Lane: A Case For Willows And Lane

by Peter Grainger

  The same light dimmed again. The men were moving around the Volvo. She strained to hear whether the engine was still running.

  ‘And calling you Miss Lane is getting increasingly absurd. What is your name?’

  There was something almost admirable in the old girl’s sense of propriety – lives might still be at risk but the social niceties were not to be entirely ignored. Lane did something then that she almost never did – she reached out a hand and took hold, gently, of Emily’s forearm.

  ‘Later. Is there a torch anywhere in the car?’

  ‘No… My husband, Ronald, he always had one. No, not now. I’m sorry.’

  ‘It’s OK, just doing an inventory. Anything else that might be useful? What’s in the boot?’

  ‘Nothing. My wellingtons… An old rug-blanket thing.’

  Lane was already at the back of the car, opening the boot.

  ‘Good, we’ll take that. If we’re here all night, it will be colder than you think by dawn. What else?’

  ‘There really isn’t anything.’

  But Lane was feeling around in the darkness. She took out the blanket and handed it to Emily. Caught up in it was a length of plastic cord which Lane arranged into loops before tying it into a bundle with the two ends. Then she pulled at something and the floor of the boot came up and away.

  Lane said, ‘Here we are. Spare wheel – jack, so there must be… OK, got it.’

  Emily’s eyes were adjusting to the darkness at last. She could see now that Lane had hold of an angled metal bar. She said, ‘Oh. What’s that?’

  ‘It’s the handle for the jack. You know, when you change the wheel, this goes into the jack and… You’ve never changed a wheel, have you?’

  ‘No. My husband, Ronald did once. On the way to Aberystwyth.’

  But Lane wasn’t listening any more. She was looking down the hill, and then Emily did the same. The Volvo’s lights had disappeared. Emily thought, they’ve gone, they’ve driven away while we were talking, and then another light was there, smaller, dancing about a little in the darkness, beginning to make its way up the hill.

  Martin Russell said, ‘She persistently questioned and challenged the decisions of senior officers. At first privately and then, reading between the lines, if that didn’t work, she went public. Serial career suicide.’

  Superintendent Harley read a little more before he responded with a nod that indicated his agreement.

  ‘It makes you wonder how she was promoted as often as she was.’

  ‘Go back to the service record. Her hit rate was phenomenal, and if she applied for promotion they could hardly refuse. I’d have looked for a way of stopping her from applying, looked for another way of keeping her on board.’

  Russell paused and re-read something in the final disciplinary notes.

  ‘And looking at these dates, that’s what the Security Command thing was about. She had a quiet spell there before she got caught up in the shoot-out at the OK Corral. I’ll wager Security Command is somewhere you can park your loose cannons.’

  ‘Someone mentioned that here,’ Harley said, pressing the Page-Up key a couple of times. ‘Here it is – one of her earlier DCIs said “There are cannons, loose cannons and then there is Detective Sergeant Lane.” She sounds like a nightmare, sir.’

  Russell made the face that says maybe, but…

  ‘It’s the old story. People with a real talent for detection, for actually nailing the bastards, often make bad managers. You and I are exceptions, obviously’, and Harley couldn’t tell whether the ACC was joking or serious then, ‘but it’s not just in policing. Do the best surgeons necessarily make the best hospital directors? Do the best teachers make the best school principals? All these organisations have the same flaw, if you ask me.’

  Harley hadn’t asked, of course, but Russell sounded convincing, as if he had actually thought about all this before. Perhaps he’d just been on a management course or something. Russell was reading more from the same screen.

  ‘Look. The same DCI said “Lane has the unfortunate quality of inspiring fanatical loyalty in a few of the team while the rest hide in cupboards until she has left the building.” Imagine dealing with that on a daily basis.’

  After a respectful pause, Harley said, ‘We should consider the implications of all this for the present situation, sir. It already explains a lot.’

