‘Any chance of—’
‘A pit stop?’
‘You took the words right out of my mouth, Guv.’ With an air of long-suffering virtue, Noakes added, ‘No elevenses, see … I mean, Hewitt don’t count.’
Deadpan, the DI replied, ‘I could see it put you right off your food, Sergeant.’
The DS looked at Markham suspiciously, but could detect no sarcastic undertone.
‘There’s a Gregg’s just past the next roundabout, Noakes, if that’ll do you.’
‘Champion.’
‘But I warn you, after the grease-fest, it’s all systems go.’
Markham felt a sudden sense of urgency, a flicker of the strange presentiment he often had when death or disaster was near. It was a specialized awareness that had been with him for as long as he could remember and had done him no favours in his early career. Eventually, he had learned to keep his psychic intuitions to himself.
‘What is it, boss?’ For all his earth-bound cloddishness, Noakes was always attuned to the DI’s inner vibrations. It was one of the enduring mysteries of their partnership.
‘I don’t rightly know, Noakesy. Just a feeling about the Newman … that we need to get over there.’ Bracingly, he added, ‘You can chow down on the way back to the station. Once we’ve done those checks, it’s back to the hospital. Hopefully Kate and Doyle will have some intel for us by now.’
CID was blissfully quiet. No doubt his colleagues were taking full advantage of Slimy Sid’s absence, thought Markham. While the cat’s away….
Noakes disappeared into the outer office while the DI holed up in his room, impatiently sweeping a pile of overtime paperwork out of sight.
Time to hit the phones….
Fifty minutes later, the two men regarded each other glumly across Markham’s desk. Outside, it was already growing dark, the last dregs of daylight fading imperceptibly into monochrome shades of grey. The regiment of leylandii which screened the police station from Bromgrove High Street tossed agitatedly as though they too were dissatisfied and restless.
‘Anything on Kennedy and Molloy?’
‘Nothing doing, Guv.’ Noakes’s frustration was palpable. ‘At least, nowt that anyone’ll admit to.’ He sighed gustily. ‘Hewitt was right about one thing. They all close ranks at the first whiff of trouble.’
‘Nothing on their records? No warnings or reprimands?’
‘Well, if there was anything, it ain’t there now.’ The DS looked troubled. ‘Reading between the lines, I’d say there were some major balls-ups early on, Guv…. I mean, they sounded like some kind of circus act … didn’t seem to matter that some folk ended up cabbages when things didn’t work out.’
Markham closed his eyes. ‘Collateral damage.’
‘Yeah. Warr must’ve felt right at home with Barnum and Bailey … the three of ’em could probably talk anyone into anything.’
‘This was all pre-Shipman, of course,’ Markham murmured. ‘Rogue doctors are a rare breed nowadays.’
Noakes looked far from convinced. Then his hangdog features brightened momentarily. ‘Kennedy’s obituary says patients at the Newman called him their friend.’ Noakes shuddered. ‘Poor devils. Butcher, more like.’ He delved into his jacket pocket and produced a crumpled photocopy. ‘That’s a picture of him and Molloy at some knees up.’
Markham wasn’t sure what he had expected, but it certainly wasn’t this.
They were perfectly ordinary. Nondescript. Two balding, stale, middle-aged men.
His sixth sense was dormant. He felt nothing at all….
‘How’d you get on, Guv?’
‘Not much better, Sergeant. I traced those five names the DCC gave me as far as the Newman. In each case, the patient was admitted for short-stay treatment but later placed on a section and detained involuntarily.’
‘So, they couldn’t leave … like prison.’ Noakes’s brow was furrowed as he processed this information. ‘Who did the section?’
‘Well, it needed two doctors plus another mental health professional – like a social worker.’
‘Kosher?’
‘Who can say … any small fry will have done whatever the doctors told them.’
‘Signed on the dotted line.’
‘Precisely.’
‘What happened after that?’
‘Patients were apparently transferred to the intensive care ward and then to a place called Seaview…. Only no-one seems sure where that is.’
