Under Parr

by Andrea Bramhall

  “She’s very well, thanks, you nosey old codger.”

  Len laughed. “You’ll have to bring her over to dinner with me and Val. She’s sick of me only bringing blokes home from work.”

  Kate squinted at him. “You do realise how that sounded, don’t you?”

  “I meant work colleagues, you dirty-minded wench.” He laughed again.

  Kate and Jimmy chuckled along with him.

  “Anyway, enough of the fun. What can I do for you today?”

  “The victim from the bunker,” Kate said, still smiling. “Dr Anderson said you were processing the evidence.”

  “Ah, yes. Our Mr Bones. Well, I’ve got quite a collection for you to look at. Has she made any determination on the bones yet? Are we looking at a murder?”

  Kate shook her head. “She seems to think accidental death, but there isn’t enough evidence either way.”

  “Ah, so she’s going with an open verdict.”

  “Probably.”

  “And what’re your thoughts?”

  Kate frowned. “You’ve got something, haven’t you?”

  Len shook his head. “I’ve got a puzzle, is what I’ve got.” He waved them over to a work bench. “Look at this.” He held up plastic bags covered in official seals and labels. “I’ve got two different shoes. Different sizes, both for the left foot. One a man’s, the other most likely a woman’s, though I have seen men in them in a hospital. And before you ask, no, it can’t be his. It’s probably three sizes too small.”

  “How’d he get his feet in them and walk?” Jimmy questioned.

  “With difficulty, I suspect. They must have blistered him to hell and back.”

  “Maybe he grabbed his wife’s shoe,” Kate theorised.

  “Yeah,” Jimmy said, picking up the train of thought, “if he’d hit his head and was confused, he might have grabbed odd shoes before going out.”

  Len sniffed. “Maybe. But that doesn’t explain the rest of this get-up.”

  “Show me,” Kate said.

  “I’ve got scraps of fabric from a flowery dressing gown. The gown would fit a small woman, definitely not our bloke.”

  “Stella was wondering if he might be a cross-dresser.”

  “If he was, he wasn’t doing a very good job with this rig-out.” Len shook his head. “No, this collection doesn’t suggest to me a cross-dresser, or a person who actually chose any of the clothes they were wearing.”

  Kate frowned. “Explain.”

  Len grinned. “I thought you’d never ask.” He lifted a bag up. “Underpants with the name Edward Bale on a sewn-in label.” He lifted another bag. “A vest with the name Dorothy Kinder, and the teeth, as you know, with the name Annie Balding on them. And there are two other names on the shoes: Rose Harvey and John Wood. All these labels are just like the ones that the wife used to sew into the kids’ uniform when they were nippers. So that got me thinking—”

  “Where are grown-ups treated like children and have labels put into their clothes because the people doing the laundry don’t always know whose clothes belong to whom?” Kate finished off his question.

  “Exactly,” Len said. “Now I see why they pay you the big bucks and give you the fancy title.”

  “A care facility of some sort.”

  “Precisely, my dear Watson.” Len grinned.

  “Len, you do know it’s a bit odd to be grinning every time we get a dead body in, don’t you?”

  He chuckled. “I don’t grin when we get a dead body in, Kate.” He winked at her. “Only when you come to see me.”

  She elbowed him in the ribs. “Careful, or I’ll tell your wife. Jimmy, have you got the details of that nursing home where Annie Balding died?”

  “Yup.”

  “Okay, I think we need to pay them a visit.” She headed for the door. “Len, it was good to see you again.”

  “Don’t be a stranger.”

  “I won’t. You’ve still got Grimshaw with my facial reconstruction to sort out for me.” As the door swung shut behind her she pulled her mobile from her pocket and punched in the number for Stella back at the Hunstanton office.

  “Bonjour,” Stella said down the line.

  “Those French classes are really paying off, then.”

  Stella chuckled. “Go ahead, mock me. Then tell me what you want me to do for you.”

  “Aw, am I that predictable?”

