the living are partly in the world of the dead, and the boundaries of death overlap with those of life. Your mother’s presence here suggests this is so, as do these burned hands of mine. See these scars. They were inflicted in life … and yet here they still are, in this place beyond life. And that trinket also – the watch – the fob watch.’
Sam reached into his pocket and drew out the fob watch, holding it by its chain so that it hung suspended between him and McClintock.
‘Why is it here, Detective Inspector? It has no right to be. It’s a relic from the life I had before this one. And yet here it is, just as real and as solid in this afterlife we find ourselves in as it was before. Ticking away. Still keeping perfect time.’
Sam watched the watch turning slowly on the end of its delicate chain, and again he felt that strange conviction come over him that this little fob watch was important, that it was freighted with a significance that was very real but somehow elusive.
‘The police files dealing with Tony Cartwright’s death have been tampered with,’ Sam said. ‘The facts of his murder have been concealed. And your name has been erased completely. There’s no mention of you. Like you never existed.’
‘Like I never existed …’ McClintock repeated thoughtfully. ‘It’s strange. Perhaps … Perhaps here, in this simulacrum of 1973, I never died in that fire. Perhaps only PC Cartwright died. Perhaps he has moved on to a better place, while I am retained here to complete the task I failed at before. Perhaps … perhaps …’ He shrugged, and fixed Sam with his narrow, pale eyes and added, ‘We’re just coppers, Detective Inspector, we’re nae philosophers. Or priests. Or poets. Or whatever it takes to make sense of ourselves.’
‘Then let’s leave sense to the poets and get back to what we
can
do,’ said Sam. ‘There’s work to be done. Unfinished business from the lives we’ve left behind.’
McClintock nodded slowly: ‘Yes. I think so. Unfinished business.’
‘Clive Gould,’ said Sam. ‘We’re here to destroy him.’
‘It looks that way to me.’
‘Can we do it? Is it possible?’
‘One must presume so, Detective Inspector, otherwise what point is there in our being here?’ McClintock narrowed his eyes, drew a slow, deep breath, and said: ‘I’ll take any opportunity I can to break Clive Gould. He was always a filthy, rotten creature. It will be a pleasure to destroy him. Back in the sixties, he used his clubs and casinos as a front for all his criminal activities. He tried his hand at all the usual rackets – extortion, robbery, prostitution – and paid out massive bribes to keep the police off his back. And those he didn’t pay off he
bumped
off – business rivals, debtors, upstarts, traitors, those who crossed him, those who irritated, those whom he decided to make an example of … He chalked up quite a body count, though nobody can put an exact figure to it. Every canal and waterway in this city must have a sludge of his old victims at the bottom.’
Sam wondered if it was one of these anonymous bodies that was dredged up and passed off as Anthony Cartwright. No wonder Carroll refused to let the widow see the corpse.
‘I want to see Gould destroyed as much as you do,’ Sam said. ‘But what happens if we manage it? If we finish this business with Gould once and for all, what then? What becomes of us?’
‘Now you’re asking the
big
question, Detective Inspector,’ answered McClintock. ‘
Very
big. I’ve thought about it, turned it around in my mind, considered possibilities. When our work here is done, will we happen? Will we remain in this place? Or will our tenancy here be terminated? Will we be obliged to move on elsewhere? And if so, where? And then again, what if we fail in our enterprise? What if it is not us who defeat Gould, but
him
who defeats
us
? What is the price of failure here? If we were to perish, Detective Inspector, what then?
Sam reached into his pocket and drew out the fob watch, holding it by its chain so that it hung suspended between him and McClintock.
‘Why is it here, Detective Inspector? It has no right to be. It’s a relic from the life I had before this one. And yet here it is, just as real and as solid in this afterlife we find ourselves in as it was before. Ticking away. Still keeping perfect time.’
Sam watched the watch turning slowly on the end of its delicate chain, and again he felt that strange conviction come over him that this little fob watch was important, that it was freighted with a significance that was very real but somehow elusive.
‘The police files dealing with Tony Cartwright’s death have been tampered with,’ Sam said. ‘The facts of his murder have been concealed. And your name has been erased completely. There’s no mention of you. Like you never existed.’
‘Like I never existed …’ McClintock repeated thoughtfully. ‘It’s strange. Perhaps … Perhaps here, in this simulacrum of 1973, I never died in that fire. Perhaps only PC Cartwright died. Perhaps he has moved on to a better place, while I am retained here to complete the task I failed at before. Perhaps … perhaps …’ He shrugged, and fixed Sam with his narrow, pale eyes and added, ‘We’re just coppers, Detective Inspector, we’re nae philosophers. Or priests. Or poets. Or whatever it takes to make sense of ourselves.’
‘Then let’s leave sense to the poets and get back to what we
can
do,’ said Sam. ‘There’s work to be done. Unfinished business from the lives we’ve left behind.’
McClintock nodded slowly: ‘Yes. I think so. Unfinished business.’
‘Clive Gould,’ said Sam. ‘We’re here to destroy him.’
‘It looks that way to me.’
‘Can we do it? Is it possible?’
‘One must presume so, Detective Inspector, otherwise what point is there in our being here?’ McClintock narrowed his eyes, drew a slow, deep breath, and said: ‘I’ll take any opportunity I can to break Clive Gould. He was always a filthy, rotten creature. It will be a pleasure to destroy him. Back in the sixties, he used his clubs and casinos as a front for all his criminal activities. He tried his hand at all the usual rackets – extortion, robbery, prostitution – and paid out massive bribes to keep the police off his back. And those he didn’t pay off he
bumped
off – business rivals, debtors, upstarts, traitors, those who crossed him, those who irritated, those whom he decided to make an example of … He chalked up quite a body count, though nobody can put an exact figure to it. Every canal and waterway in this city must have a sludge of his old victims at the bottom.’
Sam wondered if it was one of these anonymous bodies that was dredged up and passed off as Anthony Cartwright. No wonder Carroll refused to let the widow see the corpse.
‘I want to see Gould destroyed as much as you do,’ Sam said. ‘But what happens if we manage it? If we finish this business with Gould once and for all, what then? What becomes of us?’
‘Now you’re asking the
big
question, Detective Inspector,’ answered McClintock. ‘
Very
big. I’ve thought about it, turned it around in my mind, considered possibilities. When our work here is done, will we happen? Will we remain in this place? Or will our tenancy here be terminated? Will we be obliged to move on elsewhere? And if so, where? And then again, what if we fail in our enterprise? What if it is not us who defeat Gould, but
him
who defeats
us
? What is the price of failure here? If we were to perish, Detective Inspector, what then?
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