A Dark Place to Die

by Ed Chatterton

  'Sit,' says Perch, waving a hand perfunctorily in the direction of two armless leather chairs in front of his desk, not looking up from the folder of notes in front of him. Keane gives Harris a wry wrinkle of the eyebrows as they take their seats – lower, naturally, than Perch. Keane wouldn't be surprised to learn that Perch consulted some ladder-climbing business manual on details like that. The two of them sit back in the not-very-comfortable chairs and wait. With Perch, you always wait.

  He takes his time. He flicks the pages of his notes, peering through rimless spectacles, his face never lifting in their direction. Eventually, after a number of silent minutes during which Keane has to fight the urge to check his watch, Perch closes the file with an almost unbearable air of efficiency, places his pen at exact right angles to one side and looks up at his two officers.

  'Not very promising,' he says, tapping a thin finger on top of the file.

  'Sorry, sir?' says Keane. God, this man was a tool.

  Perch sighs. 'Your beach victim, DI Keane. Not made much progress, have you?'

  'With respect, sir,' says Harris, seeing Keane's neck redden, 'we've established the identity of the victim and traced a connection between him and an Australian man –'

  'Gelagotis,' interrupts Perch. Keane registers the DCI's need to let them know he's up to speed on the details. Prick.

  'Yes, sir, Gelagotis. We've also found the murder site and we're awaiting forensics on material in the container.'

  'And we know the victim was Koop's son,' Keane says, a little more forcefully than he'd meant to. 'Menno Koopman,' he adds, seeing Perch's facial expression.

  'I know who Koopman is,' snaps Perch. He taps the file on his desk. 'I can read, DI Keane. I remember Koopman very clearly.' Perch purses his lips in distaste. 'A loose cannon. Your old boss, if I remember rightly.'

  He leans forward and props the tips of his fingers together in an oddly ecclesiastical manner. 'And I'm not at all happy about his involvement.' He speaks as though Keane and Harris are personally responsible for Stevie White being the offspring of the former DCI. 'Not happy at all.'

  Perch glances involuntarily upwards as if invoking a higher authority. You're looking in the wrong direction, thinks Keane. Perch is more likely to be controlled from somewhere warmer.

  'I've had to inform upstairs,' he says, his voice quivering with barely concealed irritation. 'They're going to want to know why a family member of one of our former heads is involved in a drug killing. And not for the first time.'

  'White was hardly a family member,' says Keane. 'Sir. And Carl Koopman is still a patient at Bowden.'

  'You know that?'

  'We checked,' replies Keane, his voice even. 'Sir.'

  'Steven White had never met DCI Koopman,' says Harris, anxious to divert any head-on collision between The Fish and Keane. 'He was seventeen when White's mother emigrated and as far as we know there has been no contact since. There's nothing to suggest that Koopman's involvement is anything except an accident of birth.'

  'Really, DI Harris?' says Perch. 'Then why is Menno Koopman currently in the air somewhere between Sydney and here?'

  Keane looks at Harris. 'That's news to us, sir.'

  'I know it's news to you, DI Keane. The point is it shouldn't be. I shouldn't have to be told this through the grapevine like some village gossip!'

  Perch judiciously neglects to mention he was passed this information less than ten minutes prior to his meeting. Instead, he lets Keane and Harris squirm. He looks at Keane sharply.

  'As far as I'm concerned, Koopman is either dirty or trouble,' says Perch. 'Both of those alternatives are unacceptable and in my view he is likely to be both. The moment he sets foot in the city I want to know about it. I want an eye kept on him. And I want more detail on the brother. Got it?'

  Keane doesn't trust himself to speak after the mention of Koop being dirty. He nods and gets to his feet, his neck now positively glowing.

  'Will that be all, sir?' says Harris. She too gets up, mainly so that Perch won't be tempted to haul Keane over some very hot coals.

  Perch waves his hand.

  'Go and do your job,' he says, reaching for the phone. 'Don't make me do it for you.'

  Harris steers Keane to the door, feeling his arm flex under her grip.

  'Of course, sir,' she says. But Perch is already talking into the phone.

  'The oily fucker!'

  Keane smacks his hand on the car roof hard enough for a passing copper to shoot them a disapproving look.

