by Bill Kitson
‘Mike seems very subdued these days. I was talking to Alan about him last night, and he reckons it’s caused by Mike having to work with us all the time.’ She laughed. ‘I managed to put him straight on that score, but I think there’s more to it, don’t you? Let’s face it, Clara, you know him better than anyone.’
‘You’re right, Lisa, he’s changed a lot, and it’s all down to what happened eighteen months ago. I don’t think Mike’s got over that. OK, I know he’s been smitten by many a pretty face, and on several occasions has had a serious fling with someone, but he’s always got over it quickly, bounced back when another beauty catches that roving eye of his, but this time it’s different. He’s lonely, if you ask me. Daniel is a great distraction, but he’s away at school most of the year, and as he grows up he’s becoming less dependent on his father, both physically and emotionally. Meanwhile, Mike is stuck out in the wilds with only his thoughts for company. I know what he really needs, but politeness prevents me from saying it.’
Lisa grinned. ‘You mean a tasty blonde to warm his bed?’
‘I don’t think he’d be too worried about the hair colour, but you’ve got the picture.’
As she was speaking, the door was pushed open and Viv Pearce entered clutching three coffee mugs. ‘What are you two gossiping about?’ he asked.
‘We were talking about Mike,’ Lisa explained.
‘Lianne bumped into him in Netherdale. She said he looked a bit down,’ Viv remarked.
‘Ah, yes, the new Mrs Pearce. How is she now you’ve actually married her?’ Lisa wanted to know.
‘She’s fine. Nothing’s different now, except she wears a ring.’ Viv looked quite disappointed.
‘DC Pearce, that’s not what we’re discussing. We tolerated the build-up to your wedding, and the aftermath, for long enough. It’s time for a change of topic. And, just remember this; if you hadn’t insisted Mike went on your stag do to Spain, he wouldn’t be in the state he’s in.’
Viv looked suitably rebuked.
Clara turned back to Lisa. ‘I honestly don’t know which is worse,’ her tone was despairing. ‘Mike bouncing around the place like a hyperactive Don Juan on steroids, or mooning about like Casanova with erectile dysfunction.’
Lisa, who was drinking coffee at the time, almost choked at the description. After patting her back vigorously, Pearce unfolded the newspaper he had brought. ‘Seen this?’ He passed the paper to Clara.
She glanced at the front page of the Netherdale Gazette, her face a blank. ‘What am I supposed to be looking for?’
‘Sorry, it’s on the inside. Page five.’
Her eyes were drawn immediately to the striking good looks of the woman whose photograph dominated the page under the headline, “Gazette’s New Editor Vows to Maintain the Family Tradition.”
Lisa was unable to see the article from her seat. ‘What’s it about?’ she asked.
‘Becky Pollard has taken over as editor of the Gazette.’
‘Becky Pollard. Weren’t she and Mike — er — you know?’ Lisa asked.
‘They were indeed. Very much “you know”, and I reckon for once in his life, Viv’s actually got it right. If anyone can arouse Mike’s flagging Lothario streak, Becky is just the woman to do it. We knew she was planning to return from London.’
‘Do you think I should leave the paper on his desk with the article on view?’ Pearce asked.
‘No, I think that would be a little too obvious. Mike is supposed to be a detective, and I’m sure he’d work out your ulterior motive. I think we should let nature take its course — and leave human nature to do the rest.’
* * *
At the same time as Lisa and Clara were talking about him, Nash pulled up outside his destination. He stared at the smart, modern building apprehensively, wondering if he was doing the right thing. It was no contest, of course it was the right thing to do, no matter how uncomfortable or painful the outcome. He got out of the car, removed a small holdall from the boot, and headed for the entrance of Helmsdale Leisure Centre.
The automatic doors swished open as he approached, the twin plates of glass sliding to either side. He walked in and headed for the crescent-shaped reception desk. ‘I’ve an appointment with Toni,’ he told the woman behind the counter.
A voice behind him said, ‘I’m Toni, and you must be Mr Nash, correct?’
