Watching the Dark

by Peter Robinson

  ‘Yes. Yes, I will.’

  ‘How long have you worked with Mihkel?’

  ‘Fifteen years. Ever since he began to work at the paper.’

  ‘Was that before “Pimeduse varjus”?’

  ‘Yes. He worked on general duties at first, then he later came to specialise in crime stories. He started the column in 2001. Sometimes others contribute, but it was his idea in the beginning. Can you give me any idea what happened to him? The stories we heard were very vague.’

  Banks quickly weighed his options before answering and decided that, given the information he wanted from Erik, it would be best to tell him as much as realistically possible. ‘He was found dead at an abandoned farm called Garskill in remote North Yorkshire last Saturday morning. We think he had been dead since the Wednesday before. The place looked as if it had been home to a group of about twenty bonded or migrant workers, possibly illegal, most likely Eastern European. We found a paperback book on one of the mattresses, and it turned out to be in Polish. When we found Mihkel, everyone else was gone, and we suspect that they left for work on Wednesday morning and were later directed to new quarters. We haven’t been able to discover where they are yet.’

  ‘But how did he die? How did you come to find him there?’

  Banks paused. ‘He was drowned,’ he said. ‘In a water trough. We know it wasn’t accidental because there were bruises to indicate he had been held under. I’m sorry if this is distressing, but you asked, and I’m telling you as much as I can.’

  ‘I’m all right. Please go on.’

  ‘There isn’t much more to tell,’ Banks said.

  ‘I talked to Mihkel on Tuesday evening,’ Erik said. ‘He told me he was calling from a telephone box. He had to be very careful. The men in charge were suspicious because someone had smuggled a mobile phone into another group and used it to take photographs and make calls to a Lithuanian magazine.’

  ‘What did you talk about?’ Banks asked.

  ‘Conditions there. He said they were terrible. It was cold. There were holes in the roof. They did not get much food, and what they did get was bad. The pay was low.’

  ‘Where were they working?’

  ‘Different places. A chicken hatchery. A frozen-food factory. A chemical-packing plant.’

  ‘Can I get the full details from you later?’ Banks asked. ‘We’ll need to track these places down. That’s not my immediate concern, but it will have to be done.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘So he was writing a story for you about this?’

  ‘Yes. We have known about these illegal labour schemes for a long time, but Mihkel thought it would be useful to go undercover, to follow one from the beginning to the end and write an in-depth article. He could not know what that end would be, of course. That it would be his own.’

  ‘Did he mention someone called Quinn at all? Bill Quinn?’

  ‘Bill? But yes, of course. They had talked.’

  ‘That was all he said, that they had talked?’

  ‘He spoke about another story, a possibly big story, but that was all he could say.’

  ‘And this was connected with Bill Quinn?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘Do you have any idea what it was?’

  ‘No. Not unless Bill Quinn had found out what happened to Rachel Hewitt.’

  ‘Or had always known,’ Banks said to himself.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Sorry. Nothing. So you know about that, about Rachel?’

  ‘Of course. That was how they met, Bill and Mihkel. The Rachel Hewitt case. Mihkel wrote much about it, and he and Bill became friends. They kept in touch over the years.’

  ‘The thing is,’ Banks said, ‘Bill Quinn was killed, too, around the same time and, we believe, by the same person.’

  Erik’s mouth opened and flapped like a landed fish. He rubbed his forehead. ‘I . . . I don’t . . .’

  ‘I know. It’s very confusing,’ Banks said. ‘We don’t pretend to know what’s going on, but there are some very far-reaching connections here. One of them is the Rachel Hewitt case, and another is the migrant labour scheme you mentioned, the one Mihkel was writing about and Bill Quinn was investigating. Have you ever heard of a man called Corrigan? Warren Corrigan?’

  Erik thought for a moment, then said, ‘No. I’m sorry.’

  ‘No matter,’ Banks went on. ‘Can you tell me how Mihkel ended up in North Yorkshire?’

  ‘His story?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I suppose so,’ said Erik. ‘It’s not as if he can tell it himself now, is it?’

