Thicker Than Water

Gary had been talking in his usual voice when he started that little speech, but he was shouting when he got to the end of it. I opened my mouth to shout back, and - to my complete and absolute amazement - he was as good as his word. He clocked me a solid one on the mouth.

It wasn’t hard enough to knock me down, but it made me stagger. I blinked twice and shook my head. Licking my lips, I tasted blood. ‘Son of a bitch,’ I growled, and I started forward with my fists up. But Gary just stood there, staring me down, and after a moment I let my hands fall again.

‘Are you ready to listen to reason now?’ he asked.

I spat on the floor - a thick red gobbet - then met his gaze. ‘Have you got any?’

Gary breathed out heavily. ‘What I’ve got, Fix, is evidence. Which I’m about to share with you out of the goodness of my heart - unless you piss me off so much that I sign off early and forget you’re stuck in here until the morning. If you’re interested, sit down and shut up. Otherwise, say something really clever and sarcastic and I’ll be happy to leave you to it.’

After a moment’s painfully weighted silence, I sat down in the other chair, giving him a shrug and a wave.

‘The writing on the windscreen,’ Gary said.

‘Points to me,’ I observed.

‘No. It doesn’t.’

‘What, you know another F. Castor, Gary?’

‘We put the lab boys on it, Fix. The letters had been washed or smeared away, but the oil traces from Seddon’s fingertip were still there on the glass. He didn’t write “Felix Castor”. He wrote “Father Castor”.’

I opened my mouth to speak, but the words fled away into my hind-brain and my mouth just hung open, waiting for them to come back.

‘So then we looked at your brother’s movements,’ Gary said. ‘He was seen leaving that Saint Bon Appetit place around midnight, although he’d previously told a colleague that he was turning in for the night. We’ve got his car on CCTV twice, once in Streatham and once at Herne Hill. And - get this, Fix - the priest in the room next to his is woken up at four the next morning by the sound of someone crying. Loud, uncontrollable sobbing, in his own words, coming from Matthew’s room. And he’s prepared to go on record that it was Father Castor he was hearing.’

I found a word floating somewhere in the void that seemed as though it might be relevant and serviceable. ‘Circumstantial,’ I said. ‘It’s all circumstantial.’

‘Maybe it is,’ Gary allowed. ‘But it was enough to get us a warrant. And the Basilisk was careful to shake you first, before she went in, just in case the forensics didn’t play. She got your statement, which placed Matthew Castor at the Salisbury both before and after the fact.’

I shook my head in protest. ‘Not before. I couldn’t eyewitness him before. I just said he was with Gwillam, and Gwillam—’

‘None of it matters, Fix.’ Gary cut across me impatiently. ‘Because the forensics did play out. Matthew’s fingerprints and boot print match, a hundred per cent. And this just in - we shagged the phone records for the place where Matthew teaches. Him and Seddon were gabbing away every day for a week before the killing. They met up in that car, and your brother brought a straight razor with him. He brought an accomplice, too, and we’re still working on that. But we’ve got him, Fix. If he’s innocent, then this is a fit-up so immaculate that only God could have pulled it off.’

And that was out of the question, of course, because God loves Matt. He loves all His little children, of course, but Matt is actually on His team. I just sat there, not saying a word, and Gary sat there watching me, until PC Dennison swiped the door lock again and then leaned inside to hold the door open for Matt.

Matt was a mess: unshaven, red-eyed, his hair up in a tousled Stan Laurel peak. They’d left him his own clothes but had taken his shoelaces and his belt. Being put on suicide watch must be particularly hard for a practising Catholic.

‘Felix,’ he mumbled. ‘Thank you. Thank you for coming. I’m - it’s all been a little crazy, since—’

He faltered into silence, blinking fast as he stared at me with pleading, bewildered eyes. I got up and crossed the room to him. Neither of us was ever very big on physical shows of affection - something we got from Dad - and Matt would have cringed if I’d tried to hug him, but I put my hands on his shoulders and squeezed: a clumsy, truncated gesture of solidarity that he didn’t“ th Ma even seem to notice.

‘It’s okay, Matt,’ I said, going against both the evidence and common sense. ‘It’s going to be okay.’

Coldwood made for the door. ‘Knock on the glass when you’re done,’ he said, brusquely. PC Dennison was still holding the door open: Gary swept through and he let it fall to again with the decisive clunk of a solid mortice lock that I could probably have identified just from the sound if my mind hadn’t been otherwise occupied.

‘I need to sit,’ Matt said, and I stood aside so he could get to the chair. He lowered himself into it a little too carefully for my liking.

‘Are you all right?’ I demanded.