I was sitting with my knees pressed against the dashboard. First thoughts were that I’d count the turns, calculate where we were going, but I soon tired of that. I’d settle for the general impression. We were heading towards the motorway. After five minutes we made a high-speed left turn and I reckoned we’d taken to the slip road, which meant we were heading west. Manchester, probably. The boom of the exhaust and the wind noise confirmed that we were on the motorway, so I rested my head on the window and snoozed.
Twenty minutes later I was leaning into the seatbelt as Magda applied the brakes, then it was another twenty minutes of stop-start motoring until she pulled the handbrake on and announced: ‘This is it.’
I think that’s what she said. Her words were drowned by the noise of the airliner passing overhead on its descent into Manchester airport. When the decibel level was down to something less damaging I said: ‘That sounds like the 11.45 from Dallas.’
The car lurched as Magda got out. I opened the passenger door and swung my legs on to the pavement. As I stood up Magda took me by the arm and started to lead me away. I stumbled slightly, my legs stiff with cramp.
I heard the squeal of a gate’s hinges and she said: ‘Small step up.’
I felt it with my toe and in four or five strides we stopped again and I heard her knock on a door panel.
Another plane was approaching. Magda knocked again as its roar grew louder. Suddenly it was above us and I swear we could feel the heat from its engines. ‘Here comes the 11.49 from Australia,’ I announced, turning my blind gaze upwards and sticking fingers in my ears. The door opened and I was led inside.
‘You can take the glasses off now,’ Lorraine told me.
We were in the small parlour of someone’s house. The suite was moquette in a swirling pattern and it hardly left space for anything else in the room. They’d still managed to cram a coffee table in there, though, plus a couple of hard chairs and a sideboard. A gas fire hissed against the chimney breast and the picture above it was Monet’s waterlilies. The curtains were closed and the light on. An Asian woman beckoned for me to take a seat and asked if I’d like a tea or coffee. She was wearing a pale blue sari and had a long, finely chiselled face. It was a face that suggested that at some time in the past, long forgotten, it had been in a position of authority. I said ‘Tea, please,’ turning it into a smile and nodding.
‘Where is she?’ I asked.
‘She’s coming,’ Lorraine replied. A low rumble said the next plane was overhead, but triple-glazing reduced the noise to an acceptable level. I wondered what it did for property prices.
The Asian lady brought my tea on a tray with milk and sugar and hot water, all in matching china. I thanked her and poured myself a cup. Magda appeared with two mugs of coffee and handed one to Lorraine.
‘So she’s not staying here?’ I said.
‘No.’
There were plenty more questions in my repertoire but I decided that asking them was futile. If they wanted to play it like a Le Carré novel, fair enough. I stared at the Monet and recalled the time as a student when I saw some of the originals in the Louvre. That was one of the happiest times of my life, I remembered, fuelled by French wine and the hint of revolution in the air. I even pulled the best-looking girl in the college, but then I ruined it all by marrying her.
The problem with triple-glazing is that you can’t hear any of the other noises outside. Presumably a car pulled up at the gate and the hinges squealed again, but the first I knew of it was when the doorbell rang and the door opened. It’s usually draughts they let in, but here it was the roar of two Rolls Royce turbofans. The door slammed and the noise was gone.
Lorraine and Magda went to welcome the newcomers. Voices clashed and overlapped and someone laughed. I imagined the scene: lots of air-kissing and hugs. I’m not into same-sex hugs. Then they fell into a conspiratorial silence and one by one filtered into the room where I was sitting. I stood up to welcome them.
The girl was wearing a cheap anorak over a dress, with trainers. Her hair was startlingly blonde and her face drawn and tired looking. It could have been the plasticine one I had the photographs of, animated by some modern Frankenstein who’d finally mastered his science. Her head was bowed as if there were something on the carpet that demanded her attention.
‘This is Detective Inspector Priest,’ Lorraine told her. ‘He’s promised to help and not ask any questions about where you’re staying.’
The girl’s eye’s flicked briefly up at me and she nodded a silent hello.
