Pale Horse, Dark Horse (The Lakeland Murders)

by Salkeld, J J

  ‘Don’t even go there, Ian. Now, go and get on with it and remember, all smiles when we’re out with the troops tonight, OK? The three of us are the core of this team, remember that.’

  Thursday, 13th June

  Andy Hall didn’t sleep well, a pattern that he thought he’d broken, and at just after five he woke from a vivid dream. In it he was at the Horse Fair, walking along Roman Road watching the sulkies fly past, and scanning the faces at the side of the road. They kept turning away from him, and some were laughing at him, he was sure of it. And then he saw who he was after, well ahead of him, moving away fast. He ran, the rain running down his glasses and stinging his face, the wet mud soaking his trouser legs. But he caught up with the figure, but when it turned to face him he saw that it wasn’t Cliff Morrow, it was his ex-wife. And he realised that he’d known that all along, just from the way that she moved, or held her head. He would know her anywhere, and always.

  Hall lay in bed for five minutes, vaguely aware that she was appearing in his dreams with increasing frequency. But he didn’t bother thinking about what it meant, because he had work to do. He left Jane asleep, and was in work before six. Two of the team were on back shift, both taking the odd call on the public line from the early-risers, and scanning photographs the rest of the time.

  ‘Any joy?’ Hall asked, when he brought them each a coffee. They both looked like they needed it.

  ‘Not while we’ve been on shift, sir. Sorry about that.’

  ‘Don’t apologise, Katherine, it’s not your fault. Unless you’re in league with the offender and are suppressing evidence.’

  It was a moment before the young DC laughed, and Hall regretted his little joke.

  ‘Keep at it. We’re all counting on you. You’ve both got young, sharp eyes, and I’ll bet if anyone can spot Cliff Morrow it will be you two. But make sure you both take your screen breaks too, OK?’

  As he fired up his computer Hall felt very old. Maybe it was just the lack of sleep, but he probably was old enough to be the biological father of either of those two young cops. He reckoned that one of them, the one without the spots, was not more than three or four years older than his own eldest daughter.

  By the time he’d skimmed, filed or deleted the usual stack of policy and senior management emails, all sent at unfeasibly late hours in an attempt to demonstrate to anyone who might be in charge of the axe that making the author redundant would be a very bad idea, Hall was ready for another brew. He got up, stretched, and was half way to the door of his office when he heard excited cries of ‘sir, sir’ from outside. And though Hall had seen more ups and downs in the job than he cared to remember he too felt the familiar frisson as he went to see what the fuss was about.

  By the time the team meeting took place at nine they were all sure, it was Cliff Morrow all right. Facial recognition had confirmed the evidence of their own eyes, so now they knew for absolutely certain that Morrow had been at the Fair the previous year. Looking at the snapshot, showing the scene across the Roman Road with caravans all over the hill behind, it looked as if it was taken on either the afternoon of the Friday or the Saturday, the day that Morrow disappeared. Morrow seemed to be walking, alone, towards Appleby, and his clothing matched what he was wearing at the time of his death. He didn’t seem to be with anyone though.

  ‘It’s a start’ said Hall, ‘well done everyone. But we need more, much more. We need to know what he was doing at the Fair, and especially who he was with that day. So keep looking for more pictures this morning. The photographer is a local man, and I’ve already made contact with him. He’s retired, so we need to get round to his house and get hold of every single picture he took last year. With a bit of luck his camera recorded the exact time too. Jane, let’s get round there straight after this meeting. Now, Ian, what about the public appeal?’

  ‘We’ve had 490 calls so far, of which all but ten were not material. Of those ten we’ve got two saying much the same thing, that they saw Morrow arguing with someone on Roman Road, at about four pm on the Saturday of last year’s Fair. They both said that the language was pretty fruity, even by Horse Fair standards, and that it was Morrow who was doing the talking. We’ll be taking full statements from them this morning. The others sound right, but insignificant. People who saw him in the pub he stayed at, that sort of stuff.’

  ‘God bless the great British public’ said Hall, ‘why did we ever doubt you?’

