by Jim Eldridge
‘No,’ he said. ‘I think Mr Sun went somewhere else after he finished work for the night.’
Conway looked at him, startled.
‘You think he’s got a fancy woman?’ he asked.
‘No,’ said Georgiou. ‘If my hunch is right, we’ll know where he was taken from, and it won’t be outside his takeaway.’ He picked up his phone, dialled the IT department, and asked to speak to DS Tennyson.
‘Mac,’ he said. ‘I’m going with Conway to have another word with the Sun family. It might be a bit of a delicate chat, so I’m going to keep my mobile switched off so we’re not interrupted. If anything comes up, I’ll sort it out when we get back. OK?’
‘No problem,’ said Tennyson.
‘How are you getting on with IT?’ asked Georgiou.
‘Slow,’ said Tennyson. ‘Slow, but steady.’
‘I’ll see you when I get back,’ said Georgiou.
Conway frowned, puzzled.
‘What do you mean, a delicate chat?’ he asked.
‘I’ll tell you if I turn out to be right,’ said Georgiou. He stood up. ‘OK, let’s go and see this Mr Li.’
SEVENTEEN
Georgiou and Conway sat in the same small cramped room above the takeaway where Conway had sat just an hour or so before. This time only Mr Li, the elder of the two brothers-in-law, was in the room with them. Mrs Sun was in her bedroom being comforted by her sister. The younger brother was downstairs in the kitchen of the takeaway, preparing food for that evening. As Mr Li had told them as they sat down: ‘Work goes on.’
Georgiou studied Mr Li. He was in his fifties, Georgiou guessed, and with the death of Mr Sun, Mr Li was now the head of the family. Before, Mr Li had just been ‘a worker’; the name on the shop front was ‘Han Sun Chinese Takeaway’, so Mr Sun had been the boss. There was a great deal of wariness in Mr Li’s eyes. He wasn’t happy about being alone with the two policemen. With his two sisters and his brother in the room, he could hide, divert attention onto many other things, but not alone with these two.
He’s wary because he’s hiding something, thought Georgiou. And I think I know what it is.
Georgiou offered his condolences again, in a sympathetic voice, and asked a few mild questions about Mr Sun, rephrasing most of them from those which Conway had asked in his earlier visit, all to lull Mr Li into dropping his guard a bit. It didn’t work. Mr Li remained as wary as ever; so Georgiou dropped his bombshell, still keeping his voice low, gentle, concerned, as he asked: ‘Where was last night’s game?’
Mr Li looked back at him, a puzzled expression on his face, but Georgiou had caught the momentary look of concern in his eyes.
‘Game?’ repeated Mr Li. He shook his head. ‘What game?’
‘Mahjong,’ said Georgiou. And he added a brief sentence in some strange sounds that caused Conway to look at his boss, taken aback.
Mr Li looked uncomfortable, then shook his head fiercely.
‘No game,’ he said firmly.
Georgiou leant forward, his face showing concern.
‘Mr Li,’ he said, ‘I’m not interested in causing trouble for people who want to relax after a hard night’s work with a friendly game. I’m not interested in illegal gambling—’
‘No illegal gambling!’ snapped Li sharply.
‘All I’m interested in is finding out who killed your brother-in-law. And I think you want that, too.’
‘Racists!’ barked Li.
Georgiou nodded.
‘It may well be racists,’ he said. ‘But we need to get evidence to find out who. And, to do that, we need to know where he was last night so we can examine the area and see if the murderer left any clues when they snatched your brother-in-law. I don’t need to see the inside of the place, just the outside. Once I know that, I’ll have my men check every inch of the distance between the shop and there, checking for clues. I know it’s not far, because your brother-in-law walked there. I know that because we’ve checked with the taxi companies, and he didn’t use a cab. Nor did he take a car. Which means it’s not far from here, walking distance. Now, as I say, I’m not interested in arresting anyone for gambling, but if we’re going to catch the person who did this to your family, I need to know where to start from. And you’re the only one who can help me with that information.’
Georgiou sat watching Mr Li, doing his best to keep the tone of his voice friendly, approachable, unthreatening. Li sat silent, obviously weighing up his options in his mind. Finally, he muttered: ‘Tait Street.’
