by P. D. Viner
He looks toward the old, old tree, where the woods seem to curve down to the horizon. There, that’s where the sky will start to glow soon. In all seasons and all different daybreaks, he always knows when it’s about to start—when that first barely perceptible change will come. It’s no innate skill in him; it’s the birds. No matter what month it is, the birds will begin their chorus two minutes before he sees the first ray. He doesn’t know if they sense the change or if their eyes are just that much more sophisticated than his, but something alerts them and they sing the new day into being.
For the past nine days, except for two shifts of night duty, he has lain on this bench and slept at least part of the night here before waking for the miracle of dawn. He’d never slept here before Dani went missing, but he had sat in this spot and watched the dawn arrive. He’d done it some two dozen times over the last five years, and always the same thought had been in his head and heart: is this the day I can persuade Dani Lancing to love me?
The first time it had been Valentine’s Day 1984. He’d delivered a card to her house—anonymous of course, and then had run out to the park, amazed by his daring and full of excitement and expectation. He’d not planned to watch the dawn break; in fact it had surprised him. It was an accident—he’d been looking directly at the spot where the sun rose and … He was amazed by the beauty of it. A golden-orange light exploded in the grass and rose to form a miasma around the trees, for a short while making them look like angels; at least they did to a romantic teenager, who had just delivered his first declaration of love.
“Is this an omen of good luck?” he thought. Of course it was not the day Dani Lancing fell for him … in fact, it had been a bit of a disaster, but a love of watching the daybreak from this spot had been born in him. Today, once again, he will watch the dawn from this bench.
The birds begin the overture and there … ta-da. Raspberry ripple smudged into the dusky gray of the sky. It’s morning: February 7, 1989. The worst day of his life. The weather forecast predicted a dry warmish day. Not the weather for this news. It should be raining. Storming. Torrential rain to batter and destroy—thunder and lightning. Drama.
She’s dead.
He doesn’t actively think, “I’ll break my orders,” but he looks at his watch at 5:30 a.m. and is aware that he should be telling Patty and Jim that Dani is gone. He pulls the walkie-talkie out of his pocket and slides the button down. He croaks into it.
“Sarge?”
“Bevans?”
“I’m heading over to the Lancings’.”
“Oh fuck, Tom, don’t do that. The brass’ll be there in half an hour or so. Let them deal with it.”
“Sorry, Sarge. I’m not in uniform, I’m off-duty and a family friend. I won’t say anything about hearing the news from you. Sarge … Jack, I am very grateful.” Tom drops his finger off the call button.
“Bevans. Bevans … Fuck.”
Tom turns the volume down low and puts it in the bag with his uniform. He knows his sarge is right, but this is his duty. The DS from Durham can deal with the shit from the press. Tom can’t think about that, all he knows is that two people are in pain. And, it strikes him only now, that it’s two people he loves. Sort of, certainly two people he has become close with, cares about. Is that love? He stands and swings his bag onto his shoulder. Then he heads out.
“What the hell are you doing? Do you know what they call you? ‘The pup.’ Stupid love-struck pup. She says you follow me around drooling like some lost dog.” He hears Dani’s voice in his head.
It had been his third visit to her in Durham, the third term of her first year. He’d gone for the weekend and right from the start she’d been eager to pick a fight. He’d said something about Patricia—something nice—and Dani had blown up. Tom hadn’t risen to the bait; he could see what was going on. A lot of their friendship had been born out of each of them moaning about their mothers. Dani liked to riff on her absent, career-obsessed mother and Tom would tell stories of his mother’s drinking, offensive boyfriends and the beatings. Then his mum died.
It was the middle of Dani’s second term, that first year. Dani hadn’t come to the funeral. He had hoped she would, had asked her to, but she was busy and had tests. It was a dismal turnout. An aunt he barely knew. A woman who said she knew her from bingo and three drinking mates who sat in the back row and raised cans of Special Brew to their lips as a parting toast.
