He went back to a thorough inspection of the upstairs of Janson’s cottage, continuing with detailed notes of each of the framed awards. At this stage, he wasn’t trying to infer much from the contents, just to get the details down in his notebook. They would go over them together later and see what avenues needed further exploration. Right now, the important thing was to gather the information, accurately and completely. The challenge of putting it all together came later.
Monday, May 6, Conquest Hospital Mortuary, Brighton, 12.50PM
Jake didn’t want to delay anyone for long but he wanted to say something about Steve Tucker. He had called a brief staff meeting.
He was well aware that Tucker was an unpleasant individual and probably always had been. Not attractive, even to his mother, would be Jake’s guess. Twenty-six years old but with a mental age of around thirteen, and that was on a good day. Five feet three inches of rampant body odour, he had the habit of fondling his genitals. In public, or private, it made no difference. Well, not to him, anyway.
His skin had the texture of someone who has dedicated their life to smoking as much as possible during their waking hours. It followed of course that with such dedication to nicotine came a certain amount of phlegm, so spitting was another facet of Tucker’s charm. This was usually done with the same rules as the genital gymnastics…anywhere that took his fancy, and with little or no regard to the comfort or safety of anyone in the vicinity. Although if there was a handy wall within range, it was more entertaining to half of his brain cells to watch it dribble the way gravity dictates. The other brain cell was occupied with breathing, noisily through a permanently open mouth.
With his round face and pop eyes, heavy eyelids and bags to match, he looked like an overgrown bug with blackheads.
Jake could well understand why the women Tucker worked alongside were disgusted by him. But Jake was also touched by a feeling of “There but for the grace of God”.
‘You have to reinforce the message,’ he explained to Angie, Mel and Clare, hoping that if he could get them onside, the other women would at least give Tucker another chance.
‘What? Rewarding good behaviour? Is that what we’re talking about?’ Clare asked.
Jake nodded. ‘If he thinks there is a good reason for having a shower every day, then he might do it without me having to nag him about it, that’s all.’
‘So you want us to praise him for making an effort to clean himself up?’ asked Melanie. ‘Right?’
‘Bit like a puppy, when you’re trying to toilet train it?’ Clare was an expert in such matters.
Angie could be relied on to see the funny side of any situation.
‘So, can I smack him on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper whenever he gets out of line?’ she asked, innocently. ‘That’s okay with you?’ The other two girls were instantly convulsed with laughter.
Jake couldn’t help but laugh himself. ‘Well, if all else fails, maybe we’ll try that,’ he answered.
The meeting was over. Jake was pleased to have taken some action but not at all convinced that his words with Tucker would have any lasting effect. Neither were the girls.
They all liked Jake very much but thought he was too nice about Tucker. They all wondered why.
‘Maybe misplaced guilt,’ said Angie, when they discussed it over sandwiches in their usual spot outside the hospital.
Melanie frowned.
Angie went on. ‘It’s obvious. If you’re tall, blond, gorgeous and very, very fit, not to mention…’
Clare interrupted. ‘Angie, you’re drooling again. Stop it!’
The three of them laughed. Jake was not bad-looking by anyone’s standards and he seemed to be a pretty decent bloke.
‘So you think he’s kind to Steve because Steve’s ugly and stupid and disgusting…’ Melanie began, clearly not convinced.
‘Yeah, because Jake’s gorgeous and good enough to eat…’ Angie was off again.
‘Mmm. Not to mention funny. And kind. And very clean,’ Clare put in, laughing.
‘And healthy.’ Angie was not to be stopped.
‘Good teeth?’ Melanie offered.
Angie hooted. ‘Great teeth.’
They fell about giggling over their sandwiches and Melanie had to grab her Evian bottle to stop it falling over. People walking past them turned to look and smiled to themselves at the sight of three attractive young women, laughing together in the sunshine.