Chapter Six
When they eventually got the test results back, the forensics laboratory report confirmed that Georgina Drake had been heavily sedated. It also confirmed the presence of seminal fluid, but from two donors, not one. Nash read the report and told Clara, ‘The lab’s DNA testing failed to match the semen samples to any recorded on the national database. And that,’ he added with a wry smile, ‘leaves us no further forward.’
‘Samples?’ Lisa asked. ‘Surely the samples would be mixed?’
‘Yes, apparently Miss Drake had sex with two men before she was murdered. The fluid might mix, but the DNA strands don’t,’ Nash added by way of explanation. ‘Whether that means she died happy, I don’t know.’
‘What about the sedation?’ Mironova asked.
Nash glanced at the report on his computer screen. ‘She was sedated to such a degree that Mexican Pete believes she would probably not have recovered. Either way, by removing her heart, he made sure she wouldn’t.’
‘He, or she,’ Clara pointed out, ‘the killer could have been a woman.’
‘I bow to your defence of sexual equality,’ Nash smiled. ‘Given what the professor said about the hatred involved, I think we should begin by trying to find out all we can about Georgina Drake’s personal life. Viv’s already started on that.’
* * *
A few days later, Mironova walked into Nash’s office. Nash saw the frown on her face. ‘I’ve just taken a phone call from the head librarian,’ she told him.
‘You make him sound like a character from Happy Families.’
‘He does a bit, I suppose. Anyway, he told me that one of the tenants from those flats opposite the library came in to change her books this morning and commiserated with him about Miss Drake. When he told her what a shock it was finding the body, she said she hadn’t realized he was the one who discovered it; she thought the body had been found by the delivery driver.’ Clara paused. ‘The point is there was no book delivery on Monday. Their new stock doesn’t arrive until Wednesdays.’
‘Why wasn’t that picked up with the house-to-house enquiries?’
‘I checked with the uniform lads and they told us the woman must have been out. There was no reply when they knocked on that door and no one’s been back since to tie up the loose ends.’
An hour later, Nash and Mironova were seated in the lounge of the flat which took up one floor of a four-storey brick building, part of a terrace overlooking the library. The tenant, a lively-looking woman who Nash gauged to be in her late fifties, made her statement calmly. ‘I always sit in the bay window on a morning,’ she gestured towards it. ‘I do the crossword and have my breakfast there. It’s especially nice on sunny days.’
Nash looked out of the window, from which he had an excellent view across the car park to the single-storey library building. The staff entrance, which doubled as a delivery door, was on that side. As an observation point, that window could hardly have been bettered.
‘Would you tell us exactly what you saw?’
‘It would be somewhere between seven-thirty and eight o’clock, I suppose. I heard the sound of an engine. Normally, I might have missed it, because I have the radio on as a rule, but the usual presenter is away and I can’t stand the replacement. I looked up in time to see a white van drive across the car park. I didn’t think anything of it until it reversed.’ She paused and added, ‘It had those bleeping things.’
‘Audible warning devices,’ Clara explained. ‘Mind you, I think “bleeping things” is just as good a description.’
‘That made me pay attention, because the usual driver doesn’t bother
reversing. I saw the driver get out and assumed he was delivering. Is that why you’re here? Wasn’t he delivering books?’
‘The librarian told us there was no book delivery that Monday,’ Nash told her gently, allowing her to work out the implication for herself.
‘In that case, what was he . . . ? Oh! You think I saw the killers?’ She sounded more excited than shocked.
‘Killers?’ Clara asked a split second before Nash could speak.
‘Yes, there were two of them — driver and co-driver. I couldn’t see what they took out of the van because they were as far up to the entrance as they could get. They’d opened the van doors, and besides which, the roof of the van was in the way.’ She shuddered. ‘I’m rather glad I couldn’t see.’
‘Did you get a good look at them? Good enough to give us a description? Or the van. I know you said it was white. What about the make, or size?’
The woman frowned. ‘It might have been a Ford Transit, but I can’t be sure. It was certainly that size.’
