The Curator (Washington Poe)

by M. W. Craven

  ‘Can I get you anything to drink?’ the barman asked.

  ‘Sparkling water, no ice, please,’ Bradshaw said.

  ‘Same for me but I’ll have ice,’ Poe said.

  After the barman had disappeared, Poe said, ‘How’s your program coming along?’

  ‘I’m running tests now, Poe,’ she replied. ‘I’ll put the data in tonight and I’ll have early analysis this time tomorrow.’

  Poe nodded. He wasn’t expecting much – the victims’ ages, education levels, geography and socioeconomic factors were too different for them to be linked – but experience had told him never to underestimate Bradshaw’s contributions.

  The lack of anything connecting the victims was irrelevant, though, as they had been selected. Working out how was what SCAS did, and Poe knew Bradshaw had already tasked her small team of analysts – affectionately known as the ‘Mole People’ due to the way they tended to blink when they went outside – with analysing victim selection criteria.

  The barman brought their drinks and placed them on coasters. He also placed a bowl of peanuts in front of them. Poe grabbed half a dozen, threw them in his mouth and started crunching. He passed the bowl to Bradshaw.

  ‘No thank you, Poe,’ she said. ‘Studies have found that bar nuts can contain as many as one hundred unique specimens of urine.’

  Poe stopped chewing. He spat out what he hadn’t swallowed into his handkerchief.

  ‘Thanks for the heads-up,’ he said.

  ‘You’re welcome, Poe,’ she replied politely.

  He popped an ice cube in his mouth and crunched it to get rid of the imagined taste of urine.

  ‘And I don’t have ice in my drinks for the same reason.’

  Poe froze. ‘Urine?’

  She shook her head. ‘Coliform. It’s the bacteria found in human faeces.’

  Poe stared at his empty glass.

  ‘You see, this is why I drink beer. If something’s going to taste like piss then the least it can do is get me drunk.’

  ‘I’ve been thinking of competitive kite flying, Poe.’

  ‘Who hasn’t?’ he grumbled.

  ‘It’s a real thing,’ she continued. ‘They have leagues and everything. Some competitions are about precision flying where they have to demonstrate compulsory figures as laid down by the judging panel. Another discipline is a freestyle interpretation of a piece of music. This is called a kite ballet. Both disciplines can be individual, in pairs or in teams.’

  ‘That’s a weird thing to know a lot about,’ Poe said.

  ‘Jeremy, one of my—’

  ‘Mole People.’

  ‘—team,’ she said without missing a step, ‘has been flying kites since he was a child.’

  ‘I flew kites when I was a child as well,’ Poe said. ‘Thing is, I stopped when I wasn’t a child. You know, like adults are supposed to do.’

  ‘Anyway, Mr Cranky Pants, I called Jeremy earlier—’

  ‘Called or emailed?’

  Bradshaw never spoke to people face-to-face if an electronic message would do.

  ‘OK, I emailed Jeremy earlier and he told me that the kite in the tree looks very much like a stunt kite. Quite expensive as these things go.’

  Poe sat up straight. This was more like it. They might have started out talking about the specific gravity content of piss in bar snacks but they were now firmly back in police territory.

  ‘And did Jeremy say where you might buy such a thing?’

  ‘Too many to list. He did say that the kite’s logo was probably bespoke, though. Most serious enthusiasts have their own design, apparently. Because we don’t have a great view of it, and because we had to leave the kite in situ, I’ll have to run the photographs you took through an object-based image analysis program.’

  ‘What’s that do?’

  ‘It will break the photograph into pixels then group them into homogenous objects. Each object has statistics associated with them, like shape, geometry, context and texture, which can assist with its identification.’

  ‘Which means?’

  ‘We’ll get a report containing a number of composite images with likelihood expressed as percentage points.’

  ‘The program can predict what the logo is?’

  ‘With a percentage point indicating likelihood beside each one.’

  ‘That’s one clever program,’ Poe said. ‘Yours, I take it?’

  Bradshaw shook her head. ‘No. This is an open-source one I’ve adapted.’

  ‘When we get your report we’ll need to speak to someone,’ he said. ‘There’s bound to be some boring bastard out there who knows about this stuff.’

