Death's Jest-Book

by Reginald Hill

  He followed her up the stairs, wondered as she inserted the key in the lock whether it would be naff to offer to carry her over the threshold, decided it wouldn’t and who the hell cared anyway? put the cases down and stepped forward as the door swung open.

  And saw over her suddenly rigid shoulder that the flat had been burgled.

  The flat was a mess. It looked as if stuff had been removed from cupboards and drawers and hurled about recklessly in a desperate search, but as far as he could see the only thing that had been broken was a Chinese vase in the bedroom. It lay beneath the shelf it had fallen from. It struck Hat as he stood there looking down at it that this was the first time he’d been in Rye’s bedroom. But not the last, he told himself complacently.

  Then he saw her face and all such smug self-congratulation vanished.

  She was staring at the shards of the broken vase, her face as pale as the fine white dust which surrounded them.

  ‘Oh shit,’ said Hat.

  He could guess what the vase had held. Aged fifteen, her twin brother Sergius had been killed in the car accident which left his sister with the head injury whose healing was marked by a distinctive silver blaze in her rich brown hair. The twins had been close in life, he knew that, but just how close Sergius had stayed in death he hadn’t known till now.

  How he would have felt about bedding down with Rye in the presence of her brother’s ashes, he didn’t know. Not that there looked any likelihood of being put to the test in the near future. He tried to put a comforting arm round her shoulders but she turned out of his grasp without a word and went back into the living room.

  Personal contact not getting through, he tried professional, urging her not to touch any more than was necessary, but she didn’t seem to hear him as she moved around the living room and the kitchen, checking drawers, boxes, private hiding places.

  ‘What’s been taken?’ he asked.

  ‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘So far as I can see. Nothing.’

  Didn’t seem to make her happy. Come to think of it, it didn’t make him happy either.

  He looked around himself, hoping to find a gap. She didn’t own a TV set or hi-fi equipment, the obvious targets. Lot of books, wouldn’t be able to check those till they were back on the shelves, but they didn’t seem a likely target. He went back into the bedroom. What the hell was she going to do about those ashes? Her clothes, which had been tipped out of drawers, were scattered over them. Not the kind of thing you wanted to find in your undies, he thought with that coarseness policemen learn to use as a barrier between themselves and the paralysing effect of so much of what they see.

  There was a lap-top open on a table by the bed. Funny that hadn’t gone. Expensive model, easily portable. He noticed it was in sleep mode.

  ‘You always leave your computer on?’ he called.

  ‘No. Yes. Sometimes,’ she said from the living room.

  ‘And this time?’

  ‘I can’t remember.’

  He ran his fingers at random over the keyboard and waited. After a while it got the message and began to wake up.

  Now the screen came into focus. There were words on it.

  BYE BYE LORELEI

  Then they vanished.

  He turned to see Rye had come into the room. She was holding the power cable which she had just yanked out of the wall socket.

  ‘Why did you do that?’ he asked.

  ‘Because,’ she said, ‘if I want a detective, I’ll dial 999.’

  ‘And are you going to dial 999?’

  She rubbed the side of her head where the silver blaze shone in the rich brown hair.

  ‘What’s the point?’ she said. ‘You lot will only make more mess. Best just to tidy up, get some better locks.’

  ‘Your choice,’ he said, not wanting to force the issue. ‘But maybe you ought to make absolutely sure nothing’s missing before you make up your mind. You won’t be able to claim unless your insurance company sees a police report.’

  ‘I told you, nothing’s missing!’ she snapped.

  ‘OK, OK. Right then, let’s do a bit of tidying up, or would you like a drink first?’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘No. Look, I’ll do the tidying up myself. I’d prefer it.’

  ‘Fine. Then I’ll make us a coffee …’

  ‘Christ, Hat!’ she exclaimed, her hand at her head again. ‘What happened to that guy who was so oversensitive he couldn’t make a pass? I’ll spell it out. I don’t want a fuss, Hat. I’ve got a headache, Hat. I would rather be alone. Hat.’

