Blind to the Bones

by Stephen Booth

  Funnily enough, Mrs Shelley had taken to him in a big way. He had thought she might have blamed him for the death of her nephew, who had died during the course of a murder enquiry three months earlier, with Cooper the only person present. But when everything had been explained to her, Mrs Shelley had decided that Cooper was a hero. In a way, he had actually taken the place of her nephew, and now she took a special interest in him. He thought he could probably have asked for anything and she would have said ‘yes’. But it was unfair to take advantage of her.

  Mostly, he wanted to establish the flat as his own private territory and he was nervous of encouraging her too much, in case she decided to pop in every few minutes to see how he was. The bolts helped there, of course. Though she had keys for the locks, there was no way she could just walk into the flat when he was there. That privacy felt very precious to him at the moment. It was a privacy he had never enjoyed before, since he had lived at Bridge End Farm with his family all his life. Finally, approaching his thirtieth birthday, he felt free for the first time. He could create his own world in this little flat. And he was surprised at how territorial he had immediately become.

  He forked some duck-and-turkey Whiskas into a bowl for Randy, who rubbed himself briefly against Cooper’s legs. Though they had met each other only a few months before, the cat was very much part of the scenery in Cooper’s new life – which went to prove that you didn’t need to work at a relationship for years and years, didn’t it?

  ‘Where’s your friend, Randy?’

  He called the other cat Mrs Macavity, because she came and went so mysteriously. In fact, Cooper wasn’t sure where she really lived. Apart from the couple of months she had spent in his conservatory, caring for the five rather scruffy black-and-white kittens she’d produced in her basket one morning, her presence was unpredictable. He thought she might have an entire list of homes she called on when she felt like it. A meal here today, next door tomorrow.

  Once new homes had been found for all the kittens among his family, Mrs Macavity had returned to her old ways. She was much more of a free spirit than Randy, who didn’t wander far from his warm basket next to the boiler in the conservatory. He used the cat flap to do whatever he needed to do in the garden, weighed up the weather, and either lay for a while in the sun or came straight back in to his basket. He was an animal with a fixed routine and firm ideas about what was his territory and what wasn’t. Cooper liked that. He thought there was something in that attitude that enabled a person to establish a home.

  He’d asked Dorothy Shelley if he could be allowed access to the back garden. There was a door in to it from the conservatory, but the conservatory wasn’t part of his flat, according to the tenancy agreement, so he had no rights over it. In fact, it belonged more to the cats than to him.

  Of course, the cats didn’t seem to belong to anyone, either. But that was perfectly normal. He had cleaned the cat hairs from the floor of the conservatory and washed the black specks of mould off the raffia chair that stood under the side window. He’d have liked to throw the chair out, but it wasn’t his property. He’d have liked to have a bonfire in the garden, and put the chair on top of it. But the garden wasn’t his.

  The few possessions he had brought with him from Bridge End Farm were mostly in the sitting room – a Richard Martin print of Win Hill, a wooden cat on the window ledge. And, of course, the photograph over the fireplace – the one showing rows of solemn-faced police officers lined up in their uniforms, with Sergeant Joe Cooper standing in the second row. That would be his inheritance for ever.

  ‘I’m afraid I’ve let this garden go a bit since my husband died,’ said Mrs Shelley that evening, gazing vaguely through the glass of the conservatory as if she had completely forgotten there was anything out there. ‘The one at number six is enough for me to manage on my own, so this has got a bit neglected.’

  ‘I could tidy it up for you,’ said Cooper. ‘You’ve got some mature trees out there, but the rest of it is a bit overgrown.’

  His landlady didn’t seem too sure why she had come next door, though Cooper had been asking her to for weeks, so they could talk about the garden.

  ‘I can’t actually see it from my own house,’ said Mrs Shelley, ‘so it hasn’t really bothered me.’

  ‘It’s a shame to let it deteriorate any more. Besides, the neighbours might start complaining.’

  ‘I suppose they might.’

  ‘Do you have a key for this door?’

