by Tim Ellis
She picked up the phone on her desk.
He cleared his throat. ‘I hate to stop you now that you’ve finally started working, but haven’t you forgotten something?’
‘I don’t think so. Get my coat off; make coffee; organise copies of the victim’s picture and have them displayed in Marple and Marple Bridge; clear the shit up you’ve left on my desk . . . Your instructions were quite specific. And after I’d done all those things, you said you had another long list of tasks for me to do. So, no I don’t think I’ve forgotten anything.’
‘You were going to tell me what happened at the lock after I left. I have to go and brief Henn in an hour and I don’t want to turn up with only half the information, because you forgot to tell me.’
‘Inspector Williams and his team dredged the lock and searched the canal on either side – all they found was his trainer.’
‘What about Burrows?’
‘One of her people found a black bomber-type jacket in undergrowth a good five hundred feet along the tow path on the other side of the canal to the lock – there was nothing in it.’
‘No wallet? Identification? Keys?’
‘Nothing. Isn’t “nothing” clear enough for you?’
‘It is now that you’ve qualified it. Are Williams and the USMU still there?’
‘No. They left about four-thirty.’
‘What about Burrows and her people?’
‘Yes, they’re still there, but I think with your say-so they’re ready to call it a day.’
‘I’ll give her a call. Okay, you can get back to work now.’
‘Thanks.’
He stood up, wiped the whiteboard clean, picked up a black non-permanent marker and drew Lock Number 9 with a length of canal on either side across the centre of the board. It wasn’t an accurate illustration, or what anyone would consider a work of art, and he wasn’t going to win any awards for it, but it served his purpose. He’d receive the crime scene photographs later in the day, but they wouldn’t have the same panache.
Using lines and arrows, he identified where the body, the trainer and the bomber jacket were all found. He stuck a copy of the victim’s picture at the top-centre, and then began making notes about what he knew of the victim so far:
Victim: A thin young man (20 – 30 years of age) dressed in a long-sleeved mustard-coloured shirt, jeans, leather belt and blue Adidas trainers;
Estimated time of death: Around 3 a.m. on Tuesday morning, spent 36 hours in water, head/body injured possibly in lock gates;
Cause of death: Wooden (hawthorn) stake hammered into the heart;
Body discovered by: Hanna Saunders – lives on houseboat called Amelia – questioned, offered support;
No crime scene forensics;
No personal effects, ID, identifying marks, indication of drugs.
He made another list for Lake in red:
Distribute picture of victim;
Missing persons – awaiting call;
House-to-house – call Sergeant Rosen;
Hair cut in past week – where? Find out location of local barbers;
CCTV footage of train station from Monday night – take to forensics for analysis;
Check for other bodies/murders in canal over previous 12 months;
Check for other bodies/murders with a stake through the heart nationally in past twelve months;
List of narrowboats that passed through the lock between 11 p.m. on Monday night and 3 a.m. on Tuesday morning.
That was as much as he had. He stood back and re-examined what he’d written, but couldn’t think of anything else.
He called Burrows.
‘Where are you Burrows?’
‘Still at the canal, Sir.’
‘Anything new?’
‘No, Sir.’
‘Wrap it up then.’
‘Thank you, Sir. You know about the black jacket we found?’
‘Yes. I’m wondering how it got so far away from the body.’
‘I don’t know, Sir.’
‘Have you swabbed it?’
‘Not yet, but we will. There’s not much else to swab.’
‘No. I want it checked for DNA other than the victim’s.’
‘Yes, Sir.’
‘And thanks for your hard work.’
‘Very kind, Sir.’
Next, he called the Crime Scene Manager – Sergeant Polly Rosen.
‘Forensics are packing up, Sergeant.’
‘Okay, Sir.’
‘Anything on the house-to-house?’
‘Not a thing, Sir.’
‘Okay. Open the road and the canal up, and call it a day.’
‘Will do, Sir.’
‘And thanks for your hard work.’
‘I didn’t do anything.’
‘I know that, but the etiquette manual states we have to thank everybody, so that’s what I’m doing.’
‘Okay, Sir.’
‘And pass on my thanks to your men.’
‘Of course, Sir.’
He called Sergeant Becky Porter in Missing Persons.
‘Did you get the drawing?’
‘Good morning, Sir.’
‘Well?’
‘Missing Persons work from nine to five. I checked my phone this morning, and yes – the drawing was there. I’ve just arrived for work, so I plan to print it off and then gradually work my way through the people who have been reported missing in the past month.’
‘How long will that take?
‘Half an hour.’
‘You’ll call me?’
‘That’s what I said I’d do, Sir.’
He ended the call, went to the board and added the details of the black bomber jacket to the end of the first list, and then removed “House-to-house – call Sergeant Rosen” from the second list and added it to the first list: “House-to-house – nothing”.
He finished his coffee. ‘Right, Lake.’
‘Yes?’
‘I’m going over to the SCD to brief the Chief Superintendent.’ He pointed to the red list on the whiteboard. ‘I want those done by the time I return. Do you think you can manage that?’
