Winsome looked again at Caleb Ross’s delivery schedule spread out on her desk, along with her notes from her visits to the farms where he had collected on the morning of his death. She couldn’t come up with any point at which a substitution could have easily been made or an extra load added. All the farmers had stood in the yard with Caleb and chatted and had helped him load the bags in the van. The bags themselves had been locked overnight, or longer, in secure buildings. There was nothing extra, nothing last moment, nothing suspicious, nothing that appeared to have been tampered with.
So where had Ross picked up his load of human remains?
Winsome knew she was missing something, and it irked her. Ross had started his round at nine o’clock and had visited ten farms before his crash at five past two in the afternoon. The distances between the farms accounted for most of the time, except that, however often she added it up, Winsome was left with about one hour unaccounted for. She had assumed that Caleb must have stopped for lunch at one of the many watering holes along the way, whether it was discouraged or not, but enquiries at all the pubs he could possibly have called at for his giant Yorkshire puddings yielded not one positive response. They knew him, but they hadn’t seen him that day.
Then she remembered as her finger touched the last name on the list. Mr Wythers, of Garsley Farm, the last place Ross had called at before his accident, had let drop in passing that Ross had refused a cup of tea and a biscuit because he said he had just eaten his lunch. Winsome had checked all the places on his route, and he hadn’t eaten in a pub, so he must have taken a sandwich and flask with him, as Vaughn said he often did. Assuming that Ross had already eaten before he arrived at Wythers’ farm, which he left just after one o’clock, what was he doing between one and two? Garsley was the end of the road, as Winsome had seen for herself. ‘Beyond this point be monsters,’ she thought, remembering the old maps on the classroom walls at school. Well, perhaps there were. Or perhaps there was at least one monster who shot a young man with a bolt pistol and skinned and dressed him like a slaughtered lamb.
She headed for the station library, where they kept the Ordnance Survey maps of the county.
Alex: You’ve got to talk to them, Michael, tell them everything. A clean slate, it’s the only way.
Michael: I can’t. Don’t you see? Whatever I say, they’re bound to pin something on me. I’ve got a record. I’d be a perfect fit-up. Case closed.
A: Not if you tell the truth. I’ve spent a bit of time with one of them. Annie Cabbot. She was looking after me when you were away and . . . you know . . . that man came. She’s not bad. She helped me. Talk to her. You’ll get a fair deal.
M: (Snorts.) That’s what I love about you, Al. All the knocks life’s given you, and you’re still the eternal optimist. Pollyanna.
A: Don’t, Michael. You know I don’t like it when you call me that. And I’m not. I’m being realistic. If you’ve done nothing wrong, you’ve got nothing to fear from them. It’s the others they’re after, the ones that killed Morgan, that stole Beddoes’ tractor. Not you. You were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. You saw something you shouldn’t have.
M: You can say that again. And heard. But try and get them to believe that. Especially after I ran. (He reaches out and takes her hand. No physical object passes between them.) I’m sorry. It’s my fault that man came and hurt you. I couldn’t bear it if anything happened to you.
A: (Smiles.) Nothing’s going to happen, silly. Not if you tell them the truth. They already got the man who came to the flat. You can help them catch the others.
M: But they had to let him go, didn’t they? I mean, he’s still out there, on the streets. Maybe there is a court order against him coming anywhere near the flat again, I don’t know, and maybe he is on bail until his trial, but that doesn’t stop people like him, people like them. He’ll be back.
A: And a fat lot of use you’ll be if you’re still in here. Besides, the police will get them.
M: And let them go, and lock up people like me. (Shakes his head.) No, love. My best chance is to keep shtum. Say nothing. Get a good brief. If I do that, they’ve got nothing on me.
A: Don’t be childish. You’re acting like a fool. You can’t keep silent for ever.
M: It’s my right.
A: But they hold it against you now. I’ve heard that. And you know we can’t afford a good lawyer. If you don’t explain yourself and then you try to get out of it later, it looks bad in court.
M: It doesn’t matter.
