Blood Line

by Lynda La Plante

‘Take a look at this . . . it might jog your memory.’

  Silas picked it up in his huge hands.

  ‘Well, right off I can tell you that this is not what I’d call top of the range. This is more an intermediate’s board. I was shown another photo and that was one of my old hire boards.’

  Anna placed down the photograph of Alan Rawlins carrying a board. ‘This?’

  ‘Yeah, that’s the one, but as I said before, I couldn’t tell you anything about the bloke holding it. I don’t ever recall making a customised board for him. He could have bought a second-hand one off me, but I’m not the only board-dealer out there making money. Kids who buy my intermediate or beginners’ boards eventually sell them on, plus the hire ones get nicked if people don’t keep an eye on them when they’re off the water. The surfers come from all over the world to Cornwall.’

  ‘He drove a silver sports car, drophead . . .’

  Silas puffed out his cheeks. ‘Again, these guys all have sports cars. You know, it’s a big seasonal thing, guys in their hundreds pulling the chicks, driving around in their flash motors. It’s part-surfing, part-sexual conquests.’ He laughed.

  ‘This man is homosexual.’

  Silas shrugged. ‘We get all sorts and true, there is a clique of the gay dudes. They tend to stick together, but I personally don’t have any time for them. To me, it’s a God-given shame. Great bodies and the women drooling, and they bat for the other side.’

  ‘What can you tell me about the Smugglers café.’

  ‘Not much more than I already have. It comes and goes in popularity. One season it’s not the place to be seen at, next it’s thriving. It’s cheap. They do hamburgers and chips and it jumps a bit at night, but the cops have been coming down on them for building fires on the beaches. Can’t hear yourself talk in there; the music is throbbing out, which also gets complaints.’

  ‘You knew Sammy Marsh?’

  ‘The photographer, yeah everybody knows him. He took that picture I gave Detective Simms and the lady officer.’

  ‘You told them that he did a moonlight flit to Florida. Do you know why?’

  ‘Not really no, but I’ll be straight with you, Sammy was a bit of a ducker and diver, regular Mr Tambourine man, moving from beach to beach knocking out good weed. He’d sort of cornered the market as everyone does a joint down there, kind of goes with the sport and I used to buy off him as well.’

  Sal smiled and shrugged his massive shoulders.

  ‘He used to have this big Rasta looking out for him. Sometimes it could get a bit hairy and Sammy didn’t like competition, I know that.’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘Well, I don’t know all the facts, but some kids were all sharing a farmhouse, a good way out from Newquay, and they were growing their own cannabis plants. Had several greenhouses – lights – the lot. They were underselling Sammy and he didn’t like it. He got unpleasant, warned them off, and in the end I think they started working for him. I dunno . . .’

  ‘Was he violent?’

  ‘Sammy?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Silas gestured with his hand to about his shoulder level sitting down. ‘He was only this big. Like I said, this Jamaican dude, Errol, was his heavy arm, but he also had a few other bodyguards.’

  Paul produced Errol Dante’s mugshot. ‘Was one of them this man?’

  Silas looked and nodded. ‘Yeah that’s Errol, but I haven’t seen him for a while and nor have I seen Sammy since he went to Florida. I’m only there come the summer months.’

  There appeared to be little else that Silas could help them with and so he was thanked for coming in and left the station.

  Anna watched from her office window as Silas, ‘call me Sal’, replaced his helmet, having drawn up the white scarf to cover his mouth. He fired up his Harley and almost collided with Langton, driving his beat-up old Rover. She was glad she had seen him as it gave her a few moments to gather her thoughts on how she would approach the fact that he’d been ‘busy’ the night before. She expected him to come in to see her straight away, but when he didn’t she eased up the blinds of the window looking into the incident room. He was standing beside Paul, who was writing up on the board the information from Silas Douglas. Quickly flicking the blind closed as Langton turned towards her, she hurried to sit at her desk.

  He did sort of knock, but it was only a tap and the door opened as he strode in.

  ‘You free for an early dinner tonight?’

