Blackwater (DI Nick Lowry)

by James, Henry

  ‘Who’s “we”?’

  ‘Me and Kelly.’

  ‘How well did you know Private Daley?’

  The girl looked away, touching the corner of her eye lightly, cigarette smoke curling up her face. Gabriel couldn’t work out whether she was upset or embarrassed. Possibly neither.

  ‘We got on better before the war – you know, the Falklands. There was a gang of six lads, all really close, and we all used to go out, me an’ Kelly an’ the girls. You know, drink on payday, messing around, as you do. They had so much dosh, living in barracks, like, never having to shell out. A shame . . .’ She cocked her head slightly, recalling happier times.

  Gabriel knew of horrors out in the South Atlantic from the papers but hadn’t come into contact with anyone who had had first-hand experience. ‘What was different after the war? Were any of his regiment injured or killed?’

  ‘No, they all came back.’ She took another drag on her cigarette. ‘But one quit the army, another’s posted in Germany . . . and now Daley. Nothing stays the same, does it?’

  ‘So where were they heading that night?’

  She exhaled smoke in a jet from the corner of her mouth. ‘Dunno, but they were pretty edgy.’

  ‘Edgy? Scared, or nervous?’

  ‘Anxious. They were up to something –’ she held up her hands – ‘but don’t ask me what. Looking for someone. Going from pub to pub, couldn’t settle, like.’

  ‘Did they mention any names?’

  The girl scrunched her nose in that way young girls do, reminding Gabriel that she was, for all the make-up and cigarettes, a girl just out of school.

  ‘Nah. I asked – thought maybe we could help – but they said we didn’t know them, whoever they were. They were from out of town is what Jones kept saying, like.’

  ‘Maybe they were trying to impress you?’

  ‘Nah, I doubt it. They might have been to the Falklands, like, but they were pretty clueless about anywhere else.’

  ‘Did Jones say anything else?’

  ‘Nah, just that they were looking for these fellas from out of town.’

  ‘Fellas? You’re sure it was plural?’

  ‘Positive. Whoever it was, they were only down for the night.’

  Gabriel thanked her for this vital information but added sharply that it was a pity they hadn’t spoken to her before now.

  ‘We’ve been trying to get hold of you all weekend. We’ve been to Papillon Road several times.’

  ‘It’s a student house – what can I say? We all went home to our mums and dads to get fed over the holidays.’

  -26-

  12.15 p.m., Monday, Queen Street HQ

  ‘What? Speak up, man.’ Sparks stood in his office, clutching the telephone receiver and frowning angrily.

  ‘I said, your CID boys are making life difficult.’ The voice was so soft he could barely make it out. ‘They scare the life out of one of my witnesses, and dismiss him as unreliable. The young one, Kenton, says they’ve got another lead. But then he’s seen watching ’is ’ouse!’

  ‘So? What the fuck? That’s what they do. Be straight and stop dicking me about. I’ve got enough problems without nonsense from you.’

  ‘But I can’t file me crime stats for December while there’s a question mark over the robbery.’ Dodger Bradley’s voice was almost a whine, and Sparks despised whining.

  ‘Jesus, what the hell do you want me to do about it? How long have you been running that nick?! The case is back open. If you think the witness is credible, stick to your guns. But tie up the loose ends, will you? Then we won’t have to bother you, will we?’

  ‘The trouble is our chap’s got form.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘Armed robbery. He’s on parole.’

  ‘Well, maybe he’s turned over a new leaf – putting money into the post office instead of taking it out without an account.’

  ‘You know how ex-cons are. He won’t want to be fingered as a grass.’

  ‘Well, make your flaming mind up, but stop complaining to me about it. Jesus!’ Sparks slammed the phone down. ‘Peasant.’ God, that woman had put him in a bad mood. She’d called again to remind him that he had to improve his clean-up record.

  ‘What?’ he barked at the bulky form of Granger, who was standing tentatively on the threshold to his office, as he had been throughout the phone call. ‘Come in, come in. I’ve not got all day.’

  Granger stepped forward, a large envelope in his hand. ‘Lab results on the drugs at the Beaumont Terrace murder scene.’

  ‘That was quick.’ Sparks tossed a cigarette in the air and caught it between his lips, an unconscious habit of his when he was stressed.

