IV
Loud and prolonged applause drowned out all other sounds, and the Special Branch men relaxed their grips on their guns. The Hon Honoria beamed at the audience and raised her clasped hands above her head in triumph.
Banks still felt uneasy. He was sure he’d heard sounds of an argument or a fight outside. He knew that a small demonstration had been planned, and wondered if it had turned violent. Still, there was nothing he could do. At all costs, the show must go on, and he didn’t want to create a stir by getting up and leaving early.
At least the speech was over. If question time didn’t go on too long he’d be able to get outside and smoke a cigarette in half an hour or so. An hour might see him at home with that Scotch, and Sandra on the other end of the telephone line. He was hungry, too. In Sandra’s absence, he had decided to have a go at haute cuisine, and though it hadn’t worked out too well so far—the curry had lacked spiciness, and he’d overcooked the fish casserole—he was making progress. Surely a Spanish omelette could present no real problems?
The applause died down and the chairman announced question time. As the first person stood up and began to ask about the proposed site of the nuclear-power station, the doors burst open and a hefty, bedraggled young man lurched in with two policemen in tow. A truncheon cracked down, and the three fell onto the back row. The young man yelped out in pain. Women screamed and reached for their fur coats as the flimsy chairs toppled and splintered under the weight of the three men.
Chas and Dave didn’t waste a second. They rushed to Honoria, shielding her from the audience, and with Banks in front, they left through the back door. Beyond the cluttered store-rooms, an exit opened onto a complex of back streets, and Banks led them down a narrow alley where the shops on York Road dumped their rubbish. In no time at all the four of them had crossed the road and entered the old Riverview Hotel, where the Hon Honoria was booked to stay the night. For the first time that evening, she was quiet. Banks noticed in the muted light of the hotel lobby how pale she had turned.
Only when they got to the room, a suite with a superb view over the terraced river-gardens, did Chas and Dave relax. Honoria sighed and sank into the sofa, and Dave locked the door and put the chain on while Chas headed over to the cocktail cabinet.
“Pour me a gin-and-tonic, will you, dear?” said Honoria in a shaky voice.
“What the hell was all that about?” Chas asked, also pouring out two stiff shots of Scotch.
“I don’t know,” Banks said. “There was a small demonstration outside. I suppose it could have—”
“Some bloody security you’ve got here,” said Dave, taking his drink and passing the gin-and-tonic to Honoria.
She gulped it down and put her hand to her brow. “My God,” she said, “I thought there was nobody but farmers and horse-trainers living up here. Look at me, I’m shaking like a bloody leaf.”
“Look,” Banks said, hovering at the door, “I’d better go and see what’s happening.” It was obvious he wasn’t going to get a drink, and he was damned if he was going to stand in as a whipping boy for the security organizers. “Will you be all right?”
“A damn sight safer than we were back there,” Dave said. Then his tone softened a little and he came to the door with Banks. “Yes, go on. It’s your problem now, mate.” He smiled and lowered his voice, twitching his head in Honoria’s direction. “Ours is her.”
In the rush, Banks had left his raincoat in the Community Centre, and his cigarettes were in the right-hand pocket. He noticed Chas lighting up as he left, but hadn’t the audacity to ask for one. Things were bad enough already. Flipping up his jacket collar against the rain, he ran down to the market square, turned right in front of the church and stopped dead.
The wounded lay groaning or unconscious in the drizzle, and police still scuffled with the ones they’d caught, trying to force them into the backs of the cars or into the Black Maria. Some demonstrators, held by their hair, wriggled and kicked as they went, receiving sharp blows from the truncheons for their efforts. Others went peacefully. They were frightened and tired now; most of the fight had gone out of them.
Banks stood rooted to the spot and watched the scene. Radios crackled; blue lights spun; the injured cried in pain and shock while ambulance attendants rushed around with stretchers. It defied belief. A full-blown riot in Eastvale, admittedly on a small scale, was near unthinkable. Banks had got used to the rising crime rate, which affected even places as small as Eastvale, with just over fourteen thousand people, but riots were surely reserved for Birmingham, Liverpool, Leeds, Manchester, Bristol or London. It couldn’t happen here, he had always thought as he shook his head over news of Brixton, Toxteth and Tottenham. But now it had, and the moaning casualties, police and demonstrators alike, were witness to that hard truth.
