Off Minor

by John Harvey

  “I think it’s oil, Graham.”

  “Gas.”

  “The tutor said it was oil; a Vector oil heater. It was the artist’s own.”

  “Yes? So what else did he have to say about this? Your tutor.”

  “She said it was an act of religious contemplation.”

  “Um. So what’s this, down here at the bottom? Looks like a piece of raw meat.”

  “It’s a leg of lamb. Or was it mutton?”

  “Religious, too, is it?”

  “I think it’s suggesting a contrast between the two, the one just for eating and the other …” She stopped, a faint blush showing on her neck. “I’m really not sure, Graham.”

  “No, well, you’ve got it nearly right, I reckon.” He leaned closer to the title. “Stanley Spencer. Double Nude Portrait: the Artist and his Second Wife. Didn’t say anything, your tutor, as to how he disposed of the first one?”

  The exterior of the Victoria Leisure Center, on the corner above the wholesale market, smelled of rotting vegetables and poverty; inside the smell was of chlorine and Brut. Divine held his identification up to the glass panel at reception and when he had the girl’s attention, slipped a copy of the drawing through the opening.

  “What about him?” the girl asked, trying not to notice Divine doing his best to get a good look down her front.

  “Know him? Regular or anything?”

  She picked it up and held it closer to her face. Can’t be much more than eighteen, Divine thought, eyesight should be better than that.

  “I think so,” she said.

  “He comes here?”

  “Yes, I’m pretty sure.”

  “Well, you’re pretty,” Divine said.

  She gave him a look that would have stopped a ferret at fifty feet.

  “What, then?” Divine carried on, undeterred. If you never gave it a go, you never knew. “He use the baths or what?”

  “Swimming, yes, I’m pretty … I’m almost certain.” Leaning back in her chair, she called through to the inner office. “Les, this bloke’s a regular, isn’t he?”

  Les came out with a bundle of towels in both arms, a well-built man in his fifties with graying hair. “Never seen him before,” he said, looking through the glass at Divine.

  “No,” said the girl, “not him. Him.”

  “Oh.” Les dumped the towels and took hold of the drawing. “Yes, him, two or three times a week. Main pool.”

  “Any idea when he was here last?” Divine asked.

  Les and the girl exchanged glances, both shook their heads.

  “Sunday?”

  Les reached for his towels. “Could’ve been Sunday.”

  “You working then?”

  “Me, not Sunday, no. One in four and that’s one too many.” He pointed at the book on the counter. “See who was on Sunday. Morning?” he said to Divine. “Or afternoon?”

  “Afternoon.”

  “Freda,” said the girl. “It was Freda.”

  They found Freda in the women’s changing rooms, doing duty with a long-handled broom. “Get all kinds left in here, you know. Everything from Tesco’s chicken tikka sandwiches, still Cellophane-wrapped, untouched, to a pack of contraceptive pills with only six missing. There’s someone’ll be going white round the gills come the end of the month.”

  Divine showed her the picture.

  “Stephen,” she said. “Nice bloke. Always time for a bit of a chat. What about him?”

  “Was he in Sunday?” Les asked. “Afternoon?”

  “Not unless he’s been practicing limbo dancing. Wouldn’t get past me any other way. “Sides, like I say, liked to chat. No, he wasn’t in this weekend. If he was, I’d’ve seen him.”

  “You’re sure of that?” Divine asked.

  Freda leaned forward against her broom, fixed Divine with her eyes. “What do you think?” she said.

  Patel and Naylor spent the best part of the day sorting through the responses to the artist’s impression, throwing out the too obviously false, the one who claimed it was his father-in-law, another who swore that it was the bastard of a manager who’d refused him a loan at the bank. Four pointed in the direction of Stephen Shepperd; one, a neighbor, mentioning the fact that he’d seen him running round Lenton Rec; a man who used to work with him identifying him by name.

  Jogged by the fresh publicity, two people contacted the station about the unaccounted-for Ford Sierra. As a result Naylor delved into the phone book for the address of a Bernard Kilpatrick, owner of a sports shop out at Bulwell, currently living round the corner from the White Hart.

