The local police had cordoned off the car when Banks and Annie arrived early in the afternoon. Ronald Tanner was still in his cell, and Gerry Masterson was slaving away over her computer with lists of names and companies beside her.
‘Nice day for a visit to the seaside, sir,’ said one of the uniformed officers cheerfully, as Banks and Annie struggled to keep their raincoats on in the wind, which seemed to be trying to rip off every item of clothing they wore. ‘Isn’t it funny,’ he went on, ‘the way people assume you’re on perpetual holiday when you tell them you’re stationed in Scarborough?’
‘Indeed,’ said Banks. There was no point in even trying to open an umbrella. Banks could feel the salt spray on his face and taste it in his mouth. It was invigorating, at least for a moment or two, then it just became cold, uncomfortable and downright annoying. ‘So what have you got?’
The officer, an inspector named Martin Mills, led them to the front of the car, where they could clearly see the parking permit stuck in the window of the ancient grey Peugeot. It gave them the date, which was Tuesday’s, and the time by which the car was supposed to leave, which was 1814. Lane had put in enough money for three hours, which meant that he had parked there at 1514 on Tuesday, two days after he had ‘disappeared’. As he had paid until after six, when the parking charges no longer applied, he would have been all right there until eight o’clock on Wednesday morning. In season, the car would no doubt have been towed away quite early that day, but at this time of year, in this sort of weather, it had only attracted a couple of parking tickets before one of the more adventurous parking officers had become suspicious. Even so, it was Thursday now. Lane could be anywhere.
Banks tried the driver’s door. Locked. He was eager to find out if there were any clues to Lane’s whereabouts in the car. ‘Any chance of getting this open?’ he asked Mills. The pounding waves and screaming wind were so loud they had to shout to make themselves heard.
Inspector Mills pulled a key from his pocket. ‘Thought you might want to do that,’ he said. ‘No point just standing around getting wet while we were waiting for you. It’s an old car, no fancy locking mechanism. There’s not even an alarm system. We also checked the fuel earlier with a dipstick. Empty.’
Banks nodded. ‘Thanks. So he ran out of petrol and couldn’t afford any more?’
‘Not surprising at today’s prices,’ said Annie. ‘And Alex said he didn’t have much money with him. But don’t you think it’s a bit strange?’
Both Banks and Mills looked at her curiously. ‘What? Why?’
She pointed to the windscreen. ‘Well, that he’s on the run and he dumps his car because it’s run out of petrol and he can’t afford any more, but he takes the trouble to pay and display a parking sticker?’
‘People do odd things when they’re flustered,’ said Banks.
‘They also do what they’d normally do,’ said Annie. ‘Don’t you think this is a sign of an honest man?’
‘I’ll grant you it’s a little odd,’ said Banks. ‘Who was that famous killer who got caught because of a parking ticket?’
‘Son of Sam,’ said Mills. ‘And he was caught because of a ticket he got for parking illegally. See, even serial killers don’t pay for parking.’
‘But our Michael Lane does,’ said Annie. ‘I still think it’s weird.’
‘Shall we have a look inside?’ said Banks.
Annie took out her protective gloves.
Mills held up the key. ‘The garage assures me this should do the trick.’ He opened the door. ‘Voilà!
‘I’ll do the front and you do the back,’ Banks said to Annie.
They got in the car and started looking and feeling around. It was a relief to be out of the wind and spray for a while, a haven of quiet and shelter. The interior smelled neutral, and the seats and floor weren’t littered with sweet wrappers or discarded newspapers. The glovebox yielded nothing but a dog-eared manual, a few old petrol station receipts and a pack of chewing gum. There was a dock for a mobile phone, but no phone, also no GPS, which might have been useful for plotting Lane’s travels. There were no maps conveniently open at a particular page, either. There was a box of tissues and a few CDs in the box between the seats: Vampire Weekend, Manic Street Preachers, White Denim. Banks reached down the sides and under the seats. Nothing there but a dried-up chip, one of those long skinny ones from McDonald’s, by the look of it, and a crumpled coffee container from the same establishment.
‘Anything in the back?’ he asked Annie.