  ‘It might help us catch his killer.’

  Erik thought for a moment, then a brief smile flickered through his beard. ‘I am sorry. It is difficult for me, as a journalist, to give information to police. Old habits die hard.’

  ‘If it’s any consolation,’ Banks said. ‘It’s very difficult for me even to be in the same room as a journalist.’

  Erik stared at him for a moment, then burst out laughing. Joanna joined in. ‘I have no problem with most journalists,’ she said. ‘We’d very much appreciate it if you could give us a few details.’

  ‘Of course. As I said, it was Mihkel’s idea. Well, mostly.’

  ‘Pardon me for interrupting so early,’ said Banks, ‘but was that usually the case with his stories, or was he given assignments?’

  ‘It varied. Sometimes, if a subject was hot at the moment, he would be given an assignment like any other reporter. But something like this, something that would take him undercover for some time, and perhaps expose him to danger, that would have to be his own idea.’

  ‘I see. Carry on.’

  ‘Like most of us, Mihkel had heard about unskilled workers heading for what they thought was a paradise in the UK and other countries, and finding quite the opposite. He wanted to follow the whole process through every stage, find out who the main players were and how it was done. It was actually Bill who told him about this.’

  ‘Bill Quinn sent Mihkel in there?’

  ‘No. No. He simply told Mihkel about how the business operated and gave him the name of the agency in Tallinn. It was Mihkel who had the idea to start at the beginning and follow the trail. He was always . . . what would you say?’

  ‘Adventurous? Impetuous?’

  ‘Both,’ said Erik, smiling sadly.

  ‘Did he send you written reports?’

  ‘No. Not this time. It was too risky. No phones, no cameras, no paper and pencil. We talked on the telephone, and I made notes. He was allowed out, of course, when he wasn’t working. They weren’t prisoners. At least not prisoners in solid prisons. You understand?’

  ‘I think so,’ said Banks. ‘He was living in a very remote place. It was a two-mile walk to the telephone. Did you write up the reports in Estonian?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘OK. Go on. Can you give me the gist?’

  ‘It’s a simple enough story. He first approached an agency here in Tallinn, where they charged him two hundred euros, gave him a telephone number and told him there was a job waiting for him in Leeds.’

  ‘Did they say what kind of job?’

  ‘No. But he knew it would be casual labour of some sort, perhaps in a factory, or on a battery farm. About fifty hours a week at minimum wage. I think that is about seven euros an hour, perhaps a little more. That’s three hundred and thirty euros a week, anyway. He travelled by train and was met at St Pancras by another agent of the company, who asked for another two hundred euros. So already this job had cost Mihkel four hundred euros and his travel expenses. For all this he had no receipt. The man told him he could get a train to Leeds at King’s Cross, just across the road, and he disappeared with the money. Mihkel never saw him again.’

  ‘These people, the agents, do you know their names?’

  ‘Yes. The man in London was a Latvian, but he worked with the same agency as the one in Tallinn.’

  ‘If it came to it, would you turn these names over to t
he police or the immigration authorities?’

  Erik hesitated. ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘It would be . . . perhaps unethical. Even though Mihkel is dead. I would have to think.’

  ‘OK,’ said Banks. ‘No pressure.’ Not yet, he thought.

  ‘Mihkel went to Leeds and contacted the number he had been given. It was a staffing agency.’

  ‘It wouldn’t happen to be called Rod’s Staff Ltd, would it?’

  Erik’s eyes widened. ‘How did you know that?’

  ‘Run by a Mr Roderick Flinders?’

  ‘Yes. The agency said they had never heard of Mihkel, that there must have been some mistake, there was no job waiting for him in Leeds, but they might be able to help him. They gave him a bed in a room shared by ten people in a converted barn outside Otley and told him to wait for further instructions. Four days later he was told he was moving to another area right away. They took him to that farm you mentioned, where he was killed three weeks later.’

  ‘What happened during those three weeks?’

  ‘The conditions were terrible, Mihkel told me, and he was sharing with about twenty people. They had only one toilet, a shower that mostly did not function. Filthy drinking water.’

