Cut To Black

by Hurley, Graham

  The first of the three new tapes tracked the white van halfway down Queen Street, the spine of Portsea’s bony cadaver. On the second tape,

  the white van disappeared into the maze of streets that stretched west towards the harbour. Winter toggled back and forth, getting his bearings. Finally, he rewound the tape, ejected it, and stood up. Suttle had learned to interpret Winter’s many smiles. This one spoke of immense satisfaction.

  “Southampton Row or Kent Street.” He glanced at his watch. “Ten quid says we’ll find his motor.”

  It was nearly 10.15 by the time Eadie Sykes made it to the Ambrym offices. Amongst the messages waiting for her on the answer phone was a brief call from a DC Rick Stapleton. He was working out of the CID office at Southsea police station and he’d appreciate it if she could get in touch as soon as possible. He left two numbers, one a mobile, one a landline. Eadie scribbled down the numbers and then replayed the message. Stapleton sounded friendly enough, even apologetic, but a year with Faraday had taught Eadie a great deal about the CID mindset.

  The master tapes from last night were still in her day sack. She turned on the editing suite she used for making copies and sorted out a couple of brand new cassettes. By the time she returned from the tiny kitchen along the corridor with a mug of coffee, the first tape had been playing for nearly five minutes.

  She settled in the swivel chair she used for editing, fascinated yet again by the way she’d managed to coax a bizarre kind of truth from Daniel Kelly. She’d been lucky to find him in such a state. She knew that. Circumstances had delivered him on a plate, desperate to trade anything for that one sweet moment of oblivion, yet there was an anger and a righteousness in his defence of what he’d made of his life. He really did believe that smack was his one and only friend, his sole source of comfort in a bitterly hostile world, yet the physical results of that friendship were impossible to miss. The wildness in his eyes. The sudden fever-like shuddering he fought so hard to control. The constant itch that passed for a life. He had a rare talent for shaping a phrase but body language like this gave the lie to all his passionate rationales. Add the sequences that followed and in Eadie’s view there wasn’t a child on earth who wouldn’t draw the obvious conclusion: surrender to smack and you’ll end up wrecked.

  The interview over, Eadie slipped in the second tape and reached for the phone. While the number rang, she watched Daniel in his kitchen preparing his fix. The desperation had eased. His lover had returned. He was back on home territory, back in a world he understood, locked into those moments of foreplay that guaranteed the pain would go away.

  The number answered. Eadie asked to speak to the coroner. Seconds later, he was on the line.

  “Martin? It’s Eadie Sykes.”

  Eadie reached forward, turning down the volume on the editing machine. Martin Eckersley was relatively new to the city. Eadie had met him several months ago, finding a powerful ally in her bid to raise funding for the video. Like her, he worried about the remorseless spread of hard drugs. And like her, he believed in telling kids the truth about their real-life consequences. Just now, he was playing catch-up on a suspicious overnight death in Leigh Park. Why didn’t they meet for a quick bite at lunchtime? Earlier rather than later?

  Eckersley occupied an office in the city centre. Eadie named a cafe-bar several doors away, promising not to waste his precious time.

  “No problem. Table in the back corner? I’ll be there at half twelve.”

  The line went dead and Eadie looked up to find J-J standing in the open doorway. He looked drawn and pale, even gaunter than usual, and for a crazy moment she wondered whether he hadn’t helped himself to one of Daniel Kelly’s wraps.

  J-J couldn’t tear his eyes off the screen. At the third attempt, the needle found the vein. Eadie was watching him carefully, knowing that sooner or later she had to break the news. Emotionally, J-J was one of the most exposed people she’d ever met. In professional terms, she’d managed to turn that to their mutual advantage potential interviewees warmed to J-J’s openness, his absolute lack of guile but there’d occasionally come bleaker moments when situations had overwhelmed him. Last night had been one of them. The news that Daniel was dead would doubtless be another.

