Lonie 58

It was a light drizzle when Lonie left for work the next day. The walk cleared Lonie’s head. He’d tea in the kitchen with Davy Brown. They’d kidded around, but said nothing much to each other. A meeting with the fatman in his office with the other editors went a little better. There’d been the usual banter about his relationship with Audrey and Lonie had agreed to type something up, a preliminary report on The Goldenwell case. His fingers were paused at the Olivetti, ready to peck out a story, but as he looked into the weak uneven light at the dust motes drifting down from the ceiling, he just couldn’t. It was too personal. One piece of advice Davy Brown had given him when he started was to take himself out of the story; let the story tell itself.

Lonie still wasn’t sure how he’d been hoodwinked. He lit a fag to help him think it through. He figured there must have been some sort of collective hysterical reaction. That was it. He’d read in his Encyclopaedia Britannica about the tricks female inmates in the Salpetrière had performed, on cue, for a young Freud and the middle-aged Charcot. Then, there was, of course, Huxley’s The Devils of Loudon. He tentatively started his one-fingered typing. The noise and smoke in the newsroom became a background buzz and his Woodbine in the ashtray went out, to be replaced by another, and yet another. Soon his eyes were red-rimmed from smoking and his fingers fumbled for a fag out of the packet on his desk and there were none left. Morning had turned into afternoon and most of the other reporters were taking an extended liquid lunch break. Lonie stretched his head and rolled his neck and stood up. His back and shoulders were sore from bending forward like an old man over the typewriter. He stacked the pages together and proof read the last page on the hoof, walking towards the fatman’s office, but by god did he need a drink and by god did he think he deserved one.

When Lonie pushed through the door to the office he could have started whistling. He slapped the copy down on the desk in front of the fatman. ‘Ah think you might find this interesting.’ Lonie smiled modestly and searched his pocket for his fags.

The fatman looked up at him. He’d a red pencil in his hand and he looked grumpy enough to stab Lonie in the eye with it. Bresslen stood guard beside him, like a twisted scarecrow. They both looked as if they needed a drink too.

The pencil clattered on the desk as the fatman dropped it and he pushed back in his chair to get a good look at Lonie. ‘What you lookin’ so fucking happy about?’

Lonie shrugged. ‘Nothin’.’

The fatman’s lips puckered in distaste. His eyes didn’t leave Lonie, but an arm shot up imperiously and an empty hand waved impatiently at Bresslen to fill it with the pages of Lonie’s offering. He looked at the closely typed pages and shook his head and let them fall onto the desk. ‘What kinda crap’s this?’

‘The kinda crap you’ll like.’ Lonie grinned at him. He knew it was the wrong thing to say, which made it feel more right.

Bresslen picked up the copy and began scanning through it.

The fatman’s head wobbled from side to side as he considered this and he tugged at his chin. ‘Tell me about it.’ He used his elbows on the armrest to get a better slouching and sitting position on the office chair.

‘Well,’ Lonie’s left foot tapped and he made a face towards Bresslen. ‘You got a fag?’

Bresslen looked up from the copy he had in his hand, but continued reading. He scratched at his nostril with the hand he wasn’t using for holding the script, found his packet of fags and handed one to Lonie. He looked up momentarily to make sure Lonie had a light, before flicking over another page and continuing reading.

Lonie took a deep drag, which settled his voice. ‘It’s simple. The treatment programme in the secure unit consists of Catholic religious rituals and exorcisms.’

‘You got to be joshing me!’ The fatman looked up at Bresslen to see if he was going to contradict him.

Bresslen barely glanced at the fatman. He held his hand up to stop him from saying anything else as his eyes travelled down the last page. He flipped it over face down on top of the other pages on the fatman’s desk. ‘You lost Carol Peters?’ He squinted at Lonie.

Lonie chuckled. ‘We didn’t…’ He shook his head, and closed his eyes momentarily, and with a rueful grin started again. ‘They didn’t actually lose her. More like they misplaced her.’ He tried to make it sound like a joke.

Bresslen thumbed through Lonie’s copy. ‘Says here she was missing for about fifteen minutes.’ He held up the typewritten sheet as evidence.

The fatman’s chair squelched as he worked himself into a better position. His mouth opened to say something, but then shut again.

