Cop to Corpse

by Peter Lovesey

  The prisoner looked mentally a million miles away from the Minehead hobby horse. Halliwell had a glazed look, too.

  Undaunted, Diamond started again. Although this was beginning to sound increasingly like a confession, it was crystallizing his own thoughts. Set out like this, the process sounded logical. ‘After finding this out, I went to see the widow of the third victim, PC Tasker, just to find out if her late husband had ever had anything to do with the hobby horse ritual. He hadn’t. Quite a blow, that. I was forced to accept that coincidences happen and they’re no more than that. In short, I was up the proverbial gum tree. I’d wasted precious time on a theory that didn’t hold water. The killings had to have been random after all. But I did learn something from Emma Tasker that I still can’t explain. Among Harry Tasker’s personal items returned to her after the shooting was a scrap of paper with the words “You’re next”. It threw me into confusion again. Here was another challenge to the theory of random killings. It seemed someone had been out to get him and wanted him to know. Taunting him. What else could it mean?’ He let the question linger for a moment and then put his hand forward and touched the prisoner on the arm.

  It was the lightest of touches, but it brought a sharp response. The man jerked away and braced himself as if preparing to head-butt Diamond. Or spit in his face. But at least there was eye contact.

  ‘I asked you a question,’ Diamond said, remaining calm. ‘What else could it mean? The shooting of Harry Tasker wasn’t random. If the note meant anything at all, he was singled out, warned and slaughtered deliberately. Am I right?’

  The prisoner’s angry brown eyes were still locked with Diamond’s. Not a word was spoken. Then he lowered his head and the moment passed.

  So was it only the touch of the hand, and not the words, that had prompted the reaction?

  Apparently.

  ‘The note sent me down a route I didn’t want to take,’ Diamond began again. ‘Because he was a marked man, as I saw it, I looked for a reason. Who’s going to have a grudge against an ordinary copper? The people who know him best — his workmates. I started looking here in Bath Central for a suspect. A police officer or someone employed here. Bad mistake. A sure way to make myself unpopular. Okay, I discovered that PC Tasker didn’t always follow the rules. He had his own way of keeping law and order on his beat and some might say it was rough justice. Maybe after all it was someone from the criminal class who bore that grudge. But I didn’t find anything that justified murdering him. And now you’re in the frame, I’ve had to face it. I’m wrong again. The shootings really were random. Harry Tasker died for no more reason than being on the duty roster. He happened to be on nights when you were lying in wait with your rifle. Simple as that. Mind, the fact that it wasn’t personal makes it even more despicable.’

  He stopped speaking. He’d said as much as he wanted to say. No form of persuasion in his repertoire was going to work.

  On an impulse, he snapped his fingers. The prisoner blinked.

  ‘You’re not deaf, then.’ To Halliwell, who had also jerked in his chair, he said, ‘Still awake, I see.’

  Halliwell drew himself up, ready to leave.

  Diamond made a restraining gesture with his levelled hand. ‘Do you know if Jack Gull tried any foreign languages?’

  ‘I doubt if Mr. Gull knows any, guv.’

  ‘That’s probably true, and the English he knows isn’t exactly the Queen’s. If this guy is a foreign national, we’re supposed to find an interpreter and his consulate has to be informed.’

  Unexpectedly the prisoner became animated again, shaking his head and making sweeping movements with his handcuffed arms.

  ‘Hey, fellow,’ Diamond said, ‘what’s this about? What did I say wrong? Interpreter? Consulate?’

  If anything, the negative gestures redoubled.

  ‘You understood something I said,’ Diamond said. ‘What’s your name? Where are you from?’

  Too much to expect. But at least some form of communication was established. The man was watching Diamond and listening intently.

  ‘Whoever he is,’ Diamond said to Halliwell, ‘he isn’t keen on his government knowing about it. I’m wondering if we have an asylum seeker here.’

  ‘Funny way to seek asylum, murdering three policemen,’ Halliwell said.

  ‘But worth following up.’

  The prisoner was returned to the cells. Diamond learned from the custody sergeant that several languages had been tried on the clam-like young man and brought no response.

  ‘Well, it took a long time, but he made one thing clear to us,’ Diamond said. ‘If he’s on the run from his country it may explain why he’s saying nothing.’

  Jack Gull was called to the custody suite.

  ‘It’s becoming clear he’s a foreigner without much English,’ Diamond said, ‘but there’s more to it. Even if you don’t follow the language, you co-operate. You’d understand when you’re being asked your name. Why is he withholding his identity?’

  ‘He’s a fucking killer giving nothing away, that’s why,’ Gull said.

  ‘He could be more scared of his own people than he is of British justice. What if he arrived here like plenty of illegals have, in a container lorry, and is on the run?’

  ‘Doesn’t explain how he gets hold of a G36 and why he goes on a killing spree,’ Gull said.

  ‘All right, suppose he was rounded up soon after arriving and sent to a detention centre to be repatriated.’

  ‘Removal centre,’ Polehampton said. ‘They changed the name. The words “detention centre” were thought to be offensive.’

