Dead on Your Feet

by Stephen Puleston

  There had to be permanence, a sense of destiny. Not something subject to the fleeting tides of fashion. That was the challenge: extending the boundaries of how we perceive ourselves as human beings, living together, exposing our frailties.

  At the end of the promenade, the lifeboat was being launched for what looked like a regular drill, judging by the lack of urgency among the crew. I paused and watched as the tractor with enormous wheels pushed a cage carrying the lifeboat down into the water. The crew fired the engine into life and it roared away. A small crowd gathered, mostly older retired couples, judging by the blue rinse hairdos and the occasional walking stick.

  Perhaps some of them had paused by the shop window when the curtain had fallen. More people should have experienced the installation, of course, and I cursed silently when I thought I hadn’t been able to disguise her properly. Somebody had noticed her condition. I became lightheaded, my chest tightened.

  Then I realised I was standing on my own.

  Some of the lifeboat crew, probably mechanics or volunteers, stood around chatting, killing time. Hurrying away from the promenade I found a café and treated myself to a slice of Victoria sponge with my latte. My work in the past few days had been the culmination of weeks of planning so I felt quite justified in my self-congratulatory indulgence. Eating the cake and drinking the coffee cheered me up too.

  After paying, I cut back into the town and discreetly walked past the shop. There was a certain symmetry to the notices plastered on the wooden sheets that covered the glass. But it was a crime scene no one could enter.

  Some hooligan had actually spray-painted an indistinguishable image on one of the wooden boards. That gave me a real buzz. My work was being appreciated, enhanced and enlarged. So I needed a record. I dipped into my fleece pocket for my mobile telephone. I crossed over the road, wanting to avoid any possibility that someone might notice me taking a photograph. I fiddled with my phone, ensuring it was ready to take photographs. I even practised walking along holding the camera discreetly by my side, pressing the exposure button. Once I mastered this simple technique I ambled past the shop, snapping away. Back in my car I examined the various images.

  I was pleased, really pleased – they were all suitable for me to add to my collection. I still had to catalogue the images from his place yesterday. It was one of those other tasks I would have to plan.

  I started the car, my mind refreshed from my walk.

  Now I had to get back and plan my next installation.

  Chapter 13

  Drake woke with a jolt. The image of Rhisiart Hopkin sitting in his leather wing chair flooded back to his mind. He had to assume his death was connected to Gloria Patton’s even if the preliminary results from the crime scene suggested otherwise. The sound of a baby crying in one of the adjacent flats and then the noise from a television interrupted his rumination. It reminded him of his promise to take Helen and Megan bowling and then for pizza that afternoon. He realised it would be impossible and he dreaded the negative comments from Sian. But now he had another reason to call her, and somehow he had to tell her about Huw Jackson. He reached over for his watch and scanned the time; he would ring her after breakfast before leaving the flat.

  After showering, he chose a pair of sombre navy chinos with a dark jacket and a powder blue shirt. His concession to the informality of working on a Sunday went as far as not wearing a tie. He walked through to the kitchen and reached for the coffee. After some experimentation he had discovered that eighteen grams was the precise amount he needed to make a perfect Americano from his machine. He organised a bowl of muesli as the coffee dripped into a mug. He listened to the Welsh language bulletin on the radio – a brief piece referred to the discovery of a body in a house in Llanrwst with confirmation that the Wales Police Service were issuing a full statement later that day. It meant the PR department would be after him that morning.

  He finished his breakfast and stared at his mobile on the table.

  He reached over and called Sian. She sounded sleepy. ‘What time is it?’

  ‘I’m sorry to call so early.’

  ‘You’re seeing the girls later this afternoon?’

  ‘That’s why I am calling.’

  ‘Oh.’

  Sian was the only person Drake knew that could combine menace and criticism with a threatening undertone into a single word.

  ‘Something’s come up.’

  Now she managed an exasperated tone. ‘Nothing changes.’

  ‘I was working until late last night and I’ll be at headquarters most of the day.’

