Thicker Than Water

’ I picked up the sheets and stared at them with a certain wonder. ‘Thanks, Gary. I wasn’t expecting this.’

He didn’t answer, but it was clear from his face that there was something else on his mind, so I waited for him to spit it out. ‘Fix, I took a hard fall for you last year when you had me looking into that crematorium thing. And you never really told me what it was all about.’ It wasn’t an accusation. His expression was sombrely reflective.

‘A lot of people ended up dead,’ I reminded him. ‘I didn’t want to put you in an awkward situation.

‘You never apologised to me for getting my legs broken, either.’

‘I said sorry in my own way, Gary.’

‘By never referring to it again and dodging the subject whenever I brought it up.’

‘Exactly.’

He sho‹sizdthok his head. ‘You can be a right bastard when you want to, Fix,’ he said.

‘All right,’ I agreed. ‘I’m a bastard. It’s a gift. But I failed the police entrance exam so I never turned it into a career.’

Gary didn’t seem to be listening, so my attempt to drag the conversation back onto the well-worn tracks of our usual repartee fell flat.

‘But bastard or not,’ he said, ‘you usually look as though you know what you’re up to. As though you’ve got some kind of a game plan. This time - it’s like you’re flailing around waiting for someone to tell you what to do. Or waiting for Ruth to put the collar on you.’

It was close enough to the truth to sting a little, but I shrugged it off because I got the distinct impression that Gary was trying to tell me something.

‘It’s more complicated than it looks,’ was all I said.

‘Oh, I’m sure.’ Gary nodded sourly. ‘And if I came out and asked you, as a friend, if you knew who’d killed Kenny Seddon, what would you say?’

‘I’d say, Gary - as a professional exorcist and former police informer - that I don’t have a fucking clue.’

He searched my face. ‘Honestly?’

I nodded. ‘Honestly. Why, you think Basquiat’s right? You think I’m in some kind of conspiracy?’

‘If she thought you were in a conspiracy,’ he pointed out dourly, ‘you’d be nicked already and sitting in a remand cell in Jackson Road.

‘In hospital pyjamas.’

‘Until they could fit you for prison ones. She didn’t arrest you because she’s got a warrant out on someone else. We matched one of those sets of fingerprints.’

Relief left me momentarily speechless, the conclusions I’d been building to falling down like a card house inside my head. ‘Who?’ I demanded, after a long pause for thought."

"Gary shook his head.