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‘What made you do it?’ (Kate, professional empathy.)

  ‘I was just bored. I was babysitting for my cousin and I had the radio on, so I thought I’d just do it. Just to see if anybody’d notice, really.’

  ‘Did you not consider it would be hurtful to your family?’

  ‘Never thought about it, really. Just a spur of the moment thing. I’m truly sorry about it now, though.’

  ‘Do you have anything to say to your cousin?’

  ‘Sorry. Astagfuralah.’

  Jim hits the button and the waveforms fade from the display. “That’s about it. Just a sign-off from Kate to finish.”

  “What’s that he said at the end?”

  “Dunno. Some Arab stuff. It had Allah in it. Something for Allah.”

  “Same guy, you reckon?”

  Jim strokes his chin. “Well, I’ve had a listen to the other. Make your own mind up, then I’ll let you know what I think.”

  I reflect on what I’ve heard so far. “First impressions, the voice is similar, but to me he sounds more casual.” Ollie’s heavy breathing behind reminds me he’s there, so I turn to bring him into the discussion. “What do you think, Ollie?”

  He shrugs. “Mam said younger.”

  “That figures. More informal, maybe.”

  Jim flexes his finger. “Ready to hear the original?”

  “Sure.”

  He presses a button to the right of the first set, illuminating another pair of waveform windows. They spring to life as my radio voice fills the studio. I press down on my eyelids, focusing fiercely on Hassan (Anwar?) as he says, ‘I should like to send all my love to Amina. Amina Begum Khan.’

  I open my eyes. “He’s more rounded. Richer.”

  Jim nods at this, and we both watch the waveforms dancing as we listen to the rest of the clip in silence. As soon as it finishes, Jim says, “Here’s something interesting.” He grabs the mouse on the desk and highlights two file names showing on the computer screen in the corner. One file is labelled ALLHASSAN, the other ALLANWAR. “I was playing about with these before you came. I’ve put all Hassan’s lines – if it is Hassan – together in one file. Here, I’ll drop him into Channels 1 and 2.” He drags the file and deposits it, then comes back for the other as he continues. “Anwar’s lines are all in this package, so let’s give him Channels 3 and 4. I’ll kill the audio, just watch the screens.”

  Some dextrous knob twiddling and button punching, and the desk lights up with two pairs of waveforms bobbing up and down either side of the desk, soundlessly.

  “See the diff?” says Jim. “’Course you’ve got to allow for one being a landline and the other a mobile, but the levels on the recordings were practically identical. The different spectrums – spectra, is it? – show you two different voice types. That’s plain enough.”

  “If you say so, Jim.” I study the pulsating graphs carefully. I don’t have Jim’s eye for it, but with concentration, yes, even I can see that the waves on the screens to my left are peaking more in the lower frequencies than those on the right. “So how conclusive is that?” I ask him.

  “Does it for me. By the way, I noticed something else while I was working on this. I missed it before.” Jim kills the two running playbacks and drags HASSAN 14FEB from his on-screen folder into the edit mode window. He lifts one earpiece over his left ear for a moment while he marks an in and an out point, then opens a channel saying, “Listen hard,” and double-clicks.

  I’m surprised that it’s only my voice on Jim’s edit, and just one line.

  ‘Amina, is it? Nice name. Wife or girlfriend?’

  “Play it again.”

  ‘Amina, is it? Nice name. Wife or girlfriend?’

  I shake my head at Jim, unsure what’s he’s expecting me to hear. In the spirit of inclusion I look round at Oliver, and catch him in the act of freeing a pink marshmallow from an open bag in his coat pocket. “Sorry,” he says, as he pops it into his mouth.

  “Listen to what’s behind your voice,” says Jim. “Hang on, I’ll try and boost it with the EQ.” He puts his earphones on and adjusts knobs minutely with the main feed closed so that all I can hear for a while is the sound of Oliver masticating marshmallow.

  “Try it now,” Jim says at last, handing over the cans. He double-clicks on the file.

  ‘Amina, is it? Nice name. Wife or girlfriend?’

