by Jill McGown
Oh, yes. She walked two, three, four steps, and they were out where the fireworks were louder and brighter, hurting her head, going up the ramp toward a car. She was lowered down into the car seat, her arms slipping away from the inspector, who tipped the seat back gently.
It was better, once Inspector Hill had closed the door, and the noise had gone. But her face hurt.
Matt wrestled with the nonsnarl hose of the air pipe, which had somehow tied itself into a reef knot, and persuaded it to stretch to the other side of his car, where he checked the tire pressure.
He went through his mental list of what he still had to do. Oil. Water. Antifreeze. Windscreen washer. What else were you supposed to check when you were going on a long trip? Lights.
It would save time tomorrow, because he would have to fit in sleeping at some point before he set out, if he didn’t want to end up a statistic.
* * *
Bangs and flashes were all around him; the smoke from someone’s bonfire drifted across Rob’s line of vision as he crouched down below the level of the bush that spilled over the unfenced frontage of the garden onto the pathway. He watched as a youthful policeman crossed the road and walked along the side of the house toward the people around the bonfire.
Kids were gathered around, their parents shouting warnings about not getting too close. Dad was getting ready to light some goodie that had cost the earth and would rise and burst into life and die in seconds. Daddy, Daddy, can we go in the garden and play with explosive devices and naked flames? Of course, dearest.
The noise, the smell, the flames … They didn’t seem like fun to Rob. They seemed like a particularly bad night in Belfast, when he had watched as a car bomb had gone up. They had had a warning of a bomb; they had evacuated the area. He hadn’t been hurt; no one had.
But it was the first time Rob had seen a Semtex explosion in the flesh. TV gave you a miniature of it. You saw a street, a car. You saw a flash. You heard a dull thud and saw the camera shake. When the picture cleared, you saw smoke and buildings without glass.
You couldn’t feel the breathless instant between seeing the flash and hearing the explosion; you didn’t feel the air shake and the earth vibrate with the blast. You were given no conception of what it was like to see a complete and sturdy car there one minute, and its tangled innards the next; the twisted metal that fell from the sky, the shattered glass that sprayed into the air like lethal, lacerating champagne. You couldn’t smell the air afterward. But November the fifth was full of similar sights and sounds and smells; playing with fire seemed an odd way to Rob to want to spend your leisure time.
The policeman was in conversation with the man; he pointed toward the house across the road. Rob took his chance when he turned away again, and stood up, strolling to the cab. He was unlocking the door when the policeman thanked the neighbors and walked back down the path, crossing the road toward him.
“Excuse me!”
Rob turned from the cab.
“Can you tell me when you parked here, sir?”
“About twenty to nine, I think,” Rob said. “About half an hour ago or so.”
“Did you see anyone around here? Hanging about—showing an interest in this house, maybe?”
He pointed to the house again.
“No,” said Rob. “Sorry.”
“Well, thanks anyway.”
Rob got into the cab and rolled down the window, watching as the man across the road lit the blue touch paper and took long, backward strides to where his children stood.
A jet of flame shot down and the rocket took off, soaring up through the air with a piercing whistle before its short, violent life ended with a bang.
Lennie backed the Transit out of the alleyway. A constant stream of people were walking past, on their way to the bonfire. There were dozens of ways to get to the sodding bonfire— couldn’t they take a different one from this?
A flashing blue light caught his eye, and he held his breath as he heard the siren. A fire engine, going the same way as the crowds. Perhaps they could give some of these people a lift. A police car, too. Oh, no, groaned Lennie. No more cops. Please, no more cops.
He drove the Transit back into the alley, as close to the door as he could get.
Case had remained seated throughout Lloyd’s off-the-cuff analysis of his character, his motives, his competence, his politics, and, for good measure, his honesty, credibility, and integrity.
