Unti Peter Robinson #22

by Peter Robinson

  “I hadn’t thought it would be so high-­tech,” Alex said.

  “No expense spared for crime fighting,” said Annie as they entered the Fingerprint Development Laboratory, Vic Manson’s domain. “Except when it comes to our wages, of course.”

  Manson was at his desk already, poring over a stack of photographed fingerprints. He covered them with a folder when he saw there was a civilian present. Annie wondered why. It wasn’t as if Alex would recognize someone’s fingerprint from a photograph. Normally, of course, no one would go to Manson’s office for fingerprinting; that would be done down at the custody suite. But Manson had all the latest technology, and instead of ink and paper, he simply scanned Alex’s prints, leaving out the broken one, into the computer after Annie had explained what they were after. “These will be erased as soon as we’ve finished,” Manson assured Alex, who said she didn’t really care, as she had nothing to hide.

  “Getting fingerprints from porous surfaces is much easier than it used to be a few years ago,” Manson explained as he held the card by its edge between his thumb and forefinger. “But the quality still depends on how much the handler secreted. Paper and cards such as this one are absorbent, you see, so we need to use special chemicals to make them visible. It may take a little time.”

  “He was sweating, if that helps,” Alex said.

  Manson looked curiously at her.

  “The man who gave the card to me,” Alex explained. “He’d just had to walk up the stairs to the eighth floor, you see. The lift’s on and off, and it was off when he came. He didn’t look very fit, either.”

  “Excellent. That should help a lot,” said Manson. Then he waved his hand. “Now if you’ll give me a little time, I’ll get back to you later. I’ve still got a mass of work to get through from the hangar and the crash scene first, but I should be able to find time to fit this in sometime later today.”

  “When do you think you’ll have a result?” Annie said. “It’s all connected, we think. The crash. The hangar. This man.”

  “I’ll do my best to have something by the end of the day,” said Manson.

  “Can you run it against NAFIS, see if you can come up with a name?”

  “NAFIS? You’re a bit out of date, Annie. We’re more advanced than that now. I can run it against IDENT1, Eurodac, Europol and Interpol databases, too.”

  “Well, I suppose that gives us one good reason to stay in the EU.”

  Manson laughed. “We can even check with the FBI, if you like.”

  “You know me and technology, Vic. I’m just a silly slip of a lass. Europe wouldn’t be a bad idea, but I don’t think we need trouble the Feds just yet.”

  “Will do,” said Manson. “I’ll give you a bell.”

  Annie thanked him and shepherded Alex out of the lab. She looked as if she wanted to stay and watch, but Annie knew Manson wouldn’t like that. Like many a scientist, he wanted to preserve the mystique, the magic, mystery and secrets of his profession, like the conjuror who won’t reveal how he pulls a rabbit out of the hat.

  “What now?” said Alex as they walked back down the corridor toward the squad room.

  “Work for you, after the sketch artist. Me, too. I have to go to Leeds this morning.”

  “What about—­”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll make sure you’re well taken care of before I go anywhere.” There was no point now, she thought, in keeping the surveillance from Alex. Especially as knowing that there would be someone watching over her might ease her stress levels. Doug Wilson could take care of it for today, he said. She knew that Banks would approve, as Alex had now become a priority, if not a major witness. She was the best lead they had to Morgan Spencer’s killer and to another member of the gang. “Ian will be fine at school, and you’ll be fine at work, but I’ll make sure there’s someone keeping an eye out for both you, and someone to take you to pick up Ian and go home.”

  “But how will I know he’s real?”

  “You’ve already seen him. In the squad room.”

  “The one who looks like Harry Potter?”

  “Don’t you dare say that to him,” said Annie. “He’s very sensitive. He also has a black belt in karate.”

  Doug had no such thing, of course, but Annie felt the lie would reassure Alex more than knowing that he had grown up on an estate like the one where she lived, and that he could handle himself.

