Mortal Men (The Lakeland Murders Book 7)

by J. J. Salkeld

  ‘Half twelve, maybe a few minutes after’ said Keith, checking in his notebook.

  ‘Then I’d say between half twelve and one. Not much later. I’m no psychiatrist, DI Francis, because in my job the patients remain quiet and let me do the talking, but I’ll tell you one thing about this one. There was some hate there, by Christ there was. The first shot damn near cut the victim in the half, so the second must have had another purpose.’

  ‘Hiding his identity?’

  ‘Certainly not. His prints will do the job. As I say, just find the person who hated this man the most, and you’ll have found your killer. Now, if you’ll excuse me I’m off to the Mortal Man for a pie and a pint. Because whoever said that man doesn’t live by bread alone most certainly didn’t go to medical school.’

  Ian Mann was talking to a uniformed Sergeant a few yards away. He finished, and walked over.

  ‘All right, both? I’ve got the house to house started, and pretty much finished too. Three other houses, and no-one in any of them.’

  ‘Shit’ said Jane.

  ‘Aye, exactly. Mind you, the gun might not be smoking, but at least it’s still on the scene.’

  ‘It’s the murder weapon?’

  ‘Aye. Has to be, I’d say. It’s the worst I’ve ever seen is this, Jane, to tell the truth.’

  ‘You’re the second person to say that to me, Ian.’

  ‘Just wanted you to be aware. That’s all. Sandy says it’s all right to go in there if you want.’

  ‘Right. I’ll suit up.’

  ‘Are you sure that’s necessary?’ said Mann, quickly. ‘Andy wouldn’t go in there, I can tell you that. He’d be turning the colour right down on his monitor, if he was just looking at the pictures.’

  ‘Well I’m not Andy, am I? Of course I’m going to look at my bloody crime scene.’ Jane regretted speaking so sharply as soon as she’d closed her mouth, but Ian Mann didn’t look remotely concerned. But then he never did.

  ‘Bloody is right’ he said, mildly.

  ‘Can I come in too, boss?’ said Keith. ‘I saw some bad RTAs, when I was in uniform, like. There was this one, I might have told you about it, where we found….’

  ‘Yes, all right, Keith. I’ve heard them all, over the years. It’s quite a game for the old male coppers, telling the young females the most grisly stories that they can come up with. The odd one might even be true.’

  ‘I didn’t mean…’

  ‘Stay close to me, and don’t touch anything unless you check with Sandy first. Forget that bit of advice and you’ll be wishing you were in the same condition as the victim. Sandy’s crime scene, Sandy’s rules, OK?’

  ‘Yes, boss.’

  By co-incidence Sandy Smith came to the door just as Jane reached it.

  ‘I needed a bit of air.’ It wasn’t like Sandy to admit that she needed anything beyond coffee and cake.

  ‘Any signs of forced entry?’ asked Jane, looking down at the elderly front-door lock. It seemed about as secure as Sellotape.

  ‘On first inspection, no, but I’ll let you know for definite tomorrow. But if you need a working assumption, just for now mind, then you’re fairly safe to assume that our victim knew his attacker.’

  ‘Anything else, before we go in?’

  ‘No signs of forced entry elsewhere in the building, but again that’s just a preliminary finding. A weapon, and again it’s safe to assume that it was the murder weapon, is in situ. As soon as you’ve seen it we’ll dust it for prints, then uplift for DNA. But firearms confirm that it’s been fired recently.’ Sandy paused, and glanced away. ‘Both barrels.’

  Sandy turned, and moved slowly back into the house, calling out before she entered the living room. Jane followed her in, and stopped behind her. The room was quiet, hot, and the bright lights didn’t help. Jane could taste the blood in the air. Sandy beckoned her forward, and she moved slowly, followed by Keith. She looked down, and knew immediately that she’d made a bad decision. She turned fast, not wanting to contaminate the crime scene, and almost ran into Keith’s back. Because he was already turning too.

  A minute later Ian was telling them both to keep their heads between their knees, and shouting to one of the cops for some water.