  ‘Assistant Chief Constable Merrydown insisted the lab give it top priority, so . . .’

  Of course, the ACC, sticking her oar in again. Hell’s teeth, once she got her claws into you, that was it, she just wouldn’t leave it alone. So much for his and Lowry’s confidence-instilling chat this morning.

  ‘Well, what of it?’ he muttered as Granger handed over the manila envelope. He lit the cigarette and sat down with the report. He was aware of Granger lingering. ‘Is there something else?’

  ‘Would that have been Sergeant Bradley on the phone, sir?’

  ‘And what if it was?’ He looked up disdainfully, seeing not an officer but a middleweight well past his prime, as had been demonstrated the night before.

  ‘It’s just that—’

  ‘Just nothing.’

  Sparks did, on the whole, like Granger, finding him reliable and dependable, while many of those around him were not. But he did have a tendency to try to interfere in areas he shouldn’t. And Mersea was one of those areas. His sister was married to Dodger Bradley, and he was inclined to stick up for his beleaguered brother-in-law.

  ‘The post-office robbery, that Detective Constable Kenton is—’

  Sparks met Granger’s watery, tired eyes. ‘I know what you’re going to say – just because I said that to him,’ he said, glaring at the telephone. ‘But there are more serious matters to attend to, don’t you think?’

  The seal on the envelope was unbroken – meaning that Merrydown hadn’t seen the report before him. He tore it open. The compound scientific names were of little interest; all he cared about was the summary – the effect on the drug user. Straightforward amphetamines were nothing to get hot and bothered about . . . blah, blah, blah, yes . . . yes . . . Hello. What was this?

  The compound structure of this substance has the potential to lead a user to exhibit patterns of psychotic behaviour. Instances of hallucination and delusion are likely to increase proportionately with increased intake of the substance. Memory loss is common, and can range from hours to, in extreme circumstances, days. Gaps in short-term memory can occur both as a side effect, for several days after use, or when the user is under the influence of the drug; instances of the latter may confuse the individual, rendering him/her severely paranoid and a danger to themselves and those around them.

  1 p.m., East Mersea beach

  Lowry held the binoculars and scanned the grey blur where the horizon should be. The point where the sky met the sea was hard to judge: sea mist sealed the two like a greasy smear. According to the coastguard, the tide was on the way in but, right now, it was out for what looked like miles.

  ‘Fuck, it goes out a way,’ he muttered to himself.

  ‘Sure does.’

  Lowry turned to see a man in a Barbour jacket with dark, wavy hair. He struck the detective as handsome in a classic, chiselled sort of way.

  ‘Not much to see out there,’ the man said.

  ‘Quite.’

  ‘Are you Customs?’

  ‘No; CID, as it happens. Why did you think I was Customs?’

  ‘Not that many people as smartly dressed as you would be peering out to sea on a day like today.’

  Lowry shrugged and scrunched back on the shingle. ‘You’re right. And yourself? A twitcher?’

  ‘Hah!’
The man flapped his hands forward in his Barbour pockets. ‘Sort of. I’m responsible for the park as a whole – including the birds – but also for this.’ He gestured with a sweeping motion behind him to what appeared to be a small cliff. Lowry hadn’t noticed it before. The face of it was a grubby red-brown. It was as though the land had been severed abruptly, for there were toppled trees below while the roots of those remaining close to the edge above poked out precariously.

  ‘Hell, that’s dramatic – what happened? It’s as though something’s taken a bite out of the island.’ Lowry climbed the steep shingle bank and touched the cliff surface.

  ‘You’re not far wrong: erosion. The sea is slowly eating away at the island.’

  ‘What is this, a sort of mud?’ asked Lowry, recognizing the viscous stuff from the boots he’d found in the Land Rover.

  ‘Not really; it’s London clay. And here is one of the few places you can find it on this coast. Very good for fossils.’ The man played with a clump of it between his thumb and forefinger. ‘Yes, you never know what might turn up.’

  ‘I reckon you’re right there.’ Lowry smiled.

  ‘Where have you come from?’ the ranger asked. ‘You look as if the cold’s taking its toll on you, if you don’t mind me saying.’

