Missing, Presumed Dead

by J M Gregson

  ‘Useful phrase, that.’ The journalist managed a sneer, but he was wishing he hadn’t started this. When he had allowed himself to be irritated by that smug superintendent, he hadn’t expected to be savaged by this bull terrier of an inspector.

  ‘Very useful,’ said Percy. ‘Occasionally, as in this case, it is the only accurate summary we can release of what is going on.’

  ‘Are you saying you are near to an arrest?’ Bert was not a regular crime reporter, but he was an experienced hack, and he knew how to phrase an embarrassing question. The police wouldn’t dare to say yes to that one, and if they said no, it made them sound like incompetent blunderers.

  Percy Peach felt Tommy Bloody Tucker stirring uneasily on his right, preparing to come in with some emollient phrase, and it made him more direct than he might have been otherwise. ‘I’m saying that we’ve made remarkable progress in the last week. That I expect to make an arrest for this crime within the next one.’

  He was conscious of the little rumble of excitement among the hitherto docile audience but he did not take his eyes off the disconcerted, ageing face in the front row. There were a few more questions, but he explained that of course he could not reveal any more details. Not, as Superintendent Tucker came back belatedly into the exchanges to tell them, at this very delicate stage of the investigation.

  Once Peach went back to inspecting his fingernails, the audience recognized that the newsworthy section of the briefing was over. Tommy Tucker assured them solemnly that he ‘had taken personal charge of the investigation of this awful crime’ and ‘was determined to see it through to a successful conclusion.’

  The meeting had already begun to break up.

  Once the reporters and cameramen had been disposed of, Tucker peeled away his media smile and snapped, ‘My office, Inspector Peach.’

  Percy followed him with a carefully assumed air of innocent expectation. He always enjoyed a bollocking from Tommy Bloody Tucker.

  ‘Were you lying out there?’ said the superintendent. His anger made him handle Peach less cautiously than he normally did. He positively bristled.

  ‘Oh no, sir. I don’t believe in deceiving the public, even when they are represented by people like Bert Allcock. Wonderful name for a tabloid scribe, don’t you think, sir?’

  ‘Why the hell wasn’t I told? Didn’t I direct you to keep me informed about all developments? Especially when there was a media conference this morning. You nearly made me look a fool out there.’

  Percy reflected that Tommy needed no assistance in that. He said, ‘I didn’t know there was a conference until I arrived here this morning, sir. I didn’t get the chance to speak to you before it because I was told by your secretary that you were closeted with the television make-up girls.’

  Tucker glared at him, seeking for any sign of insolence in that round face. There was none: Peach’s dark eyes might have been a fraction wider than usual, but that was all. The superintendent said, ‘That’s not bloody good enough, Peach, and you know it. You could have briefed me yesterday.’

  ‘Had I known that we had this little exchange with the fourth estate planned for this morning, I should certainly have done that, sir. But my detective sergeant and I were pursuing our inquiries well into yesterday evening. It was after nine, indeed, when we arrived back in Brunton. Had I thought you would be at the station, I should certainly have come here, even at that hour. Were you here, sir?’

  Tucker had left at five o’clock, as always, and they both knew it. He said, ‘There was nothing to stop you ringing me at home. I’m always available, as you know, if there is urgent news about an investigation.’

  Both of them knew that he never answered the phone, preferring to use his wife as a filter for his calls, declaring himself unavailable to all except his superior officers. Peach took his time, managing with a little difficulty to look contrite, hoping Tucker would congratulate himself on scoring a point. There was no hurry, when you had the boss trump still to play.

  Presently he said, measuring his words with a slight air of puzzlement, as if still not quite sure where he had gone wrong, ‘Yes, you’ve told me that before, sir. That’s why I was bold enough to ring you last night, even at eleven o’clock. I wouldn’t have dared to trouble any other senior officer but we all know here how conscientious you are, sir. You had your answering machine on, if you remember. I left a message saying I had news for you. Quite expected you to ring me back early this morning, as a matter of fact, but I expect you were busy with other things.’

