Deadland

by William Shaw

  ‘Where do you know all this stuff from?’

  ‘Friends, you know. Websites. Chat.’

  ‘Is this what you do all day?’

  Her daughter looked away and said, ‘You know what these people want, don’t you? They would throw everyone who isn’t white and straight out of this country. They hate Jews, they hate Muslims. They hate everybody. They see their job as being to goad more stupid people into action – like the bloke who killed the MP. Don’t they terrify you?’

  Her little girl. The thin, gawky one who picked at her food. The one who used to draw careful pictures of birds.

  There had been an Afghan refugee girl Zoë had tried to help two years ago. Zoë had tried to befriend her, to teach her English. Their worlds turned out to be too different. The girl had lived with such extreme violence all her life, seen and experienced things she couldn’t put into words – at least, not words she could share with a teenager brought up here in England. The things you witnessed built a wall around you; she knew that. Zoë herself hadn’t seen it that way; she just thought the girl never really trusted her because her mother was a police officer. After a while, Zoë had stopped going to visit her.

  Cupidi thought for a while. ‘This lot don’t appear to have posted a video of the attack. Do you think that means they’re claiming responsibility for something they didn’t do?’

  ‘Either they’re too stupid to press the on button on the camera, or it wasn’t them at all.’

  ‘So someone might have seen what they put on Facebook and gone out to punish this man?’

  ‘This is what they want. And now loads of people will be thinking, “Well maybe they’re not neo-Nazi nut jobs after all. Maybe they’re on our side. Because the police aren’t.”’

  ‘Is that what you think? The police aren’t on your side?’

  A moment’s hesitation. ‘Course not, Mum. But it actually doesn’t matter what I think, does it?’ Zoë nudged her mother off the bed and stood up, still in the same greying Harry Potter pyjamas she’d been wearing all week.

  She wandered to the bathroom and came back with her toothbrush in her hand and said, ‘You spend your whole time looking for people who break the laws. That’s what you’re all about. I understand. William South. He broke the law. He has to go to prison. But what if these people end up making the law? That’s what they want. They want to get everyone so scared they’ll make legislation that punishes migrants, punishes queers, punishes people who don’t go to work. Some of that’s already happening, now. What will you do then, Mum?’

  Cupidi watched her daughter, all fire and anger.

  Zoë said, ‘Go on then. I know you’re thinking it. You’re going to say everything I say is rubbish, aren’t you? You’re going to patronise me now, aren’t you?’

  ‘All I was going to say is that’s the longest conversation I’ve had with you in the last six months.’ And she leaned forward and kissed her daughter on the forehead. ‘I have to go. Are you going to be all right?’

  ‘Never,’ her daughter hugged her back. ‘It’s all your fault.’

  ‘That’s what I’m here for. One thing. One theory is that England Rising may have used two teenagers as bait, to attract the paedophile. Does that sound plausible?’

  ‘Course. They’re not exactly following legal process in the first place, are they?’

  ‘What if one of the teenagers was black?’

  Zoë snorted. ‘No way, then. That bunch are hardcore racial purists. Even if a black kid was stupid enough to join them, they wouldn’t want him anyway.’

  ‘You sure?’

  Zoë was about to answer, but Cupidi’s phone was ringing. ‘What?’

  ‘Ross Clough,’ said Ferriter. ‘He’s just been taken in.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘He was caught trespassing just now at the Millers’ house at Long Hill. Apparently carrying a weapon.’

  ‘Jesus. Have they charged him with anything?’

  ‘Not yet. He’s at Canterbury nick.’

  Cupidi was already on her way down the stairs, rifling through her bag to find her car keys.

  THIRTY-FOUR

  Canterbury Police Station was very 1970s, all brick cladding and white-framed glass windows.

  ‘He had a knife. Jesus. I knew it,’ said Ferriter. ‘I bloody knew it.’

  There was no space in the main car park, so they drove around for another ten minutes looking for somewhere to leave the car. Ross Clough was being held in the custody suite.

  ‘So what’s the plan?’ she asked as they walked down the long corridor that ran past the locker rooms. ‘He’ll just say he was there researching some art project or some bollocks like that.’

