Crooked Street

by Priscilla Masters

  ‘Recruiting more clients,’ Ginster said sourly. ‘He’s too canny to have got caught out by any of his victims. Look at us.’ There was a flame in his eyes now. ‘We are the poor suckers here.’

  Joanna felt awkward. Her sympathy might be with these debt-ridden people who had been taken advantage of but her job was to find out what had happened to the missing man. And behind Jadon Glover, she was beginning to realize, was not simply a story of greed and exploitation but a web of people connected. So where did it all fit in and where was the missing man?

  She and Mike left Wellington Place and threaded their way between a long snake of houses, cars parked on either side, narrowing the road to the size of a small vehicle. Many of the drivers had parked sensibly, tight to the kerb, their wing mirrors folded in. Probably from experience. Constantly replacing wing mirrors could prove expensive.

  They walked to the junction with Britannia Avenue, a long row of terraced houses built in the early part of the twentieth century when the mills were busy, shuttles rattling across the looms providing a constant background clatter. There had at least been full employment then if not a fair and decent living wage. Again, cars were squeezed in all along the road with no visible space. They walked. Each house consisted of one small ground-floor window, a door which opened straight on to the pavement, two windows above, original sash windows now mostly replaced with UPVC. The replacement windows gang must have had a field day here. House after house had had their attention. In between every fourth house was a narrow passage leading through to the back.

  Three more debt-ridden families lived in Britannia Avenue: the Murdochs, cider-scented Josie and her partner, Vernon – the pair who had claimed to be out when Glover had called for his Wednesday money. The second person was the hardworking, abandoned Karen Stanton and the third person on Jadon Glover’s books was the widow of Frank Widnes, Marty.

  ‘We’ll speak to the Murdochs first,’ Joanna said.

  Vernon Murdoch opened the door. He was an effeminate-looking man in his forties, slim and with floppy brown hair which he pushed out of his face with a theatrical gesture as he opened the door, releasing a waft of cigarette smoke. ‘Gosh,’ he said, eyes wide open. ‘You’ve just got to be the police.’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘I’m really sorry – my wife is out at the moment, working.’

  ‘But not you.’

  Vernon jerked his head back towards the living room where they could hear the sound of a TV. Something inane with tinkly music and sporadic bursts of canned laughter. ‘Someone has to mind the kids,’ he said with a brave smile, displaying nicotine-stained teeth.

  ‘OK,’ Joanna said. ‘You probably know why we’re here?’

  At her side she could feel Mike bristling. As a traditional male he didn’t respond well to house husbands.

  Vernon pushed the flop of hair out of his eyes. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Of course. I do.’ He grinned. It was a mischievous expression, oddly endearing. ‘How strange,’ he mused. ‘Really odd. Jadon Glover’s about the last person I’d have expected to just vanish.’ He followed this with a terrible joke. ‘He’s hardly the traditional magician’s assistant in sequinned dress and spangled tights, is he?’

  ‘We didn’t know him,’ Joanna said, not responding to the humour.

  ‘No – quite. Well, all I can say is that if you didn’t know him you’re one of the lucky ones.’

  Joanna put a foot forward. ‘Might we come in?’

  ‘Yeah. Sure, but you won’t learn anything. Neither me nor Josie knows a thing about what happened to Jadon.’ He couldn’t resist tagging on, with bravado, ‘and we don’t care either.’

  As he led them into the narrow hall he turned and pressed a finger to his thin lips.

  ‘Pas devant les enfants,’ he said in a convincing French accent.

  There was no problem there. Les enfants were far too engrossed in the huge screen spewing out noise and colour to take any notice of the three people sitting, talking in low voices around the small table at the back of the room.

  ‘You know that nobody has seen Jadon Glover for over a week now?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Vernon said, again pushing the lock of hair out of his eyes. Joanna could almost read Korpanski’s reaction. Why didn’t he buy a fucking hair grip?

  ‘Weird, isn’t it? I wonder where on earth he could have got to.’ His expression was suitably bland. Beguilingly innocent.

  When neither Mike nor Joanna responded he gave a nervous laugh. ‘I mean, he must be somewhere, mustn’t he?’

