Scar Tissue

by Judith Cutler

  ‘And may all his toenails grow in,’ I added with venom.

  We’d drawn a blank before, of course, but I for one was determined that my eyrie’s secrets should be revealed. Without any damage, of course. We tapped and pressed the woodwork, like refugees from a children’s storybook. Perhaps the idea had always been that someone could escape up here from below, not the other way round. But it seemed such a waste.

  ‘Let’s try the roof-space above here, shall we?’ I said at last.

  ‘Thought you’d never ask. Come on!’

  However used to it you’d think we’d get to sizing up spaces, it took us a moment to orientate ourselves. Picking our way to the area we eventually settled on, we peered carefully round. It would be easier to reach it on our hands and knees, because the roof, with its profusion of beams, sloped so much, not to mention the fact that the spaces between the joists weren’t uniform.

  ‘A chimney? Where did that spring from?’ Paula demanded. ‘I don’t remember one down below.’

  ‘You wouldn’t. The one from there comes up over there. This is a little fake, I’ll bet.’ Saying it was one thing, proving it another. Eventually we discovered that the bricks the furthest side had hardly been mortared. A quick wiggle or two, and they came away in our hands.

  ‘Looks like an ordinary chimney down there. It’s even sooty.’ Paula showed a blackened palm.

  ‘Even so, I reckon there’s room to get down there.’

  ‘Only for a child. OK, OK, I know you’re skinny. But I tell you, you’re very tall for a child!’

  ‘All the more for the Fire Brigade to get hold of if I get stuck.’

  For a few long minutes it was touch and go. But then my feet round metal rungs driven into the wall, and – provided my shoulders would squeeze a bit smaller – yes! I could climb down.

  ‘Torch!’ I yelled.

  Nothing happened. No torch. No voice. Nothing.

  ‘A phonecall! What sort of excuse is that!’ I demanded when I’d let myself out of the space in my eyrie. It wasn’t difficult. The rungs stopped at exactly the right level, and as I turned to steady myself my hand rested naturally on a smooth round knob. I didn’t need to do anything – it slid gently down, there was a click, and a panel tipped towards me.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ It was clear she wasn’t. She looked like one of those Halloween pumpkin faces, all lit up from inside. Lesley or Leslie, no doubt.

  ‘Well, now you’ve got your date for tonight sorted, let’s have a proper look, shall we? If you’re up to passing me the torch, that is?’

  This time it was part of the floor we had to move, not easy in a confined space. It didn’t lift, either, but slid, as easily as if it had been oiled, no mean feat in a house where every old timber was slightly out of true. Steep steps descended presumably to the library. But we couldn’t use them. Someone had decided they worked well as shelves. Stacked on each were more bags of what I was sure was cocaine, plus a few packs of what was almost certainly heroin. As I played the torch, we gasped as one. Trussed like a Christmas turkey with blue rope, the sort of rope we used, the sort of rope that had throttled van der Poele’s guest, was a stiff.

  We said it as one. ‘Mr Granville, I presume.’

  The young woman from SOCO was one of the first on the scene. ‘You talked about intelligent use of available space, didn’t you? That looks pretty intelligent to me. Except you found him. I suppose the smell would have given him away sooner or later.’

  Another bit of a play crept up on me, something about nosing someone as you go up the stairs into the lobby. It wasn’t the best bit of the speech, as I recalled – that was where the baddie was told that the victim was in heaven. ‘If your messenger find him not there, seek him in the other place yourself,’ I murmured.

  ‘But who is yourself?’ asked a voice behind me. Gates.

  ‘I’d like it to be Moffatt. Or van der Poele, of course. Or both, aided and abetted by Marsh. But I’ve no idea why.’

  ‘It’d would be a nice clean sweep. Unlike you, I have to say!’ The grey eyes twinkled. ‘But we’ve no idea why, either. Well, we shall see. Meanwhile this further bit of hard evidence should prove useful. By the way, your cycling friend Mal sends his thanks. As you observed, he was about the only native English speaker in the place. And one or two of his overseas colleagues are singing quite happily. Well done, Caffy. We shall be inviting forensic accountants to look at the Mondiale’s books. I think they might make illuminating reading. Money laundering,’ he added, as I looked blank. ‘Drugs money has to be made respectable – and how better than in a hotel, especially one offering bureau de change facilities?’ He smiled again.