  Jane didn’t say much as they set out on the drive to Graham Fletcher’s house. But he lived in Keswick, so Hall knew that there was plenty of time. Over the months that they’d been living together he and Jane had established a kind of informal protocol, so that if any personal matters were to be discussed during working hours then it would always be Hall who raised them. But he wasn’t quite sure what to say.

  ‘Has Ian been OK with you today?’ he asked eventually.

  ‘Fine’ she said, and Hall waited for Jane to go on. But he knew that he’d probably be waiting a long time, so he tried again.

  ‘He did have every right to be angry.’

  ‘I know that, Andy. I’m sorry. It was a spur of the moment thing to go and see Ian’s brother like that.’

  ‘That’s not like you. That’s what surprises me. You’re usually so measured.’

  ‘We’re not all bloody robots, Andy. You may be able to compartmentalise everything in your life into neat little boxes, but that’s not normal. It’s not even healthy.’

  Jane always found Hall a most unrewarding person to argue with, because his tone never altered, no matter what she said. But that didn’t necessarily dissuade her. And it wasn’t the first time that his emotional availability, or otherwise, had come up.

  ‘Perhaps we’re getting things muddled up a bit here. I just wondered why you went to see Phil Mann without chatting to me first, that’s all?’

  ‘I’m sorry, you’re right. It’s just something about the way that bloke got into Rita’s car, took all that risk, you know. He must have been really driven to offend. It’s really worrying me, Andy. I can’t tell you exactly why, but it is. I find myself thinking about it all the time. Do you understand what I’m saying?’

  ‘I do, and I’ve always agreed that it’s worrying. But we’ve had nothing else since, no sign that this bloke is active. And it could be someone from out of area, anyway.’

  ‘So it’s somebody else’s problem, you mean?’

  Hall could hear the anger in her voice. ‘Of course I don’t, Jane, you know me better than that. What I meant is that, in the absence of any further evidence, I can’t see how this case can proceed anywhere. With the best will in the world we can’t do any more, you do see that, don’t you? If Gorham calls for a case review she’s going to be asking me why we’ve spent so much against this offence already, given the lack of evidence. She’s certainly not going to be saying that we should do more.’

  Jane drove in silence for a while. ‘I do see that. So you’re saying I should close the file?’

  ‘No, I’m not, because it’s a target offence. But what I’m saying is that you shouldn’t do any further work on this until and unless new evidence emerges.’

  Jane didn’t say anything. But Hall took her silence as agreement. He’d learned, ages ago, that it was sometimes the safest way.

  Graham Fletcher lived in a pretty Victorian cottage close to the centre of Keswick, but it took Jane another ten minutes to find somewhere to park. And as soon as Fletcher opened the door Hall could see how delighted he was to be helping Police with their enquiries. He took them to his study, where a huge computer screen, with a shade over it, dominated the desk.

  ‘Are you sure that screen is big enough?’ joked Hall, but Fletcher didn’t smile in response.

  ‘I’ve been thinking about going larger actually, something higher resolution.’

  ‘Have you got copies of all the pictures that you took at Appleby Horse Fair, the year before last?’

  ‘Yes, there are just over 400, all on this
memory stick.’

  ‘And is there other data, like the time the pictures were taken, on there too?’

  ‘Yes, yes it is.’

  ‘Where does the time data come from?’ asked Jane.

  ‘From the camera. Every time I take a picture the camera records other data about it as well, including the exact time.’

  ‘I see. Could I have a look at the camera? Is it the one you used to take these pictures?’

  Fletcher reached into a large canvas bag and produced an SLR camera with a zoom lens.

  ‘Impressive’ said Jane, and this time Fletcher did smile.

  ‘It’s getting on a bit now really, just like me, but yes it’s the one I used two years ago. But it was top-of-the-range then, so there’ll be an incredible amount of detail recorded, absolutely incredible. I promise you that.’

  ‘Can you show me what time the camera is set to now?’ said Jane.

  Fletcher pressed a couple of buttons and held the camera towards her, back first.

  ’10.07’ said Jane. ‘So I make that almost exactly spot-on.’