Chapter 4
Monday, May 6, Brighton Police Station, 4.00PM
The office that Saxon was to share with Parker back at police headquarters in Brighton was old but very functional, with an atmosphere of having been lived and worked in for many years. It exuded authority, formality, and even a certain menace. Saxon had used it before. He liked to think that the slight atmosphere of menace had been brought about by years of clenched buttocks involuntarily polishing the seats. Sharing the thought with Parker had induced roars of laughter, almost to the point of tears.
In Saxon’s experience, just being in a police station often made people feel tense and uneasy. Even when they had little or nothing to feel guilty about, the effect was still the same.
But it had to be said that this particular room did have a certain resonance about it. One of the clerks at the station had once remarked to Parker that the room had the right feng shui for its purpose. Parker had been non-committal.
Brighton had its fair share of New-Age enthusiasts. Some might say more than its fair share. While he didn’t know too much about geomancy, and cared even less, Parker was of the opinion that it wasn’t just the surroundings that made people nervous, it was the tactics Saxon used when interviewing.
One such tactic was to stare at the person being questioned and not blink, sometimes for minutes at a time. Saxon could live with the silence and the hard eye contact, but not all the interviewees could. He was already well-known at Brighton Police Station, as he used their facilities from time to time. Some of the police constables had once joked that if the military ever got hold of him, Saxon could be used as a secret weapon.
The walls of the office were oak-panelled; some of the furniture was 1930s, not particularly attractive, but long-lasting. The building could not be said to be on the cutting-edge of office design and technology, but it did well enough for them.
DS Parker was given a corner to himself and he was relieved to see that he was already on line. Parker loved computers. For Guy Parker, computers held the answer to almost everything. If the solution couldn’t be found in the police computer, then it was because some stupid bastard in records wasn’t doing his or her job properly.
Computers were important in his personal life too. He helped his kids with their homework whenever possible, supervising their searches on the Internet very carefully. He took his parental responsibilities seriously.
When he was away from home, as he knew he would be this week, he made a point of sending an email home to each of the boys every day. Hotmail was still the best invention yet on the Internet, as far as he was concerned. They’d had great fun choosing their email addresses and he knew that “you can check your email from Dad when you…” was a powerful inducement to an ever-growing number of things, including: “finish your dinner”, “pick up your clothes”, “clean your teeth”, “pack up your dinosaurs”, and so on. The possibilities were endless. And Lynne was expert at making the most of it.
Parker was the first to volunteer to go to Starbucks so that he could check his Hotmail and send his daily messages.
The two men made themselves at home.
Monday, May 6, Conquest Hospital Mortuary, Brighton, 4.15PM
The traumas of the morning were already fading into Tucker’s distant past. Melanie had just smiled at him. She’d even spoken to him. His skin came up in goose pimples at the thought.
‘You look nice this afternoon, Steve,’ she’d said.
And that git, Dalton, had passed some comment too but Tucker couldn’t remember what it was now. Som
ething about a big improvement and something about him, Tucker, taking things well and in a positive manner.
‘Tosser,’ muttered Tucker under his breath. ‘Total fuckin’ tosser, s’wot ’e is.’
No matter what anyone else had said to him, Melanie’s words were engraved on his soul. Little did he know the effort it had cost her to say the words. Nor could he have guessed that her entire being revolted at the thought of saying them.
No, Tucker was totally unaware of Melanie’s feelings as his fingers strayed to his trouser pocket.
Monday, May 6, Brighton Police Station, 4.15PM
Saxon read the pathologist’s report on Janson. Depressingly sparse would be an understatement. Cause of death: Mr Janson died from a broken neck. There were no marks on the body. No bruising on the head or neck. Nothing. His general health was good. In fact, for a man of his age, he was in remarkably good shape, apart from his being dead.
There were two obvious possibilities. Saxon figured that either Janson knew the killer and let him or her in, or maybe the killer was a hit man, possibly an ex-soldier. In which case, Janson would have not known he was dead until he saw the tunnel with the beckoning white light.