  ‘Stop laughing, you insensitive bastards’ he shouted over his shoulder, and everyone did, even the uniformed Inspector who’d just rocked up to take charge of the logistics and top-up on his overtime before he went on holiday. This couldn’t have come at a better time, he thought cheerfully, and wondered where he’d park the truck when it arrived.

  ‘I’m all right’ said Jane finally, feeling the weight of Mann’s hand on her back. ‘I’ve just got a bit hot, that’s all.’ She stood up slowly, but Keith remained bent over, hands on knees.

  ‘Me too’ he said, weakly.

  Jane gestured to Mann to move away, and she bent down again, alongside Keith, and talked to him for a minute or two. Then they walked back to Mann, and they all sat in Keith’s car. Jane took a long drink of water, and passed the bottle to Iredale. She could see the sweat beading on his brow.

  ‘Impressions?’she asked.

  ‘Amateur job’ said Mann, ‘but a good one. Uncomplicated, like. Turn up when there’s no-one about, knocks at the door. Chummy lets him in, bang, bang, the killer drops the gun, walks out and leaves the scene. Simple as.’

  ‘Leaves the scene how?’

  ‘Vehicle is favourite. I spoke to Tonto a minute ago. He says there’s no sign that our killer had any kind of OP in any of the likely spots, suggesting that he already knew our vic was a creature of habit. Tonto says he’ll know more by the end of the day.’

  ‘So the killer knew that the victim would be at home? This lunchtime, I mean.’

  ‘Aye. I’ve talked to a couple of the neighbours on the phone. Liked his routine did our man, apparently. Home for lunch every day except Friday, when he went to the pub. Every week. So plenty of people knew that Francis William Foster, late of this parish, would almost certainly have been at home at lunchtime.’

  ‘The ID’s been confirmed, has it?’

  ‘Aye, two minutes since. His prints are on the database, and they’re a match. So there’s no doubt, it’s Frankie who’s in there all right.’

  Something in Mann’s tone struck Jane as odd. Then she realised. ‘You knew him?’

  ‘Aye, I nicked him once or twice. Receiving, it was. Harmless little villain, was Frankie. Not the best, or the brightest, but he didn’t deserve that. A shotgun, from that range, and then a second shot to the head, just for the sake of it, like. There was just no need for it. Absolutely no need at all.’

  Sandy Smith walked out of the house, and Mann pointed towards her.

  ‘Brace yourselves’ he said, opening his door and moving quickly towards Sandy. ‘They got a bit of a shock, that’s all’ he said, as he reached her.

  ‘Aye’ said Sandy, ‘are you all right, Jane?’

  ‘I’m OK, thanks.’

  ‘Good. It’s not nice in there. Bloody hot, too.’ Then Sandy turned to Keith. ‘But you need to toughen up, you big soft jessie. Haven’t you ever seen a bit of blood before? When they’re dead, they’re dead. It makes no difference to them what state they’re in then. And he didn’t suffer or anything, if that makes any difference to you.’

  ‘Aye, well’ said Keith, ‘when you say a bit of blood…’

  But Sandy wasn’t listening. She’d already turned back to face Jane.

  ‘I’m off to the office to write this little lot up. Initial report in the morning. But a couple of points that might get you moving in the right direction. First, there aren’t any defence wounds. Your victim didn’t even raise his hands before the shots.’

  ‘So they weren’t already raised?’ said Jane.

  ‘Exactly. They weren’t, I’m sure of it. And I can see why they made you the new DI.’

  ‘Yes, why weren’t his hands up? Surely he felt threatened with someone waving a shotgun about?The weapon couldn’t have been con
cealed, could it?’

  ‘I’ll leave that to you to work out, but it seems unlikely to me. But I try to avoid even trying to speculate about anything when I’m at the scene, because it might influence my analysis later.’

  ‘That’s a polite way of saying that we should do our own detective work, is it, Sandy?’

  ‘When have I ever been polite? Against my fucking religion, that is.’

  Jane smiled. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Aye, one other starter for ten. I’m pretty confident that where the weapon was dropped was the firing position, and that the victim was about two metres away. I’ll be able to tell you more exactly in a day or so, but that’ll be near enough. And to answer your next question, yes, it’s possible that there’ll be traces of spatter on the shooter’s clothing.’

  ‘How about transfer to a vehicle?’