  ‘I’ve seen it,’ said Banks. ‘I know.’

  ‘Then you will understand. Did you also know that not all the workers were men? There were three young women also, and two couples, all together in the same damp, cold dormitory. Sometimes some of the men tried to touch the women. There were fights. Mihkel said he tried to help. He spoke to a girl from Poland and another from Lithuania. The third girl never talked to anybody. Mihkel didn’t know where she was from, but her skin was darker. He thought Kazakhstan, or Georgia, perhaps. For the privilege of living there, they had to pay Rod’s Staff Ltd. Sixty euros each week in rent. This was deducted from their pay.’

  ‘Where did they work?’

  ‘All over the north, from Carlisle to Teesside. Darlington. Middlesbrough. Stockton.’

  ‘What sort of work?’

  ‘The worst. Slaughterhouses, chemical packaging plants, fertiliser factories. You name it. The work was hard and the hours long. Mihkel’s first job was at a mushroom farm, picking mushrooms, but that was only for one shift. He never saw any money from that. Then he was sent to a frozen-food factory on day shifts, twelve hours a day, seven days a week, picking any bad beans or peas from the conveyor belt after they had been frozen and before they were packaged.’

  ‘A lot more than fifty hours,’ Banks said.

  ‘Yes. After two weeks he had worked a hundred and sixty-eight hours and he received his first payslip. It was for sixty-five euros.’

  ‘How did they explain that?’

  ‘There were many discrepancies. He was not paid minimum wage to start with, but only five euros for each hour. Would this be easier in pounds?’

  ‘No, it’s OK,’ said Banks. ‘I can keep track. Besides, there’s not a hell of a lot of difference these days.’

  ‘Too true,’ Erik agreed. ‘Perhaps we should have kept the kroon. Anyway, Mihkel was also told that Rod’s Staff Ltd withhold two weeks’ wages and pay . . . what is the word?’

  ‘In arrears?’ Banks suggested.

  ‘Yes. Two weeks in arrears. Of course, one hundred and twenty euros for two weeks’ rent had also been deducted, but had not been included in the deductions on his payslip. By then, he also owed money to people, and when he had paid them back, he had almost nothing left. This was when someone from Rod’s Staff Ltd, perhaps even Mr Flinders himself, approached him and told him he knew someone who lent money to people in Mihkel’s situation and asked if he was interested. Mihkel said yes, he was, as he had no money left for cigarettes or food. Anyway, this was the stage of the investigation he had reached when he was killed. It was on Tuesday evening he told me about the payslip and the errors on it.’

  ‘How did he get to work and back?’

  ‘Someone with a van picked them up in the morning and dropped them off at night. They got weak coffee and stale bread for breakfast. If they were lucky and had enough money, they could just make a dash to the nearest fast-food outlet before the van arrived to take them back, and buy a burger or fried chicken.’

  ‘Are you sure he never mentioned someone called Corrigan?’

  ‘No. I will check my notes, but I would remember. I have a very good memory.’

  It was too much of a coincidence, Banks thought, for someone else to be in the same business in the same general area. Corrigan must have used his minions to reach out to operations like Flinders’, while he remained at the business centre in Leeds. The two men knew each other, had drinks together, so it seemed obvious to Banks that they were in cahoots over this. Flinders created and supplied the victims, not only on city housing estates, but also in remote dormitories like Garskill Farm, which cost him nothing and netted him about a grand a week in rents. To say nothing of the kickbacks he was getting from the employers.

  On Wednesday morning, more than likely, the killer had arrived at Garskill Farm and Mihkel had been kept back from work that day. He was tortured, at which time he had probably agreed to the mobile call to Quinn to set him up, arrange to meet in the woods later that night, which had set off the detective’s alarm bells, though they had not rung loudly enough to keep him away from the rendezvous completely and save his life. Quinn had, however, kept the photographs in his room, and perhaps had planned, if all turned out to be above board, to go back and get them for Mihkel. But it wasn’t Mihkel who turned up in the woods at St Peter’s that night.

  ‘Who knew of Bill Quinn’s friendship with Mihkel?’ he asked Erik.

