Death's Door

by Jim Kelly

  ‘He played on the beach – alone?’

  ‘Well, not quite. The house was always lively in summer. Family, friends. But books were the thing for Paul. Later, politics and books. But back then, just books. Science fiction – that got him started. Clarke, Dick, Huxley. Then the classics – Austen, Dickens, Tolstoy, Conrad, Faulkner, anything he could pick up. We talked about books and politics. Thank God we had that.’

  Which was odd, thought Shaw, because he hadn’t seen a book in the house, let alone a bookcase.

  ‘But he wasn’t a book worm – not a little nerd,’ she said. ‘He loved all this – the sea, the beach. So he’d have gone down with the rest – over there? Do you see? There’s a slip of sand at low tide. The seals come in too and they used to swim with them. But Paul just used to sit; make himself a chair out of the sand. I did see him swim but it was pretty rare. Usually he was wrapped up – clothes, books, just wrapped up.’

  Shaw felt the first rain drop on his head. It felt as big as a marble, and icy.

  He didn’t even have to ask to see his room. Behind the house was the barn, half brick, the loft converted to a bedsit with shower and loo. One wall was a scrapbook of political activism – an old poster from the Grunwick dispute, the Miners’ Strike of ’82, a black and white print of Castro. The bed was unmade, like a human nest, the sheets swirled. In the corner was a mechanical poster printer and fresh pile of SOUL! placards.

  Ms Holtby flipped the window open from the bottom so that it lifted up, like the shutter on a counter, and at that moment the first lightning struck down to the marshes – forking like a synapse. The light lit the room as if it was a flashgun, and Shaw saw again what wasn’t there.

  ‘There’s no books . . .’

  ‘There’ll be a few,’ she said, flipping back the duvet. Two books: a study on green power and a biography of Ghandi.

  Shaw recognized the cellophane binding, the Dewey Decimal code number on the spine. ‘Library books?’

  ‘Always. Paul grew up in a single parent household, Inspector. No money for books. And I’ve always been a big fan of libraries – the public services. We take them for granted, don’t we? With the cuts and everything we won’t have any left in ten years. Odd, isn’t it, people always think civilization goes forward. But it can go backwards too.’ She looked at the bed, as if seeing it for the first time. ‘Libraries were an escape for both of us. So we went every week to stock up.’

  Electricity crackled in the damp air over the quayside. When he turned to look at her she’d covered her mouth with both hands. ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘It’s OK,’ he said. ‘A Saturday?’

  ‘Yes. I always drove into Wells, for the week’s shopping. Usually after lunch – no, always after lunch. Then the library. We’d be back by six because we’d stop on the way and get fish and chips for everyone. Saturday treat. So he wasn’t there that day – he couldn’t have been. How stupid of me.’

  The rain fell at last: a curtain of almost solid liquid, drumming on the hard earth, the scent of fresh water for once overcoming the tangy salt of the sea. Shaw said he’d keep in touch if there were any developments, then ran to the car, soaked before he got to the door, so he gave up, and just stood in it, his mouth open, looking up at the falling drops.

  THIRTY

  George Valentine didn’t take a seat. He stood at the duty desk in Wells-next-the-Sea police station, profoundly unhappy to be back. He’d spent ten years of his working life in this building; he’d hated each room, and the view from every window. In summer he’d watched the thin white wisp of cloud crossing the hills as the steam railway took tourists up to the shrine at Walsingham. It was a sight that had always added to a feeling of dislocation, as if his life had taken a branch line too. He’d been up to Walsingham himself once – way back – before Julie had died, before he’d been busted back to DS, before he’d been shipped out from St James’ to the sticks. By chance they’d chosen a holy day for the visit, and they’d wandered the streets of the town, watching the pilgrims, then crowded into one of the pubs for lunch. Then, on the edge of the old abbey ruins, they’d found one of the churches, the congregation bursting out, following a procession down to the shrine. So the smoke always made him angry too, for what he’d lost.

  ‘George?’

  He turned to find the station sergeant, Ken Blackmoor. He had the decency to flip up the counter flap and come round. He gave Valentine a file.

  ‘Thanks for coming – you need to see this. Frankly, you should have seen it last week. I understand if you want make a formal complaint. But I thought I’d try to save us all the trouble . . .’ He had the decency to look away.