  At the shop it appeared to be half-day closing and no one was picking up the home phone and answering, so Naylor was all for going round there, get him out to the police station, but Millington’s hand on his shoulder kept him where he was.

  “You sit tight with that little lot. I’ll see if I can run Mr. Kilpatrick to ground. Never know, might sink a quick half in the White Hart while I’m about it.”

  As it was, Millington never got his drink. Bernard Kilpatrick, engine oil on his arms and state-of-the-art tool kit spread over the pavement, was making some minor adjustments to the carburetor. He straightened up as Millington drew nearer and prepared to swap stories about the unpredictability of cars generally, engines in particular. Even something as normally reliable as a G registration Ford Sierra.

  Thirty-five

  “What I want to know, car’s that close Randall could hit it with a throw from cover point, how come none of our lot spotted it? Even if they weren’t using their eyes, what was wrong with questions? Ford Sierra owners, isn’t that what we’ve been looking for? Whatever happened to checking vehicle ownership through the damned national computer? God alone knows how many man hours, how much overtime’s gone into this already, and it takes some civilian to tip us off.

  “Well, thanks very much to Joe Public, thanks indeed, but meanwhile, what in hell’s name’s been going on?”

  Jack Skelton was not a happy man. He’d summoned his senior officers first thing and it wasn’t to pass out commendations. Skelton had dispensed with his normal shirt-sleeve order, brisk and businesslike yet approachable, and was standing there glowering at them from behind his desk in a suit sharp as battle armor, tie knotted so tight as to endanger his blood supply.

  “All right, let’s make up for sloppy work with some hard graft, some application, a sight more diligence. Charlie, I want that lecturer in here this afternoon if you have to carry her in on your shoulders, let’s get Shepperd in an identification parade sharpish. Meantime, background on him and his wife; as many questions asked about this couple as we can. Neighbors, friends, colleagues, let’s pay particular attention to the people who responded to the Identikit. Bit of an odd set-up, from what Charlie’s said, sounds as if the wife might know more than she’s letting on. Let’s get her on her own, see if she’ll open up. Rattle her if you have to, rattle anyone and everyone. There’s one child on this patch dead, another missing. For Christ’s sake, let’s do what we’re paid for and do something about it.”

  Millington intercepted Resnick on his way back to CID. “How’d it go?” he asked and, seeing Resnick’s face, wished he hadn’t. “That bad?” he said, sympathetically.

  “Worse.”

  Resnick pushed into his office, Millington following. “You,” he said, turning to prod the sergeant with his finger, “for now, Kilpatrick’s yours. By the end of the day you’re going to know everything about him from where he takes his holidays to if he flosses his teeth and how. Right?”

  “Sir.” Millington was already on his way.

  “And send Lynn in here.”

  “Not sure if she’s back, sir.”

  “Then get her back.”

  According to Millington, Bernard Kilpatrick had been smooth as silk and about as slippery. Yes, as a matter of fact, he had parked his car on the crescent on Sunday. To be quite honest, he’d spent most of lunchtime in the Rose and Crown, anyone had breathalysed him, he’d have tu
rned the thing the colors of the rainbow. Even so, he’d got in the car and started for home, turned into the crescent and before he knew what he was at, one of his wheels had been up on the curb. He hadn’t needed a second warning. Straight out of the driving seat and walked. Went back for the car later. Condition he was in, all he could do was pull off his shoes and collapse on the settee. No, he didn’t know when he woke up, nor when he went back to get the car, but he was pretty sure it was dark. Well, this time of the year, that’s mostly what it was.

  The Rose and Crown was a biggish pub, Sundays it might well be pretty crowded, but if Kilpatrick had been there long enough to get good and drunk, someone should have noticed him.

  “Graham,” Resnick called into the main office.

  “Sir?”

  “We have checked Kilpatrick’s lunchtime binge, I suppose?”

  “Divine’s down there now, sir.”

  God! thought Resnick. Like sending a kleptomaniac into Sainsbury’s in a power strike.

