Dead And Buried (Cooper and Fry)

by Stephen Booth

  Matt watched his daughters busy with their grooming equipment.

  ‘That blasted horse costs a fortune,’ he grumbled. ‘It eats its own weight in hay and oats every day, and doesn’t produce a thing. And hay isn’t cheap this year, as you know.’

  Matt looked tired. It was a busy time of year for farmers. Not that any time of year wasn’t busy. That was what Matt would have told him, if he’d been silly enough to ask.

  But Ben didn’t need telling – his childhood at Bridge End had been ruled by the seasons. Not the usual seasons known as spring, summer, autumn and winter, but lambing, shearing, harvest, ploughing and all the other jobs in the endless round of activities that a farm demanded.

  ‘Well, I spoke to a few of the blokes who were in the Young Farmers back then,’ said Matt. ‘They’re not quite so young as they were, of course. But then none of us are. And some of them aren’t even in farming any more.’

  ‘What did they say?’

  ‘I told them you were asking about the Pearsons. They were aware of the couple in the bar, because they were strangers. I think we were all aware of them.’

  ‘Who did you talk to?’

  ‘I’m not giving you names.’

  ‘This isn’t a game, Matt. I’m trying to find out what happened to two tourists who went missing near the Light House and have never been found. They might be dead. The smallest bit of information could be useful to us right now.’

  ‘I know, I know. I’ve heard all that before. But there’s a question of loyalty, you see. I think you’ve forgotten that.’

  Ben stared at him, feeling suddenly frightened by the huge gulf that had opened up between them. It had been widening for years, but now its extent was terrifying. It was as if he’d just looked up from his feet and found that the earth had opened in front of him. A yawning chasm was staring him in the face, a gulf far too wide to cross.

  Sometimes it felt as though everything had changed since the death of their mother. In the years of her illness, Isabel Cooper had been the glue holding the family together. Without her, they had fragmented and gone their different ways. Now they hardly even knew how to communicate.

  ‘Who did you turn to when there was that incident last year?’ said Ben coldly.

  ‘Me? No one. It was Kate who rang you. And it was your friend Diane Fry who got me out of a cell.’

  Of course the problem was that they had never really talked about that night. Now its memory lay between them, shocking and impossible to ignore, like a pool of blood on the carpet.

  ‘You know they wouldn’t let me get involved,’ said Ben.

  Matt nodded abruptly. ‘Yes, because they thought there would be a conflict of loyalties. Isn’t that right? Don’t they give that as the reason? You don’t really understand it, though, do you? To you, it’s just procedure, a form of words, all written down in the rule book. To me, loyalty is very real.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘So you see, you’re going to have to trust me. If you can’t do that, Ben, it’s just tough.’

  ‘Matt, it’s not a problem.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘So what did you notice about the Pearsons?’

  Matt reacted with a clumsy jerk, as if he’d been expecting the question and had tried to rehearse his response. He’d never been a good actor. Ben remembered him being cast as one of the Three Wise Men in their school nativity play, presenting his myrrh to the Baby Jesus like a robot handling a suspicious package. Wooden didn’t quite express it.

  ‘What sort of people were they?’ asked Ben. ‘Do you remember?’

  ‘Well, they weren’t noisy or anything. They kept themselves to themselves mostly. Though there did seem to be …’

  Ben looked up at the hesitation, saw from his brother’s face that Matt was trying to assemble unfamiliar thoughts and fit them to appropriate words.

  ‘There seemed to be what, Matt?’

  ‘I was going to say, there seemed to be a bit of an atmosphere between them. That’s it.’

  ‘An atmosphere.’

  ‘Yes.’

  Ben frowned. ‘Between David and Trisha? You mean they’d had an argument?’

  ‘They weren’t speaking to each other much. Just like when you’ve had a row. You know what I mean?’

  ‘Yes, I know.’

  ‘That’s what caused the atmosphere.’

  ‘So you think they’d been arguing. Just from the atmosphere.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘The atmosphere,’ repeated Ben.

  ‘Why do you keep saying it?’

