Dead Man's Time

Batchelor said. ‘My wife was in the travel business.’
    ‘Never,’ Jack Alexander said. ‘If there’s a chance, I’d love to go to Abercrombie and Fitch.’
    Grace thought about getting something for Cleo. They’d recently watched the movie
Breakfast at Tiffany’s
on television – and he wondered now if there would be anything
in that store he could afford.
    ‘We’ll make time,’ Lanigan said. ‘This is a great city, know what I’m saying? Beautiful people. We’ll get these bastards, and maybe we’ll have time for
fun too. First thing on my list to tell you, Roy: we checked out the hotel addresses put down on the immigration forms by Eamonn Pollock, Gavin Daly and Lucas Daly. None of them showed up at those
hotels.
    ‘There’s a bunch of different ways of searching for a hotel – or
hotels
– the suspects might be staying in. We’ve checked the US customs forms for all
three. They’ve all given false addresses. But they’ll have used credit cards on check-in. I’m having my team check to see if the details are merely held on the hotel records until
check-out or if they are put through. If they are put through, then we’ll find them that way.’
    ‘And if not?’
    ‘Plan B.’
    ‘Which is?’
    ‘These are wealthy guys, right, Daly and Pollock? They won’t be staying in some shithole. We’ll start with all the five-star hotels in Manhattan and work our way through
them.’
    ‘Makes sense.’
    ‘Okay, so we’ll get you checked in. I’ve booked you into the Hyatt Grand Central, which is a good location for you. Then I was going to take you to Mickey Mantle’s
– remember it, Roy?’
    ‘You took me there last time I was here, I remember. He was a big baseball star.’
    ‘You guys would have liked it. Great food – simple, nothing fancy; great burgers, great everything – but it’s closed. But I know a great Italian. You guys like
pasta?’
    ‘Sounds like a plan,’ Grace said.

86
    Amis Smallbone had a plan, too. It was 10.30 p.m. Earlier in the day he had watched Roy Grace kiss his beloved Cleo goodbye on their doorstep, then walk across the courtyard
with his suitcase, and let himself out through the gate. It was a fine, sunny day, and around midday, Cleo had taken their baby out in his pushchair, returning mid-afternoon.
    Apart from a brief break at midday to go downstairs into the kitchen and microwave a steak pie and some frozen peas for his dinner, he’d sat up here in his chair, behind the net curtains,
watching the courtyard and the front door of the Grace house.
    Shortly after 4 p.m. a smartly dressed and quite handsome woman in her mid-fifties had arrived at the house. Cleo’s mother.
Mummy
, she had called her.
Mummy
had stayed
for two hours.
Mummy
said she would return tomorrow morning at 10 a.m. with
Daddy
, and they would take Cleo and Noah out, looking at houses in the country.
    Which meant the house would be empty for several hours. Perfect. He might pop over and take a look around, although, from the plans, he already knew the layout of the place.
    He poured himself another whisky and lit another cigarette.
Noah Grace. What was your daddy planning to teach you about life?
    He remembered his own father, Maurice. Not with affection, but with respect. His one abiding memory was from when he was a small child; he could not remember his age, exactly, maybe six or
seven. His father had stood him on the kitchen table, then blindfolded him and told him to jump into his arms.
    Amis had stood there, petrified, swaying, for some moments. His father had urged him, ‘Jump, Amis. Just tumble forward into my arms. I’ll catch you.’
    Finally he had let himself go. His father had not caught him, but had stood, several paces back, with his hands in his pockets. Amis Smallbone’s face had smacked so hard onto the kitchen
floor he had broken two teeth and his nose.
    Then his father had removed the blindfold, dabbing his face with a cloth. ‘Let that be a lesson to you, son. Never trust anyone in life, not even your own father.’
    Smallbone had never forgotten that moment. His mother standing there, lamely watching. Cowed and bullied by his father into silent acceptance of all that he did to his children in the name of
toughening them up.
    When he was fourteen, his father made him accompany him on his rounds as a debt collector. Knocking on doors of shitty dwellings, opened by tearful women or scared men. Sending them scurrying
off into back rooms, scuffling