Fiona

by D Attrill

  Clicking his hand against the door, Garstone didn’t get any response. The security com appeared to have caught Armitage’s attention - until Garstone indicated how far that got him on Saturday.

  “If that's them two cozzers from last week, you can bollocks.” An irate-sounding cockney voice came from close the other direction. Garstone approached a slightly ajar window nearby, just in time to see the security guard staring face to face. He’d stood up from his chair, clutching a mug of minestrone Cup-a-Soup. Blaring away behind him was a radio.

  “One of us two.” Garstone corrected him “I’ve also brought along an old friend for Lorna.”

  “Hold on, fucking hell.” The guard disappeared out through his office door. A few seconds later, a faint buzzer came from the entrance.

  “Coming in or what?” the voice came from inside.

  They found him holding the entrance door open.

  “Thought you said that thing weren’t working.” went Armitage.

  “Just for me it does son.” the guard showed them in “Scum, I let in strictly at my discretion.”

  Garstone walked inside past the brute, who appeared struggling to bottle a racist expression.

  “So sir, where will we find the lovely Lorna this morning?”

  “In her room, probably. She won’t be going nowhere far today.” He was pointing down the corridor. “If you fancy exploring the loo on your way, feel free.”

  Ignoring the insolence, Garstone made his way down the doors. He remembered the colour of Lorna’s as he came to it. Trying the polite way, he knocked.

  “Lorna?”

  No reply.

  “You got a key for Miss Millthorpe’s room, sir?” he called to the guard.

  “D’you want a canister to ram it down with?” the thug came bounding back over. “Be my pleasure, come to fink of it.”

  Taking a selected key, he turned it and threw the door open for them.

  “All yours, lads.” Standing back, he ushered them in to look. No Lorna.

  Her bed was bedraggled, both sheets strewn across the floor, along with a pair of crumbling running shoes. Several CDs and a practically done-for portable stereo sat on the floor around a small card table that was caked in empty cigarette packets and plates of unrecognisable slop. Putrid odours of illegal substances and a long unbathed human now mutated into one single toxic mass that eventually drove him back out of the door.

  “Do you know where she is sir?” he asked the guard.

  “Hospital, ain’t she. Overdosed yesterday.”

  “Overdosed?”

  “Well something like that. Whatever it was she’d taken, she was throwin’ it back out all over the telly room.”

  “You let us in before telling us this?” Seething, Garstone was so close to cuffing this bloke, and not just in the procedural sense. “I’ve already got my Acting Superintendent going regularly ‘awol’; last thing I can handle on top is you twatting us about as well.”

  “Had to let you in, didn’t I? You’d have thought I was lying to try and get rid of you otherwise.”

  “So, where’s she gone?”

  “Probably A&E innit...druggies land themselves there when they’ve messed with it.”

  The DCs tore back to the car and headed for the Northern General.

  Garstone was all too familiar with this place just lately. Nevertheless, he and Armitage marched haughtily through reception.

  “Now then you two.”

  A woman in a light blue jumper and staff badge stopped them in their path. She was obviously another desk worker, back from her break... maybe just in time.

  “What makes you think you can just come charging through here?” she scolded them both. “This is a hospital, not a Wetherspoons bar.”

  “I’ve this, for a start.” Garstone shot his ID out.

  “Oh I see.” The staff assistant stood, folding her arms obstructively “And who are you lot here to bother today, if you don’t mind me asking?”

  “Miss Millthorpe, aged 28,” he hastily answered “Admitted very early this morning - a so-called overdose.”

  “So called?”

  “She knows she’s wanted by the police.” He was starting to shed patience, “Like you’re gonna be in a minute, for obstruction.”

  The assistant eventually shook her head, before sending them towards the A& E doorway.

  “You’ll have five minutes.” she was calling behind them. “Don’t think we won’t come looking."

  “Give us just one and we’re sorted, pet."

  Garstone answered, unheard.

