Red is the Colour

by Mark L. Fowler

  The man was coming back.

  Decision time, Jim.

  Something had changed in the man.

  Maybe, remembering, he had seen what fool stood in his house, and filling up a mug with poison he was going to end what he had started a lifetime ago. Or maybe he had remembered all along, waiting for this moment all of these years, a destiny about to be fulfilled; the boot now on the other foot.

  Or the same foot?

  Jim Tyler was confused.

  He felt the fear grow. He had been lured here, so far from home. Lured to this fairy-tale landscape, entering the nightmare …

  The eye of the storm …

  He felt his hand slip into the pocket of his coat, and tighten around the shaft of metal within …

  Tyler woke up, the scream fully-formed in his throat, waiting to come out. Bathed in sweat, he looked at the clock. It felt like he had barely fallen asleep, and yet already half of the night had been eaten away.

  He was thirsting for a drink, the urge to go out and find it overwhelming. He quickly dressed in his running clothes and ran out, through the streets, trying to exhaust the cravings.

  On returning he stood under the shower, his breath returning, the calmness coming in dribs and drabs. DCI Jim Tyler, twenty years a police officer, held the past in check, the thirst for poison, retribution, and tried to focus on the present investigation.

  As tiredness finally overwhelmed him, he lay down on the bed and accepted that he would have to close his eyes and be transported again to the faraway city and the red door and the ghosts of a dark, unshakable past.

  But none of this happened. On waking to the alarm Tyler had the feeling that he had been making love to Kim again in his dreams.

  21

  The hostel was quiet when Mills arrived that morning. The senior officer on duty was expecting the DS, and Marley’s notes were ready to hand. Mills glanced over them and said, ‘So where’s the man?’

  ‘He’s out the back, having a smoke.’ The officer filled in some of the gaps and Mills jotted down a few notes of his own.

  Douglas Marley had been at the hostel for a few weeks as part of a rehabilitation scheme to get him back to independent living. He had a long history of mental health problems, culminating in two hospital admissions following overdoses of prescription drugs. Prior to the admissions, the police had been called to the flat Marley had been sharing with a woman who had recently been imprisoned for drug trafficking.

  Mills recalled from records at the station that when the police were called out to the flat, the woman was found to have facial bruising and two broken fingers. Yet Marley maintained that he was in fact defending himself. That she attacked him.

  ‘He still does maintain that version of events,’ the officer told Mills after the DS had raised the subject. ‘It’s one of his favourite stories. He tells it at least once a week and he occasionally gets requests for it. Nobody believes him, of course.’

  ‘Do you believe him?’

  ‘Who knows,’ shrugged the officer. ‘I’ve heard stranger things. The way he tells it, she made a bit of a mess of him. Bruises to his neck and face suggestive of being repeatedly struck with a heavy object. Apparently, she kept a baseball bat in case of intruders. Could have been a marriage made in heaven,’ said the officer. ‘Or somewhere else. I’m not aware of any other violent episodes. More of a self-harmer, at least these days, as far as we know.’

  Mills asked if there had been any incidents of any kind whilst Marley had been at the hostel.

  ‘Actually, apart from something curious a few nights ago, Doug has been an absolute delight. I would say that we have seen some real progress and he’s due for review fairly soon. Who knows, but there could be hope for our Mr Marley.’

  ‘What happened a few nights ago?’ asked Mills.

  Marley, it seemed, had wandered down to the town centre, as he did most evenings, to sit on one of the benches near to St Luke’s church. ‘Sometimes he might scrounge some money to buy cider, other times he’d sit and smoke and just have the crack with the ‘other dossers’, as Doug himself tends to put it. And by ‘crack’, I mean a laugh and a joke, nothing heavier than that, at least not these days.’

  ‘Progress,’ said Mills.

  ‘But on Saturday Doug comes back early and he looks shaken up. I mean, something had really frightened him. The officer on duty that night wrote in the report book – hang on, let me find the part …’

  Mills waited while the officer took forever to find what he was looking for.