A: Don’t be so negative. (She squeezes his hand.) Look, let’s put all this behind us. A brand-new start. Me, you and Ian. We can go on a holiday or something first. I’m sure Mr Evans at the agency will give us a deal on something. Then we can move if you want, a new life. Somewhere else. By the sea.
M: But we’re just getting started on this life.
A: (Snatches back her hand.) Oh, for God’s sake, Michael. Anyone would think you didn’t want us to be together again, that you didn’t want things to be right again. Sometimes I even wonder whether you weren’t up to something, whether you don’t have something to hide. Is that why you don’t want to talk to them? Afraid they’ll find out your secret?
M: I don’t have any secrets. I just think they’ll do me for it anyway. That’s what they’re like. People like me, we’re scum to them.
A: You’re doing it again, behaving like a child.
M: And you’re being all Pollyanna.
A: Pollyanna didn’t get such a great deal, you know.
M: Whatever.
A: Stop sulking. Do you want to get out of here and be with us again? Wherever we are, it doesn’t matter to me, as long as the three of us are together.
M: I . . .
A: Do you?
M: Of course I do. You know I do.
A: Then act like it. Talk to them.
M: (Hangs head. Seconds pass. Finally he looks up again, into Alex’s eyes.) All right. (Resignedly.) All right, I’ll talk to them. I’ll tell them what I know.
A: (She takes his hand.) I’ll stand by you, Michael. Whatever happens, we’ll stand by you, Ian and me.
M: (Nods) I said I’ll talk to them.
END
Banks turned off the computer display. After letting Michael Lane stew in a holding cell overnight, he and Annie had granted his request that he be allowed to talk to Alex and had listened to their conversation. Now they wanted to review the video recording for body language before starting the interview.
‘Well,’ said Banks, leaning back in his office chair. ‘If they’ve got some kind of secret code, I’d have to say it’s a damn good one. I didn’t see anything in there that struck me as suspicious.’
‘Me, neither,’ said Annie. ‘Though I should imagine they knew we’d be listening, if not watching, too. It’s hardly a hidden camera.’
‘True. But it didn’t look like acting to me. He’s obviously terrified. For himself, of course, but for her and the kid, too.’
‘Alex and Ian.’
‘What I meant. Sometimes he seems more afraid of us than of them.’
‘Seems reasonable for him to be,’ said Annie. ‘We can be scary. Everyone knows we’re evil bastards who go around fitting up innocent people to fudge the crime statistics.’
Banks smiled. ‘Of course. I’d forgotten.’
‘Alex already knows what to be afraid of. I’ll bet her finger still hurts.’
‘He knows what they’re capable of, too, if he witnessed Morgan Spencer’s murder.’
‘Terry Gilchrist saw a car matching the description of Michael Lane’s Peugeot driving away from the scene.’
‘Which also means he could have done it.’
‘Oh, come on, Alan. You’re playing devil’s advocate for the hell of it. Where’s that famous gut instinct of yours? That kid’s no killer.’
Banks scratched his chin. He needed a shave. He had gone a couple of days without. His gut instinct did tell him that Michael Lane hadn’t killed anyone, La
ne could help them find out who did, and his girlfriend had persuaded him to talk. Now they had to act.
‘OK,’ said Banks. ‘We send Gerry Masterson over to babysit Alex Preston, and we go in with an open mind. We don’t waste time throwing accusations at him. All right?’
‘Fine with me,’ said Annie.
‘And Alex and Ian are our trumps. You saw the two of them there; he’d do anything for her. Even lie.’
‘Look,’ said Annie, ‘maybe he helped Morgan occasionally. I don’t know. But are we going after him for that, or are we after the people who killed Spencer?’
‘Mainly the latter, of course. But we’ll take what we can get.’
Annie stood up. ‘Fine. I’m ready.’
Banks followed suit. ‘Let’s go, then.’
The library at Eastvale Police HQ wasn’t much more than a standard-size office with a few bookshelves mostly full of law reference books and a desk and chair. There was no librarian, and everyone was responsible for reshelving whatever reference they had used. As a result, the shelves were chaotically arranged, and it was hard to find anything. Winsome sometimes even wondered how many of her colleagues knew the alphabet. The library did, however, boast a magnificent selection of local Ordnance Survey maps in just about every scale you could imagine.
