The Death Pictures

by Simon Hall

  Abi McCluskey would make an excellent witness, as would that nosey neighbour Jarvis. Kiddey was still protesting his innocence, but they all did that. With a bit of luck, when he saw the evidence against him and had the benefit of some good legal advice he’d change his plea and save them a trial.

  There were only those attempted break-ins the defence might make something of. But neither had been successful, had it? And he was sure they weren’t connected. Just a coincidence.

  He didn’t believe in coincidences – few detectives did – but on this occasion there was a good explanation. The lure of winning the last of those Death Pictures could easily prompt someone to try to break in to the McCluskeys’ home in the hope of finding a clue to his riddle. And as for a connection with the rapist? Well, the defence could raise it, try to confuse the jury, but it was a pretty thin hope. There was no evidence to back it up. If there was a trial, it should be a short one, maybe only a week or so.

  So that was the McCluskey case sorted. The Assistant Chief Constable had been on the phone this morning offering his congratulations. He’d also liked the media coverage. ‘So good for the force, so very positive. A big story, a fast result. Excellent work, Adam! I knew it was right to put you on the case.’ He’d managed not to say anything in reply.

  Dan’s report last night had been picked up just about everywhere. It was in all the national papers and had been on the radio and TV this morning too. Adam straightened his tie. Yes, a good result. So now back to the rapist. He picked up his coffee and walked up the stairs from his office to the MIR.

  Dan awoke slowly, lingering hesitantly in the half-life between dreams and the light. He wasn’t surprised to find tears in his eyes when he opened them. It often happened when the pull of the swamp was strong. Morning seeped through the curtains and he shrunk from it. He felt like pulling the duvet up over his head and taking refuge in its safe, enveloping darkness. He wanted to curl up into a ball, lock the flat’s door and wait for the world to pass.

  He’d suffered it so many times before. The hopeless fatigue. The listlessness and lethargy. The washing of colour from a world that turned grey all around him. The evaporation of hope. The fear of venturing outside into a happily hostile society where everyone else was content, relaxed, talkative, energetic. Everyone except him.

  The doctor he’d finally turned to had clicked his tongue a couple of times, scribbled a note on his file and suggested mood-stabilising drugs. But no, he’d never resort to that. An emotional sticking plaster was no solution. He had his own ways to fight it, with friends, drink – too much drink sometimes, he knew – work, walks, his beloved dog, something, anything to hold onto, to look forward to, to believe in. Something to grab on to, he needed something to make him get out of this bed or he’d just lie here, lost.

  The Death Pictures. Come on, the pictures. We’ve got a lead. We’re ahead of the game. We’ve got a chance to solve the riddle. We’ve got to give it a go. Come on, come on, come on. But first a run with Rutherford. That always helped. No, first a phone call to a man who can provide an insight into McCluskey. We need to know much more about his life to find out what a reference to the earth, burrowing and building could mean.

  Dan picked up the phone beside his bed. Yes, Professor Hughes was in, said the receptionist. Yes, he could have a word. Yes, the man himself could spare an hour or two between lectures. It would be a pleasure to catch up and help. Excellent, down to the university later then. But first his beloved dog, a guarantee to raise his spirits.

  They ran over to Thorn Park, the weather, so kind recently, now turning its mood to match his. The sky glowered a slate grey and a mist of drizzle dampened the air. A cool wind ruffled in from the east. The children on their way to school had restored the coats they’d discarded at the first signs of the coming summer, the running and shouting of their sunny days dowsed by the rain. The roads ran busy with commuter traffic, hundreds of blank morning faces framed in the windscreens, crossed back and forth by the squeaking sweep of the intermittent wipers. The pavements shone wet and slippery, alive with the reflections of passing feet. They jogged slowly down the hill, across the main Mannamead Road and into the park.

  Dan released Rutherford from his lead and the dog bolted away, unsure as ever which of the intoxicating array of scents to investigate first. He sniffed his way joyously along a hedge, then turned and sprinted back to Dan, sending a grey and white cloud of pigeons fluttering, cooing, into the air. ‘Just a few laps, dog,’ he puffed. ‘I’ve got lots on this morning.’ Running was hard going today, but he’d expected that. The swamp always sapped his energy.

