Blood On the Wall

by Jim Eldridge

  Little looked up from his own paperwork and shot a glance at him.

  ‘What’s up?’ he asked.

  ‘Michelle bloody Nixon,’ groaned Conway. ‘A complete nightmare. Thank God I didn’t live next door to her. Punters. Drugs. Violent and abusive when drunk, which was most of the time. Apart from her being a woman, there is absolutely nothing here which links her in any way to Tamara Armstrong.’

  ‘The names?’ murmured Little.

  Conway looked at Little and frowned. ‘Michelle and Tamara?’

  Little shook his head. Then, almost as if he was embarrassed by it, he said: ‘Nixon and Armstrong.’

  Conway frowned. ‘What about them?’ he asked.

  ‘They’re Reiver names,’ he explained.

  ‘So what?’ said Conway, shrugging. ‘Half the people in the Carlisle phone book have got Reiver names. Graham. Armstrong. Nixon.’

  ‘And Little,’ added Little. ‘That’s what made me think of it.’

  Conway shook his head.

  ‘This case is hard enough without bringing the bloody Border Reivers into it.’

  Conway remembered being taught about the Border Reivers at school in ‘local history’. The Border Reivers were the families who lived in what was known as the Debateable Lands, on the border between England and Scotland between the 1200s and the sixteenth century. It had been a time when there was no law and order in the border region between England and Scotland, and the Reiver families had taken advantage of it. For hundreds of years they lived by robbing on both sides of the border. English or Scottish, it didn’t matter. The most notorious were the Armstrongs, the Nixons, the Grahams, the Littles and the Bells. They plundered, murdered and raped, and no one could touch them. Not until James VI of Scotland became James I of England, and he took a hard line with them. He had them rounded up and hanged without trial. It had been known as Jeddart Justice. Those who weren’t killed on the spot were given a choice: execution or exile. A lot of them chose exile.

  ‘I don’t see it,’ said Conway. ‘The Reivers died out.’

  ‘Their families didn’t,’ pointed out Little. ‘You said it yourself, just look in the local phone book and see how many people have Reiver names. Thousands.’

  ‘So you’re saying this is a family feud from six hundred years ago? That after all this time someone’s decided to take revenge and start cutting some heads off? Or maybe it’s a ghost coming back and cutting heads off. Like in that film, Highlander.’

  Little looked at the disbelief on Conway’s face, heard the sarcasm in his voice, and sighed ruefully.

  ‘OK,’ he said. ‘But it’s the only thing I can see that connects the two women in any way at all.’

  ‘Maybe that’s the point,’ said Conway. ‘Maybe chummy chose them because they were completely different.’ He looked at the papers in front of him and let out a long and agonized sigh. ‘In which case, us doing this is a complete and utter waste of time.’

  Seward and Taggart parked outside the large 1960s building in Brampton Road that housed the University of Cumbria and walked into reception, making their way through a crowd of students who were either soaking up the summer sun or taking a chance to smoke a cigarette. As the uni buildings were strictly non-smoking, and as many of the students looked like they’d be at home in a vampire movie, with their death-white skin and black clothes, Seward guessed it was the latter.

  At the reception desk, they asked to speak to Eric Drake.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said the receptionist apologetically. ‘I don’t think he’s in today.’ She frowned, and then added: ‘In fact I don’t think he’s been in for the past few days.’

  ‘You know him, then?’ asked Seward.

  ‘Oh yes,’ replied the receptionist, smiling. ‘Everyone knows Drake.’

  ‘In what way?’ asked Taggart.

  The receptionist seemed to suddenly realize that these two women were officials of sorts, and she suddenly clammed up.

  ‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘I just meant that he’s well known.’

  ‘He must be,’ said Seward, ‘if you can remember him out of the hundreds of students here and know that he isn’t in.’

  The receptionist looked momentarily flustered.

  ‘In that case, can we speak to Paul Morrison?’ asked Taggart.

  The receptionist studied them carefully, aware now that something was up.

  ‘Who shall I say wants him?’ she asked.

  ‘Just tell him it’s the police,’ said Taggart.

