Original Skin

by David Mark

  McAvoy closes his eyes. Shakes his head.

  “Colin Ray?”

  Pharaoh smiles ruefully. “He’s taking over as lead. Taking a fresh look at what we’ve done so far. I’ve got Daniells and a list of errands. Ray’s the fresh pair of eyes this case needs, apparently.”

  “You fought it, though,” says McAvoy, appalled. “I know you fought it.”

  Pharaoh holds up a hand and extends the index finger. “I think I left a nail in his desk.”

  McAvoy doesn’t know what to say, so just stares at the carpet. Eventually Pharaoh gives a sigh and then straightens herself up. “Come on,” she says brightly. “It won’t have much to do with you. You shouldn’t be so wary of Ray anyway. He’s a good copper, he’s just a twat. You’ve got bigger things to worry about, like writing a report saying I’m ace and the MIT is rubbish and that they should give me more resources and money, and a daily bottle of Zinfandel.”

  McAvoy rubs a hand over his face as he gives in to a grin. “I’ll do my best.”

  “I’m not even going to ask you how it’s looking,” she says, clearly asking. “We’re expensive, aren’t we? The unit? You know we’ll be the first to go in the budget cuts, no matter what the new chairman is saying. And we’ve had a couple of high-profile fuckups these last few days.”

  “You weren’t to blame,” he says and means.

  She looks through the glass at the rain-lashed car park. Manages a smile.

  “Thanks, Aector, but it wasn’t my finest hour. Shouldn’t have committed to the raid without being one hundred percent. I fought my corner, mind. Told them the pressure on us for results is going to lead to these balls-ups. They don’t get it, though. They’re too far removed. They don’t know much more than they read in the papers, and, according to the tabloids, Hull’s going to hell.”

  “It’s never been paradise,” says McAvoy, trying to make her smile. “They exaggerate. That’s what they do. It’s a power struggle over a drug that will be legal in a few years. People are flexing their muscles. Somebody’s trying to prove they’re a big man, and people are getting hurt.”

  “We could have had them,” says Pharaoh despairingly. “Could have wrapped it up.”

  “You don’t really think these thugs are in charge, do you? They’re just muscle. We catch them, there’s still whoever is giving them their orders to worry about. And we know they must be serious. The Vietnamese don’t play nicely. Whoever’s taken over their operation must be one heck of a player.”

  “That’s not for us to think about,” says Pharaoh moodily. “They may just be the hired thugs, but they’re the ones we want. They’re torturers. Now they’re murderers. In the public’s opinion, they’re the ones we want off the streets—not the ones who have a fortune in the bank from farming bloody cannabis. It’s not a drugs operation anymore. Not really. It all has to be accounted for, Aector. Has to be on the right fucking spreadsheet . . .”

  McAvoy nods. Realizes just what a balancing act it is to chase criminals without offending the other specialist units. Some of this investigation should be in the hands of the Drugs Squad. But Pharaoh, for now at least, is keeping their hands off it—much to the dismay of Detective Superintendent Adrian Russell, who has made his displeasure known. He’s good at displeasure. He causes a lot of it.

  “They could have killed us,” she says. “They could have wedged the doors shut and burned us to death.”

  “Don’t think like that, guv.”

  “I’m not being morbid, Aector,” she says. “I’m confused. These bastards don’t think twice about nailing people’s hands to their kneecaps, and they get a chance to cook a van full of cops and don’t take it?”

  McAvoy considers. “Maybe they didn’t want that level of interest. Maybe it was a warning. There would have been uproar if anybody had been badly hurt.”

  Pharaoh shrugs again. “We’ve got a few leads to follow up, that’s the main thing. The car park at Peter Pang’s picked up their registration plate. Reported stolen from a high-class car showroom in Doncaster the day of the raid.”

  “Donny?”

  “Yeah, apparently people in South Yorkshire can afford fifty-thousand-pound cars. Who’d have thought?”

  “Anything else?”

  “Yeah, there’s a partial fingerprint recovered from the glass bottle they threw at us. Belongs to a bloke with a record long as your arm. Your arm, not mine. GBH. Embezzlement. Did years for armed robbery. Real piece of work.”