  I got a vibe. Not an unpleasant one. And one I was reciprocating, if you can reciprocate a vibe. Imagine me fancying a bloke after all this time. Half-fancying. I’d never wholly fancy a man whose eyes could be as cold as his.

  ‘I wonder if you’d do another quite unpleasant thing for me, Caffy. We shall have to leave our friend down there for some time while he’s photographed and so on. But we shall need someone to identify him, if not formally. Would you do the honours?’

  ‘Of course,’ I said briskly.

  ‘But this time – no argument – you’ll have someone with you. OK?’ came Todd’s voice. ‘Meanwhile, I don’t know what your officers do about breaks, Gates, but it’s pretty well lunchtime. We could knock up a few sandwiches if you don’t mind an al fresco meal.’

  That ought to have prepared me but it didn’t. Todd had certainly had a productive morning. If I’d thought about it I’d have expected him to replace the blown up mobile home with its twin.

  He’d done that all right. And added another twin for good measure. A matched pair stood on the site of the first.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Paula was to be driven back to Crabton Manor after lunch, which wasn’t quite the social success I think Todd had hoped it would be. Apart from a lot of police comings and goings, there was a good deal of quiet shop-talk from the SOCOs, and Paula had snubbed Jan’s gossipy interest in her new significant other. Todd himself was more subdued than I’d known him, rather edgy and anxious. He did something I’d never seen him do before – he kept glancing at his watch. But when I asked, he insisted he was fine.

  Before Paula left, I spoke to Gates again: ‘I suppose the bloke driving Paula couldn’t hang round a bit at Crabton Manor – you know, just in case.’ I wondered how I could wangle myself a lift there – I had a yen to see van der Poele’s face when he was handed the bill.

  ‘He’ll do better than that. He’ll get her to find him some overalls and he can help pack all your gear. Before you ask, he’s promised not to get housemaid’s knee. Would you prefer to see Granville before or after he’s sanitised?’

  Todd was by my side. Did he have radar ears or something? ‘In the surroundings that’ll most convince her that he’s dead. Haven’t you noticed, she’d not stopped shaking since you asked her to ID him? This is a man who’s done her permanent lasting harm. Ineradicable.’ He was willing me to show my scars, wasn’t he?

  I ignored him.

  But however much I insisted I was fine, I knew I wasn’t. I didn’t even want to see him taken away lest he suddenly sat up and pointed to me. Once he was on a slab, it should be all right. Should be. In the meantime, furious that I could let a corpse do this to me, I ran – well, stumbled – after Paula and her escort. ‘I’m coming too,’ I said. ‘I want to see the fun when Paula asks van der Poele for her money.’

  There turned out to be two blokes driving Paula and me, neither inclined to chat. So I simply looked out of the window at the countryside I was coming to love – why, on a day like this, I could almost believe I was a holidaymaker admiring the view. Windmills; sheep; houses even more attractive than Fullers concealing goodness knows what or whom. Like Sid looking at the sea defences, I found myself shivering again. But I must pull myself together. Those damned dogs would smell my fear a hundred yards away. They wouldn’t know it wasn�
�t them that had scared me.

  Paula inspected every single square inch of painting before nodding solemnly that we could stow everything in Trev. If I’d hoped to have a ringside seat when she spoke to van der Poele I was to be disappointed. We were all there to pull our weight. We would even check around and under the van so make sure we’d dropped no litter – with our non-smoking team, there’d be no butts, at least. Only one of the policemen helped. The other sat back in the car as if he were half asleep. But he hadn’t done as Paula asked and pulled out of sight. And I had an idea he was very far from asleep. Paula nodded, as if to reassure herself, and, her clipboard like a shield across her chest, marched up to the door. We could hear that knock from the van. So could the dogs.

  And so, of course, could van der Poele. But he seemed to have quite a pleasant smile on his face, and we could hear him laughing. Paula said something quite sharply, and he laughed again. We could do with Sid’s little bug, couldn’t we? There was a long pause: he seemed to be showing her something.

