Riddled on the Sands (The Lakeland Murders)

by Salkeld, J J

  ‘Got any evidence?’

  ‘Not a jot. But it just makes sense. For the first time it makes sense. Pete Capstick didn’t want money. What the hell would he have done with it? Bought himself a new tractor? I’m absolutely convinced that it was someone local who got him involved in all this.’

  ‘Well, don’t look at me.’

  ‘I’m not, honest. I just had to tell someone.’

  ‘But even if you’re right, where does it get you?’

  ‘Nowhere. You’re right, nowhere. I don’t know how he did it, but whoever killed Pete, or whoever stabbed him I should say, got in and out un-noticed. No forensic evidence and no sign of an eye-wit. It’s all this healthy sea air, everyone must be asleep by half ten.’

  ‘You’re probably right. So where do you go from here?’

  ‘That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. I wanted you to know, and I wanted to tell you this myself. Because you’ve been like half a dozen extra coppers this past week or two, and damned good ones too. I’m sorry, Geoff, but we’re going to have to scale back on this. Right back in fact.’

  ‘Already? No way, that can’t be right. Jack I can understand, you’ve got nowt to go on there, but Pete Capstick? You’ve barely even started. You’ve got the murder weapon, and that suicide note, didn’t you?’

  ‘Just fragments, Geoff. And the knife hasn’t given us anything. Look, I’m no happier about this than you are, but we all have to face facts. There’s no money, mate, and the powers that be have decided that we scale back hard, because there’s no realistic chance of a conviction. We don’t even have a single suspect, not one. On the positive side I do get to keep a couple of people on it, so we’ll keep two officers for as long as I can get away with it, but they’ll be office based. Strictly office based. I’m sorry, but unless we get a break from somewhere that’s just how it’s going to be. Obviously we’re not saying any of this publicly, so I’d appreciate it if you keep it to yourself, but I am going to tell Betty Bell, and obviously she can tell whoever she likes. So it’s not a state secret. I just thought it was fair to tell you as well, rather than let you hear it on the village’s bush-telegraph.’

  Atkinson sipped his drink, then looked up at Hall. ‘It’s not like you, Andy, isn’t this. You don’t give up that easy, I know that.’

  ‘I’ve made a fuss, mate. Been all the way to the Chief, in fact, but that’s between you and me. And I got sod all change out of any of them. They told me to lump it, or look for a transfer, my choice.’

  ‘Bloody hell, is it really that bad now? Well listen, thanks for letting me know, I appreciate it, I really do. Now shall we have a look at the board and order some grub? I’m bloody starving here.’

  It was three o’clock before Ian Mann had finished with Jimmy and his boys. One of their encrypted radios weighed heavily in his jacket pocket, but that was all he’d taken. It seemed strange being back in that world, not chatting to mates in the pub about old times, but actually out on an operation. The jokes were much the same though, and so was the tension. The lads seemed ready, but they all seemed very young too. And Mann knew that they’d think he was too old, and that they were very probably right.

  They’d all looked at Jimmy’s maps of the area and agreed who would cover which bit of ground. Even the rustle of the paper in the wind took Mann back to another time, and other places.

  ‘A couple of the lads have been walking right out onto the sand just before low tide each night’ said Jimmy, ‘just in case. Do you want us to carry on?’

  ‘You’re not worried about quicksand?’ asked Mann, and Rae just smiled.

  ‘Aye, carry on with that’ said Mann. ‘I suppose you haven’t seen anything of interest?’

  ‘No, nothing. We’re confident that nothing’s been landed in this sector.’

  They’d agreed that, from now on, Rae and his team would cover the seaward observations, with the Police covering the landward side. Mann handed over photographs of each of the team to Jimmy, and explained which ones were armed.

  ‘And none of these officers know that we’re here?’

  ‘That’s right, Jimmy. It’s how you wanted it. My plan, such as it is, is to let everyone know, if and when it looks likely to be kicking off, that you’re on the ground here. But it’s a shit plan really. There’s too much that could go wrong. Everyone creeping about, some more successfully than others.’

