Dirty Old Town

by L M Krier

  He headed to the office he shared with Jo to hear what Dr Sinclair had to say to him.

  ‘DS Hallam? Mike, is it, did I see from your photo ID? Robert Sinclair here, the pathologist. I promised to keep you up to date with anything I discovered after you left. I hasten to point out that this is not very scientific, not at all, but it may possibly be of some help.’

  ‘Thank you, doctor. Anything you can give me would be useful, especially as I’m due to interview our suspect in a little over an hour’s time.’

  ‘Please call me Robert. I feel I should thank you because you’ve managed to unleash a fanciful side within me which I had no idea existed. I didn’t want to say anything while you were there so as not to raise false hopes, and I noticed that you studiously avoided looking too closely at the victim.’

  Mike gave a guilty laugh at that.

  ‘I’m not known for having a strong stomach, I have to confess.’

  ‘I did notice some bruising to the victim’s throat. Faint, but perceptible. Under magnification, it showed up more distinctly as a human handprint, in effect. The thumb mark was to the right side of the throat, the fingers to the other side. I’ve taken extensive measurements, should the need arise to attempt to identify the owner of the hand in question.

  ‘The first thing you will no doubt have picked up on is that the indications are that, as the print was made from the front, confirmed by where the palm print is, this was done by a right hand, which may be helpful to you.

  ‘Now, this is where it starts to get right outside what I usually do. My only excuse is as I said, I suddenly started seeing it from a crime fiction perspective, and wondered what I could come up with were I to be writing it as such.

  ‘Strangely, the current Mrs Sinclair couldn’t be persuaded to allow me to grip her round the throat in simulation. Luckily, I have a teenage son who, as he is already convinced his Aged Parent is beyond redemption, didn’t seem to think it all that bizarre a request. So we did some role play.

  ‘Two things struck us as very odd, in our re-enactment. They might very well jump out at you too, with your superior experience of such things.’

  ‘Well, the first thing which strikes me is that if I was trying to stop someone intent on jumping to their death, I think I’d be more likely to grab an arm or a leg, or both, rather than a throat hold. That doesn’t sit right, somehow.’

  ‘Exactly so!’ The pathologist sounded pleased with his deduction. ‘Not really a natural reaction at all. I hasten to add that I wasn’t really trying to throw my son and heir over the bannisters. His mother was not at all keen on that either, strangely. But we did simulate it, as far as we could, he being a reasonably similar height to our victim, though heavier. And no matter how many different ways we tried it, my natural instinct was always to take hold of him by the upper arms. I did check, too. If I was in a position to grab him by the throat, I was most definitely in a position to take hold of his arms.’

  ‘And the second thing?’ Mike asked him.

  ‘Well, on this one, you have the advantage over me of having visited the scene, so you will be the best judge of this. It occurred to me that, this being in a communal block of flats, the stair rail would have to be at a reasonable height. Otherwise there would be the risk of people routinely falling over it, especially if they were coming home slightly the worse for wear.

  ‘So taking the height of the average domestic bannister, it’s not a terribly easy manoeuvre to hitch oneself up onto it backwards, as it were. And it doesn’t seem to me to be entirely logical. Although I appreciate that people desperate enough to want to kill themselves are not always thinking rationally. But, and you’d have to test this theory out with our famous dummy, without a gaping void of a big, wide stairwell, I would say there was a possibility that by going over backwards, like a diver from a boat, the person might do a sort of somersault in the air and land on their feet. That would probably result in some nasty lower limb fractures, but would it be guaranteed to kill?

  ‘I know none of this is exactly scientific, but I thought it might at least give you some ideas when you speak to your suspect.’

  Mike was making movements with his right hand in the air as the doctor was speaking, trying to picture the scene. In particular, he was looking for ways to pre-empt anything the suspect might come up with as an excuse for the marks.