  Eight o’clock, nine, ten o’clock, eleven. Whenever Stephen switched off the power, he could hear Joan moving around overhead, her footsteps filtered through the strings and muted brass of daytime easy listening. Once, she had called down the steps to inquire if he wanted coffee and he had failed to answer. Coffee meant more questions and they would come soon enough without his meeting them head on.

  In the event, it was not so far short of twelve.

  “Stephen,” his wife shouted down. “You’ll have to come up. The police are here to talk to you again.”

  The inspector was on his own this time, the heavy-looking one, the one with the unusual name.

  “Sorry to interrupt, Mr. Shepperd, it’s just one thing. Last night, you seemed certain that you’d been swimming on Sunday, Sunday afternoon. Now you’ve perhaps had a chance to think about that a little, I wondered whether you’d changed your mind?”

  Stephen blinked. “No.”

  “You weren’t jogging?” Resnick asked.

  “No, I told you …”

  “Not running, but swimming?”

  “That’s correct.”

  “At Victoria Baths?”

  “Yes.”

  “It couldn’t have been anywhere else? You wouldn’t have …?”

  Stephen shook his head. “It’s where I always go. Why don’t you ask them? They know me.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Sheppard,” Resnick smiled. “We already have.”

  Stephen stood tense, waiting for what was to come next, but that, apparently, was that. He was starting to breathe more freely when Resnick turned at the door.

  “We’d like you to take part in an identification parade this afternoon. Formality, really. Settle the matter once and for all.”

  “But I was at the pool, ask them, you said you asked …”

  “And so we did, Mr. Sheppard. This is simply for confirmation.” Resnick looked at him squarely. “There can’t be any reason for you to refuse?”

  “No,” Stephen agreed, his voice oddly distant, not a voice that he recognized. “No, of course not.”

  “Good. Three o’clock, then. Oh, and you can have somebody present with you, if you wish.”

  “Somebody …?”

  “You know, a friend. A solicitor even.” Resnick turned the handle of the door. “Till this afternoon, then, Mr. Sheppard. Three o’clock. Perhaps you’d like us to send a car?”

  “No, thank you. No. That won’t be necessary.”

  Resnick nodded and closed the door; without turning, Stephen knew that Joan was standing behind him, watching.

  Millington didn’t know where they got the nerve, close to a hundred quid for a pair of plimsolls, gym shoes. That’s all they were. All right, there was a lot of fancy work down the sides, purple and black and that, ludicrous tongues that poked out the front the size of shin pads, but when you got down to it, gym shoes is what they were. Plimsolls.

  “Sell a lot of these, do you?”

  Kilpatrick took the trainer from the sergeant’s hand and gave it a look of glowing admiration. “Can’t get enough.”

  “At that price?”

  “Word goes round we’ve got a few in stock, they’re on the bus out here from all over. Rarity value, you see. None of the big boys stock them.”

  Millington looked bemused. “That matters?”

  “Look at it this way, you’re seventeen, eighteen, what do you do, most of the time, not a lot of money to spend? You go walking round town with your mates. Bunch of lads, always running across other lads. What’re you doing? Checking one another out. The trousers, the hair, the T-shirt, more than anything else, the trainers. You go strutting along Bridlesmith Gate or round the Broad Marsh in a pair of those, maybe there’s only a dozen more pairs in the city, tops, people are going to be looking at you, thinking, hello, he’s a bit special. See what I mean?”

  “Yes,” Millington said, “but are they comfortable?”

  Two youths, black, one with a jagged razor line along one side of his close-cut hair, the other with dreadlocks caught up in the kind of hairnet Millington’s gran had used to wear, were checking out the shell suits near the back of the shop. A man in his late twenties, with the minimal dress sense and mixture of earnestness and confusion which led Millington to mark him down as a social worker, was spending for ever deciding which color badminton shuttle was right for his game.

  Millington had been forced to work with men like that, pious as piss about sexism and racism and ageism and the rights of the individual, couldn’t wait to get you out on some Godforsaken council estate at six in the morning, hammering on doors and hauling kids off into care, never mind the rights of the sodding families.