  ‘You’re right, Ian. The last thing we want to do is to get into a fire-fight with your people. So I think you brief them all soon, individually and in confidence. Happy with that?’

  ‘Aye. And you mean the lot, not just the armed officers?’

  ‘Yes, the lot.’

  Mann parked his car next to Rachel Skinner’s in a farmyard off a lane above the village. A large van was already parked there, liveried up like a parcel delivery lorry, and Mann waved a greeting to a couple of the firearms lads from HQ who were eating their sandwiches. And when Mann told Rachel about Rae’s involvement her reaction was much the same as the rest of the team’s would be.

  ‘I’m bloody amazed, Ian. What are the death-or-glory boys doing here? We don’t need them. They’ll probably mow down anything that moves out there.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be too sure about that. And remember, they were tasked to track this shipment, and basically to make a hard-stop of the vessel carrying it when it reached British waters. That was their mission, right from that start. But they were outflanked somehow, and they don’t like that.’

  ‘So we have to work with them?’

  ‘Aye, but it’s not all bad. I’m actually glad we’ve got them. Because we’ve got half a dozen highly trained operatives who cheerfully work twenty-four hour days and live in pits they’ve dug up on Humphrey Head. Can you see any of our lot doing that? Their beer-bellies would be visible for miles.’

  Rachel laughed. ‘Speak for yourself, mate. But they’re also likely to shoot first, and not bother with any questions, aren’t they?’

  ‘They’re not assassins, Rachel. You’d be surprised at their level of self-control. But it’s true, if they decide that they’re under threat, or we are, then they won’t hesitate. They can’t, it’s as simple as that.’

  ‘I could never do that job’ said Rachel. ‘How could you ever be that sure? Sure enough to shoot to kill, I mean.’

  Mann didn’t reply, and Rachel realised that she’d been tactless. ‘I’m sorry, Ian. I didn’t mean anything by it.’

  ‘That’s all right, love, I do know what you mean. I was a different person back then, I suppose. Either way, I couldn’t do it now. People are too complicated to ever predict their motivations, let alone their actions, with any accuracy. If this job’s taught me anything it’s taught me that.’

  ‘You mean the public are a bunch of greedy, selfish bastards to a man, and we only get to nick the really stupid ones? I’ll drink to that. But back to business. You’ve got the CCTV installed in the village, have you?’

  ‘Aye, it should be up and running in a bit. They’ve still got old fashioned telephone wires and poles round here, so we got our cameras up on a half a dozen poles. There’s no way we could have any boots on the ground, because they’d be spotted right off. The place is just too bloody quiet.’

  ‘Didn’t all the activity draw some attention?’

  ‘It did. But we knocked their internet off for half an hour a couple of times today, just for ten minutes, and our lads said they were fixing the problem.’

  ‘Nice one. You are a devious bastard, Ian.’

  ‘I bet you say that to all the boys. So you’re clear about our plan, Rachel? We’ll be doing our shifts from the surveillance van here, and we’re not moving down to the village unless we think it’s kicking off.’

  ‘But we’ll get out on the sand to make arrests?’

  ‘That’s the plan. I’ve agreed with Captain Rae that, if his lads spot the target, then they’ll inform us and we will take the lead when we’re in contact with the suspects.’

 
‘But only if there’s time? And Rae and his boys will already be out on the sands. What’s to stop them just forgetting to tell us?’

  ‘They won’t do that, don’t worry. But we’ve got two marked Land-Rovers sitting in that shed over there, loaded up with all the gear we could think of, so we’ll be able to get people out there fast if we have to. But they’ll stick to what we’ve agreed. Soldiers think like they march, in straight lines.’

