by James, Henry
‘A what?’
‘An army number, but not a barracks or garrison line – in the field, a portable number; a mobile phone, if you will. It’s not a number from around here.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Chief Sparks, you may take me for an idiot, but I assure you I would recognize a military number.’
-48-
2.30 p.m., Wednesday, Fingringhoe Ranges, between Colchester and Mersea
Lowry had left the blue Cortina off Artillery Street with Forensics after having made a call to Robinson at the lab. Traces of seawater in the car boot had piqued Lowry’s interest – he wanted to know everything that had been in that car, down to the last fibre. In the meantime, he’d picked up Kenton, and they found themselves out on the marshes on some far-fetched premise which the younger man couldn’t quite grasp. The cold pinched as they climbed out of the car and stepped on to the frozen mud of the lay-by.
‘Are you sure about this?’ Kenton asked uncertainly. The woods had a deathly stillness to them. Lowry laid the OS map out on the Saab’s bonnet. ‘Look here. Do you see this?’ He outlined the broken red line marked DANGER AREA.
‘I see it.’ Kenton stood close behind him.
‘The military use this for practice – manoeuvres, whatever soldiers do – shooting at things, hence it’s marked off to prevent access by members of the public.’
‘It’s all marshland beyond these trees. What makes you think there’s anything there?’
‘There’s an observation hut around there –’ Lowry jabbed at the map, on the middle of the marshes – ‘that has a phone. There’s just a chance . . .’
Lowry led the way, already regretting not having appropriate footwear. In all his time in CID, he’d never spent so much time in the cold; his toes had been permanently numb since before Christmas. He trudged through the still woodlands, feet sinking into fresh snow, and on to the marsh.
‘That girl . . .’ Kenton said behind him.
‘Which girl?’ Lowry’s mind flitted to his wife. He should’ve checked the calendar on the fridge this morning to see what shift Jacqui was on.
‘Gabriel.’
‘Hardly a “girl”.’
‘Whatever. She’s the ACC’s niece.’
‘I see.’ They’d reached a clearing, and there was no discernible footpath going forward. ‘That would make sense.’
‘Why?’
‘I met with Merrydown yesterday. I wondered what her motive was; I thought at first she might fancy Sparks.’
‘How so?’
‘All her questions were about him. She’s recently divorced, so Barnes tells me.’
‘I can’t see them as an item. Jesus.’
Lowry laughed involuntarily. ‘She’s way out of his league. Perhaps it’s his inner depths she’s trying to tap.’
‘Yeah, well, he gave me a dressing-down for hassling Gabriel.’
‘Ah, I thought something was up.’ So Merrydown had been circling him to elicit what, if anything, was going on with her niece.
‘I haven’t . . . slept with her. I thought . . . Oh, it doesn’t matter.’
Lowry’s feet squelched in the snowy marsh underfoot. Christ, this was hard going. ‘Good. Avoid screwing people you work with; it’s hard to draw the line, and you can never escape them.’ And then, after a pause: ‘I told Gabriel to work at my desk; maybe I’ll be the next one in trouble.’
‘Is that why you married a nurse?’ Kenton said, ignoring the last remark.
‘Well, I never see her, that much is true – hold on, what’s that?’
‘Looks like a garden shed.’ They approached it and Kenton flicked the latch on the hut door. A smell of musty wood greeted them.
‘Have you got a torch?’ Lowry asked.
‘No – I . . .’
Lowry tutted. The hut was pitch black. ‘Wait a sec,’ he said, walking over to the far side. A horizontal oblong of light appeared. ‘Wouldn’t be much of an observation post if you couldn’t see anything, would it?’ Lowry had lifted a wooden flap, and secured it to the wall above. Kenton made to open another. The cold air rushed in.
‘There’s not a lot in here to get excited about, is there?’ he remarked. There were two benches, a table and several charts pinned to the wall. A first-aid box hung next to a large OS map of the area. The floor gave slightly as the two men paced the hut.
‘Who tipped you off to this place, anyhow?’