  'Don't let him wind you up so much,' says Harris evenly. She has to raise her voice above the roar of a passing lorry on Wapping, the six-lane road separating police HQ from the docks.

  Men. It really was like taking care of small children. There is a lot, thinks DI Harris, to be said for having less testosterone.

  'I'm not steaming about The Fish, Em! You expect that kind of thing from him. It's the slimy rat-fucker inside MIT who told him about Koopman's flight before we knew!'

  'How do you know it's one of ours?'

  Keane jams his hands in his pockets so as not to keep waving them around. He leans back against the car door and puffs out his cheeks. He lets out a long breath and then speaks more calmly.

  'Because The Fish doesn't do detective work, Em. He's had a pencil jammed up his backside for so long he's got lead tonsils. No, a little birdie let this slip – didn't you hear him? He more or less told us. And since we're the only ones interested so far in the comings and goings of Menno Koopman, it follows that it was one of us who decided to take this tasty titbit up the food chain.' Keane walks a few paces and looks across the car park towards a view of the city skyline, and focuses as always on the Liver Building, indistinct in the misty sea air, the grey-green iron Liver birds on top looking west, straining to leave. Keane has always thought it a perfect image for the city: desire exceeding capabilities, but trying anyway. He once read that the original, twelfth-century symbol was an eagle but had been copied so poorly that a new creature was born. There was something about that too which resonated for Keane. Creativity from cack-handedness.

  'Frank?' says Em Harris and Keane turns back towards the car.

  'I bet it was that slimy bastard, Caddick. He's got an eye on leapfrogging over to HQ and it was him and Rose who've been doing the bulk of liaison with the Aussies.'

  Harris shrugs. Privately she thinks Keane might be right about Caddick. It's the sort of thing an ambitious young DS might be tempted to do: drip feed potentially titillating information to a big noise like Perch in the hope of being seen as someone useful. But it's stupid thinking on Caddick's part if indeed it does turn out to be him. All it would do would be to lose him respect within MIT and lessen his chances of access to any other hot information.

  Keane, she knows, will not let a slight like this pass without retribution, which in the knotty tangle of Mersey-side Police can take many varied and ingenious forms. There are coppers she knows for whom the pursuit of criminals is incidental to their wars of attrition against other officers. The level of grudge-holding on the force would make a Borgia blush. But she also knows that whatever happens to Caddick doesn't matter, not in the context of this case. The big thing that she's taken from the meeting is the confirmation that the father of the victim is heading their way. A father with a reputation for getting what he wants when it comes to criminal investigations. And whatever Keane's prior relationship with Koopman, Harris wants to make sure there's nothing that will leach negatively into her career. Harris has plans.

  'Koopman,' she says. 'What do you think he wants?'

  'I don't know,' says Keane, opening the car door. 'But it's just about the only thing me and The Fish can agree on. I don't like it either.'

  24

  Jimmy Gelagotis isn't the only person on the Gold Coast with an interest in the Max Kolomiets/Anton Bytchkov murders. The morning after Warren Eckhardt speaks to Keane at MIT in Liverpool, the Kolomiets file lands on his desk, bounced from the Organised Crime Group to h
is outfit, South East Queensland Homicide. Kolomiets was well known to the OCG, and there's little doubt that they'll be heavily involved, but the protocol dictates that the brief is kicked through to Eckhardt as a prelude to being handed back. Eckhardt knows before reading it that this will end up being a dual department investigation, and that he and OCG will have to share information sooner rather than later, with OCG establishing alpha domination as soon as possible. There are already emails and phone messages indicating as much in Eckhardt's inboxes.

  But for right now at least, the file is his, and his alone. He fumbles in his pocket for a cigarette before remembering for the ten thousandth time that he can't smoke indoors. Eckhardt is an old-school smoker, getting through two packs a day and it's killing him. Already fifty, he looks nearer sixty, with a pronounced wheeze to his breathing. It's been a long time since he's done anything more active on duty than walking down the office steps to the car park. He knows he should give up the cancer sticks, and quick.

  But not today.