  He’d argued with the boss about it a time or two, Resnick, ever since he had that thing going with that social worker, bending over backwards to see their side of things. Nice woman, Rachel Chaplin, shame she’d not stuck around longer. Came close to being a statistic in one of Resnick’s murder cases, got a transfer down to the West Country, Exeter, Bristol, somewhere like that, anything for a quieter life.

  Bernard Kilpatrick hit the cash register and a moment later the doorbell jangled. “Bloke who bought the shuttles,” Millington asked. “Don’t happen to know what he does?”

  “Vicar,” Kilpatrick said. “Nice enough, but can’t he waffle. Sort for whom crossing the street’s a moral dilemma.”

  “Where’s his get-up, then?” Millington asked.

  “Saints’ days and Sundays.”

  Millington shook his head sorrowfully. Surely it wasn’t so long ago that clergymen all wore black suits and dog collars and sports shoes were something you bought in Woolies, dead white and change back from a pound?

  “Only thing we’re still not too clear about,” Millington said, almost as an afterthought. “The time you went back and picked up the car.”

  Kilpatrick shrugged. “No more am I.”

  “But roughly?”

  “Depends how long I slept. Hour, maybe more.”

  “And you got home when? Three?”

  “Around then.”

  “So you could have collected the car as early as four?”

  Another shrug, his full attention not on the sergeant, watching out for what the couple at the back might be trying to boost. “Could be. Is it important?”

  “Probably not,” said Millington. “We’ll let you know.”

  Lynn Kellogg hung back, watching as Joan Sheppard got out of the car, refusing her husband’s offer to help carry her various bags and books into school. She watched Stephen watching his wife making her way between the shrieking, racing children to the classroom. Only when he had driven away did Lynn enter the school herself.

  Joan Sheppard was taking something from a cupboard as Lynn stepped into the room, warrant card in hand.

  Felt-tip pans fell between her fingers as she turned. “My husband’s due at the police station this afternoon.”

  “I know, Mrs. Sheppard, it’s just …”

  “The children are
about to come into school.”

  “What your husband said about Sunday afternoon, going swimming …”

  “This isn’t fair.”

  “We wondered if you thought he remembered wrongly? Perhaps there was a reason for him to be confused?”

  She bent down and began to retrieve the pens; there were voices outside the door, an impatient scuffling of feet. “If Stephen says he was swimming then that’s where he was.”

  Lynn stooped towards her, placing a card into her hand. “If there’s anything you think of, anything you want to talk about, to me, possibly, rather than anybody else, you can contact me on that number.” Straightening, Lynn began to back towards the door. “Sorry to have disturbed you, Mrs. Sheppard. Perhaps I’ll speak to you again.”

  Small children pressed round Lynn’s legs as she left the room.

  Thirty-six

  The department office was in a long, low building, dingy and scuffed walls and a sloping corrugated roof; as a center for learning it had the presence and authority of a converted cow shed. But perhaps if you were teaching American and Canadian Studies you liked it that way. A sense of the vast outdoors, the pioneering spirit. The secretary treated Resnick to a smile that would have seemed at home in the expanses of Saskatchewan or Manitoba and directed him outside again, along to a lecture room at the end of the block. Inside the room, Vivien Nathanson wasn’t lecturing, at least not in any way that Resnick recognized; she was sitting in one corner with seven or so students, chairs pulled clear of the tables and formed into a circle. Waiting for the Indians, Resnick smiled, slipping into a seat near the door.

  “If you need a central text,” Vivien was saying, “you could do worse than the McAdam we were looking at earlier.

  When we met, I thought knowledge had limits, that in love we were finite beasts who shared known boundaries

  but watching you touch objects for which I have no desire I see a measure of longing in your eyes

  that forces me to say, I don’t know you yet. That forces me to say, there are places in you I may not wish to know

  Anybody remember how that goes on?”

  After some shuffling of papers and sudden interest in footwear, a girl with corn-blond hair ventured: “Is it the bit about infinity?”