  On screen, Daniel was stumbling down the hall towards the bedroom. J-J stiffened as he watched the student at the open door, gazing down at the clutter on the floor, trying to puzzle his way around the abandoned duvet. The empty syringe in his forearm was plainly visible, the pale flesh ribboned with a single scarlet thread.

  Eadie waited until the sequence came to an end, then reached forward and turned off the machine. The recognised sign for someone dying is a downward movement, both hands, fingers shaped like a revolver. Instead, Eadie opted instead for a single finger across her throat. Under the circumstances, as a form of suicide, it seemed strangely appropriate.

  “So what happened?” J-J was still staring at the blank screen.

  “Sarah found him. After we’d gone.”

  “How long after?”

  “Hours after.” She paused. “It wasn’t our fault.”

  Eadie got to her feet, interposing her body between J-J and the monitor, but the moment she put her arms round him she knew it was a mistake. She could feel the stiffness in him, the hostility. He wanted no part of this. Not last night. And not now. She looked up at him, wondering what else she could say, what might soften this terrible news, but J-J had already broken free.

  “You want a coffee? Something to eat?”

  J-J shook his head, his eyes returning to the screen.

  “Where is he now? Daniel?”

  “At the mortuary. St. Mary’s.”

  He nodded, absorbing the news.

  “They’ll cut him up?” One bony hand touched his eye, then circled his stomach. “Look inside?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then what?”

  “I don’t know.”

  J-J collapsed into the editing chair. Then he looked up at her and for the first time in their relationship Eadie saw a new expression in his eyes. He didn’t trust her. She held his gaze for a moment, stony-faced, aware of a mounting anger of her own, a small, hot spark that seemed to grow and grow.

  The numbers she’d scribbled earlier were on a pad beside her day sack. She reached for the phone, turning her back on J-J, recognising the voice that answered.

  “Rick Stapleton? Eadie Sykes.”

  The detective took a second or two to place the name. Then he said he’d appreciate half an hour of her time. He understood she’d been involved in some kind of video shoot with a Mr. Daniel Kelly. He needed to check out one or two things, maybe take a statement.

  “Of course.” Eadie checked the video dubs were complete, then glanced at her watch. “Will this morning be OK? My office?”

  She gave him the Ambrym address, and agreed 11.30. By the time she put the phone down and turned round, J-J had gone.

  DC Suttle found the young Scouser’s car at the end of Jellicoe Place, a grim cul-de-sac off Southampton Row. A red Cavalier with rusting sills and a dented bonnet, it was parked at an angle with one rear wheel on the pavement. For more than an hour he and Winter had been phoning in registration numbers for PNC checks, working slowly through the Portsea estate. M492XBK, to Suttle’s delight, had produced a double hit.

  Winter was at the open end of the cul-de-sac, waiting for news on a nearby J reg Sierra.

  Suttle was pointing to the Cavalier. “Nicked last month from a car park in Birkenhead. Plus it’s been flagged by Major Crimes.”

  At the mention of Major Crimes, Winter abandoned his mobile conversation with the PNC clerk. Like every other detective in Portsmouth, he’d been aware of the hit and run that had hospitalised Nick Hayder. Clues to the registration had been circulated to every officer in the city, together with a heads-up on the possible make.

  “The fucking Cavalier.” He whistled softly. “Bingo.”

  Suttle returned to the car and peered in through the windows,
Winter beside him. The interior was a mess: two pairs of trainers, a copy of the Daily Star, an open box of Shopper’s Choice tissues, empty cans of Stella, a discarded pizza box, a litter of CDs, and tucked behind the driver’s seat a bag of what looked like laundry. The radio was missing from the hole in the dash and the tax disc was eight months out of date.

  “Here.” Suttle was looking down at the road behind the boot.

  Winter followed his pointing finger. Splatter patterns from the dark stain on the tarmac led away towards the kerb.

  “Hammered the little bastard.” Winter was searching for nearby CCTV cameras. “No wonder he was in such a state.”

  Suttle was already back on his mobile. The DS on the crime squad was out on inquiries. Mention of Cathy Lamb’s name drew Winter to Suttle’s side.