  ‘Ah, here we are. Smell of alcohol yet no clear sign of inebriation. Slight tremble visible, and pale, as though he had been badly frightened. Unusually quiet for remainder of the evening. Tried to ascertain info from Doug about what had troubled him, but he became agitated at that point and so I did not pursue the matter.

  ‘The entries since then have noted that he has been generally quieter, and avoided leaving the hostel area. Mind you, last night there was a request for his ‘woman’ story, and by all accounts he told it with his old gusto. So perhaps he’s returning back to normal.’

  Mills looked at his watch. ‘Right, I’ll go and have a word with him. I take it nobody witnessed anything that might explain what exactly took place the other night?’

  ‘I asked one or two who were down in the town, but they said that Doug wasn’t in any of his usual spots. Bit of a puzzler, actually.’

  Douglas Marley was smoking heartily out the back, in the small courtyard. It seemed impossible to Mills that this man was only forty-five years of age. He looked as ancient as his old headmaster, Frederick Wise, though with a sight less to show for the stresses and strains of life that had carved out his features.

  Mills asked if they might go somewhere more private, but Marley said that as there was nobody else around, he didn’t have any problems staying where he was.

  ‘I got no secrets to keep from the police – or anybody else. Fire away, if you have something to ask me, I don’t mind.’

  He spent a few minutes trying to build a rapport with the ancient forty-something, but though the man was genial enough, the detective doubted that his efforts were achieving very much. Douglas Marley, he thought, was one of those men with a naturally high wall, and circumstances had likely given good reason for him to work on strengthening that wall.

  Here was a man who could give an impression, thought Mills. Appearing open, but at the same time loath to give anything away. The genial smile was a mask that many wore, yet beneath it, in so many cases, when you knew how to look, lay a blazing intensity of fear and mistrust.

  The DS got down to business, referencing the grim discovery that had been made only a few yards up the road from the hostel. Mention of the corpse of the schoolboy drew nothing at all from Douglas Marley, not even a flicker.

  Mills switched track. He tried for a rendition of the infamous domestic violence incident, but Marley wasn’t playing.

  Running out of strategies, he decided to go for broke. He brought up the subject of River Trent High, asking what memories Marley had of Fredrick Wise.

  ‘Never had much to do with him – except when we were in trouble, of course. He’s probably dead by now. Don’t think I’ll cry, though, if it’s all the same.’

  Mills chose not to disabuse him of the notion that his old headmaster was dead. Marley looked as though he could do with all the good news he could get, regardless of legitimacy. He moved on. Howard Wood?

  ‘Pillock, he was, looking back.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘In every way. You blame the kids for what they do, but he’s the one who’s supposed to be responsible. It’s what they get paid for.’

  Mills was having trouble following.

  ‘Do you mean bullying?’

  ‘Bullying? What’s that got to do with it?’

  ‘I’m not sure what point you’re making, Mr Marley.’

  ‘I’m not making any point. I’m just saying, that’s all.’

  The surlin
ess was setting in.

  ‘Football fan, wasn’t he?’ asked Mills. ‘Stoke City.’

  ‘Do you follow them? You sound local enough. Not a Vale fan, are you?’

  Mills laughed. ‘Yes, I follow them, when I get chance. I hear that you were a big fan, you and Mr Wood. And Steven Jenkins …’

  Marley tightened up at the name, the twinkle of suspicion that had never gone away becoming brighter and somehow more dangerous.

  Two other men were coming out into the courtyard, and Mills suggested to Marley that they take a wander down into the town. ‘You can show me your favourite benches.’

  ‘What? You must lead a sad life. No crimes want solving?’

  Marley was laughing. Catching the attention of the two other men who had entered the courtyard, he said, ‘Listen up: this one here wants me to show him around my favourite benches.’ Turning to Mills, he said, ‘You want to get yourself a real hobby, mate. Or a proper job.’

