Worse Than Dead

by Stephen Puleston

‘Mandy had no enemies. She was just an ordinary working-class girl. She worked hard and liked to enjoy herself. What makes you think she might have been killed? Because if there’s nothing, then don’t suggest it. It’s not bloody right.’

  ‘I’m sorry Mr Beal. I didn’t mean to cause offence. We haven’t had the post mortem yet. Because your wife said there’s never been anything to suggest Mandy might have killed herself then—’

  ‘There was the suicide note after all.’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘Well, you people better stop making all sorts of accusations that aren’t proper and get out of our lives.’

  Caren noticed Peggy dabbing the handkerchief to her eyes, staring straight ahead. She promised to keep them informed and left. As she pulled the car out of the drive she saw Philip Beal standing, arms crossed, staring at her through the window.

  The journey from the Beal household to Janet Rosen’s house meant Caren had to use narrow back-roads, and she had to consult a map, a task that in normal circumstances she left to Alun. She drew up by a junction, uncertain whether she should take a left turn or continue straight ahead. She eyed the map, wondering whether, if she turned it upside down, it would make any difference. She powered the car ahead and eventually her decision was rewarded when she pulled up by a junction on a main road she recognised. For a moment she let the traffic pass until the road was clear. She thought about whether she would have any children. And how her parents might feel about having grandchildren. The alpaca farming hadn’t been the success she and Alun had hoped and often she contemplated whether Alun was really cut out to be a farmer and a businessman. For now he seemed happy enough driving. At least it gave him a regular income without any hassle.

  Twenty minutes later she pulled into Janet’s drive; the slate waste of the drive looked damp and Caren noticed the newly soaked flower beds and a hosepipe lying nearby. Janet stood up from behind a low wall wearing an old blouse, its collar turned up under a thick fleece. She gave Caren a brief smile and Caren could see the curiosity in her eyes. She’d kept her telephone call deliberately short when she asked to see Janet.

  ‘Coffee?’ Janet said.

  Caren nodded. They went inside and sat down by the stripped-pine kitchen table. Janet filled the electric kettle and flicked a switch.

  ‘Did Frank ever talk about his trips to Ireland?’

  ‘Not really. He was away for a couple of nights. If they flew to Scotland or France, then it might have been even longer.’

  ‘Did he ever tell you where he was staying?’

  ‘Might have mentioned the occasional hotel, but he kept in touch by emails or he’d call me on his mobile.’

  ‘Nothing about his friends? Who they were?’

  The kettle boiled and Janet reached for mugs and instant coffee. ‘They usually paid for the hotel. That’s what he told me.’

  She skimmed a coaster towards Caren and placed a bowl of sugar onto the table with a spoon.

  ‘Can you remember who was with him on these trips?’

  Janet gave her a helpless look. ‘As I said before, the men from the flying club. Beltrami, Ellis-Pugh, Loosemore and the others…’

  Caren realised the frustration in Janet’s mind at how little she knew about her dead husband.

  ‘What did they do in Ireland?’

  Another feeble look. ‘They’d go out for meals. Frank got excited once when he saw the guitarist from U2 in some nightclub. This isn’t helping, is it?’

  Caren sipped her coffee. It was stronger than she liked, but would have been too weak for Drake. ‘Janet, I need to ask you about something.’

  Janet cupped a mug of coffee and waited.

  ‘Frank had over €150,000 in an Irish bank account.’

  She put the mug down on the table with a thud. ‘What?’

  Caren made certain she was watching Janet’s response; if she was acting, then Caren decided she was good at it.

  ‘The account was opened a couple of years ago and the deposits were made in regular small sums.’

  ‘I’m amazed. I had no idea. Where did he get the money?’

  ‘That’s where we were hoping you could help.’

  * * *

  O’Sullivan dragged heavily on a cigarette and blew the smoke out of the window. He’d parked fifty metres down from the address in Rathmines, behind an old BMW with a flat tyre. Drake looked over at the row of houses along Westfield Avenue: he could have been in any suburb of any major city. There were wheelie bins jammed into doorways, vertical blinds on windows and an anonymous feel. A young woman with heels that clicked on the pavement passed them without a second glance, despite the careful attention O’Sullivan paid to her legs.

