Cop to Corpse

by Peter Lovesey

  He steps up to one of the entrances and looks at the array of bell-pushes on the entryphone system. Each terraced house must have been a sole residence once. Now there are flats on all floors. Beside each button is the name of the tenant. He tries the lowest.

  Through the grill a weary voice says, ‘Chrissake, what time is this?’

  ‘Police,’ says Lockton.

  ‘Fuck off,’ says the voice.

  ‘That’s what we get for safeguarding the great British public,’ Lockton comments to Stillman. ‘We’ll try another place.’

  Stillman is frowning. ‘It could be him.’

  ‘I don’t think so. He wouldn’t answer, would he?’

  There was some logic in that.

  They study the bell-system two doors along. Someone has been efficient here. Each name is typed on white card rather than handwritten on odd scraps of paper. ‘Not this one,’ Lockton says.

  ‘Why not?’ Sergeant Stillman is starting to question Lockton’s deductive skills. By his own estimation, the house must overlook the place where Harry Tasker’s body lies.

  ‘Because it’s not what I’m looking for, not what the sniper would look for.’

  He finds it at the next house, handwritten names for flats 1, 2 and 3 and a blank for the fourth, the lowest. He presses 3.

  After a long pause, a woman’s voice. ‘Who is this?’

  ‘The police.’

  ‘How do I know that?’

  ‘Look out of your front window. You’ll see our car.’

  ‘Hang on a mo.’

  Presently they are admitted to apartment 3 by a young woman in blue winceyette pyjamas. She rakes a hand through her blonde hair and tells them it’s early in the day.

  Stillman bites back the strong comment he’d like to make after being up all night.

  Lockton asks who occupies the flat below.

  ‘Nobody,’ the blonde says. ‘It’s been empty some time, far as I know.’

  ‘You haven’t heard any sounds?’

  ‘Tonight?’

  ‘Any time.’

  A shake of the head. ‘There was a noise like an alarm down in the street a short time ago, or I think there was. It woke me. Then I drifted off again.’

  ‘How do we get into the basement?’

  ‘The what? Do you mean the garden flat? The stairs in the hall.’

  The two policemen find their way down. The door is locked.

  ‘Force it, Steve.’

  Sergeant Stillman aims a kick at the lock. The door gives at the second try. ‘Shouldn’t we get armed assistance?’

  Lockton doesn’t listen. ‘Give me your torch.’

  He’s already inside, still living his dream of instant fame. The place has the smell of long disuse and the lights don’t work. He senses that the sniper isn’t here. Through what must be the living room — though the place is unfurnished — he can see a small sunroom, too poky to call a conservatory. Beyond is the garden, overgrown, a fine crop of stinging nettles waist-high and bedraggled with the overnight dew.

  He steps through the sunroom and notes that the door isn’t bolted from inside. Not a huge security risk, but any landlord worthy of the name would surely take the trouble to secure an empty flat.

  If nothing else, he’ll get a view of Walcot Street from the end of the garden. Parting the nettles, he moves on, following the torch beam, and then stops.

  ‘Jesus.’

  Ahead, resting against the railing, is an assault rifle.

  2

  ‘Don’t touch it.’

  Sergeant Stillman knows his crime scene drill. You don’t handle evidence. You don’t even go near it.

  Like a kid caught at the fridge door, Lockton swings around and shows the palms of his hands. He has stopped short of handling the gun, but only just. This is his find. The excitement is all over his features. He tries to sound cool. ‘I wasn’t born yesterday, Steve.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘Quite some find.’

  As if by mutual consent, they stand for a moment, in awe that the sniper was here in this small overgrown garden.

  Stillman says, ‘We’d better report this.’

  ‘Quit telling me my job.’

  There’s tension between these two. They were sergeants together for a long time. Stillman is experienced, steady, able and, if truth were told, more savvy than Lockton. He just didn’t bother to go for the promotion exam.

  Rank must count here, rank and procedure.