  ‘Are you talking about that woman found in the shop? It sounded dreadful.’

  Oddly, Drake began to feel relieved as she sounded sympathetic.

  ‘I won’t be able to take Helen and Megan this afternoon. But I’ll come over and see them later. There’s something I need to discuss too.’

  ‘If this is about the house and any of the financial stuff then I don’t think—’

  ‘No, I saw Mam yesterday. She… well, it’s best we talk later.’

  An embarrassed few seconds of silence followed; Drake wasn’t certain what to say next or how he was going to start the conversation with Sian that evening.

  ‘What time will you be calling? I might take the girls out myself. They were looking forward to seeing you.’

  She drew out the words of the last sentence, emphasising the guilt Drake felt when his work interfered with family. ‘I’ll call you later.’

  He ended the call, gathered his jacket and car keys and left the apartment. Adhering to his rituals meant he bought a newspaper, completed a few squares of the Sudoku puzzle and then drove off to headquarters.

  * * *

  Sara woke early, determined to have a clear mind when she arrived at work that morning. So after some basic warm-up exercises on the patio area at the back of her house she started running just before seven-thirty am. She kept a gentle pace for the first ten minutes until she got her breathing right. Then she adjusted the length of her stride as her body relaxed into the rhythm she needed.

  After five years as a detective constable her promotion to detective sergeant had filled her with pride. The only drawback had been some comments from other officers that Ian Drake was a miserable individual. But the sergeant she had worked with told her he was a good detective, determined and thorough. Drake’s handling of a case involving the deaths of two police officers was still talked about in revered terms by the detectives of Northern Division. Her first day on his team had been burnt into her subconscious, barely giving her time to get to know her superior officer. No matter how hard she tried to shake off the image of Gloria Patton standing upright in the shop premises, the crime scene still dominated her mind. She felt she had let herself down at the post-mortem. She was a detective now; this was the life she wanted and blood and guts would be a part of it.

  Still, it worried her that she hadn’t been able to switch off the evening before and wondered if it happened to every detective.

  She decided on a route that took her out of the village into the countryside with narrow lanes lined with thick hedges. Occasionally a car passed and a group of cyclists met her as she slowed her journey on one of the steep ascents. She stopped when she reached the brow of a hill and, pausing, looked down at the coastal area and out towards the windfarms dotted over the horizon.

  She had googled psychopath the previous evening, reading a simple article accompanied by various images that explained the steps used to identify the disorder. She had no expert basis for suggesting Gloria Patton’s killer was a psychopath and regretted it soon after saying it. Drake probably thought she had overreacted. The sheer coldblooded audacity of the way Gloria’s body had been staged suggested a level of depravity that frightened her. She had even clicked onto the Hare Psychopathy Checklist, reading all about the symptoms of a psychopath. By midnight her eyes burnt and she went to bed praying she would sleep.

  A car rounded a corner nearby and sounded its hor
n. Sara set off again and soon found the exercise was doing her good. She settled into a steady rhythm, managing her breathing effectively by the time she finished eight miles. Back home she completed a routine of stretches and lunges that helped her body recover and warm down. Once showered and caffeinated she left for headquarters.

  * * *

  Winder and Luned were sitting by their desks when Drake walked into the Incident Room.

  Luned wore a pair of denim jeans with a pale green blouse, no make-up. The occasional streak of grey in her thick hair made her look older. Winder had tidied his appearance over the past few months, a result Drake put down to a live-in girlfriend. It meant his blue striped shirt was neater than usual, although Winder hadn’t shaved that morning.

  ‘Good morning, boss,’ Winder said.

  Drake looked around the Incident Room. ‘Any sign of Sara?’

  Winder and Luned shook their heads.

  Drake paced over to the board, staring at the various images from Hopkin’s home. ‘I want both of you coordinating the house-to-house enquiries in Llanrwst this morning. Sara and I spoke to Hopkin’s housekeeper yesterday. We’ll need a detailed statement from her. And we need to go through all of Hopkin’s possessions at the house – make sure we aren’t missing something there.’

