Justice Delayed

by David Field

  ‘There’s no easy way to tell you, and I won’t insult your intelligence. She has breast cancer, I’m afraid.’

  ‘How long has she got?’ Dave asked, white-faced and stunned, but somehow relieved that it was finally identified.

  ‘It’s nothing like that at the moment, but she has to have both breasts removed. You can imagine the psychological blow that must be to a woman.’

  ‘It’s not as if they’re her greatest asset anyway,’ Dave blurted out without thinking through the implications. ‘It’s her I love, not her tits.’

  ‘I was obliged to say the same to Alison when she cracked up passing on Joy’s news. May I suggest that you go straight back to Joy’s place and tell her what you just told me?’

  ‘She was still asleep when I left, so she might not have gone to work today. But don’t you need me here?’

  ‘Don’t make me say anything to dent your ego. Just go home – now.’

  ‘OK – and – er – thanks, Mike. I may have thought of you as a bastard once but now ... ’

  ‘Yeah, I know – now you’re convinced. Go on – piss off home.’

  The door closed behind him, and Mike heaved a great sigh of relief and opened the file. Then he realised that he needed coffee, and might even force down a yoghurt. The file could wait, for once.

  Twenty minutes later, as the outer office came slowly alive, he began to read the P1 folio that Geoff had left for him the previous evening, which Jeremy Giles had obviously regarded as so significant. It told a familiar enough tale, via a newspaper clipping from a Carlisle daily paper.

  After deliberating for two days, the jury in the Clive Tasker trial returned a verdict of “Guilty” shortly before 3.30pm yesterday. Mr Justice Belton, handing down a life sentence, told Tasker that he had been found guilty of the worst crime that a man could commit, and that he hoped the life sentence which he was about to impose would bring some closure of a sort to the members of the Brooks family who had sat in court for the entire trial. Carolyn Tasker’s mother, Mrs Emily Brooks, sobbed quietly and was comforted by her younger daughter as Tasker sat motionless in the dock, occasionally shaking his head gently, as if in disbelief.

  As previously reported, the body of Mrs Tasker was found hanging in an outbuilding of the farm she managed along with her husband Clive by a group of hikers who had called in at the farm hoping to buy some provisions. She had been dead for only a few hours, and her husband was unable to account for his movements in the hours prior to her death. Friends told the jury of their tempestuous relationship in the months leading to the death of Mrs Tasker, who had recently resigned from her teaching post at Scotforth Comprehensive School in Lancaster after blowing the whistle on a clandestine and shadowy ‘club’ that had been formed among senior students. It is believed that their Ambleside farming business was experiencing financial difficulties, adding to the strain on their marriage.

  ‘Did you read it, sir?’ Geoff enquired, his head round the door.

  ‘Just finished, but why did it attract Jeremy Giles? And for that matter, what made you single it out? Looks pretty straightforward to me.’

  ‘Read the crime scene sheet in the same file,’ Geoff advised him, as he came fully into the office and helped himself to a seat. Mike pulled out the familiar looking sheet, then whistled in appreciation as he took in the detail.

  According to the more detailed crime report that Geoff had downloaded from Cumbria Police via the PNC, Mrs Tasker’s body bore marks of manual strangulation prior to her having been suspended from a beam in the tractor shed. She was only partly clothed, and on the wall beside her body had been scrawled, in what was later confirmed to be her own blood, the words ‘U are a slut’. Geoff had highlighted the ‘U’ in yellow marker pen, and he could have a point. At all events, it was their first lead.

  ‘I presume that Jeremy Giles somehow got access to the information in the crime sheet. It may have come out at the trial, course, but my bet would be on the late Mr Giles having friends on the force. But that still doesn’t explain how he knew to ask. Anyway, find out where Tasker’s being held now, and we’ll pay him a visit on Monday.’

  ‘We, sir?’

  ‘DI Petrie’s going to be taking some home leave, I suspect,’ Mike replied, ‘and in any case he’s got his hands full with the Troy Lesley angle. So it’s you and me, I think.’

  ‘Cathy will be jealous.’