‘Let’s just say I went to see a man about a bird . . .’ Lowry halted mid-sentence. There was a small green box mounted next to the window slit. Lowry released the tin catch. Kenton moved closer. A field telephone. He could imagine Lowry’s thoughts: was this the number? But the DI stepped back from the phone and clambered over one of the benches so he was facing the open hatch.
‘This spot commands a view of the firing ranges and beyond, I bet.’ He riffled around in his donkey jacket, pulling out a small pair of binoculars. ‘You can see the channel and the Strood from here.’ He angled forward, elbows resting on the wooden sill. Kenton slid in next to him. ‘Here.’ Lowry passed him the binoculars.
After adjusting them, Kenton scanned the dip towards the river, noticing another shed-like structure hidden in the trees at the bottom of the valley. Beyond that, he could see silvery hints of a draining tide snaking through the white. To his right, a treeless view of mudflats, still brown, having been submerged in water during the recent snow, slipped away towards heathland. And skimming across the river bed as if on air was a car crossing the Strood, the road on which it travelled invisible in the soft winter haze.
The wooden floor squeaked behind him. In a flash, Kenton was on his hands and knees.
‘This floor comes up.’
A small amount of prising of floorboards revealed him to be right. Underneath was an earth cavity.
‘Let me have a look.’ Lowry bent down and ran his hand around the inside. There was a powdery residue. Could it be? He dabbed his finger. Yes . . .
‘Guv, look.’
Lowry looked up; Kenton was pointing to a small chalkboard on the wall.
‘What?’
‘A list of range commanders and dates. Here’s a familiar name. Wonder what he’d be doing here?’
Oldham.
-49-
3 p.m., Wednesday, Queen Street HQ
Gabriel dexterously typed up her report on hauling Cowley out of the sea on Tuesday, having overcome her initial discomfort at sitting at Lowry’s desk. The DI had insisted on it, so that she wouldn’t be distracted by the humdrum of Uniform (his words). She didn’t mind the idea at all; it was the untidy state of the desk that troubled her. For such a suave dresser, Lowry took surprisingly little care of his environment: the desk was a mess of magazines, books – most about birds, rather oddly – scraps of paper, various notebooks, three ashtrays, several seven-inch records, and photos of his wife and son.
‘Oi, answer that, will ya, luv!’ someone bellowed across the room. The phones of both Lowry and Kenton had been ringing since she’d arrived, but she’d felt it wasn’t her place to take the call. ‘Go on, it won’t bite!’ At last, she reached over for the telephone.
‘Hello?’
‘About time,’ a soft but irritable female voice replied. ‘Is Detective Inspector Lowry there?’
‘Err, no, he’s not.’
‘Do you know when he’ll be back?’ The irritability had an edge to it. Panic?
‘No, sorry. Can I help?’
‘Who’s that?’
‘WPC Gabriel.’
Gabriel waited.
‘It’s Jacqui Lowry. It’s about one of my friends – Trish – she’s not turned up for work. I’m worried . . .’ The woman hesitated. ‘Can you ask Inspector Lowry to call me?’
She glanced at the framed photograph of the attractive brunette on the desk. Lowry’s wife was a nurse, that much she knew, not that he’d ever mentioned her to Gabriel. Lowry was currently out on the Fingringhoe marshes. She had no idea when he’d be back.
‘Are you calling from the hospital?’ she asked lamely.
‘Yeah,’ said Jacqui absently. ‘The ward sister marked her down as sick again this morning, even though she’d not phoned in, but . . . but . . .’ Her voice trailed off. ‘ . . . I wondered if she’d got her shifts in a muddle with all that’s gone on, and thought she was on a late yesterday. But we’ve just done handover and she’s not shown up again today. She would normally call, so . . .’
‘Of course. What’s the best number to get you on?’ Gabriel picked up a chewed Bic ballpoint. All that’s gone on – what could that mean?
