Separated at Death (The Lakeland Murders)

by Salkeld, J J

  As a young PC Hall had seen a few bodies, usually at RTAs and a couple of suicides, but as a fast-streamer he was out of uniform inside eighteen months, and since then he could count the number of bodies that he’d seen on the fingers of one hand. But if he closed his eyes he could still see each of their faces.

  ‘Do you want me to stay here?’ asked Mann.

  ‘No, come with me Ian. I want to hear your impressions of the family. You can give me whatever background you have as we drive.’

  Mann nodded. He was quietly pleased. He usually didn’t get asked for impressions. Hall gave back his suit, which the SOCO pointedly put straight into a bin bag, unused, and waited while Mann removed his.

  The drive only took a couple of minutes, and Mann didn’t comment on the binoculars and notebook on the back seat of Hall’s car. Hall had been too preoccupied to hide them under the passenger seat. They sat in the car for a couple of minutes before they went in.

  ‘Amy was 17’ said Mann, looking at his notes, ‘a sixth former at the school your kids go to. The parents, John and Amanda, separated a couple of years back, he lives in town, she’s in Staveley. They own a chain of furniture stores from here to Preston, or rather he does now. The gossip is it cost him a couple of million to buy her out after he caught her with the bloke who was round doing their guttering, or maybe the gardening. Something like that anyway. The kids, two girls, live with them both.’

  ‘Was Amy the older one?’

  Mann looked back down at his notes. It crossed Hall’s mind that a parent would have registered the birth order automatically, because in families it always matters.

  ‘Yes, two years, the younger one is called Lucy. And the parents are not known to us: so they can’t have had an especially noisy domestic when the marriage went tits up. Mind you, they lived in a great big detached house that he’s in now, so the neighbours wouldn’t have heard anyway. Immediate family all clean too, although his brother had a possession with intent to supply charge fifteen years ago. He got off, don’t know the details.’

  ‘Is that it?’

  ‘Yes, I didn’t want to start any hares running with any further enquiries until the identity is confirmed.’

  They sat quietly for a moment, both trying to play through what would happen, what they’d say, and how long they’d have to sit there silently, trying to empathise, knowing that the parents would be too shocked to show much emotion that morning. Maybe even too shocked to speak. But both men knew it was futile to try to get inside Amy’s parents’ heads, because they’d long since learned that all grief is equal, but it is never, ever the same.

  The family suite was someone’s idea of homely in the 1990s, and in comparison with the rest of the station it probably still was. The walls were painted a pastel shade of purple, and the furniture and lighting were both relatively soft. When it wasn’t in use a few of the CSOs used the place for coffee breaks, which had to mean something.

  Hall knocked on the door, and both men walked in. Hall wondered briefly if undertakers felt the same way when they met the relatives. But they probably got used to it.

  Experience and training kicked in for both policemen, and they went through the usual formalities. Hall had been given a folder by the desk sergeant as he’d arrived, and he hadn’t even opened it yet. He knew the picture of Amy was inside. WPC Smith was sitting next to Amanda Hamilton, holding her hand. John Hamilton sat awkwardly, a little apart from his ex-wife.

  Hall showed them the picture. Amanda’s sobbing told them what they needed to know. John Hamilton bowed his head and cried silently. Still he didn’t reach for his wife’s hand.

  Hall forced himself to stay still on the sofa opposite the couple, and when he felt that at least the father could take in what he was saying he asked the essential questions. They already knew that Amy had been her dad’s place that evening. What time had Amy gone out, where had she been going, did she have a boyfriend, and who were her best friends at school?

  John Hamilton did his best to answer, and Mann noted his replies. Amy had indeed been staying with him that week, she and her sister had a bedroom at both houses. She’d gone out at 8pm, and taken the little runabout that she’d got for her seventeenth. She was going to see her friend Elizabeth about something to do with an essay. No boyfriend, and Mann noted half a dozen names and addresses of friends, all of girls in Amy’s year at school.