  ‘And that’s precisely why it’ll be you and me. I’m well aware of the rumours flying around this place about the precise nature of our relationship, and wherever they’ve got Tasker will almost certainly require an overnighter. So come in on Monday with an overnight bag ready packed.’

  ‘Very good, sir.’

  Then it was on to the El Zarw file, with only limited interest. A second generation Arab with long-standing family connections to Brampton, he’d possessed excellent references in 2009, since when he had begun work for the Council as a security guard in a variety of civic establishments. Only one black mark on his work record – a formal caution for developing what was described as an ‘inappropriate’ relationship with an usherette at the Civic Theatre, which seemed to have led to his involuntary transfer to the Central Library, and that was it. No criminal history, obviously, since security personnel were tightly vetted these days, unless they worked in nightclubs, at the bottom of the security food chain. Nothing to suggest that he had a motive for covering up his private encounter with Troy Lesley in the security office while awaiting the arrival of the police, so – all in all – a bit of a dead end.

  He got a call from Dave Petrie around mid-morning.

  ‘Just checking in, in case there’s anything that requires my attention.’

  ‘All that requires your attention at the moment is a lady who’s no doubt feeling very sorry for herself.’

  ‘She’s still sleeping at the moment, and I’m bored already. Sorry if that sounds ungrateful; I really do owe you one for this.’

  ‘Are you still planning to play golf on Sunday?’

  ‘I normally do, but I’m not sure if I will this Sunday, in the circumstances. Why, you changed your mind?’

  ‘Definitely not, but my son Steven’s coming home for a long weekend, and he’s recently taken up golf. I thought that a few lessons from you might brighten up his dull weekend with the old farts.’

  ‘Unless you hear to the contrary, tell him Beechmere Lawns Golf Club, eleven am Sunday. But no guarantees.’

  ‘Thanks for that. Look, today’s Thursday - why don’t you take tomorrow off and come in on Monday, if Joy’s feeling better then? I’ll be sure to let you know if anything comes up, and it looks as if this Troy Lesley angle’s going nowhere anyway.’

  ‘What did you make of the personnel file?’

  ‘The bloke looks pretty squeaky clean to me – no reason to think he’d be interested in Troy’s USB. My first guess was probably the right one – Troy gave him cheek, he over-reacted, and then panicked when the Uniforms enquired how Troy had come by his injuries.’

  ‘My thoughts too. Hang on, sounds as if Joy’s stirring. I need to put the kettle on.’

  ‘It won’t go with your shirt,’ Mike joked back. ‘Look after your invalid, and see you Wednesday, probably. I’m taking Geoff on a prison visit on Monday, and that might spill over into Tuesday.’

  ‘Remember to bring him back. OK, see you.’

  Mike put the phone down, and looked into the empty outer office. His rumbling stomach told him that it was yoghurt time, and he could murder another coffee.

  Down in the Dining Hall, he winced inwardly as Cathy came eagerly over to where he stood in the queue, and excitedly pointed out every single flavour of yoghurt in the display cabinet. He was aware of many eyes drifting their way, and the odd nudge and smirk, and he wondered how he could politely invite her to back off, if only to save her own reputation on the force. Then he heaved a sigh of relief as Geoff came over as well, and made it look like an ‘all-office’ event. Then it was back upstairs,
and into the other folios left behind by the late Jeremy Giles, while Cathy and Geoff continued their romp through the PNC.

  Folio 2 was another newspaper clipping, this time from Newcastle, where a prostitute had been found hanging in the wash-house area of a very seedy block of units near the docks. Nothing to connect her with the crew that had lynched Ursula Winthrop, so far as he could see, only a reference to her known connections with a suspected Lebanese drug syndicate. All the same, something must have made a connection in Giles’s brain, and Mike stepped into the doorway and asked Cathy to check on the PNC. He was halfway through Folio 3 when her eager face appeared in front of his desk.

  ‘She had form here in Brampton,’ she enthused. ‘Loitering, drug pushing, and police assault during some sort of demonstration in the late nineties. But no letter “U” at the crime scene, unfortunately. Perhaps they changed their calling cards more recently.’

