‘I sometimes wonder whether you really do think that, Sir.’
‘Now, don’t go getting all hurt and sentimental on us. We’ve got a killer to catch and self-indulgent emotions like umbrage are a distraction in the effecting of such investigations, as you well know by now,’ replied Hart, feigning old-fashioned formality so as to try and turn his insensitivity into a joke. ‘I presume that’s the doctor of the dead toiling on the other side of that bush, performing his foul arts on the unfortunate corpse.’
‘You presume correctly, Chief Inspector,’ came the unsolicited reply through the leaves.
Arthur Rhodes was a great big ox; large oval face wearing a rusty beard, perched on top of a body which would be described as a tad rotund by persons of a polite disposition, fat by the less tactful; a real Henry the Eighth of a man.
Rhodes had been cutting up cadavers on behalf of the Lockingham police force for a couple of decades or more and was the pathologist Hart always hoped he would get on a case, and not just because they were best mates. But because Arthur cared. He didn’t have to drag himself out here on a miserable night a couple of weeks before Christmas. He could have stayed inside his snug home with his snug wife or nipped to the pub to sample a taste of early festive cheer while a flunky did the donkey work. He could have looked at the report and the photographs in the morning and examined the cadaver before lunch in the comfort of the mortuary. But you don’t trust other people’s reports like you trust your own eyes and you don’t trust the camera because the camera is a liar. Okay, a subtle liar admittedly, but that’s actually more misleading than if it told great big whoppers.
‘Nothing’s been moved, Harry, apart from me lifting his coat-tail and cutting an incision in his trousers. My trusty thermometer here tells me he’s been dead no more than a few hours, between three and four probably,’ informed Rhodes, alarmingly flourishing the instrument in question. His voice possessed a presence in proportion to his weight, and it resonated incongruously with the sadness of the scene. He rose from a squatting position, with little room between his bulk and the slatted-wood garden fence behind him. ‘Therefore he was killed just after it got dark.’
‘That’s handy to know,’ acknowledged Hart as he joined Rhodes by the fence. And then he winced down at the wrecked skull and black, crimson-matted hair. ‘And you’ll also be enlightening me with further consummate perception that he was perhaps slain by a blow to the back of his head, if I’m not mistaken.’
‘He perhaps was, Harry.’
‘Sir, he could have been killed earlier and then dumped here,’ volunteered Redpath, tripping over his boss’s sarcasm. ‘The time of death wasn’t necessarily obvious.’
‘You’re right. Although that would mean the body being dragged through the alley in daylight, probably from a car parked at one end. And unloaded here rather than in a pond, river, forest or somewhere else you could be reasonably certain no one would disturb you. But you’re right, we shouldn’t jump to any conclusions at this stage. Perhaps the killer trundled him along to the middle of the alley in a wheelbarrow.’ Redpath wasn’t sure whether he was being praised or ridiculed.
‘I’ve pretty much finished here,’ announced Rhodes, ‘so you can go through the pockets now if you like.’
As Hart tweaked his latex gloves to make them tight around his fingers his gaze roamed above the garden fences as they ran alongside the alley, and then scanned the rectangles of light that brightened the back windows which reached away into the night. Somewhere out there in the darkness nestled a home watching telly together, chatting over a late tea, or getting dolled up to go out. They didn’t know it as they scuttled about their everyday lives behind their glowing curtains, but one of their kin wouldn’t be returning to a cheery welcome from friendly faces and a cosy living room this evening. Or ever again. He was lying slaughtered in the uncaring mud.
*****
The mud, the body, the policemen and the houses were located in Lockingham, a town nuzzled up against the northern flank of London. On three of its sides the land was painted English meadow green, the fields peppered with pretty villages and huge country houses. On the fourth the umbilical cords of road and rail trailed down into the belly of the mother city to the south, ferrying armies of inscrutable and obedient workers to their desks. In the evenings they returned by the same routes, using the few remaining precious hours of the day to muster the strength and will to repeat the ordeal the next morning.