  He erupted down the A&E corridor opening each double door in his way with an elbow as opposed to a polite push.

  “What the ‘ell tha doing mate?” Armitage pleaded, behind. “Don’t!”

  “Shut up...” Garstone retaliated “Check each one, your side.”

  Depressing sounding screaming came from the second bay at left.

  Garstone grabbed the screen open.

  He only found a footballer with a fearsomely bloodied leg. The man's surgeon stood up, giving Garstone an unwelcoming look.

  Garstone backed out.

  He bumbled on, lividly kicking another door open.

  “No mate, don’t.” Armitage pleaded. “Tha’ll never get thissen promoted, doing this.”

  “Stuff Leyton and stuff her stinking, bollocks job!”

  Garstone barged through yet another bay screen. He found himself looking down on an unlit, although occupied bed.

  “Ello, duckie, you back?”

  He turned to find the nurse who’d showed them to Mr Summers on Friday.

  “Aye, whatever...look, have you got a Miss Millthorpe hiding in here anywhere?”

  “You’re looking at her.” The sister switched the light back in.

  A lifeless female face stared up the sheets. She was white as a ghost, so much so that her hair looked dark against the rest of her. Trickles of transparent vomit dripped from her mouth to the bed.

  Placing his hand against her forehead, Lorna Millthorpe’s flesh felt as cold as an ice bag.

  “Died about an hour ago.” the sister apologised. “Took too many sweeties it appears.”

  “They said they picked her up last night.” Garstone remembered what that beefy airhead had said, back at Horbury Refuge.

  (So it WAS an overdose.)

  “BASTARD!”

  He snapped away from the bed, before he could do any more damage to the ward.

  With Lorna dead, and her ex-partner at least as much off the radar as Leyton, there was no way of bringing that bowie knife’s owner out in the open.

  Nodding to Armitage to move, he headed out. They ended up almost tripping over a wheelchair.

  “Hi there.”

  He recognised Terry Summers voice. The cyclist sat with his leg extended in a brace, strangely looking cheerful for his situation.

  “You were nearly ready to strangle us on Friday.” said Garstone

  “Life goes on, I reckon.” Mr Summers seemed bright for what he’d been through “They assessed me yesterday; they think I’ll be walking without a crutch again, come next June.”

  “Nice one.”

  Garstone tried to continue what was becoming a friendly conversation - he could use one.

  Only then, his radio joined in. Asking Mr Summers to excuse him, he headed outside only to find Armitage already taking the message.

  “Chuffin’ hell.” His friend looked like he was about to lose his glasses off his nose.

  “Summat’s been found: Clipstone Reservoir.” Armitage was obviously ecstatic. “Chris says we’re best getting us selves out there the soonest we can.”

  The drive to Clipstone forest, out in the northern suburbs of Sheffield, took twice as long as their other two trips this morning combined.

  Gaggles of police sentried a dingy country lane, as his Vectra came to port. At least they were ones he recognised this time round.

  Thompson was already there from the Tankersley scene - h
e obviously disliked being left alone with Billington breathing down his neck.

  “Might be best to walk.” He welcomed Garstone and Armitage out of the car. “PC Bickerton’s laid us a pathway.”

  “Well they know it’s us, then.” said Armitage.

  They stepped carefully through the ferns, which were at waist height to Garstone. Noisy crackling twigs seemed unaffected by the rain of recent days. Sun suddenly broke out between the trees ahead.

  As he shaded his eyes with his hand, Garstone saw a shape rising into the sky ...the silhouette of a small car.

  He allowed Will to continue leading until they cleared the woodland curtain.

  The car had almost finished being lowered onto land as they descended towards it. Two frogmen were directing it to a small patch of grass.

  “Me dad used to take me here when I were a kid.” Armitage was studying the reservoir's pebbled shore. “Always thought we was at the beach, I did.”

  “I’m gonna need a break by the beach soon.” Garstone summoned him away from his distractions “A sodding long one.”

  They crunched their way along the edge of the stones until they reached the trail of canvas that was waiting.

