by J. R. Ellis
‘Did he tell you anything important?’
‘No further comment on that.’
‘So you’re dealing with a conspiracy here. A number of people are involved in these murders?’
‘Conspiracy is not quite the word I would use. It was clear from the outset that more than one person was involved in the murder of David Atkins. There is no evidence, at this stage, that John Baxter was involved in that murder. He was presumably killed because he had information which could lead us to the killers.’
Oldroyd was using an old technique to put pressure on the killers. It was a huge bluff: Baxter had in fact said nothing but Oldroyd had implied the opposite. The newspapers would not make pleasant reading for whoever was behind all this. They would sweat and might be panicked into some rash action.
‘What about the question of motive? Is it true that the pothole victim was hated in the village?’
Oldroyd winced at the tabloidese exaggeration. His reply was diplomatic.
‘I cannot comment on the personality of the deceased, but it does seem that he was involved in a number of relationships in the area and that some of these relationships caused resentment.’
The tabloid reporter perked up again.
‘Sex,’ he said in the manner of someone relieved to be on familiar territory.
‘Maybe,’ said Oldroyd, ‘but we have evidence of financial dealings of a possibly dubious nature. So I ask once again for anyone with any information regarding this or any other of Mr Atkins’s activities to come forward.’
‘Do you believe they will strike again?’
This question came from the back of the room and it was a tricky one. Oldroyd didn’t want to panic the community; he could see the headlines: ‘Living in Fear in a Dales Village’. It was not impossible that other people could be at risk, but this was not the work of a deranged serial killer.
‘Clearly there is a dangerous person or people at large, and while that is the case, it would be complacent of me to pretend that there was no danger. On the other hand, I consider it safe to say that these crimes are both associated with Mr Atkins, the first victim. We are not talking about some killer who could strike at random, which is why I ask yet again for anyone with knowledge to speak to us.’
Oldroyd had only just arrived back in his office when Superintendent Walker was on the phone.
‘How did it go? Did you manage to keep the bastards at bay?’ Walker’s hatred of the media could be traced back, as Oldroyd knew, to the mauling the West Yorkshire police received during the terrible years of the Ripper investigation when Peter Sutcliffe was allowed to slip through their hands and continued to rampage around the industrial towns of the area.
‘I think so; they obviously love the idea of murder coming to a sleepy Dales village, but we’ve got them under control. I did tell them about Baxter’s call, by the way. It’s worth trying to flush the murderer out.’
‘As you think best.’ Oldroyd smiled; he knew the old boy would trust him. He didn’t go into details about the satanic rituals. If Walker heard about that, he would probably have an apoplectic fit.
‘Keep at it then. Let’s hope for a breakthrough soon. Send me a full report on your progress.’
‘Aye, Tom, I will.’
Oldroyd put down the phone. Under pressure like this, there was only thing to do. Go home and listen to a string quartet.
Later that day Carter went to see what the experts had discovered on Atkins’s computer files. He sat in a large, overheated room in the basement of the building surrounded by monitors, hard drives and half-dismantled machines. It looked like a robot-servicing laboratory from a science-fiction film.
Carter sat sweating, enduring the noisy buzzing of fans and monitors and the vague smell of oil and electricity. An expert in analysing computer files for illegal financial transactions – or ‘nerd’, as Carter preferred – was explaining what they had found. He had longish greasy black hair and spectacles that were repaired with tape. Why did these people conform to their stereotypes? thought Carter.
The man seemed oblivious to the discomforts of his surroundings despite the fact that he had to raise his voice slightly to be heard above the din of the machines.
‘It’s clear that this bloke was up to no good. We found loads of files which give us evidence of suspect dealings in property, and equities, stuff like that.’
‘Suspect in what sense?’
‘Oh, you know, the usual thing: properties sold for more than they were worth due to the defects being concealed; shares bought following advice obtained illegally.’
‘It was a bit risky, leaving all that kind of stuff on the computer, wasn’t it?’
‘Ah well, that’s where we come in. These guys use a kind of code to conduct their activities and they use special programs to conceal where emails are coming from, but we can crack them.’
Carter was very interested, and relieved; at last, some progress!
‘Did he do all this himself?’
‘He wasn’t alone. It seems there were two other people involved. We can detect two sets of emails on the files but we need longer to trace them.’
‘Right, we’ll need you to do that. This could be vital information.’
Carter was enjoying himself. He liked this kind of thing. Unlike Oldroyd, he was of the IT generation and some of his most exciting times at the Met had been working on big fraud cases. He wasn’t a real techie, but he enjoyed the chase using the information from the experts to trap the cheating bastards. Carter despised white-collar crime. Most of the perpetrators were pretty well off before they embarked on their criminal careers. It was sheer greed that made them defraud their own companies or the pension schemes on which some poor workers were relying for support in their old age. He had much more sympathy with shoplifters and burglars, people from the hard parts of London who’d never known anything except a tough struggle for survival.
‘How long before you get those details to me?’
The man frowned.
‘It’s not easy. We’d have to put in a concentrated effort and we have to run a special program on the F drive which . . .’ He launched into a highly technical explanation, which Carter cut into impatiently.
