SLAUGHTER OF INNOCENTS

by M. G. Cole

  She wore the same baggy jeans and blue coat he had found her in. Too thin for the November chill, an over-sized white jumper poked out from the bottom. He was sure they were taken from a recycling centre.

  They had found Jamal’s fingerprints on the clothing dumpster, feet from where she had been killed. They were on the chute’s handle as she had tried to open it. There was no smudging to indicate a struggle, and the evidence pointed to her being attacked from behind as she was trying to claim some drier clothes. Garrick thought back to the night. It had been cold and raining. She had blindly run from Castle Hill, soaked and muddy. Perhaps she also thought a change of clothing would help her avoid whoever she was fleeing from.

  “Is that it?” asked Chib.

  Brenda nodded. “That’s all we have of her coming in. There are only a few cameras inside. Patient confidentiality. I’ll forward to catch her coming out.” She fast-forwarded the footage. She caught Garrick glancing at the time on his phone. “Don’t worry, love, I know roughly when that is.”

  Garrick quickly put his phone away. “No, I wasn’t… I have a funeral I have to go to.”Brenda leaned over and took a thin plastic folder from her in tray, and handed it to Chib. “Her checking-in records.”

  Chib read the printout through the clear plastic folder. “Galina al-Dulaimi. She was twenty.”

  Garrick took the offered page. There were scant details, and an address he was sure was false. “What was she doing here?”

  “Her appointment was with the osteopath, but beyond that I can’t tell you any more. You’ll have to make an official request for her records.” She flashed him a smile. “I didn’t make the rules, love, or I’d give it to you in a heartbeat.”

  Garrick couldn’t help but smile, she was definitely flirting with him. Chib gave a little uncomfortable cough; she was sitting between them.

  Brenda pointed to the screen. “But I can tell you she was in and out in fifty minutes. So…” she slowed the footage down. “She should be coming out…” she teased her sentence out. “Right about… now!”

  Jamal was leaving in a hurry while typing on her phone. She headed straight out of the door.

  “Hold on a tick,” Brenda said as she swapped video cassettes and forwarded to the same time code.

  They watched Jamal exit, but she didn’t head back the same way she’d arrived. Instead, she stopped and looked around. Then she must have seen somebody, as she hurried across the carpark and out of the camera’s field of view.

  “Can we see who she’s meeting?”

  Brenda was already looking through a plastic box containing more tapes. She selected one and loaded it up. Nobody spoke as another camera view, from a pole in the car park, appeared on the screen. In moments she found the correct time code, and they watched Jamal cut diagonally across the lot, heading towards the exit.

  There was a black Audi parked just beyond the entrance gate. It was too far for the camera to make out the registration, but Garrick recognised the model. An A1. The same model and colour as Peter Thorpe’s impounded car.

  A man climbed from the passenger seat and opened the rear door, hurrying her inside. Again, he was too far for the camera to pick up a detailed image, but from his heavy set and balding head, Garrick would gamble his scant life savings that it was Mircea.

  A snort of recognition from Chib confirmed his hunch.

  “We’ve got him, Chib. We’ve got the bastard.”

  21

  Although it wasn’t far, Garrick was pushing the speed limit as he drove down the M20 to Folkestone. There had been no more snow, and the gritters had done a sterling job preparing the motorway, but it was still far from ideal driving conditions.

  Turning off, the roads became treacherous again as he hurried towards Hawkinge Cemetery. Chib had returned to the station to formally charge the Romanian trucker, just in the nick of time before they had to release him. Garrick wished he could have done so, just to see the arrogant smile fall from his face. But he couldn’t risk missing the chance to meet Manfri at his father’s funeral. He was critical in sewing up Jamal’s connection with Mircea.

  Meeting at the funeral was less than desirable for another reason, other than Manfri’s own grief. The last time Garrick had been to one was two months ago, for Sam McKinzie’s, the man he had thought would be his brother-in-law, before he’d been found hacked apart on a ranch in Illinois. It had taken a while for the body to be expatriated, so the funeral had taken place a week before Christmas in Berkshire, close to the house they had just bought.

