by Edward Figg
Carter already knew just why Grant was sleeping rough. He’d already checked the registration details and had the registered owner’s name. The man was a known sex offender and was wanted for questioning by the Leeds police concerning an incident with a twelve-year-old girl. The girl had identified him from photo's she'd been shown. He was last seen three weeks ago, and had gone missing from his home address on the same day the offence took place. He'd just been released from prison only four weeks earlier after serving a four-year sentence for a sexual assault on a ten-year-old.
The two PCs, Hobson and Miller, from the other car, Kilo Zulu Four, had driven into the car park and were now walking over to the van. Carter addressed them: ‘You two, take him back. Get him booked in.’
‘And showered,’ chipped in Best, waving his hand across his face to drive away the smell.
Hobson took Grant by the arm and bundled him into the back seat of his car.
Then throwing the keys to Cotton, Carter said, ‘You'll have to put up with it just a little bit longer lad. You take his van back to the station. I'll get a lift back with PC Best here.’ He turned and walked off leaving PC Cotton looking forlornly at the van and muttering under his breath about the smell. Best came around the side of the van, smiled, patted Cotton on the shoulder, then followed Carter over to the patrol car.
*******
It was getting late in the day and dark clouds were scudding across the Kingsport skyline, bringing with them the threat of rain. Tom Crane, the desk sergeant, knocked and walked into Carter’s office.
‘'Bout time we had a bleedin' lift installed sir.’ He gave a sniff and sighed. ‘I'm getting far too old for all this running up and down stairs all day.’
Carter just smiled and tried to recall the last time he had seen the sergeant up in the CID room. Ah, yes. Last year's Christmas party. He seldom strayed far from his own comfort zone. He was not a one to roam far from his tea and bikkies. He normally sent one of his minions up with any paperwork.
‘Sergeant. What brings you all the way up to the top floor? Slow day in reception, is it?’
Crane looked down at the envelope he had in his hand and waved it at Carter.
‘Couldn't find anyone downstairs, seems they’ve all scarpered, so I had to bring this all the way up here myself. This came for you sir. Lady from the library, a Mrs Evans. Said it was urgent, dropped it in a few minutes ago, it was the list you were wanting.’ He passed it to Carter then took a deep breath. 'Taken up reading detective novels have yer sir? List of whodunits, is it?’ he smiled.
‘I should be so lucky, be nice to relax with a good book. No, Tom. Far from it.’
‘She said she’d also sent you a list of all of her borrowers just in case you needed that as well.’
‘Nice of her. Give it to Inspector Baxter will you please Tom? He knows all about it.’
Crane gave another sniff, nodded. ‘Right you are sir.’ He went over to Baxter’s office.
*******
Carter promised to update Janice Watkins on the progress, but his phone call went unanswered. He then remembered she was away attending a budget meeting over at HQ. He hung up, then picking up the handset straight away he started to punch in Christine Wilcox’s phone number. After seeing her that morning, he’d decided to ask her out. Taking her out to dinner was the safest option for a first date. Nice and simple, he though. He saw no problem with that. His finger was coming down to hit the last number, when Ted Baxter came in.
Bugger. He replaced the receiver. Dinner would have to go on hold.
‘This list from the library,’ said Baxter, his faced flushed with excitement, ‘It has the names and addresses of eight people, six women and two men…’
Before Baxter could say another word, Carter interrupted him. ‘Get on to it will you Ted? I want them interviewed. Teams of two. First thing tomorrow. Also, I'd…’
Stopping him from saying anything further, Baxter held up his hand. ‘Hang on a jiff.’ He tapped the list he was holding with his finger. ‘Four of the women on this list are the murder victims, Maureen Newman, Allison Connor, Chelsea Ellis and Emma Saxon. They were regular helpers.'
He looked meaningfully at Carter who sat staring back at him and frowning.
A hush descended over the room as both of them stared at one another. The only sound came from the ticking of the wall clock. Carter sat with his hands across his chest, fingers laced. He frowned again then reached out and took the sheets of paper from Baxter’s outstretched hand. He studied it for a few moments.