  There is something there, like the mewing of a cat, in the pause between name and Wife, and once more as the question ends.

  “Again.”

  I blank out my voice and listen only to the background. It’s there, not in the studio with me, but behind Hassan.

  “There’s somebody crying in the house,” I say to Jim.

  “There is,” agrees Jim. “Sounds like a baby. Not so near to notice straightaway. Upstairs, I guess.”

  “That is interesting.”

  But what am I to make of it? A man claiming to be Hassan Malik – who has been dead three months - calls me, unquestionably from his home number. There’s no knowing whether Amina is there… Could it be her crying in the background? It sounds more like a young child (obvious candidate, her little boy), but can we be sure, when it’s so indistinct? The significant thing is it’s a real sound, I mean one that grounds Hassan, makes him real, not some voice from beyond the grave. Then this other guy Anwar, supposedly a cousin, insists that he made the call from the house, even though it’s clear to us now that he didn’t. Is he just trying to protect Amina from media harassment? Maybe, but who knows? Certainly not me. I’m more confused than ever. And that’s before I plug in the Emmanuel connection, if there really is one.

  “You’re very quiet, Marc,” says Jim. “Not like you.”

  He and Ollie are both looking at me as if they’re waiting for a Hercule Poirot exposition.

  “Just trying to get my head round it, guys. I can’t help thinking of that old joke. What did the farmer say when the motorist stopped to ask for directions? ’Well, If I were you, zur, I wouldn’t start from ‘ere.’ That about sums it up for me.”

  Unexpectedly it’s Jim who nudges me onto the way forward. He says, with such a flourish it surprises me as much as if Oliver had said it, “Cherchez la femme. “

  Which is just the prompt I need to go house-hunting.

  IX

  The estate agent seems initially reluctant to arrange a viewing of 110 Prince Albert Road at just twenty-four hours’ notice. I’m informed the owner is in the process of vacating the place, with the removals people there as we speak, and he (he?) has plans to finish decorating before prospective buyers are allowed in. I blag my appointment by claiming I’m on a whistle-stop tour of possibilities, looking to make a quick decision before my new job starts up here in a month. The chance of an easy sale with no chain wins the day and I’m told a lady called Samantha will meet me for a quick trot round the house tomorrow at three-thirty. My heart misses a beat when I hear who my contact will be, but whether that’s through fear of discovery or emotional associations with the name I don’t stop to analyse. I suppose it’s possible that my ex-lover might have landed a job with a property company, but unlikely I would say, knowing Sam. I’m a mite disappointed that Amina won’t be around at this stage, but at least I’ve got my foot in the door, or will have soon.

  I feel strangely let down, I have to confess, when I turn up at the doorstep of 110 to find that the woman waiting for me with the keys is not in fact my Sam, or anything like her. Relieved as well, of course, since that would have completely blown the gaff but, hell, I might have traded that for the chance of seeing her again…

  As it is, this Samantha shows no sign of recognising me other than as the potential buyer Tom Etherington, a designer currently based in Liverpool. I have my ex-brother-in-law to thank for the alias this time, though he’s no more aware of it than Oliver was the other night. Samantha is a bustling type of woman, mid-forties I guess, who just about succeeds in shaking my hand, unlocking the front door and holding onto her file at the same time. It’s clea
r as we walk through, our steps echoing in the front passageway, that the removal van has been and gone.

  I’m not at all sure what I’m looking for here, just trying to get a general sense of the place to help me build a picture of what may have been the scene on the night of Hassan’s telephone call, but it is hard to find many clues in rooms that have been stripped of furniture and effects. At least they’ve left the light bulbs in, which is just as well since we’re already losing daylight and Samantha has to locate a switch each time we move to a new room. I try to keep my senses sharp as we walk through the downstairs area, tuning out the agent’s sales prattle while I stay focused on assimilating anything of possible relevance. One thing I can see easily in the bare rooms is where there are fittings and sockets which suggest telephone or internet connections. I’ve already noticed a single telephone point in the hall. There is a fairly large living-room at the front of the house, and an archway through the back wall of this room into a smaller dining area. The front window wall has a television aerial point in the corner and a double electric socket. The outside wall of the dining room also has two electric sockets and two telephone-type connections, the most likely spot for an internet source downstairs.