  ‘Our first duty,’ Lockton says as if he’s lecturing recruits at Peel Centre, ‘is to assess the scene. The sniper obviously left without his weapon. But why? All the action was down in the street. He should have felt secure up here.’

  ‘That shop alarm went off.’

  Bloody obvious. The thing must have been loud even this far off. It was ear-splitting at the scene and Lockton has already dismissed it from his mind. He says a grudging, ‘Okay.’ And tries to gloss over his lapse. ‘When you’re in charge of an operation this big, taking decisions, your thoughts are all about what happens next. Getting back to the sniper, he hears the alarm and leaves in a hurry, not wanting to be seen with the weapon.’

  Stillman says nothing.

  ‘That’s the way I see it,’ Lockton adds.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘You don’t sound convinced.’

  ‘I’m thinking if it was me, I wouldn’t leave the gun here. Maybe he means to come back for it.’

  This is another thought that hasn’t dawned on Lockton. ‘Just what I was about to say.’ A gleam comes into his eye. ‘We could trap him.’

  ‘Just you and me? I don’t think so. We need back-up.’

  Lockton ploughs on as if he hasn’t heard. ‘To come and go, he’d need a key to the front door. He must have got hold of one to let himself in.’

  Stillman shakes his head, disturbed by what is being proposed.

  Lockton thinks the issue in doubt must be his theory about the key. ‘Or he could have walked in when one of the residents was coming or going. Or a friend of a resident. In places like this people don’t necessarily know each other. You hold the door open for someone else thinking they must be from one of the other flats.’

  ‘Someone else with a gun?’

  ‘Guns like that fold up. You can get one into a bag, no problem. It’s feasible.’ Lockton peers at the rifle again. ‘I don’t know much about firearms, but this looks state-of-the-art to me. Telescopic sight.’

  ‘We knew he was good.’

  ‘He’ll be gutted at leaving it behind. I think you’re right. He won’t want to leave it here for long.’ The opportunity is huge, irresistible. Lockton can already picture himself making the arrest — and tomorrow’s headlines. ‘He means to come back for it.’

  ‘One thing is certain,’ Steve Stillman says in his downbeat tone.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘He won’t come back while our car is outside.’

  ‘Christ, yes.’ Pause for thought. The blue and yellow police car in front of the house is a glaring giveaway. ‘Move it.’

  ‘Leaving you here?’

  ‘Someone’s got to be here. I’ll stay hidden.’

  ‘I don’t advise it.’

  ‘And I don’t take advice from you, sergeant.’

  The ‘sergeant’ and the way it is said is a low blow from an old colleague. A muscle twitches at the edge of Stillman’s mouth. With an effort he stays civil. ‘You’ll need back-up. D’you want me to radio for a couple of firearms officers?’

  ‘I can do that. I’ve got my own radio.’

  ‘Shall I call headquarters to let them know what we found?’

  ‘Leave that to me.’

  The two men eye each other. The mistrust is palpable. Lockton is hell-bent on making the arrest.

  ‘As you wish,’ says Stillman.

  Because of its sheltered position, Walcot Street is slow to emerge from darkness. The tops of the stone buildings are getting a glimmer of natural light, the first of the da
y. The place is waking up to a street killing. Despite the best efforts of the police, nervous tenants are at their front doors demanding to know when it will be safe to go out. Almost without the order being given, the house-to-house questioning is under way. A number of the residents claim to have heard the shots or the alarm and gone to their windows, but no one has seen the sniper.

  Being Sunday, there isn’t the influx of working people you’d get on other days. Even so, at either end of the cordoned-off area, a few early risers are demanding to know what is happening. More persistent are television staff and pressmen trying to negotiate a better view. The news of the shooting has already broken on twenty-four hour TV.

  The police are adamant that no unauthorised person gets admittance, and as some of them are carrying guns, the warnings are heeded.

  A large forensic tent has screened off the body of PC Tasker. A Home Office forensic pathologist is now at work making a taped summary of his findings. His crouched figure is silhouetted on the tent by the arc-lamp inside. SOCOs in white zipper suits are coming and going.

