Blood Feud (Little Town)

by JD Nixon

  And that was how the Super found us.

  The first hint of her arrival was a loud burst of wailing from her car’s siren as it skidded to a halt, mere centimetres from the mob. Considering her driver was Bum Bunion (or Burn Grunion as his parents named him), a detective constable with less smarts than a clod of grass, I was pretty sure that was merely a lucky coincidence rather than any type of precision driving.

  The Super leapt out of the car and stood with her hands on her hips surveying the melee with contemptuous disbelief. She didn’t hold much of an opinion of the town or its occupants. I wasn’t surprised that she came in person. A suspicious death in her district always attracted her personal attention. That’s what made her such a good commander.

  “Fuck me dead,” she trumpeted. “What a sight! Looks as if someone put moonshine in the water supply again.”

  Fortunately for us, she’d brought a couple of uniforms along and they soon pulled up in their patrol car, wasting no time in coming to our assistance. Bum also waded into the middle. He clutched the collars of one of the townsfolk and one of the Bycrafts in a choking hold in each hand, driving them to the edge of the crowd, where he thrust them away, sending them tumbling with no dignity into the dirt. Then he moved back in and did it again with another couple.

  Between the five of us, we eventually managed to separate everyone, barely a person, including us, left unbruised and unbloodied. It was not one of Little Town’s proudest moments.

  The Super watched on with scornful interest, but didn’t intervene. Neither did the pair of Big Town detectives she’d assigned to the case who stood next to her with crossed arms, shouting out annoying instructions. I’d been hoping it would be Mr X and his partner Zelda who’d be given the case, but it was one of the old-hands, Gil, a dark-skinned, liquid-eyed man. He was joined by a dee I’d never met before, Nathan, a giant, sandy-haired man with an unsmiling countenance so craggy you could abseil down it.

  When the dust settled, the Super regarded everyone coldly, her blue eyes sharply frosty, her blonde hair as soft and neat as a tangle of barbed wire. Judging from her curled lip and rumpled brow, she was clearly in a foul mood, not an uncommon state for her. I had my fingers crossed that she hadn’t given up smoking again – if she had, she would make sure everyone suffered along with her.

  She first addressed the townsfolk, her face creased with disgust. “What the fuck is the matter with you people? Is it a full moon or something? God knows my esteem for this shithole of a town was already smaller than an ant’s arsehole, but this,” and she waved her hand around at the panting mob, “is just breathtaking dumbfuckery at its worst. So unless you people want to be obediently bending over for a hairy stranger in the Wattling Bay watch house tonight, I suggest you quickly make yourselves scarce.”

  They slinked away individually and in pairs, increasingly embarrassed and ashamed by their actions. There would be a lot of regrets in town tomorrow. I only hoped they didn’t come with any retaliation.

  She next turned her attention to the Bycrafts. “And you pieces of arse-scum can just fuck off back to your troll caves before I remember all the hundreds of reasons you should be rotting in jail.” Despite their half-hearted attempts at defiant backchat that earned a few of them another scruff-choking from Bum, they too decided that their wisest choice was to slither away.

  Then it was our turn for a blistering. I didn’t know how the Sarge was feeling, but when those blue eyes landed on me, I swallowed nervously. She contemplated us for a few long minutes, her eyes shifting between the Sarge and me. But instead of saying anything, she strode away, under the crime tape, towards the house. And somehow that seemed even worse than being yelled at.

  “You two,” she shouted over her shoulder, indicating the uniforms she’d brought with her. “Guard the perimeter.” They took up post each side of the driveway. “The rest of you get your arses up here now. Forensics will arrive any second.”

  She stopped at the stairs, staring at Greg Bycraft. “What’s this dickhead doing here?”

  “Um,” I spoke up, desperately marshalling my thoughts, trying to think of a good way to break the news to her. “He entered the house, ma’am, so I detained him for questioning.”

  She spun around, fixing steely eyes on me. “What did you say?”

  I swallowed and I was positive everyone must have heard it. “He . . . he entered the house, ma’am.”

