South by South East Read Free Page A

to McGuffin’s heart. And at the same time, I knew that the man with the broom – Charon – had just made a clean getaway.
    I was holding the door. For a moment I was trapped behind it. Tim was standing in front of me, his mouth open, his eyes wide. Then McGuffin pitched forward, landing in Tim’s arms. He was still alive. He began to talk. I would have heard what he said but it was exactly then that a train decided to pass overhead, and for the next few seconds the air was filled with the noise of grinding, creaking metal. The brick walls of the alley caught the sound and batted it back and forth like a ping-pong ball. I saw McGuffin’s lips move. I saw Tim nod. But I didn’t hear a word. I tried to move round but the glass door was still between me and them. By the time I managed to close it and get over to them, the train was gone.
    So was McGuffin.
    Tim let him go and he sprawled out on the tarmac. I tried to talk but my lips were too dry. I took a deep breath and tried again. “What did he say?” I asked.
    “Suth,” Tim said.
    “Suth? You mean – south?”
    “Yes.”
    “Was that all?”
    “No. He said ‘bee’.”
    “A bumblebee?”
    “No.” Tim shook his head. “Just ‘bee’.”
    “South. Bee…”
    “Suff-iss.”
    “Suff-iss?”
    Tim looked at me sadly. “I couldn’t hear,” he wailed. “The train was too loud…”
    “I know!” I forced myself not to shout at him. “But you were closest to him, Tim. You must have heard what he said.”
    “I’ve told you. Suff. Bee. Suff-iss.”
    “Suff. Bee. Suff-iss?” I played it over in my head a few times. “You mean south by south east? Was that what he said?”
    Tim brightened. “Yes! That was it, Nick! I mean, that’s what it must have been. South by south east! That’s exactly what he said.”
    “South by south east.” I made a quick calculation, then turned round so that I faced the corner of Skin Lane, away from the High Street.
    “A dead end,” Tim said. He looked down at the body, his face going the colour of mouldy cheese. If we stayed here much longer he was going to pass out on me.
    “You’re not going to faint, are you?” I asked.
    “No!” Tim was indignant.
    “You usually faint when there’s a dead body.”
    “No I don’t.”
    “You even fainted when your goldfish died.”
    “That was grief!”
    “We’d better call the police,” I said.
    Tim glanced at the phone box but I shook my head. “We can’t use that one. Fingerprints…”
    We half walked, half ran. The police station was a half-mile away. It seemed we were doing everything by halves. It even took us half an hour to get there. The trouble was that Tim was seeing Charon all over the place now. A woman with a pram, a traffic warden, a man waiting for a bus … they all had him paralysed with terror and he would only speak to the desk sergeant in the station when he had counted his ten fingers.
    The desk sergeant listened to our story with a cold smile, then showed us into a back room while he went to find a senior officer. I was beginning to wonder if we hadn’t made a mistake going there.
    Then the door opened and I
knew
we’d made a mistake.
    The senior police officer was Chief Inspector Snape.
    Snape was a tough, round-shouldered bull of a man. Wave a red flag at him and he’d probably flatten you. He had the sort of flesh you’d expect to see hanging upside down in a butcher’s shop. Snape hardly ever smiled. It was as if nobody had taught him how. When his lips did twitch upwards, his eyes stayed small and cold.
    But without any doubt, the worst thing about Snape was his sidekick, Boyle. And with Boyle, kick was exactly the word. Boyle loved violence. I once saw a photograph of him in full riot gear – shield, truncheon, tear gas, grenade, helmet – and that had been taken on his day off. He was shorter than Snape, with dark, curly hair that probably went all the way down to his feet.
    “Well, well, well,” Snape muttered. “If it isn’t