Death Wore White

by Jim Kelly

  Duncan Sly, the gangmaster, stepped forward to meet him, taking charge, displaying authority. His skin was like burnt leather, a smoked kipper, the product of a lifetime spent in the wind and rain. Despite a slight stoop which had come with age he was still the biggest man in the group – six one perhaps, but broad, a barrel chest, with fists that looked lifeless, just hanging from the arms. The seaman’s blue jacket was new, the lapels uncurled.

  Sly’s account was straightforward. The five cockle boats were from Shark Tooth, the shellfish company that ran Gallow Marsh Farm’s oyster beds.

  ‘The sand was clean on the lee shore when we landed – no footprints, nothing. We keep an eye out for that, in case another gang’s been working our patch. And we’ve heard about the beach… the body in the raft? Radio didn’t say much – and that bloke dead in his car. So we had a good look. Nothing.’

  Shaw buttoned up his coat and bent down to retrieve a razor shell from the sand, as sharp as a cut‐throat. He considered the coincidence that Shark Tooth owned Gallow Marsh Farm and ran the cockle boats, and filed it away with the other things that worried him.

  The pickers stood around an impromptu fire: driftwood off the sandbank, old newspapers from one of the boats, and something else glowing on a bed of pebbles. ‘Coal?’ asked Shaw, knocking the charred wood with his boot.

  ‘Always bring a bag,’ said Sly. ‘It’s bitter out here late afternoon, we take breaks.’

  Despite the warmth from the blaze they all stood stiffly. Sly thrust his hands out almost into the flames, then back into the pockets of his jacket. ‘We should work, otherwise it’s a wasted day.’

  ‘A few questions,’ said Shaw, shaking his head. ‘Then we’re going to have to ask you to go back to Wootton. This is a crime scene, we need to secure it. It’s the third unexplained death in the area in twenty‐four hours, Mr Sly. It may be a while before you can work here.’

  Shaw saw glances exchanged. Besides Sly there were ten of them, two to a boat with Sly presumably in the larger one – a smart inshore fishing smack which had dropped anchor about twenty feet out. It sat at an angle now, beached, the radio mast tilting towards the moon which had appeared in a clearing blue sky. Six of the men were ethnic Chinese, standing together, smoking the same brand of cigarettes, looking everywhere but at Shaw. Another group of three stood together and Shaw guessed they were east European; one, standing over the fire, was in late middle age, a hand held to his back, an enamel badge on his lapel depicting the Czech flag. The tenth picker – a small man – Shaw recognized as a local. He’d seen him somewhere, the fish dock perhaps, but not selling, in the background counting cash. He wore a duffle coat, the hood up. It wasn’t just the coat and his lack of height that made him look like a child. The hair was curly and blond where it showed. He bounced slightly on his toes, bristling with aggression. Shaw’s father had always warned him about small, angry men. They only survived by getting in the first blow before the fight started. Or they carried something in their fist to even out the odds.

  No one spoke.

  ‘You can smoke now,’ said Shaw. Valentine’s hand jerked towards his pocket, then pulled back.

  ‘Any idea who the victim might be, Mr Sly?’ Shaw asked.

  Sly shook his head, watching the flames. ‘I didn’t get close enough. I didn’t want to.’

  Valentine nudged a pebble into the fire with his black slip‐on. ‘Anything unusual out here in the last few days? Any other pickers? Boats?’

  ‘This is our pitch, everyone knows that,’ said the man in the duffle coat. His voice was high, thin, but didn’t lack confidence.

  ‘Sorry – and who might you be?’ asked Valentine, with enough edge in his voice for them all to look up.

  ‘Andy Lufkin.’

  ‘So nothing?’ persisted Shaw. ‘Nothing unusual?’

  ‘It’s a tough season,’ said Sly. ‘You get other pickers – bands up from London – but they stick to the shore banks on the west side.’ In the distance they could all see the coastline of Lincolnshire.

  ‘Someone’s been dumping waste in yellow oil drums,’ said Shaw. He let Sly poke some more driftwood into the fire. ‘What have you seen?’

  Sly took a deep breath. ‘We tend to keep our heads down.’

  That sounded like a euphemism, Shaw thought. ‘Turn a blind eye?’ he said, a sympathetic pain suddenly running through the wound beneath the dressing.

  ‘Mind our own business,’ said Lufkin. Shaw wondered if he kept bouncing on his toes to try and look taller.