‘And the people in the van, can you remember what they looked like?’
‘I’ll do the best I can, although I’m not sure how much help it will be.’ The woman thought for a moment. ‘They were both fairly young, I’m sure of that, certainly not as old as the usual delivery man. Probably late twenties or early thirties; I’m going by the way they moved as much as anything. The driver had a baseball cap on, so I can’t say what colour his hair was, and dark clothing. The passenger was dressed the same, which made me think it was some sort of uniform, but there were no markings or logos on either of them.’ The woman paused, before adding, ‘I may be wrong, but the passenger could have been a woman. There again, I wasn’t paying close attention, so it could equally have been a teenage boy, I suppose.’
* * *
Two days later, the team was assembled in the CID suite at Helmsdale. They had been joined by Detective Superintendent Jackie Fleming, who was based at Netherdale HQ, and who, in the absence of the chief constable, was in overall charge. Nash, however, ran the meeting. He began by asking DC Pearce, ‘Tell us what you’ve found out about Georgina Drake, Viv.’
As the recognized computer expert, Pearce was usually deputed to trawl for information electronically. Certainly in this instance, as their civilian support officer, Tom Pratt, was away on holiday.
‘Her full name is Georgina Helen Drake. She was born in Bishopton, lived there almost all her life. Her parents are both dead. She was educated at Bishopton Grammar School, but unfortunately there’s nobody there who remembers her. I checked our files and there’s nothing much about her, certainly nothing adverse. Although there is one item that might be worth noting, I’ll come to that in a minute. As far as the official record goes, the only thing she’s done wrong is get a speeding fine and an endorsement.
‘I did find something else, but it was in someone else’s file, not hers. I was tipped off to it by something one of her former neighbours said. The woman lived across the road from the Drake house, and she told me that when Georgina was younger, she got involved with what she described as “some right rum folk”.’
‘What did she mean by that?’
Pearce grinned. ‘She didn’t mince her words. She said Georgina didn’t have any boyfriends when she was a teenager. She wasn’t exactly ugly, but she wasn’t too pretty either. She also reckoned Mr and Mrs Drake were extremely strait-laced and kept her on a very short lead. Anyway, by the time she was approaching her eighteenth birthday, as the neighbour put it, “Georgina was gagging for it, and would have spread her legs for any man who offered” — her words, not mine.
‘The upshot was that she met a character called Ben Kane, who is known to us. She moved in with him. He had a flat in Netherdale at the time. Kane’s file doesn’t make very pleasant reading. He wasn’t exactly a neo-Nazi, but he was as close to it as makes no difference. He was involved in an anti-immigration protest in Leeds that ended up with an Asian man being beaten up. Kane was convicted of the assault, although he protested his innocence. He got sentenced for his trouble. It was while Kane was inside that the affair fizzled out.’
‘What happened to Kane?’
‘He’s still around. There’s no indication that he’s involved in politics these days, and he certainly hasn’t been in trouble since that one offence. He lives and works in Netherdale. However, there’s no suggestion that he and Georgina ever made contact again. After she finished with Kane, Georgina moved back home for a short time. Her father was on the point of taking early retirement on medical grounds, so she had to combine her duties as a librarian with those of carer, which I don’t suppose gave her much chance for a social life.’
‘What did her father do for a living?’ Nash asked.
‘He was a boffin; worked in the laboratory at Bishopton Engineering. After her parents died, she moved to where she lives — lived, up to her death,’ he corrected himself, ‘and that’s about all I’ve been able to discover about her.’
‘Kane might be worth interviewing, if only to rule him out. I can see he might have a grudge against Georgina. Going by what we found at her flat; it’s fairly obvious her neo-Nazi sympathies didn’t end when her affair with Kane did. Quite the opposite. And that raises a lot of questions about both her and the sort of characters she consorted with. Apart from the vague descriptions her neighbour gave us, we’ve still no clue as to who they might be. I think we should have a word with our local Special Branch man and see if he can shed a little light into that murky corner.’ Nash made a note on his pad. ‘We ought to re-evaluate Georgina Drake in the light of what we know about her, rather than the outside opinion.’