  ‘At a pinch, you might grab someone by the scruff of the neck as they were trying to jump, with their back to you, as well as an arm or something. But then, if our suspect is right-handed, which I need to check, the thumb mark is on the wrong side of the neck, surely?’

  ‘Exactly so! I’ve carefully noted all the details of each and every mark on the body and they don’t appear to me to be consistent with grabbing hold of someone to pull them back from the brink. Quite the reverse, in fact.’

  ‘It’s all incredibly helpful, Robert. Thanks very much. He’s coming in with his solicitor this morning, so I doubt I’ll get more than a succession of “no comments” from him. But it at least gives me some idea of what questions to pose.’

  ‘I’m sending all of this over right now in writing as I know you’ll need to make disclosure of my initial findings. There were rather a lot of injuries of various ages on the poor lady’s body. I’ve highlighted the more recent ones in my report. And don’t worry, none of my wild theories appear in it. Those are between us two, and for you to do with as you wish.

  ‘Would you mind keeping me posted on this case, Mike? It’s becoming really intriguing to me and I’d love to know the outcome.’

  ‘Before I forget, Jo, I’ve promised to take Trev out somewhere on Sunday, so I’ll need you to cover for me. He’s away the following weekend, so I can return the favour then.’

  ‘Ted, at the risk of repeating myself, it’s what I’m here for. You must have done your fair share of covering for senior officers in your time.

  ‘So tell me how things are going in your new extended kingdom. It sounds as if the clowns at Ashton have been taking advantage of Judy Collier’s absence to play silly beggars.’

  ‘They certainly got a surprise when I turned up unannounced and told them their fortune. Do you know Judy, then?’

  ‘Not well, but I’ve heard she’s a cracking good DI. There’s no way she’d stand for any sloppy work on her team. But I hear too that she was pretty badly injured in that car accident, so she’s likely to be in traction for quite a while.’

  ‘The Trafford lot are sound as a pound. Sarah Jenkins is very impressive. Her DI shouldn’t be concerned at all at having to be off sick.’

  Mike came back in to join them at that point, to give them the rough outline of what the pathologist had told him. He’d printed out the written report in duplicate so he could give a copy to the suspect’s solicitor at the start of the interview. A quick glance had reassured him it was a much edited version of what Sinclair had said to him over the phone.

  ‘It’s still going to be difficult for him to explain why he chose to grab her by the throat in an effort to prevent her attempting suicide. Certainly not hard enough to have left marks.’

  ‘We’ll need to get the victim’s clothing thoroughly examined too,’ Ted reminded him. ‘If he had been grabbing hold of her to stop her from jumping, we might expect to see some tearing, perhaps.’

  ‘Mike, you’ll need to check if he’s right or left handed, of course,’ Jo put in. ‘But I for one am struggling to see how it would be a reflex action to grab her throat to stop her from going over. If she was trying to go over backwards, which of itself sounds a bit strange, wouldn’t you naturally tend to grab her by the legs? Or an arm and a leg, at least.’

  ‘You’re going to have to handle this very delicately, Mike’ Ted told him. ‘Is there time before the suspect gets in for you and me to go through the report quickly together and see how to handle it? Clearly we need to make disclosure, but if we’re not very careful, we might inadvertently overplay our hand and give the defence a get out of jail card, i
f we finally have enough to charge him with.

  ‘Who’s his solicitor?’

  ‘I’m not sure yet. He’s only seen the duty solicitor so far, not got one of his own. And I’d really welcome it, boss. If you had any time to watch how the interview progresses and give me the odd steer, I certainly wouldn’t object to that either.’

  * * *

  ‘We’ll need to be thinking about the right secondary school for him very soon. He’s growing up so fast. Should we start going to have a look at some?’

  She asked the question as carefully as she could. Not looking at him as he stood leaning against the kitchen units, muscular arms folded across his big chest.

  He was calm, for now. He must have had a decent shift where things hadn’t gone too badly.

  Nevertheless, it was clearly the wrong thing to say. She should have been more careful. Thought harder about how to phrase her question.

