by James Nally
‘Now, 40,000 is a comparatively tiny volume, so this brick is rare, and so is the silver paint covering it. It’s cellulose paint, petroleum-based, full of isocyanides and likely to be banned soon. Car enthusiasts use it to restore the paintwork on vintage cars, so it’s pretty specialist. The bottom line is, if you’ve got a suspect and you find these blocks and this paint at his home, you’ve found your kidnapper.’
I’m stoked. ‘This is so impressive, Zoe. Well done.’
‘I’m glad that’s put you in a good mood,’ she says. ‘Because I don’t think what else I’ve got to tell you will.’
I can’t even speak.
‘Don’t freak out okay, Donal, and don’t start parroting everything Fintan says or thinks …’
‘What do you mean by that?’
‘Oh come on. He’s never liked me and he’s been poisoning your mind against me since we first met.’
‘I love the way you always make me sound like some gullible, impressionable halfwit incapable of forming my own opinions, Zoe.’
I wait for her to dispute this. She doesn’t.
‘Er, what? That’s what you think of me? Jesus …’
‘I think Fintan’s a misogynist and when you’ve spent time with him, it rubs off on you.’
‘Can I just have the headline please.’
‘Remember when you went to Ireland last time? After you called, Matt was really upset for a few days. I asked you not to call again, and you understood?’
‘Er, yeah.’
‘After you dropped him off on Sunday, he’s been impossible. Constant tantrums, waking all the time. It’s just too unsettling and confusing for him.’
‘What are you suggesting, Zoe?’
‘For the sake of his emotional stability, can you not see him this Sunday?’
‘What, so you can get more sleep?’
‘No, Donal, come on. You know I’m only thinking of Matt here. I don’t want him to wind up emotionally damaged by all of this. Once we sort things out, then we can make proper arrangements, but right now we can’t expect him to understand what’s going on.’
‘He’s not the only one.’
‘I know you hate me right now, and I get that. But can you please do it for Matt. I know you want what’s best for him too.’
‘I’ll think about it,’ I say, and hang up. But I know what’s going on here. She’s weaning Matt off his surrogate dad. I’m as good as dumped.
Chapter 23
Holdernesse Road, South London
Friday, June 24, 1994; 15.30
God knows what any watching neighbours must be thinking as I stalk Joan Carter and her two kids through the front gate of their terraced home.
Earlier, I’d searched all the ‘Joan Carters’ in the police computer and found one whose address in 1987 had been Summerfield Street, SE12. A London A to Z confirmed that Summerfield Street is joined to Ronver Road, the one Bremner pointed out to me as home to someone who wanted to do Nathan Barry real harm.
Joan had been married at the time to Steve Carter, a wife-beating scumbag whom Nathan Barry had presented a barring order early in 1987.
As I shadow Joan and the kids towards their front door, I realise in horror how easily I could be her psychotic ex, doing the same. Judging by the amount of times she and the kids have moved since 1987, Joan’s clearly trying to stay one step ahead of deviant Steve. For the victim of an obsessive, violent partner, there really is no hiding place.
I remind myself that I’m shadowing them for more noble reasons. I’ve got to catch Joan before she gets inside that front door. I don’t have a warrant or any official mandate to be here. If she makes it inside, she’ll be well within her rights to slam that door in my face and refuse to re-open it. How then will I find out the truth about that call she made to Crimewatch six years ago?
At the same time, I don’t want to alarm her young kids, who’ve already suffered enough. I’m gambling that they’ll tear inside as soon as that front door opens, giving me a precious few seconds to Get Carter before she can barricade me out. I don’t have a plan B.
Thankfully, Joan’s kids have read the script and sprint straight towards the kitchen snack cupboard.
‘Excuse me, Joan?’
She turns, startled and on guard, so I rattle off my follow-up line like a voiceover artist racing through terms and conditions.
‘Detective Constable Donal Lynch. Please don’t worry, Joan, it’s not bad news,’ I gabble, flashing my badge and most innocuous smile.
