Cut Out Read online

  Copyright © 2018 by Marcia Woolf

  Cover Design: GoOnWrite.com

  Editor: Alice Cullerne-Bown

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author or Crooked Cat Books except for brief quotations used for promotion or in reviews. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, and incidents are used fictitiously.

  First Green Edition, Crooked Cat Books. 2018

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  In memory of Shane Whelan.

  I should have written faster.

  Acknowledgements

  I am grateful to all at Crooked Cat, especially my editor Alice Cullerne-Bown for her thoughtful input and attention to detail; to my friends at HWG who have given more encouragement than is good for them; and to Mr Woolf, who has provided the support without which this book would not have happened. Thank you, everyone.

  About the Author

  Marcia Woolf graduated in Art History from Leeds University in the 1980s. Her first novel, Roadkill, was published by Crooked Cat in 2016 and her short stories have appeared in several anthologies. Marcia is a founder and co-director of the Hastings Literary Festival.

  By the same author:

  Roadkill - buy here on Amazon

  Cut Out

  Chapter One

  Sunday 2nd November

  Guns and Alcohol

  “I’m not sure I give much credence to nominative determinism,” said Dawn Sayler. “I mean, look at me. Hate boats, can’t swim, crap at getting up in the mornings.”

  “Damn. Just when I’d got you pigeonholed as well.”

  She grinned at me. “You haven’t changed.”

  We were sitting outside The Anchor. She pointed across the Thames. “I was born over there.”

  “Really? I thought you must be a Sussex girl.”

  “Me? Nah. I just ended up there. Usual story. I signed up for the Met out of Hendon but you know how it is. Girl meets girl, girl follows girl to village in middle of nowhere, girl turns out to be closet heterosexual. Goodnight, Vienna.”

  “And now here you are, back where you belong. Back at the heart of the great metropolis. So, how’s Geraldine?”

  “Great. We’re really good. She got a job in the bookshop at the National Gallery.”

  “All happy families, then.”

  She squinted at me through the winter sun, low in the sky. Ollie was making his way towards us over the slimy decking carrying three drinks, three bags of crisps gripped between his teeth.

  “World shortage of trays, is there?”

  I had to ask. What is it with men?

  “Tray?”

  “You know, flat thing, usually round or rectangular, useful for carrying stuff?”

  “Did I drop anything? No.”

  Sayler raised an eyebrow. I’m not sure if she thought it was the start of our first argument. Ollie ripped open a bag of ready salted.

  “What were you talking about while I was at the bar?”

  “Your colleague was expounding her views on nominative determinism.”

  He swallowed his mouthful of beer with difficulty and looked at Sayler. She shrugged.

  “Just when you think you know someone.”

  “Hidden depths,” I said. “You’d better watch yourself.”

  I thought I might be starting to develop hypothermia. We’d been there twenty minutes and none of us smoked, so I had to wonder why we were sitting on the terrace in November. Eventually Dawn decided to speak up.

  “So, not that it’s any of my business, although it is of course, but are you two…?”

  I looked at Ollie.

  “Well? Are we?”

  “Yes. Yes.”

  Sayler gave me an are you sure that’s a good idea? sort of look. By this time, I was so cold that I would have done anything just to get back inside near something resembling a heat source.

  “Why are we sitting out here?”

  “Fresh air,” said Ollie. “It’s very bracing.” He took a deep breath to emphasise the point but it only started him coughing.

  “Because,” said Sayler, ignoring him, “inside...” and nodded in the direction of The Anchor, “there may be people we want to keep our distance from.”

  Ollie looked at me apologetically.

  “You brought me on a, what’s it? A stake out?”

  “Sh.”

  “Sh? No, I will not sh.”

  “Sit down. Don’t be silly. Dawn was exaggerating.”

  “I’m going home, right now.”

  “Sit down.”

  “Why should I?”

  Dawn reached across and in one movement grabbed hold of my scarf and slammed me face down against the table.