  Cooper could have opened the door easily. The wood was rotten around the lock, which was only an old barrel lock anyway. At some time, a small piece of wood had been screwed into the jamb to hold the catch in place where the wood had crumbled completely. A few seconds with a screwdriver, and he could have been out in the garden to take a look round, then put the piece of wood back, and Mrs Shelley would have been none the wiser. But he was on her property, and he had to abide by the rules.

  ‘There’s probably a key in a drawer somewhere,’ she said.

  ‘In your house? Or in here?’

  Mrs Shelley looked around. An old table stood at one end of the conservatory, underneath a shelf of dying geraniums in plastic pots. The paint flaking from the table revealed that it had been several different colours in its lifetime, but most recently daffodil yellow.

  ‘Try the table drawer.’

  Cooper had a rummage. ‘I think we’re in luck,’ he said, pulling out an iron key.

  With a bang, Randy came through the cat flap. For the past weeks, it had been a source of increasing frustration for Cooper that the two cats had been free to come and go from the outside, while he was kept from it, able only to peer at the scenery sideways through panes of dusty glass. He put the feeling down to the arrival of spring. He could feel it in the air every time he went out of his front door on to the street or opened his kitchen window to let out the smell of his cooking. Even here, in the middle of Edendale, he could catch the scent of the fresh grass growing and the new leaves opening on the trees. He had started to get desperate for contact with nature.

  Spring in Welbeck Street wasn’t like spring back at Bridge End Farm, where he had grown up and had lived until so recently. But the chance to touch something green and growing would help. Visiting his brother Matt and his family at the farm only made things worse. There were too many memories now.

  The cat rubbed its long black fur against his leg. Randy was already starting to change into his summer coat. His winter fur was gradually coarsening and falling out bit by bit each day, so that his outline became sleeker and darker. Since Cooper had taken over his feeding, Randy had become slimmer and much fitter. Occasionally, he returned the favour with a dead vole or shrew he’d brought into the flat from the garden. Often, by the time Cooper got home, they were already smelling and attracting flies. The distinctive smell of death seemed to follow him around these days. It even arrived, as a gift, on his kitchen floor.

  14

  Monday

  DCI Kessen took up a position at the front of the room for the morning briefing. In front of him on the table were a series of exhibits relating to the Neil Granger enquiry.

  ‘He looks like a Greek god to me,’ said Gavin Murfin, taking a chair next to Ben Cooper.

  ‘Well, I think he’s more like Neptune,’ said Cooper.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s the beard. The way it’s sort of … forked.’

  ‘Yeah. Like the Devil.’

  Kessen was waiting impassively for everyone to settle down. Diane Fry came in and sat on the front row, where no one ever wanted to be.

  ‘I bet he’s worth a lot, though,’ said Murfin. ‘Thousands.’

  ‘I’ve no idea.’

  ‘How old would you say?’

  ‘A century or two, that’s all,’ said Cooper.

  Kessen cleared his throat. The room gradually fell silent.

  ‘I know what you’re all wondering,’ he said. ‘I’ve decided to call him Fred.’

  The DCI smil
ed without showing his teeth. The expression lacked humour. In fact, it looked more like a challenge to anyone who might dare to laugh.

  ‘Oh, my good Lord,’ said Murfin quietly.

  Using both hands because of its weight, Kessen held up one of the evidence bags. It was made of clear plastic, and everyone could see what was inside it. There was also a large colour photograph of the item pinned up on one of the notice boards.

  ‘An antique bronze bust,’ said the DCI. ‘This was found in a vehicle belonging to the victim, Neil Granger. The vehicle in question is a Volkswagen Beetle, which had been left parked in a lay-by on the A628, a few hundred yards down the hill from where Mr Granger’s body was found.’

  The bust was about nine inches high, with a dull green patina, and stood on a solid base. It represented the head of a man with a Roman nose, curly hair and a rather forked beard. Whoever he was, he gazed with blank eyes into the room. Cooper was reminded of a corpse he had once seen on the dissection table at the mortuary – a homeless Irishman who had been killed in a hit-and-run incident and left in a ditch. The Irishman’s hair had been black, but his face had carried a similar green tinge.