‘Thank you,’ said Georgiou. ‘Which number?’
‘Fourteen.’
‘And did Mr Sun play there last night?’
Li shook his head.
‘I go there and ask. They tell me he not come.’
‘So he was snatched somewhere between here and Tait Street,’ said Georgiou. ‘What time did he leave here?’
‘After shop shut and cleared up. One o’clock.’
Georgiou nodded.
‘It would take about ten minutes to get to Tait Street. So he was snatched sometime during those ten minutes.’ Georgiou got up and held out his hand to Li. ‘Thank you, Mr Li. There’ll be no trouble for your friends, but I will need to send DS Conway here to talk to them, to confirm what you’ve told me. I’ll give you time to talk to them to reassure them they won’t be arrested.’ He smiled. ‘Not this time, and not by me.’
‘Thank you,’ said Li, and he took Georgiou’s hand and shook it.
As Georgiou and Conway stepped out into the street, Conway asked: ‘How did you know? About the gambling? And was that Chinese you were speaking?’
‘Cantonese,’ said Georgiou. ‘And just a brief word or two. While I was in the Met, I did a stint in Chinatown. I learnt two things there. One: if you say a couple of words in Cantonese it worries them into thinking you might know a whole lot more, so they don’t use that “No speak English” ploy. Two: once the Chinese restaurants and takeaways close for the night, there’s only one game in town for most of the cooks and waiters – gambling – and usually it’s mahjong. But mahjong gambling is a very noisy business, those tiles being thrown down makes a hell of a racket, and there’s always lots of shouting when players lose. So it would need to be in a house where that kind of noise at night is already going on, and the houses around won’t complain.’
‘And Tait Street has got quite a few houses with students living in them,’ said Conway, nodding. ‘Yes.’ He turned to Georgiou. ‘But you don’t think that Mr Li was gambling there?’
‘No,’ said Georgiou. ‘Because if he had been, he’d have been with Han Sun when he was snatched.’ He looked along Botchergate towards Tait Street. ‘There are CCTV cameras along here, aren’t there?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ said Conway.
‘Right. Get along to the council and ask to check the CCTV footage in Tait Street between 1.00 and 1.15 this morning. Let’s see what vehicles were around at that time, and run their number plates. Also, get uniform in and get them to check the route between the takeaway and 14 Tait Street; pick up every piece of litter they can find and bag it. It may lead nowhere, but it might give us a start.’
EIGHTEEN
Inside the briefing room at HQ, the phone on Tennyson’s desk rang. It was the desk sergeant.
‘There’s a Diane Moody wants to talk to the inspector. I told her he was out, so she wanted to talk to you. She says she’s got some information she thinks you need to know.’
Not more on the Reivers, groaned Tennyson inwardly
‘Put her through,’ he said.
There was a click, then Diane Moody’s voice came through. ‘Sergeant Tennyson?’
‘Speaking.’
‘I think I might be able to throw some light on these murders. Especially after the one that was reported this morning, on the news. It was at Birdoswald, wasn’t it?’
‘Yes,’ said Tennyson.
‘Then I definitely have something.’
‘And that is…?’ asked Tennyson, pen poi
sed over his notepad.
‘Do you think you could come to Tullie House and I’ll explain? It’ll be easier than over the phone.’
Warning bells rang in Tennyson’s head. More history?
‘If you could give me a clue.…’ he began.
‘Or, if you prefer, I could come and see you.’
Tennyson weighed it up. Once she was in the building it might be hard to get rid of her. Diane Moody did love to talk. At least, if he saw her at Tullie House, he could offer an excuse and leave.
‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘I’ll come and see you. I’ll be there in about fifteen minutes.’
He hung up and scribbled a note: ‘Gone to Tullie House to see Diane Moody. Mac.’ He added the time beneath, then placed it on Georgiou’s desk.
‘Right,’ he muttered to himself wearily. ‘Time for another history lesson.’
But then another thought occurred to him. Maybe Diane Moody had been in the area of Birdoswald the previous night and had actually seen something. But who goes to a place like Birdoswald in the middle of the night? Tennyson chuckled to himself. Someone who was doing something she’d rather other people didn’t find out about. Maybe that was the real reason Diane Moody didn’t want to say anything over the phone.
