Identity Crisis

by Bill Kitson

  Binns and Fleming were trying to calm the residents, most of whom were milling about at the end of the street, when the superintendent’s mobile rang. She listened in silence as the control room officer passed her the message from his screen. ‘Have you got any patrol cars free?’ she asked. ‘If so, raise the key-holder and get him to meet them there. It’s probably frost in the mechanism, or something equally trivial. The chances of it being anything other than a false alarm are minimal.’

  Although she had dismissed the alert, Fleming told Binns about the development. She had just passed on the information when she got another call, this time from the chief constable. Fleming put it on speaker so Binns could hear what she had to say.

  ‘Nash is all right,’ O’Donnell began. ‘When I say that, I mean he isn’t seriously hurt. He’s got a broken arm, a cut to the back of his head and a load of scratches on his face, but he’s conscious and fairly lucid. I only had a moment to talk to him. They’ve stitched him up and wheeled him off to X-ray, that’s where he is now. The doctor says their main concern is the possibility of concussion. From what Nash told me, there was some sort of a device rigged to make his gas cooker blow up. He was very lucky. The bomber was careless and Nash knew someone had been in the flat. He spotted the device, seconds before it blew. Clara’s just a bit shaken up and has a couple of scratches and a bruise or two. At the moment she’s being comforted by her fiancé.’

  ‘I’m glad they’re both all right; we’ve more than enough to contend with. On top of everything, we’ve just had a message from the control room. Apparently, the alarm has gone off at a bank here in Helmsdale. Probably a short circuit or something, but it’s bad timing when we’re already overstretched.’

  ‘Bloody cutbacks,’ the chief muttered. ‘They wanted me to trim the establishment even further, but this will show the Authority we can’t cut any more. I’ll stay here to talk to Nash.’

  O’Donnell had been about to ask how long it would be before Nash returned from X-ray, when her mobile rang. Ignoring the disapproving frown of the nurse at the reception desk, she answered it. As she was listening, she glanced across the waiting room. ‘I’ll be there ASAP,’ she told the caller.

  As O’Donnell looked around for someone to inform that she would have to leave, she saw a nurse heading towards her.

  ‘Aren’t you the chief constable?’ the nurse asked. ‘I’m Lianne Ford. I’m Viv’s, I mean, DC Pearce’s girlfriend. Viv phoned to tell me what had happened. I came straight down from the ward. I’m on nights this week,’ she offered by way of explanation.

  ‘I’m sorry Viv’s stuck out there, he must feel out of it,’ O’Donnell sympathized. ‘But the job he’s doing is very important.’

  ‘I think he’d rather be out there and bored, than where Mr Nash is,’ Lianne pointed out.

  ‘Yes, I’m sure. And the way things are kicking off, we can’t spare anyone to relieve him. I’ve to go back. Things are so desperate; even I’m having to lend a hand. Will you explain to DI Nash why I couldn’t stay? Tell him thieves have broken into one of the banks in Helmsdale. They got in via the basement of the shop next door.’

  ‘Good Heavens!’ Lianne exclaimed. ‘Is it the one below the accountants’ offices?’

  ‘Yes, do you know them?’

  ‘I had a Saturday job in one of the shops downstairs before I left school,’ Lianne told her.

  As she was listening, O’Donnell glanced at the clock. ‘How long does an X-ray take?’

  ‘I’ll nip down and find out how long they’ll be,’ Lianne offered. ‘I know the staff.’

  She returned within a couple of minutes. ‘They had to raise a radiographer, which is why there’s a delay. It should be done in half an hour or so.’

  ‘I’d better go. Please be sure to pass on my message.’

  Lianne had been hanging around for what seemed an age. She had just started across the tiled floor to return to the ward, when the doors to her right opened and an odd trio emerged. A man she assumed to be Nash, appeared in a wheelchair which was being pushed by a tall man, who looked to be the only one who wasn’t the worse for wear. The man was also supporting a woman whom Lianne guessed to be Sergeant Mironova.

  Nash’s face looked as if he’d suffered a delayed attack of teenage acne. Close inspection revealed it to be a myriad of tiny cuts inflicted by the exploding granules of glass from the outer door of the building.