The railway station which gathered and disgorged the travellers was an enormous building, constructed in 1858 as a staging post for the railway as its track and sleepers marched north. It stood in the heart of town near the new shopping mall, with its grand arched entrances, sturdy square clock tower and lovely fawn sandstone diffusing a feeling of calm and enduring strength to all who passed by.
The station shared the town with rows of large shops and department stores bordering wide streets, churches of all denominations and degrees of age and charm, a mosque bearing a green dome with crescent moon perched on top, multi-storey car parks and a former college which had recently been ennobled to a university. The Hindu temple was out of the town centre, where the shops had become smaller and the streets narrower.
Lockingham Central Police Station occupied an acre of land bordering a roundabout a mile from the heart of town. Its red brick looked out onto the busy intersection, the big shiny windows seeming to keep an eye on what was going on, the small slitty ones appearing sinister and cruel. The police station was the biggest in the county after the headquarters itself, so the men and women behind the brick and glass were obliged to chronicle, and sometimes even try to solve, the crimes committed in both the ever-throbbing town and the deceptively serene villages beyond its fringe.
Lockingham and the surrounding area were sizable enough to support rugby and football teams in the minor leagues, a theatre, market, leisure centre, pubs and clubs, hospitals and fire stations, farms and factories. On such a varied stage all manner of human life can prosper or hide, play out its dreams and nightmares. And with all manner of human life goes all manner of human virtues, vices, kindnesses and crimes. Including, of course, murder.
*****
Hart puffed a smoky sigh into the chilly air and delved into the right-hand pocket of the dead man’s thick woollen coat, tugging out a used and crumpled handkerchief. He opened it to make sure nothing was wrapped inside and then handed it to Redpath, who placed it into a transparent evidence bag and wrote the obligatory details on the label. Out of the left coat pocket he fished out a new iPhone.
To get at the victim’s inner clothes he had to be turned onto his back and so the three men crouched down, tucked his arms into his sides, rolled him over and tipped him onto their shoes. The task was made easier as the body’s initial limpness was beginning to firm up.
As his coat was unbuttoned, the badge on a navy blazer underneath and a yellow and blue striped tie resting on his chest revealed that the corpse had been a pupil at Highdean School. For some reason this surprised all three men, although it shouldn’t have done – kids, even big ones, have to go to school somewhere, and it might as well have been to Highdean as anywhere else.
The right hip pocket of the blazer contained another handkerchief, duly unfurled, examined, and passed to Redpath. The left was empty, but the breast pocket held a driving licence. Hart compared the photographic portion with the ghostly image staring up at him wide-eyed from the sticky ground: the photo and the dead body bore the same face. He opened up the paper section, checked the address was identical to the one on the photo-card, and read aloud.
‘Sebastian Ralph Emmer. Turned eighteen three months ago. The Larches, 5 Alanbrooke Close, Lockingham.’
‘Only eighteen. Just a lad. Somehow it’s worse when they’re young.’ Rhodes shook his head slowly. ‘I’ve never got used to that, not in all the times I’ve laid folks out and carved them up.’ The other two men wouldn’t have put it quite like that, but they did reflect for a moment on s
entiments they had experienced too often before.
The left trouser pocket held some money, quite a lot they thought – two hundred and twenty-two pounds and sixty-three pence: four fifties, a twenty and some coins. Three keys were attached to the same ring. Two looked like door keys of different front doors and one was undoubtedly a car key. His right pocket contained yet another handkerchief, this one dashed with splodges of blood.
‘He must have a cold, it’s the time of year,’ remarked Redpath as he placed it into its bag. Hart had a less charitable inkling as to why a man would need three hankies, one wearing bloody speckles, but that theory could wait until he had more info about the case tucked inside his skull.
‘Right, Harry, I’m off home,’ announced Rhodes. ‘I’ll let you know details of the post-mortem as we find them out, of course. And it looks like the footprints around this side of the body might have been quite good and there could be a few fibres on the bushes or the lad’s clothes; you never know your luck. If you could get hold of the weapon, we might even find it’s got an enlightening speck of skin or blood stuck to it.’