Lloyd, breathless, and perhaps beginning already to reflect on what he had said, as he did when he thus castigated Judy, fell silent. But his blue eyes still shone with anger, and there was no guilt attached to this reflection. He was reflecting that, unlike Judy, Case had not got up and left before the tirade had become wounding. And—also unlike Judy—Case did not appear to have been wounded. So it had been a bit of a waste of breath, really. If Judy failed to leave in time, something would hit home, something would really hurt her. And he would have a moment’s satisfaction, and feel guilty for weeks. But this had been like trying to land a telling punch on a man in full medieval armor.
“Chief Inspector Lloyd,” said Case. “You are aware that I could have you up on at least three if not four different disciplinary charges?”
“You can do as you please,” said Lloyd. “I have to work with you, but that doesn’t mean that I have to like you, or respect you or your judgment. And it certainly doesn’t mean that I have to listen to you speak of a friend of mine in insulting and abusive terms.”
“A friend of yours? That’s a very coy way of putting it.”
“There’s nothing coy about it. Judy Hill is a friend of mine. A trusted friend, whom I will continue to trust, regardless of this great favor you have done me.”
Case shook his head. “Then you’re a fool.”
Lloyd sat down. “You might be right that Drummond was someone else’s fall guy,” he said. “You might be right that the Malworth Mafia is trying to cover it up. But I think there’s something your jungle drums have failed to communicate to you. I’ve known Judy Hill for twenty years.”
“Then I’m sorry,” Case said. “I thought your relationship was of more recent origin. But I strongly advise you to put an end to it. Look—I don’t doubt that she sincerely believed Drummond was the rapist. I don’t doubt that you had got your murderer, and just needed the proof. I can see how tempting it would be to use one of the bastards to nail the other. But good cause or no, corruption is still corruption in my book.”
“And in mine.”
“Not from where I’m sitting. You’re standing too close to it.”
“I’ll offer you a wager,” said Lloyd.
Case’s eyebrows rose.
“My flat, my car, my bank balance, to a penny piece—when we get to the bottom of this, Judy Hill will be proved to have had no part in any of Malworth’s shenanigans.”
Case smiled. “I’ve never been much of a one for women,” he; said. “Never felt the urge, really. A confirmed bachelor. And when I see someone who has got it as bad as you, I’m glad.”
“It’s a serious bet,” said Lloyd. “Are you taking it?”
The phone rang, and Case picked it up. “Case. Yes, he’s here.”
Lloyd waited to be handed the phone, but Case continued to hold on to it, listening without speaking. “He’s on his way,” he said, eventually, and replaced the receiver. “That: was Inspector Bell,” he said. “His men had to go chasing after an anonymous nine-double-nine. Caller didn’t speak, but didn’t hang up. The emergency operator recognized Handel’s Fireworks music, reckoned the phone must be at the Malworth bonfire, sent a fire engine, and informed us. We found Colin Drummond’s body in the Parkside underpass.”
Lloyd stood up. He was disconcerted to find that his first reaction to this second murder—his very first reaction—had been relief. His second was that if Case always took that long to send officers to a murder, the bodies must often be moldering by the time they got to them. He went to the door, and was called back.
“Oh—and Lloyd.”
Lloyd turned. “Sir?” he said. Unofficially he could call him a bigoted, deluded incompetent. Officially, now and then, he would call him sir. It might be nice to hang on to his job.
“That bet?” he said. “You’re on.”
CHAPTER TEN
CAROLE’S HANDS WERE STILL SHAKING AS SHE GOT back in, put on the television, and the kettle.
Twenty-five minutes to ten. One hour and ten minutes ago she had left the house, barely able to put one foot in front of the other. She had done the hardest thing she had ever had to do in order to do what she must do. And she had done it. She had done it.
So why didn’t she feel different? Why didn’t she feel free? Why did it feel as though nothing at all had changed?
Surely, surely, it was over now.
The firework display was taking a breather before its finale; pop music had replaced Handel for the moment, the fire was blazing, and the vendors were vending.
Lloyd had tried to ring Judy, to explain why he wasn’t there, and that they had yet another inquiry from which she would doubtless find herself barred, but she hadn’t been there. She had probably got tired of waiting for him, and had gone to visit some friend he knew nothing about, he had thought, irritated with her again. It was as if she were deliberately avoiding him.