The street was blocked off at the market square to the south and near the Town Hall, at the junction with Elmet Street, to the north. The gaslamps and illuminated window displays in the twee tourist shops full of Yorkshire woollen wear, walking gear and local produce shone on the chaotic scene. A boy, no more than fifteen or sixteen, cried out as two policemen dragged him by his hair along the glistening cobbles; a torn placard that had once defiantly read NO NUKES flapped in the March wind as the thin rain tapped a faint tattoo against it; one policeman, helmet gone and hair in disarray, bent to help up another, whose moustache was matted with blood and whose nose lay at an odd angle to his face.
In the revolving blue lights, the aftermath of the battle took on a slow-motion, surrealistic quality to Banks. Elongated shadows played across walls. In the street, odd objects caught the light for a second, then seemed to vanish: an upturned helmet, an empty beer bottle, a key-ring, a half-eaten apple browning at the edges, a long white scarf twisted like a snake.
Several policemen had come out of the station to help, and Banks recognized Sergeant Rowe standing behind a squad car by the corner.
“What happened?” he asked.
Rowe shook his head. “Demo turned nasty, sir. We don’t know how or why yet.”
“How many were there?”
“About a hundred.” He waved his hand at the scene. “But we didn’t expect anything like this.”
“Got a cigarette, Sergeant?”
Rowe gave him a Senior Service. It tasted strong after Silk Cut, but he drew the smoke deep into his lungs nonetheless.
“How many hurt?”
“Don’t know yet, sir.”
“Any of ours?”
“Aye, a few, I reckon. We had about thirty or so on crowd-control duty, but most of them were drafted in from York and Scarborough on overtime. Craig was there, and young Tolliver. I haven’t seen either of them yet. It’ll be busy in the station tonight. Looks like we’ve nicked about half of them.”
Two ambulance attendants trotted by with a stretcher between them. On it lay a middle-aged woman, her left eye clouded with blood. She turned her head painfully and spat at Sergeant Rowe as they passed.
“Bloody hell!” Rowe said. “That was Mrs Campbell. She takes Sunday School at Cardigan Drive Congregationalist.”
“War makes animals of us all, Sergeant,” Banks said, wishing he could remember where he’d heard that, and turned away. “I’d better get to the station. Does the super know?”
“It’s his day off, sir.” Rowe still seemed stunned.
“I’d better call him. Hatchley and Richmond, too.”
“DC Richmond’s over there, sir.” Rowe pointed to a tall, slim man standing near the Black Maria.
Banks walked over and touched Richmond’s arm.
The young detective constable flinched. “Oh, it’s you, sir. Sorry, this has got me all tense.”
“How long have you been here, Phil?”
“I came out when Sergeant Rowe told us what was happening.”
“You didn’t see it start, then?”
“No, sir. It was all over in fifteen minutes.”
“Come on. We’d better get inside and help w
ith the processing.”
Chaos reigned inside the station. Every square inch of available space was taken up by arrested demonstrators, some of them bleeding from minor cuts, and most of them complaining loudly about police brutality. As Banks and Richmond shouldered their way towards the stairs, a familiar voice called out after them.
“Craig!” Banks said, when the young constable caught up with them. “What happened?”
“Not much, sir,” PC Craig shouted over the noise. His right eye was dark and puffed up, and blood oozed from a split lip. “I got off lucky.”
“You should be at the hospital.”
“It’s nothing, sir, really. They took Susan Gay off in an ambulance.”
“What was she doing out there?”
“They needed help, sir. The men on crowd control. We just went out. We never knew it would be like this . . . .”
“Is she hurt badly?”
“They think it’s just concussion, sir. She got knocked down, and some bastard kicked her in the head. The hospital just phoned. A Dr Partridge wants to talk to you.”