‘True, Arthur. We’ll look in all the usual places for you: the bins along the streets, front gardens, drains, water; the places where they never turn up unless the killer’s a complete dipstick.’ And then Hart turned to Redpath. ‘Come on, let’s get back to the car and off to the station.’
After reaching the pavement at the end of the alley, Hart depressed the remote button on his key fob and his Mondeo blinked itself awake. He drove a Zetec, a dependable Ford wearing a rich metallic ink-blue coat in daylight and plush leather-trim seats inside. Hart always reckoned a police officer of some years shouldn’t be seen to be cheap, should try and give himself a bit of bearing. After all, if you didn’t respect yourself how could you expect the public to look up to you?
Redpath’s thoughts were rather different. Why, if he was spending all that money, didn’t he get himself something a bit flashier, why did he persist in being so middle-aged? And the way he chugged the thing along the street, it was like he was sitting behind the wheel of a hearse. It was the same with the way he dressed. He was always well turned out, wearing a suit or at least jacket and trousers, and he didn’t leave the top button of his shirt undone to try and look cool. Unfortunately, he wouldn’t let Redpath either. He kitted himself out as well as his dress sense would allow him. Which was to say very neat, very smart, very tidy, but no panache; all the colours shades of beige or navy blue or dark grey, and all the styles borrowed from decades before. He needed a woman, thought Redpath as he got into the car. Mind you, Redpath thought that every man needed a woman, and preferably more than one.
Hart drove at thirty under the yellow sodium lights which were illuminating a drizzle that was fusing to rain. He kept to the speed limit, because if police officers didn’t stick to the law then why should anyone else bother? Anyway, it was only cabinet ministers or chief constables in their posh chauffeured limos who were immune to getting nicked for speeding, and even then only on their own patch. If a top copper was nabbed in the county next door the officers on duty would be delighted to slap a ticket in his hand.
The streetlights received some help in lighting the way from the snowmen and Christmas trees which seemed to be beaming out from every garden the car passed. The people living in one of the terraces had teamed up so that a giant sled blazed along the walls of half a dozen houses. There was plenty of room not only for a splendid Santa but also a full complement of happy helpers and boxes and boxes of lovely presents. A veritable herd of reindeer led the way, Rudolph flying at the very front, of course, his red nose pulsing through the night. Harry liked Christmas. Sure, it was crass and commercial, but it warmed folks’ hearts and brought out the best in them for a while.
But only for a while. The copper’s cynical heart knew that, come Boxing Day, the police and hospitals would be hoovering up the pieces like the fallen needles from the Christmas tree as the pressure built up by people actually being civil to one another for a few days exploded in a blast of domestic violence and pub punch-ups.
‘So what have we got then, Darren? Eighteen-year-old schoolboy bludgeoned to death in an alley. What’s the motive? Theft?’ Hart turned left onto the dual carriageway leading to the centre of town and switched on his wipers.
‘I don’t think so.’ Redpath hailed from Newport and he had carried his lovely twang with him over the border to England so that the ends of his sentences tended to glide upwards, as though he were perpetually surprised.
‘Go on.’
‘Well, there was a fair bit of money in the lad’s pocket, Sir; a thief would have taken that for sure. And a top of the range mobile.’
‘You’re spot on. Unless he had been interrupted, of course.’
They stopped at a traffic light and Hart turned his head to his left and looked at the man fifteen years his junior. He gave a little smile, a gesture which would have appeared condescending in the daylight; this was all easy stuff but it still had to be got right and, to his credit, Redpath was doing just that.
‘He could have been disturbed, Sir. Leaving that arm sticking out was probably more than just being careless.’
‘Perhaps he was simply in a hurry. Perhaps he just wanted to get the heck out of there. Perhaps he had never stood in an alley before and whacked somebody to death.’ Hart moved up through the gears as he accelerated the car away from the green light. ‘We all learn with practice, and I’m sure he’ll make a better job of it if he ever bashes someone’s skull in again.’
‘Could the attacker have been after anything else apart from cash?’
