“I’m gonna kill this sick fuck.” Ray thumped the dashboard of the van. It was clear that he was fighting to stay angry. Personally I think he was a little confused and more than a tad worried that she had in fact run off with someone else. We pulled up outside Beth’s house. The darkness of the inside seemed to grey the white paint on the outside. Ray and I stood outside the front door looking at it pensively.
“You haven’t got a key to your girlfriend’s house?”
“No.”
“She’s got one to yours.”
“I trust her.”
“So, she doesn’t trust you?”
“I’ve got no reason to come here. I don’t need a key.”
“It’s nicer than your place.”
“But it’s not my place.”
Mike opened Beth’s front door from the inside after he had scaled the back wall, the bathroom roof and levered a window. I could see a big wet footprint behind him on the carpet and back up the stairs
“Why’s your foot wet?”
“My guess is that he put his foot in the toilet.”
“As he stepped in the window.”
“Total schoolboy.”
“OK. I feel like an amateur. Where does she keep her towels?”
Beth’s tiny stone house had a Baltic chill. Someone had obviously cut the power before abducting her and I imagined how terrified she would have been as the lights went off, the telephone went dead and she felt the cold, flat blade pressed against her neck. The fear of being bundled into the boot of the car, trying to remember the sounds of passing church bells, the smell of a brewery and the feeling of the tires traveling over a level crossing. I felt like an interloper and I knew she would hate us for snooping around her flat. Mike strutted about, pecking and snooping and picking up any interesting object that took his eye until he came to the kitchen where he literally rooted in her cupboards predictably for food. Upstairs, Ray was sniffing about her bedroom, upturning pillows, pulling out drawers and overturning the contents with his good hand like a food mixer.
“What are you looking for exactly?” I stood in the doorway arms crossed.
“I dunno, there’s gotta be something here. It’s like what they all do in all the films innit?”
“It’s like what does in which films?”
“Just help me will you.” Ray barely looked up.
“Are you sure this isn’t an excuse just to go through her stuff?”
“Well yeah, clearly but...aha.” Ray emerged from under her bed with his prize, Beth’s diary. I wondered how long his broad toothy smile would remain.
“Just remember, I had nothing to do with this or that.” I said pointing at the diary. Ray looked confused, the smile dropped and the diary subtly became a proxy weapon in his hand.
“Is there something you’re not telling me here? Now’s your chance.”
“No you Ray you idiot, there’s not anything I want to tell you apart from the fact that none of this will help us get Beth back. We are better off telling your friend PC Derringer and doing things properly this time.” There was a pause whilst Ray thought about what I’d just said. I turned and looked down the stairs for Mike. I could see him down in the kitchen. He had found some chocolate digestives and was bizarrely counting them. “Ray?” Ray had his head submerged in the diary and his finger scanned across the pages as he attempted to decipher Beth’s nocturnal scrawl.
“I know where she is.” Ray looked up from Beth’s bed he was sat on.
“Really?”
“Yes.” He snapped the hard backed diary shut like a shell.
“Where?” Mike joined me at the door with chocolate smeared round his stubble. His foot was still leaving damp impressions everywhere.
“
I knew how Mike felt as he launched himself at Ray. We’d broken into Beth’s house, stamped toilet water and untold dirt though it, then rifled through everything she owned including her most personal belongings only to discover that it was completely unnecessary. A burglar would have been more careful. When Beth’s interest was at the centre of our hearts, we were there in good faith. Now it just felt wrong breathing her bedroom air. Right now, the last thing we needed was for her bed to collapse under the weight of Ray and Mike rolling around on it like sea otters.
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