  Bradshaw shook her head again.

  ‘So rude,’ she said.

  Chapter 23

  When Poe stepped out of Herdwick Croft the following morning, Shap Fell looked like someone had thrown a duvet over it. Snowflakes the size of bottle tops were still falling. They had softly covered the ground, changing the harsh ancient moorland into something altogether more welcoming.

  Except the trees. The stunted, thorny hawthorns that somehow eked out an existence on the moor stood out like they’d been X-rayed. Harsh black against the perfect, untouched white canvas that stretched as far as the eye could see.

  Edgar yelped with joy – he loved the snow. He bounded out in a splash of white powder and had soon disappeared in new, clean surroundings. Poe had collected him last night. It wasn’t convenient but the truth was he missed him when he wasn’t there.

  He watched the spaniel’s antics for a while but Poe wasn’t dressed for snow and he was soon shivering. The cold air fogged his breath, chilled his cough-ravaged lungs and watered his eyes. As soon as Edgar returned, all wet and steaming, Poe went to find something more suitable to wear. He chose layers rather than thick coats and jumpers – snow on Shap Fell didn’t mean snow lower down.

  He called Bradshaw to tell her he was on his way, whistled for Edgar to jump on the back of the quad – the only way of getting to and from Herdwick Croft that didn’t involve walking – and set off for Shap Wells and his car.

  Poe picked up Bradshaw outside the North Lakes Hotel and Spa’s reception. Bradshaw had found someone who might be able to help. He was called Sean Carroll and he was a kite nerd. He lived in Cullercoats on the north-east coast. Poe reckoned it would take an hour and a half to get there.

  The previous night he’d called Nightingale and told her where they’d be the next day. She hadn’t been keen – Rome was burning and she wanted SCAS drawing up profiles, not goofing off playing the fiddle. Poe privately agreed but he’d told her that Bradshaw thought it was worth doing and he’d learned never to dismiss that.

  Twenty minutes later they were on the A69, headed towards Newcastle. It was a road Poe knew well and he slowed down for the fixed speed cameras and eased up to a steady eighty when the road allowed. It seemed most drivers had taken the advice on the radio and were only doing essential journeys – the road was as quiet as he’d seen it.

  They were on the Coast Road and had already passed Battle Hill when his phone rang. It was Nightingale. Poe pressed the accept button on his steering wheel.

  ‘Ma’am,’ he said. ‘You’re on speakerphone. I’ve got Tilly with me.’

  ‘How far from Newcastle are you?’

  ‘Not too far, ma’am. We’re meeting the kite dork in Cullercoats – it’s a bit farther up the coast. What’s up?’

  ‘The snow’s playing havoc over here. Half the county’s shut and the other half has blue skies and sunshine. I’m supposed to be in Newcastle later to observe the post-mortem on Howard Teasdale but I’m still in Barrow. I’m not convinced I’ll be able to get across. I was wondering if you’d be able to stand in for me?’

  ‘What time’s it scheduled for?’

  ‘Two o’clock. Professor Doyle can delay it an hour if that helps.’

  ‘Two o’clock works. I can’t see this kite thing taking too long.’

  ‘Thanks, Poe.’

 
‘Sean Carroll’s a kite enthusiast,’ Bradshaw said after Nightingale had ended the call. ‘He’s not a dork.’

  Poe grunted. He had a problem with ‘enthusiasts’. As far as he was concerned, on the ladder of weird interests that eventually escalated to criminal behaviour, enthusiasts were only a rung below obsessives, and he’d seen first-hand what obsessed people were capable of …

  Carroll was meeting them at the beach rather than his home or place of work. He was still on holiday and the weather was going to be perfect for kite flying. He hadn’t wanted to waste it. He’d promised to bring everything with him.

  He’d sent Bradshaw directions to the car park and said he’d be in an old Ford Transit. He hadn’t supplied a colour or registration number but that didn’t matter. It was the only vehicle there.

  The wind was strong enough to send sand sweeping across the concrete, obscuring the bay markings, but it was no big deal. Poe parked adjacent to him.