‘This has to be the link Ted. We need to talk to these other four about these dead women. See what you come up with.’
He rose from his desk and walked over to the window and stared down at the traffic in the street. He turned back to Baxter. ‘This is too much of a coincidence. The library could be the link. Is it possible that someone who goes there on a regular basis could be our murderer?’ He leafed through the half dozen stapled sheets again. ‘Let's look at this list of all members of the library. We can rule out females and children. Get someone too run them through the system.’ He looked up at the ceiling and, screwing up his eyes, said, ‘That's going to take time. Go and have a word with Tony McPhee and see if he can let us have a couple of his PCs to do it.’ He tapped the list with his finger. ‘Get Marcia and Jill to talk to these two women, Margaret Keane and Alice Wainwright. George Harris and Albert Streeter, go and see them yourself. Take Bill Turner along with you.’ He put his hands together as if in prayer. ‘Let's see if they have anything useful to say.’
******
Tuesday October 5th
The path that led to front door of the little bungalow had roses growing down each side of it. The reds, yellows and whites of the petals stood out in stark contrast to the green of the well-kept lawn. Albert Streeter’s property stood high on a hill, two miles outside of Kingsport and looked out across the valley.
Not too far away could be seen an oast house. It was no longer being used for drying hops and by the number of tradesmen’s trucks that were parked there, it was clear it was being converted into a home. Many of them had been converted into a private houses, now owned by professional people who'd commute daily by train to their place of work in London.
Streeter's home was small, neat and reasonably well kept but it was easy to see there was no wife living there. He seemed to take more care of his garden than he did the inside of the house. It wanted a woman’s touch.
The small coffee table was covered in stains from where mugs had sat.
The aged couch, with the odd bit of stuffing showing, had clearly seen better days. It was covered in old gardening magazines and newspapers. This was a man's domain.
Albert Streeter came into the room with the tray, set it down on the table and commenced pouring the tea. He then added milk and sugar to the two chipped mugs, stirred them and handed them to the two detectives. Despite the handicap of only having one arm, he carried out the task with ease.
‘Sorry about the wait gents, help yerself to the bikkies. Can't resist these,’ he said, pushing the plate across the table so they could reach. ‘I've always been partial to these chocolate ones.’ He looked at them lovingly then sat down heavily in the armchair causing a small cloud of dust to rise. The specks floated lazily in sunlight that streamed through the window.
‘As I said. There's not a lot I can tell you. We might only have been there for an hour or so a day. No one, as far as I recall, discussed personal stuff as such. Apart from that, it was just the everyday chit chat, like, yer know, like what we did for a living. Where we lived. What we saw on telly. That kind of thing. I did know the women but, as I said, not all that much. I spent most of my time working with old George. I never saw much of the women.’
George was the first of the volunteer helpers at the library. It was meant to be some kind of therapy for him. It was him that got me into it. I met him in a pub one night. We just got talking over a pint. He was real upset. Turned out that his older
brother, Reg, had been killed two weeks earlier in some dockside accident. Got ' imself hit by shipping container. Real nasty by the sounds of it. The brother was in customs or border security or something like that. I remember him telling me that his brother had been staying with George at the time because he was having some plumbing problem at how own place. He was converting an old farmhouse somewhere on the coast. Anyway, that’s by the by. 'E’s not the one you want to hear about.
Harris was very talkative that night. It was the longest conversation I’d ever had with him. He was real cut up about it. He showed me a picture of the pair of them, both of them in their uniforms. I remember thinking at the time, bloody ' ell! They’re like two peas in a pod. You’d swear they were twins. I know they weren’t because George said that his brother was two years older than him.
We did 'ave something in common though.’ He pointed to his artificial hand. ‘Lost this at the Falklands when those bastard Argies hit our ship. I was on the deck of the Sheffield when we got clobbered by a missile. Twenty dead. Lost some good mates that day.’