  As Drake finished, the door into the Incident Room opened. Mike Foulds followed Sara inside and their discussion drifted into silence as they saw Drake and the other two officers.

  ‘Sorry I’m late,’ Sara said.

  Drake mumbled an acknowledgement.

  ‘I thought you’d like to see these,’ Foulds said, holding up a plastic evidence pouch with two mobile telephones inside. ‘We found them in Hopkin’s place. They’ve been dusted and examined for DNA. You can access them without pin numbers.’

  Drake stared at the handsets. ‘Why would he have two?’

  Foulds shrugged.

  ‘Anything else from the crime scene? Any fingerprints?’

  ‘Lots of prints. The vast majority belonged to Rhisiart Hopkin of course. There were others unknown as yet, and a few partials too. One set in particular was all over the place. Did someone clean for him?’

  Drake nodded.

  ‘We’ll get the results processed later today.’

  ‘Get back to me as soon as you can.’

  Foulds left, quickly followed by Winder and Luned. Drake returned to his office and Sara joined him, sitting in one of the visitor chairs. He scanned the room, pleased nothing seemed to have been moved from the night before. He opened the plastic evidence pouch and emptied the contents onto his desk.

  ‘My guess is one of these is for work,’ Drake said.

  Both mobiles were modern smartphones. Drake handed Sara an iPhone. ‘I suggest you work on this one.’

  She trooped off. Drake switched on the remaining handset. He turned his attention back to the large display of the iPhone. He surveyed the various icons and apps. There were symbols for three different weather forecasting applications, a typical British fascination, Drake thought.

  He turned to the text messages Hopkin had received and sent. They were ordinary, day-to-day banter about football scores, arrangements for him to see friends, reminders about meetings – Drake noticed a series of messages from Gloria Patton. He knew that each one would have to be transcribed, checked and referenced against Patton’s own telephone.

  It hadn’t occurred to him until mid-morning that he might have expected a message with the #Iamtheone. Suddenly, he froze. If it was the same killer then surely one of the phones would have such a message?

  ‘Sara,’ he called out. ‘Have you seen any messages with hashtag Iamtheone?’

  Moments later she appeared in his office doorway. ‘The mobile I’ve got is the one from the bank. It’s messages from his superiors in the Cardiff head office and then messages from him to his juniors.’

  ‘Download all the details. We can ask the bank about Hopkin’s work.’

  Sara returned to her desk and Drake carried on scanning the messages, looking for something to link Hopkin to the death of Gloria Patton. He noticed the names of the two committee members he had met and wasted time reading the banal exchange about dates and times of meetings. A record of messages always helped an inquiry, although Drake had found too often that compromising messages were deleted. Hopkin had kept dozens going back several months. He probably didn’t know how to delete them, Drake thought.

  He made a list of everybody who had called Hopkin in the last seven days – contacting them all meant hours of work. Drake laboured for the rest of the day using different-coloured highlighters to build a picture of Hopkin’s friends and colleagues and also trying to establish what the bank manager had been doing the day before he was killed. A call to one of Hopkin’s colleagues established that he had spent Friday afternoon compiling his regular weekly report to the bank’s head office. Hopkin had made three calls on his mobile on Friday evening and Drake spoke to each person in turn. But they told him nothing to help the inquiry – one had been about the railway society Hopkin belonged to and another about the arrangements for a walking club’s monthly hike. None of his friends had ever been for dinner nor did they know who might have been the guests.

  Drake stalked around the Incident Room staring at the images on the board. Reports from the house-to-house team in Llanrwst proved a distraction although the lack of any eyewitness evidence added to his frustration.

  * * *

  It was early evening by the time Drake parked outside the house he had called home for many years. Sian’s BMW was in her usual place. He noticed the lawn had been cut and immediately he wanted to know who was cutting the grass for his soon-to-be ex-wife. It had been something he had done and enjoyed mostly.

