THE DCI BLIZZARD MURDER MYSTERIES: Books 1 to 3
Page 36
‘Surely he’s seen it all before?’
‘The lads reckon he’s hacked off that uniform did not pile in there and sort it out straight away.’
‘How come they didn’t?’
‘You read the memo,’ said Ramsey.
‘Crazy,’ said Colley with a shake of the head. ‘I mean, we could have lost an officer there last night. Another officer.’
There was silence for a moment.
‘However,’ said Ramsey, keen to change the subject. ‘For the moment, the high-ups are still working out how to play it, so it’s not a CID job. Yet.’
‘I suppose we should be thankful for small mercies,’ said Colley, glancing at the files on his desk. He noticed the piece of paper in the inspector’s hand. ‘That’s not another job, I hope.’
‘We’ve got a body, I’m afraid. I’d go myself but I’ve got to do interviews with those lads we brought in for the Kingston Avenue job. Sorry.’
‘Where was it found?’ sighed the sergeant.
‘Tenby Street.’
‘Not the new railway museum?’ asked Colley, reaching out for the piece of paper.
‘Very close, apparently. Blizzard’s over there, isn’t he?’
‘One of the guests of honour. Surely you’ve heard him banging on about it. It’s been like working with Fred bloody Dibnah.’ Colley glanced down at the paper. ‘Who’s this Megan Rees, then?’
‘Found the body. Uniform are hanging onto her until you arrive. Keep it low-key, eh? Don’t want to disrupt the opening ceremony unless we really have to. Mind, there’s so many people there, I can’t see any way that folks will not cotton on that something has happened.’
‘I think you can safely say,’ said Colley as he eased himself to his feet and took his suit jacket down from a peg on the wall, ‘that Blizzard is going to love this – absolutely bloody love it.’
With a sour look on his face, the sergeant walked out into the corridor. Heading towards him was Brian Robertshaw, his battered face bearing the marks of the incident the night before.
‘Bri,’ said Colley with genuine concern, ‘how are you?’
‘I got lucky. Gary is a real mess.’
‘How come you’re not at home?’
‘The inspector wanted to run through what happened: the top brass are still making up their minds about what to do.’ Robertshaw’s voice assumed an edge. ‘I mean, how much more do they want to know before we sort the bloody place out?’
‘Word is you are thinking of quitting over it.’
‘I’ve been in tight spots before, Dave,’ said Robertshaw. ‘But last night, last night was different.’
‘How so?’
‘Last night, I thought I was going to die. I tell you, Davy-lad, nothing’s worth throwing your life away for like that. Nothing on earth. I’ve got a couple of kids and I want to see them grow up.’
Images of his baby daughter flashing into his mind, Colley nodded.
‘And,’ continued Robertshaw, limping down the corridor, ‘if the top brass are not prepared to back us when this kind of thing happens, what is the point? I mean, I ask you, Davy-lad, what is the point?’
* * *
As the mayor droned on, Blizzard let his gaze roam round the bright and airy museum, remembering how the building had looked when he started his campaign to save the station from the bulldozers. Long since closed, the station had fallen into dereliction, dark and scorched by the arsonists’ flames, its windows smashed by vandals, the building deemed a danger to public safety and earmarked for demolition by Hafton City Council. Blizzard and fellow members of the city’s railway appreciation society had thought differently, protesting that the 19th century station building was too valuable to lose, that it was one of the oldest railway stations in northern England. It would make, they had said in meetings with council officers, the ideal home for the Silver Flyer, the steam locomotive that the society had been restoring for several years. Blizzard’s gaze settled on the nearby council dignitaries and he scowled. The inspector recalled how some of them had tried to block the plan, arguing that the money could be better spent elsewhere.
