Riddled on the Sands (The Lakeland Murders)

by Salkeld, J J

  ‘Good, thanks, that’s helpful. So either Jack drove the tractor here himself, or someone else drove it here, but if they did it’s unlikely that they were trying to hide it.’

  ‘Aye, spot on. Other than being a long way out, so you couldn’t see it from anywhere on shore, I think this would be a crap place to try to get rid of it. I’m surprised that it was as covered as it was when it was found, but that’ll just be sand that’s moved around by the tide. It might never have covered it completely, leaving it here. It’d have been found for sure, I reckon.’

  Hall nodded. The forensic team were just getting underway. They had marked out grids on the sand, and the metal detectors were already in use.

  ‘Would you excuse me a minute, guys?’ he said, and walked over to the short, muscular figure nearest him.

  ‘All right, Sandy?’

  ‘If you’ve come out here to make some dreadful pun about my name you can fucking think again, Andy Hall.’

  ‘Wouldn’t dream of it. Not a grain of truth in the idea in fact.’

  ‘Is that the best you’ve got, you dick? So what do you want? Keeping an eye on us, are you, or seeing what proper graft looks like?’

  ‘Yes, both of those. But also, on the way back could you meet us at Jack’s fluke nets, apparently they’re still up. Worth a quick look I’d have thought.’

  ‘Aye, why not? And with any luck we might get a bit of fish for tea while we’re at it. This latest bloody brainwave of yours won’t take us long.’

  ‘Oi, boss,’ someone called from the furthest search grid that Sandy had marked out. ‘Cartridge case here. Showing as steel, though.’

  ‘Holy shit’ shouted Sandy, ‘I do not fucking believe it. Ian Mann should enter the fucking lottery this weekend, but if he does I won’t. He’s just scooped the bloody jackpot. Again.’

  ‘Any more?’ asked Hall, when the cartridge case had been photographed and bagged.

  ‘Give us a chance, Andy. We’ll need to stay here and go over each grid twice, without you tramping around in your big policeman’s boots. You’re all right to look at the nets on your own? I doubt we’ll be away from here for a bit longer.’

  ‘Yeah, sure, we’ll be off. But one quick question. I thought that bullets had brass cases.’

  ‘Give this man a coconut. Aye, they are usually, so this one’s military in origin, just like we thought. Probably from a Russian-made weapon, but we’ll know soon enough.’

  Hall walked back to Atkinson and Capstick. Hall was grateful that Atkinson had made sure that they hadn’t come over to the search area. Sandy would have turned the air even bluer than it was already.

  ‘What’s all the excitement?’ asked Capstick. ‘Your mate’s got quite a pair of lungs on her, I’ll say that for her.’

  Hall smiled. ‘She has, but she had every reason this time. We’ve just found a cartridge case from one of the weapons, so we know for certain that the shooting happened here.’ Hall was watching Capstick very closely as he spoke.

  ‘Bloody hell. How is that even possible?’

  ‘We don’t know exactly, but my colleagues think that the shooter maybe trod on the case, and forced it down into the sand.’

  ‘What are the fucking chances of that?’ said Capstick.

  ‘I know, but that’s the thing about our work. The closer we look at things, the harder we work, the more we tend to find. That’s how we catch people. Anyway, let’s head back, and check out Jack’s nets on the way. We’ll just be in the way if we stay.’

  Hall almost enjoyed the journey back. He felt like an explorer, the sand was so pristine, but he could see still Grange, and the dark rectangle of Heysham Point power station on the horizon.

  When they reached them, the nets were a depressing sight. The poles were over at odd angles, the nets were torn and twisted, and the seabirds had made short work of much of the catch.

  ‘Is it all right if I clear this mess up?’ asked Capstick.

  ‘Yes, but before you do let’s have a walk round. Does anything strike you as odd, unusual?’

  They walked, and Capstick spotted nothing out of the ordinary. But for the first time Hall understood how the flukes were caught. ‘So when the tide comes in the fish swim into the net, get caught, and are picked up when the tide goes out again. Is that it, Pete?’

  ‘That’s it, aye. Simplest job in the world, this is, and the best. At least it was, once upon a time.’