He picked his way through spent rockets and Catherine wheels, breathing in wood smoke, sulphur, and potassium nitrate, a quite pleasing combination, oddly enough. The break in the program had come at exactly the right time; Lloyd had heard his voice echo around the entire area when he had appealed for witnesses over the PA system. He could get used to that—maybe he would be a DJ on local radio when he retired.
The ones who thought they might have seen something of interest were being interviewed in the church; Roman Catholic, of course. No way that C of E adherents would have kept their church going in an area like this. Tom Finch was over there now, sorting the wheat from the chaff, appropriately enough.
They had so far found five cartridges in the underpass, from a semiautomatic pistol of some sort, but no pistol. They would be searching the park tomorrow.
Lloyd walked along the underpass to where Drummond’s body was slumped against a buttress in a kneeling position, facing the wall. It was bloody and bullet-ridden, and it smacked of an execution to Lloyd. It was right at the other end of the underpass from the bonfire, almost at its exit into the park. That was where Drummond’s mobile phone had been found, broadcasting Handel to the emergency services. He could have realized he was in danger, dialed 999, and then dropped it as he ran away from his pursuer, only to be followed into the underpass.
Lloyd walked up the ramp to the railing-enclosed parkland, crisscrossed with paths, its once formal flower beds and lawns being kept down, rather than up, by the Council. No shortage of trees and bushes, which probably looked after themselves, and into which the murderer could have thrown an entire arsenal of weapons. The odd bench and shelter. It was open all year round, twenty-four hours a day. It had a large paved area which had originally been for a bandstand; now, it had the occasional car parked on it. And it might have had a car parked on it tonight, Lloyd thought, but no one would have seen it. Which was, of course, what the murderer would be counting on.
He went back down into the underpass, and found that the lights and the SOCOs had arrived with commendable speed. He watched as the lights came on, as everyone got busy, while he considered the possibilities.
People who would have cheerfully murdered Colin Drummond, form an orderly queue, he thought. It would stretch from one end of the underpass to the other. All of his victims, save the one he murdered, and all of their husbands, brothers, fathers … an awful lot of people might have wanted to send Drummond off to join the great minority. Boyfriends, sisters, mothers, widowers … flatmates. Bobbie Chalmers. She was interesting, because she could very easily get hold of a gun.
And, of course, police officers could, especially if they were corrupt in the first place, get hold of guns. He had to bear Case’s theory in mind to some extent; it might not have been Drummond who was pulling the strings in an attempt to incriminate Judy, but an ex-colleague of hers who had been manipulating Drummond. If they were both out to get Judy for different reasons, this could be the result of a falling-out of thieves. So, yes, he would bear in mind that an ex-Malworth police officer might well have killed Drummond. But for the moment, Bobbie Chalmers was his favorite, as a working hypothesis.
The emergency call had been made at three minutes past nine; the emergency services had arrived at nine-fifteen, still not knowing what they were looking for. The body had been found at nine twenty-five, the phone two minutes later. It was the uniforms who had found him, but at least Case couldn’t complain about their efficiency. It had, of course, been sheer luck. A lone officer had thought he’d better check the underpass. Still, the CID had a lot to live up to on this one.
“Guv?” Tom came along the underpass toward him. “I’ve got someone over there who saw a woman going into the underpass at about nine o’clock,” he said. “He noticed, because women hardly ever use it if they’re alone, not after dark.”
“Did we get a description? Could it have been one of his victims?”
“Well,” said Tom. “I don’t think so. Dark-haired, about five-seven, nicely dressed, thirties, respectable-looking. Mrs. Jarvis is fair-haired, Lucy Rogerson and Ginny Fredericks are too young—I don’t think it could have been any of them.”
“Could have been Bobbie Chalmers,” Lloyd said. “She has more reason to want to kill Drummond than most.”
Tom frowned. “She’s blond,” he said.