Lonie took a deep drag. ‘They didn’t lose her, lose her.’ He knew he was repeating himself, but couldn’t help it. ‘She was still in the building,’ he added feebly.

The fatman leaned across and on the desk to make his point, his weight nudging it forward towards Lonie. ‘Let’s use the numpty test. What kinda medication are Carol Peters and Larry Murray on?’

Lonie scratched at his forehead. Tired of standing, he pulled a seat across and sat down in front of the fatman’s desk, with his back to the glass window. ‘Ah never saw them getting any medication.’

‘No injections? No antipsychotics?’ The fatman’s finger tapped on the desk.

‘No.’ Lonie didn’t know where he was going with this.

The fatman perked up and looked as happy as the fatman could look without a glass of whisky in his hand. ‘No tranquilisers? None of mummy’s little sleeping pills?’

‘No. Ah don’t think so.’

‘What about Audrey? Would she know?’

Lonie considered this. He hadn’t thought about Audrey for a while and that felt like a betrayal. He spoke carefully. ‘Ah don’t think she’d know any more about that side of things than me.’

‘Right.’ The fatman drew out his deliberation as he turned to include Bresslen in his new found spryness. He scratched behind his ear. ‘What I’m hearing is there’s no medication being given. That would suggest to me that these two mass murderers shouldn’t be in a hospital. They should stand trial and be in prison, or be hanged. Preferable the latter.’ He looked across the desk at Lonie to see if he disagreed, but his star reporter’s gaze slid away. ‘Not only that, there treatment programme consisted of mumbo jumbo and prayers.’ He laughed. ‘Our readers will fuckin’ eat that right up. That exorcism lark is front page stuff.’ He rocked back and forth tears coming into his eyes. ‘But the best bit of fuckin’ all...’ He banged the desk in appreciation. ‘…and you couldn’t make it up, is afterwards they lost the patient.’

The fatman turned to Bresslen. ‘Fuckin’ brilliant. This is going to run and run and run.’ His face was flushed as if he’d been drunk. ‘Phone the typesetters. Move that muck off the front page. We’ve got a real story now.’

Bresslen tapped a fag out of his packet. Excitement was not his forte. ‘They might still be getting medication. We just don’t know about it.’ He lit a fag, his hollowed out eyes, and his whole demeanour suggesting caution.

The fatman considered and dismissed it at the same time. ‘What kind of mental hospital is it that needs to confirm…?’ He did that thing with his fingers that signified front page quote: ‘ “…yes we do give out medication.”’ He shook his head. ‘Even if they do say they do give out medication.’ His voice rose in entreaty. ‘That’s standard. And we can jump in and ask what kind, when, and if it’s before or after conducting a full scale exorcism.’

The chair squealed in protest as the fatman turned to face Lonie again. ‘What we need from you now is some background stuff. We’ll go with what we’ve got, but I want you to visit some of the victim’s mothers and fathers…Fuckin’ brilliant. Just tell them what a cushy life those two murdering bastards have got.’ He screwed his face up and his hand couldn’t help half twisting in entreaty. ‘Mind take a tape recorder. Don’t want any fuck ups now. Tell them what kinda crap that priest does. It’s him we want to crucify. Knock him down and the rest of those Papish bastards will follow like a pack of cards.’

Lonie seemed to have shrunk into his chair. ‘I’m a Catholic too.’ His eyes met the fatman’s. He needed a drink now, but for a different reason.

‘Aye, but there’s Catholics and there’s Catholics and you’re one of the good guys. I’ll tell you what…’ The fatman’s hand slapped Bresslen’s arm. ‘Give him a couple of quid out of expenses…He’s worth it…and get him a drink.’ His big moon face beamed across the desk at Lonie. ‘That’s my boy. You’ve got the rest of the day off…and if you’ve got a sore head in the morning and are in a bit late…’ He tapped the side of his nose, as if to say we’ll keep it stumm.

Bresslen followed Lonie out of the office and into the newsroom. Neither of them had much to say. Lonie went over to his desk and pulled on his coat. Bresslen waited for him at the double-doors to the newsroom.

‘How much do you need for expenses?’ Bresslen looked at his toes.

‘About fifty quid?’

He met Lonie’s eyes, snorted and shook his head.

‘Thirty quid?’

‘You’ll need to sign a chit.’ Bresslen led the way towards the cage where the money was kept.