  Sandy thought about it.

  ‘Possible, I’d say, but not certain. I wouldn’t bet your pension on it, like.’

  ‘All right, thanks. Any point as hanging about? What’s Tonto up to?’

  ‘The usual. Wandering about talking to the trees or something. I worry about that boy, sometimes.’

  ‘We all do, Sandy.’

  Both women smiled.

  ‘I’d get back to the office if I were you, Jane. And maybe leave the photos ’til the morning, the bad ones anyway. Tell you what, I’ll get Simon the snapper to put them in a separate folder, shall I? So you’ll know which ones were taken more for me and the doc than for you.’

  ‘Good idea, thanks’ said Mann quickly.

  The incident room was set up by the time Jane reached the office, and the Divisional Superintendent was hanging around like a bad smell in a broom cupboard. He was just as hard to ignore.

  ‘Have you got everything that you need, Jane?’ he asked, and she made a quick mental translation to help her to understand what he actually meant. ‘Have I given you the bare minimum of resources, but just enough to ensure that if this all goes tits up it’ll be you, the SIO, who carries the can?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I’m sure we can manage. I’ll be in touch if I need anything else.’

  ‘You do that. So what’s your plan?’

  ‘The usual, sir. As Andy Hall always says, this is no job for a clairvoyant. And that’s especially true of this one, because we’ve got precious little to go on at present. No witnesses or obvious forensics at the scene, so we’ll concentrate on the victim for the next few hours.’

  ‘Known to us, I believe?’

  ‘Yes, sir. Ian Mann nicked him a couple of times. But he was surprised that Foster would have been into anything heavy enough to get him killed. He was very much a non-league player, by all accounts.’

  ‘Perhaps he’s been going up in the world.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Jane tried to look as if the thought had never occurred to her, and it seemed to work. Perhaps a little too well.

  ‘Or perhaps his death is unconnected to his criminal activities.’

  This time Jane just nodded. There was no point in encouraging him. The new Super had come from personnel at HQ, and Jane was starting to wonder if he’d ever been anywhere else.

  ‘Anyway, I’ll leave you to it, Jane. My door is always open if there’s anything you want to bounce off me. Run it up the flagpole, and all that.’

  ‘I’ll bear that in mind, sir.’

  Half an hour later the team was briefed, and the room was humming. Jane stood for a moment and listened. The pitch of the sound was just right, urgent but not frantic. Then she and Mann settled down to work in her office.

  ‘I told Keith to go home’ he said, ‘because I didn’t think he’d be much use to us tonight. Are you OK, Jane?’

  ‘Of course I am. I’ve seen worse, or nearly as bad. I don’t know what came over me. But let’s say no more about it. I’ll be reminded of it for the rest of my service, I know that, but let’s not start the piss-taking yet.’

  ‘Understood. So what do you make of our victim?’

  ‘Based on his recent record? Calling him small fry would be a bit unfair to the other small fry. He’s just an entry-level fence moving on bits and pieces from bottom-feeding burglars, muggers and shoplifters. A dying breed, really, since most of them cut out the middleman and just shift their swag online these days. Except for that one little item on his CV, of course.’

  ‘The fact that he informed on the firm that got done for that attempted armed robbery in 2000? Aye, I saw that too. And you saw who the SIO was?’

  ‘A fresh-faced young DI by the name of Andy Hall. Yes, I saw.’

  ‘Youngish, maybe. Shall we talk to him about it?’ Mann was watching Jane’s face carefully for a reaction. She hadn’t managed to achieve Hall’s level of zen-like impassivity, but she was obviously working on it. ‘Just for the background on that previous case’ he added by way of a precautionary measure. ‘Just in case, like.’

  But Jane was already dialling.

  ‘Are you all right, love?’ said Hall. ‘I heard you had a bit of a funny turn. Is it….’

  ‘I’m with Ian, on speaker-phone’ Jane said quickly. ‘We wanted to ask you about Frankie Foster, and that attempted bank raid. I’ve requested the paper files from storage, but they won’t be here ’til the morning.’

  ‘OK, sure. I’ve just had a quick look at the stuff that did get archived electronically, just to refresh my memory.’

  ‘Not busy then, mate?’ said Mann, and Hall laughed.