  “Yes.”

  “Fine, can you check out a few more names for me?”

  “Hit me.”

  “Okay, Edward Bale, Dorothy Kinder, Rose Harvey, and John Wood.”

  “Anything more? Some of those names are pretty common.”

  “See if you can find anything in common with Annie Balding.”

  “And why am I looking up these folks?”

  “Because our body was found wearing clothing with their names written all over them.”

  “Right. And?”

  “Well, I’m thinking that there are a limited number of ways a person could get dressed up like this. Either they’re a vagrant and stole them, or they were dressed in them by someone who really doesn’t care. Now, I’m not saying that every nursing home or care worker doesn’t care about the people staying there, but some don’t. I…” she paused, not wanting to go into the details of why she knew such things. “Anyway, residents’ clothes always go to a central laundry. From there it is really easy for clothes to get mixed up, and if the resident can’t recognise the mistake, or can’t argue against it, for whatever reason, then you end up with a situation where everyone can be wearing anyone else’s clothes at any given time. Other times, guests who die, well, their families don’t want the clothes they leave behind and donate them to others there. It’s really the only way I can make sense of the things he was wearing.”

  “Understood. I’ll get those searches under way. I’ll have some results by the time you get back.”

  “Okay. Be there soon.” She hung up and slid the phone back into her pocket.

  “Aren’t we going straight to the nursing home?” Jimmy asked.

  “Where is it?”

  “Brancaster.”

  Kate shook her head. “No, we have to go through Hunstanton to get there, so we might as well head back to the station first and fill the others in on what we have. Stella also said she’ll have the initial searches back on our label names, so maybe we’ll have better questions to ask at the nursing home by the time we get there.”

  “Makes sense.”

  Kate smiled and clicked open the car. “I do try, Jimmy.”

  Jimmy snorted and shook his head as he climbed in.

  “Any news on your new car?”

  “Yup.”

  “And?”

  “It’ll have to wait.”

  “How come?”

  Jimmy shrugged. “Money’s tight.”

  Kate frowned as she turned on the engine and pulled out of the car park. Jimmy lived alone, and to her knowledge had no girlfriend or kids to worry about. So why was money too tight for a full-time-employed police officer to get himself a new car? Burnham Market’s expensive, but… “Everything okay, Jimmy?”

  Jimmy didn’t say anything, he just stared out the window as she entered the roundabout and took the second exit towards the Hardwick industrial estate. Traffic was heavy and the rain had started while they’d been inside. Bright lights refracted through the raindrops on the windscreen before falling beneath the merciless blade of the wiper.

  “It’s my mum.”

  Kate glanced at Jimmy. “What about her?”

  “She’s not well, so I’ve been helping her out. You know how it is.”

  “What’s wrong with her?”

  Jimmy fell quiet again.

  “Sorry, Jimmy. I didn’t mean to pry. You don’t need to tell me.”

  “It’s okay. It’s just hard.”

  Kate nodded and waited for him to continue when he was ready. She indicated left and took the cut through beside Sainsbury’s to avoid the huge busy r
oundabout on to the flyover. She knew she’d still have to queue in the traffic, but it would be a hell of a lot shorter queue.

  “She’s bipolar.”

  Whoa. She glanced at Jimmy. Poor sod. “Recently diagnosed?”

  Jimmy shook his head. “No. She was in and out of hospital when I was a kid. I was eight when she was diagnosed. It’s always been a part of our lives.”

  “How’s your dad coping?”

  “Dad left twenty years ago when she was first diagnosed.”

  “Shit, sorry, I remember you saying they weren’t together. Sorry.”

  Jimmy shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. We were better off without him around, really.”

  Eight years old and struggling with a mentally ill parent, somehow I doubt you were, Jimmy. “Is she in hospital now?”

  “Yes. But she wants me to keep her flat going for her. So she knows where she’s going when she comes out.” He crossed his arms over his chest like a shield. “The familiarity of it is comforting to her. Helps her recover quicker.”