Looking to his left, Blizzard saw a tall, grey-haired man with bushy eyebrows and bony, almost gaunt, features, the eyes slightly hooded. The inspector smiled broadly. It was only when former railman Steve McGarrity contacted friends on the city council, themselves retired rail workers, that the campaign to save the station had proved successful. Recalling the moment his friend told him that a combination of grants would allow the museum to be created, the inspector grinned. McGarrity glanced across at the inspector, noticed the grin, gestured towards the mayor and faked a yawn. Blizzard chuckled and glanced at Fee.
‘Alright?’ she whispered.
‘I can’t remember when I’ve been happier,’ said Blizzard. ‘I can’t think of a single thing that could ruin today.’
‘Soft git,’ she said and gave his arm a squeeze.
Chapter three
After viewing the body, David Colley clumped down the signal box steps into the mid-afternoon sunshine. He stood and watched the uniform officers talking to an attractive young redhead on the top of the embankment. Colley had always liked redheads and, without realising he was doing it, found himself admiring the shapely form of Megan Rees in her tight blue T-shirt, faded jeans and the gleaming oxblood boots. Very nice, he thought, very nice. Reminded him of Jay when he first met her. She had been in her early twenties as well. Thought of his live-in girlfriend prompted an uneasy feeling of guilt. He knew why he was thinking like this: since the birth of their baby, there had not been much … Noticing Megan Rees watching him out of the corner of her eye, the faintest hint of a smile on her lightly freckled face, Colley rebuked himself for the lapse and tried to assume a more professional manner.
‘Miss Rees,’ he said, clambering up the embankment, ‘I am Detective Sergeant Dave Colley. I understand you found the body?’
She nodded at her dog, which was now exploring the far side of the siding.
‘Rocky found it.’
‘How come he was in there?’
‘I imagine he was chasing a rabbit,’ said Megan. ‘That’s what he usually does.’
‘All the way up there?’ asked the sergeant doubtfully, gesturing to the signal box. ‘Exactly what kind of rabbit are we talking about here, Miss Rees?’
‘He gets excited.’
Was it the sergeant’s imagination or was there a twinkle in her eyes as she said it?
* * *
‘So, it gives me great pleasure to announce,’ said the mayor, looking lovingly at the locomotive, ‘that the Silver Flyer will be a permanent exhibit here. It will be a fitting home for her. It seems only fitting that, on this important occasion, Chief Inspector Blizzard tells you a little bit about how the Silver Flyer was saved from the scrapheap.’
All eyes turned to the inspector as he walked to the front. A broad-chested man slightly heavier than someone of five foot ten inches should be, he was wearing his usual dark suit. Ceremony or not, his red tie dangled loosely at its customary half-mast position. Reaching the lectern, he produced a crumpled piece of paper from his suit jacket pocket. A man who had long relied on instinct when it came to addressing police briefings, the inspector had nevertheless felt compelled to rehearse this speech time and time again, standing in front of the bedroom mirror trying to ignore his paunch and the way that his tousled brown hair was greying at the temples. Now, the moment had come, he surveyed the expectant faces of the audience, glanced down at his notes and took a deep breath.
‘Thank you, Mr Mayor,’ he said. ‘Looking at the Old Lady today reminds me of the day I found her. She was in a terrible state. I can remember thinking what a shame it would be if…’
* * *
The three officers stood on the top of the embankment and watched Megan Rees make her way across the wasteland, the dog close at her heels.
‘I reckon she likes our sergeant here,’ said one of the uniforms, winking at the other
constable. ‘Just your type as well, Davey-lad,’ he added.
Colley gave him a sour look but, before he could reply, the sergeant’s attention was distracted by loud crackling from the direction of the nearby railway museum and the sound of a man bellowing something that none of the officers could quite make out. There was a smattering of applause. After the whine of guitar feedback shrieking through an amplifier, the man started singing raucously.
Everybody’s doin’ a brand new dance now
(C’mon baby do the loco-motion)
I know you’ll get to like it
If you give it a chance now
(C’mon baby do the loco-motion).