  ‘Oh yes, it will be’ said Fletcher. ‘I check it very few weeks. I can’t promise that the time recorded on the pictures I’ve given you will be exact to the second, but they won’t be more than a minute out, at most.’

  ‘So the picture that we found on your Facebook page, the one showing the dead man, what time did you take that at?’ asked Hall. ‘It’s file number 8756.’

  It took Fletcher a minute or two to bring the picture up.

  ‘That one was taken at three thirty two.’

  ‘OK, now can we have a look at the pictures that you took immediately before and after that one? We’ll have a proper look back at the office, but I don’t think that we’ve got screens that are anything like as good as this.’

  ‘Would you like before or after first?’

  ‘Let’s go chronological, starting ten minutes or so before this picture was taken, through to about half an hour after.’

  It turned out that there were lots of pictures to look at.

  ‘I bet you wouldn’t have taken this many back in the old film days, would you?’ asked Hall.

  ‘Certainly not. I would probably have taken a couple of rolls with me, that’s 72 shots. This beauty shoots five frames a second if I want it too, so you can see how fast they add up. I spend hours editing them all, I can tell you.’

  ‘So when these pictures were taken you were walking along Roman Road?’ said Hall.

  ‘That’s right. It’s usually where things happen, other than down at the river. But I’m getting a bit bored taking pictures of the horses being washed. I’ve done it lots of times over the years, and it’s always much the same, really.’

  Hall thought that the pictures that Fletcher had taken were all pretty dull, but they were detailed, he’d give them that. He stopped Fletcher a couple of times and asked him to zoom in, and he was amazed how much he could make out. But there was no sign of Morrow in any of them.

  ‘Stop’ said Hall, and Jane looked at the faces in the frame. She couldn’t see Morrow, or anyone who looked like him.

  ‘What time was this taken, Mr. Fletcher?’

  ‘Hang on a sec. It was ten to four, this one.’

  Jane was still looking. The picture showed much the same scene as the picture with Morrow in it. It was a view from one side of Roman Road to the other, with groups of people watching the action in the road, or just walking along, and Hall was pointing at the far right of the screen.

  ‘Can you zoom in on that area for me, please?’ Hall squinted at the screen. He really needed reading glasses. ‘Can you make me a print please, Mr. Fletcher? It’s this man here that I’m interested in.’

  ‘Certainly can. But he doesn’t look like a Traveller to me.’

  The man didn’t look like a Traveller to Jane either.

  Five minutes later they were back in the car.

  ‘Who is it you spotted? One of the Plouvins?’ asked Jane.

  ‘Got it in one, though of course there’s no way of telling which one it is. So this is how we’re going to play it. We’ll get back to the office now and get this memory stick dropped off. I’ll phone ahead and get Ian and Ray standing by. The plan is that we’ll head to the Plouvins four up straight away. Me and Ray will go and see David, you and Ian see Christopher.’

  ‘Why don’t we go now, Andy? They only live a few hundred yards apart. We could see them one after another.’

  ‘No, Jane, no way. I don’t want one phoning the other, sorting their stories out. No, let’s get ourselves co-ordinated on this one.’

  ‘That’ll be a job for Ray, then, won’t it?’

  Hall laughed. ‘Do you know, I’ve stopped noticing his crimes against fashion. It shows how busy we are.’

  Ian and Jane had an extremely quiet drive to the Plouvins, which suited them both, while Ray Dixon talked almost all the way. But Hall had children, so he knew how to tune out when he needed to. He laughed when he sensed that Dixon had reached the punchline in one of his seemingly inexhaustible stories of the incompetent doings of senior Police officers down the years. ‘It’s true, is this one, boss’ he’d say at the start of each anecdote, which demonstrated to Hall that the previous one had been somewhere between an epic exaggeration and an utter invention.

  ‘So how will we know which one it was, in the picture?’ asked Dixon.

  ‘We’ll ask them, first off’ said Hall. ‘Chances are there’s nothing in it. Last time I looked there’s no law against going to Appleby Horse Fair whilst in possession of an inherited fortune.’