  ‘I don’t. I walked up from West Mersea, from the houseboats.’

  ‘My, that’s a good four miles. You’ve done well, tramping across this terrain.’

  ‘Do you know much about the coast?’

  ‘Only that it should be protected – birds nest there in salt marshes around those boats, in the grass. Oystercatchers, dunlin and the like.’

  ‘At this time of year?’

  ‘No – and a good job, too. These high tides bring in giant swells from the Atlantic. I’m surprised any of those houseboats are still there.’

  ‘You wouldn’t think it to look at it now.’ Lowry scanned across the flats.

  ‘Oh, it’s not so bad now. The surges have subsided. And the tide will always go out again, as long as we have the moon!’

  Lowry had taken to the ranger. He realized that this country park was exactly the kind of place he wanted to spend more time: outside, in the open air. The gloomy, damp weather didn’t bother him – sooner that than a bawdy, smoke-filled gymnasium. He felt good.

  -27-

  1.05 p.m., Monday, Cudmore Grove Country Park, East Mersea

  Kenton parked in the empty car park, as instructed by Lowry. He was excited and impatient; he had a lead. Climbing out of the Spitfire, he reflected on what an unusual place Mersea Island was, with its part-time police station and peculiar houseboat community. And what sort of place had he arrived in now? Although it was early afternoon, there wasn’t a soul around; this really was the back of beyond.

  Moisture clung to the air, and the naked trees were motionless in the bleached landscape. No wonder the park was deserted; it was more like the setting for a John Carpenter film than a country park. He could just imagine some ethereal spirit drifting in and out of the thin white trees. Suddenly, out of nowhere, something large and grey flew towards him, almost without a sound.

  ‘Crikey,’ he muttered. It was a large bird of some sort.

  Just then, he heard two low voices and, to his relief, he saw Lowry rounding the information hut, accompanied by a young, dark-haired man.

  ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost.’ Lowry was laughing.

  ‘I thought I had. Whatever it was, it had huge grey wings.’

  ‘It was a barn owl,’ said the dark-haired man. ‘We disturbed her coming back from the cliff.’

  ‘An owl? Don’t they come out at night?’

  ‘Yes, but you quite often see them in the daytime.’

  ‘Doug, this is my colleague, Detective Constable Kenton.’ Lowry stood back as the two men shook hands. ‘Doug Young is the park warden here at Cudmore Grove.’

  ‘If there’s anything else I can help with, please give me a shout,’ said Doug.

  Lowry nodded and waved as Young left for the hut. He filled Kenton in on his morning.

  ‘So you reckon this is the place they landed?’

  ‘It’s as good a place as any,’ said Lowry, his lips now tinged blue with cold. ‘The soil matches that on the clothes and trainers in the back of the Land Rover. A dinghy with an outboard motor was found adrift in the estuary with nothing in it apart from a torch compass and a plastic bottle of red diesel.’

  ‘Adrift?’

  ‘Which indicates to me they arrived at low tide – seeing how far it goes out here, they’d never tow it across that mud. We can check the tide times. Must have just left it there, and that’s why it floated off when the tide came in.’

  ‘That doesn’t make sense, though. Why would anybody do that?’

  Lowry looked up at the bleak sky. ‘I reckon they were lost, don’t you? Easy enough in weather like this. Even Columbus would get lost in this shit. So, what did you find out?’

  ‘The PC stationed at the cordon across the Strood on Saturday night turned back an old Land Rover. Two men were inside. Mid-twenties.’

  ‘Turned back?’

  ‘Yes – it was the night they found the body on the Strood. The road was shut from one fifteen to two thirty a.m.’

  ‘Of course.’ Lowry frowned. ‘How could I forget? Have you a tide timetable in there?’ He made a show of looking in the car, knowing full well there was no such thing, then climbed in. ‘Never mind. How did it go with the Dodger otherwise?’

  ‘Oh, okay.’ The car started gingerly and Kenton drove off, wincing as the Spitfire’s exhaust caught on the earth camber of the mud-track exit. If they got stuck, he’d never hear the end of it. He didn’t want to mention the robbery, or Nugent; the whole episode was an embarrassment to him. Instead he said, ‘Do you think Sergeant Bradley might be going senile?’