For the briefest of moments his eyes seem to glaze over as if reliving the experience. ‘Do you know that during that war, we had 258 killed and 777 wounded? At sea, we lost 2 destroyers, 2 frigates, and 2 auxiliary vessels. The Argentinians lost 649 dead, 1,068 wounded, and 11,313 captured. Their navy lost a submarine, a light cruiser, and 75 fixed-wing aircraft. It was a total waste of life. Maggie Thatcher had a lot to bloody answer for. We didn’t really come out of that one a winner.’
‘You have a very good memory Mr Streeter,’ said Baxter.
‘It’s something you don’t easily forget, son. Anyway, turned out that old George Harris lost his father at Goose Green. He was with the 2nd Battalion, the Para's. George was born in late '82 so he never knew his old man. I do remember George saying that he himself joined up when he was eighteen. He got a nasty head wound in Afghanistan and was invalided out. He used to get bad 'ed aches. He wasn’t quite right in the 'ed. I'm sure of that. He used to talk to his self sometimes. Nothing coherent, just sort of mumbled. I could be wrong but I think they were names. Kept 'imself to 'imself. What you might call a bit of a loner. As I said, it was him that persuaded me to help out at the library. I believe he persuaded one or two of the ladies who used to borrow books to come in and help as well. They very seldom came. I think he fancied himself as a bit of a ladies' man.’
Streeter looked over at Baxter who was sipping his tea and then at Turner who was munching on his third Tim Tam. ‘Your best bet is to have a word with him. He goes there a lot. Spends a damn sight more time with the women than I did, that's for sure. Beware, he can be very bloody moody at times. Won't speak for days, just grunts. Make sure you catch him on one of his good days, coz if you don't you'll be hard pressed to get a bleeding single word out of him.’
Walking back down the garden path a little later, Turner let out an exasperated sigh.
‘Well. Apart from the tea and bikkies, that was a bloody waste of time. We can definitely cross him off our list. A one-handed, cut-throat killer. He'd have one hell of a bleedin' job strangling them.’
‘Aye you’re right. But this fellow Harris sounds like he might be useful even though he could be a pain to talk to. Let's hope today is one of his good days. Let's go and see if he's at home.’
*******
DS Mike Reid was so busy on his computer that he only became aware of a person standing next to him after a hand came down on his shoulder. His arm distinctly shot out and grabbed the packet of biscuits on his desk. Without looking, he said. ‘Bugger off Luke. Go and get you own bloody bikkies.’
‘That’s not what I came for DS Reid.’
Hearing the voice of Superintendent Janice Watkins brought Reid out of his reverie. He leapt up from his chair hitting his knee on the edge his desk with such a force that files were sent skidding across the floor.
‘Ma'am, umm, sorry,’ he said, rubbing his knee. ‘I thought it was umm, I didn't mean, err, sorry ma’am. It's just…’
‘Sergeant, stop dithering and take this.’ She slapped him in the chest with a folder.
‘Mrs Harper has a complaint and says she wants you to deal with. She said that you and nobody else will do. Seems you're the nicest policeman here and that you're the only one that ever listens to her. She's down in reception.’ Watkins patted him on the head. 'Off yer go lover boy. Don't keep the lady waiting.’
‘But ma'am, it's not a job for CID. It's not a serious crime. It's uniform who should be dealing with this, not us?’
‘Uniform are all busy. You are the chosen one. Just do it sergeant.’ She turned and headed across the room.
As she left, Reid let out a loud groan and said, ‘Bugger. Why me? This is what you get for being nice to people.’ He opened the file and read the complaint. ‘This is the last time. No more Mr Nice Guy. No wonder Watkins was smiling,’ he thought, ‘she’s read the bloody file.’