  She swore under her breath. “Did he touch anything?”

  My cheeks began to burn, and I suddenly wished I was anywhere else except here. “Yes, ma’am. He touched . . . um, everything. He touched everything.”

  “He what?”

  A heavy dread settled on me. “He touched everything, ma’am.”

  She crossed her arms and glared at me. “Let me get this straight. You allowed an unauthorised person to enter a crime scene where you then proceeded to let him touch ‘everything’.”

  “I didn’t –”

  “You weren’t asked to speak, Senior Constable!” she roared. Nobody opened their mouth or moved. I completely stopped breathing for a few ticks of the clock. “Do you have any comprehension of how many ways you have probably fucked up this crime scene?”

  I didn’t dare respond, not sure if she expected an answer from me or not, but not willing to risk it.

  “Ma’am, we had –” started the Sarge.

  “I don’t remember asking you for your opinion, Sergeant!” she shouted at him. “I don’t have a flea’s balls worth of interest in listening to what either of you have to say for yourself. All I’m interested in is that two of my so-called experienced officers, who obviously don’t know shit about policing, have probably fucked up a murder investigation before it even started.”

  After a further few minutes of scalding from her white-hot anger, she spun on her heel and stalked to the front door. “Save me from fucking amateur hour.”

  At the door, she stopped and turned to face us again. None of us had moved. “I need someone competent to come in to show me the crime scene, but I guess you’ll have to do instead, Maguire.” His mouth tightened at the insult. “And you,” she nodded her head towards me, “can go buy us some coffees. I presume you’re capable of doing that without fucking it up.”

  The Sarge threw me a sympathetic glance as I sidled quietly down the stairs, my cheeks blazing with shame. Kevin fell into step next to me without a word. In the patrol car I sat for a few moments, clutching the steering wheel, my eyes squeezed tight. That reprimand had been my most painful professional experience, made a hundred times worse by the fact that it had been Fiona who’d ripped me a new one. Normally so supportive of me, her anger stang like salt on a wound. And on top of the shock of discovering Miss G, it all just felt a little too much to bear.

  A hesitant hand rested on my shoulder, followed by a few awkward pats. I opened my eyes and managed a watery smile.

  “Really . . . you know . . . unfair. That crowd . . .” He seemed genuinely upset on my behalf.

  I pulled myself together and started the car, reversing down the driveway. We waited a few moments for the other uniforms to untie the crime tape to let us pass.

  “No, harsh as it seems, the Super’s not being completely unfair. Her point’s valid. Because the Sarge and I didn’t secure the scene properly, the investigation might now be totally compromised. She doesn’t care why we didn’t secure it, only that it wasn’t secured. That infuriates her, and in a way I’m kind of glad that it does because it means she cares about finding some justice for Miss G. She’ll make sure her detective team works hard on the case. And I know it’s not personal – she’d give anyone in this situation a good bollocking.”

  “I guess I didn’t think of it like that.” I looked over, surprised at him stringing an entire sentence together. He glanced back shyly, blushing. “I think you and Sergeant Maguire did the best you could in those circumstances.”

  “Sometimes the best you can do is not good enough, Kevin. And believe me, when it i
sn’t, the Super will be there to let you know about it,” I replied dryly. “You probably noticed that she doesn’t pull her punches.”

  And as if witnessing me getting into trouble (yet again) made me more human to him, he finally began to relax around me, and we even managed to have a conversation of sorts. At Frannie’s bakery/cafe, I hurried through the order, clumsily avoiding answering any questions, afraid of saying a word about the murder in case the Super found out.

  When we returned with the coffees, the forensics team was bustling around while Gil and Nathan grilled Greg Bycraft. The Super stood on the verandah in discussion with Dr Fenn. She eyed me as I silently handed her a coffee, not quite successfully hiding the miserable, but mutinous, expression on my face. Despite what I’d said earlier to Kevin, I did think that she’d been unfair to totally blame me for what had happened. And she didn’t have to chew me out in public like that.

