Shooting in the Dark

in the frozen evening air.
    ‘You gonna be OK if we run into trouble?’
    ‘I’m a little stoned, Sam. All I’ve got to do is ride my bike, find out where the girl lives. I’m not gonna get into trouble. If trouble happens, I run away, you know that.’
    ‘You get stoned,’ Sam told him, ‘you sometimes run the wrong way.’
    ‘Don’t be a Puritan, it doesn’t suit you.’
    ‘I take it nothing’s happened here? The girls haven’t started coming out yet?’
    ‘Two separate questions,’ said JD. ‘No, the girls haven’t started coming out yet. But that doesn’t mean nothing’s happened. I had a long conversation with the lovely Marie. I think she’s starting to break down. She really fancies me, you know.’
    ‘You’re out of your skull,’ Sam said. ‘How many of those things have you smoked?’
    ‘First of the day,’ JD said, grinding the roach under his heel. ‘If I’m high, it’s with life’s possibilities.’
    Sam shook his head as the back door to the café opened, sending a shaft of light across the road. Two girls emerged with bicycles: a blonde with a red racer and a small brunette with a green Raleigh mountain bike. The second girl had a protruding jaw and small eyes and her bike had a Mickey Mouse bell.
    ‘This’s us,’ Sam said. ‘Don’t lose her.’
    JD pushed away from the kerb and wobbled over the road in pursuit of the girls. Sam rode behind him, carefully keeping his eye on the rider of the green Raleigh. Watching Geordie at the morgue, he had been struck by the fact that he could only see his friend from one point. Every observer was limited to a view from a single point but they themselves were observed from all possible angles.
    The killer of Isabel, the one who was almost certainly responsible for the death of Ralph, was an observer. If he could see his victims from another point of view, would he decide to draw back? If he could see Angeles from Sam’s point of view as well as his own, would he still be a threat to her life? And the people who observed him, the people he lived and worked with, this girl on the bike, perhaps, did any of them see him as a killer?
    The girls made a right turn on to the Stonebow, where the traffic was tailed back and cars and buses were at a standstill. The cyclists wove in and out of stationary vehicles and a slight mist came down. When they separated the blonde carried on along Peasholme Green towards Foss Bank, while the quarry took a left into Aldwark and then a right again into one of the closed courtyards.
    Sam drew level with JD and they dismounted. ‘Stay with the bikes,’ Sam told him. ‘I’ll take a look. If you hear a scream, come and save me.’ The mist was swirling now and when Sam looked back JD and the bicycles were already swallowed up.
    It was clear in the courtyard, however, and the girl with the green Raleigh only gave him a cursory glance as he came through the gate. She was wheeling the bike into a garage. Sam stood at someone’s front door and pretended to ring the bell.
    When she disappeared inside he made a note of the house number and spent the next half-hour trying to look inconspicuous as several residents arrived home from work. Finally a blue Mazda pulled through the gates and drew up to the same garage that the girl had used. Sam felt himself stiffen as soon as the driver got out of his seat. There was a shift in tension as he realized that this could be the man who attacked Angeles. Sam had not seen his face that night but he had gained an impression of his bulk and height, and the figure who was now opening the garage door fitted the bill.
    Sam kept to the shadows, watched and waited until the man let himself into the same flat as the girl, then he returned to JD.
    ‘So?’ JD said.
    ‘We’ve got the girl with the bike and a guy with blond hair about the same shape and size as the guy I saw in Angeles’ garden. We know where they live, next we have to find out who they are.’
    ‘So we follow him?’
    ‘Bright and early tomorrow morning.’
    Sam was on his bike now, but JD was kneeling at the front of his, fiddling with the dynamo. Sam waited.
    JD stood and looked at the bike then he walked around it, passing it from one hand to the other. The saddlebag was leaning over to the left and he adjusted the right strap to get it back in line. He became aware of Sam watching him and looked up, smiling.
    ‘All set?’ Sam asked.
    JD swung his leg over the crossbar. You know something, Sam? I