  “Name?”

  “Alan Rourke.”

  “Doesn’t ring a bell . . .”

  “Bad sort,” she says. “Connected to some real villains . . . Aector, look sharp!”

  She jumps off his desk and stands up straight, dragging him to his feet by his collar and bodily spinning him to the door. Peter Tressider, the chairman of the Police Authority, has just entered the room and is waving a hand in the general direction of Detective Chief Superintendent Davey, who is trailing behind him with a look of uncontrolled panic on his face.

  Tressider looks around the room, completely ignoring whatever it is Davey is trying to say in his ear. He spots McAvoy, and his mouth opens in pleasant surprise. He crosses the room with his arms outstretched, and for a second McAvoy fears he is about to be taken into a bear hug.

  “Sergeant,” he says warmly, and pumps McAvoy’s hand with a vast, fleshy paw. “Good to see you again. Heard about last night’s excitement. Fun and games, eh? My word, I know we gave you a grilling, but we didn’t expect you to go and risk your life over statistics. Still, sometimes you have to rush in headlong, eh? I think I read that in a book about the samurai, now I think on it. Excellent read. I’ll lend you it. You ever read The Art of War? Fascinating stuff. Think I’ll give it another once-over if I do make it to Westminster, eh? No shortage of bloody enemies there!”

  McAvoy has to stop himself from physically recoiling in the face of the big, bearded politician’s enthusiasm. “It was a difficult operation, sir, but there are plenty of positives to take . . .”

  Tressider waves a hand. It appears to be a habit of his. McAvoy wonders what political commentators will make of it should he get to the House of Commons. Whether they will applaud his earthy brusqueness or dismiss him as an impatient dinosaur.

  The chairman turns to Pharaoh. “You must be the boss, yes? Pharaoh?”

  Pharaoh smiles. Takes his hand. Manages not to wince as her palm is squeezed. “Afraid so, sir.”

  “Delighted you’re still with us. Delighted! No shortage of people who would have taken a month off for stress, and yet here you are! Back at work and ready to lead. Impressive. Inspiring!”

  Pharaoh gives a little half-laugh, unsure how to deal with this onslaught of optimism.

  “I just want to catch the bastards,” she says, deciding to just be herself. “Hope the powers that be let me do that.”

  Tressider gives a nod of understanding. Taps his nose with a plump finger. “We never spoke,” he says, winking. “This conversation never happened. But don’t you worry. I like your style.”

  There is a moment’s silence. “Can we help you with something, sir?”

  Tressider gives them both a warm smile. “No, no, was just here for another meeting and thought I would show my face. Wanted to check you were all fit and healthy and raring to go. I hope I can trust you to keep me informed, and you can trust me to keep my nose out, yes?”

  Both officers smile, and he shakes their hands again, even more vigorously than before. McAvoy glances over his shoulder at where Detective Chief Superintendent Davey is a picture of bewildered misery. As he looks back, he sees that the chairman’s eyes have swiveled toward McAvoy’s computer screen.

  “Interesting?” he asks, nodding at the screen. “A lead?”

  McAvoy finds himself doing an odd thing with his mouth. Licks his lips. Twitches. Colors instantly. Remembers why h
e never plays poker.

  “Just something I thought was worth checking out . . .”

  “Show me.”

  He clicks on the story he had tried to cover up when he sensed Pharaoh’s approach. The Hull Daily Mail article on the death of Simon Appleyard. Pharaoh, as in the dark as Tressider, reads halfway down and turns to McAvoy. He meets her eye purely through fear that, were he to look anywhere else, his view may take in her cleavage.

  “Pet project?” she whispers.

  McAvoy opens his mouth. Closes it again. Hangs his head. “It’s just something that doesn’t feel right.”

  He had found the story during a halfhearted Google search on his midmorning break. It made him sad. The telephone’s owner has an identity now. McAvoy has been reading the words of a real person. A loving, gregarious, confused young man who wrapped a cord around his neck and squeezed his own life away.