‘How could they send them somewhere that doesn’t exist?’ Noakes was nonplussed.
‘Well, there is a rehabilitation centre of that name. On the outskirts of Brighton. The paperwork for the patients’ transfer has the Brighton address. But they were never checked in there and the centre has no record of them ever being admitted.’
‘Won’t the ambulance service have a docket or summat?’ the DS persisted doggedly. ‘I mean, wouldn’t they sort the transport and whatnot?’
Markham shook his head. ‘They’re denying all knowledge.’
‘Jesus, Mary and Joseph.’ Noakes’s voice rose an incredulous octave. ‘You mean someone kidnapped them?’
‘Or spirited them away … Yes, it looks like they went under the radar.’
‘Didn’t the relatives kick up a stink?’
‘This is where it gets interesting. In each case, power of attorney had been granted to a member of the immediate family prior to the section.’
‘What’s one of those?’
‘Power of attorney allows someone else to make decisions if you become incapacitated.’
The light was dawning.
‘Was there money sloshing around in these families?’
‘Let’s just say there weren’t too many paupers on the list.’ Markham’s voice was brittle.
‘Chuffing Nora.’ Noakes sagged in his chair.
‘Indeed.’
‘It was a regular racket then, Guv? Families an’ medics in on it together?’
‘Well, it looks like victims were chosen carefully. And not too many of them … the admissions to intensive care were well spaced out. Anything else would have aroused suspicion.’
The DI’s lean handsome face was taut with concentration. ‘Do you remember Hayley talking about how the Friends of the Newman raised funds to send patients on trips? Holiday chalets, she said.’
‘Oh yeah.’ A tender expression crossed Noakes’s gnarled features at the thought of the receptionist. ‘It was when we were looking at the weird photo of them funny little beach huts. Hey!’ A thought struck him. ‘D’you think that’s where they stashed ’em, Guv?’ The DS became very animated. ‘Down at the seaside?’
‘Yes,’ Markham said slowly. ‘That holiday complex was the perfect cover. Nice and remote. Safe from busybody interference.’
‘An’ the signature on the photo was Your Friend, remember, Guv? The same as Kennedy’s creepy nickname.’
The DI smiled at his subordinate’s excitement. Noakes had the bit between his teeth now.
‘What happened to the patients in the end, boss? I mean, folk can’t just vanish into thin air.’
The DI leaned forward intently. ‘In the fifties and sixties, it would’ve been a cinch. If a family had the money and influence, they could literally erase the record and no-one would be any the wiser.’
‘But what about later? What about now?’ Noakes persisted stubbornly, his beefy complexion mottled with consternation.
‘Over time, given increased efficiency in the health service, it would have taken more skill to “disappear” someone.’ Markham’s lips were a thin line. ‘But it could still be done, Sergeant. Technology was just getting started in the eighties and nineties … which is why Kate and Doyle are scrabbling round in the archives at the hospital trying to get a handle on those names from Ted Cartwright.’
‘What about the ones on the DCC’s list?’
‘According to Warr, they were eventually discharged back into the community.’
Noakes snorted.
‘After that, apparently, they just walked out on their lives … no contact with family … fell through the net.’
‘Didn’t someone smell a rat?’
‘Eventually, yes. In a couple of cases, friends and distant relations became suspicious – didn’t buy the story. Words like “undue influence” and “coercion” were being bandied about.’
‘How did Warr wriggle out of it?’
‘It was easy enough to explain away Brighton. The hospital’s holiday complex in Norfolk is called Seacrest, you see. So, all he had to do was claim there’d been a mix-up with the paperwork.’
‘Very handy.’
Markham rubbed his temples distractedly. ‘As for the dropping out scenario, it was child’s play, Noakes. Social Care’s like an overloaded electrical circuit … can’t cope with all the crises. You’d be surprised how many people go missing and are never seen again.’
‘But these are fruit loops … er, sorry, mental patients.’