  ‘Oh, just trying to take it in.’

  ‘Like I say, they’d been arguing. You could tell from the way they spoke to each other, their expressions when they looked at each other, the way they sat. Their body language, if you want.’

  ‘Their body language? Really?’

  Matt began to look sullen. ‘Well that’s what you asked me for, my impressions. I can’t say any more. If you don’t like it, it’s tough.’

  ‘Oh no,’ said Ben. ‘That’s great. I love it.’

  Cooper turned the Toyota carefully in the farmyard, and bumped his way back up the track towards the road.

  Now that he thought about it, he seemed to remember that the Light House had served Robinson’s, one of his favourite beers. He could practically taste it now. They did a strong ale that tasted of ripe malt and peppery hops, with a colour like cherry brandy. Old Tom, it was called. Some beers were seasonal and only came out for Christmas, but Old Tom had been going for ever. It wasn’t a Derbyshire ale, though. It came from just over there to the west, from what used to be Cheshire.

  Cooper wondered how many pints of Old Tom he’d sunk that night in the Light House. It made him cringe to think how much he used to drink back then, especially if he was in company like the Young Farmers or the rugby club. Matt could put a few away too.

  And that made him wonder. If he’d been a little too drunk himself to remember what had gone off, how capable was everyone else? How sober had his brother been? Not sober at all, surely. Matt wasn’t the most observant of people at the best of times. Particularly not in a social situation. He might be able to tell from half a mile off which of the ewes in his field were ready to lamb, but he didn’t notice much about people. If a friend hadn’t introduced them in the most blatant manner possible, Matt would never have been aware that he’d clicked with Kate. In emotional matters, he was like a slow old bull who had to be prodded into action.

  So why would he have come to any conclusions at all about the relationship between David and Trisha Pearson? Matt wasn’t the type who sat in a pub watching the other customers for his own entertainment. He kept his eyes on his beer glass, and talked only to people he knew. If he found himself on his own, he’d study a copy of Farmers’ Weekly, even if he’d read it before. In fact it would be fair to say that Matt Cooper went out of his way to avoid contact with strangers. If they appeared to be tourists, he was likely to look the other way. Sometimes Ben thought his brother must be afraid that any passing stranger might curse him with the evil eye.

  ‘No, that’s wrong,’ said Ben out loud. ‘That wasn’t Matt speaking. He’s been coached.’

  Later, when he was looking for a reason to explain what happened next, he decided that must have been it. He had been too absorbed with his thoughts about Matt.

  At least that was the reason he gave himself – the reason why he didn’t notice he was being followed.

  Diane Fry still had her old flat in Grosvenor Road, deep in student bedsit land. It was a place that had never felt like home. It never would do, no matter how long she stayed in Edendale. But she wouldn’t be here much longer. As soon as she was settled with EMSOU – MC, she’d be moving out. Somewhere much nearer to Nottingham. That, she promised herself.

  In fact her lease on the flat would run out in a few months, so the decision might be forced on her, she supposed. It would hardly be a wrench. She had taken the flat furnished, so her entire possessions could
be packed in a suitcase and a few cardboard boxes.

  Her old colleagues in E Division had often asked her why she didn’t find somewhere better. She could have afforded it on a detective sergeant’s salary, of course. She might have put down a deposit on a small house somewhere and tied herself to a mortgage. But tying herself down didn’t feature in her planning for the future, not in any way. Yes, there was money in the bank – but she had other purposes in mind for that.

  Fry switched on the TV and left a quiz show babbling to itself while she found a frozen pizza and slid it into the microwave. She never had much appetite when she was in the middle of a case. Her biggest problem was turning off her mind, which tended to keep ticking away, turning over and over the events of the day.

  She knew she wouldn’t get much rest tonight, not even with the help of her sleeping aids. A promethazine hydrochloride tablet would only give her a few minutes of disturbing dreams before she woke up feeling dry-mouthed and groggy. She suspected she’d been taking the tablets for much too long now for them to have any effect.