  ‘Name?’

  ‘Real name Jasmin Ballantyne. Street name “Soraya”. Looked a bit woggie, apparently, so I guess she traded on the “dusky desert maiden” look.’

  ‘OK, write down her full personal details, including last known Brampton address, and we’ll see if her antecedents lie somewhere other than a Bedouin camp in the Syrian desert.’

  ‘Did you enjoy that peach yoghurt, by the way?’

  ‘I did, actually – the best I’ve tasted so far. The raspberry’s a bit tart for my taste, and the strawberry’s too sweet.’

  ‘You can get them in natural flavour too. Drop a handful of mint in there, stir it in, and it’s just like tzatziki, except for the cucumber.’

  ‘Jasmin Ballantyne, Detective Constable.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ she grinned as she backed out of the office.

  She was back a few minutes later, with Jasmin Ballantyne’s last known Brampton address, in Unswell Green. Making a mental note that the residents of that notorious slum had been decanted into the Carswell, where Dave had recently demonstrated his skill with a taser, Mike thanked Cathy, put the paper to one side, and tried yet again to work out the significance of Folio 3.

  Why the Hell was Giles interested in a railway suicide in Chesterfield in 1992? Victim a Charlie Renshaw, in his late thirties, a plate-layer with no obvious reasons for lying down in front of an up-line night mail train at two o’clock in the morning. Coroner’s verdict the usual ‘suicide while the balance of his mind was disturbed’ bromide, and that was it. But the address in Clay Cross had been highlighted in yellow, and Mike made another entry on the list of names he was preparing for Brandon Tait, then walked out with a further scribbled note for Geoff.

  ‘See if Derbyshire can shed any more light on this one, would you? Can’t for the life of me see why Giles would have been interested in it.’

  ‘Will do, sir. By the way,’ he added, nodding down at the blue plastic item on his desk, ‘some clerk from “Property” brought this up a while ago, and said you’d asked for it.’

  Mike picked it up briefly, read the label, and put it in his pocket with the intention of taking it through to his office.

  ‘It’s Troy Lesley’s USB, the one that used to belong to Jeremy Giles. I’ll go through it later, but presumably it just reproduces what we got from his hard drive.’

  ‘About Monday, sir. Looks like we’ll be heading for Skelton Moor.’

  ‘And where the Hell’s that, when it’s at home?’

  ‘Upper Teesdale, just south of Barnard Castle. It’s an open prison farm. Seems that our Clive Tasker turned out to be a model prisoner, and his farming skills have been put to good use.’

  ‘Definitely an over-nighter. And I know it’s July, but bring something windproof. Those northern moors don’t recognise Summer, as I can ruefully report from a holiday I had with my wife two years ago. Two days in York, three days in Scarborough, two days in Whitby and five days in bed with pneumonia.’

  ‘It’s a bit further west than that, sir.’

  ‘Even so. And since you obviously know where it is, you can navigate, and I’ll drive.’

  ‘I got my navigator’s badge in the Sea Cadets, sir,’ Cathy offered.

  ‘I got my advanced knots badge in the cubs, but that doesn’t mean I can tie my own shoelaces some mornings,’ Mike replied. ‘And someone has to navigate through the rest of the PNC while we’re away.’

  ‘Sir,’ was her somewhat sullen response as he walked back to read Folio P5, forgetting all about the USB in his pocket.

  ‘About as impenetrable as the rest’, he grumbled to himself as he made a note of the name nevertheless, then glanced up at the clock. He planned to go down to lunch early, hopefully to escape Cathy’s eagerness in the queue. He just had time to speed-read the key details regarding a fiery car crash on a remote country road on Exmoor – two deaths this time – and then the ’phone rang.

  ‘Front desk here, sir. There’s a Mr Tait here asking for you. Apparently he has an appointment.’

  ‘Indeed he does. Give him a seat, and I’ll collect him on my way to the Dining Hall.’

  He breezed through the outer office with a cheery smile.

  ‘About to take a genealogist to lunch downstairs. I’ve asked him to trace the ancestry of the sausage rolls. If you come down while I’m still with him, give us some elbow room – I’ve got a lot to bring him up to speed on, and he could be crucial in this case.’