  ‘We know that there have been a number of burglaries from homes in the Longdendale area during the last few months,’ said Kessen. ‘During these burglaries, small antique items have been taken. This is a small antique item.’

  The bust was heavy, and it landed with a thump when he rested it back on the table.

  ‘Initial enquiries into Neil Granger’s circumstances and his associates suggest that he may not have come into possession of this item in the normal manner.’

  Kessen hesitated, and looked at the faces of some of the officers in the back row with an expression of disappointment.

  ‘We think it may have been stolen,’ he said.

  ‘Are we going to put photos of the bust in the media, sir?’ asked one officer.

  ‘Not just yet.’

  ‘We could get a quick identification that way, if the legitimate owner comes forward. Someone would be sure to recognize it if they saw it on TV or in the papers. It’s very distinctive.’

  ‘But we would also tip off the thieves that we have it,’ said Kessen. ‘I don’t want to do that yet. That’s a fact we’re going to keep to ourselves. Understood, everybody?’

  There were nods, and a few shifty looks from officers who might already have mentioned the bronze bust to their wives or husbands.

  ‘We do have a bit of information about this item,’ said Kessen. ‘DI Hitchens will fill us in.’

  ‘Well, we e-mailed pictures of the bust to a couple of experts yesterday and asked them to give it the once-over,’ said Hitchens. ‘Apparently, it’s a copy of an original in marble that can be found in a museum in Florence. The character with the curly hair and beard is Lucius Verrus, an obscure Roman emperor. Closer to home, though, there’s a larger copy of this in Chatsworth House. That’s the Duke of Devonshire’s stately home, a few miles east of here.’

  ‘I think we know what Chatsworth House is,’ said Kessen.

  Gavin Murfin put his hand up. ‘Have Chatsworth had any antiques lifted recently?’ he said. ‘I mean, I went in there once with the wife and kids, and the bloody place was stuffed with them. You could hardly move for antiques. God knows what the old Duke’s insurance premiums must be like.’

  ‘Thank you, Murfin,’ said Hitchens, with an uneasy glance at the DCI.

  ‘In fact, while we were there, I said to the wife that if I ever got kicked off the force I thought I’d go into the antiques trade. I could train the kids to sneak a few bits of china and silver out of Chatsworth now and then, and they’d never be missed. The place is massive. In fact, can you believe there was no one even living in the part of the house that we went in? So how would they know what they’ve got, and what they haven’t? Someone could make a mint that way, I reckon.’

  ‘Gavin …’

  ‘Yes, sir?’

  ‘We’re investigating a suspicious death,’ said Hitchens. ‘Not planning The Italian Job.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Are there prints on the bust, sir?’ asked Cooper.

  ‘Yes, the victim’s. Neil Granger’s.’

  ‘He left his fingerprints on it? That’s a bit amateurish, if he’s involved in an organized gang.’

  ‘Well, they always make a mistake.’

  ‘Everybody knows not to leave fingerprints these days. It doesn’t feel right.’

  ‘It’s evidence,’ said Kessen. ‘Let’s see how it all adds up.’

  Murfin leaned towards Cooper. ‘’Course it’s evidence,’ he said. ‘Why does he have to state the bleedin’ obvious all the time?’

  ‘What were the victim’s movements after he left the church at Withens?’ asked Cooper, trying to pretend he hadn’t heard Murfin.

  The DCI looked at Hitchens, as if to suggest it was time he did something to earn his pay.

  ‘It seems he drove straight home,’ said Hitchens. ‘His next-door neighbours noticed Granger’s Volkswagen arrive. That was about twenty minutes after the Reverend Alton says he left the church.’

  ‘The neighbours saw him?’ said Cooper, who would like to have been able to speak to the neighbours himself, but hadn’t been given the task.

  ‘No, but the VW has a distinctive engine noise, they say. They also heard Granger’s front door close, and then some music later on, for about three-quarters of an hour.’

