Dead in the Water

“I guess I owe you some money.”

Mullen nodded again.

Janice Atkinson was studying him intently. “Cat got your tongue?”

Mullen knew he should say something, but the words wouldn’t come. He wondered if she was going to burst into tears. He ought to carry a packet of tissues for times like this. It ought to be part of the private eye’s standard kit.

But Janice didn’t cry. Instead she picked up her cup in her right hand. Her fingers and thumb were tight as pliers around it. For a moment Mullen thought it might shatter in her hand. Or was she going to hurl cup and green tea all over him? After such bad news, he would hardly have blamed her if she did.

Mullen knew he had to say something. “Actually,” he said, “It’s the first time I’ve done this.”

If he hoped to elicit sympathy, he failed miserably. “I bet you enjoy it, don’t you? Poking into other people’s secrets and lies?” She leant forward, hissing her fury. “What sort of man are you, Mullen?”

He winced. He felt her pain, but he knew his own too. “Look, I didn’t enjoy it. Not one little bit. But I need the money. Anyway, it was you who answered my advertisement.”

They glared at each other for several seconds. Then she dropped her gaze, her anger apparently spent. “Sorry.” Her voice was a whisper again. She leant forward. An observer might have assumed they were close, even intimate. “It’s my first time too.” Mullen shifted uneasily in his seat. He wanted to leave, but she hadn’t paid him yet.

As if reading his mind, she pulled a smaller envelope out of her bag and held it nonchalantly in her hand.

“What’s her name?”

Mullen said nothing. He hadn’t intended to tell Janice in case she went round to the woman’s house and beat her half to death. He imagined she was more than capable of it.

“What’s the name of the bitch that is sleeping with my husband?”

Mullen tried a final, futile defence.

“Does it matter?”

“Name and address.” She waved the envelope in the air. “Then, and only then, do I pay you.”

He could probably have grabbed it; he could move fast when he needed to. But in the circumstances, in a public place, who knew where that might lead?

“Well?” She pulled the envelope close to her body, alert to all possibilities.

“Becca Baines.”

“Address?”

“Wood Farm Road.” He gave her the number too. It was a flat half-way up a characterless tower block. He had followed her home one evening.

She didn’t bother to write it down. Mary Tudor was said to have had Calais engraved on her heart. Maybe the words ‘Becca Baines, Wood Farm Road’ were already carved into Janice Atkinson’s. Mullen wondered if he had made a big mistake. Suppose she went storming round there and took her revenge?

She gave a thin smile. “Thank you, Mr Mullen.” She flipped the envelope across the table. It collided with his half-drunk coffee, but the mug stayed upright.

“Everything all right?”

Startled, they both looked up. It was the waitress again, appearing like the bad fairy. Or the nosy neighbour.

Janice pointedly ignored her. She raised her eyes to Mullen. “Do you think we can get a proper drink somewhere round here?” she said. “It’ll be on me.”

* * *

Janice Atkinson was wanting more than alcohol. That much seemed clear to Mullen, but mixing work and pleasure seemed (at the very least) unnecessarily complicated, especially when he had been shadowing the woman’s husband for the last few days. Besides, he didn’t fancy Janice in the slightest. Sure, he felt sorry for her. But that was as far as it went.

She kept giggling. Mullen couldn’t keep up. One moment she had been bullying him into submission and the next she was throwing herself at him like a teenage groupie at a rock star. Women were so hard to understand.

Dutifully he laughed at her jokes and reassured her that he couldn’t possibly understand why Paul should prefer an overweight bitch like Becca Baines to her. That was a lie, of course. He could definitely see why a man would find Baines very attractive. But in the circumstances a lie seemed preferable.