  Of course she would. He forced himself not to glance towards the shattered vase.

  He nodded and said brightly, ‘I think I’ve got that. OK. I’ll ring you later.’

  ‘Fine,’ she said.

  He went to the door, stood looking down at the lock, and said, ‘Thanks for a great weekend. I had the best time of my life.’

  She said, ‘Me too. Really. It was great.’

  He looked back at her now. She managed a smile but her face was pale, her eyes deep shadowed.

  He almost went back to her but had the wit and the will not to.

  ‘Later,’ he said. ‘We’ll talk later.’

  And left.

  As Sergeant Wield approached Turk’s his clear and well-ordered mind, long used to separating the various areas of his life into water-tight compartments, had no problem with setting out what he was doing.

  He was an officer of Mid-Yorkshire CID, on duty, going to meet a nineteen-year-old rent boy who might possibly have information which would be of interest to the police.

  He was alone because said rent boy was not a registered informant (which would have required the presence of two officers at any meeting) but a member of the public who had indicated he wanted to speak to Wield only.

  So far, so normal. The only abnormality was that he was having to remind himself!

  Then through the grubby glass of the cafe window, he saw Lee sitting at the same table they’d occupied on Saturday night, looking like a kid who’d bunked off school, and he broke his stride to remind himself again.

  Turk returned his greeting with his usual glottal grunt and poured him a cup of coffee. Lee’s face, which had lit up with pleasure or relief on Wield’s entrance, had resumed its usual watchful suspicious expression by the time the sergeant sat down.

  ‘How do?’ said Wield.

  ‘I’m fine. Survived your sarney then?’

  ‘Looks like it.’

  There was silence. Sometimes in such circumstances, Wield let the combination of the silence and his un-readably menacing face work for him. Today he judged that whatever point was going to be reached would require a path of small talk. Or maybe he just wanted to talk.

  He said, ‘Lubanski. Where’s that come from?’

  ‘My mam’s name. She were Polish.’

  ‘Were?’

  ‘She’s dead. When I were six.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Yeah? Why?’ His tone was sceptically aggressive.

  Wield said gently, ‘Because no age is good to lose your mam, and six is worse than most. Old enough to know what it means, too young to know how to cope. What happened then?’

  He didn’t need to ask. Like Pascoe in pursuit of Franny Roote, he’d done some research that morning. Lee Lubanski had a juvenile record, nothing heavy: shop-lifting, glue-sniffing, absconding from a children’s home. Nothing there about rent-boy activities. He’d been lucky, or clever, or protected. A conscientious social worker had pieced together a brief family history when the boy first went into care. Grandfather was a Polish shipworker active in the Solidarity movement. A widower with dodgy lungs and a fifteen-year-old daughter, when General Jaruzelski cracked down on Walesa and his supporters in 1981, Lubanski, fearful that he wouldn’t survive a spell in jail and fearful too of what might become of his daughter if left to run loose, had somehow got out of the country on a ship which docked at Hull. Seeing no reason why the UK authorities should be very much different from those
back home, he’d slipped through the immigration net into the murky waters of metropolitan Yorkshire, only to find that what he’d fled from in Poland awaited him here. After a few months of precarious existence, he died of untreated TB, leaving a pregnant daughter with a basic knowledge of English and no obvious way of making a living other than prostitution, which was her profession when Lee slithered into this unwelcoming world.

  The new mother touched surface just long enough for her son to be registered officially and for her to get the minimum benefits offered by a caring state, but then her father’s fear of authority took over and she slipped out of sight again until Lee came of school age. Now the Law got a line on her, but by the time it was ready to pronounce on her status as an illegal alien, she was too far gone with her father’s illness for there to be argument over anything but who was going to pay for the coffin.

  Her son too was, as might be expected, tubercular, but happily at an early enough stage for treatment. The assumption of the social worker’s report was that he’d been the product of an unprotected encounter with a client, but in this alone did Lee’s fragmented account differ from what Wield had read.