  His companion was in better shape, as she had escaped the blast itself, protected by the outer wall of the building, the inner door and Nash’s body. Nevertheless, her white blouse would never be white again, the combination of dust, soot and blood from Nash’s injuries rendering it fit only for the waste bin. Her slacks were similarly stained. Her hair was tousled, her face besmirched with dust and her normally immaculate hands were blackened, the nails grimy as a gardener’s.

  ‘I wish you’d let me walk, there’s nothing wrong with my legs,’ Nash grumbled.

  ‘No, it’s your head that’s the problem,’ Clara retorted tartly, ‘your brain in particular.’

  Lianne hurried over. ‘Are you Mr Nash?’ She introduced herself. ‘How are you?’

  ‘He’s got a broken arm, a possible broken collar bone, possible concussion and a terribly bad temper,’ Clara smiled at her. ‘I’m Clara. DS Mironova.’

  ‘The chief constable was here,’ Lianne told them. ‘She asked me to tell you she had to go.’

  ‘Has something else happened?’ Nash asked.

  ‘The bank in the High Street in Helmsdale has been broken into. The robbers got in via the basement of the place next door. You know, below where the accountants, Armstrong and Gill have their offices.’

  Nash nodded agreement, then wished he hadn’t. ‘I ought to get out of here. See if I can help.’

  ‘You mustn’t do that,’ Lianne told him. ‘Not if there’s the chance of concussion.’

  Before Nash could argue the point, which he showed every sign of doing, another nurse appeared and took firm hold of the wheelchair. She swung it none too gently round and marched Nash towards one of the cubicles. ‘Doctor wants to examine you again now we’ve got the X-rays back,’ she told him in that bright, no-nonsense tone that nurses adopt for patients who behave like unruly five-year-olds.

  ‘I don’t think there’s much I can do here,’ Lianne told him. ‘Just do what you’re told, Mr Nash.’

  After a further ten minutes, a doctor appeared from behind the curtain shielding the cubicle. He approached Clara and Sutton. ‘I’ve sedated Mr Nash,’ he told them. ‘He’s going to be fairly doped-up for a few hours. The good news is that there seems to be no trace of concussion. On the downside, his arm is broken, but it is a clean break; his collarbone is also cracked, both of which are causing him a lot of pain. The problem with collarbone injuries is that too much movement creates pressure on the bone, which causes even more discomfort. He won’t be able to drive for some time, I’m afraid, but apart from that he seems fine, and we should be in a position to let him go home after the ward round in the morning.’ He smiled brightly and turned away.

  Nash was dreaming. In his dream he was confronted by two faceless men. Men he knew to be responsible for all that had happened. They were the men behind Vanda Dawson’s abduction, behind the security van robbery, the bomb that had destroyed his home and the break-in at the bank.

  The curious thing about his dream was that, although he couldn’t see their faces, he knew their names. He knew them, because he’d recently been told them. Had he been told? Or had he read it somewhere? He must concentrate … He had been told it, he was sure, but why would he think he’d read it? Read it where? On a poster? No, that was ridiculous. But he knew things about them. Where could he have learned of them? Knew about their weird lifestyle. Well, you’d have to call it weird, wouldn’t you, living underground all the time.

  He wanted to ask them about this, wanted to question them about lots of things in fact, but whenever he tried to, either he fell asleep or they va
nished. He wished they wouldn’t do that, it was so disconcerting. It wouldn’t have been so bad if he’d any idea where they went to when they disappeared. Did they go underground? Was that where they were keeping Vanda Dawson? If so, he ought to know where that underground place was. After all he’d been told about it, hadn’t he? Well, more than told about it. He’d been made to learn it, hadn’t he? All because cricket was cancelled. Anyway, perhaps that wasn’t where they went to. Perhaps they went somewhere else. Somewhere he didn’t know about….

  After a brief inspection of the crime scene, O’Donnell called a meeting at Helmsdale police station.

  Much to Sutton’s annoyance, on leaving the hospital, Clara had insisted on going back on duty. Having dropped her at the station, he headed back to Netherdale General. ‘If I can’t persuade you otherwise, I suppose I’d better make sure Nash is OK,’ he grumbled. ‘At least I can stop him trying to do anything stupid.’ He softened the anger by kissing her gently. ‘Just you take care. No heroics, understand?’

