Sid and Lady Felicia arrived at the presbytery at tea time. Suliivan had slept most of the day, drifting in and out of consciousness. The countess and the secretary had snuck upstairs, on tiptoes in their high heels on the creaky stairs, to peek around the door at the sleeping man. At least now he had moved (his hand on the pillow beside his face, legs curled up under the blankets) he didn't look quite so corpse-like. They both watched him in a strange, motherly fashion.
Lady Felicia was in tears; whether they were grief, confusion or frustration, not even she knew.
"The poor soul." She whispered, droplets beginning to spill over her eyelashes.
Sid refused to go up, saying it was disrespectful and he wasn't going to watch some sleeping bloke like an animal in the zoo. Father Brown sat downstairs with him, and gently said that it was okay to be a bit frightened of these things.
Sid didn't put much heart into his argument. For want of a better word, it did frighten him. Countless times today - even when he was busy driving or chatting or anything- his mind had wandered back to Sullivan's bedroom.
''That's enough, Sid.'' Father Brown said, gently taking SId by the elbows and pulling him away from the body, which he had been shaking.
'The doctor's here now, he'll know what to do.''
Sid threw his hands into the air as Dr Crawford pushed past and turned the body over. Sullivan's blank face was horrifying to look at.
'There's no point!'' He protested as the Doctor started rummaging in his bag. ''He's gone! Can't you see that? He's dead, we're too late!'''
'Not yet we're not.'' Said the Doctor, producing some shocking looking tube from his black bag. ''Father, if you could help me... Sid, could you hold his head, just like- yes, that's it- just hold like that while I...''
The moment he forced Sullivan's mouth open, Sid had had to look away. It was revolting; the noise of Sullivan choking abd retching, the smell of regugitated drink, charcoal and bile, the way he started half-heartedly flailed to get away from his captors.
The drive home was almost worse. Sid was dead tired, but couldn't sleep. Sullivan was bundled up in a picnic blanket and propped up against him, head lolling against his chest. Sid instinctively wound an arm around him and marvelled at the absurdity of it all. He stared at the unconscious man intently. Every so often an eyelid might lift a fraction of an inch showing a smidgen of electric blue, but that was the only proof Sid had that Inspector Sullivan was not dead.
He shook his head and lit another cigarette - probably his hundredth that day. At this rate he'd have his fingers smoked by bed time.
When bedtime finally did arrive, Sid, having managed not to smoke his fingers to the bone, was ordered home. He had shown willingness to stay, but didn't have any genuine inclination to do so.
He couldn't rest with the knowledge that Sullivan was above him somewhere in a such an awful state, and that said condition was self conflicted.
He had contented himself with asking the same questions over and over, until Mrs McCarthy suggested he run upstairs and see for himself that Sullivan was indeed still breathing. Father Brown had backed this up as sensible plan - confirmation and readjustment of ideas, all that sort of thing.
He'd stood outside the bedroom door with a rapidly beating heart for several minutes, hand warming the handle before he could work up the courage to go in.
He hadn't knocked, because he'd expected Sullivan still to be asleep.
"Oh."
Sullivan had propped himself up against the headboard of the bed and was holding his arms around himself as if he was freezing - and maybe he was cold, it always was rather chilly in here. He was very much awake, if a bit dazed looking, and Sid had forgotten just how piercing those icy blue eyes were as Sullivan stared right through him.
His hair was going to be a greasy mess by tomorrow morning. There were shadows of stubble creeping over the corners of his face and he was still an odd grey, like he'd walked through a cloud of ashes.
Sid hadn't expected any of this, and this new version of Sullivan rather pulled the rug out from under his feet.
"You look better." He said, without really meaning it.
Sullivan blinked, and stared at his knees.
"Are you - I mean, do you - y'know what, never mind." There were so many questions that Sid wanted desperately to ask, but couldn't. They looped around his tongue and tied it tightly, and he couldn't finish one sentence. "Why did you-" he blanched in horror. Should not have just said that. ''I mean - God, I don't know.''
Sullivan still stared ahead. Sid sat down on the bed beside him.
''Get off.'' Sullivan mumbled.
''Rude. I just fancied a chat.''
''About what?'' Sullivan snapped, or at least tried to snap, ''What do we possibly have in common?''
An idea caame to Sid. ''Put it this way,'' He said, ''I know what it's like to be a fugitive. Not for murder, like, but I do know what it's like to bein trouble with the old bill. And now you do too.''