  Rutherford exploded into a burst of barks and shot off towards an oak tree, a blur of ginger streaking up its side. ‘Leave that cat alone,’ Dan called, trying not to laugh. ‘Here! Come here!’

  The dog refused to move, sat solidly at the base of the tree, head fixed above. Dan jogged over. Up in the crook of a branch sat an utterly unconcerned-looking cat, gazing pityingly down at them. ‘Shhhh,’ he said to the dog, calming his barks. ‘Come on, you’ve taught him a lesson. Look how scared he is. Come on, mighty warrior. Let’s go.’

  In the shower, he noticed he felt better for the run. He dressed, gathered his notes and prints of the Death Pictures and caught a bus down to the university.

  Professor Ed Hughes had been known as Ted when he was younger and just a Doctor of academia. But the rise to fame of his poet namesake had forced him to amend that. He hadn’t done so graciously. Any mention of the other Ted Hughes would prompt a quizzical look.

  A tall, stooping man in his early sixties, he’d worked his way up to become Devon University’s Head of Art. Dan knew him from a couple of exhibitions they’d both had invitations to. He’d been attracted by the Prof’s delightful lack of tact. ‘Dreadful dross,’ he’d said, when Dan had been introduced and politely asked him what he thought of one artist’s offerings. ‘I could do better blindfold.’

  The university had applied some gentle pressure on Ed to consider retiring, but he’d resisted it. Dan helped by including him in a story on how much older people had to offer and how it was wrong they were expected to retire at a fixed age. They’d also discovered they were fellow Liverpool Football Club supporters, both having family links to Merseyside. They’d long been promising a trip up to see a match, but it had never materialised.

  His office was almost standing room only, littered with books and stacked with the canvas submissions of his students. Dan looked for a space to manoeuvre a chair into, but was stopped by the professor’s check of his watch. It was after eleven and that meant the offer of ‘a more creative place to go’.

  They walked down the stairs to the campus bar, busy despite the early hour. Dan bought a couple of pints of beer, marvelling at the low price.

  ‘We’ve seen you on TV plenty,’ said Ed, quaffing a third of his pint in one go. ‘You’re doing all that death and disaster stuff now, aren’t you? Not environment any more. How are you finding it?’

  Dan had given up pretending he didn’t miss the countryside, coast and moors of his old job and that it was his idea to switch.

  ‘The bosses moved me. To keep me fresh, they said. Confused would be more accurate. I didn’t like it to start with, but now I’m getting into it. It is fascinating being involved in police investigations.’

  ‘That’s how you come to want to know about McCluskey then?’ Dan nodded, sipping at his beer. Good and fresh, barrels never lingered long enough to grow stale in student bars. ‘After his prize, are you?’

  ‘Not much gets past you, does it, Ed?’ Dan couldn’t help smiling. ‘Yes, that’s a lot of why I wanted to know more about him. But it’ll also help me in reporting the trial too. I’d be interested in anything you know about Kid as well.’

  ‘Well, fire away. But as you know, there’s always a price in this life.’ He looked meaningfully at his almost empty pint g
lass.

  ‘Planning to be a bit hazy for this afternoon, Ed?’

  ‘I’ve got some tedious admin stuff to do and a session with some of my dullest students. It’ll help. Plus it’s a fact of history that some of the finest artists work best with a bit of creative fuel in them.’

  Dan got up and went to refill their glasses. He was glad he’d had the foresight to leave a note at work saying he was going to have today off to claim back the extra hours he’d worked recently. The swamp was still there, on the edge of his consciousness. He could feel its invisible pull. But a few beers would help fight it off. For now… He sat back down.

  ‘Shall I start at the beginning and tell the story in its proper way?’ asked Ed, leaning back in his chair and steepling his fingers together in a parody of a classic academic. ‘Or shall I do the tabloid version? The shagging, rows and heartbreak?’

  Dan picked up his notebook.

  Adam listened while Suzanne told him about the interview with Edward Munroe and his refusal to give a DNA sample.