The clues amounted to precisely zero, the same as in the two previous cases, and so far it seemed that none of the victims knew each other. For Rupert Hall and David Crowley, all their phone books and diaries had been thoroughly probed and, unless they were using a cipher on a par with the Enigma code, there was, as far as Saxon could tell, absolutely nothing to connect them at all – apart from their sexual preferences, their age, the fact that they were both male, over 50 and living alone.
Janson might well turn out to share the same sexual preferences. He certainly fit the other points. Overall, they didn’t add up to much. Certainly, there was nothing to point the investigation in any one clear direction. Saxon sighed and stretched.
He jumped when the telephone buzzed on his desk. He moved forward again and reached for the phone. It was Superintendent Alex Mitchell, the station’s commanding officer.
‘Commander Saxon, good morning to you, sir.’ The voice was hearty. ‘It’s Mitchell here. Would you mind if I pop up and have a chat with you? I know you’re busy, so I’ll keep it brief,’ he said, sounding apologetic. The public school charm oozed through the phone line.
Saxon wasn’t pleased. ‘No problem,’ he answered. ‘Come when you’re ready.’ He hung up the phone quickly. He was exasperated. Saxon didn’t need interruptions from Mitchell. He had more important things on his mind, than to talk about rising crime figures and detection rates. Wasting his time listening to that creep Alex Mitchell, explaining how good he was at his job, was not on his agenda – nor would it ever be if he had his way.
To Saxon, who didn’t care for him at all, Mitchell was your typical fast-track cop: university, then one year on the beat. Saxon tried to avoid sweeping generalisations as far as possible, but Mitchell just invited it. In the past, Saxon had found that Mitchell was good at giving the impression of listening and paying attention. However, he soon realised that all Mitchell was doing was rehearsing his next pronouncement either to the press or the chief constable. Conversations with Mitchell were often a frustrating business.
To make things worse, his “okay yah” accent irritated people even when what he was saying made sense.
A few minutes later Mitchell knocked and entered Saxon’s office.
‘Superintendent Mitchell, come in, sit down,’ Saxon said in a hurried manner.
‘Thank you, Commander.’ Mitchell looked around the room. ‘Everything okay here? You have everything you need?’ Parker pushed his chair back noisily and left the office.
‘I just wanted to drop in and say that if there’s anything, absolutely anything, I or my staff can do to make your time here more, shall I say, productive, then don’t hesitate to call me at any time.’
Saxon said nothing.
‘I should mention that the chief constable has asked me to personally keep him briefed on any developments regarding these cases, you know how much he likes to be on top of things, so to speak,’ Mitchell went on.
This time Saxon was quick to reply.
‘Fine,’ he said. ‘But let’s not keep him too informed. He’s too press-friendly for my liking. There are some details I like to keep back. If the public know too much, we’ll have the usual confessors stacked up all along the seafront, waiting to admit to everything from masterminding the Great Train Robbery to the Kennedy assassination just to get their bit of the limelight.’ He paused briefly.
‘It would be a great shame if something were to be inadvertently leaked, wouldn’t it. Particularly if the leak were to be traced back to here.’ He raised his eyebrows.
Mitchell nodded slowly in agreement. ‘Indeed, Commander, I do understand. Only what you agree to release, of course.’
This assurance was accompanied by a confident smile, with significant baring of teeth, and a slight bow of the head. Saxon thought that for once Mitchell seemed genuine. That thought was quickly replaced by the suspicion that it was more than likely just another example of Superintendent Mitchell’s desperate ambition. The entire station knew he was obsessed with promotion and fully capable of achieving heights – or depths even – of brown-nosing that were previously unknown among the population at large.
Mitchell was unaware of the thoughts going through Saxon’s mind. Just as he seemed to be oblivious to the negative vibes he provoked among his own staff. Mitchell had no doubt been on more than one personal development course, where he’d learnt some, but not all, of the pointers on body language, Saxon thought to himself. That made him smile and Mitchell was in turn sufficiently comforted that his offer had been well-perceived that he ended the conversation, repeating a slight nod of the head as he left the room.