  The file cover had a typed note pinned at the top right hand corner which read:

  ARTHUR JOHN PATCH

  Case No. 4662

  IO. DC Rowlands.

  ‘Problem is Don Rowlands was on leave and no one picked up the link.’ Sgt Blackmoor looked out the plate-glass door, which gave a view into town, so that they could just see shoppers spilling off the narrow pavements into the road. ‘So that’s a fuck up,’ he added. Above them thunder rolled, and the lights in the station seemed brighter in the gloom. ‘It won’t be the last.’

  ‘Tell me,’ said Valentine.

  Blackmoor filled his lungs, squared his shoulders. Valentine recalled that in his ten years at the nick he’d often seen Blackmoor take flak directed at his juniors. ‘Patch was burgled – end of last year. Nasty, actually. Two youngsters in the house, didn’t bother to sneak in, just turned up, cleaned him out of some silver, bit of cash. Both in balaclavas. What do the yanks call it – house invasion? Then knocked him over when he cut up a bit rough. Broke his hip.’

  Blackmoor was in his mid-fifties, but Shaw remembered that he played badminton, and kept fit. He bent down easily and picked up an ice-lolly wrapper off the fake wooden floor. ‘And?’ prompted Valentine.

  ‘And, Rowlands had organized an ID parade here at the station for this Friday morning. Clearly not much point now.’

  Valentine joined up the dots. ‘What kind of ID parade – specific suspect, or usual suspects?’

  ‘Specific. Kid called Tyler. Never been in trouble before – no record. But he’d been trying to flog a piece of silver round the backstreets of Lynn – one of those platters. It was Patch’s. Tyler said he found it in a bag on waste ground behind the station. Plus he fitted the description of the kid who’d knocked Patch down.’

  ‘How was Rowlands going to get an ID given the balaclavas?’

  ‘The old bloke had guts. Either that or he was stupid. He spat in one of the kid’s faces, so the kid knocked him down, probably thought he was out cold. But Patch was on his back, looking up, and he saw him take the hood off. Got a good look. He said he wouldn’t forget the face, and that it wasn’t one of the local kids from Creake.’

  Valentine flipped the file open. He’d get Twine to run the name through the computer, make sure there was no direct link with East Hills. But what link could there be? He hadn’t been born in 1994.

  ‘How’d we think he and his mate got out to Creake?’

  ‘Scooter. Neighbours heard the whine. Tyler’s got wheels. A provisional licence, so he shouldn’t have been carrying a pillion, but you know, sounds like he isn’t exactly a law-abiding citizen.’

  He thanked Blackmoor, took the file, and pushed through the door with his shoulder. Outside the rain had started to fall. Drops like paperweights bounced off hot pavements. Valentine shrugged himself into his raincoat, stashed the file into an inside pocket, and began to walk down towards the sea. Water ran an inch deep towards the harbour. Two children in swimsuits were stamping in puddles. He could feel Arthur Patch’s file cutting into his bony shoulder.

  Is that why the old man had died? To stop him identifying his callous, teenage, burglar? Senseless crimes happened all the time, he thought. They could happen here, in the sticks, just as naturally as in the back streets of Lynn. Which would leave their nicely honed little theory
pretty much in tatters, because it meant Arthur Patch hadn’t died because he could have identified the killer of Marianne Osbourne. But then there was the cyanide capsule: that one small spherical link between the deaths of Osbourne, Patch and Holtby. So there was a link with East Hills. There had to be.

  THIRTY-ONE

  The town smelt fresh for the first time since the heatwave had begun. The gutters ran with the rain, filling the air with the sound of falling water, despite the stretched-blue sky. The storm had blown through but gusts of wind still rocked the yachts, their masts clacking. Shaw was outside The Ship with just the road and the quay between him and the harbour. A crowd had briefly obscured the view after someone spotted a seal, taking shelter from the choppy waves in The Cut. But now the waterside was deserted. There was no table, so Shaw dragged a seat out of the pub and used the window ledge for his half pint of Guinness. He thought, for the first time, that one of the reasons he didn’t drink much alcohol – certainly not as much as his fellow detectives – was that it meant you had to spend so much time indoors. If pubs were roofless he might have had a different life.

