‘Like what?’ Paniatowski asked innocently – far too innocently – from the kitchen table.
‘On any other occasion, I’d have been “Polly” to you, but this morning I seem to be Councillor Johnson. I take that to mean this is an official visit, rather than a social one. Not that I really needed that clue to tip me off. At this unearthly hour of the morning, it could hardly be anything else but an official one.’
‘It is partly official . . .’ Paniatowski began.
‘It’s entirely official,’ Polly Johnson corrected her, slicing off a piece of lemon and dropping it into Paniatowski’s tea. ‘And don’t think I haven’t noticed that, even though you’ve only been a chief inspector for a couple of days, you’re already trying to use one of Charlie Woodend’s old tricks on me.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘As well you might, my girl. You’ve turned up at a moment when you’re certain that a poor old soul like me will be far from her sharpest.’ Polly walked over to the table, and placed the mug of tea in front of Paniatowski. ‘And the reason you’ve done that is because you want me to sign something which, if I had more of my wits about me, I’d probably baulk at.’
‘I . . .’ Paniatowski began.
‘Charlie did exactly the same thing,’ Polly Johnson continued. ‘The only difference is that he used to turn up at around three o’clock in the morning, so I suppose you could be said to be at least something of an improvement.’
Paniatowski grinned weakly. ‘It’s a fair cop,’ she admitted.
‘So what is this outrageous thing you want me to sign?’ Polly asked. ‘Do you want to search the bishop’s palace for drugs? Or maybe the Women’s Institute, for those sex toys that they fondly imagine nobody else knows they have?’
‘No, neither of those things,’ Paniatowski said.
‘Or maybe you woke this morning and decided, on a whim, that you fancied arresting the mayor for being an idiot in a public place – which, though easy enough to prove, is not strictly speaking a criminal act.’
‘Not that either.’
‘Has no one ever told you that if you want to get something out of somebody, you should laugh very loudly at their jokes – however weak those jokes might be?’ Polly asked.
‘Sorry,’ Paniatowski said.
She hadn’t even laughed at that last comment, Polly Johnson thought – and that was surely worth at least a mild titter. She must be really desperate.
The poor little thing!
‘So what do you want?’ she asked.
‘I want you to sign this,’ Paniatowski said, sliding the slip of paper across the kitchen table.
Polly read it quickly.
‘Sweet Jesus!’ she said. ‘I take it you’ve got solid, well-documented grounds for making this request?’
Paniatowski grimaced. ‘Not exactly. But I can have an X-ray taken of my stomach, if that would help.’
‘What?’
‘I’ve got a gut feeling, Polly. A strong one. And I need you to sign on the dotted line, so I can make my case.’
‘Charlie Woodend used to have gut feelings, too,’ Polly reminded her.
‘I know.’
‘And often – more often than not, in fact – they were spot on. But even so, it usually took a great deal more than one of his gut feelings for me to give him what he wanted. You see, unfortunately for you, Monika, when I was taking my oath as a JP, I forgot to keep my fingers crossed. And what that means is that there’s only so far I can allow myself, in all conscience, to go.’
‘And, God knows, I can use all the help I can get on this one,’ Paniatowski said.
She didn’t even hear me, Polly thought. She’s so wrapped up in her own worries that she isn’t even listening.
For perhaps half a minute, Polly sat there in silence, then she opened her handbag and took out her fountain pen.
‘You are to regard this as a welcome-to-the-job present, Chief Inspector Paniatowski,’ she said sternly. ‘But I won’t be this much of a pushover the next time you come knocking on my door – whatever time of day or night it is.’
‘Understood,’ Paniatowski said, nodding gravely.
Polly signed quickly – as if she wanted it over and done with before she changed her mind – and when she put her pen down again, she shivered.
‘That made me feel really quite odd,’ she said. ‘Do you know, I don’t think I’ve ever signed an exhumation order before.’
There was a time when Brewer’s Street would have been heaving with activity, even at that early hour of the morning. Moore’s Brewery (after which the street was named) would already have begun its daily task of producing thousands of gallons of ale, and in Brunskill’s Bakery (which made the bread, which made the sandwiches, which men scoffed down after drinking the ale) the ovens would have been working at full pelt. But the brewery had been taken over by an industrial conglomerate which produced a mere parody of real beer, and which – being more interested in Moore’s market than in its traditions and facilities – had immediately closed the place down. Then the bakery had gone, moving to a site more suitable for Linda Szymborska’s ambitious expansion plans.
DC Crane stood in front of the old bakery, thoughtfully jangling the keys which he’d picked up from the estate agents the previous evening.
Now he was there, all he had to do was open the door at the back of the building and step inside, he told himself.
Mission accomplished.
So why was he having doubts? Why was there a small part of his mind – possibly his subconscious, though he couldn’t be sure – which kept urging him to return the keys and forget that he’d ever planned to enter the bakery at all?
It couldn’t be that he was worried he’d get into trouble for disobeying Sergeant Walker’s orders, because Walker hadn’t explicitly told him not to come to the bakery.
Besides, the sergeant never need find out about it.