  ‘Interesting, very interesting,’ he mused, straightening his perfect tie. ‘So we’ve got three prime suspects now?’

  ‘Yes sir.’

  ‘And that’s the whole list done. The Family Courts, the CSA, Fathers for Families? Just these three we can’t eliminate?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Adam looked out at the sheet-grey sky and the grazes of drizzle etching diagonals on the windows. A pigeon was asleep, head under wing on the ledge by the flagpole where the Greater Wessex Police crest limply hung.

  ‘And we’re tailing Freeman and Godley?’ he asked ‘And now you want to tail Munroe too?’

  ‘Yes, sir, but I appreciate that’s a sensitive one.’

  ‘Yes, it is,’ Adam said thoughtfully. He was a powerful man, friends with judges, other barristers, senior police officers too, no doubt, far more senior than himself. Someone who could pull the hidden strings that connected the leaders of men. But he was a suspect and he’d refused to give a DNA sample. And he was the Devil’s Advocate. None of them would say so, but he knew the detectives would all be thinking it. How pleasant to bring some tension to his life. And it wasn’t a time for diplomacy. How long before the rapist struck again?

  ‘I think it’s a question of fairness and the public interest, Suzanne,’ Adam said slowly. ‘If we’re tailing the two other suspects, we should do the same for him. Imagine if he was the rapist and we hadn’t warned him off. What would the press say?

  He mentally rehearsed the arguments for the call he knew would come from the High Honchos after they got a ring from the no-doubt morally outraged Edward Munroe. The thought of an uncomfortable Assistant Chief Constable didn’t even register as a deterrent.

  ‘Get a car onto him straight away,’ said Adam. ‘If there’s any flak, I’ll handle it. Let’s make all three of them very sure we’re after them.’

  Professor Ed closed his eyes as he relived the memories.

  ‘He was self-taught, you know. That’s the first remarkable thing about Joseph McCluskey. He didn’t go to any art school. He picked it up himself. His early works showed lots of potential, but that was all it was at that stage. Just potential. He did mainly portraits then, to keep the money flowing in really. They got quite a bit of attention. There was marvellous life in his brushstrokes and a lovely grasp of detail. It was clear he had a talent. It was just a question of how it would develop.’

  They were starting on their third pints. Dan checked his watch. It said 12.20, so it was probably around half past. He wondered if he’d missed out in life, should have become an academic. He rarely had a chance for lunch, and if he did it was usually a tasteless petrol station sandwich, gulped down in the car whilst driving to the next interview.

  ‘Well, his talent developed nicely,’ went on Ed. ‘He moved into doing a few abstract bits, surreal even, but then came back to figures. He seemed to like figures, particularly women’s. Liked them too much in fact.’ He looked at Dan knowingly. ‘More of that later. But his work was still largely local. He hadn’t been picked up in London at all. Then he got his break. Do you remember the story of Russell Reid?’

  Dan nodded. High-flying Labour MP for the Plymouth Tamar constituency in the early 1970s, prominent in the shadow cabinet. Party lost an election, suddenly he was the leader. Brief great hopes but defeated again. Never became prime minister, left politics, disillusioned.

  ‘Well, he needed an official portrait done and he was very keen to do the man of the people thing and play up his local roots,’ continued Ed. ‘He’d seen McCluskey’s work and asked him to paint it. He did and it was a fine job. It went down very well except for one thing. Just one little detail.’

  Ed took another sip of beer. Dan knew he’d heard this story, but couldn’t remember exactly what had happened. It was well before his time. ‘Go on,’ he said.

  ‘His tie. His tie was a blazing conservative blue. He’d worn red for the sittings, but bloody McCluskey had painted it Tory blue. The press saw it and there was a hell of a row. McCluskey wouldn’t comment. No artist worth his salt does. It’s the mystery thing we like. It sells. But the papers went into his background and found out from his friends that McCluskey was a lifelong Labour man who thought the party was moving too much to the right. So that was how the picture was interpreted. A Labour man from the look of him, but Tory inside. It was a great story. And that was what made McCluskey famous. After that he could paint a dog’s bum and it would sell for thousands.’

