Daisy lived east of the Port. She and Sheba had an apartment in a block set back from the sea, part way up the steep hillside where the suburbs of Pompey crawled. Better than Sutton, light years away from the shore flats, but I couldn’t have lived there. In return for reasonable security and clean air they had three rooms in a grey, Company-owned building with a lobby staffed by grim-faced guards I’d never seen smile. If I hadn’t travelled in with Daisy they’d have done everything but strip me to check my identity. Given any provocation they’d have done that, too.
The journey in the Company car had been faster and more comfortable than any public bus. I’d just felt an uneasy sense of guilt. I’d said I wouldn’t spy on her, I knew she had nothing to do with the trouble at the Port, but that didn’t make me any easier. I had a nagging sense of things left undone. Unlike me, Daisy grew more relaxed with every metre we travelled from the Port. Perhaps it was the right time to keep my promise to Clim and the others. “I saw Em the other day.” Daisy grinned. “How is the old witch?” It wasn’t the reaction I’d expected. “Worried.” The flat word had Daisy frowning. “She’s not injured herself again, has she? Last time she wouldn’t go into clinic. Said she’d heal up just fine if I’d go away and leave her alone. So I did, much against my will. She’s too old for some of the things she tries – and those others in the mud berths don’t help.”
“Well, you won’t have to worry about it much longer, will you?”
“Would you mind telling me what the hell you’re talking about?”
Daisy didn’t lie. If I knew anything about her, I knew that. This was more complicated than I’d thought. But perhaps there was hope for Em and Clim and the others after all.
“You mean they’re wrong when they tell me you’re going to drag their boats out of the mud berths?”
“I’m what?”
I told her about my meeting with them and their certainty they would soon be homeless.
“That’s got to be Gus! Damn the man. He hears half a story and immediately thinks he understands and makes a half-arsed battleplan and rides charging in without checking his facts. No, Humility, I am not about to wreck the mud-berths. There has been talk of a second-stage development and, yes, it might affect them. I’m trying to see if the Company will work round them or, failing that, offer an alternate site.”
“You might have told them.”
“Not before I had anything solid to offer. And I don’t want you to say anything. It’s not certain yet. They shouldn’t even have heard any rumours, though I suppose that was too much to ask.”
“You know Em.”
“I should.”
“And you know Gus.”
“And him. I’ll tell him to back off. Leave him to me.”
“Gladly.”
It wasn’t much, but Clim and the others would be grateful for even the hint of a reprieve. They were survivors.
I probed a little for her opinion of her own troubles. She was less willing to talk about them.
“Forget sabotage. It was just one of those times when everything seems to go wrong. It’s over now.”
I wasn’t sure if she believed it or was trying to convince herself as much as me. “It can’t hurt if I just look around.”
“No! Let it be! Meddling never did any good.”
“What’s bugging you? Don’t you at least want to find out how Jon died? He was your employee, after all.”
The driver never even turned to look back as Daisy’s sudden anger flared. I didn’t understand. Daisy never lost control. The effort it took now was obvious but when she spoke again her voice at least was steady.
“No. I told you. Besides, you were wrong. It wasn’t Jon.”
If Tom Lee’s files still showed Jon alive I wasn’t surprised to discover Daisy had learned the same thing. If she hadn’t done the research herself Byron Cody would have told her. I’d been waiting for her to tell me.
She was staring now, my lack of reaction obvious. “You knew?”
“That the files show him still alive? Yes.”
“So now you can forget whoever it was. It’s nothing to do with you or me or the Port any more.”
Subject closed. Without proof that was how it would stay. If I wanted to salvage our friendship from this evening, I knew when to shut up. It was only when the car stopped that Daisy brought up the subject again.
“You won’t say anything about dead bodies to Sheba.”
It wasn’t a question. As an order, it was unnecessary. Sheba was not someone you talked corpses with.