by M J Lee
Chapter 79
The strong scent of freshly mown grass filled the air. ‘What is this place?’ said Ridpath, looking for a bin to put his rubbish in. There didn’t seem to be any nearby.
‘This is the Festival Gardens. It was opened in 1984, after the Liverpool riots of 1981, to bring a bit of colour into people’s lives.’
‘Did you work during the riots?’
‘I might look ancient but I’m not that old. Way before my time. Nah, I was throwing bricks at the coppers then. It was a part of growing up if you were a Scouser. That and supporting Liverpool, of course. Outside riots on the streets, in here a riot of colour. That was the joke in those days.’
Ridpath looked around at the derelict Chinese pagodas and dishevelled shrubs and trees. ‘Doesn’t look colourful.’
‘I remember coming here then, it was actually quite well done, but, of course, there was no money to keep it going, so it was left to rot.’ They were sitting on a graffitied bench. Fitzgerald spread his arms wide. ‘This is after the council cleaned it up, too. Before it was the gardens, it was a rubbish tip. They discovered recently that most of the rubbish had simply been buried even deeper. These days, it’s hardly ever used except as a fairground now and again. There’s a plan somewhere to build houses on it, create a garden paradise. Pigs might fly, I think, before this lot gets built on.’
To Ridpath, it looked remarkably like Chorlton Ees. ‘Where’s the river?’
He pointed south. ‘Over there. Quiet now, used to be buzzin’ when I was a lid.’
‘Lid?’
‘Kid. Lad.’ He changed his voice, mimicking received pronunciation with a Scouse accent. ‘A child. When I was young.’
Ridpath stood up. He thought he could just see the river from here. The unmistakeable sound of seagulls squabbling raucously over a morsel of food came from that direction. He stared back at the trees. ‘And the body, where was it found?’
‘Back there, in the trees.’ Fitzgerald joined him. ‘Let’s walk across. I think they took the police tape down a while ago, either that or it was nicked. People round here use it to decorate bedrooms.’
‘Classy.’
They reached an area of denser scrubland. ‘The kid’s body was found in there by a man walking his dog.’
Another coincidence. ‘You checked him out?’
‘Put him through the wringer. Clean as a whistle.’
Ridpath looked at the stand of trees. Exactly like Chorlton Ees; they were close to the path, but once you stepped behind them, all was quiet and hidden.
‘Lucky the body was found so quickly.’
‘Aye, lucky for us, not so lucky for the parents. The mother tried to top herself last week. Husband caught her just in time. She blames herself. Well, wouldn’t you if something like that happened?’
Ridpath stayed quiet and then said, ‘I’ve seen enough, Fitz. Do you know Canning Place?’
‘What do you want there?’
‘I need to see the pathologist.’
‘Dr Sewell? A good man. You’ll like him. Detailed, efficient and conscientious. I wish we had more like him. I’ll give you a lift to the Royal Ozzy, it’s on the way.’
‘It isn’t really, is it?’
‘Nah, but I’ll drop you off anyway. Wouldn’t want some Manc copper wandering round my patch and getting lost, would we? We can pick up the Wet Nelly on the way.’
Chapter 80
Fitzgerald dropped Ridpath outside the Royal Liverpool Hospital. The Wet Nelly had been interesting, in the same way being hit over the head with a sock full of cement was ‘interesting’.
After fighting with the signage, he eventually found the mortuary.
Dr Sewell was waiting for him. ‘You’re late.’
Ridpath glanced up at the clock. It was 2.10. The doctor was short and officious with salt-and-pepper hair that stood out like surgical needles from his scalp.
‘Sorry, I was out at Festival Gardens.’
‘Checking the location where the body was found?’
Ridpath nodded.
‘Discover anything?’
They were walking towards a big sign with the words ‘Mortuary and Path Lab’ printed on it. Dr Sewell opened the door.
‘Not a lot. The location was similar to that of my victim in Manchester.’
