist had been at primary school together. ‘Be careful who you talk to in future, Colin. Do you understand? They could kick you out for that.’

She watched the blush as blood rushed to his neck and ears and thought of Terry Neill and his banana.

She leaned in closer still. ‘I won’t tell. But I want you do to something for me. OK?’

As she drove off, Alex heard the driver ask, ‘What’s all that about?’

She watched them drive up the road, park and take their Kevlar jackets out of the boot. A gust of wind blew down the shoreline, shivering the sea kale and sending hair into Alex’s eyes.

Far off she saw a figure sitting on the back step of Arum Cottage.

She drove on up the track, turning up towards home, parking outside his house.

Getting out, she opened the boot. Bill South sat with a glass of whisky in his hand.

‘I came to say sorry,’ she said.

He nodded. ‘Not your fault.’ He lifted his glass and took a sip. ‘Want one?’

‘Not much. If it’s any consolation, Terry Neill said he was completely taken in too.’

Bill chuckled, took another swig. ‘Terry Neill isn’t going to miss it, believe me. Have you seen his house?’

‘Bitter doesn’t suit you, Bill. That house would be a bit flashy for you, I’d have thought.’

Bill nodded. ‘Your daughter says we shouldn’t need money anyway.’

Alex laughed. ‘That’s the kind of interesting thing she says.’ She held a hand out towards him; he took it with the one he wasn’t holding a glass with and gently squeezed it. ‘You told her to go away though.’

‘I wasn’t really in the mood. What are all the coppers doing on the beach?’

‘They think a suspect in the Younis case might have been camping rough by the ranges.’

‘Bob Glass?’

Alex stared at Bill. ‘You know him?’

‘He’s been around here all summer, living here and there. You never notice anything, do you? So they reckon Bob killed Ayman and Mary Younis?’

‘He had been squatting in a field behind their house. They think he argued with Ayman Younis about something. What do you think?’

‘He’s not a well man. Ex-army. Talks like he was well educated. He was in Afghanistan and Iraq. Saw all his friends blown to bits, I heard.’

‘Kill them all, God will know his own.’

‘What?’

‘It’s what the killer wrote on the walls in Mary Younis’s blood. Maybe that’s a man who had seen everyone around him die.’

‘It’s terrible, the way we throw some men away,’ said Bill self-pityingly, and he raised his glass to his lips, though it was empty already. ‘Saw you talking to Curly,’ he said.

‘You don’t miss much, even when you’re drunk.’

‘Good spot, this. You can see most things from here. Some wind coming in tonight.’

‘I was asking if he’d get me on one of the fishing boats going out of Folkestone. A ride along, so to speak.’

He dropped her hand. ‘What the hell you want to do that for?’

‘I’m not sure, Bill. I’m back to work on Monday. Light duties.’

‘Bully for you.’

‘McAdam has got me seconded to some analyst research project into crime reporting methodology. My life is over, Bill.’

‘Speak for yourself.’

She sighed. ‘You know I’ll give you the money, Bill. Just ask.’

‘Nope.’

‘I have savings.’

‘My own stupid fault I lost the money.’

‘The offer stands.’

‘Me an ex-cop, and an ex-con, and I fell for it.’

‘Don’t beat yourself up, Bill. Come here.’ She beckoned him. ‘I bought you a present to cheer you up.’

He put down his glass and took her hand again, this time so she could pull him up. He was drunker than she had thought, and stumbled a little towards her, ending up with his arms around her. ‘Sorry,’ he mumbled, stepping