As Georgiou walked back into the office and saw the note from Tennyson, his phone rang. It was the desk sergeant.
‘I’ve just had that woman reporter from the News and Star on again, Inspector,’ he said. ‘Jenny McAndrew. It’s the fourth time.’
‘I trust you told her I wasn’t available,’ said Georgiou.
After the report in the paper hinting that he was guilty of beating up an innocent youth, Georgiou had issued an order to his team that no one was to talk to Jenny McAndrew. ‘Whatever you say, she’ll twist,’ he’d told them. ‘So if you don’t tell her anything she’ll have nothing to base her so-called journalism on.’
‘I told her, but she said it was important,’ said the desk sergeant.
‘If she phones again, tell her I’ll talk to her when the murder case is solved. Until then, I’m busy. And so are the rest of my team.’
With that Georgiou hung up. He was just sorting through the forensic reports on Tamara Armstrong and Michelle Nixon when his mobile rang.
‘Yes?’ he said.
‘Inspector, you’re a hard man to get hold of,’ said a woman’s voice, and Georgiou recognized it as Jenny McAndrew.
‘That’s because I’m busy,’ he said. ‘Might I ask how you got my mobile number?’
‘That’s privileged information,’ she said. ‘I need to talk to you about these murders.’
‘No comment,’ said Georgiou curtly.
‘But …’ began McAndrew.
‘All enquiries have to go to press liaison. They’ll be able to answer any questions you have.’
With that Georgiou ended the call.
As he expected, his mobile rang again almost immediately. He checked the number. As he expected, it was Jenny McAndrew calling again. He ignored it and let the voicemail pick it up.
He was returning to the reports on Han Sun when his desk phone rang. At least it won’t be Jenny McAndrew, he reflected as he picked it up.
‘Georgiou,’ he said.
It was a woman’s voice. Very young, by the sound of it.
‘I’ve got some information,’ she said.
Her voice was muffled, as if she was speaking through cloth of some kind.
‘What sort of information?’ he asked.
‘I can’t talk on the phone,’ she said. ‘Can you meet me?’
‘When?’ asked Georgiou. ‘Where?’
‘Do you know the lock-up garages on Raffles? Off Mardale Road?’
‘Yes,’ said Georgiou.
‘I’ll see you there in half an hour. Come alone.’
‘How will I recognize you?’ asked Georgiou.
‘I’ll know you,’ said the voice. ‘If you bring anyone, I won’t show.’ And then the line went dead.
Georgiou rang through to the switchboard.
‘I’ve just had a call,’ he said. ‘Did you get the number it came from? Was it a mobile?’
There was a pause, then the operator said: ‘No. It was public call box.’
‘Where?’
Another pause, then the operator said: ‘Local. Creighton Avenue.’
The Raffles estate. Which fitted with the location the caller gave.
Georgiou dialled Mac’s mobile phone. It was switched off. He left a message telling Mac he was going to the Raffles estate following up some promised information. Then he left. The chances were it would turn out to be a false errand. But at this stage in the game, with the murderer on the loose, he couldn’t afford to turn down any chances.
NINETEEN
Tennyson followed Diane Moody into her office, the same one he and Georgiou had been in the day before.
‘Would you like coffee, or tea, or anything?’ she asked.
‘No, thank you,’ he said.
She gestured him to a chair. As he sat down, he said: ‘You said on the phone you had information about the latest murder.’
‘Not just the latest, all of them,’ she said. ‘It was when I heard about the latest murder this morning that I understood the connection.’
‘The connection?’ queried Tennyson.
Moody reached into her bag and took out a map and spread it on the table. Tennyson recognized it as the area between the Solway Firth on the east coast and Newcastle on the west. A line had been marked along it, and on the line three crosses had been made in pen.
‘Stanwix, Birdoswald, Haltwhistle,’ said Moody, indicating the three crosses.
‘Yes?’ said Tennyson, none the wiser. The feeling that Diane Moody may have seen something and come in with real and hard evidence was definitely evaporating. It’s another history thing after all, he said to himself gloomily.