‘In Chorlton Ees?’
Ridpath looked surprised.
‘I read your pathologist’s report. Dr Schofield, wasn’t it? Extremely thorough and detailed. A man after my own heart.’
‘You two should meet up and chat about the latest dissection techniques.’ Ridpath laughed light-heartedly. Mortuaries always made him feel light-headed. He never knew whether to laugh or cry.
‘You’re right, we should.’
The joke went over the doctor’s head as he unlocked the door.
‘Of course, the body has already been released back to the family, so I have nothing to show you. But we can access my original report and display it here.’
The mortuary was made up of a row of six stainless steel tables. The last two were occupied by the shapes of human bodies covered by white sheets. The whole place had a sterility and an anonymity to it that Ridpath hated. He hoped he never ended up in a place like this.
An image flashed through his mind. Polly lying on one of these tables, her body displaying the awful Y-section from her shoulder, down between her breasts and ending just after her belly button.
He quickly whispered his coping word, ‘freedom’, and concentrated on remembering the image of being on top of a mountain, the wind blowing through his hair, tired but happy.
‘What was that?’ asked Dr Sewell.
‘Nothing,’ Ridpath mumbled.
A technician was preparing the area for a post-mortem, placing the instruments in the correct order on a table next to the head of the body. ‘Let me finish this, Mike, and then we’ll get started.’
‘No worries,’ the technician answered. ‘Whenever you’re ready, Pete.’
The whole set-up was far more informal that Dr Schofield’s in Manchester. They walked down to the end of the mortuary and through another door.
A small lab. Another technician, female this time, was placing a slide on the viewing ledge of a microscope. ‘Got that gut cross-section for you.’
‘Won’t be a sec.’
Dr Sewell put his password into a computer and then entered another code for the McCarthy case. A standard pathologist’s report appeared. He scanned the report, reminding himself of the details of the post-mortem. ‘What do you want to know? I bet it’s if there are any similarities between this murder and the one in Manchester?’
Before he could answer the question, the doctor continued.
‘In post-mortem results, quite a lot of difference. Alan McCarthy was killed with a knife; two thrusts to the chest region, one of which penetrated the pericardium. The boy died instantly. Plus, unlike your case, there was no evidence of any sexual activity, either before or after death.’
‘Was the body washed?’
The doctor checked his notes. ‘It was. I found evidence of soap on the skin. A common or garden supermarket soap, Lifebuoy. Your body was also washed, I believe.’
‘We think it was to remove all fibres or DNA traces.’
‘True, there were no fibres or external DNA on the body.’
‘Where?’
‘Where what?’
‘Where was the body washed?’
‘We believe it was in a toilet in the Festival Gardens used by the homeless.’
‘Why take the risk?’
‘The risk?’
‘Of being caught washing a body in a public toilet?’
The doctor shrugged his shoulders. ‘You’ll have to ask the killer, I’m afraid. Science doesn’t tell us the motivations for any action, merely that it has happened. You can’t “follow the science”. You make a decision based on the evidence. All decisions are inevitably value judgements. Science doesn’t make decisions, people do.’
Ridpath felt deflated. He had been hoping there would be more links between the two deaths. But other than both bodies being washed, there was nothing. All the evidence was inferential: the location of the body, hidden in woods close to the Mersey.
‘Just a few more questions, Doctor. Were there any signs of violence on the body? Bruising or anything like that?’
Once again, the doctor checked his notes. ‘None that I found.’
‘Finally, you were the medical examiner called out when the boy was found.’
‘I was.’
‘Was the body posed in any way?’
‘No, unlike your boy it was naked and thrown away as if in a hurry. Not posed at all.’
‘Thank you, Doctor.’
‘I hope I have been of help, DI Ridpath, but I fear I haven’t. The only real similarity between these two deaths is that they both involved young boys.’
‘That’s it, Doctor. I can’t believe two child-killers were operating at exactly the same time only thirty-five miles apart. It just doesn’t make sense.’