  “Will you—­”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll be around to check that everything’s all right later. We should have some results from Vic by then. And we’ll also have some other officers to keep an eye on you. I’ll make sure you’re introduced to them. If you hear anything at all from the man who came to see you, call me.” They turned into the squad room. “Now wait here with Doug. I’ll go and arrange for the artist.”

  WINSOME TOOK Gerry Masterson with her to Vaughn’s ABP after Banks had given them all the quick version of Morgan Spencer’s postmortem results. She thought it could be too important an interview to carry out alone, and it would be good experience for Gerry.

  They pulled up at the gate of the fenced compound and got out of the car. The place wasn’t very large, Winsome noticed, just a few metal storage structures, aluminum most likely, an area for parking the fleet of collection vans, two temporary office buildings on blocks and a windowless structure with a tapered chimney, which Winsome took to be the incinerator. It was a fair day, weatherwise, if a bit cold and gray, but the ground was still muddy from the recent rains. Winsome and Gerry put on their Wellingtons before getting out of the car and heading for the nearest office trailer. A faint smell of decay hung around the compound—­an occupational hazard, Winsome imagined, no matter how well you packaged up the dead meat. She also noticed that there were no other farms or businesses for some distance.

  Another thing Winsome noticed as they climbed the steps to the office was a total lack of activity. There was no one in the yard, no sounds at all, only the pale smoke drifting from the chimney of the incinerator and dispersing in the chill air. She wondered if there was anybody around at all. It was Wednesday, so it should be a regular workday. She knocked on the flimsy door.

  Almost immediately it was opened by a tall and slightly stooped man in jeans and a polo-­neck green jersey. He had a head of bristly gray hair, which matched the bristles around his jaw. Winsome put him in his mid fifties. “Mr. Vaughn?” she inquired.

  “One of them. Neil. It’s a family business.”

  Winsome and Gerry showed their warrant cards and Neil Vaughn invited them inside. The side of an old cardboard box served as a doormat, and they wiped their feet as best they could without reducing it to shreds. Vaughn seemed to be the only person around. After he asked them to sit down, he returned to a desk littered with papers and swiveled his chair to face them. The inside of the trailer was bleak, as such places usually are, and on the pasteboard walls were hung with a girlie calendar curling at the edges, a large chart with written-­in squares and an Ordnance Survey map of the immediate area. The floor didn’t feel stable, and the chairs were lumpy. The office smelled of pipe tobacco, and Winsome guessed they didn’t bother much about nonsmoking regulations in the workplace out here. A small electric fire stood against the far wall. Both elements were on, but the heat wasn’t reaching where they were sitting.

  “We’re all gutted by what happened to Caleb,” said Vaughn. “I gave everyone the day off. I can’t imagine how anyone would have had the heart for collections today. I do most of the hands-­on business now my father’s incapacitated. My brother, Charlie, helps out sometimes.” Vaughn paused. “When he can be bothered, that is.”

  Winsome didn’t miss the edge in his tone. Nor did Gerry, judging by the way she frowned.

  Neil Vaughn looked from one to the other. “What can I say? We all follow our own paths. Charlie’s doesn’t involve fallen stock collection and disposal.”

&n
bsp; “What does it involve?” Winsome asked.

  “Horses, mostly. And not dead ones.”

  Winsome thought it would be a good idea to have a chat with Charlie Vaughn, and she saw Gerry writing in her notebook. Somehow, she sensed that was exactly what she was jotting down.

  “Was Caleb with you for a long time?” she asked.

  “Thirty years. I’ve known him since I started in the business. He taught me practically all I know.”

  “But he never sought promotion? Or got it?”

  Vaughn gave a harsh laugh. “There’s not a lot of promotion to be had around here. No, Caleb liked driving. He was his own boss, in his own world. Put him in the van with his music and his fags, and he was happy as a pig in . . . well . . . the proverbial.”

  “He worked alone?”