  The receptionist picked up the phone, tapped out an extension, and then said, ‘Is Paul Morrison there? It’s reception.’ She waited a moment while someone obviously went to call the lecturer to the phone, then she said, ‘Mr Morrison? There are two police officers here to see you.’ A pause, then she added, ‘No, they didn’t say what it was about.’

  She nodded, then hung up and told them, ‘He’s on his way down.’ Then she added with a sigh: ‘It makes a change being able to get hold of him. Usually with these lecturers they’re either teaching, or out.’

  ‘Then it’s a good omen,’ said Taggart, smiling.

  They moved aside from the reception desk to wait, and a few moments later a man appeared, out of breath and looking worried. He went to the reception desk, and the woman behind the desk indicated Seward and Taggart.

  ‘Paul Morrison,’ he introduced himself, his tone whining as well as slightly aggressive. ‘Look, if it’s about my car tax, I’ve already told your office this is a matter of civil liberties—’

  Paul Morrison was a short, balding man in his forties, with three earrings in his left ear and two in his right. What little hair he had was pulled back into a ponytail. He was wearing a striped suit and sunglasses. Seward wasn’t sure if Morrison was going for the Hip Film Guy look or the Second-Rate Gangster. Whichever it was, at first sight she agreed with Taggart’s friend’s description of him: a pretentious wanker.

  ‘No,’ said Seward abruptly, cutting him off, ‘this is about one of your students. Eric Drake.’

  ‘What about him?’ asked Morrison suspiciously. ‘Who are you?’

  Both Seward and Taggart showed him their IDs and introduced themselves.

  ‘Perhaps if we can go somewhere more private to talk?’ suggested Taggart. She had already picked up Seward’s tone and had immediately switched to ‘nice cop’ to Seward’s ‘hard cop’. ‘Your room?’

  ‘I don’t have a room,’ snapped Morrison angrily. ‘I’m only a part-time lecturer and so I suffer accordingly. Absolute victimization. This is a truly dreadful place as far as trying to get one’s own space. You wouldn’t believe it! We’re even forced to share lecture rooms.’ He looked towards the refectory. ‘We could always go in there and talk. Have a cup of coffee while we’re doing it.’

  Seward looked through the glass doors of the refectory. It was filled with students.

  ‘We’d prefer to go somewhere where we can’t be overheard,’ she said.

  ‘In that case, the only place is outside,’ said Morrison. ‘Fortunately today is sunny.’ As he led the way outside, he was still complaining. ‘It’s an outrageous way to treat professional people, not giving them their own space.’

  Seward thought about their own cramped and shared offices at police HQ and was going to add a soured comment of her own, but decided against it. She wanted Morrison to be the one who talked.

  They found a spot in the grounds away from the groups of students, and Taggart said: ‘We’d like to get in touch with Eric Drake.’

  ‘Yes, you said,’ said Morrison, nodding. ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s to do with an ongoing investigation,’ said Taggart.

  ‘What investigation?’ persisted Morrison.

  ‘I’m afraid we’re not at liberty to divulge that at this moment, sir,’ Taggart told him. ‘However, we understand that Eric Drake isn’t in today. Is that right?’

  ‘This isn’t a school, Sergeant. It’s a university,’ snapped Morrison. ‘We encourage mature individ
ual creativity, and sometimes the creative mind doesn’t conform to the office hours mentality.’

  ‘So any of your students can not turn up and no one bothers?’ asked Seward.

  ‘They turn up for lectures, tutorials, that sort of thing, but much of their work is carried out on their own at their own speed.’

  ‘So Eric Drake hasn’t had any lectures or tutorials scheduled for the last few days?’

  Morrison looked uncomfortable.

  ‘Well, he has,’ he said, a defensive tone creeping into his voice. Then he looked at Seward defiantly. ‘But I’m sure that when he presents the piece he’s working on, it will justify the time he has spent working on it outside the campus.’

  ‘And what piece of work is he involved with at the moment?’ asked Taggart, trying to put a friendly tone in her voice to counter Seward’s aggressiveness. Nice cop, nasty cop.

  ‘Many different pieces of work,’ said Morrison vaguely. ‘This is not a restrictive course. The students have to complete a wide range of assignments.’

  ‘But what particular piece of work were you referring to when you said that when he presents it, it will justify the time he’s spent working on it?’ persisted Seward.