  As he drove back to the station Andy Hall had indigestion, a sharp pain beneath the seat-belt. He’d eaten that pie and chips too fast. But maybe it was something else as well. Jimmy Rae and his invisible mates made Hall nervous. It wasn’t just that they worked to different rules, it was the nagging sense that Rae lived in a strictly binary, black and white world. You were with him and his mates, and whatever it is they thought they were protecting, or you were against them. And Hall just didn’t see anything like that. He understood that you had to have a very specific world view to ever be able to pull a trigger, and he knew that he never could. Because the harder he looked at anything, absolutely anything at all that involved people, the more complicated it always became. It felt like a blessing, and a curse.

  He’d been thinking about the worst offenders he’d ever dealt with. The kind that colleagues used to stand in the observation room just to watch sitting there, to see if that helped them understand, the kind that caused victim’s families to slam their fists against the side of prison vans. Could he say, with certainty, that any of them were actually evil? He wasn’t absolutely sure that he could. And, not for the first time, he was glad that his job was to investigate, not to judge, and certainly not to try to understand.

  ‘So this Miles Robinson is your arsonist?’ he said, when Jane had taken him through the email analysis.

  ‘He might be. The Home Office bod sent us that report, and he seems pretty sure.’

  ‘Not absolutely convinced though, is he? He says that the phrases aren’t especially indicative on their own, but that the broader stylistic similarities are striking.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘The trouble is that, as he also points out, most of them are indicative of age and education. Saying ‘I shall’ instead of ‘I will’ for example, that’s more of an indicator of age than anything else. So even if we did get Robinson in the dock I can’t see it getting us far. His defence would just argue that all this proves is that we’re looking for someone older, and decently educated. Plus, it’s still a stretch from the letters to the arson, assuming that he continues to deny it.’

  Jane found herself becoming irritated. ‘But surely we’ve got enough for a Warrant?’

  ‘Of course, Jane, I’m not saying that we haven’t. A bit of physical evidence would make a huge difference. And I might be wrong in saying that he won’t own up. A man like that, he’ll never have been interviewed under caution before, so you never know.’

  ‘No, he’ll deny it.’

  ‘What makes you so sure?’

  ‘I think he holds Perkins responsible for what’s happened to him. His business going bust, maybe even his wife’s death. I have a feeling that he has a fairly old-fashioned notion of justice.’

  ‘An eye for an eye, you mean?’

  ‘More or less. And who’s to say he’s so wrong?’

  Jane knew Hall well enough to know that she’d get a rise out of him with that, even if it was a distinctly slow, careful one.

  ‘You don’t mean that, Jane. Is something wrong?’

  ‘Wrong? How do you mean, wrong?’

  ‘I don’t know. You seem a bit tetchy.’

  Jane got up from the table so quickly that she knocked over her empty mug, and both of them reached out to grab it. The both failed, but neither laughed when they realised that it was empty.

  ‘So you’re happy for me to get the Warrant and execute it today?’

  ‘Yes, if you can get enough trained folk together. It’s just his house, is it? He doesn’t have any outbuildings, other premises?’

  ‘Of course not. I would have mentioned it if he had, wouldn’t I?’

  Hall was going to mention that he’d be home late, because he was going out to meet Ian and the team that evening, but he didn’t get the chance. Because Jane had turned on her heel before she’d even finished speaking. And somehow he doubted that Jane would have been interested anyway.

  By the time Hall left for Flookburgh he was feeling tired, and a bit depressed. He couldn’t even listen to music as he drove, and he snapped off the news when an item about the new Police Commissioners came on. He didn’t want to raise his blood pressure any further.

  As he drove Hall tried to tell himself that it was the Bell/Capstick case that was getting him down. He was bad at insulating his work from his life, and he knew it. But he also knew that this time work was only a contributory factor. Because while there was pressure on him to make progress he knew that the inevitable external review of the case, assuming no arrests were made in the near future, would take a positive view of his own work and leadership to date. He wasn’t as optimistic that a review would endorse his decision to mount such an expensive surveillance operation now, though, especially since the reviewing officer would have the benefit of twenty-twenty hindsight.