  ‘But you’re not certain, are you, boss?’

  ‘Don’t read anything to it, Ray. At present we’ve got the square root of bugger all in terms of meaningful leads, let alone suspects. So we need to look at anything that might move us forward very carefully, that’s all. And Morrow was found on the Plouvin’s manor, as it were. Maybe that means something, and maybe it doesn’t.’

  When they’d parked in the yard of David Plouvin’s farmhouse they waited until Jane called and said that Ian Mann was about to knock on Christopher’s door.

  ‘What do we do if one of them’s not in?’ asked Jane. ‘Go ahead anyway?’

  ‘No. Don’t do that. Tell you what. I’ll call you in two minutes to check that they’re both at home. If not, just give them some bullshit update and get out of there, OK?’

  David Plouvin opened the door to Dixon’s knock. He didn’t look pleased to see them. They went to the large living room this time, and worked their way through an obstacle course of elderly sofas and occasional tables. They’d barely sat down when Jane called back.

  ‘We’re on.’

  ‘Us too’ said Hall, and rang off.

  ‘What can I do for you, officers?’

  Hall noticed that Plouvin’s hands were shaking slightly. He put it down to the booze, rather than nerves, because his voice was calm and steady.

  ‘Do you visit the Appleby Horse Fair, Mr. Plouvin?’

  ‘Yes, most years we go.’

  ‘We?’

  ‘Yes, the whole family. Barbara is the equine expert, she hunted back in the good old days, and the kids always seem to enjoy it.’

  ‘And how about you, Mr. Plouvin? Do you enjoy it?’

  ‘Me? No, not really. When I was a boy it still seemed real enough, and I remember my dad explaining to us how the horses were bought and sold, but now it’s too busy, and it seems they’re all like play acting somehow. Like Morris Dancing or something.’

  ‘You don’t think the Travellers that gather at Appleby are the real deal, then?’

  ‘Some obviously aren’t. It reminds me a bit of all those people in the States who go on St. Patrick’s Day marches. Most of them are no more Irish than I am.’

  ‘And I expect you can be more sure of your roots than most. I expect you can trace your lineage back for centuries?’

  ‘Longer than that. These lands were granted to the family within a century of the No
rman Conquest.’

  Hall nodded and looked interested. Dixon was looking at Plouvin’s hands.

  ‘Did you go the Horse Fair this year?’

  ‘I didn’t, but Barbara may have. I’d have to ask her. She’s in Carlisle at the moment. Would you like me to call her and check?’

  ‘There’s no need, thanks. So how about last year? Did you visit the Fair last year?’

  Plouvin hesitated ‘Yes, I think so. I’m almost certain in fact.’

  ‘Just you, or the whole family?’

  ‘Er, just me, I think.’

  ‘Do you happen to remember which day that would have been?’

  ‘No, I don’t. It was very busy, I do remember that. Probably the Saturday, or the Sunday.’

  ‘Do you happen to remember what you were wearing?’

  Plouvin laughed. ‘No, of course not. But since I’ve worn much the same clothes for twenty years I expect it was much the same ensemble as I’m sporting today. I may have topped it all off with a flat cap, if I was feeling dashing. What is this all about, Chief Inspector?’

  Dixon passed the folder he was holding to Hall without being asked for it.

  ‘Do you recognise anyone in this photo?’

  ‘Yes, that’s me. There, just at the edge.’

  ‘And anyone else? Is there anyone else you recognise?’

  ‘No’ said Plouvin immediately.

  ‘Take your time’ said Hall. ‘Have a good look.’

  ‘I don’t need to. I don’t know any Travellers.’

  Hall paused, and he knew that Dixon was watching Plouvin intently.

  ‘Perhaps there are other people you know in this picture? Non-Travellers perhaps?’

  Plouvin looked again.

  ‘No, there’s no-one.’

  ‘That’s fine. I just wanted to be sure. And did you meet up with anyone at the Fair last year? Bump into an old friend, perhaps? Anything like that?’

  ‘No. No, I didn’t. Look, what’s all this about? Am I suspected of something?’