It hadn’t worked out like that. Since he’d been arrested, he’d been locked in a holding cell and virtually ignored.
As if he didn’t matter!
As if they’d decided he was small fry, who they’d get round to when they had the time!
Even when they did eventually take him to be interrogated – on Friday morning, a full twelve hours after his arrest – there was only one man waiting for him. And while it was true that he was big enough to match the bobbies in Scuddie’s daydream, he wasn’t going to do much damage with those bandaged hands.
‘When are the others comin’?’ Scuddie asked.
‘What others?’ Woodend asked.
Scuddie lolled back in his chair. ‘The ones who’ll do the dirty work for you,’ he said.
‘Sit up straight!’ Woodend snapped.
‘You what?’
‘Sit up straight, you bastard.’
Scuddie tried to think of a smart, funny reply he could tell the boys about later, but all he could come up with was, ‘You’ll get nothin’ out of me, copper!’
And then he realized, with surprise, that while he’d been speaking he’d also been straightening his posture, just as Woodend had ordered him to.
‘Why did you attack Detective Constable Beresford?’ Woodend demanded.
‘Who’s he?’ Scuddie asked.
Woodend sighed. ‘So it’s goin’ to be like that, is it? All right, you sack of shit, why did you attack Col?’
This was getting better, Scuddie thought. This was how it was supposed to be.
‘Didn’t know he was a bobby,’ he said. ‘An’ anyway, he was the one who started it. I was only defendin’ myself.’
‘So it was just you against him, was it?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Well, your mates will certainly be relieved to learn you’ve said that,’ Woodend told him.
‘What are you talkin’ about?’
‘I should have thought that was obvious. Constable Beresford died last night, and since you were the only one actually involved in his murder, you’re the only one who’ll hang.’
‘Hang!’ Scuddie gasped. ‘What do you mean?’
‘It’s when they place a noose around your neck, make you stand on a trapdoor an’ …’
‘They’ve got rid of hangin’,’ Scuddie said, with terror in his voice. ‘I heard it on the telly.’
‘What you heard on the telly, you ignorant sod, is that they’re goin’ to get rid of it. But if we rush through your trial – an’ we will, because it’s a bobby you murdered – there’ll still be time, before the law changes, for you to have your neck stretched.’
‘It wasn’t just me. We all did it,’ Scuddie said hysterically.
‘I thought that might be the case, from the amount of bruisin’ on his body,’ Woodend said.
‘So does that make a difference?’ Scuddie moaned.
‘It certainly does. Now it won’t be just you that hangs – it’ll be the rest of the gang as well.’
‘It wasn’t our idea,’ Scuddie sobbed. ‘None of it was our idea!’
‘Then whose idea was it?’
‘Bazza’s.’
‘I need details!’ Woodend barked.
‘Will … will that make a difference to what happens to me?’
‘It’s possible.’
‘Bazza said we should beat Col up at exactly nine o’clock.’
‘An’ then wait for the police to arrive?’
‘No, he … he said we should get away as fast as we could.’
‘Then why didn’t you?’
‘Once we’d started, we couldn’t stop. It was so …’
‘Excitin’?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Tell me about the tramp you beat up.’
‘Is he dead as well?’
‘No.’
‘Bazza told us to beat him an’ all.’
‘Him? Or any old tramp?’
‘Him. Bazza pointed him out to us. He said we should make sure he was out of action for a few hours.’
‘Right, that’s it. They’ll take you back to your cell now,’ Woodend said.
‘Don’t … don’t you want to know anythin’ else?’
‘Nothin’ that scum like you can tell me.’
For a moment, Woodend considered informing Scuddie of the fact that Beresford had come out of his coma, but he quickly rejected the idea. It would do the little bastard good to stew in his own juice for a few hours, he thought.
Woodend didn’t like being driven by anyone else, but his hands were in such a state that there was no way he could hold the steering wheel, and so it was a police driver who took him to the morgue.
Dr Shastri met him at the door.
