THE DCI BLIZZARD MURDER MYSTERIES: Books 1 to 3

by John Dean

  Ramsey said nothing: he did not want a row either, not with so much work to do.

  ‘And on the theme of thugs,’ said Blizzard. ‘Let me throw in another name with connections to Guthrie.’

  They looked at him expectantly.

  ‘Eddie Gayle,’ he said eventually. ‘Another one who should have been locked up a long time ago.’

  There was silence as the officers digested the information. Everyone knew that the chief inspector and Eddie Gayle went way back.

  ‘And where exactly does he fit into it?’ asked Ramsey doubtfully, glancing down at the documents piled up on the desk. ‘His name has not cropped up in any of our inquiries so far.’

  ‘He had money on the fight in which Archie Gaines was injured. When Guthrie lost his rag and headbutted the kid, it cost Eddie Gayle a pretty packet.’

  ‘Sorry, guv, but it’s weak,’ said Ramsey.

  ‘Maybe it is but it’s still worth considering.’

  ‘Depends where it comes from.’

  ‘Covert inquiries,’ said Blizzard with a slight smile.

  There was a low murmur of laughter and the atmosphere relaxed. Ramsey nodded ruefully.

  ‘Do you want me to bring him in?’ he asked.

  ‘What, and ruin my fun?’

  There was a ripple of laughter round the room, louder this time.

  ‘Besides, bringing him in now would be a mistake,’ said the inspector. ‘We need more. More on everything really. Fee, anything from the people at the museum yesterday?’

  ‘Not really. We came across a couple of guys who knew Guthrie but same old story, I am afraid – the moment we asked them to elaborate their memories failed them.’

  ‘What is clear, though,’ said Colley, ‘is that Guthrie was a busy little bee after he came back to the city, probably on Thursday. We’ve got reports from several people in our area now. A couple saw him in the street and he was seen buying something from a corner shop. Oh, and East have been on – they reckon they have got a report over on their side as well.’

  ‘So, what was he doing?’ asked Blizzard. ‘What would bring him back after all these years?’

  ‘Knowing Guthrie, he came back to settle some old scores,’ said Ramsey.

  ‘But why now?’

  Ramsey shrugged.

  ‘What about the death notice in the newspaper?’ asked the inspector, looking round the room. ‘Do we know who put that in the paper yet?’

  ‘I got someone from the advertising department,’ said Tulley. ‘Bit dim, if you ask me. When I pointed out that the phraseology was a bit disrespectful, she said she hadn’t noticed.’

  ‘And do you believe her?’

  ‘Well, she was a blonde,’ said Tulley then noticing Fee’s sharp expression, clapped a hand to his mouth and stared in horror at the chief inspector. ‘Not that I’m saying that blonde girls are, I mean, what I meant to say is that she …they…’

  The sergeant’s voice tailed off.

  ‘Without digging yourself any deeper,’ said Blizzard, ‘what about the person who placed the ad?’

  ‘Ah, yes, well,’ said Tulley, flicking furiously through his notes. ‘This, er, this very intelligent young girl reckoned that the ad was placed by a relative. A young girl. However, when we checked the details, the name and address are fake and the credit card was set up using the same bogus ID. The forensic boys are trying to find anything that links it to Megan Rees.’

  ‘But,’ said Graham Ross, walking into the room, ‘we haven’t. We went back to her house, like you said, guv, but there’s nothing there.’

  ‘However, she does have good reason to kill him.’ Blizzard stood up, his headache starting to ease. ‘Fee, let’s go and see what a night’s sleep has done for her. I hope it was better than mine.’

  * * *

  Ten minutes later, they were sitting in the interview room, looking across the table at Megan Rees, who returned their gaze with her customary calm expression. However, there was a difference from the last time they had seen her: the bags under her eyes suggested that she had slept little in the cramped cell and gave the officers their first sense that she was under more strain than she was showing outwardly.

  ‘A somewhat obvious trick,’ said Megan, gesturing at Fee Ellis. ‘What’s the thinking, Blizzard? That I’ll somehow crack and pour my heart out to a woman? Did you really think that would work?’

  Blizzard sighed: this was not going to be easy.

