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July 11 - July 27, 2025
“Ooh, yes?” says Joyce. “I love this sort of thing. I had my tarot done on the pier once. She said I was going to come into money.”
“This is jolly,” says Joyce. “I didn’t come into money, by the way.”
You must never die before your dog.”
“You must die before your children, of course, because you have taught them to live without you. But not your dog. You teach your dog only to live with you.”
“Get a dog that’s old already; beat Ibrahim’s system,” Elizabeth says.
Ibrahim doesn’t want me to get a dog, but I am sure I can change his mind. Before you know it, he’ll be dog this and dog that. You can bet he’ll be first in line to walk it too. I wish I’d got my hands on Ibrahim thirty years ago.
I am also knitting. I know, can you imagine?
Like all good husbands, Gerry knew all the flags.
“Well, let me start at the beginning,” says the man. “I wish you would, Douglas,” says Elizabeth, and downs her glass of wine. “You were an awful husband, but you always knew how to tell a good story.”
Ibrahim would have made a wonderful father, a wonderful grandfather too. But it wasn’t to be, like so much else in his life. You silly old man, he thinks as he turns the key in the ignition, you made the biggest mistake of them all. You forgot to live, you just hid away, safe and sound.
He finds a lovely independent bookshop where no one minds if you sit in an armchair and read for an hour. Of course, he buys the book he has been reading. It is called You and is about a psychopath called Joe, for whom Ibrahim has a great deal of sympathy.
He buys three other books too, because he wants the bookshop still to be here when he comes back next week.
The heart-rate monitor was terrifying; Chris had seen numbers that surely couldn’t be right. The calorie counter was worst of all. Six miles of cycling to burn off a hundred calories? Six miles? For half a Twix? It didn’t bear thinking about.
“Sir, can you get to the hospital?” Donna had called him Sir. So it was a case. “Of course, what’s up?” “A mugging. A nasty one.” “Gotcha. Why me, though?” “Chris,” says Donna. “It’s Ibrahim.” Chris is running before he hangs up.
“I don’t remember much, Chris. You know I’m normally good with details.”
“That’s great, Ibrahim,” says Chris. “Anything else?” “All on bikes. One of the bicycles was a Carrera Vulcan, one was a Norco Storm 4, and I’m afraid I’m not quite certain of the make of the third, but probably a Voodoo Bantu.”
Nike top with a white drawstring, and the other two in black Adidas. Their trainers were white Reebok, white Adidas,
“I do remember that one of the white boys had a watch with a beige strap and a blue face, and the other white boy had a tattoo of three stars on his left hand. The Bangladeshi boy had acne scars down the right side of his face. One of the other boys had a shaving rash, but that is moot, as I don’t imagine it will last longer than a day. One had a rip in his jeans, and on his thigh you could see the bottom of a tattoo, which looked to me like a football crest, Brighton and Hove Albion, I think, and I could make out the letters r-e-v-e-r, which I took to be the end of the word forever, but of
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“Yeah, I just . . . Well, they’re going to make me up a camp bed, and they said I could stay.” Ron shrugs; he looks a little awkward. “Keep him company. Got my iPad, might watch a film.”
Joyce walks over to Ron and gives him a hug, feeling his embarrassment as she does. “You look after our boy.”
“What were you listening to? Grime music?” “A podcast about bees,” says Poppy. “If they die, we’re doomed, I’m afraid.”
“Oh, Douglas, stop repeating what I last said, it’s a terrible habit of yours. That and adultery.”
So I’m all set up and registered as “@GreatJoy69” and am looking forward to having lots of fun. I’ve already followed the Hairy Bikers and the National Trust.
Joanna says I can watch something on catch-up, and I’m sure she’s right, but that feels even lonelier somehow. I’d honestly rather she just came down for lunch with her mum. She does come sometimes, to be fair. She was here an awful lot more during the murders, and who can blame her? Not me.
I love hospitals, they’re like airports.
Relieved, and then a bit bored, because you know Ibrahim, but the boredom was a lovely feeling.
I see that @GreatJoy69 has already had a few private messages on Instagram. That was quick! I will take a look at them when I get back. How very exciting!
Martin Lomax shakes his head. He once killed a poet, but that’s as far as he and poetry go.
There is a box containing half a million emergency dollars buried under that hedge, because you should never keep all your money in one place.
“But, honestly, all I was really thinking, all the way through, was that it explains Poppy’s nails.”
“I don’t really believe in revenge,” says Ibrahim. “I knew it,” says Joyce quietly.
Poppy smiles and strokes the small tattoo on her wrist. “Daisy is my grandmother. I told her once I wanted a tattoo, and she said over her dead body, anchors and mermaids and so on. So I went away, had this done, and showed it to her the next time I visited. I said ‘Daisy, meet daisy,’ and there wasn’t a lot she could say about it then, was there?”
“Then two weeks later I went round again, and she rolled up her sleeve and said, ‘Poppy, meet poppy.’ A great big poppy tattoo all the way up her forearm. She said if I was going to be an idiot, then she was too.”
“In the interest of not being boring, can I ask you a question?” “Up to a point, yes,” says Elizabeth. “How did you end up in the Service? Did you follow your dream? And I need the non-boring answer, please. I’m not a tourist.”
“Worth a go,” says Douglas, his hands indicating the inside of the wardrobe. The man nods.
Revenge is not a straight line, it’s a circle. It’s a grenade that goes off while you’re still in the room, and you can’t help but be caught in the blast.
It was Elizabeth, and the first thing she said was, “It’s not Ibrahim,” so that was a relief.
“Could you buy me ten thousand pounds’ worth of cocaine?” Bogdan looks at the money and nods. “Sure.” Elizabeth smiles. “Thank you, I knew I could rely on you. Wholesale, though, not street price.”
He has made it to another sunrise, and, descending the stairs, he decides he will have some marmalade on toast while he still can.
“My reception is on the blink, and I don’t want to miss Love Island.”
“It is fine to say ‘what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.’ It is admirable. But it no longer applies when you’re eighty. When you are eighty, whatever doesn’t kill you just ushers you through the next door, and the next door and the next, and all of these doors lock behind you. No bouncing back. The gravitational pull of youth disappears, and you just float up and up.”
“I wouldn’t want to be the last one left,” says Ibrahim. “I have always tried to never get attached to people, but I have got attached to these three.”
There is a momentary panic until she sees Joyce emerge silently from the kitchen, a knife in either hand. Elizabeth nods.
She looks down and sees Joyce at the bottom of the stairs. Knife in an overhand grip. What a natural that woman is.
“Of course,” says Elizabeth. “Don’t visit Martin Lomax. We must try to remember that, Joyce.” Joyce nods. “Understood.”
Well, I do know why—she will have an opinion, and I’m not in the mood for Joanna’s opinions.
feels unfair,” he had said, “that I have the benefit of looking at your beautiful face anytime I wish. So I wanted you to see what I see.”
“Donna?” asks Patrice. “Yes, wouldn’t be the same without her. I’m assuming you’ve met Donna?” “Oh, yes, I’ve met Donna,” says Patrice. “Once or twice.”
Patrice has already met Donna? Must be serious.
tchórz,