Then what was his problem? Was he worried that when he discovered the empty bakery was just that – an empty bakery – he’d feel a complete fool?
Possibly that was it, he decided.
But what was foolish about ruling the bakery out of the investigation? Wasn’t the process of elimination one of the cornerstones of this kind of work?
There was no point in procrastinating any further, he thought. He had come here with a purpose, and it was time that purpose was fulfilled.
‘Walk away!’ his subconscious – if that’s what it was – screamed. ‘You’ll regret it if you don’t!’
‘Bollocks!’ Crane said aloud, as he began to walk down the alleyway which led to the loading bay.
TWENTY-FIVE
The Tompkins’ Bakery’s bread-delivery man arrived at Handley’s General Store at five minutes to eight.
Watching him from the back of the shop, Jenny Brunskill was forced to admit to herself that his uniform looked much smarter than the uniforms which Brunskill’s men wore.
She should have noticed that before, she thought. It was her job to notice the little details which made all the difference. And now she had noticed it, she would make it her business to see to it that, within a month, Brunskill’s men had uniforms which made Tompkins’ men look positively slovenly.
The delivery man walked up to the counter, and placed his tray on it. ‘A dozen?’ he suggested.
‘Not sure about that,’ Mr Handley said dubiously. ‘This is a small business, and I don’t normally sell more than eight or nine.’
The delivery man laughed. ‘You’ve still not quite sussed out the system, have you?’ he asked. ‘We don’t care what you sell – we’re much more interested in what you don’t sell, if you know what I mean.’
‘I know what you mean,’ Mr Handley agreed.
‘So take a dozen, and if you have to throw any of them away, well, you won’t be the loser, will you?’
He wasn’t talking like a bread-delivery man, Jenny thought – at least, not like any bread-delivery man she’d ever known.
‘A dozen,’ Mr Handley agreed.
‘We might as well settle up for the week, mightn’t we?’ the delivery man suggested.
‘If that’s all right with you,’ Handley agreed.
The bread man consulted his clipboard, then reached into his pocket, pulled out a couple of banknotes and laid them on the counter. ‘I think you’ll find that’s right,’ he said.
‘Seems to be,’ Handley agreed.
Jenny waited until the bread man had left the shop, then went over to the counter.
‘Here you are,’ Handley said to her. ‘A loaf fresh from the bakery, just like you wanted.’
‘And you only wanted to take nine, though you ended up taking a dozen,’ Jenny said.
‘You naughty girl,’ Handley said, wagging his finger playfully at her. ‘Didn’t your mother ever tell you that you should never listen in on other people’s conversations?’
‘And didn’t anybody ever tell you that when you buy something, it’s customary for you to pay the seller for it, and not the other way around,’ Jenny countered.
Handley’s face darkened. ‘Look, I don’t know what your game is,’ he said, ‘but I want you to leave my shop right now.’
‘Don’t worry, I’m going,’ Jenny told him. ‘And as for the Tompkins’ crusty loaf I asked you to put aside for me – well, you know what you can do with that!’
Even the most devoted of grieving relatives would have thought twice before appearing at the dear departed’s graveside at eight o’clock in the morning, and the official party assembled around this particular grave had the cemetery to themselves.
‘How the hell did you get things moving so quickly?’ Beresford asked, as he watched the gravediggers at work.
‘I called in a few favours,’ Paniatowski replied.
‘Including, I presume, some that were owed to you by our beloved chief constable himself?’
Paniatowski looked away.
‘Well no, that was one of the favours that I didn’t actually call in,’ she admitted.
‘What?’ Beresford exclaimed. ‘You’re surely not trying to tell me that Mr Baxter gave his approval for a dodgy enterprise like this one without even having to be strong-armed into it?’
‘The disinterment is perfectly legal, and I’ve got the papers in my pocket to prove it,’ Paniatowski said flatly.
The pile of earth was growing on the canvas which the gravediggers had laid beside the grave, and if the corpse was literally six feet under they were probably halfway to reaching it.
‘Let me see if I’ve got this right,’ Beresford said, with growing incredulity. ‘What you’re saying – or rather, what you’re implying – is that Mr Baxter doesn’t even know about any of this?’
Paniatowski forced a weak grin to her face. ‘I didn’t want to disturb his beauty sleep.’
‘I want to be quite clear about this,’ Beresford persisted. ‘Do you, or do you not, have authorization from the big chief?’
‘As I’ve already told you, it’s all perfectly legal,’ Paniatowski replied, avoiding the question.
‘But not authorized,’ Beresford pressed.
‘But not authorized,’ Paniatowski agreed.
‘Last night, when we were in the Drum, you talked about stirring the stew to see what bubbled to the surface,’ Beresford said. ‘But if you’re doing all this entirely off your own bat, then it’s not a stew pot you’re stirring at all – it’s a bloody cesspit.’
‘That’s certainly one way of looking at it,’ Paniatowski agreed.
‘It’s the only way of looking at it, Monika,’ Beresford countered. ‘The shit will be flying in all directions – any minute now – and some of it’s bound to stick to you.’
‘Maybe,’ Paniatowski said.
