He contrived to suggest that Tig had carried the melted plastic all the way home and chewed the bullet out of it.
'Interesting,' said Glenister. 'Probably nothing, but if you leave it with me, I'll have our people check it out at the lab.'
'Been there, done that, got the report,' said Pascoe. 'Definitely a bullet. In fact almost certainly 9x19 mm NATO parabellum, possibly fired from a Beretta semi-automatic pistol, 92 series.'
He opened his briefcase, took out the evidence bag containing the bullet and the envelope containing the lab analysis and set them neatly on the desk before her.
She looked down at them but didn't touch them.
‘I see,' she said slowly. 'Well, you have hit the ground running, haven't you? So what do you make of it?'
She hadn't invited him to sit but he did so now while it was still a matter of choice rather than necessity caused by his dicky knee.
'It's obvious. A gun was fired. Hector heard the shot, the round finished up in one of the video cassettes. The big question is, what happened to the gun?'
Glenister sat back and steepled her fingers against her nose. Then she opened her hands and put them behind her head, the movement raising her pompion breasts in a manner which Pascoe had to make an effort not to find distracting.
She smiled at him and said, 'Perhaps the big question should be left till we've looked at the wee ones. Firstly I'll need to get our CAT experts to confirm the findings of your local technicians. No reflection on their ability, you understand, but we've all got our specialisms . . . Having established it is a bullet, I will want them to look at this piece of plastic you say it came out of. You still have it, I take it?'
'Yes, it's at home
'So you didn't take it to your lab? Perhaps as well. Our people prefer to start from scratch without having to contend with any damage earlier, less subtle attempts at examination might have made.'
Pascoe thought of the rusty clamp in his garage and the rather blunt hacksaw he'd used to get the bullet out.
'And if they confirm it's a bullet in a melted video cassette .. . ?' he asked.
Then we must ask how and when it got there. There may be no way of confirming it was fired from a gun on those premises on the same day as the explosion . . .'
'It fits with what Hector heard!'
'Oh aye. Hector!' she said mockingly.
Pascoe again found himself reacting to this knee-jerk dismissal of the constable.
He said, 'Look, just because Hector's pre-digital doesn't mean he doesn't function. He's managed to identify one of the men he saw, hasn't he? OK, description-wise he's no great shakes, but find the right picture and he could still pick out the other.'
His fervour seemed to impress Glenister.
'You know your own men best, Peter,' she said. 'All right. Let's say he did hear a gunshot and that this is indeed the bullet that was fired. This brings us to what you call the big question: Where's the gun? Well, you've supplied one answer, you and your dog.'
'You mean it might have been missed?'
'This was,' said Glenister lowering her hands to touch the evidence bag. 'We sifted the debris thoroughly, of course, but what we were looking for were indications of the nature of the explosion, the kinds of explosive used, their possible source. Plus, of course, body parts, remnants of clothing et cetera that could help identify the men killed. If there were a gun at or near the centre of the explosion, it could simply have disintegrated and its fragments been distorted unrecognizably by the subsequent heat.'
'Unrecognizably? Not very likely, is it?' exclaimed Pascoe. 'Not unless your people aren't as finicky as we like to be in Yorkshire.'
'Peter,' she said gently, 'you've done well, but before you slag off the efforts of others, don't forget it was a stroke of sheer luck that put you on this track. I'll find where the council are dumping the debris and make my people go over it again. OK?'
Before he could respond, the door was pushed open and Freeman said, 'Sorry, didn't know you had company. Sandy, we need to speak.'
Glenister gave a little frown. Maybe she objected to Freeman's rather peremptory tone in the presence of a native. Who was it held the whip hand in this weird twilight zone the CAT people inhabited? Pascoe wondered.
She said, 'Can it wait a moment, Dave?' 'No.'
Well, that was certainly the sound of a whip-crack, thought Pascoe.
Glenister said, 'Peter, let's continue this later, all right?'
'Why not? I'll see if I can fit you in,' he said. 'Dave, good to see you again.'
He left, closing the door firmly behind him and resisting a strong temptation to press his ear to the woodwork.
