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truth being he was just big. Like natural bullies, he’d survive anywhere. I said,
    “He’d what? End up like me?”
    Her face showed she hadn’t meant that. She hadn’t, as the Americans say, “connected the dots” or “done the math”. I realised with a jolt she probably didn’t think about me at all.
    She said,
    “I’m sorry, Jack, I didn’t mean anything. Anyway, I started to nag; it’s what women do when they’re frightened. I tried to stop but it was like the devil was in me. Tim has a temper, and he lost it.”
    The current buzz expression, excuse abuse. Losing it has replaced vicious fucker in every sense. A guy shoots his family, says, “I lost it.”
    I was losing it myself, asked,
    “Just the once?”
    Barbed wire in every nuance.
    “Sorry?”
    “He walloped you one time, that it?”
    “Yes.”
    She was lying and I could understand that, maybe even sympathise a little. A thought struck her and, alarmed, she went,
    “You won’t do anything, Jack?”
    “Do? What could I possibly do? He’s a guard.”
    Then the worst moment: she grabbed my hand and I felt the electricity. Christ, you build a wall round your feelings, a veritable fortress to insulate your nerve endings, and one lousy touch, the whole defence crumbles. Fuck and fuck again. She was pleading,
    “Jack, I need you to promise, give me your word.”
    I stood up, felt almost dizzy and definitely nauseous. I reached for some money, scattered it on the table, said,
    “I can’t promise that.”
    Got outside and the rain was teeming down. When the fuck did that happen? My white shirt was drenched and a passing car sprayed a wave of dirty water over my pants. I could have killed somebody. Turned left, muttered,
    “I have an investigation to do. That’s what I’ll do, I’ll investigate.”
    Passing the Abbey, a fellah I think I knew said,
    “Talking to yourself, that’s not a good sign.”
    Tell me about it!

“For evil arises in the refusal to acknowledge our own sins.”
    Scott Peck, People of the Lie

 
    When I got to Newcastle Park, the house where Sarah Bradley had lived, I had to kick-motivate myself. The voice going,
    “What a waste of time, not to mention bloody reckless.”
    I knocked on the door, opened by an extremely ugly girl in dungarees and bare feet. Dirty bare feet.
    She snapped,
    “What?”
    Like that.
    I was tempted to say,
    “Well, you could wash your feet for a start.”
    Began my spiel as I fast-flicked my wallet at her. It had an expired driver’s licence and my library card.
    “Sorry to bother you. I’m from Mutual Alliance, and there is a life policy on your former flatmate, Sarah Bradley. I need to check a few points.”
    She shouted over her shoulder,
    “Peg, there’s some guy from the insurance company, are you decent?…oh…I’m Mary.”
    I didn’t catch the muffled reply, but it didn’t sound like welcome. Mary waved me in, moving ahead of me down a hall. The student aroma of curry, feet, beer, trainers and forced bonhomie. Peg wasn’t much to look at either, but she wasn’t having a problem with it. Dressed in a thigh-slit nightie, she came down the stairs, yawning. Her body language suggested she knew how to utilise that body.
    She said in a Beavis/Butthead accent,
    “Shit, I need some coffee, like yesterday.”
    She probably hadn’t studied Clueless but she’d definitely taken lessons from Popular .
    I was staring at the foot of the stairs, where Sarah had died.
    Peg said,
    “Let’s park it in the kitchen.”
    Now she was Susan Sarandon. I followed. The room was like it had been hit by a careless bomb. Clothes, books, CDs, empty Chinese cartons (least I hoped they were empty), tights, bras, wine bottles with stubs of candles and discarded roach papers.
    Mary was making coffee, asked,
    “Get you some?”
    “No, I’m good.”
    I perched on a hard chair, got my notebook out, said,
    “Just a few questions and I’m…like gone.”
    See how Peg liked the echo treatment. It didn’t