  Hall climbed back onto the trailer and waited for Pete to finish. Geoff was helping, so he didn’t think it would take long. And this place certainly wasn’t going to tell them anything useful at all. Hall wanted to get back to the office as soon as he could. And he wanted to get the sand out of his hair. And from his ears and his nose too.

  Capstick dropped them off outside Atkinson’s house.

  ‘Fancy a brew?’

  ‘Just a quick one’ said Hall. ‘I need to get back to the office. You fancy coming in for an hour too? Have a look at where we are. I can get one of the lads to run you home after.’

  Atkinson looked pleased. ‘Aye, lad, why not?’

  Fifteen minutes later they were in Hall’s old BMW, heading back to Kendal.

  ‘So what do you reckon?’ asked Atkinson.

  ‘About Capstick? Too early to say. His manner seemed a bit off somehow, but maybe he’s always like that.’

  Atkinson laughed. ‘He is. Too much time on his own out on the sands, that’s Pete’s trouble. I wouldn’t read too much in to it.’

  ‘I thought he reacted a bit to the fact that we found a cartridge case’ said Hall, when he’d negotiated the big roundabout beyond Grange.

  ‘Aye, I know what you mean. I think he was just surprised that we, I mean you, found anything. I’ll admit I was. Chance in a million I’d say. I wonder if you’ll get prints off it?’

  ‘Possible, let’s see. But you never know, we might be able to match it to a weapon at some future date, and we do know now that the rounds were fired right where we found the tractor, and on Friday night too.’

  ‘How far away was the shooter from the tractor?’

  ‘Sandy says about six metres.’

  ‘What’s that in old money?’

  ‘Twenty feet.’

  Atkinson nodded. ‘And I suppose even Sandy and her merry band don’t expect to find vehicle tracks, anything like that?’

  ‘Out on the sands you mean? No, not a chance. And I didn’t notice much in the way of CCTV coverage either.’

  Atkinson laughed. ‘No, probably the only place in this bloody country where you’re more than fifty feet from a camera.’

  They drove in silence for a while. Hall was thinking ahead to the team meeting.

  ‘Poor old Jack’ said Atkinson, just as they were passing Levens, ‘who would have thought it?’

  ‘So how’s the village taking it?’

  ‘Shock, like you’d expect. When I was a kid there was the odd death, every few years like. Fishermen who went out and who never came home, and people sort of knew how to cope, whether the body turned up or not.’

  ‘Did it usually turn up?’

  ‘Aye, nine times out of ten. I’m surprised that Jack’s hasn’t.’

  Hall didn’t reply.

  ‘So you’re not seeing or hearing anything unexpected?’

  ‘No, nothing. It’s a tight knit community. My family have lived there since the early 1900s, and my great-grandparents only moved from Grange, but we’re still classed as offcomers, by some at least.’

  Hall laughed. ‘A welcome addition to the gene pool, I’d have thought.’

  ‘So you’ve noticed that there aren’t too many different surnames round about, have you? Aye, that’s true enough.’

  ‘So what about Jack and his family?’

  ‘The Bells have been here for centuries, bloody graveyard’s full of them, but Jack’s dad left the village before he was born and only came back when he was about fifteen. I remember thinking how funny he sounded, foreign almost, but of course I wa
s just a little kid then.’

  ‘Where had they been? New Zealand or something?’

  ‘No, Preston I think it was. That’s still foreign to some round here though, lad.’

  ‘What will happen if the body isn’t recovered? In the village I mean.’

  ‘Like I say, it has happened before, so there’ll be a memorial service, and people will just get on with it. And I’ll tell you this, Andy, and I’m speaking as an ex-copper who was still being surprised by the stupidity and basic bloody criminality of folk until the day I retired. I just can’t see anyone from Flookburgh mowing down Jack Bell with a bloody machine gun. Most of them can’t work their video recorders, let alone a sodding gun.’

  ‘Does anyone still have a video recorder?’

  ‘We’ve only just got Betamax here, mate. Fucking PVRs are decades off yet, I tell you.’

  When they parked behind the station Hall turned on his phone, and checked his messages.