  “Because!” she yelled, as the first gunshot cracked the air over our heads and ricocheted off the top of the river wall. By the time the second shot was fired she was shielding me under the bench. I heard Ollie yell stop, Police and then several pairs of feet running down the steps away from the pub. We waited a moment. Dawn realised she was crushing me and rolled away.

  “Fuck.”

  “What is it?”

  “Sullivan.”

  I struggled out from under the bench and onto my knees. He was lying spread-eagled at the top of the steps. In the distance I could hear sirens, and a woman came out of the back door and ran over towards Ollie. I felt I was going to laugh because she was running in slow motion. She was shouting in slow motion too.

  “Ambulance! Get an ambulance.”

  I started to go towards them but my legs felt strange, like I was wearing heavy boots that wouldn’t leave the ground.

  “Stay here. Don’t move.”

  Sayler pushed me back onto the bench and ran over to the steps. She was barking into her radio, something about two men headed towards the Bermondsey Road, but I couldn’t understand. We’d just be having a quiet drink, he’d said. An opportunity to tell Sayler. Because she was his partner; because she deserved to know. And I’d asked him why we needed to say anything, because if she hadn’t worked it out by now she wasn’t much of a DI.

  I stood up and went towards them. Sayler was shouting at the group of people who’d come out of the pub, telling them to get back and give them some space. She’d got him onto his back and the woman – she must have been the landlady – was handing her bar towels. As I got closer, I could hear Sayler saying, Ollie, Guv, stay awake mate, it’s okay, the ambulance is coming, but she was kneeling in a pool of blood that was seeping from under Ollie’s coat and, bizarrely, steaming in the freezing air.

  I was shaking. A small, thin woman came over, took off her fleece and put it round my shoulders. “You all right, love? Friend of yours, is he?”

  I nodded.

  “Don’t worry; the ambulance is on its way. Come on, come inside where it’s warm.”

  She guided me over to the back door of the pub. When we got level with Ollie I could see that he was breathing, trying to say something to Sayler. It sounded like Nelson. The thin woman propelled me towards the door. “Come on, love. Let’s get you warm.”

  I sat down and she went behind the bar and came back with a brandy and a coffee from the filter machine. The coffee smelt sour, overcooked. I took a sip. There was a commotion outside and we turned in time to see two paramedics, a big guy who started working on Ollie right away, and a dark-haired woman who was ordering all the onlookers to get back, give them room to get the stretcher in. In a couple of minutes, the crew were taking him down the s
teps to the ambulance. Sayler came into the bar.

  “You okay? Look, I’m going with him to the hospital.”

  A young woman stepped out from behind her.

  “This is PC Chivers. She’ll stay with you here. Are you taking this in?”

  I nodded. Sayler looked at me as though she still thought I hadn’t understood.

  “I’m fine,” I said, “go on.”

  The thin woman put her arm around me, to let Sayler know she would take care of things, and PC Chivers sat down on the banquette. I was well and truly sandwiched. Sayler went. The siren started up and soon disappeared into the distance.

  Chivers felt my hand. “You’re frozen,” she said. I didn’t feel like explaining. I started to drink the brandy.

  “Tea would be better. Shall we get you a cup of tea?”

  I shook my head. Hate tea, always have.

  “He’ll be fine. He was conscious when they took him down to the ambulance.”

  I nodded.

  “Did you see what happened?”

  The thin woman spoke for me.

  “They were sitting outside, her and the policewoman and the bloke who got shot.”

  “Outside? Together?”

  “Yeah. Don’t know why, it’s bloomin’ freezing out there. Nobody else on the terrace. Then there was a noise – the first shot, I suppose.”

  Chivers stopped her. “You need to make a statement. You both need to make statements. There’ll be another officer here soon.”

  The thin woman nodded as if she’d been there a thousand times before.

  “Do you want another brandy, love?”

  I handed her the empty glass.

  “Your boyfriend, is he?”