  There was no argument against this.

  ‘You were out last Wednesday?’

  ‘Yeah,’ he said, a bit too quickly. ‘Ellie had a swimming lesson and we all decided to go. We took Nat.’ His eyes flicked from one to the other to see whether he was being believed.

  It would be easy to check with the pool attendants.

  ‘But …? If you defaulted with your loan and didn’t pay, didn’t it cause problems?’ Joanna asked innocently.

  ‘Well, yeah. But …’

  ‘We understood that defaulting on a payment wasn’t an option. Had you missed before?’

  ‘Once or twice.’ He added hurriedly, ‘We just paid double the following week.’ He sniffed. ‘He knew us. He knew we’d pay in the end.’

  Unspoken words rang loudly in Joanna’s ear.

  He knew we’d have to pay in the end. What Joanna was realizing was that for the debtors or clients there was no escape. They were rats caught at the bottom of a concrete-lined pit while their creditors peeped over the rim and laughed. There was no escape – not even death.

  ‘I see.’ But she didn’t. Not really. From what she had heard the rules were strict. You pay every week. Was there some special reason why the Murdochs were an exception to what had been presented as a rigid rule?

  ‘How much money had you borrowed?’

  Vernon Murdoch practically squirmed in his seat. ‘Three grand,’ he muttered and before they, knowing the interest rates, could exclaim, he defended it. ‘The mortgage company was going to repossess the house.’ He looked around him. ‘This place – it’s all we’ve got.’

  And again Joanna could read Korpanski’s mind. So why not get a job?

  Murdoch answered the silent question. ‘I can’t work,’ he said sullenly. ‘I have … nerves.’

  And where would we be without them?

  ‘Josie, your wife?’

  ‘Barmaid,’ he said, ‘at The Quiet Woman.’ He grinned. ‘Suits her. She can walk to work and back home again. She likes a drink.’ He waved his hand. ‘Perfect job for her and I mind the kids, see? Saves on extortionate childminders’ fees.’

  Joanna studied him. Vernon Murdoch was a jaunty, quite likeable fellow who would freewheel through his life, quite happily, living on the edge, doing as little as possible – preferably no work. But … She glanced across at the children who alternated between watching her and Korpanski and the huge wide-screen television; he was doing a good job with them, at least. And life with an alcoholic may well not be an easy road to walk. Vernon himself appeared sober.

  She stood up feeling she would not find her answers here. She shook Murdoch’s hand. ‘Thank you,’ she said.

  Murdoch met her eyes, must have read her verdict and nodded, then spoke over his shoulder to the two children. ‘Come on, you two. That’s enough telly for today.’

  He aimed a broad, cheeky grin at Joanna. ‘Shame the park’s closed.’

  She didn’t rise to the bait.

  Outside, Joanna looked at her sergeant. ‘Well, Mike, what did you think?’

  He pursed his lips and frowned. ‘I can’t see him getting one over on our friend,’ he said. ‘He hasn’t got the balls.’

  ‘And his wife?’

  ‘From the sounds of her she’s not going to manage much either before she falls down.’

  ‘No. But we’d better check up on his alibi all the same.’

  They knocked on the door of Number 10, Britannia
Avenue.

  Karen was another pale girl who looked as though life had treated her harshly. She wore big glasses, was very slim and petite and might as well have had victim tattooed across her forehead, there was such an air of having been hard done by, a miasma which clung to the air around her.

  She peeped around the door. ‘Hello?’

  Joanna and Mike introduced themselves and she let them in. The room was small but surprisingly elegant. Painted dusky pink with a cream carpet, there was a pleasant scent of roses. In the window was a small mahogany table on which stood a glass vase with roses the exact same shade of dusky pink as the walls. Classic FM was playing softly in the background and a book lay face down on the sofa. Suite Française by Irene Nemirovsky, an Auschwitz victim. An unexpected choice of reading. Would Karen Stanton prove to be more of a fighter than she appeared? Joanna and Mike sat down.

