by Adam Croft
‘Wait a second,’ Frank Vine said. ‘Audio recorded? You want us to carry tape recorders around with us now?’
‘Not tape recorders,’ Pope replied. ‘Dictaphones. It’s something I introduced at Milton House and it works very well. Gives us an extra layer of evidence in court. Not that our written notes aren’t taken seriously, but it’s kind of hard for a jury to ignore a recorded conversation, if you see what I mean.’
Wendy couldn’t argue with that, but she found herself feeling slightly uneasy. As far as ethical and progressive policing went, she was certainly on the same side of the fence as Malcolm Pope, but she had to admit that recording external interviews didn’t quite sit right with her. People always tended to act differently when they were being filmed or recorded and the occasional off-the-record remarks or conversations would stop dead, which could make life far more difficult for them.
Malcolm Pope smiled. ‘Needless to say there’ll have to be some more changes if we’re going to get results quickly, but I think that’ll do for now. If anyone needs me, I’ll be in my new office on the third floor.’
Frank Vine raised an eyebrow. ’You not joining us in here, then? The guv always used to sit—’
‘Like I said, Detective Sergeant Vine. Things are going to have to change.’
Malcolm Pope exited the room and headed in the direction of the lift. The incident room remained silent for a few moments before a chuckling Steve Wing broke the deadlock.
‘Here, Frank. Mate said to me the other day, “Do you use your dictaphone?” I said, “No, I use my fingers like everyone else.”’
Frank allowed himself a titter before getting back to the topic in hand.
‘What was all that about then? Who does he think he is?’
‘He’s our new SIO, Frank. And I think he’s got some pretty valid points,’ Debbie Weston said.
‘Are you having a laugh?’ Frank replied, raising his voice. ‘How can you be happy about it? As things stand, you’re the only DC so you’re left as the poor lacky doing our leg work.’
‘I’m fine with that. I actually quite like the menial work.’
‘Sod that,’ Steve said. ‘If I wanted menial work I’d’ve got myself a job as a secretary. Reckon I’d look good in a skirt, Frank?’
‘About as good as you look in anything. So no. Listen, if Malcolm Pope’s gonna sit there and think he can change all the good work we’ve done over the years just because the guv’s away, he’s got another thing coming.’
Wendy shook her head and decided to take charge of the situation. ‘We’ve not got much choice. The best thing we can do is get our heads down and get on with it. With any luck, the guv’ll be back at work before long. We’ll have trouble keeping him away, you know that.’
The other officers nodded, but looked far from convinced.
15
Wendy knew Jack Culverhouse needed help. That much was obvious. The culture changes in the police over the past couple of decades had really shaken up some of the old school officers like Culverhouse. He hadn’t been in the force long when things started changing, but he was a stubborn git and he’d only ever joined because of what the police force was, and not what it was becoming. If he’d seen the changes on the horizon, it was doubtful he’d have ever joined in the first place, she thought.
He used to speak fondly of officers he’d worked with when he first joined the force. One, Jack Taylor, had been the DI when Culverhouse was a fresh-faced young PC trying to worm his way into CID. Taylor had been a corrupt bastard at best, but he knew what it took to get results and he was very much of the old school.
She’d also heard Culverhouse talk about an officer named Robin Grundy, who’d retired a couple of years before she joined the force. It was Grundy who Culverhouse had taken over from as DCI at Mildenheath, with Grundy having privately chosen him as his successor a few years previously. That was the way things were then, and the vast majority of it had changed enormously since. There were a few remnants of the old school remaining, but they’d largely been marginalised.
Charles Hawes, the Chief Constable, was a man trying to be a friend to everyone, doing his best to please the elected Police and Crime Commissioner and sucking up to those who espoused the new way of doing things as well as keeping more than one leg in with the old school. Although he’d have called himself a diplomat, others thought he was weak and on the fence.
Culverhouse had told Wendy about how Jack Taylor had thrown his life away, hitting the bottle big time after an off-duty incident saw him having to resign from the force. She could certainly see the parallels with Culverhouse’s current situation and, as much as he frustrated her, she simply couldn’t allow herself to watch him go the same way as Jack Taylor.
Robin Grundy, on the other hand, had left Mildenheath CID all those years ago with his head held relatively high. He’d gone on to set up his own private investigation agency and had done fairly well for a few years before retiring completely and preferring to tend his garden and allotment instead. Every officer had to retire at some point, and Wendy would far rather Culverhouse went the way of Robin Grundy and enjoyed a few years on his allotment than going out how Jack Taylor did, lying in a gutter with only a bottle of whisky for comfort.
She’d arranged to meet Grundy at his home in Mareham, a small village four or five miles outside Mildenheath with a number of very big houses. When she finally found his house, she wondered if perhaps she’d ever live in a place like this. If she made DCI, she might stand a chance. As things stood right now, she’d be more than happy to just have one of the two cars he had proudly parked on his huge gravel drive — an E-class Mercedes and a new Jaguar.
She walked up to the front door and rang the doorbell, waiting for him to answer. He was still fairly young — probably only in his late sixties, Wendy thought, doing the maths — and by what she could see now he looked even younger. Police work didn’t usually age a man well, but Robin Grundy had been the exception.