  Then they shook hands, and Paula returned slowly, still with her clipboard but now with a Tesco carrier bag. I won’t say it was bulging, but it certainly looked both full and heavy.

  ‘He’s only been and paid us in cash,’ she announced. ‘In the van, girls, before he changes his mind.’

  I hovered. Did she mean me too, or would the uncommunicative policemen return me to Fullers? I looked hopefully at the one stripping off his overalls. ‘Best go with them, Miss,’ he said. ‘Now it’s our turn to have a little talk to Mr van der Poele. Sharpish, please, Miss,’ he added, to Paula.

  Sharpish meant me starting and driving. I reversed neatly, waiting only for a couple of cars hurtling up the lane. And then another. And another. Seizing my chance, I pulled out quickly. Too quickly. I stalled. All the swear words I knew – and there were more than enough to offend Meg – wouldn’t make the bloody van start. There we were, stuck in this highly conspicuous vehicle in the middle of what was quickly turning out to be a police raid. An armed raid. Paula said, ‘Everyone out this side. Now!’ We obeyed. Seeing what had happened, a policewoman waved us over to their version of Trev and bundled us in.

  ‘Keep down,’ she urged.

  We kept. Paula huddled over the bag as if it were a new-born baby.

  There weren’t many shots, and those that were fired seemed to be almost at random. No. Whoever it was was aiming at the police vehicles. They were reinforced. Ours wasn’t. And though it’s hard to make diesel burn, bottles of paint thinners go up like a dream. And did.

  I wouldn’t quite have expected Paula to dash up and try to beat out the flames with her bare hands, but I wouldn’t have expected her to watch our old friend’s funeral pyre as calmly as she did. She watched till the bitter end, as we all did, her face almost impassive. But not quite. It was as if – no, she couldn’t have the same pumpkin look as when she thought about her new date. Could she?

  When all the fireworks were over, she got up cautiously, grimacing as she straightened her knees. She sat down on one of the seats; we were to do the same. Only when she had our full attention did she open the carrier bag and start to remove its contents, wad by wad. Wad by wad of fivers, to be precise. She counted them out, and then, I’m afraid, counted them back in again. ‘He paid in cash,’ she said simply. ‘At first he asked for a discount. When I said that wasn’t part of our terms, he just rolled over like one of his dogs. The whole lot. In cash. I suppose,’ she said to the WPC, ‘now everything’s quiet here, you couldn’t run me to a bank, could you?’

  The young woman shook her head sadly. ‘I think I’d better run you to the police station in Ashford,’ she said. ‘Chief Superintendent Gates’s orders. I’m afraid that may be stolen cash.’

  ‘Laundered, not stolen,’ Gates said calmly. ‘I’m sorry about the mix-up. I think it ought to be impounded but–’

  ‘If you impound it, these women can’t eat or pay their rent this week. I can’t buy paint for the next job.’

  ‘A bank loan?’ he ventured. So my impassioned lecture had been in vain.

  ‘I can’t afford a bank loan. So it looks as if another small business will bite the dust.’ Paula might have spoken slowly and calmly, but she stood over him like an avenging Fury.

  He stood too: they were eyeball to eyeball. At last I twigged. He was winding her up. He’d promised me she’d not suffer. So why trouble? Because he liked his power, that’s why. What a good job I hadn’t let myself forget those cold grey eyes and started fancying him. ‘My superiors –’

  ‘Bollocks,’ I said. ‘Stop messing us about, Gates. It’s been a long hard day and we need to get to the supermarket for our weekend’s shop. Unless your superiors would like to push our trolleys and pay?’

  It wasn’t the supermarket that I went to, of course. It was the morgue. Fortunately I was so fired up with Gates I forgot to be anxious. And I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of asking why someone at his level, a man surely more used to pushing papers than accompanying young women on routine visits to stiffs, was driving me himself – surely not just because Todd told him to?

  I chose my moment – he was just manoeuvring into a tight parking space. ‘So who killed Granville? And why?’

  He pulled on the handbrake before he replied. ‘We’re almost certain – on the forensic evidence, of course – that it was van der Poele. Until we’ve talked to him we can’t be sure.’

  ‘Come now, he’s not going to lie there on his hospital bed and confess, is he?’