A scuffle broke out behind them and someone went flying into the small of Richmond’s back. He fell forward and knocked Banks and Craig against the wall.
Banks got up and regained his balance. “Can’t anyone keep these bloody people quiet!” he shouted to the station in general. Then he turned to Craig again. “I’ll talk to the doctor. But give the super a call, if you’re up to it. Tell him what’s happened and ask him to come in. Sergeant Hatchley, too. Then get to the hospital. You might as well have someone look at your eye while you pay a sick call on Susan.”
“Yes, sir.” Craig elbowed his way back through the crowd, and Banks and Richmond made their way upstairs to the CID offices.
First Banks reached into his desk drawer, where he kept a spare packet of cigarettes, then he dialled Eastvale General Infirmary.
Reception paged the doctor, who picked up the phone about a minute later.
“Are there any serious injuries?” Banks asked.
“Most of them are just cuts and bruises. A few minor head wounds. On the whole, I’d say it looks worse than it is. But that’s not—”
“What about PC Gay?”
“Who?”
“Susan Gay. The policewoman.”
“Oh, yes. She’s all right. She’s got concussion. We’ll keep her in overnight for observation, then after a few days’ rest she’ll be right as rain. Look, I understand your concern, Chief Inspector, but that’s not what I wanted to talk to you about.”
“What is it, then?” For a moment, Banks felt an icy prickle of irrational fear. Sandra? The children? The results of his last chest X-ray?
“There’s been a death.”
“At the demonstration?”
“Yes.”
“Go on.”
“Well, it’s more of a murder, I suppose.”
“Suppose?”
“I mean that’s what it looks like. I’m not a pathologist. I’m not qualified—”
“Who’s the victim?”
“It’s a policeman. PC Edwin Gill.”
Banks frowned. “I’ve not heard the name. Where’s he from?”
“One of the others said he was drafted in from Scarborough.”
“How did he die?”
“Well, that’s the thing. You’d expect a fractured skull or some wound consistent with what went on.”
“But?”
“He was stabbed. He was still alive when he was brought in. I’m afraid we didn’t . . . There was no obvious wound at first. We thought he’d just been knocked out like the others. He died before we could do anything. Internal bleeding.”
Banks put his hand over the receiver and turned his eyes up to the ceiling. “Shit!”
“Hello, Chief Inspector? Are you still there?”
“Yes. Sorry, doc. Thanks for calling so quickly. I’ll send down some more police guards. Nobody’s to leave, no matter how minor their injuries. Is there anyone from Eastvale station there? Anyone conscious, that is.”
“Just a minute.”
Dr Partridge came back with PC Tolliver, who had accompanied Susan Gay in the ambulance.
“Listen carefully, lad,” Banks said. “We’ve got a bloody crisis on our hands back here, so you’ll have to handle the hospital end yourself.”
“Yes, sir.”
“There’ll be more men down there as soon as I can round some up, but until then do the best you can. I don’t want anyone from tonight’s fracas to leave there, do you understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And that includes our men, too. I realize some of them might be anxious to get home after they’ve had their cuts dressed, but I need statements, and I need them while things are fresh in their minds. Okay?”
“Yes, sir. There’s two or three more blokes here without serious injuries. We’ll see to it.”
“Good. You know about PC Gill?”
“Yes, sir. The doctor told me. I didn’t know him.”
“You’d better get someone to identify the body formally. Did he have a family?”
“Don’t know, sir.”
“Find out. If he did, you know what to do.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And get Dr Glendenning down there. We need him to examine the body. We’ve got to move quickly on this, before things get cold.”
“I understand, sir.”
“Good. Off you go.”
Banks hung up and turned to Richmond, who stood in the door-way nervously smoothing his moustache. “Go downstairs, would you, Phil, and tell whoever’s in charge to get things quietened down and make sure no one sneaks out. Then call York and ask if they can spare a few more men for the night. If they can’t, try Darlington. And you’d better get someone to rope off the street from the market square to the Town Hall, too.”
