Nightrise by Jim Kelly Page A

to register a death. You get a certificate. But to do that if someone’s died in an accident, or suddenly, you need the coroner to say it’s OK. And how can he do that if there’s no body? I guess this time he didn’t say it was OK. So Dad was left . . .’ He drained the can. ‘In limbo.’
    The beer was freeing up his memory. ‘We did try. We went to some office out at Swaffham Prior. The registrar saw us – a man called Trelaw. I’ll never forget the name. It was on his door, and he made us wait, in this cold office with a cold grate. That winter was icy. And then, when we did get in, he said no, we couldn’t have the death certificate – we needed the body. I think Mum just gave up.’
    Now that he’d unpacked the memory there was more of it than he’d expected. ‘I can see him now. Trelaw. A big man, one of those men whose bones seem to show through they’re so big, like an elephant, with the skin hung between. He had this big black fountain pen, and he held it like a child holds a crayon.’ He shook his head, amazed he’d been able to reach back for the image.
    â€˜And when we went he stood up and he shook her hand, and then he shook mine, and he said: “I’m sorry for your loss”. Nobody else had included me until then. I think that’s why I remember him. Mum didn’t speak – afterwards, on the way home. I think it was a blow. If she’d got the certificate she could have moved on, got on with her life, my life, but it was like we were caught – like one of those fossil flies petrified in amber.’
    He hadn’t noticed the squad car pulling up outside behind Humph’s cab. A uniformed PC, short with glasses, appeared by Dryden’s table, weighed down by a Hi-Vis jacket.
    â€˜Mr Dryden?’
    He placed a single golden Yale key on the tablecloth. It was bright and new and appeared to emit its own light.
    â€˜Compliments of Sergeant Cherry,’ he added.

THIRTEEN
    T he Jubilee Estate smelt of burnt tyres and newly mown grass. Late afternoon; the sun pressing down, driving the shadows under parked cars and around the trunks of the cherry trees, planted with military precision along the freshly cut verges. The flag of St George hung from a bedroom window; an Action Man hanging from a tangled parachute which had caught in the overhead phone lines.
    He made Humph walk, leaving the cab outside his own house. Leopold Street looked just like all the others they’d just strolled down. When Dryden got to the front gate Humph wasn’t in sight behind him so he waited, studying the house. Sweat broke out on his skin. What was it about housing estates that seemed to make them radiate their own heat? It was all that concrete, tarmac and brick. The house was mid-terrace, sixties, with asymmetrical windows of differing sizes which made its ugliness almost heroic. The garden was lawn, neat but perfunctory. The houses on either side were even uglier thanks to various Homebase affectations: a carriage lamp over the door on the right, a pair of giant plastic butterflies over the other.
    Humph came round the far corner, mopping his face theatrically with a white handkerchief. When he reached Dryden he took three deep breaths before speaking, then decided to say nothing.
    Dryden walked up the path and opened the door with the Yale. Crossing the threshold he breathed in the smell of it, trying to find a trace of his childhood. When they’d moved to London after his father’s death he’d noticed one day that their flat – in a block over shops on the Finchley Road – had somehow managed to develop exactly the same smell as the farmhouse at Burnt Fen. What was it? A subtle blend perhaps of diet, washing powder, beverages, furniture, clothes and books. And at the farm there had always been a stock pot gurgling on the range – something his mother contrived to somehow continue in the city. And