A Long Time Dead

by Andrew Barrett

“Good description,” he chewed.

  “His hair’s a mess.”

  Beaver laughed. “Is that it, his fucking hair’s a mess?”

  “Tall, six foot, maybe six-one. Slim, wears glasses.”

  “Well that’s better than ‘his fucking hair’s a mess’.”

  “You don’t want to fuck with me, kid. You might have a skin-head and tattoos all over your neck, but it doesn’t make you hard.”

  “What time’s he usually home?”

  “He works shifts. Better hunker down and prepare for a long wait.”

  Beaver’s eyes sparkled. “Who are you?”

  “Someone you need to stay on the right side of.”

  Out of the two, Beaver turned away first. “The equipment?”

  The man in the scuffed leather jacket reached inside a pocket with a massive gloved hand, pulled out a gun and placed it on the filing cabinet. He slid the weapon over towards Beaver.

  ‘You need the right equipment, Beaver,’ Jess had said, ‘and I know someone who knows someone with just such equipment. Get it, learn how to use it, and blow the fucker’s mind away. If you do a good job, you’ll be hearing from us’.

  He picked it up, felt its weight, and curled his hand around its knurled grip. He admired its dull shine by the diffused glow from the skylight. He sniffed it. “It’s brand new,” he said rubbing oil from the trigger into his fingers. “How come it’s brand new, I didn’t expect a brand new weapon.”

  “So give it back and I’ll be on my way.” The man held out his hand.

  “Can it be traced? I mean, it’s brand new; a used gun can’t be traced.”

  “You’re new to this game, aren’t you?” The man mocked.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “You need a brand new weapon.” He spoke slowly and deliberately. “Suppose you get caught with a used gun, suppose the police send it to ballistics—”

  “Now you’re talking shit!”

  “Am I? I know a bit about forensics, kid.”

  Beaver looked at the gun; saw the obliterated serial number. He felt its weight again and adored the power it gave him. He almost had a semi on. “Go on.”

  The man’s lips barely moved when he spoke. “If a gun is tested forensically, they can match it to any crime it was used in. You’re caught with a used gun, kid; you’re caught for its crimes.”

  “They can’t prove—”

  “Listen to yourself!” He slapped the filing cabinet and dust bounced into the air. Then he said, “You’re a bright kid, you’ve been away, you know what it’s like to have a record; it would be down to you to prove that you didn’t do whatever the gun says you did.”

  Beaver thought it over. It made sense.

  “Do you want to spend your time looking at it, or do you want something to fire from it?”

  “It don’t come with bullets?”

  “I never transport weapons and ammunition together.”

  “You don’t want to piss me about or—”

  “Put your fucking mouth to sleep, boy.” The man pointed a finger right in Beaver’s face. “Remember this; I’m doing you a favour, I don’t normally deal with street shit like you. So mind your tongue before I pull it out through your fucking nose. Clear?”

  Beaver stopped chewing, “Where’s the clip?”

  The man in the black leather jacket and dark glasses walked away from Beaver, heading for the door. “It’s in a brown paper bag hidden in the grass by the left gate post.”

  “Which gate post?” Beaver strode after him, but the man turned and stared. Beaver thought it would be a lot healthier to stay just where he was.

  “At the entrance to the farm.”

  “And what do I do if I need more ammunition? How did you know I’d only need one clip?” he shouted. A gloved hand pulled the creaking door closed behind it, and left Beaver alone thinking he’d just been rogered wholesale.

  He smacked the clip home with the heel of his hand just like they did on TV, and then slipped the weapon into the front of his belt, paused, thought better of it and tucked it into his back pocket.

  Beaver walked further into the harsh countryside, Jess’s instruction being to practice. He would fire half the clip and hope that would be enough. If nothing else, it would get him accustomed to the gun’s kick.

  Chapter Nineteen

  — One —

  When Chris arrived at Nicky’s house, Gareth, the technician from the Fingerprint Development Laboratory, was waiting outside in his car, the engine running, heater on full and wipers intermittently flicking rainwater from the screen.

