His knock was answered by a tall, slender woman in her mid- to late-thirties wearing jeans and a rust-coloured jumper. Banks thought he remembered her from his previous visit. Her wavy chestnut hair tumbled over her shoulders, framing a pale, heart-shaped face, free of make-up. Perhaps her chin was a little too pointed and her nose a bit too long, but the whole effect was pleasing. Her clear brown eyes looked both innocent and knowing at once.
Banks presented his warrant and the woman moved aside wearily. They knew we were coming sometime, he thought; they’ve just been waiting to get it over with.
“They’d better not damage anything,” she said, nodding towards McDonald and Craig.
“Don’t worry, they won’t. You won’t even know they’ve been here.”
Mara sniffed. “I’ll get the others.”
The two uniformed men started their search, and Banks sat in the rocking chair by the window. Turning his head sideways, he scanned the titles in the pine bookcase beside him. They were mostly novels—Hardy, the Brontës, John Cowper Powys, Fay Weldon, Graham Greene—mixed in with a few more esoteric works, such as an introduction to Jung’s psychology and a survey of the occult. On the lower shelves rested a number of older, well-thumbed paperbacks—The Teachings of Don Juan, Naked Lunch, Lord of the Rings. In addition, there were the obligatory political texts: Marcuse, Fanon, Marx and Engels.
On the floor beside Banks lay a copy of George Eliot’s The Mill on the Floss. He picked it up. The bookmark stood at the second page; that was about as far as he’d ever got with George Eliot himself.
Mara came back from the barn with the others, three of them vaguely familiar to Banks from eighteen months ago: Zoe Hardacre, a slight, freckle-faced woman with frizzy ginger hair and dark roots; Rick Trelawney, a big bear of a man in a baggy paint-smeared T-shirt and torn jeans; and Seth Cotton, in from his workshop, wearing a sand-coloured lab coat, tall and thin with mournful brown eyes and neatly trimmed dark hair and beard framing a dark-complexioned face. Finally came a skinny, hostile-looking youth Banks hadn’t seen before.
“Who are you?” he asked.
“Paul’s not been here long,” Mara said quickly.
“What’s your last name?”
Paul said nothing.
“He doesn’t have to say,” Mara argued. “He’s done nothing.”
Seth shook his head. “Might as well tell him,” he said to Paul. “He’ll find out anyway.”
“He’s right, you know,” Banks said.
“It’s Boyd, Paul Boyd.”
“Ever been in trouble, Paul?”
Paul smiled. It was either that or a scowl, Banks couldn’t decide. “So what if I have? I’m not on probation or parole. I don’t have to register at the local nick everywhere I go, do I?” He fished for a cigarette in a grubby ten-pack of Player’s. Banks noticed that his stubby fingers were trembling slightly.
“Just like to know who we’ve got living among us,” Banks said pleasantly. He didn’t need to pursue the matter. If Boyd had a record, the Police National Computer would provide all the information he wanted.
“So what’s all this in aid of?” Rick said, leaning against the mantelpiece. “As if I need ask.”
“You know what happened on Friday night. You were arrested for obstructing a police officer.” Rick laughed. Banks ignored him and went on. “You also know that a policeman was killed at that demonstration.”
“Are you saying you think one of us did it?”
Banks shook his head. “Come on,” he said, “you know the rules as well as I do. A situation like this comes up, we check out all political groups.”
“We’re not political,” Mara said.
Banks looked around the room. “Don’t be so naïve. Everything you have here, everything you say and do, makes a political statement. It doesn’t matter whether or not any of you belong to an official party. You know that as well as I do. Besides, we’ve got to act on tips we get.”
“What tip?” Rick asked. “Who’s been talking?”
“Never mind that. We just heard you were involved, that’s all.” Burgess’s trick seemed at least worth a try.
“So we were there,” Rick said, “Seth and me. You already know that. We gave statements. We told you all we knew. Why come back pestering us now? What are you looking for?”
“Anything we can find.”