‘So what’s this important new information you’ve got for me?’ Woodend asked immediately.
‘Good morning, Dr Shastri. I apologize for destroying your beauty sleep by sending you two cadavers in a single night,’ the doctor said.
Woodend grinned. ‘Good morning, Dr Shastri. I apologize for destroying your beauty sleep by sending you two cadavers in a single night,’ he dutifully repeated. ‘Now what’s this important new information?’
‘It concerns the second victim, Barry Thornley. How do you think he came to be on fire?’
‘I should have thought it was obvious how he came to be on fire. He accidentally spilled some of the petrol on himself, an’ when he was burning the poor bloody tramp, he set himself alight, too. Isn’t that right?’
‘I will answer that question in a moment, but let me ask you another one first,’ Dr Shastri said. ‘I found traces of fibre on Thornley’s head. Did they, perhaps, come from one of your stylish sports coats?’
Woodend grinned again. No one else, in the whole of Whitebridge, would ever have described any of his sports coats as stylish.
‘Probably,’ he said. ‘I wrapped it around him when I was tryin’ to put out the fire.’
‘And were burned yourself, as a result. I do not think there are many men who would run such personal risk in an attempt to save the life of a particularly nasty murderer.’
‘To tell you the truth, I didn’t even think about what he’d done. I saw he was on fire, an’ I did my best to put that fire out.’
‘So like you,’ Dr Shastri said. ‘And, in this case, at least, virtue has been its own reward.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘If you had stood by and done nothing, the damage to Thornley’s head would have been much more extensive.’
‘Yes, that’s obvious enough.’
‘And then, even a brilliant physician, such as I am myself, would have been unable to detect the fact that shortly before he was set on fire, he received a blow to the head.’
‘Are you sayin’ that somebody knocked him unconscious?’
‘Possibly, but I suspect not,’ Dr Shastri said. She smiled. ‘You are always trying to persuade me to do your detective work for you, you lazy man, and this time I think I will indulge you.’
‘Go right ahead,’ Woodend said.
‘If the person who struck Thornley on the head simply wanted him dead, why not hit him as hard as he possibly could? It would be much safer, because Thornley was what I believe you would call “a big strapping lad”.’
‘He was, an’ I would,’ Woodend agreed.
‘Even if his murderer intended to burn him, his task would have been made much easier if Thornley had been unable to resist.’
‘Agreed.’
‘But his killer does not hit him with the maximum force he can summon. Instead, he delivers a blow calculated only to stun him, and when he pours the petrol over him, he restricts himself to pouring it over the trunk and legs. Now why was that?’
‘So that Bazza could do just what he did do!’ Woodend said.
‘Just so,’ Dr Shastri replied. ‘You did not believe that Thornley had set fire to himself because you are stupid – you believed it because that is exactly what the killer wanted you to be
lieve.’
There may, at some time in the dim and distant past, have been gloomier lunchtimes spent around the table in the Drum and Monkey, Woodend thought – but he was finding himself hard pressed to remember one.
The Dr Shastri Effect – the magical spell she wove, which seemed to imbue even the most dismal situation with a little light – had worn off, and black depression had followed.
They had been given their opportunity to find the killer, he told himself – and they had failed.
It could be argued, of course, that it was not their fault – that the killer had seen his opportunity and had grasped it with both hands. Yes, it could be argued that way, but it didn’t alter the fact that two men had died, and that one of them – at least – had been completely blameless.
To make matters worse, he was in charge of a team of the walking wounded, and, with his bandaged hands, was one of them himself.
The doctors were predicting that Beresford would make a full recovery, but it would be quite a while before he was fit for duty again.
In Monika’s case, it was her mind, rather than her body, that he was worrying about. She had endured so much – the horrors of war-torn Europe, the sexual abuse from her stepfather, the feeling of alienation as the only Polish kid in an English school – and having to associate with Ron Scranton, a man who embodied most of the things she hated, was putting a terrible strain on her.
And then there was Bob Rutter.