Monday, May 6, Victoria Station, 6.00PM
Penelope Field, or Poppy, as her friends inevitably knew her, stopped at WH Smith on the station forecourt. She bought the evening paper and a copy of Marie Claire.
Thank God today was over. Four more days to go before the weekend. She wished, as she did every day, at least once, that she were self-employed and that she didn’t have to do this awful commute every day to a job she no longer enjoyed.
She couldn’t wait to get home to Sewel Mill.
Monday, May 6, 12 Pavilion Square, Brighton, 11.00PM
Saxon parked his car. Would he ever get used to coming home to an empty flat? Will I ever have to get used to it?
In some ways, he was already coming to terms with it. He no longer expected to see food in the fridge unless he’d bought it himself. He knew that the bedding wasn’t changed unless he did it. He’d been married for six years but he had never become dependent on having someone around to do all that for him, so the transition back to a quasi-bachelor state was not difficult for him, at least not from a practical point of view. Emotionally, it was a different thing.
To his eyes, the separation had come so quickly he hardly had time to draw breath. He’d arrived home at his usual time last night, way past midnight, and she was gone. The note she left for him told him not to worry about her, and that she would phone him in a few days.
It had to be said that apart from the shock of Emma’s sudden departure, and his ongoing, albeit suppressed, concern that she might not come back, Saxon was a contented man.
This was the place he had always wanted to be. He loved his job. He thrived on the combination of analysis and action, of thinking and hunting. The challenge was to spot the mistakes that all murderers make. The police macho types could keep their dark, smelly alleyways, where they waited for drug deals to go down, or their car chases with lights flashing and sirens blaring, while they belted around narrow streets. Saxon was one of those rare people who enjoyed what they did and were good at it. There had never been any other career for him.
Paul Saxon was just seven years old when his father Richard Saxon was murdered. Even now, the flashbacks still haunted him like sc
enes from a black and white movie. That was the point in his life, almost to the minute, when he decided to be a policeman. His desire to get the bad guys came from a very strong personal conviction that nobody should have to suffer the way he did. When confronted with a new case the thought always raced through his mind – how dare people kill, and think that they can get away with it?
In the kitchen, Saxon reached for the Black Label and poured himself a generous two fingers over a couple of ice cubes. Emma would not have been pleased to see the Scotch kept in the kitchen, but she wasn’t there, was she.
Chapter 5
Thursday, May 9, Brighton Police Station, 2.00PM
Parker was satisfied that he had unearthed every scrap of information about Christopher Janson, but disappointed that none of it led to any real breakthroughs at all, apart from the further link with the other two cases, once it was established that Janson, too, was gay.
Although he was well-liked in the village where he lived, it seemed that Janson’s former colleagues and contacts in London’s magazine world were less enthusiastic about their recently departed acquaintance. The generally held view was that talent had played little or no part in the acquisition of the majority of the awards that had so impressed Edie Hayward and so exhausted Guy Parker.
Unless, that is, someone was giving out prizes for being two-faced and highly manipulative. Or perhaps a little statuette in recognition of almost total disregard for ethics and morals if they stood between him and something he wanted. The consensus was that Janson was a creep.
The village was unaware of this persona, knowing him only as a long-term resident, who had worked up in London for many years but who now lived permanently in Sewel Mill. The village viewed him as a charming gentleman, a warm and obliging neighbour. How could they know that Janson had made many enemies throughout his career? Parker was amused at the huge disparity between the two pictures he was given.
Janson was known in the industry as someone who would happily slither past anyone in his way, and then stab them firmly between the shoulder blades if a suitable opportunity presented itself. Having two faces was a minimum requirement in his view, particularly with regard to the editors he’d worked under. Behind their backs, they were morons. To their faces – they were anything he knew they wanted to be. One old colleague often referred to him as the editor’s lapdog. As the editors came and went, Janson merely changed laps, usually a few weeks before the changeover. He had survived in the industry through mediocre ability combined with stealth and cunning. Not to mention a formidable talent for internal politics. His own best interests took priority, and if someone else suffered in the process, it was hardly his concern.
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