  ‘What music?’

  ‘Does it matter, Ben?’

  ‘I’m just wondering how thick the walls are. If the neighbours could tell what the music was, it might mean the walls are thin, and they would hear more of what went on next door.’

  ‘His neighbours are a different generation to Neil Granger,’ said Hitchens. ‘I don’t suppose they would have recognized the music if they’d been sitting with it blasting down their own headphones.’

  ‘Anyway, I think it was Nirvana,’ said Cooper.

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘The CD was still in the player when we visited the house with Granger’s brother. I checked. And it lasts about three-quarters of an hour.’

  ‘Brilliant.’

  Cooper was conscious of a few heads turning towards him around the room.

  ‘But the thing is, the neighbours never heard Granger go out again,’ said Hitchens. ‘They seemed confident of it, too. They say they usually recognize the sound of his door closing and his car engine. I think they’re right – they would have noticed the same noises later at night, when it was quieter. But they sleep in a bedroom at the front of the house, and Granger keeps his car on some spare ground at the back.’

  ‘So Granger went out again after the neighbours had gone to bed.’

  ‘And now you’re going to ask what time that was,’ said Hitchens. ‘You might think they were early to bed, because they’re middle-aged. But in fact, the neighbours stayed up watching a late-night film on ITV.’

  ‘Schindler’s List,’ said Cooper.

  ‘Now, how the hell did you know that, Ben?’

  ‘I watched it myself. It finished at 1.30 a.m.’

  There was a strange silence from the officers immediately around him. Even Gavin Murfin seemed to be trying to use his body language to pretend that he was sitting next to someone else entirely. Cooper realized he would probably get ribbed mercilessly in the CID room afterwards. His fellow DCs would be calling him Sherlock for weeks. But he never had quite learned when to keep his mouth shut.

  DI Hitchens was staring at him with something like pity. Mr Kessen had gone all glassy-eyed, not unlike poor old Lucius Verrus on the table in front of him.

  ‘Damn right, Cooper,’ said Hitchens. ‘So the chances are that Neil Granger went out of the house some time between 1.30 a.m. and the time he was killed on Withens Moor later that morning. Unfortunately, we can’t be exact about the time he was killed. Or Mrs Van Doon can’t.’

  Another officer across the room took up the challenge. ‘Grang
er’s VW was parked in a lay-by on the A628, so somebody might have noticed it.’

  ‘We’ve got teams tracking down lorry drivers who were on that route in the early hours,’ said Hitchens. ‘There’s an all-night roadside café a couple of miles down the road, and we’re hoping the owner might be able to put us on to some of his regulars who were on the road at that time. That might narrow the time down for us. If we’re really lucky, they might have seen another car in the same lay-by. Or even a car and occupants.’

  ‘Why did Granger park on the road when he could have driven up the track right to the air shaft? Wasn’t there a car that came down the track over the hill? It was seen by the first officers at the scene.’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ said Hitchens. ‘DC Cooper?’

  ‘The driver’s name is Michael Dearden,’ said Cooper. ‘I went to see him yesterday. He lives just outside Withens at a house called Shepley Head Lodge, and he says he uses the track for a short cut. It’s an old quarry road, but it isn’t suitable for anything apart from a four wheel drive. Granger’s old Volkswagen wouldn’t have made it up the hill.’

  ‘Whoever met him might have had a four-wheel drive,’ said Hitchens. ‘So we have to bear in mind that they might not even have approached the scene from the A628. If this Dearden came over from the Withens direction, someone else could, too. There’s no restriction on the access at Dearden’s end, Cooper?’

  ‘No, sir. There’s an open gateway. Withens Moor is access land.’

  ‘We mustn’t neglect the possibilities. We’ll get someone to check out the lie of the land there.’

  ‘We’re going to take our time at the scene, too,’ said DCI Kessen. ‘We need to exploit every forensic opportunity.’

  ‘Unfortunately, sir, the SOCOs say the ground had been trampled thoroughly before the scene was secured.’

  ‘How did that happen?’