  ‘The doctor,’ he said, glancing down at a piece of paper on the desk, ‘seems to think that you should be sectioned. At least until we can find out if there has been a reoccurrence of your illness.’

  ‘Well there hasn’t.’

  ‘The report says,’ continued Blizzard, ‘that you exhibit pronounced mood swings and a pathological disregard for the death of Billy Guthrie.’

  ‘I’m not sure pathological is the right word. I can tell the difference between right and wrong. It’s just that I happen to think that what happened to Billy Guthrie was justified.’

  ‘According to your records, it would not be the first time that a psychiatrist has expressed such concerns about your state of health. There’s a report here from a chap called Johnston…’

  ‘Him,’ scoffed Megan. ‘He wanted his way with me, that’s what that was about. The man was an old lech.’

  ‘Be that as it may, I cannot ignore the fact that you exhibit…’

  ‘Come on, Blizzard. I am sure that your inquiries have revealed plenty of other people who would agree with me about Guthrie. Some of your officers among them, I suspect. Does that make them mad as well?’

  ‘I have to go with what the doctor says.’

  ‘An easy line to come out with,’ she said, eying him keenly, ‘but what do you think, Chief Inspector? Do you think I am some kind of deranged madwoman?’

  ‘I think that you are as sane as they come, Miss Rees.’

  ‘Then why not let me go.’

  ‘I am afraid I cannot do that.’

  ‘Why?’ Her voice had an edge to it.

  ‘Because your sanity makes you all the more interesting to me. I think you are a calculating woman who is perfectly capable of murder – and you have just told me that you think Guthrie’s death was justified. Until I can work out your little game, you are going nowhere.’

  ‘What?’ protested Megan. ‘You haven’t got enough to hold me so you’re going to bang me up in a nuthouse until you have? How crap is that? And probably illegal.’

  Blizzard did not reply.

  ‘And you?’ said Megan, looking suddenly at Ellis. ‘What do you think? Do you think I am a disgrace to the fairer sex, Fee?’

  ‘I think you need to remember where you are,’ said the constable sharply. ‘This is a murder inquiry.’

  Megan said nothing.

  ‘Besides,’ said Blizzard wearily, tiring of the verbal jousting and standing up, the chair legs scraping on the floor. ‘It’s not my decision anymore. It’s down to the shrink. Of course, I could put a word in for you if you co-operate with our inq…’

  ‘Another somewhat cheap shot, Chief Inspector. Me, a vulnerable young lady, and you an experienced detective trying to bully a confession out of me?’ The voice was mocking. ‘What would a good lawyer make of that?’

  ‘Pity you declined our offer of one.’

  ‘I didn’t know you were the kind of police officer to play games with innocent young women. I thought you were better than that.’

  Blizzard closed his eyes but, for the first time in two hours, he realised that his headache had disappeared. So intense had been the conversation he had not noticed the pain vanish. Suddenly feeling more human, he opened his eyes again, sat down and fixed Megan with an icy stare. Taken aback, she sensed that something had changed and, for the first time, uncertainty showed in her eyes. Fee glanced over at the inspector: the old John Blizzard was back.

  ‘Time to cut the games, Megan,’ said the inspector, a new edge to his voice. ‘I want answers and I want them n
ow before some quack stuffs you into a loony bin and throws away the key. Did you kill Billy Guthrie?’

  Megan shook her head quickly. ‘No,’ she said, ‘no, I did not.’

  ‘Does the name Lawrie Gaines mean anything to you?’

  Again she shook her head.

  ‘And what about Archie Gaines. Have you ever heard of…?’

  The question was interrupted by a knock on the door and Blizzard looked up irritably as Colley walked in.

  ‘What?’ snapped the inspector.

  ‘Sorry, guv, but before you continue the interview, there’s something you really do need to see.’

  Megan Rees gave them both a worried look.

  ‘I think,’ she said, ‘that I would like that lawyer now.’