  ‘Not with anything that actually matters, no. I’ve got a very nasty feeling that the report I’m working on is going to get quietly buried by the ACC.’

  ‘What’s he like? Better than Val, I hope? Gone, but not bloody forgotten, she is.’

  ‘She was all right really. At least she was consistent. You knew where you stood, anyhow. But this one seems out of his depth, always either brown-nosing the Chief or taking it out on the junior staff. Anyway, that’s not what you want to talk about, is it?’

  ‘No’ said Jane, quickly. Hall had been saying much the same at home for weeks, complaining about his lot in general and the ACC’s behaviour in particular, and it hadn’t been all that interesting, or surprising, the first time around. She’d started to feel slightly guilty about encouraging Andy to take the promotion, although she still thought that it had been the right decision, all things considered.

  ‘So Foster grassed up his mates after this abortive bank blag in Kendal, is that right?’ she said.

  ‘Yes, that’s right. There were four of them in the van, and the other three all got longish stretches. And that was mainly because one of them opened up with a bloody Kalashnikov on the place. Totally unnecessary, it was. A complete waste of time. The doors would never have opened, and in any case the money had already gone. It was like a kid throwing a tantrum. Really bloody stupid all round.’

  ‘How come the bank was closed? It was at lunchtime, wasn’t it?’

  ‘It was just a sub-branch, near the old auction mart. It’s long gone now of course, but they used to just open it up on livestock auction days. The farmers all wanted to get cash before the sale, and to pay it back in afterwards. One of the biggest auctions of the year it was that day, and apparently they were queuing up outside to bank their cash afterwards. So our boys were well informed, although we never found any evidence of an inside man at the bank.’

  ‘Or woman’ said Jane.

  ‘Sorry’ said Hall, ‘I’ll send myself on a gender equality refresher course immediately. We’re bound to have at least one. Anyway, our boys turned up late at the bank for some reason. One of them was still adjusting his stockinged mask or something, I expect. We never got to the bottom of that, either, as it happens. And none of the three lads who we nicked for the job would say who’d fired the weapon, and friend Frankie said he wasn’t sure. So they all did time for it. I tried to explain that there was no downside in them telling me which one it was, but the other three behaved like proper old school villians. Which was odd, considering they were al
l really just normal working blokes, who let a beer-fuelled fantasy become reality. Christ knows why, really. Anyway, it was because of Frankie that the other three got put away.’

  ‘His testimony got them convicted? You’re sure?’

  ‘Absolutely. No doubt about it. I don’t think we’d ever have charged them if Frankie hadn’t grassed.’

  ‘Why did he, then?’ asked Jane.

  ‘He was a bit unlucky, or more likely he lost his nerve. He got stopped at a road block about an hour after the blag, came off wrong to the copper, and as soon as I got him into the interview room I knew he was in on it. So I made him an offer, just the usual, and he nearly took my bloody hand off for it. Bottled it totally, he did.’

  ‘Just like that? Wasn’t he worried that the others would take exception? That’s usually what keeps cons quiet, especially if they’re obvious weaklings like Frankie.’

  ‘I agree, but the other members of the team weren’t exactly your usual violent bastards, were they? Not by a long way.’

  ‘Do you know what’s happened to the others since? Where they are now?’

  ‘One of them, Matthew Somes, he died in prison, I do know that. Suicide, sadly. The others, I’ve no idea. I hadn’t thought about that case in years, to tell you the truth. Yes, it was an almighty cock-up from start to finish, but apart from one of them shooting the place up it wasn’t very different from plenty of other half-arsed schemes cooked up by the local cons. As I always say, we only catch the stupid ones.’

  ‘Yes, Andy’ said Jane, ‘you do always say that.’ She paused, and Hall didn’t say anything. ‘So a clear motive for murder then, for one of the two survivors?’

  ‘Too right. Both Winder and Tyson spent the better part of a decade inside, and they’d have known bloody well that it was all down to Foster. The transcript of the case is in the archive somewhere, and I haven’t had a chance to read it yet, but I do remember that Frankie gave evidence in open court.’

  ‘Thanks, Andy,’ said Jane. ‘I’ll get the files picked up now.’