  ‘Strike a light, what are we coming to?’ Diamond said. ‘To my ear, “removal centre” sounds a whole lot more sinister. Call it what you will, he’d mix with all sorts there. Some of them would know where a weapon can be bought. And we’ve all heard of break-outs and detainees escaping.’

  ‘He’ll have been photographed and fingerprinted if he was detained,’ Gull said. ‘That’s compulsory. He would have shown up when we ran the check.’

  ‘It’s still worth checking on recent breakouts. Didn’t a bunch of people escape from one of those places last year?’

  ‘I’ll get onto the UK Border Agency, see if they can throw any light. But no one has explained to me why he shoots cops.’

  ‘Did you look into his eyes?’

  ‘How could I not?’

  Diamond didn’t say so, but there are some things a senior detective has to work out for himself.

  ‘One thing nobody has mentioned is what happens when we charge this guy,’ Keith Halliwell said in the incident room.

  Diamond frowned. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘If he still withholds his name, what’s the legal position? Can we actually charge an unknown man?’

  ‘Fair point. I’d need to think about that.’

  ‘And if he isn’t charged, and the custody clock runs out, are we compelled to release him?’

  ‘No way. We can’t let a serial killer walk free when we know the forensic evidence is watertight.’

  ‘You say that, guv, but is it lawful?’

  ‘Off-hand, I can’t say. It’s been a heavy day. Do me a favour, Keith.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Don’t mention this to John Leaman. Or Ingeborg.’ He stifled a yawn. ‘I’m bushed. With the killer under lock and key, I think we can safely get an early night.’

  ‘I’ll second that.’ Halliwell switched his computer to the sleep function. ‘There was good news from the hospital this afternoon. Ken Lockton has recovered consciousness. They think he’ll make a full recovery.’

  ‘Thank God for that.’ Diamond hesitated. ‘I hardly dare ask.’

  ‘Does he remember what happened? No, guv. No memory at all. Concussion does that sometimes.’

  ‘Too much to expect. We don’t get many breaks, do we, Keith?’

  ‘There is one thing before you go. I dealt with the mail as you asked.’

  ‘What do you want
— a pat on the back?’

  Halliwell grinned. That would be a rare event.

  ‘I haven’t looked into my office,’ Diamond said. ‘No problems, I hope.’

  ‘All very straightforward, guv. Three quarters of it was junk, and the rest I could cope with.’

  ‘What’s the thing you wanted to mention, then?’

  ‘It’s on your desk. An envelope marked “personal”. I didn’t like to open it.’

  ‘In case it was from an old flame of mine? More junk, I expect. Or someone wanting money.’ He remembered seeing the envelope the previous day. ‘I’ll pick it up, then.’

  He went through to the office.

  His desk hadn’t looked so tidy for at least a week. Just that one letter remained in the in-tray. He picked it up. Detective Diamond — PERSONAL. The sender didn’t seem to know his rank or initials. The white self-seal envelope had obviously been put through a printer.

  He opened it and withdrew the slip of paper it contained.

  Short and to the point: YOU’RE NEXT.

  27

  He invited Paloma over. If he didn’t speak to someone outside the CID fishbowl, he wouldn’t get much sleep. In case she got the idea that romance was in prospect, he warned her it was cheese and cream crackers and there was a reason why he didn’t want to go out for a meal.

  She arrived with a bottle of kaolin and morphine. ‘I heard what you were saying, and I think I know what this is about,’ she told him. ‘This is an old-fashioned remedy and really effective.’

  ‘I don’t have diarrhoea,’ he said. ‘I prefer to eat in tonight, that’s all. I’ve opened a bottle of Merlot. I’m touched by your kind thought, but mine has a better flavour than yours.’

  ‘Mine may have a better kick,’ she said.

  ‘And it could still come in useful,’ he said.

  She had also called at the cleaner’s and collected the first of his two suits. He was going to need it in the morning.

  He showed her the ‘You’re Next’ note and a shiver went through her. She didn’t need telling about the similar one found in Harry Tasker’s card-wallet. They’d discussed it when he was feeling bruised after the team meeting a couple of days before.

  ‘But I heard on the car radio that you arrested someone.’

  ‘We have,’ he said, ‘and all the evidence shows he’s the sniper. This looks to me like a practical joke.’

  She was appalled. ‘Joke?’

  ‘Black humour. It’s a police thing. No one is immune from it. I dish it out sometimes and I must expect it back.’

  ‘Well, I don’t remotely understand what’s funny about it,’ Paloma said, ‘but if that’s all it is, some kind of joke, can’t you make a show of laughing it off?’

  ‘That was my first reaction.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And I’d like to. The difficulty is that there’s a small chance it’s genuine, sent by the same individual who sent the note Harry Tasker received. As the SIO, I’m bound to take it seriously and treat it as evidence.’

  ‘That’s what your joker intends.’

  ‘Probably.’

  ‘Does it look the same as the first note?’

  ‘Just about identical. The only difference is that there was no envelope with Harry’s note. He may have destroyed it. The slip of paper is the same size, the wording is the same and so is the font. Easy to copy, of course. They’ve all seen it.’

  ‘If it’s meant as a joke, can you be certain it came from inside the police station? Calling you Detective Diamond instead of your proper rank is odd. Would one of your own team address you like that?’