  The sergeant left in temporary charge of the scene has now been supplanted by CID officers. They have ordered a sweep search of the gardens between the shop-backs and the river. Dogs are being used to check the outbuildings. It’s a rare luxury to have enough personnel to mount an operation on this scale.

  Officially the night shift will end at 6.30, but a major incident like this alters everything. When enough of the next shift — the early turn, as it is known — are bussed in, it’s possible that the sleep-starved will be laid off. Until then they remain on duty.

  Sergeant Stillman has moved the police car from its conspicuous position in the Paragon and parked it on the lower level, outside the taped-off section of Walcot Street. Being a wise old hand — and exhausted — he has decided to have forty winks — or a few more than forty. If he is needed, he’ll find out. A personal radio with the volume on full is better than an alarm clock. He’s at his post and on duty and you can’t ask more from a man who’s been up all night. His head lolls to one side until it finds a comfortable position against the car door and he drifts into a shallow sleep.

  Meanwhile the whiz kids from CID have gone through the same process Ken Lockton did earlier, calculating the probable direction of the fatal shots. The pathologist has explained about the bullet’s angle of penetration. The armed police inform them that a search has already been made of the lock-ups along the wall. It’s deceiving, that vast wall. Daylight has to strengthen before someone looks higher and decides to order a search of the elevated gardens.

  This time enough men assemble outside Bladud Buildings to make a near-simultaneous entry to each house and garden. By now hardly anyone in the neighbourhood can be unaware of what is going on, so there’s no difficulty gaining admission. Most of the garden flats are occupied and the small gardens easily searched. There’s just the one that Lockton and Stillman entered earlier. ‘Someone forced this,’ the officer says at the bottom of the stairs.

  ‘Hold it, then,’ his colleague says. ‘We’d better bring in the armed response lads.’

  It doesn’t take long. The firearms team have driven up in their Trojan Horse van. They can’t wait for some action.

  They crowd the narrow staircase in their body armour and ballistic helmets. More are detailed to enter from the gardens on either side. The object: to terrorise any intruder into submission by letting him discover he’s under attack from all sides.

  ‘Armed police!’ goes up the shout from the loud-hailer. ‘Drop your weapon and lie face down.’

  This is the drill. If no one is inside, the anticlimax can be a real downer.

  The first pair kick the door inwards, enter the flat and take up offensive positions. More follow. It’s a show of strength designed to intimidate.

  They move forward, checking each room in the basement flat. The search is simplified because the place is unfurnished. In seconds they are through the building.

  ‘Stand by, stand by,’ a voice says into all the earpieces. ‘We have a sighting. Garden, right hand side almost against the wall.’

  A sighting.

  This is the adrenalin moment they train for.

  The movement forward is stealthy now. The only cover in the garden is a rich crop of weeds, and weeds don’t stop bullets.

  ‘Give him the message again.’

  ‘Armed police! Drop your weapon and get face down.’

  A long, tense pause.

  ‘Result,’ says another voice. ‘The tosser has surrendered.’

  Sure enough, a dark figure at the right of the garden is among the mass of thistles, prone. No obvious sign of a weapon.

  The black-clad officers take no chance. You don’t mess with a killer. They ‘stack up’ at strategic points, guns at the ready, covering the two senior men who must approach the suspect from behind and handcuff him.

  It’s swift and efficient. The pair go in at the charge. The first flings himself across the suspect’s back to be sure he can’t move while the second applies the cuffs. There’s no resistance.

  ‘Cool.’

  Except that the man on top presently says, ‘See what I see?’

  ‘What’s that?’

  He stabs his finger at the two silver pips on the epaulette the suspect is wearing. Then at the mass of blood at the back of his head.

  3

  ‘You can stand down, Super. The Serial Crimes Unit is on the case.’

  Without a second look at the lanky young guy in leather jacket and shades who had just appeared on the scene, Detective Superintendent Peter Diamond said, ‘You could have fooled me.’