  Chivers turned towards me. “DCI Sullivan?”

  I looked up into her smooth olive face, perfectly oval like a Modigliani.

  “We know each other,” I said.

  The thin woman, still hovering with the empty tumbler in her hand, seemed flustered. “I’m sorry. I thought – I got the impression, from the way he...”

  “That’s all right.” I gave her a smile. “Just a misunderstanding.”

  Chivers patted my hand again. “You can call me Carmen,” she said.

  “Carmen. Nice name.” Then, because the brandy was starting to warm me through and I was recovering from the initial shock, I added, “Got a cigar?”

  It was dark by the time I was allowed to go home. Carmen came into the block with me and took me right to the door. I think she was probably angling for a look-see but I thanked her firmly and backed in, giving her no opportunity to cross the threshold.

  “Do you want me to check that everything’s okay?”

  “I’ll be fine. You’ve been very kind. Thank you.”

  She seemed disappointed.

  “You’ve got the number for the station?”

  “Yes.”

  I checked for the card inside my coat pocket. “But I don’t think I’ll have any reason to call. I’m more resilient than I look.”

  “Okay. We’ll be in touch when there’s any news.”

  Fortunately, the phone started to ring. She gave me a quick wave and disappeared along the landing, radio crackling. The insane bit of me thought it would be Sullivan calling from the hospital and I probably sounded more pleased than usual when I picked up the receiver, but it was Jack, ringing from Wandsworth.

  “Hey. How’s things?”

  “Fine. Good. How are you?”

  It obviously wasn’t the response he was expecting.

  “What have you been up to?”

  “Up to? What do you mean?”

  He laughed, nervously, like he wished he hadn’t asked. “Nothing, just, you know, how’s things? What have you been doing? Just a general enquiry. I tried to call earlier but you were out.”

  “Shopping.”

  “On a Sunday afternoon?”

  “Well, now I’m on my own...”

  “You can please yourself.”

  “Yes. No. I mean, does it matter? Every week, I’ve been here.”

  “I always ring on a Sunday.”

  “Jack. We get one call a week. Let’s not waste it arguing. I’m sorry, okay? I went out and I forgot the time, the tube wasn’t running so I had to get a taxi. I got home late. There’s nothing to worry about. Now talk to me.”

  “I had a visitor yesterday.”

  This was just about the most astonishing thing Jack had ever said. I started doing a mental checklist of the people who might, conceivably, go to see my brother but given that – apart from his solicitor – he’d had only one visitor in two years and that was me, it didn’t take long.

  “A visitor?”

  I tried not to sound incredulous.

  “Don’t you want to know who it was?”

  “Of course.”

  “You don’t seem very interested. I wonder why that is? Too busy shopping I suppose.”

  “Jack? What are you on about? Come on, tell me. Who came to see you?”

  There was a long, resentful silence at the other end, punctuated only by Jack, breathing deeply, like he always did when he was angry but didn’t want to lose his temper.

  “Jack? Who—?”

  Then he hung up.

  I removed my coat and went over to the window. The panorama of lights over East London shimmered and reflected off the glass, lines of traffic flashing and glinting silently in the distance, meandering, stopping and starting with the one-way system towards the horizon. I stared out at it all for quite a while, trying and failing to work out which of the many clusters of illuminated windows might be the Whitechapel hospital. I thought about Sullivan, lying in a bed somewhere, stitched and bandaged, feeling stupid and vulnerable and lucky to be alive. I imagined Dawn Sayler, perched uneasily in a plastic chair by the bed, making bad jokes and offering to let his parents know where he was, to tell them that he was doing well, not in any danger, not to worry. I pushed the button that operates the blinds. A little electronic whirr, a jolt, then they began to close across between the triple panes of self-cleaning solar-tinted glass with the same dispassionate sweep as curtains closing round a coffin at the crematorium. I switched on the lamp by the fireplace and sat down. It isn’t a real fire. I don’t know if anyone has a real fire in London. Its flame began to dance, a stylised, idealised picture of a fire, licking its fingers like a hooker in an Amsterdam brothel, teasing and writhing with the promise of an experience no-one was ever going to get.