‘There isn’t any maybe about it. You deliberately went out of your way to blind-side the chief constable.’
‘Charlie Woodend used to do that all the time.’
‘Yes, he did. But Mr Woodend always knew what he was looking for when he pulled a stunt like this.’
‘Usually knew,’ Paniatowski corrected him.
‘All right, usually knew,’ Beresford conceded. ‘But you have no idea what you’ll find when you hand this stiff over to Dr Shastri.’
‘True,’ Paniatowski agreed. ‘But there’ve been two murders, so why shouldn’t there have been three?’
‘Because we know the motive for the murders of Tom Whittington and Linda, and there isn’t any possible motive here.’
He was right, Paniatowski thought, in a sudden burst of panic. It had been a crazy idea – an idea she’d never even have contemplated if she hadn’t been both exhausted and desperate.
But it was too late to stop it now, she told herself, as she watched the gravediggers step back and the undertaker’s assistants move in to lift the coffin from the grave.
‘I think you’d better leave,’ she told Beresford.
‘Now why would I want to do that?’ the inspector asked.
‘Because if you leave now, you might still just be able to get away with claiming that you didn’t know was going on – that I’d kept you as much in the dark about it as I kept the chief constable.’
‘I think you’re wrong there,’ Beresford said.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I think that if I leave now, I’ll have a very good chance of getting away with it.’
The undertaker’s assistants had removed the coffin from what should have been its last resting place, and were about to take it to the waiting hearse – but Beresford still showed no signs of moving.
‘Well?’ Paniatowski asked.
‘Well what?’
‘You’re still here.’
Beresford shrugged. ‘If you’re on a sinking ship, the least you can do is make sure the deckchairs are arranged nicely,’ he said.
There were two ways to enter the old bakery’s loading bay. The first, which had once been used by the bread-delivery vans, consisted of a set of high double gates, which were now heavily chained and padlocked. The second entrance was a small door next to the gates, which had been used by the bakery’s staff, and the key that DC Crane had in his hand was to the smaller entrance.
He inserted the key in the lock, and felt an uneasy twinge when it actually turned.
He pushed the door open, and stepped inside. A little of the outside light filtered into the large loading bay, but not enough to really see very much at all. Crane, congratulating himself for having anticipated this problem, switched on the torch he’d brought with him, and aimed it across the room.
His beam of light picked out the shape of the car – and not just an ordinary, common-or-garden car, but an E-type Jag!
Crane felt his stomach clench up. It had all been a game so far, he suddenly realized – a light-hearted version of a Shakespearian tragedy which he had been playing in his head for his own amusement.
And while he’d argued to himself that it was possible this was the scene of the crime, he’d never really believed it would be.
Not until now!
He walked over to the car, ran his finger across the bonnet and examined the result with his torch. The finger had picked up some dust, but not a great deal, and he was willing to bet that the vehicle had not been parked there for more than a couple of days.
It was then he began to feel that he was not alone in the loading bay – to sense that there was some presence watching his every move.
‘Come out, wherever you are!’ he shouted, with all the authority he could muster.
There was no answer.
‘This is the police,’ Crane continued. ‘There is no escape. We have the place surrounded.’
Christ! he thought. What a terrible thing to say. I sound like I’m in some cheap American cop show.
The silence continued.
‘Stay where you are,’ he ordered, then remembered that only seconds earlier he’d told whoever it was to come
out.
During his training, it had been drummed into him that in situations like this he should always proceed with caution.
But that training had not taken place in a dark bakery delivery bay, in which a murder victim’s car had been stored. It had not prepared him for the hair-raising sense of evil which seemed to be floating through the air. In other words, the training had been a complete waste of time.
He plunged into the darkness, the torch in his hand – held at chest level – cutting a thin path through the darkness.
‘You can’t escape!’ he shouted, and was surprised to discover that even the sound of his own voice was starting to frighten him.
He was not expecting any obstacles to be in his way, and when he encountered one he was totally unprepared to deal with it.
Suddenly, he had lost his balance and was lurching forward. He put out his hands to break his fall, but even as they were making contact with the ground, his head collided with something hard and unyielding.
He had heard that a blow to the head could cause you to see stars, but was amazed to discover that it was actually true.
What the hell happened there? he asked himself, aware, even as the thought passed through his mind, that only a small part of his brain was working properly, and that the rest of it was off on some kind of sun-dozed holiday.
He tried to force himself to focus.
The object he had hit his head on had undoubtedly been metal, but the one that he had tripped over had not. It had been solid, but not as solid as a lump of iron. Not as sharp, either. It had been rounded, and – he was guessing here – it had probably been quite long.
He was wasting time, he told himself. If he really wanted to find out what had tripped him and what had assaulted him, he should examine them in the light of his torch.
He had dropped the torch, but he could see the beam shining into the darkness.
It was no more than a few feet away, he estimated. In order to retrieve it, he didn’t even need to stand up.
And maybe it would be better not to stand up until he had the torch in his hand, and could see what he was doing.
He wriggled, moving his whole body closer to the torch, then stretched out his hand to grasp it.
The Dead Hand of History Page 21