‘DS Knight, I presume?’ he said, smiling as he held the door open and beckoned her through. The hallway was light and airy, with a lot of wooden furniture and white paint. She followed Grundy through to the living room — one of a couple, she presumed — which had two low-backed sofas arranged around a large flat-screen TV on the far wall. They sat down on a sofa each.
‘Sorry, I should have offered you a drink. Would you like a cup of tea?’ Grundy said.
‘I’m fine, thanks anyway,’ Wendy replied. ‘I just wondered if I could perhaps talk to you on a personal level. As one police officer to a former police officer, but not officially, if you see what I mean.’
Grundy smiled. ‘Personal advice?’
‘Sort of,’ Wendy replied.
‘Don’t worry, I know exactly what you mean. The job’s a cunt, right?’
Wendy tried not to look shocked at this seemingly well-to-do man’s vulgar use of language, remembering he was very much from the same school of policing as Jack Culverhouse.
‘Well, it’s alright,’ she said. ‘I’m doing okay. There’s someone else we have in common who isn’t doing so well, though.’
‘Jack Culverhouse?’ Grundy said. ‘Yes, I could’ve seen that coming. Especially after the Ripper stuff recently. He’s been on a hiding to nothing since his wife left.’
‘You knew about that?’ Wendy asked.
‘Oh yes. We were fairly close, Jack and I. Drifted apart somewhat recently, though. Happens a lot in that job. You go from month to month without realising you haven’t spoken to anyone who isn’t an officer, a crim or a nark. It takes over.’
It was Wendy’s turn to smile. ‘Tell me about it,’ she said. ‘I don’t know if you’ve heard, but he’s on leave at the moment.’
Grundy’s eyebrows rose. ‘I hadn’t. But then again there’s no reason why I would’ve done. Voluntary or not?’
‘Not entirely,’ Wendy said. ‘He’s been a little less choosy with his words and actions recently and the upper echelons have become a
lot more fussy. There’s been a bit of crossover between those two things, see. Long story short, Hawes thought it would be a good idea if he took some time away.’
‘Hawes going soft in his old age, is he?’ Grundy asked.
‘Something like that. Problem is, Jack’s hit the bottle now. He’s a cynical old bastard anyway, but there’s just no getting through to him at all at the moment. He won’t take any help and seems to be quite happy to just throw it all away.’
Grundy tapped out a rhythm on the arm of the sofa before he spoke. ‘It was bound to happen eventually. Rock bottom, they call it. Most officers have been there at some point. You start to wonder what it’s all about. You ask yourself why you bother. The biggest attraction is in self-destruction. I’ve seen it happen so many times.’
Wendy could see that Grundy had had some personal experience of this. He didn’t need to say it; she could just tell. ‘But what can I do to help him?’
Grundy raised his eyebrows and shook his head. ‘Not an awful lot, unfortunately. He needs to help himself. Easier said than done, I know, but that’s the only way. The thing is, Wendy — can I call you Wendy? — he needs to feel needed. All officers do. That’s why we do the job, because we want to help people who need us. We want to do a public service. When things change at a higher level in the police force, sometimes it feels like those changes are out of your control. With someone like Jack, whose way of doing things is so at odds with the bigwigs, that’s likely to be amplified. He probably feels he’s being squeezed out slowly and this whole being put on leave thing just proves that. You need to prove him wrong, prove that he’s needed. Can you call on him for something?’
Wendy snorted. ‘Already tried that. It was him taking a stand and leading from the front — or not, as the case may be — that got him into this mess in the first place. I can’t go into the details, but there have been things going on which he’s been... Let’s just say he was reluctant to investigate as fully as he should’ve been.’
‘I see,’ Grundy said, raising his eyebrows again. ‘Sweeping the dirt under the carpet, eh? Nothing new as far as I’m concerned, but I appreciate things have changed a lot in recent years.’
‘You can say that again,’ Wendy said, nodding. ‘Unfortunately, Jack Culverhouse hasn’t.’
16
Mildenheath’s main church was a former abbey, an enormous twelfth-century stone building which stood in its own beautiful grounds, barely a stone’s throw from the crossroads in the town centre but at the same time seeming a million miles away from it. It seemed completely oblivious to the urban sprawl which had sprung up around it, instead choosing to stand ignorantly amongst it, with just enough open space of its own to keep the modern day at arm’s length.
The church had its own sombre history, being the place where royal divorces and the funerals of late medieval noblemen had occurred as well as having served as a safe house for royals during the English Civil War. Now, though, it was the site of the memorial service for PC Luke Baxter.
What struck Wendy the hardest was that life and daily policing still went on despite the event. A number of officers were unable to make the service because of work. Shifts had been moved to accommodate close friends and colleagues of Luke’s, but the cold fact of the matter was that life went on.
On the other hand, a huge number of serving and former police officers from across the country and beyond had come to pay their respects to Luke, a man they’d never known but with whom they’d shared a very personal bond; a bond symbolised by a simple uniform, which every one of them wore immaculately as they filed into the church.