  If Poe had thought about it at all, he’d have pictured someone like Bradshaw’s friend Jeremy. When the office had unofficially labelled her team the Mole People, Poe was sure they’d done it with Jeremy in mind. A pale, bookish man with thick glasses and thin fingers. Could solve fractional equations without using a calculator but had to be told to wear a coat when it was cold.

  Sean Carroll looked more like a bouncer.

  He was six-and-a-half feet tall, shaven-headed and, despite the cold, he only wore a T-shirt. He had hands like bunches of bananas and knuckles like walnuts. A barbed wire tattoo wrapped a bicep bigger than Poe’s thigh.

  He smiled warmly and shook Bradshaw’s hand, his ham-sized fist dwarfing her own. When he shook Poe’s, his grip was firm and dry.

  ‘I understand you want help identifying a kite, Miss Bradshaw?’ He had a strong Geordie accent.

  ‘We do, Sean Carroll.’

  Bradshaw’s unusual way of addressing people didn’t faze him. He nodded, reached into the open window of his van and retrieved two files. He handed her one.

  ‘You can take this away but I’ll answer anything I can now.’

  ‘Tilly’s sent you photographs of the kite and composite computer images of possible logos,’ Poe said.

  ‘She did, aye. I understand I can’t see the original?’

  ‘Sorry. No one’s seen it yet.’

  Carroll opened his own file and removed a sheet of paper. The language was in Dutch but there were enough pictures for Poe to recognise it had been taken from the website of a kite supplier in Rotterdam.

  ‘I think the kite you’re looking at is a Mirage Stunt Kite. Probably the XL model.’

  The kite was V-shaped, a bit like a stealth bomber or a hang-glider. The colours matched the ones in Poe’s photographs. Despite the page being in a language he didn’t understand, he recognised dimensions when he saw them. Fully assembled, the kite had a wingspan of ten feet. He’d thought it was big but not that big. If that thing caught a strong gust of wind it looked like it could rip someone’s arm off. Perhaps competitive kite flying wasn’t as nerdy as he’d thought … It also explained the massive muscles on Carroll. He wondered how Bradshaw’s friend, Jeremy, managed it – Poe had seen him reach for his inhaler after walking to the fridge.

  The other thing Poe had no trouble translating was the price tag: three hundred and fifty euros. With the pound doing what it was, that meant it was over three hundred quid. A lot of money to leave flapping about in a tree.

  Carroll put the website page and one of Poe’s photographs side-by-side.

  ‘See how the carbon frame matches here’ – he pointed at the top of the kite – ‘and here’ – pointing at a wing.

  Poe nodded. ‘This is the one. What can you tell us about it?’

  ‘Just the basics. I don’t have the funds for something like this. It’s a bit slower than other stunt kites, which means you have more control. It can fly in winds up to thirty miles per hour. One hundred and fifteen-foot dual Dyneema line, straight-tracking with a highly responsive—’

  ‘Dyneema?’ Poe cut in.

  ‘It’s an ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene, Poe,’ Bradshaw said. ‘It has extremely strong intermolecular interactions because its long chains have a molecular mass of between 3.5 and 7.5 million AMUs.’

  Poe looked at her blankly.

  ‘I guess she’s the brains of the outfit, huh?’ Carroll said.

  ‘That’s a peculiarly specific thing to know a lot about, Tilly,’ Poe said.

  ‘I researched kites last night. Didn’t you read the document I sent you?’

  ‘I think you already know the answer to that.’ He’d skimmed it without really understanding it. Instead, he’d focused on the type of people who flew kites. What clubs they went to, what competitions they entered. It was why he hadn’t been surprised that Carroll’s printed webpage was in Dutch. Kites were a huge deal over there.

  Cost aside, the other interesting aspect about the Mirage Stunt Kite XL was that the golden logos weren’t pre-printed on the wings. Poe reckoned the kite’s owner had probably added them.

  ‘What do you know about logos, Sean?’ Poe asked.

  Instead of answering, Carroll led them to the back of his van and unlocked the doors. A kite rested on the bare metal floor. It wasn’t the stealth bomber shape of the Mirage; instead it seemed a bit limp and lifeless.

  ‘This is what’s called a foil design. It doesn’t have the rigid frame of the Mirage and it’ll only take form when air enters it via the front edge vents. When it’s in the sky it looks like a modern parachute instead of a hang-glider.’