  'Off to the coroner's office,' he tells Nick Matui, bent over his keyboard picking out a report on a domestic homicide in Nerang that came in overnight. Matui looks up and smiles wryly as Eckhardt pats his jacket pockets. He might be checking for his car keys but Matui knows Warren is making sure there are some smokes left in the pack.

  'Sure, Ekkers. Say hello to Max for me,' Matui winks. It's safe to say the death of Max Kolomiets is not being mourned at Homicide.

  Eckhardt makes his way outside to where his police issue Commodore is parked under the only patch of shade in the lot. As he leaves the chill air-conditioning and steps into the Gold Coast heat, Eckhardt coughs wetly. He immediately rummages around for a cigarette, jams it gratefully into his mouth and lights up. He takes off his jacket and draws the smoke blissfully into his diseased lungs.

  More like it.

  There is no real need for him to attend the coroner's office. The autopsy has already been done on Kolomiets and Eckhardt attended part of it; enough to already give him most of what he wants to know. He didn't attend the crime scene as he was laid up with a bout of flu which he'd only shaken off the day before. Matui filled in and brought him up to speed before handing the file over. Eckhardt already feels at a disadvantage with the Kolomiets case. And, like his counterpart twelve thousand miles and ten time zones away, Eckhardt has an atavistic need to get close to the victim. Just like Frank Keane, Warren Eckhardt would be hard put to identify why, or how, seeing the corpse helps . . . he just knows it does.

  He cranks up the Commodore's air-con and switches the radio to Nova. He hardly ever likes any song they play but the station's bright chatter is as much a part of his daily life as the heat. He turns the car towards the coroner's office and is there within ten minutes. The office is wedged incongruously between a downmarket Chinese restaurant and a tyre shop.

  Eckhardt parks, takes a last regretful drag of his cigarette (his second since leaving Homicide) and pops a breath mint, before locking the car and entering the CO.

  After the usual form-filling, he's granted access to the cold room where post-autopsy bodies are neatly stacked in two rows of stainless-steel mortuary drawers. The multi-pierced attendant snaps the lock on one and slides Max Kolomiets's body out for inspection. With a nod at Eckhardt, the assistant draws back the top sheet and leaves him to it.

  'Hello, Max,' says Eckhardt softly. He speaks without rancour. He's only met Max Kolomiets once, during an investigation into a routine drug murder. Kolomiets was listed as the victim's employer and was interviewed as such by Homicide. With his high-priced lawyer in attendance, Kolomiets slid smoothly away from the investigation, the only technical connection between him and the victim easily explained. Of course, Max had nothing to do with the crime. He was simply the poor man's employer. What this man did outside working hours was his business and his alone. No further questions? Then we'll be off.

  As Kolomiets left the interview room he winked at Eckhardt and Eckhardt knew exactly what Max was telling him. I did this, and there's absolutely nothing you can do about it, now or ever. Eckhardt knew, as did the whole team, that the victim was 'allegedly' skimming from Kolomiets and that could result in only one possible outcome. Proving it was another matter, and Kolomiets walked, as he always walked. 'Don't worry,' he said to Eckhardt at the door, 'you can't vin them all.' The Russian was untouchable. Except he wasn't.

  Which is interesting, reflects Eckhardt: it means that something important in the safari park has changed.

  He examines the neatest of Kolomiets's head wounds, the one that came as he lay already dead on the grass of the soccer pitch. It was a grace note, a shot by someone who didn't want to leave anything to chance. Forensics hasn't come back with any firm data on the gun, but from off-the-record snippets gleaned from the coroner, as well as his own experience, Eckhardt knows the muzzle was placed against the skin calmly by someone well-versed in violence. The body of Anton Bytchkov lay on a gurney in another of the coroner's steel cabinets, the wound in his head telling the same story.

  The witness, the boy, won't speak.

  Eckhardt doesn't blame him. It is frustrating but completely understandable. Eckhardt was over at the boy's home the previous morning and tried his best to put him at ease without success. The shrink is due for another visit that afternoon and Eckhardt is hopeful she'll have more success. A petite blonde wearing a tight-fitting skirt and a sternly professional expression, she called into the office at Homicide after the session with the witness and Eckhardt knew he'd have told her anything. The boy, of course, is another matter.

  'One more session and he might begin to give us something,' the shrink explained as she left.