  Taken by surprise, she blinked and then nodded.

  ‘Good. There’s a small Italian round the corner, we can walk to it. Say in ten minutes?’

  ‘Fine. Do I see you there or . . .?’

  ‘No, we’ll walk over there together. I just want to catch up on a couple of things.’

  ‘I would have thought you caught up enough last night.’

  He hesitated, swinging the door open. No matter how long she had known him, he could still make her hairs stand up on end when he gave her that cold, arrogant look.

  ‘Just doing my job, sweetheart. Ten minutes.’

  He closed the door and she could have kicked herself for bringing it up. She had always hated it when he called her ‘sweetheart’ – now even more so. She also reckoned that the promise of a dinner between them wasn’t what he intended by this evening’s date. Instinct told her he was going to use it for another reason.

  As Anna made her way to the ladies cloakroom to comb her hair and freshen up, Langton was in deep conversation with Brian Stanley in the incident room. Exactly ten minutes later, he was waiting for Anna in the corridor.

  ‘Let’s go,’ he said briskly.

  ‘Do you mind if I just tell the team I’m off?’

  ‘Already told them.’ He took her elbow and guided her out. It didn’t feel right. It felt as if he was pushing her.

  They hardly spoke during the short walk to the restaurant and he no longer held her arm, but walked quickly. As always she had to speed up to keep up with him.

  Sole Mio was a small restaurant furnished with checked tablecloths and candles stuck into wine bottles. The owner greeted Langton like an old friend and asked if he’d like his usual table. As it was virtually empty being so early, they had a choice, but Langton went to a small booth at the side and eased himself in, leaving Anna to sit opposite. He picked up the menu, glanced at it briefly and suggested that she have the house special.

  Anna hid herself behind the menu. She was feeling very nervous and unable to read. Langton took out his reading glasses to look over the wine list.

  ‘I’ll have the sea-food spaghetti,’ she told Langton as he signalled for the waiter. He ordered the food, asked for a bottle of Chianti and then removed his glasses, tucking them into his pocket. He then spread out his cutlery, leaving a larger space in front of him.

  ‘Anna,’ he said quietly.

  She glanced up and gave a shaky smile.

  ‘How you doing?’

  ‘Fine, thank you.’

  ‘Remember I once told you that I’d worked with your father? I’m going back quite a long time now – fifteen years or more . . . Anyway, I got my first murder enquiry as a DCI. Jack wasn’t on the case with me, but I’d just been working alongside him learning the ropes so to speak.’

  He paused as the waiter showed them the bottle of wine and then uncorked it and poured a drop for Langton to taste. He swirled it around the glass and then drank it.

  ‘Lovely, thank you. Just leave the bottle on the table.’

  The waiter poured a glass for each of them and did as requested.

  ‘The case was a murder enquiry, obviously. The victim was a twenty-two-year-old waitress – a single mother with a little girl aged three. She was found in an alleyway not far from where she worked; her throat had been cut and she was almost decapitated. She was or had been a very pretty woman, but the unusual thing about the case was, she had not been raped and her handbag, with her wages in, was still beneath her body. So robbery was not the motive and we could
find no one who had a bad word to say against her. The first suspect we looked at was her ex-boyfriend. He was a pleasant enough guy and—’

  Anna interrupted. ‘Why are you telling me this?’

  ‘Just listen, will you?’

  He sat back as his starter was brought to the table, a shrimp salad.

  ‘Did you order a starter?’ he asked Anna.

  ‘No, just the sea-food pasta.’

  ‘Do you want that brought now, or will you wait until my main course is here?’

  ‘I’ll wait.’ She took some bread and buttered it, watching as he ate at his usual fast pace, jabbing at the salad with his fork.

  ‘Okay, where was I . . . the boyfriend was not the father of her little girl, so I traced him, a Spanish waiter, and I discovered that he had quite a history of petty crime. He’d also legged it to Marbella so I went over there and questioned him, and he gave me three or four names of men he knew my victim had been seeing. I came back and I tracked down all four of them, questioned each one, and they gave me two more names. Seemed my innocent little single mother had quite a sexual appetite.’ He took some bread and wiped around the salad bowl, then picked up his wine glass and sipped before placing it carefully down beside his plate.