“Look,” Rick went on, “I still don’t see why you’re persecuting us. I can’t imagine who’s been telling you things or what they’ve been saying, but you’re misinformed. Just because we employed our right to demonstrate for a cause we happen to believe in, it doesn’t give you the right to come around with these Gestapo tactics and harass us.”
“The Gestapo didn’t need a search warrant.”
Rick sneered and scratched his straggly beard. “With a JP like the one you’ve got in your pocket, I’d hardly consider that a valid argument.”
“Besides,” Banks went on, “we’re not persecuting you or harassing you. Believe me, if we were, you’d know it. Do any of you remember anything else about Friday night?”
Seth and Rick shook their heads. Banks looked around at the others. “Come on, I’m assuming you were all there. Don’t worry, I can’t prove it. I’m not going to arrest you if you admit it. It’s just that one of you might have seen something important. This is a murder investigation.”
Still silence. Banks sighed. “Fine. Don’t blame me if things do get rough. We’ve got a man up from London. A specialist. Dirty Dick, his friends call him. He’s a hell of a lot nastier than I am.”
“Is that some kind of threat?” Mara asked.
Banks shook his head. “I’m just letting you know your options, that’s all.”
“How can we tell you we saw something if we didn’t?” Paul said angrily. “You say you know we were there. Okay. Maybe we were. I’m not saying we were, but maybe. That doesn’t mean we saw anything or did anything wrong. It’s like Rick says, we had a right to be there. It’s not a fucking police state yet.” He turned away sullenly and drew on his cigarette.
“Nobody’s denying your right to be there,” Banks said. “I just want to know if you saw anything that could help us solve this murder.”
Silence.
“Does anyone here own a flick-knife?”
Rick said no and the others shook their heads.
“Ever seen one around? Know anyone who does have one?”
Again nothing. Banks thought he saw an expression of surprise flit across Mara’s face, but it could have been a trick of the light.
In the following silence, Craig and McDonald came downstairs, shook their heads and went to search the outbuildings. Two small children walked in from the kitchen and hurried over to Mara, each taking a hand. Banks smiled at them, but they just stared at him, sucking their thumbs.
He tried to imagine Brian and Tracy, his own children, growing up under such conditions, isolated from other children. For one thing, there didn’t seem to be a television in the place. Banks disapproved of TV in general, and he always tried to make sure that Brian and Tracy didn’t watch too much, but if children saw none at all, they would have nothing to talk to their pals about. There had to be a compromise somewhere; you couldn’t just ignore the blasted idiot-box in this day and age, much as you might wish you could.
On the other hand, these children certainly showed no signs of neglect, and there was no reason to assume that Rick and the rest weren’t good parents. Seth Cotton, Banks knew, had a reputation as a fine carpenter, and Mara’s pottery sold well locally. Sandra even had a piece, a shapely vase glazed in a mixture of shades: green, ultramarine and the like. He didn’t know much about Rick Trelawney’s paintings, but if the local landscape propped up by the fireplace was his, then he was good, too. No, he had no call to impose his own limited perspective on them. If the children grew up into creative, free-thinking adults, their minds unpolluted by TV and mass culture, what could be so wrong about that?
Apart from the sounds o
f the wind chimes, they sat in silence until Rick finally spoke. “Do you know,” he said to Banks, “how many children come down with leukaemia and rare forms of cancer in areas around Sellafield and other nuclear-power stations? Do you have any idea?”
“Look,” said Banks. “I’m not here to attack your views. You’re entitled to them. I might even agree. The thing is, what happened on Friday night goes beyond all that. I’m not here to argue politics or philosophy; I’m investigating a murder. Why can’t you get that into your heads?”
“Maybe they can’t be as neatly separated as you think,” Rick argued. “Politics, philosophy, murder—they’re all connected. Look at Latin America, Israel, Nicaragua, South Africa. Besides, the police started it. They kept us penned in like animals, then they charged with their truncheons out, just like some Chilean goon squad. If some of them got hurt, too, they bloody well deserved it.”
“One of them got killed. Is that all right?”