‘Oh God, what’s this about?’ she grumbles, in the fatigued, world-weary tone of someone who’s spent her life answering doors to prying coppers. ‘It’s nothing to do with the kids, is it?’
‘No, no. I’m looking into the murder of Nathan Barry.’
Joan’s body sags as if suddenly deflated. Her right hand still clutches the key anchored in the front door’s top lock; it might be the only thing keeping her upright.
‘Are you okay, Joan?’
She nods absently, as if preoccupied by a past life flashing before her eyes.
‘You’d better come in,’ she sighs resignedly, pushing the door open and trudging through. I realise I’m the knock she’s been dreading for six long years.
I follow her through a jaded, woodchipped hallway that’s doubling as a bike workshop, into a messy kitchen full of ill-fitting white goods and mismatched furniture.
‘Go and watch TV in the other room,’ she orders her monster-munching kids.
They leave reluctantly, and only after relating their feelings towards me through a series of well-rehearsed ‘evils’. I comfort myself that at least deviant Steve appears to be off the scene. That’s what the intelligence report had said, and Joan is sporting no facial signs of his handiwork.
She takes her time filling an electric kettle and switching it on; then opens a cupboard to four chipped mugs.
‘Tea?’
‘I’m fine thanks. This will only take a few minutes.’
‘Well I’m parched, so you may as well take a seat.’
I know she’s buying time to get her head and tale together. Colleagues would seize upon this as a sign of guilt, use it to ‘get into her’. But I can’t bring myself to bully an already brutalised woman. Maybe that’s why I’m still an acting DC, not a fully blooded detective on a murder squad.
Instead, I look for signs that might help me prise her open later, when I hit her with my own particular brand of interrogation … you know, the one that makes Terry Wogan look like Klaus Barbie.
There are no photos or family mementoes, no fruit, flowers or pot plants. The place screams barrel-scraping short-term rental; the latest temporary bolthole in Joan’s constant race to keep them one step ahead of that controlling, out-of-control creep, Steve Carter.
It’s bereft of feminine touches, as is Joan. She’s wearing grey sweats, a stained, shapeless white T-shirt and shoes you wouldn’t put on your feet to escape a fire. I’ve seen it before with women who’ve been abused long-term; their entire body language and dress speaks ‘sexless and worthless’.
Then I recall how Zoe had ‘let herself go’ earlier this year, spending days in the same tatty pyjamas and jumper and, to my mounting horror, not bothering to shower or brush her teeth. No one had been battering her around, so I really shouldn’t judge. What I should have paid far more attention to, in hindsight, was when she’d started sprucing herself up again, no doubt for Charles.
Joan sits opposite me, stirring her steaming, milkless tea in a cracked and stained old mug and I wonder how starved her life has been of kindness or comforts.
‘Thanks for agreeing to talk to me, Joan.’
She sneers and I suddenly see her as a surly teen rebel who didn’t so much ‘fall in with the wrong crowd’ as joyously embrace them. For status. For belonging. For any kind of love.
Steve gave her that love, then hollowed out all her humanity to feed his own worthlessness. I’ve no doubt he did what all these bastards do; isolate her from f
amily, friends; hitting her so she couldn’t go to work out of shame or social workers out of fear of losing the kids. Slowly, methodically, he broke her until she became utterly dependent upon just him. Today, I’m going to show her that we’re not all bastards.
‘Look, Joan, I’m not going to take a formal statement or even write down what you tell me today. I just need to establish some facts and you’re the only person who can help me.’
Her head nods but the eyes aren’t buying it.
‘Honestly, whatever you tell me won’t come back on you. You have my word on that. I appreciate the risk you’re taking even talking to me.’
Now she looks confused.
‘How did you first meet Nathan?’
‘It was two days before Christmas ’87. I’ll always remember it because I had no money to get anything for the kids. I was in a right state.
‘Stephen had walked out on us a few months earlier and left me with all the bills. I couldn’t cope. They sent Nathan round that afternoon to cut off the electricity, gas, phone.’
Her face softens. She’s right back there. ‘He saw how desperate I was, rang them all and negotiated a deal.’