  Joanna opened the conversation with the usual questions which Karen answered in a quiet voice, sweetly soft. The real difference between her and the other debtors was that she had kept meticulous records. ‘I knew the interest rate was scandalous,’ she said, ‘but the bank wouldn’t lend me any money. I really didn’t want to move out of here.’ She looked around her with a smile. ‘I know it’s not great but … it’s home and I knew I had to buy Jock out when he left. Here,’ she said, handing them the notebook. ‘I borrowed two thousand pounds initially from Daylight.’

  ‘Daylight?’

  She smiled. ‘It’s a great name for a money-lending business,’ she said. ‘I could almost appreciate the humour. Their blog says you see daylight at the end of the tunnel. But the joke is it’s really daylight robbery. It would be funny if it wasn’t so awful.’

  Joanna nodded, speechless for once, and Karen continued, ‘I’ve paid off fifty pounds a week for two years and I’m finally there having given them over five thousand. Not a bad return on their initial investment, is it? In fact,’ she said brightly, ‘I’d invest in them myself if they ever went public.’

  ‘But you’re free now?’

  ‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘Free. I gave him my last fifty pounds on Wednesday and told him that was that.’

  ‘How did he respond?’

  ‘He started blustering, saying it didn’t work like that and I showed him my book and said that I would go to the ombudsman and report him.’

  ‘How much did he mind that you’d finished paying?’

  Karen Stanton smiled. ‘Quite a bit,’ she said mischievously, ‘but when I pointed out that they’d doubled their money in two years, that I’d never missed a week, never gone out or made excuses like Josie and Vernon did or even poor old Carly, he didn’t have a leg to stand on.’

  Joanna was silent for a moment, just beginning to realize how tight this web was. They all knew each other. They could have worked together, plotted their revenge on a person who fronted the business which had appeared to rescue them from their problems only to have dropped them in a worse place. It also dawned on her that of all Jadon’s clients that night, Karen was the only one to have had no motive.

  ‘What time did he leave you?’

  She narrowed her eyes. ‘I’ve already told your officers.’ There was the hint of steel about her now.

  ‘Just for the record, love,’ Korpanski said testily.

  ‘About eight thirty, I think.’

  ‘And did you see where he went next?’

  ‘No. It was a filthy night. I settled down and watched the TV for a bit, had a glass or two of wine.’

  ‘Did you go out after that?’

  ‘As I said, it was a filthy night.’ She paused. ‘Where would I go anyway?’

  Time to try a different approach. ‘Your daughter?’ Joanna began.

  ‘Chose to live with my ex and his current,’ she said, her voice carefully controlled. ‘Elinor, the woman my husband left me for, has a daughter the same age as Shona. The girls get on very well, apparently. It would seem petty to insist she stay with me just because I’m her mother.’

  So, she lost both her husband and daughter to her husband’s mistress. Well, Joanna thought, at least I didn’t steal Eloise. She stayed with her mother.

  Karen continued as though realizing perhaps her story didn’t quite ring true. ‘I admit I was hurt initially. Hurt and angry but I’ve got used to it now. I’m seeing someone else and things are working out quite well, particularly now I’ve paid off my debt. I can start to plan a future.’ She smiled. ‘I have a guy of my own. It’s early days,’ she added quickly, ‘and he’s not exactly Johnny Depp but he seems really nice and now I’ve sorted out my finances we can do things. We can have a holiday together. Have a life.’ She gave Joanna a fiercely protective look. ‘Had I insisted Shona stay with me she would have resented it and learnt to hate me.’ The phrase held an uncomfortable resonance to Joanna. ‘As it is …’ She stood up, suddenly agitated, then turned around. ‘I don’t do baggage,’ she said sharply. ‘I don’t hold grudges.’

  ‘Even against Jadon Glover?’ It was Mike’s contribution and it provoked a startling response. Behind the thick glasses Karen’s eyes flashed.

  ‘Even against him,’ she said finally.

  They left and moved next door.

  Frank Widnes’ widow proved to be a feisty-looking woman in her early sixties. Her blue eyes bulged. She looked angry.

  Joanna faced her with some trepidation. ‘You say that Jadon sometimes gave you a week off paying?’

  Marty nodded, her eyes as wary as a hunted animal.

  ‘Didn’t you worry?’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘About debt.’