  “Who exactly was inside this house when and after you discovered the victim?” she asked, tapping an impatient toe before I even had a second to arrange my thoughts to answer her.

  “Initially Kevin and I, then the Sarge and Dr Fenn.” I paused, embarrassed. “And Greg Bycraft. That’s all.”

  “Who the fuck’s Kevin?”

  “The recruit from the academy.”

  She groaned. “Don’t tell me that you . . . Actually, do me a favour and just don’t tell me. It would make my life easier if I simply didn’t know some things about you. But you and that kid need to give your fingerprints to forensics.”

  “Mine are already on file, ma’am.”

  “I couldn’t give a shit if they’re imprinted on the Police Commissioner’s dick. Give them again.” She blinked twice, expecting me to have moved in that nanosecond. “I mean now.”

  “Of course you do, ma’am.”

  “Tess, you’re not in any position to be giving me attitude today. Remember that.”

  My gaze was steady. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “You’ve been hanging around with Maguire too long. I’m not putting up with that polite insolence from you as well.”

  “I don’t know what you mean, ma’am,” I lied.

  “He is not a good influence on you.”

  “With all respect, I have to disagree with you, ma’am.”

  She considered me closely for some moments as if measuring my precise level of attitude on some internal device she possessed – a sort of sassometer. “And then you can give your initial statement to the dees. I want to know exactly what the house looked like inside, down to the minutest detail, down to the precise location of every drop of fly shit before Greg Bycraft was set loose inside.” Spoken accusingly, as though I’d deliberately released him from a cage to wreak havoc on her crime scene.

  “Of course, ma’am.”

  She shot me an admonishing look. “I’m warning you, Tess. My patience today is limited.” That was a blatant untruth because her patience was non-existent at the best of times.

  Thinking better of any further response, I gathered Kevin and trundled us over to forensics to have our prints taken. The Big Town police had recently upgraded to digital fingerprinting and had invested in a unit back at the watch house as well as a very expensive mobile unit.

  “Thanks, guys,” said one of the more experienced crime scene officers cheerfully, a woman with the appropriate name of Karen Killington. “You’re the last of the suspects to be printed.”

  “We’re not suspects,” I retorted grumpily, not in the mood for her perkiness. In my humble opinion it was wrong for a crime scene officer to ever be perky. They should be sombre and serious, just like their jobs. “We were the first on the scene.”

  “Then you’re obviously the guilty parties,” she smiled. “Everyone knows that.”

  “We’re not guilty of anything.”

  She laughed as she packed away the unit. “That’s what they all say until they’re arrested. See you on the evening news!” And I discovered there is something worse than a perky crime scene officer – and that’s one who thinks she’s funny.

  After Kevin and I gave our statements to the dees, we waited for further instructions. Forensics were fully occupied, Dr Fenn had left to return to the prison, the Big Town uniforms faced no trouble from the scattered number of spectators not earlier involved in the brawl, the coroner’s van had come and gone, taking Miss G away to the public mortuary in Big Town for an autopsy. The Super assigned all four of us uniforms, as well as Kevin and Bum, the inglorious task of combing the large, overgrown yard for any discarded weapon.

  As the light faded and Venus appeared brightly in the evening sky, we had to give up the search, all six of us sporting some scratches from the wild garden. The Big Town staff prepared to leave town, taking Greg Bycraft with them for further questioning. The Super wouldn’t return tomorrow, but Gil, Nathan, and the forensics team would. It was a long drive for them each way, but they were grateful not to have to spend one more second in this town than necessary. And after what they’d witnessed earlier, I really couldn’t blame them.

  Before she climbed back into her car, the Super approached me. I froze, worried about what I’d done wrong now, even though I’d spent hours diligently searching for a knife. But instead of another bollocking, she took one of my hands in hers and squeezed, her hard blue eyes softening slightly.