Instead he went to see Wield and put him in the picture about the bullet.
His reaction was familiar.
'So Hector could've been right. Had to happen! What's Sandy going to do?'
'Fuck knows,' said Pascoe. 'Get her own examination done, then probably kick the whole thing into touch if it doesn't fit her agenda.'
'Pete, you've got to wait and see,' protested Wield. 'Like I told you yesterday, she really seems to be treading eggshells to make sure we don't feel sidelined.'
'You reckon? Well, I think pretty soon you're going to hear a great deal of crunching underfoot. Something's happened, and us being on the need-to-know list is even less likely than Hector getting things right. And if you'd care to bet on that, I'll just run home and get the deeds of the house!'
A man who had left a garden hammock to get blown up on an English Bank Holiday should have learned to distrust certainties.
Fortunately Wield didn't take the bet. Fifteen minutes later Pascoe got a summons to the CAT Ops Room. When he arrived he was met by men coming out carrying computer equipment. Inside he found Glenister talking animatedly into the scrambler phone. As he approached she finished speaking and handed the receiver to one of her men who unplugged the phone and put it into a box.
'You're moving out?' said Pascoe.
'Yes, we're on our way. Wouldn't have been long anyway, we were just about done here, but something's happened. What do you know about Said Mazraani?'
'Just what I've seen and read. Lebanese academic, teaches at Manchester, good looking, talks well, dresses smart, claims high-level contacts throughout the Middle East. In other words, all the right qualifications for getting on the talking-head shows whenever they want an apparently rational Muslim extremist viewpoint. What the papers called the acceptable face of terrorism until he blotted his copybook with Paxman.'
This had been the previous month, after the kidnapping and videoed execution of an English businessman called Stanley Coker. Mazraani had been trotted out to give an insight into the motives and mindset of the kidnappers, a group calling themselves the Sword of the Prophet. He prefaced his remarks with a fulsome expression of sympathy for the dead man's family, which he repeated when asked if he unreservedly condemned the killing. 'Very nice of you,' said Paxman. 'But do you condemn the killing?' Again the verbiage, again the question. And again, and again. And never a direct answer came.
Next day the papers went to town, led as always by the People's Voice.
The People's Voice, the youngest and fastest-growing of the tabloids, was in fact not so much the voice of the people as the rant of the slightly pissed know-it-all in the saloon bar who isn't fooled by government statements, legal verdicts, historical analyses, or forensic evidence, but knows what he knows, and knows he's right!
The Voice headline screamed
BEHEADING HOSTAGES IS OK!
(so long as it's done in the best possible taste)
'That's the one,' said Glenister. 'Well, barring miracles, he's done his last talking-head show. For the past two days there's been a rumour that Al Jazeera had received a tape showing an execution, a beheading. But not a Western hostage this time. A Muslim.'
'So? In Iraq they've shown little compunction about killing their own.' Then it came to him what she was saying. 'You don't mean . . . ?'
'This morning the BBC
, ITV and Sky all received copies of what is presumably the same tape. Yes, it's definitely Mazraani. He hadn't been seen in any of his usual haunts for several days. We sent a team to visit his flat in Manchester. They were told to be discreet but there was already enough of a smell to bother the neighbours. He was in there, him and his head, quite close but not touching. Plus another man not known to us.'
'Jesus!' exclaimed Pascoe. 'Was he beheaded too?'
'No. Shot. They want me back over there now. Mazraani was on my worksheet.'
'This sounds like big trouble,' said Pascoe.
'More than you can imagine,' she said grimly.
'Well, thanks for bringing me up to date . . .' he began.
'That's not why I sent for you,' she interrupted. 'It will be in the papers anyway. Al Jazeera have said they're going to broadcast today. No, what I wanted to say, Peter, was I've asked Dan Trimble if I can take you with us. He says fine, if you feel up to it.'
Pascoe was gobsmacked and made no attempt to hide it.
'But why . . . ?' he managed.