  ‘Do you want to know how I racked up the debt?’

  Joanna couldn’t say she’d had enough of hard-luck stories so she plastered on her interested look. She thought she already knew. In fact, she didn’t know the half of it.

  ‘After Frank had hanged himself because of the never-ending debt they persuaded me,’ she said bitterly. ‘How fucking ironic is that? Give Frank a decent send-off, they said. Have you any idea how much funerals cost, Inspector?’

  Thank God, no. And no wonder the woman was so angry.

  ‘A decent send-off costs more than three thousand pounds. So they added it to the original debt.’

  Joanna couldn’t find any words to respond. Then, inexplicably, Marty’s face softened and she continued, ‘But yes. Sometimes Jadon didn’t call. Maybe he did have a conscience after all.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Mike put in without thinking.

  Joanna’s response was even blunter. ‘Jadon – have a conscience?’

  She tried to get inside the woman’s mind. ‘So the debt was no nearer being paid off.’

  Marty Widnes shrugged.

  ‘Debt is part of life,’ she recited as mechanically as a religious mantra. ‘Don’t they say two things in life are certain: debt and taxes?’

  It was only as they left the street that Joanna recalled the quote. It wasn’t debt and taxes. It was death and taxes.

  FIFTEEN

  Thursday, 13 March, 3 p.m.

  PC Gilbert Young had been detailed to visit the swimming pool and check out the Murdochs’ story that they had attended their daughter’s swimming lesson on the Wednesday night that Jadon Glover had last been seen. The woman at the desk was large and lethargic. She spent ages searching through the work roster, finally looking up. ‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘Craig was the lifeguard here that night. You’ll find him poolside. And don’t forget to wear the overshoes,’ she bellowed after him.

  Craig was sitting at the top of a small ladder, a slim figure in navy jogging pants and a yellow polo shirt. He was watching the elderly swimmers course their lengths – slowly. This was an over-fifties session.

  His grin was neat, teeth even and white, his accent Mock-Australian. ‘Hi there,’ he shouted down. ‘You all right?’

  ‘I just need to ask you a couple of questions.’

  ‘Right you are then,’ he responded jauntily. ‘I’ll just get Steve to cover for me.�
��

  He sauntered along the length of the pool to a room at the top, eagle eye still cocked on the swimmers. He took his life-protection work seriously. PC Young followed him up to the staff room. When Steve had been dispatched Craig perched on the desk. ‘Fire away,’ he said.

  ‘You know a couple called Josie and Vernon Murdoch?’

  ‘Yeah. They got a couple of kids. Little Ellie’s coming on quite well with her doggie-paddle.’

  ‘Can you remember if they were here on Wednesday the fifth? That’s nine days ago – a week last Wednesday?’

  He hardly hesitated. ‘That the night that guy went missing?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘They were as a matter of fact.’

  ‘Right through the lesson?’

  ‘Yeah. Right through till the end. Half six to half seven.’

  PC Young felt the tiniest quiver of excitement. All to do with timing, he thought. An hour here, an hour there.

  Joanna and Mike encountered the fingertip search again as they left Britannia Avenue and headed for Barngate Street, threading through the play area. The SOCOs were having a problem with the bark. The surface was tricky to work on and hard on their knees. Joanna checked in again. ‘Found anything?’

  Cornell shook his head. ‘Not so far, Joanna.’ He scanned the scene, officers on their hands and knees moving forward, picking up all sorts of detritus, cigarette ends, sweet papers, a snapped pencil, a couple of coins, chewing gum.

  He looked concerned at the amount of debris he was collecting. ‘Are we going to get clearance for testing on all this?’

  She shook her head. ‘No. Just focus on the cigarette butts and maybe the chewing gum. Apparently he’d have a sneaky drag on Silk Cut. As for the rest, bag it up and wait for developments.’ She looked around at the scene, dull and cool. ‘Maybe Glover will turn up in the south of France or somewhere and we can chuck the lot away.’

  ‘In your dreams.’ Cornell risked a quip. ‘Shame we can’t bill him ourselves and charge him that fantastic interest rate, let us focus on more important things, eh?’

  More important things.