Minerva Harper could complain for England. Everybody in the nick knew her. Even the canteen ladies had heard about her. She was a celebrity. An eighty-year-old, right royal pain in the arse. She was known to all and sundry as Moaning Minnie. When she walked into the station everybody ducked for cover. He rubbed away at his right knee and stared at Watkins’s departing back then bent down and started picking up the papers that were scattered on the floor. He gathered them up, put them back onto his desk and looked around. Who could he fob this off to? Seeing PC Tony Best working away at his desk on the other side of the room gave him an idea. He went over and explained what he wanted. It took Reid a few minutes to get Best to agree to it, but in the end, PC Best agreed, with one condition…
*******
‘I want Anndrasdan, my next-door neighbour, arrested,’ said Minerva Harper, taking of her hat and tossing it on the table. She sat down. Her grey hair seemed to be pointing skyward. To Reid, it looked like she was wearing a dead hedgehog on her head. He tried not to smile.
She stared intently across the table at Reid, waiting for a reaction, but none came. He sat with arms folded.
‘The man's a menace when he been drinking. He can't even speak our language. Last week he got into my garden at night and urinated on my flower bed. It still smells. And furthermore…’
Reid smiled at her, nodded his head and tried his best to shut out her droning. All he wanted to do was to pacify her. ‘Let her get it out of her system,’ he thought. ‘Set her on her way then hand the whole thing to uniform. Let them deal with it.’
He let her ramble on and on and on.
She'd only been in the room ten minutes and already Reid felt like he'd been sitting there a year. She hadn’t stopped talking since she sat down. He couldn’t get a word in edgeways no matter how hard he tried. She had managed, so far, according to her file, to complain about nearly everyone in her street and half of the local government. Reid felt smothered. She was a wave washing over him. Drowning him in words. He needed to be rescued. He closed his eyes and tried to look like he was concentrating on what she was saying. He opened them again and stared at her mouth as she formed the words. It was like an alphabetical avalanche. He smiled gently and said, ‘All we…’ He only managed to get the two words out before she interrupted him.
‘He also wears a skirt.’
‘A skirt?’ he said, frowning and cocking his head slightly to one side.
‘Yes. A skirt. I've seen him many times and sometimes he carries a large bag.’
‘You mean, like a handbag?’
Best show a bit of interest, he thought. He sat up and started to make notes on the pad in front of him. He opened his mouth to speak but then had second thoughts about asking whether the man wore high heeled shoes. He knew she wasn't the type of woman to have a sense of humour.
She had, according to the file, berated some poor council worker for showing his bum crack while weeding the flower bed on the roundabout at the end of the High Street. She even sent a letter to the council about the man, calling him a disgus
ting sight and insisted that council issue all their workers with full body overalls. That same morning, she had even bailed up Sergeant Tom Crane in reception. Poor Tom! He was not behind the protection of his glass bullet-proof screen and had to stand there while she poked him in the chest with her rolled up umbrella demanding that he do something about, in her own words, ‘that pornographic show’ in the High Street. Crane, taking the easy way out told her to contact the council then retreated back to the safety of his glass-enclosed sanctuary.
‘We can't arrest him for that Mrs Harper,’ he said, with a deep sigh. And as for your flower bed, we have to have evidence. We need proof. Did you see him urinating on your flowers?’
‘No. Not exactly. But I know it was him. I even went over to his house yesterday to have it out with him. He refused to come to the door. I shouted through the letter box.’
‘Jeez, no wonder he didn’t want to come out. I certainly wouldn’t have,’ thought Reid.
‘The smell coming from in there was disgusting. He must live in a pigsty. Made me feel sick.'
‘When was the last time you saw this Mr Anndrasdan?’
She screwed up her face in concentration, leaned forward and said. ‘Six, seven days maybe.’
At that moment, there came a knock on the door. It opened and PC Best stuck his head in, smiled at Minerva then looked at Reid.
‘Sorry to interrupt sergeant, but there's an urgent phone call for you. It's the chief constable. He said it’s very urgent.’
Reid pushed back his seat and stood up. He started stuffing papers back into the folder.
He thought about the smell she’d just mentioned.
‘Sorry, but I must take this. Don't worry, Mrs Harper. I'll get someone around to see your neighbour and have a few words with him.’
‘Thank you, Mr Reid. I knew I could rely on you. You're a gentleman.’