  “Great you could make it this fast, lads.” PC Andrews was waving them over to the wreck. “Called, the second they spotted it.”

  “What time?”

  “About twenty five minutes. Some local guy out fishing; got his hook stuck solid; he believed it was an old ice-cream tub at first. Turned out a rather heavy one so he took a wade ...congratulations, he’s won a car.”

  Garstone felt he was dreaming.

  A WHITE VAUXHALL CORSA sat there, dribbling its stagnant contents from cracks round the doors.

  He read it right on the spot.

  Tom Payden had tried stealing the same car as his own, currently impounded one, in order to try the same mind games Garstone’s father had spoken of.

  With an alibi already in place from leaving the station last night, Payden had obviously gone straight on to avenge his brother’s betrayal - aided, maybe, by that uber-elusive partner of his. Whichever way, Garstone hoped for once that he would find someone dead inside that wreck.

  The Corsa’s doors and windows were all fully closed. He could see that the water was still above the glove compartment inside.

  “You guys got anything for the doors?”

  Garstone was not going to drop the find lightly, for the miles he’d come.

  He knew where Tom had gone wrong. He’d probably been spotted by someone at that ‘Mcdonalds’...say those kids Mike Raylesthorpe was on about. Payden had likely panicked, taking refuge in an isolated retreat, only it wasn’t that isolated, was it; also, away from the lights, he was unable to notice how soft the slope he’d parked up on was. Sounds of other cars passing could have frightened him into hiding, curled down in the footwell… forgetting to secure the handbrake.

  Oops.

  Garstone let two officers smash the driver window out, then manually release the door from inside.

  “Don’t you want to stand back, Greg?” PC Gresham suggested.

  Garstone and Armitage stood watching as the sludge cascaded out like a mountain waterfall. He resented how the upholstery scheme had gone from grey marl to greenish brown. No body though - he hated that even more...maybe.

  “What about the boot?” Armitage asked.

  He was right. If Tom Payden had not been crouching beneath the window he’d have tried all the other obvious places.

  A silly and ultimately fatal mistake, indeed, but one they needed to be certain about.

  Forcing the boot open, PC Andrews allowed the reservoir collections to crash out and away.

  It was low enough already to see there was no body.

  No Payden, no drugs, no boxes...no-bloody-thing!

  Garstone slammed the boot again, nearly saving them the job of removing more glass.

  Shit, and double shit.

  Tricked into haring off back to Lorna Millthorpe's hidey-hole yet again; sent to the hospital to see her lying on her death bed; duped into believing Tom Payden had done it then ended it all; Leyton still nowhere to be seen…

  Not in the mood for talking, he traipsed down to the water again, took the heaviest stone he could throw and for a second imagined the water was DC Abdullah's windscreen.

  “Know what you mean mate.” Armitage had joined him.

  “Maybe I don’t myself.” he fumbled about for a flatter rock. Skimming felt more fun than fundamental discussion. “No one cares about us anymore, pal. Leyton even, by the look of things.”

  He was right. She’d have been at every one of those three scenes today, regardless of Abdullah's orders. Scarcely ever was Joanne Leyton stopped from chasing a trail, cold or hot.

  “What do you want us to do with the Corsa?”

  “Well as it’s no longer a crime scene...”

  “Need something a bit more useful than that.” Bickerton added.

  “What about shoving it up your arse?” Garstone ranted. He just did not feel he could care any longer.

  “Ey up, don’t tha think that’s a bit harsh on ‘em,?” Armitage still seemed to.

  “Well, I hope my replacement officer will turn out being a bit more polite.”

  “Mate, what you saying?”

  “What I’m saying… if this is what my department’s come to... I’m done with it.”

  Taking a deep breath, Garstone look at his friend and then got on with what he hoped he’d never have to say.

  “Leyton’s gonna find my notice sitting on her chair, when she arrives this afternoon.”