Tom sat alone, in the front row. He wore his uniform. He wasn’t sure why but it helped keep him strong—it was unseemly for a copper to blub in public. He sat there waiting for the vicar, wishing for the day just to be over. Then someone slipped in beside him and a hand gripped his. He looked over and it was Patricia. She didn’t say anything, just winked at him.
After the funeral they walked together, around the cemetery. There was no wake. No sandwiches starting to curl in the back room of a pub somewhere. Instead, the young policeman and the mother of his love walked and talked. Well, she smoked and he talked. He talked of his mother—but it wasn’t the complaints and horror stories he might have told Dani. Instead it was tales of laughs, fun and shared happiness: the time when this happened, that broke, they got lost going there, she used salt instead of sugar … good times. And under the outstretched wings of a stone angel, in a field of the fallen, Patricia folded Tom into her arms and stroked his head while he cried.
“Poor pup,” she had said, comfortingly.
Of course, the minute he’d heard that Dani was missing, he had gone to them. “What can I do? What do you need?” Patricia and Jim appreciated it. They weren’t being taken seriously in Durham, they said. They wanted him to check out the progress from inside the force. That was his mission—if he chose to accept it. He did.
After Dani had been missing for seven days, Tom was at the Lancings’ every evening for an update. On his days off he went to Durham and talked to the police there. He went alone, even though he knew Patricia was going too—sometimes with Jim, but other times alone. He liked spending time with Jim, but often Patricia scared him. He had no idea what drugs the doctors had prescribed for her, but he thought no human being should be that tightly wound. Her grief scared him. It felt like a violent cloud that hung over anyone that came close to her. In her presence he felt frustrated—like a child furious at the injustice of the world and yet unable to do anything to change it. At least with Jim he could put a hand on his shoulder, connect at some level. With Patricia, she was inside some private bubble, waiting and waiting and waiting for her daughter to come home.
“Oh, Jesus.” A sob convulses him. She isn’t coming home. Not for them and not for him.
“Dani!” he howls, filling the park with pain.
For a second he’s outside his body looking in, watching some old, old man weep for his lost love. The pain screws his face until it shatters like fine porcelain in a fire. Then the wind changes and he’s stuck like it. The Sad Man is born.
Jim stands in Dani’s bedroom and looks out at the encroaching day. He likes to be in there; it still smells of her: coconut shampoo and menthol cigarettes. She’d been home for just two disastrous days at Christmas. They had rowed and … they hadn’t had enough time. They hadn’t even spoken to her on her birthday. The first time … but he mustn’t think like that. She’d be back soon and the room—her room, was ready. He’d changed the bedding only a few days before and bought a new toothbrush and the toothpaste she likes. When she’s found, she’ll need to be looked after, be in comfort and safety. That’s their job, their only … Through the window he sees Tom enter their road, walk a little way and stop on the corner. Jim feels his stomach churn. He can see the young man batting at his face, like a wasp is buzzing around. Then he realizes Tom is crying.
Jim’s throat closes up; he finds it hard to breathe.
“Patty.” He thinks of his wife next door, asleep for the first time in days—even if it is purely due to sedation. Tom will be here, will knock in about a minute. Why is he crying?
&n
bsp; Jim is out of the front door as quietly as he can. He’s in the street before he realizes he’s still in his pajamas. He looks down the road—Tom’s still where Jim last saw him—was that good news? He walks toward Tom, each step becomes a wish, a prayer. “Let her be alive. Found alive. Found alive.” Hope.
Tom sees him approach and tries to pull himself together. He remembers the first time they ever spoke, after they both watched Dani run. He even remembers the stupid thumbs-up he gave him that day. The pain spasms the policeman. Jim sees the pain and slows. There is no good news. There is no hope. Their eyes lock like two gunslingers facing off at dawn. Tom shakes his head and the tears stream. With a cry, like he’s been shot, the pajama-clad man falls to the ground.