  “The way he writes . . .”

  McAvoy struggles to put it into words. Cannot explain why, from the outset, he has felt such unease.

  “Writes?” asks Tressider.

  “There’s something about his death that troubles me,” he says, and he feels sweat prickling on his forehead. Can picture two men standing by the River Hull in the pouring rain. Can see the phone sitting on the mud. Can see himself slithering down the dock wall to pick up the device that has led him here. Wonders what the fuck he was thinking and how badly this will end.

  “Follow your gut, my boy,” says Tressider, and he appears to lose interest. “You can’t go wrong if you do that. Anyway, it’s been a pleasure. Mrs. Pharaoh, I look forward to our next meeting, and, Aector—did I get that right?—I’m delighted to hear you’re unharmed. Do keep me posted.”

  He turns away. Gathers up Davey the way a tornado snatches cattle, and bangs out of the door like a benign storm.

  “I’m thinking about hurting you,” says Pharaoh eventually. “I’m not going to do it, but there will be a part of me this afternoon that will regret not punching you in the head, I hope you realize that.”

  McAvoy looks down. Keeps quiet.

  “Were you going to tell me?” she asks.

  “There was nothing to tell. Not really.”

  She gives a frustrated sigh. “Like we’re not busy enough.”

  “I can do it on my own time.”

  “You haven’t got any time, Aector. You’re up to your eyes in drug dealers and babies. It was only yesterday that bugger told us he wanted violent crime stats down inside a quarter. And now you want to turn a suicide into a murder investigation?”

  “It just needs a bit of a dig, guv . . .”

  Pharaoh throws her hands up. Looks at the closed door, as if Tressider were still there. She shrugs. Appears to reach a decision.

  “Fuck it. I’m only on peripherals. And the boss said to follow your gut. Give it a dig. And if you balls-up the crime statistics, it was all Colin Ray’s fault. Deal?”

  McAvoy smiles.

  “Deal.”

  • • •

  THE ELEMENTS have made Hull a city of gargoyles. McAvoy has never seen so many faces locked in grimaces. Attractive office workers snarl into the driving wind. Shoppers popping to Marks & Spencer to pick up their evening microwave meal gurn angrily at the rain. The entire Old Town seems to be wincing.

  It is just gone lunchtime. Whitefriargate, here on the periphery of the city center’s nucleus, should be bustling with shoppers. Instead, the weather has forced everybody indoors. McAvoy has the broad, attractive shopping street to himself. He’s one of the few people who bother to look up. Lets his eyes roam past the first floor and enjoys the architecture: the handsome old mercantile palaces that lead down to the Museums Quarter and the waterfront. Enjoys the ornate frontage of the bank on the corner of Parliament Street. Lets himself daydream a little. To imagine this street when Hull was living its best days rather than remembering them.

  He’s glad he walked. Likes to feel the city beneath his feet. Wishes the destination were farther away.

  The files from the Simon Appleyard case have not yet been electronically input, and the paper copies are still at the Coroner’s Court. He is enjoying the walk. Looking forward to an hour or two in a quiet room, immersing himself in the final moments of a prematurely ended life.

  His booted feet leave large prints on cobbles that seem to have been dyed the color of varnished clay by the incessant rain.

  The smell of spit-roast chicken assails him from the butcher’s shop. He realizes he has not eaten since yesterday. Makes a mental note to admit this to Roisin when he gets home, so as not to be accused of hiding things from her, and then wonders if it would be kinder to conceal it so she does not feel pressurized into making him something as soon as he walks in. Wonders if she will think that he is trying to make her feel guilty. Whether it would not just be easier to tell her that last night they went to the dance class so he could find out why somebody had buried a mobile phone.

  He wonders if this is how other people feel. Wishes, just once, he had a clue how to live.

  He continues to salsa in his mind as he makes his way to the attractively named Land of Green Ginger. The little side street is home to two pubs, a legal office, a beauty salon, and a courtroom, though not all of these facilities are mentioned by the leasing agents who try to flog the seemingly endless apartment developments springing up in this part of the Old Town.