‘Forget chummy,’ said one of the uniforms. ‘Someone should arrest that bloke for murdering a good song.’
‘Aye,’ said Colley, ‘Blizzard will love that.’
To the others’ amusement, the sergeant mimicked the dour tones of the chief inspector.
‘Bloody pop band, what were they thinking of, David? No respect for the city’s railway heritage. Do you know how many sprockets we used in the Old Lady? Seven million – seven sodding million, that’s how many.’
The constables laughed.
‘Hey,’ said the sergeant, glancing hopefully at them, ‘I don’t suppose either of you fancy nipping over to tell him that we…?’
His voice tailed off as their looks said it all.
* * *
As Blizzard completed his speech and the applause broke out again, the inspector gave a huge sigh of relief and returned to another squeeze of the arm from Fee Ellis.
‘Was that OK?’ whispered the inspector.
‘Very good.’
Blizzard looked across at Steve McGarrity who gave him a thumbs-up before returning his attention to the mayor.
‘Thank you, Chief Inspector,’ said the mayor with a smile. ‘A most arresting talk, I think you will all agree.’
Again, he paused for laughter that did not come.
‘Yes, well,’ he continued quickly, moving over to a small blue curtain on the wall and reaching for the draw-string. ‘It is now my very great pleasure to formally declare this fine new museum open and to reveal the name selected.’
He pulled the cord and the curtain swished open to reveal a plaque bearing the words In Steam.
‘What kind of name’s that?’ snorted Blizzard as people started to clap.
‘Will you behave,’ hissed Fee, noticing the looks from several city councillors.
Blizzard continued to grumble as, ceremony at an end, the crowd started to drift away. The inspector’s demeanour changed when he spotted a willowy redhead wave at them then start to work her way through the throng. Blizzard beamed when he saw the baby fast asleep in the pouch swung around her front: it was the same every time the inspector saw his god-daughter.
‘How does she do it?’ whispered Fee.
‘Do what?’ asked Blizzard.
‘Jay. She only had the baby nine weeks ago and look at her, it’s like it never happened.’
‘You’re not exactly a porker yourself,’ said the inspector.
‘Is that supposed to be a compliment?’
He nodded reassuringly.
‘Do you know,’ said Fee, ‘I have been out with men who said the wrong thing at the right time, the right thing at the wrong time but very rarely with a man who managed to do both at the wrong time.’
‘What did I say?’
The arrival of Jay and baby Laura brought the discussion to an end.
‘And what have you done with my boyfriend?’ asked Jay accusingly, fixing Blizzard with a stern look. ‘Making the poor man work on a lovely summer’s day like this?’
‘Yeah, I’m sorry about that but I did say…’
‘I think,’ said Fee as Jay winked at her, ‘that she is pulling your leg.’
‘Don’t worry, I know how it works,’ said Jay, gently resting her hand on his arm for a moment.
Blizzard was about to reply when he noticed Steve McGarrity edging through the crowds towards them.
‘Sorry to interrupt, ladies,’ McGarrity said with a gentlemanly nod, ‘but would it be possible to have a couple of moments of John’s time?’
‘We’ll go and get an ice cream,’ said Fee and the women wandered off to explore the carnival.
‘Congratulations on the speech,’ said McGarrity. ‘Better than the mayor’s piss-poor attempt. The man’s always been a buffoon. I always reckoned it was a miracle that he managed to point the bloody engine in the right direction.’
‘I suppose he did his best,’ said Blizzard then noticed a figure working its way slowly through the crowd towards them. ‘Tommy’s really struggling, isn’t he?’
McGarrity followed his gaze towards the heavy-set, jowly man in his early sixties, who wore an ill-fitting hired black suit and whose lank black hair was slicked down with gel for the big occasion. Every step seemed to be an effort and even from this distance, they could hear Tommy Rafferty’s wheezing chest.
‘Never seen him this bad,’ said McGarrity.
