by Nick Oldham
‘Hi,’ he said, ‘Er . . . do you do coffee?’
‘You name it.’
‘Latte with an extra shot?’
‘No problem. Small, medium or large?’
‘Medium.’
She nodded and turned to the complex-looking coffee-making contraption at the back of the bar. Flynn eased one cheek of his arse over a bar stool and surveyed the room again. He gave the lone woman a quick smile – she looked away – and the man continued to ignore him.
‘Weather not good,’ he said to the back of the woman behind the bar.
‘No.’ The coffee maker gurgled, hissed and steamed. ‘It’s caught us by surprise and it looks like it could be a bad one.’ She turned to him with his foamy drink and placed it carefully on the bar. ‘Passing through?’
‘Just visiting – but they weren’t at home.’
‘Ah.’ She leaned on the bar and he couldn’t help but notice her figure, which was very nice. She caught his look and smiled. ‘Two twenty-five, please.’
He paid her, counting out the exact change. When she turned to the till, he pulled a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket and ironed it out on the bar top. Headed ‘Lancashire Constabulary – Message Log’, it was a pro-forma document that ensured nothing could be missed when taking a message of any sort from anyone. The top message that Flynn had seen on the pad in Cathy James’s office, he had managed to snaffle it in the instant before Tom had appeared at the office door and thrown him out. It was the most recent message she had taken.
Flynn read it, then got out his phone, waited for a few moments for a signal to be indicated on the screen. One didn’t. He tutted. He raised his head to the woman behind the bar, who had turned to watch him.
‘We struggle out here at the best of times,’ she told him. ‘They’re always on about putting boosters in, or whatever, but they never seem to get round to it. Probably not worth it. This weather will make certain there’s no signal at all, I reckon.’
‘I take it the landline works?’
‘There’s a public phone in the toilet corridor.’
Flynn had noticed a phone behind the bar. ‘Any chance of using that one?’ he asked sweetly. ‘Don’t want my coffee to go cold.’
She weighed him up, then said, ‘OK,’ and gave him the cordless handset.
‘Thanks. I’m Steve Flynn, by the way.’
‘Alison Marsh.’
‘Ah, the landlady. Pleased to meet you,’ Flynn smiled. He got Cathy James’s mobile number from the contacts menu on his own phone and thumbed it into the handset, put it to his ear and waited. A connection was made – then went straight through to voice mail. He tutted and hung up, realizing he was doing a lot of tutting recently.
‘No joy?’
‘Nah.’ He handed the phone back to Alison.
Reading from his stolen message pad, Flynn asked, ‘You wouldn’t know where Mallowdale House is, would you?’
Flynn saw the woman’s instant reaction. ‘Why?’ she said sharply, and it took him back slightly.
‘Is it local?’ he asked, carrying on as though nothing had happened.
‘Yes.’
‘And it’s . . . where?’
‘Two miles up the road, past the police house.’
‘And that’s it?’
‘Big house, behind a big fence, big grounds.’
‘When you say big grounds, what do you mean?’
‘Well, the house itself is in big, fenced-in grounds, but the land surrounding that all belongs to Mallowdale.’
‘What, like moorland or forest, kind of thing?’
‘Yeah – why?’
‘Er, nothing,’ he said. He picked up his coffee and took a sip. It was a good brew and the extra shot had an instant effect. He was puzzled by Alison’s strange reaction as he re-read the message again, written down and recorded by Cathy James, who still remained uncontactable.
In the ‘From’ section, she had written, ‘Anon.’
In the body of the message she’d written, ‘Poachers on Mallowdale House land again.’
And that was it, very bare bones. Flynn could only imagine the conversation. He guessed the phone must have rung in Cathy’s office and she’d answered it: ‘Hello, police at Kendleton. PC James speaking. Can I help?’ It would have started something like that. Professional, courteous. Then, whoever it was had said, ‘There’s poachers on Mallowdale House land.’ The phone call would have ended abruptly, or she would have quizzed the caller further, asking who was calling, asking for a description of the poacher or poachers, any vehicle, any accompanying animals – such as a dog. But the message was from Mr Anon. It was dated yesterday, timed at 16.30 hours. The words PC James attending were scribbled on the bottom of the form.