TWENTY-THREE
Friday, October 8, 2010
Marcus Keyson sees the way her hand shakes. After a while he discounts nervous energy and decides she has Parkinson’s, probably early stages, and isn’t fully managing her medication yet. While she talks he watches her. She looks like a runner, very thin but muscular, powerful. She could have been a looker when she was young; she has the bone structure for it. Her eyes are the real point of attraction, they actually seem to burn as she talks about her daughter. Though, truth be told, he’s pretty much zoned out of her story, just the odd nod here and there. Something she said early on sent his mind spinning.
Finally she stops talking and looks at him expectantly, like a puppy. He nods slowly; that always seems to put people at their ease.
“Mrs. Lancing, I will need to look into this further. I have ex-colleagues I can talk to, I have a relationship with the Durham coroner’s office. But just to recap, you mentioned Detective Inspector Tom Bevans—he’s an old friend—was he involved with the original investigation?”
“No, not really, just by … he … he was Dani’s friend.”
“Friend?”
“He … does it matter?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
“He was … he loved her.”
“She loved him?”
She pauses. “No, not in that way.”
Bingo.
After she leaves, he googles her. Award-winning crime journalist, first with the Northern Echo and then the Independent. There are dozens of articles she’d written over the years. Two books, one titled Wives of the Killers, which seems to be a series of interviews, and The Ugly Man. Both have great reviews and the second won two prestigious awards. There are also press releases and news stories linking her to Lost Souls, a charity campaigning for victims’ rights. Next he googles images of her and there are many: one of her accepting an Evening Standard prize, a National Journalism Award for an interview with Sonia Sutcliffe, another of her on a demo and a few at Greenham Common. The best is one of her haranguing Margaret Thatcher. He was right: she had been quite a looker back then. He feels excited, his whole body tingles. The long-dead girl and Tom Bevans. And … something else is pulling at threads in the back of his mind. A long-ago tragedy. He struggles to remember—a note he had seen twenty years before. A suicide note. It spoke of shame, corruption and … lance. Was that it? Lancing? He shakes his head—the thread will not unravel. Instead he turns back to the job in hand and flicks the intercom.
“Can you come in here please, Lauren?” he asks.
A few seconds later his assistant limps in.
“I need you to find me an investigator in Durham. They’re to find out names and addresses for anyone involved in the investigation of a murder. Danielle Lancing, February 1989.”
Lauren starts to make notes.
“I want to know the name and current address of every copper on the murder team back then. I also want to know who was writing up the notes, and where any samples and evidence are kept. Okay?”
She smiles. Everything is okay as far as she’s concerned.
“And …” He pauses. “Gerald Spurling. I think you’ll find he was the coroner on the case. I’d like to see his reports from the public record.”
“Okay.” She nods.
“And can you check on the state of forensic review with Durham CID, make it sound general but I need to know about this girl, Dani Lancing. Why is her case coming up now, is it just luck or did someone request a review?”
“Will do.” She smiles.
“And call Ronson and ask him to come and see me ASAP. Oh, and I want all the murder team members cross-referenced with a London officer—DS Tom Bevans. He was a PC back then.”
Lauren stops making notes.
“He’s the one who—”
“Yes. Yes, he is, so do a thorough job. Okay?”
She smiles and moves to walk around to the back of his chair; she stretches her fingers as she walks and reaches out for the back of his neck.
“Not now.”
She blushes at the rebuff. “Of course,” and she leaves.
Marcus Keyson sits back in his chair and dares to dream—of revenge. A chance to get back at the man who made all this happen—who destroyed his career, tarnished his reputation and betrayed him. His Judas. Maybe all this could be turned to some financial advantage as well. Tom Bevans should pay. Maybe Patricia Lancing should pay too; he could do with clearing some of the debts—even get away from this awful place.
“This is so good. So good.”
