shook my head. ‘He wants to tell his story before the police come for him. The press decided he was guilty twenty years ago, and so he wants to give his version before he goes before a jury, just to give himself a fighting chance.’
Harry wasn’t laughing any more. ‘And what if you decide not to go along with his plan?’ he said. ‘You could just expose him and be the man who caught Claude Gilbert.’
‘I’ll see how good his story is first,’ I said. ‘I’m still not sure it’s really him.’
‘And if it isn’t?’
‘The story runs as another hoax,’ I said, ‘and you get a bit of northern brass for your city readers to snigger at. She’s an ex-lover of Gilbert who was seeing him a few months before his wife was buried alive, and she says they’ve rekindled the romance.’
I could see Harry’s mind race through the sales figures, the syndication rights.
‘I can see that there’s an angle, but the hoax is page eight at best, not the front,’ he said. ‘You might just get your train fare back. We need Gilbert himself for the banner headline.’
I smiled. Harry hadn’t yet said anything I hadn’t expected.
‘So, where are you meeting him?’ he asked.
I shook my head. ‘She hasn’t told me yet,’ I said, and I patted Harry on the arm. ‘I’ll keep my movements quiet for now.’
‘What, you don’t trust me?’ he said, feigning a hurt look.
‘You’re an editor,’ I said. ‘You would shit in your grandmother’s shoes if you thought it would get you good circulation figures, and Claude isn’t going to come forward if there’s someone with a big lens hiding behind a tree.’
‘Okay,’ he said, chuckling again, holding his hands up in submission. ‘What do you want?’
‘An expression of interest,’ I replied. ‘Six-figure sum if it’s true. Exclusive rights.’
‘And picture rights?’
‘That depends on the big number.’
Harry nodded. ‘If you get Claude Gilbert, I’m sure we can sort something out.’
‘Good,’ I said. ‘We’ve got a deal.’
‘So what next?’ Harry asked, and he looked pleased with himself.
‘I find Claude Gilbert,’ I replied, and started walking back to the arched entrance of the underground station, the excitement of a guaranteed front page putting a smile on my face.
Frankie parked his scooter in the same place as he had the day before, near the cottage outside Turners Fold, his helmet chained and padlocked to the footboards. He clambered over the gate again and set off along the two-rut track, looking around as he went, checking that no one could see him. When he got close to where he had been the night before, the spot marked by a stick jammed into the ground, he crawled along the floor to make sure that he couldn’t be seen, his knees swishing through the long grass that gathered against the wall.
He peeped over the wall and smiled when he saw he had the same view, that he’d got it right. The bathroom window was closed now but the curtains to the bedroom were open, like they had been the night before, when he had caught her as she went in after her shower, a towel around her body.
He wanted to get closer now. He had taken a few pictures the night before. He had trained his camera on her but then turned away as her towel slipped down her body. His camera had carried on clicking though, because he knew it was different that way. He wasn’t looking at her body, he knew it was wrong to do that, but his pictures were different. They were just photographs, not really her. Not really any of them. His photographs. Just scrambles of colour.
He reached into his bag and produced his water bottle. He knew he could be there for a long time.
Then he noticed that her car wasn’t there. There was the red sports car, but the house looked dark.
It was time to get closer.
I found Susie waiting for me under the vast timetable at Victoria station as we’d arranged, conspicuous in her heels and short skirt among the backpackers and metropols. I weaved through the travellers; when I caught Susie’s eye, she rushed towards me and grabbed me by the arm.
‘About time,’ she said, her voice tetchy.
‘What’s wrong?’ I asked. ‘Why the urgency?’
‘Because I can’t smoke in here,’ she said, and she set off towards the exit.
‘Slow down,’ I said, laughing. ‘Don’t you want to know how I’ve got on?’
‘Walk and talk,’ she said. Once we got outside, she pulled a cigarette packet from her handbag and lit up quickly. She blew smoke past me and sighed. ‘Go on, what’s the news?’ she said, suppressing a cough but seeming calmer now.
‘I went to speak to my old editor.’
Susie looked suspicious. ‘You told me that much, but why couldn’t I come along?’
‘Because I didn’t want you to be annoyed if he wasn’t interested.’
‘And is he interested?’
I nodded and smiled. ‘Oh yeah, he’s buying,’ I said, although when a smile broke across her face too, I added quickly, ‘but Claude’s got to come forward. Without him, you are the story, and if it’s just you, you won’t get much more than a new handbag out of it. And it could ruin your life.’
Susie took another long pull on her cigarette, a determined look in her eyes. ‘He’ll come forward,’ she said. ‘Follow me. I know where we need to be.’
She walked off ahead of me, towards the jukebox rumble that drifted onto the street from the Shakespeare, a red-fronted pub opposite the station, though the music couldn’t compete with the constant roar of diesel engines from the stream of buses and taxis. It was a busy corner of London and right now it seemed like everyone—suits and shoppers, groups of old ladies—was leaving, heading for the trains or coach station.
Susie pointed ahead, past a double-decker heading to Brixton. ‘That’s where I first saw him, crossing the road there,’ she said. ‘He was carrying a Sainsbury’s bag, with a newspaper under his arm.’
‘So he was living around here, not just passing through,’ I said.
Susie smiled. ‘You’re sharp.’
‘So why don’t we just go to where he is, if he’s not far away?’ I said, trying hard to keep the frustration out of my voice.
‘Because this is how he wants it.’
‘And how