  He gave a snort of contempt as he said, ‘You’re not going near any school we might think of sending him to. You’d ruin his chances. They’d be worried he might turn out to be a half-wit like his precious mother.’

  She put her head down so he couldn’t see the tears which sprang so readily to her eyes at his words. She stayed quiet for a moment. But this was important. It was her son’s future and she wanted it to be right for him.

  ‘I would like to see the schools, though. I wouldn’t show you up, I promise. I wouldn’t say anything. I’d just like to be there.’

  His voice was louder this time as he scoffed, ‘For god’s sake, woman, if you sit there in total silence they’ll think you’re even more of an idiot than you are.’

  There was a noise from the living room and the boy appeared through the connecting doorway. His face was dark with anger and his voice was loud as he said, ‘Stop bullying my mum! It’s not up to you. She’s got the right to have her say, too.’

  The woman stopped what she was doing and moved instinctively to stand between her son and his father. She could feel the tension building in both of them.

  The father’s voice was equally loud when he replied. Angry.

  ‘Don’t you speak to me like that, my boy,’ he bellowed. ‘Not unless you want to feel the back of my hand. I’m your father. It’s me who says what happens in this family.’

  She could feel her son trembling with pent-up anger, as well as fear at the consequences of his behaviour. She reached behind herself to catch hold of him and keep him there. Sheltered from harm, with herself as a human shield.

  The boy was still shouting at the top of his voice.

  ‘Leave my mum alone, you big fat bully. I hate you! I hate you!’

  The man’s voice was an enraged roar now.

  ‘You’ll apologise right now, boy, if you know what’s good for you. I know what’s best for you with the career you want. What does she know, eh? She can’t even cook a meal without ruining it. Can’t even look after herself properly, the clumsy bitch, never mind deciding what’s best for you.’

  He was leaning past the woman, trying to grab a fistful of the boy to drag him out from behind her. The boy in his turn was screaming every swear word he knew, while trying to bite the large hand which was groping for him.

  The woman would remain passive in the face of an attack on herself. Her instinct made her stand up and fight back to protect her son. The minute she brought her hands up to claw at him, the man lifted a hand to fetch her a backhanded slap across the face which sent her sprawling onto the floor, her head banging against a cupboard door, blood starting to spurt from her nose and cut lip.

  The boy was beside himself now. He launched himself at his father in a ferocious but pointless fury. Rather than enrage him, his attack seemed to make the man calm down. He simply took hold of the front of the boy’s shirt and held him effortlessly at arm’s length. His voice was lower, more in control.

  ‘Well, you’ve got some bottle, I’ll give you that. I wouldn’t have thought you had it in you. But you need to learn to choose your battles carefully. You’ll never be big enough or man enough to take me on. Never. There’s too much of your mother in you. And that,’ he gave a contemptuous nod to the woman on the floor, still seeing stars too much to think of trying to get up, ‘that’s just not worth fighting for.

  ‘I’m going back out now, to the pub, where I can at least get something decent to eat for a change. When I get back, I want to see your homework done to the best standard you’ve ever produced. And I want an apology from you, for your behaviour. If not, you’re going to find out how much trouble you’re in.’

  With that, he turned on his heel and stalked out, pulling the front door to behind him with much more force than he usually did.

  The boy grabbed a clean towel, ran it under the cold tap, and crouched down next to his mother, dabbing as gently as he could at the source of the bleeding, wincing with her as he saw the pain it caused her.

  ‘It’s all right, mum, it’s all right. I’m here. I’ll look after you. I’ll always look after you. Don’t cry. Please don’t cry. As soon as I’m big enough, I’ll get a job and we can move away from him. I’ll keep you safe. Come on, mum. Let’s sing our song. That always makes things better. You said so.’

  The tears which spilled down her cheeks were of love, of pain and of a terrible sense of shame that he was the one trying his best to take care of her.

  Simply opening her mouth made her split lip scream with pain, but she forced the best smile she could manage as she started to sing.