  So far, so ordinary. As I walk through into the kitchen I can smell fresh paint - the decorating must have started. All the signs are that Amina had been planning this move anyway, though the media exposure might have forced her hand. Through the kitchen window I can see a tiny back yard.

  “Can I take a look out here?”

  Samantha finds the right key and lets me out, keeping vigil inside as if she expects squatters to invade should the house be left unguarded for a second. There’s not much to see outside - three worn steps down to the damp concrete area where there’s just enough room for a short clothes line, and the regulation green and black wheelie bins behind the yard gate. I trip the sensor light above the back door as I step out into a light drizzle. The gate is unlocked, so I wander through into the back lane to see what the access is like from this side of the property. There are double yellow lines painted both sides of the narrow lane, presumably to leave it free for the odd delivery van to squeeze through to the rear of shops in Springhill Gate, and for the council to collect the bins.

  The neighbour’s yard door is wide open. From my viewpoint in the middle of the lane I watch an old Asian woman, traditionally dressed and with her head covered, struggling down next door’s back steps carrying a tied bin bag in one hand and pressing the other against the wall for support. She slowly brings the bag to the back gate where her bin is already so filled with rubbish that the lid can’t shut properly. The woman seems only to notice me in the lane when she has finally reached her bin. She fixes me with a look of extraordinary contempt that she continues to hold as she crams her bag ineffectually into the other rubbish before swinging back the lid to let it rest on top of the pile. We stay staring at each other, saying nothing, until she puts her bony hand on the edge of the yard door and shuts it with more force than I’d expect from a frail old lady. I’m guessing she’s not too keen on young white guys nosing about her neighbourhood.

  Out of curiosity, I lift each of Amina’s bin lids on my way back in. They are both completely empty and seem (I can smell the disinfectant) to have been recently scrubbed and sanitised. Amina is nothing if not house-proud.

  “I’ve met the neighbours,” I tell Samantha as I step in over the threshold.

  “Aha. Asian?”

  “Yes.”

  Subtly sotto voce Samantha says, “Just to reassure, there are lots of white people in this area too, Mr Etherington.”

  “I don’t have a problem with it.”

  “Jolly good.” Samantha switches back into bright mode. “Can I take you upstairs?” No innuendo intended, nor do I react as if there had been, which I might have done a week ago. We take a slight diversion at the foot of the staircase so she can show me a downstairs loo conversion, hardly more than a cupboard, with a miniscule sink. The floor has a dark patch below the basin, as if there has been a minor flood, but neither of us remarks upon it. What’s much more interesting is what I find at the top of the stairs. A door. It’s set in a plaster wall, clearly not part of the original design, separating the small landing at the top of the stairway from the bedrooms beyond.

  “This is odd,” I say, tapping the door frame as we pass through.

  “Mmm, it is a bit unusual,” Samantha agrees. “Good safety feature, though. Do you have little ones, Mr Etherington?”

  “No, but if I had I think I’d be perfectly happy with one of those gates from Mothercare.”

  “Possibly, but this way you wouldn’t have to worry so much about the noise from the TV waking them up.”

  “Or hear them crying,” I say more or less to myself as we walk into the smaller of the two bedrooms at the front. My mind is on the Hassan recording, trying to place where he might have been when his little boy woke up. I look along the street from the bedroom window, confirming it’s the one where I saw the woman’s arm closing a curtain. The dimmer switch on the wall is another sign – this is probably where the child slept. There’s nothing else remarkable about this room, nor the one next to it, nor the bedroom at the back, all completely stripped. No separate telephone line. One little detail I pick up, hardly significant, is that all the sockets upstairs have those flat plastic plugs covering the holes, presumably to protect the sockets from inquisitive fingers, though I hadn’t seen any downstairs – maybe they’ve just forgotten to take these ones away.

