Snow Kills

by Bridgestock, RC

  The officers were quickly and quietly out of the cars. The silence was overpowering, but then, under the officers’ feet, the dry twigs, leaves and small stones on the pathway were reassuringly audible. Before Dylan knew it, they were in the vestibule and he was rapping the heavy, black, iron door knocker. A blind hung awry at a window, creating a strange and sinister expression. The knocking seemed to vibrate across the open grassland like a moorland breeze, but Dylan could also hear bird song.

  The dog inside started to bark incessantly and soon Norris Regan appeared with a dressing gown over his everyday clothes, his wig askew on his head.

  ‘Mr Regan. I am Detective Inspector Dylan, from Harrowfield CID. You are under arrest for the abduction and murder of a Kayleigh Harwood.’ He cautioned Regan and, stepping forward, grabbed the startled looking man unceremoniously by the collar of his dressing gown. He would have pulled him off the ground if it hadn’t been for the weight of the leg irons which were now visible. Handcuffing him, Dylan pulled Regan from the house before passing him over to two uniformed staff waiting to transport him to the cells. The arrest was so swift that if you had blinked you would have missed the action. Regan didn’t speak. His mouth was an ugly slit in a face full of bleached fury. Dylan was in no doubt that they had taken him by surprise. This suited him fine, the last thing he wanted was to be standing having a discussion with the perpetrator. One thing he had learned over the years was to never tell the person he was arresting that he only ‘suspected’ them of the charge. The doer would always insist that they hadn’t done the crime if the police only ‘suspected’ them of it.

  By the doorway, Norris Regan’s dog whimpered as she cowered in the corner. The kennel staff would look after it – after all, Tess had done nothing wrong.

  Outside the house, the teams were getting into their protective clothing and face masks. The police presence was a quiet hive of sustained activity. Dylan put on his own protective clothing and retrieved some latex gloves from the box. He would walk around the house first. He needed to see the layout for himself before he talked to Regan in an interview room back at Harrowfield station. Vicky would be interviewing with him, but at the moment she was struggling to get the zip of the paper suit past her cleavage.

  She saw Dylan’s look. ‘Not a word boss, not a word,’ she said, her face red and contorted. ‘I am in a Small, I am...’

  ‘Would I dare disagree?’ he said, laughing as he watched Jasmine climb the path. A size six, Jasmine he knew, would never have the same trouble. She was trailed by Louisa Edwards, another dedicated SOCO officer.

  ‘I don’t know about police officers looking younger,’ commented Vicky. ‘Now then you bright, skinny, tart,’ she called, ‘what you up to?’.

  ‘Hi Vicky,’ said Jasmine, smiling at her colleague and friend. ‘I’ll never lose the nickname Dawn christened me with, will I?’

  ‘It’s your own fault for being so darn smart,’ Vicky chuckled. ‘I hear your department is going all American on us soon?’

  ‘They’re threatening to call us Crime Scene Investigators. CSI to you, Vicky.’

  ‘You’ll always be bloody SOCO to me,’ she said with a toss of her head. ‘Just like you’ll always be a bleedin’ bright, skinny, tart!’

  ‘Come on you lot, let’s get this over with,’ said Dylan as he blew his rubber gloves up like a balloon to make them easier to put upon his large hands. Talc filled the air and he coughed. ‘Think on, hands in your pockets until we have perused the scene. If you came to a house as a visitor or guest, it’s most likely that you would use the hallway, lounge and toilet, I would have thought, wouldn’t you? So let’s start there first.’

  He turned to see his suited followers nod the affirmative in his direction. ‘We need to concentrate on those rooms.’ Dylan spoke his instructions as loud and as clear as he could from behind his face mask. He walked to the furthest point of the hallway.

  ‘The bathroom is very small and there is no lock on the door,’ he said, opening and closing it. ‘To keep it closed you could use a hand or a foot while sat on the toilet.’

  ‘A man might not bother, but a woman would, maybe?’ Vicky said. ‘And I speak from experience. It’s only a fraction better in there than the public loos in Tin Can Alley down town.’