  He didn’t recall much about the day, other than the endless parade of people telling him how sorry they were for his loss. And it wasn’t even his sister’s funeral. Whether she would ever have the dignity of one, he couldn’t say, but being at somebody else’s brought that nagging concern back.

  PC Sean Wilkes had seen reports that the town’s inhabitants were not happy with having a Traveller funeral procession through their streets, let alone one of them buried in the local graveyard. Garrick was reminded of the intolerance he’d seen reflect in Stan’s eyes, back in Wye. Duke might be laid to rest in an unmarked pauper’s grave, but the locals felt it would leave an inedible stain on the town. The Travellers had settled on the southwest side of Hawkinge; the graveyard was to the north, so they had little choice but to cut straight through.

  Garrick drove up Spitfire Lane to the roundabout and was mid-turn onto Aerodrome Road when he slammed on the brakes. His Land Rover’s tortured engine coughed and stalled. He stepped out of the car for a better look. Ahead, the road was blocked with a wall of people. It wasn’t just Kezia’s community, but large numbers from others had come to pay their respects to Duke, or at least to ensure he stayed buried.

  Leading the procession were six people in white shirts and ties, playing fiddles and trumpets in a lively, if slightly discordant, tune. Two horses came next, with splendid feathers on their heads, snorting great puffs of steam into the frigid air. They pulled a cart draped with flowers and colourful ribbons woven around Duke’s casket.

  Four more horse-drawn wagons followed. A grim-faced Kezia sat with the driver of the lead wagon, and next to her a man in his twenties, with wild unkempt hair and stubble on his chin. He had smouldering dark eyes and in another world, movie-star looks. Garrick was certain this was Manfri. He looked sidelong at the smattering of locals who lined the street. Some returned his hostile look, others holding children, were merely fascinated by the spectacle.

  Behind the wagons, more Romani walked next to trucks and cars that had been garishly decorated with colourful ribbons. They all beeped their horns. Every mourner wore something white, and there was the occasional splash of red too. The emotion worn on their faces was tangible, brows heavily furrowed, and some were openly weeping.

  The presession stretched as far as Garrick could see. He estimated in excess of three-hundred people in all. Kezia caught his eye as the procession turned into the cometary road. It took several minutes for the last of the group to pass by. Garrick parked his vehicle up on the kerb and followed them inside.

  He decided to wait outside the church which stood at the centre of the cemetery, which was just as well because the mourners spilled from the doorway such were their numbers. He kept glancing at his phone to read updates from Chib about Mircea’s foul-mouthed response to being formally arrested. Apparently his English had improved dramatically.

  Then the funeral procession emerged from the church. Duke’s casket was carried by six grim-faced men, with Manfri on a leading corner. Kezia led the mourners, who clung to one another in a rising tide of emotion. Garrick was struck at how composed Kezia was.

  As the coffin was lowered into the open-grave, Garrick became aware of a familiar face at the edge of the crowd. Curious, he stepped closer.

  “Trisha?”

  Trisha Warren didn’t immediately recognise him, but when she did, she looked more shocked than surprised.

  “Detective Garrick.”

  She was wearing a
black suit, a white shirt under her jacket, and sensible wellies.

  “I’m surprised to see you here.”

  “I helped arrange the funeral with the local priest. It’s times like these the church is really needed in stitching communities together.”

  “It looks as if you have done a fine job.”

  She took the compliment with a silent nod and remained fixed on the activity at the grave.

  “Do you do a lot of work with this community?”

  “There’s always work to be done when society doesn’t accept you. And how is your investigation going with the girl?”

  “Making waves,” he replied cryptically. It seemed enough of a response for her.

  “Tell me, do you think these folks get used as much as the refugees?”

  “Used? You mean exploited?” She nodded. “They get bad mouthed, and painted as the aggressors, then they get used and exploited by the real criminals.”