'Peter, I can't be certain, but I've got a feeling there might be some link with what happened here. Being as involved as you are usually means that judgments get blurred, corners cut. But from what I've seen, I get the impression it's just tightened your focus, heightened your responses. If there are any connections, could be you're the one most likely to sniff them out. So what do you say? Couple of days can't hurt, and you'll only be an hour or so's drive away.'
Pascoe hesitated, finding this hard to take in. He was given a breathing space by the appearance of Freeman, who gave Glenister a file and Pascoe a flicker of those cold eyes before disappearing.
'You say you've cleared this with the Chief?' he said. 'What about your bosses?' 'They're fine with it.'
He found himself reluctant to accept the unanimity of this vote of confidence.
'And Freeman? I bet he jumped for joy.'
'Not the jumping kind,' she said with a smile. 'Though in fact it was Dave who put the idea in my head. You've made a big impression there.'
This got zanier.
He said, 'I'll need to talk to . . . people . ..'
'Your wife? She struck me as a sensible woman. I'll have a word if you like, assure her I'll take good care of you.'
Pascoe smiled.
'No, I'll take care of that,' he said.
'That's a yes then. Good. Go and get packed.'
As Pascoe moved away he wondered what Glenister would have said if he'd told her that what really worried him was the prospect of admitting to Wield that he'd got it absolutely wrong.
The sergeant didn't gloat. That wasn't his thing, but he surprised Pascoe by saying, 'Pete, watch your back out there.'
'Watch my back? It's Manchester I'm going to, Wieldy, not Marrakesh.'
'So? There's funny buggers in Manchester too,' said Wield. 'You take care.'
Part Three
Awhile he holds some false way, undebarr'd
By thwarting signs, and braves
The freshening wind and blackening waves.
And then the tempest strikes him; and between
The lightning bursts is seen
Only a driving wreck.
And the pale Master on his spar-strewn deck
With anguish 'd face and flying hair
Grasping the rudder hard.
Still bent to make some port he knows not where.
Still standing for some false, impossible shore.
Matthew Arnold, 'A Summer Night'
1
Lubyanka
Manchester is monumental in a way that no other northern town quite manages. You can feel it flexing its muscles and saying, I'm a big city, better step aside. The building which housed CAT had all the family traits. It was solid granite, its tall facade as unyielding as a hanging judge's face. Carved into a massive block alongside a main entrance that wouldn't have disgraced a crusader's castle were the words THE SEMPITERNAL BUILDING.
'Tempting fate a bit, aren't you?' said Pascoe as he and Glenister approached.
She laughed and said, 'Not us. It was a Victorian insurance company. Went bust during the great crash so they paid for their hubris. It's been used for lots of things since then. We took it over three years ago. Most of your new colleagues refer to it as the Lubyanka, the Lube for short. Whether that's tempting fate or not, we've yet to see.'
They went into a wide foyer which looked conventional enough until you noticed that further
progress could only be made through security gates with metal detectors, X-ray screening, and large men in attendance. There were almost certainly cameras in operation too, thought Pascoe, though he couldn't spot them. Perhaps they were hidden among the summer blooms which filled what looked like an old horse trough standing incongruously at the foyer's centre.
At the reception desk, Pascoe was issued with a security tag with a complex fastening device.
'Don't take it off till you're leaving,' said Glenister. 'They're self-alarmed the minute you pass through the gate. Removal anywhere but the desk sets bells ringing.'
'Why would I want to take it off?'
'Why indeed? It's to stop anyone taking it off you.'
She said it without her customary smile. Necessary precaution or just self-inflating paranoia? wondered Pascoe.
They went straight into a room with twenty chairs set in four rows of five before a large TV screen. Pascoe and Glenister took seats in the second row. He glanced round to see Freeman in the row behind. Was this indicative of a pecking order? And if so did they peck from the front as in a theatre or from the rear as in a cinema?
As if in answer, the man sitting directly in front of him turned round and smiled at him. Pascoe recognized him instantly. His name was Bernie Bloomfield, his rank was commander and the last time Pascoe saw him, he'd been giving a lecture on criminal demography at an Interpol conference. If he hadn't pursued a police career, he might well have filled the gap left by that most sadly missed of British actors, Alastair Sim.