  He prepares his speech in his head. Wonders if they could help him. Just needs a quick favor. McAvoy knows a couple of the ladies at the Coroner’s Court and feels instantly embarrassed when he acknowledges that they will probably cooperate for no other reason than they like him.

  He can feel the wind and rain doing him good. Breathes deeply. Enjoys the scent of distant sea spray and motor oil. Inhales the greasy aromas of the butcher’s, the sandwich shops. Sucks in a lungful of the ever-present cloud of cigarette smoke that hangs outside the dark blue door of the amusements as the punters spend their slot-machine winnings on tobacco and five-for-a-pound lighters.

  He wonders if he loves this city or wishes it dead.

  The phone in his inside pocket rings and he ducks into the doorway of a trendy new clothes shop to take the call.

  “DS McAvoy, Serious and Organized.”

  “Sergeant Arthurs, Silly and Slapdash.”

  McAvoy moves to one side to allow two teenage girls access to the shop. Despite the weather, they have bare legs beneath short, pleated skirts, and their hooded jumpers are soaked through. He wants to know whether they should be in school. Whether they are okay. How old they are. What they want. Whether they’re safe . . .

  “Thanks for calling me back, Sergeant,” he says, forcing himself to turn his eyes back to the street. “It’s about an incident you attended last November.”

  “Yep, you said in your message,” Arthurs says brightly. McAvoy has not met the uniformed officer, but from his voice fancies he is in early middle age and almost certainly a dad.

  “Simon Appleyard.”

  “I’m sorry, can you give me a little more . . .”

  “The hanging at Springfield Court. You attended.”

  “Oh, right,” says Sergeant Arthurs, recollection dawning. “Yes, sad one, that. The landlord found him, I think. Inquest was just a few weeks back. Open verdict, wasn’t it?”

  McAvoy nods, and realizes the other man cannot see it. “Yes,” he says. “What can you tell me?”

  “Well, it’s not that exciting,” says the other policeman. “The landlord needed to get in to read the meter. Couldn’t get any answer. Let himself in, and there he was. Dead in the kitchen. Slumped forward on his knees. I think the rope was tied to a knife rack on the wall. He’d been there a few days. Me and Shelley Dalston attended. WPC Dalston. You know her?”

  “No,” he says, not wanting to be sidetracked. “I’m on my way to look at your report ri
ght now, actually. Can you give me the abridged version?”

  Sergeant Arthurs gives a little laugh. “The highlights? Well, he was naked, there’s a start for you. Oh, and he was covered in baby oil. Proper covered in the stuff. What else do you want to know? There was no note, I can tell you that much.”

  McAvoy looks up at the sky. The clouds remind him of curbside snow; bulging and dirty white.

  “What’s in the forensics report?”

  “Well, the whole thing went up to CID after we did our bit, and they gave it about five minutes of their valuable time. When the inquest was coming up, I asked a couple of questions on what had come of it all. Pathologist said cause of death was strangulation. Earned her money that day, eh?”

  Across the road, a smartly dressed man appears from the glass-fronted doorway of a legal office. He pushes open a large gold umbrella that almost knocks over a middle-aged woman who is struggling with something heavy in an Argos bag. McAvoy wills the man to apologize. To admit his mistake and help her. To be good. Watches the man walk away.

  “Was there anything on his computer, do you know? Was it sent to the tech unit?”

  “No computer as far as I can recall,” says Arthurs. “That’s almost a story in itself these days. I don’t think he had much in the way of family, though. I seem to recall he was into dancing, if that’s any good to you. What exactly is it you’re looking into?”

  McAvoy had hoped the question would not be asked, but was prepared for it. “Another police service has been in touch,” he lies. “CID in Berkshire have got two apparent suicides. There’s a chance they were logging on to a website where people could share tips on how to bump yourself off.”

  “And they think our lad might have done that? No, like I say, no laptop.”

  “No phone?”

  “Not that we could see. His next of kin lives a few miles away, so it was another force that broke the news. His auntie came to ID him. Lovely lady . . .”

  “Did you ask her about his phone?”