  ‘Take the door away Jasmine and this handrail on the corridor. Let’s check for fingerprints, Louisa. Make sure you check the underneath of the rail as well as the top. If you held this, your fingers are going to wrap beneath it, aren’t they? And if someone was trying to erase prints, they might only dust above. I know it’s a long-shot, especially after all this time, but we need to take every opportunity we have to put Kayleigh in this house.’

  ‘Already made a mental note to do that,’ said Jasmine. ‘It doesn’t look like the occupier is up on his cleaning sir, luckily.’

  ‘Sorry Jasmine, I’m teaching you how to suck eggs, aren’t I? Just thinking aloud.’

  ‘Told you she was smart didn’t I?’ whispered Vicky to Louisa.

  ‘It’s a team effort,’ she said, eyes smiling. ‘Kayleigh was wearing a white fur jacket when she went missing, so I’m also thinking that we should take tapings from the furniture,’ said Jasmine. ‘If she’s been here, it might put her here for us.’

  ‘Take the cushions, the furniture, whatever you need. If she was here, we need that evidence. Regan is not going to offer us the information unless we can substantiate it. Okay...’ Dylan said eventually, as he stood staring into a used cess pot in the bedroom. ‘We’ll be interviewing after lunch. Let me have an update about two o’clock, Jasmine, unless you find something damning beforehand.’

  As Dylan left the scene he spoke to the others. He needed to be armed with all the information possible for the interview.

  ‘Right Vicky, you and I need to get back to the nick. Let’s hope the press don’t get wind of what we’re doing just yet. We might just be lucky with this one. It is a bit remote up here.’

  ‘As remote as you can be on a main road I guess, but you know how the media have got the ability to scan our police radios better than us. I can’t think it’ll be long before they’ll be sniffing around. When I was a rookie I always wondered how the press got to the scene on occasions before we did. I thought there was someone in the Control Room tipping them off. I always suspected Donald Irvine. You remember him don’t you boss? Piggy eyes that were too close together for my liking and them eyebrows... joined in the middle of his forehead.’

  Dylan laughed, ‘If that’s your scientific approach to assessing people, Regan won’t stand a cat in hell‘s chance.’

  ‘Well, I did tell you he was involved right from word go didn’t I? His eyebrows are almost nonexistent come to think of it.’

  ‘So that’s another tell-tale sign I should be aware of in your book, is it?’

  ‘It helps if we can prove he’s lying, of course,’ she said.

  ‘You think he’s going to lie to us in interview?’

  ‘He’s a man and he moves his lips, doesn’t he?’

  Dylan shook his head. ‘You never cease to amaze me.’

  ‘Then I rest my case and my job is done,’ she said.

  Dylan laughed at his colleague.

  ‘What’s your fella done now?’

  Vicky screwed up her face and shook her head. ‘What fella?’ she said. ‘and for that very reason.’

  ‘I might have guessed.’

  Dylan checked with the Custody Sergeant that Regan had nominated a solicitor on his arrival in the Custody Suite.

  ‘He’s having the duty solicitor sir, Yvonne Best from Perfect and Best,’ he said. Dylan wasn’t displeased.

  ‘Before you go sir,’ said the Custody Officer. ‘I should tell you that the prisoner was wearing women’s underwear beneath his attire and is insisting that he wears his wig when he is not in his cell. I’ve placed him in an all-in-one paper suit so he had nothing to self harm himself. But he is insisting on wearing them leg irons, therefore he’s on open door wat
ch,’ he added out of the corner of his mouth.

  ‘Good, I want an officer outside his cell at all times.’

  Vicky walked in Dylan’s office with two cups of coffee in her hands and kicked the door shut behind her with a booted foot.

  ‘Duty Solicitor Yvonne Best,’ said Dylan without looking up from his computer. ‘And we need him examined by a doctor to ensure he is educationally, as well as physically, okay for interview. I’d like to get the first interview arranged for as soon as we can after lunch, so I’ve got Lisa ringing her office.’ They settled down to work on the questions for the interview, and agree strategy. ‘We’ll need his background history before we start,’ said Dylan.