  Mills, believing that the interview was over, got up. Then Marley surprised him. ‘Actually, now you mention it, I could do with stretching my legs. I don’t know, the things you get asked to do nowadays. What a bastard life.’

  In the churchyard behind St Luke’s, Marley selected a bench from the two vacant ones and the two men sat down. Before Mills could start up a conversation, Marley said, ‘Look, I don’t want no trouble. I’ve seen too much of that. One or two of ’em in school might have picked on that lad who went missing, but I don’t know much about that. I kept myself to myself. Best way.’

  Surprise, surprise, thought Mills, but he took the sliver of opportunity anyway.

  ‘He was a Chelsea supporter, I believe.’

  ‘Who was?’ said Marley, as though challenging Mills to expose the traitor without delay.

  ‘The boy who went missing. Alan Dale. And one or two of the boys from your class may have picked on him because of that. Steven Jenkins was one of them, I understand. Who else do you remember?’

  Marley stood up. ‘I’ve heard enough about all this crap.’

  ‘Phillip Swanson was there too,’ said Mills.

  ‘Was where? What are you talking about?’

  ‘Sit down, please, Mr Marley.’

  ‘I’ve heard enough. Was where?’

  ‘Just up the road from the hostel. Bottom of The Stumps. My colleague spoke to Robert Wild last night, and he believes that you were there too?’

  ‘Wild, what does he know? He wasn’t …’

  ‘Wasn’t what, Mr Marley? Wasn’t … there?’

  ‘I want to go back. I’ve had enough of this. Harassment, that’s what this is. I’ve got my rights and I’m making a complaint against you. You can get solicitors at the hostel.’

  ‘Who did you see down here, Mr Marley?’

  ‘Here?’

  ‘Where we are now, this churchyard? You were here a few evenings ago. Or were you somewhere else? Not in your usual place? Why was that?’

  Marley didn’t answer.

  ‘Steven Jenkins is dead, did you know that?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘He was murdered.’

  ‘Murdered? Why?’

  ‘We think that someone doesn’t want the police finding out who was down The Stumps with Alan Dale on the day he died. What do you think about that, Mr Marley?’

  ‘What should I think? I don’t know anything about any of it.’

  ‘Who else was there? A summer evening, June, 1972. You were fifteen years old. There was you, Jenkins, Swanson – who else?’

  Marley was already making his way through the churchyard, back towards the town. Mills grabbed his arm, and swung him around.

  Looking Marley square in the face, DS Mills flinched. My God, he thought. That’s pain there in his face, and so much fear.

  ‘I don’t know anything,’ said Marley. ‘I wasn’t there, I tell you. I keep myself to myself, and always have done. Why don’t you leave me alone?’

  ‘I want to know what happened. I want to know what happened to Alan Dale.’

  ‘I told you, I don’t know anything.’

  ‘You played your part, that evening, in 1972. You played your part, torturing a timid little boy – and I want to know who was there with you, and I want to know what happened.’

  Mills saw the pain and the fear turn to anger.

  Marley pushed him away and made off, with a surprising turn of speed.

  DS Mills took out his phone and rang Tyler. The DCI would probably appreciate being the first to hear that his sergeant had lost it, and that there was a complaint on the way.

  ‘Harassment, you reckon?’

  ‘Probably that.’

  ‘Nice work, DS Mills. I’m at the school. We’ve had some interesting information back from interviews with some of the old girls from the class of ’72. Two make mention of your friend Hillman. Two, separately and unprompted, on the subject of bullying brought up Hillman.’

  ‘In what way? Do you mean that incident when he and Jenkins—’

  ‘The suggestion is,’ cut in Tyler, ‘that a few years earlier, at junior school, Martin Hillman was top dog, at least in his class – though it might have stretched some way beyond that. The two old girls who pinpointed him were in his class all through junior school. And they paint a picture of a bully and a troublemaker, though one who quickly learned how to make the less intelligent kids do his dirty work for him, and carry the can.’