  Chapter eight

  Blizzard got out of the car and he and Colley stood looking out across the wasteland near the railway siding. The inspector scowled: it was always the same when he came here and saw the scene of desolation. Ever since the houses had been bulldozed, the area had become a haunt for fly-tippers. The inspector looked at the sofa standing in the middle of the wasteland. Difficult to tell what colour it had been, he thought gloomily, red perhaps. Close by, he noticed a couple of equally grubby armchairs and someone with a sense of humour had placed an old standard lamp next to them. It created a surreal picture, almost as if the living room was still there and the house had been bulldozed around the occupants. The inspector let his gaze roam further across the wasteland. Colley followed the inspector’s gaze and sighed as he noticed a burned-out car and Blizzard’s eyes narrowed. One, thought the sergeant, two, I’ll give it to three…

  ‘What’s that bloody thing doing there?’ said the inspector.

  Three.

  ‘I thought the council was supposed to get rid of torched cars,’ continued the inspector irritably. ‘I seem to recall seeing half a million sodding memos about it from some stuffed shirt at headquarters. Multi-Agency Arson Task Force and all that malarkey. I even had to go to some damn-fool meeting about it. I mean, what’s the point if nobody does anything about it? If you ask me, we should…’

  ‘Indeed we should,’ interrupted Colley, stepping out onto the wasteland, his shoes crunching on broken glass. ‘It’s over here.’

  ‘I mean, look at it,’ continued the inspector, vaguely waving a hand as he followed the sergeant. ‘The railway company built these houses for its workers. And over there was the locomotive works. And just beside it was the first railway shed to be constructed in Hafton. It’s a car wash now.’

  The inspector caught his colleague up.

  ‘We’re losing it, David,’ he said earnestly. ‘We’re losing it.’

  ‘I certainly am,’ muttered the sergeant.

  Blizzard was about to reply but something in the detective’s demeanour counselled silence. The inspector had learnt that silence was the best way to deal with the flashes of irritation that had become more and more frequent since the birth of the sergeant’s baby. So, without speaking, the detectives approached three uniformed officers standing around a crouching Graham Ross in the middle of the wasteland. The forensics chief turned to face them and held up, in a gloved hand, the muddy remains of a credit card that had appeared to have been the subject of a crude attempt to slice through it. Blizzard peered at it.

  ‘This definitely the one?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s the one used to book the newspaper advert,’ said Ross. ‘Someone tried to obscure the details but it’s the same fake name. And Dave says that Megan Rees walks her dog over this area every day. Got to put her in the frame.’

  ‘Half the dog owners in Hafton walk their dogs across here.’

  ‘Yes, I know but surely the fact that the credit card has…’

  ‘I don’t buy it,’ said Blizzard with a shake of the head as he peered closer at the card. ‘I mean, ask yourselves for a start – how come we didn’t find it the first time we searched the area yesterday afternoon?’

  ‘Sometimes people miss things,’ said Ross.

  ‘I reckon someone put it there for us to find. A somewhat crude attempt at that. I mean, it’s all too easy.’

  ‘Sometimes murders are,’ said Ross.

  ‘You sound like Ronald,’ grunted the inspector.

  ‘Maybe he’s got a point,’ said Colley. ‘Our last four have been sorted within 24 hours, remember. In fact, it was you who complained the other day that we weren’t having to do any thinking. I seem to recall you giving your lecture on the lack of ingenuity in the modern murderer. Said you were going to write an academic paper on it when you retired. Whatever happened to good old-fashioned murders, you said?’

  ‘Not this one. I think we’re missing something.’

  ‘Missing what?’

  ‘If I knew that, it wouldn’t be missing.’

  A shout attracted their attention and they saw a man running from the direction of the museum.

  ‘Who’s he?’ asked Colley, glancing at the inspector.

  ‘Malcolm Watt. The museum manager.’

  ‘He looks terrified,’ said Colley as the man neared and they could better see his pale features and wide eyes.

  ‘What’s wrong, Malcolm?’ asked Blizzard.

  Watt paused to catch his breath then pointed over at the museum.

  ‘He’s dead,’ he blurted out.

  Having followed him back to the museum, Blizzard and Colley stared at the crumpled body sprawled on the ground before them. Having slipped from the roof the night before, the young man had landed in the lee of the building, obscured from view by a series of large bushes.

  ‘Any idea who he is?’ asked Blizzard, glancing round at his sergeant.

  ‘I am pretty sure that his name is Terry Roberts,’ replied the detective, crouching down to have a closer look. ‘Lifted him last year for nicking lead off a church roof. He lives with his mother on The Spur.’