‘DCI Oldroyd needs this urgently. We’re under pressure on this case to make a breakthrough.’
The mention of Oldroyd’s name provoked the reaction Carter expected: a mixture of fear and respect crossed the technician’s face.
‘Oh, right. Well, we’ll make it a priority and it should only take us a day or so.’
‘Great,’ replied Carter and with some relief left the underground lair feeling optimistic that he was on to something.
When he arrived back in the office, Steph was at the computer tapping away at the keyboard with a frown on her face.
‘You don’t look happy,’ he remarked as he sat down at his workstation near hers.
‘I’m not; something’s really bothering me and I can’t bloody find anything about it.’ She closed her eyes and sighed. ‘Oh, it’s so frustrating!’ She banged her fists either side of the keyboard.
‘Temper, temper,’ he said. Privately he thought she looked even more attractive when she was angry. ‘What is it?’
‘Ever since we started investigating this case I’ve been having this strange feeling that I’ve read something or there was something in the news a while ago that’s got something to do with it.’
‘Sounds vague.’
‘Exactly. I can’t pin it down, but I’ve got a feeling it might be important.’
‘It’ll come to you when you least expect it.’
Steph sighed.
‘I’m getting nowhere. I can’t spend any more time on it now.’
She moved the mouse pointer on to the cross at the top of the screen and clicked emphatically. It seemed like another dead end.
Carter looked at her.
‘We’ve not got very far yet, have we?’
She returned his look.
; ‘Oh, I don’t know. Don’t underestimate the boss. I told you; he doesn’t always share everything as you’re investigating but he’ll have plenty of theories.’
‘You really admire Oldroyd, don’t you?’
Steph looked at him condescendingly as if he had asked a rather silly question.
‘Everyone does. He’s known and respected everywhere round here. He works things out when you think there’s just no evidence, nothing at all to go on. And he has such an incredible knowledge of Yorkshire and all its different areas and people. Anyway,’ she changed the subject, ‘how are you doing? Do you still like it up here? It’s been pretty hectic since you arrived. I don’t suppose you’ve had a chance to settle in.’
‘Not really,’ Carter replied, ‘but I’m enjoying it.’ He thought for a moment; maybe it was worth another try. ‘Look, do you fancy coming out for a drink after work, you could tell me more about what it’s like round here?’
To Carter’s surprise, her expression changed completely. She looked worried and confused and glanced away from him.
‘Sorry, I can’t, I – I’ve got something else on.’
It was just like in the pub the other day. One minute she was all friendly and then she went cold. The sparkle and confidence Carter found so attractive went out of her. What was the problem? He found this coldness a turn off but also puzzling because he sensed she liked him.
‘OK. Well, maybe another time.’
‘Yeah.’
She got up and went out of the office and Carter watched her go. He shrugged his shoulders regretfully; plenty more fish in the sea was his motto, so unfortunately it seemed time to move on.
As the day progressed in a fairly humdrum manner, Carter was left contemplating again how different things were in this part of the world from the one he’d left. He wasn’t used to this rootedness that so many people seemed to feel. His whole experience of life was of a shifting urban scene, a vast, energetic but amorphous environment with nothing deep that tied you to a particular place.
In the afternoon most of his new colleagues were out of the office and it went rather quiet. He felt a tinge of nostalgia for the constant bustle at the Met and for his old, fast life in London. He decided to take a break and call Jason. He smiled when he heard the familiar cheery voice above the usual buzz of noise in the background.
‘Hey, how’s it going, me old mate? Can’t talk for long, I’m run off my feet here. It’s chaos; one minute they’re pressurising you to make the deals and the next they’re panicking that someone’s going to break the rules and lose the company millions.’ He didn’t sound in the least concerned about it.
‘I’m OK; it’s a bit quiet here today.’
‘Nothing doing up there then, just a few people stealing clogs or mistreating their whippets?’
‘Not exactly, but, you know, I don’t really know many people yet so it’s a bit sort of low key.’
‘Oh, the poor chap’s lonely! What you need, mate, is a woman; what’s the talent like up there? There must be something worth chasing.’
Carter was about to tell him about Steph, but decided he didn’t really want to talk about her in the way Jason would expect.
‘Give me a chance; I’ve only been here a few days.’
‘That should be long enough for a stud like you; get your finger out! When I think of all those women police officers in their uniforms with the tight skirts I could almost join the police force myself.’
‘That would be a joke: you in the police force. You’d be more pissed than the drunks you were supposed to be arresting. “I’m sorry, sir, but it is my duty to arrest you for not drinking enough this evening. You’re a disgrace to the male sex. How dare you walk the streets in this sober condition?”’
Jason seemed to love the image.
‘Too right, mate; anyway must be off, I have to press a few more computer keys and shift a bit more money around the world. It’s called work and at least it pays well. I’ll give you a call soon. Ciao.’
Carter smiled at the phone; he felt better. However wild and morally dubious his friend was, he was also undoubtedly good for the spirits.