  ‘That comes well from you, Major Sutton.’ Clara remarked as she got out of the car. ‘Honestly, I’m fine, now that my hearing has come back.’

  ‘That’s good news, you’ve been deafening us all for the last couple of hours.’ Sutton smiled and waved goodbye as he drove away.

  If any local inhabitants had been passing the police station they would have wondered why the place was lit up at 4 a.m. Fortunately, few Helmsdale residents were prone to wandering the streets at that hour. ‘We can’t examine the bank premises until a forensic team has been in,’ O’Donnell told the detectives, ‘and they can’t go in until structural engineers have ensured the premises are safe. Removal of a large chunk of the dividing wall means that until they get jacks in position, the buildings could collapse at any time.’

  The chief constable looked round at her colleagues. With Pearce still on surveillance duty, she had called in DC Andrews, who, although officially still on leave, had agreed to come in. The fact that the request came from the chief may have influenced her decision.

  ‘We’re hamstrung as far as the bank’s concerned until later this afternoon, and as we appear to have ground to a halt with regard to the security van hijack, that leaves us with the abduction, and the fire at Nash’s flat. What’s the latest on that?’

  ‘The fire brigade will be sending their forensic officers in to inspect the place once it’s safe to do so,’ Fleming reported. ‘I’m liaising with CFO Curran. He knows this is to be treated as a suspicious incident, so he’ll insist they give it priority.’

  ‘What’s the strength of our information about the cause of the fire?’ the chief asked.

  ‘According to what Mike told me,’ Clara said. ‘He returned to the flat after a meal and went into the kitchen for coffee. He saw the coffee machine had been moved and noticed the oven timer light was on. He could see a load of nails had been stuffed into the cavity between the glass doors, presumably to act as shrapnel. He was attempting to leave the flat as I arrived, that was when the explosion happened. I think he’d have been killed instantly had he been inside. We’ll have to wait until he’s fit to talk to us to find out if he knows more. At the moment he’s sedated, so it’ll be a while before that happens.’

  ‘I think it’s significant that the explosion happened at almost the exact time that the bank was being broken into,’ Fleming commented.

  ‘Designed to distract us, you mean? I’ll buy that. If we’re right’ − the chief grimaced ruefully − ‘it worked perfectly. Again, we’ll have to wait on forensic reports.

  ‘What I suggest,’ O’Donnell continued after a few seconds’ thought, ‘is that we concentrate on wrapping up the abduction case. We’re fairly sure Vanda Dawson’s body is lying somewhere in those woods on Black Fell. Number one priority must be locating that and getting SOCO and Professor Ramirez to work. At the same time, continue with the plan to arrest McKenzie this morning. We’re in line for a lot of flak from the media over the hijack and the bank robbery, the PR benefit of being able to bring the Cremator to book will outweigh the negatives completely.

  ‘Clara, if you feel up to it, I want you to take over from Pearce on the surveillance of McKenzie’s farm. When he leaves on his milk round, I want you to follow him just as Nash had planned to. Pearce must head out to Black Fell in time for first light with the officers.’

  She turned to DC Andrews. ‘Lisa, I’d like you to go through to Netherdale and pick that search warrant up as soon as it’s ready. Meet Clara back at McKenzie’s place. Superintendant Fleming has already arranged to have an ARU on standby for the arrest. Apart from the fact that McKenzie’s one of the most sadistic serial killers of all time, I don’t want him topping himself once he knows the game’s up. Either that, or harming any of my officers, so I want you all in vests, understand?’ she added. ‘He’s capable of anything, by my reckoning. Not only the torture his victims have to suffer, but the anguish he puts their relatives through means he’ll stop at nothing: so we take no chances.’

  Nash regained consciousness. Although his eyes were closed, he was aware this wasn’t his room, his flat. Then memory returned in a flood. Like flood water his recollection was a jumble of thoughts jostling one another downstream. The bomb. That was the strongest current. It dominated his thinking. He had been injured, but what of Clara? He remembered she was OK. She’d taken care of him, summoned help, stayed with him at the hospital. He wondered where she’d gone after she came with him to casualty.