  ‘And that means,’ said Blizzard with a thin smile, ‘that we’ll have to go onto the estate. Every cloud, eh, lads?’

  * * *

  Marion Roberts sat in the living room of her flat on one of The Spur’s upper landings, hunched forward in her chair, hands constantly twisting and untwisting a handkerchief sodden with her tears. A small, thin woman with mousy brown short hair and pale features, she had been sobbing ever since Blizzard and Colley arrived shortly after lunch. It was a pitiful sight and even the inspector, who usually left the administration of compassion to his sergeant, was moved by her distress. Sitting next to Colley on the sofa, the inspector surveyed the distraught woman for a few moments. He was acutely aware that his well-documented antipathy for The Spur sometimes blinded him to the fact that real people, good people, lived on the estate. It was something that Tommy Rafferty reminded him about from time to time. Rafferty argued that police officers saw so much bad that they forgot how to see the good. He considered how best to approach Terry Robert’s mother.

  ‘Marion,’ he said. ‘We are truly sorry for your loss but we really do need to find out what happened to Terry.’

  The comment brought on a fresh flood of tears and, for a few moments, she was unable to speak. The inspector glanced helplessly at the female constable standing at the door. The young officer came forward and placed a comforting hand on Marion’s arm. It seemed to calm her slightly and she looked up at the detectives and nodded.

  ‘I do have to ask why your son was on the museum roof last night,’ said Blizzard.

  ‘You can probably guess that.’

  Blizzard nodded: he had seen Terry Roberts’ record, a litany of thefts, burglaries, handling stolen goods, drunk and disorderly and drug possession. At twenty-three he was typical of the young men who lived on the estate. One of his most recent convictions was for theft, Roberts having been arrested as he and an accomplice left a church in a Transit van loaded with lead stolen from the roof. Terry Roberts had been the first name that ran through the minds of Canham and Robertshaw as they had driven onto the estate two nights previously, having heard t
he reports of a truck spotted near a church.

  ‘I imagine,’ said Blizzard, ‘that your Terry was after the lead.’

  She shrugged. ‘He kept his business to himself.’

  ‘But you did know he had been in trouble before? He was hardly an angel, Marion.’

  ‘How dare you say that,’ she said. ‘And with the boy hardly cold.’

  ‘I’m sure he did not mean it that way,’ said Colley quickly. ‘But we do have to ask these questions, Mrs Roberts.’

  She looked at him for a moment then nodded. There had always been something about Colley that made people trust him. She pointedly turned away from the inspector.

  ‘You ask them then,’ she said to Colley.

  ‘We are wondering if there might have been two of them up on the roof, someone with your Terry. A man coming home from the club recalls seeing a man running from the scene shortly after your son fell. Do you know who that might have been?’

  Marion shook her head.

  ‘And if you did know, would you tell us?’ asked Colley.

  She shook her head again. Colley looked at the inspector, who sighed: it was always like this on The Spur. He walked over to the window and stared down over the quadrangle, his eyes scanning the stairwells for signs of another ambush. He would not have been surprised to see something: there had been too many incidents for things to be any other way. And there were plenty of people on The Spur who had never forgiven him for bringing to justice the killers of Kenny Jarvis.

  From the window of the flat, the chief inspector watched as several youths sauntered across the quadrangle, towards his car, which was parked next to the patrol vehicle which had brought the female constable and a uniformed sergeant. There had been much debate about how many officers should accompany the detectives, Ronald arguing for a van-full, Blizzard advocating a low-key approach. Blizzard had won the argument but, low-key or not, there was a police van parked three minutes away from the estate, hidden down a back alley containing half a dozen officers in full riot gear.

  The inspector watched as the youths approached the police vehicles and the uniformed sergeant got out of the vehicle to confront them. No words were spoken but the sergeant stood, arms folded as he stared hard at them. Blizzard watched as the youths glared back at the uniformed officer then walked on, their mocking laughs reverberating round the deserted quadrangle. Just as Blizzard was moving away from the window, he saw one of the youths turn and spit at the patrol car. Words were exchanged between the sergeant and the youths. Glancing up and seeing the detective watching him, the boy stuck up a single finger, laughed and sauntered away to rejoin his friends.