Shooting in the Dark

imagining it.’
    Her voice got a little shrill there, towards the end of her speech. The eyes, if he could have seen them, maybe beginning to bulge? You set up in business as a private eye; you’re really setting yourself up for anything that comes along. She wouldn’t be the first crazy to come in off the street. Sam had sometimes played with the idea of changing the sign outside the office, so it announced him as a psychoanalyst instead of a private detective. Same kind of work in many ways. You follow up a line of clues, hope you find a crock of gold at the end. You know 50 per cent of the time it’ll be the other kind of crock, but the guy who hired you is the one paying the bills.
    There were good policemen and bad policemen, everyone knew that. Sam Turner wasn’t a bigot. Hell, Sam Turner knew there were good policemen and bad policemen even though he had never, in his entire life, met one of the good ones. Same goes for doctors. It was in their interest to make you feel secure, like they knew more about your body than you knew yourself. They couldn’t afford to let it get out that there was a whole lot more they didn’t know about disease, that when it came to matters of life and death, they were just as mortal and fallible as the rest of us.
    If Angeles Falco was fighting against the police and her doctor, it seemed to Sam that she needed a helping hand. ‘I don’t think you’re paranoid,’ he told her. ‘You don’t seem like the obsessive type. I can’t promise anything, but I’ll take the case.’
    Her shoulders relaxed, she leaned against the back of the chair. ‘I brought a thousand pounds,’ she said, drawing a long white envelope from inside her jacket. ‘Will that be enough to get you started?’
    Sam blinked, edged up to the line and was first off his mark.
     
    He took her down the stairs and she asked what was wrong with his right hand.
    ‘Got it caught in a car door,’ he said. ‘It’s not a hundred per cent at the moment. I’m seeing a physio every other day.’
    ‘Ah,’ she said. Just that one word. A vague smile played around her mouth, as if she was waiting for him to catch up.
    Sam looked down at his hand, hoping for a clue. But nothing came.
    Except a faint whiff of whisky. She’d tried to mask it with mint, maybe a mouthwash, but there’re some things you can’t hide.
    He watched her tap her way across St Helen’s Square. The stick was long, came up to her nose when she held it against her. She refused a taxi, said she had some shopping to do in the town. The crystals of frost that had covered the road earlier in the morning had now evaporated.
    Back in the office, Sam gave Celia the money in the envelope and watched while she opened it up. ‘Should keep us buoyant for a while,’ he said.
    ‘I’ll put it in the safe,’ she said, fanning the notes. ‘There are criminals around. There were bells ringing in the bank this morning. The place surrounded by policemen.’
    Sam shrugged. ‘What do you think, Celia? Is it as criminal to rob a bank as it is to start one?’
    ‘Usury used to be seen as a crime. Now they tell us it’s the only way to run the world.’ She slipped the money back into the envelope and walked over to the safe. ‘When I was a girl, we believed the meek would inherit the earth. Everyone thought that. It was taken for granted. Now it’s the exact opposite. The people who inherit the earth are the cruel and the callous. It seems to have fallen into the hands of people who have no feelings, no heart. Overbearing people.’
    ‘Hey, what happened to my optimistic secretary?’
    Celia smiled. ‘I’m still here,’ she said. ‘This must be the only office in town where everybody believes in losers.’ She put the money into the safe and closed the door.
    ‘Will you give the sister a ring?’ Sam said. ‘Isabel Reeves. See if I can see her soon as possible. Better have the story from both of them.’
    ‘I’ll do it now.’
    ‘And d’you have JD’s number?’ Sam asked.
    ‘Yes, I’m the secretary, Sam. That’s my job.’
    ‘Give him a ring, will you? See if he’s free for a few days. I’m gonna need someone to help with surveillance on these two, see if we can find who’s watching them.’
    JD Pears was a crime writer, a poker player and a drummer in a band, a voracious dope-smoker, who had come to Sam’s detective agency to do research, and ended by getting himself employed from time to time. JD’s head was full of American