  ‘Why don’t we take you both home now’ said Hall. ‘WPC Smith can stay with you Mrs Hamilton. And of course we can get someone to stay with you too, Mr Hamilton, if you’d like that.’ Hamilton just shook his head. Hall knew that he’d spoken every word that he could manage for now.

  Hall and Mann left the station by the front door, and saw Ryan Wilson and his solicitor saying their perfunctory goodbyes outside.

  ‘What was young Ryan in for this time?’ asked Hall as they walked round the back of the station, past the compound with the crashed cars and impounded vehicles, to where Hall had finally found a parking space.

  ‘Tip off yesterday. He got pulled on the M6 and we found about 100 grands worth of assorted narcotics in the doors.’

  ‘That’s miles above Ryan’s usual pay grade, isn’t it? He’s more two wraps and a packet of chips I’d have thought.’

  ‘Aye, I know. It’s about 99 grand above his speed. Anyway, I’ve left the techies to look at his computer to see if we can find out who his dealer is. It was a fair weight of gear, it really was. But I don’t hold out much hope they’ll find owt useful.’

  For the first time that day Hall smiled. His Sergeant was about as keen on technology as he was on forensic medicine. ‘OK, but let’s come back to that when we can. If Ryan has got himself mixed up in something significant then we need to get mixed up in it too.’

  Hall drove the mile back to the scene slowly. Neither went to open the car door when they stopped. ‘So what did you make of the parents?’ asked Hall.

  ‘No question about the grief...’

  ‘...but that doesn’t mean one of them didn’t do it, right?’

  Hall tried not to finish other people’s sentences, it was a bad habit, but Mann nodded agreement.

  ‘When we’ve finished at the scene let’s get the team together and start divvying out the background tasks’ said Hall. ‘I’ll take the father.’

  The two men took fresh suits, overshoes, gloves and masks and waited for Tonto to call them up to the woods. It was raining, not hard but steadily, and the sky was darkening all the time.

  Ryan wouldn’t have admitted it to anyone, but he was worried. It started to rain hard as he walked home, through the inter-war council estate where he’d always lived, and he was soaked by the time he got in. It was just before 11am. The television was on in the living room, and the curtains were drawn. He called out to his mum, but got no reply. So he made a coffee, sniffed the milk, and decided to drink it black. Dry cereal seemed like a safe bet too.

  He sat on the sofa, felt around under the cushions for the remote control, and turned the TV off. The room suddenly seemed very dark and very quiet. He thought about what had happened over the last 24 hours, and asked himself a few questions.

  Would the cops let him away with the car collection story? They’d know it wasn’t true, but could they prove it? He had no doubt that Adam would have covered his online trail very well indeed, so Ryan doubted that he’d ever be found.

  But what if they did charge him with possession with intent to supply anyway? When he’d asked the duty solicitor she’d said he’d get around five years this time, if he went down for that amount of gear. So how about grassing Adam or maybe even Wayne up? Ryan didn’t have to think about that one for long. He’d known Wayne all his life, and though he’d never met Adam - Wayne had put them in contact - Ryan would never tell the cops anything that implicated anyone else.

  He really couldn’t have grassed up Adam, even if he’d wanted to, because what he’d told Sergeant Mann was almost true. He’d never actually met him at all, but he didn
’t want to bring Wayne’s name in to it. In fact, he’d only had instructions by text, email or via Wayne. He didn’t even know if his real name was Adam. But what he did know was that the money was decent, and until last night the risks had been low.

  So he’d just have to wait and see what happened. Let the dust settle for a few days, and then talk to Adam about what to do next. And especially to ask him the question that had been running round Ryan’s head on a loop since the moment he saw those blue lights behind him on the motorway. Had it been a random pull, a couple of cops bored witless at the end of a long shift, or had he been grassed up?

  Ryan knew Police procedure better than most, so he thought back over the chain of events. He didn’t think he’d been followed, but he never used the rear view mirror much after he passed his driving test when he was seventeen, so he couldn’t be sure.

