Deceit is in the Heart (P&R15)

by Tim Ellis

  He phoned the number on her business card. It diverted him to voicemail. ‘Just a quick call to see if there’s been any developments. Call me when you get a minute.’

  Then, there was Toadstone’s graduate – Kirsty Nicholls – and her visit to the Passport Office and GRO. Would she find anything? Tomorrow, he had to travel up to Heptonstall and speak to the previous owner of the Ford Focus – Brendan Young – who lived at 26 Hebble End.

  Next, he phoned the Chief and was diverted to voicemail again. ‘Call me when you get this, Ray.’

  He was beginning to get a complex. Nobody wanted to talk to him. He tried Toadstone again, and was diverted to voicemail a second time. ‘I’m not pleased that you’re not answering your phone, Toadstone. Call me when you get this. Also, if all I am is a distant voice in the darkness – I won’t be able to let you buy me lunch in the Alf’s Head tomorrow, but if you miss this message and go anyway – it won’t count as your turn because I’m letting you know now that I can’t make it, so it’ll still be your turn to pay on Thursday at twelve-thirty. Just so we’re clear on that point. Call me.’

  His phone jangled.

  ‘About time,’ he said. He guessed it was either Toadstone, the Chief, or Lauren Perry.

  ‘Is that you DI Parish?’

  ‘Who’s this?’

  ‘Chief Constable William Orde.’

  His heart sank to his feet and slithered under the table like a withered old haggis ‘Hello, Sir. You’ve heard?’

  ‘Heard what?’

  What had the Chief Constable heard? He nearly gave the game away like a pathetic amateur. ‘That I’m on leave?’

  ‘Yes, I know that you’re on leave, Inspector. Where are you? Is that a public address system I can hear?’

  ‘Gatwick, Sir.’

  ‘Are you going somewhere?’

  If he wasn’t too much mistaken – that was a leading question. Why was the Chief Constable ringing him, if not to invite him for a one-to-one chat in his office about the illegal investigation he was running from his armchair? How had he found out? Had someone made a phone call? Maybe it was the people at Newcastle – they certainly had a motive for stopping the investigation. What about Toadstone? Was that why he wasn’t answering his phone? Was he embarrassed about saving his own arse? Maybe it was Richards – no, she wouldn’t rat him out.

  ‘I’m just about to board the plane for Manchester, Sir.’

  ‘Manchester?’

  ‘It’s a long story, but I’ll be back home tomorrow afternoon.’

  ‘I hope Chief Constable Reginald Van der Kuyp of Greater Manchester Police is not trying to poach one of my best officers, Parish?’

  ‘No, nothing like that, Sir.’ He wondered if William Orde QPM would have similar thoughts if he really knew what one of his best officers was up to.

  ‘Have you heard about DCI Kowalski?’

  ‘He’s on a case, isn’t he, Sir?’

  ‘Not anymore he isn’t. I’m afraid . . .’

  Jesus! His brain began filling in the blanks. ‘Dead?’

  ‘No, he’s not dead. But he is going to be out of action for the next three months. How do you feel about acting up?’

  ‘Me? I’m flattered you should even think of me, Sir.’

  ‘Desperate times require desperate measures. I could send in someone else, but then I’d also have to give you another partner. I can move murder investigations sideways, but shifting people is always complicated . . . Richards is at Bramshill, isn’t she?’

  ‘Doing her SCAS secondment. You authorised it, Sir.’

  ‘So I did. Of course, that was before Kowalski decided to break his leg in a hundred places and get peppered with shrapnel.’

  ‘What happened, Sir?’

  ‘As you’ve said – it’s a long story. But needless to say, I’m not in my happy place at the moment. I didn’t mention the PCSO I lost in the blast, did I?’

  ‘Killed?’

  ‘Well, we didn’t mislay her. Of course, it’s not Kowalski’s fault that he killed another one of my officers, but don’t tell him I said so.’

  ‘What about the case he was working on?’

  ‘It’s in Snaresbrook.’