Her eyes well up. ‘He then handed me a fifty pound note and told me to buy a turkey and the kids something for Christmas. He said I could pay him back later.
‘He popped round on Christmas night wearing a Santa hat with a gift for me, a bottle of perfume, and told me to arrange a babysitter for the evening of the 30th. That night he told me how he felt trapped in a loveless marriage and was only sticking with it for the kids. I really admired his honesty and it felt so nice to be … I don’t know, fancied I suppose. We got together but neither of us had any real expectations. We just thought we’d see how it went for a few months.’
‘Four months later, you’re calling Crimewatch telling them your ex, Stephen Carter, murdered Nathan.’
She shakes her head: ‘It wasn’t me. Why would he hurt Nathan? He didn’t know anything about us.’
‘Okay, so the three occasions Stephen turned up and battered you between January and March that year, which gave Nathan grounds to present a barring order … what had that been about exactly?’
Her eyes darken and mouth stiffens.
I’ve got one card left to play, and it’s a blatant lie. ‘Look, Joan, Crimewatch traces every call it receives, and records them, despite their claims to the contrary.’
Her mouth opens a fraction and I visualise her insides collapsing like cliffs into a raging sea. Now I’ve got her on the ropes, I land my second tactical fib.
‘I’ve listened to that recording, Joan. It’s clearly your voice.’
She gazes down into her untouched black tea; it’s no longer spinning or steaming.
She sighs. ‘I thought Stephen had gone for good. And I’d no intentions of taking him back. Of course, someone told him I was seeing another bloke. They couldn’t just let me enjoy a bit of happiness.
‘He must have started spying on me and following us. He turned up begging me to finish it with Nathan and take him back. When I said no, he lost it.’
‘And then, when he couldn’t batter you into dumping Nathan, he took matters into his own hands. You know he killed Nathan and that’s why you phoned Crimewatch.’
‘No, no,’ she protests. ‘I called Crimewatch because I wanted to get back at him for ruining what I had with Nathan. Then I couldn’t go through with it.’
‘Oh come on, Joan. Stephen had the motive. He has a dangerous, violent streak. He couldn’t stand the idea of another man having you, so he followed Nathan and took his chances in the pub car park.’
‘He wouldn’t have killed Nathan,’ she states, challenging me with a glare. ‘He would’ve killed me.’ For the first time, she’s looking directly into my eyes. ‘Don’t you get it? He would’ve taken it out on me and the kids. So I ended it with Nathan.’
‘When was that?’
‘End of March. Two weeks before Nathan was killed. Stephen didn’t need to get him out of the way, as you put it, because we were already finished.’
I try a new tack. ‘You provided an alibi for Stephen on the night of Nathan’s murder. Now’s your chance to retract that statement, Joan.’
She folds her arms and stares right through me.
‘If you have any suspicions, Joan, you must state them now, or you’ll be the one landing in prison.’
‘Why don’t you ask him yourself?’ she says.
‘I plan to.’
‘He’ll be back at five.’
I feel like my jaw has landed on the battle-scarred table.
‘You’re still … together?’
She nods. ‘Of course. Love drives people crazy sometimes, but it’s still love. As a mum, I’ve got to think about the kids, do what’s best for them. Kids need to be with their mum and dad.’
Chapter 24
Clerkenwell, Central London
Friday, June 24, 1994; 17.00
Fintan insists we watch Ireland versus Mexico in an English pub.
The Three Kings in Clerkenwell don’t just share a fictional throne, they also share one stingy 16-inch TV set; a fact we establish only after it’s too late to go anywhere else.
‘Great call Fint, I can’t make out the players or hear the commentary and I’d wager there’s more atmosphere in the crypt across the road.’
‘Yeah, great isn’t it?’ says Fintan. ‘No George Hamilton wittering on or pissed people singing or women screaming. I know the Archway has always been our sports pub, but the mob in there just don’t understand soccer. There’s a good chance we’ll get hammered today but they’ll still party like we’ve won the bloody tournament. I don’t know about you, but I’m sick of all this “just happy to be here” underdog shite.’