‘They are all the points on Hadrian’s Wall.’
‘Hadrian’s Wall?’ repeated Tennyson.
‘Yes,’ said Moody, nodding. ‘Whoever is doing these killings is doing them along the line of Hadrian’s Wall.’
Tennyson looked at her, and it struck him that Diane Moody was enjoying this. It was as if this was an academic puzzle to be solved. Then a kind of detective antenna inside Tennyson’s head registered that there might be a hint of something else behind Moody’s relish. She was treating this like playing a game. Maybe, just maybe, she might be part of the game. Tennyson’s eyes were drawn again to Moody’s large, strong hands, and now he registered her broad shoulders. Moody could be strong. How strong? Strong enough to hang a body from a tree? Or maybe there was more than one person involved?
‘Tell me about Hadrian’s Wall,’ said Tennyson, and he pulled his chair closer to the desk.
Georgiou pulled his car into the space in front of the lock-up garages that backed onto Mardale Road. Three cars were on the space; two of them with flat tyres. Abandoned, he guessed. A glance at the third showed no tax disc on the windscreen. Stolen, or abandoned, or left to rot.
He sat behind the steering wheel for a moment, waiting and watching. There was no one around. He wondered if she was watching him, whoever she was. If so, where was she?
He got out of his car and looked across the road to the houses on the other side. Neat little houses. Small front lawns kept short and trim. Low fences. One even had window boxes with a display of brightly coloured flowers. He could see a notice on the gate of one of the houses: ‘Beware of the dog’, with a picture of a fierce-looking Rottweiler. The house next door also had a sign on its gate, but this one read: ‘Never mind the dog, beware of the householder.’
Georgiou grinned. He liked odd notices, variations on traditional themes. Like those stickers in the rear windows of cars that instead of saying ‘Baby on Board’ said ‘Beware: Lunatic at the Wheel’. Politically incorrect, and also possibly illegal if the Health and Safety obsessives had their way, but they amused Georgiou.
He guessed that
the householders across the road weren’t amused by the lock-up garages they looked out on. The large metal doors were covered in graffiti; some of it obscene, some of it intelligible only to local knowledge. ‘PT duz it,’ said one. Does what? thought Georgiou. Who was PT? Or what? And why spell ‘does’ as ‘duz’? It was the texting generation, writing in some form of abbreviations.
The abandoned cars added to the feeling of run-downness and general depression.
When he first came to Carlisle, his colleagues had warned him about the Raffles estate. They told him it was a no-go area. Dangerous. Many of the houses had been boarded up and used by drug addicts. Needles hidden in the grass and lying on the tarmac were a major hazard. And don’t leave your car on the estate, his colleagues had said. They’ll have your wheels off and sell them back to you within the hour. Things had changed since then. Many of the old houses had been demolished. Some of the difficult tenants had been removed. The new ones who had taken their place had been vetted, it was claimed. Raffles was going upmarket. But it still had people on it like Ian Parks and his family. They were so firmly entrenched they’d never leave, not unless they were forced out. And with someone like Councillor Maitland protecting them, that was unlikely to happen.
Georgiou looked around. He’d give it five more minutes and then he’d go. No one was around. No one was coming. No, wait! There was someone coming: a young woman wheeling a baby-pusher. Was this her?
Georgiou watched as the woman approached … and then she walked straight past.
Georgiou wondered if it was a hoax. A joke of some kind. Bringing him out here in a false errand to waste his time.
He looked at the grassy patch next to the garages. As well as a collection of litter, drink cans, there were two supermarket shopping trolleys and a ripped mattress. He guessed that after dark this patch of land became the gathering place for one of the many gangs of feral youths that haunted the city’s estates. And not just the estates: the underpasses, the parks, school yards. It wasn’t just in Carlisle, it was a national problem. At least Carlisle didn’t suffer from the same levels of gang violence that places like Nottingham and Bristol did. Gun crime. And don’t even start me on London and Birmingham and Manchester, he thought. Drive-by shootings. City estates out of control run by gangs of all ages, from old-time thugs down to nine-year-old kids on bikes and drugs. Most of them armed to the teeth.