The garden through the window, and the weird candelabra thing with ‘88’ on it.
‘She saw the garden first,’ he explained. ‘And it turns out to be very like the view from Edie Evans’s bedroom window.’
‘Yeah?’ said James Buck.
‘And this thing here that I thought was a flower … Anna said it was a bicycle bell, and we found it right there, hidden under the wood of the window-sill.’
‘Yeah?’ Buck seemed more interested this time. ‘She painted huge circles on the walls of Daniel’s room too. Huge blue circles. Made a right mess.’
Marvel nodded; he thought it best not to admit that he knew. ‘Did she say what they might be?’
James Buck shook his head and frowned into his paper cup. ‘There are noodles in this coffee.’
‘Yeah,’ said Marvel. ‘Sometimes they mix up the soup with the other things.’
‘Oh,’ said Buck. ‘OK.’ And he went on drinking it. ‘What’s this?’
‘I don’t know what that one is either,’ said Marvel. ‘It looks like a candlestick or something. With the number “88” on it.’
Buck picked the drawing up and held it as he sipped his soup. A splayed bottom, a long kinked stem, branching out into a thick top with two things that could well have held candles.
He turned it sideways.
He turned it upside-down.
‘I know what this is,’ he said. He looked at Marvel in surprise. ‘Hey! I know what this is!
Marvel put down his cup. ‘What?’
Buck frowned at the paper. ‘But how the hell would she know?’
‘Know what? What is it?’
James looked at him, clear eyed with confidence. ‘It’s the exhaust system on Mr Knight’s Audi TT.’
41
‘THERE’S VOMIT ON the bloody forecourt!’ Brian Pigeon slammed the door of the Alfa and sought out Ang, who was skulking across the workshop with his broom.
‘There’s vomit on the forecourt!’ he shouted again. ‘I nearly drove right through it!’
‘Yes,’ said Ang, although he looked confused.
For a start, he worked from the inside out every morning, and he hadn’t seen the vomit yet.
Also, he’d never heard the word ‘vomit’.
‘Well, don’t just stand there! Get a bucket!’
‘Yes,’ said Ang. ‘I know.’
He looked around but he didn’t move.
Brian Pigeon took out his phone and shook it at him. ‘Jesus, Ang! Are you going to clean up that mess outside or am I going to call Immigration?’
He hit the Dial key.
‘Shit, no,’ said Ang and hurried towards the door with his broom.
‘Not a broom! A bucket!’
Someone answered the phone and Brian Pigeon said, ‘Hello? Immigration?’
Ang ran back to the kitchen for a bucket so fast that Brian Pigeon almost choked laughing.
‘Hello? Hi, yes – sorry about that. Brian Pigeon in Bickley here. Listen, Autolifts should be delivering this week. Are you ready to roll when I call—’
He stopped as Ang passed him with a bucket and a big roll of polishing cloth that cost four quid a metre.
‘What are you doing? Jesus Christ. What a complete moron … Sorry, not you. I’ll call you back.’
He tossed the phone down on the workbench and steamed towards Ang Nu, who didn’t know what he’d done wrong this time.
Marvel studied Anna Buck’s drawings as they drove to the garage. Of course, now that he thought the candlestick was actually an exhaust system, it was obvious. The splayed bottom was the engine manifold, combining smoothly into one pipe and running almost straight to the big square silencer at the back of the car. The bits he had thought were candle-holders were exhaust pipes.
The number 88 was apparently the letters BB. Buck said they stood for the makers of the custom exhaust – Billy Boat.
And the four circles were an Audi logo.
It all made sense now.
In a nonsensical kind of way.
DS Brady drove. He’d been nervous about coming at first because of the case having been closed, but when Marvel had shown him the drawing and explained the new lead, he’d been too excited to say no.
Now Marvel twisted the rear-view mirror away from Brady so he didn’t have to turn around to speak to James Buck. ‘Do you know this Mr Knight?’
‘Only from the garage. He’s rich. Bit of a dick.’
‘And you don’t know where he lives? We could go straight there.’
Buck shook his head and stared out of the rain-spattered window at row after row of small, cheap shops selling dusty cake tins, second-hand furniture and other people’s jewellery. ‘Not around here,’ he snorted.
James had caught the bus to the police station, but the ride home was a lot quicker.
That was good. He needed to speak to Anna about the drawing. He was sure he was right; he had admired that exhaust as it hung over his head on the lift in the workshop. Mikey had called him over to have a look at it because the whole thing was chromed and was the cleanest thing James had ever seen under a car. Billy Boat made exhausts for a range of top-line cars – each distinct from the other – and James remembered thinking that this single exhaust unit probably cost more than he could have earned in two months. So he was sure he was right, even without the BB insignia that confirmed that Anna hadn’t just drawn a weird, coincidental shape.
How could she know what Mr Knight’s exhaust looked like from underneath the car? She sat outside the garage all the time, but she didn’t come in.
He needed to speak to her.
He would be able to soon. The shops became their local shops – the newsagent, the playschool, the florist …
The car stopped across the road from the garage. James could see Ang scrubbing the forecourt in the drizzle. For a moment he thought he was cleaning the five footprints, but then realized he was a few yards from there.
‘Wait here a minute,’ said Marvel and got out with the sergeant.
James had no choice; the back doors didn’t open.