  “That was one concession he earned over the years. And there weren’t many as would want to ride with him and put up with the smoke and the music. That prog rock stuff, I think it’s called. Old-­fashioned, at any rate. Gives me an earache. And I know smoking’s not strictly legal on the job, but . . . well, it was Caleb’s cab. We usually have a team of two on collections, of course, but the local farmers were happy to help Caleb if they had to. Everyone knew him. He hadn’t a bad word to say for anyone. And he was strong. It wasn’t often he needed a hand with a load.”

  Winsome was getting the picture. Caleb Ross was a saint. Well, saint or sinner, it didn’t matter that much; Ross wasn’t the victim who interested them, unless he had played a part in the events of his own demise.

  “Do you know if Mr. Ross had any financial problems, any money troubles at all?”

  “Caleb? Good Lord, no. At least, he never complained. He lived a simple life. Had a little cottage in Lyndgarth, just off the green, lived there with his wife, Maggie. The kids had grown up and flown the coop. Maggie . . . has anyone . . . ?”

  “She’s been informed, sir,” said Gerry.

  “That’s a relief. I must pay her a visit. Soon as I . . . well . . .” He waved his hands over the mess of papers. “I thought there was no sense in me staying at home. I couldn’t bear it, just pacing and thinking of poor Caleb. So I came to work. Thought it might take my mind off things.”

  “And has it?” Winsome asked.

  “Not really. Something like this, it’s hard to get your mind around it. We all have to go eventually, I know that, but Caleb was fit and strong, and about the same age as me. I suppose I assumed he would always be around.”

  “From what we can gather, it was just a tragic accident,” said Winsome. “The perfect storm. Though I don’t suppose that’s much consolation.”

  One of the elements made a crackling sound, as if a fly had just landed on it. “Then why are you here?” Vaughn asked. “Is it a matter of insurance?”

  “Nothing like that, sir,” said Winsome.

  “Neil, please. Then what?”

  Winsome and Gerry exchanged glances. “You haven’t been watching the news?”

  “A constable came to the office,” Vaughn said. “All I know is that he told us Caleb had died in a crash due to severe weather conditions. I didn’t want to go home and see it replayed endlessly on the news. Is that not what happened?”

  “That’s exactly what happened,” Winsome said. “A freak hailstorm, a stray sheep and an oncoming car. There’s no question of blame or anything.”

  Vaughn looked puzzled. “Then what . . . ?”

  “It’s what Mr. Ross was carrying that interests us.”

  “I don’t understand. Carrying?”

  “There was another body found at the scene.”

  “Another body? You mean a human body? Whose?”

  “Among the animal parts, sir . . .”

  “Good God! I don’t believe it. How could a human body be mistaken for a fallen animal?”

  “We don’t think it could, but all the parts were wrapped in black bin liner.”

  “Parts?”

  “The body had been cut into several pieces. I must ask you to keep this information to yourself for the moment, sir. All the press and TV have are rumors so far.”

  “Of course. My God. And you’re saying someone put it there? This human body?”

  “It looks very much that way. I can’t imagine it got there by accident.”

  “But why?”

  “We don’t know why. Right now we’re more concerned about how and who. Obviously, it was meant to be disposed of.” Winsome glanced out of the window. “It would have ended up in your incinerator, most likely, and nobody would have been any the wiser.”

  “Except for the crash?”

  “That’s right. So what we need to know is what farms Caleb Ross visited yesterday morning, where he might have stopped, say for a tea break, or lunch, and who might have had access to his schedule.”

  “I can certainly supply you with a copy of Caleb’s pickup schedule, but surely you can’t think anyone here had anything to do with what happened?”

  “We don’t think anything yet, sir. We’re still gathering facts and evidence. Can you help?”

  “Certainly.” Vaughn riffled through the papers on his desk. “That’s easy. Our copies of yesterday’s pickup schedule are here somewhere. Caleb’s is . . . ah, here it is.” He brandished two sheets of paper stapled together. “Of course,” Vaughn added, “he didn’t finish his rounds, so he didn’t get to all these places. I think the last one was Alf Wythers, Garsley Farm, just outside Swainshead. He’d probably have had his lunch in the village, then set off over Belderfell Pass to where his next collection point was. But, of course, he never got there.”