  ‘My mam were going to get married, but she couldn’t ’cos she were only fifteen, so she had to wait till she were sixteen, and something must have happened with my dad …’

  Had some bastard lied to the girl in order to get her into bed for nothing? Or had she lied to her son so that he wouldn’t have to grow up thinking he was the product of a five-quid shag up against a garage wall?

  Whatever, it was clearly important to the boy. To the young man. To the nineteen-year-old male prostitute who’d got him here on the promise of useful information.

  Wield sat up straight and looked at his watch to break the thread of confidentiality.

  ‘OK, Lee,’ he said. ‘I’ve got things to do. So what did you want to see me about?’

  For a moment Lee looked hurt, then his features became watchful and knowing.

  ‘Thought you might like to hear about a heist that’s coming off,’ he said with an effort at being casual.

  ‘A heist?’ said Wield, hiding his smile at the use of this Hollywood word.

  ‘That’s right. You interested or wha’?’

  ‘Won’t know till you tell me a bit more,’ said Wield. ‘Like, what? Where? When?’

  ‘Friday. Security van.’

  ‘Good. Any particular security van?’

  ‘You wha’?’

  ‘You may not have noticed, lad, but the streets of our city are pretty well jammed with security vans at the busy times of day.’

  ‘Yeah, well, it’s one of Praesidium’s.’

  This was better. Praesidium was a newish Mid-Yorkshire security company which by aggressive marketing was making its presence felt in a growth industry.

  Wield close-questioned Lee about the cargo, time and location, but the boy just shrugged, and his only response to enquiries about the source of his information was it was guaranteed good, this with a double dose of that knowing look.

  ‘OK, Lee,’ said Wield. ‘It’s not much to go on, but I’ll mention it to my boss. He’s a payment-by-results man, by the way.’

  ‘Payment? What payment?’ said the youth angrily.

  ‘You’ll be wanting something for your trouble, won’t you?’

  ‘It was no trouble, just a favour, for what you did for me last night. Or should I have offered you money for that? Or summat else maybe?’

  The implication was clear, but the indignation seemed genuine.

  Wield said, ‘Sorry, lad. Picked you up wrong. My line of work, you think … well, you know, you don’t often get owt for nowt. Sorry.’

  ‘Yeah, well, that’s all right,’ said Lee.

  ‘Good. OK. Listen, how can I get hold of you?’

  ‘Why should you want to get hold of me?’

  ‘Just in case anything comes up. About the … heist.’

  Lee thought a moment then said, ‘I’ll be in touch if there’s owt, don’t worry.’

  Wield said, ‘Sure, that’s fine,’ not doubting he could get a line on the young man whenever he wanted. ‘Got to go now. Cheers. You take care of yourself.’

  This time he didn’t look into the cafe as he walked by the window, not wanting to risk another glimpse of vulnerability. For the moment all that mattered was this tip. It was too vague to be of much use as it stood. He could imagine what Dalziel would tell him to do, so he might as well do the do-able part before he got told.

  Back on his bike, he headed for the estate that housed Praesidium Security.

  Praesidium’s boss, Morris Berry, a fleshy man with sweaty palms, was unimpressed. He called up the job sheets for Friday on his computer and after a quick examination opined that, if the tip were true, they must be dealing with a singularly unambitious gang of heisters as the only job worth the risk of a hit was the rural wages round. This delivered wage packets to various small businesses across the county. OK, with Christmas bonuses included, the initial amount carried was larger than usual, but it still only amounted to thousands rather than hundreds of thousands, and of course with each delivery, it got less.

  Wield checked for himself and had to agree with the conclusion. At least it narrowed down the likely time of the hit as the gang must know that the longer they waited, the less they were going to get. Berry laughed and asked what made him think crooks were that clever. This lot must be really thick to contemplate attacking one of his state-of-the-art vans with the latest tracker devices installed so he knew their exact location all the time.