3.15 p.m., Colchester Road
The light was fading with the onset of more snow as Sparks crossed over on to Mersea Island. He had two things on his mind. The first was the pressure from his boss: Merrydown had given him yet another ear-bashing on the telephone about the North Essex clean-up rates. This time it was the Mersea sub-division, which had not filed a stats report in months. It was bad enough to have poor results but supplying nothing whatsoever was tantamount to treason. Ordinarily, County wouldn’t give a toss what the locals got up to in a rural community like Mersea, but once Merrydown knew drugs had got on to the island, she’d made a beeline for East Road’s latest submission, only to find an empty manila folder. So, no crime stats and the wrongful arrest of the Taylor brothers for the post-office robbery – Dodger Bradley had well and truly cocked up, and the chief had taken it upon himself to get to the bottom of it.
The other thing on his mind was more sensitive. Having telephoned Lowry from the pub about the possibility of a field line, Sparks had returned to finish his drink with Lane and the conversation had moved to more convivial matters, such as where to get a decent meal outside of Colchester. Sparks had been impressed to hear that the army had a list of ‘recommends’, several of which were unfamiliar to him. One was on the island: a new oyster restaurant added to the list by Captain Oldham, who apparently owned a houseboat moored just outside the harbour. The fact that the captain was a Mersea resident, albeit only when off duty, had struck the chief as odd. Sparks had not even registered the houseboat community on West Mersea until Kenton was punched after snooping around there, but it now emerged that Oldham was one of these virtual gypsies. Sparks tried not to be swayed by his dislike for Oldham but, personal feelings aside, he couldn’t ignore his instincts as a policeman. There was – dare he say it? – something odd about the captain.
3.25 p.m., Abbey Fields
Gabriel, having placed her report on Felix Cowley in Lowry’s in-tray, was now on the south side of Colchester. The military side.
Lowry had left her one additional, simple task: to check whether the big Irish soldier, Corporal Quinn, had spent New Year’s Eve in the Glasshouse, as he’d claimed. Having allowed herself to be fobbed off by Captain Oldham’s office once before, this time she was determined to come up trumps. She had checked that the military policeman himself would be at his Abbey Fields office. She had booked an appointment, claiming she’d been tasked with setting up a liaison committee between the police and the army following the recent disturbances. (Lowry had mumbled something to that effect, hence the idea.)
She quickly ascended the steps and entered into a brightly lit atrium. Underneath glinting candelabra were lush red walls adorned with exotic animal heads, the spoils of empire. A neat little man in green behind a desk ticked her name off a register and ushered her to sit down. Nestled in a comfy armchair, she looked up at the painting on the wall opposite: an imposing figure in a pith helmet, one foot resting on an enormous tiger. Somewhere in the building a piano was being played – Mozart, if she wasn’t mistaken. People say the police live in their own world, but it was nothing compared to the armed forces; they lived in another place and time entirely, or so it seemed to her.
‘WPC Gabriel?’ A uniformed man in olive with a bright red belt and highly polished shoes addressed her politely. ‘Come this way, please.’ They marched down an oak-panelled corridor towards the piano music. The soldier stopped at an open door and gestured for her to enter. It was not so much an office, more of a large sitting room, like something from a period drama on the television. At the far end, sitting at a grand piano, was Captain James Oldham, head of Colchester’s military police force. His playing was beautiful. It was difficult to imagine that someone capable of performing such delicate music was responsible for such a brute presence of force in the town. She drifted closer, not wishing to interrupt his playing. Gabriel noted his thinning hair and balding pate.
‘Can I assume, WPC Gabriel, that this meeting has nothing to do with arranging a liaison committee?’
His question caught her unawares but still didn’t quite break the spell of his playing. ‘That’s wonderful,’ she couldn’t help saying.
‘Do you know it?’
‘Mozart.’ She’d not played in ages. ‘A sonata. Eight?’
‘Very good. You must play?’
‘Not in ages,’ she said, feeling apologetic for reasons she couldn’t fathom. ‘It’s not an easy piece, from what I recall.’
‘Mozart is very difficult to play, even for one who’s left-handed.’ He span round on the stool. ‘One has to be so very light.’ He examined a well-manicured hand, but then, catching himself, glared up at her with eyes of watery grey that betrayed nothing of what went on behind them. ‘Well?’
‘I’m here regarding Corporal Quinn.’
‘Hmm.’ He smiled. ‘I suppose that could be construed as a “liaison” issue. Though of what interest he is to you now, I can’t possibly imagine.’