“Not anymore.”
“She’s only about twenty-six,” said Tom.
“Well? It was dark.”
“Nicely dressed? She’s a bit flashy for that description, isn’t she, guv?”
“Nice is in the eye of the beholder,” said Lloyd. “She has every motive in the world to want to shoot him, and I’m sure she can have access to a semiautomatic pistol if she chooses.”
“That’s why I’m having trouble with ‘respectable-looking,’” said Tom. “I mean—that description sounds more like Judy than Bobbie Chalmers. With respect,” he added, with a smile.
Tom had obviously been treated to Judy’s opinion of their new Chief Superintendent. He was quite famous, apparently, though he had been merely a name to Lloyd, one he had heard floating around Bartonshire Constabulary for years. Matt Burbidge apparently knew him as Hard Case; Lloyd privately thought of him as Head Case. “Tom, can you hold the fort here?” he asked. “I’d like to talk to the Drummonds, find out if they know where Colin was going, what he was doing tonight.”
“Sure, guv.”
Colin’s parents lived on the other side of the bypass, naturally, on the outskirts of Malworth, where the houses took up a great deal of room, and rarely had more than two occupants. The Drummonds looked so much older than when Lloyd had last seen them that he was quite shocked; it had only been two years. But they had seen their son tried for rape, and convicted. Custom had suffered; they had had to close the Malworth shop, and the Barton one had only just survived. Then the conviction had been overturned; now, their son was dead. Lloyd didn’t suppose that he would have come out of that lot looking any less emotionally ravaged.
“I don’t want to intrude,” he said. “It’s just that if we can get an idea of where Colin might have been going, it would help.”
“He said he was meeting someone,” said Mrs. Drummond.
“Meeting someone? Did he say who?”
“No.” She wiped her nose, her eyes, with a paper handkerchief screwed into a ball so tight it could hardly be seen. “Someone rang him.”
“When?” said Lloyd.
“I don’t know. He didn’t say.”
“Did they ring here, or his mobile?”
“I don’t know.” She smiled tearfully. “He took that everywhere,” she said. “It reminded me of when he was
little and he had to take this spoon everywhere. Just an ordinary dessert spoon. But if we took him out anywhere, he had to have his spoon.”
Lloyd nodded. Until now he had never thought of Drummond as having had a childhood. “Can you tell me what he said about this phone call?” he asked.
“He said someone had rung him saying that they had information on Rosa. That’s the—the girl he was seeing.”
“Yes,” said Lloyd. “I know.”
“And then he said, ‘so I won’t be in this evening,’ and he left here about half past eight.”
“Thank you,” said Lloyd.
“He was very anxious to trace Rosa,” she said. “She could prove that he didn’t do those things. It’s one thing—being acquitted—it’s another being able to prove to people that you’re innocent.”
“Yes,” said Lloyd.
“Do you—” She broke off, touched her nose with the tiny ball of paper, and tried again. “Do you think someone lured him with that?” she asked. “And killed him?”
Yes, he did rather. “I don’t know, Mrs. Drummond,” he said. “But rest assured, we will know more soon.” And he left.
Mr. Drummond hadn’t said a word.
When he got back, Freddie was just getting out of his car. He grinned at Lloyd. “I know I wanted you to get him,” he said. “But a simple arrest would have done.”
“Someone got him,” Lloyd said, as they walked into the underpass to a backdrop of Roman candles and starbursts.
Freddie stopped walking. “Be honest, Lloyd,” he said. “He threatened Judy. Off the record, this time of all times—do you honestly care who killed him?”
“I don’t give a damn that he’s dead,” said Lloyd. “You can make as many jokes over this corpse as you like. But no one has the right to do that to anyone else, so of course I care who killed him.”
Freddie shook his head. “You can be a sanctimonious so-and-so, do you know that?” he said good-humoredly.
Lloyd didn’t think so. “If it’s what it looks like,” he said, “it’s someone taking the law into his or her own hands, and exceeding even its powers.”