'Peter, good to see you again,' said Bloomfield.
For a moment Pascoe was flattered, then he remembered his security label.
'You too, sir,' he said. 'Didn't realize you were in charge here.'
'In charge?' Bloomfield smiled. 'Well, in this work we like to keep in the shadows. How's my dear old friend Andy Dalziel doing?'
'Holding on, sir.'
'Good. I'd expect no less. A shame, a great shame. Andy and I go way, way back. We can ill spare such good men. But it's a pity it was one of your less indispensable officers who was first on the scene. Constable . . . what was his name?'
'Hector, sir,' said Glenister.
'That's it. Hector. From what I read, we're likely to get more feedback from the speaking clock. "Sort of funny and not a darkie", isn't that the gist of his contribution?'
There was a ripple of laughter, and Pascoe realized that their conversation had moved from private chat to public performance. He felt a surge of irritation. Only here two minutes and already he was having to defend Hector in front of a bunch of sycophants who clearly felt very superior to your common-or-garden provincial bobby.
Time to lay down the same markers he'd already put in place with Glenister.
He said with emphatic courtesy, 'With respect, sir, as I've told the superintendent, I think it would be silly to underestimate Constable Hector's evidence. While it's true that in his case the picture may take a bit longer to come together, what he does notice usually sticks and emerges in a useful form eventually. What he's given us so far has proved right, hasn't it? In fact, with respect, isn't most of what we know about what happened in Mill Street that day down to Hector rather than CAT?'
This defensive eulogium, which in the Black Bull would have had colleagues corpsing, reduced the audience here to silence. Or perhaps they were simply waiting to see how Bloomfield would deal with this uppity newcomer who'd just called him silly and his unit inefficient.
The commander
gave Pascoe that Alastair Sim smile which indicates he knows a lot more than you're saying.
'That's very reassuring, Peter,' he said. 'Or are you just being loyal?'
'Never back down,' was the Fat Man's advice. 'Especially when you're not sure you're right!'
Pascoe said firmly, 'Loyalty's nothing to do with it, sir. You find us a live suspect and I'm sure you'll be able to rely on Hector for identification.'
'I'm glad to hear it. Now I think it's time to get our show on the road.'
He rose to his feet and let his gaze drift down the rows.
'Good day to you all,' he said. 'What you are about to see is a tape played on Al Jazeera television earlier today. It isn't pretty, but no point closing your eyes. Some of you will need to see it many times.'
He sat down and the lights dimmed.
The tape lasted about sixty seconds, but even to sensibilities toughened by a gruelling job as well as by general exposure to the graphic images shown most nights on news programmes, not to mention the computer-generated horrors of the modern cinema, the unforgiving minute seemed to stretch for ever.
There was no soundtrack. Someone said 'Jesus!' into the silence.
After a long moment, another man stood up in the front row. Fiftyish, balding, wearing a leather patched jacket, square-ended woollen tie and Hush Puppies, he spoke with the clipped rapidity of a nervous schoolmaster saying grace before he is interrupted by the clatter of forks against plates. His label said he was Lukasz Komorowski.
'This is without doubt Said Mazraani. His body was found in his flat this morning with the head severed, preliminary examination suggests by three blows as illustrated in the video clip. The chair, carpet and background in the tape sequence correspond precisely with what was found at the flat. There was a second body in the flat. This belonged to a man called Fikri Rostom who, as you will hear, Mazraani introduced as his cousin. Rostom, a student at Lancaster University, was shot in the head.'
He paused for breath.
Glenister said, 'What's the writing say?'
‘It says Life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.'
He paused again, this time like a schoolmaster waiting for exegesis. Pascoe knew it was biblical, probably Old Testament, but could go no further. Andy Dalziel would have given them chapter and verse. He claimed his disconcerting familiarity with Holy Writ had been acquired via a now largely neglected pedagogic technique which involved his RK teacher, a diminutive Welshman full of hwyl and hiraeth, boxing his ears with a leather-bound Bible each time he forgot his lesson.
Death of Dalziel - Dalziel & Pascoe 22 Page 8