  Chris recorded his time at the scene with the log-jockey, who told him that Shelby was already inside awaiting their arrival. Chris thanked him, then shook Gareth’s hand – a soft, wimpish shake, and exchanged the usual inter-departmental pleasantries. “Have you booked in?” he nodded towards the officer with the clipboard.

  “Oh yes, done that,” Gareth said. “Are we suiting up?”

  “No need. I think we have all the trace evidence we’re likely to get.”

  “Okay. Which room are we starting in?”

  Chris said, “This way. I’ll give you a hand with your kit.” Struggling with an umbilicus, something similar to a thin vacuum cleaner hose, two large aluminium boxes, a transformer and a further plastic box of goggles and black sheeting, they made it into the lounge and then stopped and listened to the shouting coming from upstairs. “Just follow the noise,” Chris said.

  “Lenny, just write the bloody thing!” Shelby was screaming.

  Chris looked at Gareth and saw the worried look on his face.

  “It’s a simple report, for God’s sake. Yes. Yes! You know the headings, I left you a pro-forma.” Shelby sank into the monotonous tone of someone reciting a list. “What risks did the offender take entering the house or using an escape route? What physical or emotional aggression was required for her to become compliant? What? I don’t bloody know; think of one yourself for a change. Yes, one more heading: Planning. Is it possible he used reconnaissance, or even had a rehearsal of some kind? And what did he do to avoid detection?” There was a growl.

  “He’s a pussycat, really,” joked Chris. “Come on, best not keep him waiting.”

  They struggled up the stairs and into the bedroom. Shelby stood at the window, phone pressed awkwardly to his ear, fingers crawling through his thin hair. It was 11.35; results were slowly coming in, but not all of them were of the positive variety that Shelby wanted. The errant next-door neighbour had been located in Wales but could shed no light on any of their questions, more intent it seemed to carry on with his holiday. No results from house-to-house, zero from the taxi companies.

  “Got that? Good. Yes. On my desk by 1600hrs because I have to have it on Chamberlain’s desk by 1800hrs. What? Never mind bloody squash!”

  Shelby hit end, rammed the phone into his jacket pocket and turned to face Chris and Gareth. He let out a sigh. “Thanks for coming,” he said with no particular enthusiasm. He patted the phone through the pocket, “I hate these things. They always know where you are, they never leave you alone, and ha, Lenny Firth suddenly turned fucking stupid on me. One more IQ point and he’d be a glass of water.”

  Chris laughed, Gareth quietly set up the equipment, plugged it into the mains and selected a filter for the Quasar.

  “All set then?” Shelby stepped aside, rubbing his hands. Chris was about to answer when Shelby’s pocket rang. “Bear with me a minute.” He walked from the room and yelled into the mouthpiece, “Yes!”

  The machine hummed as Chris flicked on the light switch, taped a black plastic bag over the window to minimise ambient light, and waited for Shelby to finish his ranting.

  “Is he always like this?” Gareth whispered.

  “Is that why you looked so worried when I pulled up outside?”

  “It showed?”

  “He is when things don’t go his way. And things are not going his way. Not these days, anyway.”

&nbs
p; Shelby came back into the room, his face long and full of disappointment. “Better find me some fingerprints, lad. Those you found, Chris, aren’t much to go on, unfortunately.”

  “You are taking the piss, I hope!”

  “Six of the nine you sent in were hers, one belonged to her brother, one was crap – Barry from the Fingerprint Bureau’s words, not mine – and the other is unidentified.”

  “Has he fed it through the AFR system?”

  “Yup, no joy.”

  “The NAFIS computer?”

  “Give him time, man.”

  Chris muttered something about incompetence, and tutted to Shelby.

  “Don’t worry, I’ve asked him to do a manual search and then to check all attending officers. I’ve arranged for someone to go to the bank and get elims from that Joanne woman. I suppose he’s doing the best he can, though it can’t come quick enough for me.”

  “Me neither,” echoed Chris. “Where’s the photographer? He was supposed to meet us here at 11.45.”

  “Anyway, get on with it lad, let’s see if we can’t find a few for him to look at when he finally arrives.”