  Half an hour later, Brandon smiled as he forked carefully through his fish pie.

  ‘It’s not unusual for clients to take me to lunch, but this is the first time I’ve taken on the culinary challenge of a police canteen.’

  ‘We like to refer to it as a “Dining Hall”,’ Mike advised him, ‘and I can assure you that the meat pies are promoted in order of seniority. And if I may unsubtly change the subject, you got here a lot earlier than I expected.’

  ‘A lot earlier that I expected, too. I’m not sure if it was the efficiency of our modern motorway network, the early breakfast, or the prospect of spending a couple of weeks with a seemingly insatiable pathologist, but – here I am. So what do you have for me?’

  ‘Two ends of a dark tunnel which may or may not meet in the middle. At one end, I want you to trace the ancestry of a number of people whose names, addresses and dates of birth I can supply at the outset. The other end – and don’t choke on your fish pie, but watch out for the bones anyway – are a couple of women in the Seventeenth Century who, along with their descendents, may have been conducting a very fatal vendetta with the ancestors of the first lot. I need you to find out who their descendents might have been.’

  Brandon smiled.

  ‘It’ll make a change from proving that some bank under-manager in Swindon had a distant great great uncle who was transported to Australia, where he became a leading politician. Not to mention the almost weekly Internet trudge through the Public Records Office for war heroes in the First World War trenches.’

  ‘So you’re happy to take it on?’

  ‘I can’t answer that for certain until you finish treating that ham salad like some sort of delicate archeological dig, take me to your lair and show me the target.’

  Mike had noticed Geoff and Cathy in the lunch queue, and an empty office would make it easier, so he pushed the plate away and stood up.

  ‘First of all, we’ll get you a “Visitor’s” pass, so that you’re not challenged in every corridor you walk down, then it’s up to the first floor and a couple of whiteboards.’

  First was the whiteboard in the outer office.

  ‘These six individuals in purple all lived in West Brampton Shire in 1615, where they joined forces to lynch a lady who may or may not have been a witch. Her name was Ursula Winthrop, and she’s the one in green. Below her, in red, are two females with the same surname – Abigail and Margaret Winthrop – and my working theory is that they began to take revenge on the ones in purple because they failed to get justice for Ursula’s death. Inside my office, on the other whiteboard, are the names of various recently deceased persons who
may have been related by descent to the ones here in purple. Have I succeeded in losing you yet?’

  ‘Far from it, but I have two preliminary questions. First of all, were the West Shire records transferred to Brampton when it became a county borough, or whatever, and secondly – can I have permanent access to a computer that connects to more than the computer in the next office?’

  ‘Second question answered immediately. You’re standing right next to what will be your desk for as long as you need it. The computer on it goes everywhere short of the moon. I’ll make sure that the two officers who’ll be sharing the office with you don’t disturb you with their idle social chatter. As for the first, you hopefully remember Joy Collins, our other dinner guest from last week, along with her partner Dave? You will also no doubt remember that she holds the Aladdin’s Lamp to all the Bramptonshire records? She’s a bit hors de combat at the moment, but can no doubt rise from her sick bed to open the doors to many corridors of history.’

  ‘A police officer, an actor and a budding poet,’ Brandon smiled. ‘May I begin now?’

  ‘I thought you’d never ask,’ Mike smiled back. ‘But first, come into my inner sanctum and collect the first two victim details.’

  He led the way through the door, waved Brandon into a visitor’s chair, then found the notepad on which he’d written the home addresses of Ethel Pockridge and Emily Baynton.

  ‘As you’ll already have deduced, they’re the most hopeful in terms of tracing the line back to 1615,’ he explained. ‘I’ll feed you the rest as and when you need them, but you’ll need to start from the 1615 end as well, remember.’

  ‘On that point,’ Brandon replied, ‘I need to speak to Joy directly, so that I can navigate my way through the archives. Bitter experience tells me that each council does things its own way, and I can cut out a lot of necessary work if I have a site map in advance.’