  ‘I schlepped from one end of the country to the other. Was into the case four weeks when the parents admitted they had kicked her out when they discovered she was pregnant. I had a slew of ex-boyfriends, plus women who had known the victim, but what I was still trying to uncover was a motive. Who, out of all these people I’d interviewed, would have sliced her throat and left her dying in this back alley? I checked into her bank accounts, all the boyfriends’ bank accounts; she had a pittance of a savings, so after another two weeks the case was getting cold. I had nothing.’

  Langton stopped speaking as his starter plate was removed and he began to twist his napkin.

  ‘I was having a drink and Jack Travis came into the bar. He asked how it was all going. This was my first solo DCI case, right, and I wanted to make an impression. I said to him, “I’ve fucking turned over every possible stone and got zilch.”’

  Their main courses arrived so he remained silent until the waiter had left, pouring more wine for himself and topping up Anna’s glass. She waited, toying with her pasta. Langton had a Saltimbocca alla Romana with vegetables and again ate hungrily before he continued.

  ‘Your dad listened. I’d had a few beers and then he asked if I minded if he gave me some advice.’

  Langton held up his hand and pointed his index finger.

  ‘He said that one – in a murder enquiry, always look close to home. Someone had hated my victim enough to slash her throat – not to take her money, not to rape her – but just slash her and walk away.’

  He ate another mouthful and then held up his hand again.

  ‘Two – the motive was hatred. It wasn’t robbery, it wasn’t sexual. It had to be someone who knew her, knew what time she left her job, knew she walked up that alley as a shortcut to the bus stop.’

  He ate more, chewing his meat, and gestured towards her plate as she’d hardly touched a morsel.

  ‘Is that all right?’

  ‘It’s fine.’ She took a mouthful, but the food felt greasy and she could hardly swallow. Langton repeating her father’s words had made her feel very emotional.

  ‘Three – by looking at the kill, it had to be someone close to her. She had no defence wounds, no struggle, no blood or skin under her fingernails, which meant she faced her killer and wasn’t afraid of him.’

  Again he paused to eat. Anna just moved her pasta around the plate.

  ‘Four – he said I should return to anyone close, particularly the ex-boyfriend. Next day I brought him in again and after two hours of interrogation he gave it up. He admitted to the murder. He said she had kicked him out. By this time he had grown to love her little girl and wanted to marry her, but she had rejected him.’

  Langton drained his glass. He then stared hard at Anna, wiping his lips with his napkin and tossing it down.

  ‘You want to know why I am telling you all this?’

  She nodded, pushing her food aside.

  ‘Anna, you are bringing in how many fucking links and suspects? You’ve got a board that looks like the train timetable at Euston station, with links and arrows and possible connections. You’ve got homosexual contacts from magazines; you’ve got a whole slew of suspects connected to drugs in Cornwall. You keep opening up avenues of probable suspicions when what you have is a bloodbath at that flat Alan Rawlins lived in. You’ve got no body, you’ve got evidence that another male slept in that same bed where you believe the murder took place, a victim you have yet to even bloody identify.’

  ‘I am aware of that,’ she said stiffly.

  ‘You can’t keep chasing all these probable connections. You have to get to grips with this Tina Brooks woman. She’s lived with him, but she only admitted he was missing after his father reported it. She could have disposed of the body with help maybe, so I’ll give you that, but the whole reason I am talking to you is because I think you have started to open up a can of worms that may wriggle and look suspicious, but you haven’t hit close to home. It doesn’t matter if Alan Rawlins led a double life, that he was homosexual with a nasty streak to him. The basic facts are that someone was brutally murdered in that flat. Tina has to be your prime suspect and all this surfing stuff, this drug dealer Sammy Marsh, is making the enquiry look like a trainwreck.’