  Squinting into the distance he realized he could just see the pines on East Hills across the marsh. The rain had cleaned the air, filtering out the dust, so that the far distance was clear, appearing to telescope the view, bringing the horizon closer. Shaw let his eye traverse it: pin sharp and no pain. He took an inch off his Guinness and closed both eyes, so that he only heard George Valentine’s arrival. The way his DS’ breath rattled in his throat was distinctive, and he produced a peculiar whistle when blowing cigarette smoke out through narrow, dry lips. Shaw heard his footsteps pass and then, a minute later, the DS returned, dragging his own metal seat, the legs screeching on the pavement.

  Shaw opened his eyes. ‘First of the day,’ said Valentine.

  They heard the church up in the town chime the half hour. The DS hadn’t touched his pint, which he held on his knee at a slightly dizzy angle so that the head threatened to spill over the rim. He told Shaw about his visit to Wells’ nick and the ID parade planned for Friday.

  ‘And that’s a motive for murder?’ asked Shaw. ‘You think this kid blew up an entire house to avoid a burglary charge?’

  ‘We can’t ignore it, Peter. And we’re not talking burglary. We’re talking GBH here – in the course of a burglary. First time up in court – OK, but I reckon he’s going down, and it isn’t going to be six months is it? More like three to five years. That’s a motive. And are we really saying this is a coincidence? Really?’

  ‘Why do we only just know this?’ said Shaw, angry because he could guess the answer.

  ‘Poor communications – Wells’ slipped up. They’re sorry.’

  ‘If it makes you feel any better,’ said Shaw, ‘which it shouldn’t, the same – or something like it – goes for Holtby, only this is definite: he didn’t die because he was a witness to the East Hills murder. His aunt told us he was on the beach that day at Morston. He was actually in Holt library every Saturday afternoon. Right little bookworm. He didn’t get back until late evening, and then the whole family had a fish supper. So unless the killer joined them for large cod and chips I can’t see we’ve got this right at all – can you, George?’

  ‘What about Osbourne: the DNA match?’

  ‘Another twelve to twenty-four.’

  A police motorcyclist and pillion edged to a stop by their chairs and Tom Hadden took off a helmet, stowed it in the carrier, slapped the rider on the back. The BMW 5,000c was gone in a thin cloud of lead and sulphur.

  ‘Classy,’ said Shaw.

  Hadden pointed at their glasses. Valentine drained his dregs, Shaw put a hand over his Guinness. The CSI man came back with a pint of cider for himself, and a third chair to join the other two. Producing a snapshot, he set it on his knee.

  ‘Who he?’ said Valentine. The face was puckish, with heavy lips, a man in his early thirties, with luxuriant hair in dark curls. But it was the eyes you’d remember, big and watery like a child’s, but wary, as if he was always watchful.

  ‘That’s Marc Grieve – Chris Roundhay’s lover. One of the seventy-four people we took off East Hills,’ said Hadden. ‘Died in 2001, RTA near Norwich.’

  Shaw picked up the picture, studying the wide, curiously frank open face.

  ‘So?’ asked Valentine. ‘We know Roundhay’s DNA doesn’t match. We know this kid’s DNA doesn’t match. What’s your problem?’

  ‘Once we had a blank on the mass screening I did a risk assessment of the seventy-four suspects: was it possible we’d made a mistake?’ said Hadden. He closed his eyes, deep in thought: ‘Clearly we needed to focus on the five men who’d died since 1994 – including Grieve. In each case we took a sample from a member of the family. Grieve’s case stands out because it was different in one significant way – he was adopted.’

  Hadden sipped his cider. ‘I’ve had a look at the file. Grieve was born shortly after his parents split up. His mother took in another man almost immediately – there was some domestic violence, social services were involved, and Grieve was taken into council care aged three months, and the boyfriend disappeared. The mother upped-sticks and went north – Newcastle. Died three years later from an overdose of methadone. The original father kept track of the boy. When Grieve was finally adopted he applied for leave to see his son, which he did, every other weekend for a few hours until he was eighteen. Over the years they kept in touch. It was from this man that we took the DNA sample which we then used as a proxy for Marc Grieve in the mass screening.’