But Flynn was only guessing. All he had was a sketchy message about poachers from an anonymous source, and no doubt Cathy would have seen it as her duty to investigate, even though yesterday was actually her rest day. What it did was tell Flynn that Cathy had taken a message yesterday afternoon and that Tom was possibly telling lies about having seen her at home. How true was his claim that he hadn’t seen her for a couple of days? Or perhaps he wasn’t fibbing and they’d just had a big spat that wasn’t any business of Flynn’s, perhaps everything she’d told Flynn over the phone was just a woman’s scorn? Perhaps she was just making things up to get at Tom for something else. What Flynn didn’t like, though, was Tom’s attitude.
Flynn scratched his head, not really knowing what to think, but he did know that policemen had occasionally come a cropper investigating reports of poachers. He remembered a PC even being murdered. These days poachers weren’t jolly characters feeding their families, they were often organized, ruthless gangs and big money was involved, depending on what they were hunting.
He sighed, thinking he should just get the hell out of here before he got trapped.
‘I’m curious . . . sorry . . .’ Alison interrupted his jagged train of thought. ‘Hope you don’t mind.’
‘About what?’
‘Mallowdale House . . . you’re not the first person to ask about it today.’
Flynn pouted. ‘And?’
‘Like I said, I’m curious.’ She leaned on the bar again, pushing her breasts tightly against her jumper in a move with obvious consequences for the male of the species, a fact Flynn was certain she was fully aware of.
‘To be honest I’d never heard of Mallowdale House until about twenty minutes ago,’ Flynn said. His eyes registered the fact that the third finger of her left hand bore no ring of any sort.
‘Well, you wanna keep away.’
Flynn blinked. ‘You said that without moving your lips,’ he said, and he and Alison grinned briefly as both of them turned to the origin of the voice – the old-timer sitting on the stool at the end of the bar, apparently engrossed in his newspaper but actually earwigging. ‘What do you mean?’
The man, bearded, dressed in ancient tweeds, raised his chin and said, ‘Just an observation, is all.’
Flynn waited for more. Nothing came. He glanced back at Alison and arched his eyebrows.
‘They’re not that friendly, that’s all,’ she said, ending the subject.
‘Do they have a poaching problem?’
She guffawed. ‘Anyone who goes on to Mallowdale land does so at their own risk. The poachers have a problem with the owners, I’d say.’
‘Is that a long way of saying no?’
‘You work it out.’ Clearly the tone of her voice implied that she’d said enough.
Flynn exhaled and thought, ‘Bloody villagers.’ He was half-expecting to hear banjos being plucked in the background. ‘I see the “No Vacancies” sign is up.’
‘Yeah, sorry. I’ve only got two rooms, both booked for the night. I have actually got six, but the rest are all being renovated and are uninhabitable.’
‘Have the guests landed yet?’
‘Not so far.’
‘Think they will?’ He gestured at the weather through the wind
ow.
‘Why, do you need a room?’
‘Considering.’
‘I have to give them time to arrive. If they’re not here by eight and I haven’t heard from them, I’ll assume they won’t be coming and maybe re-let – if that’s any good to you?’
‘Sounds half promising.’ He threw back the remainder of his coffee and wiped his lips with the paper napkin. ‘Nice brew. Maybe see you later.’
Alison leaned on the bar again in the way that stretched her jumper tight. ‘Maybe . . . ooh, speak of the devil.’ She looked past Flynn’s shoulder through the window. ‘These are the people who asked about Mallowdale House.’
The blood drained from Flynn’s face. Outside, a black Range Rover that Flynn immediately recognized had pulled up in the car park. The one with the impatient driver that had taken off his and another car’s wing mirrors. Two men got out. Flynn slid off the bar stool and walked to the door, zipping up his jacket, then stepped back into an alcove as the two men came in through the pub door with a crash and headed to the bar without apparently noticing him.