TWENTY-FOUR
Monday, October 11, 2010
Keyson pushes the heavy doors open and stands on the threshold of bedlam. He whistles “The lunatics have taken over the asylum” as he steps inside the special ops room for Operation Ares. As he does so, he slips the ID card from around his neck and drops it into his pocket. It’s a fake, of course, and impersonating a police officer is a serious offense. He smiles.
For all the chaos, it’s the sound that really makes an impact. Officers howl into their phones, each having to project over the din of colleagues and the incessant squawking of dozens of unanswered phones demanding attention. Added to that are the slams of filing cabinets, the squeals of felt-tip markers and the pacing of a lot of nicotine-deprived, overweight men.
The air is sticky with testosterone and cheap aftershave, knockoff Calvin Klein from Petticoat Lane market. Keyson had forgotten its pungency. He takes a deep breath and heads for the center of the web. This had never been his office but he’d spent so much time here it had almost been home—once. For three years, unless he was actually scrutinizing a cadaver, he had been here, among the living. He’d believed he’d made friends. For a while, he thought Detective Inspector Jane Thorsen might be the one. Not a long while, though. He reaches the heart of the operations room, unnoticed, and stands there waiting.
He watches his ex-colleagues and imagines them all dead. Violent, blood-splattered deaths, and he’s the man brought in to solve their murders. It cheers him enormously. Finally he’s noticed. A nod, a shake of the head, a whistle, someone pointing and then the wall of sound deadens and flatlines. Close by there is a chorus of “I’ll call you back.” Phones are replaced on their receivers. The room is quiet.
“What the fuck do you want, Keyson?”
He turns. Of course, it’s Clark. Clark, who used to call him “Marcus.” Who had invited him to both his stag night and his wedding. Clark, who had once vomited on his shoes—suede shoes—and told him he’d never loved his mother and now she was dying of cancer and what could he do? Clark, who had practically offered him his own sister once, but who had spat in his face after the tribunal. The two men square up. Keyson would be only too glad to fight Clark.
“Clark,” Thorsen barks through a megaphone. The sound echoes off the walls filling the room. “If you lay a hand on a civilian, you’ll be on a fucking charge so fast.”
“But—”
“Get back to work. Stay where you are, Keyson.”
Grumbling, the crowd dissipates back to desks and phones. The noise level builds again and all is back as it had been. Thorsen waits to make sure everyone has obeyed, then walks over to Keyson. As she approaches him, she notes the small changes. He is still
well groomed, always spent freely on his hair and skin, but his clothes are a little shabbier than before. The coat is the same he had three years ago and his shoes are worn. There is a shine to the knees of his suit—not worn-out, but the old Marcus Keyson replaced his wardrobe every year. Interesting—life in the independent sector not quite so sparkling for God’s gift to forensic science. He is still bloody handsome, though, she thinks as she stops in front of him.
“Why the hell are you here, Marcus?”
“Good to see you too, Jane,” Keyson says, with what he believes is a winning smile.
Thorsen crosses her arms and glares at him. Keyson notes how she hides her chest, breast reduction in her late teens due to backache. In bed he had kissed the tracery of fine scars. He never told anyone, not even after she’d maced him. That should have earned him something, shouldn’t it? He’d even met her mother.
From behind DI Thorsen, a small, bespectacled man emerges, looking a little mole-like: DI Jenkins.
“I think, unless you need something, that you should turn around and get out, Dr. Keyson.” Jenkins—the voice of reason. The only one who didn’t turn against him after the tribunal. How he hates Jenkins.
“I’m here to see the Sad Man,” Keyson says to Jane, ignoring Jenkins altogether.
“I’m sure the guvnor has no desire to see you again,” she says, her voice level but full of fury at the disrespectful use of Tom’s nickname.
Keyson nods, then takes a pad and pen off an adjacent desk and quickly scrawls a note. He folds it in half and hands it to Thorsen.
“Please give him this. Tell him I’ll be over the road in Munchies. I’ll get him a tea. Four sugars, if I remember correctly.”