  “But it means you have to fund two homes on your wage.”

  He nodded.

  “Brothers or sisters?”

  “I’ve a sister, but she’s at uni, training to become a vet. She doesn’t have any money to help with mum’s costs, so the car will just have to wait a bit longer.”

  “Anything I can do—”

  “No,” he said quickly. “Thanks and all, sarge, but no thanks. I can manage.”

  Her respect for the young DC rose even further. He’d proven himself to be a dedicated, hardworking officer with a bright future in the police force ahead of him. He’d also proven himself to be a strong and determined young man, who took family loyalty and pride to a level she rarely saw any more. She felt a lump in her throat and swallowed with difficulty. “Fair enough, but if you change your mind, you know where I am.”

  He didn’t say anything, just nodded once.

  “And if you need to talk…”

  He smiled gently. “Thanks, but I’ve been down this road before, sarge. I know the journey.”

  “I know. But you don’t have to do it all on your own, you know. It doesn’t hurt to have a little company along the way.”

  “I’ll bear that in mind.”

  The rest of the twenty-minute journey passed by in silence. Kate couldn’t help but wonder at what his and his sister’s childhoods must have been like. Her own hadn’t exactly been ideal, but she’d never had to deal with looking after a parent in a situation like that. Her gran’s cancer had been difficult enough to deal with when she was sixteen, but physical illness somehow seemed easier. The symptoms were easy to see, and the results of the cancer eating away at her body had been increasingly evident every single day.

  Mental illnesses were not nearly so accommodating. They didn’t provide a measured, quantifiable progression of degeneration. The steps towards recovery were not nearly so tangible as they were in a cancer patient where you could see the removal of a tumour, the shrinking of a growth, the regrowing hair. Quite frankly, mental illnesses fucking sucked.

  Kate pulled up outside Hunstanton Police Station and reached for the handle of the door.

  Jimmy put his hand on her left arm. “Sarge, I’d appreciate it if you’d keep what I told you just between us.” He flicked his gaze towards the upstairs windows. “I don’t really want the lads to know.” He shrugged. “You know how they are. It just…well, you know how they are.”

  Kate did, but she thought they may well have surprised Jimmy had they known. Not that she’d had any intention of mentioning what he’d told her to anyone anyway, but if reassurance was what he needed, so be it. “Jimmy, I would never have dreamed of telling anyone what you told me about your mum. It’s none of their business. I’m glad you told me, so that I can help if you need or want me to. That’s it. As long as you do your job and this doesn’t interfere, you’ll never hear me mention it.”

  “Thanks, sarge.”

  Kate nodded and smiled. “Come on then, let’s go and see what Stella’s managed to find for us.”

  CHAPTER 7

  Kate opened the door to the office and held it for Jimmy as he carried a cup holder and carryout bag from a well-known coffee shop.

  “Beware! Greeks bearing gifts!” Tom hollered across the room.

  “That had better be a gingerbread latte you’ve got for me.” Stella crossed the room, sniffing the air as she came, hands outstretched.

  “Would we dare to bring you anything else?” Kate plucked the correct beverage from the tray. “Madam’s gingerbread latte, skimmed milk, no cream, extra sprinkles, and there’s a chocolate croissant in the bag for you too.”

  “I don’t know why you bother with the skimmed milk, then go and undo the good work with a chocolate croissant,” Collier said with a grin. “Shouldn’t you donate your croissant and reap the rewards?”

  Stella frowned at him, clearly trying to work out if he was teasing or serious. To be fair, the serious young detective rarely seemed to tease, so it was a legitimate cause for wonder. “Are you trying to say I’m fat?”

  “No.” He poked into the bag and pulled out the jam donut Kate had got for him. “That I’m hungry.” His smile widened.

  Well, well, well. Looks like the kid’s got a sense of humour after all.

  “Don’t even think about touching mine, pretty boy,” Tom shouted as he finished making some notes on the board before coming over to grab his own snacks.