  Eckhardt pats Max on the cheek, his flesh as unresponsive as a side of beef.

  'Don't worry, Maxie,' he wheezes. 'You can't win 'em all.'

  25

  The only flight Koop can get, turns out – through no desire on his part – to connect via Amsterdam. As the plane dips in towards Schiphol, a disoriented and queasy Koop is unable to feel or articulate anything much about seeing his parents' homeland unroll beneath the wings of the jet. In truth, the place looks dismal, the light of the northern hemisphere flat and leaden after the sparkle of the past two years in Australia. Koopman disembarks and walks stiff-legged through the airport with an increasing sense of dislocation.

  What does he think he's doing?

  That feeling only increases after making the short hop on a budget airline into Liverpool. The same grey-green landscape, only this time as familiar as the pattern on his boyhood bedroom wallpaper. Koop gets off at Liverpool feeling like death and looking only marginally better. He's booked a room at a hotel down near the Pier Head. With both his parents now gone, and his brother still in hospital, Koop has no family in the city. There are friends, colleagues, that Koop might have called up to stay with but, like most coppers he knows, he prefers his own space, even if that's just a rented room. This is not a social visit and Koop doesn't want to fend off questions about his life in Australia and explain why he's back. Even he doesn't know that. Besides, staying in a hotel will keep him light, flexible.

  For what, exactly? Koop grimaces. Now he's actually in Liverpool it strikes him how ridiculous his pilgrimage is. Perhaps Zoe is right.

  He picks up his bag from the carousel and moves through into the arrivals hall. Amongst the business travellers and returning weekend revellers, Koopman stands out, tall, tanned, his grey hair bleached lighter by the faraway sun.

  'Jesus,' says Frank Keane, moving forward and putting out a hand. 'It's Crocodile fucking Dundee.'

  After a moment's hesitation, Koop smiles and shakes Keane's outstretched hand. 'Frank,' he says, holding on a fraction longer and a fraction harder than convention requires. It's taken only a second but Koop finds himself establishing – or trying to – some sort of alpha-male dominance with his old colleague. Worse, he's pretty sure that the woman with Keane is aware of it too. From the look on her face she's less than impre
ssed. He tries to relax, slightly ashamed of his posturing, however small it may have been.

  'Not sure if you know Em? DI Emily Harris, Menno Koopman.'

  Harris shakes Koop's hand. Her grasp is cool and confident. 'DCI Koopman, good to meet you.'

  'Call me Koop. And drop the DCI too, if you don't mind. It's been a while since anyone called me that.'

  There's a short silence during which Menno Koopman regards the two Liverpool detectives. Em Harris does the same to him, not even trying to hide the fact that she's doing so. He's better-looking than Harris expected, taller too and carrying his fifty years with ease, and there's a steel in the eyes that doesn't bode well for any 'hands-off' message she and Keane might want to deliver. Other travellers drift past them, heading for the exits. Koop is aware of the sound of his hometown accent all around him, the nasal squawk as distinctive as ever, every second word a swear word.

  'You greet all visitors to Liverpool personally these days, Frank?' says Koop.

  By way of reply, Frank Keane hoists Koop's bag and pats him on the shoulder.

  'Not all of 'em, Koop. Just the important ones.' He points to the door. 'Lift?'

  Koop raises an eyebrow. 'Do I get a choice?'

  Keane laughs.

  'Since when has anyone told you what to do, Koop?'

  'In that case I could murder a pint.'

  Koop asks them to take him to The Phil, a hulking sandstone Victorian-gothic pub straddling a corner opposite the Philharmonic Hall and under the shadow of the retro-futuristic Catholic Cathedral – 'Paddy's Wigwam'. The Phil is the only pub Koop has ever heard of that has urinals listed as tourist attractions.

  'You do miss this, a bit.' He waves a hand around the pub as Keane sets down a pint of lager in front of him. 'In Australia. The history, I mean.'

  Koop drinks in the ornate plasterwork and complex Victorian woodwork, the soft lights rebounding off polished brass and curving light fittings. He wouldn't have been able to tell anyone that was what he'd missed before getting back, but now he's here, it's obvious. He resolves to see more of the old stuff. A bit of kulcha, mate.