  “You’re going to be talking to her? Cath?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Don’t mention the business with the lad you tailed last night, Faraday’s boy. Not yet anyway.”

  “Why not?” Suttle was staring at him, bewildered.

  “Just don’t, that’s all. Has the skipper seen your pocketbook?”

  “No.”

  “Good. I’ve just got a couple of calls to make. Then everything’ll be sweet.”

  “But…”

  “Just do it. Call it a favour. That asking too much?” He shot Suttle a grin, then returned to the car, concentrating on the bumpers and radiator grille.

  Suttle bent to the phone again. When he finally got hold of Cathy Lamb, she told him to stay with the vehicle while she raised Scenes of Crime. They’d need to go through it inch by inch to establish ownership.

  Suttle mentioned the Major Crimes interest. There was a moment’s silence while Cathy Lamb computed the possible implications.

  “You’re telling me we might be able to link this vehicle to Nick Hayder?”

  “Yeah.” Suttle was eyeing Winter. “You should see the state of the bonnet.”

  “Excellent. I’ll talk to Major Crimes. Keep the kids off the car.”

  Cathy Lamb rang off. Winter was squatting in front of the Cavalier. Careful not to touch anything, he indicated an area beneath one of the headlights. The metalwork had been recently attacked by someone using a wire scourer, the circular gouge marks clearly visible.

  “Since when did scroats like these worry about the state of their motor?” He glanced up at Suttle. “Makes you wonder, doesn’t it?”

  Eadie Sykes was on the phone to the mortuary when Rick Stapleton knocked at her office door. She glanced at the proffered warrant card and waved him in, nodding towards a vacant chair while she finished her conversation. The mortuary technician’s name was Jake. She’d talked to him already that morning, establishing the time lag between the blood tests and the imminent post-mortem, and now she wanted to be sure she could gain access to the mortuary at least half an hour before the first cut.

  “To do what, exactly?”

  “To shoot video.”

  “You can’t do that.”

  “With permissions I can.”

  “Like whose?”

  “Like the next of kin. And the coroner.”

  “Doesn’t happen.” Eadie could picture the wag of the head. “Not in my experience. First off, you’ve got to…”

  “I’m afraid I’ve got someone here.” Eadie cut him off. “Do you mind if I ask you one quick question? How long from start to finish? It’s a question of tape, really. Hate to miss anything.”

  “Home Office job, you’re talking hours. This is local as far as I know. Forty-five minutes, max.”

  Eadie thanked him and pocketed the phone before scribbling herself a note. Then she glanced up. Rick Stapleton was wearing a black polo neck sweater under a gorgeous leather jacket. He carried a hint of expensive aftershave and looked a great deal fitter and less careworn than other detectives she’d met. He returned her smile with interest. She liked him on sight.

  “So what’s Ambrym?”

  “It’s an island in the New Hebrides. I was born there.”

  “But you’re Australian, right?”

  “Fraid so. My dad was in the government service. He taught English on the island. We stayed there until I was eleven.”

  “And that’s it?” Stapleton was on his feet now, inspecting a dog-eared poster Eadie had carted halfway round the world: a deep-blue lagoon framed by palm trees and shell-bursts of frangipani with a tumble of tropical clouds overhead. “Looks good.”

  “God’s acre. Paradise. I wept for days when we finally bailed out.”

  “And here? Southsea?”

  “Paradise lost. You want coffee? My life story? Or is there some other way I can help you?”

  Stapleton said no to coffee and produced a pocketbook. In the end he’d take a formal statement but first he had a couple of questions.

  “You make videos. Is that right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you were with a young man last night? Daniel Kelly?”

  “Correct.”

  “What time was that? Approximately?”

  “Around half five. We were there a couple of hours max. He is was a junkie. We were…”

  “Was?”

  “I understand he’s dead.”

  “How do you know?”

  “A friend of his, Sarah. She phoned me this morning. She was the one who gave us the initial introduction. We did an interview with him last night. About his habit.”