  ‘How about a child’s inflatable raft – a boat, in bright green colours?’ asked Shaw.

  ‘This weather?’ said Lufkin, and bit his lip.

  ‘Yes. This weather. Perhaps that’s what killed the bloke inside.’

  They heard the thudding progress of a motor launch, hitting waves. Shaw could see Justina Kazimierz in the prow, letting saltwater spray her face.

  Then Shaw’s mobile buzzed. A text message from DC Fiona Campbell at the hospital.

  ‘HOLT’S TALKING,’ it read.

  17

  They took the Eurocopter to the pad on top of the A&E department. Shaw radioed for the Land Rover to be brought there, then spent the rest of the flight with his forehead pressed to the window. He’d left Hadden and the CSI team working against the clock. Valentine had briefed the murder team back at St James’s and they were checking missing persons. But for now Shaw needed to focus on John Holt. He could see how the murder on Styleman’s Middle might be linked to the body in the raft – smuggling perhaps, trafficking, rival gangs fighting for a pitch. But if there was a link to the murder of Harvey Ellis in his pick‐up truck then it had eluded him. Two violent killings within a few miles, and a few hours, demanded that Shaw searched for one. And Holt was his key witness.

  As they swung round in low cloud over the roof of the hospital Shaw tried to re‐focus on the line of cars in the snow that night. Harvey Ellis in the lead vehicle, John Holt in the Corsa behind Sarah Baker‐Sibley’s Alfa. He quickly re‐read the statement Baker‐Sibley had made when re‐interviewed that morning. Yes: she’d watched Holt go forward to the pick‐up truck. But had she taken her eyes off him? No. Not for a second.

  But that didn’t mean John Holt was not important. He was the last man to see the victim alive. What had he seen? What had been said?

  Holt’s room was hospital‐hot – a cloying dry warmth suffused with the aromas of disinfectant, custard and stewed tea. The metal bed, the ubiquitous NHS bedside cabinet, the single seat, the grey linen washed a thousand times. As a doctor checked John Holt’s temperature Valentine tried not to touch anything, aware that his life would probably end one day in a room like this. He took a deep breath, trying to force air into shrivelled lungs, then retrieved the packet of cigarettes out of his raincoat pocket and dropped it in the bin.

  The doctor finished, thrusting her hands down into the pockets of her white coat. She looked like she’d been on her feet for a week, dank hair held up in a Caribbean headscarf. ‘Ten minutes,’ she said to Shaw. ‘No more. No arguments, please. He thinks he’s as strong as an ox…’ Holt laughed, eyes owlish behind the heavy black‐rimmed spectacles, his white hair lifeless, stuck to his scalp in the hot still air of the room.

  On a chair beside the bed sat a robust woman, upholstered, grey hair too thin to hide the dome of the skull beneath. Respectable was the word that seemed to sum her up – but then Shaw remembered Holt’s address, the dockside slum. They’d clearly fallen on hard times.

  Mrs Holt looked at her hands, then at her feet. ‘He’s not well. It was a dreadful night – his blood pressure’s really bad. He had a haemorrhage so he’s lost a lot of blood.’ Shaw could see the broken blood vessels in the old man’s nose and a bloodstained wodge of cotton wool. ‘He’s not been well for a long time,’ she added.

  ‘Don’t fuss, Martha,’ said Holt softly, rolling his false teeth slightly as if they didn’t fit. ‘The man’s got a job to do. I had to put up with half an hour of
Michelle – I doubt this will be any worse.’

  Martha Holt flushed. ‘Michelle’s our daughter – she’s worried about her dad. She wanted to make sure he stayed in hospital until he’s well. He’s sixty‐eight this year – we both think he should take it easy.’

  ‘My daughter thinks I’m going to die on her,’ said Holt. ‘Worried she’ll have to pay a bill for the first time in her life.’

  ‘John,’ hissed his wife. She turned to Shaw. ‘Families,’ she said, smiling thinly.

  ‘My wife’s too forgiving,’ said Holt.

  Shaw wondered if he always talked about people as if they weren’t there.

  Valentine began asking questions. It was his interview, Shaw had said on the way up in the lift. Step by step the DS tried to find out what the witness had seen, what he’d heard, what he’d felt. So far the interrogation was faultless.

  Sweat gleamed on Holt’s upper lip. ‘Michelle lives in Hunstanton,’ he explained, the voice healthier than his body. ‘With Sasha – my granddaughter. I was driving over to finish pruning some trees – they cast shadows on Sasha’s window when the moon’s out. It’s frightening in winter. She’s had nightmares.’