  Hall felt himself losing confidence in the plan with every mile he drove. What if Vic Osman and his people were wrong, and no big shipment was coming in over the next few days? At well over ten grand a day all up Hall wouldn’t be able to keep everyone in place for more than a few days, so he might easily have to stand everyone down the day before the drop. It would be just his luck, he thought.

  And would anyone really try the same plan twice, knowing that they’d been spotted the first time around? Usually Hall had no trouble putting himself in an offender’s place, given a particular set of circumstances, but he knew that he was always bad at assessing their tolerance of risk. Because, almost by definition, someone who had spent his entire working life in the Police would have a much lower risk-tolerance than a working criminal. So maybe that concern was unfounded, and they would try it again, especially if their person on the ground was convinced that the Police had withdrawn.

  And there was one thing that Hall was still absolutely sure of. Whoever had stabbed Capstick knew him well, everything pointed in that direction, and Hall was sure that the few people he’d told, unofficially, that the investigation was being wound down wouldn’t keep it to themselves. So whoever that person was would already know what Hall had said to Betty Bell and Geoff Atkinson, and the apparent absence of Police in the village would only reinforce that lie.

  But his thinking felt fractured, dull and tired, like there were things he was missing just on the edge of his vision, and he knew why that was. He’d lived with that feeling during the last year or two of his marriage, trying to insulate his working self from the rest of his life. It had worked, up to a point, and even in retrospect he was still surprised at how well he’d kept everything together, even as his marriage finally collapsed. But he hadn’t expected to feel that way again, and certainly not so soon. And just as he was starting to doubt his professional judgement Hall felt far from sure that he’d made a good decision about Jane, and he wondered if she was starting to feel the same way too.

  So Hall was relieved when he pulled into the farmyard, and saw Mann swinging open the back door of the truck. It would be all work from now on, all details and decisions, and that was just what Hall wanted.

  Wednesday, 3rd July

  ‘You are entitled to have a solicitor present, Mr. Robinson’ said Jane. ‘And you do understand that you’re under caution?’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘And you still maintain that you had nothing to do with the fire at Mr. Perkins’ garage?’

  ‘Absolutely. I have no knowledge of the event whatsoever. And I’m equally sure that your very intrusive search of my home proved fruitless.’

  ‘Not quite. You have a one gallon petrol can?’

  ‘Is that a statement or a q
uestion?’

  ‘A question.’

  ‘Then yes. I have a petrol-powered lawn mower, and the gardener fills the can up periodically, I understand.’

  ‘So you don’t handle the petrol can yourself?’

  ‘I will have done in the past. I used to cut the grass myself, but recently it’s got a bit too much for me to manage.’

  ‘How recently?’

  ‘I engaged the gardener last summer, during my wife’s final illness.’

  ‘And you haven’t purchased any petrol since then?’

  ‘That’s right. So you probably won’t find my fingerprints on the can, and certainly not any record of me buying petrol and putting it in the can, or any trace of fuel on my clothes or shoes. There’s bound to be some on my old gardening gloves and boots, because I wore those when I was grass-cutting myself, but they’ve not been touched in months.’

  ‘You could have worn other clothes, and disposed of them since the fire.’

  ‘And that’s an assertion, is it? Am I required to reply? There are any number of things that I could have done, but haven’t. I do hope that we’re not going to have to go through them all in turn.’

  ‘Have you destroyed or disposed of any clothing recently?’

  ‘No. I only buy new clothes when the old ones wear out, and that happens very seldom these days.’

  Jane pushed a small pile of printed emails across the table.

  ‘And did you send these to Mr. Perkins?’

  Robinson flicked through the pile.

  ‘I’d have to read them against the originals on my own computer to be sure, but at a glance they do look familiar.’

  ‘This is a copy of the letter that Mr. Perkins received, before the fire.’ Jane pushed it across and Robinson read it, quite slowly.