  She’d always thought of her older sister Angie as the addictive personality of the family. But at least Angie had cleaned herself up and escaped the heroin. Now she was back in Birmingham, working in a vintage clothes shop, still refusing to talk about some of the things she’d been doing in these past few years.

  Fry felt envious of her sister sometimes. She would love to be able to disappear for a while, then come back, start a whole new life and never feel she had to talk about her time in Derbyshire.

  It was funny, though, how things worked out. No matter what she did, certain aspects of Derbyshire seemed determined to keep coming back to haunt her. Deep down, Fry knew that she would never be allowed to escape completely.

  15

  ‘Well, it arrived,’ said Gavin Murfin next morning. He had his feet up on his desk, ready to soak up any attention like a basking seal.

  Cooper stopped halfway into the CID room, with his leather jacket still hung over one shoulder. He really wasn’t in the mood for Murfin this morning.

  ‘What arrived, Gavin?’

  Murfin held up a box. ‘My OBE. Special delivery by a bad-tempered bloke on a pushbike. He was disguised as our usual postman, but I reckon he must have been a royal equerry at least. I’m sure there was a corgi peeking out of his bag when he rode away.’

  ‘Oh, it’s your DJ medal. Damn, I haven’t got mine yet.’

  That made Murfin beam. ‘Priorities, mate. Someone has to get it first. So Maj chose those of us with the longest and most distinguished service, like.’

  ‘That could be it, I suppose.’

  ‘I’ll let you have a look, though.’

  ‘Cheers.’

  Cooper cradled the box carefully. The medal bore an image of Queen Elizabeth II on one side, looking a bit severe, with the inscription Elizabeth II Dei Gratia Regina Fid Def. On the reverse was a diamond symbol with the royal crest. It resembled a ten-pence piece in size, and carried the dates 1952–2012.

  They were all due to get their medals to celebrate the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. They were being presented to the armed forces, emergency services and prison service staff, as well as community support officers who had completed five full years of service in February.

  With that thought, Cooper’s eyes were drawn across the room to where Becky Hurst sat. Not everyone in the office would receive the medal. Hurst hadn’t quite completed five years. She’d moved rapidly into CID from a spell as a response officer in C Division, which was a testament to her ability. But she missed out on the qualifying date for the Diamond Jubilee medal by a week or two. He knew that it bugged her, especially when medals were being handed out to PCSOs and even to Specials, the unpaid volunteers who turned out at weekends to help at major events.

  ‘Nice,’ said Cooper. ‘Take it home with you, Gavin.’

  ‘But I thought—’

  ‘No. Take it home.’

  Murfin looked at him, and for once he didn’t object or make a sarcastic comment.

  ‘Okay, boss.’

  It was going to be hard to avoid the subject altogether during the next few weeks, as other officers received their medals. Murfin was the first, but all the medals were due to be awarded in the first half of the year. The Diamond Jubilee celebrations themselves would take place at the beginning of June. They had even moved the Spring Bank Holiday from the last Monday in May to coincide with the anniversary.

  Cooper took off his jacket and sat down at his desk, feeling that he was always skating on thin ice in some way, whatever he did. Here in the office, when he was at Bridge End Farm, when he was with Liz … Was this what life was going to be like from now on?

  ‘So tell us, Gavin,’ said Cooper, ‘what did Diane Fry do yesterday?’

  ‘She talked to the family of the old landlord from the Light House,’ said Murfin, seeming equally ready to change the subject.

  ‘Mad Maurice Wharton?’

  ‘Not him, but the wife and daughter. And she made a right mess of it, too, by all accounts.’

  ‘Oh?’

  There could only have been one source for that account, since Becky Hurst had been allocated to work with Fry. Cooper couldn’t resist a small smile of satisfaction at this evidence of how little loyalty Fry had earned for herself. Then he let the smile drop. It was an ungracious thought. He had no real reason to be jealous of Fry, did he? No, of course not.

  ‘The wife and daughter?’ he said. ‘What about Maurice Wharton himself?’

  Murfin shook his head sadly. ‘He’s in a bad way, apparently. Cancer of the pancreas.’