I said: ‘You can call me Charlie. I’ll not ask you your name.’
We sat down, the girl in an easy chair next to the fire, me in the one adjacent to it. Lorraine and Magda were on the settee, the Asian woman and the person who brought the girl on hard chairs.
I said: ‘First of all, can I ask how old you are?’
‘She’s nineteen,’ Magda interrupted.
‘Are you?’ I asked.
‘Yes,’ she replied, her voice barely audible.
‘And you can speak English quite well?’
‘She can understand what you say,’ Magda told me, ‘but sometimes has difficulty expressing herself.’
I stood up and walked to the door that led into the kitchen and felt four pairs of eyes follow me. I presumed the girl’s were still fixated by the carpet. It was bright and airy in there, and there was a small Formica table with matching chairs. I feel more at home talking to witnesses across a Formica table. The kettle felt full so I switched it on.
The women watched in silence as I picked up the tea tray and carried it into the kitchen. I placed it on the table, pulled two chairs out opposite each other and placed the other two against the wall, as far way as possible, which wasn’t very far. When the kettle came to the boil I refreshed the teapot and found a clean cup and saucer for the girl.
‘Can you come this way, please,’ I asked her. She glanced in bewilderment at the women but rose to follow me. Usually we place the prisoner with the light on his or her face, but this time I did it differently. I sat her with her back to the window, and I was the one who had to blink into the brightness. I poured her a cup without asking and indicated for her to help herself to milk and sugar. She piled two big spoonfuls into her cup with a touch of milk.
‘Thank you,’ she said.
Magda and Lorraine took the two other seats, the other women stayed in the front room.
‘Let’s start again,’ I suggested. ‘First of all, how old are you?’
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
‘I am nineteen.’ Ludmilla told me.
It was less oppressive in the kitchen and now I could see how young she was. Her eyes were large and blue, giving her a slightly startled expression, but there were dark patches beneath them.
‘And when did you come into this country?’
‘On the tenth of November.’
‘Thank you. Which airport did you land at?’
‘Is that relevant?’ Magda demanded.
‘Of course it’s relevant,’ I snapped, which seemed to placate her.
‘Leeds and Bradford,’ the girl replied.
I remembered the photographs. ‘Before we go any further,’ I said, ‘do you recognise this girl?’ I slid the pictures from the envelope and passed them across the table. Magda and Lorraine came across and peered over her shoulders.
The girl studied them for a few seconds and shook her head. ‘No, I not recognise her.’
‘OK. Thanks for looking.’
‘Who is she?’ Lorraine asked.
‘One of the bodies that were found on Bleak Tor,’ I replied, and they shuddered with distaste. The girl handed the pictures back to me and I put them in their envelope. It had been a long-shot that hadn’t come off.
‘We were at the airport,’ I said. ‘Leeds and Bradford airport. I believe someone was there to meet you.’
‘Yes. A man.’
‘He had a board with your name on it?’
‘Yes.’
‘What did
he look like?’
She shrugged her shoulders.
‘How tall was he?’
‘Not tall.’
‘Stand up, please, and show me how tall he was compared to you.’
She rose to her feet and indicated that he was a few inches taller than she was. About five eight, at a guess. That narrowed it down to fifteen million.
‘What colour was his hair?’
‘Black.’
A movement outside the window caught my attention. The sky went dark as it was filled with a Boeing 747, headlights blazing, coming straight at me with its wheels hanging down like talons. I ducked involuntarily as it shot overhead.
‘You’re sure?’
‘Yes.’
‘Good.’ That meant only five million left. ‘Was his hair short, long, wavy, going bald. Anything like that?’
She studied for a few seconds. ‘He had…’ Her hands went to her head. ‘At the back, like a horse.’
‘A ponytail?’
‘Yes. A pony’s tail. Very short.’
I felt a wave of excitement run through me. It was like painting by numbers, and the Laughing Cavalier’s face was slowly being revealed. But let’s not cut corners, I thought. Call it 50,000. ‘Can you describe his face?’ I asked.
She touched her own and shook her head. ‘A bad face.’