‘The science suggests otherwise, Detective.’
‘But as you said earlier, Doctor, science doesn’t make judgements, people do. And my judgement is that these two cases are linked.’
‘Despite there being no evidence to support this claim?’
Ridpath tapped the side of his head. ‘The evidence is in here, Doctor.’
Chapter 81
On the drive back to Manchester along the M62, Ridpath’s mind went over every detail of the case again and again.
Nothing made any sense.
Were the cases linked?
Possibly, but there was no concrete evidence, plus Merseyside already had a suspect who had confessed to the crime.
In Manchester, they didn’t even have a suspect. Turnbull’s bullheaded insistence that Michael Carsley was guilty had wasted valuable days of work.
Daniel’s statement that it was his mother who was violent towards them, not his father, was interesting. Could the mother have picked up David from the street? It might explain why the boy got into the car. But the idea of any mother killing her son was unthinkable. Nonetheless, he made a mental note to ask Chrissy about Irene Carsley. Perhaps he would have to pay her a visit again.
By the time he parked outside Police HQ back in Manchester, he had been through the case, backwards and forwards. The problem was he still had nothing to offer Claire Trent.
Upstairs, on the MIT floor, the detectives were gathering in the Situation Room. There was a distinct atmosphere of gloom over the place. Ridpath could smell it, that bitter aroma of failure.
The meeting began with Claire Trent taking the lead.
‘Harry, what do you have on the car?’
‘Not a lot, boss. Working with Reynolds, we’ve narrowed it down to one model. A Vauxhall Corsa manufactured between 2014 and 2019. This is one of the most popular models of saloons in the UK. There were 279,000 sold during this period. I’m still trying to find out how many in the North West.’
‘It’s too wide, can you narrow it further by version or year?’
Harry Makepeace shook his head. ‘The pictures aren’t good enough, boss, and we can’t see the number plate on either of the CCTV images. It’s the best we can do.’
‘Right, Harry, keep going.’
‘You want me to start building a database of the owners?’
‘Yes, and cross-reference it against the Register of Paedophiles. Maybe we’ll get lucky.’
‘And if we don’t?’
‘You’ll have to start contacting each owner individually, asking what they were doing on those dates.’
‘We could end up being swamped, boss.’
‘Start with the North West.’
‘I’ll need help – there are too many people to call.’
Claire Trent ran her fingers through her hair. ‘I’ll find the resources.’
‘Maybe somebody with experience of running a contact tracing operation.’
‘Then don’t call Dido Harding,’ said a wag from the back.
Everybody laughed at the weak joke. Ridpath could feel the collective release of tension. As ever with the police, black humour lurked just beneath the surface of even the most serious meetings.
‘Thanks, Harry,’ Claire Trent summed up as the laughter died down. ‘Get started straight away.’
‘Yes, boss.’
Sarah Hampson coughed. ‘I think at this point I should let you know the nationals have doubled down on the story.’ She held up the front page of the Daily Mail. Two words in big, bold, black letters dominated everything.
MORE INCOMPETENCE
‘This is going to be the front page tomorrow morning and this time they are not speaking about the government but about us.’
‘Can’t we do anything to stop these headlines?’
‘Last time I looked it was a free press. We keep feeding them our point of view but when a narrative takes hold, it’s difficult to shake.’
‘Has the chief constable seen these, Sarah?’
‘Not yet, Claire.’
‘Anything we can do?’
Sarah Hampson shrugged her shoulders. ‘Hope and pray another big story happens overnight. If it doesn’t, this is what will run.’
‘Something for me to look forward to tomorrow. Julie, any news from the search close to the Water Park and Jackson’s Boat?’
‘Twenty-three bags of rubbish and seventeen used condoms but nothing else, boss. It’s been nearly three weeks.’
‘Thanks, Julie. And Alan, anything from Greater Manchester Transport?’