Breathing heavily, Rafferty walked up to them and extended a hand to each of them in turn. Blizzard tried to ignore how clammy his grip felt.
‘Museum’s looking good,’ said Rafferty.
‘Yeah, but I’m not sure about the name,’ said Blizzard. ‘In bloody Steam, what’s that about? I mean, a nine-year-old could have done better. Who chose it, for God’s sake?’
‘A nine-year-old,’ said Rafferty. ‘In a wheelchair.’
He glanced over at the young girl, who was having her photograph taken by a press photographer.
‘Ah,’ said Blizzard and looked uncomfortable before brightening up as he noticed people flocking round the Silver Flyer. ‘Still, no matter, eh? I mean, this is about celebrating the romance of…’
There was a gentle tap on the inspector’s shoulder and he turned to look into the face of David Colley.
‘Sorry, guv,’ said the sergeant.
Blizzard’s smile faded.
Chapter four
‘Well whoever he was, he certainly knew how to ruin a party,’ said Blizzard, staring down at the body as the sound of the fairground organ drifted across from the nearby railway museum.
Colley nodded as he and the chief inspector stood in the signal box and surveyed the dead man. Blizzard walked over to the shattered window and gloomily stared down at the two uniformed officers taping off the far end of the siding. His gaze slid over to the station, vaguely glimpsed through the belt of trees.
‘Might have known something like this would happen,’ he said. ‘I just hope no one spots our lads.’
‘I asked them to be low-key about it. Mind, there’s a limit to how long we can keep something like this quiet. We’ve already had two or three people sticking their neb in.’
‘I’ll bet you have.’ Blizzard looked back at the body. ‘It would help if we knew who he was.’
‘The lads were wondering if we should call him the Railway Man,’ suggested Colley with a mischievous smile. ‘In keeping with the theme of the day.’
Blizzard said nothing and continued to gaze moodily out of the window. As the silence lengthened, Colley left him to his contemplation and tried instead to read the clues presented by the corpse. It was something Blizzard had taught him when they first started working together. ‘Let the dead speak to you,’ the DCI was fond of declaring, one of his favourite sayings. One of many, it had to be said, thought Colley as he crouched down by the corpse. And what was this man saying? Surveying his wiry frame, the thinning black hair and straggly beard flecked with grey and the metal-rimmed spectacles, the sergeant decided that he was in his mid-fifties, maybe even sixty. The weather-beaten and lined face indicated a man who had lived an outdoor life, an impression confirmed by the hoary state of his hands, gnarled and pitted with the passing years. The hands of a manual worker, perhaps a railman come back to relive some old memories, Colley thought as the fairground music continued to hang in the afternoon air.
Without realising he had done it, the sergeant flexed his right wrist where it had been fractured by one such drunken brawler during his early days as a uniform officer. It was as he was sitting in A&E waiting to be treated later that night that Colley had learned a valuable lesson: it had been Brian Robertshaw who told him that the way to deal with such incidents was to let the drunks knock seven shades out of each other before the uniforms intervened. Safer that way, Robertshaw had said. Thought of Robertshaw took the sergeant’s mind over to events at The Spur the night before and he frowned. Robertshaw had been right: everyone knew the estate’s reputation but this had been different. Outside the rules of the game by which everyone played.
The sergeant was about to walk over to join Blizzard at the window when something caught his eye and he peered closer at the dead man: although the hair was black, there were several brown strands poking through. Puzzled, the sergeant straightened up and walked over to the window where the two detectives peered through the trees at the crowds milling around the renovated station building. Colley was about to say something when they heard a man’s indistinct voice as he struggled against the crackling second-rate PA system, his voice fading away then returning in sudden booms as the man attempted in vain to be heard over the noise of the fairground organ.
‘Didn’t know they’d booked Norman Collier,’ said Colley. ‘Mind, he would have been better than the sentimental shite you trotted out in your speech. Did I hear correctly that you banged on about romance again?’