  ‘You never know.’

  ‘I do. Van der Poele wouldn’t confess to living and breathing if he wasn’t “persuaded” to. And I’m sure you people aren’t supposed to “persuade”, are you?’

  ‘Not unless you’re on the wrong side of the law, and you’re trying to “persuade” an apparently friendless young woman. It seems it’s open season for anything, then.’ He gave an apologetic smile.

  Which I didn’t return. ‘Van der Poele. Were he and Granville in the same business? Or rivals? Or was it needle going way back?’

  ‘You never give up, do you? Van der Poele made a lot of money from drugs.’

  ‘So did Granville. So was it a turf war?’

  ‘More likely, according to our sources, who I’m not about to reveal even to you, Caffy, they’d become partners in this illegal immigration scam – van der Poele had premises he could stow a few people in if needs be. Granville had managed to find those hidey-holes at Fullers. A nice deal. He’d have liked to own Fullers legally, I suspect, but your friend Todd Dawes outbid him and moved Paula’s Pots in before he could clear everything out. Everything including a lot of drugs. And the drug-dealing hadn’t been part of the deal.’

  I nodded. It sounded feasible. If you didn’t ask why they hadn’t shifted them when the builders were sorting out the outside. Which I did.

  ‘We’d better check out the builders: one of them must have been involved. Maybe one found the cache and offered information about further hiding places – like the staircase from the false chimney.’ He seemed to think that had ended the conversation.

  It hadn’t. ‘But what about “my” body – the one on the bed at Crabton Manor?’

  ‘According to the folk at the hotel, one man got stroppy about the conditions he was supposed to work in. So he was taken to work somewhere else: Crabton Manor. They assumed he’d got a nice soft billet there.’

  ‘Soft, yes. On top of that duvet.’

  ‘And now I’m afraid we’ve got to look at another of “your” bodies, Caffy.’ He laid a hand on my wrist. ‘Are you sure you’re up to this?’

  Death hadn’t been kind to the cruelly handsome man that had been Clive Granville. Which was fair, I suppose, given how kind he’d been to me.

  ‘Is it Clive Granville?’ Gates pressed.

  I couldn’t reply. Swallowing, I asked, ‘Can you leave me alone with him for a minute? I want to say goodbye.’

  ‘Goodbye to that bastard?’

  I nodded. />
  He backed away.

  I looked at the lips pulled back in one last grimace, the clenched fists. Standing in the sightline of those now blind eyes, I pulled up my T-shirt. ‘You did that to me, you bastard. You made me live with this forever. But at least I’m alive. Get that? And now you can’t touch me. Not here on the outside or here on the inside. Ever, ever again.’

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  What I needed after all that emotion was a duvet to dive under and a kind hand pressing a mug of creamy drinking chocolate into mine. What I got was a policeman in a dead faint.

  Gates. Yes, Gates. Apparently he’d wanted to keep an eye on me – was afraid I might launch an attack on Granville’s corpse, maybe. Anyway, there he was, his face as grey as his eyes, spark out on the tiled floor. Yelling for help, I loosened his tie and raised his feet. Yes, he was coming round nicely before the morgue first aider arrived. I’d have thought they were used to fainters: perhaps they were, but not Chief Superintendent fainters.

  ‘Your stomach,’ Gates whispered. ‘He did that to your stomach?’

  ‘I told you he wasn’t a nice guy,’ I said mildly, not wishing to upset the sick.

  Time for him to be the strong man again. He struggled on to one elbow. ‘You’ve made a claim to the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority?’ Obviously it was easier for him to deal with facts than emotions.

  I shook my head, holding out my hand for his car keys. I’d heard of it, of course, I explained as I backed out, but had never wanted to risk asking for money in case some bright civil servant took it into his head to call Granville as a witness.

  ‘No, it doesn’t work that way,’ Gates explained.

  After the van, his Rover was a dream. We positively bowled along to the police station.

  ‘Talk to your friend Jan. She’ll be able to tell you all about it. You’ll probably have to be seen by a shrink and a plastic surgeon and they’ll ask for your notes from the hospital where you were treated. After that, it’s a simple matter of telling three old guys about your pain and suffering and holding out your hand for several thousand quid.’