  Tucker knew exactly what was implied: he had been far too preoccupied with his preparations for the media conference to pay attention to his answerphone. He looked at his DI for a smouldering moment, during which Peach found the files on his desk of absorbing interest. Then he said, ‘You’d better brief me now.’

  Peach took him through a shortened version of the discussion he had conducted with Lucy Blake in the pub on the previous evening. There appeared now to be five main suspects, he explained, with the air of a man simplifying complex issues for a backward child. In his own mind, there were six, but he was not going to tell the establishment about Bob Cook until he was more certain about the degree of his involvement. ‘Five, if you include Christine Turner as a separate suspect from her son, as I’m afraid we must,’ he said firmly to his resentful superintendent.

  ‘It won’t be her,’ said Tucker. ‘Pillar of the community, she is.’ Then, as Percy wondered if her husband had been a member of the lodge, Tucker said suddenly, as if the thought immediately exonerated her from all suspicion, ‘Isn’t she the Lady Captain at the North Lancs?’

  ‘Ladies’ Captain, we call it there, sir,’ said Peach patiently. ‘And even that office doesn’t put her in the clear, in these democratic criminal days. She is also a mother, and mothers can be fierce in defence of their children, as I’m sure you know, sir.’ Tucker had once failed to appear to support Peach at a promotions board because his wife insisted he attend his son’s school sports day, and neither of them had forgotten it. Percy was convinced he would not have become an inspector without this absence; it was probably the one thing on which his superintendent agreed with him.

  Tucker’s brain sifted through the other names. With the air of a man offering a priceless insight from years of experience, he said, ‘My money’s on the black boy.’

  ‘Gary Jones, sir. The lad on the greenkeeping staff at the North Lancs.’ He had only just said the name, but he repeated it, as though it was important to check that a geriatric had fastened upon the right person.

  ‘That’s the one. He’s got the background for crime. Probably a chip on his shoulder as well. You mark my words, when this is over, it’ll be him we’re banging up for this one.’

  ‘That’s a very interesting thought, sir. A hunch, I suppose you’d call it. You’re well respected for them in the CID section, I know.’ Peach’s face had as much thought and expression as a ventriloquist’s dummy’s. At that moment, he found himself hoping against hope that Gary Jones was totally innocent. Tommy Bloody Tucker’s view might be the first bit of luck the lad had had since the discovery of the little that was left of Debbie Minton.

  Tucker’s face brightened. The bollocking seemed to have gone wrong as usual but there was still the rare prospect of fun to be enjoyed at this awful man’s expense. ‘Getting on all right with your new detective sergeant, are you, Percy?’

  For a moment, Peach allowed himself to look puzzled, whilst the expectation built in Tucker’s battered breast. Then a smile lightened the inspector’s stubby features. ‘DS Blake, sir? Very promising CID officer, I think. Been a real help to me already. If I may say so, sir, I detect your hand in this appointment. You’ve always been such a good judge of men and their potential. And now of women. No one could accuse Superintendent Tucker of not moving with the times, eh, sir?’

  Tucker’s jaw had dropped at the beginning of this and sunk further than seemed possible during its development, though Peach had affected not to n
otice it. The superintendent now seemed to have difficulty in getting his parted lips to meet again. Eventually he said, ‘You—you haven’t found it difficult at all? Err, working with a woman, I mean?’

  ‘Not at all, sir. It’s been a revelation. Between you and me, I said to myself, “If Thomas Tucker thinks she’s got what it takes, then she must have. It’s up to me to offer her every help I can, until she finds her own feet” I said. And I must say, that hasn’t taken her long. Lucy—sorry, I suppose I should say DS Blake, but we’ve got used to working without the formalities—has settled in very quickly. I already find it difficult to remember how I operated without her. Not that I’ve anything against DS Collins, you understand, but sometimes personalities just go well together. I expect you spotted that possibility, sir. I know how much thought you put into building up the right team.’

  ‘But you’re a—you’re a traditionalist, Percy. You can’t enjoy working with a woman, surely? Not from what I’ve seen of you before.’