‘The appropriate terminology is “vulnerable disappeared”, Sergeant. Oh, Missing Persons and the rest do their bit, but after a while …’ The DI’s shrug was eloquent in its resignation.
‘What d’you think happened, boss?’ Noakes asked after a pause.
Markham’s face was very sad.
He thought of those windswept Norfolk cottages.
‘Neglect at best. Hastening the poor souls on their way at worst.’
‘Like a serial killer?’ The DS was appalled.
Markham gave a harsh laugh.
‘Oh, I don’t think Doctor Warr would have seen it in that light, Noakes. His apprenticeship with Kennedy and Molloy would have inured him to any pangs of conscience.’ The DI recalled Jim Hewitt denouncing the doctor’s arrogance. ‘Saving families from pain and embarrassment is how he would have rationalized it to himself.’
‘An’ boosting his bank balance at the same time.’
‘Fringe benefits,’ Markham agreed sombrely, ‘though I think the lure of illicit psychosurgery held considerable appeal for him.’
‘Like one of them Nazi doctors.’ Noakes was disgusted. ‘I remember our Natalie did a project about ’em in school … Dr Mangle or summat.’
The parallel with SS doctor Josef Mengele, the “God of Auschwitz” was horribly apt. And yet, for all his revulsion at the way Jonathan Warr had excised vulnerable individuals from their family annals, the DI told himself that the psychiatrist was himself a victim, indoctrinated and warped early in his career by those two bad angels….
‘So the murderer’s most likely connected to one of the poor daft buggers Warr an’ the other two screwed over?’
‘That’s what I’m thinking.’ Markham drew a deep breath. He seemed to be debating with himself. ‘But I may have got it all wrong … it could be something to do with the recent allegations about patient abuse.’ His mouth set in a grim line. ‘The good doctor’s name has come up in that connection as well.’
‘Nah.’ The DS spoke in his most decisive tones. ‘I reckon you’re right, boss. Cutting him up an’ that … it’s got to be linked with the surgery malarkey and mispers.’
A smile broke through the gloom of Markham’s face.
‘Thanks for the vote of confidence.’
‘S’right.’ Despite the studied casualness, it was clear Noakes was pleased.
‘Who else knew what was going down, Guv?’ Then, in a whisper, ‘What about the Chief Super? Was he takin’ a cut?’
Markham felt as though his head was going to explode.
Noticing how heavy the guvnor’s eyes were, Noakes checked himself. From his pocket, he produced a Snickers bar. ‘Get that down you, boss,’ he said gruffly. ‘You didn’t have owt from Greggs.’ A rosy glow travelling up his neck, he added, ‘Your Olivia won’t be happy if you conk out cos of not eating.’
Oddly enough, the cheap chocolate hit the spot.
Five minutes later, with Markham revived, the two men left the station on their way back to the hospital.
A blustery wind had got up while Markham and Noakes were thrashing out possible scenarios for murder.
The DI felt relief. As though something broke loose in him out of sympathy. Then the faintly mouldy coldness of the car park made him shiver, so he was glad after all of the warmth of the car.
In the Newman, Kate Burton was waiting for them. At the sight of her earnest face, Markham felt a pang of compunction. He should take her out with him more often. Give her a leg up what Noakes called the greasy pole.
‘Any luck with the archives?’
‘Well, we managed to track down index cards for the names, sir, but there’s not much information save for the neurological jargon.’
Markham’s compunction deepened as he spotted a copy of Gray’s Anatomy at Burton’s elbow.
Misinterpreting his look of concern, she said brightly, ‘At least we know they were all psychosurgery patients here, sir. Doyle’s running some computer checks, though given the dates it’s probably a lost cause.’
‘Good work, Kate.’
They were interrupted by Claire Holder.
‘I need you, Inspector.’ Her voice was hoarse, her face so white that the skilfully applied cosmetics stood out in patchy, streaky blotches like a clown’s makeup.
Markham was already moving towards her.
‘What is it, Ms Holder?’
‘There’s something blocking the ventilation shaft at the back of the clocktower.’
‘Something?’
She moistened dry lips.