  He opened his eyes, blinking in the bright light. He was in a small, sterile looking room, so obviously a hospital ward. His was the only bed, but he wasn’t the room’s sole occupant. A man was bending over a chair sorting through a small pile of clothes. Examining them and making notes on a small piece of paper. They were his clothes. He recognized them and David Sutton in the same instant.

  ‘David, what are you doing?’

  Sutton looked up, his frown of concentration lifted. ‘I need your clothes sizes. What you were wearing last night’ − he indicated the pile − ‘is ruined. All the rest of your things went up in the fire. The hospital is planning to release you this morning, all being well. I don’t think February is the right time of year to be wandering the streets in nothing but a hospital gown, do you? Apart from the fact that you might scare old ladies. So I thought I’d go to the shops as soon as they’re open and buy you at least one change of clothing to tide you over, and have it ready for when you leave.’

  ‘That’ll be as soon as I can get out of this bed.’ Nash went to sit up; then winced as the pain in his arm and shoulder went into hyper-drive. He gasped slightly before trying to move again, this time more cautiously. He hoped this would make the discomfort less. It didn’t. As if summoned by some form of NHS telepathy, a nurse entered carrying a small plastic cup. She smiled at Sutton as she moved past him and stood looking at her patient.

  ‘Good morning, Mr Nash, how do you feel?’

  ‘Rotten,’ he admitted, ‘but I’ll feel better when I get out of here.’

  ‘You’re due for discharge this morning once doctor has had a good look at you. How’s your head? Any pain, blurred or double vision?’

  ‘No, my head’s fine. The pain is in my arm and shoulder.’

  ‘Not surprising. You’ve a broken arm and cracked collarbone. These will help.’

  She offered him the cup. Nash moved gingerly to take it, using his left hand. He was learning. As he was swallowing the tablets, she poured him some water from the jug on the bedside cabinet, filling the glass only halfway. Nash realized he was very thirsty. He drained the glass. As if expecting this, the nurse immediately refilled it. He drank more slowly this time. ‘Doctor will probably be round to see you in a couple of hours or so. I’ll be back shortly to take your temperature and blood pressure, then they’ll bring you your breakfast.’

  Once the nurse had gone, Sutton looked across at Nash. ‘I’ve got all the details I need, so whilst you’re being sorted out by the medics I’ll
nip to Good Buys and get you something to wear. It’ll be nothing fancy, but it will tide you over until you can make more permanent arrangements.’ Sutton’s expression changed. ‘I think, from what I’ve heard, you can kiss goodbye to anything that was in your flat. By all accounts it was completely gutted. Sorry, and all that, but the main point is you escaped without permanent damage.’ He paused, before adding, ‘The other thing you’ve to be thankful for is that Daniel was away at the time.’

  Nash moistened his lips. ‘Small mercies, but you’re right, David. There was very little in the flat that can’t be replaced.’

  ‘I don’t know what you intend to do once you’re out of here, but for the time being you can’t drive. There are other things to consider. Fortunately, your wallet was in your trouser pocket, so I’ve got that safe, as well as your mobile phone.’ Sutton patted his jacket pocket. ‘For someone who professes to know nothing about computers, an Android phone is fairly sophisticated.’

  Nash shrugged, then wished he hadn’t bothered. ‘It was a good offer in the shop, and I’ve promised myself I’ll become more computer literate. Before my son outdoes me.’

  ‘It’ll be no good to you unless you get a replacement charger soon. That’s another thing on the to-do-list. The main thing you have to consider is a place to stay until you can get sorted out. That isn’t going to be easy with you being fairly immobile. Added to that there’s the question of getting about. And then, as you said, there’s Daniel to think about.’

  ‘Oh Lord! I’m supposed to be driving to France next weekend to collect him.’ Nash glanced down at his arm. ‘That isn’t going to happen.’ His face clouded.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Sutton asked.

  ‘I haven’t got his aunt’s phone number, it was in the flat. I never got round to putting it in my contacts list on the mobile.’

  Sutton took Nash’s phone from his jacket and Nash saw his fingers flying across the touch screen, far faster than he’d ever managed it. He read out a phone number, then looked up with a grin.