  ‘Never let it be said that Percy Peach isn’t open to new ideas, sir. You’ve taught me that, I often feel. We have to move with the times. I remember you saying that when some of us had reservations. And how right you’ve been.’

  ‘You haven’t found Sergeant Blake—well, a bit too forthright and independent in her views?’

  ‘Oh no, sir. I like to think I keep abreast of the leading thinkers like yourself, in my quiet way. Still too many chauvinists in the police, in my view. But things are changing all the time. I’m sure our own CID section can thank your enlightened leadership for much of that. And there’s no doubt you’ve given me a gem in Lucy Blake. A gem, sir.’

  ‘You haven’t found her gender has got in the way of good detection, then? I know you had some reservations when—’

  ‘Me, sir? Reservations? I must have given the wrong impression—but then I haven’t your communication skills. Or your vision. Just a villain-taker: I know that’s my reputation, and I can’t deny it. But Lucy Blake has given a new perspective to my work. More flexible, we are, as a duo. She has skills I couldn’t offer. And she seems to respect my experience, I’m glad to say. I can’t really envisage a more effective combination.’

  He beamed his dazzling beaver beam at Thomas Tucker and dismissed himself.

  ***

  Peach did not have to seek out Bob Cook. The young constable rang in from Preston and asked to see him.

  ‘I’ll come to your house,’ said Percy with cheerful malevolence.

  ‘No, not there!’ said Cook hastily. ‘I’ll come and see you at Brunton CID; I finish my shift in an hour. It needs to be private. But it shouldn’t take more than a few minutes.’

  ‘Let’s hope it doesn’t, lad,’ muttered Peach to the phone after he had set it down. He was only thirty-six, but he had been in the force for eighteen years. Policemen who turned to crime were the dregs, dragging down the reputation of every copper in the country along with them. If Cook was among them, he would receive no mercy from Percy Peach.

  Cook was still in uniform when he arrived in Brunton CID. Perhaps he hoped that the curious would take it that he was merely reporting in on a routine criminal matter. Being in the uniformed branch, he had never worked with Peach in CID. Though occasional police-lore snippets of Peach’s fearsome approach to petty criminals had seeped through to him, he had hitherto known Percy only as an indifferent golfer.

  Such experience can colour a man’s thoughts and leave him unready for the exchanges of real life.

  Bob Cook found a woman with Peach. She was businesslike in full-sleeved green blouse and tartan skirt; as he entered, he felt himself assessed by the bright blue-green eyes beneath the wide forehead with its frame of dark red hair. His first thought was that she was a secretary. It was briskly dismissed by Peach. ‘Detective Sergeant Lucy Blake, Constable Bob Cook. Sit yourselves down and let’s get going.’ Cook stood awkwardly before the proffered chair. Lucy Blake had nodded and smiled at him, but he took his eyes from her, not wishing to seem insulting in what he had to say. ‘I said on the phone that what I had to say was private, Percy. Just between the two of us.’

  ‘And I said when you rang that I was going to contact you in any case. DS Blake is here in her professional capacity, at my request. Unless I decide that what you have to say is unconnected with any criminal matter, she stays here.’

  Cook became very stiff. ‘In that case, sir, I have made a mistake. I came here voluntarily. If we cannot speak alone, I feel there is no purpose in a meeting.’

  ‘Please yourself, Bob. But you’re involved in the Debbie Minton murder case. We shall be investigating you anyway.’

  ‘What do you mean “involved”? I’ve no connection with that wretched girl’s death.’ He could not summon up the tone he wanted, so that what he meant as outrage emerged almost as apology. He needed suddenly to sit down, as he felt his senses racing, but to do so seemed to admit the very association he was denying.

  ‘Maybe not, but you applied for a transfer on your first working day after the girl’s death, and chose not to reveal that to me. I was bound to find that interesting, coming as it did from a policeman who knows we’re involved in the investigation of a murder. DS Blake, incidentally, already knows about this. We await your explanation of your actions with interest.’

