I dredged up an approving grin for him—the kid had earned a pat on the head—and I was starting to ask how he snapped, when it hit me. The sick dull crack of Shay’s head off the wall, his mouth falling open as he hung limp by the neck from Da’s big hands. Ma screaming Look what you’ve done now, you bastard, you’re after killing him, and Da’s thick hoarse voice Serve him right. And Cooper: The attacker caught her by the throat and slammed her head repeatedly against a wall.

Something in my face worried Stephen; maybe I was staring. He said, “What?”

“Nothing,” I said, swinging my jacket on. Matt Daly, flat and final: People don’t change. “You’re doing a good job, Detective. I mean that. Get in touch as soon as you’ve got those phone records.”

“I will, yeah. Is everything—”

I found twenty quid and shoved it across the table at him. “Sort the bill. Let me know right away if the Bureau turns up a match to those unknowns on the suitcase, or if Detective Kennedy tells you when he’s planning to close out this investigation. Remember, Detective: it’s down to you and me. We’re all there is.”

I left. The last thing I saw was Stephen’s face, watery through the glass of the café window. He was holding the twenty quid and watching me go, and he had his mouth open.

Chapter 16

16

I kept walking for another few hours. Along the way I cut down Smith’s Road past the entrance to the Place, the way Kevin had been meant to go after he dropped Jackie to her car Sunday night. For a good stretch of the way I had a clear view of the top back windows of Number 16, where Kevin had taken his header, and I got a quick over-the-wall glimpse of the first-floor ones; after I went past the house, if I turned around, I got a full view of the front while I passed the top of Faithful Place. The street lamps meant that anyone waiting inside would have seen me coming, but they also turned the windows a flat, smoky orange: if there had been a torch lit in the house, or some kind of action going on, I would never have spotted it. And if someone had wanted to lean out and call me, he would have had to do it loud enough to risk the rest of the Place hearing. Kevin hadn’t wandered into that house because something shiny caught his eye. He had had an appointment.