  ‘I don’t know. It was not something they hid. Anyone could know. Sometimes Mihkel wrote updates on the Rachel Hewitt case, and he often mentioned his connection with the English policeman.’

  ‘In the newspaper?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So anyone at all could know?’

  ‘It would surely not be of much interest to anyone. What are you thinking?’

  ‘I’m not sure,’ said Banks. ‘But someone wanted Bill Quinn out of the way, and that same person also wanted Mihkel out of the way. Can you think of anyone who would want that?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I’m missing something,’ Banks went on. ‘There has to be some connection between Rachel Hewitt and the illegal worker scam.’

  ‘Why? How?’

  ‘Because we believe someone sent the same killer to get rid of both Bill Quinn and Mihkel.’

  ‘But why bring up Rachel Hewitt? You have already said that Bill Quinn was also involved in investigating the workers.’

  ‘That’s true. Maybe he was working both sides.’

  ‘And perhaps with Mihkel’s help he was about to become a danger to them, and they knew that? Perhaps they were both killed for the same reason. The Rachel Hewitt case was simply what brought them together in the first place, not the reason for either of the murders.’

  Banks had always been aware of that possibility, that he could be wandering way off target by taking Rachel Hewitt into consideration. But there was something about her disappearance that bothered him, and something had obviously been gnawing away at Bill Quinn ever since his trip to Tallinn six years ago. There were the photographs with the unknown girl, too. Banks knew, however, that he had to try to keep an open mind on this, that he was in danger of allowing one set of facts to obscure or distort another. Maybe the two events weren’t connected, but that didn’t mean Banks shouldn’t try to find out what had happened to Rachel as well as solve Quinn’s and Mihkel’s murders. He didn’t think he could go through the rest of his days not knowing what happened, the way Bill Quinn had. Look what it had done to him. And her parents deserved better.

  Banks took out copies of Bill Quinn’s photographs, including the blow-ups and the cropped version showing only the girl. He laid them before Erik on the table. ‘We believe that these photographs were taken here in July 2006, when Bill Quinn was over at the sta
rt of the Rachel Hewitt case. This is the only real evidence that convinces me that what happened to Bill Quinn was connected with Rachel’s disappearance, otherwise I’d accept that he and Mihkel were both killed because of the migrant worker scam. The rest is simply copper’s instinct. But the photographs are important. Trust me on that. We believe that someone set him up with this girl. It’s possible that she drugged him or got him so drunk he didn’t know what he was doing, then got him up to his hotel room so these photographs could be taken. Are you with me so far?’

  Erik looked puzzled, but he said, ‘Yes.’

  ‘We don’t know why, but one good guess is that he had somehow or other got close to whoever it was abducted Rachel. Everyone said he was haunted by the case right up until his death. I wonder. One thing that would explain it is that he found out what happened to Rachel and was unable to do anything about it, that he was blackmailed into silence. Bill Quinn was devoted to his wife, but he stumbled this once, and it came back on him in a very big way. When his wife died a month ago, that silence was no longer so important. What he had to do was find a way of making his knowledge public without revealing that he had hidden the truth for six years.’

  ‘And to that end, he enlisted Mihkel’s help?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Banks. ‘I think so. I know it’s only conjecture at this point, but it’s the only thing that makes sense. The killer knew that Mihkel and Quinn were in touch, knew that Quinn was free now that he was no longer troubled by anyone showing the pictures to his wife. That Mihkel was in England at the time was irrelevant to the killer, really. He could have been anywhere. It simply made things more convenient for the killer, or whoever sent him. Two birds with one stone, so to speak.’

  ‘How did the killer know Mihkel was at this farm?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Banks. ‘But it would be my guess that Mihkel slipped up somehow, despite taking such care. I would imagine that all these migrant gangs have spies planted to keep an eye out for infiltrators like Mihkel. They’ve been stung too often before, as you yourself mentioned earlier. Then someone was sent to tidy up.’

  ‘But surely if Bill had discovered anything about Rachel Hewitt, the Tallinn police would know? There was no way he could simply go about and make the investigation by himself.’