Wendy recognised a number of familiar faces, not only former colleagues and friends but also representatives from the local and national press gathered outside the church, who’d taken a great interest not only because of the death of an on-duty police officer but the manner in which it had happened, being shot by one of the most notorious serial killers of recent times. She spotted Luke’s aunt, Shirley, and his older brother, Sam, at the front of the church, speaking to the vicar. Thankfully, this was at least a safe haven for them as the press had been explicitly told they were not allowed inside the church as the service was for friends, family and colleagues only.
A strange mixture of both sadness and pride swelled up inside Wendy. Sadness at the loss of a fine young police officer, but pride at the number of people who had turned out to honour his memory. She chuckled inwardly as she imagined the smug look on his face if he could’ve known how many people would come here for him. She wondered, briefly, if she would’ve received the same service had it been her who had died. The truth was it hadn’t almost been her they were here for; it was Jack Culverhouse. What was going through his mind right now must’ve been ten times, a hundred times worse.
As the vicar began speaking, the words all rolled into one and Wendy realised she was barely listening to what was being said. She occasionally tuned back in before zoning out again, her mind preoccupied by her own thoughts and memories. She wondered if it was the same for the others at the service, too.
After a few minutes, Wendy heard the door at the entrance to the church open. She turned around to see Jack Culverhouse, not dressed in police uniform but in a white polo neck and dark chinos. He held a baseball cap in one hand and a pair of large sunglasses in the other. He wisely decided against making his way towards the pews and instead opted to skulk at the back of the church, out of sight.
As the congregation rose to sing Amazing Grace, Wendy saw him heading back towards the door. Thankful that she’d sat on the end of a row, she peeled off and headed in pursuit of him. As she got to the exit she could see Jack walking quickly across the gardens, the baseball cap and sunglasses having provided an effective disguise against the waiting press who were now in Wendy’s way.
She knew the best tactic was to say absolutely nothing. Even saying ‘No comment’ or ‘I’ll be back in a minute and I’ll speak to you then’ was equivalent to opening up a friendly dialogue as far as the press were concerned, so she opted to keep quiet and instead followed Jack round towards the war memorial, masked from the church and the press throng by an ancient stone wall.
When she got to the war memorial, she found him stood, staring at it. She slowly made her way up to him and stood a few feet short.
‘Heroes, these men. Every one of them,’ he said, a slight slur coming through in his voice. ‘Every single year in November we honour what they did for us. I do, too. I wear my poppy, I watch the Remembrance service and I come down here and lay a wreath. And do you know what? I didn’t know a single one of the buggers. I wasn’t even alive. My parents hadn’t even met. But I still do it. And here we are, spending just one morning in church to honour the memory of a colleague, a friend, who until recently was living and breathing and laughing with us, and who sacrificed his life for mine. And can I even bring myself to sit at the back of a church and sing a couple of hymns for him? Can I fuck.’ He sighed. ‘What sort of man does that make me?’
Wendy walked closer to Jack and put an arm around his shoulder, trying to avoid the strong, sweet smell of alcohol.
‘It makes you a man with human emotions. A man who’s struggling to come to terms with what’s happened. And do you know what? That’s absolutely fine. No-one’s judging you.’
‘I’m judging myself,’ he said quietly, before the tears began to roll down his face and his shoulders began to heave.
Shortly after, Wendy was making her way back to the entrance to the church, not particularly keen herself on going back inside, but seeing it as preferable to hanging around with the photographers and reporters who were gathered outside.
Although they were all clamouring for a comment from Wendy as she passed through, the usually shy voice of Suzanne Corrigan made itself heard above the others; not because of its volume, but because of what she said.
‘Detective Sergeant Knight, do you think the public’s diminishing confidence in the police has led directly to the vigilante a
ctions we’ve been seeing recently?’
Wendy tried to let no emotion show on her face as she pushed open the main door to the church and went inside.
17
He pulled up on the kerb on the opposite side of the road from the house, having changed the number plates on his Vauxhall Combo in a rural lay-by a couple of miles away. He knew it was away from any CCTV cameras and would allow him to get close enough to his target’s house without being traceable.
The registration on the new plates matched that of an identical Vauxhall Combo owned by a van hire company on the outskirts of Birmingham. He’d looked at van hire companies’ fleets online until he’d found one that matched. On the slight off-chance that someone mentioned to the police that they’d seen his van, the registration would lead them down a dead end.
Sure, they’d realise soon enough that false plates had been used. Then their first port of call would be to ‘show plate’ manufacturers on the internet — companies that had been set up with the public line that they were supplying number plates for shows and exhibitions and not to be used on the road, although they were used almost exclusively for people wanting to make their obscure, cheap personalised registration plate look more expensive than it actually was by illegally altering the spacing of letters and numbers.
They’d waste a good day or so phoning around those companies to see who’d made the registration, when in fact he’d made it using an old manual jig and roller set he’d bought four years earlier from a friend whose motor factors business had closed down, telling him he knew someone who wanted to buy it from him. He figured that four years was long enough for no-one to make the connection, particularly seeing as he’d be destroying the plates later tonight to remove all trace of the evidence anyway.