  Cupidi stopped and thought. ‘Let him say that, then. On paper he’s done nothing wrong except for trespass on private land.’

  ‘With a weapon?’

  They hadn’t put Ross in a cell; he was sitting on a bench near the desk. He smiled when he saw them. ‘It’s you.’

  ‘Want a cup of tea or something?’ a constable asked them.

  ‘You’re OK,’ said Cupidi. ‘I was told Mr Clough was carrying weapons. What were they?’

  ‘Knives. He had them in a bag.’

  ‘Knives?’

  They took Clough to an interview room, a pale, windowless cubicle, with a plain table and plain chairs. Spaces like this made Cupidi want to be outdoors, away from this. She recited, ‘You do not have to say anything . . .’

  ‘They already said that,’ he said.

  ‘Well in that case you won’t mind if I say it again then.’

  ‘Knock yourself out.’

  ‘So,’ said Cupidi when she had finished. ‘What were you doing at the Millers’, Ross?’

  ‘Research.’

  She looked at him. There was nothing hostile about his gaze; it was more one of aloof amusement. ‘What kind of research, Ross?’

  ‘Very interesting research. For my sculpture.’

  ‘Right. The one of Astrid Miller with an arm chopped off?’ said Ferriter drily.

  ‘I think it’s going to be a series.’ Ross Clough sat back in his chair, swept hair out of his eyes. ‘Do you have a pen and paper?’

  Ferriter left the room and returned with a single sheet of paper and a biro. Clough took them, laying the paper in front of him on the table.

  ‘Why did you take knives?’

  ‘Because they’re my tools.’

  ‘What do you use the knives for, Ross?’

  ‘For cutting things, obviously. I’m a sculptor. Among other things. They’re box cutters, for God’s sake. Not daggers.’

  ‘What exactly were you hoping to find out, Ross?’

  ‘If I knew, then I wouldn’t have had to go there. That may be how a police inquiry works, but it’s not how an artistic enquiry progresses. I’ve been thinking about that arm. Freud says that any limb is a representation of the penis.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ said Ferriter.

  ‘A penis. You know about them?’ He smiled. He picked up the pen and, instead of taking notes, started to draw. ‘You are investigators. I am too. You investigate what you can see. Art is a form of investigation that goes behind what you can see.’

  Cupidi peered at his pad. He was drawing a human arm, like the ones they had seen on the walls of his flat in Margate.

  ‘I tried looking you up on the internet, Mr Clough,’ said Ferriter. ‘I was expecting to find some information about you online, but know what? I didn’t find much. You’re not actually a very successful artist, are you?’

  Cupidi admired her use of the word ‘actually’. For the first time Clough looked rattled. ‘It depends what you mean by successful,’ he said.

  ‘An artist whose work people give a stuff about,’ said Ferriter.

  ‘Opportunity in the art world is not evenly distributed,’ said Clough.

  ‘Oh, I see,’ Ferriter continued. ‘You’re angry about the artists who have made it?’

  ‘No. Not really. If they’re
good, why should I mind? If they’re not, good luck to them.’

  ‘Angry about the people who stop you from making it, then?’

  Maybe there she had hit a nerve; the muscles around his mouth tightened. ‘I came from a disadvantaged family,’ said Clough. ‘My father was a builder. He did not want me to go to art school. It’s a closed world. You have to have the right connections.’

  ‘So you resent people who do have the right connections, like Astrid Miller?’

  ‘I have a great admiration for people like her, as a matter of fact.’

  ‘So you make naked sculptures of her?’ asked Ferriter.

  ‘I was thinking of making one of you,’ he said, looking at her for a reaction.

  ‘You had a knife.’

  ‘Several.’

  ‘Why did you have them?’

  ‘It’s where I keep them. In my pack.’ He looked up. ‘Otherwise they’d get lost.’

  ‘You know what it looks like, don’t you? We call it “going equipped”.’

  He laughed. ‘What, “equipped to make an artwork”?’

  Ferriter took out a sheet of paper from her pocket and looked at it. ‘April the second. A Monday. You weren’t on the rota at the Turner. Where were you?’