  I thought about what Jack had said and what it meant, although there was a sick sensation in my stomach that told me I already knew. Whoever had been to see him – and maybe it was no-one, not a real person that is, but just a rumour, a word in his ear, someone trying to stick him with the pin that would hurt him the most – I felt sure that this voice had whispered, not a word of a lie, about Sullivan and me.

  I went into the kitchen and poured myself a glass of wine and took it back to the fireside, along with a plate of cheese and some olives, Bayonne ham and a slice of ciabatta. I wondered what Jack had eaten today. My experience of prison food was that it slid along a greasy scale from blandly edible to indescribably vile, and Jack was fussy. He’d been used to the good stuff. I’d noticed he was getting thinner. The cheese stared up at me reproachfully, but I ate it anyway.

  Outside a gale was buffeting the sides of the building, shrieking and whistling against the edge of the balcony. Every so often a sheet of rain hurled itself at the glass with a sound of shingle washed by waves. I heard a passing siren, its wail carried off on the wind. What to do, what to do? If the cat was out of the bag with Jack, I had no choice: he had another twenty months to serve, and if he was a good boy and kissed the right boots, maybe less than that. It had been madness to get involved with Sullivan. Like Eve in the Garden of Eden, I hadn’t thought it through at all. There he was, a nice round ripe piece of tempting fruit, just dangling there invitingly. Actually, it was worse than that, because Sullivan hadn’t been so passive. It had been erosion.
Phone calls, unscheduled visits, flowers delivered by smiling Japanese florists, more phone calls, tickets to the theatre, the ballet, the opera, every decent restaurant within a mile radius, so long as they were places and events where we could be certain not to bump into anyone who knew us, places where we could sit together in the dark, or where – on the rare occasion a familiar voice called out his name or mine – either of us could slip away into the crowd and avoid an introduction. We were careful. We had it all under control. So there were more phone calls, invitations to art galleries, opening nights, book signings, private views. Who wouldn’t have given in? I liked the guy. I suppose I started to kid myself that it wouldn’t do any harm, although any eight year old with a matching degree of life experience could have told me it was all going to end in tears. I don’t know what Ollie was thinking of. Well, I do, but that’s men for you. And I suppose the sex was okay. I was missing that, it’s true. If I closed my eyes I could try to pretend it was Jack, but it wasn’t the same. So then I felt guilty twice, once for cheating on Jack and once for letting Sullivan think he was entirely responsible for pleasures that were really all in my head. Sorry guys. Sorry.

  The thing I found difficult to grasp was why Ollie was willing to take a risk. I mean, I think there must be some rule about serving officers not screwing women with criminal records whose brothers are doing time for – well, all the stuff that Jack was in for – and it wasn’t as if we could be boyfriend and girlfriend in the sense that applies to the general population. I couldn’t go on a friendly night out with his colleagues, for instance. Not that I wanted to. He was taking a risk with Sayler. And she was taking a risk too, because I felt sure she should have reported him, even if they were partners. None of it seemed very logical to me. But as the old joke goes, the only place you find logic ahead of loyalty and lust is in the dictionary.

  I lay in bed and listened to the rain drumming against the windows. I imagined the water sluicing down the gutters and into the disintegrating Victorian London drains, swirling and eddying black water, pounding its way deep underground with a visceral, animal urge to get to the sea, to subsume itself into the heaving cold of the ocean and vanish into the whole. I thought about Jack, lying on his bunk, staring into the plain grey nothing above, planning. I thought about Sullivan, shifting uncomfortably in his narrow hospital bed, trying not to loosen his stitches, trying to work out what happened between the gunshot and the operating table. I considered the gunshots. It’s so easy to make assumptions. But what if whoever fired the gun wasn’t firing at him? What if Sullivan hadn’t been the target?