What the bloody hell was he even doing there at the table? It was true that his resignation from the police was still pending, but his de facto resignation from the team was now entering its second week.
‘I want to help if I can, especially after what happened to Colin Beresford,’ Rutter said, reading his thoughts. ‘I want to see if, this last time, we can work the old magic together.’
Woodend sighed. Well, why not? he wondered. What possible harm could it do?
‘The reason that the killer murdered Barry Thornley in the way he did was because he hoped it would fool us into believin’ that Bazza alone was responsible for the deaths of the tramps,’ he said. ‘But the reason he had to murder him at all was that he knew we were closin’ in, and he saw Bazza as the weak link in the chain. Are we agreed on that?’
Rutter nodded. ‘If Bazza knew that Colin Beresford was a policeman, then we can be almost certain that the killer – the man who was pulling Bazza’s strings – knew as well.’
Woodend turned to his sergeant. ‘Is that how you see it, an’ all, Monika?’ he asked.
‘Why do you keep calling him “the killer”?’ Paniatowski demanded angrily. ‘It’d be much easier – and quicker – to call him Scranton!’
‘We can’t be sure that Scranton is our man,’ Woodend said gently. ‘An’ until we are, I’d be happier if we all just called him the killer.’
But the problem was that Monika was sure, he thought.
No, that wasn’t strictly true, he corrected himself. It wasn’t so much that she was sure, as that, since she’d read the British Patriotic Party’s pamphlet, she wanted it to be Scranton – needed it to be Scranton.
‘So the next question is, will the killin’ stop now?’ Woodend continued. ‘An’ if it does stop, will that be because he’s no longer got anybody to do his dirty work for him? Or because he’s achieved what he set out to achieve?’
‘Given what happened to Bazza, I think it’s clear enough that he’s prepared to do his own dirty work, if he has to,’ Rutter said.
‘Unless he’s already recruited someone else to take Bazza’s place – and it was that new recruit who killed Thornley,’ Paniatowski said.
‘Now that is a depressin’ possibility,’ Woodend said.
‘It’s more than a possibility, if you ask me,’ Paniatowski retorted. ‘Scranton’s got any number of thugs who’ll do his bidding.’
‘By fixatin’ on Scranton like that, you’re closin’ too many other doors,’ Woodend warned her.
‘Why do we need to even consider any other doors, when we’re already standing in front of the right one?’ Paniatowski shot back, aggressively.
‘Monika, please, if you’ll just try to be objective for a minute—’ Woodend began.
‘Why don’t we move on to something else?’ Rutter interrupted. ‘Something that there’s a remote possibility we can all agree on?’
‘Good idea,’ Woodend said gratefully.
‘Monika?’ Rutter asked.
‘If there is such a thing as an aspect we can agree on,’ Paniatowski replied.
Rutter cleared his throat. ‘Are we all willing to accept that last night’s murder was not a random act?’ he asked.
‘Yes, I think we are,’ Woodend said, glancing at Paniatowski for confirmation. ‘By yesterday afternoon – at the latest – Big Bazza already knew who the victim was going to be. That’s why he sent out his gang to beat up Pogo, who’d been acting as the victim’s unofficial bodyguard.’
‘So what we have to ask ourselves is whether the other two victims were also so carefully targeted,’ Rutter continued. ‘And if they were, why were they? Was it because they had something in common with the third victim?’
I’ve missed your contributions to these meetings, Bob, Woodend thought. And not just your contributions – I’ve missed you.
‘We already have some background on the first two victims, but not enough to tie them together in any way,’ he said. ‘If we could identify the third, we’d have widened the field an’ it might just be possible to start makin’ connections.’
‘Do we have any information at all on the third victim?’ Rutter asked.
‘Nothin’ solid,’ Woodend admitted. ‘Remind us what your mate Pogo had to say about him, Monika.’
At the mention of Pogo’s name, Paniatowski felt a slight stabbing pain in her chest. She wondered where he was now, and prayed that somewhere – somehow – he would find another purpose.