  ‘Very possibly, yes,’ Lowry said, tightening his scarf and hunkering down in the bucket seat. He seemed preoccupied.

  ‘Right, let’s get out of this goddamn cold,’ Kenton said, raising his voice as the car took off on the straight and empty East Mersea Road. His nose had gone numb – he really had to do something about this car.

  1.10 p.m., Colchester General Hospital

  Jacqui hurried on to the ward. She was late for her shift.

  After a lost weekend, she’d slept dead for fourteen hours and hadn’t managed to stir herself until gone noon. Hastily tying up her hair, she’d not had time to put on her face or even have a shower. Heads lifted from the nurses’ station – shift handover was in progress – among them, Trish, her forehead concertinaed with concern when she caught Jacqui’s eye.

  ‘What? I’m only ten minutes late,’ Jacqui whispered, sidling up to her.

  ‘Not that,’ she hissed back. ‘I need to talk to you.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Excuse me, sister, I need the loo. It’s urgent!’ Trish clutched her elbow and hustled Jacqui out of the nurses’ station, grabbing something as she went. Jacqui was barely out of her coat.

  ‘Jesus, Trish, what the hell’s the matter with you?’

  ‘In here, quick!’ Trish ushered her into the Ladies. ‘Look at this.’

  She thrust the Gazette under Jacqui’s nose. TWO BUTCHERED AFTER DRUG-FUELLED FRENZY screamed the headline. Jacqui’s pulse quickened as she read the article.

  ‘It doesn’t name them. It might not be—’

  ‘Oh, come off it – it says Greenstead Estate.’

  ‘But this was last night – it was Saturday we were out with them.’

  ‘And Sunday morning. It’s got to be them. Mid-twenties. Drugs. Jacks, we were fucking there!’

  ‘Were we?’ Then a chink of reality forced its way into her consciousness. ‘I can’t . . .’

  ‘Can’t what?’

  ‘Can’t really remember.’

  ‘I’m with you on that.’ Trish sighed, ‘Whatever that gear was, it was powerful stuff, all right. I still don’t feel myself.’

  ‘Me neither – fl
ashbacks all the time. I can’t remember anything after we left the club.’ She hadn’t tried to remember was nearer the truth; she’d blocked it out, and every time she did think about it, she felt nauseous, like the time in the car with Paul yesterday (and even that meeting felt like it might not have happened).

  ‘Imagine what those boys were on – they were racing faster than flamin’ James Hunt when we met them.’

  Jacqui returned to the article to be greeted by her husband’s name, then looked up to see Trish eyeing her.

  ‘What are you going to tell Nick?’

  -28-

  2 p.m., Monday, Queen Street HQ

  Kenton stood in the corner of the chief’s office next to Granger. Lowry was in front of them, patiently explaining to Sparks his theories on the Greenstead murders and the drugs coming in from Mersea. It was patently obvious he did not like the situation. Smuggling was difficult to police on this coastline, and they thought they’d stamped it out, or so Kenton had heard.

  ‘Okay,’ Sparks said sharply, ‘let’s assume that this is the case. Focus on finding the bloody stuff and the maniac that did those men in Greenstead. That’s our priority now.’ He levelled his stare at Kenton. ‘Stop poking about with the post-office robbery; you’ve discredited their witness – bravo. So now let them get on with it. I don’t want the Dodger bleating down the phone at me again.’

  Sparks ground out his cigarette and glowered at the three men in the room. A pulse throbbed at his temple: the tension was palpable, and they were each personally responsible for the turn of events. ‘These drugs –’ he picked up a manila folder and flapped it on the edge of the desk – ‘they aren’t your run-of-the-mill amphetamines.’

  ‘No?’

  Kenton glanced at Lowry as he sat back down, calmly adjusting his Sta-Prest trousers as he crossed his legs. The inspector was at ease, perfectly calm. Oddly, the more intense Sparks grew, the calmer Lowry became, and vice versa. It occurred to Kenton that he’d never witnessed the two of them overheated about something at the same time. It was either one or the other; they were never both angry at once.

  ‘No.’ Sparks flipped open the folder. ‘What we appear to have is a mix of amphetamine and lysergic acid diethylamide – LSD, or acid, to give it its street name – and something as yet unidentified.’