A very croaky voice, so raw and painful Sid worried that the stomach pump might have punctured his voice box. "Have you any idea," He asked slowly, still staring at the covers over his legs, "What they do to policemen in prison?"
Sid did have a right idea.
The thought of Sullivan in prison was galling - tramping around in a tattered grey uniform, no blue suit, no hair cream, miserable, downtrodden, disrespected, dirty, no chance of parole. He wasn't the kind of man you'd want as your cell mate either; an uppity git with a superior attitude and a penchant for following rules he may as well have made up, they were so obscure.
But coppers in prison... Sid had heard horror stories about what happened to them. Granted, some of them deserved what they got, backstabbing bastards and all, but they made him shiver all the same.
Bad things really did happen behind bars, and if any man was to face the worst brunt of the detention facility it would be, ironically, the man who put men in it.
Shunned by every other prisoner, food tampered with, beds filled with unspeakable things, few possessions stolen, humiliated, spat at, verbally abused, physically assaulted.
Sid had once been told about a bobby called Gillert. Gillert had been too nosy for his own good; every single borderline illegal activity in Hambleston, he'd have his big nose stuck in it. He'd tramp the roads in the dark looking for minor misdemeanours - not unlike Sullivan himself. Anyway, he was caught fiddling accounts in some parish business and sent to HMP Gloucester (the same nick Sullivan would have ended up in) where he led a pretty miserable existence. The story went that he'd annoyed one of the big shots in there, saying he would notify the authorities of a gambling ring they had going. Betting on which prison officer would fall next on a certain step, racing earwigs, rolling bottle tops, that sort of thing. Harmless games. Anyone else would have turned a blind eye, enjoyed the camaradrie.
They'd found Gillert bled out in the showers. It wasn't a knife that killed him, but something like it. The freezing water had washed every trace of evidence of the cobbled floor, but they probably wouldn't have bothered investigating anyway. There would be no fuss at all. Soon, Gillert was just a story Mickey DeRourke told down at the Red Lion.
It could easily have been Sullivan.
But it wouldn't have been Sullivan. Because they would have walked him into a red cell, strapped a belt round his shoulders, stuck a bag over his clever face and pulled a lever. Snap. Neck broken. Goodnight Vienna. And that's if he was lucky: if fate was cruel to him, his shiny shoes could have kicked out for a few minutes until his body finally gave up. Killed the way the killers he arrested had been.
Sid jolted out of his macabre imaginings, and the man himself, the free man with a clear name, reappeared.
"You're not in prison though," He reminded Sullivan and himself, "You got off. You're free. Why would you do something like this?"
''Why are you here?'' Sullivan deflected from the question.
That rather stumped Sid for a second. ''Worried, I guess. Wanted to check you were still kicking.''
Sullivan looked him in the eye, looking genuinely puzzled. ''Why?'' He asked calmly.
God, that felt like a kick in the stomach. That was shocking, and on top of all the emotions of the last few days, his lip started trembling.
''Because... Because I don't want you to die.'' He whimpered, ''And no one ought to go like that, so- so just, talk to someone. I know we haven't always got on but you should not be putting yourself down like that - hell, no one should. You've been through a path rougher than a dog's arse ad if you ever want to talk about it, we're all ears - the Father, the others- me, I'll listen. D'ye hear me?'' Sid took one almighty sniff and nodded firmly, rubbing his eyes and being shocked by how damp they were.
Sullivan looked a little queasy at this frank display of emotion. ''Sorry,'' He said, ''I doubt I was a pretty si-''
''Oh don't start that.'' Sid interjected, ''Don't ever apologise for that. Anything like that.''
Sullivan rubbed at his face. He was visibly exhausted, even though he had slept all day. Sid realised this and hastily made for the door, not wanting to prevent the merest fraction of healing.
''I'll go on now so you can rest - but you remember what I said, right?'''
''Yes.'' Sullivan said uneasily, ''Thank you.''
''No need. I'll chat you tomorrow then.''
Sullivan scoffed. ''I don't plan to be leaving here a minute after nine o'clock tomorrow morning.'' He announced, portraying a glimmer of the arrogant git he used to be.
Despite the gravity of the situation, Sid snorted. ''Yeah,'' He agreed, picturing Mrs McCarty's face when she heard this invalid's plan, ''Good luck with that.''