  ‘I’m the first to arrive.’

  ‘Hundred and first, maybe.’

  ‘The first SCU man.’

  ‘And you are …?’

  ‘DI Polehampton. The others will be here shortly.’

  ‘Having a late breakfast, are they?’

  ‘Traffic, I expect.’ Irony was lost on this guy. ‘As the first at the scene, I’m taking over.’

  ‘Oh, yes? You and whose army?’ After almost twenty years in Bath CID, Diamond wasn’t being given the elbow by a twit who looked as if he was straight out of training school.

  ‘In the name of Chief Super Gull.’

  Supergull.

  Diamond filed that one away for future use.

  Polehampton said, ‘He heads the special team co-ordinating the hunt for the Somerset Sniper.’

  ‘Special I’ll give you,’ Diamond said.

  ‘I hope you’re not being sarcastic.’

  ‘It’s just that I find you hard to believe, Inspector Hampton.’

  ‘Polehampton. You can speak to Headquarters if you want.’

  ‘Too busy,’ Diamond said. ‘You speak to them. They’ll tell you this is my patch. The men you see around you are my people and they were first on the scene — fact. They’ve been here since first thing dealing with the murder of a close colleague. None of us are walking away from that.’

  ‘I can understand that. If you want to stay and observe, you’re welcome, but kindly update me first.’

  There was a pause while Diamond reined himself in. Far more was at issue this morning than a spat over who was running the show.

  ‘Here’s your update,’ he said. ‘Two officers attacked, men we work with every day. One dead and the other may not survive.’

  ‘Two?’ Polehampton blinked. ‘Nobody reported a second attack.’

  ‘He’s just been found, that’s why. Ken Lockton, a uniformed inspector with a serious head injury.’

  ‘God Almighty — another shooting?’

  ‘Bludgeoned, they’re saying. The ambulance is on its way. I’m cordoning the area in hope of snaring the skunk who did this.’

  ‘You’d better carry on, then.’

  Diamond walked away, speaking into his personal radio, with far more on his mind than Inspector Polehampton. ‘It is secured? … And the garden? … Is there any hope he’s still alive? … D
on’t move him. Make sure his airways are clear and wait for the paramedics.’

  At times like this, the basics of first aid leave you feeling more helpless than the victim.

  He sprinted up the flight of steps to see for himself. Sprinted up the first ten or eleven, anyway. There were fifty-six and he felt about fifty-six pounds overweight. After emerging at the top, gasping, he turned right, towards a cluster of police vehicles. This second crime scene was in the garden of a house in the Paragon, a mid-eighteenth century terrace where in less dangerous times Jane Austen had stayed on her first visits to the city.

  Just as he arrived at the house, so did the ambulance, siren blaring.

  He stepped aside for the two paramedics and their stretcher and followed them through the unlit basement flat to the back. You couldn’t call it a garden. There wasn’t a flower in sight, just a mass of weeds, much trampled. Near the front a huddle of armed police stood over a dark shape.

  Lockton was face down in nettles.

  All Diamond could see of the injury was a matted mess of blood and hair. It was obvious the man was out to the world, but the gravity of his condition was impossible to tell.

  Suffocation is the commonest cause of death after a head injury. If the victim is unconscious his tongue relaxes and may block his throat. The paramedics checked this, even though the firearms team said they had already done so, putting two fingers at the angle of the jaw and two at the point and opening the mouth.

  They went systematically through the standard tests for signs of life. There seemed to be hope. They applied a mask, lifted him onto the stretcher and carried him through the house to the ambulance.

  For everyone left in the garden it was like the hiatus after a funeral. Some of the gun team had removed their helmets and goggles. These men who thrived on action seemed uncertain what to do next until Diamond broke the troubled silence. ‘It’s up to the doctors now. If there’s a chance of saving Ken, they will. The rest of us have work to do. It’s just possible there’s evidence here that hasn’t already been trampled over, so watch where you walk. Leave by the same route. Step one by one towards the wall and go through the house and return to your duties.’