  He demonstrated this with a computerized map of Yorkshire which showed van-shaped icons flashing away at various locations. Then he zoomed in on one of them.

  ‘There we are, Van 3 on the A1079 approaching The Fox and Hen. If the bastard stops there, he’s fired!’

  The bastard, happily for him, kept going. Wield, impressed enough to have even more doubts about Lee’s tip, glanced at his watch. Jesus, it was two o’clock. Time for a pint and pie in what should by now be the CID-free zone of the Black Bull.

  Peter Pascoe felt nervous. Despite all his assurances first to Ellie then to the Fat Man that the Linford case was well under control, he still had misgivings. At the heart of them stood Marcus Belchamber, advocate solicitor, of what was generally regarded as Yorkshire’s premier law firm, Chichevache, Bycorne and Belchamber.

  It was universally acknowledged that if you wanted to sue your loving gran for feeding you toffees at five to the detriment of your pancreas at thirty, or if you wanted rid of your spouse but not your spouse’s assets, you retained Zoë Chichevache. If you wanted to draw up a commercial contract which would leave you keeping your fortune when all about you were losing theirs and blaming it on you, you retained Billy Bycorne. But if you simply wanted to stay out of jail, you sent for Marcus Belchamber.

  He was of course an ornament of Yorkshire society, exuding reliability and respectability. His standing as a minor man of learning, particularly in the field of Roman Britain, was unassailable. Even his one approach to flashness was an unobtrusive learned jest in that he drove a Lexus bearing the numberplate JUS 10, which, if you took the digit 1 as letter I could be translated as Behold the Law!

  Dalziel had a dream. ‘One day the bastard ’ull overreach himself and I’ll have his bollocks for breakfast.’

  But, in the private opinion of the Fat Man’s colleague, such a culinary treat was unlikely ever to be on the menu. Why should one who could so easily gather the golden apples free ever risk lending his clients his arm to shake the tree?

  And today Belchamber was appearing for the accused, Liam Linford.

  Pascoe had been in on this case almost from the start, which was late one November night when John Longstreet, twenty-six, taxi driver, had arrived home from his honeymoon with his wife, Tracey Longstreet, nineteen. Home was a flat in Scaur Crescent on the Deepdale Estate. Because the street in front of the flats was lined with cars, Longstreet had parked opposite. As he un
loaded the cases, his young wife, eager to enter her new home, had set out across the road, pausing in the middle of it to turn and ask him if their honeymoon had left him so weak he needed a hand.

  As he started to reply to the effect that he’d soon show her how weak he was, a car came round the corner at such speed it threw his wife ten feet into the air and thirty feet forward so that she crashed down on the windscreen of the braking vehicle, slid along the bonnet and rolled off under the wheels. The low-slung machine trapped her beneath the chassis, dragging her along the road for two hundred yards before finally scraping itself free of what remained, and accelerating away into the night.

  Pascoe first saw John Longstreet forty-five minutes later at the City Hospital. He was advised by the attendant doctor that he was in such deep shock it was pointless talking to him. Indeed, when Pascoe, ignoring the advice, took a seat next to the man the only coherent phrase he managed to get out of him was ‘black skull’ repeated over and over.

  But for Pascoe it was enough. He put it together with another phrase elicited from the one extremely distant independent witness to the effect that it was a ‘yellow sporty job going a hell of a lick’, and he set off towards the substantial residence of Walter Linford.

  Wally Linford was an entrepreneur who’d ostensibly made his fortune out of a travel company in the loadsa-money eighties, but in CID it was known this side of proof that his true metier was the financing of crime. Not directly, of course. Projects would be vetted, proposals assessed, terms agreed, at some distance from the man himself. And his approval would never be written, indeed often not spoken, but just made manifest in the form of a nod. If things went wrong, Wally stayed right, able to enjoy the fruits of his investments and bask in the respect and approval of his fellow citizens, to whom he appeared as a fair employer, a generous supporter of good causes, and a loving father.