  “I know today has been an absolute shit for you, Tess. I know you were fond of Miss Greville and I’m sorry you had to be the one to discover her like that. But the best thing we can do for her now is to find her killer and throw that fucker in jail. And maybe we already have him in custody?” She paused, looking back at the house, its silhouette darkening against the early evening sky. “But I don’t know . . . It wouldn’t surprise me if it was a Bycraft, but it doesn’t smell like a Bycraft. Do you know what I mean?”

  She’d built her career on solving crimes involving Bycrafts, so she knew them almost as well as I did. I respected her opinion about them every bit as much as she respected mine.

  “I do, ma’am. And I agree with you. It just doesn’t smell like a Bycraft.”

  “The Bycrafts are animalistic and reckless, but this is something more. Beyond that. Different somehow. There are fingerprints everywhere in that house. It’s as if the killer had no concern about being caught. And the Bycrafts all share an instinct for self-preservation, no matter how thick they are otherwise. Which, unfortunately, only makes Greg Bycraft’s story more plausible to me.” She tightened her grip on my hand. “What you need to do tonight is to have a glass of wine, a long bath, a little cry, and then call Jake over. A mind-blowing fuck is the best thing in the world for getting over shocks like this. Call it an affirmation of life or whatever crapola you like, but just make sure you call him. He has just the dangly specialised equipment you need to help you forget all about today.”

  That brought a reluctant half-smile to my lips. “Thanks for the advice, Fiona, but Jakey’s working tonight. That won’t be happening.”

  “Pity. Better make it two glasses of wine then. But no more than that though, do you hear me? You’re no good with grog and I don’t want Maguire taking advantage of you while you’re legless.”

  “Fiona –” I began to complain about the injustice to both the Sarge and me in that comment, but her ringing phone interrupted our conversation. She pulled it out and checked the screen, rolling her eyes as she recognised the number.

  “Bloody hell! It’s those numbnuts from the city riding my arse about my budget again. They’re claiming I spent too much this month on toilet paper. Can you believe it – fucking toilet paper! Talk about getting your priorities straight. I’m going to tell them that we’ll just switch to using memos from the Police Commissioner instead. That should shut the dumb arsewipes up.”

  And without another word, she and Bum sped off, glad to shake the dust of Little Town from their shoes, swiftly followed by the dees and forensics. The Sarge, Kevin, and I made our weary way back to the station, where they abandoned me, haring up to
the police house for hot showers and a nice dinner to celebrate Kevin’s last night in town. He’d be up bright and early tomorrow morning to drive the seven hours back to the city, hopefully having learned something about policing in the time he’d been here, apart from how futile it could be in a town full of Bycrafts.

  When they left, I sat at my desk, too dispirited to make a move for home myself. I thought about Miss G and the relationship we’d shared all through my life, including the dealings the Sarge and I’d had with her on his first week in town all those months ago. I couldn’t suppress the tears that welled in my eyes and trickled down my cheeks. It felt right to cry for her – a lovely, harmless, placid soul who’d always lent a helping hand when she could and had a kind word for most. I wondered if she’d been awake when she was attacked and thought of how frightened she must have been if she was. Life was so unfair sometimes. It seemed to me that the greedy and heartless prospered in this world while the gentle and generous were ground into the dirt, time and time again.

  I didn’t know how long I sat there mulling over life, but it was quite dark outside when the bell rang and the back door to the station opened. I jumped to my feet, hastily swiping at my eyes with the heels of my palms and reaching for my gun. I relaxed when I saw it was only the Sarge, freshly showered and dressed in jeans and a t-shirt.

  “I came to see if you want to join us for . . . Oh Tessie, my girl,” he said when he set eyes on me. “Come here.”

  And he strode over, wrapping his arms around me. I leaned against him and quietly let my tears run their course, punctuated frequently with giant soggy breaths as he rubbed my back.

  “I know how upset you must be, having known Miss Greville all your life,” he consoled, awkwardly reaching down to pull out some tissues from the box. “It’s not fair what happened to her. She didn’t deserve that and the best thing we can do for her now is to catch whoever did it.”

  “That’s what Fiona said.”