‘Couple of twenty-p coins down the back of the seats. A Mars bar wrapper, copy of the Beano from last month. Looks like Ian’s been in here. Nothing else.’
‘OK,’ said Banks. Let’s get it locked up again and shipped to the forensic garage. See if they can get anything out of it. I’d like Vic Manson on it, too. Prints would help. We’ll see if anyone other than Michael, Alex and Ian have been inside recently.’
‘You’d have to take Ian’s prints for elimination purposes then.’
‘He’ll love it,’ Banks said. ‘I know I would have done when I was a kid. In fact, I remember getting my very own fingerprint kit for Christmas one year. I took everyone’s. Even the postman’s.’
Annie rolled her eyes. ‘Why doesn’t that surprise me?’
‘Don’t mock. They came in useful when we nicked him for receiving stolen property later.’
‘You never—’
Banks pointed at her. ‘Got you there.’
They got out of the car, and a blast of cold wind laced with sea spray hit them again. It was the kind of chilly damp that penetrated deep into Banks’s body and gave his bones an inkling of the aches and pains they would be feeling even on a normal day in a few years’ time. When they had made sure the car was locked, Mills suggested they adjourn to a tea shop over the road and warm up. He even offered to buy.
When they were settled with their cups of tea, Banks rubbed a clear patch in the misted window and gazed out at the bleak grey North Sea heaving in the distance. His mind became lost out there on the almost imperceptible horizon where sea met sky, until he realised that Annie was asking him a question.
‘So where do you think he is, then?’
‘He parked here just after three on Tuesday and he rang Alex from a public telephone in York on Tuesday evening. You can catch a train to almost anywhere from York, even connect to the Eurostar. He could be on the bloody Riviera by now.’
‘Remember,’ Annie said, ‘he’s got no money. And we’d know if he used any of his credit or debit cards. Besides, he doesn’t have his passport with him.’
‘Somewhere still in England, then. Or maybe he took a train north to Scotland?’
‘But what about the money, the abandoned car, the empty petrol tank?’
‘Maybe they were designed to throw us off the scent. We’re assuming that he had no money, but we don’t know it for a fact, do we? We’re just basing our assumption on Alex Preston’s word. We’re making a lot of guesses about his motives, too, but maybe it’s just blind fear that’s driving him, and there’s nothing to be read into it. Is he just a scared kid or a seasoned criminal on the run? He could have money on him that Alex doesn’t know about.’
‘A private stash?’
‘Why not? Especially if he was involved in criminal activities.’
‘Happens all the time,’ said Mills. ‘People don’t always tell their partners about financial matters, especially cash. Look at those blokes who spend a fortune on prostitutes. Do you think they use their credit cards?’
‘These days, probably yes,’ said Banks. ‘It no doubt appears on the statements as dry-cleaning or something.’
Mills laughed.
‘But seriously,’ Annie went on. ‘OK, let’s say he does have money with him.’
‘I can think of three, maybe four ways he might have got it,’ said Banks. ‘First off, he was prepared to go from the start and took his own private funds Alex didn’t know about. Second, he could have got it
at his meeting with Spencer. We don’t know what happened there except that someone’s tracking him down because of it. Maybe it was a meeting to split proceeds, or a pay-off? Couldn’t he be on the run because he made off with someone’s money?’
‘But Alex said he was running because he saw something he shouldn’t have seen at the hangar.’
‘But again we only have her word for what he said, and even if she’s telling the truth, we don’t know that he is. And don’t forget, if Lane was involved with people who knew about overseas smuggling routes, he might not need a passport to get out of the country. If they needed to get him out, they’d get him out. And he’d hardly tell her about a pile of money he’d nicked, or received for criminal activities, would he?’
‘What’s the third and fourth?’ asked Mills.
‘He could have nicked it or someone could have given him it.’
‘Does he have any friends here in Scarborough?’
‘Not as far as we know.’
‘There is one more possibility I reckon we should follow up while we’re in the area,’ said Annie.
‘Lane’s mother and grandparents?’
‘Right. They live in Whitby, which is just a few miles up the road. We need to head up there and have a word.’