  Mills started to ask a question, but Tyler hadn’t finished.

  ‘One of the girls suggested that with the rougher lads, it was generally a case of what you see is what you get. She said that Hillman gave her the creeps and she reckoned that Hillman’s mother was even scarier. ‘A right old witch,’ was how she put it, ‘and nasty with it.’’

  ‘Did the two girls attend River Trent High?’ asked Mills.

  ‘They did indeed. And these two had already marked Hillman’s card, and so they knew what they were looking for.’

  ‘You make them sound like a couple of sleuths.’

  ‘On the whole, I would say that girls, and women, are the more observant, and with more reliable memories. You see, contrary to what some have said about me, I do pay attention on the diversity training. Anyway, they both of them stated that Hillman remained a manipulative character, still pulling strings, ever more adept at keeping his own face out of the spotlight. If you weren’t looking out for his involvement, you probably wouldn’t notice it.’

  ‘Keeping his head down and getting on with his work.’

  ‘On the face of it.’

  ‘These “old girls” – they didn’t have an axe to grind?’

  ‘It’s not clear why they should. No angles have emerged, should we say. I’m doing some more digging and later I have another interesting appointment lined up.’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Robert Wild’s old flame.’

  ‘Pamela Scott? You’ve located her?’

  ‘She lives in a place called Bradeley and works as a mobile hairdresser. I may have a trim while I’m finding out what she remembers from that day. I mean, apart from what Robert Wild might prefer to think she remembers, if you follow me.’

  ‘I think I do, sir.’

  That sarcasm, thought Tyler, as he ended the call. It was sometimes difficult to establish beyond all reasonable doubt.

  Tyler smiled as the headteacher entered her office bearing a stack of files. He finished off another fine cup of tea and, as usual, complimented her on the standard of refreshments at the school.

  She had already suggested that DCI Tyler might like to have his own name placed on the outside of her door, and that in turn she could try to find some private space at the police station. It might help, she said, in her efforts to attend to her own paperwork.

  ‘Point taken,’ he said. ‘But you wouldn’t like the company. And anyway, I think Miss A. Hayburn suits that door perfectly.’

  As they worked through the files the detective suddenly broke off.

  ‘Just one aspect of the
name that perplexes me,’ he said.

  ‘What name?’

  ‘Yours.’

  ‘And what perplexes you about my name?’

  ‘I wonder,’ said Tyler, ‘what the ‘A’ stands for?’

  22

  Why hadn’t Sheila Dale come forward all those years ago?

  She had seen the marks on her brother. She’d heard his story about the savagery of his classmates – why hadn’t she gone back to the school, demanded to see Wise, called the police? Why hadn’t she raised holy hell?

  To Tyler the answers seemed ludicrously clear.

  What would an uncaring bastard like Fredrick Wise have done? Another round of thrashings, perhaps, to further inflame the situation? As for the police … in those days, those dark-age days of thirty years ago, you didn’t involve the police merely because a child was being bullied to death. It was all a part of growing up.

  Being, or becoming, a man.

  Tyler looked at Miss Hayburn and thought: things would have been very different, even back in the day, with a person like you in charge. Someone who knows the meaning of compassion.

  He watched her moving through the files; through the boxes of archived material with an eye that didn’t miss a trick. That disarming smile had built many a bridge over troubled waters, he had no doubt. Here was a diplomat, and at the same time a natural leader, and one who didn’t have to resort to the weaponry of the battlefield to maintain civilisation.

  She looked up from her labours and caught his eye. The two of them quietly exchanged question marks, and then she said, ‘Well, I do believe that we’ve found something.’

  It had been a shot in the dark.

  That punishment records had been kept at all was one thing. That they were still intact, buried deep in the school archives, was certainly stretching it. Wise, for whatever reasons, had kept meticulous records, and here, in red ink, under June, 1972, a relatively quiet month on the discipline front, it seemed, the names of Steven Jenkins and Martin Hillman stood out for all who might one day seek to find them.