  ‘That’s the Mets’ responsibility, isn’t it?’

  ‘Exactly what I told Kowalski, so you can forget about that case. It’s a bit sensitive anyway, and the Commissioner has sent a Special Advisor – Chief Superintendent Kim Champ . . .’

  ‘Fagin?’

  ‘Doesn’t anybody have any respect for rank anymore, Parish? I know she’s miserly, insincere and has a network of spies riddled throughout the force, but she’s still a senior officer.’

  ‘Sorry, Sir.’

  ‘So, will you fill in for Kowalski for three months while he’s contemplating his navel?’

  ‘Will I get the pay, Sir?’

  ‘Of course, but you’ll need to cancel your leave.’

  ‘I can start first thing Thursday morning.’

  ‘Not tomorrow?’

  ‘As I said, I’m off to Manchester now. And I can’t put it off. I’ve checked-in, and I’m just waiting for the call to go to the Boarding Gate.’

  ‘Okay, Thursday morning it will have to be. In the meantime, if anything urgent rears its ugly head I’ll have the Chief’s secretary direct it to my office.’

  ‘Temporary secretary. Lydia O’Brien. But she’s got her head screwed on the right way.’

  ‘She’ll need to have. I’ll speak to you on Thursday morning, Parish.’

  ‘Look forward to it, Sir.’

  The call ended.

  Hopefully, by Thursday morning, he’d have a much better idea about where this case was going. One way or another, he’d have to tell the Chief Constable what he’d been doing during his leave.

  Detective Chief Inspector Parish! Yes, that had a certain ring to it. And not before time as well. Shame that Ray had to get put through the mangle for him to be offered his chance at the big time.

  ***

  Stick brought a steaming coffee in a grubby mug and placed it in front of her.

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I’m sure I paid for “First Class”, but the service seems to be reminiscent of “Third Class” on the Titanic.’

  ‘You’re referring to the mug?’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Somebody must be using yours.’

  ‘Using the mug that you bought me for Christmas? And you think it’s acceptable to give me a filthy mug teeming with bacteria and other life-threatening alien life-forms?’

  ‘Well no, but . . .’

  ‘I notice that nobody’s using your mug.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And my mug has “Vote for Xena” in big red letters on the side as you very well know . . . So, it’s not as if anybody can get confused about who’s fucking mug it is, because I’m the only Xena in the station, and I’m also the only person worth voting for in this hellhole. What are you going to do about it?’

  ‘Find your mug?’

  ‘Too fucking right. I’ll help you. I’d very much like to know who has the balls to use my mug.’

  They scoured the empty squad room, and Xena eventually found her mug on a desk by the fax machine.

  ‘Whose desk is this?’

  ‘No one’s.’

  ‘It must be someone’s because my mug is sitting on top of it.’

  ‘Maybe somebody came to use the fax machine, put the mug down on the vacant desk and then forgot about it.’

  ‘Bastards.’ She looked around and saw that there was a desk next to the vacant one with papers and files spread out on top of it. ‘Whose desk is this?’

  ‘DC Arthurworry’s.’

  ‘Arthurworry? When you’re having squelchy sex with Jenifer, do you lie back and think up these names?’

  ‘His full name is Unwin Arthurworry.’

  Xena half-laughed. ‘There should be laws about giving children names like that. That’s the reason he’s taken my mug,
isn’t it? He’s psychologically damaged from going through life being baited, tormented and vilified.’ The mug was still a quarter full of cold herbal tea that had the aroma of raw sewage. She poured the liquid over the files and paperwork on Arthurworry’s desk, and then held out the mug towards Stick. ‘Disinfect it, and then fill it with brown nectar.’

  Stick looked around as if the cookie-jar police were breaking down the door. ‘You deliberately poured coffee over the papers on his desk.’

  ‘If he can’t do the time, he shouldn’t have done the crime.’

  ‘It might not have been him.’

  ‘He was in the vicinity. That’s good enough for me. Collateral damage. Somebody has to pay the ferryman.’

