No Middle Ground

by Jack Slater

  ‘Shit,’ Jane breathed.

  ‘Did she say how many?’ Dave asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Have you got his address?’ Pete asked.

  ‘He lives up on Wreford’s Lane. Been there for years. Ever since the divorce, I think.’

  ‘And Sally’s got a key. Where is she?’

  ‘I told her to go somewhere in company like you said, boss. She said she’d got to pick her kid up from nursery and she’d take him to her mum’s until her feller gets off work.’

  ‘Mum’s it is, then. Let’s go.’

  *

  As Pete turned into the narrow semi-rural lane on the northern edge of the city, Ben in his own car a few yards behind him, he couldn’t help but look over at the wide grassy area to his left where, a few months ago, a taxi driver had died horrifically while Pete and several other officers were making arrests at an illegal dog-fight a few hundred yards along the road. His mind pictured the taxi, abandoned near the hedge over there, door hanging open in the moonlight.

  Then he was past and away from the scene, back in the present.

  Jonas Hanson’s house was on the right side of the road, looking over the valley opposite that led down towards the city. There seemed to be two classes of houses along this narrow semi-rural road – well-kept and unkempt. His was of the second variety and his car was still notable by its absence.

  Pete parked outside the house and signalled for Ben to pull up onto the short sloping drive that was stained with sand and cement that hadn’t been properly washed off. They approached the front door together. Pete knocked loudly. They waited for several seconds but there was no response. Ben produced the key that Sally had given him back at her mother’s house.

  He inserted the key, turned it and stood back for Pete to push the door open.

  ‘Police. Is anyone in?’

  There was no response as they stepped inside, Ben closing the door behind them.

  ‘Hello? Mr Hanson?’ Pete called.

  Still nothing.

  Pete nodded towards the sitting room door as he headed for the kitchen at the rear. He glanced out to the back garden, which was as untidy as the front, then checked the utility and the garage before heading for the drawer Sally had described when they met. Pulling it open, he immediately found the little bundle of keys she’d mentioned and lifted them out, closing the drawer out of habit as he nodded for Ben to lead the way back to the hallway and up the stairs.

  As Sally had talked about doing before them, they checked the rooms on the first floor before reaching for the pole to hook the hatch and its telescopic ladder down.

  Pete led the way up, found the light switch and flipped it on, revealing a large, nearly empty space with a pale chip-board floor and sloping ceiling. The table and the suit-cases were just as she’d said they’d be. One blue, one burgundy and the third a kind of browny-orange. All it needed was a couple of chairs and they’d be set for the next half-hour or so. He climbed up, couldn’t stand up fully in the limited headroom but led the way across to the waiting cases.

  ‘One each or one at a time, boss?’ Ben asked.

  ‘A quick glance in each and we’ll have them away if she was right,’ Pete told him. ‘You’ve got the evidence bags?’

  ‘Yep.’

  Pete pulled on a pair of blue nitrile gloves and lifted the blue case aside – Sally had already described its contents to them. ‘Here, put that in one, then.’

  He went for the next case – burgundy in colour. Assessing the size of the key it would want, he began flicking through the little bundle while Ben unfolded a huge brown paper bag, drew it over the blue case, folded the top shut labelled it.

  The third key he tried snicked the lock softly open. He tossed the keys to Ben and nodded at the other case then drew the twin zips apart, ran one of them down the side and pulled a corner of the lid up to peer in under one of the lights.

  Just as Sally had said, neatly folded newspapers – whole papers, not just cuttings – half-filled the interior. Among them, at the bottom, he could see the glint of gold and silver. He desperately wanted to pull the case open and see in detail what they’d got, but he knew better. He drew a reluctant breath and pulled the zip back up the side of the case, closing it until they could process it properly.

  Ben opened the third of the cases as Pete was pulling an evidence bag over his. Like Pete, he took a careful look inside then glanced up. Their eyes met and Ben nodded slowly. ‘Must be about ten in here.’

  ‘Ten?’

  ‘At a guess. I could look closer.’