  ‘When you wish upon a star ...’

  Chapter Thirteen

  Mike Hallam started the recording by identifying those present as he sat down opposite the suspect and his solicitor. He slid a copy of the pathologist’s initial report across the table.

  ‘I’ve just this minute had the preliminary report from the post-mortem, so you’ll no doubt want an early break to discuss the details with your client,’ he told the solicitor. ‘For now, if neither of you has any objection, I can give you the basic outline.’

  The solicitor inclined a cautious head in agreement but added a caveat, ‘Be prepared for me to stop you if I feel I need time alone with my client before we proceed any further.’

  ‘Of course, thank you, Ms Castle.’

  He looked straight at the suspect as he started his questioning.

  ‘These are merely the initial findings, of course, so there will be more to come, by way of blood analysis, for instance.’

  ‘She were on pills, the wife. For her nerves. Mood swings, and the like. If you find owt like that.’

  ‘The wife?’ Mike queried. ‘I think you told the first officers attending that you weren’t married.’

  ‘Not official. But we lived together for years. I thought of her as the wife.’

  ‘And what about the boy? Are you his biological father?’

  ‘I’m the only dad he’s ever known. But no, I didn’t father him, I’ve just been like a father to him for ages. And a good ’un, too. When can I see him? He must be going frantic without either his mam or his dad.’

  ‘He’s being well looked after, I can assure you. And you must understand that we need to establish who has legal custody of him. As his home is currently a crime scene ...’

  ‘Scene of a suspected crime, officer,’ Ms Castle corrected him at once.

  ‘Excuse me, a potential scene of crime. But that means the boy can’t go back there for the moment, any more than you can. So would you have anywhere safe for him to stay if you had custody?’

  ‘I’d sort summat. I’m dossing with a friend for now, so he couldn’t come there, but I would find somewhere. The lad needs to be with his dad. Especially now.’

  ‘There are no grandparents, as I understand it?’

  He shook his head.

  ‘The wife lost hers years ago. Mine are both in homes now. Dementia. Both of them. It’s a bastard of a thing. Especially as they weren’t old when they started with it.’

  ‘Sorry to hear that. As you probably
realise, as you’re not a direct relative, and there’s no one else we can trace, the custody issue will need to be decided by Social Services.

  ‘But now that I have the initial post-mortem results, I’d like to ask you a few more questions. No doubt your solicitor has advised you that you’re not obliged to answer them, but obviously it would help us if you would.’

  He saw the solicitor open her mouth to speak and cut in smoothly, ‘So to make sure you understand your rights, I will caution you again, for the recording, as I did when we spoke initially.

  ‘You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention, when questioned, something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.

  ‘Now, would you mind telling me once more exactly what happened on the night your partner died. In your own words. I know we’ve spoken about it before, but it’s possible that in the intervening time you may have thought of additional details.’

  ‘The wife had serious issues. We argued a lot, I’m not denying that. I was worried about her with the lad sometimes. That she might do something stupid with him around.’

  ‘But not worried enough to contact Children’s Services, for example?’

  Again the man shook his head, more emphatically, this time, at that question.

  ‘I never thought she’d harm him. Not deliberately. She worshipped him. And he doted on her. But she was very accident prone. Always managing to hurt herself somehow or another. We had rows about it. They got a bit heated sometimes when she got hysterical, so now and then I had to try to shout over her to make her listen to reason.’

  ‘Can you tell me exactly how she fell?’

  ‘Jumped,’ the solicitor put in. ‘I understand my client has already told you that his partner ran out of the flat then jumped over the handrail, despite his best efforts to stop her. Are you now saying this incident is more than the tragic suicide which it appears to be? And if so, do you intend to charge my client with something?’

  ‘We’re a long way from any conclusions yet. The PM report I’ve handed you shows that the deceased died from a broken neck, which appears to have occurred as the result of the fall. I’m simply trying to establish all the details I can about how she came to fall.’