  ‘Absolutely. She can use weapons, drive fast and think on her feet. What isn’t so certain is her ability to take the best strategic decisions, if you see what I mean. Where the hell are they? Why hasn’t she just got Willows’ mother to a place of safety? Is she the sort who would subconsciously want to prolong this? To take them on?’

  ‘Do we show this to Hannaford and Cooper, sir?’

  ‘Yes. Tell them we’ve got it. I don’t want to be accused of concealing anything. But I wouldn’t be surprised if they are already aware of it. There’s something odd about all this.’

  Harley waited, wondering if he might be told what it was, but then Russell said, ‘And we can’t go home until this is sorted, can we? Bloody Friday night, as usual. I’m going to ring my wife. Get some food brought in, will you? Nothing too spicy this late.’

  Russell had been right. Hannaford looked bored, even impatient, as Cooper read quickly through the screens, and Harley thought to himself, he’s just looking for anything that they didn’t already know. But that means that they knew this before we did, maybe even before they entered the building – and how is that possible when there was no need for any sort of internal investigation until just a few hours ago? This material must have been sent from the Met, whereas Hannaford and Cooper are based in Exeter – and then he corrected himself. Messrs Hannaford and Cooper had said they are based in Exeter.

  Hannaford said, after a glance from Cooper that Harley couldn’t read, ‘She sounds like a piece of work. Anything else found at her place?’

  Harley said, ‘Not that I’m aware of. If there was, someone would have called it in.’

  ‘Your people that good, are they? I mean, they’d spot what was significant if there was anything?’

  A very long time ago, Superintendent Harley had been invited to have a spell in internal investigations; he had declined and now congratulated that younger self on his foresight and caution. He didn’t bother to answer Hannaford’s question.

  ‘What about the one she shot? Have we at least got a name now?’

  ‘No. He went straight into surgery because of the blood loss. The bullet hit the femoral artery.’

  ‘I don’t give a toss whether she shot his knackers off – didn’t we get a blood sample to test? Unofficially? You know, grab one of the dressings when the medics weren’t looking, and get it off to the lab, pronto. No?’

  Harley allowed his silence to speak for itself. Hannaford’s modus operandi was to make everyone else aware of their own incompetence as quickly and as often as possible, or at least to make them question their own competence which was effectively the same thing when you were confronted with his unsmiling face and his unpleasant demeanour.

  Hannaford made a pretence then of asking Cooper whether there was anything of use in the information about ex-Detective Inspector Lane. The answer was in the negative, and then Hannaford summed it all up again for the benefit of no-one in particular.

  ‘So we’ve got a perpetrator in custody – he is under guard, I’m assuming – but we’ve still got no idea who he is or where he came from. We had two more who left on foot just before Cornwall’s finest arrived on the scene but somehow they escaped into the wilds of the surrounding farmland. A maverick ex-cop has driven off with the mother of one of your officers – who isn’t telling us a bloody dicky bird – and we don’t know why they haven’t just turned up at some local nick. And sometime around midnight I’m going to get a call from some little shit at the DPP asking whether this has prejudiced the case that’s due to kick off on Monday morning. Wonderful. Is this a typical Friday night in Bodmin, superintendent?’
>
  And that, thought the superintendent, is your first mistake, Hannaford, because no-one from the DPP would call an internal investigations officer with a question like that. They might call your boss, whoever he or she is, or your boss’s boss, but they wouldn’t call someone like you. “The case that’s due to kick off on Monday morning” – that’s what this is really about. Harley was tempted then to say, can you show me your warrant cards again, I’d just like to make a phone call, but the men had met with ACC Russell first, and presumably he had been satisfied. Might be worth asking later, though.

  Harley said pointedly to Cooper, ‘Robert Willows is an excellent officer. He has my full confidence, and my sympathy. If these people had known him beforehand, they would have realised that any attempt to use him to interfere with or remove evidence would not work. From what I have seen, he has cooperated fully; he doesn’t have anything else to tell you.’

  Cooper looked half-convinced but as usual it was Hannaford who spoke.