  ‘But . . .’

  ‘Are you still here? You’d better hurry up, because you still need to ring Hefferbitch and also find out what the animal whisperer has been up to.’

  ‘You could . . .’

  Her eyes narrowed. ‘I could do a lot of things numpty, but what I’ve chosen to do at this moment in time is sit at my desk and direct my minion in his duties. Is that all right with you minion?’

  ‘Very much so.’

  ‘Not thinking of starting a revolution, are we?’

  ‘I never would,’ he said over his shoulder as he headed towards the kitchen.

  ‘I’m glad to hear it.’

  He returned shortly afterwards with her spotless mug filled with steaming brown nectar.

  She passed him the grubby mug. ‘You forgot this.’

  He took the dirty mug back to the kitchen, and he returned he phoned Di Heffernan

  Xena leant over and flicked the switch onto speakerphone.

  ‘I’ve been expecting your call,’ Di said.

  ‘Have you got anything for us, Di?’

  ‘You’re not alone, are you?’

  He glanced at Xena. ‘No, I’m not alone.’

  ‘The search didn’t uncover the head.’

  ‘What about Dr Nathan Wapshott?’

  ‘He confirmed that there were three types of animals feeding off the corpse: badgers, foxes and rabbits.’

  ‘Rabbits always seem so nice and friendly.’

  ‘If you’re food, you have no friends.’

  ‘I can understand that.’

  ‘Anyway, he tracked all three back to their living accommodation, and sent in CCTV cameras either on the end of a wire, or – in the case of the rabbit warren – on a weasel.’

  ‘And he didn’t discover the head?’

  ‘No. Obviously, he can’t be one hundred percent certain that the animals in question didn’t take the head, but he informs me that he’s fairly close to it. To take a whole head and transport it back to their living accommodation would be unusual behaviour for any of the three animals. He’s not saying that it couldn’t happen, simply that it would be unusual. Also, he found no evidence of a head being transported such as rolling, pushing, dragging and so forth. None of the animals would have lifted it up and carried it.’

  ‘Thanks, Di. It’s looking increasingly likely that the head was probably disposed of elsewhere.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Anything in terms of forensic evidence?’

  ‘This should be interesting,’ Xena mumbled.

  ‘The basic principle put forward by Edmund Locard in the “Theory of exchange” is that: “Every contact leaves a trace.” Well, that’s all well and good in theory, but the problem here is that there’s been far too much contact either by animals and/or humans. As you already know, we found a plethora of animal tracks. We also found footprints from trainers, boots, shoes, flip-flops – even a one-legged donkey . . .’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Oh!’

  ‘And I’m sure that trace evidence from the killer is among them, but which ones . . . ? I’m shrugging by the way.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘That’s a permanent deformity with you, isn’t it? That, and scratching your lice-ridden head.’

  ‘Always a pleasure, DI Blake. We found traces of the victim’s blood, a glut of fibres, fingerprints on discarded food cartons and drink packaging – these are what we call the “silent witnesses” . . . sometimes though, I just wish a few of them would speak up.’

  Xena snorted. ‘Is this monologue going to go on for much longer?’

  ‘I think I’m about done.’

  ‘So, what you’re saying Di, is that there’s too much crime scene contamination?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Thanks for . . .’

  ‘. . . Nothing.’ Xena aimed at the phone.

  Stick put the phone down. ‘One of these days . . .’

  ‘. . . That bitch is going to find some forensic evidence that might help us solve an investigation?’

  ‘Something like that.’

  ‘So in the final analysis – we still have no head . . .’

  Stick’s eyes lit up. ‘But we do have the tattoo.’

  ‘Let’s not get overexcited. All we know is that the woman had a tattoo on the right side of her upper chest.’

  ‘If you tell the press that in the morning . . .’

  ‘It certainly narrows the field down. What about the two women from Missing Persons: Jessica Hogan and Celia Howland?’