In his flat overlooking the Stray, Oldroyd decided to play a quintet instead of a quartet. Schubert’s Trout Quintet for piano and strings always put him into a good humour. It was the young Schubert, exuberant and happy, celebrating his visit to Steyr in 1819 before the despair caused by contracting syphilis had engulfed him. Oldroyd pushed the remote and the first soothing bars were heard on the piano.
He looked out of the window across the Stray. It had been a bright day but clouds had gathered and heavy rain was beginning to fall. It spattered against the window as Schubert’s music suggested the tumbling waters of the trout stream.
Oldroyd felt calmer as he sat down, closed his eyes and listened. His father had been a competent amateur cellist and had taken Oldroyd and his sister to chamber concerts. An abiding love of the unique sound of the string quartet and other chamber groups was the result. He listened to the rippling notes on the piano and sank deeper into the chair.
And then suddenly his eyes popped open. He sat up straight, thought for a moment and then got up quickly and switched on his computer. He logged on remotely to the system at work and, with some excitement, he opened the file of photographs of the Jingling Pot crime scene and looked again. On one particular shot he zoomed in and, after a long gaze, he nodded. A satisfied look appeared on his face. He remembered something Tim Groves had said to him that afternoon and things now fitted into place. He sat down again and reabsorbed himself in the Schubert with a smile on his face. Chamber music truly was inspiring and in the most unexpected ways.
In the house next to the gift shop in Burnthwaite, Anne Watson was also looking out of a window at the rain. A grey mist concealed the fells across the dale and water ran down the grey stone tiles of the roof opposite. Her face contorted with disgust. She took a long pull on her cigarette and a gulp of the gin and tonic she held in the other hand. She thought how she hated this bloody place. It was tedious enough in the good weather, but when it rained it was the dreariest place in the world.
Why on earth had she ever allowed Bill to persuade her to come here? She was a city girl from Manchester, who had then gone to art college in Leeds. She and Bill had been fellow students and their relationship in those early years had been passionate and exciting. Practically all they ever did all day was have sex, smoke dope and go to bars and the cinema.
They got married after graduating but problems began almost immediately with work and money. Then she fell pregnant with Alice and there was a more serious need to earn cash. Bill started to evolve money-making schemes, one of which involved trying to get loans to buy properties and renovate them. After a while, he seemed to tire of it and then suggested the move out of Leeds into the Dales.
She had been sceptical from the beginning but Bill said it would not be a ‘crappy gift shop’; they would sell proper art and craftwork by local artists, potters and jewellery makers. He thought it would be nice for Alice, who was still only a baby, to grow up in the countryside. She knew another, more selfish, reason was that it would give him the chance to indulge his hobby of cave exploration.
She had agreed because she hoped it would anchor him, give him a purpose. It might also improve their relationship, which was starting to deteriorate owing to Bill’s restlessness and his recklessness with money. He was fond of Alice but, like a lot of men, pretty useless with babies and toddlers. They had to take on a huge mortgage to get the place, and Anne found that things were actually very much as before. She was landed with running the shop while Bill swanned off talking to local artists and weavers. He continued to devise ever wilder financial schemes.
So here she was, running what was effectively a ‘crappy gift shop’, despite his promises. Was it for this that she had studied Art? What had happened to all her career aspirations? All sacrificed to him! Tied to a shop in a claustrophobic little village, miles from anywhere, fu
ll of Tory-voting farmers and retired couples and infested with gossip. The only positive thing was Alice, who had taken to living in Burnthwaite straight away.
She thought she was going to go mad selling Kendal Mint Cake to hikers and hearing from the locals about how so-and-so parked his car outside their window and they had no right to. It was like being in The Archers, a programme she despised. She had started the affair with Dave Atkins more out of boredom than anything else. Dave had a sense of fun and shared her view of the village. Having an affair was exciting; the only exciting thing she had ever done in Burnthwaite. She knew she wasn’t Dave’s only lover, but she didn’t care. Ironically, it was through Bill that she had met him. They knew each other through caving, another ridiculous activity she couldn’t see the point of; those dark dripping places just gave her the creeps. Dave could laugh at it, saying it was really a lot of hairy men (and women) proving they were hard by crawling through tunnels and getting covered in shit.
Anne took another drink from her glass and sighed. The problem with Dave was that he knew too much about everybody, including her husband. She lit another cigarette and frowned. Surely Bill would contact her soon? As if on cue, the telephone rang.
‘Where the hell have you been?’ she snarled into the receiver. She could barely contain herself to listen to the reply.
‘Great, that’s wonderful for you, isn’t it? Yes, of course she’s wondering where you are. Why the hell did you run off like that? I think you’re completely spineless, that’s what I think. And what about the weekend? Oh, I see. Who do you think you are? A spy from a James Bond movie? Why don’t you get real for once?’
She dragged hard on her cigarette and tapped her foot on the floor while listening to his reply.
‘That’s pathetic. It’s typical of you to leave me in the lurch, isn’t it? What’s all this about anyway? Yes, the police have been. What do you expect when there’ve been two murders and you knew both victims? No, I didn’t cover for you. Why should I? I said I didn’t know where you were, which was true. Well, of course, she’s asking me every day: where’s Daddy? So you’d better think of something quick before Saturday.’