“Being sorted as we speak.”
“Right, home, but you can Google your way into the French Resistance tonight and see what you can find. I have a date with a pint sized Black Sheep.”
Cyril smiled and licked his lips.
“Cheers!”
***
Peter had organised a number of games and treats and now they swam in the pool, both naked. Neither spoke. The sky was darkening and the sun fell away. Peter stopped and looked over the edge. Had he only been here twenty-four hours? It seemed longer. Phillip swam under water before finding Peter’s ankle. He ran his hand up his leg slowly and cupped his genitals before his smiling face burst through the surface.
“Amazing the things you find in your dark and mysterious pool!” he said with a smile. “You know how to please a man, Peter. All your knowledge of the anatomy doesn’t go to waste.” He leaned and kissed him. “A drink followed by business and then I must go. Race you to the far end.”
Peter brought a bottle of champagne and held the base of the bottle to his groin allowing the cork to explode and disappear into some hidden corner of the garden. Champagne frothed and bubbled out. Both men giggled childishly.
“Come here with your bottle!” Phillip put his mouth over the open end and sucked in the bubbles. They giggled again.
“Police have been to see me too,” Peter announced as he sipped his drink. “They were asking about Mary. I gave them the diaries, not all of them you understand and told them about our marriage etc. They seemed happy enough. The Chief Inspector then came to dinner. He knew about Sierra Leone and now he knows about my blood diamonds. He also has taken a shine to Janet.”
Phillip didn’t pick up his drink. He seemed to chew his lip and wrung his hands. As if on cue, a sudden, chill wind disturbed the potted plants on the patio and rippled the mirror black surface of the pool.
“What about Sierra Leone? Just what was he after? Surely he had no comprehension of the diamonds. Peter did he know about the diamonds or did you show him?”
“Showed him, why not? Best place to hide something is right under their noses. The story is plausible because it’s true. Why should he think there are more? He’s more interested in the bodies; he’s determined to find Mary Nixon. I’m amazed there was anything left in the grave, young bones don’t last long, or shouldn’t. As I said, I didn’t give him all the diaries, one remained with me. What about your brush with the British police? Seems strange both of us in the same week.”
“Again it was about Mary, our association, when we knew each other and about my time after college. They also wanted to know if I’d seen her since. For some inexplicable reason I couldn’t take it seriously and so I made up a yarn about meeting her by chance on a station. I was bored by their questions and thought I would give them some false hope. It’s easy to do that when you’re distanced and on the phone. Silly thing to do in retrospect but what’s done is done. We’ll just remain cool, they’ll find nothing. Now, Doctor, we need more medicine. Do you have the dollars from the last shipment? As you know, that’s why the picnic has been organised. You’ll have collected the money by then, yes?”
There was a pause. Peter drank more champagne. “It’s ready but...I want this to start closing down. I’m getting too old and we’ve done this long enough. It only needs this police investigation to tip up one thing and all of this...” His hands swept the buildings and grounds, spilling champagne as he arched and then he pointed at them both. “All of this, all we’ve striven for and I hope most importantly of all, you and me. We’ll be finished, washed up and behind bars for the rest of our naturals. Surely our friends have enough by now.” He emphasised the word ‘friends’ and his facial expression added gravitas.
“Peter, stop and think what you’re saying. Get real, they won’t stop, they’ll never have enough, besides, if you do fail to deliver, you’ll go to prison anyway. At present they are sharing the profits with us, they don’t need to but they do. They could take it all, every bit for what they hold on you, and my darling, they know you know that. Sleep on it but do nothing silly or rash. These people can be like brothers but they can also be...” He didn’t need to finish his sentence.
“I was tricked from the outset, you know that.”
“Yes I do but you haven’t complained all these years. Relax a little.”
The wind blew more strongly. One of the empty glasses was blown from the edge of the table and shattered on the patio, scattering shards of glass in all directions. Both men looked at each other and forced a smile.
“A bientôt, mon cheri.” He raised his hand to his lips and blew a kiss. “I know you’ll do what’s sensible.”
Peter sat staring at the dark depths of the pool, he neither spoke nor gestured. His emotions had just turned through one hundred and eighty degrees.
Chapter Nineteen
The rain fell like grey, organza veils and ran in near parallel lines along the murky water, creating miniature white-caps as they progressed up the quays. From the shelter of the tower block’s canopy, Lawrence looked at the modern landscape that had sprung up from the once desolate and ruined industrial docks. The red sign that shone in the gloom now called men to a new but equally expensive vice, not the red lights that once were famous in the district. These announced the holy ground of Manchester United; hazy and blurred they provided the only true splash of red in the landscape. As he turned his head, new buildings filled his field of vision, an unimpressive and soulless bronzed, glazed tower, the modern lift bridge, the Imperial War Museum with its slab-grey, metallic, battleship-like sides, the BBC building all pretentious lights and finally the Lowry building. He smiled at the thought of the artist returning and standing next to him. The sky was correct, the rain was certainly correct, even the occasional, matchstick-like person huddled against the weather wouldn’t have been amiss, but the buildings, what would he have said about those? The thought brought a smile to his face but in reality he was only trying to mask his insecurity. He was worried today. This was strange ground on which to play his dangerous game. Then he thought of Ypres, that too had been dangerous ground but they had faced the uncertainty the future held with smiles on their faces.