Winsome knew she could access maps on her computer, that digital was all the rage these days, but she still preferred the real thing: the well-worn folds, the thick and serious texture of the older cloth maps, the colours, contours, dots and dashes. She had a strong memory of the detailed map of the Springfield area on the wall of her father’s office back in Jamaica, showing just about every homestead. Winsome could still remember gazing at that map as a child and naming in her mind the people who lived in every marked dwelling. She had learned to read other maps only later, in the potholing club at university, and it was a skill that occasionally came in useful in the course of her work. Homicide and Major Crimes covered the whole of North Yorkshire, as opposed to the smaller patch of the old Western Area, and that meant a lot of moorland and open countryside as well as a few larger towns, such as Harrogate and Scarborough. She certainly couldn’t name everyone who lived at every farm, but the 2-1/2-inch to a mile map should show her some possibilities as to where Caleb Ross may have been during the missing hour before his death.
With the map unfolded and covering the table, she stood and leaned over it, pinpointing Garsley Farm with the magnifying glass that hung on a chain from the table. That was Ross’s last stop, only about a fifteen-minute drive from Belderfell Pass. She had driven that road just yesterday, and there was nothing on it to detain anyone: no houses, no farm, no shops, no pub. She also ruled out everywhere east of the farm. If Ross had wanted to make a longer stop anywhere there, he would most likely have done so before visiting Mr Wythers and avoided retracing his tracks. She concentrated on the western and northern moorlands.
There wasn’t much to see. She could follow the heights of the various mountains from the way the contour lines grew closer, traced the dotted lines of footpaths that seemed to disappear in the middle of nowhere, spotted ancient stone circles, deep gullies, old riverbeds, abandoned lead mines and slate quarries. She saw Woadly Edge, which she knew to be a rock face rising steeply at a right angle from the landscape and framing an entrance to the cave system she had explored on numerous occasions. She knew the place well and didn’t remember any buildings in the vicinity, which was why the tiny words high point farm caught her attention. When she looked more closely at the map, the contours showed it was hidden from Woadly Edge and the access road the club had used by a small hill, perhaps a drumlin left by the retreating glacier thousands of years ago. In fact, the farm was set in a hollow all of its own, a sort of dimple in the landscape, or so it seemed on the map. It was odd to call a farm in a hollow High Point, but then Winsome realised the hollow itself was on fairly high ground.
Carefully, Winsome scoured the map within the range she estimated Ross could have driven in the time he had, perhaps picked up an unauthorised load, and stopped for a brief chat, then made it to the point on Belderfell Pass, where he met his death. High Point Farm was the only place that fit the bill. It hadn’t been on Ross’s official pickup list, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t had business of his own there. Ross smoked marijuana, Winsome remembered, and there were plenty of hydroponic growers tucked away in the rolling dales and remote moorland. Maybe High Point Farm was such a place.
A quick check of the land registry, also kept in the library, revealed that High Point Farm was owned by one Kenneth Atherton, a name unfamiliar to her.
A quick jolt of excitement throbbing through her veins, she went back to the squad room. Gerry was gone, so Winsome left a brief note on her desk, checked her mobile batteries and left the building.
‘I suppose you were listening in back there, when Alex and I were talking,’ said Michael Lane. They were in a different interview room, and Banks and Annie sat opposite him at the battered metal table. He didn’t look much the worse for his few days of sleeping rough, Banks thought, a stubbly beard and tangled hair that needed a good wash and brush being about the only obvious signs. He was a handsome kid, and he looked mature for his age, though he still had the aura of youth about him. Banks could understand what Alex Preston, eternally hopeful, saw in him: perhaps someone she could change and forge a future with. Someone who might lack ambition and wealth but who would cherish her and treat her with kindness and love. Someone who would look after her and Ian. Wouldn’t we all want someone like that?