  Much to Shelby’s disgust, Gareth placed a warning sign outside the room, closed the door and commenced the safety briefing required when using this apparatus. “This is a 400 nanometre-wavelength filter we’re using, so we need...see here on the card? We need a filter of 380 or more. Let’s check our goggles for the—”

  “Oh, get on with it, man!”

  Gareth put his goggles down and stared at Shelby.

  “What’re you waiting for, lad, get—”

  “Listen, you dragged me out here to do you a favour, Inspector Shelby, and I’m doing you that favour.”

  Shelby’s jaw went slack.

  “This safety chat I’m giving is not only obligatory under Health and Safety, but I happen to think it’s a good idea; I find being able to see quite useful. If I’ve read the card incorrectly or given you the wrong goggles – who’s blind and who’s to blame?”

  “Okay, okay, now get on with it.”

  “Sir,” Gareth said, “check your goggles for the correct frequency or I’ll have to insist you leave the room while I carry out the examination.”

  He snatched the goggles and snapped, “What’s the frequency?”

  Gareth responded, “Thank you, sir. 380 nanometre.”

  Shelby shuffled his feet and pulled the goggles on, “Right, find me some marks.”

  Gareth put his goggles on and bid Chris do the same.

  The room was in near darkness, only cracks and chinks of light slithered in through minute gaps around Chris’s makeshift blackout curtain, and more poured in through gaps around the door. It was like staring up at a midnight sky on a clear winter’s night.

  The torch, fed by the umbilicus from the main machine, spewed a cone of yellowish light at the walls. The cone was six inches across, but was magnificently bright; even with the goggles sealed onto their sweating faces the glare was atrocious. When the light illuminated an area of contamination, its reflected hue was bluish green.

  For several minutes, Gareth played the light between waist and shoulder height across two or more yards of wall before anything substantial showed itself. “Keep your goggles on,” he crossed to the main machine and selected another filter of a different frequency. “I’m placing a 420 filter into the machine,” he robotically recited, “and the 380 goggles are still safe.” He returned to the mark on the wall, trained the cone onto it and four fingerprints from a small left hand shone back at the group, almost dazzling them.

  Chris placed an adhesive arrow near the marks and that too, like the white shirts of nightclub dancers under fluorescent lights, gleamed a brilliant white.

  They continued all along one wall, finding and arrowing marks until Chris stood, gripped the small of his back and said, “Right Graham, that’s it for me. I’m off to the mortuary now; see if the PolyLight has shown up.”

  “Wouldn’t fucking surprise me if it hadn’t.”

  Gareth turned off the machine and then hurriedly gathered the goggles back into the plastic box.

  Chris’s forehead was wet through and an odour of rubber and moisture filled his nostrils. Again, the room appeared brighter, and the marks, which were so evident under the high intensity light, returned to complete invisibility again.

  Shelby continued. “You’ve got my mobile number, haven’t you?”

  “Thought you didn’t want people ringing you,” Chris smiled.

  “I want that poly thing there and working as arranged, I don’t want anybody crying off. Understood?”

  “I’ll sort it. Don’t panic.”

  Gareth skulked in the corner, cuddling his machine.

  “And ring me as soon as you’ve got any news. Any news at all.”

  “I will, don’t worry.”

  “Don’t worry, he says,” talking to no one in particular. “Where’s that sodding photographer!”

  — Two —

  Chris headed for the mortuary, past the splendour of nineteenth century buildings in the city’s centre, and out the other side where the quality plummeted into an abyss of red brick council estates.

  The midday news spilled out of the tinny van radio. News of more job cuts at a local clothing manufacturer, news of men trapped in a pothole in the Dales. Then, the newscaster’s crackling voice made an unusual appeal:

  “Police are asking for help in the murder of a local girl, Nicky Bridgestock, from Wakefield. They are anxious to trace the key to her house, which was believed to have been secured by her murderer. The single Yale key is on a ring with a distinctive fob, showing a small male figurine about an inch and a half tall, in a state of sexual excitement. If anyone knows of its whereabouts, could they please contact the Wakefield Incident Room on...”