  ‘It’s a film,’ said Morrison. ‘A short film.’

  ‘What sort of film?’ asked Seward. ‘Documentary? Drama?’

  ‘Drama,’ said Morrison.

  ‘Any particular genre?’ Seward pressed. ‘Fantasy? Horror? Film noir?’

  Taggart looked at Seward in momentary surprise; then recovered herself. She’d been taken aback to hear Seward talking like one of these art critics on the telly. Morrison also looked at Seward with a new wariness. He checked Seward’s expression for any sign of sarcasm, but saw none. The truth was that Debby Seward loved films. She had spent her childhood being taken to the cinema by her father, a complete movie nut, and had come to share his love of films. Laurel and Hardy silents. Musicals. Westerns. She particularly liked old black and white thrillers. Film noir, the film buffs called them. She loved them for the stories, for the intrigue. But most of all for the flawed heroes: the Robert Mitchum types, doing their best to be heroic against a tide of sleaze and corruption.

  And, as deeply as she loved film, she had contempt for those who lived off it without giving anything back. Film critics who felt themselves so clever by writing a few witty lines, words which in some cases had destroyed the career of a writer or director or actor. The fakes who couldn’t make it as creative people in their own right, so they got their rocks off attacking those who could. People like Paul Morrison.

  ‘I believe Drake’s work touches on all known genres,’ said Morrison. ‘He is a very talented and driven young man. He has a fierce imagination, and a wonderful eye. Do you know the work of Orson Welles?’

  The patronizing way that Morrison emphasized the name ‘Orson Welles’, as if talking to an idiot, prompted Seward to ask ‘Do you mean Citizen Kane or his television adverts for sherry?’ just to annoy him, but instead she just nodded, watching him.

  ‘Drake has the same kind of intensity and individuality about his film-making that Welles had, before the studio system destroyed him,’ said Morrison. ‘If he can cope with the system, he has a real future in front of him. I believe he has the potential to be another Scorsese.’

  ‘Or maybe even another Curtiz,’ said Seward quietly.

  Morrison stared at Seward, stunned.

  ‘What?’ he said.

  ‘Michael Curtiz,’ said Seward. ‘The man who directed Casablanca, Angels with Dirty Faces, The Adventures of Robin Hood—’

  Morrison snapped out of his state of shock.

  ‘I know who Michael Curtiz is, Sergeant!’ he said, almost angrily. ‘I lecture on film.’

  Seward nodded.

  ‘Of course you do,’ she said. ‘Well, thank you for your time, Mr Morrison. You have been most helpful.’

  As the two detectives walked away from Morrison, heading for the car park, Taggart asked: ‘What was all that about this Curtiz character?’

  ‘Hungarian-born film director,’ said Seward. ‘Worked with all the greats: Humphrey Bogart, James Cagney, John Wayne. He directed the only good film Elvis Presley ever made: King Creole.’

  Taggart gaped at Seward, open-mouthed.

  ‘I like films,’ explained Seward. ‘When I see anything good, I want to know who made it so I can watch out for their stuff again.’ She shrugged. ‘I shouldn’t have said anything to him.’

  ‘Yes, you should,’ said Taggart. ‘He was being a pompous prick. You put him down nicely.’

  ‘But I did it because I was angry,’ said Seward. ‘I got annoyed because he was treating us like morons, like an inferior species because he thinks we don’t understand the world of arts, as if he and his kind are some sort of superior species to the rest of the world. I just wanted to put him right. It was stupid. It brought me down to his level.’

  ‘Now who’s being superior?’ said Taggart, grinning.

  They entered the reception area and headed for the desk.

  ‘Right,’ said Taggart, ‘let’s see if we can get an address for this reincarnation of Orson Welles.’

  Five to three in the afternoon. At the police station it was time for a pooling of information gathered, if any.

  As Georgiou and Tennyson walked past the reception desk on their way to the briefing room, they were stopped by a shout from Sergeant Graham.

  ‘Inspector!’ he called.

  ‘What now?’ groaned Georgiou, expecting it to be something to do with the superintendent.

  As Georgiou approached the desk, Sergeant Graham held out a copy of the local newspaper to him, with a grin.