  ‘Normally, no. As a way of bamboozling me, I wouldn’t put it past them.’

  ‘Could some bloody-minded member of the public have sent it?’

  ‘The first note hasn’t been made public — except to you.’

  She smiled faintly. ‘I’m innocent. I have better ways of winding you up. Why is it being kept a secret?’

  ‘Sometimes we keep information back so as to have something known only to the killer and ourselves. My team has seen the first note and so have Jack Gull and his deputy, a mental giant called Polehampton. The “Detective Diamond” bit looks like an attempt to divert suspicion — as if it must be from the killer himself, always assuming the killer is an outsider.’

  ‘And it can’t be from the killer because he’s in custody.’

  ‘Since early this morning, yes.’ He felt his skin flush as he revealed the flaw in his logic. ‘But I have to tell you that the letter was on my desk unopened for most of yesterday. I saw it myself and didn’t open it. The last forty-eight hours are a blur.’

  Paloma took a moment for thought. ‘He was still at liberty when the letter arrived on your desk?’

  ‘He knew we were on his trail by then. It’s hard to believe he would have come to Bath Central police station and delivered a death threat by hand. I’m ninety-nine per cent certain it’s a hoax.’

  ‘The first note wasn’t a hoax,’ she said. ‘The threat was carried out.’

  He remained sceptical. ‘I’m not even sure if that first note was what it seemed. There may have been some innocent explanation for those two words, like a reminder to Harry from his mates to stand a round of drinks. We talked about this in CID. This was the team meeting I told you about. Made me about as popular as a birdwatcher on a nudist beach.’

  ‘Haven’t they got over that by now?’

  ‘I still sense some soreness. You see, it was the note that acted as the catalyst, my suspicion that some police officer could have written it. If they’re taking revenge, this is a neat way of doing it.’

  ‘ “Neat” is not the word I’d use.’ She took a sip of the wine. ‘Bear with me, Peter, and please look at this another way — the one per cent chance that the note isn’t a hoax. Have you spoken yet to the man you arrested?’

  ‘Plenty. The problem is he’s saying nothing in return. We suspect he’s a foreigner with a poor command of English.’

  ‘I doubt if he wrote the note, then. You need to be up with the language to use the apostrophe correctly. Plenty of native speakers get it wrong. Your average foreigner would leave it out altogether and spell it Y-O-U-R.’

  He raised his thumb. ‘Good thinking. You’ve disposed of the one per cent. It looks certain this is just to teach me a lesson.’

  ‘Do they know you’ve opened it?’

  ‘The team? They will now. Keith Halliwell made sure I looked at it before I left the office.’

  She tilted her head in surprise. ‘You’ve often said Keith is your main support. Would he play a mean trick on you?’

  He weighed the question. Already he was thankful he’d invited her over to help him get the incident into perspective. ‘Put like that, I’m less sure. I’ve known Keith longer than anyone. I’d say it’s unlikely — except …’ He stopped and cast his mind back. ‘Except that he was leading the protest at the meeting, that is until Ingeborg took over and said I was ordering a witch-hunt. It was an issue of principle for Keith, standing up for his colleagues. Right at the end I asked him to supply me with a list of police personnel from the three stations and he virtually refused, said I was putting him in an impossible position. I backed down and said I’d do it myself. In all our years together I’ve never known him to defy me. I could see how deep it went.’

  ‘If it affected him like that,’ Paloma said, ‘I can’t believe for a moment he’d take revenge with a practical joke. He’ll be as bruised as you are. It’s obvious he has a high regard for you.’

  ‘I’ve always thought of him as rock solid.’

  ‘And he is. You’ve got to see that, Peter. He was right. You did put him in an impossible position. It’s a good thing you had the sense to climb down. Things have improved since, haven’t they?’

  ‘By degrees. We’re back to normal, just about.’

  ‘Did he actually watch you in the act of opening the envelope?’

  Diamond shook his head. ‘I was alone i
n my office. He didn’t see my reaction and neither did anyone else.’

  ‘You said Ingeborg was angry. Is she capable of setting you up?’

  ‘Well capable. She knows my weak points.’

  ‘The female of the species …’

  He shook his head. ‘But I can’t see her doing it. She’ll criticise me openly, tell me I’m off message, but there’s a tipping point and Ingeborg has never gone past it. I trust her. I trust them all, or they wouldn’t be in the team.’

  ‘John Leaman?’

  ‘He’s a one-track man, incapable of twisted thinking.’

  ‘Twisted it certainly is,’ Paloma said. ‘And cruel. What’s it meant to achieve?’

  ‘At the very least, me dosing myself with kaolin and morphine.’

  She wasn’t letting him laugh off the danger. ‘Have you ever thought why the first note was sent to Harry Tasker?’

  ‘It’s a kind of bravado on the part of the killer. Serial killers sometimes get an extra kick from announcing their crimes in advance. Jack the Ripper is supposed to have done it.’

  ‘I thought most of the Jack the Ripper letters were sent by people cashing in on the publicity, like the man who sent the Yorkshire Ripper tape.’