  “Play nicely, boys.” Kate took a sip of her own cappuccino and a bite of her “death by chocolate” muffin. She moaned and closed her eyes to savour the deep, slightly bitter taste of the chocolate. Heaven.

  “So, what do you know, girls and boys?” Stella asked as they all sat around eating and drinking.

  “Male, aged sixty to eighty. Had a head injury, but the doc wouldn’t say it was the cause of death, only that it would have killed him eventually,” Jimmy said around a mouthful of Danish pastry.

  “We’ve got the victim wearing scraps of clothes from a whole lot of people. One of whom he may be,” Kate added.

  “Or not,” Jimmy continued.

  “The doctor also said that she couldn’t rule on accidental or suspicious death on the strength of what she had, so she would end up recording an open verdict.” Kate took another sip of her drink.

  “Damn,” Tom said. “So it’s identify and notify, then on to the next case.”

  Kate shrugged. “Maybe. I guess that depends a little bit on who he is, where he came from, and I still want to know how he got into that bunker.”

  “You may never get those answers, Kate,” Stella said.

  “I know. But I feel we at least need to try and get them.” She glanced at Tom.

  “Fair enough.” Stella reached across her desk and handed her a stack of pages. “Missing persons reports from the twenty-eighth of November 2013 to the end of December.”

  “How many?”

  “Twelve hundred.”

  Kate dropped the pile onto her knee and looked up at Stella.

  “No way,” Collier said. “There’d be no one left in Norfolk!”

  “That’s got to be the national results, right?” Kate said.

  Stella nodded. “I can’t find a local report of a missing person that meets the description, as vague as it is, of our bony friend. So we’ve got to look at national results and see what crops up.”

  “Bloody hell,” Kate said. “Right. You start looking into those then, and see which ones are still alive and accounted for and which are actually still missing.” She dropped the pile on to Collier’s desk.

  “What? Why me?”

  “Because I asked you to, and it’s your job to do what your superior officer asks you to do.”

  He scowled but picked up the sheaf of pages. “Yes, boss.”

  Kate offered him her sweetest smile. “Thank you. Stella, what about those names? Any connection to the nursing home where Annie Balding died?”

  “I’m sure thi
s won’t come as a shock to you now, but yes. Every one of them lived there.”

  “Excellent.”

  “And died there.”

  “Bummer.”

  “Indeed.”

  “How long ago?”

  “Did they die?” Stella asked and Kate nodded. “Edward Bale passed away in November of 2013, and all the others were well after. May 2014 onwards.”

  “All died in the nursing home?”

  “Yes. And before you start getting a bee in your bonnet about that, old people die in nursing homes. It’s kind of what they’re there for.”

  “I was just going to ask if any of them died of the same thing. That was all.” Kate sniffed.

  Stella glanced at her notes. “All look like they were suffering from different illnesses. Cancer, Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s, one with motor neurone disease, one with a stroke. They were all signed off by a doctor as natural complications of the illnesses they had.”

  “Just like Annie Balding,” Kate said.

  “Just like a lot of old people,” Stella replied.

  “True,” Kate conceded. “But if they’re missing a dead old person, why don’t we have a missing person’s report about it?”

  “Maybe they aren’t.”

  Kate looked at her sceptically. “Our victim was wearing clothes, shoes, and the dentures of people in their nursing home. How else did he come by them if he wasn’t a resident there too?”

  “Maybe a vagrant who stole things off the washing line?” Tom suggested.

  “A washing line? Are you having a laugh?” Kate said.

  “What?” he asked.

  Jimmy cleared his throat. “A commercial-sized laundry like those places have wouldn’t have a washing line. They’d use tumble driers. That’s why relatives are asked to bring clothes along that can be tumble dried when the residents move in.”

  “And you know this how?” Tom asked.

  “My gran was in a nursing home for the last few years of her life.”

  Tom grunted but accepted the facts.

  “Any other believable suggestions for our body ending up in those clothes, other than him being a resident at this nursing home?” Kate asked.