The Swap - By Antony Moore Page 0,100

speech and Harvey could kind of see them, but really everyone seemed to be just saying what they were thinking today, so it just boiled out. And if it wasn't really true as such, it did at least reflect honestly how he was feeling. Sort of. Bleeder gazed at him with a kind of far-away amazement on his face and then closed his eyes for a long moment.

'I think you should keep the comic, Harvey. I think that is probably what you should do, all right? I think perhaps the comic is what this is about for you and I'm glad we could discuss it. But now I must go for a while.' And he turned again to the narrow space between the bushes that formed a little pathway across the headland and he followed it until it turned and bore him out of sight.

Harvey stood for a while where he was. I am experiencing conflicting emotions, he told himself. But it wasn't really true. Jesus Christ, it's mine! And he set off, suddenly pumped up with emotion, until he broke into a run and gambolled like a flat-footed lamb along the path, back towards the hotel. The murder was solved, he was rich and he'd got Maisie, and everything was going to be just totally, totally perfect.

Chapter Thirty-five

Maisie wasn't there, which was the only setback of the day really. There was no one guarding reception so Harvey simply leaned over the counter and stole the key. Once in his room he paced the floor for a while and then had a shower, being still slightly sticky from the first encounter on the cliffs and sweaty from the second. But when she didn't return after about an hour, he went out again. He couldn't be still. Feeling sure that he would meet her on the return journey, he left the hotel, untended as far as he could tell, and walked back into town. He needed a drink, and someone to drink with, preferably female and gorgeous. He made for the Lifeboat, still waiting to meet her eye in the faces that he passed, still expecting her voice to call to him in a way that meant she had been looking for him. But she didn't come. The Lifeboat was the pub they always drank in on Friday nights when he was seventeen, good for pulling and good for scrumpy that made you sick after only three pints. He had entered and ordered lager when he heard a voice in his ear.

'Hello, H, you're early, I thought we weren't meeting till seven.' It was Steve.

'Er, yeah, all right, mate?' Harvey allowed the situation to occur without any comment on his part.

'It's only half six. Is this the new Harvey Briscow? Weren't you always fashionably late for everything?'

'Er, yeah, but I've not much to do today.' No point in not lying.

'No? Try having a baby, there's never not much to do. That's why I had to get out: bit of peace and quiet. I'm not allowed out that often, but for the great H. Briscow, Jean makes an exception. What am I having, by the way? Oh, pint of Tribute please, thanks, Harv.'

So Harvey ordered Steve a drink and relaxed onto his barstool.

It was a longer night than he had planned but he wanted to be with someone. Harvey rarely shared confidences, and certainly told Steve nothing of the day's unfolding, but he did like someone there to exchange pointless platitudes with, someone whose shoulder he could look over in the hope of spotting someone better to talk to. Irrationally he kept thinking she would walk in and their eyes would meet and he'd blow off Steve and she would sit on the barstool next to him and she wouldn't tell tedious stories about childcare and childhood, rather she would listen, rapt, as he recounted the Bleeder experience. Because he was suddenly desperate to tell someone what Bleeder had said. He was off the hook, the nightmare was over. No more tears, as both Johnson's Baby Shampoo and Ozzy Osbourne had put it in their time. No more tears. He did the sigh a few times during the evening. He was off the murder rap and he was rich. But still he had to listen to Steve retell how he deflowered Melanie Simpson in the back of a Ford Capri. It lacked that feeling of momentousness really.

When at last they left the pub he found it was nearly midnight and the stars