Dead Men's s Boots

If he’s unhappy because you ignored his last request, then maybe after Todd’s done what he needs to do—’

‘Why does Pen have a room free?’ Carla demanded, derailing my thoughts.

‘Uh – because we had a bit of a falling out,’ I admitted.

‘You two? What could make you two row with each other?’

‘Rafi,’ I said, and she let the subject drop. Everybody always does. Conversationally, that one word is the ace of trumps.

3

If you come out of High Barnet Tube and head uphill along the Great North Road, you pass the Magistrates’ Court on the left, in between a bathroom supplies shop and an estate agent’s.

Or you could stop right there and save yourself a little effort, because it’s not as though Barnet has anything more exciting saved up to show you.

It was the day after the night before, and the night before had involved all the many units of alcohol I’d failed to take in before the funeral. I felt fuzzy-headed and sticky-eyed as I walked in off the street, finding myself in a red-carpeted foyer where tasselled ropes barred off some directions, steered you in others.

It was like a cinema, except that there didn’t seem to be anyone selling popcorn."

"Nobody challenged me. There was a single usher on duty, but he was talking with strained patience to a belligerent young guy in a hooded jacket outside the door leading to court number one, and he didn’t even look round as I passed. I followed the arrows to courtroom three, where a sign said that the Honourable Mister Montague Runcie was presiding, and slid in quietly at the back.

It looked like I’d only missed the warm-up. The magistrate, a man in his late fifties with a pinched, acerbic face and three concentric rings of wrinkles across his cheeks as though his eyes were wells that someone had just dropped a pebble into, was still examining papers and holding a muttered conversation with the court clerk. Pen was sitting right at the front with her back to me, as tense as all hell if the set of her shoulders was anything to go by. But she hadn’t started shouting yet so that was good.

I sat down in an empty seat at the back of the room. There were a lot of empty seats: this was the sort of case that could easily make the local papers, but it didn’t look like any of them had caught onto it yet. In the digital age, cub reporters don’t bird-dog the courts and the cop shops any more: they print out the press releases that come in over the wire, clock off early and spend more time abusing substances.