  ‘No,’ Pete said. ‘Not until forensics have had a go at them. But we’re looking at getting on for thirty cases if that’s right.’

  ‘He’s been a busy bastard, one way or another, hasn’t he?’

  ‘Get a bag on it and let’s go,’ Pete ordered, not even wanting to speculate about the lives this man had either ruined or ended over the years. And if he hadn’t cleared off without warning, they’d never have known. How was that even possible? OK, Sally had said the ones she looked at were from up North, but even so… His lips pressed together as Ben closed the third suitcase and began to pull an evidence bag carefully over it.

  This was looking like it could be the biggest case of his career. Of the station’s history. And the timing couldn’t be worse with the Burton trial starting tomorrow and the Southam brothers out there, intent on causing mayhem. But it was their case. Sally had come specifically to Ben. It was technically possible to hand it over to someone else – Mark or Jim, depending on what else they had on their boards. There was no way he’d give something like this to Simon Phillips. But what kind of message would that send to Sally, to Ben and to the rest of the station? No. He had a good team. They’d just have to work it in his absence and he’d step back in as much as he could until the court was done with him.

  Ben finished what he was doing and straightened up.

  ‘Right. You go down, I’ll hand them down to you,’ Pete told him. ‘Two in my car, the other in yours and we’ll have forensics meet us at the station to go over them. The sooner we can get into the contents, the better for the victims or their families.’

  *

  A few minutes later, Pete was knocking on the door of the next house to Jonas Hanson’s. There was a car in the driveway beside him, so he hoped that meant someone was in. Ben was on his way back with orders to put an alert out on Hanson’s car so that the ANPR system might pick it up, then get onto forensics to meet them back at the station.

  He waited for several seconds before a dark shadow moved behind the frosted glass as someone finally approached. The door opened to reveal a man in his forties, dressed in vest and shorts, dark hair curling out of the low neck of his too-tight top and bristling over his shoulders. All he needed was a beer can in his hand to complete the picture, Pete thought.

  ‘Yes?’

  Pete lifted his warrant card. ‘DS Gayle, Heavitree Road police station. We’ve had a call to your neighbour’s here. I was wondering when you last saw him.’

  The man grimaced. ‘Don’t know. Gotta be a couple of days, I suppose. We don’t exactly live in each other’s pockets, you know?’

  Pete nodded. ‘I appreciate that, but anything you can tell me might help. His daughter’s quite worried.’

  The man grunted. ‘I suppose it’d have been Friday afternoon. When he came home from work.’

  ‘And his car. Was it still there Saturday? Sunday?’

  ‘Saturday morning, it was. Don’t know about after that.’

  ‘And you haven’t heard him or anything?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘OK. Thanks for your help.’ Pete stepped away. Had barely turned his back when the door was shut firmly behind him. He shook his head sadly. No questions about what might have happened to the guy. No expression of sympathy. Nothing. This really was a close community – not. He headed for the house on the other side of Hanson’s. This was one of the well-kept ones. Two expensive cars sat in the drive
way, the curve of garden between them and the road neatly manicured and mulched. The doorbell chimed melodically when he pressed it. A distant, tinny voice came from a speaker somewhere. ‘Just a moment.’

  When the heavy wooden door swung open it revealed an older lady, stiffly upright in white blouse and dark slacks, her silver hair neatly styled. ‘Yes?’ she asked.

  Pete introduced himself. ‘I’m trying to find out about your neighbour. His daughter called this morning and reported him missing so I wondered when you might have seen or heard him last.’

  ‘We don’t have a lot to do with him, I must admit. Quiet sort of chap. Keeps himself to himself. He seems to work hard, but you know how it is, officer. We come and go at different times. I last saw his car leave on Sunday, just before lunch. My husband was weeding out here and I called him to eat. We tend to eat early, these days. Better for the digestion you know.’

  Pete nodded.

  ‘Just before twelve.’

  ‘OK. And he hasn’t been back since?’

  ‘No, but he does go off for days at a time now and then. Working away, you know.’

  ‘Yes, so I understand. Well, thank you for your time, ma’am.’

  ‘Not at all, officer. Glad to help.’