  ‘A regular visit?’ asked Valentine. ‘Couldn’t your daughter prune the tree?’

  He laughed. ‘Michelle’s unwell.’ He said it in a way which made them understand he didn’t believe it. ‘She gets an allowance from the government. For her and Sasha. A handout.’

  Martha Holt stiffened, but didn’t interrupt.

  ‘I’m retired, Sergeant. Ill‐health. This heart of mine,’ he said, tapping a hand on his chest. ‘Although I can still get up a set of stepladders. But I had to close down the business. Dizzy spells on hundred‐foot scaffolding isn’t a very bright idea, is it? There’s no real routine. But like I said, I’d been over on Sunday to trim the sycamore – but Sasha said to leave the magnolia because she likes to climb the branches. But then Sunday night she had a nightmare – the shadows again. So I went back on Monday to finish the job.’

  Martha Holt touched a card on the bedside table. A piece of folded A4 paper, a child’s picture of a house. Beside it another card, more expertly drawn, of a black cat curled on an Aga.

  ‘That’s hers,’ said Holt, catching the movement. ‘That’s my Sasha.’ He touched the first card, ignoring the second. He rubbed his arm where a drip had been fed into the vein.

  ‘You live in town?’ asked Valentine briskly, keen to get the besotted grandfather off his favourite topic.

  ‘Quayside.’ He held the DS’s gaze while his wife watched her hands.

  But it wasn’t the quayside. The quayside was renovated warehouses looking out over the water, rabbit hutches for the upwardly mobile at London prices. Devil’s Alley was a world away, just round the corner.

  ‘Is that where the car got vandalized?’ asked Valentine.

  ‘Car park at Sainsbury’s,’ said Holt, patting the sheet. Valentine let that pass. ‘Talk me through your journey last night, please.’

  ‘Right.’ He held his hand to his forehead, confused, trying to focus. ‘I went along the quay, then out by St Anne’s to the ring road. Just past Castle Rising the AA sign was out on the road so I turned down the track. Came up behind that woman.’ There was no mistaking the note of dislike. ‘Well spoken, in a hurry. She thought I should check if we could move the tree. She wasn’t worried about the driver, mind you. She didn’t seem to care about anyone else – she just wanted to make her next appointment. Like the whole world has to stop for her.’

  ‘And in the cab you found…’ prompted Shaw.

  Holt shrugged. ‘The driver.’ He let his fingers drum an annoying rhythmless tattoo. ‘And the passenger.’

  Shaw and Valentine locked eye contact, and in the silence they could hear the Rolex ticking.

  ‘Let’s take them one at a time,’ said Shaw quickly. Valentine took out his notebook.

  ‘Driver was a young man,’ said Holt. ‘Nervous type, said he was doing some work at Hunstanton – a bit of extra, he said. That’s exactly what he said – I’ve got a good memory, you see.’

  His wife nodded dutifully.

  ‘He said the tree was too heavy to move so I went back to reverse out.’

  ‘Nervous type?’ pressed Shaw, trying to slow him down.

  ‘Yes. He had a tape on… Well – or one of those CD things I suppose. I don’t know. Music they call it; bilge if you ask me. But he was keeping the beat with his hand on the steering wheel – the heel of his palm, then the fingers. Fast. Clever too. He had a map out but he said he was lost. Wanted me to look, but I didn’t have my glasses for reading, just driving. I tried, but nothing, it was just a blur. Besides – what was the point? We weren’t going anywhere even if we could work out where we were.’

  Shaw raised a finger. ‘And the passenger?’

  ‘Young girl. Twenty‐odd, I reckon. I think she’d hitched a ride.’

  ‘Why do you say that?’

  ‘I asked where they were going and she said she was heading for Cromer. “Heading”, that was the word. I think she was trying her luck, you know – seeing where I was off to. But as I said, no one was going anywhere for a while. She said she had a job, that she was an artist. Bubbly type. She had a bag, like a knapsack, on her lap, and she sort of hugged it when she said that – like she had something in there.’

  ‘What kind of knapsack?’ asked Valentine.

  Holt looked at the DS, his eyes shifting out of focus behind the glasses as if he was seeing it again: ‘Multicoloured, yellow and black patches, with a kind of drawstring. Not very big.’

  ‘This girl – was she good looking?’ asked Shaw.