  Now Cook did sit down. He was a young, fit man, but as he felt the dizzying impact of Peach at his most inexorable he needed a chair. He could not rid his mind of the irrelevant notion that he should never have proposed this man for membership of the golf club, as if Peach’s new proximity to the place where the body had been discovered had somehow sharpened his awareness of the issues. Cook managed to say dully, ‘I didn’t strangle Debbie Minton.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it. Now convince us.’

  Bob Cook glared at him in outrage. Logic told him that it was silly to count on their fellowship as golfers for anything, but they were also fellow-policemen. Surely that meant something? Peach’s answer was to study him as dispassionately as if he were a rat involved in some scientific experiment, whose reactions might now be of great research value.

  It was Lucy Blake who said, ‘This is a murder investigation, Bob. You can gain nothing by trying to deceive us. You must realize that it can only be a matter of time before we dig out whatever it is you would like to conceal.’

  She was younger than he was, and his first male response was to reject her soft-voiced counsel as presumptuous. But he knew enough about the resources which went into a murder investigation to realize that what she said was no less than the truth. He did not look at her but he said to the implacable Peach, ‘What is it you want to know?’

  ‘We need to know all about your relationship with Debbie Minton. Everything. With dates, as far as possible.’

  Cook looked at the squat features with undisguised hostility. He had come here voluntarily, and run into this barrage. But he knew deep within him that he had merely been hoping to spike some CID guns by his voluntary presence, perhaps even to gain some kudos through giving information on his own terms. Now these terms had been rejected and new ones dictated. That was what he was resentful about, even though he realized only dimly what had happened. He said sullenly, ‘I had a relationship with Debbie. Over about a year.’

  ‘Which was the year before she disappeared?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And how far did this relationship extend?’ Peach saw the desperation creeping across the harassed face. Before Cook could attempt the prevarication which would invite a further mauling, he said, ‘You were knocking her off, weren’t you, Bob?’

  Cook glanced involuntarily at Lucy Blake, embarrassed by Peach’s earthiness, wishing again that they could have done this without her here. He had not thought himself a conventional man until now. He said helplessly, ‘Yes. I’m not proud of it.’

  ‘I hope not.’ Peach paused, studying the now abject figure in the armchair beyond his desk. He was like a prize-fighter, deciding that a few vigorous blows to the b
ody now might set up the knock-out to conclude the contest. ‘You’re a married man with two children, Bob. What is the state of your marriage?’

  ‘It—it’s okay. I don’t see that it’s relevant to this.’

  ‘Don’t you? Was there ever a question of your leaving your wife?’

  ‘No!’ Cook was aghast at the suggestion, and his denial came almost before the question was concluded.

  ‘So Debbie was no more than a bit on the side.’

  Cook hesitated, searching desperately for a way round the sordid suggestion, failing to find one. ‘I suppose so. It didn’t feel like that at the time.’

  ‘You’re not the first man to take what he can get. But this was after you’d questioned her about her involvement with drugs, wasn’t it?’

  It was an educated guess, which hit the mark. Cook nodded miserably.

  ‘So you were exploiting a professional relationship. A young girl was grateful for getting off with a warning about the drugs and you stepped in and got her drawers down while she was still being grateful.’ As Cook made to protest, he said sharply, ‘That’s how a barrister would put it, if it suited him. You’ve been to court often enough to know the score.’

  ‘I suppose so. But I didn’t see it like that. I’m not denying that I should have done.’

  Peach sighed. ‘This isn’t a moral investigation. For what it’s worth to your career and your marriage, no one outside this room knows about this meeting. If you prove to have had nothing to do with this death, I’ll try to keep it like that, but there are no promises. This is a murder investigation, and we’ll probe everything connected with the victim.’

  While Cook looked as if he were struggling towards some kind of thanks, Lucy Blake said, ‘There were other people getting what they wanted from Debbie Minton, as well as you. Sex, to put it in a word.’ She waited to see if he would claim his relationship was different, which might have been significant. When he did not, she said, ‘Did you know she was promiscuous?’