7

Miracle of miracles, his connection pulled into Nottingham station no more than twenty minutes late. The young taxi-driver chatted amiably as he drove, apologising for the detour necessitated by the tram tracks along Canal Street and up Maid Marian Way. 'Testing 'em, know what I mean? Putting 'em down, pulling 'em up, putting ' em down. Trams they got goin' round, five mile an hour you're lucky. First ones 'posed to be startin' next year. Same they said last year, innit?'

The house was in the Park, a large and rambling private estate near the castle. Victorian mansions originally built for those who had profited from mining and manufacturing, the sweat and labour of others. Now it was barristers and retired CEOs, new heroes of IT and dot.com.

Martyn Miles had made his money from women's fashion and a chain of hair and beauty salons, in one of which Elder's wife, Joanne, had been working when her affair with Miles began.

Miles had bought a tranche of land near the northern edge of the estate, carved out of some burgher's tennis courts and grounds, and commissioned an architect friend to design something modern yet self-effacing, a curve of concrete frontage borrowed from Frank Lloyd Wright and the New York Guggenheim. The emphasis inside was on space and light, everything arranged around a living room of double height, separated from the stone patio and garden by a wall of glass.

When her marriage to Elder had broken down, Miles had moved Joanne in. Since then, things between them had been rocky: the last Elder had heard, Miles, having moved out and magnanimously left Joanne with the keys, had thought better of it and moved back in. But things might have changed again.

Joanne's Freelander was parked outside. No sign of whatever Martyn might have currently been driving, but there he was, stretched out on the sofa, legs crossed at the ankles, pale blue linen shirt toning in with the blue-grey of the room.

'Hello, Frank.' He swung his legs round slowly and smiled. Something colourless with tonic sat within reach on the floor. 'Just holding the fort till you arrived.'

Elder said nothing. Brittle, anonymous jazz played faint through speakers unseen.

Joanne stood close against the glass, smoking a cigarette.

Opening the front door to him, she had turned her head from the kiss Elder had aimed, maladroitly, at her cheek.

'Can I get you anything, Frank?' she said now.

He shook his head.

She was wearing a silver-grey metallic dress that shivered when she moved. Make-up, even expertly applied, hadn't been able to disguise the dark skin heavy below the eyes.

'It's a good thing you came, Frank,' Miles said. 'A good thing. Get this sorted before it goes too far.'

How far was that? Elder wondered.

'These past weeks,' Miles said, 'she's been out of control. Running wild.'

'Don't exaggerate,' Joanne said.

'You wouldn't know, Frank,' Miles continued, ignoring her. 'No way you could, not living where you do. But she's been doing just as she likes, out all hours. Seventeen, I know, Frank, a young woman, but even so. Rolled up here drunk more than a few times, smelling like I-don't-know-what, some poor sod of a taxi-driver outside waiting to get paid. I've tried talking to her but she won't listen. And, besides, you might not think it's my place.'

'All that happens,' Joanne said, 'you end up losing your temper.'

'Sometimes she's enough to make a saint lose his temper.'

'You would know.'

'Okay, okay.' Miles raised both hands in resignation. 'I'll off out and get a drink, let you two talk amongst yourselves. Good to see you, Frank.'

Elder nodded.

Whistling softly, Martyn Miles slipped his feet into a pair of soft leather shoes, pulled on his leather coat, expensive and black, and left the room. Neither of them spoke until they heard the front door close.

'Sit down, Frank. Are you sure you won't have a drink? I'm having one.'

'Okay, a small Scotch'll be fine.'

'I'll see what there is.'

'Anything.'

She poured herself a large white wine, Elder a more-than-decent measure of good malt.

'She's not here, then?' Elder said. 'Katherine?'

'She came in an hour ago, changed her clothes and went out again.'

'She knew I was going to be here?'

'I told her.'

'And you don't know where she went?'

Joanne shook her head.

Elder sipped his Scotch. 'You said she was seeing someone.'

'Rob Summers.'

'Someone she knew from school, or…?'

'He's not a boy, Frank. In his twenties, maybe more.'

'You've met him, then?'

'Not met exactly.'

'And the two of them, it's serious?'

'If it was, it wouldn't be so bad. It's more casual than that, as far as I can tell. His whim, I dare say. When she's not with him, she's hanging round with all manner of riff-raff. Punks and Goths and God knows what. The kind you see lolling around the Old Market Square.'

'Jesus,' Elder said.

'I am worried about her, Frank. You know, drugs and everything.'

'She's got a level head on her.'

'You think so?'

Elder got up and paced from wall to wall. 'That psychiatrist she was seeing…'

'Psychotherapist.'

'You haven't talked to her, I suppose?'

'Katherine stopped going to her a good few months ago.'

Elder stopped close to where she was sitting on the settee. 'It's a mess, isn't it? A fucking mess.'

Reaching up, she took hold of his hand and, for a moment, until he pulled it away, rested her head against his arm.

Elder spent the night in one of the small hotels out on the Mansfield Road, took one look at the breakfast and opted instead for a brisk walk into the city centre, a coffee sitting hunched up against the window in Caffe Nero, scanning the front page of the paper someone had left behind.

The Old Market Square had been titivated since Elder had seen it last. The grassed areas towards the Beastmarket end had been landscaped and some of the old benches had been replaced. Katherine was sitting between two men of indeterminate age, bearded, shaggy-haired and scruffily dressed, cans of cheap lager in their hands. It was not yet ten in the morning.

A girl in a beaded halter top and skintight jeans, her face festooned with studs and rings, sat cross-legged on the ground.

A third man with a blond pony-tail, wearing jeans and a stained Stone Roses sweatshirt, stood with one foot balanced on the end of the bench, watching Elder as he approached.

Elder stopped a short distance away.

'Kate…'

Not looking up, Katherine continued, carefully, to roll a cigarette.

'Katherine, we have to talk.'

'Sod off,' one of the seated men said.

Katherine brought the roll-up to her mouth and licked along the edge; pulling clear a few stray strands of tobacco, she took a disposable lighter from her pocket and lit the cigarette, drawing the smoke down into her lungs. One more drag and she passed it to the man on her left.

'Katherine,' Elder said again, his voice raised and impatient.

'Leave me alone.'

'I can't.'

Elder moved closer and the pony-tailed man swung his foot down from the bench and stood in his way.

'He's police,' one of the men on the bench said. 'Fuckin' law.'

'Not any more,' Katherine said.

'Who is he then?'

'My father. He thinks he's my father.'

'Katherine

'She doesn't want to talk to you,' the pony-tailed man said. 'Can't you see?'

'Get out of the way,' Elder said.

The man grinned and stood his ground. 'Make me.'

Fists clenched tight at his sides, Elder wanted to take a swing at the sneering face and punch it as hard as he could. Instead, with one last glance at Katherine, he walked away to the sound of their jeers.