  He hadn’t recognised the two cops, but they were Cumbrian all right. Probably just traffic boys from Penrith, because he’d been pulled over just before Shap Summit. They hadn’t said that they thought the car was defective, nor had they breathalysed him. He hadn’t even been speeding.

  Then Ryan thought about the way the cops had looked the car over. Boot first, then a look inside. It was cold and windy up there on the tops, and they didn’t take long. They’d sat him in their Volvo, the driver stayed with him in the car, while the other one looked the old Mondeo over. Ryan had seen the back seat squab go up, then back down, then the torch flicking around the inside of the car. Then the cop had called his mate on the radio, and Ryan found himself cuffed, walking down the hard shoulder, and looking at the bags of gear jammed inside the front door panels.

  So could the cop really have been a proper little Sherlock and found the gear by chance? Based on past experience Ryan doubted that very much.

  Ryan’s mum shouted his name from the top of the stairs, and he called back.

  ‘Where you been at?’ she called out, louder than she needed to be with the TV off.

  ‘Police. I got bailed 'til next week.’

  ‘You all right?’

  ‘I’m fine mum.’

  ‘All right. I’m going back to bed for a bit.’

  Ryan sipped his coffee, ate a couple of spoonfuls of the dry cereal, and flicked the TV back on. He turned over to one of the new channels, and recognised Kendal - the town hall, a bit of the one-way system, Gooseholme, and the factory shop complex on the old K Shoes factory site. There were daffodils and sun, so the footage must be months old. And they were talking about a murder.

  ‘Mum’ Ryan shouted, without getting up. ‘Mum.’ He hadn’t really expected an answer, but he knew his mum would have been interested. It wasn’t everyday that Kendal made the news, and though his mum probably wasn’t proud of much, she was always proud to be Kendalian.

  Tonto hadn’t taken long, and within ten minutes of Hall and Mann arriving back at Queen’s Road they were all heading back up the hill. A TV crew was just setting up, and Hall was glad to get past them before they’d got the camera on its tripod. He’d always felt that he had a good face for radio.

  The footpath into the woods wound up from the road, between overhanging evergreen bushes that just seemed to multiply the rain. Water was running down the path now. Two of the SOCO team carried up a scene of crimes tent, and the pathologist complained loudly about the weather as he plodded back up the hill. At the top of the path the woods proper started, with tall beeches and oaks interspersed with smaller hazel and the odd conifer, and Mann gestured towards the widest path through the trees.

  Hall knew it well, because his house was only a ten minute walk away, and he often walked through the woods, across the golf course, then out onto Cunswick Scar. Sometimes the children had come too, especially when they were younger. In spring the wild garlic up here was almost overpowering, but now the ground was covered in soaking, decomposing leaf litter. No wonder Tonto hadn’t needed long.

  The woods would be sealed off for the next two days, because Hall ordered a fingertip search covering 10 metres around the scene, and a metre on each side of all of the paths in and out of the woods. And it was 2pm before Amy’s body was finally moved.

  The rain had stopped by then, and Hall and Mann stood on the path, looking at the patch of earth where Amy had been found.

  ‘Tonto doesn’t think she was moved herepost mortem’ said Mann. ‘No deep footprints below the leaf litter, and no drag marks. The Doc agrees, though he’ll confirm after the PM. So there’s a decent chance that she came here voluntarily, which also suggest that she knew the killer.’

  ‘Yes, so let’s concentrate on a known assailant. Killer wore gloves, but very likely to be male apparently, or at least that’s what the doc reckons. But what about sexual assault? Her jeans and underwear were pulled down, but I’m not convinced at all. Just doesn’t look right, does it?’

  ‘Someone trying to suggest a sexual assault by a stranger?’

  ‘It wouldn’t be the first time. But we’ll know more after the PM. So I think we’re clear about the strategy here: full background on Amy, family and friends, plus house to house obviously. And let’s work up a timeline for last night from the time she left her dad’s house. Has the car been found?’

  ‘Yes, outside her friend’s house, locked, keys were in Amy’s handbag. We’re having it uplifted anyway: assume that’s what you want?’