He checked his watch. Fifteen minutes if its time keeping could be trusted. Lawrence was more anxious this time. It was the CCTV cameras that he feared, like the machine guns that faced the troops leaving the trenches. There was no cover; you simply were out in the open. He moved up the steps keeping the umbrella low and positioned himself so that he could see the doors to the Lowry building. The matinee would commence in thirty minutes. He walked across the Plaza, umbrella low and hood up, determined not to let his face be caught on camera and stood under the cover of the building’s generous overhang. Two giggling females dashed puddle-splashed across the Plaza and took the same shelter. They both checked their watches.
“Bloody late as per usual, she’s always got some excuse. Five minutes and we’re going in. I’m gagging for a coffee before it starts,” one grumbled before they both giggled again.
Lawrence saw her first. She was trying to wrestle with an umbrella that had blown inside out, totter on heels and navigate the puddles at the same time.
“And she was left in charge of the elderly and the sick, she can’t look after herself!” he said out loud.
“Sorry, were you talking to me?” one of the young ladies addressed him.
Lawrence moved a little further away and didn’t look at her or reply.
Both girls looked at each other and raised their eyebrows.
“Sorry, sorry, couldn’t park straight and then left the ticket in the car. Just came outside and this thing gave up the ghost. Been waiting long?”
She tossed the umbrella into a waste bin.
Lawrence glanced round and saw them turn to go in. He followed, deliberately keeping his hood up until he had passed the internal cameras facing the doors. He checked the board to determine where the performance was staged and then followed the girls. At th
is moment, he had no idea where he would carry out the ‘chastisement’, he just had to be patient. His opportunity arrived before he had finished this thought process. Two of the girls went to buy coffee leaving Carla, still flustered by her lateness, alone in the corridor. He moved towards her but was startled when she stood and walked directly towards him. She smiled and walked around him. He stopped and turned to read a poster. The toilet, that’s where she’s going. Quickly, he turned and dropped down a flight of stairs that would take him to the same destination. He saw her enter the ladies’ toilets. Within seconds he followed her, not considering that they might be fully occupied so close to the start of the performance; surprisingly, they were not. He moved into the next cubicle. An elderly lady, checking her appearance in the mirror, turned to look, unsure if she had seen a man or not but then she only caught sight of his coat and the cubicle door shut. She turned back and finished attending to her hair before leaving. She thought nothing further about it until she was standing out in the rain, the theatre alarm attacking her hearing aids.
Without fuss, he prepared the phial and the butcher’s glove and blew his whistle lightly. It seemed to echo in the tiled, subterranean room. Carla heard it but thought it signalled the start of the performance and began to panic a little. He covered his face with the mask, pulled up his hood before standing on the toilet seat. He leaned over; Carla was just bending slightly, her head down, her hand reaching for the handle to flush when she felt something smash on her head. The phial shattered and the note stuck to the viscous fluid that spread onto her hair. At the precise moment it hit her, she instinctively pushed the handle and flushed the toilet. With his foot, Lawrence too flushed the toilet he was in, masking the small scream of shock that Carla made. He opened the door, thrust his gloved hand into his coat pocket and left, passing two ladies who both looked at him; even though he was hooded and masked they dashed for empty cubicles, nature’s call and the approaching start time of the matinee proving to be stronger than their curiosity.
Lawrence was now quite scared as he lowered his mask with his left hand and moved back into the more crowded corridor. He turned towards the main exit doors. He glanced up towards the ticket office and noticed the security guard dressed in the usual blue. For a moment he was unsure of his next action. He lowered the hood before walking straight to him.
“Excuse me, this may be nothing and I don’t want to make a fuss but I’ve just passed the ladies’ toilets and I feel sure I heard a scream. I didn’t dare enter so I came straight here thinking...”
He hadn’t finished his sentence before the security guard ran towards the toilets. Lawrence popped up his hood and left the building, walking as briskly as he dared. He had now only to bag safely the glove and mask before he could dispose of them. Rather than take them with him, he might sink them in one of the quays. They couldn’t be found there, surely.
The security guard heard the sobbing as he entered the toilets.
“Security, do you need assistance?”
The sobbing continued as the cubicle door opened and Carla stood with her hand holding her hair. It looked wet and there were traces of blood running through her fingers. In her other hand she held the note. Tears ran down her cheeks. The security guard collected the note and read it.
“Shit! Everybody please leave, now!” he shouted, losing a little of the calm control he had been trained to use in times of emergency. He looked directly at Carla and softened his tone. “What’s your name, love?”
“Carla,” she sobbed. “What does it all mean? Who would do this?”
“You’ll be fine, just trust me.”
The three other people in the room quickly left, each looking at the sobbing girl who was standing in the cubicle entrance.
The guard hadn’t a clue what sulphur mustard was but reading the words typed in bold on the card he held, might save your life, focussed his mind into action.