  ‘Late edition of the News and Star,’ he said jovially. ‘Thought you might like to see what they’re saying about you.’

  ‘Let me guess,’ hazarded Georgiou. ‘That I’m a wonderful human being.’

  Graham laughed.

  ‘Not exactly,’ he said. ‘They’ve got an interview with Mrs Parks. She seems a bit upset.’

  Georgiou shrugged.

  ‘I’ll get one later,’ he said.

  ‘Take this one,’ said Graham, thrusting it towards Georgiou. ‘Why waste your money. Let the chief pay for it.’

  Georgiou took the paper with a slight grin and went back to where Tennyson was waiting for him.

  ‘Made the gossip columns?’ asked Tennyson, grinning.

  ‘Something like that,’ said Georgiou.

  ‘What’s it say?’

  ‘Let’s get our priorities right,’ said Georgiou. ‘First let’s see what everyone else has got, then I’ll read my press notices.’

  NINE

  Seward, Taggart, Conway and Little were all gathered around an open copy of the News and Star as Georgiou and Tennyson walked into the briefing room.

  ‘This is crap!’ Conway was snorting indignantly. ‘Absolute crap!’

  ‘I’m sure it is,’ said Georgiou, ‘and I’ll read all about it later.’ He brandished the copy of the paper he’d just picked up from the sergeant.

  ‘Take my advice, don’t bother,’ said Seward, her face showing she was angry. She moved away from the others and sat down at her desk, still fuming.

  ‘Don’t let it get to you,’ said Georgiou.

  ‘But you haven’t read what Mrs Parks says about you!’ protested Conway. ‘It’s libel! You ought to sue her!’

  ‘No, it won’t be,’ said Georgiou. ‘It will be very carefully phrased, with no direct accusations, just hints and innuendos.’

  ‘Not this one,’ said Conway, tapping the open paper. ‘She says you beat her son up and it’s a disgrace you’ve been allowed back.’

  Georgiou shrugged.

  ‘Like I said, I’ll read it later and decide what action to take, if any. In the meantime, let’s get back to the priority: the murders. What have you got?’

  Ruefully, Conway and Little repeated what they’d turned up, which was just a rehash of what Tennyson had reported at the mo
rning’s briefing. Then Seward and Taggart gave their report about what Rena Matlock had said about Eric Drake, and Tamara Armstrong being involved with making a film with him; and their interview with Paul Morrison.

  Georgiou nodded, interested.

  ‘This Drake character sounds interesting,’ he said. ‘The killings have got all the hallmarks of some cheap horror film. Maybe there’s something there.’

  ‘Do you want to talk to him?’ asked Seward.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘You’ve got it this far. You go with it. So, what else? Any connections between the two women?’

  The four detectives looked gloomy as they shook their heads.

  ‘Nothing,’ said Conway. ‘We’ve tried everything you suggested, plus a few more. Different hairdressers, different hospitals for their appointments. They lived completely different lives. Nothing at all.’

  ‘Except for the fact they were killed,’ said Taggart.

  ‘And their names,’ said Little.

  There was a pause in the room, and everyone turned to look at Little, who suddenly looked embarrassed.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘It’s nothing.’

  ‘No, nothing is what we’ve got,’ corrected Georgiou. ‘What’s this about their names?’

  Little looked at Conway, who shrugged as if to say ‘This is nothing to do with me’.

  ‘Armstrong and Nixon are both Reiver names,’ said Little.

  And, with a shamefaced look that told everyone perhaps he felt he was being foolish, he enlarged on what he’d said to Conway about the Reivers being the connection. When he had finished, he looked around at the others.

  ‘Well,’ he said defensively, ‘we were asked if we knew of a connection.’

  ‘True,’ said Georgiou. ‘And, however far-fetched, at the moment it’s the only one we’ve got. OK, leave that one with me. For the rest, Seward and Taggart, go and dig out this Drake character. Conway and Little, go and see if forensics have finished their report yet. I want everything. What was under Tamara’s fingernails. Any traces of chemicals or anything on her skin. The killer must have gripped her to tie her up; let’s see if he left anything at all. Traces of deodorant. Sweat. Hairs. Anything. Where did the electric tape come from? Let’s nail down absolutely everything.’