Rick turned away in disgust. “I never said I was a pacifist,” he muttered, looking at Seth. “There’ll be a local police inquiry,” he went on, “and the whole thing’ll be rigged. You can’t expect us to believe there’s going to be any objectivity about all this. When it comes to the crunch you bastards always stick together.”
“Believe what you like,” Banks said.
Craig and McDonald came back in through the kitchen. They’d found nothing. It was eleven o’clock. At twelve Banks was to meet Burgess, Hatchley and Richmond in the Queen’s Arms to compare notes. There was nothing to be gained by staying to discuss nuclear ethics with Rick, so he stood up and walked over to the door.
As he held his jacket closed and pushed against the wind to the car, he felt someone staring at his back through the window. He knew he had sensed fear in the house. Not just fear of a police raid they’d been expecting, but something different. All was not as harmonious as it should have been. He filed away his uneasiness to be mulled over later along with the thousand other things—concrete or nebulous—that lodged themselves in his mind during an investigation.
II
“Nothing,” Burgess growled, grinding out his cigar viciously in the ashtray at the centre of the copper-topped table. “Absolutely bugger all. And that woman’s crazy. I’ll swear I thought she was going to bite me.”
For the first time ever, Banks felt a sudden rush of affection for Dorothy Wycombe.
All in all, though, the morning had been disappointing for everyone. Not surprisingly, the searches had produced no murder weapon or documents attesting to the terrorist plot that Burgess suspected; none of the witnesses had changed their statements and the reaction to Burgess’s divide-and-conquer tactic had been negligible.
Sergeant Hatchley reported that the Church for Peace group seemed stunned by the murder and had even offered prayers for PC Gill in their service that morning. The Students Union, according to DC Richmond, who had visited the leaders—Tim Fenton and Abha Sutton—at their flat, thought it typical of the others to blame them for what happened, but insisted that assassination was not part of their programme for a peaceful revolution. While Burgess thought Dorothy Wycombe quite capable of murder—especially of a member of the male species—she had stuck to her guns and ridiculed any such suggestion.
“So it’s back to square one,” Hatchley said. “A hundred suspects and not one scrap of evidence.”
“I did find out from one of the lads on duty,” said Richmond, “that Dorothy Wycombe, Dennis Osmond and some of the people from Maggie’s Farm were close to the front at one time. But he said everything went haywire when the fighting started. He also said he noticed a punkish-looking kid with them.”
“That’d be Paul Boyd,” Banks said. “He seems to live up at the farm, too. Run him through the computer, will you, Phil, and see what comes up. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s done time. While you’re at it, find out what you can about the lot of them up there. I’ve got a funny feeling that something’s not quite right about that place.”
He glanced at Burgess, who seemed to be staring abstractedly over at Glenys. Her husband was nowhere in sight.
“Maybe we should have a look into Gill’s background,” Banks suggested.
Burgess turned. “Why?”
“Someone might have had a reason for wanting him dead. We’ll get nowhere on means and opportunity unless the knife turns up, but if we could find a motive—”
Burgess shook his head. “Not in a crime like this. Whether it was planned or spur-of-the-moment, the victim was random. It could have happened to any of the coppers on duty that night. It was just poor Gill’s bad luck, that’s all.”
“But still,” Banks insisted, “it’s something we can do. Maybe the demo was just used as a cover.”
“No. It’ll look bad, for a start. What if the papers find out we’re investigating one of our own? We’ve got enough trouble already with an enquiry into the whole bloody mess. That’d give the press enough ammo to take a few cheap shots at us without us making things easier for them. Jesus, there’s enough weirdos and commies to investigate already without bringing a good copper into it. What about this Osmond character? Anyone talked to him yet?”
“No,” said Banks. “Not since Friday night.”
“Right, this is what we’ll do. Get another round in, Constable, would you?” Burgess handed Richmond a flyer.
Richmond nodded and went to the bar. Burgess had switched from Double Diamond to double Scotch, claiming it was easier on his stomach, but Banks thought he was just trying to impress Glenys with his largesse. And now he was showing her he was too important to leave the conference and that he had the power to order others to do things for him. Good tactics, but would they work on her?