  Pulling out his ID wallet, he watched a ripple on the reservoir water. He waited until the wind went by again, whilst taking his last look.

  “Chuff’s sake mate... don’t.” Armitage looked absolutely stricken by the decision.

  “Nah... best not...” Garstone retracted “Decent leather doesn’t come cheap, eh.”

  “I’m not on about that, you barm pot.” Armitage was tugging his hand back. “Could just have a bit of time off from it. Transfer or summat, maybe? You know, I might even join thee.”

  “Well, seeing it’s both of us she sent up the creek...”

  “Someone own a blue Vectra?” An arrived officer came skipping along the side to them.

  “Aye.”

  “There’s a mobile inside it, going barmy.”

  Garstone shot off up through the trees to the surface again, and wove through parked units to the Vectra. Opening the passenger side, he saw the light of a phone through his coat. He felt disgusted at having left his phone lying in sight twice in one weekend; he ignored his shame and tried to see who was calling.

  “Christ on a bike.” Garstone said aloud as he saw who.

  (ii)

  Things had got little better at the other end. The Rottweiler outside the door - until now mistaken for Fiona or her beloved’s Calton - was clearly not intent on giving in without a bit of either Leyton or Becky to dine on. They both had more of a fight on their hands than before in trying to hold him out. The door handle screws were starting to work themselves loose as the animal took attack after attack.

  A crackling noise on the other side indicated that he had begun to work his way in through the wood. Leyton however had a sturdier portion prepared to meet him with. She’d suddenly spotted an old pine dresser cupboard to her right. She tried get one of the twin door panels off it : she twisted it away, and it tore off quickly without effort.

  “Isn’t this animal cruelty?” Becky asked, awkwardly.

  “Nothing as cruel as what I’ll do to Fiona – that’s provided we finally catch her.”

  Leyton remembered who the real target was, if she could ever reach her again. “Don’t worry. I’ll only use this if I have no option.”

  “What are you trying? Getting him to eat it?” Becky was looking absent again.

  “Anything would taste nice to that thing, heh heh. I just need you to help get the other half of that
cupboard door free too.”

  Becky obliged, although it was obvious that she’d only just interpreted.

  Leyton signalled her to help lift the cupboard up at her end, using the surviving door.

  “Two more inches way, Bex.”

  Becky proceeded to do so, although visibly baffled at the fact that they hadn't emptied it first

  “Brill.” Leyton stopped her. “Right, can you pass me the door? Quicko.”

  She grabbed it and pinned it between the cupboard and the bedroom door then used the sole of her shoe to hard-wedge it. Testing completed, they both waited to see if the Rottweiler would react.

  A few seconds saw no sound of movement from outside.

  Taking the heavier barricade backwards could be as dangerous, if the drawer or the contents slid out.

  The only other way appeared to be through an unfeasibly small quarterlight window. At twenty inches by eleven it looked like the least healthy option, yet as long as they each went through feet first, they both stood a chance of surviving.

  Trying to reach the latch, she found it was screwed shut by metal plates.

  “See if you can find anything to break it with!”

  “Are you crazy?” Becky was reading her mind already. “You’ve got a twenty feet drop.”

  “I noticed an old drainpipe at the side when I visited. Just clamp your arms around it and ease yourself down. In other words, imagine that you’re a fireman.”

  “This should be your best bet.” Becky had seized one of the broken doors “They’ve got decorative iron-capped corners - should do the glass a fair old bit of damage.”

  Becky twisted off the second panel from the cupboard, and clambered onto the bed.

  Leyton followed, trying to clear the impenetrable clutter from the top. Becky was already into the task. She took a hefty swipe at the window but appeared to lose her hold on the weapon just slightly too soon.

  As Leyton helped her attack a second time, a splintering, sickly crack came behind, making them drop it.

  “God!”

  They both got off the bed and directly to the door.

  The cupboard panel they’re placed down had cracked nearly in two. Both fought to get the second piece in, alongside it; they were not waiting for the animal to lumber in at them again.