  2 April: the day someone signed in as Abir Stein at EastArt.

  ‘I had Mondays off. On account of working the weekend.’

  ‘What did you do?’ asked Ferriter.

  ‘I don’t really know. Why is it important?’

  ‘Do you keep a diary?’

  ‘Normally I’d be working in my studio, but it was a low point. I couldn’t work out what to do. I was really stuck. Until this came along, I was in a bit of a hole. This case. Our case. We’re working on it together.’ He smiled at them some more.

  ‘Our case?’

  ‘Yes. As in the case we are all interested in right now.’

  First time round in interviews, you just got them to give their version. You weren’t trying to pick it apart yet. That would come later. But you had to make the most of it. Second time around, you might not have the same chances. They would always be more cautious, more guarded, especially if you had charged them by then.

  ‘Do you know a man called Abir Stein?’

  ‘Spoke to him. Never met. On the phone. Actually he was a bit pissed off I had his number.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘See, I kind of nicked it. It was on the paperwork when the “In Memoriam” exhibition was in planning. Couldn’t believe it. It seemed like it was meant. So I just copied it down. He’s really famous, you know.’

  He leaned forward and started to draw on the paper Ferriter had brought.

  ‘You realise it’s an offence taking somebody’s private number from the workplace like that?’

  ‘You peeked around my flat without asking. I saw you do it. You didn’t think I noticed, did you? I could probably complain about that,’ he said.

  Cupidi said, ‘Be my guest.’

  ‘But you have to be a bit cheeky, don’t you, if you want to find out what’s under the surface? I was just doing that. You’re the same.’ Clough looked up at Ferriter, then down at the page again. ‘I called him up and asked if I could show him some of my work. But he wasn’t very receptive.’

  Ferriter leaned forward. ‘He turned you down.’

  ‘It’s like a closed circle sometimes. It’s so incestuous.’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘The art world, of course.’ He paused, looked up again at her. ‘The sticking plaster suits you. The Japanese have this idea of beauty in imperfection. The beautiful wound.’

  Ferriter ignored him. ‘What did Abir Stein say?’

  ‘He asked how I got his number. I told him. I’m always honest. I was hoping he’d see how committed I was, but he was just angry.’

  ‘How did that make you feel?’

  ‘Sad, obviously. Very sad.’

  ‘And were you angry yourself?’

  ‘He’s supposed to be interested in art. But I’m used to it. I’ve had a lot of rejection. I’ve sent stuff to all the big people in art. Hans-Ulrich Obrist, Larry Gagosian, Sadie Coles – you know of these people?’

  Cupidi shook her head.

  ‘One time, I doorstepped Iwan and Manuela Wirth at their gallery in Somerset. Hauser and Wirth? I had made sculptures of both of them, but they didn’t even look. You’ve never even heard of it?’

  ‘Did you ever go to Stein’s address?’

  Clough shook his head. ‘I couldn’t find out where he lived. Do you think it’s his arm, then? The one we found in the gallery.’

  Cupidi looked at Ferriter, then back at Clough. ‘Why do you say that?’

  He didn’t look up from his drawing. ‘Because you’re interested in him. Because he’s been very, very quiet these last few weeks. Suspicious, no? I’ve tried calling his number but it goes straight to voicemail. Can I go now? I haven’t actually done anything wrong, have I?’

  ‘Stalking. Trespass.’

  ‘Are you going to charge me?’ There was little concern in his voice. If anything, he sounded like he wouldn’t mind it at all.

  ‘What would you like us to charge you with?’ asked Ferriter.

  Scritch-scritch-scritch went the biro on the paper as he hatched shade on the side of Ferriter’s face. He had drawn her looking across the table at him, sticking plaster over one eye.

  *

  When they said Clough could go, Cupidi was about to lead him out to the front office when he stopped and said, ‘What about my bag?’

  ‘Right you are,’ said the custody officer. He returned from the locker with a black canvas backpack and was about to hand it to Clough when Ferriter took it.

  ‘I’ll take that,’ she said.

  Ross hesitated. ‘Why?’