  Stick looked at the Missing Person reports in the section entitled “Distinguishing Marks”. ‘Both women had tattoos,’ he said. ‘Jessica Hogan had a tiny butterfly on her labia majora, a cobra up her spine and a heart with “Kiss my ass” on her left buttock. Celia Howland had a chain tattooed around her left ankle, and a heart around her navel.’

  ‘Crazy. We can forget about those two then.’

  ‘Have you ever thought of getting a tattoo?’

  ‘What makes you think I haven’t already got one?’

  ‘Have you?’

  ‘With the surgical scars I’ve accumulated, a tattoo would be superfluous.’

  ‘Some people use tattoos to camouflage their surgical scars, you know. A zipper for example, a spider, or the stem of a flower. They make a feature out of the scars.’

  ‘And you think I should do that, do you?’

  ‘I don’t think anything of the sort. I was merely informing you of your options based on what some people do.’

  ‘So now I’m “some people”?’

  ‘What do you think we should do tomorrow?’

  ‘I could go and get a tattoo. Has Jenifer acquired any tattoos on her travels?’

  ‘She has . . . I have no idea.’

  ‘Tomorrow, while I’m telling lies at the press briefing, you can find out everything you can about Dr Martin Fuchs and his wife, their two children and the cottage in Great Amwell. And then we’ll take a trip out there.’

  ‘What about this?’ Stick asked, holding up the plastic evidence bag with Kim Bannister’s yellow hairbrush inside it.

  ‘Send it back with a message that the DNA doesn’t match our headless corpse.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘After you’ve done that . . .’

  ‘Isn’t it going home time?’

  ‘Going home is an option for those people who have actually done some work today. For the other lazy bastards . . . Well, they can bring the incident board up-to-date, and sift through the messages from the public who think they have information pertinent to our enquiries and those busybodies at Crimestoppers who imagine they can do our job better than us.’

  ‘Of course, I’d forgotten that you’ve done the majority of the work today.’

  ‘You should be glad that I was here to remind you then.’

  ‘Oh, I am.’

  ***

  Once Jerry and the Chief Constable had gone, he called Toadstone.

  ‘Are you sure you should be ringing me, Sir?’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘The Chief Constable said you’re no longer in charge of this investigation. In fact, there’s a Chief Superintendent Champ here who seems to think she’s in charge now.’

  ’Do you s
till have the photographs?’

  ‘Of the pages in the ledger?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘On my phone?’

  ‘You’re stonewalling, Toady.’

  ‘I’m nervous, Sir.’

  ‘No need to be. Send the photographs to my phone and your exposure is reduced to zero.’

  ‘What if . . . ?’

  ‘The sooner you send me those photographs, the sooner you’re out of the loop, Toady. As far as anyone is concerned – I took the photographs myself with my phone.’

  ‘And it’s nothing to do with me?’

  ‘You were an innocent bystander is all.’

  ‘I watched you take the photographs. I advised you not to, but you wouldn’t listen to the sensible advice of an amoeba so far down the food chain he hasn’t learnt to walk on two legs yet?’

  ‘That sounds about right.’

  ‘I’ll zip-up the photographs and send them to your email account. There’s a lot of photographs here, and I don’t think you’ll have enough memory on the memory card in your phone.’

  ‘Just so long as I get them.’

  ‘What are you . . . ? In fact, I don’t need to know anymore.’

  ‘All you need to know is that your conscience is clear.’

  ‘Oh, it is, Sir. Photographs! What photographs?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  He ended the call.

  In an ideal world he would have walked down to where they were keeping Bronwyn, sat on her bed and told her what he had planned. But it was far from an ideal world. Not only could he not walk anywhere, but neither could he hitch a lift in a wheelchair for an assisted visit. To add to the problem, Bronwyn wasn’t about to jump out of bed and pay him a visit either. He also didn’t know where she was located, or if she was accepting visitors.

  He pressed the alarm bell.

  A small Chinese nurse hurried into the room. ‘Where emergency?’