The night air hits my cheeks as I stumble out of the office, my fingers instantly fumbling in my pocket for my phone, punching out Si’s number.
Come on, I beg for him to pick up, the memory of the caller’s voice ringing in my ears. Instinctively, I feel in my other pocket for the recording device Maureen had bought for my birthday as a thank you for the stories I’d written publicising local fundraising events for the refuge.
‘Issy, what do you want? I’ve got to be in court in the morning.’ From the clarity of Si’s voice, there is no way he had been asleep and I remember that he is probably still pissed off about what had happened earlier.
‘I need you to come over. Please.’ My voice sounds rasping. There is a brief pause and then he says, ‘Fine. I’ll be there in five.’
By the time I get back to the flat he is already waiting at the door.
‘Fucking hell, that was quick,’ I say. ‘I thought you were in bed.’
A self-styled Bolshevik from Tunbridge Wells, Si had launched his own furious protest against rising rents and inflated coffee prices in Kentish Town by moving to a one-bed in Stamford Hill, which is twenty minutes away, minimum, even in a cab.
He looks at the floor. ‘I lied, I stayed out.’
‘Right. And you just happened to be …?’
‘Just around the corner from the office? Erm, yes. Jesus, Isobel, do you want me here or not?’
‘Sorry,’ I say, moving forward and taking his hand. ‘Come up.’
The light in the hall still isn’t working and as I push open the door to the flat, I briefly imagine it through Si’s eyes: the dingy kitchen counter, sparsely decorated with a couple of ashtrays and a jar of instant coffee. The same wall-hanging I’d inherited from the previous tenant when I moved in.
The floors are the original wooden boards, modernised with decades’ worth of stains, partially concealed by a battered Persian rug my mother bought years ago at a shop on Highgate Road; it was one of the few things they’d left behind when they moved.
‘Listen,’ I say, pulling out a bottle of whisky from one of the cupboards, along with two glasses. Pouring a triple measure in each, I pass one to Si, catching him inspecting the rim before he drinks.
‘I do actually wash the glasses before I put them away,’ I snipe, moving to sit next to him on the tiny sofa. ‘Listen, I need your help with something.’
‘Oh yeah?’ He leans forward and kisses my neck.
‘Si, I’m serious, I need you to listen to something.’ Pushing him away, I pull the dictaphone from my pocket. ‘Just listen to this, OK?’
Si exhales loudly and then I hear the voice again, over the crackling of the recorder. I really should invest in a digital one, though somehow it would feel disloyal to Maureen to get rid of the one she gave me. In the eight months since we’ve got to know each other properly, she’s become as much a mother figure as a friend.
Isobel, I am watching you. No police, or I will kill you too.
‘What the hell’s that?’ Si shifts slightly away from me.
‘It’s him,’ I say. There is a satisfaction in my voice and I stare intensely at him for a moment, challenging him to contradict me this time.
‘Who?’ He looks concerned.
‘It’s the man I was telling you about. The one from the Heath, who sent me the shoes! The brick, I …’ There is more excitement in my voice than fear and Si blinks.
‘What the hell? Start at the beginning. He’s called you?’
‘Yes! I need to ask you something. You studied languages …’ Si looks up, as if he had misheard the question.
‘Listen to this, in the background. If you turn the volume up you can hear talking … Is it anything you recognise?’
Noting the desperation in my face, he reluctantly closes his eyes and listens. The recording is grainy but under the fuzz there are clearly men’s voices in the background, though the whole thing feels distorted.
‘God, I don’t know, I can hardly bloody hear them …’
Turning up the machine to full volume I press Play again and watch his face intently.
‘Yeah I think he’s used one of those voice-masking apps. It’s all a bit slurry.’
Si shakes his head. ‘I don’t know what language it is they’re speaking but it’s nothing I understand.’ There’s a pause and then he says, ‘Is …’ His voice is cautious. ‘I’m really worried about you.’
Without saying another word he leans forward and pulls me gently against his chest. When he releases me a few moments later, he doesn’t try to kiss me. Rather, he says, ‘I think you should call Oscar.’
Knowing how Si feels about Oscar, I know what it must take for him to mutter these words.
I nod. ‘Yeah, I’ll call him in the morning,’ I say, knowing full well that I won’t.
Si is pulling on his trousers the following day, ready to leave for court, when it strikes me.
‘Hey, what about that old professor of yours? What’s his name … something Mansfield?’
‘What about him?’
‘He worked as a translator …’ I know this from the only time I ever met him when he spent the duration of our conversation blasting me with the details of his achievements, which include speaking fourteen languages, not least various obscure regional dialects that make him not only an expert in his field but, in his own words, extremely well paid.
Despite being a total arsehole, Professor Mansfield made quite an impression on Si back in his student days, and after several mentions and a single uncomfortable meeting, I had filed his name away for a moment when such a contact might come in handy.
‘Isobel, no … Just the police, all right? Stop playing detective, for God’s sake,’ Si replies with a knowing look when I suggest he might give me his number. ‘Anyway, I can’t just give you his details without asking.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because I know you, and he’s busy and it’s rude and—’
I pull back my head. ‘Rude? Oh, fuck off, Si. You realise how serious this could be? And anyway, it’s not like I couldn’t dig out his number myself, it would just save a lot of time if you gave it to me.’
He looks up at me, shaking his head resignedly. ‘Fine. At least let me ask him. If he tells me to piss off …’
I give him a grin, the first I’ve mustered in a long time, and immediately Si’s face softens. ‘But don’t harass him, OK? And call Oscar.’