  The smoke drifted over towards Drake and tickled his nostrils.

  The car was still untidy and he’d found himself sitting quite still, hoping that by doing so less of the dirt might permeate his clothing. O’Sullivan drew on the dying embers of the cigarette and threw the stub out onto the pavement.

  ‘Let’s go and see yer man,’ he said.

  The house was an old-fashioned property, spread over three storeys and Drake guessed that it had been turned into bedsits and flats long ago.

  Drake heard the muffled sound of the doorbell ringing somewhere in the building. After a couple of minutes, the door opened.

  ‘Are you Paul Maguire?’ O’Sullivan asked.

  The man nodded. ‘Sergeant Malachy O’Sullivan and this is Inspector Drake from Wales.’

  Maguire’s haircut had left a dark shadow over his head where he’d recently shaved. His skin was a pallid grey and he stared at O’Sullivan with black, almost moribund, eyes.

  He pushed the door open to let both men into the house.

  ‘Come through into the kitchen,’ Maguire said. ‘I don’t know how I can help.’

  ‘I’m investigating the death of Frank Rosen, one of your former tenants,’ Drake said.

  Maguire sat by a table and Drake and O’Sullivan did the same. They weren’t offered coffee and Drake could see O’Sullivan taking in the room.

  ‘He rented a room from me.’

  ‘How did he find the room?’ Drake said

  Maguire drew a hand over his mouth and then clutched both hands together, as if buying time. ‘I don’t remember, just now. Small ad probably.’

  ‘When was it?’

  ‘I checked my records after the Garda rang me. It was three years ago.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘I can’t remember.’

  ‘It must have been odd. Someone from the UK renting a bedsit.’

  ‘Why? I’ve two Poles and a Latvian in the house.’

  ‘Did he tell you anything about himself?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Did you ask?’

  ‘Why should I? I rent bedsits by the month. He paid three months in advance and I gave him the keys.’

  ‘Did he ever have any mail?’

  ‘Don’t remember.’

  Maguire sat back, folded his arms, and let out a long gasp as though his patience had run out. ‘He paid the rent and I gave him the keys.’

  Drake kept his annoyance barely in check. ‘Did you notice anyone staying with Frank?’

  Before Maguire could reply O’Sullivan chipped in. ‘Try and remember as much as you fucking can. Wouldn’t want anyone to think you’d not been cooperating.’

  ‘I keep odd hours. So I never saw him come and go.’

  Drake again. ‘How long did he rent the room for?’

  ‘Six months, then he left.’

  ‘Any explanation?’

  ‘He just left.’

  A radio started playing somewhere in the house. Maguire sat and stared at Drake. O’Sullivan pushed back his chair and stood up. ‘Have you got a list of your tenants?’

  Drake looked at Maguire as he fumbled through a folder and passed a neatly typed list over the table. O’Sullivan and Drake followed Maguire back through the house, retracing their steps out onto the fr
ont doorstep. Drake zipped up his jacket and turned to Maguire. ‘Where do you work?’

  ‘In one of the nightclubs in town.’

  ‘Have you got time for a pint before the boat, Ian?’ O’Sullivan said, butting in across Drake. ‘I’ve got a powerful thirst.’

  * * *

  Moelwyn Carol Hughes had never liked his Christian names. The first was the same as a range of mountains in the middle of Wales and the second was a girl’s name. There were too many Welsh boys’ names that were also girls’ names in English for his liking. If he ever had children, they’d be Michael or Justin or Donna or Tracey, anything easily pronounceable in English.

  Nobody called him Mr Hughes, except the screws in jail. He was MC to his family and Hammer for everyone else after an incident late one night in a pub when a drunken Scouser had taunted MC about his name. He’d called out all over the pub that MC’s father must have been a paedo to give his son a girl’s name, until there was an embarrassed silence and the man was dragged outside for his own safety. MC said nothing, but later took a hammer and smashed every window and dented every panel of the man’s Mercedes.