  Lisa brought the pair a bacon sandwich. It was going to be a long day but the team spirit and buzz in the CID office was exhilarating. ‘Yvonne Best is in Court ’til lunch time, but will be free for you for one o’clock,’ she said. ‘In the meantime, she has got one of the clerks in her office to attend, get some background information from Mr Regan and fill out the legal aid forms, no doubt.’

  ‘After the first interview, I intend to get updates from the officers at his home address and then we’ll continue. I just hope that there will be something else by then that we can drop on his toes,’ Dylan said to Vicky pensively as they walked down the corridor to the interview room.

  Dylan’s first impression of Norris Regan, sat in the white coverall suit and ill-fitting synthetic wig, was of a pathetic individual. Yvonne Best was sitting as far away as she could manage in the confined space. His legs, in leg irons, were outstretched at the side of the table. Dylan and Vicky went through the administrative procedures and identified themselves and the others for the purpose of the recording tape. Dylan explained on the tape about the leg irons which the prisoner wore – that they were not prescribed for him medically, but because he had worn them for a number of years, it was likely Mr Norris Regan had suffered muscle wastage and was advised to wear them.

  ‘That’s right,’ Regan said.

  ‘Tell me, whose leg irons were they?’

  ‘Mother’s,’ he replied.

  The interview could now begin in earnest.

  Chapter 33

  It made sense to Dylan for Vicky to start interviewing, as she had already formed a rapport with Regan.

  Formalities, caution and introduction over, she started on their planned interview strategy.

  ‘When I spoke to you at your house about the missing girl, Kayleigh Harwood, you told me and DC Granger that you had only thought about taking hot drinks out to people who were stuck in the heavy snow on White Wednesday, is that right?’

  Norris Regan looked at her and nodded.

  ‘Mr Regan is nodding in the affirmative,’ said Dylan. ‘Would you please speak out for the purpose of the tape?’

  Regan nodded, his movements jerky.

  ‘Could you tell me again what happened that night?’ said Vicky.

  ‘Hell fire! I haven’t killed anyone. If you’re looking for someone to blame you, should be talking to them I saw damaging that car.’

  ‘That’s right. If I remember rightly you told me you were just about to go out with a warm drink for the stranded motorists when you saw and heard some young lads making a bit of a commotion, so you decided to go back inside. You said you didn’t go out again that night, is that right?’

  Regan appeared thoughtful.

  ‘Is that right? Just tell us how it was, in your own time. In your own words, what did you do that night?’

  ‘I thought it would be a nice thing to do. There was a blizzard. I thought the motorists might be stalled, hungry and cold so I made drinks and was going to go out in the heavy snow when I saw two lads banging on a car and shouting; I went back inside sharpish.’

  ‘And you didn’t go out again?’ said Vicky.

  ‘No,’ he said nodding his head.

  ‘You mean yes? You’re nodding your head.’

  ‘I mean no,’ he said nodding his head.

  ‘Okay... Did you have the leg irons on that night? Because no doubt that would have made it much more difficult for you to walk in the snow, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘These are neither use nor ornament in the snow,’ he said, patting the irons. ‘Are you’re trying to catch me out.’

  ‘Not at all, we’re just trying to seek the truth.’

  ‘I’m not a liar.’

  Vicky raised an eyebrow. ‘So we’ve established you had every intention of being the Good Samaritan that night, but you were put off by the actions of the two young men you saw?’

  ‘They sounded drunk.’

  ‘If what you’re telling us is true, why do you think we would bother arresting you for abduction and murder?’ Vicky said, thoughtfully.

  ‘Because you’ve got it wrong.’

  Dylan cleared his throat. ‘Tell us what we’ve got wrong, Mr Regan?’

  ‘You’re looking for someone to blame and I’m not what you see as your average looking man am I? I’m not as daft as I’m cabbage looking though, either. She’s the good cop and you’re the bad. You can play your games all day but you’ll get the same answers to your questions from me.’

  ‘Nobody is playing games Norris, I can assure you, and your solicitor will confirm it. This is a very serious investigation and we believe that you were the last person to have contact with Kayleigh Harwood before she was reported missing.’