  He pointed at one of the logos imprinted on the nylon. ‘That’s what I fly under.’

  It was an anthropomorphic magpie. It wore a black and white waistcoat, a black and white top hat and a bright blue morning coat. Black trousers, yellow shoes and a walking cane completed the image.

  Poe wasn’t a massive football fan any more – the money involved these days had sucked the charm from the game – but he recognised Newcastle United’s mascot when he saw it.

  ‘This is bespoke, I assume?’

  Carroll shrugged. ‘Aye, sort of. The design isn’t my own – I lifted it from the Toon’s website – but as far as I know, I’m the only one flying it.’

  ‘Did you have to register it anywhere?’

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘So there’s nothing we can check our images against?’

  He shook his head. ‘Kite flying’s not really taken off in the UK. Not like it has in other countries.’

  Poe studied the magpie. It had been attached professionally. No wrinkles, no peeling edges.

  ‘How did you fix the logo on?’

  ‘Silkscreen print transfers. The ones we use are designed for industrially washed work clothes. There are seven or eight companies who can do it in a three-mile radius of here alone, though.’

  Poe grunted his frustration.

  ‘Tilly’s program identified a pterodactyl as being the most likely image,’ he said. ‘A gliding Batman was second and an eagle third. There were seven others we have to consider too.’

  ‘Pterodactyls are flying dinosaurs from the Tithonian age of the Jurassic period, Sean Carroll,’ Bradshaw said.

  Carroll smiled. ‘Flying kites is just a hobby, Miss Bradshaw. During the day I’m an entomologist at the Great North Museum – what used to be called the Hancock Natural History Museum; I know what a pterodactyl is.’

  ‘Is there anyone we can ask?’ Poe said before Bradshaw could respond. If she had a fault it was that she could be a bit snippy about any science that wasn’t maths. She barely tolerated physicists; she wasn’t going to let a biologist get the better of her.

  ‘Best I can do is ring round some of the event organisers,’ Carroll said. ‘See if anyone recognises them.’

  It wasn’t a brilliant solution – they weren’t even sure the killer flew kites competitively. Poe said as much.

  ‘Oh, he flies competitively, Sergeant Poe. I can guarantee you that. If you just w
ant to go in a field and turn a few loops, any thirty-quid stunt kite will do. This is a next-level kite with a personalised logo; someone will know the man who stands under it.’

  Chapter 24

  Poe had an hour to kill before Estelle Doyle’s post-mortem. The sea breeze was clearing his lungs, so he walked down to the beach with Bradshaw and Edgar, who immediately started playing tug-o-war with a sun-bleached piece of driftwood, the spaniel’s tail wagging faster than a twanged ruler. Bradshaw finally wrested the stick free, pretended to throw it, and when Edgar ran off she doubled over laughing.

  Poe stood and watched. Before long his skin was coated in a light mist of brine. He licked his lips and tasted salt. Foam-crested waves lapped at his feet. He liked the North Sea almost as much as he liked the Irish Sea. It was rough and choppy, grey not blue. A British sea. Even in summer it was too cold to swim in.

  He joined Carroll and watched him expertly fly his kite. With the slightest pull he had it twisting and turning and doing loop-the-loops, with another it was slicing through the air like a peregrine falcon. At all times he was in complete control.

  A breathless Bradshaw joined them. Her face was red and her eyelashes were encrusted with salt. She was grinning wildly.

  ‘Edgar’s found another stick, Poe. He ran into the sea so I couldn’t chase him.’

  ‘He’ll come out when he’s bored, Tilly.’

  ‘Watch this,’ Carroll said. He straightened his right arm and pulled back his left. The kite dipped sharply and raced towards the sand. At the last possible moment he pulled it up. It flew three feet above Edgar’s head and he launched himself into the air trying to catch it. For a few minutes Carroll flew nearer and nearer to the spaniel without ever getting close enough for him to catch it. Edgar barked in frustration.

  ‘How did you get into this?’ Poe asked.

  ‘A few years ago I wasn’t feeling very well,’ he replied. ‘I asked the doctor what he recommended for chronic wind and he suggested a kite. Ten years later, here I am, addicted.’