  ‘Oh, one thing…’ He took a card from his jacket and handed it to her. ‘You couldn’t just give me a quick buzz when he turns up again, could you? To save us continuing to search.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Pete nodded and headed for his car. He didn’t know what had happened to Hanson or if he would return at some point but, if he did, then he wanted to know about it. As well as stopping the search for the man, he wanted the opportunity to get here as soon as possible and talk to him.

  But in the meantime, now he had a timeline, he could go and see Graham in the CCTV room to see if he could provide a direction of travel while they waited for forensics to go over the suitcases.

  *

  As reluctant as he might be, Pete had concluded by the time he got back to the station that there was only one approach to be taken. He set the last of the bagged suitcases beside his desk, maintaining the chain of custody, and headed straight for DI Colin Underhill’s office.

  Colin saw him coming and nodded him inside, peering pointedly past him at the three big evidence bags before raising his eyes to meet Pete’s gaze without saying a word.

  ‘Evidence,’ Pete said. ‘Looks like we’ve picked up another case, whether we like it or not.’ He gave a brief explanation of the morning’s events.

  ‘So, you’re taking on a case on behalf of your team, knowing that you won’t be here most of the next few days and that one of your team knows the… suspect, victim, whatever he turns out to be?’

  Pete shook his head. ‘Ben doesn’t know him. He knows his daughter. And what else are we going to do? How would it look to her, having come to Ben – to me – if we go and hand it off to someone else? I’ve thought it through. You’re the boss, obviously, but you know as well as I do, I’ve got a good team down there. They can handle it whether I’m here to hold their hands or not.’

  ‘His lordship’s going to take some convincing. Especially if it turns out to be as big as you think it is.’

  Pete sighed. ‘Education’s a wonderful thing, isn’t it? You go out into the world thinking you know everything about everything before you even start work for real. Then if you’re humble enough, you learn the truth. If not, you end up like him.’

  ‘And it’s mostly those who end up like him that end up in charge, so watch your step, matey.’

  ‘It’s a sad old world, isn’t it? So, what do you reckon, guv? Do we carry on or what?’

  There was a knock on the door behind Pete. He turned as Dick opened it.

  ‘Harold’s downstairs, boss. With a team.’

  ‘OK.’ Pete turned back to Colin. They both knew who Harold was. Supervising forensic scientist Harold Pointer. Colin thrust his chin at the door. ‘Go on. Get on with it.’

  ‘Cheers, guv.’

  Pete quickly followed Dick back to his work station. ‘Dick, Ben. One each.’ He nodded to the big packages. ‘We’ll see if Bob can give us an interview room to work in.’

  ‘Or two. Or three,’ Dick said, picking up one of the cases to follow Pete out of the squad room.

  ‘You’ll be lucky.’ The station only had three interview rooms. They weren’t going to get all of them. This was going to be a long process.

  They met the forensics team at the bottom of the stairs. ‘Harold,’ Pete said. ‘Good to see you. I heard a rumour you were planning to retire.’

  The chubby, bespectacled man shook his head. ‘Not retire, Detective Sergeant, just move to London for a quieter life.’

  Pete laughed as he buzzed them through to the back corridor. ‘You couldn’t. You’d miss us too much.’

  ‘Much as I’d harbour no ill-will towards your offspring, Detective Sergeant, your enforced sabbatical last year did provide a pleasantly quiet interlude, work-wise.’

  ‘You enjoy the challenge. Admit it. You wouldn’t be in the job, otherwise. And the public might as well get their money’s worth out of you. Wouldn’t want you sitting around getting fat, would we?’

  ‘My abdominal diameter is entirely bought and paid for.’

  ‘Yeah, exactly – by the public purse,’ Pete retorted as they reached the custody suite. ‘Hey, Bob. How many rooms can you give us? We’ve got some evidence to examine.’

  The middle-aged custody sergeant looked up from his keyboard. ‘I can give you two right now, but I can’t guarantee how long you can keep them both.’

  Pete looked back at Harold. ‘What do you reckon? Stick to one and take your time?’

  Pointer tilted his head. ‘Probably best in the wider scheme of things.’