  He parked the van in the mortuary car park and listened to the sports headlines. When they came and he heard the bad news, he screwed up the betting slip and tossed it on the van floor. He closed his eyes and banged the window with a fist. That was his last chance to make this week’s payment without having to sell anything and without having them pay another embarrassing visit at work.

  Absorbing the stillness for a moment, he collected his thoughts and prayed that his assiduous dedication came to Bell’s attention. Quickly.

  He rolled his cardigan sleeves down and covered the goose pimples on his arms, climbed from the van and trudged into the mortuary. Ann Halfpenny lounged in one of the side rooms eating a microwave lasagne and sipping coffee from a mug that bore the legend: ‘Mortuary Technician – working with a stiffy!’ It was supposed to be a rest room; it had an old black and white TV in the corner and copies of 1973 Homes and House magazines on a low heavily stained table. Torn chairs were scattered around the room, and overflowing ashtrays and countless cigarette burns gave the fawn carpet tiles a pattern.

  “Hello Annie,” Chris poked his head into the room. “Still taking the diet seriously, then?”

  She waved two fingers at him. “Want some coffee?” she asked through a mouthful of pasta.

  “Why not.” Chris chose a seat facing the car park. “Might as well relax until the man from FDL decides to show up. Can’t get staff these days.”

  “Funny, he said exactly that about ten minutes ago.” She revelled in his embarrassment and passed the cup. “He’s through there,” she pointed at the theatre, “setting his gear up. You know, Chris, he refused a cup of coffee, said he didn’t want to keep you waiting.”

  “Ah.”

  Ann laughed at the look on his face. “Drink your coffee; I’ll wash up and then I’ll pull her out of the freezer.”

  “Freezer! You’ve not bunged her in the bloody freezer?”

  “No, I haven’t. But I can’t get enough of that face of yours, deary. She’s in the fridge, you prat. Go on through, I’ll be there in a mo.”

  * * *

  “So it’s just some writing on her left hand then?”

  Chris stared at Peter Lor
d, Gareth’s colleague from FDL, and thought his hair was too damned long. “Won’t take us too long, eh?”

  “It shouldn’t be too taxing. Shall we make a start?”

  They pulled back the cloth covering Nicky’s body.

  Chris winced. Her skin was not just pale any longer, but white, clammy like a bar of soap left in cold water. Her lips were blue, her fingers almost translucent, and she felt as cold as ice. Her breasts now sagged either side of her torn rib cage, sexless.

  “Hello,” said Peter, waving a hand in front of Chris’s far away eyes, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.”

  “No, that’s fine. You didn’t startle me,” he began removing the plastic bag from Nicky’s left hand. “I’ll get the lights.”

  Ann drew down the thick black blinds and suddenly the room fell from brilliant white into mind-numbing blackness. Green shapes floated before Chris’s eyes, but all he could genuinely see was a fluorescent marker by the light switch, another by the fire extinguishers, and blinking LEDs on Peter’s flash pack.

  “Shall we try low power UV first?” Peter asked. They did, but all it succeeded in showing them was the glowing hairs on her arms and dark patches on her grey neck and thorax where her blood had stained. “I thought we’d get better results than that.”

  “Don’t worry; let’s crack on with the heavyweight gear.”

  “I heard that!” Peter’s voice boomed. No Health and Safety spiel this time; Peter threw Ann and Chris a pair of well-used goggles. “Ready?” he asked, grabbing a pair for himself.

  “Go for it.” Chris held Nicky’s arm in gloved hands while Peter played the strong yellowish light across her dead flesh.

  “If anything of value does show up, you’ll have to hold the PolyLight and I’ll take the snaps if that’s okay, Chris?”

  “Not a problem.”

  The light stroked her hand. The ink they had all seen yesterday with their naked eyes was even more discernible, appeared refined.

  “Looks like...I don’t know,” Peter spoke his words slowly, concentrating on the light source, “Looks a bit like ...‘R’? Wouldn’t you say?”

  “Can’t really make it out, do it again.”