Banks turned to Mills. ‘Thanks, Inspector. Sorry to put you to such trouble on a miserable day like this. Someone from forensics will be over for the car before long.’
‘You don’t think we should leave it here and keep it under surveillance in case he comes back for it?’ Mills asked.
Banks thought for a moment, then said, ‘Have a patrol car keep an eye out until our men come. But I don’t expect he’ll be back now. He’s left it here for two days already. And like I said, it’s a red flag. Even he must know that. He’s not coming back for it. We’ll learn more from forensics than we would by leaving it here.’
‘You’re the boss. We’ll guard it with our lives till they come.’
Banks smiled. ‘I wouldn’t go that far.’ Then he looked at Annie. ‘Come on, then, let’s have a ride up to Whitby. With any luck it’ll be teatime when we’ve finished and we can grab some fish and chips and salvage something out of this day.’
Chapter 11
It was a damp grey afternoon when Winsome set out from Eastvale west into the dale to make a few inquiries at the farms on Caleb Ross’s route.
She stopped in a lay-by just outside Helmthorpe and consulted her Ordnance Survey map. Through her potholing and walking experience, she already knew the area. She had also become adept at reading maps, and could visualise the landscape as it was laid out on paper, in contours, broken lines and arcane symbols. As she had suspected, the next call, near the hamlet of Mortsett, was halfway up the daleside to her left, then the farms grew fewer and farther between as she moved on past Helmthorpe and Swainshead into the High Pennines.
Thus far, she had heard nothing but praise for Caleb Ross and the job he did, and the fallen stock on the farmers’ copies was just as it was described on Neil Vaughn’s master document. On the surface, this was the sort of job Banks could have sent a DC or even a couple of PCs in a patrol car to do, but on the other hand, he had told Winsome he needed the instinct of a seasoned detective, someone who could read the nuances, give voice to the unspoken. Winsome was trying to dig, or see, under the surface, look for the unconscious signs and signals others might miss. There hadn’t been any so far, and she didn’t expect it to be any different this time as she pulled into yet another farmyard. Her boots were already caked with mud and worse, and she feared she would never be able to wash the farmyard smell out of her hair and her clothes, or scrub it from her skin. The farmer, Reg Padgett according to Winsome’s list, was working in the yard in his donkey jacket, flat cap and wellies, and he came striding over to Winsome as she pulled up.
‘I know who you are,’ he said, beaming as she got out of the car and held out her warrant card.
Winsome smiled shyly. ‘So my fame precedes me?’
‘I’ll say it does. Rugby tackles and drop kicks. We could do with you on the England side.’
‘I don’t think I’m quite up to that. And it wasn’t strictly a drop kick.’ Winsome was referring to the rolling push with which she had sent a three-hundred-pound drug-dealer flying over a third-floor balcony on the East Side Estate a year or two ago. ‘The papers got it all wrong.’
‘Never mind, lass,’ said Padgett. ‘Whatever it was, it got the job done.’
Indeed it had. Winsome’s action had put the person in question in hospital for nearly a month with numerous fractures and abrasions, and earned her a reprimand for excessive force, which she thought was excessive in itself.
‘I’ve come about Caleb Ross,’ she said. ‘He had a pickup here last Tuesday morning, didn’t he?’
‘Indeed he did,’ said Padgett, lifting up his flat cap and scratching his head. ‘Poor Caleb. I heard about what happened. A real tragedy. Treacherous, that place, even on the best of days. But surely you don’t think there’s anything suspicious about the accident?’
‘No, it’s nothing like that,’ said Winsome, taking out her copy of Vaughn’s list. ‘It says here that you were his fourth call of the day.’
‘I wouldn’t know about that, but he did seem in a bit of a hurry.’
‘A hurry?’
‘Yes. Usually he stands around and chats for a while, you know, just passes the time of day.’
‘But not on Tuesday?’
‘No. He seemed to just want to get the job done and go. Two stillborn lambs. Too many of those at this time of year. Keeping him busy, I suppose.’
‘Did he act as if there was anything bothering him?’
Padgett chewed on his lower lip for a moment, then said, ‘No-o-o, I wouldn’t say that. He just seemed distracted. In another world, like.’