  ‘You’ve got me flummoxed. You and your officers can search my house ’til they’re blue in the face but you won’t find ought.’

  ‘Oh aye, so where is she then?’ said Dylan.

  ‘I’ve no idea.’

  ‘You’re lying. We know you saw her that night.’

  ‘He’s a one your gaffer, isn’t he?’ Norris Regan said to Vicky. ‘He’s got that bit between his teeth alright, and he’s not going to drop it, is he?’

  ‘Your fingerprints were taken before your arrest and we have your marks on an item found in Kayleigh Harwood’s secure vehicle, how do you explain that?’ said Vicky.

  He took the wig off his head and his pallor changed. ‘Ah’ll go to t’foot of arh stairs, you’ve gone and fitted me up,’ he said. ‘They must have been planted,’ Norris said, raising his voice as he turned to face Yvonne Best.

  ‘Mr Regan, please,’ Yvonne Best said.

  ‘We are simply trying to find out what happened to the young lass that went missing near your house that night. We know you saw Kayleigh, but what we can’t understand is why you’re lying to us about it. What happened to her Norris, did you abduct her?’ Vicky said.

  ‘Pack it in.’ Regan was on the edge of his seat. ‘Now do I look as if I could abduct a fit young girl in my condition?’

  ‘It’ll be easier if you just tell us the truth. Your fingerprints have been found on a biscuit wrapper found inside Kayleigh’s car. Explain to us how they got there?’ said Dylan.

  Head bowed, Regan gave Yvonne Best a slanting look. His face appeared to go slack and his mouth opened but he didn’t speak.

  ‘It’s no good looking at her, she can’t help you. Mrs Best wasn’t there, but you were. I’ll ask you again, do you admit seeing Kayleigh Harwood, in her car, on the evening of White Wednesday? Did she come to your house? Where is she now?’ Dylan pushed on.

  ‘Inspector Dylan, multiple questions,’ Yvonne Best said wagging her finger at him. ‘You know my client can only answer one at a time. Do you have evidence? If so, can you disclose that evidence to me?’ she said.

  Regan had the smug look of a toad breakfasting on fat marsh flies as he stared back at Dylan.

  She was right. ‘Noted,’ Dylan said, directly dismissing Yvonne Best’s comment like he would return a ping pong ball in a game of table tennis. ‘Is it right Mr Regan that you have told officers on previous occasions that you wear your mother’s leg irons because they sexually excite you?’

  Regan appeared tongue tied.

  Mrs Best’s face was a picture. Vicky had difficulty stifling a smile.

 
‘Is it also right that you have magazines of a sexual nature alongside calliper devotee literature at the side of your bed?’

  Regan looked up at the corner of the interview room ceiling and and declined to comment.

  ‘Is it right that you slept in the same bed as your mother, when she was alive?’

  His head shot towards Dylan and his eyes met his.

  ‘What’s that got to do with you?’ he said.

  ‘Well there is only one bedroom in your house. Was your relationship with your mother a sexual one?’

  ‘No,’ he said nodding his head.

  ‘You’re nodding your head. Do you mean yes Norris?’

  ‘No, I mean no,’ he said and continued to nod his head in the affirmative.

  ‘Have you ever had a real girlfriend?’ asked Vicky.

  ‘No,’ he said, shaking his head.

  ‘So you must have thought all your Christmases had come at once when you found a pretty young girl stranded in the snow, Norris? I think that was just too much temptation and you couldn’t control yourself,’ said Dylan.

  ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he mumbled.

  ‘Explain to us how your fingerprints got onto the Kit Kat wrapper inside Kayleigh’s locked car?’

  ‘I want to talk to my solicitor in private.’

  Dylan slammed his pen down on the paperwork in front of him on the table and leaned forward. His chair legs scraped on the interview room floor tiles. ‘Okay, that’s perfectly within your rights to do so. We will terminate the interview and allow you to speak to your solicitor,’ he said, shuffling the paperwork on the table into a neat pile before picking it up.

  Dylan took big determined strides down the corridor. Vicky ran to keep up with him. This was going to be a long day of tension, and of waiting. Would Regan eventually tell them anything without them finding the evidence?