‘Still with us, Monika?’ Woodend asked gently.
‘Yes, I was just collecting my thoughts,’ Paniatowski replied.
She told Woodend and Rutter about Brian’s fuzzy-minded mission, and how, half the time, he couldn’t even remember the name of the town he was convinced held the answers. She mentioned his interest in the Engineers’ Arms, and his enthusiasm for the shiny black Bentley, which had turned out to be ‘not quite the right shape’.
‘Not quite the right shape,’ Rutter repeated thoughtfully.
And Woodend saw a gleam and intelligence in his eyes which had been missing for quite a while.
‘He told Pogo he’d known a killer, but that had been a long time ago,’ Paniatowski continued. ‘Oh, and he also said that Brian wasn’t his real name – that he’d actually been christened Brunel.’
‘Brunel!’ Rutter exclaimed.
‘Does that mean anythin’ to you?’ Woodend asked, with a hint of hope in his voice.
‘He must have been named after Isambard Kingdom Brunel, the great nineteenth-century engineer,’ Rutter said.
‘So what?’ Woodend asked, disappointedly. ‘Folk are always namin’ their children after famous people. One of Joan’s cousins even called her kid Elvis – the poor little bugger!’
‘Are you saying that his real name might be why Brian was so interested in the Engineers’ Arms, Bob?’ Paniatowski asked.
Rutter shook his head. ‘No, I think there could be more to it than that.’
‘Let’s hear it, then,’ Woodend suggested.
Rutter shook his head for a second time. ‘I’ve got a vague idea in my head, but it’s not ready to come out yet. Can you give me a couple of hours to chew it over, to see if I can make any sense of it?’
‘Aye, there’s no rush,’ Woodend said.
And there really wasn’t, he thought. Rutter’s idea – like most of the ideas they’d managed to come up with on this bloody, bloody case – would probably do no more than lead them up a blind alley.
There was one more point which needed to be raised, he remi
nded himself – and he wasn’t looking forward to it at all.
‘When are you seein’ Ron Scranton again?’ he asked Paniatowski.
‘Tonight, for dinner and dancing,’ Monika told him, with the disgust more than evident in her voice.
‘You don’t have to do it, you know,’ Woodend said, remembering he’d used almost exactly the same words to Colin Beresford.
‘I want to do it,’ Paniatowski replied.
And that was what Beresford had said, too.
Woodend automatically lifted his arm to check his watch, and found himself staring at thick surgical bandages.
‘When I saw the police doctor this mornin’, he told me that I needed to take an afternoon rest,’ he informed Rutter and Paniatowski. ‘So I told him that there was no time for afternoon rests durin’ a murder inquiry. He wasn’t impressed.’
Paniatowski smiled. ‘I’m not surprised,’ she said.
‘In fact, he was so unimpressed that he said that if the only way to make sure I rested was to certify me as unfit for active duty, then that was a course of action he was quite prepared to take. All of which means that – as you’ve both probably already guessed – I shall be reluctantly followin’ his advice, an’ getting’ my head down for a couple of hours.’
‘I think it’s for the best, sir,’ Paniatowski said.
‘Maybe you’re right,’ Woodend agreed. He stood up. ‘Would you like a lift back to headquarters, in my chauffeur-driven vehicle, Monika?’
‘I’ll take her,’ Rutter said.
‘No need to put yourself out, lad,’ Woodend told him. ‘Like I said, I’ve got this chauffeur-driven car, an’ …’
‘I’ll take her,’ Rutter repeated firmly.
‘Is that all right with you, Monika?’ Woodend asked, disconcerted by the urgency that he’d detected in Rutter’s tone.
Paniatowski just nodded.
‘We’ve … er … got a little business together that we need to tidy up,’ Rutter said, as if he felt compelled to explain. ‘Nothing important, but it has to be done.’
‘I’ll see you both later, then,’ Woodend said.
And he was thinking, They hardly ever see each other any more. What kind of business could they possibly have?
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