‘Any beard or moustache? Hair…?’ I stroked my chin.’
‘No. No hair on face.’
‘Fine,’ I said. ‘You’re doing fine. What was he wearing?’
‘Black. He wear black clothes.’
‘A jacket and trousers, like mine?’ I fingered the material.
‘No. Not like you. The same.’
‘A suit?’
‘Yes. A suit. And a big coat.’
5,000. We were getting there. ‘Anything else?’
‘No.’
‘Anything at all that you remember about him?’
She thought about it but shook her head.
We try not to lead a witness but sometimes you have to. ‘Was there anything about the way he walked?’ I asked.
Her face lit up and she nodded, but the words were outside her vocabulary. She jumped to her feet and walked across the kitchen, dragging one leg slightly.
‘He walked with a limp?’ I said.
‘A…limp?’ she repeated.
‘Yes. A limp. That’s what we call it. One leg is shorter than the other.’
‘Yes!’ she agreed. ‘One shoe big.’ She lifted her own foot and tapped the side of her trainer.
One! We’d got it down to one. Something happened inside of me. I swallowed hard but it wouldn’t go down. It felt as if a block of wood was stuck in my throat, and every time I swallowed it moved slightly, but the corners were snagging on the sides. My face was burning and I had difficulty breathing. Is this it, I thought? Is this what a heart attack feels like?
I leant back in the chair and looked up at the ceiling, pulling air in through my nose, forcing it to the far-flung recesses of my lungs. Above me a child’s mobile hung from a drawing pin. Fishes, six of them, in gaudy colours. A shadow filled the room as the next airliner came down, and the fishes twitched and rotated.
The girl was staring at me. ‘You’ve been very brave,’ I said when I could speak again. ‘Very brave, but now I want you to be even braver. I want you to tell me about the other man who came to visit you at the flat.’
She shuddered and looked down at her knees. ‘Tell me about him, please,’ I said. ‘I believe you heard his name.’
‘Yes.’
‘What was it?’
‘Doo-gie.’
Lorraine said: ‘I think she means Duggie.’
I ignored her. ‘What did Doo-gie look like?’ I asked.
Her voice was a whisper, barely audible. ‘He was big,’ she said.
‘And his hair?’
‘Very short.’
‘What was he wearing?’
She looked around and stopped at Magda. ‘Like that,’ she said, pointing.
‘A T-shirt,’ I suggested.
‘Yes, T-shirt.’
‘What else?’
‘And jeans. Sometimes.’ A frustrated look crossed her face. ‘And…’ she began, and drew stripes on her leg with her fingers. ‘Adidas.’
‘A tracksuit,’ I said. ‘An Adidas tracksuit.’
‘Yes, I think so.’
‘Anything else?’
‘Yes. He have…’ Again her words ran out. She rubbed the top of her arm. ‘Pictures. He have pictures.’
‘Tattoos,’ I said. ‘Well done. Did you see what they were pictures of?’
‘No. Many things. Bad things.’
I picked up the envelope with the photographs and fidgeted with it, wondering whether to risk it. I decided to. ‘I said you’d been very brave, but now I want you to be even braver.’ I pulled a photo from the envelope and turned it to face her. ‘Do you recognise anybody on this photograph?’
She started to tremble and sob, great convulsions shaking her body. Lorraine jumped to her feet and grabbed her shoulders. The girl stood up and they walked into the other room. Magda came to look at the picture. There were four men on it, taken at the funeral. I think they were the pallbearers, and they were all similar looking. Bouncers Mark I. Magda sniffed and moved off.
When they returned the girl said: ‘I sorry.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘I’m the one who is sorry. We know who these men are, and with your help I can put them in jail for what they did to you. Now, can you point to the one that you think is Doo-gie?’
Her hand was shaking but there was no doubt about where her finger landed: straight on the fat smug face of Duggie Jones.
I didn’t show her the picture of Wallenberg. As evidence, her identification was decidedly shaky, but it was worth sacrificing because I doubted if I’d ever persuade her to appear in court. Just the same, I’d keep Wallenberg in reserve. I said: ‘I think that will do for the moment. Can we have a short break, please?’