  ‘Even so, I want his place turned over now. Cooper will go with a couple of yours.’

  ‘I believe that to be completely unnecessary, and intrusive under the circumstances.’

  ‘Well, we’ll put that in the official minutes. How far away is it?’

  Harley’s face set hard then, despite himself.

  ‘Yes, it will be officially minuted and officially complained about. Your entire approach to this is inappropriate and deliberately offensive.’

  It was what Hannaford wanted.

  ‘Yes, we hear something like that in every investigation. We’re used to it. How far away is Willow’s place?’

  ‘Trevinnick is about ten minutes’ drive. We already have a police officer with his wife. Do you really need to go in and-’

  ‘That’s a plus – you actually thought to put someone in there. Won’t be any bother getting inside, then.’

  Lane tried the phone again to see if the torch at least would work but it did not. Then she put it into the rear pocket of her jeans, folded the blanket and handed that to Emily, pushed the bundle of plastic string into a front pocket, tucked the gun into her waistband and carried the jack handle in her left hand. With her right, she felt the way around the great heap of small branches, and Emily Willows followed her.

  The brashing must have been done within the past day or two because the scent of pine resin was strong, and at one point Lane’s hand came away sticky with it. Once around the cuttings, they found themselves back on the track though it was reduced now to little more than a footpath. But it still led the way straight on towards the top of whatever hill this forest had been planted upon twenty or thirty years ago. Lane halted, took her bearings and asked Emily if she was alright to carry on.

  ‘Yes. It’s a while since I had any proper exercise. This is as good a time to start as any.’

  Lane was looking up at the avenue of stars above them. There was still no moon but here, in the countryside, far from the nearest town, the thick dusting of light from the Milky Way was plainly visible, running east to west, forming something like a crucifix with the little earthbound footpath that they were about to walk upon; it’s impossible to say whether Lane herself saw the beauty of it but she knew now that they were heading due north.

  As they began to move, Emily Willows said, ‘Of course, I know that you get plenty of exercise. I’ve seen you going off running.’

  Lane was moving at a surprising pace, and Emily quickened and shortened her own steps to stay close; to her the wood around them seemed impenetrably dark. She remembered what Lane had said about night vision and thought that it must have been true then, just a statement of fact rather than a boast.

  ‘Do you run far? You’re gone for quite a while.’

  Lane kept walking, only half-turning her head to answer.

  ‘A few miles.’

  ‘Really? Miles? Just to keep fit?’

  Emily was becoming aware of two things then – that her own breathing was already shortening, and that Lane was not going to engage in a long conversation.

  ‘No. To improve fitness and extend my performance.’

  It all sounded very rigorous and demanding; Emily pulled a face in the darkness before she said, ‘I see. You have a programme. How far do you plan to run in the end?’

  ‘Twenty six point two one nine miles.’

  ‘Oh, – a marathon! Are you doing something for charity?’

  ‘No.’

  Without pausing in the walking, Lane looked back periodically; Emily would half turn and stumble but before her eyes could focus, they would be moving forward again, heading for the brow of the hill that was closer now, a dark, smudged line across the deep blue of the night sky ahead of them.

  ‘Just a personal challenge, then. Very worthy, all the same. Commendable… Great sense of achievement when you’ve done it, I’m sure…’

  Lane said, ‘We should save our breath.’

  ‘Yes, absolutely. But I’ve never met anyone who plans to run a marathon, so-’

  ‘I’ve done it several times, years ago. I’m just getting back to fitness, that’s all.’

  Their speed wasn’t slowing at all – if anything they were moving more quickly and Emily Willows wondered whether this was intentional, in order to silence her.

  ‘Oh my goodness, how impressive. No wonder you’re all skin and bone. So you took a break and now-’

  ‘I got injured.’

  ‘Hamstring,’ Emily managed between breaths, ‘that’s what usually happens, isn’t it?’

  ‘No. I got a work-related injury.’

