Free Bryant & May - The Burning Man by Christopher Fowler Page A

He trained as a doctor and is going into private practice soon. He wasn’t seeing anyone serious while he was in med school, because he wanted to concentrate on his career. But now—’
    ‘What? Now you’re going to let your parents choose you a husband?’
    ‘Colin – I actually like him. I’ve known him all my life.’
    She felt lousy telling him. Bimsley had the look of a man facing a burglar armed with a broken bottle. ‘So he suddenly decides he wants to get married and it suits your folks, and you’re just going to do what you’re told?’
    ‘It’s not like that.’
    ‘Then what is it like? Tough, independent, “I-can-do-it-myself” Meera, who never needs anyone else’s help, is going to start having babies to please her mum and dad.’
    ‘That’s unfair, Colin. You don’t understand the pressure I’m under, and Ryan’s a nice guy – he’s really nice. You’d like him.’
    The fight had gone out of her, Colin thought. Normally she would have instantly punched back.
    ‘No, I wouldn’t like him. Why didn’t you tell me about this before?’ he asked. ‘You know how I feel about you, how I’ve always felt.’
    ‘This isn’t about you. We’ve never been out together. I never said I would. I never, ever led you on, Colin.’
    ‘Yeah, I know. It’s not fair of me to put you on the spot. Fine. Well, I hope you’ll be very happy with your ambitious doctor. I’m going to do the late-night pubs around here. And I’m off-duty so I’ll be drinking.’ The rain was falling harder. Turning up his collar, Colin thrust his hands into his jacket pockets and stalked off along the street.
    Meera watched him go, then went to collect her Kawasaki.

12

BREAKING FREE
     
    By midnight on Monday the few remaining small fires had been snuffed out by auxiliary units, assisted by the pounding rain, and most of the protestors had disbanded for the night, heading for any shelter they could find. There was talk that the weather had succeeded in clearing the streets where the police had failed. Perhaps that would be the end of it.
    But on Tuesday morning, new reports about anarchy in the city quickly infected everyone’s mood. The detectives were frustrated by the paucity of leads, Dan Banbury was infuriated by the lack of evidence and Raymond Land was upset about having to cancel his holiday again.
    An uneasy truce now held in the roads surrounding the Bank of England and the Findersbury Private Bank. Under advice from Superintendent Darren Link, the police had blocked off further routes with heavy steel barriers. Trains started delivering protestors from all over the country, and even though the authorities had begun checking European arrivals in London, conducting searches whenever flights landed and ferries docked, nothing had been done to stop their arrival from other ports of entry.
    Link, who displayed an eschatological attitude about the riots that would have alarmed his bosses had they known, was working with the anti-terrorist squad to identify known activists and lift them off the streets before they had a chance to act. Ideally he would have liked to get each of them in a dark corner for a twenty-minute debrief with a blunt instrument, but senior eyes were watching him.
    The weather forecast for Tuesday was at least partially fine, and with Dexter Cornell continuing to goad his adversaries by promising in TV interviews that he would not be intimidated into leaving the bank before he was good and ready, it now seemed likely that further violence would erupt in the next twenty-four hours.
    In fact, a bizarre act of violence occurred soon after, but not in a way anyone had imagined, and not in the City’s Square Mile.
     
    His muscles were sore and stiffening fast.
    He had been working without light for the last two hours, dragging everything he needed up the steep staircase to the roof. The rising dust in the attic triggered his asthma, and he needed to sit quietly on the tiles for a while until he