The Lover's Children novel Chapter 104

KLEMPNER

It’s chaos. I daresay it’s organised chaos, but to my untutored and unfamiliar eye, the mass of people, enquiry kiosks, uniforms in blue and white and green, and corridors leading off in all directions is a kaleidoscope of confusion.

Queues of people jostle and hustle for glass-fronted attention desks, some tapping into information screens, others muttering and complaining over the shoulders of those ahead of them.

Blocks to right and left are taken by banks of chairs, designed apparently with discomfort in mind, half-occupied by the waiting public. Beside the blocks, ticket dispensers stand beside vending machines, currently offering the best in healthy eating and gourmet coffee to some unsuspecting sucker with his arm in a sling.

Marching along the seated ranks, I scan the waiting people. No luck. Instead, I make my way along the queues. Hoodie’s not there either.

Cursing, I spin, then picking a random corridor, dash to the first corner, trying to spot him in the welter of blue-uniformed nurses, white-coated doctors, green-robed orderlies. Reversing back into the main lobby, I try a different corridor. Still no joy.

Jumping onto one of the seats, I raise myself above the crowd, searching for my man.

Damn!

*****

MICHAEL

Danny finds me a bag from somewhere behind the bar. Turning it inside out to use as a kind of glove, to avoid smearing my own prints onto the glass, I stow Pat’s beer bottle inside then knot it closed

As for heading home, Danny’s right to be cautious of course, but she’s not the stalker’s target and walking her back from the Sapphire Club is uneventful.

At her door, I think for a moment she’s going to try to kiss me. Instead, she offers me her hand. “Night, Michael. Thanks so much.”

“My pleasure, Danny. Sleep tight.”

As the door closes behind her, I consider my options…

Return to the Sapphire Club?

Is there any point? It would be closed by now.

Find a late-night bar and see what develops?

What’s Klempner doing?

As I haver over whether I should call him, my mobile flashes up an incoming…

location attached. get ur ass here pronto. hoodie followed women. i’m on him now. get woman out of here

Christ!

I tap in a reply, then set off at a run…

*****

Twenty minutes later…

You have reached your destination…

Gulping at my air-dried throat, I drop hands to knees, trying to grab enough air to quell the stitch jabbing at my ribs.

Straightening up in the middle of the deserted street, I revolve.

Fuck!

Of course, sending a location via mapping app is an entirely sensible approach in itself. But an address would have been useful.

Both sides of the road are populated by three and four-storeyed properties of the kind that once housed the prosperous middle classes, but these days are broken up into apartments. If I count only the two or three houses to my left and right, in front or behind, there must be sixty separate addresses within fifty yards.

To the East, the sky is paling, but at five in the morning, there’s not a lit window in sight. Still, to say it’s as cool as it’s going to be, the night air is oppressively warm.

On the off-chance, I message Klempner.

am at location wot address?

But after five minutes, there’s no reply.

Ask Danny?

Then I curse as it dawns on me I don’t have her number.

Trotting up the nearest set of stone steps to a door, I read through a dozen names. There’s no Martina listed. Trotting down again, I try the next building. There’s an M. Barrett and an A. M. Williams.

Fifteen minutes later I have a dozen addresses with an M for a first name, but no firm fix for a Martina.

Propping myself against a streetlamp, I wait. No one’s up and about yet, or likely to be for at least an hour.

Looks like it’s going to be a long night….

*****

Around six, a bread delivery van rattles by, followed by a couple of cars. A door opens at the top of a set of steps and a woman in cleaner’s overalls comes out. I interrupt her. “Excuse, me. I’m looking for Martina. She lives around here somewhere.”

She gives me an odd look... “Sorry, don’t know her…” and trots on.

Another five minutes and a man in a blue boiler suit comes up from a basement apartment. As he unlocks a van, “Sorry to bother you, but I’m trying to find a woman called Marty who lives here somewhere. Or you might know her as Lily.”

He pauses, ponders, then, “No, doesn’t ring a bell. What’s she look like?”

“Tall, dark. Hispanic type. Very pretty.”

He swings his head. “No. Don’t think so.” Then, suspicion lurking under beetled brows. “How come you’re looking for her if you don’t know where she lives? And you don’t know her name either?”

Crap…

I’m making myself look like a stalker.

“Oh… I, um… I need to talk to her.”

Radiating disbelief, the plumber taps his nose then drives off.

Perhaps I should bring in the police anyway?

But Klempner was specific I shouldn’t.

Marty gestures to the girl. “My flatmate, Lindsey.” Then, to me… “Michael, Charlotte and… I’m sorry?”

“James.” He steps forward, offering his hand. “James Alexanders.”

Lindsey makes to rise. “If you need to talk, I’ll eat in my room.”

But Michael interrupts her. “No, you should stay too. It may affect you as well.”

“Okay…” Marty sets fists on her hips, arms akimbo. “You want to talk. So… talk.”

“Last night, the man from the club who’s been worrying you, followed you home.”

Her lips part. “How do you know? You followed him?”

“Not me, but Larry that you met with me last night, did. He followed him here, and then kept after him when he moved on. So far as I know, he’s still on his trail now.”

Her mouth opens and shuts. Opens and shuts again. Then she sits, almost drops, onto the settee. “He followed me all the way here?”

“Yes, I don’t know the details yet, but yes, he followed you. Whatever you thought Marty, he does know where you live.”

James nudges Charlotte, who takes the cue, sitting beside the girl, taking her hand in her own. “It’s really important you tell us about this man.”

Marty nods, swallowing hard. “Sure.” Her voice is shaky. “What do you want to know?”

“That’s better. We don’t mean to frighten you, but you need to take this seriously. Now, how often is he coming to the club? Every night?”

“No, not every night, but regularly.”

“Particular nights?”

She considers. “He’ll turn up two nights out of three one week, then not at all the next week. But then I run into him during the day instead.”

“During the day? Where?”

“Different places. The first time it happened, I was shopping, down at the market. I dropped something. He picked it up, then offered to buy me a coffee.”

“Did you accept?”

“No, I said I was busy. But another time he was already there in a coffee bar I use. He laughed and said it was a coincidence…” She wraps her arms around herself, ducking her head. “I… I tried to convince myself it was just a coincidence. Guess I was fooling myself.”

James has listened in silence so far, but now he breaks in. “You say he comes to the club several nights at a time some weeks, but not at all other weeks? But then you meet him during the daytime?”

“That’s right.”

“Sounds like a shift worker to me,” he muses.

Her lips part. “I’d not thought of that. Yes, it’s just like that. But look, why are you all here? Okay, I’ve got a stalker. I’ll call the police and…”

“Marty, we have good reason to think that he’s not just any stalker. We think he may be the killer you’ll have seen in the papers, the one they’re calling the Surgeon.”

“The Surgeon?” She pales. “But he’s…” Her voice falls to a whisper… “He’s hunting prostitutes. That’s what it says on the news. I’m a dancer. Not a prostitute.”