  Emily found a new burst of energy now that the conversation was actually getting somewhere.

  ‘Right, an injury at work. What did you used to do?’

  They had reached the first summit – further on it was clear that there were more slopes to climb. Lane stopped, turned and looked for a good ten seconds down towards where they had left the car, and Emily was aware that the only sound was her own laboured breathing.

  Lane said quietly, ‘Them having the only light gives us something of an advantage but only as long as they use it. If they realise that, they’ll turn it off. They might already have done so, and be moving up behind us, so we need to listen as well, OK?’

  Emily nodded.

  Far away on another hillside, a bird hooted, an owl of some sort – otherwise the silence lay around them like a soft, starlit blanket.

  ‘Good. I can’t hear anything at the moment. It looks as if we’re coming to the edge of this plantation in about another fifty yards – after that it’s open ground.’

  Lane’s voice was dropping all the time.

  ‘Realistically we can’t outrun them if they spot us, so our best bet is to stay hidden in the trees. That way we should hear them if they’re close. We’re going left here, off the path, about thirty metres, and then we’ll stop and wait and listen. No more talking.’

  Chapter Twelve

  Superintendent Harley made sure that the officer going with Cooper to the Willows’ home was Sergeant Jennifer Spall; she was a friend of Robert Willows, and when Harley spoke to her privately she had confirmed that she also knew Marie, his wife. He said to Spall then, ‘Fortunately the real pain in the arse is staying here but don’t let the other one get heavy – we don’t have to put up with that. I’ll already be complaining about the way they have treated Robert. Keep your eyes and ears open.’

  Cooper said little during the short car journey, and his answers to the two routine questions she asked him about how he wanted to proceed when they arrived were non-committal, almost neutral. She thought, he doesn’t see any point in this, he thinks it’s harassment as well; he might be in investigations but he’s just a foot-soldier like the rest of us.

  To Marie Willows, Cooper said, ‘Does your husband have an office at home? A desk where he keeps things?’ and she had showed him upstairs to the spare bedroom. Cooper said then that she was free to stay while he searched the room but she turned away in contempt, and we
nt downstairs to Jenny Spall.

  ‘How is he, Jennifer, really?’

  ‘He’s OK. Quite calm, just worried about his mum, obviously, and you. He asked if he could come back with them to here but they said no. Probably best that he doesn’t until they know something more.’

  The sound of drawers and cupboards being opened came from upstairs.

  ‘Jenny… What on earth is going on? They can’t possibly think that he is involved. The idea is – is preposterous.’

  In much of her speech, Marie Willows would pass for a native but the situation and the demands of the word ‘preposterous’ made her sound very French indeed.

  ‘We all know that, Marie. Some of it is just routine – they cover all the angles. No-one at Bodmin will believe it for a moment. This man isn’t one of us, they’re from out of the county.’

  Marie was bright and understood the implications; Jenny Spall thought then that she had said too much and not helped at all.

  ‘But they still have not found them? Where can they be?’

  Jenny Spall shrugged. Footsteps on the stairs which paused halfway down. Cooper was talking to someone on his phone but she couldn’t make out what it was about.

  Marie said, ‘And who is this neighbour? I saw her once. She was strange. She looked away before I could say hello.’

  ‘We really don’t know much, Marie.’

  Actually, she thought, we know even less than that. Senior officers were holding hurried conversations behind closed doors, and the underlings were fetching pizza and coffee. Good old-fashioned mushroom management – keep them in the dark, open the door occasionally and chuck in a load of-

  Cooper came into the room, holding up a red wallet file.

  ‘I’m removing this material.’

  Marie was dumbstruck and turned to Jenny Spall, who said, ‘What is it?’

  ‘Papers relevant to a case that Robert Willows is involved with. The case.’

  Jennifer Spall took steps towards him and reached out her hand. Cooper withdrew the file and held it under his arm. He said, ‘This might be confidential material. He might have broken procedures and be in a lot of bother because of this. As a colleague, you can’t-’