  ‘Do you know your way up to the CID office, Geoff? I need to pop in and see the Super for a minute. Won’t be long.’

  Hall was confident about that for a reason, because meetings with Val Gorham were never long. She seemed to prize efficiency above friendliness, and even politeness, and Hall reckoned that was already costing her. Her predecessor, Eric Robinson, hadn’t been a station favourite, and to Hall’s surprise Gorham was doing even worse. And while he knew that he wasn’t the most popular senior officer in the force - he’d once overhead an old cop refer to someone as a ‘stuck-up southern bloody know-it-all’, and he was pretty sure that he fitted that particular verbal Identikit - he was at least well respected, and well-liked by some. Even he knew that coppers like a joke and a gossip, especially after a shit day dealing with the mad, the bad and the sad who made up the bulk of their customers, but Gorham didn’t seem to partake. Not ever. Hall wondered briefly who she talked to, how she let off steam.

  ‘Andy, thanks for dropping in. I know that you’re busy with the Bell investigation, and I look forward to reading your update later today. I wanted to talk to you very briefly about John Perkins. You know that his garage-cum-storeroom has been destroyed by fire?’

  ‘Yes, ma’am. DC Francis texted me earlier. Cause not yet determined.’

  ‘It is now. I’ve got the initial Fire Service report and they’re saying arson, no question.’

  ‘I see, ma’am. So whoever sent that letter has just got our full attention, then.’

  ‘Indeed. Who will you put on it?’

  ‘DC Francis. She’s met Perkins, and she mentioned to me another suspicious garage fire that she went to take a look at. Might be connected.’

  ‘That’s fine, and I must say that DC Francis really does seem to keep you very well informed.’

  Gorham’s face was as straight as the pictures on her wall and the pens next to her computer keyboard. Hall wondered if she even knew that Jane Francis had more or less moved in with him and the girls now. Maybe she didn’t.

  ‘Yes, ma’am. Was that it?’

  ‘Not quite. I’ve had Perkins in here today, and he’s making a complaint against us, and says he’ll be claiming compensation, too.’

  Hall was about to reply, but Gorham held up her hand. ‘I just wanted you to know that I’ve had a look at the file, and I’m completely happy with the way that the case has been handled so far, and that I don’t want you to give any complaint a moment’s thought. It will come to nothing. Nothing whatsoever.’

  ‘I see, ma’am. I’ll pass that on to Jane.’

  ‘Do. I must say I do hate dealing with members of the public. Most of them really are such utter and complete twats.’

  Hall laughed. He wasn’t sure that he’d ever done that in this office before. ‘They certainly can be, ma’am. That’s one of the few advantages of murder cases. At least one of the parties doesn’t ever have much to say for themselves. Mind you, we can’t even find Jack Bell’s body, let alone turn it over to the doc for our victim to have his final opportunity on this earth to tell us something about what happened to him.’

  As Hall had predicted he was only two minutes late for the start of the team meeting, and when he walked in Sandy Smith and Ian Mann were having a bit of banter, and it sounded as if Mann was coming off worse.

  ‘Settle down everyone. Let’s crack on, shall we? Sandy, I know you’ve had a long day, so do you want to start?’

  Suddenly she was all business.

  ‘We’ve finished with the tractor, and we’ve still got ten slugs in total. But looking at the tractor we can see that there were more hits, just ricochets, like. We’ve got thirty two definites, and another half dozen probables. They’re all on the same side of the tractor, the seaward side when it was found, and they’re all quite high up, between just over one metre and about one and a half.’

  ‘So consistent with being fired at a person?’ said Hall.

  ‘Yes, and before you ask, we still can’t be certain of whether there was one shooter or two, but I’m going to suggest there were two, standing about two metres apart and about six metres away from the tractor. That’s judging from the strike angles and deflections on the tractor, as far as we can calculate.’

  ‘Anything on that shell case yet?’

  ‘The good news is that there’s a partial thumb print, but the bad news is that it’s so sand-blasted that it would only help with elimination. But we’ve got good strike marks and striations, so if a weapon is recovered later we’ll be able to match it, no problem.’