  Winsome took the list Vaughn handed her, looked it over and passed it to Gerry, who slipped it into her briefcase. “It seems like a long list,” Winsome said. “Was he always so busy?”

  “It’s lambing season,” said Vaughn. “Sad to say, but it’s a time of high mortality on the dales farms.”

  “Could someone have added to the load at any of the places Mr. Ross visited?”

  “It wouldn’t have been that easy. At least not always. Sometimes the fallen animals are kept at some distance from the actual farm buildings, you understand, in which case it probably wouldn’t have been very difficult for some interloper to swap a bag.”

  “Is there no record of the numbers? Bags, packages, you know?”

  “Of course. Record keeping is essential when you’re dealing with fallen stock. Any carcasses sent off farm for disposal—­which is the only legal way to do it, most of the time—­must be recorded, and all carcasses must be accompanied by a commercial document while in transit. In triplicate.” Vaughn swallowed. “Of course, in this case, the documents would have . . . well . . .”

  “I understand,” said Winsome. “But the farmers would have a record of what stock they had had taken away?”

  “Yes. They should.” Vaughn scratched under his collar.

  “Is there a problem, sir?”

  “No, not really. I mean, ninety-­nine percent of the time everything’s shipshape and aboveboard, but sometimes, well, human error can creep in.”

  “Even in something as important as fallen stock records?”

  ­“People don’t like to admit it, of course, no more than the police like to admit they make errors, I’m sure.” Vaughn smiled, but neither Winsome nor Gerry Masterson returned it. “But it happens sometimes,” he went on. “Records don’t always match the numbers.”

  “Why would that be?”

  “Oh, perhaps another animal has died after the list was made up and before pickup. Caleb and the other drivers would usually change it on their copies of the commercial documents, even though they’re not really supposed to.”

  “There’s no black market in fallen animals, is there?” Gerry asked. “No profit to be made?”

  Vaughn looked puzzled. “No. How could the
re be? I don’t understand.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Perhaps food produce? You know, like the horse meat in the burgers.”

  Vaughn laughed. “No. That horse meat business was a direct result of the banning of DSM in meat products.”

  “DSM?”

  “Desinewed meat. It’s what left when all the good cuts have been taken. It’s used in processed meats.”

  “The nostrils and eyelids?” Gerry said.

  “It might include them, but that’s not the point. When its use was banned, producers had to find other sources of cheap meat products to make up the shortfall. Hence the horse meat business.”

  “What about wild animals, game?”

  “The law’s complicated on that subject. You can blame the EU for that, too, of course.”

  “Why?” Gerry persisted.

  “It’s a matter of disease, infection. Wild animals can carry disease, even though they haven’t been tended or fed by humans. Often it’s best to make sure. But in many cases, you can’t, and if it’s apparent the animal has died of natural causes, it’s permissible to bury it without calling us. On the other hand, there’s a requirement to carry out BSE/TSE tests on all fallen cattle over forty-­eight months. That’s mad cow disease to you. The rules are stringent on most matters.”

  “Do you get many infected animals?”

  “We’re not approved for over-­forty-­eight-­month-­cattle sampling and testing. Too much hassle. It was mostly stillborn lambs At least that’s what it would have said on the labels. But now we know different, of course. I’m still finding this hard to believe.”

  “Getting back to how these human remains could have been added to the load,” said Winsome. “Would it have been possible for someone to add them to Mr. Ross’s van, say, while he was having his lunch?”

  “Officially, there’s supposed to be someone with the van at all times.”

  “Only officially?”

  “Caleb usually took his own lunch, just a sandwich and a flask of tea, but he liked his giant Yorkshire puddings. He might have stopped off in Swainshead for a quick bite at the White Rose, if the disinfectant or dead animal smell didn’t clear out the whole pub. It depends on the kind of day he’d been having. But he wouldn’t have had anything to drink. He was strictly teetotaler, was Caleb.”