“Mike to Station, Mike to Station, receiving? We have an incident in the ladies’ toilets, lower floor. We need to evacuate the building immediately, I say again immediately. Call emergency 999 and we need all services. Tell them, and this is very important, so for Christ’s sake make sure they understand, that it’s a suspected sulphur mustard attack, one casualty and possibly me. We’re staying here. Real emergency, real emergency.”
The alarm bells broke the silence of the building and the afternoon crowd headed for the emergency exits. The system would automatically trigger the emergency services but the call was made to ensure that they were told of the chemical attack. Two girls appeared in the toilets.
“Carla, is that you? We’ve been looking everywhere. Are you alright?”
“Ladies leave the building, now. She’s staying with me. She’s fine just a little shaken. If you want to help her, go now. When the police arrive tell them you are acquainted. Please now leave. Go!” he bellowed this time and they turned and followed the crowd.
***
Cyril was just holding up his second pint of Black Sheep bitter, admiring its colour and its head, when his phone rang. He looked at the number, it was work. He suddenly felt old.
“Sir, Graydon. There’s been another attack, this time in Manchester, same note, everything. Call came through ten minutes ago to Manchester emergency from the Lowry Theatre. There are two potential victims, a woman and a security guard. All services are on the way. I’ve called and asked for Scene of Crime Officers (SOCO) to begin forensic investigation.”
“Get somebody there now. No, you go! Call me as soon as you arrive. Communicate with Manchester as you’re travelling. Use the blues.”
Cyril looked at the pint, put it back on the bar and left.
***
Lawrence kept his hand firmly in his coat pocket until he was away from the scene and out of sight of any cameras. Carefully, he removed his closed fist and placed his hand into a thick, plastic bag. He removed the glove. He wrapped it a second time and tied the ends. He then carried it for a while before putting the bag back into his pocket. Leaving it there would be stupid. The coat was contaminated now so he might as well take it.
The rain had almost stopped and if anything the sky was lighter. After purchasing a ticket from the platform machine he waited at the Metrolink platform near Media City and within minutes the tram arrived. He kept his hood up until boarding the tram as he had read that every Metrolink platform was monitored by CCTV.
His planning had proved accurate as the journey took barely thirty minutes. When the tram stopped at the platform in the undercroft of Piccadilly Station, he pulled up his hood and left, taking the escalator to the station concourse. Once on the concourse he passed a number of what appeared to be plastic palm trees and he allowed himself a smile for the first time. Considering the various shades of grey that Manchester weather had to offer, they were totally incongruous. Once on the busy walkways he dropped his hood and removed his coat and the one glove that was exposed but kept his right hand in the pocket. He had a suspicion that it might be contaminated even though he had taken precautions and worn two gloves. The coat to all intents and purposes appeared to be over his right arm.
***
DS Graydon was in constant communication with Manchester and requested extra patrols at the railway stations and bus stations. She also requested an urgent review of all CCTV in the vicinity of the crime scene. She was curtly informed that this was standard procedure and was being effected. If anyone looked like a possible suspect, she was assured that immediate action would be taken. It had to be said that there seemed to be a degree of resentment that this woman from the sticks was trying to call the shots. This attitude bothered her not one jot, she would liaise directly with Chief Inspector MacArthur who was the responsible Senior Officer at the scene.
The station was busy as Lawrence checked the timetable and his platform. He noticed an increased police presence and somehow felt that ordinary people were watching him. He tried to assure himself this was natural paranoia brought on by guilt, if there wa
s such a thing and therefore he had little to worry about. He was correct, nobody had stopped him and within fifteen minutes he was in his seat and heading for Leeds. Cautiously he had checked for cameras in the carriage and he ensured that he was sitting facing away from any object that could be a camera.
DS Graydon called Cyril. “Sir, it might be worth sending a camera van to Harrogate Station to video all those coming off trains that might link to Leeds and therefore Manchester. If the person is travelling by car, there’s little we can do, but at least we have the facility to cover the railways. We’re searching CCTV to try and find a match for anyone in the area; it’s routine, as you know, to work backwards from the time of the incident. The weather there isn’t good and they inform me that some of the cameras’ images are close to useless, but we live in hope and that is something we shouldn’t be saying in the 21st century!”
“Never mind just tell me about the victim!”
“White, female, thirty-one, name of Carla Price and, wait for this bombshell! If you can believe it, she’s a care home manager or should I say was? She was sacked after a highly critical Government Inspection report concluded that the home was grossly, unsatisfactorily managed and that it failed to give adequate, safe care. There is a pattern, Sir, and it doesn’t take a genius to see it. I’ll chase Proctor to add her to his list. There may be something else other than the obvious professional link but we’ll chase that down on my return. She’s been taken to Manchester Royal along with the security guard who found her. They’re also questioning witnesses too so there’s a long night ahead.”
“I’ll call in the team. We need the statements straight away. Check HOLMES 2 (Home Office Large Major Enquiry System) for uptake from Manchester. How far are you away?”
Only The Dead: an explosive new detective series Page 10