  ‘Thanks Sandy. Stay if you can, but go if you need to.’

  ‘I’ll stay.’

  ‘Right, then, moving on. Ian, door-to-door. Tell us you’ve heard tell of folk with machine guns and guilty expressions, knocking around the village. Save us a lot of hard work, that would.’

  ‘Sorry, boss, no such luck. In terms of Jack’s timeline, what his wife told us ties up with what everyone else saw. He was last seen from the shore at about nine, out at his fixed nets, just like Capstick said. After that, we’ve got nothing. As to Capstick, again his story checks out. He was out a few minutes ahead of Bell like he said, so he certainly didn’t follow him, and he was back about eleven. Two wits saw him drive past when they were coming out of the pub.’

  ‘Pissed?’ asked Hall.

  ‘They say not, why?’

  ‘Either of them fishermen?’

  ‘Aye, one’s a part timer.’

  ‘Good. Tell you what, Ian, would you go and see him, tomorrow is fine, and ask him what he saw on Capstick’s trailer when he came back in.’

  ‘Anything in particular?’

  ‘No, just anything unusual. You know, just get him to think back. But one specific thing to ask if he doesn’t mention it spontaneously. Does your wit remember seeing any sign of what Capstick’s catch was that night? How much he caught, what he caught. If I remember rightly he said he had a few shrimp, but not enough to take to the fisherman’s co-op. Is that about right?’

  ‘Exactly right, boss. That’s what he claims.’

  ‘OK, mate, thanks for that. And I imagine they missed a few householders on today’s knock?’ Mann nodded. ‘So maybe go back out with three of four uniforms tomorrow and get the rest covered off.’ Mann nodded. ‘Now, anything else of interest from the door-to-door so far? Tittle-tattle about Jack, anything.’

  ‘No, nothing worth re-telling. They’re all friendly enough like, the villagers are, but cautious, you know. Not because we’re coppers, more because we’re outsiders, really.’

  ‘Welcome to Cumbria’ said Hall, smiling. ‘OK, Ian, well done. Put yourself about a bit tomorrow, have a drink in the pub at lunchtime, see if anyone opens up a bit more. Tell them you come from a long line of halibut or something. Now, Jane, what have you got on Bell?’

  ‘Early days, boss, but I think we can rule out suicide, if anyone even thinks that’s still a possibility.’ That drew a couple of laughs. ‘No money worries, house paid off, family is solid as far as anyone knows. He’s hardly got an electro
nic trail at all, either. Didn’t use his laptop much, and his mobile seems to have only ever made calls that lasted long enough for him to say, ‘I’ll be home in five minutes, and what’s for tea?’ He poached a bit, and got caught the odd time over the years, but I expect they all do. I certainly wouldn’t use it as some kind of indicator for a generally cavalier attitude to the law. I think he felt it was his birthright to lift the odd wild salmon, that’s all.’

  ‘OK, Jane, we’re starting to get a pretty good picture of Jack Bell now, aren’t we? Only two options then really, he was either a master criminal who knows how to cover his tracks, or he’s a wrong-place, wrong-time sort of victim. Jane, are you absolutely sure he’s not the former?’

  ‘Not absolutely 100%, but as near as damn it. His wife’s said we can search the house and outhouses tomorrow, and assuming we don’t find anything there I’d say he’s clean. Realistically his wife would have to have been involved if he was at it in a big way, and I spent an hour with her earlier and I’m confident that the only thing she’s trying to hold back from us here is her grief.’

  ‘Got you, thanks. So, unless we get any indications to the contrary, let’s work on the assumption that Bell had no previous contact with his killers. But remember, don’t bake that idea too hard yet, because we may get a contra-indication, and I don’t want us to miss it if one comes along. So, Ray, last and in your case very definitely least, what can you tell us about Pete Capstick?’

  ‘Charming, boss. Thanks for the big build up. Lives alone, bit of a solitary character, grumpy bastard really, but no previous other than a bit of poaching when he was a lad. No sign of new found wealth, or any wealth at all come to that. He inherited the cottage from his folks, and gets by on his income from the fishing. Tech support are looking at his mobile and all the online stuff, nothing of interest so far.’