  ‘I don’t know if it was Alan Rawlins who was murdered in that flat.’

  ‘But she must bloody know what went on – she lived there! I don’t want to make you lose confidence, but what I do want you to do is put the pressure on Tina Brooks. Going off to Cornwall is not going to bring in a result, Anna. So what if Alan surfed with a gay troupe of guys? So what if he led this other life? The basic facts are it is very probable he was murdered inside his own flat, his body dismembered and then dumped. The answer is close to home, Anna, believe me. I want you to think like your dad, think how he guided me, because right now I am sorry to say it, but you have let this case run right off the rails.’

  She had to cough to clear her throat. It felt terribly constricted.

  ‘How long have I got?’

  He sighed, rubbing his face tiredly.

  ‘Listen, I am not about to pull the enquiry. All I’m asking you to do is to focus on the basic facts. Remember, I am telling you this because I did the exact same thing and it was Jack, your father, who pointed me in the right direction.’

  Anna sipped her wine. He went to top up her glass again, but she shook her head.

  ‘No, thank you.’ She chose her next words very carefully. ‘I would like to discuss this with you tomorrow.’

  ‘Why not now?’

  ‘Because I need to digest everything you’ve said to me, then I’d like to talk it over with you.’

  She got up and he gestured to the ladies cloakroom, thinking she wished to use it, but she picked up her bag.

  ‘I’m leaving now. If it’s preferable I will come to your office, or shall we say nine o’clock here at the station?’

  ‘I’ll come to you.’

  ‘Thank you, and thank you for dinner.’

  Langton watched her walking out, unsure if he should go after her or not. Her expression had been unreadable even for him. He didn’t think he had been too hard on her, on the contrary. He would, if it had been anyone else, have expressed his concerns over the way the case was being handled in front of the entire team. He would also have replaced her with another DCI. Maybe she should learn the hard way. Instead he had taken her out for dinner and tried to be as diplomatic as possible. He truthfully felt her murder enquiry was a mess of over-investigation, wasting valuable time.

  He signalled for the waiter to remove their plates and then ordered a double brandy, deciding that in the morning he would call a briefing. Anna must by now be aware of his misgivings and realise that it could not continue.


  ‘Was there something wrong with the sea-food pasta, sir?’ the waiter asked.

  Langton shook his head as his brandy was placed in front of him.

  ‘No. She just wasn’t hungry.’

  Anna went straight back to her office and spent a long time on her computer looking over the file of the old case that Langton had referred to. Eventually she’d had enough and left for home. She had fought to keep control of her emotions, refusing to allow Langton to see how deeply his criticism had affected her. But by the time she’d returned to her flat and was getting into bed, the flood-gates opened; she couldn’t stop crying. She felt that by using her father as part of his review of her work, Langton had betrayed her.

  Sleep didn’t come easily as she finally calmed down enough to digest everything Langton had spoken about. Intuitively she knew that the meeting with him in the morning would be make or break time, but somehow the old fighting instincts she used to have lay dormant. She had never felt so alone and so lacking in self-confidence.

  Chapter Eleven

  Anna was up and blowdrying her hair at six. She chose her wardrobe carefully, not that she ever had much choice as the row of similar black suits and white shirts were like her own uniform. But this morning she dressed in her most expensive ones and wore high heels. She even put more make-up on than usual, and whether or not it was for Langton’s appraisal, it made her feel better.

  She left early for the station, wanting to have an overall grasp of the case, and once there, took all the files into her office and sat behind her desk, checking and cross-referencing all the data. Instead of her confidence being severely damaged, she now felt the reverse. She rang through to the incident room to say that she wanted to be informed as soon as Detective Chief Superintendent Langton made an appearance, and for coffee to be brought into her office.

  Paul tapped on her door and she waited a moment before telling him he could come in.

  ‘Yes?’ she said briskly.

  ‘The report from the Tech Support team has arrived.’

  ‘Good or bad news?’ she asked.

  ‘I’ve not had time to read it. It’s quite dense and I’ve a copy here for you.’