  He pressed the front door bell and heard Sian’s footsteps.

  ‘I expected you much earlier.’ She turned and went back inside the house.

  She wore a pair of her expensive trousers that accentuated her slim build. Helen and Megan ran from the sitting room when they realised Drake had arrived and he hugged them both. ‘Look, I’m really sorry about today.’

  ‘Is it an important murder case?’ Helen said.

  ‘You know I can’t tell you.’

  ‘Dad.’ She had inherited her mother’s ability to inject a single word with enormous meaning.

  ‘I need to speak to Mam.’

  ‘Are you going to read to us later?’

  ‘Of course.’

  Drake went through into the kitchen and found Sian preparing her evening meal. There wasn’t an invitation for him to join her.

  ‘Coffee?’

  He shook his head. ‘Look, I’ll keep this brief. I saw Mam yesterday. She’s been wanting to discuss something with me for a while.’ He kept his tone serious, matter-of-fact and it had the desired effect; Sian sat down at the pine table. She stared over at him intently.

  ‘It was about Dad.’

  ‘Are there problems with the legal papers?’

  ‘No, that’s straightforward enough.’

  Sian threaded the fingers of both hands together and leant forward slightly on the table.

  ‘Mam told me stuff about Dad I never knew. It came as a complete shock.’

  ‘Get on with it, Ian.’

  He gave her a sharp, reproachful look. ‘She told me Dad left home at eighteen and started a relationship with an American woman. She was a lot older than him and my Nain and Taid disapproved – apparently there were blazing arguments between Dad and Taid.’

  Sian crossed her arms and raised her eyebrows.

  ‘They had a child, a boy.’

  Sian’s mouth fell open in disbelief.

  ‘Tom was a father when he was eighteen?’

  ‘I know, it is hard to believe.’

  ‘So why haven’t you been told about this before? Your family are useless about sharing personal details. They are so secretive and why did she tell you this now? The man involved must be in his fifties by now. Does your mother know w
here he lives in the States?’

  ‘I met him yesterday.’

  ‘What!’ Sian’s chair squeaked against the tiled floor as she sat upright.

  ‘He lives in Llandudno.’

  ‘I don’t believe this. You’ve got a brother in Llandudno?’

  ‘He wants to meet more of the family.’

  ‘Don’t be stupid. You don’t know anything about this man. Have you thought about checking him out? Having a DNA test done? And what is it he wants? After all these years. I don’t think it’s fair on your mother. You’re definitely not involving the girls in any of this.’

  Drake floundered, uncertain how to respond. Sian continued. ‘What does your sister think? I can imagine she would tell you to have nothing to do with him.’

  ‘Mam hasn’t told her yet.’

  ‘Now she is completely mad. She needs to tell Susan straightaway.’ Sian stood up, walked over to the worktop, and flicked on the electric kettle. ‘What’s his name? Is he Drake too?’

  ‘Huw Jackson.’

  As he said his brother’s surname Drake sensed that he had recently heard the name -Geraint Wood had mentioned a Jackson being involved with Gloria Patton. Drake knew exactly what he was doing the following morning.

  Chapter 14

  ‘There’s someone to see you, Inspector.’ The woman behind reception smirked and tilted her head towards the faux leather sofas nearby. Drake glanced over. ‘She’s been waiting for half an hour.’

  Although it was a Monday morning, Drake felt as though it were midweek already.

  He walked over, stretching out a hand. ‘Good morning. Detective Inspector Ian Drake.’

  ‘Jeremy said you wanted to see me. I’m sorry, I should introduce myself. I’m Valerie Reed, Jeremy’s girlfriend.’

  The husky voice matched the blonde hair styled into swirls that suggested it had been cut randomly but in reality had been carefully constructed. The eyelashes were heavy and almost as long as the artificial nails painted a bright red that grazed Drake’s skin as they shook hands. Ellingham’s neighbour described her as a film star. It was probably what the old man thought such a person might look like.