‘I should think so.’
‘Good. We’ll go back to Marple Bridge afterwards and finish off interrogating the locals.’
‘Give the Chief Superintendent my best, and tell him I’ll be in contact soon.’
‘Tell him yourself.’
He grabbed his overcoat and headed for the stairs.
***
Force HQ in Central Park, Newton Heath was all steel, stone and glass. As far as he was concerned, it was an architectural eyesore. It had no character and he was glad to be located at Bootle Street with the rats and silverfish.
He caught the lift up to the third floor, where he was convinced that officers in the SCD constructed paper airplanes and developed their doodling skills, plodded along the corridor and knocked on Chief Superintendent Henn’s door.
‘Come.’
He went in.
‘Ah, Dark!’
He sat down in one of the three chairs in front of the Chief Superintendent’s desk without waiting for a formal invitation. Henn could sack him if he didn’t like it. Not only was he not calling him “Sir”, but he wasn’t going to stand up like a wet-behind-the-ears detective either.
‘The body found in the canal at Marple?’
‘Nearly right. Marple Bridge.’
‘Can’t say I’ve ever been there.’
‘That’s probably because it’s hidden in a valley.’
‘You make it sound like an idyll.’
‘An idyll for murder.’
‘So, how are things going?’
‘Slow to middling.’ He outlined the facts as he’d recorded them on the whiteboard.
‘We’re agreed it has nothing to do with vampires, aren’t we, Dark?’
‘I certainly am.’ He was surprised Henn needed to ask.
‘No leads?’
‘No, but we’ve hardly made any ripples in t
he water yet.’
‘Good call to ask the forensic artist to draw a reconstructed face. That’ll save you time and me money, which are both welcome in these austere times.’
‘Saving money wasn’t my motivation.’
‘I hear DC Lake is back?’
‘Came back yesterday afternoon.’
‘And you’ve renewed your partnership?’
‘If that’s what you’d call it.’
‘I’m sure she’ll work out just fine under your tutelage.’
‘You have more confidence than me.’
‘What about a press briefing?’
‘Nothing to tell them.’
‘Tomorrow morning then?’
‘Possibly.’
‘Thanks for dropping by, Dark.’
‘I was in the area.’
He made his way out, pleased that he’d managed to avoid saying the word “Sir”.
Chapter Five
Lake was sitting with her ankles crossed on a clutter-free desk nursing a mug of coffee as he walked down the steps. Her eyelids were closing like window shutters.
‘While the boss is away . . .?’
‘The apprentice is knackered.’
‘If you’re sleeping on the job, I’m assuming you’ve completed all the tasks on the whiteboard?’
‘You assume correctly. How did your meeting with the Chief Superintendent go?’
‘It went. He was happy with our lack of progress.’
‘That’s reassuring.’
‘He asked about you.’
‘Oh?’
‘He said he was confident you’d come good.’
‘And what did you say?’
‘You don’t want to know what I said.’ He looked at the red list on the whiteboard. Lake had changed the colour of the marker pen and given each line a green tick. She’d moved the line relating to Missing Persons to the list above: “Missing Persons – nothing”.
The corner of his mouth creased upwards. ‘Sergeant Porter was going to call me back, not you.’
‘I called her instead. She said that none of the people who have been reported missing in the past month matched our victim.’
‘As I expected.’
‘And before you ask, “Yes” a green tick means I’ve completed the task. Copies of the victim’s picture are being stuck to anything that doesn’t move in Marple and Marple Bridge as we speak. I have the addresses of seven local barbers. I took the CCTV footage to forensics with a copy of the victim’s picture and they’ll get back to us later today with the results. The two bodies discovered in the canal, that the Station Manager mentioned, were the only two bodies that I could find, and neither were found to have died in suspicious circumstances. There have been no bodies found with a stake through the heart in the past twelve months . . . In fact, in the past three-hundred years, so I think we can safely rule out a plague of vampires, or a visit from Professor Van Helsing for that matter. Last, I have an address in Congleton we can visit to obtain a list of the narrowboats that were on the canal during those times, but identifying which of the boats passed through the lock is not possible unless we speak to the driver of each boat in person apparently.’
‘Oh?’
‘There are three types of narrowboats, so I’m told. There’s the working boat, but there aren’t any of those on the Peak Forest Canal anymore. There are those that are actually houseboats where people live, and then there are those that are hired out to people for day trips. Nobody knows where any of them are on the canal at any point in time, and nobody records who or when people use any of the locks.’
‘Strange way to run a business. Right, let’s go then. Sitting around here all day drinking coffee isn’t going to produce results.’
‘You’re welcome.’
‘And it shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise to you that I never thank people for doing the job they’re paid to do.’
‘No, that doesn’t surprise me.’
‘Good. We’ll go in my car.’
‘I want bringing back. Last time, you left me and I had to get back on my own.’
‘I’ll try to remember to bring you back.’
‘You’d better.’