  ‘Ouch.’

  ‘Ouch is right.’

  ‘You know, on the way here I was trying to recall what he looks like,’ said Cooper.

  ‘Are you kidding?’ said Murfin. ‘Did you never actually see that bloke? Once seen, never forgotten. If you wanted to describe him to someone, you’d have to invent a whole new word for ugly.’

  ‘I think I do recall him now, though. A big guy, long hair growing over his collar at the back, and a fine set of jowls?’

  ‘Two fine sets of jowls,’ said Murfin. ‘I always found him a bit scary, in fact. But in a good way, if you know what I mean. Like watching a horror film to give yourself a fright when the monster appears.’

  Cooper looked at the files and found a photograph of Wharton. ‘Well I’m not sure he’s that bad.’

  ‘No, no – that doesn’t do him justice,’ said Murfin. ‘Trust me. You’ve got to see him in the flesh to get the full effect.’

  Villiers and Irvine entered the office. Cooper reminded himself that Luke had been spending all his time ploughing through the case files, reading reports, going over old witness statements. He was starting to look a bit jaded already.

  ‘Are you okay, Luke?’ he asked.

  ‘Sure.’

  Cooper looked around his team. Such as it was, they were all here.

  ‘So what do we really make of this theory that the Pearsons skipped the country?’

  ‘We?’ asked Irvine, as if surprised to be asked.

  ‘Well, give me an overview. What has everyone been saying over these past couple of years?’

  ‘Oh, pretty much everything you can imagine has been said at some time,’ said Irvine, warming up as he got the chance to share what he’d learned from all those reports. ‘In the early days, there were lots of crackpot rumours springing up, as always. People reported seeing the Pearsons in New Zealand, in Guatemala, in Florida. Someone started a Facebook page called “I’ve seen David Pearson”, with faked pictures using the shots of them issued for the press appeals. Basically, they treated David like some latter-day Lord Lucan, with Trisha as a female sidekick. Stories went round that the Pearsons had bought a villa in the Algarve, an apartment in Moscow, a council house in Inverness. David was even spotted busking on the London Underground. He’d apparently learned to play the guitar, grown a beard and gained three inches in height while he’d been missing.’
<
br />   Hurst laughed, but Irvine’s face didn’t change. His expression said it was only what he would expect from some people, who were pathetic.

  ‘Did that go on for long?’ asked Villiers.

  Irvine shook his head. ‘It was a one-month wonder. People soon got tired of it and moved on to the next craze. None of it helped us, of course. We didn’t have a hope of sifting through everything, so we just concentrated on a few of the more likely sightings. And I’m using “likely” in a very relative sense, to mean the least bizarre.’

  ‘There was nothing else? No credit card transactions, no cash withdrawals, no record of the Pearsons passing through customs or buying air tickets?’

  ‘No, none of those.’

  ‘Well, either that was a particularly good disappearing act,’ said Villiers. ‘Or they’ve been dead all this time.’

  Irvine shrugged. ‘We all know it’s possible to drop off the grid completely, if you have enough money. And the Pearsons had the money. They could have bought forged passports, new identity documents, opened bank accounts in new names. It only needs one contact to fix the whole thing.’

  Cooper flicked through the file for financial details. ‘They both left money in their bank accounts. Quite substantial amounts, too.’

  ‘The inquiry team were aware of that. They watched those accounts closely for any signs of activity, but there were no transactions other than a few standing orders and direct debits, which kept going out until the bank put a stop on them.’

  ‘So they didn’t have any money?’

  ‘On the contrary. From the evidence of fraud and embezzlement that we and HMRC uncovered in David Pearson’s business activities, there’s a large of cash unaccounted for somewhere.’

  ‘How much?’

  ‘The best part of two million pounds.’

  Villiers gave the low whistle required whenever a large amount of money was mentioned.

  ‘Wow.’

  ‘Actually, it isn’t all that much,’ said Irvine.

  ‘A cool two mil? Not all that much? What do you mean? Your salary must be a lot higher than I thought, Luke.’