‘We won’t interview most of the commuters till tomorrow morning, boss. No point on a Sunday. But the security for the trams are not hopeful. It seems most travellers are pretty much zombies in the morning.’
‘Right, Alan, so nothing to report.’
Alan shook his head.
The mood in the meeting was even more deflated than at the beginning, if that was at all possible.
Claire Trent called on Paul Turnbull next.
‘We’ve been through all the witness statements one more time, concentrating on those who live on the route David Carsley potentially took from the park to the ATM. We even went out this afternoon to re-interview them. But it’s been three weeks now. People’s memories have become even more vague. A couple of things. There definitely was a man with a dog, an Alsatian. His name is Peter Davies. He went into the station this morning and owned up to being in the park on 21 July.’
‘Why didn’t he come forward earlier?’ asked Claire Trent.
‘He’s a lorry driver and went over to Poland on a job that afternoon. He has a watertight alibi for the time of the abduction. We’ve checked out footage of him at his depot in Sharston.’
‘Bring him in anyway. I want every possible lead or suspect shaken down. Nobody, I repeat, nobody is in the clear until I have reviewed their statements. You said a couple of things?’
‘We checked with the Procurator Fiscal in Scotland why Michael Carsley wasn’t charged with child abuse or domestic violence.’
‘And…?’
‘There wasn’t enough evidence of who was the perpetrator, him or his wife, so they let the case lapse, delivering a stern warning and placing both children under a care order.’
‘Why did nobody follow up?’
Turnbull shrugged. ‘The family had gone south to Manchester, so I guess they thought it was somebody else’s problem. One less issue to deal with.’
‘Right, Paul, keep going, there must be something we missed. Finally, Ridpath. You went to Liverpool today?’
‘He’s not still trying to link our case with the murder in Liverpool?’ Turnbull’s hand slammed hard on the desk. ‘Why are you indulging his fantasies, Claire? It’s a waste of our time.’
Just as Ridpath was about to speak, his phone rang. He looked at the screen and saw it was Mrs Challinor. What did she want? He wasn’t due to return to the Coroner’s Office until tom
orrow. Was she trying to remind him? Not like her.
He answered, but before he could get any words out, she spoke.
‘My grandson, he’s gone missing.’
Chapter 82
‘What?’
‘My grandson, Ben, he’s gone missing.’
The whole of MIT was watching him, including Claire Trent.
‘How? When?’
‘My daughter took him to the cinema as a treat for his birthday. They were waiting for the film to start when he announced he wanted to pee. She pointed to the toilet and asked him to go while she stayed behind to look after his sister. He went and didn’t come back.’
‘When was this?’
‘About an hour ago. She’s frantically looking for him and has just called me.’
‘Right, let me get on it. Where is your daughter now?’
‘Still at the cinema. She doesn’t know what to do.’
For some unknown reason, Ridpath knew this was bad.
‘What is it, Ridpath?’ asked Claire Trent.
He held his hand up again to stop her speaking. ‘We’ll send a car to bring you here. I’ll go to your daughter now.’
‘What shall I do, Ridpath? I’m going to the cinema.’
‘No, stay where you are until the car arrives. What’s your daughter’s number?’
Ridpath reached into his pocket to write it down in his pocket book as she spoke.
‘Let me repeat, wait for the car to bring you to Police HQ. Do you understand, Mrs Challinor?’
‘Yes.’
‘I’m going to ring your daughter now.’
‘She’s out of her mind, Ridpath, not making much sense.’
‘Don’t worry, I’ll handle it. Stay where you are until the car arrives.’
He rang off. Claire Trent was staring at him.
‘Boss, we have a problem.’
Chapter 83
It had been easier than he thought.
He waited in the toilet of the cinema, pretending to wash his hands. He’d chosen that one specially. There were steps leading to an exit through a fire door. From there, it was a two-minute walk to the car.
The boy had come in on his own. His hair was freshly combed and he was wearing new clothes; a Harry Potter badge saying Gryffindor prominent against his pale t-shirt.