* * *
Ben Kane was willing to attend Netherdale HQ for an interview, and Nash was glad he hadn’t formed a preconceived impression of him from the information supplied by Pearce. The man was nothing like the fascist thug portrayed in his file. Quiet, mild-mannered, almost apologetic, he seemed glad to talk about his association with the dead woman, and from the way he spoke, Nash guessed the man’s statement was somewhat of a cleansing exercise.
‘I was young and naive where women were concerned when I met Georgina. At first it was wonderful. I thought I’d struck gold. Imagine having a woman who can’t get enough of you; a woman who wants you morning, noon, and night.’ He glanced across at Lisa Andrews, who was sitting in on the interview with Nash. ‘I’m sorry to be so explicit,’ he apologized, ‘but there’s no polite way to put it. I was so smitten, it took some time for the penny to drop, and I realized that what Georgina wanted wasn’t me, but what I had between my legs. And even that wasn’t enough for her. When I said she couldn’t get enough, I found out that she couldn’t get enough of any man. Sometimes more than one at a time.’
‘You’re saying Georgina Drake was a nymphomaniac?’
‘Up to a point, I suppose so. Men had to meet her requirements. They had to be the right stock, good British stock, untainted by any deformity, such as colour or racial degeneracy.’ Kane held up his hands. ‘Those are her words. Once I learned what she was like, I wanted out, and told her so, but before that happened, I got arrested for that Leeds demo fiasco. The prosecution made out that I was the instigator, and that I’d been seen beating the guy up. I wasn’t able to prove it, but I wasn’t even in Leeds on that day.’
Kane sounded convincing, but it was asking a lot to accept the word of a convicted man with no evidence to back up his claim. ‘How do we know you’re telling the truth? The file on you is fairly specific. How do we know you’re not still the racist thug that file suggests?’
Far from taking offence, or reacting aggressively, Kane smiled. ‘Perhaps this might help.’ He reached into the hip pocket of his jeans and produced his wallet. He flipped it open to reveal a photo inside the clear plastic sleeve. Looking over Nash’s shoulder, Lisa saw that the photo was of a family group. Alongside Kane was an extremely pretty Asian girl. Each of them had a child balanced on their knees. The elder, a girl, would be about three years
old, Lisa guessed, her younger brother about eighteen months. Their likeness to both parents was strikingly obvious.
Nash looked across at Kane. ‘Does she know about your past?’
‘Of course she does, she knew from the beginning, before we were involved with one another. I wouldn’t hide anything from Anita, especially something as important as that.’
‘How did you meet?’ Lisa asked.
‘It was in Good Buys supermarket in Netherdale, not long after I was released from prison. I’d been knocking on doors, looking for work. That is a very depressing experience when the most recent entry on your CV is a prison record. After a couple of weeks of trying, one late afternoon I was well and truly fed-up with life, and I headed for the in-store cafe to get something to eat. Little did I know it, but going into that cafe was the best move I ever made. Anita was restaurant manager at the time, and they were very busy. The poor girl was rushed off her feet, because two staff members were absent. She was trying to deal with some irate customers who were angry because they were being kept waiting and they could see vacant tables that hadn’t been cleared or wiped over. I reacted instinctively. I grabbed a tray and a cloth and within a couple of minutes I’d got four tables ready for people to sit down. Anita was able to concentrate on serving them.
‘Later, when things quietened off, we got talking and she offered me a job. I had to tell her about my record then, but she managed to square it with her boss. I found out later she threatened to leave and asked him how he fancied running the restaurant. Working together, we became friends, and eventually realized we loved one another.’
‘Do you still work there?’
‘I do. I’m now restaurant manager,’ he said, proudly. ‘Anita can only work part-time, because of the children, so she’s moved to work on the shop floor as one of the supervisors. She does the evening shift, after the restaurant closes, so I get to look after the kids. That also means we both get to spend time with them every day.’ He shrugged. ‘It works pretty well.’