  “Such as?”

  “It’s not for me to say, detective.”

  “If you want me to be more succinct, then how about drugs? Particularly ones ferried through this community.”

  He watched as Trisha tensed and didn’t immediately reply. When she did, she picked her words with care.

  “Drug use is not a particular problem with them, or the refugees. That tends to be a working class burden. These people are considered below that.”

  “I didn’t say use, I said ferried. Passing through the community in a classic county lines operation. I know it’s happening.”

  “Was,” Trisha quickly interjected. She wrestled with how much to say. “It began and ended with Duke. He used the community to sell them to dealers. He’d been involved in many a scam in the past, believe me, but this was the easiest money maker he’d ever had.”

  They watched as mourners began to toss wreathes into the grave. Kezia didn’t. Her eyes never left the casket, as if worried in doing so, the occupant might escape.

  “Kezia had wanted it stopped. As did most of the others. They knew it would bring nothing but ill-fortune down on them. And they were right.”

  Alarm bells were ringing in Garrick’s mind. She had given no indication she knew Jamal or Galina. He studied Trisha carefully, but she seemed oblivious to his interest. “It sounds like you worked closely with them?”

  She shook her head. “Only Kezia, really. She came to the church, and that’s where I heard of their problems. They need money to live, so where are they supposed to get it? They don’t qualify for government benefits and nobody is exactly in a rush to employ them.”

  “So crime is the only way.”

  She gave a humourless laugh. “That is the easy way out, detective. I told you Guiding Hands has been working to help them find legal employment. Refugees, Travellers, anybody who needs it. I have had a lot of success finding them work on farms around here. It’s not pleasant work. It’s backbreaking and the hours are long, but it pays something. Gives them the hope of a normal life.”

  When Garrick looked back, the funeral was dispersing. He saw Kezia standing aside talking to Manfri. His head was bowed, but he kept casting looks towards Garrick. They were evidently talking about him, and just as obvious was his reluctance to do so. The matriarch won out, and they both began walking towards him.

  “How well did you know Jamal?”

  “Who?”

  Did she pause fractionally before replying? Or had she simply not been paying attention? Her face gave nothing away as she gave a terse smile and a little wave to Kezia as they joined them.

  “Thank you for arranging this,” Kezia said to her in a low voice.

  “Of course. If there is anything more I can do, then call me. You have my number.” She nodded to Garrick. “Detective” Then she walked towards the church, never once looking at Manfri.

  Up close, Manfri was even better looking that Garrick had thought, and wondered what it would take to turn Trisha’s head.

  “She said you’re investigating Jay’s murder,” he said almost in a low growl. Both hands kept nervously balling into fists, whether from talking to the police or the weight of having to bury his father, it was impossible to tell.

  “Did Jamal have a last name?”

  “No one I asked. No need. She was leaving her past behind, she didn’t need to drag it with her. Have you found him?”

  It was a pointed question.

  “We have a suspect in custody.”

  “It was that bloody Mircea, wasn’t it? I should’ve killed him meself.”

  Kezia barked at him in rapid Romani. He snapped in reply, but hung his head solemnly.

  “He didn’t mean that, sir,” Kezia said. “It’s all the emotion of the day.”

  Garrick nodded in understanding. “I can quite believe that. I wouldn’t worry, I didn’t hear him say a thing.”

  He caught Manfri’s look and hoped that he’d earned a modicum of trust. No, he hadn’t; it was just a flicker of curiosity.

  “I need to know everything about Mircea.” He saw a wall of reluctance raise. “This is not about grassing him up, or any misguided code of honour. This is purely about establishing Jamal’s life and making sure whoever killed her, pays for it.”

  Manfri rolled on the balls of his feet. He swapped a look with Kezia, who gave the smallest nod of approval.

  “Okay, then. I’ll tell ya. But it will cost ya a drink.”

  22

  The barman at the Mayfly pub was probably a student, but the look he gave Manfri was poison. In his cheap suit and thin black tie, he was easily marked out as belonging to the funeral precession. The scattering of locals, hunched over their pints, were equally hostile.