Flynn noticed Alison’s eyes had become wary. The men unzipped their top coats and stomped their feet on the floor to dislodge the snow they’d picked up.
Flynn’s mouth went dry as his inner sluice gates opened and adrenalin gushed through his body. In the five years since he’d been a cop, his memory had not dimmed with the passage of time. He recognized that two dangerous men had just entered this out-of-the-way country pub.
Before his departure from the organization he loved, he had spent a good number of years hunting down professional criminals who made their grubby but lucrative living from dealing drugs and causing misery. Not the gofers or the toe-rags on the streets, but those who organized the importation and distribution of the substances had been Flynn’s targets. Flynn, as a detective sergeant on the drugs branch with Lancashire Constabulary’s Serious and Organized Crime Unit, had successfully targeted some of the leading crime lords in this genre.
Sometimes, of course, he’d been unsuccessful. Often cases built up meticulously over months or years came crashing apart for a variety of reasons.
One such case that he’d been involved in was against a very high-ranking villain called Jonny Cain, maybe one of the richest dealers Flynn had ever encountered. His wealth had been estimated to be somewhere in the region of twenty million. But Cain, a sly, devious man, had eluded the clutches of the law by surrounding himself with layers of protection and operating his business on a cell-by-cell basis. Above all, though, his ruthless approach to anyone who might be a threat to him ensured that few people had the courage to testify against him.
Flynn knew that about a year ago, the police had got Cain as far as a crown court trial for murder, but that had collapsed. Flynn also knew that an unlikely potential witness against Cain – another gangster – had ended up with his brains blown out by a professional assassin. As far as he knew, it had been impossible for the police to prove a definite link between Cain and that killing (although everyone knew it to be the case).
Flynn recalled all this in the moments standing in that alcove because the two men who had just walked into the Tawny Owl, and changed the atmosphere completely, were two of Jonny Cain’s most trusted minders.
Flynn had a quick flashback to the Range Rover incident – the slicing off of his door mirror – and bored into his recall of it. Even though the vehicle’s windows had been smoked out, he was sure there had been four shapes within and it didn’t take a rocket scientist to guess that one of those shapes could well have been Jonny Cain.
Had Cain and the other guy been dropped off at Mallowdale House, Flynn wondered. That was the address that Alison said they’d been enquiring about. And if that was the case, what the hell were they doing here, what did they want and who were they calling on at Mallowdale House?
Flynn dug deep within his mind and regurgitated the names of the two minders: Roy Napier and Sim Riddick, two very evil men who were smiling civilly at Alison. She eyed them cautiously, then glanced in Flynn’s direction. The faces of the two men turned the same way and this time they saw Flynn in the alcove, although they gave no sign that they had recognized him.
Quickly he tugged up his collar, gave Alison a quick wave and stepped out into the harsh snowstorm that engulfed the village.
In his right hand was the message about the possible presence of a poacher on Mallowdale House land.
NINE
‘Karl! Karl!’ Henry bellowed against the heavy snow smashing into his face as he scrambled back up the path. Panic didn’t need to rise in him – it was there instantly. He had walked maybe thirty metres along the path from the point at which he and Donaldson had stopped, then, for no reason really, just the hint of the suggestion of an out-of-place noise, he’d looked back to check on the Yank – and he wasn’t there. Henry could so easily have walked half a mile with his head down before looking over his shoulder, and if he’d done that and Donaldson hadn’t been there . . . That horrendous thought was just one of the many that tumbled though his mind. ‘Karl,’ he screamed again, reaching the point where they had rested briefly. Henry faced directly into the weather, shouting his friend’s name through hands cupped around his mouth.
The path was narrow and precarious. Stepping off it could have serious consequences under any circumstances as the hillside fell sharply away. It was particularly dangerous underfoot because of the steep angle and the loose shale.
It was obvious to Henry what Donaldson had done: taken a step off the path, or simply lost his balance and pitched over the edge.