  Dan chuckled into his pint. He didn’t know if it was the beer, Ed’s company, or the fascination of McCluskey and the Death Pictures, but he was feeling better. Mood swings, a classic symptom of the swamp. Beware the mood swings, he thought. After the light comes the dark, just like day and night, only faster, so very much faster.

  ‘And he used – some say abused – his fame beautifully.’ Ed had begun chortling too now. ‘He was still young and a handsome bugger. He would meet women he liked the look of and offer to paint them. They would be flattered and accept. And he would paint them – amongst other things. Then later he took on students as well, and the word was that some of the women were taught in two ways. Horizontally and vertically.’

  Ed’s tone changed, more serious now. ‘Then he met Abi and he did seem to fall in love with her. They settled down happily. For a while there was no talk of any affairs. Then it started, just one or two and much more discreet than before, but they were definitely there. You know how gossipy and bitchy the art world is. From what I’ve heard, the affairs went on up until he died.’

  The two mysterious women in the Death Pictures, Dan thought. It must be. Were they important to the riddle? They’d certainly be important to El. And did Adam know this? Could they have something to do with McCluskey’s death? He still wasn’t quite convinced Kid did it, was he? He didn’t know why. It was just a feeling, but he’d learned never to ignore them.

  Dan jotted a couple of notes on his pad and asked, ‘Ed, what did Abi think about all this?’

  The professor considered, swirled the remains of his pint. ‘It’s difficult to tell. They were a very private pair and I didn’t know her well. All I can say is that she always stood by him. She seemed very loyal and was obviously totally devoted. He certainly loved her. For what it’s worth, my guess is she accepted his little failings and indiscretions. Many women do you know. It’s one of the great differences between the sexes.’

  Dan felt his mind race. What if Abi hadn’t accepted it? What if she was growing more and more jealous and angry? Could she have killed her husband? But then, how did that fingerprint of Kid’s get on the knife? And didn’t she have an alibi? And then that question again; why kill him right at the end, after so many years of affairs when he was about to die anyway? He’d have to talk to Adam, and El too. It was time they compared notes on their research.

  �
��What about Kid?’ asked Dan. ‘How did he and McCluskey know each other? And what was their falling out about?’

  ‘Many questions you have,’ replied Ed. ‘That’s three in one go. I’m off to the loo. It’ll probably help me form my answers if I have something to stimulate my mind when I return.’ Dan got up and made his way back to the bar.

  ‘So then, Kid,’ said Ed, settling himself back down and sipping at his pint. Dan felt relieved to see it wasn’t going down as quickly as its predecessors.

  ‘Kid was one of McCluskey’s pupils, and a talented one too. Probably the most talented of the set and they were a pretty good bunch. McCluskey only took on a very few and they had to be good. Kid was, very good. It was obvious from the start he was going to make it big. He had a great eye for colour and form. A bit more abstract than McCluskey, but a very fine painter. And he did sculptures too. Not as many as his paintings, but the sculptures were very good. You know about how he became famous, with the burger sculpture? That was a corker.’

  Dan nodded. Ed sat back and smiled, waved at a student in another corner of the bar.

  ‘How close were they, Kid and McCluskey?’ Dan asked.

  ‘Very close. McCluskey used to talk about him in terms I never heard him use about anyone. He had no children you see, and I think Kid was like a son to him, if you’ll excuse the pun. Yes, they were very close.’

  ‘So how did they fall out?’

  ‘It was never entirely clear, but this is how the story goes. McCluskey had another pupil, Joanna someone. I can’t remember the name. She was talented too, maybe even as good as Kid. McCluskey was very fond of her, perhaps even had designs on her. Who knows? I wouldn’t have put it past him. But Kid was fond of her as well, too much so. They got it together, as I believe the saying goes, and became a couple. It lasted a few years, but then Kid dumped her for some other woman…’

  The professor’s words faltered, and Dan sensed he remembered something unpalatable, was debating whether to reveal it. He felt his journalist’s instinct activate. It was the sensitive ground, the dark land of secret regret which was where the best stories were always found.