‘We beat Italy. Why do you think we’ll get hammered?’
‘FIFA are desperate to get us knocked out. That’s why they’ve sent us on this 2,000-mile round trip to play a game in Orlando at lunchtime. It’s 104 degrees. Irish people aren’t even supposed to lie out in that!’
‘Steve Staunton may die!’
‘Don’t laugh, six of our players are well over thirty. Remember what happened to poor old Barry McGuigan in Vegas? And he was a fit, non-drinker.’
‘Paul McGrath will definitely die.’
Sure enough, Los Mexicanos appear to be made of Los Asbestos; fresh featherweights bobbing and weaving around our lumbering George Foreman tribute act. Every time there’s a break in play, the Irish backroom staff throws on bags of water. Sadly, for our sun-drunk albinos, the bags split on opening so that the precious water splats comedically onto the parched sward.
‘It’s like watching a troop of baboons trying to break into a Capri Sun,’ quips Fintan.
Moments before half-time, the Irish players are deliriously helpless to prevent Mexico scoring. Fintan rants and rails but I can’t shake Joan Carter’s words out of my head.
As a mum, I’ve got to think about the kids, do what’s best for them. Kids need to be with their mum and dad.
This is a woman savagely beaten by her husband on at least three occasions. My worst crimes have been to leave unfinished bowls of cornflakes on the sideboard, or used towels on the bathroom floor. Yet I’m the one getting kicked out. Matt’s losing the only real dad he’s ever had in the world. How can Zoe behave so selfishly?
Fintan seems even keener than me to avoid the inane half-time analysis, so I tell him about my trip to see durable Joan, the human punchbag and devoted wife of Carter the Unstoppable Slug Machine.
‘It wasn’t Carter or any other jealous husband who killed Nathan,’ he laughs. ‘It just doesn’t fit.’
‘Yes, it does.’
‘The pathologist described the attack as an assassination, it was so savage and clinical. The man who wielded the axe wound tape around the handle knowing this would eliminate his prints. We’re talking a professional enforcer here, not some irate suburban cuckold.’
I bristle. Is this how he sees me n
ow? Of course, Fintan will never be a cuckold; he always ensures he gets his infidelity in first. I can’t think of a girlfriend he hasn’t cheated on. It’s almost like a compulsion. He justifies it by claiming that as soon as he finds a woman who wants sex as often as he does, he’ll commit.
I try again: ‘People have murdered out of sexual jealousy, Fint, you know that.’
‘Okay then, suppose you want to get back at this Charles fella who’s been messing around with Zoe.’
‘Don’t even …’
‘I’m serious, Donal. I know manly confrontations aren’t your thing, but I’m sure you’ve fantasised about it. How would you do it?’
My arched eyebrows let him know I’m only fleetingly participating in this twisted little parlour game.
‘I’d find out where he lives or works, wait for him to come out one morning or evening, let him know how I feel and scare the shit out of him.’
‘Exactly. Even if he was Marvin Hagler, you’d confront him. No matter how violent any of these jealous husbands might be, they’d make sure they confronted Nathan first and had their say. No jealous husband is going to wait in a dark corner with an axe, attack him from behind, whack him repeatedly in the skull, then, after he falls, bury the hatchet into the side of his face with a backhand worthy of Roscoe Tanner. That’s too efficient, too decisive and too personal. Whoever used Nathan’s skull as a chopping board was sending out a very clear message to lots of other people. Mess with us and this is what you’ll get.’
I hate him for being so certain; isn’t that what scuppered all previous investigations? I’m keeping an open mind.
‘Unless he was shagging the wife of a violent criminal,’ I say. ‘Maybe the guy had already warned him off. He ignored the threat and paid the price.’
Fintan screws up his face in mild disgust. ‘You want it to be a jealous husband who killed Nathan, don’t you Donal? You’re so desperate to prove that a shagger like Nathan got his comeuppance because of what’s happened to you, it’s almost biblical. That’s what this is all about, isn’t it?’