“You and I, Banks,” he said, “will pay this Osmond fellow a visit this afternoon. DC Richmond can check up on those drop-outs you went to see and feed a few more names into the PNC. Sergeant Hatchley here can start making files on the leaders of the various groups involved. We want every statement cross-checked with the others for inaccuracies, and all further statements checked against the originals. Someone’s going to slip up at some point, and we’re going to catch the bugger at it. Bottoms up.” He drank his Scotch and turned to wink at Glenys. “By the way,” he said to Banks, “that bloody office you gave me isn’t big enough to swing a dead cat in. Any chance of another?”
Banks shook his head. “Sorry, we’re pushed for space. It’s either that or the cells.”
“What about yours?”
“Too small for two.”
“I was meaning for one. Me.”
“Forget it. I’ve got all my files and records in there. Besides, it’s cold and the blind doesn’t work.”
“Hmmm. Still . . .”
“You could do most of the paperwork in your hotel room,” Banks suggested. “It’s close enough, big enough and there’s a phone.” And you’ll be out of my way, too, he thought.
Burgess nodded slowly. “All right. It’ll do for now. Come on!” He jumped into action and clapped Banks on the back. “Let’s see if anything’s turned up at the station first, then we’ll set off and have a chat with Mr Dennis Osmond, CND.”
Nothing had turned up, and as soon as Richmond had located Paul Boyd’s record and Banks had had a quick look at it, the pair set off for Osmond’s flat in Banks’s white Cortina.
“Tell me about this Boyd character,” Burgess asked as Banks drove.
“Nasty piece of work.” Banks slipped a Billie Holiday cassette in the stereo and turned the volume down low. “He started as a juvenile—gang fights, assault, that kind of thing—skipping school and hanging around the streets with the rest of the dead-beats. He’s been nicked four times, and he drew eighteen months on the last one. First it was drunk and disorderly, underage, then assaulting a police officer trying to disperse a bunch of punks frightening shoppers in Liverpool city centre. After that it was a drugs charge, possession of a small amount of amphetamines. Then he got nicked breaking into a chemist
’s to steal pills. He’s been clean for just over a year now.”
Burgess rubbed his chin. “Everything short of soccer hooliganism, eh? Maybe he’s not the sporting type. Assaulting a police officer, you say?”
“Yes. Him and a couple of others. They didn’t do any real damage, so they got off lightly.”
“That’s the bloody trouble,” Burgess said. “Most of them do. Any political connections?”
“None that we know of so far. Richmond hasn’t been onto the Branch yet, so we haven’t been able to check on his friends and acquaintances.”
“Anything else?”
“Not really. Most of his probation officers and social workers seemed to give up on him.”
“My heart bleeds for the poor bastard. It looks like we’ve got a likely candidate. This Osmond is a social worker, isn’t he?”
“Yes.”
“Maybe he’ll know something about the kid. Let’s remember to ask him. Where’s Boyd from?”
“Liverpool.”
“Any IRA connections?”
“Not as far as we know.”
“Still . . .”
Dennis Osmond lived in a one-bedroom flat in north-east Eastvale. It had originally been council-owned, but the tenants had seized their chance and bought their units cheaply when the government started selling them off.
A shirtless Osmond answered the door and led Banks and Burgess inside. He was tall and slim with a hairy chest and a small tattoo of a butterfly on his upper right arm. He wore a gold crucifix on a chain around his neck. With his shaggy dark hair and Mediterranean good looks, he looked the kind of man who would be attractive to women. He moved slowly and calmly, and didn’t seem at all surprised by their arrival.
The flat had a spacious living-room with a large plate-glass window that overlooked the fertile plain to the east of Swainsdale: a checkerboard of ploughed fields, bordered by hedgerows, rich brown, ready for spring. The furniture was modern—tubes and cushions—and a large framed painting hung on the wall over the fake fireplace. Banks had to look very closely to make sure the canvas wasn’t blank; it was scored with faint red and black lines.
A Necessary End Page 7