  ‘There you go, Bob. Compromise is key.’ He stuck his hand out expectantly.

  ‘Funny bugger. Number three. It’s already open.’

  Pete nodded the direction. ‘After you, Harold.’

  The tiny room wasn’t anywhere near big enough for an entire forensic team, two police detectives and three suitcases plus their equipment. Harold sent all but two of his team away. Pete sent Dick back upstairs and Ben to the CCTV room to see if he could find any footage of Hanson on Sunday, to gain a clue of the direction he’d taken while Harold opened his aluminium tool case on the floor before lifting the first of the big packages onto the table.

  He checked the label before slicing through it.

  ‘We have a brown suitcase,’ he announced before cutting the paper bag away carefully with scissors.

  ‘We do,’ Pete agreed as he glimpsed the contents of the bag from his position in the corner of the room, arms folded in a newly donned white paper jumpsuit.

  They began by brushing finger-print powder thoroughly over the outside of the case. Three sets of prints were found and lifted, one from either side and one from the base of the suitcase. They were large and clearly male but, beyond that, Harold was unwilling to comment. Instead, he ran the zips back and flipped open the lid. Its black interior was taken up with several folded newspapers and a sprinkling of other bits and pieces.

  Harold nodded to one of his assistants to begin with the jewellery while he lifted out the first newspaper. Carefully, he placed it on the small paper-covered area of the desk that was not already occupied by the suitcase and unfolded it. Pete saw the Daily Express header.

  ‘June 20th, 2007,’ Harold read and carefully opened it up. ‘Let’s see…’

  The paper crackled as he folded back the pages, careful to touch them only at the very corners with his gloved fingers.

  ‘Ah-hah.’

  He’d folded back only two pages when he stopped. Pete moved to one side, struggling to see what he’d found past his corpulent white-clad bulk.

  Harold stepped to one side, again blocking Pete’s view as he turned to face him, hands behind his back. ‘Page four, Detective Sergeant. A report of a young woman’s body bei
ng found in Suffolk. Just outside Lavenham, in fact. Pretty place. Don’t know if you’ve been…?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Oh, well. You wouldn’t like it, I don’t suppose. Too peaceful. The victim was found nude and displayed lewdly in the churchyard of a nearby village, it says in the newspaper. She was identified by a police officer from Bury St Edmunds who recognised her as someone he’d previously arrested on several occasions. Drink and drug related charges, none of which resulted in a prison sentence. The report gives her name and age. And here, Detective Sergeant, is her identification which she’d have taken to the local pharmacy for her regular Methadone dosage.’ He flourished a small white plastic card which he was holding carefully by its edges.

  ‘So at least four years and two counties. So far,’ Pete said. ‘And you thought you were busy before, Harold.’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  ‘So?’

  Colin Underhill looked up from his desk as Pete stepped into his small half-glazed office space at the end of the squad room. It was after four-thirty. Harold and his reduced team had taken more than half a day to go through the three suit-cases.

  ‘It’s a complex one.’ Pete closed the door behind him and stood facing the big man. ‘No prints on the cases except those we expected. The contents, either. There’s news reports and trophies from a total of twenty-seven deaths and disappearances from 2003 to 2014, ranging from Yorkshire to Suffolk to Dorset and several points between. But none in Devon.’

  ‘You know what they say about shitting on your own doorstep.’ Colin leaned back in his chair, thick fingers intertwining on his belly.

  ‘Yeah, but what does it mean for the case? I mean, it clearly is one case - one suspect - but spread out from here to Timbuktu. I lost count of the different jurisdictions.’

  ‘Well, I don’t envy you the writer’s cramp or the cauliflower ear from all the time you’ll be spending on the phone. But you’re going to have to contact each relevant force as well as Missing Persons, get the case notes and go through them, record all the similarities, all the possible links between the locations, the victims and see if your man’s kept any paperwork that links him to any of them apart from what you’ve already got. If he has, fine. If not, you’ll need to liaise with the other forces and get them to try and find evidence that he might have been there at the relevant times. You said he’s in the building trade?’