‘As if he was thinking about something else?’
‘That’s right. As if his mind wasn’t on the job. He seemed cheerful, though. I mean, I wouldn’t say he seemed anxious or depressed or anything like that. You don’t think . . . ?’
‘We’re almost certain it was an accident, Mr Padgett.’ But another thing that had occurred to Winsome since she started the job was that someone might have been following Ross, trailing him, chasing him between farms, even, and that might have contributed to the accident. Palmer, the driver coming the other way, hadn’t noticed any cars approaching from the same direction as Caleb after the crash, but he was probably in a state of shock for a while, and he had pulled over to the far side of the road, away from the drop. He could easily have missed something. ‘Did you notice any other cars around when Mr Ross arrived?’
‘No. But I wouldn’t. You can see for yourself, this is a well-hidden track. We can’t see what’s happening down on the Mortsett Road from here, so I wouldn’t have noticed even if there had been. We had no other callers here, I can tell you that.’
‘Could anyone have gained access to Mr Ross’s van while he was here?’
‘No. We were standing out here, just like you and me are now, and the van was where your car is. I remember he had the window open and that blooming music he likes blaring out. Fair scared the wits out of my chickens. Put them off their laying, nearly.’
‘Could anyone have tampered with your fallen stock before it was picked up?’
‘I don’t see how,’ said Padgett. ‘I follow all the correct storage regulations. They were bagged, tagged and locked in the barn until Caleb came for them.’
‘No signs of illegal entry?’
‘None at all. Where are you going with this, lass?’
‘You’ll have heard rumours that he was carrying more than he should have been. That’s really all I can say for the moment.’
‘The human body parts, you mean?’
‘You’ve been watching the TV news, then?’
‘Well, you’ll know the truth, I suppose.’
‘That I do, Mr Padgett.’
‘Whatever it was, it didn’t
come from here. Mrs Padgett’s still very much alive and well.’
‘I’m sure she is. We’re interested in Caleb’s state of mind. Could he have been drinking, or anything like that?’
‘Not Caleb. I happen to know he’s a teetotaller, and he certainly didn’t behave as if he was drunk. No, as I said, he was just a bit keen to get going, as if his mind was running ahead of him.’
‘What about drugs? We know that Caleb smoked marijuana from time to time. Did you see any signs of that in his behaviour?’
‘I wouldn’t know what to look for. But he seemed normal to me. And if he did smoke that stuff, like you say, he kept it well to himself.’
‘What about a woman?’ Winsome ventured. Some of the farms were isolated, and if Caleb had taken up a dalliance with one of the farmer’s wives, or a milkmaid, if such creatures still existed, it might both distract him and cause him to hurry.
Padgett just laughed. ‘Caleb? If you’d have known him, lass, you wouldn’t have said that. Devoted to Maggie, he was, for a start. And for another thing, he wasn’t exactly your Brad Pitt or Tom Cruise, if you know what I mean.’
Winsome laughed. ‘He wasn’t really close to the end of his rounds,’ she said. ‘So it’s unlikely he was in a hurry to get home. In fact he had a few hours to go. Was he late when he arrived here?’
‘Not so far as I’m aware. It’s not an exact science, his business, though you could usually depend on him to arrive close to when Vaughn’s said he would. Dependable firm.’
‘Do you know if he ever made any unscheduled stops?’
‘I wouldn’t know about that. Shouldn’t think so, mind you. Caleb was an honest man. He took his work seriously. I can’t see him taking a job on the side and trying to put one over on his employers.’
Neither could Winsome. For a start, it wasn’t the kind of job on which you could really take anything on the side, though she supposed he could accept untested animals over the age limit for a few quid and have some sort of out-of-the-way burial spot he used for them. And for the human remains he was carrying. The idea seemed a bit far-fetched to her, though. It must have been something else that made it appear as if his thoughts were elsewhere and he was in more of a hurry than usual. She didn’t even know yet whether he had Morgan Spencer’s body parts in with his load at that point, let alone whether he knew about them. Perhaps he was looking forward to picking up his marijuana later on the route?
Abattoir Blues: The 22nd DCI Banks Mystery (Inspector Banks 22) Page 24