  ‘I think so, yes.’ Holt re‐focused on a point just above his toes. ‘I didn’t get that good a look because I had to bend down to see in the cab – my back’s not what it used to be.’ He paused. Shaw thought it wasn’t a hopeful sign, a witness who wanted to make excuses. ‘Sort of fair,’ Holt added. ‘Long hair, lank I think. Yes. Not much of her, you know, like they are these days. But leggy all right, jeans and a sort of quilted top and those big boots. She had them up on the dashboard. Cheeky really.’

  Shaw gave him some time, trying not to push too quickly for information. ‘How did she seem? You said Ellis – that’s the driver by the way, Harvey Ellis – you said he was nervous. Was she?’

  ‘No – bit excited if anything. Flushed.’

  ‘Any accent – was she a local girl, d’you reckon?’ asked Valentine.

  ‘No. I’d guess the Midlands, you know – sounded like she had a bad cold.’

  They laughed and Mrs Holt withdrew her hand from the counterpane.

  ‘How did he die? The driver,’ countered Holt, suddenly, the tone of voice wrong, as if he were asking a question at a supermarket checkout.

  ‘Someone pushed a chisel into his eye socket, into his brain,’ said Shaw. ‘Although I’d like you to keep that to yourself at the moment – we’re not giving the details out to the press.’ Martha Holt looked at her husband, but his face just froze.

  ‘Who would do that?’ he asked, blinking behind the glasses.

  ‘How about a leggy blonde?’ said Valentine, coughing up some phlegm.

  They stood.

  ‘Mr Holt, it would be really helpful if we could put together an artist’s impression of this girl – the hitchhiker. Could you help me do that, do you think?’ asked Shaw. ‘We need to find her.’

  Holt shrugged. ‘Soon as you can get your artist, Inspector, I’m happy to help.’ He smoothed down the counterpane.

  ‘I’ll be five minutes,’ said Shaw.

  He was four. Shaw always kept his basic kit in the back of the Land Rover in a black attaché case: a sheaf of high‐quality cartridge paper – Bristol, with a slight pink tint, and a rough texture like skin. Then pencils, woodless plastic‐coated leads, chisel‐point, and a range of H, F and B hardnesses. A piece of J‐cloth for blurring, a set of tortillions – cone‐shaped sticks made from compressed paper used
to blend graphite lines to produce a smooth finish. Erasers, eraser shields, brushes and pastel chalk sticks. Shaw had studied art at Southampton University. He’d always drawn as a kid, an only child’s escape, encouraged by his mother. What his father didn’t know was that the course at Southampton offered a year out in forensic art at the FBI’s college in Quantico, Virginia.

  He opened his dog‐eared copy of the FBI Facial Identification Catalog. Over the years he’d added to the basic catalogue. Thousands of mugshots compressed by category: bulging eyes, broken noses, pouting lips, lantern jaws, providing the basic building blocks for composite imagery. He’d added his own, cut from newspapers, brochures, and magazines. There was also a recorder for the cognitive interview, so that later he could reconstruct the order in which the witness had accessed their memory. Recall first, then if that failed them, the catalogues for recognition. And last a colour chart for the eyes, hair, and any distinctive clothing or jewellery.

  Twenty minutes later Shaw had the basics of the face established.

  ‘I’m not much good, am I?’ said Holt. ‘I just can’t see her face. Not clearly.’

  ‘You don’t have to – the memory’s not like that. You’ll see her in flashes, we just have to wait for them. Each time try and take something new from the image. Don’t force it. It’ll come.’

  And it did. They talked about that night, about the snow, about walking forward in the icy wind. Slowly Holt’s memory gave up its secrets. Another twenty minutes and they were done. Shaw was pleased. The face looked out at him: dominated by the wide arched eyebrows, the small mouth with too many teeth.

  Holt had closed his eyes while Shaw worked, sketching in the features, adding a light source from the right to add the 3D effect.

  ‘Oh – yes, yes, that’s her. That’s terrific.’ Holt sat up, holding the sketch book.

  There were other last‐minute changes. They darkened the hair at the parting, lowered the ears, added a shine to the teeth as if they’d been polished.

  Finished, Shaw fetched the ward sister and she counter‐signed the sketch, with Holt and Shaw. They used a date stamp off the ward desk, the hospital motif underlaid by the symbol of a ship at sea – the Lynn badge. Shaw gave it to Valentine, who bagged it in cellophane and signed it as evidence received. He’d book it in with the desk at St James’s, then they’d use photocopies.