‘One of the facilities team reported a noise earlier … said it sounded like soot fall or rats. I went up to the viewing platform to check it out…. I’m the only one with access, you see.’
The woman swayed as though she was about to collapse.
Burton pressed her into a chair.
‘Tell us what you saw, Ms Holder. And don’t be afraid.’ Markham was gentle but inexorable.
No words came.
‘A body?’
His colleagues looked startled, but Markham was icy calm. All day, subconsciously, he had been thinking of death.
And now it had come again.
9. Aftermath
IT WAS A LONG way up to the viewing platform.
‘Why can’t we use the lift?’ Noakes asked, pointing to a quaintly old-fashioned elevator to the left of a spiral stone staircase.
‘That’s just for show. An antique. It’s rickety and temperamental, so we try to use it as little as possible.’
That’s how the killer got his victim’s body up to the top, Markham thought with a sudden searing conviction.
Markham, Noakes and Burton followed Claire Holder single file up the stairs which smelled unpleasantly dank and musty.
They emerged on to an expanse of black asphalt in the middle of which sat a circular concrete pod faced with glass panels.
At first, nobody spoke. It was strangely peaceful up on the roof, with a stiff breeze whipping their faces. After the claustrophobia of the oxygen-less hospital, Markham welcomed the eye-watering chill. Below them, the lights of the suburb gave off their neon phosphorescence, enveloping surrounding buildings in a lurid nimbus.
He turned to the director.
‘You said you’re the only one with access.’
‘Well, it’s a bit spooky up here, so staff give it a wide berth.’ The woman gave a shaky laugh which teetered on the verge of hysteria. ‘There was some nonsense about the ghost of a former patient who threw herself from the tower in Victorian times.’ Attempting to sound more business-like, she added, ‘This is the only key to the viewing deck.’
Easily nicked and copied. Noakes might as well have said it aloud.
Claire Holder was babbling now. ‘“Viewing deck” sounds a bit grand for what it is … but you get a bird’s eye view and some shelter …’
And some privacy for the odd shag. Again, Noakes’s expression was eloquent.
The director unlocked the door to the pod with shaking hands. At least
, thought Markham, she’d had the wit to secure their crime scene.
Inside, it was very simple, just a concrete seat running round the wall.
In the centre of the floor, was a sunken oblong hatch covered with a wire mesh grille.
The DI squatted and squinted down through the grille before straightening up. With a lurch of her heart, Burton thought he looked as though he was standing at a graveside. Silently, she passed him a pocket torch.
‘Thanks, Kate.’
Markham directed the flashlight down the shaft.
The other two both saw it then.
A glint of red.
Hair.
Wispy ginger hair.
They had found David Belcher’s final resting place.
Noakes’s face was working.
‘Poor bugger,’ he said. ‘Him an’ Mikey never even got that visit.’
‘You know who it is?’ The director sounded distracted.
Markham realized he had almost forgotten she was there. He nodded to Burton who took her by the arm.
‘Let’s go back down, Ms Holder. You were right, there’s a body there, but we can’t say anything more yet. I need to make some calls from your office.’
When they had gone, Noakes and Markham looked at each other.
Finally, the DI spoke.
‘It was a stroke of bad luck for the murderer that something dislodged the body.’ He knelt and loosened the grille which came away easily in his hands. ‘It’s about halfway down … there’s a bend in the pipe and he’s lying over the curve.’ Now Noakes too was squatting on his haunches, peering into the darkness below.
‘What d’you reckon, Guv … did they come up ’ere for a private word? Was he knocked out an’ then shoved down the chimney? There’s chemicals an’ all sorts in there … you’d be suffocated in no time.’
‘I think he was more likely killed on the premises then brought up in that lift which was out of bounds, Sergeant.’
Noakes took this in. ‘An’ the moonshine about a ghost meant no-one’d be coming up for a shufti any time soon … wonder who started that story…’
The two men rose to their feet and stood facing each other across the hatch.
Detective Markham Mysteries Box Set Page 69