  Then repeated it twice more, each time the Scouser replaced the car.

  Nobody saw anything and he soon moved back to Liverpool.

  Now MC sat in a car, newly stolen from Birmingham, cleaned and then fixed up with fake plates. Once he’d finished MC would return the car and it would be cleaned again and another set of plates attached.

  The street lights cast a sporadic glow over the cars parked in the road. The occasional drunk meandered over the pavement. MC had a baseball bat under the passenger seat and his mobile in the cradle clipped to the dashboard. He drew back the cuff of his leather jacket and read the time.

  Not long.

  Chapter 14

  Drake had little choice when he thought clearly. The drug squad had to be notified. And much as he didn’t relish the prospect, he had to contact Inspector Glyn Newman. He picked up the telephone.

  ‘Ian, keeping well?’ Newman said.

  The greeting sounded forced. Drake’s frustration felt like a pin in his mind, trying to keep his thoughts in place. Maybe Glyn Newman knew already. Maybe his informers made him one step ahead of anyone else in Northern Division.

  ‘I need to see you, Glyn.’

  Ten minutes later Drake was sitting opposite Newman. The smell of stale tobacco hung in the air. Newman’s herringbone jacket badly needed a visit to the dry cleaners. He undid his collar button, before pulling his tie down and then sat back, staring at Drake. For the first time Drake noticed that his eyes had a natural menace, a coldness polished to a keen edge. Nobody mentioned his successes because it was only his failures that came in for criticism by the judges, but somehow, each time, Detective Inspector Glyn Newman survived.

  ‘I’m investigating the murder on the ferry in Holyhead.’

  ‘I know.’

  Drake hesitated; it was the sort of remark that suggested Newman knew a lot more.

  ‘The chief engineer, Frank Rosen, was killed on the car deck. There are traces of cocaine on his work clothes and one of his jackets and his shoes.’

  There was no flicker of interest from Newman, no raising of eyebrows or furrowed forehead: he sat and waited. Drake guessed that Newman took a particular interest in riling his colleagues, but he wasn’t going allow him to feel that he was succeeding.

  ‘How can I help?’ Newman said eventually.

  There was a knock on the door and another officer walked in. He wore an open necked shirt under a navy fleece and chewed gum vigorously.

  ‘You know DS Wallace, don’t you?’ Newman said.

  Jeff Wallace dragged a chair over to the desk and sat down. He gave Drake a lazy smirk. It had been two years since Drake had worked on a case with Wallace and the passage of time had only hardened Drake’s resolve never to work with him again.

  Drake looked over at Newman. ‘I need to know if Frank Rosen has ever been of interest to the drug squad?’

  ‘I haven’t heard the name. What’s the date of birth and address?’

  Newman scribbled the details as Drake dictated the information.

  ‘Anything going on in Holyhead that I should be aware of?’ Drake said, casting a glance at Wallace.

  ‘Nothing,’ Wallace said.

  ‘The town had a bad drug problem when I was there.’

  ‘Like I said, nothing. Except the usual day-to-day, small-scale.’

  Drake speculated where Wallace and Glyn Newman drew the distinction between low-level drug dealing and something more serious. Years of working in the drug squad had probably blurred the balance.

  ‘Can you get your officers to ask around?’

  ‘You know what it’s like, Ian,’ Wallace said. ‘We put the occasional supplier inside but another takes his place and the men at the top who run things never get their hands dirty. The addict on the street just has to get his fix. What can we do?’ Wallace had stopped chewing by now.

  ‘I need to know whether there’s a drug connection.’

  Wallace pushed the gum onto his lips and then back into his mouth. ‘I’ll ask around. But the statistics speak for themselves: sixty per cent of all crime, maybe more, is drug related and the rest is booze related. If we’re lucky we might get one of the main suppliers making a mistake. And then – top-of-the-class drug squad.’

  Wallace sat back. There was a cynical edge to the comments that Drake found unsettling.