  “How was he?”

  “Brilliant. You want me to show you?”

  Without waiting for an answer, Eadie leaned across and pressed the play button on the video machine. By now she was word-perfect on Daniel’s attempts to get his life into some kind of focus.

  “This guy was a gift.” She boosted the volume on the video. “Just listen.”

  Stapleton turned to watch but his attention soon flagged.

  “The guy’s strung out.” He smothered a yawn. “What else did you tape?”

  “After the interview, he shot up.”

  “And you taped that?”

  “Of course we did.”

  “Then what?”

  “He went to bed.”

  “And died.”

  “That was later. After we’d gone.”

  “Can you prove that?”

  Eadie stared at him, indignant, still aware of the murmur of Daniel’s voice from the video.

  “Prove it?”

  “Yes.” Stapleton held her gaze. “We’re looking at a suspicious death here. You may have been the last to see the guy. I need to know where you went. And at what time.”

  Eadie finally looked away, telling herself that this man was simply doing his job. The post-mortem would presumably establish a time of death. After leaving the flat in Old Portsmouth, she’d returned to the office to view the rushes and plan the rest of the movie.

  “I was here from around eight to gone midnight.” She gestured at the pile of video cassettes beside the PC. “I made four or five calls on my landline. They’d all show up on the billing.”

  “And after that?”

  “I went home.”

  Stapleton nodded and made a note in his pocketbook. Then he looked up again.

  “Was it smack he was using?”

  “Yes.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I’ve seen it before. Plus he told me .. She nodded at the screen.

  Stapleton paused a moment, listening to Daniel describing his days in Australia, then returned to Eadie. He wanted to know where the heroin had come from. When Eadie told him about the delivery, he pressed her for more detail.

  “I haven’t got any. One minute we were sitting in front of the camera, the next he was off down the stairs to sort himself out. Then he was back again. End of story.”

  “Yeah.” Stapleton scribbled another note. “End of story.” He looked up. “The lad fixing…That’s on this tape?”

  “No. There’s another one.”

  “I’m afraid I’ll have to seize them bo
th. You’ll get a receipt, of course, and the coroner’s officer will return the tapes once the inquest is over.” He paused, eyes straying back to the screen. “You said ‘we’, earlier.”

  “That’s right. Me and the cameraman.”

  “He’s got a name?”

  “J-J.”

  “J-J. What sort of name’s that?”

  “Dunno. You’ll have to ask his father. The boy’s deaf.” Mention of deafness brought Stapleton’s head round. The smile was chillier this time.

  “And his surname?” he said softly. “This boy of yours?”

  J-J rode to the top of Portsdown Hill. He’d acquired the bike only recently, his first-ever, and after a week of wobbling around the city he and the travel-worn old Ridgeback had become inseparable. He loved the freedom and reach the bike gave him. He loved the way he could thread a path through the longest rush-hour traffic jams. And most of all, as he mustered the confidence to tackle the big fold of chalk to the north of the city, he loved the way his body somehow found the strength to keep pumping up the long, long hill. The closer to the top he got, the more aware he became of the thunder of his own pulse. He could feel it in every corner of his thin frame. He could hear it in his head. For the first time in his life, he thought he understood the meaning of sound.

  Today, though, was different. Halfway up the hill, exhausted, he’d got off and pushed, head down, walled off from the press of traffic on the main road north. Now and again, a juggernaut would shoulder past, a sudden buffeting and the stink of diesel, but J-J was oblivious. All he could think of, all that mattered, were the images he’d seen. First in the camera’s viewfinder. Then in Eadie’s office. The stuff he hadn’t shot the spoon, the syringe, the needle, Daniel Kelly’s stumbling path to bed had lodged at the very front of his brain, billboard-huge, the most public of accusations. You helped kill this sad, sad man. You helped kill him as surely as if you’d loaded a gun and handed it across. You delivered the money, arranged the delivery, took advantage of his distress, and walked away. Could any other betrayal be as damning -and as terminal as that?