‘Just a matter of routine.’ She relaxed slightly. ‘He claims to have been locked up on New Year’s Eve. Can you confirm this?’
‘New Year’s Eve? Why are you interested in where Quinn was then? The punch-up was the night after.’ Oldham had soft-looking tan skin; she wondered if he might be foreign.
‘Yes,’ she said hesitantly, ‘but he subsequently harassed a member of the public over his concern for Private Jones, the soldier who—’
‘I know who Private Jones is, thank you. But I fail to see the connection.’
‘They were in the same platoon, were they not?’
He smiled at her fixedly. ‘This member of the public – can you enlighten me as to who it was?’
She sensed he was niggled. ‘I will if you can confirm that Quinn was incarcerated on New Year’s Eve.’
He raised himself from the piano stool. ‘I don’t happen to know off the top of my head.’
‘But you could find out easily enough.’ She indicated the shiny telephone that sat on an ornate octagonal table.
‘Very well.’ He picked up the receiver and placed an index finger in the dial. She looked away, thinking it rude to watch, and reviewed the elegant room. It was indeed from another era. The walls were lined with oil paintings, though not of a military nature; many were seascapes. On top of a cabinet was a stuffed bird of some description. Ghastly. Probably shot. It seemed that, if they weren’t shooting men, the military must shoot the wildlife to relieve the boredom, especially in foreign climates, as indicated by the tiger painting in the atrium.
‘Yes, he was,’ Oldham said, bringing back her attention.
‘Excellent . . .’ She made to go.
‘And who was it that Quinn was at odds with, in the town? This member of the public?’
‘Oh, we suspect it was over a girlfriend.’ She didn’t think she needed to give a name; it’d not mean anything to Oldham.
‘A girl. It often is.’ He said, unimpressed. ‘Though not on Saturday night. The chap in the Lamb? Philpott, I think his name was.’
Gabriel was uncertain what to say; she was growing acutely aware that Captain Oldham knew far more about what went on in town than she did.
‘Yes, it was Jamie Philpott.’ She wanted to leave.
‘And what does Mr Philpott do with himself when he’s not sparring with members of Her Majesty’s armed forces?’
‘I’m afraid I can’t really c
omment, sir. However, I can confirm he’s helping us –’ she hesitated and then said – ‘with another matter.’
‘“Another matter”,’ he repeated slowly, as though weighing up the words. ‘I see. I think that concludes our business.’
‘Thank you, Captain Oldham.’
‘My pleasure – anything in the spirit of cooperation,’ he said. ‘And take up the piano again – I’m imagining you’d be rather good.’
-50-
3.30 p.m., Wednesday, Mersea Police Station, East Road
‘Well, Dodger, none of us are getting any younger.’ Sparks stretched his legs, the wooden chair twingeing underneath him. Bradley sat on the other side of the hearth in the small back room of the East Road police station, twiddling his thumbs across his expansive girth. They were practically in darkness, except for the fire, which spat feebly.
‘Age has nothing to do with it; you’d have to be mad to want to be out in the Blackwater in the middle of the flamin’ night, this time of year.’
‘Water under the bridge now – we got one of them off Brightlingsea.’
The Dodger grumbled. Sparks hoped his days on the force wouldn’t end like this. There wasn’t much between them if you thought about it – six, seven years?
‘Now then, where’s your December incident report? Merrydown has been breaking my balls about crime stats – and poor though they are, at least Colchester’s were submitted promptly. Yours aren’t even in.’
‘Aye, well, that’ll be your fault.’
‘My fault? How the bloody hell is it my fault?’
‘Your boy hassling us over the post-office job after Christmas.’
‘Eh?’
‘I tried calling you to get him to back off so we could get on with our business, but you failed to intervene, and he wouldn’t let it lie.’
Sparks stood up to light a cigarette. ‘You should’ve spelt it out, Dodger, rather than making cryptic phone calls. I’ve a lot on my plate – I’ve got a house full of bodies on a council estate—’
‘Ahh, well, that’s none of my business. I can’t file me bleedin’ reports with your mob sticking their oar in; you stick to yorn and we’ll keep to ours.’