They had already cautioned Lane, who had refused a legal-aid solicitor since his talk with Alex, and set the tape machine running. ‘We were offering you a courtesy by allowing you a few minutes with Alex Preston,’ Banks said. ‘We didn’t have to do that. In fact, it’s against regulations. We were just being nice.’
‘Sure.’
‘Can we proceed with the interview, Michael?’ said Annie. ‘The sooner we get it over with, the sooner you can be with Alex and Ian again.’
Lane studied her. ‘You’re the one she talked about, aren’t you?’ he said. ‘Annie something?’
‘DI Cabbot to you.’
‘Have it your way. She said you were all right.’
‘You’ll have to make up your own mind about that, won’t you? Why don’t you start by telling us about what happened last Sunday morning at the abandoned airfield near Drewick?’
‘You don’t mess about, do you?’
‘Michael,’ said Banks. ‘It won’t do any good stalling or making offensive comments. It won’t make things go any quicker. We have a few ideas of our own, and you might not like some of them, but here we’re giving you a fair chance to tell us your version. Contrary to what you said earlier, nobody’s going to “fit you up” with anything you didn’t do, and running away in itself is no crime unless you’re running from a criminal act you committed.’
‘It doesn’t mean you’ll believe me, though, does it?’
‘That remains to be seen. At the moment all I know is that you were observed fleeing a crime scene, and I’m on the verge of holding you for that, lacking any reasonable explanation. Only you can talk me out of it.’
‘I wasn’t fleeing a crime scene!’
‘What were you doing, then?’
‘I was running for my life.’
‘That’s better,’ said Banks. ‘Tell me what happened.’
Lane appeared to go through a brief inner struggle with himself, apparent from his changing facial expressions and nervous twisting of a silver ring. ‘All right,’ he said finally. ‘Morgan Spencer was a sort of mate of mine. I mean, we weren’t that close, didn’t hang out or stuff like that. He was a few years older than me, and he liked to hang out at the club scene in Leeds or Manchester or Newcastle. That’s not my thing at all.’
‘So what did you do together?’
‘Worked, mostly. Morgan had a removal van, and I’d help him shift stuff for people. We’d have the occasiona
l jar or pub lunch together.’
‘What sort of stuff did you move?’
Lane looked at Banks as if he were backward. ‘Furniture, of course.’
‘OK, go on.’
‘And we did odd jobs around the dale. Bit of roofing, general fixing things up. He was good with motors, too, was Morgan.’
‘What else did you do to make a living?’
‘I happen to be not bad at sheep shearing. It was something my dad taught me. I just seemed to pick it up easily. But Morgan was no good with animals.’
‘When did you last see Morgan before you went out to the hangar on Sunday morning?’
‘Friday. We were doing some work on a barn out Lyndgarth way.’
‘Did you tell him that Beddoes was in Mexico?’
‘Why would I do that?’
‘So he could steal Beddoes’ tractor. I’m sure you knew about the holiday, either from your dad, who was looking after Beddoes’ farm, or from Alex. He booked the trip at the agency where she works. Did it come in conversation, you know, idle chatter while you were working?’
‘I might have mentioned it. It was a cold day. I might have said something about some lucky bastards getting to go to Mexico. But I had nothing to do with stealing the tractor.’
If that was when Spencer had first heard about the Beddoes’ farm being empty, it explained why he had stolen the tractor so late in the week. If he’d known earlier and done it Monday or Tuesday, it would probably have been safe at its destination by the time Beddoes got back and missed it. As it was, it had ended up near Dover. ‘OK. Let’s move on to Sunday morning.’
‘Right. Well, Alex was just getting ready to go to church with Ian. She’s not really religious, like, but she thinks it’s a good idea to bring him up right, you know, and he likes the Bible stories.’ Lane smiled to himself. ‘Probably the violent bits, like his video games. Anyway, Morgan texts me and says to meet him at the hangar, that he might need help with something.’
‘What sort of help? Did he mention the tractor?’
Abattoir Blues: The 22nd DCI Banks Mystery (Inspector Banks 22) Page 31