‘Maybe. But unlikely. What else do eighteen-year-old kids wearing their school uniforms carry around with them that someone wants enough to kill them for? Not much, I shouldn’t think. And even then the killer would nick the money as well, to make it look like a simple robbery. That’ll fool those stupid cops, for sure.’
‘So there’s no motive, then? A random killing, just for the fun of it? Or some other kids out for kicks that went too far? Is that how it’s shaping up?’
‘Not a chance. They would have scarpered as soon as they realised what they’d done, they wouldn’t have fiddled around dragging him behind some bushes. No, somebody didn’t like Sebastian Emmer. In fact, I reckon they loathed him, detested him so much it went beyond mere hatred. Or perhaps they might have even been scared of him. Or scared of something he knew. Frightened enough to risk spending the rest of their life in the slammer.’
Hart pulled into the police station car park and turned off the engine. ‘Let me have the lad’s things then get yourself home. And have yourself a good kip, tomorrow’s a big day. You need to be here at six-thirty. We’re going back to school.’
*****
Sitting in their living room watching a soap on TV, the woman and her daughter could hear the car drive up. Then its door opening, followed by the groans of the overhead garage door creaking into life, the car door slamming shut, the throaty revs growling from the engine of the rhodium-silver Jaguar XJ Portfolio as it inched into the garage, garage door squeaking down, a man’s voice cussing about dropped keys or something or other. Finally, the front-door key turning in the lock. The customary sounds heralding the master’s return.
‘You’re back late, Dear,’ greeted his wife as she stood in the living room to welcome him home.
‘I am not back late. Perhaps you haven’t noticed, but these are the hours I work. All the hours God sends. Do you think we could afford to live in a place like this if I just sat around on my arse all day?’ He looked at the woman for the first time. ‘Like other people.’
‘Your dinner’s in the oven. It’s a nice casserole, something that wouldn’t spoil if it was left a while. Becky and I have had ours.’
‘I’ll eat it in here on my knee while I’m reading the paper.’ He glanced at the television. ‘And turn that bloody thing down, I won’t be able to concentrate. You need your ears seeing to.’
‘Is Sebastian coming home this evening?’
‘How the hell should I know? He’s eighteen, he can do what he damn well likes.’
‘Perhaps we should keep a closer eye on him. That’s an age when people can get themselves into all sorts of mischief,’ suggested the woman. ‘Maybe we ought to know a bit more about what he gets up to.’
‘What I hope he gets up to,’ answered the man as he sank into his armchair and opened his Daily Telegraph, ‘is drinking and screwing. He’ll have plenty of time to be miserable if he ever makes the mistake of getting married, so he might as well wring a bit of pleasure out of life while he’s got the chance.’
‘I worry about him. He’s not doing very well at school, and he’s not always as polite as I’d like.’ Mrs Emmer took a deep breath as she stood in front of her husband’s chair. ‘I don’t want him growing up bad-mannered.’
‘Then do something about it, you’re his bloody mother for God’s sake. The hours I work, you can’t expect me to do everything.’
‘I’ll get you his school report.’
‘I’d rather you got me my dinner.’ The newspaper rustled as Mr Emmer slapped it down onto his lap. ‘And the money I pay that bloody school, he should be top of the class with Einstein.’
‘I’ll go and get your dinner,’ replied Mrs Emmer as she walked out to the kitchen.
Her husband looked up from his newspaper to the girl sitting across the room. ‘And you get to bed, Rebecca. You’ve got school in the morning.’ And then, shouting out to his wife, ‘I don’t know why you let her stay up so bloody late.’
A slight girl padded out into the hall. ‘Night, Mum,’ she called softly as she climbed up the stairs.
4
Hart didn’t make straight for his office after he had jogged up the steps into Lockingham Central Police Station, he first strode along the corridor to pay a call on Inspector Lynn McCarthy. He had always enjoyed a chat with Lynn, seemed to acquire a mental boost from her cackly laugh and her bright smile. If he wanted cheering up, needed a lift to go with his mid-morning cuppa, Lynn was the tonic he imbibed. But tonight he had come on business and he didn’t much feel like a chuckle, and there wasn’t even time to spend on the usual pleasantries.
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