  Newman nodded slowly. ‘Send me a copy of the forensic report. And a full list of people of interest and suspects. Have you got any?’

  ‘I’ll send you a summary of the forensic analysis. Just get back to me soon as you can.’

  Drake stood up.

  ‘Send me everything you have,’ Newman said, leaning back in his chair. ‘I can’t work without complete information.’

  Drake had no intention of providing the drug squad with details of his investigation. ‘Thanks for your help, Glyn.’

  Drake didn’t bother with handshakes. He turned and left.

  * * *

  Alun’s text reached Caren’s mobile as she sat at her desk, with her second coffee of the morning. He was leaving Dover on his way to Dublin and planning to stop at home for a couple of hours on his way, if he was making good time. She smiled and thought about the prospect of seeing him again, sensing his kiss and the warmth of his skin next to hers. She replied, telling him she was in work all day.

  She found her concentration lapsing as she punched the individual details of the crew members into the Police National Computer. After inputting twenty names, she had the first positive result as a ‘possession of controlled substance conviction’ flashed up against the name of one of the junior engineers. She straightened in her chair and stored the details.

  Soon after him there was a spate of drink driving convictions that popped up – mostly twelve-month bans and fines of several hundred pounds. An able seaman had a conviction for assault as a juvenile and then several for common assault, all in Liverpool City Magistrates court.

  She stopped when the results for the name of Darren Green appeared on the screen. She read down the long list of previous convictions, which included a caution for assault when he was sixteen, culminating in a six-month sentence for carrying an offensive weapon when he was twenty-one. But it was the conviction for supplying Class B drugs that drew her attention.

  After Drake returned from his meeting with Inspector Newman he had buried his head in various papers in preparation for his briefing with the new superintendent, and Caren anticipated that he’d want to know everything about Green. Deciding that she needed more background and maybe intelligence, she called a liaison officer in Merseyside police, explaining that she needed the information as part of an important inquiry.

  She replaced the handset and looked at the time, eager for the hours to slip past. An hour later her telephone rang.

  ‘Sergeant Waits?’ She didn’t recognise the voice. ‘DI Keith Charnwoo
d, Merseyside police.’

  Caren hadn’t been expecting a detective inspector to call her back and it sharpened her attention as she listened.

  ‘You’ve got an interest in Darren Green.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘He’s a bad fucker.’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘You’ve got his precons I take it.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, treat that as the icing on the cake. We didn’t have half the evidence on Daz Green that we’d have liked. He was implicated in a conspiracy to murder when a drug deal went tits-up. He was part of a gang that bundled a man into the back of a van that drove from London to Toxteth, telling him he was going to be skinned alive. The guy had to sit in his own shit and piss for five hours while they joked about killing him.’

  Caren scribbled notes, blocking out the noise from Winder and Howick in the background.

  ‘Then there was the armed robbery in the night club. Daz Green has a nasty habit of sticking shotguns into people’s mouths.’

  ‘Did you have enough to prosecute?’

  ‘No, unfortunately. But he’s implicated in at least three murders. And then there was the drug dealing we could never prove – he had the best brief in town. So what’s he done?’

  ‘A chief engineer on a ferry from Holyhead to Ireland has been killed. Daz Green is an able seaman on the ship.’

  ‘And you’re checking all the crew.’

  ‘That’s right, sir.’

  ‘Be careful, sergeant. Daz kept some nasty company.’

  Caren printed off an A4 sheet of paper with Daz Green typed in bold font along the top. Underneath his name she added MAJOR PRE CONS and pinned it to the board in the Incident Room, just under the photograph of Rosen. Drake would want him noted as a person of interest, but even so she kept ploughing her way through the other crew until she’d finished. The afternoon had passed more quickly than she’d anticipated. Her mobile buzzed into life and her mood lifted as she read the message from Alun, telling her he could stop for an hour. She’d changed the sheets of the bed that morning, had laid out clean towels in the bathroom. It would be another couple of hours before he’d arrive – just enough to call into the pharmacy on the way home.