  ‘There are knives in it. We’re hardly going to hand it to you in here.’ Ferriter put on gloves, took the bag and, watched by Clough, emptied it onto the custody desk. Pens, two black notebooks and a water bottle fell out, some masking tape rolled off the table onto the floor, followed by two artists’ scalpels, the blades tucked into wine corks.

  She picked up the knives first, pulled the cork off one and examined the blade. She looked up at Clough, but he didn’t seem concerned. Then she opened the notebooks.

  ‘They’re private,’ said Clough loudly.

  She turned a page.

  ‘I don’t want you to do that.’

  And then another page. ‘Bloody hell,’ she said.

  It was another drawing of her, done in biro, just like the one in the interview room. Ferriter’s face, lips slightly parted, a slight smile on her face.

  ‘Are you actually allowed to do that? It’s my personal notebook. I don’t show that to anyone.’

  Cupidi took him by the arm. ‘We’ll return the bag to you at the entrance to the station.’

  When Ferriter brought the bag out two minutes later he grabbed it off her, unzipped it and peered inside. ‘Did you take anything?’

  ‘No, sir. Of course not.’

  He delved around, then looked up, still frowning.

  *

  Back in their car, Ferriter took out her phone and started flicking through it.

  Cupidi said, ‘It wasn’t him who assaulted us. He doesn’t have the physique.’

  ‘You’d have broken him in two if he’d had a go. Wishful thinking.’

  ‘You don’t like him much, do you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘We need to get CCTV from EastArt, though.’

  ‘Jesus,’ said Ferriter, still staring at her phone. ‘He drew a picture of you too. It’s creepy. Take a look. You look pretty good. I look like some porn star. It’s revolting. Is my mouth that big?’

  The photograph on her phone was of a page from Clough’s small sketch pad; the whole sheet was densely covered in notes and angular, scratchy ink drawings, like the ones they had seen on the walls of his studio in the flat in Arlington House.

  ‘He’s written something too
. What does it say? Pinch out,’ said Cupidi.

  Ferriter peered in towards the screen. ‘Oh, the little bastard.’ She held up the device. Under Ferriter’s face was the word ‘stupid’. ‘That little weirdo,’ complained Ferriter. ‘Who does he think he is?’

  Cupidi took the phone to look more closely at the drawing of herself. ‘You’re just stupid. I’m a pervert apparently,’ said Cupidi. Under the sketch, the word ‘pervert’.

  ‘I’ll wring his neck. He’s an arrogant little git.’

  ‘You photographed every page?’ said Cupidi, scrolling through her photo folder.

  Five pages were given over to a timeline. The day he had first noticed a smell in the art gallery was on a section labelled ‘Day One’. There were all sorts of other scribbles on the page. ‘Missing girl aged five or six. Man said “Like meat, horrible”.’ There were dozens of other notes too, but many too small to read.

  Cupidi peered at the screen. ‘Listen to this. “Young policewoman. Very sexy. Wearing Jo Malone perfume but breath smells of stale alcohol”.’

  ‘Oh my God. I do wear Jo Malone.’

  ‘And your breath?’

  ‘It was last Saturday.’

  She read again: ‘Gods and auspicious animals. That was what was written on the plinth of the artwork, wasn’t it? He noticed all this stuff. I want to get this blown up.’

  She held up the phone. In amongst it all was a small drawing of a middle-aged man. Ross’s style was simple. He used a few lines of ink, hatching carefully for shading. The face looked familiar to Cupidi but she couldn’t place it.

  *

  That afternoon she called up Devon King, the constable who had been with the Met’s Art and Antiquities Unit. ‘I’ve emailed you all the transactions we can find on Abir Stein’s account. Will you have time to look at them?’

  ‘These things can take weeks to go through, you know.’

  ‘By Saturday, then?’

  ‘It’s easier if you know what you’re looking for.’

  ‘Big suspicious chunks of money. I want to know about what’s going to and from the Foundation from his account.’

  ‘You think this is about a deal that’s gone wrong?’

  ‘Honestly? I don’t know.’

  ‘I can’t promise anything.’

  Ferriter was standing by her desk, holding her phone again. ‘Look.’ She held up the biro drawing of the man that Cupidi had thought she recognised. ‘That’s Abir Stein, isn’t it? Clough told us he hadn’t met him.’