  Hall nodded.

  ‘But is it worth pulling in our friendly neighborhood sex offenders as well?’ he suggested. ‘I’m just concerned that we don’t have the resources to get it all going at once.’

  ‘We could just check out the ones with any history of violence’ suggested Mann.

  ‘But that’s all of them, isn’t it? OK, let’s do the lot. But Kendal addresses only for now.’

  ‘Is it all right if I get uniform to do it? It’s not like they’re worth any discretion.’

  Hall thought for a moment. ‘No Ian, let’s do it the decent way. I don’t mind if it’s a uniform, but get them to do it in civvies.’

  Mann glanced at Hall. There were some things about policing that they’d just never agree on.

  Chief Superintendent Eric Robinson didn’t sit in on the team meeting, but within a minute of Hall completing the briefing at 4.30pm his Blackberry buzzed. It was as if the Super had the place bugged.

  Hall walked to Robinson’s office, which looked the way he always imagined a mayor’s office to look, all polished oak and a portrait of the Queen, and brought him up to date. The initial PM results would be available that evening, with DNA and blood tests over the following 48 hours.

  ‘So you’re looking at the family first?’

  Hall didn’t need reminding of the stats. He said they were.

  ‘I know them you know, or at least the girl’s dad and his father. We’ve bought their furniture for many years. My grandfather bought a couple of pieces by Simpsons of Kendal, we’ve still got it at home. Lovely stuff, and quite valuable now I’ve been told.’ Robinson paused, as if anticipating congratulation on his grandfather’s taste. ‘They’re a proper old Kendal family, the Hamiltons.’

  Hall waited for Robinson to tell him what was on his mind.

  ‘Andy, as you know I try to keep my operational officers away from the financial pressures as much as I can, but this really couldn’t come at a worse time for us a force. The cuts are so deep that we really will have to look again at a merger with Northumbria if it looks like we don’t have the specialists to deal with the more complex cases, and you know as well as I do what that would mean.’

  Fewer jobs for senior officers thought Hall. But since we had never been much of a careerist that didn’t matter to him. He just couldn’t see the attraction in being a policeman who went to meetings and read spreadsheets all day. So he’d resisted Robinson’s suggestions that he might consider taking a uniformed job at HQ, maybe working directly to the Chief.

  ‘What I’m hearing’ said Hall cautiously, ‘is that a quick resolution to this case would have wi
der implications for this force, and that we should all try to manage down our resource utilisation.’

  Robinson smiled. He liked Hall, a man who knew how to speak the language of modern policing. ‘Exactly Andy, exactly. This is an absolute top priority case, so you have my total support. Absolutely. But we must also take cognisance of the bigger picture too, but I see that you’re already well aware of the context. That’s excellent then. So could I just ask you for a brief email summary every shift summarising where we’ve got to, and the resources allocated?’

  ‘Might it be possible to do it verbally sir? Might be more efficient and expeditious that way.’

  Hall hoped he’d hit on a likely buzz-word, and although Robinson looked a little surprised, as if Hall had suggested using carrier pigeons and code, he nodded agreement.

  ‘So where to now?’

  ‘I’m going to speak to Amy’s father, then catch up with Ian back here. He’s been co-ordinating the house-to-house.’

  ‘Good. And you will remember the golden rule, won’t you Ian?’

  Hall wondered if it might be something to do with spreadsheets.

  ‘What’s that sir?’

  ‘Make sure that you get some sleep tonight. Too many investigations are undermined by senior officers who keep going too long, especially in the first days of an investigation. That’s how things get missed, and bad decisions get made.’

  Hall nodded. He knew Robinson was right, especially because he’d been waking at four every day for months anyway. So he was going into the case tired. He also knew that having a really good reason to stay away from home was the last thing that he and his family really needed. His working life revolved around getting people to acknowledge what they’d done, and their personal responsibility for it, but he knew that he’d been avoiding facing up to the unmistakeable when it came to his own family. And, one way or another, that situation would have to change, and soon.