Henry blasphemed. He had once had food poisoning himself. He recalled it vividly, the whole experience. The creasing gut pain, the shits, the nausea. It had drained him completely of any will power, sucked all the energy out of him. All he had wanted to do was go to bed and curl up like a foetus and pull the sheets over his head and die. At least until the next desperate urge to race to the toilet came. It had also made him woozy and light-headed, and he guessed that could be what had happened to Donaldson.
Henry stood at the edge of what was virtually a precipice, his head shaking as he dithered about what to do. The wind howled around his head and he cocked his ear to one side, trying to listen. He shouted the American’s name again.
He was sure he heard some sort of response. The wind swirled away and then there was nothing but the buffeting of the snow, drowning out everything.
Henry shuffled sideways, tentatively placing one foot off the track into the shale. It slid down straight away, but he knew he had to go for it. Angling his whole body to counteract the steepness of the slope he moved down, inches at a time, grinding his feet into the ground with each step.
Within seconds he was enveloped by the snow and had lost sight of the track.
Then he fell and slithered down the hill, emitting a roar, grappling with his fingers, trying to stop his descent. And then he stopped suddenly as he crashed into something hard – which screamed.
‘Fuck, Henry,’ Donaldson said, as Henry regained his feet and crouched by the curled-up body of his friend.
‘What the hell happened? Why did you leave the track?’
‘Thought it would be a wheeze,’ he gasped. ‘A quick way down.’
‘You hurt?’
‘Yeah – busted my ankle.’
Henry’s heart could not have sunk any lower at the words. He crouched over Donaldson with his back to the weather, digging his heels into the shale. Donaldson had managed to sit up.
‘Which one?’
‘Left.’
‘Can you move it?’ Henry looked at the left foot as Donaldson tried to rotate it. He grunted as it moved slightly.
‘Yep, it moves – but I can feel it swelling in the boot.’
‘Hopefully not broken, then?’
‘Dunno – feels bad.’ He raised his eyes and looked at Henry. ‘Pisser, eh?’
Henry nodded. ‘Pisser.’
From the directions given, Flynn
knew that Mallowdale House was out of the village, beyond the police house, meaning he would have to drive out past Cathy’s place again. But he could not bring himself to drive past without speaking to Tom once more. He wasn’t remotely happy with what Tom had said to him and he was increasingly concerned about Cathy. He knew she was a big girl, an experienced cop and all that, could look after herself . . . but until he heard from her he wasn’t going to be satisfied. His still very active cop instinct told him he needed to dot the i’s and cross the t’s.
He stopped outside the police station, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. Decision made, he got out and went up to the front door and pounded it with the side of his fist. Roger the dog responded as before, barking angrily. Flynn kept up the pounding, standing back and checking the windows for any signs of Tom avoiding him. Nothing happened. The dog, from somewhere inside the house, continued to bark.
Flynn then saw there were tyre tracks and footprints in the snow at the garage door, almost filled in again by the snowfall. He walked across to the garage, turned the handle and found it to be unlocked. He pushed open the up-and-over door, which rose easily on its runners and revealed an empty space. Tom’s car had gone and the tracks had obviously been made by the vehicle reversing out down the drive. Maybe he had gone to work.
Flynn stepped into the garage and saw there was actually an inner door at the back that led through to the house, into the kitchen. He went to it and heard the snuffling of the dog at the gap along the bottom of the door. Flynn’s hand went to the handle, turning it slowly, opening it just a crack and peeking through, seeing the dog’s eye.
‘Roger,’ he cooed softly. ‘Roger . . . it’s me, Flynnie.’ The dog reacted by going frighteningly still. He opened the door another inch. ‘Hiya, Roger . . . good lad.’ The dog shuffled back a few inches, its eyes watching Flynn intently. Its hackles were up and for an old dog, it looked nasty to Flynn. ‘Roger, good lad . . . it’s me . . . remember me?’
Roger’s ears twitched uncertainly, the beast not knowing what to do – attack or roll over and expose its tummy.