  “We don’t serve your kind in here,” the barman said quietly to Garrick.

  Garrick leaned in and dropped his voice. “Sorry, I had trouble hearing you, lad. Which is just as well, as discrimination is illegal.” He slowly held up his police ID card until it was in the boy’s face.

  The barman paled and set about pouring a Guinness and half a pint of larger. Garrick pointed to the Guinness.

  “And it’s mighty good of you to offer him that on the house. He has just lost his father.” He picked up the half. “I’ll pay for this, of course.”

  Taking a table in the corner, Manfri took a long slow sip of Guinness and closed his eyes, savouring the taste.

  “I thought you people didn’t drink?”

  “What? Gypsies?”

  “Romani. In my, admittedly slim, research, I thought you practise Hindu beliefs as well as Catholic ones?”

  “It’s not forbidden. And it’s not as if we’re the Irish.” He glanced at Garrick’s half-pint. “I thought you people drink all the time?”

  “What? Cops? You’d be right there. To your father.” He raised the drink in salute. Manfri didn’t reciprocate. “First off, I apologize for having to do this after your loss. I appreciate it.”

  Manfri shrugged. “Not many will miss him.”

  “Tell me about Mircea.”

  “What do you know?”

  Garrick sighed. This wasn’t a game he wanted to play, but there was nothing to be gained in alienating him.

  “That he found Jamal hiding on his lorry. Rather than turn her over to the authorities, he made her sell drugs. She didn’t want to, but how could she say no. I know you found her and gave her shelter in your community.”

  “It was September last year. We were near Hythe. Me and two of the other lads were coming back from work when we found her. She’d been mugged. She was shaking, bleeding, frightened. And she still looked like an angel.” His voice cracked, and he sipped his drink.

  “You were working?”

  “You sound surprised? Do you think I was breaking into cars or robbing pensioners?” He looked defiantly at Garrick.

  “You’ll have to forgive me. I am not good at hiding my ignorance.”

  “The church organises work. I saw you speaking with Trisha. She’s one of the few good ones.” He looked reflective. “It
was a job picking vegetables on a farm. Paid bugger all and was backbreaking. I hated it. But had I not taken that job, I would never have met Jay.” He sighed and propped his elbows on the table, running both hands through his hair. “She had nowhere to stay, so I took her in. I never tried anything, before you ask.”

  “I wasn’t going to. It’s very clear you were in love.”

  He nodded. “Only tata didn’t see it that way. He wanted her out. Thought she was a whore. Just another gadji. That was until he found out about the drugs.” He paused to collect his thoughts. “She wasn’t selling much, so don’t judge her, she hated it. I’d offered to get some of the lads to sort Mircea out, but she was against that too. She worried he’d take it out on the others he had doing his dirty work. And now me Tata had her between a rock and a hard place. He was happy to take them off her hands and wanted more. He could see how we could get it wider. In the farms, in the towns, and he’d reap the profits. I wouldn’t do it, but Jay felt the pressure. Thought she was responsible for driving me and Duke apart. Truth was we always hated one another. This just reinforced it.”

  “So, she took more drugs from Mircea?”

  “That’s about it. She threatened to stop, and Duke threatened to ban her from the community. She told the Romanian she’d pack it in, and he threatened to have her deported. What could she do?”

  He fell into a thoughtful silence as he stared at the white head on his drink.

  “So I suggested we leave together. I got more family out in the West Country. She was up for that, but she wanted to do more with her life. Typical, Jay.” He smiled fondly. “She was unstoppable when she wanted to be. She decided to turn herself in and claim asylum. She wanted to stay here properly. Then she and I could do whatever we wanted.”

  “That was a brave decision.”

  “Aye. She talked it through with Trisha, who said she could organise everything.”

  Again, Garrick felt edgy. Trisha had failed to supply any of this information. Details that would have helped him solve the case much earlier. What was she hiding?