Dead Man's Time

J-cloths. Then he returned to his study.
    He wrapped the revolver in the cloths, binding them with Scotch tape, then placed the package inside one disc of the gong. He placed the other disc over it, then held the gong up and shook it.
To his immense satisfaction, there was no sound at all.
    Then, with painstaking care, he began to replace the gong in the clock, and reassemble the chiming mechanism. It was important, if anyone were to take a close look, that it was in perfect
working order.
    He finished shortly before 3 a.m. But still he wasn’t tired.
    Still he burned.
    A fire that had been lit on a February night in 1922 burned even more intensely now, early on this September morning nine decades later.
    He crushed the tiny remaining stub of his cigar out in the ashtray, then looked down once more at the page of the
Daily News
. At the four names written in the margin.
    At one in particular.
    Pollock.
    Mick Pollock.
    Pegleg Pollock.
    Then at the list of names, scribbled in his shaky handwriting, on the notepad on his desk. The ones given to him by the genealogist Martin Diplock.
    Coincidence? God’s calling cards?
    Or a dead man whose time had come?

65
    At 4 a.m. Noah began crying, wanting another feed. Feeling totally exhausted, Grace climbed out of bed and followed Cleo through into his room as she switched on the light.
    ‘Go back to bed, darling,’ she said, lifting Noah out of his cot.
    ‘I’ll sit up with you.’ In truth, he felt wide awake. He was still finding it hard to believe that the lovely Sarah Courteney was having an affair with that little shit, Gareth
Dupont. And he sincerely hoped for her sake that her thug of a husband, Lucas, never found out.
    Cleo carried Noah back into the bedroom, then sat on the edge of the bed and lowered her nightdress over her right breast. Roy Grace watched, mesmerized. This tiny creature was their son. His
son. One day he would play football with him. Cricket. Go swimming. Maybe cycling. This frail human, sucking away on Cleo’s breast. They had made this little person. Brought him into the
world. They would be responsible for him for ever.
    Cleo had a small rash above her breast. Her hair tumbled around her face as she looked down at Noah, with such deep love in her eyes that Grace felt his own eyes filling. Noah’s thin,
straggling hair was matted forward across his forehead in a way that reminded him of the character of Bill Cutting that Daniel Day-Lewis played in
Gangs of New York
.
    Throughout his career, he had confronted a few monsters. But you couldn’t pigeon-hole murderers into any one category. Some were tragic people who killed in the heat of the moment out of
jealousy, and spent the rest of their lives regretting those few minutes of madness. Some were greedy villains with no conscience, who would kill for a bag of beans. And then there were the
predators who slaked a lust by killing.
    There was one common denominator among most of the people he had ever locked up. They came from broken homes.
    He hoped that Noah would never find himself in a broken home. Cleo had been upset with him a few days ago, for working so late. Looking at the woman he loved and the child he loved, he knew, as
much as he loved his job, that if he had to make a choice right now between his career and being a good father to his son, he would quit the police tomorrow.
    Then, in his mind, he saw the photograph of Aileen McWhirter’s face – like a ghost.
    It was followed by the image of Lucas Daly’s wife, the broadcaster Sarah Courteney, with her incredibly sexy body, taking off her mask in Gareth Dupont’s bedroom. She was shagging
him? Shagging a man who had robbed and murdered her husband’s aunt?
    Just what the hell was all that about?
    Different scenarios played in his mind. Had Gareth Dupont targeted her as an unwitting stooge? Perhaps to get information about the old woman’s movements? He was casting his mind back to
the visit he had paid her at her Shirley Drive home, with DS Batchelor. She had told him then she was close to Aileen McWhirter. She had also seemed genuinely upset over her death. Crocodile
tears?
    He didn’t think so. She had a bullying husband, which made her vulnerable; had Gareth Dupont preyed on that? That was the most likely scenario, he decided. He’d called her, to try to
make an appointment to go and talk to her again – without her husband present – but she told him she was out of town for two days, working on a pilot