“What’s up?” Richmond asked.
Banks sighed and ran a hand through his close-cropped hair. “It looks like we’ve got a murder on our hands and a hundred or more bloody suspects.”
TWO
I
The wind chimes tinkled and rain hissed on the rough moorland grass. Mara Delacey had just put the children to bed and read them Beatrix Potter’s Tale of Squirrel Nutkin. Now it was time for her to relax, to enjoy the stillness and isolation, the play of silence and natural sound. It reminded her of the old days when she used to meditate on her mantra.
As usual, it had been a tiring day: washing to do, meals to cook, children to take care of. But it had also been satisfying. She had managed to fit in a couple of hours throwing pots in the back of Elspeth’s craft shop in Relton. If it was her lot in life to be an earth mother, she thought with a smile, better to be one here, away from the rigid rules and self-righteous spirituality of the ashram, where she hadn’t even been able to sneak a cigarette after dinner. She was glad she’d left all that rubbish behind.
Now she could enjoy some time to herself without feeling she ought to be out chasing after converts or singing the praises of the guru—not that many did now he was serving his stretch in jail for fraud and tax evasion. The devotees had scattered: some, lost and lonely, had gone to look for new leaders; others, like Mara, had moved on to something else.
She had met Seth Cotton a year after he had bought the place near Relton, which he had christened Maggie’s Farm. As soon as he showed it to her, she knew it had to be her home. It was a typical eighteenth-century Dales farmhouse set in a couple of acres of land on the moors above the dale. The walls were built of limestone, with gritstone corners and a flagstone roof. Recessed windows looked north over the dale, and the heavy door-head, supported on stacked quoins, bore the initials T.J.H.—standing for the original owner—and the date 1765. The only addition apart from Seth’s workshop, a shed at the far end of the back garden, was a limestone porch with a slate roof. Beyond the back-garden fence, about fifty yards east of the main house, stood an old barn, which Seth had been busy renovating when she met him. He had s
plit it into an upper studio-apartment, where Rick Trelawney, an artist, lived with his son, and a one-bedroom flat on the ground floor, occupied by Zoe Hardacre and her daughter. Paul, their most recent tenant, had a room in the main house.
Although the barn was more modern inside, Mara preferred the farmhouse. Its front door led directly into the spacious living-room, a clean and tidy place furnished with a collection of odds and sods: an imitation Persian carpet, a reupholstered fifties sofa, and a large table and four chairs made of white pine by Seth himself. Large beanbag cushions lay scattered against the walls for comfort.
On the wall opposite the stone fireplace hung a huge tapestry of a Chinese scene. It showed enormous mountains, their snow-streaked peaks sharp as needles above the pine forests. In the middle-distance, a straggling line of tiny human figures moved up a winding path. Mara looked at it a lot. There was no overhead light in the room. She kept the shaded lamps dim and supplemented them with fat red candles because she liked the shadows the flames cast on the tapestry and the whitewashed stone walls. Her favourite place to curl up was near the window in an old rocking chair Seth had restored. There, she could hear the wind chimes clearly as she sipped wine and read.
In her early days, she had devoured Kerouac, Burroughs, Ginsberg, Carlos Castaneda and the rest, but at thirty-eight she found their works embarrassingly adolescent, and her tastes had reverted to the classics she remembered from her university days. There was something about those long Victorian novels that suited a place as isolated and slow-moving as Maggie’s Farm.
Now she decided to settle down and lose herself in The Mill on the Floss. A hand-rolled Old Holborn and a glass of Barsac would also go down nicely. And maybe some music. She walked to the stereo, selected Holst’s The Planets, the side with “Saturn,” “Uranus” and “Neptune,” then nestled in the chair to read by candlelight. The others were all at the demo, and they’d be sure to stop off for a pint or two at the Black Sheep in Relton on the way back. The kids were sleeping in the spare room upstairs, so she wouldn’t have to keep nipping out to the barn to check on them. It was half-past nine now. She could probably count on at least a couple of hours to herself.
A Necessary End Page 2