Dark drove back to Marple Bridge, parked up behind the Indian Restaurant opposite the train station, and then the two of them walked down the hill to Town Street.
The local police had stuck the victim’s picture, overlaid with the words: “Do You Know This Man?” and “Call our 24-hour Confidential Hotline: 0800 555 111”, on the majority of static objects.
‘You take the left, I’ll take the right,’ he said to Lake. ‘And remember why we’re here. Focus on the businesses, but you can also ask people who pass you in the street as well.’
‘Okay.’
It took him forty-five minutes to reach the last business on the right side, which was a hairdressing salon. He propped himself up against a wall and waited for Lake.
Eventually, she came out of the Dental Surgery, waved at him and then followed the path round to the GP Surgery in the shadow of St Mary’s Church. After a further five minutes, she came back out and crossed the road to meet him.
‘Well?’ he said.
‘Nothing.’
‘Nor me.’
‘Maybe you’re wrong, maybe he’s not local.’
‘He’s local.’
They began walking back to Brabyns Brow.
‘I’m hungry,’ Lake said.
‘Didn’t you have breakfast?’
‘Do you think I had time to eat breakfast?’
‘What you do with your free time is not something I dwell on.’
‘Free time! You . . .’
‘There’s a cafe up here at the end called Porky’s. We can grab something there. It seems like your kind of place, and it’s your turn to pay.’
‘When was it your turn?’
‘Last night in the pub.’
‘You bought yourself a drink.’
‘You obviously had other things on your mind.’
She sighed and shook her head.
Inside, they found a free table and sat down.
The place was awash with jabbering mothers and crying babies.
He wished he hadn’t bothered. He didn’t like children, especially other people’s children. In fact, he’d been surprised when he realised that he actually liked his own daughters once they’d become sentient human beings. But the warm feeling he had for them, didn’t extend to other people’s children.
A skinny waitress appeared. ‘Can I take your order?’
He’d seen more meat on a lamb shank.
‘A full English,’ Lake said. ‘And a pot of tea.’
He hadn’t had breakfast himself and it wasn’t far off lunch, so he decided to have the same. ‘Make it two, but with coffee.’
She wrote their order on her pad, nodded and left.
‘Didn’t you have breakfast either?’ Lake asked him.
‘No. So, what’s next?’
‘Local barbers. We’ve been in two here, so we’ve got another five left to visit. They’re all in Marple.’
The waitress brought the drinks first, followed by their meals.
They ate in silence.
‘I’ll wait outside while you pay,’ he said, once they’d finished.
‘You’re really going to make me pay?’
‘And Regulations state that meals on expenses are not permitted anymore, so don’t bother keeping the receipt.’
Outside, he walked along the street a little way and looked over the stone wall into the swollen River Goyt. A heron was standing on a rock waiting for its lunch to swim by.
Lake appeared and stared down into the river. ‘There’s a heron down there.’
‘Are you ready?’
‘Yes.’
They walked back up the hill to his Rav-4.
As he pulled out of the car park and headed up Brabyns Brow towards Marple, Lake said, ‘We don’t have a single lead, do we?’
‘Ar
e you always so pessimistic?’
‘No.’
‘What do you think we’re doing at the moment?’
‘Clutching at straws.’
‘And you’d rather go home to bed?’
‘I’d rather have a solid lead.’
‘Do you think that ignoring the meagre leads we do have is the way to solve a murder investigation?’
‘You’re twisting my words.’
‘Ah! It’s my fault? I suggest that you keep your own counsel until you have something positive to contribute.’
‘That seems like a good suggestion.’
He parked in the central car park.
They walked to the top of Market Street and turned to face the way they’d come.
‘You go left, I’ll go right,’ he said. ‘At the main road, we’ll both turn left and carry on down to where the businesses end and the houses begin, and then we’ll walk back and cover the top end.’
‘Okay. Same as before – businesses and people walking by?’
‘Yes.’
He felt as though he was pounding the beat again. He could have asked the local police for assistance, but their manpower had been cut to the bone and nobody would have thanked him for pushing work their way. Not only that, they might have missed something. He was happier doing the legwork himself. And it wasn’t as if he had anything better to do. Normally, he’d be fitting the pieces together and trying to make a whole, but he didn’t have any pieces to fit together at the moment.
Most of the time, when he entered the shops, pubs or banks, he didn’t have to say anything. He held out his Warrant Card in one hand, the victim’s picture in the other, and the person he was showing them to shook their heads, so he left.
As he came out of the book shop on the main road, Lake shouted over to him.
He had to wait for the traffic to pass before he could cross.
‘Yes?’
She pointed to the sign. “Lee’s Barber Shop”. ‘He thinks he remembers our victim.’
Dark walked into the barbers. There were two worn-out empty sofas, a coffee table with magazines, a chest of drawers with two sweet jars on the top, a television blaring to one side of the barber’s chair and half-a-dozen framed football shirts hanging on the back wall that had been signed by famous footballers: Rooney, Aguero, Yaya Toure . . .