  Musac blared from the fairground beyond the quay as a Ferris wheel began to rise into the air, the lights suddenly bright now the sun was setting. Out in the harbour navigation lights were beginning to appear.

  ‘And you think the real father might be the boyfriend – the one who disappeared?’ said Shaw. ‘And that we got the wrong man, and that Grieve might be our match for Sample X?’

  ‘Yup. Maybe. The error – if it is one – is down to me. I’m sorry.’ Hadden’s normal whisper cracked as he emphasized the apology.

  ‘Where is this boyfriend?’ asked Valentine.

  ‘Social services never got his real name,’ said Hadden. ‘Once they involved the police he was never seen again. No, there’s only one way we can be sure we’ve got Marc Grieve’s DNA, Peter: one way we can rule him out as a suspect with confidence, and that’s if we exhume his body. Twine’s put a request into the magistrates for tonight – dusk, at Lynn Cemetery. As prosecuting officer . . .’

  ‘I need to attend,’ finished Shaw.

  The evening he’d planned, with his family on the beach, seemed now like a scene from someone else’s life. Instead of the open sands, a swim after sunset he saw a narrow dark trench, the slit of the grave at his feet. He let his eyes drink in the evening light, as if he was trying to recharge a battery, because he thought he’d need the memory of the colours when darkness fell.

  ‘But Grieve’s dead, right?’ asked Valentine. ‘Even if he killed Shane White on East Hills he didn’t kill Patch, Osbourne or Holtby? What am I missing here . . .’

  Shaw stood, holding the metal chair perfectly balanced in one hand. ‘Think about Chris Roundhay’s version of events on East Hills. He said he spoke to Shane White, the lifeguard, then went back to Grieve. After that point the two of them – Roundhay and Grieve – were together until White’s blood was washing in with the tide. If Grieve’s a match for Sample X then Roundhay lied – again. So what really happened that he needed to mislead us? Maybe they both did it, maybe Roundhay held him down while Grieve put the knife in. If Grieve matches Sample X then Roundhay’s in the frame. And unlike Grieve, Roundhay’s alive.’

  ‘But why bother? My money’s still on Joe Osbourne,’ said Valentine. ‘Why don’t we just wait for his DNA result? You said twelve to twenty-four. What’s the problem?’

  ‘The chief constable’s press conference is the day after tomorrow,’ said Shaw. ‘Even if we get a usable sample off Greive’s bon
es tonight we’ll be pushed to get a result in time. My money’s still on Osbourne too, George. But if he comes back negative we need Grieve’s result by Thursday. So Tom’s right. We need to nail this. Once and for all.’

  Hadden nodded into his cider.

  Shaw thought of the first time they’d interviewed Roundhay at The Ark, on the day of the mass screening. He’d admitted telling lies in his original statement. Perhaps he’d simply replaced them with others.

  ‘Let’s pick Roundhay up, George. Get Paul to send a car round. He can join us at the cemetery. Let’s ruin his day too.’

  THIRTY-TWO

  Lynn’s municipal cemetery had been built by the Victorians outside the old line of the city walls, beyond the London Gate, on flat land running out through what had been a cordon of market gardens. At its heart stood a folly, a single church spire, the base open on all sides, so that anyone could walk in and look up into the echoing interior. Swallow nests dotted the stonework like mould, and a net stretched over the space held the desiccated corpses of fallen birds. Outside, the stonework was soot black, stained by a century of industrial pollution from the town’s bottling works, jam factories and the sugar beet plant, all of which lay downwind towards the docks.

  Shaw stood beneath the spire looking out across the gravestones feeling the space above him, the dead air trapped, seeming to press down. The view was no more uplifting: the Victorian’s vision of a peaceful, civic last resting place for the town’s dead had been ill-used by the twentieth century. The inner ring road ran along one side of the plot, the main road over the river down the other, so that now – at just past midnight – lights moved everywhere and the swish of traffic was an eternal soundtrack.

  A light cut into the darkness which cloaked the gravestones. A CSI van, a light flashing but silent, creeping through the gates and along one of the principal avenues of the necropolis, making its way towards a single lit electric lantern – the spot where Shaw had parked the Porsche beside Grieve’s grave. When it stopped shadows moved, as if the ghosts of the dead had been called to a meeting.