We went in to the other room and the women talked about fetching some food from a local takeaway. I pulled a twenty-pound note out of my wallet, decided it might not be enough and found another, and offered to treat them. You’d have thought I’d offered to give them all a rubdown with baby oil, but when I explained that I’d claim it on expenses and that it was a government body, i.e. the police, and not a member of the opposite sex who was paying, they acquiesced.
Fifteen minutes later we were tucking in to an assortment of Indian goodies: pakoras, samosas, bhajis, seekh kebabs, and lots of other things that I didn’t know the names of. I hadn’t realised how hungry I was until I saw the spread, and I piled my plate high. Lorraine and Magda piled theirs like the Tower of Babel while the girl just had one or two items. I asked the Asian woman for the names of everything and she told me, but her voice was very quiet and a plane was rumbling overhead. I bit into a samosa and nodded my approval.
When we’d demolished the spread I cornered the girl like some chancer at a party and asked her if she was happy to continue the interview. She said she was. I led her into the kitchen and we started again.
‘Now I’d like you to tell me about the house where they kept you,’ I began. ‘Did you hear anybody mention the name of the town. Like, Heckley?’
She shook her head.
‘Halifax? Huddersfield?’
More headshakes.
‘Never mind,’ I said. ‘Did you see the house when he first took you there?’
‘Yes.’
‘Was it a big house?’
She shrugged her shoulders. What is big when you spent much of your childhood living like a farm animal? I asked Lorraine if there was an A4 pad anywhere and one was found for me. I drew a house on it. A nice house, with a chimney and a front door with a path winding up to it. It took me about ten seconds. I spun the pad round and said: ‘Did the house look like that?’
‘No.’
I drew two parallel lines almost the full width of the pap
er, then vertical lines at brief intervals along them, dividing the space between the lines into squares. In each square I drew a front door with a couple of steps up to it, and rows of windows. ‘Did the house look like one of those?’ I asked.
The girl became animated. ‘Yes,’ she agreed. ‘Like that.’ We were off again. There were probably about a million terrace houses in East Pennine, assuming the house was in East Pennine.
‘Was there a little garden in front?’ I asked. There wasn’t.
‘Was it at the end of the row?’ She shook her head, but hesitantly this time. ‘What is it?’ I asked.
She put one hand to her forehead, deep in thought. ‘It feel long ago,’ she said.
‘It was long ago,’ I said. ‘A lot has happened to you in a few days. Try to remember.’
The girl reached forward and took the pad again. She picked up my pen and studied the crude drawing. Suddenly she drew lines at the end of the row, indicating the last house and pointed to the one next to it. ‘That house,’ she declared. ‘Not at end; next to end.’
‘Well done,’ I said, smiling at her, but she hadn’t finished.
‘There,’ she said, pointing. ‘Name of street on wall. I not understand.’
‘What didn’t you understand?’
‘Name. Two names. I look in my…my book with words…’
‘Dictionary?’
‘Yes. My dictionary. Words mean trees. First word mean trees, second word mean trees also, but no trees anywhere.’
I looked across at Lorraine and Magda. ‘Does that mean anything to you?’
They shook their heads unhelpfully.
‘You’re doing well…’ I began, but cut the sentence short. Every time I spoke to her I stumbled over the words because I didn’t know her name. My end of the conversation sounded false and awkward. I said: ‘I wish I knew your name.’
The two chairs off to my left creaked but the occupants didn’t say anything. The girl looked down at her lap and then at me.
‘Ludmilla,’ she whispered.
‘Thank you,’ I said.
Somebody brought us tea and I poured. Ludmilla put another two heaped spoonfuls of sugar in hers. She was entitled to a little treat, I thought.
‘Was there anything else you remember about where the house was?’ I asked. ‘Were there any sounds you heard. Like clocks chiming or church bells? Any shopkeepers shouting their wares?’ Do any shopkeepers shout their wares, these days, I wondered? ‘Anything at all?’
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