Crane was to remember about Karl Popper and his ironic law very forcibly not long after.

FIVE

The second he opened the door Crane pushed him firmly backwards into the hall, stepped inside himself, then closed the door behind him.

‘Hey, what’s your game!’ There was a savage glint in his eyes and his fists were clenched.

‘I wouldn’t, Marvin,’ Crane said calmly. ‘There’s just you and me today, not you, me and Myrtle.’

That stopped him. Then he gave a sneery smile. ‘No flies on you is there? I hope you don’t think it’s payback time. For your sake.’

‘I’m not looking for trouble, Marvin, but I should warn you I don’t smoke, don’t drink a lot, and work out on a regular basis.’

‘Either go now, pal, or get thrown through the door.’

‘I’d do yourself a big favour and chill out, if I were you.’

But the other took a swing at him, which Crane was ready for and avoided. He then gave Jackson his right fist into the belly. It was a soft belly, with all the pints the man saw off, and air left his lungs like a burst tyre. He fell to his knees, cursing and groaning and clutching himself. It looked as if he should have done himself a favour and chilled out.

‘What was that you were saying about the tooth fairy, Marvin?’

Crane saw the woman then, standing at the kitchen door at the end of the hall. She was small and spare and had sharp, close set features. She wore a grubby yellow T-shirt and drawstring shorts. Her reddish hair was in rollers. She looked as if she’d seen it all before. ‘You silly sod!’ she cried, in a piercing voice. ‘Who do you owe money to now?’

Still clutching himself, Jackson muttered through clenched teeth, ‘All right, so it was payback time. Now piss off, will you.’

‘I told you I wasn’t looking for trouble. I’m here to ask you a couple of questions.’

‘Hey, mister, who the hell are you, anyway?’

‘Shut it, Effie.’

‘Don’t tell me to shut it, you big dozy sod.’

‘Just where were you the night your sister died, Marvin?’

He looked at Crane uneasily through slate-blue eyes. He had the plain Jackson features, not helped by the shaved head. ‘What’s it to you?’ he said, as he got wincing to his feet.

‘A lot, take my word.’

‘How would I know? It must be a year.’

‘Everyone on the Willows knew what they were doing when they found out Donna hadn’t come home, she was so well-known. It’s a bit like the Sunday morning we heard the news about Princess Di, isn’t it? It kind of sticks in the mind, And you were Donna’s brother.’

‘Don’t say you’re digging all the crap up again,’ Effie cried. ‘Not that trollop—’

‘Effie, will you for fuck’s sake keep your neb out?’

‘Nothing but trouble. Well, tell him, nothing but trouble and aggravation, that one, day she was born.’

‘You know they’ve had Bobby Mahon down at the nick, don’t you? There’s not much you miss on the Willows. Well, did you know they’re certain to release him, because they don’t believe he did it, even though he says he did.’

He hadn’t heard. He watched Crane in a puzzled silence. ‘So?’

‘So that’s why I need to know where you were that night.’

‘Here, you’re not making out it were anything to do with me?’

‘She was into you for money, wasn’t she, for some reason?’

‘Who told you that?’

‘I get paid to find things out.’

‘Into him for money!’ Effie screeched. ‘The little twat was never off his back: twenty here, twenty there, then there’s not enough to pay the sodding rent book.’

‘I’m warning you, Effie—’

‘I was glad! I was glad some bugger threw her in the frigging reservoir. Couldn’t see why he’d left it so long.’

‘One more word—’

‘Go on, you daft clown, you fancied her yourself. Think I’m blind? I know you think I’m stupid.’ Her shrill, cawing tones were suddenly raw with a distilled bitterness. Her voice resounded in the silence. Jackson had reddened, his eyes fell from Crane’s.

‘Is that what she put the bite on you far?’ Crane said, in a voice too soft for Effie to catch. ‘Did something happen between you and Donna when she was under age and you were over? Something she wanted hush money for? Something Malc would have put you in A and E about, if not a coffin?’

Jackson still couldn’t meet his eyes. ‘She didn’t need no encouragement,’ he muttered. ‘Fourteen or not.’

‘What’s going on?’ Effie scuttled along the hall. ‘What you whispering about? I’m supposed to be your partner.’

‘I was just telling him what’s likely to happen if he doesn’t get his story right about where he was the night Donna died,’ Crane told her. ‘Because now Bobby’s out of the frame they’re going to take a closer at all her other contacts’ – he gave each of them in turn a hard stare – ‘who might have been glad to see Donna out of it for one reason or another.’

Her pinched features were now as flushed as Jackson’s beneath the line of rollers. ‘He was with me, mister,’ she said hurriedly. ‘As true as God’s my judge.’

‘I don’t believe you, Effie. It was the antique guns, Marvin, yes, Dougie’s big one? You want my advice, you’ll put your hand up to that or they’re going to go after you for Donna’s killing. They’ll dig it all up, about her being into you for money and … all the rest. I reckon you’ve got two choices.’

‘Oh, shit!’ Effie wailed. ‘He’s trying to go straight, for fuck’s sake. He’s already been inside.’

‘I know, Effie, but there’s one job he’s not paid for.’

He left them standing in the hall in a numbed and wretched silence.

Crane’s mobile rang. ‘Frank Crane.’

‘Ted here, Frank. Mahon’s completely cleared. We knew he would be, but we told the silly sod that if he’d really cared about Donna it’d help us to find the real killer if he told us the truth. Well, he really had been in Leeds with the French totty. He finally came up with a postcard he’d got from her. She’d written from Fontainebleu with a full address. It’s dated four days after the Saturday in question and actually refers to the clubbing last Saturday and him being most of the night with her. He must have given her a belt round the chops so she’d not forget him …’

Once again he sat with the Jacksons in their cramped living room. Once again emotion seemed to thicken the air. ‘Dear God,’ Malc muttered, hunched in his chair and staring into space, features expressionless. ‘We were positive it were him, every last one of us.’

‘These things sometimes happen, Malc,’ Crane told him. ‘I’m very sorry. It means starting from scratch, I’m afraid. The police are aiming to re-assemble the original team who worked on it. I think we can safely leave it to them now.’

‘No, carry on, Frank,’ Connie said, in a sad, firm voice. ‘You got things going, when no one else did, even if it only showed it wasn’t Bobby.’

‘I’d like to stay with it, Connie, but you need to think about the cost.’

‘It doesn’t matter, the money. We’d not have another day’s peace of mind if we didn’t think we’d done everything we could. We owe it to our darling daughter, God rest her.’ The skin around her eyes seemed permanently roughened and red with the endless weeping of the last twelve months.

‘You go right ahead, Frank,’ Malc said in a wavering tone, dabbing his own eyes with a handkerchief. ‘It’s what we both want.’

Crane glanced at Patsy. She was as impassive as before, unable to dredge up any more emotion for her dead sister, even though she’d loved her too, with a love Crane felt was maybe surer than theirs, based as it was on her wry acceptance of what she’d known the real Donna to be like.

He got up. ‘All right, I’ll give it my best shot. I’ll be in touch. Need a lift, Patsy?’

‘Please.’

Connie and Malc saw them out as usual, standing in the light of the small lamp above the front door, Malc’s arm protectively about Connie’s bowed form. Crane had seen much human misery in his time with the force but had never been able to handle it as professionally as he should. He thought, ‘Christ, I’ll nail the bastard if it’s the last thing I do.’ He wasn’t to know that it very nearly was.