  The only other room upstairs is the combined bathroom and toilet and an airing cupboard, all empty. The ceiling outside the bathroom has a trapdoor, but I don’t feel I can ask Samantha to let me look in the loft, even if we had a stepladder to do it, though I do notice the slight smudge of dust along the edge of the hatch that suggests it has been recently moved, so I guess anything that might have been stored up there has been taken along with everything else in the house.

  “So, are you going to be working in the city centre, Mr Etherington?” Samantha asks as we’re making our way downstairs. “Very convenient from this part of town.”

  “No, I’m… I work from home mainly.”

  “Well, you won’t be disturbed here. You couldn’t pick a quieter street. What do you think?”

  “It is quiet, yes.”

  “I mean what do you think about making an offer?”

  “Oh, I’m interested, certainly. Thing is… I’m wondering if I could meet the owner, before I make my mind up.”

  “There’s no need, really. We have full responsibility for the sale. If you’re looking to negotiate on price…”

  “It’s not that, honestly. I’m not trying to go behind your back. I’m just keen to know a little more about what it’s like living here, you know, in this house, in the neighbourhood… From the horse’s mouth, as it were,” I add to save me from Samantha unloading her local knowledge.

  “I can see where you’re coming from,” she says. “I can’t promise. We were asked to handle all the details ourselves, but if you give me your contact number I’ll see what I can do. I’ll also be able to let you know if another bid comes in, give you a chance to top it. We do expect this property to go very quickly, Mr Etherington, so I’d recommend you don’t take too long to make up your mind.”

  “That’s good advice, Samantha, thanks.” To keep up the pretence of not having a local base I give her my mobile number and even double-check with her which way I need to go for the city centre. I leave her trying to rub bird muck off the For Sale sign with a paper hankie, and as soon as I’m round the corner I drive off in the opposite direction.

  Back at the flat I stretch out on my bed and stare at the ceiling, trying to fit what I’ve just seen to what I know about Amina and her dead husband, which isn’t much more than jack shit. I’m certain now that Amina’s move had been planned – the evidence of decorating suggests she’d already been tarting the house up for sale, and who leaving a place in a
hurry would take the time and trouble to clean out the dustbins? Besides, a move makes perfect sense with her and the kid left on her own – the house is too big for just the two of them. I’ve learnt nothing beyond the mundane, but that door at the top of the staircase bothers me. Why? Samantha’s take on it was perfectly reasonable; it’s there to stop the child falling down those dangerous stairs. But there’s one detail about the door that still niggles. The fact that it has a keyhole.

  Bizarre as it seems, I’m starting to relate some of what I’ve come across at Prince Albert Road to my eye-opening experience at Warkworth Street, the unobtrusive whore-house. Those added partitions and doors. The upstairs rooms that can be locked from the outside. The arrangement is slightly different in the Springhill property, and there are fewer bedrooms, but it could serve the same function. I’m even thinking that the below-stairs conversion into a toilet might have been for the convenience of clients gathering downstairs, drinking, waiting their turn. Was Hassan Malik another one involved in running a brothel? Were punters told to turn up at the back door, away from prying eyes, where they’d be checked out under the light and maybe a camera as I was in Warkworth Street? Was that behind the old woman’s look of contempt, seeing me in the back lane, another of those strange men she has witnessed sneaking in and out of the house next door? And Amina…? Did she know about it? Was she even living in the house at the time? What about the baby?

  I shift across to my desk. Before I left the edit suite yesterday Jim gave me a memory stick containing the two voice files we’d compared. I’ve had a couple more listens already, and now I want to hear the Hassan piece again through my cans so I can really concentrate on that background sound. I’ve trained my ears to virtually block out my voice at the point where the cry can be heard in the distance. Each time it has sounded like an infant voice, not so much crying as faintly protesting, bleating even. But suppose I ask myself a different question. Timid as it is, could this be the cry of a young girl – Edona’s age, or less – startled by some painful abuse? lacerated? almost unheard behind firmly closed doors? It’s possible.